MARCH
"Here we are, in beautiful Las Vegas!" Theodore Rex exclaims, stepping fresh out of the airport with suitcases held in each claw. The dinosaur's nostrils inhale deeply, replacing stagnant plane air with the fresh air of the city. "Viva Las Vegas! Viva, Las Vegas!" He began to sing, shuffling his feet in what one might call some sort of dance if they were feeling generous that day.
Inch High Private Eye squirmed his way out of the bulging edges of one of the suitcases, peering out from what could be described as a nest made of clothing if one was not afraid of the letters they would receive from offended fastidious nest-builders.
"I think I may have shifted a bit during the flight," the miniature mystery solver states, holding his stomach with a groan.
"Well I didn't pack any toilet paper so be more careful next time!" Theodore says, mishearing his pint-sized partner. Theodore scans the area, "Wow! Sure ain't busy today! Maybe they close the casinos on Sundays?"
Inch High recovered his composure to begin looking around. The cargo hold had hardly been a place to gauge the sort of flight he and Theodore had arrived on, but he noticed the airport traffic was nearly non-existent, and the same thing could be said for any buildings that dared to ascend beyond the second story. Inch grabbed his chin now, looking at the especially lush foliage that was not afraid of receiving any punishment for daring to creep onto the city infrastructure.
"This city sure is a sight, but the scenery is all out of sorts. This looks very different from the motion pictures." Inch observes, before being forced to take a new look at things as he and his suitcase ride are hoisted above the head of Theodore Rex.
"There, is that more like the pictures?" Theodore asks.
"I'm still not seeing it, but I can appreciate the view. This place really blows me away. You should put me down before you have to chase me down the street again!" Inch says, holding his hat on his head with one arm and keeping himself from blowing away with the other. The suitcase is lowered, as is Theodore's brow as he considers the situation.
"Hmm... Well you know nothing they show in movies is real! I mean, I saw this awesome movie about Las Vegas once, and there were cavemen and dinosaurs and even this little green alien!" Theodore says, almost wishing that as he said it, the movie would come to life before his eyes just to prove him wrong.
"I believe you are thinking about Rock Vegas, Theodore, and we need to have a long talk about your taste in movies when we've figured this all out." Inch says as he finally leaps free from his suitcase suite to hitch a ride in Theodore's jacket.
The policing pair begin to walk into the city, continuing to figure out just why the city seemed so out of sorts to them. Inch High's private eyes are caught by the street signs, "Hmm... all the signs here seem to be in Spanish!"
"Well, it is Las Vegas, which is, after all, Spanish for 'The Vegas', so it makes sense they'd have Spanish signs, right?" Theodore says, scratching his head as he tries to justify the oddities before them.
Inch High does not respond immediately, instead watching the foot traffic that consisted entirely of ownerless dogs meandering about the nearly empty streets. "If these pooches are any indication, we are definitely not in Kansas anymore, let alone Las Vegas."
"What do you mean?" Theodore asks, "I'm sure Las Vegas has tons of dogs!"
"Some people might call Vegas a Dog Town, but it certainly isn't a One Horse Town. Let's stop in somewhere so we can get to the bottom of this." Inch High says, tugging Theodore's jacket to try and mush the massive dinosaur in the direction of a nearby corner store. Instead, Theodore marches down the street, his head staring skyward as they walk under a large banner. Theodore begins sounding out the Spanish words on it, reading it much slower than he needed to in doing so, but before he could reach the conclusion that lie at the end of the banner's advertisement, Inch High had already spotted the problem as he watches a truck pass by on the lonely road.
The tiny detective's eyes bulge large enough to nearly match the size of that red X in the corner of your browser window as he reads the license plate, "Theodore... may I see our plane ticket?"
"Sure! It should be right next to you!" Theodore says, jamming his claws into his pockets to try and find it. Inch quickly bats away the curious claw that plunged into his protected pocket to prevent any accidental impalement and rummages around the many contents of the jacket, eventually pulling out the crumpled airline ticket.
"Just as I suspected. We are in Las Vegas alright... Las Vegas, Santa Barbara, Honduras!" The private eye exclaims dramatically, his index finger shooting upwards as he says it.
"OH NOOOOOOOooooo...oooooo....oooo? Really? Wow, what a mix-up! Guess I shoulda been more careful ordering our plane ticket! Maybe next time you should look it over first!" Theodore says sheepishly, but Inch High seems to be in less jovial mood than his compatriot.
"I would, but it's hard to read when your eyes are as big as the letter I," Inch says, not angrily, mind you, but more in the way someone who has come to terms with this sort of impediment in his life and must admit such things on a regular basis.
"Well, maybe we can get you a magnifying glass, or, well, a REVERSE magnifying glass, to make the words smaller! OH! We could turn a telescope backwards, that always makes things seem smaller!" Theodore says, slamming claw into palm as if he had won some sort of victory for thinking up the solution.
"Smaller, but further away too. But that can wait. For now, we need to find our ticket out of here." says the pipsqueak PI.
"Do we have to? I mean, I always wanted to go on vacation! I even packed a Hawaiian shirt! Hawaii is kind of like Honduras, right?" Theodore asked, pleading with his pal and face nearly shoved in his coat pocket to reach the PI.
"Maybe when there are missing people who disappeared from sunny beaches or nature walks. For now, we need to make sure that Las Vegas's population has a few less question marks at the end of it!" The detective declares, dashing Theodore's hopes of a brief Honduran vacation.
"Fine, we'll go then... Hey! Maybe this time I can convince them to let you on as my carry-on!" Theodore says, his spunk already back and the spring back in his step as they begun the not-so-long trek back to the airport.
"Well, I do contain less than 3 ounces of liquid," Inch High notes.
"Good! Then we won't need to stop at the restroom!" Theodore says, and the two begin to arrange their flight back to America and onwards to Las Vegas!
...Las Vegas, New Mexico, that is.
This humble city in the Land of Enchantment proves to be a much more convincing City of Lights substitute than the Central American municipality, and one that takes far longer for the dopey duo to realize is not actually the city they were assigned to.They also had the far more plausible excuse to send back to their superiors this time: the NM and NV difference between the two similar cities in similarly abbreviated states was more understandable on a bureaucratic level than the excursion out of the country. Unfortunately, red tape cuts deep, especially when its wrapped around you twice, and as Theodore Rex and Inch High Private Eye tried to work their way to the City of Lights, they found days dragging into weeks dragging into months. Even as May threatened to arrive, the two found their butts firmly planted in Las Vegas, New Mexico's Plaza Hotel, hoping to soon be doing something besides watching the complimentary basic cable...
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