Return of the Pen

Well, that’s how it goes with passive aggressive herbivores. Daisy has a bit of a temper as well. The Adverb Mass Indicator won’t win me the Nobel after all because the one and only of its kind was stomped to atoms, in the Barnyard, where Daisy took it after she grabbed it from me with her mouth and ran outside. Then again, the late AMI can only exist in Saragun Springs, so I guess Oslo would not be overly impressed with a broken smoke detector with a short USB cord hanging from it, even if it did still exist in one piece.

“So, is it still Ignore Gwen Cooper Day?” asked (surprise) Gwen.

“Wow,” I said, “that time again already? Seems like Ignore Gwen Cooper Day comes earlier every year.”

“Right?” Renfield added.

“Har dee har har,” Gwen said.

She approached me from behind and wrapped one of her impossibly long arms around my shoulders. Renfield arrived at my other side. Together we gazingly gazed at Daisy, digging a grave for the semi-vaporized AMI in the Barnyard with her hooves. I swear I heard a beep at gazingly, but it must have been my imagination.

“Who knew that a Pygmy Goat could contain so much rage? She’s like an even tinier Joe Pesci,” Renfield said.

“Daisy is very deep,” I said.

“I bet she salts the grave,” Gwen said.

“I’m gonna engineer a ‘Redundant Dialogue Attribution,’” Renfield said. “My RDA will go off after three–no four consecutive sentences end with ‘said’ as they have done on this page.”

“Way to punch a hole in the fourth wall, Renfield,” I said, lighting a fresh smoke.

The other members of our meeting were distracted by the results of his/her Free Will. Queen Maab had passed out, so we put her to bed in a cigar box that contained a tiny mattress, pillows and a quilt. BTI sleeps twenty-three hours per day, so the odds were against him being awake, which he wasn’t, still asleep in the chair Gwen had placed him in. The Judge was silent, perhaps worried that by making a sound he’d awaken Maab. Poppyseed was egging Daisy on out in the Barnyard, zipping from ear to ear like a little Iago. As Gwen had predicted, Daisy had run off for a moment into the big red barn and returned with a bag of rock salt.

“All right gang,” I said, “since you want some action, Gwen, and since Renfield claims to be weary of smiling and saying ‘Great news!’ before peeing in my Cheerios, I’ve got a little time travel gig for you two to star in, along with Daisy, after she settles down a bit. Let’s go to Wardrobe and Makeup.”

Mr and Mrs Berkshire

We made our way to the Wardrobe and Makeup Department run by a pair of Berkshire Hogs, Taffypuller and her husband, Tallywhacker. Although we produce stories to be read, many FC’s like to dress for their roles. Method FC’s. Tall Gwen led the way, Renfield was a couple steps behind her while I brought up the rear. When viewed from a distance we probably looked like three columns in a spreadsheet telling of dwindling productivity.

Taffypuller tips the scales somewhere in the low eight-hundreds and is mostly white and a little brown while Tallywhacker is much porkier and is mainly brown with patches of white. Wardrobe Mistress Taffy is a Sow of few words, while Makeup Artist Tally is a Boar who often lives up to a homonym of his porcine gender. He also has a verbal dingleberry, “By waddle”–a catchphrase tic of sorts that no one criticizes because everyone in the Springs is weird in her/his/its own way and knows it.

“By waddle, Misses Gwen, Renfield and Leila, we’ve been expecting you,” Tally said. Which made sense because I’d just sent him a text of that flavor about three minutes prior. The Wardrobe and Makeup Department is stocked with patterns and clothes that my Employer has worn in life. Fortunately she is an androgynous clothes hound and a compulsive shopper, even though much of her stuff is best suited for Halloween. Taffy can alter any of her garments, which is pretty goddam convenient for this Pen.

“Hiya, Tallywhacker,” Renfield said. “And how are you, Taffypuller?”

Taffy glanced up from her sewing machine (In Saragun Springs Sows are known as “Nature’s Seamstress” and your typical Boar can make a Mrs. Doubtfire out of you in a few minutes–again in defiance of cloven appendages). “Fine.”

Gwen, a bit of a clothes hound herself, was already perusing the racks. “Ohhh, I love what you have done with this seersucker, Taffy–Dear God can this scream 1978 any louder?”

Daisy trotted in because she has an unerring sense of knowing where the narrative lies.

“Gang,” I said to Renfield, Gwen and Daisy, “I want to send you three on a mission to Other Earth, but circa 1947. You two,” I added, motioning to Renfield and Gwen, “need to be fitted for the proper attire from that era, which Taffypuller has become an expert on thanks to our hoarder Employer’s vast National Geographic collection.”

“What about me, Miss Leila,” Daisy asked. “Don’t I rate a costume?”

I patted Daisy on the head. “It’s like this Daisy, you are going to Other Earth incognito, with a helmet cam that will feed a time vortex linked to a tablet I will be viewing on the other side of the portal at the Springs. You will be invisible, which is probably for the best considering the attention a talking Goat might bring at any Earth.”

Daisy didn’t like that and began to stomp the floor in a snit.

“Oh, all right,” I said. “What kind of disguise would you like to wear?

“I want to be a Unicorn,” she said.

“Of course you do.”

“By waddle, I can devise a paper mache horn and glue it to Miss Daisy’s little head,” said Tally.

But that will get in the way of the effing camera, was queued on my tongue and ready to go, but seeing the smile the horn idea put on Daisy’s face, I let it go and said, “See? All better.”

I left the three in makeup and wardrobe and went back to my office to prepare the equipment and review the top secret Other Earth file on my computer.