by M. D. Cooper
The walls inside were aglow, sparkling and crystalline in appearance. Lashes thought that they were almost translucent. As she felt a slight gravitational shift, she wondered aloud, “Think this is the space elevator down to the surface?”
“Feels like it might be,” Ramsey said in agreement.
“But the station is hundreds of kilometers up,” Stick said with furrowed brow. “It’s going to take us days to get down there by horse.”
“Days?!” BAMF exclaimed, a worried look on her face. “Then let’s get a move on!” She stood up in the carriage and leapt into the front with the cabbie. She snatched the reins from him and yelled, “Mush!”
The cabbie was making indignant sputtering noises, and the horses didn’t change their gait until BAMF leaned over the front of the carriage, and punched one in the hindquarters. “I said, MUSH!”
The horse looked back, saw BAMF half out of the carriage, ready to kick it, and reared up, taking off down the road.
“Ma’am! Ma’am! Stop!” the cabbie cried out, finally finding his voice, while Vivia flitted to and fro above the carriage, wringing her hands and crying out, “Oh dear, oh dear, this just won’t do, no, no!”
The cabbie tried to pull the reins back from BAMF, but she glared at him. “You want what the horses got?”
“Uh…no, ma’am,” the cabbie said, and moved as far from BAMF as he could, clutching the rail on the side for dear life as the carriage careened down the boulevard, weaving in and out between other travelers, BAMF screaming with delight.
“This isn’t going to end well,” Ramsey said with a shake of his head.
That was when the flying monkeys descended.
Two of the monkeys landed on each horse and pulled the reins sharply, bringing the runaway carriage to a halt while BAMF screamed. “No! Mush, MUSH!”
Ramsey reached up and grabbed BAMF’s arm. “Let it go, they’re the cops here.”
“Monkey cops? I pity the monkey that—” BAMF stopped short as Ramsey scowled and pointed at the seat next to him.
“Ooooo, you’re in trouble now,” Stick said. “Ain’t no way you have a license to drive one of these.”
BAMF settled back into her seat as the monkeys finally brought the horses to a halt. Another group landed and placed bright orange pylons around the carriage while the cabbie attempted to calm his skittish horses, all the while casting dirty looks at BAMF.
Damn, Lashes thought. Freakin’ BAMF is going to ruin everything!
A monkey in a large hat approached, his long, drooping moustache twitching as he regarded them with unblinking eyes. “Now, am I to understand that you thought it was wise to take control of this carriage, and race through The Enchanted Tunnel™?” the Chief Monkey asked.
At least, Lashes assumed he was the Chief Monkey. He had the biggest hat.
BAMF didn’t say anything, her arms crossed and her lower lip hanging down in a pout.
“I’m sorry, officer,” Ramsey said, speaking up for the sulking woman. “BAMF here has a bit of a problem with long waits. We’ll behave now, we promise.”
“Yes, I believe you will,” the Chief Monkey said as a new carriage pulled up.
This one was in the shape of a large orange pumpkin, fully enclosed with thick wooden doors. It would be much harder—though not impossible—to climb out and get at the driver. However, Lashes didn’t harbor any illusions that a couple of doors and a bit of a climb would stop a determined BAMF.
However, the ape sitting atop the pumpkin—an ape that dwarfed the pumpkin by a fair margin—would probably deter BAMF from attempting to take control.
Lashes wondered how the carriage wasn’t crushed by the beast. Well, I guess it’s supposed to be a magical place.
Under the monkey’s watchful eyes, the team filed into the new carriage, Vivia looking especially dejected after the tongue-lashing the Chief Monkey had given her for losing control of her charges.
His speech had contained words such as ‘de-pixed’ and ‘bopped’. Whatever those words meant in the context of punishment, they had a visible impact on Vivia’s normally bubbly personality.
As they got settled, the Chief Monkey stood at the door, looking them all over and pausing at BAMF, who had resumed her pouting pose in the new carriage.
“We’d be there now if it weren’t for you, BAMF,” Stick said.
“You said it was going to take days to get there,” BAMF accused her. “I was trying to hurry it up.”
“You can all relax,” the Chief Monkey said with a smile as he unfurled his rather impressive wings. “You’re only ten minutes away from the gates to The Enchanted Kingdom™. Now don’t give Kong any trouble. He doesn’t like trouble.”
“Really, just ten minutes?” Stick asked skeptically, her pink hat flopping over her face as she leaned over. “Are you sure?”
The Chief Monkey just shook his head and closed the door before flying off into the sky.
“Seriously, Stick,” Lashes said. “Let’s not antagonize these…people any more.”
“OK, I was just try—” Stick began but stopped abruptly as the giant ape, who they now knew was named ‘Kong’, shifted, and the carriage groaned.
Their seats vibrated as the massive simian called out for the horses to ‘GOOOOOO HORSEEEEEES’. Or at least, that’s what Lashes thought he said.
She was surprised that the horses didn’t take off in a blind panic; the sound of Kong’s voice thrumming through the carriage set her teeth on edge and made it hard to breathe.
Once they began to move, Ramsey looked around at the group. “OK, team, we have to be on our best behavior here. Seems like they don’t tolerate shenanigans. We have to get through The Enchanted Kingdom™ and to The Dark Forest™, where we’ll meet with Ronnie, my friend who is worried about the disappearances.”
“What is that?” Vivia asked. “Disappearances?”
Much better, Lashes thought. Deepen the mystery.
“It’s nothing, Vivia, don’t worry about it,” Ramsey said.
Vivia pulled herself out of the folds in Stick’s skirt and fluttered up into the air. “It doesn’t sound like ‘nothing’. Is some sort of dastardly villain up to no good in The Dark Forest™? It is where they hide out. The Prince™ of The Enchanted Kingdom™ leads his armies in there from time to time. He even killed a dragon in The Last Battle™; but every time he goes in, those villains scatter into the mountains, and just come back in a few months.”
“How bad can it be?” Lashes asked.
“Did you forget the part where I mentioned a dragon?” Vivia asked. “I really think you should stay out of The Dark Forest™.”
“Well, I guess we’ll see when we get there,” Lashes said with a warm smile, hoping to placate the small pixie. She thought that Vivia was in on the plan, but now she wondered. Either that, or the small creature was just laying it on too thick. Vivia had to be a non-sentient AI of some sort; Lashes couldn’t imagine they would have humans remote piloting this many creatures.
Stick must have been wondering the same thing about the pixie, because her hand darted out and grabbed Vivia by the wings.
“What are you really, little pixie-person?” Stick asked. “Are you an AI of some sort? You can’t be a modded person; you’re too small. They can’t fit a brain into something this tiny.”
“I beg your pardon!” Vivia said indignantly. “You will put me down right this instant! I am a person—and I do have a brain! I am not an AI, and I will not have you holding me by the wings! No, no, it will not do!”
“I think they’re all remote piloted,” Ramsey said. “Somewhere on the planet below is a giant chamber of people, all in sim-beds, running this show.”
Vivia glared at Ramsey. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I a
m me! A pixie of Pixie Grove™ in Neverevereverland™.”
“Gotta give them credit,” Lashes said. “They don’t break character.”
“Yes, I have exceptional character,” Vivia said. “Which is why I have not reported you for molesting my pixie-person.”
As she spoke, she waved her wand and disappeared, causing Stick to jump and paw at the air looking for the pixie. “Where’d she go? I was just holding her!”
A bright light flashed, and suddenly there was another person in the pumpkin carriage with them. Lashes couldn’t believe her eyes. It was Vivia, but she was much larger—over a meter and a half tall, at least.
She scowled at the group. “Now, I don’t like being big like this—it is very awkward—but I need you to understand that you are guests here, and you cannot treat the indigenous species of this world as though we are not people too.”
Lashes couldn’t contain her amazement. “How…how did you do that?”
Vivia shrugged her shoulders, sparkles of pixie dust falling from them. “Easy, magic.”
BAMF reached out and touched Vivia’s shoulder. “You feel real….”
“Yes,” Vivia nodded. “Of course I’m real. But touching me like that put you inside my personal bubble. This is about boundaries. You have to respect mine, and I’ll respect yours.”
At that, she lowered her brow—a glower that was far more ominous, now that it wasn’t only ten centimeters tall. “What I just did to embigger myself, I can do to you too, so behave.”
“You’d make BAMF bigger?” Stick asked. “How will that help?”
Vivia sighed. “Why do I always get ones like these? No, I will make her smaller. We could maybe put her in a little lantern or something.”
“Wow,” Lashes laughed. “I can’t imagine how many times that would have come in handy.”
“I pity the foo—” BAMF began to say, but Vivia placed a finger on the large woman’s lips. “Temper temper, Miss BAMF. We’re here to have fun. You need to loosen up; there’s so much tension in your shoulders. They give excellent massages at The Royal Palace™. I’ll be sure to book you one!”
BAMF grunted and mumbled something that no one could understand. Well...Lashes could understand it, and suspected that everyone else could too, but they all pretended they couldn’t.
No one spoke until the carriage passed out of the tunnel, and they found themselves emerging from a hillside into a land of gently rolling hills dotted with copses of trees.
The grass was tall, and gently waving in the breeze. Wildflowers were dotted throughout, their sweet scent drifting through the air.
“Welcome to The Enchanted Kingdom™!” Vivia cried out, a bit too loudly. “Oops, sorry, not used to being big. I’m going to go small again, but you behave…” Her statement was directed at BAMF and punctuated by a wave of her wand.
BAMF nodded sullenly, and then Vivia waved her wand, disappeared in a flash of light, and then reappeared a moment later with a smaller flash, now back to her original size.
“Oh, how wonderful,” Vivia said. “I really can’t bear to be big. Everything feels so itchy all the time.”
Stick replied.
Vivia’s squeaky voice broke the silence and interrupted the team’s private conversation. “If you look out the right side of the pumpkin, you’ll see a fantastic view of The Royal Palace™ of The Enchanted Kingdom™!”
Lashes peered out the window, groaning as Stick leaned across and dug her elbows into Lashes’ thighs.
At the bottom of a long hill, spread across a vast plain, laid the sprawling Royal Palace™. Lashes estimated that it had to be at least one hundred square kilometers—though that depended on how far over the horizon it went.
Tall, crenelated walls wrapped around The Royal Palace™, with hundred-meter-tall towers at regular intervals. Beyond, the castle rose up, towers and halls stepping up toward a single white tower that rose over a kilometer into the sky.
Some parts of The Royal Palace™ appeared to be white stone, while others were made of emerald. Blue onyx capped the towers, and the entire structure gleamed in the late afternoon light, almost too bright to look at.
“Holy crap! It’s huge!” BAMF exclaimed.
“Well, of course it’s huge,” Vivia explained. “The Prince™ and The Princess™ have many guests—yourselves amongst them! You’re going to have such a wonderful time. I can’t wait to show you the—”
“Maybe later,” Ramsey interrupted. “We’ll spend the night here, clean up, refresh ourselves, and then be on our way at first light. We have to get to The Dark Forest™ as soon as possible.”
“Are you sure, Mr. Ramsey?” Vivia asked. “There is so much to see in The Royal Palace™. Part of it is even under siege by The Imperial Forces™! I understand that late tonight, The Cat Woman™ and The Bat Man™ are going to lead an army of penguins against the Imperials.”
“Um. Is The Royal Palace™ safe?” Stick asked—appearing visibly concerned as she clutched her dress.
Vivia nodded solemnly. “Oh, yes; The Imperial Forces™ have notoriously bad aim. The just have to look out for whoever the current Dark Lord™ is. They can do this Magic Pinchy Thing™ that is quite deadly.”
“’Magic Pinchy Thing’?” Lashes asked.
“Yeah, like this,” Vivia said as she held up her tiny right hand and made some gesture that was too small to discern. “Then you get all chokey like this.” The tiny pixie then proceeded to grab her throat and make gasping sounds while fluttering about erratically.
“They do that to themselves?” BAMF asked. “Doesn’t seem that dangerous to others?”
“No, you silly goose,” Vivia laughed. “They do that to you!”
“We need to avoid any Imperial entanglements,” Stick said, her eyes deadly serious.
“Oh, don’t worry,” Vivia replied. “I have heard that The Bat Man™ has produced a special repellant to keep dark lords at bay. One spritz and they run off.”
“I can think of a number of times that would have come in handy, eh, Colonel?” Lashes asked.
“That’s for sure…I wonder if he could make a version that could keep customs agents away,” Ramsey said with a sardonic grin.
“I still don’t know how we got down to the planet so fast,” Stick said as she craned her neck and looked out the window. “I can tell by the gravity and the movement of the ground that we’re definitely planetside. But we took a horse down the elevator shaft…”
BAMF snorted. “Fool, you can’t tell by the gravity and the movement of the ground.”
“I can! Us pilots are very attuned to movement; you wouldn’t understand,” Stick replied sweetly.
“I understand that I’m going to—” BAMF began, but stopped when Vivia darted in front of her and waved a miniscule hand in her face.
“Tut tut, Miss BAMF. You must learn to control yourself. I wouldn’t want to have to bop you!”
BAMF mumbled something about seeing how well her fist would bop a small flying creature, but then settled back in her seat and stared silently out at the meadows that the carriage was passing through.
“Are those teacups having picnics?” Stick asked at one point.
“Yup!” Vivia replied brightly. “They love to get out on a nice day like this.”
“Ummm, OK, just checking.
” Stick replied.
Several minutes later, they reached The Royal Palace™ gates, where a guard stopped the carriage.
“Have some troublemakers, do we?” the guard asked.
Kong rumbled something unintelligible in response, and the guard laughed.
“Yeah, there’s always someone,” the guard replied, and stepped back, waving them through. As they passed, Lashes realized that the man was made of metal—carefully painted, with a strong jaw and heavy brow.
“OK…that just looks creepy, for some reason.”
Vivia nodded. “I know; they changed the guards recently, I’m not sure they’re quite right. We used have the giant badgers at this gate. They were much more fun; not so stern. And the talking bears often came by with honey for the guests.”
“Why’d they change them?” Ramsey asked. “Did they need to tighten security?”
“Security?” Vivia asked. “No, no, it was the bees. Bears aren’t too concerned about being stung, thick hides and all, they often brought the entire hive, bees and all.”
Lashes laughed. “I can see how that would be problematic.”
Vivia nodded solemnly. “Now the bears are patrolling the edges of The Dark Forest™. They like it more out there, anyway. It suits them.”
Ramsey scowled as they passed under The Royal Palace’s wall.
Lashes cast a worried look at the colonel.
Once past the wall, the carriage arrived in a vast courtyard where dozens of other carriages—though no pumpkins with massive apes atop—were queuing up to disgorge their passengers at the palace’s main entrance.