SEA CRITTER CAPER

Along the Hidden Garden’s furthermost treeline is a coast. It doesn’t have a fancy name, though Pepper wouldn’t have cared if it did. She is visiting, despite telling Jonathan and Wanda that she did not want to go. She often finds herself in situations like this, though it is starting to happen less.

She originally was not going to go to the Hidden Garden again. More specifically, she did not want to return during the summer months, especially after hearing that the sea god was going to be there. In a way, there was fear in her heart that she was going to relive the horrors of the last summer festival. Relive the unending and sweltering days, dig in the sand for nothing, drown in water and shells.

She feared that it would return, the nightmares.

And while she had heard that the sea god was not Poseidon, but someone else, this does not bring her any form of relief. The only reason she goes is because Critter, Agar, and Nurse Bruce insist on it. Critter, especially, is adamant about going and even spent time honing his reality bending skills to make Pepper understand them.

Critter is a Crabbot, and not just any Crabbot, but a Crabbot that had been born from Poseidon’s dreams. It had made itself corporeal in the chaos of the summer festival, and had attached itself to Pepper, who was a figment of Poseidon’s imagination at the time.

There had been so many other Crabbots generated then as well, and when Crabbots swam in large schools, their latent divine power was unleashed. This had been something of a sore spot for Poseidon at the time, since the blurring of the god’s dreams and the All Mother’s reality had been a catastrophic mess.

One that none of the mortal foxes of the realm had been able to escape from. At least not completely. To them, the mortals, that summer festival had been a dream of their own design. The experience couldn’t be scrubbed from every thread. Some might have been able to remove it, but for most, that was just not an option.

Critter, being one of the more powerful of the Crabbots generated at that time, had taken a liking to Pepper. Even he did not know why, but if Critter wanted something, then he was going to get it.

“We want to see our home,” Critter says. Pepper doesn’t question how Critter can speak to her. “Our home, the ocean. It is still now. It is not in the dreams of our god any longer. You have nothing to fear.”

Pepper obliges, carrying the three of her aquatic pets to the coast just beyond the Hidden Garden. It occurs to her to ask a million questions, but she does already have most of what she needs to know just through this simple request. Not only that last summer was indeed a reality, but that she would never really be able to let it go. It is a core part of her lived experience.

When she lowers the special tank that she has to carry the swimming pets, Nurse Bruce is the first to leap out into the ocean waves. Agar is a quiet pet, having made no sound despite Critter giving her the ability to. She merely buries herself in the wet sand with nothing but her antenna poking out.

Pepper sits in the wet sand as well while Critter floats in the tank.

“We love you,” Critter says. “And are loved by you.”

“I know,” Pepper replies. She doesn’t have much more to say than that.

“Do you think that you will be better one day?”

“Maybe.”

“That is good enough for us.”

Pepper rests her chin on her large arms as the ocean waves lap at her feet. Agar burrows deeper into the sand, but Pepper can still see the little bump of where her body is as she moves around.

“I think that I should not be better,” she says finally. Critter is quiet. “I was going to kill him, you know. Or try to. Because that’s the only thing I know how to do. Kill the things I don’t like.”

“This is not true,” Critter replies. “You are different. I have seen it.”

“Did Astral put you up to this?”

“Astral is busy with his own problems. Dealing with the madness just like you.”

“He hasn’t shown his face around here for a long time.”

“Perhaps it is because you are doing what he wants of you.”

“Which is?”

Critter swims around in the tank. It would be so easy for him to leap into the waves and frolic with the ocean life, but that is not what he wants. Nurse Bruce can only hold off on chomping at something for so long and Critter would rather not be bitten again.

“To fill pages,” Critter says finally. “That is all he ever wants of anyone. Except for Dipsi.”

“Is that what he calls himself now?”

Critter pauses. “It is what he likely was always going to be called, but his dreams are not the same as your reality. He is different now. Maybe he had the same opportunity as you.”

Pepper sighs and pats Critter on the head. There is nothing but a frothing bubble from Critter’s mouth as the words disappear and reality snaps back to the way it ought to be. There simply are not enough Crabbots to keep the dream going.

Pepper appreciates it anyway. She knows that Critter is right. She does love them - her pets - and she is loved by them. But as the day is turning to night, Pepper digs into the sand to get Agar out from a pocket of shells that were probably once sea snails.

And she has to lure Nurse Bruce back with a particularly tasty treat. Little does she know, Nurse Bruce is carrying an extra snack for itself, which appears to be a pair of clam shells tightly closed.

“Where did you get this?” Pepper asks, but Nurse Bruce cannot answer anymore. He merely swirls around in the tank and plays with the new shell friend.