“ Even as vine mouse up on a wall , so the philia of the Mung Fu warrior grips a challenge and removes paintliketiny fingers , as well as cause mold , passing water and inexorable geomorphologic damage in that which he conquer . ”–A State of Bean : principle of Mung Fu
“ Let ’s light a fire , ” Jack said as he survey their bivouac .
“ So you ’re the one , ” Pak said . “ I never would have think it , but all the piece fit . ”
“ Excuse me ? ” Penny say , accept off her floppy camouflage hat . “ Jack is the one ? What do you mean ? ”
“ Can I fill her in ? ” Jack asked . Pak nodded .
“ Great , ” Jack said . “ I was n’t certain about opsec . Though you say she could come , so I guess she ’s o.k. . ”
“ Yeah , ” Penny said . “ I ’m hunky-dory . ” She did a little half spin like a fashion model in her well - fitting camo pants and olive - olive drab armored combat vehicle top .
“ You ’re silly , ” Jack said . “ Did you go shopping at the LL Bean Army Surplus ? ”
She shrug . “ Tell me what ’s up . I ’m dying to know . ”
“ Arson , ” Pak order .
“ Right , ” Jack said . “ Someone has been starting fire all over the shoes and we think this is the next spot where they ’re going to relegate out . ”
“ Cool , ” Penny said . “ I was make some guesses on the flight , but they were all industrial plant relate . I thought you might have discovered some new kind of maize or something wearisome . ”
“ Boring ? ” Jack say , stricken .
“ No offense , ” Penny said .
“ Too belatedly , ” Jack enjoin . “ Why did you need to come if you thought I might be doing something plant related out here ? ”
“ Because you ’re here , ” she suppose with a pass of her hair .
Jack smile . “ That work . I am beaming you come . Anyhow , we ’re going to see if we can catch the arsonists in the number and – wait – what ’s that in your backpack ! ? ”
Something was move in Penny ’s pack . Jack tear his hunting tongue expectantly – then saw the head word of a pocket-sized cat come out from the bag .
“ Dinglebat ! ” Penny said . “ I think I told you to stay home ? ”
“ Lots of hoi polloi bid themselves along , ” Pak say .
“ Meow , ” Dinglebat said .
“ So , about that fervidness , ” Jack said . “ It does n’t feel like camping without a flack . ”
“ True , ” Penny said . “ We could use some of the dry scrubby clobber to light a campfire . If we earn an country it wo n’t spread . ”
“ No , ” Pak said . “ They ’ll see our smoking resurrect . ”
“ You ’re right , ” Jack said . “ I forgot about that . ” He attend around at the prairie stretch off into the distance . “ This is disturbed , though . We ’re in the middle of nowhere . We drove two hours out and have n’t seen a single person in Swedish mile and miles . It would take a consecrate firebug to issue forth all the style out here . ”
“ The models do n’t lie , ” Pak said . “ They may fare in on a helicopter . ”
Jack and Penny seem up at the blue sky , begin to change state pink and amber around the edges as the sunlight sank below the horizon . It was totally innocent of helicopters .
“ They could also arrive in a balloon , ” Pak said .
Jack and Penny looked up again . No balloons .
“ Or a skyrocket , ” Pak said .
“ You ’re joking , ” Penny said , after look up for a third time and fail to detect any projectile .
Pak shrug .
“ If we do n’t have a blast , I ca n’t cook s’mores , ” Jack said . “ wait , ” he said , pulling a paper bag out of the bottom of their rented Ford Ranger . He make in and produce bag of marshmallows , a few hot chocolate legal profession and a box seat of Graham cracker . “ I pluck up everything we need when we slay the grocery in town . ”
“ I get wind you buy it , ” Pak said . “ I get into it was your estimate of a balanced meal . ”
“ No , ” Jack reply . “ It ’s not balanced . It does n’t haveOcean Octavesin it . S’mores are just a treat . You know , a ‘ let ’s repay ourselves for chase Oklahoma arsonists ’ treat . But you need a firing to make them . ”
“ You ’ll have to hold off for the arsonists to part one , ” Penny said .
Jack appear up at the darken sky . “ I do n’t see any rockets yet . ”
“ I was joking about rockets , ” Pak said .
“ I bonk , ” Jack replied , then walk to the hand truck and toss off the cowl .
“ What are you doing ? ” Penny said .
“ There ’s more than one way to skin a cat . ”
“ Meow ! ” Dinglebat yowled indignantly .
“ Have no fear , ” Pak say to the khat , patting it on the head . “ It is just a statue of talk . ”
“ Do they have mosquitoes out here ? ” Penny ask Pak .
“ Yes , ” Pak respond . “ But it has been very wry , and we are not near any chain reactor of discarded tires where they might multiply . ”
“ How did mosquitoes multiply before we make up car tyre ? ” Penny asked .
“ They lived in sawhorse troughs , ” Jack said from the other side of the truck .
“ I was just wondering about mosquito because we do n’t seem to have any tent , ” Penny said .
“ Sleeping outside balances the qi , ” Pak said .
“ Oh , ” Penny say .
“ There ! ” Jack said , returning with the truck ’s stamp battery , some wires and a few parts . “ We ’ll be able to make s’mores later . I have a plan now . ”
“ Great , ” Penny enounce . “ But I think I want to eat something less sugary first . ”
“ Of course , ” Jack said . “ It require to be way benighted before you make s’mores . Ideally , your eye should n’t be capable to tell the conflict between carbonize marshmallow and melted drinking chocolate . ”
Dinglebat evaporate into Penny ’s bagful and then remerged with a tin of sardines in his mouth .
“ Ew , ” Penny say . “ Where did you even get those ? ” Dinglebat pull the tab without gracing her with a response , then delicately nipped at a fish – then pull out back as if he ’d been bitten .
“ What is it ? ” Penny asked . “ Is one of them still alive ? ”
She picked up the can and take the side .
“ Aw shucks . These are n’t real . They ’re made of soja . It say ‘ Soydeens – the mouthful of the sea , mercilessness devoid . ’ Oh Dinglebat , I ’m sorry buddy . You pick up the wrong ones . ” She shook her head . “ That ’s what you get for stuff sardines in my bag . Not to mention your own punch-drunk ego . ” She sniff at the open can and looked closer . “ Yuck . Look , Pak – they even made small spinal column out of soy . Gross ! ”
Pak shook his brain . “ It is a abuse of a baronial noodle . Here , I have some food in my own pack . ” He lifted a satchel and handed it to Penny .
She opened it and pulled out a few square packages . “ Ramen ? What is this , college ? ”
“ They are a traditional food for thought of my people , ” Pak replied . “ Long ago , in the Ming Dynasty , Li Ramen invented the first dehydrated- ”
“ Do n’t heed to him , ” Jack enounce . “ Ramen come from Japan . ”
Pak shrugged . “ They steal it from China . ”
“ Do we have any water to boil ? ” Penny allege .
“ No , ” Pak replied . “ contribute water dilutes the Ramen ’s energy . Here , ” he said , taking a bundle from Penny and tearing it unfastened . “ You only remove the square of compressed bonce , then launch the flavourer packet , like so , ” he said , pull launch the seasoning packet with his teeth and splash part of it on the compressed block of ironical wheat noggin . He rolled up the remaining half of the seasoning packet boat and put it back in his pack , then took a tatty , comminute bit of the ramen noggin .
“ Do you habituate all the flavouring mailboat ? ” Penny call for , take a ramen foursquare of her own and preparing it as Pak had shown them . Jack did the same .
“ No , ” Pak replied . “ Some persist behind , like echoes of our preparation , meal taste and untouched , culinary signposts on the route of life , a dusting of eternity , like stars of flavored saltiness in the front left sack of one ’s khakis . ”
“ Wow , that ’s beautiful , ” Penny tell .
“ Also , you may lactate on the packets after , ” Jack said around a taste of crunchy bean . “ When you crave more monosodium glutamate . ”
Pak shook his pass unhappily as he chewed the last pungency of his repast . “ I will not deck this folderal with a response . I am going to slumber . ”
“ Now ? ” Jack said . “ It ’s what – 8:30 or something ? ”
“ I have been awake continuously for 27.5 hours , ” Pak replied , unrolling a sleeping bag . “ Please watch for arsonists . I would not like to burn to demise in my time of slumber . ”
“ How can you sleep when your bed is sting ? ” Penny said .
“ And how can we trip the light fantastic toe when the earth is turning ? ” Jack said .
“ Gravity , ” Pak said , shutting his optic .
Jack could see Penny ’s abstract in the moonshine a few feet away . He garner up his s’more cooking supplies and set them up a XII feet from Pak . Penny adopt him over after a present moment .
“ Here , ” Jack said , handing her his flashlight - enable cellphone . “ Hold the light for me so I can put this together . ”
“ Sure , ” Penny said . “ That looks complicated . ”
“ Not too much , ” Jack sound out , running a pair of leads from the motortruck battery . “ Not compare to rigging up my Mustang to burn vegetable oil . You ’re hypothesise to do that with diesel locomotive engine , not gas engines . ”
“ I had to do some MacGyver vogue stuff back when I was small , ” Penny enjoin .
“ Yeah ? ” Jack said , as he lit a portable alkyne woolly mullein and started work on the shaping of a crude tooth decay magnetron from the scavenged rear right hubcap of the Ranger .
“ Yes , at the facility where they produce us , ” Penny order . “ You see , it was n’t like I had a normal bringing up , with a mamma and a dad , in a place where … ”
“ Hmm , ” Jack said , wonder if he was give out to be able to properly direct the RF emitter or if he ’d need to incinerate one of the truck tire in edict to harvest the wires in the sidewall for a crude Faraday cage . No , that would necessitate lighting a ardour , and if he was go to cauterise a tyre , he might as well just cook the s’mores straightaway .
“ … the volume of the program would have destroyed normal girls , but we were n’t normal … ”
“ Right , ” Jack said . Maybe aluminum hydrofoil would work , he enquire as he created a ascendency racing circuit from parts of the motortruck radio . Though would s’mores even be good cooked with radiation ? The burned sharpness were part of the magical spell .
“ … over a thousand clones living their own lives right now . My babe , my genetic … ”
“ Sure , ” Jack mumbled , engaging the gimmick and maneuver it towards a marshmallow . To his pleasure , it lit on fervency almost at once .
“ So that ’s the real news report , ” she state with a suspiration , then looked at what Jack was doing . “ And wow – you made a laser ! ”
“ A optical maser ? ” Jack said , lift his first finished s’more proudly , then pass by it to Penny . “ You were n’t paying any attention . I made a microwave . ”
“ Same , same , ” Penny pronounce , require the s’more and tasting it . “ Ew . ”
“ Ew ? ” Jack asked .
“ Yeah . The graham cracker is kind of cold or something . It ’s like cardboard . ” She licked her fingerbreadth . “ I wish the chocolate , though . It tastes kinda different . ”
“ What ? ” Jack said . “ I bought a good stain ! ” He looked at the Graham banger box , take back his phone and shining the Inner Light at the belittled print . “ No way , ” he said . “ I got the gluten - innocent ones . Ruined by voguish allergies ! ”
“ Oh well , ” pronounce Penny . “ We can just eat the marshmallows and chocolate . ”
Jack sigh and look at his oil and now wretched microwave . “ Yeah , I reckon so . If I know the prairie plant better , I ’d hunt for a Graham cracker substitute . On the east glide we haveBuccellatum grahamii , with its wafer - like nutmeats . Out in Oregon there’sPanem meltuberculum . You have to blackguard the roots , but they ’re enceinte . Here , though , I ’ve have nothing . suffer in the woods , so to mouth . Or grassland , as the grammatical case may be . ”
“ It ’s okay , ” Penny say . “ I think it ’s amorous that you seek to use a laser to falsify me a s’more . ”
“ Thanks , ” Jack said . “ I ’d better throw these bits and piece back in the truck so the dew does n’t mess up them up . ”
“ Did you break away anything reusing the number like that ? ”
“ Nothing serious , ” Jack tell . “ I ’ll put everything back together tomorrow . ”
“ Great , ” Penny say . Jack loaded his microwave oven into the back seat of the truck , then sit down next to her . She leaned her head onto his berm and he err his arm around her waistline . This could be the moment , he thought . Would it be uncanny to propose to her in an Oklahoma prairie ? What if she say no ? Maybe I should sing that “ I ’m just a girl who ca n’t say no , ” song to her to kind of select the pump . Like when a salesman asks a bunch of questions which all have yes resolution , so you ’re in a yes mode , then he asks ‘ would you like to corrupt this 3,000 dollar vacuum with a built - in lounge chair on payment with 26.4 % annualized sake ’ and you automatically say ‘ yes , ’ then ruin your entire hereafter . But it would n’t ruin Penny ’s future if she read yes . In fact , it would give her the adept time to come possible . Jack envisage the two of them raising a harvest of little Broccolis . Maybe I ’ll buy a place wagon . A place wagon would be cool . One of those huge ones from the 70s with the fake woods on the side . I could freshen up the entire thing , he consider . A total refurbishment , and it would be awesome because everyone usually does that with muscle cars . And then-
“ Well , ” Penny yawned , standing up and patting him on the berm . “ I ’m off to sleep . See you on the flip side . ”
She walked over to where Pak was and pulled out a kip suitcase , leaving Jack alone with his failed s’mores .
“ Should ’ve just ask her , ” Jack muttered to himself . He looked at the box of pseudo Graham crackers , picked it up and hurled it off into the nighttime . Nature could eat them . If they were even biodegradable .
