Relee\'s Adventure on the Balloon Savannah
Relee's Adventure on the Balloon Savannah
a short story by Relee the Squirrel
Relee is a young adult red fox squirrel, but she looks a bit childish, like a little girl. She stands only three feet tall and has copper orange fur all over her body. Her ears are pointed, and have small tufts of fur on the end. Her muzzle is short with a large pair of buck teeth. A long copper tail stretches from behind her and swishes quickly back and forth. Her paws are small and delicate, with short but dexterous fingers. Despite her small size, she has developed human-like breasts on her chest, fitting proportionately to her size.
Relee is dressed in nothing but a pair of blue denim coveralls, decorated with sparkling silver stars on the hips and chest. The legs are rolled up to her knees, and the straps of the coverall are pulled tight to her chest. A pair of canteens is strapped over her shoulder, full of water to keep cool in the hot sun.
It's a sunny day on the savannah and Relee is exploring the area. The plains are very flat and Relee can see for miles in any direction. Something catches her eye though. It's a strange and colourful display in the distance. Unsure of what it is Relee starts walking towards it.
In little time the squirrel can see that there is a large patch of green grass in the huge savannah of yellows. Spotted around the field of grass are several moving objects of extremely bright colours, unnatural to this environment. Pinks and bright blues and even some things in a neon green move about on the grass.
Reaching the edge of the strange grass, Relee bends down to examine it. The plants are very strange, looking perfectly healthy, as if tended by a master gardener. They are so healthy they have a glossy shine, almost like artificial plants. Relee reaches out her paw to touch the grass, she finds to her surprise that it IS fake! Quickly feeling around Relee comes to the conclusion that all of the grass in this area is made of a soft rubber. She has never heard of anyone making rubber plants of such variety before. The plants are all the same as the surrounding yellow grasses but for their colouration; they're all the same shade of green.
Curious, Relee takes a few steps onto the field of rubber grasses and finds it surprisingly comfortable to walk on. The grasses are thicker than on the rest of the savannah and feel like a strange sort of carpet. Looking off into the distance from this point Relee can see the edge of the grass, several hundred meters away. She can also see something huge and bright pink at about the middle of the grass, but can't quite tell what it is from here. It's surrounded by the brightly coloured moving things though, and Relee isn't sure those things are safe.
Relee looks around some more and notices one of the brightly coloured things alone near the edge of the grass. Quickly heading towards it she soon discovers that it's some sort of moving balloon animal! After making this realization Relee starts to creep up on it slowly, not wanting to scare it away, if that's even possible. When she's within a few meters of it she stops and takes a closer look.
It appears to be a lime green balloon gazelle, surprising Relee with its accuracy while maintaining a rounded, balloon like appearance. Despite that, it is quite translucent and Relee can see through it's body. It seems to be sleeping at the moment, but Relee doesn't want to wake it up so she slowly creeps away before looking towards the large pink thing again. She heads for it next, wanting to see if the other moving things are animals as well.
As she approaches the pink area of the field, Relee recognizes more and more animals... But mysteriously some seem out of place. One banana yellow giraffe and one deep violet giraffe are the most noticeable among the group, but there are no trees anywhere on the field. A neon pink rhino is sitting down surrounded by a rainbow of gazelles, unfazed by them. Various small animals cover the ground, looking at this distance like jellybeans. A rainbow herd of zebra is grazing on the other side of the pink area.
Finally Relee reaches the pink area and sees what it is. It's a pool of strange pink liquid. Several of the balloon animals are drinking from the pool, and when they do the pink liquid flows up into their body and deposits itself in their feet. Relee is amazed to see such a thing, and wonders how it works. She walks right up to the pink pool and looks into it. It's translucent, and flows like water, but seems a little thicker.
Afraid that the pool might be polluted with some strange chemicals, Relee steps back and turns around only to see a giant ten-foot tall blue lion standing on it's hind legs there!
The lion is a balloon creature like the others, but it is also human like, a creature like Relee. Its body is a mockery of the furry form however. The lion's chubby body is built in a cartoonish replica of a furry's body.
"Aren't you going to have a drink? It's good water." Says the lion in a surprisingly squeaky voice.
Relee is flabbergasted. She pushes her paw into the large lion, feeling it's rubbery texture in awe. "What... What are you?" says Relee, stuttering slightly in her amazement.
The lion chuckles heartily, its whole body giggling from the motion. "I'm just a lion my dear! But please, drink some of the water. I don't have one of you in my collection..."
Relee takes a step back, forgetting for a moment the pool behind her, and says, "What do you mean 'your collection'?"
The lion shakes his head back and forth saying, "Tsk tsk, we'll have to do this the hard way then." And with that he grabs Relee with his cartoonish paws, lifting her into the air as if she weighed nothing at all. His bloated paws somehow unbutton her coveralls and let them slide to the ground beneath her. Relee screams in fright as the lion opens it's massive mouth and slides her in. Fortunately the lion's rubber teeth are too soft to harm her, but Relee quickly finds herself dropping inside the belly of the lion with a thud that vibrates the rubber skin of her captor.
Relee can hear the squeaky laughter all around her as the lion celebrates her capture. The lion leisurely walks over to the pool and bends down on his paws and knees to drink from the surface of the pink water. With a loud slurp a shower of the stuff pours down on Relee, soaking her and staining her fur pink. Relee tries pushing her paws into the rubber lion's body, but she soon finds that the only way out is the way she came in, through the lion's mouth. She tries to climb out, but her claws won't dig into the rubber at all. Eventually she just slides down to rest in a pool of the pink liquid that is forming as the lion continues to drink more and more.
Relee starts to worry as the liquid rises more and more, covering her body until she has to tread water just to keep her head out. Finally the lion stops drinking, and sits down on his haunches, patting his hugely inflated belly contentedly as Relee struggles inside. The lion even takes to licking its rubber body clean, seeming to ignore the flailing squirrel.
Inside the lion Relee feels a strange tingling sensation... Managing to look down without dipping her head into the liquid, she sees to her surprise and shock that her fur is dissolving, and leaving a very shiny pink skin behind. Finally she can swim no more, and sinks down into the pink liquid.
Through tinted pink vision Relee watches her fur dissolve, leaving behind shiny pink rubberized skin. Her tail fur melts together, forming a large single balloon in the shape of a squirrel tail. Her paw-fingers melt together and apart again, forming a new pair of chubby paws with only three fingers and a thumb each. Her foot-paws change as well, the toes melting together and apart giving her three toes on each chubby paw, and thick, round pads on the bottom. Her face changes and distorts, becoming a cartoonish squirrel's face made out of slick rubber. Relee holds her right hand paw in front of her, shocked and afraid of what she sees until she finally can't hold her breath any longer. As she starts to asphyxiate she tries to swim up and get another deep breath of air, but instead she finds herself breathing in the pink water! As the water flows into her it dissolves her insides, filling her up more and more until she's totally hollow inside. She looks at herself in horror and sees right through to the other side...
At last the giant lion stands up, his great strength almost failing him as he struggles with the weight of all that water and the new squirrel balloon... As he stands up a tear forms between his legs, and all of the water filling him empties out, carrying the squirrel balloon along with it. As Relee falls to the ground she shakes off a bit of the water before the lion picks her up again.
"What did you do to me you... you... my voice!" she cries out as she hears her new high pitched squeaky voice... Before she can recover from that shock, the lion lowers his head to her and begins to lick the last of the pink water off her. His rubber tongue squeaks loudly as it rubs against her new rubber body. Relee is manipulated in stunned silence as this massive blue lion licks every inch of her new body. At last the lion finishes and sets her down, smiling at her.
"You make a pretty balloon." Says the lion, with a wide grin on his face. Relee finally snaps, and makes a run for the open savannah. She runs a little slower with her new balloon body, but the lion doesn't chase her. When she reaches the very end of the rubber grass, however, some strange force strikes her. A force field of some kind surrounds the grass, keeping her from leaving!
Relee turns around, and the blue lion is standing right there. He smiles and says; "Now you'll be part of my collection forever and ever."
Relee just squeaks, and begins her strange new life...