The Forest norn ran through the garden and to the learning machine area
where General Flib made his abode. He pushed the call button several
times. When the lift finally came down, he slammed the up button.
"General Flib! General Flib!!" he called out when the lift finally
came to a stop.
"What, what, whazzit?" the general mummbled as he fought out of sleep.
"The grendels! The grendels're breeding! I saw eggs!" the spy babbled.
"WHAT?!?"
"The grendels can lay eggs! I saw a purple one lay an egg!" Sid said.
The general was shocked to full awareness. He arched a brow.
"Are you alright, colonel?" he said wondering if he had gotten into the
hooch while on duty. "Everyone knows grendels can't lay eggs! I think
you need to take some vacation time, colonel Sid." Flib said
condecendingly. Just then the lift came up again, colonel Foxy in it.
"General Flib! I saw a red grendel lay an egg!" the ron norn wheezed.
Was everyone getting drunk on duty these days?! Flib thought. Such
disregard for one's responsibilities!
"Have you been into the hooch again? You know that could result in a
demotion!" Flib was getting tired of drunk officers, they needed to be
taught a lesson!
"But I swear to Goddess! I really did see a grendel lay an egg!!" the
ron norn protested.
"Yeah, and I'm a shee." the general growled. The lift came up again,
this time carrying a female white haired norn.
"General Flib, I found something very alarming on the island!" Anne said.
"What?! An egg laying grendel? A vendor that gives out hands? A toy
that cures every disease known to Norn?" he snapped.
"Well... um, why don't you just have a look at these?" the brown eyed
norn said. She brought out a camera cob and showed him the pictures she
had taken. Pictures of grendels, grendels kissPOPing, grendels laying
EGGS....
"Oh my HAND! I don't believe this!! This is a problem of major
consequences! We have to do something about this!! This is a disaster!"
Flib screamed.
"Sure, he believes it when SHE tells him. I tell ya Fox, we've GOT to
find better jobs than this." Sid wispered to Foxy.


Umaumaarg (uma-uma-ARG), an orange grendel looked at his harem and his
offspring with pride and smiled a huge grendelish smile. Life on the
island was pretty easy for them, all things considered. The island and
all that was on it belonged to them uncontested, they had coconuts on
the palm trees along with lemons from the lemon vendor to eat. Sometimes
they got sick of those and stared longingly at the carrot vendor on the
unaccessable tree house up above. Of course, there were few things that
compared to having Fig (red) and Urgle (purple) to kissPOP the time away
with...
The sound of two young grendels duke-ing it out brought him back from
his musings. Ah, fighting, the respectable past-time of grendels. Off
in the bubble room, two grendel eggs were very close to hatching. Three
to come, Umaumaarg thought smuggly to himself. Fig was getting ready to
lay another egg. He put down the green baby he was bouncing on his knee
and went down to the bubble room, leaving Urgle to watch the young ones.
Fig was busy placing coconut hair, palm leaves and molted bird feathers
around the eggs to improve the nests that surrounded them. She beammed
with pride on how masterful the nests looked now that she added to them.
She felt a pang. She sqauted down and laid her long expected egg. She
admired the purple and orange shell. Umaumaarg came by to watch over the
eggs, freeing her to get nesting material for the new egg.
Umaumaarg plopped down the arm load of lemons he brought for the soon to
be hatched grendels to eat. The furthest egg began to make crakling
sounds. Shortly, a tiny blue male crawled out and found his way to the
lemons by his father. The little lizard ate all but one of them before
falling asleep. The orange grendel puffed his chest in pride before eating
the last lemon.


Oozle slammed back his 30th hooch of the day. He growled and belched.
There was nothing to do. He was bored out his brain. He was sick of his
forced dwelling next to the shower near the mine cart stop. He grumbled
irratably. "*urppp!!*"
"Stupid hand! Never *burp* lets me have any fun!" Oozle said as he
munched on an ancient carrot.
Oozle had been bansihed to the bottom area of the observatory lift for
killing a baby norn. The thing was just out of its shell, looking kind of
sickly. Fair game in Oozle's book. He had punched the thing around, he
was having mounds of fun. Then the hand found him. The baby had died a
nanosecond after the flying set of digits had come across the reptile.
Then the angry creature swooped down and beat him like he had never been
beat before! She had him running all over Albia in fright, beating him
for what he had did. He had been herded to where he was now and force
fields put in place so he could not go up the lift and get near the norns
again.
Oozle looked down at his empty hooch cup in disgust. He was sick of
being stuck here bored out of his mind with nothing to do but get drunk.
He threw the cup at the force field. *Bzzap!* Just then, the mine cart
came to a stop in front of him. Hmmmm.... he hadn't seen the mine cart in
a very long time. Let's see where this goes, he thought. He got in and
pressed the button.
He reached the end of the path of the mine cart. As the cart came to a
stop, he saw the lift just about done comming down with an orange male
grendel in it dancing with a ball. The orange grendel stopped dancing and
saw him.

***********************************************************************
What will this chance encounter of grendels lead to? What will general
Flib do about this new tribe of grendels? Will Goddess EVER get a
clue?? Stay tuned for A NORN'S TALE: PART 5!

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