The grass on the right folded against the current. 🌿
THE BOOK OF TAD
PAGE 77
SOMETHING LISTENING 🫧
From beneath the upper rib, Glint watched a snail withdraw into its shell. Then another. Something behind the stems was moving carefully enough to make almost no sound.
Zale backed into TurboTAD. He usually apologised to anything he bumped, including stones. This time he said nothing.
Finley loosened the cover of his copied strip. TurboTAD reached towards him, and Finley pulled it against his chest.
“I’m opening the cover,” he whispered. “I’m not going after it.”
TurboTAD drew his flipper back. Finley kept his distance from him.
Through a gap, a pale rectangle tilted. Three dark marks crossed its corner. Finley brought his strip nearer his eyes, but stayed in their shelter.
A voice came through the grass.
“If you’re going to whisper about my property, come where I can hear properly.”
Zale’s tail tightened into a curl.
“Bront?” TurboTAD asked quietly.
Zale nodded.
The voice sighed. A long, irritated sigh, as though four tadpoles were the last thing it had expected beneath its doorstep.
Glint kept his lantern covered. In the green daylight, the grass separated around a broad head.
“The giant water bug,” Zale whispered. “Don’t move closer.”
Finley covered his strip again. Beyond him, a hooked foreleg settled on the pale rectangle.