As First Dates Go

Chapter Three

"Wait - just let me go and check the map," Dashi decided, getting up and beginning to head to the back of the Gup. "We can't be that far from where we're supposed to be."

Shellington tried to take the controls with the grace and ease that Dashi seemed to employ, but typically in his natural clumsiness, his paw somehow managed to slip on the thruster and the Gup lurched worryingly sideways, not helped much by the suddenly strengthening currents around them. Shellington did his best to level the Gup out, but it was more difficult than he had been previously used to just driving through calm waters. He had never really been in any kind of storm in a Gup before, or never driving one, at any rate.

Dashi looked quickly back at him, evidently feeling the Gup battling the paths of water that swept through the kelp forest. "Shellington! Be -"

But what he had to be, he would never find out, because just then the water apparently made up its mind as to which way it wanted to travel and this new, stronger current took the Gup from the front, tilting it up and abruptly backwards. Shellington had no choice but to hold on for dear life, while Dashi, who had been quickly trying to make her way back to the dashboard to help out with the tricky steering, was thrown backwards by the jolt into the back of the Gup A.

Luckily, a moment later, the Gup met a soft landing in a thick, interwoven few strands of kelp, and Shellington opened his eyes to find them stationary in green leaves, the only sign of the currents a slight battering from behind. They were safe. Obviously not there yet, of course, but safe.

"Dashi?" Suddenly realising his girlfriend was no longer sitting in the seat beside him, Shellington looked around anxiously, his voice raising in inexplicable fear. "Dashi?"

The female dachshund was sitting, looking slightly dazed, in the back of the Gup - the remains of the party food that Tunip had given them scattered all around her. There was kelp cake stained on her fur, and a stray fish biscuit or two clung onto the wide rim of her hat.

Shellington rushed to help her up, babbling instantly, as was his defence mechanism in such situations. "I'm so sorry, Dashi! I lost control of the Gup, and -"

Dashi allowed him to pull her to her feet, out of the pile of crushed party food. "No, I shouldn't have made you drive the Gup in these currents -" she explained hurriedly.

"I should have -"

"Are you -?"

"It was completely my -"

"No, no, it was me -"

Shut up, Shellington! Obediently, the scientist managed to quell his babbling, just as his girlfriend fell silent, the same thoughts evidently occurring to her. They stared at each other, Shellington's eyes wide and worried, Dashi's expression ever so slightly comical, given that she was now covered in patches of kelp cake.

Then, just as Shellington was beginning to panic just a little more at her reaction, Dashi lifted a paw and wiped some kelp off her cheek - flicking it in one neatly aimed motion at Shellington. He pulled a disgruntled expression as the missile hit him in the ear. This broke the spell: the photographer's expression changed back into her characteristic smile and mercifully, she began to laugh infectiously just a moment later. Shellington, once he had ascertained for sure that Dashi wasn't angry at him, flicked the scrap of kelp back in her direction (though he wasn't as good at aiming as her so it missed entirely) and joined her in her tentative laughter.

"How do I look?" started Dashi in a giggle after a moment, striking a pose and tilting her head cutely to one side as a fish biscuit fell out of the wide brim of her ridiculously large hat, as if on cue.

Shellington had to admit, she did look twice as amazing as he had ever thought she had this morning, especially with brightly coloured morsels of kelp cakes sticking to clumps of her long chestnut fur. "You look - perfect," he repeated, again completely honestly.

Dashi giggled at the compliment. "Well, it's nice to know that food seems to suit me, anyway. I'm not sure it'll be making any magazine covers any time soon, but we can but hope."

"Hey, you've got a little something on you," pointed out Shellington, gently wiping away another piece of kelp cake from a spot just beneath one of his girlfriend's ears.

"Sorry," Dashi said slightly ruefully, looking around at the boxes of food she had managed to fall into. "I guess I'm now wearing most of the feast the Vegimals prepared for the party."

"It's okay. Look." Shellington attempted to clear some of the crushed kelp cakes away from the piles, only really managing to get most of it on his own fur in the cleaning process. Now, at least, both he and Dashi looked like they had been in a particularly messy food fight. "Luckily, Tunip packed the food in boxes, and only the top ones opened when you fell on them." He gestured to the boxes underneath, slightly dented, but still intact. "We still have party food to bring to the party."

"Now all we need to do is get to said party," commented Dashi thoughtfully.

"It can't be far now," reasoned Shellington. "We can probably swim from here - providing we haven't been going in the wrong direction all this time, of course. Shall we get out of the Gup and try to get our bearings?"

"Good idea," agreed Dashi, her lips briefly brushing his own as she almost skipped past him. "Let's go."

They were both still chuckling quietly as they made their way out from the Gup carrying boxes of party food, Shellington absently flicking a piece of kelp cake at his giggling girlfriend as she reciprocated with her own speck of green seaweed from what appeared to be the remains of a seaweed sandwich.

"You know, this does look kind of familiar..." started Shellington slowly, something in his subconsciousness alerting him as he breathed in the familiar scent of his home, even more potent than the letter had been. He was home.

"Hello! Shellington!" The pleasant tones of his sister cut across him in greeting from the kelp wall after only a moment of looking around, and Pearl swam into view, looking a little taken aback as she took in their appearances. "What - um - happened to you two?"

Shellington paused in his response, wondering how to answer the enquiry. Luckily, Dashi seemed to instantly read his worried expression and easily took over explanations duty, as she was accustomed to doing when his eloquence failed him. "Nothing that we couldn't handle," she assessed lightly, slipping her soft paw into Shellington's. The sea otter squeezed it gratefully. Thanks, Dashi.

Pearl nodded, apparently deciding that it was safest not to inquire into details of why they were both apparently wearing food. "Nice outfit, by the way, Dashi," was her only cheerful reply.

"Thank you!" Dashi replied sincerely, giving her friend a hug as they approached.

"We're not late, are we?" Shellington asked in sudden concern. "We got a bit lost, you see, and -"

"You're just in time," Pearl reassured them, cutting him off for the second time in so many minutes and beckoning the couple to follow her with a paw. "The party's just beginning. Follow me!"