#the slippery heiliug

[pikkish-moved]

Best of Both Worlds ~ 10

In which a new creature is discovered

Chapter 10

In all honesty, Alph was more than happy to be going on today’s expedition with both Charlie and Olimar. Aside from Grandpa Drake, he had decided, they were just about the two people he had come to respect most in the world. Charlie was a war hero and an amazing captain, and Olimar, though not as galactically recognized, had more than proven himself to Alph through his repeated survival on the planet as well as his mechanical knowledge and excessive research on the planet’s biology.

Landing in the sand beside the Drake, Alph took a moment to appreciate the stunning beauty of the surroundings. Charlie and Brittany had described the place, and he had seen the images from the Drake’s scans, but nothing could quite compare to the actual sight, the wide stretch of white sand, the water as far as the eye could see, the enormous waves.

But, Alph reminded himself, shaking his head, they had work to do here, and not a whole lot of time for appreciating scenery.

As he turned back to Olimar and Charlie, he found they were already deep into consideration of their next move. “It’s a definite possibility,” Olimar was saying, “but I still think we ought to try the tidepools again. We have the time right now, and we can come to explore the grass forest when the tide is high and we don’t have access to the tidepools”

Charlie nodded sagely. “I guess it is true that Brittany and I could have missed the pikmin, if they were there. You have much more experience in locating them than we do, so it bears worth checking again.”

“And you’re right about the tides,” Alph jumped in. “We’ve only got around nine hours left before we wanted to be back!”

With that, it was decided, and they set off towards the tidepools.

Thanks to Alph actually landing the ship today rather than a crash landing, he was able to get them quite a bit closer to the tidepools than yesterday. However, at Charlie’s request, to minimize the likelihood of some form of attack, there was still some distance from both the tidepools and the grass forest, so they still had a little ways to walk. Unsurprisingly, as captain, Charlie took the lead, and Alph quickly fell in behind him.

“So, Captain,” Alph began, “what are the animals like in the tidepools?”

Charlie shot a mildly amused glance back at Alph. “You’ll be able to see soon enough for yourself.”

“Actually,” Olimar joined in, jogging a little to catch up to walk beside Alph, “a little preparation would be nice. As your designated xenobiologist, I wouldn’t mind a little more information on what I’m going to be dealing with. You didn’t really tell us a whole lot last night.”

Not looking back this time, Charlie just kind of gestured vaguely. “That’s because we didn’t really do a whole lot of investigating. We decided that since we didn’t have any pikmin with us, it would be smarter to avoid any conflict.”

Alph thought that seemed fair enough, and going by Olimar’s lack of a response, he thought so, too.

Presently, they arrived at the tidepools. On reaching the pools the size of large ponds or even small lakes, Alph paused.

The tidepools were stunning.

After another moment or two, he shuffled forward a bit, kneeling down to peer over the edge of the pool. There was a little school of puckering blinnow darting around above a waddlepus, and a couple sputtlefish chasing after wogpoles. And, kneeling next to Alph, Olimar pointed out towards the bottom of the pool a pearly clam clamp, commenting that he hadn’t seen one of them since the first time he had been on the planet.

“They’ve usually got a pearl inside, but getting it can be tricky. They’ll snap shut as soon as pikmin go for it, and any caught inside will be killed.”

Alph didn’t have to ask how Olimar knew the pikmin would die. The very nature of PNF-404 was more than enough evidence.

Still, Alph thought, it was impressive that Olimar could pick out the vaguely shiny shape, distorted by the water, and still know well enough what it was.

“So, what, they’re mollusks?” Alph asked.

“Yeah. Though, I don’t think the pearl is a real pearl. It’s too weak, and breaks too easily.”

Alph frowned thoughtfully, looking at the shape underwater. “Huh.”

Then Charlie was calling out to them. “Hey! We’re still on a time limit, here!”

Olimar nodded a little, standing up. “He’s right, we’ve still got to find the pikmin.” He offered a hand out to Alph.

Accepting Olimar’s help up, Alph nodded in agreement, and then they were off.

As they wandered between tidepools, avoiding the more wollywog populated areas, Charlie began, “Olimar, you’re the pikmin expert here. What exactly should we be looking for?”

“Well seeing as there’s so much water here, I’d expect that, if any, blue pikmin would be the ones we’d find here.” He paused a moment, peering into a pool as they walked by. “Though, in my experience, the onions are typically landed in relatively sheltered areas, and I don’t really see anywhere like that.”

Following Olimar’s gaze, Alph couldn’t help but agree. All the tidepools he’d seen so far were well populated with hungry animals, and the rocks they were walking on were hardly any safer, with yellow wollywogs in the immediate vicinity. The area off in the distance didn’t seem much better, either; Alph was able to spot a bulborb off a ways, thankfully sleeping, though a handful of dwarf bulborbs were close by, sniffing at what looked like a lump of seaweed. The other way, swooping snitchbug was flying around a tall rock peak- though, it swooped down once, and a peckish aristocrab darted out of a dark crack in the rock, snapped up the snitchbug in its claw, and disappeared back within its cavern.

Alph pointed to the rock in which the aristocrab must’ve now been enjoying its meal. “We should probably avoid that way for now.”

“Yeah,” Charlie agreed.

And they continued walking on.

Until, as they passed a pool, Alph saw in his peripheral vision a pinkish blob sliding out of the water, onto the rocks behind them.

Letting out a startled shout, Alph spun around, stumbling into Olimar as he backpedaled.

The creature was a large one, though not especially so by PNF-404 standards. It’s body was a bright pink, sluglike mass, though its head was lifted off the ground, and it sported a long, thin, tubelike snout no doubt used for sucking up food, two round, black eyes, and a pair of antennae covered in a fine, pink fuzz. And worst of all, the creature was coated in a thick slime, only its snout and antennae penetrating the gooey armor.

As Alph continued backing up against Olimar, who was, in turn, forcing Charlie to keep backing up, the creature continued forward, slowly sliding towards the trio.

“Olimar,” Charlie breathed, voice barely audible, “What is that?”

Olimar’s reply was short, quiet and contained just as much nervousness as Alph felt. “I have no idea.”

Alph’s heart leaped into his throat. This thing was completely new. Even Olimar didn’t know what it was, had never seen it before. They had no idea how to deal with it, and no pikmin to protect them.

And then, the creature stopped, looked at the three of them, and turned and glided away.

For a long, long moment, all three of them were still. Then, as Alph turned to look at his companions, Olimar let out a nervous chuckle. “Well, I guess it doesn’t want to eat us.”

“That,” Charlie replied, his brow furrowed, “or it just isn’t hungry right now.”

Alph cast a glance at the pool the thing had sunken into. “I don’t know about you guys, but whichever one of those it is, I think we shouldn’t be here to find out.”

“Agreed.” Charlie took a few steps forward, then suddenly slipped, apparently not having anticipated the gooey residue the creature had left behind on the rocks to be quite so slippery. It was only Olimar’s quick action, reaching out to grab Charlie’s life support pack, that prevented the Koppaiate captain from plunging headlong into the very same pool the creature had disappeared into.

“Now we really should get out of here,” Olimar said, helping Charlie regain his balance, “before anything else can happen.”

And making their way carefully across the slimy trail, they did just that.

PREVIOUS

PIKLOPEDIA: The Slippery Heiliug

NEXT

[pikkish-moved]

Best of Both Worlds ~ 11

In which Olimar wants everyone to be friends, and Brittany refuses

Chapter 11

Brittany’s day had been productive, to say the least. Without any interruptions from Charlie- or anyone for that matter- she had gotten a lot done.

For safety during travel, the vast majority of the Drake’s scientific equipment had been packed away in the cargo bay, as opposed to in the small lab where it belonged. And on top of that, Brittany found, Alph and Olimar hadn’t been exaggerating when they said the cargo bay was a mess. In fact, Brittany found that to be something of an understatement.

By the time she had managed to find and then cart all of the equipment from the cargo bay to the lab and unpack it, the others were arriving back from their expedition, and they were lifting off into space again, just ahead of the beach’s rising tide. Unfortunately, the others’ day was somewhat less productive. It took only a glance at them to tell they hadn’t found any pikmin. Alph, though, seemed very enthusiastic to explain to her why Charlie was coated in a pinkish purple slime from the waist down, telling her they had encountered a big sluglike creature that Olimar had decided to call a slippery heiliug.

As the evening wore on, the crew found their way into the Drake’s small kitchen for their nightly dinner rations, and soon after, Charlie and Alph both retired for the night. Brittany was about to leave the small room herself, when she noted Olimar, still sitting at the counter, scowling down at the koppad in front of him.

“Something wrong?” She inquired.

Olimar glanced up at her before gesturing vaguely back at the koppad. “Just having some trouble with this.”

Brittany snorted as she stepped back over to the counter, but, recalling the Hocotatian’s earlier kindness, refrained from making a “technologically inept old man” joke. “What’s wrong with it? I’m sure if you told Alph, he could fix it…”

“Oh, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it,” Olimar looked up at her again, this time with a bit of a smile. “No, I think I’m just getting old.”

Another snort escaped Brittany as Olimar made the very joke she had avoided.

“But,” Olimar continued with a small sigh, “I’m sure I’ll figure it out eventually. It’s just much more… complicated ...than my hocpad.”

“That thing?” Brittany frowned, recalling the outdated equipment Olimar had shown up with when they were readying to launch the Drake. “That was a piece of trash.”

Olimar laughed. “Maybe so. Hocotate Freight was not known for giving its employees the highest quality equipment!” After another sigh, he looked back at the koppad. “But it was a lot simpler to navigate. There were only three programs on it! Er- only three that worked, anyway.”

Brittany had to laugh at that. Olimar certainly did his former employer’s stinginess justice. But the company, in turn, did not seem to have benefitted the Hocotatian, as its old, archaic technology had apparently left him behind the technological learning curve. “Well, what were you trying to do, anyway?”

“Honestly? I was just trying to find my journal,” came the sheepish response. “I need to update it with the heiliug piklopedia entry.”

“Oh,” Brittany frowned a bit. “You just-“

Olimar waved her off. “Hold on, if I don’t figure it out myself, I won’t remember how to do it next time!” Then he smiled. “Thank you, though.”

Brittany just nodded. “Thought I’d repay the favor you did for me this morning.”

Olimar just frowned. Evidently, he had already forgotten.

“For getting Charlie off my back,” Brittany clarified.

Olimar let out a little breathy chuckle. “He’s not such a bad person, you know.”

At that, Brittany flat out scowled. “He’s stupid.”

“He may be a little… thick-headed… but he’s a good person at heart.”

“A little thick-headed? How blunt do I have to be before he gets the message that I’m not interested?”

“He could stand to back off a bit,” Olimar agreed. “Though I can’t say I don’t sympathize with him! When I fell in love with my wife, I could hardly think of anything else. Sometimes, I still can’t! ...Regardless, though, Brittany, for all of Charlie’s flaws, he’s not a horrible captain.”

“No, he’s just a horrible man who can’t see when he’s overstepping his boundaries.”

Olimar sighed and shook his head. “And I suppose there’s no convincing you otherwise?”

“No, there’s not.”

“Well, then I guess I probably shouldn’t try any more. Not tonight, at any rate, considering how late it’s getting.”

As Olimar stood, gathering up his koppad, Brittany let out a soft hum of agreement. She had been on her own way to bed before this conversation. She turned to leave, Olimar not far behind. In the hallway, they exchanged a brief goodnight, before each headed to their own cabin for the night.

PREVIOUS

NEXT