Cartoons, Ancient Pixies, and A Really Bad Dream

“You actually believe that no one who sees Diomedes will think to do a double take?”

Tinkletoes does not acknowledge Writer Lady’s question much less answer it.

“Look at who I’m talking to.” She mutters. “This is going to be an absolute train wreck.”

“Did you hear about the train wreck?” Ray asks as he walks into the kitchen. “Astronomical.” He says. “No one was killed. No one hurt. Hollywood could not have planned a better accident.”

“There was something about one on the Internet.” Tinkletoes comments.

“There was something wrong with the tracks, when the engineer was trying to stop he hit the brakes too hard.”

“The cars jack-knifed?” The self-proclaimed mercenary asks.

“No. This was way better. One car ran right up the back end of the other, pushing it’s back end up into the air. Like this.” Ray holds his right hand up horizontally, he raises his left hand below the right one vertically in an attempt to illustrate a visual image of the crash.

“Kind of like an old cartoon.” Tinkletoes observes.

“It’s cool when they figure out how to do cartoon stuff in real life.” Ray says as he opens the pantry and begins looking for food. “Oh yeah,” Ray turns to Writer Lady. “Diomedes wanted me to tell you that,” he holds up his hand and closes his eyes, “we have exited your bed chamber and you can now resume your rest period confident that you will not be disturbed before the yellow glowing orb has once again shown in the morning sky.”

Writer Lady smiles briefly at Ray’s effort to repeat Diomedes’ words exactly. “Thank you Ray.”

“No problem. Are you going back to bed?” He asks.

“Sleeping is what most people do at this hour.”

“I was wondering,” Ray continues.”is it true that the spirits of ancient pixies use a door in your closet to travel back and forth from their ancestral grounds?”

Writer Lady’s face contorts into an odd mix of confusion, surprise, and concern. She pauses before answering.

“That was two floor plans ago.” House responds with an exasperated sigh. “Does anyone know how to listen anymore? The ghosts of the Ancient Ones prefer the attic now.”

“Get too crowded on the main floor?” Tinkletoes asks.

“No. They prefer the darkness of the attic. It’s better for their rituals.”

“Rituals?” Writer Lady asks as her face pales. “What kind of rituals?”

The self-proclaimed mercenary shakes his head. “You know House, she always makes things sound more intense than they really are. Go back to bed.”

“What about Diomedes?” She asks.

“TP and I have everything under control.” Tinkletoes says.

“No you don’t.”

“We do.”

“You don’t.” Writer Lady volleys back.

“We do.” Tinkletoes returns to the stove and Writer Lady. The self-proclaimed mercenary picks up the mug of tea and hands it to her. “You’re going to need lots of rest, because you’ll be busy tomorrow afternoon telling me how wrong you were to suggest we could not handle this.” He takes position behind her, gently guiding her out of the kitchen, through the living room, down the hall and back to her bedroom.

“How is he going to get enough sun?”

“Smelts’ brother has a really big truck with a bucket on it. He’s in the parade tomorrow. He’s agreed to give Diomedes a ride.”

“I thought you weren’t close to Smelts.”

“No one is. No one likes him all that much.”

“Why would his brother help us?” She asks.

“He doesn’t like Smelts that much either.”

As they approach Writer Lady’s bedroom she asks, “What happens if this other Smelts doesn’t show up?”

“Doing these local parades is good for business. He’ll show.”

“What if he doesn’t? What if he has a flat tire or runs out of gas?”

“He’ll call another Smelts, the one with the towing company.”

“What if the bucket truck can’t be fixed?”

“We’ll find another truck for him to stand on.”

“What if the sun doesn’t come out?” She asks.

“We’ll take him someplace where the sun is shining.”

“What if TP’s goop won’t stick to Diomedes’ scales keeping the magic within it from attracting more heat to Diomedes’ back?”

“We’re men. We can handle it.”

“A lot can go wrong.” Writer Lady points out as she’s guided into her room.

“We’ve got it. Relax.” Tinkletoes says as he exits the room closing the bedroom door behind him.

“There’s no way this is going to work.” She says before sipping her tea.

“I heard that.”

Writer Lady tries to sleep. When she isn’t picturing all of the things that might go wrong at the Summer Lovin’ Festival she contemplates why the ghosts of ancient pixies would want to spend any portion of their afterlives in her home and what type of dark rituals they might be performing in her attic. She wonders how dark a pixie ritual can get. “They’re pixies. Pixies are like the cheerleaders of Faerie. Cheerleaders are fairly harmless, they might wear you down with all that spirit and all those ‘Read-y? O-kays!’ She relaxes and closes her eyes, a dream comes into focus. Writer Lady finds herself frozen unable to move or scream. She watches helplessly as half-dead pixie cheerleaders fly through the house spilling blood at every opportunity. So many bodies...the blood all looks the same. It glitters with magic. The blood changes color. From red, to gold, to yellow, green, dark green, teal, sky blue, purple, pink, gray, to brown and to black the cycle repeating over and over. All of the colors and shimmering magic in the blood can only belong to one living being.

“Diomedes!”