O Most Wonderful

Three

Bella burst into peals of mocking laughter.

'Well of course she's a She, ya big lug. What else would she be?'

Hank scowled, in spite of himself.

'She's not usually, that's all.'

'So, what?' piped Presto from the back of the group, 'Everybody in your world's the opposite sex?'

'Guess so.' Hank walked back to the centre of the group, blanking Bella, and then found that there was nobody there that he felt particularly comfortable in addressing directly. 'And, as little as I enjoy bumping into Venger at the best of times, I really don't want to meet a… a female one.' He pulled a face at the thought.

'Don't worry, Blondie.' Bella sat back down in her distant corner. 'We'll keep you safe from the Big Bad Girl.'

'We have to find Myra,' added Sean, quietly.

Hank looked round in the direction of the soft voice, and then had to look away again. It was the first time the red haired young man had spoken in a long time, and Hank could tell from his expression that Sean liked him being in Jess' place about as much as Hank did. There was a connection there with Sheila, an attraction, even. And since the only difference in this new world was gender, Hank had to assume that the same chemistry existed between Sean and Jess. Except… it wasn't just that. Sean was Sheila. He had her eyes, her face. His soft voice was deeper, but he came out with her turns of phrase. He cared for the little Barbarian and the Unicorn the same way Sheila did. His costume was, of course, different. Instead of the pink dress he wore a lilac shirt with brown breeches and boots to midway up his calf, but he was short and slim like his female counterpart, with the cape on and his back turned, it could be hard to tell the difference.

The male Acrobat Chris, on the other hand, towered over them all, including Hank. The Black youth's costume was much closer to Diana's than Sean's was to Sheila's, with little altered except the replacement of her halter neck top with a large, bejewelled brass plate over his shoulders and pectoral muscles. Still, Hank had found himself starting to warm towards Chris surprisingly fast, and it struck him how easy his relationship with Diana had always been, as well as how much he missed having close male friends his own age. Presto's outfit was exactly the same, as was her build, her appearance, her expressions; even her name… there was hardly anything to the casual observer save a slightly higher voice and longer haircut to tell this Magician from the other. Frankie, too, looked an awful lot like Bobby, with the same freckles and rough-and-tumble appearance. She had been clothed, by whomever it was that dressed them on coming to the Realm, in a knee length leather pinafore dress, and Bobby's boots and hat. Uni was almost exactly the same, merely slightly bigger and darker coated. But then there were those looks in their eyes – alien looks. The little girl and her Unicorn kept glaring at Hank with fear and distrust – expressions that he was unused to receiving from them. He imagined that the little ones must miss their own Ranger. He sighed. He missed his gang too. His thoughts turned automatically to Sheila, only the fair young woman in his mind's eye began to morph involuntarily into Sean. He pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to force the vision into returning to a female shape. It did, but became taller, darker, prouder… shinier… a high black ponytail and a rounded breastplate and legs and legs and legs from here to…

He pinched at his nose harder, growling a little to himself.

Get out of my head, Dammit!

'Yes,' he sighed, shaking the image from his brain, 'Sean's right. And the sooner, the better.'

'There's only one problem with that, Blondie.'

Hank frowned again at Bella's voice behind him. He knew it. He just knew she was going to say what everybody else was already thinking.

'Where in the Hell do we even start looking?'

---

'Um… whassname… Jess… slow down, would you?'

The female Ranger stopped for the eighth time, clenching her fists. She turned around, slowly, counting silently to ten.

'What is it this time?'

Bobby slowed as he caught up with her.

'Whaddaya think?'

The Blonde scowled as she doubled back to the steep verge she had just climbed, muttering to herself.

'Montgomery…'

Pushing past the others, she caught a nearby branch to steady her and held an open hand out to the young man still struggling up the verge.

'Here.'

Eric flashed her the briefest look.

'I'm OK.'

'No, you're not,' snapped Jess, 'you're too slow. Take my hand.'

Eric looked at her again, then gave her a grudging smile and let her help pull him up.

'Thanks, Blondie.'

---

Hank hauled Bella up with a deliberate roughness.

'And stop calling me Blondie.' He tried to ignore her pursed-lipped expression of coquettish innocence. 'My name is Hank. It's perfectly easy to remember, but if you can't manage that I will happily spend the hopefully short amount of time I have to spend in this dimension responding to "Ranger," "Man With Bow" or "Hey, You", but definitely not Blondie.'

Bella tossed her hair.

'What's up with you, Blondie?'

'What's up with me?' Hank, aware that the others were now staring, tried to concentrate on Bella's eyes, tried to see her as Eric. 'What the matter with you, Er… Bella?'

'Me?' Bella fluttered her eyelashes.

'Yes, you,' seethed Hank. 'I mean, look at yourself. You're just flicking straight into flirt mode, the way you do every time you're around a member of the opposite sex.'

'How dare y…'

'Oh come on! Don't play innocent with me. I know you, remember.'

Bella gasped, wide eyed. 'Are you suggesting that I'm…'

'I know what you're like,' hissed Hank, cutting her off again, 'and I know that you can't help yourself acting like this around girl… around guys, even though you are never, ever able to pull it off. Now would please, please stop it.'

'I'm not doing anything!'

'You're embarrassing us both,' seethed Hank, 'so stop flicking your hair and batting your eyelashes, Erica, or Bella, or whatever your name is, stop calling me Blondie and just. Back. Off.'

The brunette narrowed her eyes in fury, opening and closing her mouth for a moment, searching for a comeback. Hank was just about to turn from her, the little victory won, when the impossible happened. Her bottom lip began to wobble.

Uh-oh. I hope that isn't what I think it is… I don't think I can deal with…

He watched in silent horror as Bella's face reddened and her eyes filled with water.

Please, don't cr…

Bella suddenly let out a loud, miserable wail, turning on her heels and storming off into a thicket with noisy tears.

Hank buried his face in his hands, attempting to regulate his own angry breathing. Nobody else was stopping the female Cavalier from marching off on her own. Neither was anybody approaching him. Two hours. That's how long he'd been in this new Realm, and already he'd made a girl cry. He'd never said anything to make a girl cry, ever before. And he'd certainly never got that sort of reaction out of Eric before, either. But then, he'd never turned on Eric so nastily. There was something about Bella that was bringing out the worst in him. And he wasn't entirely sure that it was the new Cavalier's fault.

'Hey,' he cried out to the rapidly diminishing red cape, 'I'm sorry, OK?'

'No you're not,' sobbed the girl from the undergrowth, 'you're just a big jerk.'

'Listen, Bella…' Hank started, stepping towards the brunette.

She spun around to face him, angrily. 'Leave me alone! If you know me so well, you should know me well enough to let me damn well alone. And why the Hell would I be flirting with you? You're Jess. Or at least you're supposed to be. 'Cause Jess is a nice person, and you're a… you're just a hateful, hurtful Bastard.' She turned back into the undergrowth, wiping a tear from the end of her sharp nose. 'Sooner you go back to where you came from, the better…'

'Bella, don't…'

Chris put a hand on Hank's shoulder, stopping him from stepping any closer towards the Cavalier.

'Hey. Don't worry about her, Hank. She'll be OK. She does this kinda thing all the time.'

Hank sighed. 'Really? She must get all Eric's tears, then. He does that kinda thing none of the time.'

Chris looked unconvinced. 'He never pulls any dumb tricks to get attention?'

'Only every second God gives him.'

Hank was relieved to see Chris break into a grin, and hear the others chuckle to themselves.

'Well, there you go.' Chris patted Hank on the back. 'They must just have different ways of dealing with Being Bella.'

Hank returned Chris' smile, gratefully. 'Well, I guess we may as well take a break while we wait for Her Ladyship.

---

Jess sat against the tree with an audible sigh, pushing the few remaining tears of frustration away with the back of her hand. She had never argued so badly, so personally with Bella as she just had with Eric. She had never known Bella to be so spiteful to her, but worst of all, she had never known herself to be so unkind to one of her gang either. And Eric had noticed, and when he had span around to tell her so before storming off into the cover of the thicket, God help her, she had crumbled.

Diana sat next to her, and took her hand.

'You all right?'

Jess nodded, smiling falsely.

'I will be.' She squeezed Diana's hand. 'I hate this place, Diana. I can't get my bearings at all. Please understand. That's why I'm being such a… a…'

'Hey.' Diana's tone was suddenly sharp, making Jess look up into the familiar eyes of her altered friend. 'I hope you didn't pay one bit of notice to what that stuck-up jerk said. He just wanted to get your attention. You are not being a Bitch.'

Jess frowned to herself for a moment before speaking.

'How do you put up with it, Diana?'

'What?' Diana's face lit up with mocking merriment. 'With the subtle charms of the Eric Montgomery School of Seduction? It's something that any human being with boobies has to get used to, I'm afraid. You either learn to tolerate it or end up going completely mad.'

Jess smiled a little. 'I might go for the second option.'

'Good choice,' murmured Diana. 'That way you don't fall into his little traps.'

'Traps?'

Diana smiled to herself. 'He tricks you. You start playing along, and before you know it, you're having fun. Next thing you know, you actually start missing it every time he has a quiet day…'

'Never gonna happen,' laughed Jess. 'I live for my Cavalier's Off Days.'

'So does Hank,' replied Diana. 'So did I, once upon a time…'

---

Unseen, Eric slid into the thicket again, pressing his back against one of the larger trees and cursing to himself.

Fantastic. Now she's swapping notes with Diana.

He couldn't go back yet. Not while they were talking. He'd heard his name. He was sure he had, and while normally he'd have been delighted to believe that two pretty girls were discussing him, this was far from an ideal situation.

He had made her cry. He hated that. He hated himself for doing it. She had been right. He couldn't help himself. He didn't know why he did it with girls – either picking on them or going overboard trying to impress them, or some weird combination of the two, until the poor girl didn't know whether she was coming or going and usually ended up hitting him, blanking him or bursting into frustrated tears. But, he told himself, pressing his lips tightly together; he hated her for doing it, too. Because she was Hank, and you shouldn't be able to make Hank cry by calling him a stupid name. And Hank wouldn't have snapped like that in the first place, either. And Hank didn't smell like grass and flowers.

He sighed in irritation, pressing the back of his head harder against the tree. He had to go back soon. And the sooner they got going, the sooner they could find Myra. And the sooner that happened, the sooner Jess would just go away.

---

The lonely figure flitted its eyes between the looking glasses, watching the same scenario play itself out in both.

There was a laugh as the armoured one in the images stalked like a sullen housecat back towards the verge where the others were waiting for it, while the fair one made its best attempt to ignore it without appearing to. The images shrank, suddenly, and the looking glasses were filled with a much wider spectrum. The forest as a whole, and a vast expanse of sky. Something was coming. Something dark and deadly. Something fun.

The voice in the heart of the forest was like a million people – male and female, young and old – whispering at once.

'Oh good.'