Brunches |
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Uninterestedly, the fat-lipped old curmudgeon floated close to his glass-jar-and-algae home, silently watching a dragonfly nymph suck the last vestiges of life from the shrivelling carcass of a tadpole.
The nymph was a fearsome-looking creature, resembling nothing more than a huge beetle. It had lethal, hook-studded front limbs and a grasping set of curving clamps under its head with which it had grabbed the tadpole, and, holding it close, had proceeded to inject its needle-shaped mouth into the bulging body, dispensing an acid-like fluid which would quickly dissolve the contents thereof.
After an appetizing interval, the tadpole had been reduced to a bag of juicy fluid, and the nymph had proceeded to suck him up as if through a straw and into its own hungry belly, placating its ever-present hunger and replenishing the source of supply for its own strong juices. It dropped the flaccid tadpole carcass and with a flip of the powerful beetle legs, dove to the mud on the bottom to lie in wait for its next victim.
The old fighter yawned. Silently, a tiny bubble escaped his lips and floated, glistening, to the surface. He wanted to eat the dragonfly nymph, even though it was many times his size. He had attacked one once, and had escaped with a large piece of his tail missing and his ego badly damaged. Now, he was wary. It had taken almost two years for his damaged tail fin to repair itself to its original luxuriousness. He had no realization of the length or passage of time; nevertheless, he was wary - and hungry.
He forced energy into his relaxed, limpid muscles, and with a slow, graceful swaying motion, glided to the thick roots at the base of the flame tree.
Above the waterline, underneath the low-hanging leaves of a liana vine, was a cluster of newly-hatched caterpillar eggs. The fat, juicy green bodies of the baby caterpillars were one of his favorite delicacies, and the cunning old fish knew they were there. Two had squirmed and wiggled their way to fall with a tiny splash into the water, and the sensitive lateral-line receptors on the old fish's sides had picked up the vibrations instantly, and he had languidly swam up and gobbled each of them down.
But he was still hungry. He gave a sudden pulse of energy to his flowing fins and sailed neatly out of the water to land with a plump atop the soft, green moss beneath the low-hanging leaves. The moss was damp with moisture under the dripping lianas, and since this was a cloudy day and the atmosphere wonderfully wet, he could lie in luxury, breathing the clean, damp air directly, his scales retaining moisture, and would not be affected by the fact that he was out of his natural element.
He had done so many times previously, instinctively realizing that he was safe from being dried out by the air for a time. If his outer scales ever became too dry, he would perish; but he could lie here eating fat caterpillars for up to thirty minutes and be comfortable. He took two quick flipping flops further up the moss and proceeded to gobble his brunch.
With a rapid, paddling motion, the dragonfly nymph pushed his sluggish way deeper into the mud at the bottom of the pond. He turned his slick, thick body and came almost to the surface of the mud, stopping just as his beady eyes hauntingly cleared the sludge. His legs were folded snugly to his body, and he was motionless as he waited, anticipating his next course of liquified tadpole. Soon he would be mature and would make his exit from his watery home much in the same manner as had the mayfly nymph in the eye-marked guppy's algae. He, too, would split his shell at the surface of the pond, to emerge into the bright sky of morning on silvery wings of metallic gossamer - to fly free in the sunlight and mate in glorious abandon with a female of his kind. He knew nothing of these impending events, that he ultimately was destined to become one of a class of insects renowned for the color and beauty of its members.
His body would be bright, iridescent green as a dragonfly, and he would possess an astounding set of double wings decorated in sequin splashes of all the colors in a prism, and overlain, body, wings, and all, with a glimmering sheen of radiant blue. He would be an explosion of color in sunlight, and would dazzle his dragonfly ladies with his spectacular aerial gymnastics.
Motionless, he waited.
(c) 1993 Carson Clippard