Taterskin & The Eco Defenders: Book 2, Chapter 7
Book 2 ("Tell It to Future Generations"), Chapter 7
CHAPTER 7
Albert and the Gorilla, Hippo, Cheetah, and Peregrine Falcon touched down in Tinga Tinga at the usual spot, not far off the road near the animals’ watering hole there.
Sojourner Truth saw the Zephyr and came over to see what was up and to talk to Albert. He introduced her to Ooga, Jowls, Jubatus, and Falcona and went on to explain to her the reason for his visit. Sojourner fully supported the work of the Eco Defenders, as you might remember from my first book about us.
Sojourner told Albert that he had just missed Warble and Mary McGorkle — they had only recently gone back to Wisconsin after spending two years there in Tinga Tinga. The McGorkles had loved it in Africa, but were curious about what their old town of Oconomowoc looked like 500 years after they had left it (it having been the 21st century when they had departed, and now being the 26th).
Sojourner walked with Albert and the animals down to the water hole. Tubthumper the Elephant was the first to notice the gang of six coming toward them. She could make out what looked like two humans and four animals, but couldn’t see them well enough to make a clear identification of who or what they were yet.
After she mused aloud about this, to nobody in particular but to all in general, Rory looked up and immediately recognized the half dozen souls approaching them (Lions have better eyesight than Elephants).
“Tubthumper, Chum, Yukyuk, it’s some of our old friends from the 19th Century!” the Lion said. “The ones we helped to protect the Congolese and put an end to poaching throughout the whole continent!”
The five visitors (Albert, Ooga, Jowls, Falcona, and Jubatus) and the five locals (Tubthumper and Chumbawumba, Rory, Yukyuk, and Sojourner) enjoyed a joyous and raucous reunion. As she had only just met the animal visitors, Sojourner listened with rapt interest to the tales related by Albert and the eight animals as they relived the two campaigns they had mutually taken part in: How Albert, Warble, and Ward confronted the captain of the Belgians, with Alexis the African Grey Parrot interpreting between the English that our friends spoke and the Flemish, or Dutch, that the Captain spoke; and how Alexis, by force of circumstances, was compelled to bite three or four pieces out of the captain’s ear, at which point his ear took on the appearance of the edge of a postage stamp; and how Warble had smacked the money out of the hand of one of the poachers, who had attempted to bribe them, and how these animal murderers were devious and stubbornly avaricious to such a degree that they eventually had to be stampeded by elephants (with Tubthumper and her brother Chumbawumba in the forefront of that charge) and Rhinos (Ocero Puddleby among them) and Hippos (with Jowls Behemoth playing his part well) and such.
Soaking in the admiration clearly evident on Sojourner’s face, the animals tried to be modest about their roles in the fracases, but after Jubatus began bragging about how useful his 80 mph speed had been in the battle against the Belgians, Falcona couldn’t help but boast about beating him in the race to relay the news of the Belgian’s arrival in the Bay to the front lines. Jubatus then retorted that yes, Falcona had beaten him to the ‘finish line’ (and he hadn’t even known that a race was on, or he would have ‘turned it up another notch’ and doubtless won), but he was the one who had had the presence of mind and the quickness of tongue to relay the news to Albert before Falcona could get over herself regarding her (barely) beating him there — ‘by a feather,’ as Jubatus put it.
Since the animals were fired up recounting their prior exploits, Albert thought this would be a good time to attempt to recruit them to help out with the further rescue operations he had planned.
Their interest was definitely piqued, but naturally they wanted to know the specifics first: What exactly were we planning to do, where, and when (that is, in which year or years would these operations take place)?
Albert admitted that the itinerary was not fully fleshed out yet, but told them of several ideas he had.
“The good thing about the fact that our plans aren’t yet set in stone,” Albert said, “Is that if you agree to help us, you will have a say in the matter. We will all, as a group of Eco Defenders, mutually decide the whos, whats, wheres, whens, and hows of it all.”
That sounded good to everyone, especially since the four from Tinga Tinga already knew those in Zenia, and looked forward to seeing and working with them again.
That having been settled, early the next morning all boarded the Zephyr. Ooga remained in the co-pilot’s seat to the right of the console. Falcona sat on the console. The second row of seats was taken by, from left to right, Tubthumper the Elephant, Rory the Lion, then Tubthumper’s brother Chumbawumba. The back seat was filled by Jowls, Yukyuk the ‘Chuckling’ Hyena, and Jubatus.
Albert realized that future generations would probably appreciate a chronicle of our adventures made to alter history, so he wrote down the full names of each passenger. He already knew that Rory’s last name was Zamba, but he didn’t know the others. Ooga’s surname, he then found out, is Ah-Ooga (so his name is Ooga Ah-Ooga); Tubthumper and Chumbawumba’s surname is Modoc; the Elephant siblings noted, though, that it was hardly ever necessary for them to use their surname, as they were the only sibling elephants named Tubthumper and Chumbawumba in all of Africa, believe it or not). Yukyuk said she only had the one name, and that it was her middle name.
“If you have a middle name, you must have a first name,” Albert responded, confused.
“Nope. All I’ve got is a middle name: Yukyuk. That’s it. That’s all she wrote — literally: when I was born, the nurse wrote in the log:
“NFN?” Tubthumper asked. “So you do have a first name — even if it’s just initials. What do they stand for?”
“No, I don’t have a first name. ‘NFN’ stands for ‘No First Name.’ So, as you can see clearly now: I have no first name.”
“That makes no sense,” Chumbawumba said, getting kind of agitated about it, despite the fact that he probably shouldn’t care.
Rory merely looked on, grinning and slowly lashing his tail back and forth. He found the whole conversation whimsically ludicrous, and could barely suppress a chuckle himself.
“Well,” Yukyuk admitted, “Full disclosure: I have been told that I do have a first name, but that it’s silent, and thus has no orthographic representation.”
Chumbawumba now lost his cool. Ears flared, trunk raised, and trumpet blaring, he said the whole thing was ridiculous, and stomped off into the forest to give himself a chance to work off some of his exasperation about the matter and cool down.
Ooga, feeling the same way about the verbal exchange as Rory, was jumping up and down in glee, feeling that the name itself was humorous enough, but Chumbawumba’s violent reaction to it made it even more so.
Tubthumper, although not upset about it, was nevertheless curious. “I have to agree with my brother: If you only have one name, why wouldn’t it be a first name? I’ve heard of people (and animals) having no middle name before, but I’ve never heard of someone having no first name.”
“Family tradition says they asked my dad what he wanted to name me, and he was going to choose a first name for me, but he was speechless, and the nurse got impatient and moved on to my middle name, which my mom chose.”
“Why did your mom choose ‘Yukyuk’? Is it a family name, her maiden name, or” —
“She didn’t.”
“What do you mean, ‘She didn’t’? She didn’t choose it?”
“Nope.”
“Then ...”
“My mom was laughing so uproariously about the nurse getting angry at my dad for not being able to make up his mind about the first name he wanted to give me, that” —
“I thought you said he was speechless.”
“OK, OK; Here’s the real story, if you must know: The nurse came in, obviously in a hurry and already out of patience, because she was busy with too many patients. She snapped up the clipboard, barked at my dad for a name, and waited, tapping her foot with the pen poised above the sheet.”
“And then what happened?” Tubthumper asked.
“My dad couldn’t make up his mind on a name. He said, ‘Bertha ... no, Gertie ... no, Grace ... no, Chastity ... no, Ina ... no, Irene ... no, Della ... no, Prudence ... no, Penelope — that’s when the nurse scribbled down ‘NFN’ for ‘No First Name.’ By then my mom was laughing so hysterically — or ‘hyenically,’ as some people refer to it — that she couldn’t answer the nurse regarding what my middle name was to be, and so the overworked Nightingale simply wrote down the sounds my mother was making phonetically.”
“The nurse was a Nightingale?” Albert asked.
“What else? Aren’t all nurses Nightingales?” Yukyuk replied, stunned by the question.
“I didn’t even know Hyenas were born in hospitals,” said Albert.
“Who said anything about a hospital? This was underneath a bush in the Serengeti,” said Yukyuk.
“No hospital, and yet they had to fill out paperwork?” Albert wondered, scratching his head.
“Paperwork is one thing you can never seem to avoid,” Yukyuk asserted, rolling her eyes and shaking her head. “Even in the animal world, bureaucracy abounds.”
“So when this Nightingale visited you, she” —
“She? It wasn’t a hen, it was a rooster. His name was Rufus.”
“Those were the days,” Chumbawumba said, who had calmed down enough to return to the group. “Back then, the Nightingales made bush calls. Now you have to go to where they live if you want to get some medical attention.”
“Yeah, and it’s not always real easy to climb up in those trees to where they are,” agreed Jowls the Hippo.
Albert didn’t know how much of all that to believe. As he walked away to clear his head, he heard Yukyuk begin to chuckle, which apparently was infectious, as many of the others (Tubthumper, Chumbawumba, and Jowls, to be specific) began stomping their feet, clapping their hands (Ooga), slapping their tails on the earth (Rory and Jubatus), or ruffling their feathers (Falcona). So Albert then had his doubts whether any of it was true. Apparently the animals were just ‘pulling his leg.’
When Albert returned from his little walk, he called out, ‘All aboard that’re going aboard’ and the animals jumped, climbed, flew, and hopped in. Albert set the GPS/CPS to 2527 Zenia, and away they flew.
Taterskin & The Eco Defenders (in paperback, kindle, or hardcover) is available here.