Tales From the Cave-Beauty & the Superbeast

Family

M'gann still had her face and her thoughts buried in her book when Wolfe finally caught up with her past the crowds.  He positioned himself before her and struck a manly pose.  "Good morning, Megan."  "Morning, Wolfe.", she said flatly, not even bothering to look away from her book.  Wolfe took this as a cue to reach over and pluck the object from her hands.

This certainly got her attention.  "Wolfe, can I please have that back?"  She started over to grab it back, but Wolfe held it out of her reach as he leafed through the pages with a puzzled look on his handsome face.  "How can you read this?  There are no pictures."  "Well, some of us can use our imagination!", she said, folding her arms over her chest.

Wolfe tsked as he flung the book over his shoulder.  "Y'know Megan,", he said as it landed in a mud puddle.  "Its high time you got your head out of those silly books and started focusing on more important things."  M'gann rolled her eyes at Wolfe's comment as she retrieved the object of her interest, her focus more on it than him.  "More important things?", she asked sarcastically, not really wanting an answer.  "Like what?"  Wolfe shot her a suave grin.  "Like me."

M'gann rose to her feet, looking back at him with a quirked eyebrow.  "Like you?"  "Look, I'm trying to save you from further embarrasment!", Wolfe said a-matter-of-factly.  "The entire town is talking!  It isn't right for a woman to read!  Pretty soon, she starts getting ideas in her head, and before you know it, she starts...thinking for herself."  He shuddered at the thought.

M'gann merely rolled rolled her eyes as she wiped the mud off her book with her apron.  "Wolfe, you are positively primitive."  "Aren't I?", Wolf said, obviously not knowing what that word meant.  He put his arm around M'gann and began to lead her back towards the town square.  "Why don't you come over to my place, and I show you some of my trophies?"  M'gann ducked under his arm and started to walk in the opposite direction.  "Maybe some other time."

Three pretty blonde village girls were standing close by and were watching everything as it unfolded.  They gasped seeing M'gann walk away from Wolfe.  From where she was, she could hear everything they said.  "He invites her to his house and she turns him down?!"  "She must be crazy!"  "Wolfe is gorgeous!"  M'gann fought the urge to gag.

"Look, Wolf, I have to go check on Papa and Pinocchio, okay?", she called back, not even looking at him over her shoulder.  Suddenly, she heard Lampwick laugh.  You could tell it was him, because besides having donkey ears, teeth and a tail, his laugh still sounded like hee-haw, hee-haw.  "That wacky ol' geezer and his wood-for-brains son?!  They need all the help they can get!"  Wolfe soon joined his laughter.

That provoked M'gann to turn right around, placing her hands on her hips as she stared the two rude brothers straight down.  "Don't talk about my family that way!"  "Y-Yeah, don't talk about her family that way!", Wolfe barked, doing a heel-face-turn and bonking Lampwick right on the head with his fist.  "My father is NOT a wacky old geezer!", M'gann said sternly.  "He's a genius!"

No sooner had she said that, a loud explosion came from Geppetto's workshop, followed by a bloodcurdling scream and smoke coming out through the windows.  "Papa!", M'gann gasped.  She ran up the hill towards her house, her troubles with Wolfe left forgotten for another day.
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M'gann burst through the door to the workshop, her vision blinded by the thick black smelly fog filling the room.  "Papa?!  Pinocchio?!  Are you guys okay?!"  "Oh, we're fine!  We're fine!", Geppetto's cheery old voice called out, putting M'gann's worried heart at rest.  "Pinocchio tried to help out, but he hit a wrong screw or something."

When the smoke cleared, Geppetto was at the window, letting the smog drift out through the opening.  Pinocchio was standing in the center of the room with soot and a guilty look on his face.  "I'm sorry."  M'gann only smiled.  Even though his puppet days were behind him, he still had so much to learn, so many mistakes to make.  But hey, isn't that part of growing up?