Book 1: Business Model

  Chapter 1: Something Scrumptious Part 1

  Gomm was contemplating eating the babies. It wasn’t that he was ravenous. Instead, he was aware that he would be hungry soon and wanted to head off the hassle of getting something when he was hungry.

  Luckily, he wasn’t huge and didn't need more than a few younglings to hold off the specter of hunger for a while. The baby carrots crunched softly as he decided the snack was warranted to give him energy for today’s play.

  Gomm didn't have a lot of cousins to play with. They were a small settlement at the end of the day, even on Tuesdays. Fifteen or so Goomer populated the warren just outside farmer Jenkin’s eastern fields.

  With rare settlement visitations, Gomm’s chances to meet new Goomer weren't as frequent as he or the other dibbun would like. He contemplated the severe lack of new playmates,

  Never is not frequent, right? Is that how to use that word? Boring is what it is around here.

  Gramma Choch had kept promising the visits from other Gomm would eventually happen. But, after a year with no new playmates, Gomm was doubtful. Gramma wouldn’t let him play with the humans nearby.

  Gomm flexed his will to brighten his pelt to a lighter shade of white and adjust his eyes to be better accustomed to the bright day. Their red gemlike shape shifted slightly to accommodate his desire. He gazed at some of the human children playing near the village in the distance beyond the farm near his warren.

  Maybe it’s the claws? Or the antennae?

  Gomm pawed gently with his short, blunt claws at the segmented lengths sprouting from his head. He felt a slight tingle from the delicate organs sprouting from his head and scrunched his short muzzle in distaste. It was probably Jerry. It seemed to be coming from the place he and his friends had left off playing yesterday.

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  Impatient bastard. Should go see what he wants. Sek’s might be there already too.

  Gomm wasn’t sure why bastard was a bad word, or what it meant, but his uncle Lester had used it and he was a plethora of forbidden language. Jerry deserved it, Gomm was sure.

  Dismissing the thought of the young female and the accompanying flutter of winged bugs in his stomach at the thought of her waiting for him. Gomm scurried awkwardly on two legs for a short distance before he gave up and dropped to all fours, sprinting. Two-legged running like the adults was beyond him for now.

  The brush rustled around him as he hurried toward playtime with his friends. He burst through to a small clearing seeing his friend’s, Jerry and Sek, waiting for him. Jerry was skinny and tall for a gomm. He was currently murdering dandelion heads with a stick he had scavenged. Sek lounged on a nearby boulder, idly sharpening her claws on it’s smooth grained surface.

  Jerry snorted at him as he bumbled into the clearing,

  “About damn time, Gomm. I sent that call out ages ago.”

  Sek paused in her meticulous inspection of the sharpness of her claws she blew some dust off of them and blinked slowly at him.

  “Ignore him, Gomm. What are we doing today?”

  Jerry scowled and his antennnae twitched in irritation but Gomm lifted the lips of his muzzle in a smile. His gramma hated that they imitated the human’s mannerisms but Gomm noticed a particular shine of admiration in Sek’s eye’s as she glanced at the sharpness of his exposed fangs. Gomm confidently answered her question.

  ”Albuquerque,”

  He continued as Sek’s antennae twitched in a pleasing and distracting way. Jerry’s coat brightened in pleasure as well ntil Gomm continued.

  ”Jerry, get some more small posts from the warren stash, and we’ll see if we can’t beat what we got done yesterday. Sek, you fetch our plan sheet from the toy box, and we’ll start laying out where we want it to keep going.”

  The game was decided. Jerry and Sek scurried to retrieve the requested toys while Gomm sat down and slowly started to draw in the dirt what he remembered from the plan yesterday. Their game site was a short distance from the real warren, closer to the southern field, but still out of sight from the main farmhouse.

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