Maybe even a thousand

New fairytale The View from the Top of the Tree continues from yesterday.

“Let’s go home and get my telescope!” Paisley cried, descending from the tree in a hurry.

Imogen and Thyme followed her to her house.

They waited in her front garden while she put the telescope in a bag, and packed a picnic of satsumas, dry roasted peanuts and vego bars, and then they hurried back to the tree as fast as they could. Back up in the tree, Paisley got out the telescope and took a closer look.

Waiting for a turn with the telescope, Imogen and Thyme pondered the possibilities.

“Perhaps it’s shifting land masses,” said Imogen. “That’s what happened in the Stone Age. The continents got rearranged. Or was it the Ice Age?”

“No, it’s probably a sea creature with chameleon camouflage capabilities,” said Thyme. “The question is: did she camouflage herself to look just like Gibraltar, or has Gibraltar always been a sea creature, who just sat still for thirty years?”

“Right, that makes sense,” said Imogen, unwrapping a vego bar and taking a bite.

“Longer than that,” said Paisley, with one eye closed, still looking through her telescope. “Gibraltar has probably been there for a hundred years. Maybe even a thousand.”

Neanderthals inhabited Gibraltar as far back as 50,000 years ago, while Gibraltar’s recorded history began in the 10th century, but those facts don’t necessarily prove how long it’s been there, because it could have been anywhere when Neanderthals were on it.

Thyme contemplated this for a moment, and then said “Well whatever, a really long time. I bet sea creatures can do all kinds of things we don’t even understand.”

Thyme was quite right. Gibraltar, or the sea creature known as Gibraltar, had been there for a very long time, even longer than a thousand years. And one day she had woken up and found herself inhabited by around thirty four thousand humans. She didn’t like that at all, they made noises and smells which were really distracting. So she swam underwater for a while, to wash off all the humans, and then she made her way around the coast, saying “Hello” to all her friends as she went.

**

Come back soon for the next part of The View from the Top of the Tree!

Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating funny, interesting, and sometimes slightly bizarre vegan fiction since 2012