The alien briefly inspected a huge wooden door in front of her and then walked through it as if it were a mere hologram.
She entered a long hall with a long wooden table stretching from one end to the other.
Every seat bar one was occupied with a variety of colourful life forms.
The alien approached the seat where Shiva the lioness was sitting and gave her the book. Shiva thanked her profusely and turned the book into a ring and placed the ring on one of her claws. The alien then went and sat in the empty seat.
The thirteen humans were there. Penicillin was there. All the creatures who had escaped Grimwitz’s prison were there.
Shiva, Bobby, the F.C.T., Isis, Buffalo, Kazz, Donald the Druid, Slithey Tove, Gary the Gardener, Pod, Billy Fish-Head, Tonna, and Brecht had all returned from their mind-hopping experiences when they were led out of The Forest of Id. The Forest had rocked them more than Penicillin had anticipated. He had to get the other animals to help him physically guide the humans this way and that on their journey. The humans kept having out of body experiences and this affected their mobility. Eventually they all got to the meeting hall they now sat in. Initially all the humans could do was talk feverishly about where they had all been. After a while Penicillin managed to calm them down.
At the head of the table sat a huge fifty-foot fire-breathing dragon. Since the roof of the hall was fifty-five foot high the dragon’s head fell just short of the rafters. She was a haughty red and black beast with long curving horns above her pointed ears and a high decorative frill down her back tapering off towards her pointed tail. Her huge, featherless wings were coloured in shades of red, black, mauve and purple. They flapped wildly when she was excited. She had scales that glinted red and black all over her body. Her snout, eyebrows and ears were a brilliant fiery crimson like the sunrise. Her claws, teeth and horns were milky white like a summer cloud and her eyes were jet black jewels set on bright red, round Lily Pads moving on a sea of white marble. Her armour was made of plates of elven silver and along each plate were set rubies, ebony and coiling tendrils of crystal. Elven silver link-mail covered her hands, the top of her head and her feet. Her armour could deflect the strongest steel-tipped arrow. When the weather wasn’t too hot she would also wear a red helmet with holes for her horns to go through. Her claws were sharp enough to cut the lightest of silks with a single stroke and yet powerful enough to punch through the heaviest of shields. Her touch could also be as gentle as a kitten’s.
Sydny Smith flew into the hall through a skylight window that was propped open just wide enough for his cherubic form to squeeze into. As he circled above the assembled crowd he spotted the humans. A strong force drew him down to them. They saw him settling down to the ground and looked at him quizzically.
“Who are you?” Bobby asked him. “You look strangely familiar.”
“And so I should, Bobby,” Sydny said.
“You know who I am?”
“Yes,” said Sydny. “You, Shiva and Buffalo have made it back to your human forms and now there are thirteen humans in The Garden. I don’t know how you did this but it’s a big move. I’ll tell you, a number of creatures here in the Eden realm are very excited about it. It’s the first time something like this has happened in our experience.”
“I’m glad to know this,” said Buffalo. “But who are you?”
“I’m Sydny Smith.” he said.
The humans all looked at him.
“That name rings a bell all right,” said Bobby.
“You all need to get back to Earth at some point. You’ve been dropped into the Eden realm by some strange force.”
Shiva the human spoke…
“Perhaps if you know so much about what is going on here, you can fill us in on who is here at this gathering. Two of us and our lioness and badger counterparts (she nodded at the lioness and she nodded back) have been struggling in the dirt in Grimwitz’s cave until just lately. Then all thirteen of us were rushed forwards and backwards in different time zones thanks to the effects of the Forest of Id. Although it’s all been very exciting we are somewhat confused. We aren’t familiar with all these new people.”
“No problem,” said Sydny.
“First of all, who’s that dragon?” said Buffalo.
“The dragon’s name is Rosa.”
“That’s cool.” said Shiva. “Do you think you could fill us in on what she does and all that?”
“Well,” said Sydny. “Like the dragons Plato and Aristotle, Rosa is a keen social commentator. She firmly believes that improvements to any social system cannot be taken to their necessary extremes unless the whole system is fundamentally changed. She believes that life is in a permanent state of revolution and considers such self-determining leaps in consciousness the only part cognitive beings have to play in deciding their own destiny.”
“Sounds reasonable,” said Buffalo. “I’ve always felt myself that day to day occurrences are, for the most part, largely a result of social influence.”
“Rosa also believes,” said Sydny, “that it is only within the chaos of revolution that our map of the future will be written. She believes that time works in spirals and cycles in the same way that D.N.A. twists and turns in order to structure life at an atomic level. She is heavily critical of reform. She believes that any necessary change in order to prevent fundamental hardship must entail the whole restructuring of that system. For her the catalyst of revolution is what gives the universe its dynamic ability to evolve. For her revolution throws up all the variety of cross-cultural representation necessary to increase the liberty of every life form involved. She also believes that if revolution is restricted and contained within a specific geographical area then the results will lead to a system as bad as the one that that revolution has tried to replace. Rosa thinks that revolution should be interdimensional and multi-cultural. She advocates cultural fusion and is continually warning those in Eden that if cultures attempt sectarian separation from one another this will ultimately result in confrontation.”
“She’s obviously studied her revolutionary politics in a serious school.” said Bobby.
“Oh yes,” said Sydny. “For Rosa, revolution is a scientific, historical and cyclical certainty and she believes that it must be understood in order to use it for the advancement of everyone.”
“That’s great for her,” said Shiva. “But what do you believe Sydny?”
“I think she’s onto something,” said the cherub. “I also believe that any overwhelming adherence to mere reform would lead to a misrepresentation of the needs of all life. But it is her attitude to change rather than mine that has led to the communal decision that she should chair this meeting to decide what to do about the goblin infestation of the Forest of Abel.”
“And the motorway the forces of Cain are driving through it as we speak!” said Penicillin.
“So it’s gotten that bad already.” mused Sydny.
“We must hurry.” said Rosa.
Along the dragon’s left hand side sat four elves.
There was Imresteen. Her passion for singing knew no bounds. She had developed a vocal range that held listeners in a euphoric trance. Such was the universal nature of her art that she was known to have charmed the giant ogre of Grimstein away from strangling sheep for a whole year. Her five-minute rendition of “Light-Flight” by a band from Earth tales called Pentangle almost rehabilitated the ogre. After he had considered the beauty of the universe for a solid year of hard thought, onlookers said he then counted down from ten to one and internally combusted leaving nothing but a pile of ash. Witnesses claim that he had a grin on his face when he did this. To date it is the only recorded incident where an ogre has been seen to appear contented.
Imresteen had small pointed ears, dark skin and long golden hair. Her silver silken robes glistened in the light from fiery torches set at intervals along the walls. Her piercing green eyes made you feel that she was looking deep into the inner reaches of your soul.
Next to her sat Threen. He was an elven wood-carver.
He too had golden hair but his skin was green and his eyes were brown. He wore an oaken crown in the shape of an adder. His relationship with trees was said to be on an extremely telepathic level.
Next to him sat Hira. She was an elven healer. Her remedies for poisonous stings, bites and berries were widely praised. Her black flowing hair matched her dark eyes and her skin was as pale as the moon. She wore a black silken robe with a silver broach in the shape of a poppy which fastened it to her shoulder.
Next to her was Treem. He was an elven songwriter. At present he was experimenting with a style of music that baffled his community. He called it Free-Form Jazz. He had picked it up from Earth tales that Sammy the Pixie had given him. His orange hair and orange fez allowed room for his orange pointed ears to sit comfortably either side of his North African style hat. He had an orange badge on the hat with the words “FAR OUT!” written on it.
All the elves were tall and slim and all had pointed ears.
They had such a vibrant and healthy attitude to
relationships between species that they were often asked to represent Eden in communications with creatures from the areas of desolation. All Elves had radically different coloured skin within their family groupings. Elf parents and elf children were never the same colour and nor were elf partners and elf brothers and sisters. On close inspection any onlooker would soon realise that no two elves were exactly the same colour. The extremes in tonal difference between the members of this extraordinary species was well regarded throughout Eden.
Next to Treem was Old Tom. He represented the dwarves of Endlestrasse.
Old Tom fingered his long red beard as he tried to remember the instructions the queen of Endlestrasse had given him regarding this meeting. The queen couldn’t make the meeting herself owing to a boxing match she had planned to have with her husband. It had been her idea. The boxing match had been set up in order to resolve a washing up rota they had attempted to set up in their home.
Next to Old Tom sat Sammy the Pixie. As usual he was dressed in a red pointed hat with no brim. Its main distinguishing feature was that it had a bell on the end of its point. He also wore a red waistcoat with gold buttons, a green shirt, red and green vertically striped trousers and green, pointed boots. He was clean shaven and had long, pointed ears sticking up on either side of his face. He also had an extremely cheerful smile.
Pixies were an extremely surreal community of life forms. Their conversation was of a nature which suggested that they often saw different dimensions in the universe at the same time. They were often pre-occupied with something that those around them couldn’t see, hear, smell or touch without going through an inter-dimensional doorway. They seemed to share this perception with cats more than any other species. Witches and wizards often had cats as familiars so that they could communicate more effectively with pixies. Pixies were frequently known to say such things as “Wow look at that!” or “Oh did you hear that?” Pixies were thus generally regarded as co-existing between two or three different planes of existence at any one time.
Sammy was the pixie representative for multi-cultural affairs in Eden. It was his job to liase with other species and state the standpoints of all the other pixies.
Sammy didn’t mind but he would often be heard to be desirous of the opportunity to embark on multi-dimensional journeys with as much regularity as his mates. He did find the internal wranglings of Eden a bit much at times. The funny thing was that a few of his mates often wished that they had a job like his where they could get on with the serious political stuff. Sometimes they seemed critical of their very own lack of discipline when it came to the temptation to embark on regular journeys between the planes in the multi-dimensional universe. This seemed to indicate that you can’t please all the pixies all the time.
It also seemed to prove that they were prone to the “grass is greener on the other side of the fence” schism.
Pixies also had an automatic and sporadic ability to glimpse other points in time. Pixies sometimes assumed something had happened when it hadn’t. Sometimes they thought something was about to happen when it already had. Their glimpses into the future were sometimes accurate but also often way off the mark owing to the infinite number of possible futures available in a universe with an infinite number of different time streams. In fact pixies often argued that imagination had such a strong interface with memory that every living thing may well have, to a large extent, an infinite number of possible pasts as well. Pixie premonitions were very frequently analysed owing to the invaluable assistance their more accurate efforts had afforded various communities in Eden. These premonitions were random though so they were normally only ever heard when folk least expected them.
Pixies also had one other ability that was largely unique to both them and only a few other species. This was the ability to change sex at random. This was thought to be linked to their ability to change colour. Their mood swings often involved a changing of colour every so many seconds although they normally spent days on end as one sex or another. Today Sammy was a She rather than a He.
Next to Sammy sat five centaurs. Arms and hands revealed random plates of silver armour. Horned helmets decorated with swirling mandalas of silver and black gave their rugged faces a grim countenance. These centaurs, half-horse and half-human, were from the group whose spokesperson was Surjeet.
Plato the dragon had gone to check on The Tree of Life and the centaurs had come here.
Surjeet sat on her hind legs and removed her helmet. Her long black hair fell about her armoured shoulders and she surveyed the company with a wild grin on her face. The other four centaurs were all men and they took their helmets off too. One was Ranjit, one was Ravinder, one was Antonius and one was Frank. They were all warriors who followed Surjeet along the borders of Cain in a continuing attempt to stop raids from its foul inhabitants. All five sat on a slightly risen padded board. Had they sat on chairs then they would have towered above all save the chair-dragon.
Next to them sat the humans themselves, with Sydny hovering nearby.
Shiva the lioness and Buffalo the badger sat amongst all the other escapees from Grimwitz’s cave next to them and each of the animals had a rising chair that brought their heads up to the height of the others present at the meeting.
Penicillin, the elven druid, sat next to them. He was wearing his black robe with an interlocking, silver, five-cornered star embroidered on the front. His long silver sickle hung by his side and was fastened to a chord made out of red silk. Hanging from the other side was his red silken pouch full of herbs, berries and fungus. His dark skin seemed to have a silver sheen to it as it reflected the light from the nearby torches.
It was a massive table for a massive congregation.
Sydny introduced each of these Edenites to the humans with subsequent explanations as to who they were. Each human, in turn, introduced themselves with brief explanations as to who they were.
When the humans had finished enthralling the company with their short introductions Sydny moved around the table and continued with explanations as to who was who.
“Who’s that at the opposite end of the table to Rosa?” asked Shiva.
“That’s Lady Lamia,” Sydny said.
She sat high on her serpent coils and removed her black top hat to reveal her jet-black hair. Her bullwhip was coiled on the table next to her.
“There’s a lot to tell about her, but this isn’t the place.”
On the other side of the table and next to Lamia sat the alien who had arrived last. She needed no introduction as all of the humans present now knew about Kazz, Isis and the Job Centre where Kazz and Isis had first met an alien. The alien knew this through her telepathic links with the others of her kind that had conducted the experiments in the Job Centre. She levitated an inch or so above the chair beneath her. To the casual onlooker she appeared to be sitting on it in the normal fashion.
Next to her sat three witches.
“You should talk to them at some stage,” said Sydny. “They are from a small community of gnomes that are spending a while in this dimension in order to gather together Earth tales. Their mission is to return to their dimension with as many Earth tales as possible. They have thus become involved with the problems in Abel through their desire to read the book Shiva the lioness has got on her. It is to be their eighty-eighth book in two days. Gnomes have selective recall abilities that enable them to memorise literature word for word. They were to collect one hundred pieces of literature and return to their dimension to recite them to other gnomes, who also have selected recall, and thus culturally fuse with Earth a little more. Gnomes are regular visitors to this plane of Eden in order to gain knowledge. In turn they always get involved in ‘local affairs’. They see this as only reasonable considering that they feel grateful for the opportunity to enjoy Eden’s culture.”
The gnomes were extremely varied in build. They all had extremely long, thin noses and pointed ears but apart from that they were the most diverse group of varying shapes and sizes. The first gnome witch was Eeeowin. She was about six foot two and incredibly thin. Her body and arms together were the width of a human leg. She had long multicoloured hair, an incredibly long nose and a wide mouth and sat with long eyelashes blinking slowly. Her eyes looked massive seeing as they were double the size of human eyes and were situated on a face as thin as her body.
Next to Eeeowin was Fug. Fug was like a big ball. The contours of her body were so spherical that she did not appear to have a neck. The only break in spherical symmetry was her long, thin nose that stuck straight out in front of her like a balancing weight. Next to Fug was Din. Din was three foot seven and had so much hair that you could hardly see her body. Her long nose poked through her immense black, curly forest of cranial insulation and her ears were the only thing visible either side. Her arms appeared every now and again and huge hands pulled away her mane to reveal a mad, grinning face with huge eyes and a giant mouth. She was called Din because she could not go for more than ten minutes without laughing hysterically and loudly. All were dressed in black gowns that were tied at the waist by red rope.
In fact all gnomes regardless of age, gender or upbringing were hysterical neurotics who pulled their faces and bodies into extreme emotional contortions in order to display their reaction to the universe around them. They were probably the most eccentric community of life forms when they were excited. Their whole physical form could change according to the emotional responses.
“Whereas pixies change colour according to mood,” Sydny told the humans, “Gnomes change shape! The shapes that Eeeowin, Fug and Din have at this emergency meeting are the ones that they chose to have as a result of the calm required in order to get the meeting under-way. As soon as debating begins they are sure to change shape entirely every few minutes, so watch out for that.”
Although female and male gnomes could look like anything, both out of choice and at random according to temperament, their genders were fixed. Obviously gnomes retained the option of bisexuality like any other enlightened species but gnome geezars were gnome geezars and gnome girlies were gnome girlies.
It was often said that if two or more gnomes were caught having sex the scene was like some mad sped-up cartoon film that had become a wash of abstract images changing form at such speeds that the onlooker did not have enough time to determine what any of them were! Gnomes were also not shy of copulating in front of other life forms.
Whilst static and inert Eeeowin, Fug and Din had chosen their girths, heights and shapes. They surveyed the air in front of their eyes as they waited for the meeting to start. Since they were prone to radical enlarging and shrinking, the gnomes had a whole section of the table to themselves.
Now the humans had been introduced to everyone, Sydny flapped his wings and shot up in the air at an incredible speed, finally hovering around Rosa’s massive head.
“Right. Let’s begin this meeting!” the dragon bellowed.
“We all now know of Able’s invasion.” said Rosa. “The alien consciousness has already telepathically fed that account to everyone.” She had too. This had happened instantly like many telepathic links.
The dragon swung her head to face the alien.
“So, from your telepathic account, I believe you have been reading a book of Earth tales in The Forest of Id. It seems to involve our Earth friends here. What revelations did you experience in the writings?”
“Well....” said the alien; “We seem to be in a situation that requires two plans. One revolves around our immediate need to stop the forces of destruction from continuing through the Forest of Abel. The other involves our dealing with the forces at the top of the particular hierarchy that have initiated this wave of desolation.
After reading a particularly poignant story involving two separate dimensions of Earth and representatives of Eden I feel that an aspect of assassination is necessary behind the borders of Cain.”
The alien was, of course, saying all this without moving her lips.
“Who were the representatives of Eden in the Story?” asked the dragon.
“Lamia, myself and another of my kind.” said the alien.
“You were in the story?” asked Rosa looking surprised.
“I was. It came as a shock to me too.” said the alien.
“How did you know you were one of the aliens in the story?” asked the dragon.
“I knew because I remembered the incident that the story centred around.”
“So the story was true!” exclaimed the dragon.
“Yes.” said the alien.
Sammy the Pixie was grinning.
“Well I never!” exclaimed Fug. Fug was about five foot eight inches as well as being as round as a balloon. She was, in fact, as round as she was tall. Her spherical form, long nose and wide mouth were no less shocking than her explosion of curly pink hair. Hearing her speak was startling to many at the meeting.
“So all the stories in “Relative Rewind” are mostly true then!” exclaimed Old Tom the dwarf.
“Yes.” said the alien.
“Wooh!” said Din.
The gnomes started stretching into long, leaning tubes of screaming hysteria. Their hands reached out in all directions really quickly as their faces twisted into the backdrops for immense and sudden pleading.
“Can wee look at the boook now?”
The gnomes swayed this way and that and seemed to be billowing like sheets on a washing line. They grinned, they smirked, they whined, they chuckled and they pleaded, all within two or three seconds....
“Ohh please! We’llll look aaaafterrr it! Prommmmmise!”
The lioness took off the ring and it turned into the book. The fact it still mutated from ring to book provided a visceral reminder to the company that the forces attacking Able were an extreme threat. The lioness then passed it to the gnomes. They all hurriedly read it from cover to cover in 33.3333333333333333333333333333333333333 seconds flat! They then sat low in their chairs and deflated with a look of immense satisfaction on their faces. They returned the book to Shiva.
“So what do you reckon?” the dragon asked them.
They all jumped up and down suddenly and shouted.
“ASSASSINATION! ASSASSINATION! ASSASSINATION!”
“The assassination of whom, may I ask?” said the dragon.
“The spectre in The Stock Eggs Change!” chorused the gnomes.
When they’d said this, one assumed the shape of a sword, one assumed the shape of a spear and one assumed the shape of a sub-machine gun. After a second of this they reverted to six foot two and incredibly thin, five foot eight and as round as a balloon and three foot seven with so much hair that you could hardly see her body. This time, though, it was Fug who was tall and thin, Din who was as round as a balloon and Eeeowin who had all the hair.
“What does everybody else think?” asked the dragon.
“Assassination!” they all cried.
“No preferable alternatives?” asked the dragon.
“Assassination!” they all cried.
“Right, who’s going to do it?” asked Rosa.
Everybody including the humans put their hands up.
“Alright,” said the dragon, gravely. “In accordance with The Laws of Chaos I will ask a question and the first person to answer it gets the job. That person will then ask a question and whoever answers it will get to go with them. All those who do not go with the assassins may then get any number of their kind and confront the forces of desolation in The Forest of Abel. That is, apart from the humans.”
She swung her head towards them. “We must get you back to Earth. I know this might be shocking but shock is the only way we can do this quickly enough to restore the balance of things before it compromises your safety in a most extreme way. I hope you’ve found your experiences on Eden informative.”
With that she roared a roar that sounded like the loudest sound any of the humans had ever heard. They all disappeared in an instant.
Rosa now turned to face those remaining. “Don’t worry they have all been returned to points in their dimension approximately half an hour after each of them injested the indigo pills. Their memories of space/time irregularities and their visit to Eden will be logged in their subconsciousnesses. These will be a constant source of inspiration to them when they are unlocked from time to time. Their taste of Paradise will no doubt play a part in involving them in our battle with the forces of Cain. Their role is now on Earth and human events will mainly dictate that role. Our direct influence on terrestrial affairs should be minimised where ever possible. Cain seeks to control human affairs like it tries to do with everything else. We must allow humans to reach enlightenment largely as a result of their own actions. Mind altering substances can be an asset in this area but now, with the introduction of these indigo pills, their connections with us will be ever more pronounced. We must protect The Tree of Life and stop any attempts by Cain to use humanity as a weapon against it. Humanity must protect the Earth and stop those amongst them who would seek to do Cain’s work. I don’t think, however, that Cain was expecting any physical manifestation of humanity in Eden so there is more unfolding here than we all realise.
I know my expulsion of the twelve humans from The Garden was sudden but they wouldn’t have given this up easily if they had stayed any longer. That would have been very dangerous for them. All humanity must be admitted if the time is right, not one person excluded. So back to our plan. Is everyone agreed?”
“Yes!” they all said.
“Right question one. What is mitosis?”
Everyone immediately replied together....
“Mitosis is cell division in which a nucleus divides into daughter nuclei, each containing the same number of chromosomes as the parent nucleus.”
Rosa grinned.
“We seem to be in a very pronounced probability matrix and riding along an extremely potent synchronicity curve. Since you all know the answer to that question with an equal reply time it seems likely that our minds have joined in many places over this issue. I will not waste time with any other general knowledge questions and pull two names out of a hat.”
Lamia removed her top hat and threw it to the dragon. It landed upside down on the table just in front of the dragon’s red and black scaly belly. Sydny Smith pulled sheet after sheet of paper out of his left nostril. When he had counted one per member for each of the present company the dragon scribbled each person’s name on each piece with one of her long red claws. There was clearly a lot of Magick at work here. Rosa then folded each sheet and put them into Lamia’s top hat and shook it. Sydny Smith then pulled out one of the folded sheets. He opened it and Rosa read it out. “The first assassin is, wait for it wait for it, Rosa the dragon!” Those around Rosa the dragon congratulated her.
“The second assassin is, wait for it wait for it,” Sydny said, rummaging in the hat. He pulled out a sheet of paper and looked at it.
“Let me read the paper,” said the dragon. She grabbed the sheet and then announced it to the whole gathering.
“The second assassin is Imresteen the elf!” she said. The hall erupted in cheers.
Rosa then clapped her mighty hands.
“Right!” she boomed, “Let’s get going!”