"You crazy fool....I won't give in to you,"
This jovial yet exceedingly romantic exchange of lyrics from the film Moulin Rouge continued throughout most of the icy trek to the still-distant south pole, namely from the mouths of Helen and Carver, but occasionally from Ben and the man baby. With the protecting influences of the wrinkled centenarians guiding them like a shining beacon towards their destination, the six heroes were making good progress, as they strode into the majestic Antarctic sunset, the freezing wind billowing around them in translucent swirls. Ben and Helen had occasionally reverted back to their usual fairly immature yet commandingly impressive selves in order to join together in a rendition of the ever popular "Man Babies", or to simply discuss in whispered yet easily-audible voices which of their love interests was better equipped for certain tasks.
Once Helen had got over the "OH MY LORD I HAVE A BOYFRIEND" euphoria, she still flashed Carver a white-toothed heart-melting twinkly smile every now and then, before continuing one of many bizarre conversations with her dear old friend Ben. The man baby was having slight trouble keeping up with the overall pace of the group, but with the assistance of the suddenly much more chivalrous Carver was able to see himself through the worst of his strange skin irritations from the cold, and the threatenings of a nose hernia. In the meantime, Helen and Ben had lagged behind slightly to talk to Bobolous about any clues he may have to stopping the seemingly unstoppable flow of pizzazz out of their own universe, never to be seen again. Bobolous felt in his whaley heart that now would be the time to mention the snowflake.
"Well Dad, I don't know if you remember that ghastly young lady at my school who went by the name of Patricia, but through a fairly odd series of incidents, she ended up getting hit by a plane" - Bobolous and Ben turned to Helen, affronted. Once Helen had stopped laughing, she waved a hand for Bobolous to carry on. Helen had always possessed a very warped, dark sense of humour.
"She let these little pieces of paper fall out of the plane window, and they ended up being stuck to the windscreen, I think that's how that plane crashed in Dubai airport, when you mentioned that shop with the roboti-
"DON'T TALK ABOUT THE ROBOTIC SHEEP" - Helen screamed, before burying herself in Ben's shoulder making a strange high-pitched humming noise. Bobolous didn't even want to know what would happen if he mentioned the robotic sheep any further, so he continued his tale,
"Well...here are the pieces of paper that I managed to recover. All it says on the first line, when you stick them together is 'Listen to Phillip Pullman, he knows his shit."
"Ah, good old Phillip," said Helen, " He does indeed know his shit, Bobolous, it's thanks to him that all this came about. You see, I don't know if you're literate enough to have read His Dark Materials, but this whole idea of Dust explored in his novel is in fact known as "pizzazz" in our world. And due to the draining tendencies of a creature such as Le-Mon, if he was put in the right place at the right time, which unfortunately, he was, he would be able to create an opening, not into another world, but out of all known existence. THAT'S why we have to find a way to stop it, 'cause...it's pretty bad."
"Well, I couldn't quite make out the rest of what the paper said, but see if you and Dad can."
Carver called a break, and with the help of Ben and Helen's wonderful psychic auras, they created a little coldproof dome where everybody sat comfortably on rather suspiciously spontaneous armchairs, while Ben and Helen examined the piece of paper on a small and rather tasteful coffee table.
"Helen...that looks like 'titties',"
"Oh for heavens sake Ben, now is not the time for a blatant sexual reference!"
"....It does, though!" - And sure enough, the word "titties" was clearly spelt out at the end of the piece of paper, which was rather inconveniently cut up into the shape of a snowflake.
"So, it's...'something something something something something something something something something something something something, something something something something something something something something something something something titties.'" - Helen declared.
"Yep, looks like it." Ben stated. It was going to be a very long night.
After several hours of rather coarse language, some serious bitch-slapping, the occasional scratchy bitey fight, and a lot of tearful hugging and making up, Ben and Helen managed to decipher the rest of the snowflake. This is what Helen had to say on what the rest of the note said.
"NO."
"YES HELEN. YES," - Ben screamed with glee, as him and the man baby roared with laughter at the contents of the note,
"You seriously cannot expect me to do something like that...it's...immoral,"
"It's for the good of mankind!"
"Do you WANT me to never be able to look at myself in the mirror again?"
"Well you might be readier for stuff a lot quicker if you didn't,"
"Oh ha ha..."
If you haven't guessed already, because you're that stupid, the note said "A trained female psychic must drink the juice of a lava lamp, while the influence of the colourful light shoots out of her titties." That of course meant, that our rather unfortunate heroine had no other choice but to display her breasts to anybody who may be standing nearby at the South Pole, once she drank the juice of the lava lamp in order to summon all the pretty colourful pizzazz back down again. Only a trained psychic could drink the juice of a lava lamp, you see, it's somewhat dangerous. And it had to be a female psychic, because two places of exit were required in order for the juice of the lava lamp to work properly.
The other four congratulated Ben and Helen on the remarkable feat of discovering what words were on a piece of paper cut up like a snowflake, and as the dome was lowered back into Carver's remarkable expedition rucksack, a sudden violent sound behind them made them all jump.
"YOU. BASTARDS." - croaked a furious yet marine-creature-like voice from behind them. Helen, Ben, the man baby, Bobolous, Carver,Mr Wrinkles, Mrs Wrinkles, and Biscuit turned around sharply to come face to face with the great fish herself. The murderous, seemingly legendary yet so very real Sammy the whale shark was surveying the group with an expression of utter hatred on her face.
"Do you arrogant self-centered people have any idea how many scales I have lost off my stomach CRAWLING AFTER YOU IN THIS DESOLATE WASTELAND?! You couldn't think to stop, oh no...it was just too much for you flashy psychics ,YES I'M TALKING ABOUT YOU TWO IDIOTS" - she screamed at Ben, who proceeded to hide behind an equally frightened Helen, " - couldn't think to even stop for a second and look for a signal of somebody being RIGHT BEHIND YOU EVERY STEP OF THE WAY?" The infuriated animal took a deep breath after this rant, and delved into a stony sulking glare, as if daring a member of the group to question what she had just screeched. The only member of the party brave enough to come forward and demurely state something fairly obvious was Mrs Wrinkles
"hey bbz im so wet n horny 4 u, wanna cam 2night muah lol xxxx"
"...I'll pass, madam. God, you're all a bunch of perverts, aren't you? First YOU" - she pointed a fin accusingly at Bobolous, "staring at me like I was some kind of circus freak, and DON'T THINK I DIDN'T SEE THE WAY YOUR DORSEL WENT UP AT THE SIGHT OF ME, just because I was stuck in that ghastly human-made tank doesn't mean I'm a stupid shark. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, I suppose, but I can notice things. Oh yes. I've seen things happening in crowds at the Atlantis aquarium that all you pansies could never even DREAM of,"
"So..." Bobolous stuttered, looking terrified at the rather angry looking whale shark "Does this mean that that day when...Helen and Ben destroyed the bouncy castle" - the entire group were relieved to see the makings of a chuckling smirk appearing on Sammy's sharky face at the mention of this "...that brief moment we shared when we looked at each other, meant...nothing to you?"
"Look kid, don't take it personally, but you're made of chocolate. Do you really think I could handle a guy who was made of an easily melted rather delicious looking confection? I've seen you and that sexy eyed human wandering around, even heard snatches of your conversations at points, you seem like a very nice shark, but you can see that it wouldn't work, surely?"
"I can change, Sammy...YOU KNOW I CAN CHANGE" - Bobolous was about to launch into a song that he wasn't quite sure of, before being pulled back by both of his parents in order to stop Sammy from gumming him to death on the spot. And so our heroes are left in this rather niggly little situation, with a murderous whale shark cornering them, as they desperately try to get to the South Pole in as little time as possible. It'll be interesting to see how my counterpart manages to get them out of this one in the next chapter. Watch this space.
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