And this, reader-friend, is where things get interesting. I realize, being the author, that TAL 3 has been delayed numerous times, and that its credibility factor was lost quite some time ago. Still, there's a lot more to be wrapped up before I can go on to TAL 4. So, here goes nothing...
One-Eye returned. Looking just as he had before the Madcoil incident, the Wolfrider strode into the clearing with an apathetic look on his face. His dagger was back in its pouch, and his shoulders were slightly slumped. Though the elf saw Strongbow and Moonshade, and though raindrops were hitting him upside the head, he silently sat down on the soaked grass.
"Well? What?" asked Redlance. His body was shaking from the cold rain, and his teeth were chattering from the bad weather, but he strained his voice to be heard over the storm. As he clenched his fingers close to his palms, he said, "Something elapsed between the time you charged out, screaming 'The traitor!' and now. I want to know, One-Eye. And if you don't tell us, I may have to become most uncharacteristically violent." He scowled and brushed several drops of water from his face.
To that, the optically impaired one replied, "All you need to know is that there *is* such a thing as BaJR." Looking away from Redlance, One-Eye placed both of his hands on top of his head.
Three Elf-Widths away, Strongbow sat on his own patch of mud. Damn... so the traitor lived after all, he thought, Well, Bearclaw, looks like you're in trouble. He looked towards One-Eye, nodded mutely, and then re-positioned his body. Strongbow began staring at the little river of clay that had been formed in the ground.
***
Skywise realized that he was in the Middle of Somewhere Hall. At this point, he knew several things: 1) his pants were back on, 2) Glue Fountain was a very large place, and 3) Aroree might not be talking to him again for a while. This much established, he was taken slightly aback when he saw the majority of his tribe seated around a rectangular table. "Did I miss something?" he asked them, while scratching the back of his neck.
Since she had returned to the room only a few minutes earlier, Nightfall turned to look at Skywise, and with a piece of chicken in her hand, said, "Yes. Come, dear, sit down, and we'll explain everything to you." Smiling deliriously, she cracked all eight of her knuckles.
"Why not," Skywise said quietly. He ambled towards the table, searching for an empty seat. As he peered around, he sighted something odd in the middle of the table. "What's that thing in a cage?" he asked his fellow elves, while pointing to the flying dreamberry-creature that served as part-time centerpiece.
Voll looked at the stargazer, cleared his throat, and said soberly, "That is properly called a flying dreamberry-creature. However, most of us just refer to them as DIPs. I forget what the acronym stands for, but the little buggers do make for good decor."
Though lost in thought, Skywise seated himself in a chair that Ember brought out for him. "How odd," he said, "I wonder what would happen if a DIP got out of its cage?" Suddenly, Skywise's face was overcome by an evil grin, and he realized the comedic potential of the situation.
"Are you thinking what I think you're thinking?" asked Suntop, who leaned over the table to look directly at Skywise, "Because if my thinking is right and you are thinking like I think you are, you want to release the flying dreamberry-creature, right?" With his right hand, the young elf pushed his plate off to the side.
Sitting still, Skywise calmly replied, "Right."
After a brief sigh, Suntop said hastily, "That's probably a bad idea." Frowning, he glanced at his brother... but thankfully, Leetah had Quickblade in her grasp.
I'm being tempted, Skywise thought, I've got two options here... I could admit that they're right, and sit back down and behave. Or I could give in, cause trouble, and allow a lot of wacky stuff to ensue. Well, this is gonna be tough. I should probably stop thinking about it, and just choose an option. Come on, Skywise! Stop thinking! Don't let them know that you're mentally unstable. Clenching his teeth, Skywise took a deep breath, and then went into action. He jumped out of his seat, picked up the iron cage, and threw it against the table five times. With the fifth impact, the metal gave way. To the mild surprise of all the elves, the DIP flew out, and began giggling.
"Oh, my," Voll said. He slowly walked out of the room, not bothering to say another word.
As the Wolfriders and others looked upwards, the flying dreamberry-creature shrieked, "Kablooie! Kablooie!" It suddenly split into two equally-sized DIPs. Now there were two of the laughing things.
Skywise walked back to his chair, and sat down. "Well, that was certainly fun," he said casually, "but we may soon have a problem on our hands."
***
Windkid noticed, all of a sudden, that the Captive of Captives had stopped whipping him. "What?" he blurted loudly, "Are you too much of a wimp to finish the job?" Realizing what he had said, he thought, He'll kill me for that later... but I had to say it.
With a sigh, the C.C. turned toward the exit door. In his gruff voice, he told the twitty little Glider, "Follow me... there's trouble about. Winnowill was afraid that this might happen, and now they've done it. I'm talking about a DIP outbreak. You've probably seen one, but once you have, you don't want to be alive for the next time." He walked out the door, waving to Windkid for him to follow.
As the strange pair walked briskly down the halls, they began to notice a slight trembling in the walls. The Fountain had been built on sand... and to use a rather poor metaphor, the tide was coming in.
Two minutes later, the odd couples were face-to-face. The Captive of Captives, complete with black hood, and Windkid the slightly bruised delinquent were now facing Winnowill and her downcast, mean-looking half-troll kid Two-Edge. But this was nothing compared to the other figure in the room. Looming over Two-Edge and Winnowill was a gigantic bagfrog, yellow-green in color, filling the hall with its overblown frame, and its tongue hanging out. Seeing it in all its glory, Windkid whispered, "Oh, shit..."
"Well then, Two-Edge," growled the C.C., striding towards the Bagfrog, "I'm not feeling very well today. Our best contact with the world outside has been delayed just above Glue Fountain. Not only that, I've had to spend far too much time with Windkid, and there's been no opportunity for me to get out. I'll go along with your plan... as long as my cubs are *safe* in that Bagfrog." Placing his two fists in front of Two-Edge's face, he waited for an answer. After a moment, the half-troll nodded. "Good," the Captive of Captives said, and stepped right into the open mouth of the Bagfrog.
Winnowill, trying to hold back from laughing, scratched her head. "I'll never understand him. Come along, Two-Edge," she said quietly, as she took a step into the massive animal.
Seeing that he now had a chance to get away, Windkid fled from the room, running towards the staircase. He didn't care if a falling boulder stopped him - this was his one opportunity to have a life.
***
The room was now blocked by a landfall of stones. Breathing heavily, Tyldak ran towards the Bagfrog Hall, thanking the spirits that he had left the humans' room in time. Unluckily, they had followed him out. Now running at full blast, Tyldak screamed, "Follow me--quickly!" to the group of panicking humans.
Meanwhile, the Wolfriders were in the aviary with the majority of the Chosen Eight, boarding the mounts along with the Gliders. One of them, Dewshine, saw the mob outside, and the elf leading the pack, said, "How unusual," and turned right back towards her tribe. She knew that they were a cowardly, suspicious lot.
***
Hearing several dozen voices screaming dissonantly, Dobil spun one hundred and eighty degrees. To his amazement, seven massive birds, each loaded down with several Wolfriders, burst out of the same hole that Strongbow and Moonshade had emerged from. There was a moment's pause as the bond-birds began to touch down on any available clear ground. Dobil whispered, "Oh, crap." Then, as an ear-shattering rumble came from Glue Fountain, Tyldak soared out of the pit, with Windkid hanging on to his left leg. With his hands and fingers twitching, Dobil fainted.
**Looks like you caught up with me,** Strongbow sent openly, staring at Lord Voll, who was trying to land his oversized bird on top of a tree, **I knew you'd see things my way. So, do you care to apologize to me?**
Shaking her head slowly, Moonshade tapped her lifemate's right shoulder. "Actually," she said in a whisper, "They've got a few small problems down in Glue Fountain." She pointed towards the pit, which was now spewing forth smoke and flames as tall as any Wolfrider.
Walking down from his now-landed mount, Voll cleared his throat, and sent to everyone within range, **Long ago, Winnowill told me that an elf called Santaclaus lives in the northernmost reaches of this world. Right now, since we've pretty much lost Glue Fountain, I'd be willing to see if he really exists. Anyone care to come along?** he asked casually and nonchalantly.
***
"Excuse me!" Cutter shouted to Voll, over the rush of the arctic wind in his face, "We seem to be flying closer to the ground. Should I be worried?"
Voll looked back, and saw that the Chosen Eight were at a higher altitude than he. He sighed loudly, and said, "Yes, we're going downward, but I can't do much about it. Tenspan here is a male bird, and like his kith and kin, he has a need to snack. It's impossible to control it. When he eats, you better believe that he eats!" Gritting his teeth, Voll held tight to the reins.
A feeling of impending doom overcame Cutter. He sent to the others, **We're going down! Get ready for a change in the agenda!** Even as he sent this, the bird was swooping down at a sixty-degree angle.
Just then Voll noticed Tenspan's targets - a group of polar bears. He mentioned to Cutter and his immediate family, "This just might be rough! Prepare to exit in case of emergency. You should know by now where the escape routs are. It's a damn good thing I packed my ejector seat... WHO-HOOO!" he screamed as he flew from the rapidly diving bird. The Glider was catapulted into the distance, so much that the other elves lost track of him after a minute.
Tenspan struck the snowy ground with a thud. Cutter and his family rolled right off the bird unto the cold ground. Quickly brushing the snow off his jacket, Cutter told his family, "With any luck, they'll come down to help us."
Luckily for the chief, the Chosen Eight flew down and unloaded their passengers. Tyldak ran by, and inspected the newly deceased bond-bird. Seeing that it had missed its trajectory, he said, "Tenspan is not looking good. I'm going to need help to bring this large avian back to the Glue Fountain medical facility."
Kureel, speaking for the first time in several chapters, reminded Tyldak, "What Glue Fountain? It's gone, no thanks to your lousy, stinking Wolfriders!" Giving Tyldak the elven finger, he took his bond-bird and flew the coop.
"How rude," Tyldak said softly, "I was just trying to be sarcastic." He gave Tenspan a little kick.
Finding that her patience was running out, Dewshine said with a growl, "You don't listen to *him*, do you, Tyldak?" She drew a sword from out of her coat.
The oddly-shapen Glider was struck with a dilemma. Choosing to take evasive action, he blurted, "Uh... I have to take a certain Windkid to the Captive of Captives *yet again* and I'll be back... later... eventually!" he said, seizing the youth by his left wrist and flying off in the same direction that Kureel had gone - south.
Feeling sober at last, Skywise was exasperated. He shouted, to nobody in particular, "This had better not be a non-sequitur. I hate those things!"
may the time of leaf change not speed past and all your hunts be rich and the bounty full
A moment later, all the Gliders had left. The polar bears were beginning to... well, bear... down on the Wolfriders. Tension was mounting as TAL 3 finally began to wrap up after over two months of procrastination!
Dewshine, who was already feeling pumped-up and angsty, shouted, "Let's go!" Before anyone else was even close to ready, she revved up her wolf and bowled over a polar bear that happened to be within striking distance.
Seeing violence occur, Hoodbearer immediately became interested in the situation. She ran over to the closest bear to her, and beat the stuffing out of the stunt dummy.
Meanwhile, One-Eye stood around in this battlefield of confusion, feeling not only confused, but also frustrated. For a while, he simply stood where he was and stared at Hoodbearer. She looked curiously familiar, though he couldn't place the face.
Cutter, instead of fighting, leapt behind a rock that was higher than he. He sent to Leetah and the cubs, **I don't know what you're doing out there in that... that battlefield... but I suggest that you join me behind Rock here!** Still woozy from the ride, he threw up all over the snow.
As for that family, Leetah and her cubs were having a marvelous time taunting one of the polar bears. Quickblade was wrapped up in his mango-throwing routine, Ember was annoying the polar bear with a pair of scissors, and Suntop was boring the polar bear with his incessant droning, but Leetah was preoccupied. She saw a cub, who was about eleven turns old, wildly slashing at the very same polar bear. This youth had a huge knot of hair atop his head, rather ragged and unfashionable clothing, and the smell of oil about him. In short, she was not interested in hiding behind Rock, for he/she did nothing more than stand there like... well, a rock. Though Leetah was not overly bright, she figured that Rock would soon end up in the rejected character files, and indeed,
is there to this day.
Redlance and Rain were most certainly not on speaking terms, so the former had teamed up with Pike. Together, they fully executed the "pull my spear" trick on a polar bear. The itinerant healer, though, was just wandering all over the map, wondering what sort of perverse delights he could find.
Strongbow hadn't been too happy even before going into battle. His bad attitude, that shooting thinking, carried over into the combat. So he fired arrows at the white targets. Though they died in quick succession, there were simply too many targets and not enough arrows. Feeling ready for more existential angst, he broke his now-useless bow over his knee.
On the other end of the spectrum, Treestump was fighting solo, and enjoying himself. While kicking big-time polar bear derriere, he managed to have a fascinating conversation... with himself.
Everyone's favorite Wolfrider chief, now growing tired of pacifism, jumped out from behind the rock and entered the fray. He started cutting down the menaces left, right, and center. The only direction that he forgot was the back. That was unfortunate for him, as one slightly-less-than-imbecilic polar bear got behind Cutter, and slapped him like a mosquito in the fanny. Suddenly, Cutter realized that everyone was looking straight at him - and he knew why. I really, really gotta go to the bathroom... he shouted to himself.
Only then was Treestump distracted from his internal monologue. One stray thought then ran in Treestump's mind before he could catch it: He's caught in a plot device! Luckily, Pike did not think such a thing.
As things went from worse to worse, two other elves came by and attempted to make it better. Skywise and Foxfur, together and finally with a common enemy, battered the villainous bear with their implements of destruction. Cutter was saved, and right before he soiled his good pants. "Bleeeeeech" was his only comment.
Stormbringer, the one better known as Stormie, the tribe artist and eclectic, poked several bears to death with only a hairpin. Nightfall, the tribe's back-up gossip, suspect individual, and manipulative album producer, mooned the bears to embarrassment. Panicking because his native tribe was nowhere in sight, Dobil stood in place and pouted unproductively. Woodlock, never one for battles, stood by the so-called Go-Back. In summary, things were going well.
Then, just to cloud up the clear sky, there came a strange, whiny cry, like that of a flattened Sun Folk. Though Cutter was busy heaving his guts out, he muttered, "If that's some sort of sick non-sequitur..."
Y O U ' R E A L L G O I N G T O D I E ! ! ! ! !
Suddenly, Clearbrook, who had been more or less sitting and watching, screamed, "No!" The only one's attention she caught was One-Eye's. He slowly walked over to her, and stood his lifemate up. She had been looking at her hands too closely, and had thought that she had five fingers.
"What the..." moaned Cutter, not feeling well at all.
Skywise, still by the chief's side, informed him, "Um... I think our resident songwriter needs a little help," in a casual voice.
An inspiration came over Cutter as he screamed, "I gotta scootch!" and charged over to the polar bear that was coming close to One-Eye and Clearbrook. Jumping in and hitting it with the flat side of his sword, he said to One-Eye, "She's a bit more disturbed than usual?"
He grunted in reply, "You got that one right. Of course, no one in their right mind actually listens to me, but that's not important right now." He stood up and joined in the fight.
That analysis was partially correct, for no sane elf had ever listened to One-Eye. But at the same time, Clearbrook was lying in a prostrate position, weeping about something imagined (or in one of those *evil* non-sequiturs). "Sheesh... I take the time and trouble to go to the humans and get my contract renewed, and look what happens," One-Eye muttered in dismay.
Cutter, losing blood (fake, of course) like a character in an arcade fighting game, started to keel over. Before he passed out, though, he saw one thing that was bizarre, and one thing that was just plain weird...
The Bizarre Thing: Strongbow, out of arrows, just plain pushed one of the bears over. It just happened, by pure coincidence, that Moonshade was on the other side. As the bear's ominous shadow loomed over her, her only words were, "All Strongbow needs is one more experience point."
The Just Plain Weird Thing: The strange calls came very close, and Cutter could just barely make out an inane conversation between two riders of foreign beasts:
FIRST RIDER: Rotten fish guts, Krimmy!
SECOND RIDER: You said it. We've got to pick up all these bloody bodies, and I don't like it one bit. No, brother, not at all. It's downright nasty.
FIRST RIDER: Hello down there! Do you mind coming with us--
At this point, Cutter blacked out. This is the end of TAL 3. Please advance to TAL 4 when it is available. In the next installment, a small amount of the confusing stuff will be wrapped up, though nothing will really be resolved.
Just a Geocities Link
Once I've made some progress on "Transformation Sequence," I'll get started on TAL 4. It has six chapters and an epilogue, but I'll try to get it *finished* before my winter break. Wish me luck...
This is a not-for-profit fan page, and is not affiliated with or sponsored by any person, company, or entity (with the exception of the webrings) mentioned within. Elfquest, its characters, and all indicia thereof are copyright 1978-1998 Warp Graphics. "The ElfQuiz Parody" is a satire thereof and should not be misconstrued as an actual work of Warp Graphics or its employees. This page was created, by John Alan Riggs (more commonly called Alan), on October 24, 1998.