Trigesimus Sextus Gradus

“What’s the mouthfeel of that spider?” To you and I, of course, it sounded like a series of gobbles and an avian wail of inquiry. To the gaggle, it hardly needs mention, the sounds read exactly as reported. 

“Gooey, squishy… moist. It provides a good coating. Crunchy at first, naturally,” came a chipper reply (a cluck and a purr, nonsense to us. And such would all of the following speech sound to our ears). Mergle swallowed the spider and apologized to her mother for speaking with food in her mouth. Even for turkeys, it’s an unbecoming habit.

The inquirer happened to be the master of the turkey flock. She was leading her comrades through the lake-adjacent forest, their ancestral home. Their claws still sunk into the white ground-above-the-ground for most of the route, though the white shroud had slipped off of the trees by now. Some of the trees were regaining their feathers. Over the past few days, the slow-falling sky had turned to fast-falling sky, drenching the forest in the smell of fresh eggshell-to-be.

Thus, the turkey maidens (and him, who I will introduce later) marched toward the cherished Clearing Place. The turkeys of this valley preferred to congregate there first, for it was the fabled nest of the First Hen. Her spirit presides, in purified form, above the valley, visiting the gaggles and gangs now and again to usher in reiterations of the cycle. At present, she was hidden, prancing behind the stagnant, gray, brush piles of the sky.

The master bird stopped with a cluck, prompting her comrades to meander into an imperfect line alongside her. Stretched before them was the scratchy, black, frozen-not-slippery-river on which the Smelly Things roared. The hen purred, her head snapping to pause over segments of the river. It was quiet, today, and no Smelly Thing passed them by. The river gleamed, and in the glimmering she made out the writhing forms of long, pale bodies. Her tail ruffled.

“Let’s have ourselves a snack! The frozen-not-slippery-river is peaceful and fruitful, it’d be a shame to leave it unharvested,” she whooped. The others cheered with gobbles and purrs of their own. Claws planted on gravel, the hens stretched over the blacktop to snap up worms, spreading themselves further along the length of the road. Hearing the plucking of her brood grow distant, the master stretched her neck, kicked her strong legs, and strutted onto the hard, scratchy surface. She snapped up three worms in rapid succession, purring loudly.

The other hens, necks tired from reaching to the center of the road from the shoulder, plodded after her, seeing that it was safe to stand upon the frozen river. The spoils were bountiful, and each turkey ate her (and his) fill. The master garbled and trotted to the opposite edge of the road, whereat she ushered her compatriots back onto the pebble-filled frozen-not-slippery-river bank. Satisfied that the road was clear, she stooped her neck and took a mouthful of pebbles into her beak, swallowing them carefully. She trotted up and down the row, making sure the rest had consumed their portion.

Desperate yammering cut through the silence. He squawked and flapped his feathers loudly, generating great alarm among the hens. The turkeys snapped their heads upright and scanned either side of the river, bodies tense for fear of a screaming-fast Smelly Thing.

Instead, they saw a Spinning Thing carting a featherless biped.

“Such a ruckus could drive us to danger! Will your alarm ever match the threat, Freggens? Or are we condemned forever to bear the clatter of your feeble spirit at every drop of a leaf?” the master bird scorned him. The bird who had wailed, with a gray eye and patches of exposed skin, hung his skinny head and waddled to a distant edge of the group of hens, who danced away from and gobbled at the biker as he safely, slowly, passed them by.

“Hup, now! That’s plenty of refreshment and featherlessness for now. Form up!” The master bird reordered the gaggle. As a unit, they trudged back into the forest, leaving the frozen-not-slippery-river behind them. Freggens made his way along from the rear, pouting as he went.

“This way, dearies,” the master bird chirped, ushering the gaggle up a hill. Stepping through the white ground-above-the-ground was not preferred, especially uphill, but the wise master bird knew that the crest of the hill would have a very shallow coat. So the gaggle bore with her, careful to trace each others’ steps, carving a path through the forest. Freggens, mulling his mistake, chose to forge his own path behind the hens. He did not deserve to walk the easy trail blazed by their marching line. 

Such went the pack, cooing and gargling various conjectures and positions on topics political and apolitical alike, with Freggens distantly trailing, stinking of scorn, for many an ebb of wind.

Mergle chittered and growled. Her mother stopped, and the hens began to circle up. Freggens, head down, didn’t notice the change in pace, and continued trudging along.

The master bird scanned the forest in the avian way, snapping her neck to and fro, angled in curious positions. She caught a sliver of orange fur whisking behind a trunk. She hollered and flared her wings, arousing the rest of the gaggle, who made themselves large and loud. Freggens, shocked by the display, leapt into the air with so little control that he landed on his side.

The sliver of orange popped up from behind the trunk, revealing itself to be a creature lesser in size than the master bird herself. It had orange fur, and green eyes, and sharp fangs and a long tongue, and its name was

“Miss Vue, you villainous wretch!” The master hen called. Her voice began with a bite of rage, but gave way to relief by the end of her greeting. 

“Margelgel, my friend! What a fine gaggle you have found under your wing,” Miss Vue replied, strutting toward the pack. 

“They are. Quite attentive, you found? And ready for a fight?”

“Quite, quite. They are well-prepared for predator response. The hens, that is,” Miss Vue glanced at Freggens, who was now stumbling back to his feet. Margelgel followed her gaze.

“Indeed. Thank you for the drill, as usual, my dear,” she gobbled. The other turkeys relaxed, returning to their smooth, striding formation. Freggens, twice now embarrassed, lagged further behind than before, wattle like a waterfall dragging along the ground. Miss Vue joined the group, chatting with Margelgel about the waning winter, and other topics apolitical.

When they came upon the second frozen-not-slippery-river, Miss Vue gave her regards and slipped back into the woods. Margelgel clucked, and the turkeys formed a tight, three-bird wide line. When she decided the Smelly Things were far from their path, she began to trot onto the black ground. 

“Come along, dears,” she encouraged, “the Clearing Place is but a few paces hence. And they’ll be no more excitement ‘fore we reach that sacred plot.”

Uplifted, the birds began to skip along the road. All but the six at the end of the lines failed to hear the Smelly Thing passing behind them, and even those six paid it no mind, for it was, after all, behind them.

The gaggle pranced their merry way along the familiar path. They celebrated as they poured out from the trees into the Clearing Place. It was beautiful, even with the still-gray-sky above. Turkeys from many other packs were streaming in to the place as well.

Margelgel spun on her claws to count her gaggle, haphazard-like, for confident she was that her hens were safe. But, her count was off. She seized in cold, eyes wide, and looked her group up and down.

“Where, pray-tell, is Freggens?”