How Green Becomes Wood

"...what?" Daizi asked, picking up Ivy, not immediately understanding what had occurred. "Oh, because Millie is a goose?"

"Baba!" Ivy said happily, this time looking at Dark as she snuggled into Daizi's arms.

"Hello, my darling," Dark told her, "I have to go search for your brothers. Luckily we have many, many hours of sunlight left."

"Are you comin' Lex?" Cooger asked, "I swear, I always say I'm gonna get some walkie-talkies, then I don't, and now this time it would actually be good to have 'em."
 
"I'm coming," Lex assured Cooger, brushing herself off a bit. "I bet those boys are like two feet out of sight and looking at mushrooms or something and just lost track of time." She smirked at him. "I was hoping the first time you and I would be wandering off into the woods together, it would be for something less serious, and more inclined toward purposefully getting lost."

~~

The twins were looking at mushrooms, as it happened, but they were a bit farther than two feet into the woods.

"Ba is going to be so annoyed," Alec remarked as he carefully built a "corral" around a confused centipede.

"So is Mama," Xander agreed, handing Alec a bit of bark to use as a gate.

"One of them is going to scold us for not telling them where we were going."

"Which we would have done if we thought it was going to be anything more than walking the dog!"

Alec glanced at Enkidu. "Did you at least get a good walk?"

"Cooger's going to make some comment about us being some sort of payback or something," Xander grumbled. "If he hasn't already."

Alec sighed. "I hope they aren't too worried." He made a little ramp for the centipede to climb up onto the mushroom.

"Cooger might sic Millie on us," Xander said.

"Hmm. Dangerous."
 
"They might be, but it's for the best to look around anyway," Cooger replied, "This is bear country. Black bears ain't too dangerous, and Enkidu'd scare 'em off, but you know." Turning to grin at her said, "Firsts are nice, but I'm satisfied to get to have repeats, we've got time to get lost later."

"Well do not," Dark said, interrupting their flirting, "We do not want to lose more people in the woods today. Are we going as a group or splitting up?"
 
Lex made a face at Dark but then took it seriously. "Does everyone have a watch? I think it'd be best if we split up to cover more ground. Ten minutes in, and then back to the cabin. If the phones aren't working, then we can't call to say we found them, so we should do timed trips in and try to stay within shouting distance. Sound good?"
 
"Sounds good," Cooger said, although admittedly he felt it was a bit dramatic, it felt like a military operation, "One of us can walk along the area by the shore, and there's a road that runs up that way," he pointed, "if someone wants to take that area, which would be a good marker to not get turned around. I should probably be more in the center, since I know at least some of the area and won't get turned around as easily."
 
Dark went walking through the woods, quickly picking up a nice stick to help knock away the brush when the trail got too narrow, calling out for his boys and---cleverly, he thought---Enkidu, using his dog's commands, since he was likely to hear his name well before the human boys did. Cooger occasionally called for the dog, but didn't think to use his name all that regularly.
 
"Being lost is more boring than scary," Xander remarked, stretched out along a long, barely holding Enkidu's leash.

Alec shrugged. "You do tend to get used to it."

Xander lifted his head. "Hey, do you hear something?"
 
Enkidu's ears were upright well before Xander said anything, and then he began whining, standing up. At first he seemed like he was just listening, but then he tried to dash off away from the twins, seemingly deeper into the woods.
 
Xander almost lost the leash but managed to grab it at the last second. He gripped the leash tightly and grabbed Alec's hand. "He hears something!"

"I hope it's what we want him to hear!" Alec chirped.

The pair crashed through the woods, following Enkidu's guidence.
 
"Ba!" Alec yelled, hearing their names. "Here we are!"

Xander didn't bother calling out as they ran toward their father's voice. He let go of Enkidu's leash when they were close, letting the dog run before them. Then they stumbled into sight, both of them looking at Dark with identical expressions of relief.
 
At the sight of Dark, Enkidu ran excitedly, his tongue lolling out of his mouth and jumped up against Dark, who bent to hug him, "Finally," he sighed, "Why did you wander off like that?"
 
"It wasn't supposed to be a wander. We were just giving Enkidu a walk, and we were going to be back in minutes," Xander complained.

Alec flopped against Dark, hugging him. "I'm so glad to see you! I did not want to live on mushrooms and flowers and any squirrels we could catch!" he declared dramatically.

"You'd never survive the building of the house," Xander replied.
 
"You would have been found eventually," Dark replied, hugging Alec back, "I am glad I noticed you were gone when I did, though. Were you both just wandering around? And by the way, you are allowed to say you want to take the dog on a walk for just a few minutes."
 
"We weren't sneaking away or anything. We just walked," Xander defended himself. "We were only going to go a short ways, turn around, and come straight back. It wasn't supposed to be far enough to need to tell anyone."

"Like walking to the pond," Alec agreed, "only, what we thought was the path was not the path, and then we turned the wrong way."
 
"I just prefer, if you are going out of eye sight, to know you have gone out of eye sight," Dark said blandly, changing his gaze to Alec, "Especially considering some of us do not have the best track record with navigation. Still, I am glad to know you are both alright. Were you just wandering around the whole time?"
 
Alec hooked a thumb at Xander. "I thought having him around would be enough to get us back."

Xander pointed to Enkidu. "I thought if we got turned around, he'd want to get back to his people. Turns out he's more interested in exploring than in you."

"Looks like my poor sense of direction is stronger than Xander's ability to find his way around. We'll let you know if ever there's a next time," Alec assured Dark. Then he grinned. "We wandered for a while, but then we hunkered down in a great little place to wait for rescue."

"It's just back that way," Xander said, pointing in the direction they'd come from.

"Want to see?" Alec offered.
 
"He loves to sniff," Dark said, taking Enkidu's leash and patting his dog on the side. If nothing else, his dog looked as though he had enjoyed a lovely afternoon, "I would like to see it, can I trust you can navigate back to it? I would hate to end up lost with the rest of you, Cooger would never allow me to live it down."
 
Xander snorted. "Now that would be something. A rescue party for the rescue party. It's right back here." He led the way back to the log where they'd been waiting and their tiny little scale model buildings and "farm." All of the "animals" had long escaped except for a couple of snails who were not particularly bothered about hanging out in a stick fort.
 
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