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The three maids waited in the balloon for most of the night, in increasing agitation. Mirabelle’s face was like thunder, imagining Igor ravishing the Breton wenches as they slept in their beds. As is often the case during a long tense wait in the black of night, the maids thoughts turned increasingly murderous, worry transposing to anger and thoughts of vengeance.
The truth was that the Russians were having a great deal of difficulty finding any food. The peasants were starving and there was nothing to steal. Dreading returning to the balloon empty handed, they continued the fruitless search.
Meanwhile Pseu was leisurely perusing ceramic tiles in the Locmaria quarter, unaware of the difficulties of the Russians.
Eventually, the three men returned to the balloon, with nothing to show for their nights escapades. Mirabelle snorted derisively, resisting the urge to slap Igor.
“It’s getting light” said Boris, “We really must leave now, food or no food. Let’s go!”
The balloon rose just as the sun was casting a pinkish glow and the river mists were rising in ghostly wisps.

Exhausted from lack of sleep, the occupants slept, taking turns to stay awake. Fanella was on the first watch, shivering and grumpy with hunger. Surreptitiously, she gobbled down a few foul tasting handfuls of lard. When it was Adeline’s turn to keep watch, she had a similar idea, and likewise swallowed some greasy globs of lard, thinking, as Fanella had done, that a few handfuls would not be missed. When the others took their turns on the watch, they also had similar ideas, erroneously assuming that nobody else had thought to do the same. By lunchtime, when they’d all had sufficient sleep, there was not a great deal of lard left. A dramatic and judgemental argument ensued with everyone accusing each other of monumental stupidity, but as Boris wisely pointed out, they were all equally to blame.
“But we’re over the sea now, and we’re losing height!”
Uh oh, said Pseu to herself. I can increase the wind speed to hurricane force, but that might be a bit too risky. Or I can allow the wind to resume it’s prevailing westerly course, but that wouldn’t help, they’d end up back where they came from and that would be catastrophic.
“Perhaps I can help” whispered Belen telepathically. “If you think you can land the balloon on my decks.”
It would be a tricky landing, but there was no other option. Quickly Pseu worked out the likely coordinates of the ultimate descent and beamed them to Belen.
“The homing parrot will help” added Belen. “Follow the bird and adjust the wind direction accordingly.”

Sleep wouldn’t come, and the narrow wooden pew was hard. Cedric had shifted to every possible position trying to get comfortable, and succeeded only in cricking his neck. He eased himself off the pew and crept outside. It was a clear crisp night and the moon shone brightly in the chapel yard. A broad flat tomb beckoned him, looking more promising to stretch out on than the wooden seats inside. It was the tomb of the 14th century mystic (often called witch) , Marguerite Isabeau. Many had claimed to see Isabeau flying around at night, draped in white robes.
Lying flat on his back on the tomb, with his cork bum as a pillow, Cedric wrapped the voluminous white choir boys robes around his body. Despite the chill air, he dozed off, dreaming of lemon pavlova.

~~~~

Igor Popinkin kept to the darkness beneath the trees as he made his way towards the Folly for the rendezvous with Mirabelle. The moon was bright and it was imperative that he stay well hidden. The shortcut through the chapel yard was an open stretch of ground where he might be spotted, but it was unlikely for there to be anyone there at this hour. He was so close now that he mustn’t made any rash mistakes now and spoil it. Igor paused momentarily, reminding himself to be fully present at all times and paying attention. That’s when he noticed Marguerite Isabeau, risen from the grave again ~ although not very far from it, in this instance, as she was lying on top of it, quite motionless. As if drawn by a magnet, he inched slowly towards her, mesmerized by her ghostly beauty. Closer and closer, until he was standing over her, peering down at her scarlet lips. His hot breath and specks of dribble running down her chin woke her, and she opened her eyes.

~~~~

“Am I dreaming?” asked Cedric breathlessly. “Or are you an angel?”
“No, you’re an angel”, replied a baffled Popinkin.
“Why thank you sweetie, oooh, a Russian angel! Love your accent ~ fancy meeting you here!”
“Where were you expecting to meet me then?” Igor replied, even more puzzled. “You mean you were expecting me, Marguerite?”
“Marguerite who?”
“Isabeau. You!” Exasperated with the conversation and confusion, and remembering his rendevous with Mirabelle, Popinkin said “Look, I have to go, but meet me here at the same time tomorrow night.”
Cedric sighed, but he did note that his stiff neck had gone and he felt much happier.

Sadie often got lost. Her ability to get lost was second only to her ability to attract complete strangers asking her for directions. Therefore Sanso’s words sounded like complete gibberish. Fortunately, at that precise moment, her daily quote from “Juicy Vibration Raising Lemons” came through on the e-zapper and she felt her morale raise considerably.

Good Team Work! it read, succinctly and profoundly.

taking spain
knew black team under often help especially week starting

Sandy Costa had been making a note of all the sightings throughout the year, as well as noting a variety of other apparently unrelated incidents and clues, and he kept them all in imaginary basket. (breaking news: draft saved at 11: 11 again). The Case of the Missing Surge Team and Possible Connection to the Flurge was known for short as the Basket Case.
Sandy was an unemployed channeler, although if you asked him to define himself in one sentence, that’s not what he would have said. He might not have known what to say, but he wouldn’t have said that. Not long after people had started growing their own food, producing their own energy, and writing their own books and magazines, everyone had started channeling their own mumbo jumbo, and Sandy was no longer in demand.
The Basket Case had been keeping him occupied and entertained, and the clues were starting to pour in like rain into an old boot.
Lisbon were expecting the arrival of some potentially interesting characters in the near future, from as far afield as Bangpie, and Caketown. There had been several cases of parallelitisis in Mari Fe’s village, a condition often associated with basket cases. There were whisperings through the sweet pea vines that there was something stirring in New Tartland, too.

Ed Steam and the surge team had been missing in action, or in the case of some, missing in inaction, for a little over a year. Nobody really knew what had happened, or where any of them were. There had been rumours of sightings and enlightenings, occasional frightenings and slightenings, most of which had been debunked by Slopes. If Two’s a Clue and Three’s a Surge, as it was often said, Nil, it would seem, was a Flurge.

Dory was on her way to an local greening event, a sort of garden show and time manipulation in one, where contestants took turns demonstrating their skills in rapid~greening. A hideous concrete relic on the coast had been earmarked, and contestants from all over the world were to take turns covering the monstrosity in flowering greenery in the shortest amount of time possible. The events were usually held on a weekend, because everyone was busy vacationing during the week, so use of time manipulation was permitted, as long as it wasn’t too over the top, in other words, weeks and months were permissable, but not years. Except in special cases, such as in the cases where the contestants refused to follow the rules, which it must be admitted, was unsurprisingly often. Prizes were awarded to everyone who participated, really, there were 3D print your own prize stations scattered around the perimeter of the monstrosity site.
The half finished abandoned hospital that Dory had participated in the previous month had turned out spectacular, especially the mystical combination of tele ~imported prehistoric tree ferns, cherry trees and solar powered fireflies. The addition of ice cream and cupcake printers in the corridors had been the icing on the cake. Indeed the icing in what used to be the mortuary was rather pretty, especially when one hadn’t seen snow for decades, a cool crisp tundra scene with icicles and blue shadows on the snow covered slabs, with clumps of red spotted mushrooms for a splash of colour, not that the extra colour was needed as the very air was a swirling mass of colours.

Aqua Luna had difficulties understanding what the voice was telling her. The words made perfect sense, separately. They were like bubbles floating around her, she could almost see them. Each had a different hue and some where even shining a bit.
“What am I experiencing ?” she asked.
At least it was her thoughts, but she wasn’t sure the voice would understand as each bubble seemed to follow its separate route once out of her mouth.
When more bubbles appeared in the room, it seemed they were coming from all around her, and not from a specific location. She wondered if she was in some kind of whale ship, in its stomach.
When more bubbles came, she began to feel a bit irritated. She smashed one with her left hand and got startled by the booming “SHAKE”. She retreated on the spongy stomach which was emitting bubbles now. She tried to shoo them away and their explosion was more like a squishy sound.
A bigger bubble was coming toward her. It was with shades of pink and blue, very vibrant. She put her hands on her ears before it blew out, but the sound seemed to come from her skin now.

“HAHAHAHA”

When more bubbles came to her, the words she heard were the following

quickly full days told moscow
dragon sounds face earth itself
pin often middle herself under light
katarina warm asked further turned

It made no sense at all, but she was beginning to find it fun.

sense attention silly himself
read inside: king portal
land suddenly deep party
body friend knew magic
interesting pink side flight ship
days hot energy, sir
once ~ often ~ baltazar surge hand, already steam events map

Eventhough Stu was not very bright, he had always been successful with women. Thanks to his young and handsome body. He’s been working at the gas Station in Cottonwood since he was 15, he’d figured out at that time it was the best way to meet women. Some of them were even coming as far from Phoenix, and his boss was rather content about it too. He’d even encourage his employee to take off his shirt more often.

Days were following days, and it was the same routine, washing cars, filling gas tanks, meeting women. Nothing particular had even happen in Cottonwood. Of course there were often weirdos as they were close to Sedona. Some of them were asking if he had seen any ETs lately, or some guys asked him once if he’d ever been probed by aliens.
It was all part of the job, and he didn’t really pay attention. His best response was no response at all and play the dumb. Except with women. He would always find something to say to make them laugh and he especially loved to see those sparkles in their eyes, that’s when he knew he could ask them anything.

Quick witted Arona, realising their cover was blown, grabbed Mandrake and hid behind a hot pink leather chaise lounge in the corner of the room.

“Mandrake, I think Yikesy might be going though another growth spurt,” said Arona, after a few moments spent reflecting thoughtfully on proceedings in the room. “Good thing I brought him that cute snuggle fit stretch’n‘grow set to wear for the mission.”

Mandrake rolled his eyes. “He isn’t a baby, Arona and you really shouldn’t make him wear those ridiculous outfits. Although, I must say, in this instance, for the sake of decency, it is probably just as well. But for goodness sakes, the boy is just about old enough to grow a moustache.”

“Oh well, I guess you are right. But he has such an endearingly ugly little baby face still, people often think he is younger than he is. I wonder if that strange woman in the red coat would take a photo if I asked her.”

Belle Endwhistle received the telepathic call from Skye while she was floating on the cool aqua pool in The City. Belle, affectionately known as Bee, was one of the surge teams helpers from the “other side”. She had always had a particular fondness for cars, hats and vintage designer dresses; before the surge team was initiated, she had often turned up in dreams, driving a flying red car and wearing a variety of outlandish hats. Bee been delighted to accept the offer to chauffeur the fleet of red cars, and always enjoyed meeting old friends on the physical side.

The world didn’t end that day.
But maybe it should have, or at least the endless list of senseless rules, silly obligations, half-compromises and clever-yet-too-often-outdone-by-stupidity ploys to defeat them.
Stuck in the middle of his twelfth failed attempt at booking a flight for the Land of the Long Cloud, he found himself dreaming of buying… well, no— buying was sorely overrated nowadays. With all the rules on how you could or could not spend your money, he’d found it impossibly difficult to buy his friend the new camera of his dreams.
So, let’s dream of building something instead: a dream submersible airborne trailer, or maybe just a flying house with giant wheels, to soar above the pettiness of this world, and to go unfettered wherever fancy called.
He knew why the shark tank in the department store had exploded last week, killing only the sharks and turtles. It probably wasn’t being boxed, as much as being forced to look everyday at the headless consumers that killed the creatures. Whatever the reason might have been, in all fairness, they’d managed to boldly go beyond the end of their world.

“Oh, and she got 222 points in wordplay for ‘youarethefuckwittp’ “ chimed in another, also unidentified voice.
“Is that a word?”
“Apparently so … yes I believe it is in the 2057 Erstwhile Lemoaning first edition dictionoory … phrases which have come into common usage … just because of how often they are used in everyday conversation.”