"Treble clefs and tortoises! What a mess!" cried Mrs. Vivaldi.
"Sharon!" "Sharon!"
The pain in Sharon's ribs was much relieved when her father pulled the table off of her, and her mother rubbed the sore spot carefully to make sure there were no broken bones. It seemed that she had only sustained bad bruises.
"Are you okay, Honey Lamb?" her mother asked.
"I - I think so," Sharon gasped.
"Metronomes and mastodons!" cried Natasha Vivaldi. "Quick! Get the strings off her throat!"
A bald man, splattered with paint, pulled a pair of harp strings away that threatened to choke Bakhra. Natasha Vivaldi loosened the collar of the dwarf's shirt.
"Can you breathe now?" the man asked. Sharon now recognized him as Mr. Tindy.
"The harp!" Bakhra sobbed.
"I know the harp's broken," said Vladimir Vivaldi, "just like everything else, it seems. Don't worry, we won't make you pay for it."
"Two violins broken in three days," lamented Antonio Lutoslawski. "What is this world coming to?"
Lynndenbaum blew into his flute, only to spray green paint on anybody who was near him.
"Where are we?" Sharon asked.
"We could be anywhere," said Mr. Schlussel.
"We were in Mr. Tindy's shop a minute ago," said Sharon's father.
"And I was in my own living room over the music shop," said Mr. Vivaldi.
"Any way of getting our new coordinates, Fiona?" asked Mr. Schlussel.
Fiona tapped on the keys of her laptop, but being drenched with red and blue paint, it did not respond.
"What happened?" asked Sharon.
"It might have been a natural catastrophe resulting from our world's all-too-tenuous relationship with the cosmic tree," suggested Vladimir Vivaldi.
"I infer that some enemy has done this on purpose," said Peppercorn flatly.
"After all, we aren't certified existing beings," added Lynndenbaum.
"Gerald!" Sharon spat out the words. Then she groaned when her angry movement hurt her in the ribs.
The group found itself confined in a room made up out of fragments of parchment and torn sheets of music and pieces of instruments and chopped-up pieces of furniture. Blobs of paint of various colors were spilled over everything. When Mr. Tindy picked up a bent-out-of-shape music stand and Mrs. Vivaldi pulled a scrap of parchment out of the rubble, the room shook and piles of torn music fell from the ceiling, covering up everybody in the room.
"Neopolitan chords and Nickelbacks!" cried Natasha Vivaldi as she swam her way to the surface of what had become a pond of shredded musical scores.
"By the looks of it, all the world's music has been ripped up and mixed together," said Mr. Schlussel.
"I thought that had happened already, judging by what I hear on the radio," said Sharon's father with a faded smile.
Nobody laughed.
"I thought you weren't going out," Sharon said to her parents.
"When the new President announced the installation of the cosmic tree, we thought we'd try it," Sharon's father explained. "I tried going to work and your mother tried doing the shopping, but we both ended up at Tindy's. Once there, we decided to help him with his map."
"What's our hutch doing here?" asked Sharon with a lump in her throat.
The hutch, which had been handed down in the Van Vann's family for several generations towered over them, but its windows were all broken and the china inside of it shattered.
"I just don't know," said her father, trying not to break down over the loss.
The mess of papers and parchments continued to move and a muffled voice could be heard about the rattling. First a claw appeared, and then the blue-eyed dragon's little head broke the surface of the papers.
"Tabitha!" it cried forlornly.
"You're back!" cried Sharon.
"Tabitha!" the dragon cried again, as if it had a one-track mind.
"Tabitha still hasn't come," said Fiona.
The dragon sprang over to a television that was perched at a cockeyed angle between an upside-down couch and a dining room table and tapped the screen. The television turned on to show an image of Gerald Kaylen, his tie slightly askew, as he read his speech from a podium.
"Flugelhorns and flamingos!" cried Mrs. Vivaldi. "What is that television doing in my living room?"
"I was wondering what that television was doing in my living room," said Mr. Tindy.
"I am pleased to announce that we have discovered the root and basic cause of the disturbances that have destabilized all space and time the past three days," Gerald announced.
The audience broke out into loud cheers. The blue-eyed dragon scratched on the screen fretfully.
"That's an accomplishment!" Lynndenbaum exclaimed with withering sarcasm.
"It has become apparent to the state department." Gerald continued, "that it is the illicit map bought two days ago by Sharon Van Vann, which has caused the chain reaction of chaotic shifts in the times and spaces of our world."
More cheers.
"How dare he!" yelled Sharon. "Is there no end to the insults he'll throw at me?"
"Tabitha!" yelled the dragon in its loudest voice yet as it clawed the television screen all the more frantically.
"We have now incarcerated Ms. Van Vann and all her accomplices in a virtual reality confinement device that has them quarantined so that they cannot infect our Cosmic Tree Ordinance," Gerald continued.
The cheers were louder than ever.
"Tabitha!" cried the dragon again.
"My poor honey lamb!" said Sharon's mother as she held her sobbing daughter in her arms and stroked her hair. "The things he's saying about you!"
"Something happened to him," said Lynndenbaum.
"From which I infer," said Peppercorn, "that something else can happen to him that will have a better effect on our situation."
"Therefore," said Natasha Vivaldi, "We should do what we can to have a better effect on our situation and on Gerald's."
"I don't want to have a better effect on Gerald's situation," Sharon sobbed through her tears.
"Poor Honey Lamb," said her mother.
"That's understandable," said Mr. Schlussel, "but we still need to do what we can."
"Which isn't much," said Fiona.
On the television, people throughout the presidential studio stood and waved signs that read "GERALD THE GREAT" and "GERALD IS A JEWEL."
"Our country is now safe from the forces of disorder and disharmony and anarchy and anapesticide," said Gerald.
"When we were interrupted just now," said Antonio Lutoslawski, "we were making music."
"And I was working on a map," said Mr. Tindy.
"So, let's return to precisely those activities!" Mr. Schlussel urged.
"Since President Gerald likes neither our maps nor our music," added Lynndenbaum.
"But everything is broken," moaned Bakhra.
"Slippery seals and saxophones!" cried Natasha Vivaldi. "I know that! All the more reason to do what we can!"
Antonio Lustoslawski picked up a paint brush and tapped rhythmically on an empty bottle of ink. Lynndenbaum picked up a scrap of parchment, made a cylinder and blew into it. Peppercorn picked up broken harp strings and other pieces of instruments and began to compose a sculpture out of them. Fiona gathered a couple of shards of the broken china from the Van Vanns' hutch and beat out a rhythm. Bakhra started to sing in a deep, rich, voice a strange melody. The dragon continued to cry "Tabitha!", but now the cry took on a musical quality. Sharon's father took other pieces of China and constructed wobbly houses with them. Sharon, still feeling paralyzed by what Gerald had said about her on the air, roused herself enough to help Peppercorn with his project. When the room shifted, Peppercorn, with no show of emotion, started over again. Before long, everybody was playing an improvised instrument or constructing a three-dimensional map in the middle of the living room floor.
"You can all see for yourselves the anti-civil machinations of Sharon Van Vann and those followers whom she has deluded," said Gerald on the television. "What you are seeing is a Virtual Reality transcription of the incarcerated state of these principal and architectonic enemies of the people. Do not let the youth and innocent look of this girl fool you! You can see for yourselves that this den of anarchists is yet again creating unlawful music and attempting to build illegal maps."
Sharon's face burned when she saw herself in the television, dropping the flute key she was trying to place on the play map. The camera then shifted to the audience in the presidential studio, where the people were laughing at her.
"We may be funny, but this is fun," said Antonio Lutoslawski who continued his drumming with the paint brush, undeterred by his reflection in the television.
"Tabitha!" cried the dragon when it saw its own image on the television.
"That wasn't in the script of my speech," said a puzzled and uneasy Gerald Kaylen.
Again, people cheered and waved their signs to reassure their president.
"The moment has arrived when you can all go your ways with your new maps and--"
The dragon shattered the glass of the television screen with its claws and plunged into the electronic jungle inside the box.
"Good riddance to that idiot box!" said Mr. Tindy.
**********
"I am pleased to announce that we have discovered the root and basic cause of the disturbances that have destabilized all space and time the past three days," Gerald announced.
The audience broke into loud cheers. Gerald tried to focus his eyes on the printed page to keep from thinking about what had happened to Sharon Van Vann.
"It has become apparent to the state department." Gerald continued, "that it is the illicit map bought two days ago by Sharon Van Vann has caused the chain reaction of chaotic shifts in the times and spaces of our world."
More cheers and blinding flashbulbs. His face would be in all the newspapers within an hour. The warm reception felt good.
"We have now incarcerated Ms. Van Vann and all her accomplices in a virtual reality confinement device that has them quarantined so that they cannot infect our Cosmic Tree Ordinance."
The cheers thundered in Gerald's ears. Throughout the presidential studio, people stood and waved signs that read "GERALD THE GREAT" and "GERALD IS A JEWEL."
"Our country is now safe from the forces of disorder and disharmony and anarchy and anapesticide."
Gerald looked at the script to see if he had read it right. He had. But with the cheers so loud and everybody on their feet, there was no need to worry about what the last word meant. The monitor up above the podium was switched on to reveal the picture of Sharon and the other members of her group making music and doing art work with the wreckage as if they were kindergartners.
"You can all see for yourselves the anti-civil machinations of Sharon Van Vann and those followers whom she has deluded," Gerald explained. "What you are seeing is a Virtual Reality transcription of the incarcerated state of the enemies of the people. Do not let the youth and innocent look of this girl fool you. You can see for yourselves that this den of anarchists is again creating unlawful music and attempting to build illegal maps even now."
When members of the audience burst out into laughter and others cheered, Gerald looked up from his script to soak it all in. At the same time, he found it hard to look at his friend in the monitor and he refocused his eyes on his script.
"Tabitha!" cried a blue-eyed dragon, whose face suddenly appeared in the monitor.
"That wasn't in the script of my speech," said a puzzled and uneasy Gerald Kaylen.
Again, people cheered and waved their signs to reassure their president.
"The moment has arrived when you can all go your ways with your new maps and--"
PLOP!
Gasps throughout the studio audience.
It didn't hurt, but something had just fallen on top of Gerald's head. He put up a hand. There was indeed something on his head, something sharp, gooey, and slimy. Whatever it was, it moved about slowly in Gerald's hair.
"Donnybrook!" cried a small, high-pitched voice just above Gerald.
"I'll get that, Mister President!" said the man in the sweat shirt, as he came running with a wet towel in his hand.
Meanwhile, the man in the tuxedo removed whatever was on Gerald's head, and Gerald could see for himself what it was.
"Why it's a newly hatched blue-eyed turtle come from heaven!" exclaimed Gerald. "This wasn't in the script, either," said Gerald as the man in the sweat shirt tried to get the eggy goo out of his hair, with limited success.
"Donnybrook!" cried the turtle that still rested in the hand of a startled man in the tuxedo.
"I'll take care of this," said the man in the tuxedo, and he threw the turtle against the wall.
"No!" cried Gerald. "That's no way to treat a baby turtle!"
"You have a most important speech to terminate, Mister President," said the man in the tuxedo, as he handed Gerald another printout of a freshly-printed script.
"And we just can't wait for turtles," added the man in the sweat shirt as he washed off Gerald's hands.
Gerald gave the turtle one last look. Since it appeared to have been well splattered against the wall, it seemed that there was nothing he could do but go on with his speech.
"I reiterate and stress and make totally clear that dragons and talking turtles are not certified existing beings and any allegations of their existence are rooted in the desire of Sharon Van Vann to undermine our confidence in the comprehensiveness and completeness of--"
Gerald was interrupted by the shattering of glass above his head. As he wiped away the shards that landed on his shoulder, the audience rose to its feet in a panic.
"Tabitha! my hatch mate!"
"Donnybrook!, my hatch mate!"
"GET THAT TURTLE" yelled the police-chief judge. "Sargent of Arms! Sargent of arms! "GET THAT DRAGON!"
When a group of soldiers stood up and aimed their pistols, something snapped inside of Gerald. He wheeled around and took a good look at what had been behind him. Seeing the blue-eyed dragon's head peering through the broken monitor and the blue-eyed turtle climbing up the wall towards it, Gerald snatched the turtle from the wall and held it to his chest. Outcries from the audience grew louder, but the soldiers lowered their pistols.
"I, Gerald Kaylen, President of this fair and glorious country," Gerald began, his voice shaking so much he could hardly speak, "do solemnly swear and declare to all the people of this country, that it is henceforth a federal offense to hurt, kill, maim, or in any way inconvenience a blue-eyed turtle or a blue-eyed dragon."
"TREASON!" yelled the police chief-judge.
"TREASON!" yelled the man in the sweat shirt.
"TREASON!" yelled the man in the tuxedo.
"IMPEACH HIM!" yelled a man in the front row.
"IMPEACH HIM!" yelled a woman from the second row.
Gerald ducked when signs started to fly at his head and crowds began to storm the podium.
"Hang on," said the turtle to Gerald.
Gerald held the turtle as tightly as he could and braced himself for whatever was going to happen. He was flipped about so quickly that he thought the police-chief judge had caught him, but instead, he found himself riding on the turtle's back through the monitor framed with broken glass and into the electronic tangle beyond.
"This way, Tabitha!" said the dragon up ahead of him. "I'll get the others!"
*********
"I found Tabitha!" said the baby dragon, sticking its head back through the broken television set.
The music-making and map-making ceased.
"Why, cabbages and cornets!" cried Natasha Vivaldi, "Good for you!"
"Quick! This way!" urged the dragon as it scampered back inside the wrecked television.
"Not much room if you ask me," said Sharon's father.
"The dragon will take care of that," said Peppercorn. "Let's go."
To prove his point, Peppercorn climbed into the television set, taking care to avoid cutting himself. When Mr. Schlussel himself made it through successfully, everybody else was emboldened to follow him into the cave of electronic cards and wires. Sharon half-walked with her mother and was half-carried by her father through the electronic cave. Gradually, she became aware of riding a bumpy seat. She reached out to her mother and caught her hand. Then her father steadied her as well.
"Poor lamb," her mother purred, keeping a gentle hold on Sharon.
"This way, Tabitha!" said the dragon up ahead where flashing lights were becoming visible through a small opening.
"I'm coming, Donnybrook!" said the turtle.
Sharon and her friends emerged into another jumbled, but larger cave. Neon signs assaulted her eyes from every direction. With more light to see by, Sharon realized that she was riding on the back of a turtle. Clustered on the turtle's back with her and her parents were her friends, with Peppercorn close by.
"Gargantuan gorillas and gongs!" cried Natasha Vivaldi. "We've ended up in the Endberry Mall!"
"What's left of it," said her husband.
Sharon could see for herself that she was in a mall where the stores had been torn apart and mixed up with each other and placed in a dense forest. Before her eyes, a tree branch snatched a corner of a store and stuffed it into another store, and then another pair of tree branches snatched that store fragment and shoved it back in the general direction from which it came. A short distance down the main hall, there flowed a large fountain with artificial trees growing around it. In front of the turtle, the blue-eyed dragon capered about the mall, charming some of the children and frightening some of the adults.
"We're getting there," said the turtle. "We're getting there."
Then Sharon realized, with a start, that she had been rubbing elbows with none other than Gerald Kaylen. She instantly slunk away into the protective arms of her mother. Everybody else on the back of the turtle edged away from Gerald as well.
"Don't be glad to see me or anything," said Gerald.
"I won't," Sharon promised him. "Not after what you said about me."
"Something happened to you, didn't it?" said Peppercorn, his voice flat.
Gerald's face clouded. To Sharon's amazement, tears were appearing on his cheeks.
"Yea, something happened to me."
"I'll have you know that Gerald Kaylen saved my life just now," said Tabitha.
"Boy, did he ever!" crowed Donnybrook. "And right on national TV, too!"
"Bully for you!" snapped Bakhra.
"Don't be jealous, now," said Mr. Schlussel.
"I am sorry, Sharon," said Gerald.
"Is that all you can say?"
Gerald shrugged his shoulders and hung his head.When Natasha Vivaldi gathered a sobbing Gerald into her arms, Sharon looked away. What she saw then was an array of televisions scattered inside and outside of a shop. On each television was a picture of Gerald. A small group of children settled in front of one of the televisions and ate their ice cream cones. Other people gathered to watch. The camera cut to a newscaster.
"Hector Skinflint, Speaker of the Chamber of Misrepresentation, has just announced a unanimous vote in the Chamber to impeach President Gerald Kaylen. This vote was followed immediately by a unanimous vote to convict the ex-president for misdemeanors and malicious malefactions in connection with springing the escape of Sharon Van Vann and other criminals dangerous to the State and to all concepts of valid and certified reality."
Sharon tried to look at Gerald with more sympathy, noticing now the egg dried up in his hair, but he didn't look at her. On the television, the camera dissolved to a shot of the police chief-judge.
"It is the duty of every patriotic citizen of this free country of ours to search out, apprehend, and bring to justice our traitorous ex-president."
"Hey!" cried a little girl among the children. "Isn't that Gerald?"
"Yea," said an older boy. "Hey! It's Jailbird Gerald and his mighty turtle!"
That caught the attention of other people, who also recognized the boy and the turtle.
"There they are! Get them!"
In a matter of seconds, a sizeable crowd of people, murmuring in ominous tones, had surrounded the deposed president. A few seconds later, a contingent of police officers arrived on the scene, guns and billy clubs out and ready.
"You're under arrest, EX-President Kaylen!" announced a mustachioed officer.
Before the police could nab Gerald, a platoon of army officers moved in, armed with machine guns.
"The impeached president of this sovereign nation is under arrest!" announced the officer.
"And the escaped convict Sharon Van Vann is also under arrest!" announced a woman officer who was leading another platoon of soldiers.
Gerald, not knowing how he was going to get out of this situation, simply froze where he was. Donnybrook landed in front of the groups of army and police officers.
"Are you arresting Gerald Kaylen and Sharon Van Vann for the crime of violating the sovereignty of the cosmic tree inaugurated by Gerald Kaylen?" the young dragon asked.
"That is indeed the case," an officer replied solemnly.
"Correction!" cried an officer leading a different platoon. "Mister Kaylen is in violation of the cosmic tree of President Mariano Fettuschkinoff!"
The hubbub grew louder.
"Correction of the correction!" announced a woman in a ringing voice. "Gerald Kaylen is in violation of the cosmic tree inaugurated by President Monica O'Segundo."
"Correction of the correction of the correction!" yelled another man who raised a hand grenade above his head.
"Better get out of here while we can," muttered Tabitha.
Tabitha waddled through the crowd as people started to attack each other all round them. Branches of trees whipped out at the soldiers and police, further complicating the melee. Donnybrook swooped in and out of the attackers, leading them into each other and quickly adding to the confusion of humanity at cross purposes with each other.
"Hang on," said Tabitha in a steady voice, as if there was nothing to worry about.
He plodded his way towards the fountain and sniffed at the trees planted by it. When Tabitha found the tree that satisfied him, he climbed up it, although its trunk was so slender that it did not seem strong enough to support the weight of one small child, let alone this large group. A couple of the policemen grabbed the tree and shook it, but Tabitha held on and stepped out on a wispy branch that bounced him and his passengers up and down. After all she had been through, Sharon was beyond fear at this point. She hardly knew where she was going when Tabitha took her through a skylight and out on another limb that felt slightly more solid. Green buds decorated the branch. Nestled in a crook of the branch up against the trunk was a tree fort. Tabitha climbed into it.
"Thank you for living in a tree fort in my branches while we rebuild the universe," said a deep voice from inside the tree.
"You're welcome," said Peppercorn with more composure than Sharon or Gerald had.
"It isn't all that fancy," said Tabitha, "but it's the best we could do in an emergency."
Sharon's father helped her off the turtle's back. The living room, much larger than Sharon expected, was mostly bare, but there was a large sofa against one wall and a large glass chandelier hung from the ceiling.
"Not bad for a start," said Vladimir Vivaldi.
"Not bad at all," said his wife, almost speechless for once. "Thank you, Tabitha!"
But Tabitha was gone already.
Everybody strolled aimlessly about the house that seemed large enough for all of them to live in comfortably. Sharon was surprised and pleased when she saw her own bed, rumpled the way she had left it, placed in an upstairs room. The view outside the windows was a constant shift of scenery as if hardly anything knew where it belonged in the world. Sharon and Gerald tried to avoid each other, but they kept running into each other instead.
"I really am sorry," Gerald finally said when he gave up on avoiding her.
Sharon looked at Gerald, looked away, and looked back at him.
"You had a pretty bad time of it, didn't you?"
Gerald nodded.
"It must have been bad for you," he said.
Sharon nodded and looked away because she didn't want Gerald to see her crying.
"Fatuous figurines and fiddles!" boomed the voice of Mrs. Vivaldi. "How did you ever get that up here?"
Sharon and Gerald both quickened their footsteps to see what the commotion was all about. All of the men in the group were clustered around a grand piano and shoving it off Tabitha's back and onto the floor. A moment later, Donnybrook flew in through an open window with the hutch that had been handed down in Sharon's family for several generations.
"I'm sorry I couldn't fix the windows and the china," said the dragon as he put the hutch down on the floor.
"That's all right," said a bemused Sharon Van Vann.
THE END