Snaggers Keepers/Part 5

Sometime after Prozalek helped the Smurfs restore the village back to normal and then left, Empath and Polaris decided to take a walk around the outer limits of the village. Smurfette came along with crutches. Both Empath and Polaris walked slowly enough for Smurfette to keep close to them, and to make sure she didn’t strain herself in her recovery.

“So what are you going to do without your meditational stone, Polaris?” Smurfette asked.

“This one will manage to do his meditations without one, Smurfette,” Polaris answered. “It is not necessary for this one to have such an item with me. It is merely a tool for this one to focus his thoughts upon.”

“But Empath smurfed it to you for your smurfday,” Smurfette said, concerned for him. “Doesn’t it matter that Empath smurfed effort into giving you a smurfday present that would be useful for your private times?”

“Polaris is right, Smurfette,” Empath joined in. “As much as this smurf put a lot of effort into selecting a perfect gift for him to enjoy his moments of meditations with, it is still nothing more than a tool that can be replaced. The Psyches have lived for centuries without the need for having personal possessions bind them in such a way that they can’t live their lives without them on hand. It’s too bad the same couldn’t be said for Prozalek. His very life and peace of mind is tied into that amulet that controls the demon inside him.”

“I hope that someday he won’t have to smurf around with that burden,” Smurfette empathetically said.

“Or anyone else, for that matter,” Polaris seconded.

“So what are you going to do about your weight problem, Smurfette?” Empath asked.

Smurfette sighed, sounding like she had a bitter pill to swallow. “Well, I’m just going to have to smurf the fact that, even as much as I want to smurf down to a perfect body size, I’m going to have to smurf careful about what I eat and what I don’t eat. I don’t think it’s worth smurfing myself to death just in order to still be slim enough to smurf anything.”

“Even if it attracts other male Smurfs?” Empath asked with a hint in his voice.

“You know, a girl Smurf’s gotta do what a girl Smurf’s gotta do,” Smurfette answered slyly.

“Hey, Empath, look what I smurfed out in the forest,” a voiced called out.

Empath, Smurfette, and Polaris turned to see Clumsy approaching them, carrying a bag full of rocks. He laid the bag before them and opened it to show the various types of rocks he had picked up in the forest when Smurfette noticed something. “That rock smurfs like it’s very shiny,” she observed.

Empath noticed what Smurfette was looking at. “It’s Polaris’ meditational stone!” he exclaimed. “Clumsy must have found it somewhere that was hidden from Nabby’s view of sight.”

Polaris picked up the stone and observed it, recognizing all its markings and recalling when Empath first gave it to him for his day of emergence. He never thought that holding something would give him such memories.

“Gee, Empath, I didn’t know that this rock would be so valuable to Polaris,” Clumsy said honestly. “If he smurfs it so much, he can have it. I got plenty of rocks to smurf me busy.”

Polaris then shook his head, handing the stone back to Clumsy. “It has no more value to this one, Clumsy. You can add it to your collection of rocks. It’s this one’s personal gift to you.”

Clumsy was stunned that Polaris would hand him back his valuable stone. “Well, thanks, Polaris,” he responded, putting it back in his bag before closing it back up. “I know the perfect place in my house where that stone would go.”

Empath watched with Smurfette and Polaris as Clumsy carried his rocks home. “Polaris, you certainly made a fellow Smurf happy with this smurf’s day of emergence present to you.”

“As this one can recall, Empath, it is you who said that the giving of gifts is what makes one a Smurf,” Polaris answered. “Nothing would make this one feel more like your own people than to see this one’s present be put to better use among this one’s fellow Smurfs.”

“A good thing, too, that Nabby no longer has anything to smurf from you, Polaris,” Smurfette said. “He’ll have to go smurf somebody else if he’s going to keep smurfing off with somebody’s stuff.”

Just then, in the distance, the three of them could hear Greedy shouting in anger from the kitchen.

“Nabby, smurf back here with that!”

“This smurf only hopes that food will be the only thing Nabby will be nabbing for the time being,” Empath commented.

Smurfette laughed with Empath as they headed off.

THE END