Chapter Twelve

Cowland

 

Cowland? This was a beautiful pasturelike land with orange, green and yellow grass. Nauseating. Timtallagay opened it's bag and pulled out a book with pretty designs on the cover. I stood and gawked, at the grass, the book and the.....cows.

Cows began to cluster around TimT, some of them painted and decorated in gorgeous colors. TimT bagan reading to the cows.

"Why is he reading to cows?" I asked Injarda-o quietly.

"He always does this when we come here" he replied.

One of the cows butted into me, very hard. I said ooph, and looked at the cow. The cow, believe it or not, was glaring at me.

"I take it you understood that" I said to the cow, feeling stupid. "My apologies."

The cow was having none of it, and apparently objected to having the poetry reading interrupted. She butted me in the abdomen, hard enough to prevent further speech by cleverly and effectively knocking every ounce of air out of my body. I said ooph again, and shut up as the cows seemed to prefer. I stood there confused, realizing that I'd apparently offended a bovine. Whatever.

Timtallagay continued to dramatically read a short epic poem to the herd, which listened raptly. I stared, noting that noone else in the group was talking or disturbing the reading in any way. This is really weird. If this is Injarda-o's idea of a comfortable, homey place to be, then he is not only weirder than I thought he was, he may be weirder than I can think he is. I am standing on the Plains of Fruit Loops, for Poetry Appreciation Hour of the Bovines. I don't feel well. It's at times like these that I'm coming to realize Dara might not be all that bad.

"They like poetry" Injarda-o told me.

"Apparently" I noted dryly "they seemed very offended."

"They're very smart" he continued, obviously seeming to think that this was helpful.

"Smart...cows" I commented. I turned my back on Injarda-o and his scenicly painted, smart, poetry-loving bovines. I heard him continue to talk about this being his very first trump place. There's a shock.

Timtallagay announced that we were going on a shadow-shifting walk. We started off on shaded, tree-lined path. The grass begins to become taller, and we are walking in pairs. Injarda-o starts walking up with TimT, and Gwen and I hung back discussion some of our genetic research ideas. Tekvar brought up the rear, looking bored.

Timtallagay starts skipping, pulling Injarda-o along arm in arm. At the bottom of each 'skip', Tim fades into the distance. We find that we have to match his pace to not lose him, but to my horror I realize that we have to match his bounce as well. I take up a jouncing jog as Gwen gives in and starts skipping alongside of me. I just can't do it. I will not skip. Tekvar looks disgusted and eventually seems to develop a sort of hopping leap that lets him keep up with Timtallagay.

The shading of the road goes to a gold-yellow, and widens. The trees begin to go to a green shade, and the green slowly deepens. The sky turns bluer, and colors begin to get more stable. This is a terribly inefficient way to travel. It seems so random and unplanned. Ick.