Chapter 5:After a while, the silence between the three friends was beginning to get very awkward – not to mention that Cera’s mood dropped further the longer she was forced to sit around, boring herself to death.
“So uhh, what you guys do for rest of day anyway?” Petrie finally spoke up to break the almost dangerous silence between them.
“Pissing off Tricia, do you ever listen?!” Cera snapped at the Flyer above her.
“Me do but me forget things,” Petrie replied, chuckling nervously.
“Say Cera…” Littlefoot, who had been deep in his thoughts until now, spoke up curiously. “Why are you so mean towards your sister? I’d love to have a sibling I could play with when you guys can’t play, you know?”
“Threehorns are mean, you should know that by now!” Cera declared defiantly, raising her tail high up in the sky.
“Well, me think you too mean too many times…” Petrie muttered under his breath though Cera heard him.
“What’dya say, Flyer?!” the Threehorn snarled viciously.
“N-nothing…” Petrie stuttered, instinctively preparing to take flight.
“That’s what I thought!”
“Well, how’d you like being pestered by Tricia if she were your older sister and not your younger sister?” Littlefoot interrupted his friends’ quarrel.
“SO what?!” Cera shot back angrily.
“You be bully just like Hyp!” Petrie accused from the top of his tree, Cera getting to her feet in agitation.
“Say that again, beakface!”
“Guys please!” Littlefoot sighed deeply. “Well, I’m not sure if I wanted to be your sibling, Cera, older or younger…”
“Who’d want a flathead as a brother anyway?!” Cera retorted furiously, pacing around.
“Hey!” Now Littlefoot began to take Cera’s bad mood personal, rising from his usual position at their meeting place too.
“Humpff!”
*
It was only until much later after she and Spike had covered quite some distance from their nest already that Ducky’s mind began to calm down enough to allow productive thinking again. It was only then, now that she wasn’t sleepy anymore, that she began noticing just how odd some things which were happening around her ever since the previous day actually were…
“Hmm, our mommy did not wake us up this morning, no she did not…” the Swimmer noted, trying to calm her nerves. Cera had been unusually snappy as of late and their late arrival surely wouldn’t be helping at all.
“First my mommy is so tired from a meeting that she goes to sleep way before the night time… and now she is sleeping in, something must be wrong!” It was that moment when Ducky realised for the first time, that these two most odd events might have a connection after all. Though what did it mean? Was her mother really just tired and needed to catch some additional sleep? Ducky knew too well how it was like to be sleep-deprived after going on so many nightly adventures in her short life already. It wasn’t rare that she’d sleep through most of the day after such a stunt – and Spike was sleeping at every given opportunity as it was… but she had never witnessed her mother drawing apart from her tight sleeping schedule before.
“Something must be wrong, yes it must!” Ducky was beginning to feel the shiver down her spine return to her despite the day being warm and humid. It would probably be nothing but she just couldn’t choke back a small but significant pessimistic part of her mind which rarely made itself known to the young girl as it was. That alone was a worrisome sign; she had to talk to Spike about it!
*
“So uhh, what me was trying to say earlier… after me think a lot of time, me go visit Guido to spent rest of day, what ëbout you, Littlefoot?” Petrie spoke up again after a short break of Cera steaming and them exchanging a series of gestures in the Threehorn’s direction while she wasn’t looking.
“Well, like I said…” Littlefoot gestured. “I was pretty bored. That’s why I said I’d love to have a sibling, y’know? I ended up having to listen to stories of my grandpa that I’d already hear a thousand times!”
“Sound like fun…” Petrie commented.
“Oh, would you stop whining about not having brothers or sisters already?!” Cera ranted all of a sudden. “Actually, you have Shorty, isn’t that your brother now?”
“A brother who I see once a year? We’re not even related!” Littlefoot argued. “And, anyway, I’m not treating him like shit unlike you do with Tricia!”
“My siblings sometimes mean too…” Petrie mentioned but nobody really listened to him.
“For the record, I actually supervised her while she was headbutting rocks to test her strength, okay!?” Cera shouted, aggressively jumping towards the Longneck, almost as if she was going to enter a fight. “And now shut up, will ya!?”
Littlefoot indeed went silent for another few minutes, appearing thoughtful and concerned.
*
“Spiky?” Ducky spoke up unusually quiet as the Spiketail continued to hurry towards their meeting place. Upon hearing his big sister addressing him, he slowed down his speed a little, looking back to the Swimmer who was sitting on his neck with a concerned expression.
“I am a little worried about our mommy, yes I am…” the girl admitted hesitantly, looking at her brother expectantly, knowing that he’d have an answer. He always had one after all.
Spike fixated his gaze on Ducky for a moment before he replied in his unique way.
“Worry not, Ducky, I’m sure she just wanted to get some sleep this morning…”
“Just like me…” the Spiketail added contemplatively, suppressing his anger about being woken up rough even by the standards he was used to – his family had tried every oh so mean trick to wake him up already as it was. In the end, holding his grudge never did him any good so he discarded his frustration about Ducky’s rudeness in the morning quickly.
“Considering that Cera will spear us with her horns by the time we arrive… she certainly had a good reason to wake me up like that…”“Yes, but what if something is wrong? She always wakes us up, yes she does! So why not today, huh?”
“She truly does do that every morning…” Spike would have sighed if he knew how to. As far as he was concerned if his mom wanted to sleep in instead of her usual habit of waking at daybreak then that was fine with him. Ducky’s behavior made him worry more than the actual problem though… if it was one to begin with. His sister was always happy and optimistic towards life. Seeing her in such a position of doubt and uncertainty made him feel bad for her so he tried to calm her nerves.
“I’m sure it’s nothing, Ducky. Now let’s hurry, I want to play a game, don’t you?”
“Mmh, I guess so…” Ducky mumbled, still pondering hard – the thought just wouldn’t let her go no matter how hard she tried.
*
“You know, Cera, sometimes I really wonder how I am still friends with you…” Littlefoot spoke up after a few minutes of silence between the three friends. The air was unusually thick as it was, literally and figuratively speaking. The rainfalls of the previous days had made the air heavy with humidity so it was unusually quiet where they were, far away from the loud, populated parts of the Valley as it was.
“While you only care for yourself and you not being entertained, Petrie and I are worrying about Ducky and Spike, you know? Just whenever you’re being nice for a while, you turn into an asshole all of a sudden again! I don’t get it; this is really not okay!” Littlefoot faced the Threehorn angrily.
“So what? That’s how I am, deal with it!” Cera huffed. “If you’re worried about them, don’t stand around here worrying! Do something! Yes! Do something and move your fat butt over to Ducky’s and Spike’s to see if there’s something wrong and don’t stand around here worrying like Petrie all day, geez!”
Littlefoot gave the Threehorn quite a stare after her rather blunt speech but he had to admit that Cera was right about one thing… as much as he hated to admit it.
“I should really check back on them just in case…”“You know what, I’ll even come along despite being an ëasshole’, okay? Are you happy now?!” Cera offered, aggressive but diplomatic all the same.
“Happy? No… but good to know you’re not completely unreasonable…” Littlefoot answered angrily. “Come Petrie…”
“Unreasonable?!” Cera spat that word out as if it was a piece of meat.
“At least I’m not getting upset about a silly game unlike you do…” Littlefoot muttered. “Now come along… unless you have something better to do!”
“Humpff! Just shut up already, do I even look like I have anything better to do?!”
Littlefoot deliberately turned away from the Threehorn without answering, taking her words quite literally. He knew Cera for too long already. If there was one thing she absolutely hated, it was being ignored. Petrie silently took off from his perch, having followed the intense argument silently lest to get himself into the focus of Cera’s bad mood again.
Without another word spoken, the sparks of electricity between the two friends almost visible, they started trotting though they didn’t get far…
*****
Well, a little later than intended but here is the next chapter! Motivation stayed low after the loss of that chapter, unfortunately. I also think I wasn't able to recover the chapter as nicely as it was written before but at least it's about 500 words longer despite the dialogue lacking description
a little(in my opinion, that is.)
Ducky's part got a bit longer and probably better than before but the fight between Littlefoot and Cera doesn't quite please me but oh well, as long as you enjoyed the chapter, I'm happy
oh, and guess what? I only noticed that I forgot to include the prompt again while posting this
Well, at least the story now officially qualifies lol.
With this chapter, I've also got a faint idea of how to name this story in the end. (Suggestions still more than welcome!!!) As always, things weren't planned when I started this, but, right now, it looks like there will be a second important theme in this story besides... well, you'll see soon enough
Anyway, now I can finally continue to advance the story, motivation has returned! I'll start working on chap 6 right now, maybe I'll get that one done too before it's getting too late
