#105: Melvin - Cuddle Huddle

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Melvin didn't’ quit. He roused TigerMom and the kids. Between them they did their best to prepare themselves. Prepare themselves for what? They had no chance. They prepared themselves for one more breath instead of one less. They would never give up while they lived.

Melvin and TigerMom sat back to back to back in the middle of the small platform they’d made from seat cushions. They and were all huddled together under the bus’s ripped out head liner on the highest point of ground. The children were all dog-piled against them. The littlest were cuddled in their laps and snuggling. Everyone was shivering uncontrollably. Teeth were chattering. Everyone pressed close like sheep in a snow huddle trying to conserve heat. If the water wasn’t rising that would keep them alive for a time.

The water, however, was still rising. The unending rain continued. The Heavy Fog blanked out anything more than a few feet away. The water dripped, dripped, and fell on their heads, ran down their the back of their necks and under their completely inadequate coats. They all dozed in fits and stops while the water creeped closer.

Take my warmth little ones.
Absorb the last of my body heat.
I give it too you freely.”

He thought he heard TigerMom crooning..

“Warm your poor freezing body
one last time before you die.”

Must have lost something in Translation. It didn’t rhyme at all. Not that he was going to tell her that.

The water at their feet was rising, it had been rising for days, weeks, forever. There wasn’t much ground left anywhere. They were on a small circle of ice covered ground, some unnamed hill, now a sinking island. The water was mere yards from their outstretched feet, in any direction.

It was cold, so very cold.

Why was that a bumble bee?

(Back in the Banana Slug)

Shelby looked at the bug feed that Joshua gave him. Hmmm.... it looked like two adults and a passel of kids all huddled together under a tarp, trying to stay out of the rising water. It looked very uncomfortable. The water was dangerously close.

He thought about it. What would be the best avatar rescue combination? How many survivors were there? He couldn’t tell. There appeared to be a lot. A bus load perhaps. Oh well, better too send too many Avatars than too few. He could always recall the Avatars. or could make more from SSmoke. Young lives were harder to replace. He’d send rescue Manta’s as they became available.

Shelby was a combat vet. Combat Vets tend to decide what to do quickly. Within ninety seconds of processing the information Shelby sent a LOT of dragons, a swarm. They left the staging area and flew like bats out of hell. It was a long ways to those poor people. The water was rising, night was falling and it wasn’t getting any warmer and the ice was getting thicker.

They hurried.

***

Melvin didn’t see the first dragon arrive in the dark. That was a probably a good thing. It would not have inspired confidence. Carl was tele-operating the first dragon and Carl wasn’t known for his landing’s yet. Actually he WAS known for his landings but not favorably. His dragon came in too fast, too low, hit a bump and went spinning out of control across the river ice. When it reached the edge of the ice it fell into the water. Carl probably said a bad word that day.

Or two.

In the dark Melvin didn’t see the antics of Carl, the next dragon or the next dozen dragons that landed. They all managed to do a better job of it than Carl had. If the truth were to be told Melvin was almost dead. He had worked himself so hard that he was going to die from exhaustion soon if something didn’t intervene.

Everyone, even the TigerMom, was unconscious. None of them noticed the dragons land in a ring around them. None of them noticed the dragons approach. None of them noticed being eaten alive by a dragon, or the sting of the neuro-loop’s bite. That was probably a good thing.

The Dragons even ate the Bus Headliner and the SeatCushions and turned it all to SSmoke.

The humans hadn’t really been eaten, exactly, but they had been slurped inside a dragon. Odd that, the dragons were so small but they expanded to meet the need. The SSmoke re-arranged itself to become omni-suits. The humans began to sleep more peacefully. They were warm.

***

Melvin woke up. He was NOT where he expected to be. If this was heaven (or hell) it felt remarkably like being inside a womb. Did wombs have Sippy Straws that provided WarBucks Mocha? He didn’t recall exactly but he doubted it. This one did. He took a last long drink then opened his eyes to stare directly into the eyes of the TigerMom.

Face to Face to her was just about the last thing Melvin had expected, dreams weren’t supposed to be this real. His vision cleared and he became aware that he was actually in a PufferFish and that another PufferFish, containing the TigerMom, was nose-to-nose to him. He decided that he wasn’t awake yet. He and the TigerMom’s nose were but inches apart He’d never before seen an expression of concern on her face. Surely this was a dream.

Actually he’d never before seen any expression on her face, at all. She had ‘inscrutable oriental’ down pat. It didn't’ last long. When she saw that he was awake she ‘shuttered’ instantly. The poker face was back in place. She didn’t say anything, as usual. He concluded that this wasn’t a dream after all.

After a little bit of examination he decided that he was in some kind of survival suite or some such. All of the children were inside the same kind of thing. Everyone clustered around him in the water.

Water? The encroaching water had caught them at last. Were it not for the PufferFish survival suits they would all be dead for sure. Imagine that.

Weldon further noticed that in addition to wearing a puffer fish suit each one of them were accompanied by a....a....water creature of some sort. Some were fish but one was decidedly odd.

“I told you not to bring that one, Carl,” he heard a young girl scolding.

There appeared to be one little fish for every puffer pod. It was easy to see at a glance that one of them wasn’t like all of the others. It must have been Carl. Melvin had a great deal of experience with Carls. He’d been a Carl himself while growing up. It was a tough life.

CARL!” he shouted. “Get your BUTT over here boy! Right now! “

First you had to get their attention. That was the hard part, after that it got easier.

The little Sea Monster swam as fast as it could go. Shortly it was doing a fair imitation of standing at attention in front of Melvin’s Puffer Fish. Melvin had the impression that a greater reality opened before him. An augmented reality. He was looking at a little sea monster yet at the same time he could see a ‘pure grain, hundred proof’ Carl behind him. Very odd.

“I don’t like that Carl” Melvin said. He wished he had a cigar. Giving the “lecture” with a cigar as a prop was so much easier. Something about the smell, the burning hot ash and the smoke blown into their face he supposed. Oh well. No cigars while underwater.

“Like what Sir?” Carl said uneasily. Both the little sea monster AND the little boy squirmed.

“You know what I mean” Melvin hissed. “I heard the little girl. You intended to scare my little girls didn’t you.”

“Yessir.” Carl said nervously.

Good, the boy was honest, Brave too. He could work with smart, Brave was just gravy. Oddly enough Melvin had subconsciously learned to use the PufferSuit almost instantly. It defined intuitive. Melvin “leaned” his head near Carl’s and ‘whispered’.

“To be honest with you boy, I used to do that myself. I thought it was fun making them squeal and run.” He said. “Frogs were my specialty.”

“You did?” Carl asked. A hopeful tone in his voice.

“Yes I did.” Melvin replied. “Then a horrible, horrible thing happened.”

“What was that sir?” Carl really didn’t want to know. But he was as curious as a cat.

“I grew up!” Melvin quit whispering.

“Now GROW UP CARL!” He shouted. “PlayTime is over. Pick another ....another....”

“Avatar” one of Carl’s companions, a little girl, spoke up. “They’re called Avatars. We teleoperate them mentally from home. It’s a Virtual Reality thing. Kinda like ‘Doom’, or ‘Donna Does Dallas.”

“Thank you missy” Melvin said, He thought about that for a second, shudder. “I appreciate the info. I see right now that I’m woefully short on info. How’s the best way to get me and the rest of us up to speed? I imagine you’ve done this before?”

“Yessir’ we’re in-briefers. I think that’s what Captain said. Isn't’ that what he said? “one pretty little girl asked another as she replied. All of them but Carl seemed to be cute little girls. Melvin upped his opinion of Carl by a few notches.

“Yes” Yet another one said “As Lucy likes to say ‘we gots a lots of ‘splaining to do”. We can do that you know.”

“Usually it’s one on one. Very rarely do we encounter a group.” the little girl said.

“If it works don’t fix it” Melvin replied. “Please proceed. Carl and I are going to have a little chat.”

All of the Avatar’s returned to their respective humans in the PufferSuits. Soon they were all in deep conversation. Melvin turned back to look at Carl.

Ah.” he said “Much Better, Avatar, is it?

In front of the cute little devilish boy was a cute little devilish lobster.

“Now son. Settle down and tell Old Melvin here just how the Cow ate the Cabbage will you?” Melvin told him. Melvin’s body language hinted at threat.

Carl, was a city boy. He didn’t know from Cows OR cabbages. However, he didn't think this was the perfect time to mention that. He did, however, think that he understood the metaphor. He caught the body language just fine. He definitely didn’t want this guy angry with him. He’d do the best he could.

“Well sir it’s like this.” and he proceeded to recite from a memorized script that The ArchMage had required the RowdyBunch to memorize.

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The Next Episode Is
# 106: Heney Drake :Welcome Aboard…
The Previous Episode was
#104: Daniel Freemartin - Operators are Standing By.…
The First Episode was
# 1 : Prologue…
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Book One: SoulStone
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