It’s been 3 rounds and the lawyers in the blood red heels are drinking champagne in a throne on their very own continent! In non-dork terms, I’m red and I’m winning right now 🙂 And Daydream’s battle stories just keep getting better. We’re going to have to put these in a book when we’re done 🙂
Day Three
Bob Bald, Border Immigration Lawyer in Chief, has been summoned to Detention Centre A3 on the outskirts of Stormside. He curses the compulsory blood red high heels that are standard issue in the lawyers’ quest to unite Gremu, struggling across the muddy earth at the edge of the Beowood. A nervous clerk salutes as Bob gets one of his heels caught in a grate outside the Centre. ‘What the hell is so important that you had to get me out of bed at 4.43am, Junior?’ asks Bob, wrestling with the shoe strap.
‘Sir,’ says the clerk, gulping nervously. ‘You need to see this.’
‘Jesus Junior, it’s the night before the big push to take Maika Tenei,’ grunts Bob, his face turning a violent shade of purple as he continues to grapple with the erstwhile shoe.
Bob eventually abandons the high heel and clops lopsided down a long corridor before entering Room 102. There is an old pirate, drooling, handcuffed to a desk in the centre of the room. ‘He came charging out of the Beowood in the middle of the night. He says he is Sir Ian McKellen and he has important information. Tests indicate that he recently ate a team of anthropologists.’
‘Ha!’ laughs Bob, staring disinterestedly at the old man. ‘This isn’t Sir Ian McKellen. This is a rabid pirate. I know a rabid pirate when I see one.’
The rabid pirate mutters something under his breath.
‘What did he just say?’ asks Bob.
The rabid pirate mutters the same something, his head rolling on his shoulders.
‘Speak up man!’ barks Bob, hobbling closer and putting his ear in the pirate’s face.
‘They’re coming,’ gargles the old man.
And then he clamps his teeth around Bob Bald’s ear.
…
The brown continent is a peaceful place, divided down the middle by a large trench. To the west are the lawyers, to the east the bloranges. Both have one large army and one small army. For two days they have risen at dawn to the sound of two lonely bugle players on either side of the divide, brushed their teeth, put on their high heels and painted themselves borange respectively, before waving across the trench at one another. Then they patiently queue at a shared ice-cream van playing Burt Bacharach’s Greatest Hits, Volume 1.
This morning the large Doblone blorange army wake to the sound of a solitary bugle. They yawn and stretch and brush their teeth and step out of their tents. Curiously though, there is no sign of the equally large Serendipity army of lawyers on the other side. ‘That’s weird,’ says a burly blorange, pointing at the motionless blood red tents, ‘they must be having a lie in.’
‘Almost as weird as having ice-cream for breakfast,’ says a skinny blorange as they shuffle over to the ice-cream van.
‘Bonjourno,’ says the ice-cream seller. He is a native Doblone with a twirly green moustache.
‘Bonjourno,’ cries the five armies of bloranges while “What The World Needs Now Is Love” plays.
‘If-a you’re-a looking for-a zee lawyers, they-a headed north in zee night. I-a reckon zey will-a just-a march into Dranaeish while you-a lot stand around eating ice-creams. Capiche?’ says the ice-cream seller.
‘I have no idea what this ice-cream seller is saying,’ says the burly blorange soldier.
‘Anyone speak Doblone?’ asks the skinny one.
None of the bloranges speak Doblone.
The burly blorange shrugs. ‘I’ll have a 99 please.’
‘Suit-a yourself,’ says the ice-cream seller.
…
In the south of Casciorus, the horned Hund are getting ready to spring a surprise. They have assembled one crack unit of the Purple Elite, planning on taking advantage of the Celery Riots in neighbouring Starfall. The Hund don’t say much. They just like to smash things. And they’ve heard that Ryn is trapped at the top of Velorian Tower. Which makes them even more excited to smash things.
Unfortunately in all their excitement, they forgot that they are allergic to celery, so their surprise attack is beaten off by a rioting army of Oran Coron thieves and hooligans and psychotic dentists, all armed with celery sticks. Using the melee as a distraction, Ryn and her Number 2 wolf escape through the crowd and head back to Oran Coro to recruit some sociopathic vegetarians.
…
Daydream Generators emerges during the night in the Beowood. He surveys the scene. 4 armies of the scrawniest looking naked bananas he’d ever seen. ‘Alright, listen up,’ he tells them, ‘we need to forget about Logan’s Rock.’
‘What’s Logan’s Rock?’ asks one particularly scrawny banana.
‘Precisely,’ says Daydream, ‘you just earned yourself a promotion, boy.’
‘What’s boy?’ asks the banana.
‘What? What do you mean?’ asks Daydream, eyeing the banana suspiciously. ‘Look, never mind. We’re abandoning the dark green continent and are about to spring a surprise attack on Stormside. Personally, I’ve always liked the lawyers more than the bloranges, so it’s unfortunate, but we need to win a card, it’s our only chance of survival.’
‘What’s card?’ asks the scrawny banana.
Daydream counts to 10 really slowly and produces a shiny golden card from his pocket. It says “Land of Sun” on it with a “W”. ‘You see this? This is a card,’ he says. ‘This means we have a contact in the god’s dimension, a rogue African warrior angel named Captain Splitpants. The “W” means he’s designed us a weapon.’
‘What’s weapon?’ asks the scrawny banana.
Daydream shoots him and points at the even scrawnier banana standing beside him. ‘You. You just got promoted.’
‘What’s pr- ?’ ‘Never mind,’ says Daydream and he points through the trees towards the border of Stormside. ‘Weapons ready. CHHHHHAAARRRRGGGGGGGEEEEEE!’
The bananas have no weapons. They shuffle through the trees and get mowed down by a couple of drunk litigators driving souped up motorised portable blenders. It is another spectacular failure and that’s left for Daydream to do is sob quietly into his fist.
Bob Bald watches through a telescope on the roof of Detention Centre A3. His head is heavily bandaged where his ear got chewed off.
‘Told you,’ says Sir Ian McKellen smugly, standing beside him.
…
Tolstoz arrives in Arnet on the back of a badass grey furry dragon called Greyback, just as the day is dawning. He has a new found optimism, thanks to the words of an ancient Klensi cat wrangler, who read his tea leaves and told him to expect Gremu world domination. In her defence, she never actually said it would be Oz who would dominate the world, but he seemed to miss that part. He bops up and down on Greyback’s shoulders, instructing the cat wrangler to take his finest squad of jungle cats from Cannis and attack Tig. ‘I’m a cat wrangler,’ says the old woman, ‘not an army general.’
‘Damnit!’ cries Oz. ‘At the risk of repeating myself, do we, or do we not have the most badass uniforms?’
The old woman shrugs.
Tolstoz clicks his fingers and the cat wrangler stares at him. He clicks his fingers again. And again. ‘That means get it done,’ he says, and Greyback roars behind him.
‘Suit yourself,’ says the old cat wrangler and she whistles. The jungle cat squad’s ears prick up and their eyes go all loopy as they follow her across the border to TIg.
They are met by a Viking called Olaf, riding a T-Rex. ‘Halt!’ he says. ‘Who goes there?’
‘It’s me,’ says the old cat wrangler.
‘Oh, hello you,’ booms the Vikings.
‘You interested in buying some cats?’ asks the old woman. ‘Tolstoz’s finest jungle warriors.’
‘I’ll give you 20 shekels,’ says the Viking. ‘And not one shekel more.’
‘21,’ says the old cat wrangler.
‘Oh, alright,’ says Olaf. They spit on their palms and shake hands, and with that the attack on Tig is over.
…
Commander Watkins and her faithful griffin, Cuddles, recline in the throne room of The Empire. The Emperor’s chair has been moved and Cuddles reclines on the dias, a beautiful purple, green, and orange velvet blanket beneath him. Commander Watkins has a leg draped over the arm of the throne off to the side as she recovers from the day’s exertions. An extra round blorange reports on the battles of Tig and Largo. Commander Watkins listens silently until he is finished. ‘Brave bloranges. We shall honor their memories and valiance in battle by continuing to bring peace across the entire world of Gremu. We shall not stop until all-’
Cuddles squawking interrupts her.
‘The mages will be called in next. We will scry all of Gremu and see if we can discover what countries we need to protect. The damages have been great and the world of Gremu will take hours to recover. I’m growing concerned about those pineapple’s with their dinosaurs. The continent of Watkins may become a large battle ground if they run into the wolves looking for doughnuts. Do wolves like pineapple?’ Watkins muses.
‘Hmmm.’ The roundest blorange clears his throat.
‘Continue.’ She waves her hand at him.
‘The armies of bloranges are prepared for our attack on The Sand-Lands.’
‘Tell them to wear their turbans and to put spf 130 sunscreen on. I expect it will be a hot dry day. Everyone carry an extra canteen of water. Cuddles and I will attack from the sky should you need our support.’
‘All hail Emperor Watkins!’ cries an enthusiastic blorange at the back of the throne room with a polaroid camera and a tourist t-shirt that says “BLORANGE YOU GLAD WE CONQUERED YOUR COUNTRY”. It has a picture of Emperor Watkins with her thumbs up, and Cuddles looking non-plussed beside her.
Suddenly an intense looking blorange rolls in. He has a medal from the Battle of Logan’s Rock, and a scar where a banana stabbed him with a biro. ‘Emperor Watkins, I can confirm that the Sand-Lands have fallen. We were met with minimal resistance.’
Watkins looks at her watch. ‘But I only issued the command 17 seconds ago…’
The intense blorange shrugs and hands her a fax.
‘Fax?’ says Watkins. ‘What is this, the 17th century?’ She peers at the print. ‘Oh,’ she says, ‘it’s from the Doblone bloranges. No doubt complaining about the price of ice-cream agai-’ She stops, her bushy tail going rigid and her floppy hat stops flopping.
‘Emperor Watkins?’ asks the intense blorange.
‘Those sneaky lawyers just took Dranaeish!’ says Watkins, dropping the fax in shock.
…
Feedme sits in the manager’s office in the main pants depot on Bloomers Wonderland. She’s tried leaving several times, but each time she gets lost in the island maze and ends up back at the factory. She thumps her pineapple head on the desk while a horde of grizzly Vikings wait impatiently for instructions and a couple of T-Rexes run amok downstairs, gobbling up the factory workers. Feedme is wearing exactly 27 pairs of pants, just because she can.
‘Commander?’ asks the tallest of the Vikings, a savage barbarian who goes by the name of Fifi.
‘Mmm?’ asks Feedme, not lifting her head from the table.
‘Your instructions?’
‘Oh I don’t know!’ she gasps. ‘I have literally no idea what I’m doing.’
Fifi points at a map on the wall. It has a lot of green pins in it. ‘For someone who doesn’t know what she’s doing, you’re doing remarkably well,’ he says.
‘Beginner’s luck,’ says Feedme. ‘It’s like I’m just flailing around in the dark.’
‘Ma’am,’ says a scruffy looking little chap with a huge helmet, ‘if I might be so bold, may I suggest that we try to win a continent.’
Feedme looks up. ‘What do you think I’m trying to do?’ She gestures at the map. ‘There’s just so many of them!’
‘I feel your pain,’ says Viking Rodeo Queen. She is sitting in the corner of the office with her white flag tied around her little shoulders.
Feedme takes a deep breath and stands up. ‘I’ve got it,’ she says.
The Vikings lean forward.
‘Everyone attack everywhere,’ says Feedme.
‘Every… what?’ asks Fifi, confused.
‘You heard me,’ says Feedme. ‘Just… go out and smash things.’
‘Miaow.’
‘Who said that?’ asks Feedme. ‘Did someone let a cat into the factory?’
Fifi points at a platoon of elite hypnotised jungle cats playing with some balls of wool over by the window. ‘Olaf bought them from a Klensi cat wrangler in Cannis,’ he says. ‘He paid 21 shekels for them.’
‘Bargain,’ says Viking Rodeo Queen.
…
‘Shhh,’ said Sparrow. ‘Roman, do you hear that?’
‘What is it, my love?’ asked Roman. He’d successfully smuggled the toaster out of the Iron Land, but was still waiting for his toast to pop. It had been nearly 24 hours and still nothing had happened.
‘That sound,’ said Sparrow, going to the window of the palace overlooking the bay.
Roman punches the toaster. ‘Work, damnit!’ he cries. ‘Oh, you’ve got to be ****ing me,’ says Sparrow, feeling her legs turn to jelly.
‘No, my love, I am not,’ says Roman. ‘24 hours I have been waiting for this toast to pop. 24 hours!’
‘Not that,’ says Sparrow, pointing to the sea, ‘I mean them.’ Six armies of shapeshifting lawyers are walking across the water on their high heels, making a splish-splish-splish sound. Amie is at the front of them on a blood red chariot, Sir Ian McKellen at her side, with a shirtless Lieu pulling the chariot on a push-bike, his muscles gleaming in the sun. Amie chinks a glass of champagne with the old pirate who has made a miraculous recovery from rabies, and is busy recounting the story of how he ate Bob Bald’s ear.
‘Roman, my love, a giant army of lawyers are heading this way. Szar will fall before the day is done. We must retreat,’ says Sparrow. ‘Head north to Kichaita.’
‘Very well, my love,’ says Roman. ‘Just… let’s wait another minute and see if this toast pops. I’m starving.’
‘Roman, we don’t have a minute,’ she tells him. ‘The lawyers are almost here. It’s the biggest army Gremu has ever seen. Apart from when The Empire went bananas, but then they don’t really count. I mean, the bananas don’t even have weapons.’
‘WHAT!?’ cried Roman, and he staggers back from the toaster in shock. ‘Sparrow, my love, Sword In My Side, you will never believe this… I forgot to put the bread in!’ He roars with laughter as the lawyers land, firing machine guns and throwing grenades. ‘S**t!’ says Roman, grabbing the toaster in one hand and Sparrow in the other. ‘To the rooftop. A pegasus awaits us there!’
‘Oh crap,’ says Sparrow.
… In the god’s dimension, Sarah Spielberg props up the bar. ‘Another one of those nectars (hic),’ she tells the angelic Indian barman.
He pours another elixir of golden liquid and slides it down the bar to her. She blinks and misses it and it crashes on the floor beside another thirteen previously broken glasses. ‘Another one of those nectars (hic),’ she says again.
An elderly Indian prophet floats above the bar stool beside her. He pushes his thick glasses up onto his nose and rubs his bald head happily. ‘In my opinion, drink is not the solution,’ he says.
Sarah squints at him. ‘Where did you come from?’
‘I am everywhere,’ says the little bald man.
‘I like… (hic)… your purple… tunic,’ says Sarah, swaying precariously on the stool.
The little bald man laughs. ‘To attempt to take over the God’s Dimension so soon is folly.’
Sarah reaches for the next glass of nectar as it slides down the bar and it bounces off her fingertips and joins the other glasses on the floor. ‘****,’ says Sarah.
‘But we have taken Teotl,’ says the little bald man. ‘And even though the lawyers have conquered all of Maika Tenei, Sparrow and Roman are safe. They arrived on the Island of Chi by pegasus a short time ago. Akira has taken them in and is tending to their wounds as well as trying to find some bread for Roman’s toaster.’
Sarah tries to focus on the little man. ‘Are you… Ghandi? (hic)’
‘I am a purple god,’ says the little man. ‘I can be whoever you want me to be.’
Sarah looks at him and scratches her head. ‘I think… I will call you… Derek.’
Derek smiles and hands her a golden card. ‘We may have lost Hund thanks to that pesky celery, but the horned gods are on our side, and when the time comes, they will rain lightning and locusts down on the battlefield.’
‘Locusts… yuck,’ says Sarah.
‘In the meantime, try this,’ says Derek, and he hands her a steaming mug of mysterious black liquid.
‘What… is it?’ asks Sarah.
‘Vedan tea,’ says Derek. ‘It gives you magic powers. It has a special, secret, magic ingredient in it.’
‘Ooooooh,’ says Sarah, and she sips the tea, grimacing because it tastes like old socks. ‘What’s the secret ingredient?’ Derek smiles. ‘You’ll never guess.’
‘Old socks?’ asks Sarah.
Derek looks offended. ‘How… how did you know?’
Sarah spits out the tea across the bar, and the bartender rolls his eyes.
…
Bob Bald meets Ryn on the border between Starfall and Stormside. ‘Well, hello neighbour,’ he says. ‘I understand you have driven the purple warriors from Casciorus.’
‘Hi,’ says Ryn, brandishing a stick of celery, Number 2 wolf standing close behind her. ‘You understand correctly.’
‘You do realise that it’s going to take more than a bunch of psychotic dentists and sticks of celery to defeat us Stormsiders,’ says Bob Bald.
Ryn grins. ‘Perhaps. Care for a doughnut?’
‘I’m sorry,’ says Bob Bald, ‘but could you please speak up? A rabid pirate bit one of my ears off.’
‘I SAID… DO YOU WANT A DOUGHNUT?’ asks Ryn.
Bob Bald looks worried. ‘You have… doughnuts? H-how is that possible?’
Ryn taps her nose and spins a doughnut on the end of her fingertip. ‘That’s for me to know, and you to find out, one-eared lawyer man.’
…
‘We’re rolling,’ says Lieu.
Sir Ian McKellen looks into the camera with a smile. He scrubs up well. He clears his throat and begins to speak. ‘As the sun goes down at the end of the third day in Gremu, our commanders take stock of their positions.’
‘Emperor Watkins in the East, sits atop the Empire’s throne and endless miles of mashed banana, as a new ice-cream war opens up to the west in the brown continent.’
‘Oz and Greyback took Watkin’s Glen in the dying embers of the day. For him, a second card, and a tiny glimmer of hope.’
‘Feedme sits in her pants factory, her forces diminished, but with a foot in two continents. Can she work out what she’s doing before it’s too late?’
‘Sarah sobers up and sees that she has all but been confined to the God’s Dimension. But where there is a will, there is a way. Meanwhile, Derek is still huffing about the socks.’
‘Ryn survives with her ragtag troop of Norse and Eskimo gods, Oran Coron dentists, lone wolves, and woodland fairy foxes, armed with celery and doughnuts. But is survival enough?’
‘Daydream… well, even the greatest daydreamers would find it hard to imagine a way back from his present circumstances.’
‘And Amie?’ He turns and Amie is sitting on the Feirfall throne in Kichaita, blood red flags draped from the rafters. She lifts a glass of champagne in Sir Ian McKellen’s direction. ‘Well, let’s just say, somebody just bagged themselves a continent.’ And he raises a glass back in her direction.
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