Chapter 4: Swamp Girl

When Flynn opened his eyes, the first thing he noticed was that he could not move. Oh, this is bad. This is very, very bad. He was sure that the brothers had caught up with him, and he was about to be beaten to death or cut into pieces or both. He blinked and tried to bring his vision into focus.

He was in a chair, tied up with rope. A sinking feeling settled in his stomach. That was definitely a point in favor of his having been caught.

He'd climbed into this weird house on stilts, leaped through a window, and then—what? He couldn't recall what happened. Pain, certainly. Somebody must have knocked him out, and he could think of only two people who would want to do that. He decided he might as well look around and see how bad this was.

He finally focused his vision and noticed something that immediately struck him as very strange. The walls were painted from floor to ceiling with pictures. Animals, swirling vines, flowers, starburst designs... girls with long yellow hair... Flynn suddenly felt a slight ray of hope. Slight, but it was there. Surely the person who had done all this was a woman. The designs were very feminine in style.

"Struggling... struggling is pointless."

Okay, the voice was definitely female.

"I'm not afraid of you."

Yeah, could've fooled me, he thought. Her voice was trembling.

A girl stepped into the light. A small-figured girl with blonde hair that fell down past her waist, past her knees... all the way down to her ankles. He had never seen hair that long in his life. She was dressed in a purple skirt and a pink camisole top, which showed off her figure very well. Any other time, Flynn would have been gaping admiringly at her. There was something familiar about her face. He was sure he had seen a face similar to that recently. Could he possibly have met this girl before? No, he would definitely remember the hair. So why did she seem so familiar to him?

"Who are you, and what are you doing here?" She raised the iron skillet that he suddenly noticed she was holding.

He decided that he'd better answer. He had made a connection between that pan and the gaps in his memories between jumping through the window and finding himself in the present situation, and he did not want it to happen again. He had to get out of here and contact his chase team. "Hey, Blondie."

"Rapunzel."

He blinked. "My sympathies." He cleared his throat. "All right. The name's Flynn Rider. Storm chaser extraordinaire, best-looking guy in Corona, and completely at your mercy, beautiful." He put on The Smolder. Not once had it failed him with a woman, whatever it was he wanted from her. In this case, all he really wanted from this strange backwoods girl was to be let out of there.

She glared back and raised the pan higher. "I asked you what you were doing here, Flynn Rider."

Oh, she was going to be a tough customer. He heaved a sigh. The outbreak was going to begin in the early afternoon, and he really did not need any more delays. "Okay, look. I was running through this swamp, trying to avoid these crazy guys who wanted to kill me. I needed a place to hide and saw a cabin. That's all I'm doing here."

Her mouth dropped open a little. "You... you're telling the truth?"

"Yes!"

"So... you're not a smuggler?"

"No! I was abducted. I got away. I saw your house. I climbed through the window. End of story!" He could not believe this.

"One moment," she said in a flustered voice, and dashed out of the room and upstairs to the loft. "I need to talk to Pascal."

Pascal? Does she have a brother or something? But nothing could have prepared Flynn for the sight that met his eyes when she returned from the loft. She had a green snake draped around her neck. It was very clearly a python. What the hell?

"Uh... is that snake Pascal?"

"Of course." She spoke in natural tones, as if this were obvious.

"And... you talk to that snake."

"Well, sure."

OK, I'm actually really freaked out now. "Does he... answer back?" He wasn't sure he wanted to hear the answer.

"Not in words, silly. Expressions."

Small relief. "Uh, Blondie—"

"Be quiet!" She whirled around, back to him, and began to mutter to the snake. Flynn stared, transfixed. He had to admit, it really did look like the snake's head shifted and its tongue darted about in readable responses to what she said. Maybe she wasn't completely crazy, just very sheltered, and didn't know that snakes couldn't understand—

"I know! I think he's telling the truth too."

"What choice did I have?"

"But I don't know what to do with him!"

He knew he shouldn't. He knew that he was, as he had rightly (if flirtatiously) said, completely at the mercy of a weird swamp-dwelling woman who talked to snakes, tied him to a chair, and threatened him with an iron skillet that he knew she was more than willing to use. He didn't even want her. He had had more than enough out-of-the-ordinary events today. But he couldn't resist an opening like this. He smirked, wagged an eyebrow, and said in a sultry voice, "Oh, I have some ideas for things you can do with me."

She stopped talking and turned around very slowly. Her eyes narrowed. She raised the skillet. Shit. One of these days he would learn—

WHACK.

Something was tickling his ear. Something hissing. WHAT? Flynn's eyes popped open. Merely inches from his face stood the strange blond girl—Rapunzel—and that python of hers. It was darting its forked tongue in his ear. A strange taste was in his mouth.

"Oh my God!" he exclaimed. "What is wrong with you?"

She smirked and drew away, holding a small bottle of something in her hands. He licked his lips and tasted the strange taste again. Had she poisoned him with whatever that crap was? "What is that stuff?" he asked.

"Medicine," she said. "You looked pretty battered."

"I am pretty battered," he said pitifully. "It's really not been a good past two days for me, and beating me on the head with an iron skillet doesn't help." He paused. "But I do feel somewhat better, and I shouldn't. What's in that crap anyway?"

"It's made from flowers."

"Flowers."

"Yup."

He wondered if the medicine were actually a hallucinogenic drug, but then, he'd taken marijuana before and knew the effect it would have on him. Nothing about his current perception seemed off. His consciousness seemed normal, and in fact, he really did feel better than he'd felt since... well, since he had been fired. He recalled stories about folk medicine and herbal remedies, and wondered if this girl had discovered some swamp plant that really did promote quick healing.

"What kind of flowers?" he asked.

She glowered at him. "I don't know their name, and I didn't wake you up to discuss medicine. Pascal and I have finished our conference, and I have decided to offer you a deal."

"Deal?"

"You called yourself a 'storm chaser.'"

He grinned. "I am the storm chaser around here, sweetie."

She ignored this and strode across the room to the fireplace. Something stood in front of it, covered in a sheet of blue cloth. With a flourish, she pulled away the cloth to reveal an easel propping up a painting of stylized clouds, lightning, and... tornadoes.

"Do you know what these are?" She gestured at one of her stylized whirlwinds.

What was she asking? Had she seriously no idea what tornadoes were? Was there something in the painting that he was missing?

"You don't mean the tornadoes, do you?"

"Tornadoes. So that's what they're called." She stroked the head of the python, then turned to face him. "All right. I think that this afternoon, some of these 'tornadoes' will appear."

"You better believe they will," he said smoothly.

"You will take me with you, chase down these tornadoes, and return me here safely."

Oh no. No. No backwoods weirdos tagging along with me when I find the guys. Absolutely not. He cleared his throat. "Yeah, no can do. Ordinarily I'd happily give you a chase tour, but today, I've got a major job to do when this system comes through, so I won't be taking you anywhere."

She glared. "Something brought you to this house, Flynn Rider. Call it what you will, fate, destiny—"

"A pair of homicidal maniacs?"

"—and so, I have made the decision to trust you. But trust me when I tell you this." She stepped over to him and pointed the pan directly in front of his eyes. "You will stay in that chair, tied up, until you take me chasing tornadoes with you. If that means next spring, so be it. I promise."

He cleared his throat. "Look, it really wouldn't be good for you to be found holding me hostage here. That's highly illegal, you know. So nice try, but that threat has no teeth. I'm intending to meet up with my team and report the people who abducted me to the police. Speaking of which, I'd like to use your phone."

"Phone?" She looked confused.

"Yeah, you know, a phone? To call people with?"

She stared blankly at him.

Suddenly a really, really bad idea occurred to him. You've got to be kidding me, he thought. First I'm abducted, then I'm chased into this swamp running for my life, and then I leap into some backwoods cabin in the middle of absolute nowhere with no phone? "You... don't have a phone, I take it."

She shook her head.

Shit shit shit. He could be out here for a very long time, and no one would have a clue how to reach him or even if he was alive. This was really not his day.

"Do you live out here all by yourself? And—Pascal?" he said, reluctantly uttering the snake's name.

"No, my mother lives here too."

"Is she here right now?"

"Of course not. She's walking to the coast to pick up some shells to make paint."

So no car either, they lived in the middle of nowhere, and they made their own paint. The mother must be some kind of survivalist determined to live off the grid. It would figure that he'd stumble into the house of someone like that on a day as big as this one promised to be. He sighed. "Look, Blondie. As much as I'd love to take you to see the tornadoes, I can't. Why don't you ask your mother?"

"She won't let me leave—" Suddenly the girl broke off and turned away, but the damage was done.

Good Lord, he thought. No wonder she's strange. The mother won't let her leave the forest and doesn't have a phone. What kind of people are these? Poor kid. Something strange and alien began to stir in his chest. He supposed the name for it was compassion. Yes, that was what people called it.

All of a sudden something occurred to him. She had known that there were going to be storms that evening. How? The sky was clear, with only puffy little cumulus clouds here and there. They probably had no means of communication with the outside world. How could she have known? "Uh, Blondie, can I ask you something?"

"Rapunzel. And yes."

"How did you know that there were going to be tornadoes later today?"

"Oh, I have instruments for monitoring the weather. I've studied patterns for years."

He blinked. "Mind untying me? I'd kind of like to have a look."

She stared skeptically at him. "You'll just run away if I do, I'm sure."

He put on a calculated pout. "I thought you said you trusted me."

A startled look came over her face; then her eyes narrowed. "You talked me out of it," she snapped.

He kept up the pout.

With a sigh, she walked around to the back of his chair. He craned his neck to see what she was doing, but it was no use. Then he felt his legs being untied. With a gasp of relief, he stood up.

He was not actually planning to dash for the window, nor would he have attempted it as long as his hands were tied, but Rapunzel evidently did not intend to give him the chance. With a smirk, she draped her python around his neck in coils. "If you make any false moves, Pascal will squeeze you," she said dangerously.

He didn't dare argue. This snake around his neck was actually really intimidating. Pythons are predatory, Flynn thought. They squeeze their prey to death and then swallow it whole. He didn't think this particular python could swallow him, at least, but it was definitely in a position to squeeze him to death. He allowed Rapunzel to lead him upstairs, thinking that ordinarily, it would be a good thing for an attractive woman to lead him by the arm to her bedroom—but not if his hands were tied up, a dangerous snake was coiled around his neck, and the attractive woman in question was keeping him in her house with a death threat.

"So, Rapunzel," he said, more to calm himself than to actually hold a conversation, "why is the snake named Pascal? Is it named after someone?"

"No," she said. "His full name is Hectopascal, but that's too long and not as cute."

"What?" Flynn sputtered. "You named your snake after a unit of atmospheric pressure?"

"I know it's weird," she said, blushing and hiding her face.

"It's weird all right, but I have to admit, I'm kind of impressed."

She smiled and then ducked down again. "All right. Here." She threw aside a curtain of multicolored beads, pulled Flynn over to a door, opened it, and pushed him out onto a balcony. She removed the snake from his neck—thank you, Lord—and coiled it over the railing.

He blinked. He was facing treetops. He knew the house was about that high up, but it was somehow different seeing it from this angle.

"It's right here," Rapunzel said hesitantly, gesturing at something in the corner. Flynn turned to look.

It was a homemade weather station. There was a weathervane and anemometer, a barometer, a rain gauge, and instruments for measuring the temperature and dew point. There was also a radio.

"What's this for?" he asked her, trying through his tied hands to gesture at the radio.

"Oh," she said. "That picks up data from my balloons."

"Balloons?"

"My mother brings me balloons with little instrument packages every now and then. I only get three a month, so I have to choose when I launch them."

"You take your own soundings?"

"Is that what they are? Let me show you one, actually." She went back into the bedroom and emerged with a plot.

He stared in disbelief. It was a Skew-T. And it was from that morning.

"She is okay with this because she is glad I'm content learning about the outside world this way," Rapunzel said. "But I'm not. I can see these—tornadoes—from the treetops. I want to see them up close and in person."

Flynn had to admit that he really did feel sorry for her now. And he was intrigued by her clear interest in and knowledge of the weather. He hated to have to tell her that he couldn't take her with him. He really did. But still... she wasn't his responsibility. He glanced up to break the bad news to her when he realized that she wasn't there.

She emerged from the room again, this time carrying a big cardboard box.

"There's something else," she said in a hushed, almost guilty voice. "Mother doesn't know about these. But I have been planning to go and see the tornadoes. I have devices to measure inside of them. I've been making them for years out of extra supplies... instruments from balloons that I told her I'd sent up but never did..." She picked up a handful of something from the box and held it out to him.

He gasped, then sucked in his breath. Her hands held delicate instruments, about the size of tennis balls, with metal propellers on top of them. He could hardly believe his eyes. Why hadn't he thought of this?

"Do they... do they work?"

"I think so. I tossed one into a gale one time, when there was a rainstorm, and it sent reasonable data back to my radio."

What a fantastic idea, Flynn thought. If Moore doesn't work—or even if it does—this is so much better to deploy into a tornado. This is exactly what I need to suck up to the Koenigs and get hired again. Suddenly he came to a resolution.

"Rapunzel," he said, "I have a counter-offer for you."

"Oh?"

"I will take you to see the tornadoes today if you will bring these to the laboratory where I work. This is a really amazing idea, and it can be put into practice if you would give—let me show the design to my employers."

Her eyes widened. "Really?"

"Really. This is a great idea."

"You'll really take me chasing storms with you?" she squealed. He nodded. "This is wonderful!" She began to dance giddily around the balcony, holding his bound hands and swinging him around.

"Uh, Rapunzel—"

"Hmm?"

"Would you untie my hands?"

"Oh! Sorry!" She quickly untied the knot and took the ropes off.

He stretched his wrists. "Now," he said, "there's no time to lose. The outbreak is due to begin in a couple of hours. I've got to meet up with my team, which means I've got to get out of this swamp—uh, what are you doing?"

She was uncoiling the snake. "Can't Pascal come along?"

He shuddered. "No. Sorry, but a storm chase vehicle is no place for a snake."

She glared at him. "Pascal is coming along."

"Okay, okay. But can't you put him in a cage or something?"

She turned as white as a ghost.

Flynn didn't know why she had reacted that way, but he didn't want her passing out. Maybe she'd owned a previous pet that died in a cage, and it disturbed her. "Or a box? Anything? I just think he might freak out being loose in a car." And I would definitely freak out having him loose in the car.

"He can go in a box," Rapunzel agreed. She went into her bedroom, got down on her knees—Flynn tried to avoid looking at her butt before finally giving in and staring—and withdrew another box from under her bed, into which she placed the snake.

"Now," she said, "since you don't get to see my sensors up close until after I've seen some tornadoes, I'm sealing the box." She smirked at him, and before he could object, she had retrieved a jar of what looked like homemade glue—created from tree sap, from the looks of it—and a roll of paper, which she cut into strips. She painted the paper strips with the glue, closed the flaps to her box of sensors, and sealed that box shut.

Clever girl, Flynn thought ruefully. He had been intending to swipe one of the sensors. Well, he wasn't going to let her get the best of him. His gaze flitted around her room for something else he could steal. It was really a strange bedroom, with practically everything painted with the same art deco-type designs, and knickknacks everywhere. There was so much to choose from. He settled on a bottle of shampoo or something from her dresser. With hair like that, she definitely would need shampoo, and there was no point in stealing something that was of no use to her.

He had just stashed the shampoo bottle in his pocket—ugh, I need my satchel, he thought—when she looked up. "All right, Flynn. Ready to go?"

"Am I ever," he said.

"Then let's go!" A light seemed to gleam in her green eyes.

"Yup. Let's go catch some tornadoes, Blondie."