[Okay, I got the numbering confused. This is Part XI. I'm counting the
missing day now, because it means the part is the same as the date,
which makes working out where I am easier :-)]
[ARGH FSCK. Sent out the unspellchecked version. Hoping the
Supersede works...]
Jack explained the plan to Melody and the Minstrel.
"If I'm not back by midnight" he finished "I've been captured,
and probably eaten, so you'd better cut down the Beanstalk." he
handed Hippo a very sharp axe.
"Remember, the stroke of midnight"
Jack hugged his mother, and with a florid bow, began to climb
the beanstalk.
Melody was crying
"Oh my poor son!" she wailed "Caught with a mystical geas!"
Hippo looked confused. "Geese? What have geese got to do with
it? It's a hat, not a goose"
Melody fwaped him "Geas! Geas!" she said
"Where?" shouted Hippo.
"Oh never mind. You're right. Mystical geese would be silly. I
mean, who ever heard of a golden goose?"
"Exactly. So now we just wait until Midnight?"
"Yes" said the Widow Geekay. "Tea?"
"Don't mind if I do" said the Minstrel, and offered his arm, in
a gentlemanly fashion. Jack's mother, with a short hesitation,
took it, and they both went inside.
When Jack got to the top of the beanstalk he was totally worn
out. Again. Any hopes that he'd learnt anything by his previous
experience were dashed against the rocks of reality. From the
rucksack on his back he drew a large bundle tied with string,
and then got to work.
Carrie was just finishing cleaning the kitchen when she heard
the knock at the door. Her husband had been irritable for days,
ever since that boy had escaped from the oven. She opened the
door, and...
"Hi" said the man at the door, "My name's Tony Sheppard. I'm a
travelling Peddler. Could I interest you in a few things?"
Carrie thought this though a little. The man looked tall, but
was covered in mud. Never-the-less, he was human, and therefore
cooking him would get her back in her husband's good books.
"Do come in, my good man. You look hungry. Would you care for
some dinner?" she asked nicely.
They sat in the kitchen for a while, eating and talking of the
world around. Carrie confessed she hadn't seen much of the world
since they came to live in this remote area, and Tony told her
stories of the world outside. Just then, and just as before, the
Giant came home, and Jack - in his disguise as Tony - was
hassled into the oven. This time Supermouse opened the door
within seconds of Carrie closing hers.
Supermouse and Jack watched unseen from the Giant's Mantelpiece
- easily forty feet high - as the Giant devoured food and
drink. Eating whole roast cows as if they were apples.
Eventually he was finished with his starter, and Carrie went to
go get the main course from the oven, while the Giant took the
Magic Hat from it's box and put it on his head, hoping that this
one time the magic would infuse him, and he would become the
greatest storyteller of all time...
Then the complex subtleties of Jack's Masterplan came into
action. Supermouse leapt from the Mantelpiece, and flew right in
front of his nose, screamed "Burble Burble Burble", with paws
in ears and tongue waggling. The enraged giant leapt from his
seat and chased the enchanted rodent out of the door, while Jack
clambered down from the Mantelpiece by means of Supermouse's
secret passageways, and ran across the floor to where the hat -
which had fallen from the giant's head - lay resting.
As Jack picked up the hat, a tremendous feeling of power washed
over him. He longed to put the hat on.
So he did.
And his mind was filled with images, with stories, with
characters and events and places and people and objects and
magic and... and...
...and he was so enraptured with the feeling of power that he
totally failed to notice when Carrie hit him on the back of the
head with a frying pan.
He came too several hours later, head throbbing, with Supermouse
standing over him with an ice pack.
"Ow" said Jack, with depth and feeling.
"That was a silly thing to do" said Supermouse.
"What was?" asked our pained protagonist.
"Putting the hat on. You're lucky, I had just flown back into
the room. I rescued you and the hat -" and here Supermouse
nodded towards the object on the table behind them "- before
Carrie came back"
"Back? Back from where?"
"Unconsciousness. I put her to sleep with the Rodent Nerve
Pinch"
Jack decided it was wisest not to ask. He noticed that the hat
was propped up on the end of a broom, when he remarked on this,
Supermouse answered: "It's best if I don't touch it, I think".
Jack, remembering what had happened when he picked it up,
agreed. Suddenly, a thought struck him.
"What's the time?" he asked
"About 10 in the evening. Why?" answered the rodental rescuer.
Jack said a bad word.
Then he said a few others.
When Jack had finished reciting Bad Words, Jack explained what
The Minstrel had been told to do at midnight.
"How long does it take to climb down?" asked Supermouse,
worried.
"About an hour and a half."
"If we run we can just about make it" replied the mouse.
They ran.
They would have made it.
Unfortunately, the Giant happened to glance out of his window at
the wrong moment...
"Och eye! There go the wee thieves now!" he said, and leapt out
of his seat, and into hot pursuit of the fleeing fairytalers.
Jack wasn't a bad runner, and Supermouse could fly easily, but
Jack couldn't carry on running forever. Especially carrying a
hat on the end of a broomstick.
"You'll... have to.... carry the... hat..." he wheezed.
"No no no no no" said Supermouse. "I'm magical already! Do you
know what will happen if that much power collides?"
"..." said Jack, shaking his head.
"Neither do I!" Said Supermouse.
"... We... Don't... have... any... choice" said Jack "We'll...
have... to... risk... it"
Jack flipped the stick, and the hat went spinning on the breeze
towards Supermouse.
"NO!" said the rodent "NO no no! We can't ris..."
And then Supermouse caught the hat.
And then all hell broke loose.
Supermouse began to glow around the edges, the intensity of the
light growing as the hat was clasped in the rodent's paws. The
form seemed to be growing and shrinking at the same time, as if
all Supermouse's powers were changing and growing and
mutating... Supermouse was going to be able to defeat the giant!
Then the rodent's form vanished, along with the hat. And all was
quiet on the cloud, except for the ever increasing crescendo of
the Giant's footsteps behind them. Jack was still an hour from
the beanstalk at this point, and felt he couldn't run another
step. He leapt into the cloud at the side of the road and hoped
it would both support his weight and hide him.
It did both.
The giant ran right past him and down the road, Jack following
at a slightly slower pace.
The giant spent a short while wandering around the road before
he found the beanstalk. He looked down it, couldn't see Jack,
and sat down to think for a moment.
"The wee lad musta got here before me and gone down" he thought
aloud. "Or, the canny boy hasn't got here yet." The Giant stood
up "In which case I'll either catch him up, or I'll be waitin'
at the bottom!" he cried, and started to climb down.
Jack waited a little while, and then peered carefully over the
edge. Had he got here before the Giant? Did he still have time
to climb down? He looked at his watch... or where his watch
should be. It must have fallen off when he was hiding in the
clouds.
At midnight his only route home would be cut off. He had no idea
if he could get back home after that - he'd failed the Fairies,
they wouldn't do him a favour now - so his only choice was to to
start climbing. He had no idea how much time he had lost
wandering down the road.
He started to climb.
[More tomorrow]
Yours in total sincerity
Aquarion
