Family Day Out

In the aerospace wing of the museum, the Lunar Festival was in full swing. This event was an entirely new concept to Wollemia and her children, mostly because none of them had ever experienced a lunar cycle before. Wollemia had spent her life under the false lights of Atlantis, only knowing the moon as a theoretical celestial body that was allegedly in the sky. Being the type to not believe things unless she saw them herself, she had viewed the night sky as an old fairy tale to keep children occupied, dreaming of a brighter world they would never see while under the dome. Cashew and Hazel however, were only lacking this experience due to their short lifespan, having been born not two full moons ago. The kids were ecstatic, barely able to take in all the twinkling lights and whirring motors of the fairground games. They passed by stalls offering exotic foods and materials, old human aircraft covered in paper chains and lights, exhibits torn down and repurposed into games with red tickets as their tempting prizes. It was exciting to the point of overstimulation, leaving them caught between bolting off to different attractions, essentially sticking them to the ground. 

"Children, stay close," Wollemia said firmly to the two wide eyed hatchlings.

"Yes, mama." they responded in unison, still not taking their eyes off of the sights and sounds of the festival. Wollemia sighed, knowing she would have to be on her toes to keep both of them from running off. Cassia only had Cacao to look after tonight after taking the twins the last time they had gone on a 'family outing' like this. It seemed only fair to take turns with who had to be outnumbered, but Wollemia was already regretting agreeing to split up. Not only was she missing out on experiencing this for the first time with the father of her children, but she had been landed with the two most boisterous of their brood. She cast her eye over the fairground, trying to find something to occupy their attention. She landed on a plastic circular mat, covered in small airplanes with small loops tied to the top of them.

"Look, let's go play this one," she said hurriedly, using her feathery tail to scoot the children along. They went under their own steam once they spotted the potential toys, only stopped by the small barrier that encircled the mat. It seemed to be a plastic pond, its bottom was even blue like it was trying to mimic the water that should be sitting within. At the moment it was dry, letting the toy planes sit in place.

"Welcome folks, what a beautiful family," the Para attending the game greeted them, "You want to hook some planes?"

"Yeah! I wanna!" Cashew chirped, his feathers wiggling with excitement. He hopped from foot to foot as he looked expectantly at his sister, not wanting to play without her.

"How do you hook planes?" Hazel asked, a tad more reserved than her brother.

"Simple as pie, my little friends," the Para said warmly. He reached behind the game and pulled up a long pole with a string at the end. The string ended with a metal hook, something Wollemia recognised as a fishing hook from her shifts at the river fishery in Atlantis. "You use this here fishin' rod to hook one of these planes, then you get prize tickets!"

"Is there a time limit? A point scoring system? How many tickets do they need for a prize?" Wollemia asked in her typical blunt manner, making the Para recoil nervously. Before he could answer he felt the rod slipping out from under his arm as the two Iggys worked in tandem to carry it over to the game area. Cashew propped the rod against the barrier and squinted at how the hook dangled about a foot in the air above the planes. 

"Move it backwards," he told Hazel, who was keeping her foot against the end of the rod to stop it sliding across the floor. She slowly scooted back, letting the fishing rod move back in small increments and letting the line hang lower and lower to the ground. Wollemia watched in awe as the two children began to problem solve, casting a glance at the attendant to make sure they were playing this game correctly. It seemed even he was preoccupied by the stump-high hatchlings working like a well-oiled machine as he was simply observing with his mouth wide open. She felt a thrill of guilty pride, like she was somehow responsible for the natural quick thinking of her hatchlings. In all reality, it was either genetic from Cassia's side of the family or they had some mysterious third mentor out there somewhere. Wollemia had been told frequently in her youth that she was not the sharpest, so she at least knew it didn't come from her.

Hazel's tongue stuck out between her teeth in concentration as she focused on moving the fishing rod back little by little. It had pushed her back to the point where she could no longer see inside of the plastic pool anymore but she listened dutifully to Cashew;s instructions.

"Are we nearly there?" she asked curiously, her head pressed to the wooden pole.

"Nearly, just a little more!" Cashew called back, the distance seeming enormous to their tiny bodies. He was leaning over the barrier wall, watching the hook swing closer and closer to the model planes. "Okay! Stop now!" he said sharply as the hook bumped one of the metal loops stuck to the bright red plane. Hazel stopped abruptly, making the hook begin to swing with the sudden halt of momentum. 

"Do I need to move it side to side?" His sister asked but Cashew was quiet, squinting at the hook swinging back and forth without passing through the loop at all.

"I think so, it's not grabbin' it," he said in frustration, "Move it uhhh, left." Hazel moved the rod to the right, sending the hook into the path of another loop, this one belonging to a dark green plane. "Nearly there!" Cashew yelled, shaking the side of the pool in excitement. The rod shook in turn, sending the hook swinging wildly in circles, barely tipping against the loop of the dark green plane. He groaned in frustration and began to bark more orders to his sister, who followed dutifully despite neither of them being quite sure about which direction was left or right. Hazel refused to be deterred, especially since she couldn't see the wide margins they were missing by.

Wollemia watched the hook swing back and forth, jostled by the joined excitement of the two siblings. It would probably never settle in a position to grab the toy plane with the way they were manoeuvring it with such enthusiasm. She made eye contact with the attendant and, without her children noticing, reached up and gently pushed down on the end of the rod until she heard it clink through the loop, indicated by the loud cheering of the hatchlings. The attendant smiled, slightly nervously, and congratulated the children on a job well done. Not only did they receive a fistful of tickets each, but they got to keep the small plane to play with too. With a loud yawn, Cashew slumped against his mother's legs, allowing his sister to chew on the plane and run laps around Wollemia as she did. 

"Will we go find dad?" the adult Iggy asked.

"Yeah, find Cacao too," Cashew agreed, his exhaustion causing his words to slur.

"We have to let him play with it too!" Hazel approved, barely intelligible through the toy clamped in her teeth. Wollemia leaned down to let Cashew clamber up onto her shoulders and draped himself over her back. She didn't worry about him falling off, this was one of his favourite places to nap and she could get a surprising amount of work done while he was there. A sudden melancholy thought struck her as she wondered how long she would be able to carry him around like this. All of a sudden, she was very grateful to have spent this stressful day herding her children around the fair. Maybe they would stop by the fountain outside for a while and wait for Cassia and Cacao to find them instead, spending a little more time alone together.