The Search for Shiny Things: Part 13

The teddy had just left the river behind when it stumbled over something soft and black. Tumbling to the ground, the teddy and the thing both yelled with surprise. They went on a little longer than they needed to, because yelling turned out to be fun. Then they greeted.

"Very nice to stumble upon you," said the teddy. "I am the teddy bear, and who might you be?"

"I am the white cat with blue eyes," said the fluffy black. It was perhaps a cat, the teddy thought, under all that fur. It had so much fur all over, even in its face, that one only really saw a fluffy thing. But it was most decidedly black.

"I am looking for a tree, and shiny decorations," said the teddy. "Have you mayhaps seen some?"

"I have not seen anything," said the white cat. "I am a white cat with blue eyes. You see, white cats with blue eyes are often blind, and just so I cannot see a thing, it is pitch dark where I am."

The teddy looked up at the bright and shiny sun above and thought the place they were at was most decidedly not dark.

"It may be rude but could I ask," said the teddy, "it seems to be you are black, and the day is bright. Are you perchance somewhere else, really?"

"Not quite," said the cat. "I thought, if I was not white, I might not be blind, so I asked to have my fur colored black. But it did not help. If anything, I see even worse now."

"What are you doing out on the road?" asked the teddy, for it seemed to him that it might be difficult if one could not see.

"One must not be limited by one's disability," said the cat bravely. "I have made my way all the way from that part of the road to this part of the road today, and am quite happy with the progress."

The teddy looked at that part of the road, and this part of the road, and thought about the distance it had traveled today. "Where are you going then?"

"I do not know," said the cat, "I cannot see what is ahead."

"There is a river, further on," said the teddy. "Watch out... I mean be careful so you don't fall in."

"That should be fine, I can swim quite well. It is this blasted darkness that bothers me. If only I had light."

The teddy thought that if the cat wanted light, it should have light, even if it seemed light enough from where it stood. And then it remembered that it had some candles, and a box of matches.

"I will help!" said the teddy, and took the wreath of leaves that the squirrel had put on its head, and set the candy cane candles in it, and set the whole thing on the cat's head, and lit the candles with the matches.

And with a big and frightening fwooosh, the candles melted, and the cat caught fire.

The Search for Shiny Things: Part 12

"There it goes," said the teddy and looked down into the hole. Falling was really the same thing as jumping, for a plushie. There was a weak echoing sound of something very soft landing on something very hard, then silence.

"Should you go down and help?" asked the squirrel.

"Perhaps it would be better to get it back up," said the teddy. "See if you can find rope on the boat, and we will make a ladder and put it down the hole." The teddy cleared its throat. "Dearest greyhound, are you alive?"

A whining noise came from deep down the hole.

"You brought the matches, did you not? Why not find your friends with the matches, and we shall make a ladder so you all can get back up."

A tiny little flame flickered into existence as the greyhound lit the first match. "Oh no, oh no," it said. "I can't, I can't."

"Of course you can," the teddy said. "And you're already down the hole."

There was another whining noise, and the little flame wandered away out of sight. The teddy stayed, and over the next few minutes while the squirrel found rope and an instruction booklet for how to tie rope ladders, listened carefully. For a while there was nothing, then there was some screaming a few times; each time made the squirrel wince and look up from its work. Then came a very loud scream, that soon changed into laughing, and more voices joining in laughing. And for the next while, more screaming and laughing and howling and shrieking. The squirrel finished the rope ladder, and with the help of the teddy, tied it firmly to the boat and sent it down the hole.

"The ladder is ready," called the teddy.

"Soon, soon," called the greyhound back.

They waited patiently, perhaps in the squirrel's case not quite so patiently, and eventually the greyhound came back up, followed by a parade of plushie animals in identical soldier caps. Chatting and laughing, the group greeted the two.

"Were you very scared?" asked the squirrel.

"Very," said the greyhound, "but it turns out being frightened when there is no danger is a lot of fun. All that screaming and jumping gets my stuffing fluffed."

The biggest plushie, a somewhat crookedly sewn snake, studied the rope ladder closely. "I dare say," it said, "that this rope ladder shows excellent character. Who made this?"

"I did!" exclaimed the squirrel, whiskers quivering.

"It did," the teddy confirmed; the teddy had in fact not lifted a paw to help.

"Would you like to be trained as soldier?" asked the plushie snake.

"But you are all plushies," said the squirrel doubtfully. "Can I really be a soldier?"

"We shall find out, if you'd like to try."

So it was decided. The greyhound cooked dinner, and was as the hero of the hole rewarded with the best serving, and the squirrel and the teddy got second and third. While they ate, all huddled on the ground by the boat, the plushie snake taught the squirrel to weave a wreath of twigs and leaves.

Although the food was good and the company excellent, the teddy figured it should continue on its way. The squirrel bequeathed it with the newly made wreath, and the greyhound handed over a box of matches. "Although the method was drastic, I must thank you for pushing me into the hole," the greyhound said. "Without you I would never have discovered how much fun it is to be frightened!"

"Teddies are crazy," said the squirrel.

"I helped," said the teddy indignantly.

The teddy thanked for the meal and invited them all to come to the teddy and the moth's white and drab house, after asking them about trees and shiny decorations, of which the soldiers knew nothing. And so it went on with its search.

The Search for Shiny Things: Part 11

The squirrel let the teddy go first over the bridge, because, it said, if it held for the teddy, it would hold for the squirrel. The teddy did not particularly like the reasoning, but had to get across the river anyway, so off they went.

On the other side of the river, the teddy accompanied the new friend to the sail boat. It was a fairly large boat, neat and clean and with a fancy looking weapon up front. It could probably hold many soldiers, but at the moment there was only one. A plush dog, or at least the teddy thought it was a dog, sat alone on deck. It was gray and had fluffy ears and tail, and was clearly not a fleshy dog but the kind with stuffing, like the teddy. Glad to find another of its very very extended family of vaguely related creatures, the teddy waved and climbed on board, beaten to it by the squirrel that excitedly looked around.

The dog straightened with a serious face as they came, and hid something behind its back.

"Who goes there!"

"I want to become a soldier!" exclaimed the squirrel. "Probably in your army, too."

The dog gave the squirrel a sideways glance. "You're tiny," it said.

"Now, now," said the teddy. Although it agreed.

"Well, it doesn't matter," said the dog. "I am left in charge here while my squad is gone, but I do not have the authority to enlist new soldiers." It spoke a little deliberately, like it was trying very hard to say all the words right.

"Where have they all gone?" asked the squirrel.

"To investigate a hole in the ground," said the dog and gestured to the side of the boat.

"Why?"

"Because there is no wind."

The teddy and the squirrel looked at each other trying to figure out how a hole in the ground was related to the wind. It was, the teddy thought quietly, as strange as how a panda bear was related to a squirrel.

"When will they get back?"

"I don't..." the dog straightened again. "I am the one asking questions!" it barked. "Who goes there!"

"We aren't going anywhere, we're just standing," said the teddy.

The dog shot him an angry look. "Who are you?" it said.

"I am the teddy bear, and this is the squirrel," said the teddy. "And who are you?"

"I am the greyhound."

"Greyhound?" wondered the squirrel.

"Greyhounds are proud and fast," said the greyhound and stretched its neck. "Tall and excellent soldiers."

The teddy thought the plushie greyhound looked a little more plushie than greyhound, but every one were what they were, and if it was a greyhound then it was, plushie or not. "When will your friends be back? The squirrel much wants to be a soldier," it said.

"I do not know," said the greyhound. It weighed them up and slumped a little. "In all honesty," it said and held out what it had hidden behind its back, "I am the chef, not a proper guard at all. I was left here to make dinner, while they got bored and went to play in the caves." It set the chef's hat on its head.

So that was what the wind had to do with the hole.

"Could you show us this hole?" asked the squirrel.

"What good would that do?"

"None at all, but you are not making dinner, so aren't you bored too?"

They went. The hole was not very far from the boat. It was indeed just a hole in the ground, deep and dark, so dark one could not see what was on the bottom. The greyhound stayed some distance from the hole and looked at it with a sad tint to its button eyes, while the squirrel ran right up to the edge and peered into the emptiness.

"Hello?"

Only the echo answered.

"They won't hear you," said the greyhound. "In fact, I believe they are lost. You see, they all went in the hole, but they forgot the matches, so they can't see anything. They're all gone and I'll never see them again. I'll just have to wait for the wind and go back and report them all gone."

"Can't you bring the matches into the hole?" asked the teddy.

The greyhound shook its head insistently. "I cannot."

"What about you?" the teddy asked the squirrel.

"It's too deep," said the squirrel. "It's fine for plushies to fall so far, but if I jumped into that hole I would die."

"What if you toss the matches in?"

"They will all have wandered off," said the greyhound. "Ah," it sighed. "You see, it's that I'm scared of the dark. I don't dare go down there, or I would this instant. I would come rescue them with the matches, and they would all call me their hero, and I would get the best food for a week. Maybe several weeks." It got something dreamy in the button eye plastic. "There's nothing dangerous down there, I know. So if only I dared jump."

"I will help," said the teddy.

"Really?" asked the greyhound, coming closer to them by the hole. "Will you go down with the matches?"

"Hm," said the teddy, "that was not quite what I meant." With that it gave the greyhound a helping pat on the back, and pushed it firmly forward. And with a tiny little slip, and a tiny little yelp, the greyhound fell into the hole.

The Search for Shiny Things: Part 10

"Noooooo!" bawled the squirrel.

"I'm sorry," said the teddy with uttermost sincerity. "I will build it up again."

"Don't bother, I will never become a soldier." The squirrel kicked one rock and sat down on another.

The teddy felt terrible. With nothing better to do, it started gathering the pile of rocks into a more ordered pile. The teddy's journey was also at risk, since the path led past the river. If there was no bridge, then there would never be a tree or shiny decorations.

"Why do you want to be a soldier?" asked the teddy.

"I don't know," said the squirrel. "It just seemed like a fun thing to do. Why do you need a tree and shiny decorations?"

"So that my house will be nice," said the teddy, "and not just white and drab. So that my friends can come and visit and have fun. I only have one friend now, but there will be more, I'm sure. Do you want to be my friend?"

"Sure," said the squirrel, with as much melancholy severity as a squirrel born two days ago could possibly be expected to muster.

"Then I have two," said the teddy.

"But no tree." The squirrel barely kept from snickering at the pun. It was a terrible pun. The teddy picked up the stone the squirrel sat on, as revenge. The squirrel squeaked and suddenly started jumping and dancing.

"What now?"

"The instructions! It's the instructions for the bridge! I put them under the base of the bridge!"

"How... clever," said the teddy diplomatically. There was indeed a stack of papers with instructions for a bridge on. Together the teddy and the squirrel spread the instructions on the ground and began to piece together the bridge, and it seemed that with instruction, it was actually not very difficult at all to build one. Sooner than either could have imagined, it was done.

Relieved of guilty feelings, the teddy proudly looked at the finished bridge. "I helped!"

The Search for Shiny Things: Part 9

A little ways away the road the teddy walked was interrupted by a river. By the river side a squirrel lifted one rock, then the other, looking this way, then that. On the river bank stood a swaying pile of rocks, about to fall over at the slightest hint of breeze. The teddy knew there was no breeze because on the other side of the river sat a boat with white sails, and the sails had no wind. The rough cloth of teddies had trouble feeling wind well, and perhaps that was lucky because it made sure teddies rarely felt cold.

"Hello, squirrel," said teddy.

"How do you know who I am?" asked the squirrel, immediately fascinated. It ran a lap around the teddy, looking at it from all angles.

"Everyone knows a squirrel is a squirrel," said the teddy, confused.

"Everyone has not told me that yet," said the squirrel. "In fact, I was born just two days ago, so that may be why."

The teddy felt this conversation was perhaps taking strange direction, and besides, the squirrel's spinning was making it dizzy. "You have not happened upon a fine green tree, or any shiny decorations?" it asked.

"Nope," said the squirrel, and went back to the rocks.

"What are you up to here?" asked the teddy, eyeing the rickety tower of rocks.

"I am building a bridge," said the squirrel. "You see, there are soldiers on that boat on the other side, and I aim to join their ranks, but first I must get across the river."

"This doesn't look terribly much like a bridge," hummed the teddy.

The squirrel squirmed. "I know, I know," it said with a sad voice, or at least the teddy thought it might be sad. Squirrels were difficult to know, because they tended to sound happy always, even when they really weren't. "I got fine instructions for how to build a bridge from the nice panda that lives up the road," the squirrel went on. "We're related, you see. But I lost the instructions, and now I'm not sure."

The teddy pondered on that family tree for a moment.

"Gah you caught me!" exclaimed the squirrel, and the teddy jumped. "I didn't lose it, exactly. It was complicated and I don't like reading. I hid it so I wouldn't need to read it, I thought I could build the bridge without. But now I can't remember where I put it, I've looked everywhere. Who knew building a bridge would be so difficult!"

"Not me," said the teddy, although it thought it might have suspected it just a little.

The squirrel tossed down the rock it was holding. "I give up!"

"Don't give up," said the teddy. "I will help." And so it picked up the rock, figuring that since it was so much taller than the squirrel it could put the rock at the top of the tower much easier.

"No, no, be careful!" the squirrel warned.

The words were barely out, before the tower quivered under the weight of that little extra stone, and collapsed with a terrible clatter.