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- As TLG approached the muddy flat shoreline he eases the controls as the Bee slows to a hover and descends to the muddy floor. The legs of the Giant insect sink into the mud slightly as the wings slow to a stop.
- The trap door once jammed now opens easily and TLG clambers out. He surveys his surroundings, finding himself in a Cove. It all looks oddly familiar to him. Everywhere he looks, he has pangs of déjà vu. He looks up at the trees around him and the river running down the flat, winding its way through the mud to the sea. There were lots of Reeds and odd looking, mangled plants that grew in the mud.
- He looked up at the towards the source of the river and noticed a small waterfall with orange rocks from which beautiful ferns hung over like Huge sea anemones waiting to clasp an unwitting passersby. TLG looks to the ground down and kicks a small rock that lay on the firm mud. Just then, he feels a droplet, he looks up and notices his cloud was raining. Well just drizzling really, this was unusual for his cloud. ‘CLAP’ goes the sound familiar of the annoying lightning as it hits his head. He continues around the shore line for a while calling
- ‘Odelin? Odelin?’ However, there is no reply.
- TLG sits himself on a log under a fern tree to shelter from his cloud. Feeling depressed, hopeless, in utter despair at the thought that from now on, rain would follow him also, he gazes back to where he came from, wondering if he would ever be rid of his curse.
- Just then, he hears a distant cry for help. ‘Help me!’ He stares out over the mud, searching for the source of the plea. His eyes fall upon a stick poking out of the mud that seems to be moving. Suddenly his hair stands on end as a strong and menacing déjà vu hits him. ‘Odelin’ he gasps.
- TLG gets up and starts galloping toward the stake poking from the ground from which the voice was emanating. As he gets closer, the stick seems to change before his eyes, looking more and more like a bone or a bovine horn or tusk. He tries furiously free the object from it muddy tomb, but it will not budge. He tries to dig around the base but it is no use.
- ‘Help!’ said a voice, clearly coming from the ground.
- He leans against the horn, and it bends slightly.
- ‘Who is down there? Is that you Odelin?’ He frantically looks around for something to use. Just then, TLG notices a large rock sitting on the mud. He runs over, clasps the rock, and struggles with it, to an appropriate position and then hurls it at the protrusion. There is a sudden pop as the suction of the mud releases the device. TLG gives it a final push and the whole thing rolls to the surface revealing a large crater where it once lay buried. Thrown off balance, TLG landed yards away.
- He gets up, brushes the mud from his knees and studies object he has just liberated.
- ‘A skull’ he whispers to himself as he studies the exhumed body part carefully. The skull is about TLG’s size. Crabs and worms recoil from the light and bits of mud, loosely clinging to the bony object, randomly fall off as they succumb to gravity. It appears to be the skull of a huge bovine creature, but with teeth like a great cat and huge forward facing eye sockets.
- He peers closer looking into the eye sockets. Suddenly a squid like tentacle with red and black stripes, slithers out from the left eye socket. TLG watches in surprise as another and another and then another tentacle creep out of the left eye socket of the skull. Four tentacles clasp the rim the eye socked as if to brace something from within the skull, then slowly, a little face emerges from the centre of the tentacles.
- TLG jumps back as a small gnome like creature climbs out of the skull. The creature stared up at TLG who towered above the tiny creature of about one span in height.
- *Nemis*
- ‘You are not Odelin’ TLG remarked.
- ‘And you are most welcome?’ the small creature replied, humouring TLG for his impertinent non-introduction. The creature writhed their before TLG, on the tips of his two leg tentacles. He could not stand still as he had no feet. His little arm tentacles were writhing also, as if the small creature were battling to control them.
- ‘So who are you?’ TLG inquired.
- ‘I am Nemis the mud Gnome.’ The small creature stated with pride as he wiped some black mud from his face.
- ‘What a marvellous creature you are.’ TLG remarked.
- ‘And you should know’ the creature replied.
- The strange little creature looked like a Gnome but had four tentacles in the place of arms and legs.
- ‘How did you get down there?’ TLG asked with a humorous and slightly endearing manner.
- ‘I do not know.’ He replied.
- ‘In fact I think this dead thing used to be me.’ The little creature paused for a moment, and exclaims.
- ‘I had better go and find another me! I think I should go this is the way as the Sea is calling me. Can you hear it...?’
- The creature beckons TLG to come closer and looks TLG in the eyes and then at his cloud. TLG can see the reflection of his lightning flashes in the creature eyes. Nemis turned and looked out across the water of the cove, his face reflecting the sombre mood of the failing light.
- ‘There is a whirlpool waiting for me.’ The creature said as he stared out to sea.
- Nemis turned around to face TLG who is still kneeling before Nemis, but as Nemis looks at TLG, TLG notices the small creature complexion changing. TLG recoils in horror as he watched Nemis transform before his eyes. His once pale skin turned from light grey to black and the rims of his eyes turned blood red to match the stripes on his tentacles and his eyes blackened to match the glistening mud, still clinging to his face.
- Nemis then collapses onto his back and stares up at the sky. Then slowly as if being manipulated by some unseen magnetic force, Nemis starts to spin. TLG watches in amazement as Nemis spins faster and faster until he is just a blur. Then Nemis starts to drift across the muddy ground of the cove in the direction of the tidal river until he reaches its bank. Then, without warning, plummets into the mud, leaving behind an explosive giser of mud that eventually disperses on the muddy ground.
- ‘Wait!’ TLG cried.
- TLG was disappointed at the fact he did not get the chance to ask Nemis where he could find his Odelin. Then TLG hears a frail voice in his head like a thought but more pronounced. It was clear but unearthly, as sounds appear in dreams.
- ‘Something really bad is going to happen.’
- TLG felt a chill run down his spine as the words sunk in like a cold winter wind.
- TLG thrust his face into his hands as he tried to get the voice out of his memory.
- ‘May be I am going mad.’
- TLG turned to face the mouth of the river and stared at the orange face of the waterfall but as he does, he notices the muddy ground by the riverbank move slightly. Then a bit more as the ground heaved TLG was startled.
- *The Brittle Star*
- ‘An Earth Quake?’ though TLG. All of a sudden, the ground broke and a thin red and black striped tentacle lashed out from beneath the mud; TLG stumbles back in horror as more tentacles writhed from the mud. Time seemed to stand still for TLG as he watched frozen as the macabre seen played out before his eyes. Finally he could fully describe the creature that appeared before him. It looked to TLG like giant brittle starfish with red and black tentacles that measure three yards each in length from the centre to the tips. It had one huge eye in the centre that gleamed and blinked to wipe the mud from its shiny lens. It writhed on the spot and appeared to expand and contract with impossible physics. It was a remarkable sight to behold.
- TLG had the sudden urge to leave, as he gathered his composure and slowly walked backwards in the direction of his Bee machine being careful not to fall over while keeping his eyes fixed on the slithering beast.
- TLG was amazed as the creature started spawning new brittle stars of the ends of its tentacles. These smaller creatures grasped and clung to its parent, giving the appearance of uncontrolled infestation.
- As he receded, the creature seemed to notice him and started slithering toward him. TLG started walking backwards faster, but the thing or things approached faster still. TLG turned and ran with all of his might towards his Bee. He dived up the trap door and clambered in to the machine.
- ‘Let’s go!’ he shouted as he grabbed the lever at the front and the giant bee wings started beating furiously.
- The machine lunged into the air he wrenched the lever forward to full throttle as he gasped with panic. To his delight, the Bee ascended bravely, hovering higher and higher.
- Suddenly, without warning the Bee stopped in its tracks. TLG looked out of the Bee eyes at the scene below him. The creature that was once on the ground was now hanging onto one of the Bees legs. But it no longer resembled a starfish. The small creatures that had materialised from the stars tentacles had grown massively in number and were now changed together to form a new creature. The brittle star now took on the appearance of a dead tree with roots that was and was clinging on to TLG's bee with its branches and its roots fixed into the muddy floor of the bay.
- The tree starfish creature grabbed with more branches. TLG forced the lever backwards and forward and from side to side, attempting to free the Bee. But it was no use. The giant tree creature pulled the bee down, preparing to devour it. TLG could only look from the windows in hopeless horror.
- Gradually the Bee was pulled down to face the creature. There in front of the Bees eyes, on the trunk of the creature, a face appeared from the within the writhing braches. It was a hideously horned face with huge eyes and rows of razor sharp teeth. It gazed at TLG through the bees windows with sorrowful tears rolling down its massive cheeks and dripping down off the ends of its teeth.
- The face was covered with small brittles all slithering and tangled. New stars were appearing everywhere, some were crawling from within the creatures mouth and falling way with the tears. Smaller stars were attaching to the bee machine and clinging to the windows. TLG was so close he could even see yet smaller star creatures spawning from the tentacles of these stars. He imagined that soon, the bee along with himself, would be overcome.
- TLG looked into the creatures large black eyes and was instantly engrossed. It was as if he was looking into the face of a soul that was incarcerated in a vessel that is had no control over and was mourning for its victims as it devoured and consumed them eternally. Forever tortured by the guilt of its own destruction.
- The creature screamed like the concerted dying gasps of the population of eternity.
- TLG was drawn in as if to accept his fate, almost longing to be consumed as the massive mouth opened in hunger. He pulled himself together and released his gaze. He looked around his bee and noticed more levers on the floor. Surprised at not noticing them before, he grabbed one and heard a loud creaking sound. He looked out of the window again and noticed two large mandibles wedged between the bee and the creature before him. He pulled another lever and the mandibles slammed shut but the creature only flinched at the powerful event and as soon as the lesion opened, the brittle stars reformed and repaired themselves. TLG started pulling levers in all directions. The Bees swayed and snapped, mandibles snapping everywhere with the creature dividing and regrouping, but just as it appeared to TLG that the situation was utterly hopeless, tremendous event occurred from out of nowhere.
- Suddenly there was an enormous flash of light and then silence. TLG fell backwards to land on his back on the floor. He felt as though he had been struck by his lightning but with a hundred times the familiar force. He pulled himself to his feet and peered out the window. The once incredibly animated dark creature was now white and completely frozen along with all his minion brittle stars. No more writhing or twisting in fact nothing was moving at all except for a fine, white dust that slowly drifted earthbound past the concave windows. It was as if the creature had been turned to stone. TLG approached the window peered downward. He could see the grasping tentacles fixed and frozen on the bee machines legs.
- Suddenly there was a creaking sound from beneath him. He could see cracks appearing in the creatures limbs and white dust sprayed from the lesions like gusts of fine snow. The creature was falling apart. TLG watched as the white limbs that so tightly clasped the earth started exploding. TLG held on for his dear life and as the remaining trunk of the creature plummeted to the ground, taking the Bee with it. With a hollow thud, the Bee with TLG inside hit the ground and the bee came to rest on its belly with its legs spread out on both sites and its mandibles partly submerged in the mud .The remains of the creature lay on the top of the mud.
- All was silent. TLG lay still on the floor of his bee waiting for the next event. There was a strong smell of argon hanging in the air and the sky had turned yellow.
- It occurred to TLG that a sudden lightning bolt had bought down this creature. It was as if a large storm had suddenly gathered to strike down this beast only to disappear as fast at is gathered. TLG knew that his own storm cloud was very personal an only for him, he certainly could not control the lightning or had any inclination to.
- *The Aftermath*
- TLG could see the huge sad face of the creature from the windows as it lay on the ground, so cut down. As TLG watched, the beast decayed before his eyes. The branching tentacles turned into white dust that just blew away in the gentle breeze and those huge eyes started sinking, TLG could almost perceive a sigh of relief as the stony creatures face melted off its skull and bone finally to reveal a lonely horned skull lying empty on the muddy base.
- Serenity persisted like that of the aftermath of a battle. Although the atmosphere was probably the same as before, it seemed ghostly in contrast and after effects of the panic on TLG's constitution gave him a sense of unreality.
- He wandered over to the skull that lay on the mud. How could this be? TLG pondered at the unlikely situation in which he found himself. This is very wrong. TLG examined the skull and it was in the exact same position as when he had pulled it from the ground. The hole was still in the ground. The only outstanding difference was that the skull was clean like it had been polished by sand and tide. TLG imagined that he was stuck in a dream that was so real he could never awake, to be entombed in madness for eternity.
- He was not at all surprised when, Nemis climbed out of the river, with a begrudging look on his face, climbed into one of the eye sockets of the skull. With that, the skull sank into the mud until only a lonely horn just breaking the surface remained visible.
- *Starry Night*
- Luckily, the Bee machine did not sustain any damage in the skirmish and was standing there on the mud waiting. The sun had since just disappeared over the horizon and the air was thick with twilight. The tide had come in so far, that the water was only inches away from the Bee machine. TLG shuffled up to the water’s edge and watched as the water crept along the mud.
- The wind had died away completely now as the darkness set in. The sky was filled with stars and Galaxies and moons. TLG stared into the water, which was so flat that could see the whole universe, reflected in it. He could also see his own reflection occasionally lit up by the odd splinter of lightning, which also reflected on the underside of his little storm cloud. As he gazed down with his toes touching the water, he felt like he was standing on the edge of the world looking down into outer space. As he gazed deep into the perfect sky he felt as if something was not right with this place. With all its creatures and stars and galaxies there seemed to be something broken or distorted but he could not make sense of this feeling. Maybe it came from the way things happened here.
- Creatures do not just turn into other creatures.
- Lighting does not just come out of nowhere.
- I should not have a little cloud that shocks me eternally.
- He stared more intently down at the galaxies and the moons and the stars. He waited there and watched for something to change. He was half expecting a moon to explode or a galaxies spiral arms to suddenly animate and crawl off into the distance. Things did change, but only as one would have expected. The stars twinkled, the occasional shooting star streaked across the sky and there was soft undulating effect caused by ripples in the water that made the whole scene appear to move up and down in constant motion.
- Suddenly TLG felt very alone and a long way from home. He climbed back into his Bee and decided to sleep. He removed his tunic, placed it on the floor, and lay down using it as a pillow. He was soon asleep dreaming about very normal things.
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