Chapter Five

The carracs, or air boats, moved in formation high above the tree line with a quiet hum, powered by some unseen motivation that confounded some of Nira's guests' ability to guess at.

Simon, Jeanette and Arthur were each hard pressed to explain it and Theodore could hear them engage in spirited talk on the subject.

He leaned against the railing of the craft's observation deck and watched the clouds move in their own formations. The ride was so tranquil for him, that only the slight rocking from a cross-current breeze reminded him of motion.

All around him, his eyes fell on scenic beauty in abundance, above and below. Misted valleys and incandescent cataracts flowing from proud mountains. Farms spanning from open, sloping flatlands in orderly patterns that caught his eye. Vast tracts of forests, green and hearty, girdling soft, blue and glittering lakes blessed with whatever life he could only imagine.

The easy smile that flowed across his face surprised him a little. He was more convinced a while ago that it was going to end badly for him and the others. Now, as the wind ruffled the fur on his face, he started to feel incredibly like a native coming home from a long exile.

The sun and the scents in the breeze and the sweet, spicy odor of the woods that made up the carrac he rode, stimulated him with their unfamiliarity. Energized him in spite of his still present misgivings about the situation he and the others were still in. In some way, the whole of this experience began to anchor him emotionally to this land very quickly. This land of Chipmunks.

Theodore thought about scenic beauty absently again and found that he was looking at Eleanor and couldn't readily look elsewhere. Inside, he felt locked like a piece of steel in the allure of a lodestone. With a sigh, he patted the pocket that held the silver bracelet and turned back to the vista. The time still wasn't right yet, he felt.

Arthur felt that with the exception of Jeanette, he and I.T.O. had seen way too much of both The Chipmunks and The Chipettes. Especially Simon, whom Arthur was pleasantly fantasizing about pitching over the side of the deck into the sweet by-and-by.

For now, however, he had to settle for listening to him talk, or prattle, as Arthur would have called it.

"If there's no power source, then it might be some natural property of the woods that make it up," Jeanette said.

"Anti-gravitic wood?" scoffed Simon amiably. "Nonsense. I believe there is a power plant on board. Just silent, if anything."

Jeanette struck a thoughtful pose and tried a different tact. "Maybe. Then again the laws of physics may work differently in this world. Maybe the carrac's structure is essentially light-weight with powerful lighter-than-air gases held and pumped into strategic chambers for lift like a nautilus, y'know?"

"It hardly matters," Arthur cut in. "Counter-gravitic craft are just the thing the MunkTechs will need to tear into to understand."

"And exploit," Simon shot at him.

Arthur visibly strained to ignore the barb. "I doubt these people have ever heard of patents. For the sake of diplomacy, we'll only reverse engineer one of their lesser used ones."

Spoken like a true conqueror, Jeanette thought darkly. "Why bother?" she blurted out. "You didn't feel too diplomatic when you stole Simon's computer and tortured him."

"That was because is in his case, we simply took advantage of his inherent weakness to its maximum effect," Arthur replied, cooled and matter-of-factly. "These people have no discernable weaknesses as of yet."

A twinge of pain sang in her stomach. "How can you be so cold-blooded, Arthur? So hateful?"

She glanced over to Simon, who regarded Arthur with equal frigidity. "That's alright, Jeanette. Arthur's a trained one-trick pony and his cronies are a bunch of vampires, taking more than they could ever produce from the world. Like a parasite."

With a look of hot emotion in his face, Arthur stepped up to Simon, hands turning into eager fists, but Jeanette moved in between the two, watching out for an audience.

"And parasites have their weaknesses, too," Simon said, his gray eyes turning harder and cooler in his readiness to attack.

"You may not find mine in your lifetime, Simple Simon."

"Please, you two," Jeanette pleaded in a whispered hiss. "Let's just not say anything for the rest of the trip, okay?" The two males backed off reluctantly when they saw one or two of the Autumnal Guard glance their way disapprovingly.

The debate on the carrac's propulsion ended as quickly as it started, with Simon always looking for the chance to maneuver himself between Arthur and Jeanette, either in the conversation or physically. As far as Arthur was concerned, at any rate.

He knew that simply talking with them...with her, wasn't going to garner any trust or even grudging admiration from them, but he expected that from his enemies.

And enemies they were. They did far more than meddle, all of them. They disrupted and destroyed, wrecked and ruined. In his mind, they, and even Jeanette, in her own way, would pay the price for that.

He stroked his chin and upon painful contact, remembered David striking him. In the back of his mind, he counted himself lucky that David was somehow transformed into a Chipmunk before he hit him. A blow, full-tilt, with Human strength behind it, would have been devastating.

It was a bit difficult to understand the Human's behavior that prompted the hit. Did David think he was a Chipmunk in some way that he needed to defend Simon? He wasn't even his blood son. Did all of that, in some perverse irony, bring about David's change? Would it account for the old Human, Miss Miller, as well?

They were abominations in Arthur's mind, not purebreds like everyone else. For Miss Beatrice Miller, he would make it a mercy killing; she couldn't fathom the joy of being a member of his noble species. However, for David...His death for touching him would be interesting to come up with.

Well, he figured, time enough for such things as vengeance. The Archive had done the miraculous, the impossible, by leading I.T.O. here, and its usefulness was far from over. The weapon, the power to defeat the Humans, was somewhere in this beautiful, verdant land. The hunt alone would be thrilling and The Archive would find it for them.

As a consequence, he glanced over to Jeanette, his heart aching when he saw her emerald eyes glow in the sun and the wind play with her rich brown hair. Her beauty was striking, no matter the setting.

Yes, he thought. Time enough for all such things.

At another end of the deck, a small crowd gathered around Nira made up of David, Alvin and Brittany on one side, and Phillip and The Roaming Eyes on the other. Both groups busied her by asking her rapid-fire questions while she stood with a nominal contingent of guards nearby.

"We detected an odd sound pattern coming from The Garden of The Green Gate," she explained.

"You mean that place we just left?" asked Brittany.

"Yes, young Brittany. We were commanded to go there and convey our Lady's wishes should we find anyone coming from The Gate. She seemed to know that someone might be arriving from there before we knew."

David took another look at the moving vista. "Are we going to see her now?" Then he once again felt self-conscious at hearing the sound of his new voice. He was just not used to hearing those high-pitched vocalizations come from him and not attribute it to helium.

"Yes, sir-"

"David, please," he entreated politely. She stopped, feeling a bit off-track and curiously pleased to know that he wasn't the kind to put on airs, as did so many others who had in the past.

"As you wish...David."

Alvin and Brittany watched these exchanges silently, but also gave each other knowing glances.

"Well, anyway," she continued, trying to breeze the moment away," This craft, The Royaleen Carrac,is the fastest in the skies." She began to trail off while watching the wind move the white, over-sized shirt David wore like a flowing, majestic robe and tussle his hair, making him look both angelic and a bit roguish. She almost forgotten the question.

"We'll reach the capital very soon," she stammered demurely. "Her Majesty has granted all of you a private audience and she's very eager to meet you."

David seemed oblivious to what was going on inside Nira, but felt more than a little floored by all the attention they were getting. It looked bad at first, but now things were looking relatively better. Now, if he could just figure out how to reverse his and Miss Miller's condition and get both of their families out of all this.

"Wow, we're sure getting popular," he said. "We left one kingdom and wound up in another." Then he heard Nira gasp.

"You left your king or queen?" she quickly asked, worry lining her soft face. "Will you be missed? Were you needed? What was your station? Do you have a title? We certainly had no idea that you served your own lord or lady and was taken from him or her! W-We could have arranged a diplomatic meeting-"

Smiling, David held up his furred hands to calm her. "Whoa, whoa! Take it easy, Miss. I didn't mean I served a king or anything. I'm just the manager of two singing groups. My sons', The Chipmunks, and Miss Miller's daughters', The Chipettes."

Nira said nothing for a few seconds. She was certain she understood some of what he said and did calm down, but she found it difficult to turn away from his eyes for a moment.

"See, we were going to perform for a college buddy of mine, King Rudi of Bulgravia, when we were brought here." David concluded.

"I see," she said hesitantly, then added quietly, "And you may call me Nira."

"Okay, Nira"

Alvin and Brittany glanced knowingly towards each other some more.

Until then, Phillip had been patiently waiting, letting the rest fire off, from his opinion, one inane question after another. Now it was his turn to ask, in his estimation, the right questions.

"What about military hierarchies?" he asked brusquely. "Technological and strategic strengths?"

Among those who secretly questioned why Phillip would ask such things, David took the most umbrage. Asking about military strength right after transporting a small, yet functional army with him? All of that hardware and support?

None too subtly, he sounded like he wanted to get the lay of the land before conquering it. Judging from that, David concluded that his friends and family had just stumbled into the embryo of an invasion. He spoke up fast.

"Nira, not to tell you your job or anything, but it might be best not to answer that," he offered, as diplomatically as his worry allowed. Then he gestured lightly towards Phillip. "They kidnapped my family and friends. We didn't come here willingly and that army he brought might be used to take over your world."

He paused to study Phillip's reaction and tensed inside. He expected to hear a violent response from him or an order to his nearby bodyguards to punish David for his statement.

But there wasn't so much as a threat, veiled or overt, sent to the elder Seville. Phillip and The Roaming Eyes looked at him, bewildered and bemused, and that worried David to no end.

"Well, if the 'general' here is quite through," one of The Roaming Eyes replied to no one in particular, "He might be pleased to know that we were expected to come here with our army."

"Why?" David charged, forgetting that he had no way of making them talk if they so chose. "Who's expecting you? The Queen?

"Why, yes," Nira interjected brightly. "Very much so. With her blessing."

David looked to her, his new face creased in a mix of worry, concern and confusion, but her face maintained that pleasant optimism that reminded him of a lamb before its slaughter. He sighed and said no more on the subject.

The trip took, on the whole, little more than an hour, and Alvin and Brittany were soon pointing at the horizon-blotting canopy of the Super Tree.

"That thing is huge," Brittany said.

"That's what the girls tell me," Alvin said slyly, watching her to see if she had gotten the joke. One slap upside his head a second later showed that she did.

Still a fair distance from the tree, its size made it look as though they were going to collide with a green mountainside.

The rest of Nira's group took their places along the railing to get their own views of the sight, as magnificent a vision as Nature could create.

The blue ribbon of a river ran from under the black maw of a tunnel of titanic, imposing roots and the clearing where the tree grew was, although grassy and lush, devoid of any smaller, common trees for close to five miles in every direction, as if the rest of the surrounding woods gave the mammoth plant a very wide berth.

It seemed just as well, for everything below the all-encompassing canopy was dim, blocked of any reasonable sunlight during certain times of the day.

The trunk was huge for such a living thing. Its relatively squat circumference could have held the equivalent of a mid-sized forest in its girth. As the carrac descended closer, the onlookers could just start making out in the distance activity and slight movement within the tree itself from tiny windows and openings carved from the massive armor of the bark wall. To either side and in various levels of descent and ascent were the orderly inbound/outbound traffic of other carracs, carrying either passengers or cargo.

Theodore was particularly awestruck by the Super Tree's majesty, presence and sheer impossibility of being real.

"What is that?" he asked under his breath.

"It's beautiful," Eleanor joined.

Nira, who had just heard them, stood at the head of the observation deck, answering with unabashed reverence. "This is our capital, young ones. Arbomagnus, The Great Green Father and the high seat of power for Her Majesty, Queen Winna the Fourth."

She knelt down to one knee, head down, arms outstretched with her eight fingers spread. Around the guests, every Autumnal GuardsMunk followed her in supplication.

As one, the guests knew that they were paying homage to the tree and so kept quiet as their carrac drifted closer and downward towards the titanic trunk, their surroundings becoming darker and cooler as they entered the seemingly endless shade of the massive tree.

After another minute, Nira and the knights stood again and she regarded them with a look as though what just happened wasn't too terribly profound.

"It's what we do," she said simply.

Nira's guests wondered what else she and the other natives would do as they were reaching the large, circular opening of the royal carrac hangar bay and the shroud of shade from the Super Tree closed in around them all.

Theodore had been in airports before and had seen their hangars from time to time at a distance. This gave him some general impressions of places like that. He carried those impressions as he disembarked with the others from the berthed craft to stand on the balcony that overlooked the expanse of the bay.

However, what he saw of the bay put his generalizations into conflict. Although a fully-functioning hangar and service area, it was also a vision of architectural beauty. Curved, support beams of wood weaved and flowed around and among the depths of work space that cradled the carrac. Even the uniforms of the work crews added to the overall look of natural and utilitarian elements within.

No matter how airy and busy the bay was, however, the Autumnal Guard that rode with him reminded him that the element of foreboding and intrigue was still in his and the others' future. And it made it all the cloudier by it.

There wasn't much time for proper orientation after the carrac was berthed. Just enough for a hasty course in etiquette concerning how to behave in Queen Winna's presence.

As they marched behind Nira, she led them to the carved doors that separated the bay from whatever laid beyond.

"After Queen Winna is finished with you, I shall endeavor to give you a proper tour of Arbomagnus," Nira said, manipulating the large, secure lock. "Until then, stay with me and don't lag behind. I wouldn't want you to get lost."

With that, the doors swung out and away and the guests stepped through and into the unexpected.

The cacophony of living hit them hard as they stepped out into a wide, curving promenade and vendor's market. Well-lit from strategically placed crys-lamps, they could see vines lacing the lower walls and high ceiling.

All around them, Chipmunks of almost every social strata hustled and chattered freely and busily. Males and females milled about, engaged in their various businesses or social pleasures, catching the guests' eyes with their styles of local dress. Some random assortments of Chipmunks of either sex would notice their gender counterparts in the group of newcomers and would throw them a friendly smile, wink or nod to the slightly hidden chagrin of their traveling companions.

It was a pleasant shock to Nira's charge. The times in their lives when they encountered so many of their species at once was so distressingly rare that moments like now became indelible in them. At least for all but two of them.

For just as telling, just as compelling, was the sheer absence of Humans. Totally. The truth of this hit David and Miss Miller noticeably that their species simply didn't exist here.

For their foster children and their I.T.O. "hosts", there was nothing to detect, either casually or by intent. No Human scents or colors, none of their sizes or idiosyncrasies. It was as if everyone around the two of them were awakening for a life-long dream of Man and his ways. To David and Miss Miller, they felt like ghosts and it felt more than a little eerie.

From the squeaking hub-bub of the area, Nira led them down a small, branching corridor that led them to a bank of wooden and metal-caged elevators on the far side of the hall. She pulled out a key, opened the door to one of them and bade them enter with her.

"This private lifter will take us to the royal levels of Arbomagnus," she explained as they ascended silently.

The car opened to reveal a floor of stark difference from the one they left. It was a little less busy and congested with Chipmunks but very ornate and its patrons' appearances reflected that.

The hall was a beautiful fusion of Nature and opulence. Mirror-polished floors of wood reflected the brilliance of crys-lamp chandeliers that hung high in curved, vaulted ceilings.

Polished corridors branched away from the main hall at either side, leading to private chambers, offices, dining halls and wardrooms. Smaller but no less tasteful, they displayed informational cuneiforms touched with gild on the smoothly sloped walls.

Everywhere, they saw Chipmunk courtiers, advisors, representative nobility and perfumed courtesans strolling here and there, involved in either their duties or dubious enterprises, while Autumnal GuardsMunks stood at various locations throughout in quiet attention.

At the far end of the hall stood a pair of high double doors, ornamented in gold and protected by two rows of GuardsMunks in full heavy-plate armor and brandishing wickedly fashioned weapons.

"The throne room is past these doors," Nira said in a hush. No one in her group could believe this. A world entirely of Chipmunks, flying boats, a giant tree that held the very queen that ruled it all. It would have made for excellent fiction if their feet didn't feel the floor beneath them, their noses didn't breathe in the perfumes and scents of the unfamiliar around them and their eyes didn't take in all the wonder the architecture provoked.

They walked silently past the grim knights, glancing at their armor and weapons with greater clarity. They looked impressive and dangerous.

Nira and the group reached the doors and she regarded the liveried male standing before them. Both greeted each other quietly and then he turned and entered the throne room.

"Remember," she breathed nervously, "Be on your best behavior and don't forget what I told you." She heard sounds of acknowledgement from the group, then the doors parted and they walked through.