Loss - Lucas Sinclair

The Pollywog (Part 2)

"Ow!" Nikki groaned, holding foot after hitting it against the table. "Ugh, really?" She spat irritated. She was constantly accidently kicking furniture or tripping over herself and it was seriously starting to get old.

She sat down on the floor angrily, wanting to wait for the pain to pass. It took a moment for her to realize that objects were falling around her. The loud crash of everything hitting the floor at once made her jump and turn to the sound. Her eyes widened at the damage that had been done to the household items laying still on the floor.

The objects had a faint blue hue around them. They were scattered all over the place like she had hit them all at once. Like her powers weren't pointed in one direction, but in every direction.

"That's new," she muttered under her breath as she stood up, looking at the amount of damage she caused.

Multiple things were broken. The impact of her powers made a lot of the stuff get knocked off of shelves. The mess made the vase she broke not that long ago look like a light rain compared to this hurricane she had caused.

"Really?" She asked to no one in particular. "All of this over a stubbed toe!"

She sighed and ran a hand through her almost shoulder length hair.

This is going to take forever to clean up.

***

The party plus Max gathered in the AV Room at lunch like Dustin asked. Everyone watched as he set his ghostbusters trap on the table in front of them.

"You ready for this?" Dustin asked smiling excitedly. After getting a round of nods, he pushed the trap door button and the doors flew open.

Everyone leaned over to get a better look at the little tailed, almost slug-like creature that sat inside it.

"His name is d'Artagnan," Dustin introduced, smiling at his new little buddy. The group watched as Dustin carefully took the creature out of the box and held him in his hand for everyone to see. "Cute, right?"

"D'Artagnan?" Mike raised an eyebrow at the name.

"Dart for short."

"And he was in your trash?" Max asked.

"Foraging for food," Dustin eyes glittered with the happiness of making a new friend. "You wanna hold him?"

"No, no," Max shook her head as Dustin passed him over to her anyway. "I don't want to-oh, god, he's slimy!"

Max passed him to Lucas who grimaced at the creature. "Ugh, he's like a living booger."

He quickly passed it to Will who scrunched up his nose in disgust. "Ugh, oh, god!"

Finally, he passed it to Mike who hid his reaction very well as he studied the creature before him. "What is he?"

"My question exactly," Dustin answered quickly turning around to his backpack.

After a few moments, he slammed down a stack of research books he had stolen from the library and started his explanation. "At first, I thought it was some type of pollywog."

Max scrunched up her eyebrows in confusion. "Pollywog?"

"It's another word for tadpole. A tadpole is the larval stage of a toad."

"I know what a tadpole is," Max rolled her eyes.

"All right, then you know that most tadpoles are aquatic, right? Well, Dart, he isn't. He doesn't need water."

"Yeah, but aren't there non aquatic pollywogs?" Lucas tried to remember if he had it right.

"Terrestrial pollywogs? Yep. Two to be exact." Dustin flipped open one of the books and read off the names. "Indirana semipalmata. And the Adenomera andreae. One's from India, one's from South America. So how did one end up in my trash?"

"Maybe some scientists brought it here and it escaped?" Max hypothesized.

The word "scientists" alone was enough to gain both Lucas's and Mike's attention. Both turned each other with a little bit of worry in their eye but didn't speak about it. They didn't want to bring up the possibility of having to deal with more scientists after what happened the last time.

Mike looked back at Dart and immediately forgot what he was thinking as something changed with the pollywog. "Do you guys see that? Looks like something is moving inside of it."

Everyone looked at Dart with a little bit of disgust as something inside him was definitely moving. Mike brought the light up closer to Dart making him screech in pain and try to escape. He was almost at the edge of the table before Dustin caught him and calmed him down.

"And there's another thing," Dustin continued. "Reptiles, they're cold blooded. Ectothermic, right? They love heat, the sun. Dart hates it. It hurts him."

"So, if he's not a pollywog or a reptile..." Lucas trailed off, letting Dustin fill in the rest of the blanks for him.

"Then I've discovered a new species."

A silence took over the group as they watched Dustin's and Dart's friendship grow. Dustin smiled down at the thing and pet him gently.

Dustin's never getting a girlfriend. Lucas thought before the bell rung, telling them lunch was over.

They packed up their stuff and left the room, going into the busy hallway.

"We gotta show him to Mr. Clarke," Lucas insisted, thinking that if anyone would know what to do with it it would be him.

"What if he steals my discovery?" Dustin caught up to him looking worried.

Mike shot him down quickly. "He's not gonna steal your discovery."

"You know, I'm thinking about calling it Dustonious pollywogus. What do you think?" Dustin asked Max with a hopeful look on his face.

Lucas shook his head at his friend. Of course he would use Dart as a way to get Max to like him.

"I think you're an idiot," Max spoke what Lucas was thinking.

"When I become rich and famous for this one day, don't come crawling back, saying, 'Oh, my god, Dustin, I'm so sorry for being mean to you back in 8th grade. Oh, my god.'"

Lucas couldn't help but laugh at Dustin's "teenage girl impression".

Yup. He thought. Dustin's certainly an idiot.

Authors note
Hope you guys liked it!

Love ya!!❤️❤️❤️

Edited in 2025.