A Rag Doll's Guide to Here and There

by Richard Roberts

  “It’s all I’ve ever seen them do.”

  Sandy reached her free arm out and plunged it into the wool. There must have been a solid body under there, because her arm’s descent stopped abruptly. Twisting her lips nervously, she looked down at me, back at the sheep, down at me, back at the sheep, and then one more time at me. “Do you think it would get the giant’s attention if we pushed it over?”

  I winked. It was an interesting suggestion. One factor was more important than any other, and I told Sandy firmly, “I’m certain we won’t be in any danger. I’ve never heard of a giant stepping on anyone even by accident, not even when one of the shrivener apprentices became over enthused and attempted to shrive a giant coming straight toward him. They are very gentle people. He might be upset, but he won’t hurt us. If you do get the chance to explain, the odds that he will forgive us and take you anywhere you want to go are quite high.”

  She grimaced, flinched, and told me, “Here goes.” The sheep must have been heavy. She grunted as she pushed, but after a few seconds it tipped up on two legs, and then flopped over on its side.

  Sandy backpedaled from the stricken sheep quickly, scanning the horizon. “Do you think the giant will notice?”

  I stared off at the mists myself. “That is the most unguessable question, isn’t it? I don’t believe anyone—oh, my. We have our answer.”

  The stone giant who had wandered off toward the mists was coming back. There was no mistaking that it was headed straight for us. Each step thumped louder and louder. When it began to really loom, Sandy scurried back. Then she scurried back some more. I felt the vibration run right up Sandy’s body when it stopped in front of the capsized sheep. A shadow flooded over us as it bent, and bent, and both hands reached down. Fingers bigger than Sandy lifted the sheep upright, and pulled the thick wool off, leaving the sheep scrawny and no hairier than a carpet.

  I nudged Sandy in the ribs. “This is our chance!”

  “Hey! Mister Giant! Down here! Hey! Can I have a ride? Can you hear me?” Sandy yelled.

  I tried to yell, but it came out a bit incoherent because Sandy waved both hands wildly over her head to get the giant’s attention, and I was in one of those hands. “Hey! Hello! Eeee!” I managed, flailing my own arms, which the giant probably couldn’t see, even close up.

  When the world stopped being a blur and my body stopped flopping around everywhere, I found Sandy tucking me into her arm again as the giant reared back up. It gave us a rocky smile and a friendly wave, tucked the wool it had collected into a cloud, and started walking away.

  The ground thudded, but more quietly with every step. A fairy and rat, perhaps the same pair, popped out of the grass together. They twittered at each other as they ran around brushing the grass in the giant’s footprint back up. Then the fairy flew off to the next footprint, and the rat disappeared into a hole and popped out of one over there, helping her straighten the damage. They worked quite quickly. I couldn’t imagine it would take more than, oh, three fairy/rat pairs to clean up after any stone giant.

  My speculation had drifted. I looked up at Sandy and spread my hands. “We have our answer. We’re simply too small for a stone giant to hear.”

  Sandy sighed loudly, her shoulders slumping. “I guess I walk.” She stomped back to the road, legs held straight in sullen protest. After her first few steps along the flagstones, she asked hopefully, “Unless you have any brilliant ideas?”

  I blinked up at her. Did I? Well, I didn’t know about “brilliant”, but one idea seemed suddenly very obvious. “Actually, there is one thing you could try. Just yell for help. Who knows who might hear you?” Besides, a human yelling in need—that was practically magic itself, wasn’t it?

  Her eyebrows rose. She stared at me, and I could see much the same thought working through her head as mine. It’s not like it could hurt, right?

  Rearing back, she lifted her face to the sky and—quite deafeningly—yelled, “CAN ANYONE HEAR ME? I COULD REALLY USE A RIDE!”

  Her voice echoed along the road, or maybe that was just the way it made the fluff in my head rattle.

  A second passed. Another second. Three or four. Then a mass of feathers and limbs fell out of the sky, hitting the road in front of us with a painful sounding crunch.

  It might have sounded painful, but the huge grey bird—well, bigger than Sandy, and she was bigger than a bundlish, which is pretty big! —stood up. Wings flapped, and the feathers settled down on its fat, round body. Two orange eyes and a beak with a pretty brick patterning turned to gawk at Sandy with extreme embarrassment. “Cuckoo! Cuckoo! It’s alright! Cuckoo! I’m fine! I take worse falls than that all the time! Hey… are you a human?!”

  Its neck stretched out, head tilted down so it could press its eyes almost against Sandy’s face.

  It was clearly my duty to intervene. “She is, indeed. Newly arrived from Elsewhere, and already she’s saved my life. You seem quite sturdy, Sir or Madam or Perhaps I Shouldn’t Speculate. Could you give her a lift to wherever is down this road?”

  It pulled its head way back, staring at me, now. Then its neck stretched out to one side, peering at Sandy. Then out to the other side, peering back at me. Then its body lowered to the ground, and its wings stretched out to either side, little clawed hands laid humbly on the road. “That would be—cuckoo! —the greatest honor a Greater House Cuckoo—cuckoo! —could dream of. Cuckoo!” The head gave a little jerk when it cuckooed. That seemed compulsive. Perhaps a disease?

  Sandy stepped up to the bird, and very gingerly reached one leg across to straddle its back. The cuckoo stood up, and kept standing up, until Sandy sat with her legs dangling well off the road. Leaning over in Sandy’s arm, I peeked past a wing. The cuckoo had been crouched the whole time, hiding a pair of long legs with huge X-shaped feet.

  A second bird reared up out of the fluff atop the cuckoo’s head. This new arrival was smaller than my arm, scraggly and long necked, and it pecked the Greater House Cuckoo on the top of its head. “Tick!” Another peck, and a vehement, “Tick tock!”

  Leaning away and grimacing, Sandy pointed a finger at the tiny bird. “Is that… supposed to happen?”

  The Greater House Cuckoo lifted and tilted its head to peer back at us, only to flinch at another peck. “Yes, and also no. May I proudly introduce my daughter, Escapement? Cuckoo?”

  “She’s awfully small,” Sandy pointed out, still with a worried frown.

  “Yes, cuckoo!” Another peck, and another wince from the bigger bird. “She’ll be a Lesser House Cuckoo for some time.” Peck. “Cuckoo!” Peck. “Cuckoo!”

  “Tock! Tick tock tick tock!” clicked Escapement. For a bird with a two-word vocabulary, she sounded desperately impatient.

  “Yes! Cuckoo! Alright! Cuckoo!” The bird lurched underneath us, reaching one long leg out. It bounced again as it took the second step, and by the fifth we were rocking to the quick rhythm of a flat-out run. At least, if the cuckoo could run any faster, that would be a bit scary. The paving stones really soared past underneath us.

  That seemed to be enough to stop Escapement from pecking, but she leaned forward over her parent’s face and repeated, “Tick tick toooooock.”

  Sandy stared at this awkwardly. I hung from her arm, squeezed uncomfortably tight. Sandy’s other arm gripped the shoulder of the Greater House Cuckoo to keep from falling off as it rocked. She seemed stable enough to me, and when that became sufficiently clear Sandy asked, “What’s your name? I’m Sandy Golding.”

  The Greater House Cuckoo kept its neck stretched out for speed, but its head turned just slightly to peer back at us. “Cog! Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Half the cuckoos over There are named Cog. I wanted my little girl to have a pretty name. Cuckoo!”

  Sandy nibbled her lip, or possibly her jaw jiggled from riding a bouncing, sprinting Greater House Cuckoo. She did sound anxious. “I hope it works out. My best friend’s name is Charity, and she hates it.”

  I tilted my head back in surprise. “But Charity is a be
autiful word!”

  Sandy nodded emphatically. “I think so, too! But… other kids make mean jokes. Even adults, sometimes. She almost stopped being my friend when I accidentally called her by her real name in our new school.”

  I adjusted the angle of my glasses. That was getting to be a real habit. “My whillickers. It appears that humans need heroes as well! That would seem reasonable. When everyone is special and powerful, your conflicts must be equally titanic, and require the intervention of godlike superbeings to resolve.”

  For some reason, this made Sandy snort with laughter.

  “Tick TOCK!” Escapement yelled, giving Cog’s head a fierce peck.

  Cog managed to run even faster, and between huffs and puffs told us, “Sorry. Have to run. My fault. Escapement warned me early. Cuckoo! I got lost.”

  Sandy gave me a questioning look, but all I could do was shrug. She bent low, holding onto Cog’s shoulder, and waited.

  Cog ran. Sandy sat on the cuckoo’s back. I hung from her arm. My magic glasses seemed to have removed my patience. I distinctly recalled being able to sit for hours and stare at the sky back when I was just a fluff head.

  Sandy turned her head, and I followed her gaze. There was the stone giant in the distance. It lumbered along, until suddenly… well, slowly it turned and gave us a wave. It seemed my suspicions about stone giants were confirmed: Amazing eyesight, deaf as a post. Perhaps next time we could write a message?

  Sandy kept watching the stone giant, but I looked ahead down the road. A little smudge on the horizon had grown. It looked like a wall now, or perhaps a skyline?

  Escapement saw it too, and extended her scrawny neck as if she were trying to drag Cog forward. “Ticktockticktockticktock!”

  “We’ll make it!” replied Cog, who sounded desperate but couldn’t stretch any further.

  We passed a side road on the right. Cog ignored it. We passed another on the left. Cog ignored that. They curved even where I could see, bending toward the town. It had to be a town. The line on the horizon had grown to where I could make out a solid wall of houses.

  I punched Sandy in the ribs, expecting that would feel like a nudge to her. She glanced down at me, and I pointed at the town ahead of us. She sat up straighter, and lifted me up to her shoulder. I grabbed her head immediately. Now I was really bouncing around! I didn’t feel secure even with Sandy still holding onto me!

  It was still a very nice gesture.

  The road ended in a T intersection in front of us. Well, not quite a T. The neat blue flagstone road ended, and a brick road branched off to the left from its side, and after a hundred feet or so turned and went straight into town. Another branch, this one paved with cement blocks, broke off to the right shortly before the main road ended. The right-hand road turned into the town pretty much the same way.

  Our ride lurched when we passed the branch to the right, and Cog skidded to a halt right at the end of the road. “Everybody off! Cuckoo!” it shouted. “This is as far as I go. Good luck! Cuckoo!”

  Sandy let go of me and slid carefully down onto her own feet. She winced as she did. A Greater House Cuckoo must not be a comfortable ride.

  “What is this place?” she asked.

  “Cul-De-Sac! Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Goodbye!” Cog answered, dancing impatiently from one foot to the other. As soon as “goodbye” was said, Cog’s wings flapped furiously, carrying both cuckoos up and into the air. I did see Escapement lean over the side of Cog’s head and wave with a tiny, scruffy wing.

  Sandy crouched down, and I gripped her head extra tight to remain on her shoulder. She picked up one of Cog’s fallen feathers from the road, and held it up for us both to examine. The feather was grey as dust and the size of Sandy’s hand. She ran a fingertip along the edge, and the whole feather crumbled away into sand. Ah, of course. It had been grey as stone!

  We looked up at the town of Cul-De-Sac instead. It had to be a town. It had buildings. True, they were packed wall to wall in an irregular line that circled around into the distance. Most of the windows I saw were broken, and none had lights. A number of the buildings, especially the ones that stuck out around the edges, had collapsed and had sharply tilting roofs and piles of brick and stone rubble.

  “Do you know anything about this place, Heartfelt?” Sandy asked, her tone anxious, or perhaps just skeptical.

  I fumbled through my blurry memories. Oh, my. Dying and having my stuffing restuffed had done more damage than I thought. Then I brightened. “Actually, I do! Flops mentioned Cul-De-Sac most times he visited. The first thing out of his mouth as he pulled up his wagon was usually ‘I got stopped in Cul-De-Sac, and managed to unload—’ and then some list of who he’d met and what food he’d given them. He treated visiting the town as routine, and I believe he mentioned bats.”

  As I scratched my head and squinted and did the other things that are supposed to help memory, Sandy started down the left-hand road. She hmmmd. “I guess I’m not scared of bats. Nothing about bats attacking?”

  I shook my head quickly, and puffed out my chest. Why, I almost felt offended! Almost. “Oh, my, no. That kind of thing doesn’t happen around Here. Maybe over There bats attack people! Are bats dangerous Elsewhere?”

  Sandy took a minute to respond. When she did, it was with a start. “Oh. No. I think bats are kind of cute. You hear stories about bats getting caught in your hair, but I heard that doesn’t actually happen. If it did I’d freak out, no matter how cute they are, so you guard my hair, okay?”

  I gave her a salute. “Yes, Your Highness!”

  That made her snort again.

  The road curved slowly, or at least it felt that way walking, even with Sandy’s long legs. Eventually we could see where it crossed through a gap in the line of buildings and ran into town. The place still looked abandoned. It looked abandoned even as we walked in between the outer buildings. More houses were squashed up against each other on either side of the street. Not just against each other. I could see a small cottage laying sideways in-between two wide, three-story mansions. The little building had caved the roof half-in on both of the bigger buildings.

  Most of the buildings looked old. They were literally falling apart, with skewed doorways and collapsed upper floors. I was starting to wonder if we’d found our way over There after all, when I spotted a neat little stone pedestal with a brass bowl on it.

  Sandy had seen the bowl already, and headed for it. She had just stepped up close enough for us to peer in at the pile of white wooden tokens when we heard someone yell. “Over here! Don’t just stand there, run!”

  Sandy hesitated. I whispered to her, “Do it.”

  She took off, her little rubber-bottomed shoes thumping on the brick roadway. Then I saw why we had to run, and I yanked on Sandy’s hair, burying my face against her head.

  I could just peek out enough to see the single story cement-block industrial building hit the ground behind us. The crash was worse than Sandy’s yelling, and the impact made her skip a step and stumble back upright. Wooden tokens from the knocked-over bowl sprayed all around Sandy’s feet.

  She staggered to a halt, and turned around to stare at the new building. It plugged the street neatly. Stray bricks and blocks had been knocked out of the sides and the walls didn’t go up quite evenly, but still, pretty neatly.

  “Oh, no. Oh, no no no!” the voice that had warned us complained. A ball of bricks rolled up next to Sandy and unfolded into a squat little round character. Well, he was little compared to Sandy. He was at least twice my height, not including his tail. Riding on the shoulder of a human was altering my perceptions a bit. He had bricks stuck to his whole body, and brick dust where a brick wouldn’t fit. Heavy, clawed hands reached up to grip the top of his head, and his short snout wriggled in misery.

  He wailed, “I had just finished! I dug and laid the whole street! It ran right to the road to the mists and everything!”

  “Does this happen often?” Sandy asked, looking between the road builder and the newly falle
n building.

  “Not when I’ve only just stamped down the last few bricks! And—oh, no. Quick, help me put these back!” He crouched down, which his shield-backed body was very well suited for, and began to scoop up tokens off the street as fast as he could. Sandy kneeled down to help him, and I slid down her arm onto my own feet, scooping three tokens together into a small pile.

  We were too late. A light flashed, and a pale body zipped past me, grabbing all three tokens. Sandy squealed and grabbed her hair, but she didn’t need to worry. Yes, a swarm of bats descended from everywhere, but they weren’t interested in us. Each one grabbed a few tokens in its feet and flew off again. I only got a good enough look at their light-yellow bodies because each one was slowed down holding a brightly lit lantern in its mouth.

  It took them only seconds to carry off every last token, and the road builder sat down on his tail with a thump. Curling forward, he put his upper pair of arms over his head again, and groaned, “Just tell me when it’s over.”

  “They’re already gone,” Sandy answered him, but he shook his head.

  “Not the guide bats.”

  That was all he said, so we looked around, and then up and around, and I heard the first, “Cuckoo!” before I saw the first eager, beaked face peek over a rooftop.

  “Cuckoo! Cuckoo!” The hooting cry of the Greater House Cuckoo echoed up and down the street as they raced down the walls of buildings or fluttered out of the sky. Mixed among the calls were quieter but excited, “Tick tock tick tocks”. Soon we were surrounded by cuckoos, in an only slightly slower motion repeat of the bat swarm. Each cuckoo yanked a brick out of the road’s surface, stuffed it in his beak, and flew away. Some managed to stuff two or three in their beak. The cuckoo closest to us scooped up a big pile of bricks in one wing, grabbed the wall of the building next to us with the other hand, and climbed three-legged up the side to the roof, then ran off. It and the tiny chick on its head could have been Cog and Escapement, for all I could tell. They all looked pretty similar.