Guppies Go Home: Part Five

Part Five
"What in goodness sake's was that?!" Girardon caught up to Gil just minutes after the incident. "Not only did you make a fool out of me, but the Eastern Atlantean, and the entire city itself! Did they teach you any ediquitte in that outside town of yours?"

"Dad, that 'outside town' is my home! And I was called Gil there, that's my name!" He said. "It's the only place I know."

"Look at your friends, son. They've come from the same place you have, and they're embracing it. They're having lots of fun, and that's all I want for you too, what do you say?" Girardon pulls out a fully repaird crown.

"Never." Girardon puts it a bit closer. "No, I said." He ges up and starts to put it on Gil's head. "Tell you what." Girardon explains, he lets out a heavy sigh, "Go on, calm yourself, and we'll try again later, okay?" Before he could answer, Gil was long out the door.

After about fifteen minutes of swimming, Gil finds himself in the urban area of North Atlantis. Not as bad as the rural district, but proportional. Still going about hastily, Gil runs into an older fish. "Hey, watch it there, son, this is all I have left." Gil saw that the fish had dropped a small bag. Gil goes to pick it up, and realizes- Mr. Grouper.

The two swim back to the shack he had seen he drunken lobster had run off to. "What happened," Gil asked, "I thought you were on your way back to Bubbletucky the night we arrived?" Mr. Grouper took a drink and began speaking. "I thought so too, son. It started right after I left you with Girardon. I went back to Beau and the tourbus.

"Well, looks like I gotta head home. I said. Beau leaned out the window and said 'How you gonna do that, fins?' and drove away. No one one would stop for me, and it's much too far to swim back. The fish here are trated like, second class citizens. We're all out of the way, living in mear ghettos!"

"Not just fish," said Gil, "lobsters, snails and crabs too. I've seen em all here."

"Just horrendous."

Gil returned home that evening with a little something on my mind. "Dad," he said, "The fish, crabs and snails are all living in terrible conditions." Girardon, sitting at his desk, replies sarcastically, "well, looks like the little abandonner has finally returned home." He gets up, "I've been Duke of the East Atlantean for ten years now, and I've done everything in my power to help everyone thusfar. Your news of the rural conditions is no news to anyone. They aren't in business, so they have to find labor work; it doesn't pay much, but thats all they can do. There's a difference between working for the city, and working in the city, don't you know?"

"That goes against everything you told me before!" Gil exclaimed.

"Now, look son, Atlantis is a merman city, founded and run by man. The seafolk try to take advantage of our peaceful society and end up ruining it for everyone; and when one stages a revolution...?" There was a long pause.

"Wait a minute, Atlantis wasn't attacked by evil, but the lower class itself!"

"No, no, no! Listen, it was only hypothetical, revolution. The Atlantean Congressional would never allow such a thing."

"You'd never allow it because you know it would work!" Gil swam away again.

"You ungrateful little brat! If it wasn't for me, your sorry little hide would be used as a barbarian throw rug!"

--

The next day, Nonny met Gil at the city square, only half a block away from the watchful eye of Girardon II. "You, wanted me to see something?" Nonny asked.

"Help me call the rest of the group, and we'll meet back here." Gil answered. The next half hour was spent allowing time for Goby and Rocky to get there from a football match, and another hour for the girls to finish doing their hair. After the second hour, the boys had enough, dragging Molly, Oona and Deema out of the salon. "But, they haven't even had time to get the curlers out!" Exclaimed Deema.

Gil had taken them back to the shack, where he and Mr. Grouper talked the night before. "Well," Rocky said, "You dragged us out here for an outhouse with a sofa?" Gil couldn't believe it. Where could he have gone? There wasn't anywhere else to be. Suddenly, There was an explosion, a cloud of smoke, and fire engine sirens filled the air.

"What in the blue Baltic?" Said Rocky, as everyone may as well have said. They got there to find the front end of a grocery store had been blown away. Many lobsters, snails, and fish were being hauled away in ambulances and paddy wagons.

Gil went back to the shack every day for the next week, and still no sign of Mr. G. Finally, he got the group back together, and told them they were going to the prison.

Goby looks up at the prison warden and said "Excuse me, we're here to see somebody." The warden looked up from his paper, took a swig of coffee and said, "Who ya lookin' for, son?"

Gil proceeded to say "We're looking for a, Mr. Grouper."

"Ah, son, we took in five groupers just last night, I'm gonna need a fist name."

"As are we." Said Gil.

"You crackin' wise, boy?!"

"Much as the city walls." You see, I forgot to mention this, but its inferrable that the walls of Atlantis are very well kept.

"... Follow me, gang." The group is led through the hidden corridors of the prison, out of the way of its capives. They finally reach what appears to be a window, but indeed is a one-way mirror. "Now you can see them," the warden says, "But they can't see you. Bring in the recent inmates by the name 'Grouper.'"

Five brawny goldfish swim into the room. "Feel free to point out your guy." Immediately the Guppies pick Mr. Grouper out of the crowd. "Number six, sir." Goby said.

Guards escourt the hardened criminal school teacher before them. "Well,... Good morning, everyone..."

End of Part Five