Moe the ButterflyBy: Stephanie Kim

Moe is a monarch butterfly. Every winter, he flies down to Mexico where it is warm. In the summer, Moe flies back to Texas where he lives with his friends and family.

f Moe

One winter day, Moe was making his yearly trip down to Mexico. He was flying and watching the scenery. Moe wasn't looking ahead and fell behind everyone. "Wait up guys!" he cried out, but no one could hear poor Moe.

Moe

"Oh no! What will I do?" Moe asked himself. "Are you lost little buddy?" he heard a voice from behind ask him. Moe turned around to see a pelican. "Yes! Please help me! Everyone else is up ahead and they are way above me, but I can't catch up to them!" Moe told the pelican. "Oh, I'll help you. My name's Larry," the pelican told Moe.

Larry

Once the two had introduced themselves to each other, Larry started teaching Moe how to catch up with everyone else. "Ok, so what you need to do is flap your wings a lot and then stay still. Nature will take over soon." Moe started flapping his orange wings. "Like this?" he questioned his new friend.

Larry glanced over at his friend. "Yeah that's good! Keep flapping!" Moe kept flapping his wings. "Whoa!" he exclaimed as he was suddenly swept high up into the air and pushed forward. "What WAS that?" Moe asked when Larry had caught up.

"There isn't only one. There's a lot of them. They're called wind currents and convection," Larry explained. "Wind currents are created by the movement of the wind. With these currents you'll catch up to everyone else in no time." Moe sighed in relief. He might have some explaining to do, but at least he could catch up to everyone.

As the two friends were flying back to all of the monarch butterflies, there was a huge hurricane moving fast towards the two friends. "Uh...Larry? What's that thing moving towards us really fast?" Moe asked his friend nervously. Larry turned his head to look at the oncoming hurricane. His eyes widened. "That's a hurricane! It's a fierce storm that's created by ocean currents, which are formed by wind and other factors. We have to get out of here now!" Larry practically yelled. Both of them flapped their wings as fast as they could, but they were caught in the hurricane and swept away far from home.

In the hurricane, Moe had been knocked unconscious. When he woke up, he started looking for his bird friend. "Larry? Larry? Where are you?" Moe heard a distant voice call out his name. Even though he was tired, Moe started flying towards the voice.

When Moe had gotten close to the voice, he saw a familiar pelican. He zoomed up to his friend. "Larry! I found you! Are you ok?" Moe asked worriedly. " "Yeah, I'm fine. You?" Larry replied. "I'm fine, but where are we?" Moe asked curiously. Larry looked around. "I think...I think we're in Nepal...."

Moe looked at Larry, confused. "What's a Nepal?" he asked. Larry looked at his friend and started to explain. "Nepal is home to the largest mountain in the world, Mt. Everest. But that doesn't matter. We should find a way home. At least I know the way..." His voice trailed off as he flew with Moe following close behind.

"Larry...It's getting hard to breathe..." Moe panted. "That's because... we're near the top of Mt. Everest. It has... really high pressure close... to the top... of the mountain. As we fly lower...the low pressure will be easier to breathe in" Larry explained during breaths. "Oh...can... we start flying a little...lower than?" Moe asked. Larry nodded. "That...would be...a good idea..."

As Larry and Moe were flying, Moe felt something hard hit his back. "Ow!" Moe exclaimed. "What is it?" Larry asked. "Something just hit my back," Moe explained. Larry looked up into the sky and something hard hit his beak as well. It was hail. A type of precipitation. Flakes of snow, another form of precipitation, started to fall from the sky as well. "Follow me! We're about to be in the middle of a snowstorm!" Larry yelled.

"Larry, are we there yet? I'm tired from flying so much today..." Moe complained. "Just a bit farther!" Larry called out behind his shoulder. Moe groaned, but followed his guide/friend. Larry stopped and hovered right in front of a window. It was nighttime, so the people inside couldn't see the pair. "Larry, what is this place?" Moe asked.

"It's called a laboratory, or lab, for short," Larry explained. "It's a place where scientists work and research." Moe looked around the lab with wide eyes. Something caught his eye. "What's that?" he asked his friend. "What's what? Oh, the barometer?" Moe looked at him funny so he started to explain. "A barometer is one of the many meteorological instruments used by scientists. And see that weird thing on the table with lots of symbols? That's a weather map. It helps scientists tell the temperature and weather easier." Moe looked impressed. "I'm tired now...Can we sleep around here?" Larry smiled at his tiny friend. "Sure."

When they woke up, Moe found tiny drops of water on the grass and leaves around them. He wanted to wake his friend up to ask him what it was, but he decided against it. He went to go find something to eat instead. He found some nice flowers and sucked the nectar out of it. He brought back some berries for his sleeping friend.

When Moe came back to Larry, he was awake. Moe tried to hurry over to him, but he was dragged down by the berries. He finally made it and handed all the berries, except one, to Larry. Moe started to suck the berry juice out of the berry he had kept for himself. "Are these for me?" Larry asked. Moe nodded and kept sucking the juice out until there was no more left.

"Ahhhhh! That's good!" Moe said after all the juice had been sucked out of the berry. "I'm glad that the tree gave us those! Right Larry?" Larry smiled. "Yes, but do you know who REALLY provided those berries for us?" Moe thought about it for a while and shook his head. "It's the sun. The sun provides the energy for the tree and using the sun's energy, the tree is able to give us those berries." Moe listened intently and nodded his head in agreement.

They were about to leave when Moe remembered the tiny water drops. "Oh! Before I forget, Larry, what are those tiny drops of water on the floor?" Moe asked, pointing with one of his small legs. Larry followed his leg. "Oh, those are drops of dew." "Dew?" asked Moe, confused. "They're tiny droplets of water that form on cool surfaces. Dew point is the temperature when it is cool enough for the dew to form." Moe looked thoughtful for a while before the two took off into the morning sky.

As the two kept flying, Moe felt a change in temperature suddenly. "Larry, did you feel that as well?" Larry looked at his surroundings. "We must be at a front." He glanced at his friend's confused face. "A front is the transition zone from between two air masses of different density. There are four main types, stationary, cold, warm, and occluded fronts." Moe looked like he was going over the types of fronts in his head. Despite how tired he was, Larry had to chuckle to himself.

As fun as it was to travel with Larry, Moe was starting to get tired. "Larry? Are we almost there yet?" Larry looked at his friend and smiled. "You're in luck. We're almost caught up to everyone." He pointed ahead with his wing and Moe could see a cloud of orange and black in the distance.

Moe started to speed up his flying. When he was a lot closer, he noticed that Larry was staying behind. As much as he wanted to see everyone else, he had to see his pelican friend. "Aren't you coming along?" Moe asked. Larry shook his head. "I'm a bird, not a butterfly. Besides, I'm a traveller. I travel places. I don't stay in one place. So, I'll be leaving now. Go meet everyone else." And with that, Larry started flying away.

Moe watched as Larry flew away. He looked back at the cloud of monarchs before making a decision. He sped towards his bird friend yelling, "LARRY! LARRY! Wait for me!" At the sound of his voice, Larry turned around and waited. "Coming with me?" Larry asked once Moe had caught up. Moe was breathing heavily. "Yeah, I decided that being with you was better. I can learn more things. And besides, I never had many friends among them." Larry laughed as the two friends sailed off into the sky.

THE END