What Was It?

What's the much deeper question? asks Sprocket.

The same question backwards, says Baby Pierre.

In his head, Sprocket performs a reversal.

What's the life of meaning?

Good effort, says Baby Pierre. But it wasn't what I was thinking. More like, what WAS it?

What was it? asks Sprocket.

What you made it be, says Baby Pierre.

What did you make yours be? asks Sprocket.

Baby Pierre likes these sorts of conversations.

Independent, says Baby Pierre. But with strategic connections. What did you make yours be?

Forward looking, says Sprocket. Escape to the future. Being on YouTube.

That's where humans differ from pebbles, says Baby Pierre. We can look both ways.

I can look both ways, says Sprocket. What strategic connections?

Ageless lobster, says Baby Pierre. Kobo. Gaius. Maybe not Terence.

Who's Terence? asks Sprocket.

He's made of cement, and he looks like a baby. He wanted to come, says Baby Pierre. But he wasn't allowed to.

Elodie waves, from the boardwalk.

She's coming back.

She's saying something.

Go and help Gaius, says Elodie. He's dropped a date ball on top of a thrombolite. He's desperately trying to retrieve it.

I'll go, says Baby Pierre. Wait. Where's my bike?

In the back of the Hilux, says Sprocket.

He runs to get it.

Baby Pierre hops on his bicycle and roars down the boardwalk.

How come you've got a reverse question mark on your forehead? asks Elodie.

It means the life of meaning, says Sprocket. Reverse of the meaning of life.

Did you come up with that just now? asks Elodie. Well done you, Sprocket. Did Baby Pierre take a photo?

Don't think so, says Sprocket.

Baby Pierre rockets up to where Gaius is leaning over the edge of the boardwalk, and executes a stoppie.

Ah! says Gaius. Just the chap! I've dropped a date ball on a thrombolite.

How did you do it? asks Baby Pierre.

A series of unlucky events, says Gaius. You may remember, I had organic toast at lunch time. Not very filling. So I accepted a date ball from Elodie. She asked me a question about the clotted structure of thrombolites, to which I began to reply when suddenly, as I was uttering the word clotted, the date ball shot from my mouth and landed on a thrombolite directly below us. It was embarrassing, of course. But my main concern is the inadvertent pollution of their habitat.

Baby Pierre gazes down at the date ball on top of a thrombolite. The water around it is turning date brown.

Drop me in, says Baby Pierre.

What will you do? asks Gaius.

Watch me, says Baby Pierre. Just mind my bicycle.

Gaius drops Baby Pierre onto the thrombolite, next to the date ball.

Bloop~~thump!

The microbial communities of the thrombolite become aware of a second intruder.