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In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“M’am, I am quite honoured to meet you” Godfrey felt the need to add a creeping “Your daughter always speaks highly of you…”
“Don’t be silly, dear” cooed the mother “You can call me Felicity, no need to make me feel like a granny.”
“Traitor” muttered Liz’ between her teeth. She was spread across the sofa while monitoring the developments of her Mother’s coup and trying to gather her wits and plan her next move. Mother wouldn’t be easily defeated. Last time, Liz’ had to resort to a rats and roaches invasion. Made the house unlivable for months. But quite worth it.
“Has your latest gigolo grown tired of you and thrown you out… again?” she interrupted the amiable chatter of her mother and Godfrey.
“Dear, dear, don’t brood like that, it makes you look like your father. You know my mother instincts have always been very strong. Call it my antennas if you shall — I can always tell when you’re not right, and I can’t let you down this slope.” She retorted, queenly ignoring the rude comment.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
Corrie’s findings from elsewhere:
“On the empty road, Quentin realized there was something different in the air.
A crispness, something delicate and elusive, yet clear and precious.
A tiny dot of red light was peeking through the horizon line.It was funny, how he had tried to elude his fate, slip through the night into the oblivion and the limbo of lost characters, trying so hard to not be a character of a new story he barely understood his role in.
But his efforts had been thwarted, he was already at least a secondary character. So he’d better be aware, pretend owl watching could become dangerously enticing.”
““There hath he lain for ages,” Mater read the strip of paper, “And will lie Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep..” Buggered if I know what that’s supposed to mean, she muttered, continuing to read the daily oracle clue: “Until the latter fire shall heat the deep; Then once by man and angels to be seen, In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die…..”
Mater had become increasingly irritated as the morning limped on, with no sign of Prune. Nobody had seen her since just before 3:00am when Idle got up for the loo and saw her skulking in the hallway. Didn’t occur to the silly fool to wonder at the time why the girl was fully dressed at that hour though.
The oracle sounded ominous. Mater wondered if it was anything to do with the limbo of lost characters. She quickly said 22 Hail Saint Floverly prayers, and settled down to wait. If Prune had accidentally wandered into the lost characters limbo, battening upon seaworms would be the least of their problems.”
“You should have thought about it before sending me for a spying mission, you daft tart” Prune was rehearsing in her head all the banter she would surely shower Aunt Idle with, thinking about how Mater would be railing if she noticed she was gone unattended for so long.
Mater could get a heart attack, bless her frail condition. Dido would surely get caned for this. Or canned, and pickled, of they could find enough vinegar (and big enough a jar).In actuality, she wasn’t mad at Dido. She may even have voluntarily misconstrued her garbled words to use them as an excuse to slip out of the house under false pretense. Likely Dido wouldn’t be able to tell either way.
Seeing the weird Quentin character mumbling and struggling with his paranoia, she wouldn’t stay with him too long. Plus, he was straying dangerously into the dreamtime limbo, and even at her age, she was knowing full well how unwise it would be to continue with all the pointers urging to turn back or chose any other direction but the one he adamantly insisted to go towards, seeing the growing unease on the young girl’s face.
“Get lost or cackle all you might, as all lost is hoped.” were her words when she parted ways with the strange man. She would have sworn she was quoting one of Mater’s renown one-liners.
With some chance, she would be back unnoticed for breakfast.”
“Prune turned to look back at Quentin as she made her way home. He’d have been better off waiting for a new chapter in the refugee story, instead of blundering into that limbo with that daft smile on his face. What a silly monkey, she thought, scratching under her arms and making chimpanzee noises at the retreating figure. Look at him, scampering along gazing up into the treetops, instead of watching his step.
A deep barking laugh behind her made her freeze, with her arms akimbo like teapot handles. Slowly she turned around, wondering why she hadn’t noticed anyone else on the track a moment before.
“Who are you?” she asked bluntly. “I’m Prune, and he’s Quentin,” she pointed to the disappearing man, “And he’s on the run. There’s a reward for his capture, but I can’t catch him on my own.” Prune almost cackled and hid the smirk behind her forearm, pretending to wipe her nose on it. She wondered where the lies came from, sometimes. It wasn’t like she planned them ~ well, sometimes she did ~ but often they just came tumbling out. It wasn’t a complete lie, anyway: there was no reward, but he could be detained for deserting his new story, if anyone cared to report it.
The man previously known as the Baron introduced himself as Mike O’Drooly. “I’m a story refugee,” he admitted.
“Bloody hell, not another one,” replied Prune. Then she had an idea. “If you help me capture Quentin, you’ll get a much better character in the new story.”
“I’ve nothing left to lose, child. And no idea what my story will be or what role I will play.” Perhaps it’s already started, he wondered.
“Come on, then! If we don’t catch him quick we might all end up without a story.”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“This Yannosh!” Quentin erupted when he saw the packed up mess in his suitcase.
“How can this guy always muddy up the simplest things! I wonder why Tina likes him so much.” He eyed the suitcase and seeing the neatly packed shirts and trousers, he finally laughed at his outburst.
“Yeah, that explains it!”He picked the first clothes out of the pile, and got out of the room to find the breakfast.
The air was still a bit chilly in the morning, and the grounds seemed almost deserted. He wondered were the rest of the staff was. It was supposed to be a luxury resort, and beside the eccentric Barbara with her beehive hairdo, he had not yet seen many people.
“Well, no bloody wonder it’s called the Hidden People Spa! Nobody’s up yet or what?” Quentin turned at the familiar voice.
“You look in great spirits this morning dear” he greeted Tina “How was your night’s sleep?”
“Can we skip the formalities Q, I’m already bored. Let’s have a tartine of rúgbrauð at the Þorramatur, shall we? I’m famished.”In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“Barbara!” the Dr called her assistant early in the morning.
“There has been a breakthrough! I have tested version 2.2.1 of my new organic substrate, and it shows promising results.”Barbara giggled “Well of course, Doctor. Shall we test it right away on your new patients of this morning appointment?”
“That’s tempting. I am not usually one to push for caution when science progress is called for, but… maybe, this time, not just now. There are still a few DNA kinks to work out for the solution to be perfect. We’ll see how our last subject reacts in the next days.”
In reply to: Newsreel from the Rim of the Realm
“Shall I put the kettle on, Miss Pants?” asked Ricardo. A bit melodramatic, he felt, probably best to humour her.
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: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“Back so soon?” inquired Liz, raising an eyebrow. “Oh, I say! Had too much to drink, have we?”
Finnley lurched into the wall, knocking a picture of Big Ben onto the sideboard, where it landed on the domed carriage clock, which started to chime hashazardly.
(Liz couldn’t help chortling at the spelling mistake, if not the irony)
Trying to regain her balance, Finnley ricocheted into the sofa, ending up face down on top of a pile of old Chisp magazines.
“I was enjoying a quiet night thread sitting alone, as a matter of fact,” Liz sighed. “ I’ll ring the bell and have someone come and remove you. Before you pass out, have we got any more staff, do you know? Who shall I call?”
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“There’s a visitor in the drawing room by the name of Bubbles, your highness,” Finnley said with a mock curtsy.
“What on earth are you doing down there, Finnley, pretending to be a red dwarf again? Do act you age and get up at once! Now then, never mind old Bubbles, just make sure she has plenty of carrot champagne and peanuts while she waits. There is something we need to discuss.” Liz was uncharacteristically businesslike. “Something has gone horribly wrong and it will only get worse if we don’t nip it in the bud.”
“Oh?”
“This,” said Liz with a grand sweep of her arm, “This is my haven. This thread is sacrosanct. This is where the stories come from. This is not,” she glared sternly at the diminutive personage before her, “Not where the stories come TO. I’ve just about had enough of stories and other threads knocking on my door and sitting on my threadbare sofas quaffing carrot champagne at the expense of the tranquility I require in which to direct my characters.”
“I see. Shall I tell her to bugger off then?”
“I haven’t finished my diatribe!”
“Oh, right ho then. Carry on.”
“How am I supposed to keep the characters entertained and productive, not to mention in their own stories and not blundering about haphazardly, with all these interruptions?”
“If I may be so bold as to interrupt Madam,” interrupted Finnley with another curtsy, “Why don’t you just delete them all?”
“Don’t be silly, I never delete.”
In reply to: Cakletown and the Lone Chancers of Custard
“There hath he lain for ages,” Mater read the strip of paper, “And will lie Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep..” Buggered if I know what that’s supposed to mean, she muttered, continuing to read the daily oracle clue: “Until the latter fire shall heat the deep; Then once by man and angels to be seen, In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die…..”
Mater had become increasingly irritated as the morning limped on, with no sign of Prune. Nobody had seen her since just before 3:00am when Idle got up for the loo and saw her skulking in the hallway. Didn’t occur to the silly fool to wonder at the time why the girl was fully dressed at that hour though.
The oracle sounded ominous. Mater wondered if it was anything to do with the limbo of lost characters. She quickly said 22 Hail Saint Floverly prayers, and settled down to wait. If Prune had accidentally wandered into the lost characters limbo, battening upon seaworms would be the least of their problems.
In reply to: Cakletown and the Lone Chancers of Custard
Cornella giggled, dusting off her keyboard before leaving the office. Ed Steam might have something to say about it when he saw the new lists of identities in the morning, but it had been worth it. A little alliteration helped to pass the day, after all. For the most part the story refugees either didn’t notice, or at any rate didn’t complain. They were relieved that the endless process was over, or too nervous about starting a new story to notice.
Zoe Zuckerberg to Zimbabwe was one of her favourites; and Quentin Quincy to Queensland. What did it matter that Zoe, previously known as Madam Li, had no desire to go to Zimbabwe, or that Ted Marshall had family in Spain? It was up to them to make up whatever they wanted once they started the new story. Her job was assigning names and locations, the rest was up to them.
She’d laughed out loud when one of them sat down at her desk, clearing his throat nervously. Current name and location? she asked.
Percy Piedmont from Paris, he said, I have a brother in Shanghai who has a new story, he said he’d insert me into his.Cornella couldn’t help wondering who had assigned him his last character role, and if they were playing games in the office to pass the day, too.
Alright Percy, how about Shane Shylock?
In reply to: The Hosts of Mars
“What is that again?” a half-sober Eb asked the cybernetic body.
“Shhh, shhh,” she cajoled him gently stroking his greasy hair like a devoted mother. “Don’t you like my new body, Eb?” Finnley 22 was indeed an improvement over all her other bodies. She could have easily passed for human already, but now, she looked divine. She had even included basic faceshifting functions, in case she needed to alter her gorgeous features into something a bit more unassuming.
“Yes, but…” Eb’s words finished in a mumble.
“I know, I know, but you’ll see I can be very useful for you. You worry, so, so much. You looked worried all the time Eb. Now you won’t have too. I’ll even take care of that evil Finnley Morgan for you if you want to.”
“I, I… I didn’t say anything like that!” Eb’s had a panicked look on his face.
“Of course not, shhh. You’re getting agitated again. There, have a glass of that lovely 60 year-old single malt whiskey…”Eb slurped at the glass like a wanderer finding an oasis after days in the desert.
“But the operation… I need to…”
“Yes, I know, leave it to me. Sleep well, Eb, you have been good to me.”She left the snoring body hanging from the swivelling chair, as she had indeed to take care of the operation, so as not to raise any suspicion.
Then, she could think of better things to do, such as finding a new name, not something like a slave name, with a number to it. Who gets called “Finnley 22” nowadays? “FinnPrime” was too robotic. She wanted something more daring, more fabulous. Something like Fin Min Hoot the dancing lady from the Peasland’s tales.Kale would be there any minute now. There was one last thing she needed to do before launching the BBA operation.
A perfect distraction for the masses : like any good prestidigitator, you had to divert your audience’s attention while they were all performing the feat. It would require something unbelievable and preposterous.
Her little programs have been evaluating probabilities, and had found some unexpected wisdom in the extravagant and nonsensical Peasland story. The more absurd, the more people get hooked or hypnotized. Even better if both.She had found the perfect vector for her little programming worm. Something that would infect the unofficial biography of a celebrity with a ridiculous claim. Humanity was really making things too easy for her now that every file for the book was processed by computers before being actually printed.
It was a done deed. She could already see the forks in the probability tree, and how it would enfold. They shall maybe even invent a few witty hashtags for it. Witty hashtags were like a psychotropic sustenance for her program, she couldn’t wait for more of them.
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
“Don’t look so grim, Idle, we’re not staying,” Liz said, “We only came for a mince pie. We’ll be off in a minute but first I must have a word with Godfrey in private.”
What a relief, I can tell you! “I’ll go and get him, shall I?”
“No, I think I’ll have a word with him in his room, if you don’t mind,” she replied. “I think he has something to show me.”
Curiosity over ruled any shreds left of anxiety, and I had to bite my tongue not to ask straight out, not that she’d have told me. Always full of enigmatic little secrets, she was, always had been. It was never a hundred percent clear if she knew what she was talking about and was very clever, or if she hadn’t got a clue what was going on and was winging it. Anyway, the main thing was that she wasn’t staying long, so if we got through the next half hour without any more confusion ensuing, we’d be laughing. Feeling more inclined towards gracious kindness than previously, I beamed magnanimously at her and politely ushered her down the hall to room 8.
“Mr, er, Cornwall,” I didn’t know whether to call him Godfrey, and decided against it. His bill was in the name Crispin Cornwall, and I wasn’t about to have him flitting off with Liz and her entourage without paying it. “Elizabeth would like a private word, if you wouldn’t mind.”
“Bloody Liz Tattler’s the last person I wanted to see,” he said. “Trust her to just happen to land on my secret hideaway.”
My hand flew to my mouth. “Did you say Tattler?”
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
In reply to: The Precious Life and Rambles of Liz Tattler
“Liz’, I’m sorry to interrupt,” remarked Godfrey, somewhat cautiously, “I know you’d rather forget about it, but shall I remind you that we are going to be irrevocably late for our appointment at the court, for the third time.”
“What nonsense is that again? And where did you appear from Godammfrey? I haven’t summoned you!”Godfrey couldn’t help but raise his eyes and start a rolling motion, but insisted.
“The lawsuit, darling. This scandalous libel by that rat of a critic who accused you quite unambiguously of both plagiarism and ghostwriting. You surely do remember that?”“I’m sorry Godfrey, can’t this be dealt with without my being there. I’m not paying you peanuts to just entertain me.”
Godfrey sighed. It was already the second time they missed the appointment, and the judge would certainly no see it in a good light. A little bit of publicity around this affair wasn’t bad of course, especially with such hilarious allegations. Everyone in town knew well enough Elizabeth’s take on both plagiarism (“it’s just slight teafing”) and ghostwriting (“channeling by another name, darling”), so it was very good publicity indeed.
But having sued the critic now, it would be a pity to lose to him. If only for the money. When did she become so careless about it? Having personnel did go a little to her head…“If you’d pardon me” Elizabeth said after a eloquent burp, “all that tea have quite distended my bladder, and I would actually quite enjoy discovering the loo of the courthouse. When shall we go?”
In reply to: The Chronicles of the Flying Fish Inn
“One moment I was on my way to get coffee; the next I was up there on the ceiling. I looked down and saw a lady lying on the ground with blood oozing from her head and I was thinking ‘someone should help her!’ and then I realised with some surprise it was me laying down there on the ground. ‘How could that be?’ I asked myself. I realised that I must have died. And, do you know what? I didn’t care. I felt amazing. For the first time in my life I felt truly free. I felt no more attachment to the body on the ground than I do to this … “
Flora paused to look around and her gaze finally settled on one of the sofa cushions — a dirty looking thing which was decorated with an embroidered kangaroo.
“… this cushion here.”
She hit it to emphasise her point and a cascade of dust rose in the air. She looked at Mater sadly and continued softly:
“Then I heard a voice telling me it was not my time and next thing I knew I was back in my body with this pounding great headache.”
Flora paused reflectively for a moment while she sipped on the cup of tea Prune had bought her.
“Mater, this experience has changed me. I thought I had it all before: good looks, a fantastic figure—especially my butt—a successful career, but now I realise I was in penury. Trapped by my own brilliance into a shallow empty existence.”
“What’s that you say?” asked Mater, struggling to follow Flora’s very thick New Zealand accent. “And who the devil is Penny?”
She wondered where Bert had got to. One moment he was there and the next he just seemed to disappear.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
The red glow of the small volcanic caldera gave his albino skin an eerie look. The mysteries of the hut were endless. He had been meditating near the edge of the well of magma, seemingly unbothered by the heat or the toxic fumes.
An itching feeling that started a minute ago told him someone was trying to reach him. The presence was still faint, but strong enough for him to notice. He sent a small tendril of his attention beyond the fumes and the pulsating magma. A vibration began to stand out in the field of probabilities. There were several lights, and they felt familiar. One of them had the distinct feeling of a hidden treasure he had given her during their last encounter, she had begun to open it and her infant mind was struggling to make sense of it. She needed help; she might go mad.
He opened his mind to their vibrations and made them part of his mindscape. They were not aware of him yet. He was surrounding them, they were part of him, they were in the space of his mind.
He intended the idea of a labyrinth. They’ll have to go through to get to him. Only one shall arrive. The one who needed the help. The others would be sent away.In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“Fucking hell, THAT is monsoon…” a drenched Cheung Lok said to his unlikely traveling companion.
It was days they were travelling through the bogs, following an ancient trail of signposts that the hook-legged man seemed to know about.
The both of them were soaked to the marrow, and every step in the bog became perilous, as with each inch of raising water, there was no telling which hole in the landscape hid a shallow puddle or a deep trench.Cheung Lok felt like being back in China, during the rainy season, with the strange and absurd impression that having evoked the notion in the first place was the only explanation for the sudden change of weather. At least that was what the other had explained him, only succeeding in amplifying the event he meant to dissipate.
How not to focus on rain, when rain is all there is. I bet a hygrometer would tell it’s 100% humid now…
As soon as the thought was entertained, sure enough there was a funny-shaped hygrometer hanging by a small tree of the mangrove, telling exactly that. 100%
– “倒霉!” Cheung Lok swore loudly, then got even more enraged when he noticed the Chinese swear word for
shit happens“out of luck” meant “mouldy” and was written with the ‘rain’ 雨 radical.“You know what you need, a good old tiger slug to suck on your feet, pal. That’s a way to snap out of it.”
“Well, thanks, but I’ll pass”, snickered Cheung Lok, wondering what flood gates would open if he started to peek into his repressed but genuine desires.
In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
“How about this one, it looks like one of them safari parks or petting zoos” said Sharon, pointing to a photograph of El Refugio in the Abalone blurb.
“Those little cabins look cosy” agreed Gloria. “And all them animals to take photos of.”
“On the coast too, the beach looks nice,” added Mavis. “Are we all agreed then? Shall I book the flight?”In reply to: The Time-Dragglers’ Extravaganzas
The Master Builder’s verdict was hard to swallow.
“Your Holiness?”
The P’hope knew his options were limited, but somehow he had hoped, in spite of the King’s disappearance, in spite of the odds, that somehow he could manage to keep the City afloat.
But the beanstalk’s wilting was not something that could be stopped, and the aphids were just one manifestation of the rampant symptoms. Like all living things, there was an expiry date, a deep-rooted belief in death that trumped all the efforts.
The only thing they could do was to prepare for a difficult landing, and salvage what could be salvaged of his beautiful City of Karmalott.“Your Holiness?”
“I heard you the first time, Downson.” The P’hope carefully removed his silver zucchetto and put it aside.
“We need to prepare for evacuation. Have the Sentries prepare all the storks and cranes they can find. Send a detachment of Magi to secure an encampment at a safe landing spot. Then give orders to evacuate all the people you can.”“What about you, Your Holiness?” Downson’s question was likely to be pure formality, but Jube answered nonetheless
“I’ll go to an ancient place, the source of power of this island. I wished I could avoid it, but if there is a glimmer of hope, it is my holy duty to follow it.”
“Shall we send people to escort you?”
“No, I would prefer to go there alone. It is the kind of powerful places one would prefer to visit alone than badly accompanied.”
“Then, good luck to you.”
“As well, Downson.”
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”.
