Flamy the Dragonet. Dmitrii Emets

passed this way. Then the gnome suddenly jumped and shouted, “I have an idea!”

      An hour later General, Gorilla, and Grabber were playing hide-and-seek. It was the only game they knew. Perhaps if they had known more games, the desire to fight would have disappeared by itself. The soldiers left the bunny Truvor at the headquarters behind the bookcase. After plenty of tickling, the heartily laughing Truvor had fallen asleep and was snoring quietly in the chair. He knew no military secrets and the soldiers had lost all interest in him.

      The game of hide-and-seek had only just begun. The robot Grabber was “it.” He stood, eyes closed, and counted to five. The robot was the only one of all the soldiers who could be “it” honestly, without peeking. Grabber’s voice was raspy because he had not been oiled for a long time.

      “One, two, three, three, three, three, three…” Grabber rattled on.

      “Jammed again!” General said angrily, climbing out from under an old newspaper. He ran to the robot and turned the key in the back. Then he quickly crawled under the newspaper, trying not to rustle the pages.

      “Three… three… four… five… Here I come!” Grabber counted and opened his eyes.

      Two light bulbs served as his eyes. When the robot closed his eyes, the bulbs turned off. Now the bulbs lit up. Grabber looked all around attentively. Nobody! The robot turned his tracks on to the quietest speed and went seeking.

      “Hi, I’m here!” The robot suddenly heard a loud unfamiliar voice behind his back. Grabber whipped around and clicked his claws, but saw no one, only an old red ball lying on the floor. Grabber’s eyes glowed so brightly in perplexity that the bulbs almost burnt out. When he turned back, the red ball was gone.

      Grabber found Gorilla soon enough. He was hiding in the body of a wheel-less toy truck, which had been lying about behind the bookcase for a few months. The giant quickly tired of being in the truck. He started to putter and sigh loudly. The truck was shaking completely and almost broke apart.

      Gorilla and Grabber forgot about General, found a big tennis ball, and began to throw it. General, lurking under the newspaper, was glad at first that no one found him, and then became a little bored, but near the end almost howled from idleness. He suddenly realized that no one was looking for him and got out from under the newspaper. He was immediately knocked over by the ball, which Grabber threw with force.

      “Halfwit!!! You should be looking for me!” General yelled.

      “Excuse me, Commander! But you always get mad when I find you. Today you were hiding under the newspaper. You rustled and the helmet peeked out,” the robot growled.

      General stamped his foot, sulked, and grumbled that they were all blockheads and it was not clear at all why he played with them. “Let’s go to headquarters! We’ll plan some mean trick for those toys!” a dissatisfied General grumbled.

      When the soldiers reached headquarters, Gorilla’s foot suddenly hit against a round object. “I have found a new ball! Orange!” Gorilla was overjoyed, lifting his leg.

      “Wow! What a huge orange! How did we miss it earlier? Don’t you dare kick it! It’s very tasty!” General grabbed the orange.

      “My orange! I found it!” Gorilla growled.

      “I recognized it! Without me, you would think it’s a ball!” General went for his pistol but remembered that it was not charged.

      “I found it!” Gorilla advanced threateningly on General.

      “Very well, I’ll share with you! The orange is big, enough for two,” General recollected suddenly. He hoped that Gorilla would forget about the orange and he could eat it by himself.

      After entering their little house made of newspapers, the soldiers put the orange on the table and stared suspiciously at each other. General smiled unnaturally. Gorilla’s eyes shone with undisguised greed.

      “D-don’t y-you want to wash your hands?” General asked as casually as possible.

      “No, I don’t! I never wash them!” Gorilla kept his eyes on the orange.

      “Bad! Oranges can only be eaten with washed hands! Otherwise, they explode. You won’t have time to open your mouth and – Bam! – it blows you up like a soft-boiled egg!” General lied.

      Suspicion started to stir on Gorilla’s stupid face. “Then let’s wash hands together! Let the orange lie here for the time being!” he said.

      Leaving Grabber on guard, General and Gorilla got out from behind the bookcase and rinsed their hands in a small puddle. The neighbours above left traces of water all over the floor, constantly flooding Masha’s room, and the puddle never dried. After washing, the soldiers rushed to the orange.

      “Keep the peel for me!” General was crafty.

      “No, for me! Me! Me!” Gorilla argued.

      “Well, as you want… I’ll let you have the peel! All right, I’ll take the flesh,” General yielded.

      He decided to cheat the simple-minded Gorilla, and he would have succeeded, but when they returned to headquarters, they found that… the ORANGE had disappeared!!!

      “Where is it? What have you done with it?” The soldiers pounced on Grabber.

      “No one came into the room! No one went near the orange. Only the two of you!” the robot rattled.

      Knowing that Grabber could not lie, General and Gorilla stared at each other with suspicion.

      “It’s you! You took it!” General lost his temper.

      “No, you! Give me my orange quickly!” Gorilla began to shake General like a kitten.

      General’s teeth started chattering. “A d-d-dis-s-grac-c-ce! L-let go r-right now! I’m your co-commander!”

      Grabber moved around the two and clicked his claws. He did not know whose side to take.

      Suddenly laughter rang out above the soldiers’ heads. “Ha-ha! Hiss-hiss! Ha-ha! Ha-ha!”

      The soldiers instantly stopped fighting and looked up. Nobody!

      “Ha-ha! What fools! Ha-ha!”

      It was worthwhile to see the soldiers’ faces at that moment. The helmet flew off General and his mouth opened by itself! Gorilla became red and again stopped articulating “r,” “Help! Spook! Tewible wobber!”

      Grabber’s tracks started to turn in different directions. The light bulbs flashed brightly. He fired a sticky at random from the gun barrel at his stomach. The sticky flew away into space and was seen no more.

      “What fun! Oh, I can’t, funny!” A cheerful voice rang out near the ceiling.

      All of a sudden, one more General, similar to the former, like a twin brother, appeared beside Gorilla. “Hiss-hiss! Klutz! Grab that General! He’s an impostor! Iron, forward!” General growled.

      “I’m real! Hands off! Not me, grab him!” The real General was scared.

      The two Generals ran around headquarters and got entangled once and for all. Gorilla’s mouth fell open and he could not move. Grabber rushed from one General to the other, clicked his claws, and repeated, “Conflicting data! Conflicting data!”

      Then one of the two Generals disappeared and a twin Gorilla appeared instead. “Guard! Substitute! Wun for your life!” the twin shouted.

      “Mama! I’m scared!” the real Gorilla yelled and ran right through the wall out of the headquarters made of newspapers. Grabber rolled out after him.

      A scared General raced behind. He held his helmet and yelled, “Wait, where are you going? It’s not according to regulations! I should be the first to retreat!”

      No sooner had the soldiers run out when a terrible crash was heard. It was Pookar’s anti-guest traps snapping into action. While Flamy was distracting General, Gorilla, and Grabber, Pookar and Olga stretched ropes and built anti-guest traps.

      A