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In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“So, ‘ow we going to find ‘im then, Glor?” asked Sharon, taking a slurp of thick muddy-looking tea. “Ow! That’s too bloody hot. I’m going to ‘ave another word with the Matron about that Nurse, I am.”
“You do that, Sha. Nurse Trassie wasn’t it?”
Sharon nodded and pursed her lips tightly. “Bloody uppity tart. We bloody pay enough to be ‘ere, I reckon. They should get the tea bloody right.” Her eyes narrowed menacingly. “ Anyway, she’ll keep. So,‘ow we going to find ‘im then, Glor?”
“Whose that then, Shar? Oh, you mean the doctor who does the beauty treatments? I’d forget my bloody ‘ead if it weren’t screwed on, wouldn I!”
Gloria scratched her head vigorously, perhaps checking it was still there, before taking a moment to examine her fingernails.
“Wot’d Mavis say then?” she asked at last. “When you did that texting thing to ‘er?”
“‘Ere let me find my phone and I’ll read it out loud to you. Oh, blimey, ‘ave you seen my glasses, Glor?”
Gloria’s generous curves wobbled and gyrated as she convulsed into fits of laughter.
“They’re on yer bloody ‘ead!” she said pointing and gasping for breath. “Oh, I nearly peeed myself, ya blimmen muppet!”
“Thanks, Glor. Wot I’d do without you, I don’t bloody know. Don’t mean to make you pee yerself though. It’s ‘ard enough getting them nurses to give out them extra thick pantyliners. Blimmin uppity tarts. Expecially that Nurse Trassie. Anyway, she’ll keep.”
Sharon peered at her phone. “Mavis says: Wot a bloody brainwave! I need a makeover for my new fella!!’ LOL! “ She frowned. “Wot’s that word mean, LOL, Glor?”
“Oh, it’s text talk. The younguns talk like that now and our Mavis always did like to keep up with trends. Lots of lust it means. That saucy cow!”
“She always was a saucy one that, Mavis! Look at us stuck in ‘ere and ‘er with a new fella. Lucky sod. Maybe after our beauty treatment, we might get us a new fella too.”
“I don’t know ‘ow we’re going to track down the Doctor though, Shar. I don’t know ‘ow we’re going to track him down when we’re stuck in this bleedin’ ‘ole.” Gloria shoulders shook and she began to sob loudly.
“There, there, Glor. Don’t cry,” said Sharon, rubbing her friend’s back. “They’ll put you on more bloody pills if you cry. Oh! I know wot will cheer you up!”
“Wot’s that then,” asked Gloria, sniffing loudly into her hanky.
“I’ve ‘ad one of my bloody brainwaves!”
“I knew you would, Shar! You’ve always ‘ad brains. I’m all agog!”
“We’ll get Mavis to go to the papers! Put in an advert to find ‘im!”
“You’re a blimmin genius, you are, Shar!”
In reply to: Seven Twines and the Dragon Heartwoods
The rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun.
Margoritt showed Glynis to a small area, partitioned off from the main room; a narrow bed, a tiny window to the outside and and a simple wooden shelf.
“You’ll be wanting some privacy,” she said. “And something dry to wear,” she added, handing Glynis a dress, plain in shape and made from a soft woven fabric, pearly spheres woven into a dark purple background.
The second person to give me something to wear, she mused.
The fabric was amazing. It made Glynis think of stars at night and the way you could never see to the end of the sky. It felt both reassuring and terrifying all at the same time.
There is magic in the hands that wove this, she thought, hesitant though to voice her thoughts to Margoritt, however kindly she seemed.
“A master weaver has made this!” she said instead. “Was it you?”
“No, not I … but you are right, it was made by a master … as you can no doubt see, it doesn’t fit me any longer. I’ve had it sitting there going to waste for many years and am glad to put it to use. It doesn’t cover your head like the other did, but really there is no need here.” Margoritt smiled. “Go, get changed. Come out when you are ready and I will have some tea and cake for you. Then you can meet the others properly.”
“Is it okay? hissed Sunny in a loud whisper when they were alone, anxiously hopping from one foot to another.
“Yes, i think so … I’ve been very careful,” Glynis reached in her pouch and gently pulled out an egg.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it … almost golden… for sure it must be the gift the man from the market promised me in my dream … the way it just sat there on the path … lucky I did not stand on it.” She stroked the egg gently.
“Sorry about all this, little one,” she said softly to the egg. “I wonder what creature you are inside this shell … and what safe place can we hide you till you are ready to come out of there?”
“I can sit on it of course,” said Sunny. “It will be my honour and privilege to assist.”
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“You do exaggerate so, Finnley,” remarked Liz. “It was much longer than five minutes, and you chose to go when all the rest of the staff were on holidays too. Damned inconsiderate of you all, really! You’re lucky you still have a position here to come back to, my girl.”
Liz shuffled some papers on her desk in a businesslike manner and then blew the ensuing dust off her keyboard with a flourish.
“And don’t make those vile gestures behind my back.”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“I recommend the reindeer stew,” said the waiter with a slight nod towards the menu in his hand, yet not taking his eyes off Connie’s face.
Connie started with excitement. Reindeer stew? Reindeer was the code word!
“Ah, yes, thank you but I couldn’t possibly eat … Rudolph,” she replied.
Sophie snorted from across the table. “Prancer! you idiot,” she hissed. “You couldn’t possibly eat Prancer.”
“Prancer! I mean Prancer!” Connie giggled nervously however the waiter’s expression remained inscrutable.
“Very well,” he said, surreptitiously slipping a folded note into the menu and placing it on the table. “Let us see if we have something more to your taste.”
“Rudolph!“cackled Sophie as soon as the waiter was out of earshot. “Lucky I was here you bonehead. You could have messed up the whole mission.”
Connie wondered why people tended to preface Sophie’s name with “sweet”.
Rude, cantankerous, nasty old biddy, she thought and felt a familiar twitching in her clenched fist.
Taking a deep breath, Connie managed a forced smile. Better to stay on good terms, at least for now.
“Thanks for that, Sophie. What would I do without you? Let’s see what this note says, shall we?”
Carefully looking around to make sure they were not being watched, Connie unfolded the note.
“If you want to learn about elves, you need to go to Elf School”, she read.
“My word,” said Sophie. “How delightfully delphian.”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“You’re lucky it wasn’t your hands,” said Tina. She had visited Quentin after Connie had left. Strange reporter that one. Kind of short sized with big eyes that never blinked. Tina snorted and dismissed the memory with a roll of her eyes, then looked at Quentin straight in the eyes, awaiting for his answer.
“What do you mean ?” asked Quentin. Tina didn’t expected the answer to be a question. She rolled her eyes as if Quentin had missed the obvious.
“The giant gouda ball, you’re lucky it didn’t roll on your hands.”
Quentin looked at Tina with a bit of concern in his eyes. She had been acting weird lately and making odd random connections between events and comments. He looked at his friend more closely. She had a bird nest on her head. With two eggs. It was a fake nest. He certainly hoped the eggs were too. He had no idea
“Anyway,” Tina said, “I won a trip to some island of the hidden people from the http://travellerofworlds.tp website. Wanna come with me, Quentin?”
He thought of his options. The most obvious response would be that he had no idea what a hidden people could be. If it was hidden it could very well be that it was hiddeous and needed to be hidden. On the other hand… Quentin looked at his other hand. It was empty.“They say it’s on the rim of the realm,” added Tina as if she had read Quentin’s thought and need for a motive.
Now, he thought, the rim of the realm, that sounded quite an interesting unexplored territory to discover.
“When do we leave ? I need to ask Yannosh to pack my suitcase.”In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
It was already warm and Kale was glad for the shade the large oak trees offered as he walked along the sidewalk. He was heading for the Tangy Pickle cafe; his favourite breakfast spot just a few blocks from where he lived.
A song had been running through his head all morning: a big hit from a robot band which were popular in the late 2030’s: “Sour Tart and The Denouements.” He hadn’t even like the band at the time— just the name was depressing —but for some reason the tune and a few of the words were looping through his head like annoying little ear worms.
… bugger current information planet robot key bugger current information planet robot key bugger current information planet robot key…
So Kale was busy pondering the implications, if any, of endlessly looping ear worms when Flynn messaged him:
“Interview scheduled for 9.30am tomorrow.”
“Blimey, that soon? Okay, well what else can you tell me?”
“The ad has been taken off the network and all associated information shut down.”
Weirdo.
“But your interview is scheduled with a Mr Eb Ruide. And I’ve got your outfit ready.”
“Hang on, Flynn. This all sounds a bit odd don’t you think?”
“Oddness factor 57%. Probability of success 22%. If I may quote the famous robot philosopher Monenole: The point is the exploration. So gird your loins and stick your chin out. You can do this! What fun! See you later!” messaged Flynn
Gird my loins? That robot really needs rewiring.
He was nearly at his destination. There weren’t many people around this early in the morning, just a few stalwart joggers and the occasional dog walker. Most people, the lucky ones who had employment, worked from home. So Kale was most surprised to see an attractive dark haired female—oddly attired for the hot weather in fishnet tights and knee high boots—standing outside the cafe.
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
Godfrey was a supervisor of the miners team. After the landing, and the greetings by the locals, the lucky draw had him and his team assigned to the sulfur mines, which were vital to the colonies to fertilize the plants.
For him, hardly lucky at all.
Rotten eggs and smelly fish, he thought, at least one of us will be pleased“Norbert!” he called “Are all the equipments ready to move?”
“One more cargo, and we’re good to go.”
“OK, everybody, let’s get ready to move.”Somehow, the outlook didn’t feel as bad,… almost a breather of fresh oxygen and freedom.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
Those maps got me remembering all kinds of things, not that I was fretting about the note because I wasn’t, but once I’d quit flapping about the note, all kinds of things started popping into my mind.
Odd little cameo memories, more often than not a mundane scene that somehow stuck in my head. Like that cafe with the mad hatter mural, mediocre little place, and I cant even remember where it was, but that number on the mural was just wrong, somehow. It’s as clear as a bell in my memory now, but not a thing before or after it, or when it was, other than somewhere in New Zealand.
I kept getting a whistling in my left ear as I was recalling things, like when I remembered that beach on the Costa del Sol, with a timebridgers sticker in the beach bar. I can still see that Italian man walking out of the sea with an octopus.
I can still see the breeze flapping the pages of a magazine lying on a bench in Balzac’s garden in Paris, something about a red suitcase, but I can’t recall what exactly.
A motel in a truckstop village in California…the sherry was making me drowsy. I almost felt like I was there again for a moment.
Conjure up a bowler hat, he said, while you’re out today. I forgot all about it (how often I thank my lucky stars for having a bad memory, I much prefer a surprise) and saw a delightful hurdy gurdy man wearing a bowler hat (In June! I do recall it was June). My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean, he was playing. I’m sure to have forgotten that, but I made a video recording.
All these locations were holes in the maps, those ripped up maps the girls brought home from the Brundy place, just after I got that note. I was beginning to see a pattern to the connecting links between the letters ripped out of the map locations, and the wording in the note (which was made of ripped out letters from place names on a map, and glued onto the paper, as anyone who is reading this will no doubt recall). The pattern in the discovery of connecting links was that the pattern is constantly changing, rendering moot the need to decipher a plot in advance of the actual discovery of spontaneous development of the shifting patterns of discovery, and deliverance of the decipherable delegation of the delighted, promptly at noon.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
The stranger arrived as I was setting off, but I didn’t have time to stop. By the looks of him he had been on the road for a while. I called out to him that if he was after a room he had better go and bang on the front door, but he might have to knock loudly because they were all asleep.
I shrugged off a vague feeling of guilt.
Not my problem; let someone else deal with it. Early to be calling though.
It wasn’t long before I was wondering dismally whether my mission would need to be aborted. It was only 7:00am, but already the heat was stifling. I was considering my various options, none of which seemed that attractive, when Bert pulled up next to me in his van.
“Where are you off to, Mater? You want a lift somewhere. Hop in.”
I hopped in. I liked Bert, although he wasn’t one for conversation. He was about my age, maybe a few years younger. Hard to tell with the men around here, they all looked like aged leather. He raised an eyebrow when I told him where I was going, but otherwise didn’t comment. We drove in comfortable silence.
“Not far now, Mater. You want to stop for a coffee? It’s still early.”
“Are you asking me on a date, Bert?”
There was an awkward moment while he worked out I was teasing him, then his face cracked into an amused smile.
“Can you cook?”
“Burnt toast is my speciality. If you are lucky I would open a can of spaghetti.”
“You’ll do then I guess, even if you are a crazy old coot out walking in this heat.”
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Cheung Lok felt himself fall suddenly with nothing to hold on to, when the elephant he was riding suddenly shrank to human size knocking him down to the ground, partly unconscious after the event.
This Sanso, sure is 麻烦 [¹]. I must to start to believe harder in my luck was his thought before he lost consciousness.On the other side of Sanso, a strange man with a turban was struggling with a bizarre striped dog-sized sea cucumber with teeth. Meanwhile, his target, Sanso seemed to leave back to the encampment’s ruins with… his elephant turned… something else.
That was all he could remember when he woke up a few minutes later and wondered what had happened and how Sanso could have slipped away again.
Noticing how he was tracking a man that seemed to make a point at having no discernible pattern, the realization came in a flash of blinding certainty that Sanso knew probably nothing at all about Irina, and surely didn’t care at all about warning her. In other words, Cheung Lok was on his own, and the painful clarity was soothed in equal measure by the other realization that he could let go of this 王八蛋².Looking around, he noticed the guy with the turban still struggle with the appetizing stripped sea cucumber.
“Hold steady pal, I’ll ezap that bugger.”
The other who had turned almost purple took a series of short breaths when he was released from the monster. “Thanks mate, those things are my bane.”
“No need to thank me, I’ll deep-fry it for us later. Care to join?”
“Hell why not. Name’s Berberus by the way. And you shouldn’t trust elephants here. It is known.”
“Thanks for the tip, pal. Cheung Lok.”
“You’re going back after Sanso?”
“No, it’s pointless, I just happened to find him on my way to a series of turbulences on the island and couldn’t pass the opportunity, but that one is more slippery than a wet snail during monsoon.”
“What is monsoon?” Berberus asked perplexed by the yellow faced man with the strange accent.
“Don’t you mind that. Shall we go?”___
[¹] 麻烦 máfan in Chinese, can be roughly translated as ‘irritating piece of hemp’, meaning being trouble or vexatious —or some may argue, in this case, unbelievably lucky and difficult to keep track of, in a continuous way or any other way.
[²] 王八蛋 wángbā dàn : “The King’s eighth egg”, a colourful Chinese way of insulting people, meaning roughly “bastard”.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
A series of powerful meditation sessions with Greenie (Gwinie had told Irina she didn’t mind the moniker) had Irina more and more sure-footed in the strange reality of the island.
There was always confusion when she tried to change her surrounding too forcefully. All the transitions seemed like traps to dull her senses back into old familiar patterns, such as securing the perimeter, and idle talks with Mr R. Simple things like changing her focus from one object to another was proving challenging, and she had to keep herself awake grounded in shifting sands, staying clear from the comfortable dreams.
Thoughts of the light city in the clouds carried her, and she’d programmed Mr R to help her with reality checks. Mr R, unlike what she’d thought initially, was not completely immune to the effects of the changes of reality. She surmised it was because it was an evolved AI, and he probably incorporated evolved perception constructs into his programming. In a sense, he was programmed to chose between alternate realities to fulfil the expectations of those in his care. Without this choosing program at his core, or whatever speck of consciousness it was, he probably would have been immune as any piece of inanimate matter —but also probably less useful, as her reality would have been irrelevant to him.
Irina had found out that she was actually lucky to have found Greenie, since during her long sleep, she had maintained a sort of ground reality based on the blueprints she was familiar with, which seemed quite close to what the City called “reality”.
Meditations had revealed, by parts that Irina had interpolated, that Greenie was trained to be part of an order of people, who betrayed her and left her for dead. Her training had helped her survive, and even in Greenie’s quasi-autistic state, had helped Irina too.Irina decided (and hoped it was the first time she had) to go to the cloud city, and help Greenie return to her rightful place.
It did cross her mind that it was maybe what Management had wanted her to do all along, and that her island could only be her gift if she claimed it.
Feeling the thought leading her towards unwanted manifestations and slumber, she snapped out of it.“Mr R, prepare everything, we are leaving at dawn. To the beanstalk.”
“Madam, everything is already prepared, as you asked hours ago.”
“Very well Mr R. Then let’s make dawn happen and let’s paddle.”In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
The stench of burning thatch filled the scorched air and stung their eyes as they ran towards the river. Fanella struggled to keep up with Sanso, clutching tightly to his arm, sometimes losing her footing in her flimsy sandals and bashing her bare knees on the cobblestones. “Lucky this great fire is a distraction from your unseemly attire, young miss” said Sanso, “Your naked legs are so arousing.” While appreciating Fanella’s charming thighs, Sanso failed to notice that his chopsticks were on fire. A spark had ignited them and they flared bright orange as he threw them down. Within moments they were obliterated into scattered ash. “Chop Chop Cheung Lok, now catch me if you can!” Sanso shouted gleefully.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Irina started to smell foul play when she arrived at the coordinates indicated in the last of the laconic messages sent to her by the Management.
“Are you sure you got the coordinates right Mr R?”
“Very much so Madam, but if you will allow me, I will double check to alleviate the hint of doubt I perceive in your most suave voice.”
“Yes, do that please.”When becoming anxious, Irina tended to get prone to bossiness, and didn’t like what she heard in her voice.
“I adore this door.”
Yes, that was much better with suave undertones, with a hint of foreign raspy accent to spice it up.In truth, the door was plain, wooden, with a number painted on it, half erased, and a series of symbols which, although she could not place them, raised a distant alarm in her mind.
“Rainbow magic?…” That was how they renamed the lore of black magic when it was privatized and re-marketed to the masses. She had not seen rainbow magic in ages, and there was no way that door would lead to an actual island without moving her out of this time and space.“Bloody buggers. Should have read those cryptic fine prints more carefully.”
She realized there was a good chance her promised island was in a godforsaken place lost in time. She could count herself lucky if the deserted island was not in the palaeolithic and raided by dangerous dinosaurs…
There was little choice. Either boldly embrace the great unknown behind the door, and trust her luck, or stay behind, short of the island of her dreams and probably condemned to run from the Management’s evil plans anyway.
At least, with option one, the lottery could be favourable.
That was what you got for dabbling in sketchy and questionable shots.“Mr R, are you ready?”
“Always, Madam.”She felt lucky and pressed the door.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Secretly, Sadie had a beautifully laid out plan in her head, like a vacation plan with stop-overs at luxury hotels, and activities to entertain the children.
That made her slightly miffed about the succession of sidetrack adventures and the lack of focus of her protégés.The plan was simple enough, they had to take the magical crystal from under the whale’s noses, and get back to the closest Time sewer, where they could funnel up (her fancy verb for “complete”) the special reboot edition of the Time Draggler’s show.
Surprisingly, Linda Paul’s interest and instructions seemed to have weakened and her usually generous and unwarranted input have been inordinately limited. Maybe the summer heat wave had mollified her, or her projects had shifted since the pilot of the Time Draggler’s show had failed to grab the network’s attention and fulfil its promises.
She couldn’t say. But something in what the techromancer told her had stuck, and she couldn’t quite shake it out. “A train will come for you, and you will have to catch it, this Time is your train.”
The hell if she knew what Time that was anyway.
But one thing was sure, this one-time gig was growing on her, and she didn’t want to get back to dog food tasting. So one way or another, she’d have to make it work, and move the drag’s lazy butts to make a heck of an entertaining show.“Look! I vink vey’re over vere!” Maurana was getting the gist of the telepathic conversation.
It was lucky the interior of the cave was lit, as outside the night had fallen like a cold black carpet on a pack of dust bunnies, dropping the water’s temperature. Luckily, the suits seemed to have their own warming as well as glowing mechanism.
Terry was over Consuela, who seemed unconscious and in a REM sleep.
“Hey! Consuela learnt your eye rolling technique!” Maurana gleefully tuned towards Sadie.
“Don’t be silly, I think he’s in shock, pass me that electric eel, to wake that bitch up.” Terry was always for a bit of drama. It seemed to do the trick.“Woah, you can’t believe the stuff I’ve seen…” Consuela’s pupils were dilated so much it was hard to see the whites of her eyes.
“Classic case of red algae intoxication, no need to consult the ezapper for that” Sadie said. “It is known that dolphins use it as a shamanic tool to astral. The concentration in these waters is surprinsingly high. Nothing than some fresh water can’t cure.” Too much time under water, she started to babble like a fish.
The Time window wouldn’t stay indefinitely open. She needed to get them move, and take back her authority. With children like them, one thing that worked was to shake some shiny stuff in front of them and let them follow it.
“Anyone interested in a Whale Queen’s Race?”In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“Lucky we don’t have days for you to get your knickers in a twist about it then.” said Sadie brightly. She checked the time. It was just after 1pm. She knew from her previous research the attempt on the King’s life was to happen at 6pm. It didn’t give them much time. But I am sure it will be all the time we need! she reminded herself sternly. She wondered when Linda Paul would send through their next instructions. Now that the key was not in the ferret as had been anticipated, Sadie found herself floundering — despite the confident outward appearance she presented and the engaging way she explained the highly technical capabilities of the wondrous e-zapper.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“Weehooo, I got the 57!”
Casanova started, and almost got punched in the face by Father Balbi’s exhuberance.
“Time to wake up, old man. I’m sure Cavagnol was interesting in your dreams, but it doesn’t bring us more money. If we could be so lucky as to foresee the future in your dreams, but experience showed us your accuracy doesn’t go well with wine and women.”Realizing where he was, father Balbi snorted and scratched his beard.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
Maurana was starting to feel queasy in the lurching carriage, and asked Sanso to rein in the zebras so that she could step outside for a moment. As soon as the steaming animals clattered to a stop, Maurana threw open the door and skittered down the steps, and issued forth a long mustard coloured ribbon of projectile vomit that draped the hedgerow like a garland.
“Darling, that gorgeous mustard colour goes so well with the wild roses, I really must have a gown in those colours!” said Conseula, who was still planning her new oufits. “A rose gown with mustard ribbon garlands, and a whalebone corset and hoops of course. I say, Chair, where did you get your cork bum from?” she added, as the footman climbed down from atop the barrel of champagne to stretch his legs.
“From the best bum cutter in France, Gilles Culeau. He has a secret recipe for the most comfortable bums you can buy, and in my job, you need a comfy bum. He uses a special outer casing of cork, and stuffs it with ferret fur, for extra warmth and comfortable padding ~ not like those cheap solid cork bums you find in Paris. Culeau’s bums are made from the finest imported Seville cork…”
“Where is his shop, I simply must have one ~ do shut up that ghastly retching Maurana ~ where Chair, can I procure a Gilles Culeau bum?”
“Well this is your lucky day, bichet, because he has an establishment in the hamlet at the entrance to the tunnel.”
“Maurana, if you’re quite done with that vile spectacle, will you get back in the carriage. We’re going bum shopping, toot! toot!”In reply to: The Surge Team’s Coils
There wasn’t a cloud in the sky over the mudflats of the Guadalquivir river delta. Bob and Dennis were having a late breakfast of tapas on the terrace of a local bar: battered cuttlefish testicles, ensaladilla Rusa, and reindeer meat montaditos, washed down with fino sherry.
“ We better get back to work, Dennis. I have a feeling we’re very close to finding something.” said Bob.
“Excuse me, did you mention work?” a voice piped up from a table behind them. “I’m looking for work. Just got out of jail yesterday ~ oh don’t panic!” the man in the scarlet sweater said, noticing their raised eyebrows. “I wasn’t in there for any crime, just for being an illegal immigrant. My name’s Barry, by the way, pleased to meet you.”
“Well, Barry, this is your lucky day!” replied Bob. “It just so happens we could do with an extra pair of hands today. Nothing permanent, or legal ~ ha ha ~ but a bit of cash in hand might come handy, eh?”
Barry was well aware of Bob and Dennis’s mission, but he didn’t let on.
“Be happy to, yes! What kind of work is it?”
“We’re looking for a p p p p portal, m m m mate” said Dennis.
In almost no time at all during the afternoon work in the mudflats and marshes, Barry shouted “Bob! Dennis! I think I’ve found it!” He was holding a large stone disc , looking for all the world like a Marie biscuit.
In reply to: Snowflakes of Tens
Racy Mc Tartshall had been absent for so long that it was hardly any wonder that nobody remembered her, despite the importance of her mission which had long since been forgotten. Mc Tart, as she was affectionately known (or would have been if anyone had remembered her) was a tartist of the highest calibre, consistently producing hugh class tart (which was of course three grades higher than high, and 2 grades higher than hagh, and so forth). Mc Tart had been investigating Nosebook, sniffing out potential distortions, claritortions, connectortions and myriad other contortions, for the distortium, claritortium, connectortium and contortium, respectively ~ focusing mainly on the connectortium, naturally enough.
While researching something or other that was no doubt relevant at the time but had long been forgotten, Mc Tart met Alfred in the Library. ““Aha! Alfred in the Library with a Book, was it!” she exclamined. “I knew I’d find a clue here”. “It wasn’t me!” he retorted, aghast. “It was Albert in the Chapless Pants club with a Rolling Pin!” Mc Tart, feigning an all knowing expression, replied “Ahhhh” and made a mental note to investigate.
Mental notes, known as m’otes for short, floated like wisps in the air currents and occasionally sparkled in the sunbeams, although more often than not, they clumped together under the bed in bunny shapes, slowly dying of boredom. Thankfully the sheer pointlessness of mental notes ~ m’otes ~ made not a whit of difference in the grand scheme of the connectortium investigation because of the abundant nature of Fluce’s ~ (fucking lucky chance encounters), notwithstanding the heated debates continuing in the Distortium about the precise nature of Fluce’s and their relationship to M’Otes ~ or not, depending on the point one wished to make at any particular time.
And so it was by Fluce that Mc Tart met Blithe, Heck and Walty in “le Tunnel” one dreary grey Noremember afternoon. There was nothing to suggest, on first inspection, any thing of interest for the Connectortium mission, but Mc Tart was not discouraged. “Many a moth maketh maths marbles” she reminded herself as she perused the nenu (which, the reader will deduce, is a hugher class of menu).
[link: high class]
In reply to: The Eights’ Shift, Stories
Ann slapped her forehead when she realized her mistake, notwithstanding that there were no ‘mistakes’ as such.
The story is for the writer that writes it, not the reader.
What the repercussions of that were for the future of publishing, Ann wasn’t quite sure.
“Oh, I can answer that for you, dear” Lavender responded. “On my recent trip to the future I went to the Pick Your Own Pages book store. There’s a wonderful Pick ‘N’ Mix section, and a Lucky Dip. You can pick various quantities, such as chapters, pages, paragraphs or sentences, and you arrange them yourself.”
“What a wonderful idea!” Ann replied.
“Oh, the idea was an old one, very old!” Lavvie explained. “People were doing it all along, though they didn’t realize it. The idea of being spoon fed an entire story went out with the Ark. It was the advent of random quote generators that started the ball rolling.”
Ann beatled off to check the random quote for the day….
“Arona! Sanso! Oh, how wonderful to see you guys again! Come and meet Lavender and Walter, we’re discussing continuity….”
