Jolly and the Legume-Stalk
by Erin Gieg
October, 1998

DISCLAIMER:  The Characters of Battlestar Galactica belong to Glen A.
Larson. No copyright infringement is intended.

     Once upon a battlestar, a warrior named Jolly lived alone in his
quarters with only a Keltoi ovine to his name.  Everyday he faithfully
fed his ovine. Once a yahren, he sheared the fleece off the animal and
took the wool to market.  The cubits from the sale, with proper
rationing, would pay Jolly's way for the rest of the yahren.
     One day, Jolly arose and went to feed his beast only to find that
the ovine had gone prematurely bald overnight!  Sadly, Jolly decided that
he would have to sell his pet.  With the now-woolless beast in tow, he
set out to the shuttle to the Pathmain, where a seeder's market was held
regularly.  Along the way, an old gap-toothed man stopped him.
     "Where are you going with that ovine?" the man asked.  "It doesn't
have any fleece."
     "I'm going to the seeder's market to sell it." Jolly answered.
     "I'll tell you what," the man said. "I'll trade you these glycine
legumes for your bald ovine."
     "I couldn't," Jolly said, shaking his head.
     "It's more than you'll get at the market."
     Reluctantly, Jolly agreed to the deal.  He took the legumes from the
man, turned around and trudged back to his quarters.
     The man looked thoughtfully at the ovine after Jolly was out of
hearing range, and said, "Looks like you got into a spot of Colonial hair
remover, little chap."  Then he chuckled to himself.  "Looks like I got
myself a good deal out of this."
     Meanwhile, Jolly made his way home, and when he sat down in his
quarters, he looked again at the legumes in his hand, and began to get
quite depressed.  
     "I guess that's that," he said to himself.  "How am I going to make
these few legumes last me all yahren, let along a cycle.  Whatever was I
thinking?"
     With that, something within him broke, and he tossed the legumes
over his shoulder, where they clattered down a vent and into a plantbed
in a hydroponics bay a level below.
    In the morning, when Jolly woke up, it was pitch black.
     "Oh no," he thought. "We've had a power failure!"
     He quickly opened the door to the hallway and stepped outside his
quarters.  Clad in his plaid pajamas (complete with a giant red pom-pom
on the tip of the cap), he realized that his assumption was in error. 
Some people chuckled as they passed, while others tried to hide their
smiles. The lights were definitely working.  Jolly went back inside and
turned on his small portable lamp.  Then, he noticed it.  There was a
giant legume-stalk in the corner of the room and it had punched a hole in
the floor and the ceiling and grown up and up and up, so that Jolly could
see no end to it. (He knew what it was, of course, from his friendship
with Ensign Greenbean).  
     "Well," thought Jolly.  "I guess I've nothing left to try."
     Up the beanstalk he went.  
     After centons and centons of gasping and wheezing, Jolly finally
made it up to the top.  Stepping down onto the ground (ground??!!  Of
course there was ground!  This *is* a fairytale, after all), he viewed
rows and rows of sand dunes stretching off into the horizon.  With a
groan, he set off toward a large pyramid that he could see in the
distance.
     "Where's a shuttle when you really need one," he grumbled. 
     Many centars later, he reached the door of the pyramid.  He knocked.
     "Ouch!" he yelped.  "Those stone door hurt!"
     Suddenly, the door slid aside, and a giant Lucifer poked his head
out.  
     "You can not come in here," he said.  "My commander will put you
into a cell and torture you."
     Jolly paled a tad at the thought, but he straightened up in a micron
and said, "I don't care...I'm extremely hungry.  I must have something to
munch."
     So Lucifer let Jolly into the pyramid and fed him.  Jolly had just
finished his haggis when he heard a great pounding on the floor.  
     "What's that," he asked.
     "It's my superior, Baltar," said Lucifer.  "You must hide in the
oven."
     "What's an oven doing in a cylon building?" Jolly wondered.
     "Never mind," Lucifer answered, leaving Jolly to fear the worst, but
he hid in the oven anyway.
     Soon, the giant Baltar came in the room, and he stuck his nose in
the air.     
     "Fee Fi Fo Fum
     I smell the blood of a Warrior-man
     Be he white or be he plaid,
     I'll have him for my torture rack"
     Then Baltar giggled insanely, "Gee, I'm good."
     "Ever so," Lucifer said sarcastically, and rolled his eyespots.
"You're imagining things again, Baltar.  Sit down and I'll get your
lunch."
     When the lunch was eaten up, Baltar said, "I want to count my
cubits.  Misers do that, you know."
     Lucifer attempted a sigh, then decided he would have to program that
ability in.  He gave up trying for now and went to get Baltar's cubits.
     After placing the bags on the table, he gave Baltar a disgusted
look.
     "I do not know why you keep those old rusty cubits around.  You
cannot spend them anywhere."
     Baltar ignored Lucifer and counted cubits until he fell asleep.
     Jolly heard the loud snores coming from the giant, so he popped out
of the oven, grabbed two bags of cubits, and ran all the way home.
     The cubits bought Jolly food enough for quite a few sectons, but the
time came when the last cubit had been spent, so Jolly climbed up the
legume-stalk and went straight to the pyramid door.
     The door slid open at his knock, and Lucifer poked his head out
again.
     "Aren't you the one who came and ate my haggis and then stole
Baltar's cubits?"
     Jolly scratched his head thoughtfully.  "I guess I can't fool you."
     Lucifer bowed slightly, then said in a conspiratorial whisper, "That
is all right.  I do not like Baltar either."
     Lucifer brought Jolly some nice ambrosa and mushies.  Jolly gobbled
them up as fast as he could.  No sense in letting them go to waste, after
all.  Before he could ask for seconds, Baltar's footsteps pounded toward
the room.
     Lucifer sighed, having reprogrammed that aspect, and said to Jolly,
"Well, you had best get in the oven again."
     Just after Jolly hid in the oven, Baltar came tromping in.
     "Fee Fi Fo Fum
     I smell the blood of a Warrior-man
     Be he white or be he plaid,
     I'll have him for my torture rack"
     "It sounds better every time I use it," Baltar cackled.
     Lucifer just nodded.
     "Yes, well you're wrong again."
     "Drat!"
     Lucifer brought Baltar his breakfast. Once the giant was finished
eating, he said, "Lucifer, bring me my poulon."
     "I don't know why you insist on keeping that thing," Lucifer said
disdainfully.  "It's a disagreeably messy creature.  It cackles and makes
a mess all over the coffee table."
     When Lucifer brought the little red poulon and put it on the table,
Baltar looked at it greedily and said, "Lay."
     And the hen laid a golden egg.
     "Oeuf!" the hen grunted.
     After Baltar thought the poulon had produced enough eggs for the
time being, he fell asleep.
     Jolly, again hearing those enormous snores coming from the table,
jumped out of the oven and put the hen in a burlap sack that he had
brought with him. As quickly as he could, he ran out the door of the
pyramid and all the way home.  
     The poulon laid many golden eggs.  Jolly sold them on the Pathmain. 
This lasted for a little more than a yahren.  The time came when the hen
could no longer lay perfect eggs.  Jolly was obliged to sell her. He went
once again to the pyramid at the top of the legume-stalk.  He waited near
the door until Lucifer opened it and came outside to get Baltar's
underwear from the clothesline.
     "How humiliating," Lucifer muttered over and over.
     Jolly sneaked into the room where he had hidden before and hid in a
large basket.
     Lucifer came back in, hung the underwear by the fire to finish
drying, and started to pour a goblet of ambrosa for Baltar.
     Soon, the thumping of Baltar's footsteps were heard, and when he
entered the room, he said: 
     "Fee Fi Fo Fum
     I smell the blood of a Warrior-man!
     Be he fat or skinny or a ninny,
     He'll be longer when I get through with him"
     "Sometimes I amaze myself," Baltar grinned.
     Lucifer did not even bother to comment this time.
     "Well, it has got to be that warrior who stole your cubits and your
poulon.  He will be in the oven, I imagine."
     So the pair went and whipped open the oven door, and besides for a
bruised forehead where Baltar did not manage to move out of the way in
time, they found nothing.
     Baltar went back to his ambrosa.  When he was done, Batlar asked
Lucifer to get his harp.
     Lucifer came back in the room with a small golden figurine holding a
delicately crafted p'iob. 
     "What happened to my harp??" Baltar screeched.
     "You broke it in a rage last time when it wouldn't play your
favorite song."
     "Oh, well then I guess this will do," Baltar said.  "Play!"
     The little figurine played his instrument.  Finally, after a host of
songs, the figurine was getting tired of being jostled about the table
whenever Baltar thought the song was dance-worthy, so it began to play a
lullaby.  Soon, Baltar began to snore.  
     Jolly climbed out of the basket and began to make off with the p'iob
figure.  
     When they were just out the door, the figurine realized that Jolly,
with running through the sand so fast, was going to get dust all over in
his p'iob, so he called out, "Hey, BALTAR!"
     Baltar woke up and saw Jolly just out the door.  He got up
immediately and shouted for Lucifer to go and get him his property. 
Lucifer started off after Jolly, rolling his eyespots again.
     Jolly ran and ran. Finally he made it to the legume-stalk.  He
looked up and saw Lucifer coming down after him.  Finally, Jolly reached
the bottom of the stalk. He set down the p'iob figure near the door.
Quickly, he rummaged about a drawer and found a small laser.  He started
the tool cutting through the legume-stalk.  Lucifer was nearer and
nearer. At last, the laser did its job and the legume-stalk detached from
its bottom part and floated up and off into space.  (insert suspension of
reality here)  
     So Lucifer and Baltar and the pyramid drifted and drifted...until
they were picked up by a basestar.
     And Jolly lived with the p'iob player, who did not get dust in his
instrument after all.  Jolly earned cubits by hiring the figurine out for
various folk festivals about the fleet.  And he lived happily ever after.
                        THE END    

Erin Gieg aka Airys, Adamma, Giegabyte, or Erin #5 (so far...)
giegabyte@connect.ab.ca