Get caught up on Susie’s Adventure and read the previous chapters.

Susie’s Shell Searching Adventure /// Chapter 6

Their revolution had to end before they could truly get on with things. While Susie wasn’t necessarily eagre to get off the Ferris wheel, the excitement of their possible future made her desperately want to carry on in their mutual journey. To arrive at that place that had once seemed so far off, and which, if she were to be honest, might still be far off now, though she still possessed a hope that her vision might become reality, her dreams the present. 

That snake had her shell; she was sure of it. She and Mel both were rather certain on that count. Now they needed only to reach the shell. And no forces, nor creatures could keep her and Mel from fulfilling their destiny together. They would get that shell. Together. They had to. 

The snake was not huge. Longer than a slug, most definitely, and really quite fat, about as round as a Pringles can, but Mel and Susie had definitely seen larger snakes in their lives. It looked grey from a distance, but they couldn’t be sure. The entire display was quite preposterous: a fat, grey snake with a snail’s shell plopped atop it like a top hat. They weren’t thrilled about the idea of a snake taking the shell, and they were less thrilled about confronting the snake to get the shell back. Surely the snake wouldn’t just agree to return the shell; they’d stolen the shell after all. So what were two small slugs to do to free a shell from a whole snake?

‘Susie,’ Mel said as they were approaching the ground. ‘I have to tell you something.’ 

Susie waited. 

‘I’m afraid of heights,’ Mel said, to which Susie laughed. ‘And snakes. I hate snakes. I don’t know if I could ever come with you. I don’t know that I would be of use.’ 

A deflating blow. Susie didn’t know how to respond. She didn’t want to force Mel to go with her, she had just trusted her instincts that they were meant to do this together and that she would never lose Mel. She felt certain they were fated to spend eternity together, no matter the adventure set before them. She said all she could in reply, ‘Okay.’ 

There was silence as they disembarked the Ferris wheel and moved away from the crowd of dung beetles and fireflies, butterflies and caterpillars. Susie said, ‘Please don’t think I was trying to sway you otherwise. You don’t have to come. I would never ask you to.’

Mel looked at the ground. There was space between them now and Mel looked to be in pain, as though she were being held back by some unknown organization. ‘I’ll go,’ Mel said. 

‘You don’t have to,’ Susie said. ‘I won’t ever ask you to do something you don’t want to.’

‘I do want to,’ Mel said. ‘Friends support one another. Of course I’m going to be there for you.’ 

Susie smiled. She didn’t say anything, but her silence spoke the words more clearly than her utterance might. Friends support, but to enter the quest together felt like a requirement of something more. 

‘Just don’t expect me to contribute a whole lot,’ Mel said. 

Susie laughed. ‘It’s two slugs versus a snake,’ she said. ‘What the foop could possibly go wrong?’

Susie and Mel started to make their way through the circus streets and down to the bayou until Mel abruptly stopped. 

‘What about Pedro?’ Mel said, grabbing at Susie with her nape. 

‘What about him?’ Susie said. 

Mel shook her head. The world did not consist of only the two of them, however sad that might be. She explained that they had to at least say goodbye. They had to tell him what they were up to and where they were headed, and, as the good friends and slugs that they were, they had to check in to see if he had found what he was looking for. There was one problem, as Susie promptly pointed out: They hadn’t a clue where they would find him. 

And so they set out again to walk confidently through the streets unknown to them. At last, Mel began to talk to some of the passersby. ‘Have you seen a praying mantis?’ she would say. ‘Tall, brown but almost white, likes to speak in Spanish?’ Most shook their heads and continued on, clinging tight to their pre-destined path, unwilling to let go for a time to help their weary colleagues find their own way forward. Most except for a scorpion, named Frisky, who said he knew exactly where to lead them. 

Susie felt compelled to pull Mel aside. ‘Mel, he’s a scorpion,’ Susie said. 

‘He can take us to Pedro!’ Mel said. 

‘But he’s a scorpion,’ Susie said. 

Mel screwed her face up. Confusion, hopefully. ‘As Pedro might say,’ Susie said. ‘Scorpions equal no bueno. Son diablos.’ 

Mel was unimpressed. Always the kind and trusting one. ‘Come on Suse, we need to find Pedro.’ 

It ended poorly, of course. Though not as poorly as Susie imagined. Turns out Frisky was mostly just a petty jokester. He led them back towards the base of the mountain and, once there, found a tall tree and pointed to it. 

‘Here,’ Frisky said. He beckoned the two slugs over to the tree. ‘Here, we close our eyes,’ Frisky said. 

Susie cast a glare at Mel. After they had all closed their eyes Frisky said, ‘And now, we pray!’ Even Mel was unimpressed, but the scorpion burst out in a roar of laughter. His head arched all the way back towards his stinger like he was doing yoga. A scorpion become a cobra.

‘I told you scorpions suck,’ Susie said in monotone as they left the laughing scorpion near the tree. 

Now they really were lost. They hadn’t paid attention to how the scorpion had led them here and they had wasted time by trusting people. They walked back towards the circus when Mel unpopped herself from the ground with a mighty jump of glee. ‘There!’ she said. ‘There! Frisky led us right!’

In front of them was a small, circular, makeshift tent, with a splotchy sign posted out front that seemed to have been cobbled together with newly recycled trash. ‘Fortune’ the sign seemed to spell, and nothing else.

‘Even if that is for Pedro, Frisky most certainly did not help us,’ Susie said, unamused. 

‘Sure he did,’ Mel said. ‘He got us to pray.’ 

Susie looped her antennae in a Ferris wheel, rolling her eyes as large as she could. Mel was happy now, as if she ever weren’t. She poked at Susie as she led them into the tent. There was a lot of smoke from a fire that had been lit beneath a table which was surrounded by a small collection of stones. Sure enough, when the slugs entered, a praying mantis emerged from the opposite side speaking in some weird voice and inviting them to sit and hear their fortune. He hadn’t recognized them. 

‘What’s with all the smoke, Pedro?’ Susie said. 

Recognition dawned. ‘Amigas! Vinieron! Oh, it is such a joy to see you again. I got my own tent, you see? A table, a sign, now all I need is customers! Seekers of good fortune! The fire, yes, it is not optimal. But I am in a rush, you understand. The smoke must make for mist for now. Sit! Sit, amigas. Let me tell your fortune!’

‘We’re actually here to say goodbye,’ Mel said. 

‘We saw my shell,’ Susie explained. ‘Some snake had it, he took it down to the bayou. We’re headed out to get it.’

‘Ah, I see,’ Pedro said. 

‘But we could hear a fortune,’ Susie said, shrugging her eyes, and Pedro lit back up his eyes as bright as the flames beneath his table, even through the smoke. 

‘Yes! Certainly you could! A prophecy for your journey! Come. Sit,’ he beckoned. 

They each took their seats about the table. Pedro closed his eyes and clapped his arms together, bowing his head. From all sides entered fireflies who circled about Mel and Susie in a dazzling display until Pedro suddenly let out a large sigh of air and slammed his arms on pressed a sea-foam crystal ball between his front legs. The fireflies exploded outwards, spread themselves open into a taxidermied sky, and shut their butts off and on, twinkling in the smoke. Pedro’s eyes were as smooth as the stones each creature sat upon and he began to speak in a voice that was not his own: 

 

Once tried, once failed, and never more,
two slugs or snails, add one mentor,
into the bayou laced with death
shall vanquish our good hero’s breath.
A tale, new told, quite like the old,
of Cane and a Bel uncontrolled,
where hearts succumb forevermore
and loss remains the only cure.

 

Pedro’s eyes seemed to roll back about in their sockets as they thankfully reverted back to their normal colour. The eeriness in the room died out, leaving Mel and Susie relieved, and the fireflies extinguished their butts and disappeared from the room altogether as if they had never been there. Even the fire under the table was extinguished, which left the room quite dark.

Pedro clapped his arms onto the table. ‘Well, amigas’ he said. ‘This. Sounds. Exciting!’

‘Muy emocionante,’ Mel said, tentatively. So very exciting.

‘It sounds kind of awful, actually,’ Susie said. ‘I’m going to die?’ 

‘Ah, well, if you look at it that way I suppose it isn’t quite as exciting.’ Pedro looked down at the ground. 

‘It’s just a silly prophecy,’ Mel said. ‘You’re not going to die on me.’ 

Pedro looked up. He was hurt. ‘La profecía es la verdad, amiga. No doy profecías falsas. Pero, supongo que es posible que la profecía no sea como parece.’

Mel and Susie stared at him blankly. ´No entiendo lo que dijo,’ Mel said. 

Pedro stood up. He said, ‘Go on, amigas. Leave me. Fulfill your quest and your duty. You cannot live in fear of that which you have not yet experienced. Do not let me stop you from following your hearts. It is your hearts which know best what fortune shall befall you.’ He then scurried out the back of the tent and left Mel and Susie on their own. 

Mel and Susie looked to one another. Mel said, ‘So now we test the fortitude of our faith?’

‘Now I’m scared,’ Susie said. 

‘But we have to go,’ Mel said. 

‘We have to go,’ Susie said. 

‘And we’ve got each other,’ Mel said. 

‘Until I die,’ Susie said. 

‘But you won’t,’ Mel said. 

‘No,’ Susie said. ‘My heart will just succumb forevermore since loss is apparently the only cure.’ 

‘We have to go still,’ Mel said. ‘It’s your shell we’re talking about. A snake can’t just wear your shell.’ 

‘I know,’ Susie said. 

‘Trust the prophecy,’ Mel said. ‘We just don’t yet understand all things.’ 

They exited the tent and set a path to leave el circo and head towards the bayou, the last place they saw the snake. They moved slower than usual, slow even by slug standards, but they moved nonetheless, side by side, into the unknown.

 

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