Saga Saga - OT Some Pig (MMM Warm Fuzzies Roulette; Monster Challenge; puffer pig; ice spider)

Title: Some Pig
Author: Findswoman
Era: Saga; probably sometime around OT since we know that’s when Azmorigan is active.
Characters: OCs, starring a puffer pig named Whilbs; Azmorigan
Genre: Humor, drama, fluff, mush
Summary: A puffer pig forced to sniff out treasure for an unscrupulous treasure hunter makes a new friend and finds a better lease on life.
Notes: A response to two challenges:

• @Raissa Baiard ’s awesome Monday Mush Mania Warm Fuzzies Roulette, in which I received the puffer pig, a porcine mammal with the ability to sniff out precious metals and to inflate when scared or nervous.
• @Kahara ’s equally awesome Monster Challenge from almost four years ago (don’t judge! ), in which I received the prompt “ensnaring”:
  
  Spoiler: ensnaring

  IT’S A TRAP! Seriously, watch your step around these tricky, ensnaring monsters. Some build traps to ambush their prey, using webs, pits in the ground, and other constructions. Others are able to lure people in with a kind of hypnotizing influence. It’s generally a bad idea to wander into their domain, because the way out is much more difficult than the way in.

As usual I thank Raissa for beta reading, general encouragement, and invaluable suggestions that made this story a lot better.
Content warning for a few instances of mild animal cruelty.

---

Crack went a whip in a dark, cold cave. “Move it, you worthless animal!” Crack again. “We’ve been here since dawn and you still haven’t found the stash! Go on, now! Move!”

Whilbs was trying. Really, he was. As a puffer pig, something like this should have been be a snap for him, especially with the high percentage of pure aurodium said to make up the legendary treasure stash said to be hidden in the ice caves of Maldo Kreis; everyone (or at least every puffer pig) knew pure aurodium had a very distinctive scent. But the air was cold, as was often the case in caves, and the inside of his nose was tingling, and there were strange phantom scents everywhere—probably just different kinds of rock—that kept interfering. Nor did it help that he kept slipping on patches of ice, and that stupid whip kept killing his concentration…

…and oh yeah, that nasty old Azmorigan had given him nothing to eat since sunrise that morning, either.

“Worthless beast!” Azmorigan kept up his muttering between cracks of the whip. “I should’ve known that crook on Ord Mantell was gonna swindle me. Eh, no matter. At very least I’ll get some tasty bacon out of you once we’re back on Nar Shaddaa!”

Bacon! Whilbs startled and gasped at this word, losing a precious wisp of maybe-aurodium-scent that had wafted to his nostrils only moments before. He knew, as all of his kind did, that ending up on some biped’s breakfast plate was a constant danger in a canid-eat-canid universe like this one. But to think of it happening so soon— that took the breath right out of him, and when he caught it again, the aurodium scent was gone, replaced with the stark reek of regular old rock.

But what could he do? Nothing but give a sigh-snort, droop his floppy, trunk-like snout even closer to the ground, and keep on walking and sniffing. Azmorigan was still behind him, still grumbling and cracking his whip.

On and on they went like this for what felt like hours, until Whilbs stopped before a smaller passageway that split off from the main cave path. It was narrow and barely tall enough to admit an average biped, but Whilbs could catch a distinct if fleeting whiff of aurodium emanating from within. This, he thought, could definitely be it. He turned to Azmorigan with a soft, questioning yelp.

“All right, fine,” Azmorigan grunted. “You better be right this time!”

With a bright squeal Whilbs was off down the passage, Azmorigan following him as best he could. The path grew narrower and darker as they went on, and the air was stuffy and close; Azmorigan of course still grumbled. But there was no mistake: the delicious, tangy scent of aurodium was getting stronger. Whilbs picked up his pace as he loped deeper into the cave toward it. The portly Azmorigan had trouble matching his speed and fell further behind with each minute, occasionally yelling “Wait!” or some choice oath. But Whilbs paid him no heed. Even in this cramped, dark, unfamiliar environment, it felt good to be following his own nose at his own pace— safely ahead of the crusty old Jablogian and his whip.

Presently, he arrived at a crossroads in the passageway. And there he saw something.

It was… well, he wasn’t sure what it was, because he had never seen anything like it before. It looked like one of the spiders that sometimes hung out on the walls of his enclosure back on Nar Shaddaa, only gigantic. It moved on eight spindly, multi-jointed appendages that clattered uncannily on the stone ground. Its body— or maybe it was a head— or maybe both— was an immense white-gray blob or bulge sitting at the center of the eight appendages and tapering downward to a round, toothy maw. A ring of red eyes set at the base of the bulge glittered luridly in the gloom of the cave.

Directly at Whilbs.

Whilbs simply couldn’t help himself. No puffer pig in such a situation could; it was instinctual. In the space of a few seconds he had inflated to a spiked sphere some three times his normal size, as his kind always did when frightened or endangered.

And having done so in the confines of this low, narrow cave, he now found himself stuck, his limbs dangling uselessly from his inflated body, and completely at the mercy of the strange many-eyed, many-legged being before him.

“Oh blast, oh blast,” he said to himself. “Oh blast, this is it for me. I’m never going to find the aurodium stash, I’ll never get out of this cold, cramped cave ever again, and I’ll probably be eaten alive by that… thing over there. I wish I’d at least made it back to Nar Shaddaa; even if Azmorigan’s going to turn me into bacon, I’d at least be able to move around and breathe! Er… Help!” he yelled at the top of his voice. “Help! Someone! HELP!”

He paused and hazarded another glance at the large spider. To his absolute surprise, it was still staring at him motionlessly and had not made a single move to eat him. Instead, the gleam in its dark red eyes now seemed… quizzical? Puzzled?

And then, to Whilbs’s even greater surprise, the spider spoke.

“What’s wrong?” it asked. “What are you doing?”

“I’m… I’m stuck, and I can’t move!” Whilbs left it at that, not feeling that this was the time or place to get into the mechanics of decreasing adrenaline levels triggering the deflation response.

“Well, why didn’t you say so at first?” replied the spider, waving a leg expressively. “Here, would it help if I gave you a push?”

“Um, okay…” This was not what Whilbs had expected by any means, but he wasn’t about to refuse. Especially since it was starting to get stuffy.

The creature lifted two of its front legs. Whilbs couldn’t stifle a shudder as it placed them on his shoulders, directly above where his forelegs dangled.

“All right,” the spider said. “One, two, and… three!”

On three the spider’s powerful legs pushed Whilbs backward, dislodging him from the narrow part of the passage. He was still partially puffed and not yet able to stand on his legs, but he could at least breathe and move more comfortably, and he could feel the deflation process beginning, slowly at least.

“Gee, thanks,” he breathed. “I appreciate that.”

“No worries at all, glad to help,” replied the spider in a friendly voice that seemed incongruous with the sinister rings of eyes and teeth.

“I’m Whilbs, by the way.” The puffer pig extended a forefoot.

“Sharlytt.” The spider touched his paw with the tip of one knobbly foreleg, then gestured down the passage behind her. “I live down that way, on Fyrn Elbara’s farm. Pleased to meet you.”

“Likewise.”

“So, anything else I can do to help? You seem a little… lost around here.”

“Well, yeah, truth to tell, I kind of am,” Whilbs answered honestly. He had just regained his normal size and was feeling much more at ease. “Do you happen to know of a stash of aurodium in this vicinity?”

“Stash of aurodium?” Sharlytt’s red eyes narrowed in puzzlement. “Never heard Farmer Elbara mention that before. You really think there’s aurodium around here?”

“Yeah, I thought I could smell it down that passage over there.” He gestured with a hoof down the left branch of the crossroads.

“You thought you could smell it.”

“Oh, of course! All my kind can. Things like aurodium and platinum and precious stones and jewels and such.”

“That’s new on me,” Sharlytt mused. “You must be a very exceptional creature indeed if you have skills like that.”

Whilbs sighed. “Well, you’re very kind… but try telling that to Azmorigan.”

“Azmorigan?”

“Pudgy reddish biped with shifty little green eyes and more chins than he needs. He’s the one who brought me here and wants me to find the aurodium, and he said he’d turn me into bacon if I don’t—”

He broke off, hearing a distant, curse-punctuated galumphing sound down the passage behind him.

“Oh no! Oh! No! I bet that’s him now… what am I gonna do? If he sees me here chatting with you he’s gonna kill me… well, he probably is anyway, but…”

“Oh, don’t talk like that!” exclaimed Sharlytt. “Look, I’ll tell you what. You go on and follow that scent and I’ll deal with him, okay?”

“Deal with him? How?” Whilbs was concerned, especially as the galumphing increased and the cursing grew louder. “Not like I love the guy, but he’s my only chance of getting home, so…”

Sharlytt cocked her knobbly head. “Oh, I wouldn’t necessarily say that.”

“What?”

“I said, I wouldn’t necessarily say that. But anyway, don’t worry, I didn’t mean that kind of deal with him. Like, just… distract him. Slow him down a touch. Hold him up, if you will.”

“Okay…”

“And then you can bring your aurodium or whatever right back here and give it to him, and maybe that’ll put him in a better mood.”

“Okay…?”

“Really, you can trust me. I do this kind of thing all the time for Farmer Elbara. It’s my job to keep the bad stuff away from her farm. We spiders are good at that.”

“Okay…” Whilbs acquiesced. “If you say so. Guess it’s worth a try.”

“Great! Now quick, he’s almost here! See ya, Whilbs!” Sharlytt waved one of her feet.

“See ya, Sharlytt… er… thanks!”

*

Whilbs made his way through the cave’s pathways following the aurodium scent. Other than assorted minor creepy-crawlies, it was pretty easy going— not to mention completely Azmorigan-free, which was the best part. Being more relaxed, Whilbs found it much easier to distinguish the crisp aurodium tang from the other scents of the cave, and in not too long he came upon its source in a low cavern, only a little taller than himself, that split off from the main path.

He inhaled deeply as he entered. Heady stuff, aurodium! And this miniature treasure cave was full of it. Bars, ingots, and coins of various sizes were scattered about, some loose on the floor, some in sacks of various sizes. He found a small sack of coins, took it in his mouth, and trotted back down the passageway. This would make a good “teaser” to start with, and he’d lead Azmorigan back later for the rest. (“Assuming Sharlytt hasn’t dealt with him too harshly,” he remarked to himself, half earnestly, half the opposite.)

*

Meanwhile, Sharlytt was hard at work. She let out a length of translucent, ribbonlike webbing and attached it to one side of the cave wall, close to the ground, then took the other end over to the opposite wall and stuck it there. She did the same with another length of webbing, and then another, and then another, and so on until the floor of the cave passage crossroads was criscrossed with a mesh of sticky, translucent strands.

“That ought to do it,” she said, giving her work a quick once-over before retiring a short way down the right side of the passage to hide in the shadows.

Presently Azmorigan ran up to the crossroads, huffing and puffing like an old-fashioned steampowered repulsortruck. “Where’d that stupid animal go? He better have found it by now or else I’ll— AAAGHHH! WHAT— THE— KARK!”

His legs, disproportionately short and spindly for the size of his body, suddenly found themselves ensnared and entangled in a mass of sticky, silklike mesh. Try as he might, he could not pull them free; the sticky stuff, whatever it was, was simply too sticky. Nor did his pocketknife have any effect on the sinewy strands, no matter how fiercely he slashed at them. It was, in fact, so stiff and twangy was the webbing that on one attempt to cut himself free it twanged back against the knife, knocking it from his hand and sending it clattering far away down the passage he had come down.

“KAAARK!!” he bellowed. “WHAT IS THIS! WHO DID THIS! Let me OUT OF HERE! RIGHT NOW!!!”

Sharlytt took that as her cue. She emerged from the shadows and approached Azmorigan, red eyes glittering and fangs bared, and said:

“Hi.”

“GAAAAAAAAHHH!” The hapless Jablogian’s limbs flailed in fear, serving only to snare him deeper into the webbing. “Wha.. who… I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die, I’m gonna diiiiiiiie!”

“I mean, one of these days, sure, but not today,” said Sharlytt playfully. “For now, we’re going to have a little fun!”

So saying, she extended a chitinous leg and gave Azmorigan’s shoulder a playful but hefty swat.

“AAAAHHHH!” he screamed

“Ha ha!” Sharlytt laughed, then thwacked Azmorigan’s opposite shoulder with a different leg.

“GAAAHHH! Stop it!”

“All in good time, my dear fellow!” THWACK went another giant leg, this time right in the middle of Azmorigan’s ample abdomen, causing him to wobble violently back and forth in the springy webbing like a youngling’s toy.

“WAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!” Azmorigan’s cry echoed hideously in the caves. “STOWOWOWOP! Lemme GOWOWOWO!”

*

“Yikes!” Whilbs stopped in his tracks at the bloodcurdling screams, shrieks, and yells reverberating up the stony passageway. “That’s Azmorigan, and no mistake! What’s happened to the old lunkhead now? Should I be terrified? Should I be relieved? Better proceed with caution…”

He did so until he was just around the corner from the junction where he had first met Sharlytt. He was totally unprepared for the crazy spectacle that confronted him there: Azmorigan ensnared in Sharlytt’s webbing, screaming and cursing while being biffed, boffed, and swatted about by her strong, chitinous legs like a boxer’s punching bag.

“Hah!” He almost dropped the bag of coins from laughter. “Couldn’t happen to a nicer fellow! He does have to get me back home sometime, though, so… um…”

He advanced cautiously, set the bag down in front of him, and sat expectantly on his hind legs facing the action.

“Er… hi, Sharlytt. Hi, Azmorigan. I’m ba—”

“GAAAAHHHHH!” Whack! “KARKIN’—” Whump! “RASSAFRACKIN’—”

Suddenly Sharlytt stopped, noticing Whilbs. “Oh, it’s you! And you’ve got the goods, I see!”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Whilbs replied. “At least some of them.”

“Wha…? Huh?” Azmorigan took advantage of this momentary reprieve to turn and notice Whilbs. “Oh, there you are, you idiot beast! What’ve you been doing all this time?” His eyes fell on the bag of coins. “Oh, er… um… Good, you found it! Now, give it here!”

He reached forward toward the sack, only to be twanged painfully backward by the springy webbing. “YEEOW! No, seriously! Give it here!”

Whilbs simply picked the sack up in his mouth and made as if to pass it to Azmorigan, but instead dropped it off to the side, slightly farther away than before. “Guess it’s my turn to deal with you now, big guy,” he said.

“Doing good, Whilbs, doing good,” put in Sharlytt as Azmorigan once again strained vainly forward to grab the sack— and once again bounced backward.

“KAAAAAAAAAARK! YOU CHEEKY LITTLE—”

Whilbs ignored him. “Thanks, Sharlytt,” he replied, moving the sack yet again and occasioning a similar response from the Jablogian. There definitely was something satisfying in getting one over on his cruel, greedy owner. And yet…

“Y’know, Sharlytt?” Whilbs began, against the continued backdrop of Azmorigan’s shrieks, shouts, and oaths.

“Yeah?”

“I hate to say it, but when do we, er, let him out of here? It’s just, he does have to take me back home at some point.”

“Oh.” Sharlytt waved a nonchalant leg. “I told you, I don’t think you have to worry about that.”

“Wh—what do you mean?”

Sharlytt hesitated a moment. “Here,” she said finally, “let me get someone who can explain it much better than I can. You can keep an eye on this one for a few minutes, can’t you?”

“Uh, sure…”

“Okay, great! I’ll be back in a sec!”

She skittered off down the cave passage, and Whilbs was left alone with the trapped Azmorigan and all his invective. Fortunately, long practice had left him able to pretty much tune it all out. He simply responded with the occasional “oink” and moved the sack of aurodium coins every now and then. It was kind of fun, in its way.

“BRING THAT BACK HERE, YOU!”

“Oink.”

“You KARKIN’ LITTLE KARKER—”

“Oink?”

“JUST WAIT—”

“Oink!”

“Once I’m out of here I’m gonna CHOP OFF your UGLY MISSHAPEN HEAD an’ ROAST YOU ALIVE OVER A—”

“Ah, nice job, Sharlytt!”

“Huh?” asked Whilbs. “Who’s that?”

He craned his head. Sharlytt had returned, but she wasn’t alone. With her was a biped of a type completely different from Azmorigan: a Human female in patched coveralls and a wool coat, with fair skin that had become tanned and callused from working outside. Her gray hair, streaked with remnants of brown, was pulled back into a ponytail and bound in a red bandanna. Despite the large herding staff she carried, she had a friendly expression. She smiled at Whilbs as she saw him.

“So you’re Whilbs,” she said. “Pleased to meet you. Name’s Elbara, Fyrn Elbara. I’ve got a farm near here; Sharlytt may have told you.”

“Sharlytt?” Azmorigan remonstrated. “Who the kark’s Sharlytt? And why’re you talkin’ to the pig?!”

“Good afternoon to you, too.” Elbara turned to Azmorigan, eyeing him sidelong. “To whom exactly do I have the, er, honor?”

“IT! DOESN’T! MATTER!” Azmorigan yelled, straining toward Elbara against his sticky, elastic bonds. “Just LET ME OUTTA HERE so I can take my aurodium and LEAVE!”

“Ah! Pleasure to meet you, Mr. It-Doesn’t-Matter, and yes, of course I can do that!”

So saying, Elbara produced a large, frightening-looking pocket knife and began to slice away the bonds of webbing around Azmorigan’s lower legs. Once he was free, he made a beeline for the sack of coins, which he snatched up greedily.

“Good! Finally! Now c’mon, you worthless little vermin, you.” He gave Whilbs a brisk rap with the whip. “Let’s get outta here an’ go home!”

Elbara exchanged glances with Sharlytt, then looked over at Whilbs, then turned to Azmorigan with a glint in her eye.

“We can do that, too,” she said, “but not quiiite the way you think.”

“What?!” barked Azmorigan indignantly. “What’s that supposed to mean?!”

“What that’s supposed to mean is, I’ve got a nice, big, cozy, clean pen back in my barn that’s just the right size for this fine fellow right here. He’ll get to dine on homecooked table scraps three times a day, he’ll have lots of friends to keep him company, not to mention lots of pats and scritches, too.”

Whilbs’s eyes widened. This sounded like an impossible dream after Azmorigan’s whip and the narrow, stuffy pen that awaited him back on Nar Shaddaa. “Gosh, do you really mean all that?”

“Yes, I do! And best of all—best of all—he wouldn’t have to hunt for aurodium in cold, dark caves for people who whip him and insult him!” With that, she fixed Azmorigan with a gigantic grin.

Azmorigan hemmed and hawed and puffed. His already bulgy face bulged even more, turning about three shades redder in the process. His rotund body seemed to inflate almost in puffer-pig fashion.

“What— why you— how dare you—”

But Elbara just kept smiling at him. Sharlytt’s teeth clicked. Whilbs just said, “Oink.”

“All right, fine,” Azmorigan grumbled at last. “’Least I got what I came for. I’m through with this awful place, anyway. See ya!”

He lumbered off down the passageway, grumbling about how puffer pigs were worthless anyway, how he probably could have found the treasure himself anyway, and how he should have known he’d been swindled on Ord Mantell. As he finally disappeared around a distant bend, Elbara smiled and turned to Sharlytt and gave her a friendly pat.

“Good riddance, eh, Sharlytt, ol’ girl?”

“Yep. All in a day’s work. Couldn’t leave a swell beastie like Whilbs at the mercy of a jerk like him.”

“Of course not.” Elbara smiled at Whilbs. Slashing away more webbing to form a path, she went over to him and gave him cordial pats on the head and snout. He grunted happily; it was warm and felt good. Azmorigan had certainly never done anything like that.

“So, how ’bout it, big guy?” she said at last. “Shall we?”

“You betcha!” Whilbs squealed with delight. “And… er… thanks.”

“You, sir, are more than welcome. Now, home we go!”

So Human, ice spider, and puffer pig made their way down the cave path: Elbara leading with staff and glowrod at the ready, and Whilbs and Sharlytt behind, where they exchanged a blithe hoof-claw bump followed by a series of playful nudges, shoves, taps, and chases.

It was still as chilly in the cave as when Whilbs first arrived, but now it felt warmer somehow.

*

Some time later, they emerged from the cave into a scene unlike any Whilbs had seen before. Rolling, half-grassy, half-rocky fields stretched as far as the eye could see, dotted with grazing rock-goats. A barn, a silo, a simple farmhouse, and a few sheds stood around the edges of the central field, where a few more goats grazed, a few nunas pecked insects from the ground, and a fluffy white-and-chocolate canid trotted about happily. Sure, it was still chilly— this was Maldo Kreis, after all— but the sky was bright, the air calm, and pleasant scents wafted about: fresh straw, hearty fodder, and warm animal breath. Whilbs inhaled it all deeply and turned to Sharlytt.

“Yes, indeed,” he said. “Home we go.”

fin

Spoiler: Notes

Maldo Kreis
Knobby white ice spider

The title comes, of course, from E. B. White’s Charlotte’s Web (1952), where it is the first message Charlotte weaves into her web complimenting Wilbur the pig. There are other references to Charlotte’s Web throughout the story, most notably in the characters’ names: Whilbs (Wilbur), Sharlytt (Charlotte), and Fyrn Elbara (Fern Arable).

 

Thank you all so much for the reads and comments, which are always much appreciated!

Thanks so much! Yes, I really enjoyed revisiting Charlotte's Web in the course of writing this; I can see now, more than I did as a kid, what a lovely story of friendship it is, and if I could bring even just a little of that into this story in this wonderful SW universe we love, then I feel I've done my job! So glad you enjoyed.

Thank you! I felt that was no less than Whilbs deserved. And it was fun trying my hand at talking animals and at least one person who can kind-of-sort-of talk to them; that too was inspired by Charlotte's Web.

Well, thank you so much! Puffer pigs were semi-new to me, and it was a creature I didn't expect to see in this particular roulette, so I'm so glad you enjoyed the results. As to the spider, she can be scary when she wants to be, but much of the time she's a pretty friendly soul and generally more interested in defense than offense.

Thanks so much! Yes, again, it was a real joy revisiting such a classic story and understanding better than ever how beautiful it really is. There's a scene in the Rebels episode featuring puffer pigs that features a puffer pig that gets stuck in a door when it inflates from being scared, which ends up being one of the decisive factors in thwarting the baddies, so I was definitely riffing on that here. And indeed the GFFA is so full of unfriendly large spiders (I also considered using kryknas, from Atollon) that I thought it was high time for a friendly, heroic one who uses her "ensnaring" talents for good—which I imagine confuses the heck out of at least some of the visitors to the Elbara farm. Whilbs and Sharlytt will definitely get to see each other and hobnob further now that Whilbs has a happy, pleasant home! Thanks so much again, and apologies again for taking so ridiculously long with your challenge. Better late than never, I say!

Exactly—everyone, in a way, wins! (Though what Azmorigan doesn't know, and will never find out, is that that little bag of gold was only a small fraction of what was there in that cave... oh well, what he doesn't know won't hurt him, right? ) You are right that I wasn't in any way attempting to be subtle with the names, though really they and the general concept of a pig and a spider becoming friends are the only real similarity between this story and the original Charlotte's Web. Good point about Cyrrick, too (and wow, I'm impressed that you got his name right! ); of course he is really just a Human spy who happens to do his spy work in elaborate monster suits, but he knows when to maintain the illusion of monstrous ruthlessness and when not to. Sharlytt has been an ice spider all her life, but she does have it in common with Cyrrick that she knows when it's time to be a monster (per the Monster Challenge prompt) and when to be a friend (per the MMM prompt). Thanks so much as always for coming by to read and comment; I'm so glad you enjoyed this!