Shear Madness at the Airport

The terminal smelled like coffee and carpet cleaner and quiet desperation. Clive loved it. He'd never been in an airport before, and everything fascinated him — the moving walkways, the overpriced sandwiches, the way everyone walked like they were late for something even when they clearly weren't.

First problem: he looked like a sheep. This needed addressing.

He ducked into a shop called "TRAVEL ESSENTIALS" which sold the kind of things nobody actually needs — neck pillows shaped like animals, phone chargers that cost more than phones, and hats. Lots of hats.

Clive grabbed the biggest one: neon green, with "I ❤️ BEING A TOURIST!" across the front. He jammed it down to his eyebrows. Then sunglasses — massive ones, the kind that made you look like either a celebrity or a fly. He checked himself in the mirror.

"Stunning," he whispered.

"You buying that?" The cashier was watching him with the dead eyes of someone on hour nine of a twelve-hour shift.

Clive dumped a handful of things on the counter. Bottle caps, mostly. A washer he'd found in the forklift. The cashier looked at the pile, looked at Clive, and seemed to perform some internal calculation about whether this was worth the confrontation.

It was not.

"Have a nice flight," she said flatly.

Next: ID. Clive spotted a kiosk offering custom photo lanyards — the kind of thing conference attendees wear to feel important. He trotted over.

"One ID, please," he told the bored attendant.

"Stand there. Don't blink."

The camera flashed. Clive grinned with every tooth he had, which in retrospect was a lot of teeth for a "human."

"Name?" the attendant asked, pen hovering over a form.

Clive's mind went blank. Completely, catastrophically blank. He looked around for inspiration. Saw a poster for a steakhouse.

"Beef," he said.

"...Beef?"

"Mr. Beef."

The attendant wrote it down without further comment, which told Clive everything he needed to know about how much this person cared about their job.

Armed with his new identity — Mr. Beef, international traveller — Clive headed for the gate. The final security checkpoint loomed ahead. He watched other passengers hand over their documents, studied their body language, and tried to replicate the specific brand of tired irritation that seemed to be the universal airport mood.

He handed over his laminated ID. The guard squinted at it.

"Mr. Beef?"

"Beef by name," Clive said, and then, for reasons he'd never be able to explain, flexed his foreleg. "Beef by nature."

The guard handed it back. "Go ahead."

The metal detector beeped when he walked through. Clive froze.

"Any metal items, sir?"

He fished around in his wool and produced three loose screws from the forklift. He held them out like a child showing a teacher something they'd found at recess.

"Sentimental value," he said.

The guard waved him through, and Clive was fairly sure he heard her mutter "I don't get paid enough for this" as he walked away.

The gate was packed. Clive found a seat, picked up an abandoned newspaper, and held it upside down, pretending to read. When the boarding call came, he shuffled into line, holding his fish market receipt between his teeth because his hooves couldn't manage the grip any other way.

The flight attendant at the door glanced at his "ticket," glanced at his face, and waved him on. Clive suspected she hadn't actually looked at either.

He found a window seat and climbed in, pressing his nose to the glass like a kid on Christmas morning. The businessman next to him did a slow double-take.

"Flying solo, Mr... Beef?"

"Just me and the sky," Clive said, buckling his seatbelt on the fourth attempt.

The engines roared. The plane accelerated. And then — that moment, that impossible, stomach-dropping, beautiful moment — they left the ground.

Clive watched the world shrink beneath him and felt something he couldn't name. Not excitement, exactly. Not relief. Something bigger. Something that felt like the beginning of everything.

He had no ticket, no plan, no idea where this plane was going, and absolutely no business being on it.

It was perfect.