DoA Trappers: Snowdragon | Tatlitli, (Laugom)

Fishing entry for Tatlitli aq696

Adventure December 2023 for Laugom if108

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Laugom lounged in the snow, belly up and bathing in the weak winter sun. He watched Tatlitli haul in her freshest catch, and mused on the nature and form of snoots.

 

Tatlitli moved very slowly on land, even when half-submerged. Unlike Laugom, who undulated across sand and snow with wild abandon, Tatlitli preferred a sedate shuffle, where her fins never fully left the ground. Privately, Laugom thought she looked irrationally terrified of somehow floating off into the sky if she dared to let go. He'd managed not to say it to her face -- she certainly wouldn't appreciate it!

 

The net was swollen and fluttering with fish, and Tatlitli dragged the crudely-woven trap very carefully up the beach. And very slowly.

 

Laugom had fully exhausted all his creative powers. Thus, being as finished as he could be, Laugom had nothing to do while he waited. And waited. He thumped his paws against the bulbous mass of snow in various patterns, packing it firmly so that it would hold the crude shape. When he ran out of actual busywork to do, he added the tip of his tail to the chorus. No less than three percussive masterpieces later, Tatlitli finally arrived.

 

"Ahh, me ol' mate Tatlitli, how many years has it been? So good to see you well and hale, after all this time!"

 

"Shut up, you claybrained fool."

 

Laugom did his level best not to laugh. "Has it truly been an eon since last we spoke? Ahhhh, to hear the voice of my good friend again is a wondrous thing, truly a miracle!"

 

"I barely left, you snow-snorting lout. The sun hasn't even moved."

 

Laugom chortled, rolling upright and wriggling about until he could show off his bulbous, crude, painstakingly-designed creation. "Speaking of snow, mate, what d'ya think? I'm having a bit of trouble with the snoot."

 

"The snoot," Tatlitli echoed. She glanced at Laugom's magnum opus for all of two seconds and said, "You're having trouble with the everything."

 

Laugom managed to turn his guffaws into mock sputters of immense offense. Tatlitli ignored the whole spectacle, and picked at her net. Fish spilled everywhere in a puddle of flashing scales and twitching fins. Tatlitli began to pick through them one-by-one. She killed the larger fish with quick strikes behind the gill plates from her claws, and lobbed them further up into the snow. 

 

For smaller fish, she pulled some water up the beach, encased them, and tossed them back into the sea. When he ran out of guffaws, Laugom took a moment to admire her magic. While she wasn't the most imaginative mage, the things Tatlitli could do were done with exacting precision. It was just a pity that she had no appetite for flair or pizzazz... or snow-dragons.

 

Tatlitli was right. His snow-dragon did look more like a... well, it didn't really look like anything. It turned out that sculpting was much more difficult than the udin made it look. Laugom's lack of opposable thumbs didn't help.

 

Tatlitli was already done sifting out the smaller fish. She worked with all the speed and efficiency one would expect from an experienced trapper. The slaughtered fish had ended up scattered all through the snow. Laugom delicately picked up one that had landed against his snow dragon and moved it away. "Got a nice haul, mate. Never would've thought to set up a net this close to shore, myself."

 

"The currents are right for vent-dippers. Wasn't expecting so many silver-flecks, though."

 

"Well, good that one of us had some success!" Laugom looked back at his poor lumpy snow-dragon. From this angle, it looked even worse, which made sense in hindsight. He hadn't exactly been walking in circles around it to check how the other sides were turning out, given that he had a whole lot of body and only two legs. "Mate, maybe I should be your apprentice instead. I don't think sculpture's for me. Better to leave the snow-dragons to surface-dwellers, eh?"

 

Tatlitli grunted. "Sort the fish then, apprentice."

 

Laugom oozed over and gave the scattered fish an appraising look. "Ah, silver-flecks would be the ones with the silvery bits in their fins?"

 

Tatlitli nodded. The angler bulb on her head also nodded. "I call these vent-dippers because their bellies look like the magma down in volcanic vents."

 

"That's lava. If you can see it, it's become lava."

 

"Shut up, snow-guzzler." 

 

Carefully, he picked up one of the vent-dippers in his teeth, and moved it to a cleaner patch of snow. Then he plopped a second one onto the pile--

 

"Stack 'em properly," said Tatlitli. "Here--" She picked up the second fish and rearranged it to be parallel to the first, but facing the opposite direction. "You want to alternate them so that the stack stays stacked. And you don't want to stack too high, or the fish on the bottom get crushed, but we don't have enough fish for that."

 

It was almost like building a snow-dragon, sort of, but with fish instead of snow. And Laugom had to admit that one of these building materials was a lot tastier than the other.