Each of the kingdom's governments had specific designs to their balloons. This was for recognition as the designs relied heavily on their colors and shapes indicative of their sigil or at least duty. The Beauty of Aqua—the Drop Kingdom's flagship—had an envelope designed like a giant raindrop with a hull resembling a fountain. The King Barbardo was a galleon and the purple envelope spiraled like a snail's shell or French horn like the Windmill Kingdom's sigil. It was therefore unsurprising the balloon descending towards them had an envelope that looked like a giant, orange sun.
The Icarus-class was infamous thanks to the Little Princess—Fine and Rein's personal balloon. Though, anyone who would name their design after a figure famous for flying too close to the sun and coming crashing back to earth either did not grasp the irony or did and that was the joke.
The twins never seemed to softly land their craft, always making a hard landing if not outright crashing. It was an unwieldly craft where maneuvering needed more than the basic controls facilitated, and it only had rigid feet to land on that did nothing to cushion or control its contact with the ground.
"You're just going to go back home?" Ophelia asked.
"Yeah." Fine rubbed the back of her head.
"We used up our entire charge back there," Rein added.
"There's not even enough power left for me to use telepoomotion to get back to the Sunny Kingdom de pumo," Poomo said.
"But, nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?" Rein asked.
"Now we know we can't counter the Mother Tree's magic," Fine added. "That's something."
"It must be nice to be able to pick some victory out of the jaws of defeat," Spigot commented. "Just remember, nothing about Princess Milro and Princess Sophie being shrunk."
"Don't worry," Rein said.
"Their secret's safe with us," Fine added.
The Little Princess landed in the sand with a distinct thud, not cutting enough descent speed to settle on its feet. It instead bounced before coming to rest. The door on the underside of the bathysphere-like hull opened. An older Human woman with her hair sitting on top of her head in a style that resembled a chef's hat stepped out along with a black Nyamal woman with tipped ears. While the feline-like Nyamal wore the typical orange dress and white apron of a Sunny Castle maid, her Human counterpart wore a purple dress that was more ornate in design but still accompanied by a white apron.
The Nyamal rubbed her backside. "I think this confirms it's a problem with the airship, not just Princess Fine and Princess Rein's flying skills, Madam Camelot."
"Act properly, Lulu," the Human—named Camelot—said. "There are citizens of other countries present."
"Of course, Madam Camelot." The Nyamal—Lulu—bowed to Camelot and then faced forward.
"We're here to pick you up; Princess Fine, Princess Rein," Camelot said.
"Thanks for coming on such short notice, Camelot," Fine said.
"Why are you coming back so soon?" Lulu asked.
"The Prominence ran out of power," Rein answered. "We need to recharge it."
"You need to pace yourselves," Camelot scolded. "I hope you're at least doing great things with your power."
"It certainly was great," Fine said, exhaling a strained laugh.
"At least you can have dinner with your parents," Camelot said.
Fine piped up, "What are we having?!"
"If only we could charge the Prominence with Fine's appetite," Rein commented.
"Tell me about it de pumo," Poomo occurred.
Fine and Rein boarded the Little Princess. Camelot and Lulu turned back with them. Fine and Rein turned back and waved. "Good luck to you all," the twins said in unison.
"Thank you," Lee and Ophelia said in unison.
The door closed, and the balloon raised into the air. The engineers waved until it became imperceptible with distance.
Spigot dropped his arm to his side. "Alright, enough distractions. Get back to work." He walked towards the Hurricane sitting on the tarmac.
"Yes, sir." The engineers headed to the Hurricane waiting on the tarmac.
"I wonder if there's a thing with governesses having names starting with 'Cam'," Lee mused. "Camelot is Princess Fine and Princess Rein's. Camille is Princess Milro's. I wonder if Queen Camellia was a governess at some point."
"If she was, I have nothing but pity for the poor child," Ophelia said.
Emily glanced to Franklin creeping away. She grabbed him and dragged him towards the stairs. "Don't make me duct tape you to the chair again." She pushed him onto the bottom step and blocked him up the stairs.
Lee climbed up after him and headed straight for his station. Nicole sat in the station in front of his, and Milro and Sophie stood at Ophelia's station. She turned back to Lee as he sat down. "We need the computer core unlocked."
"Give me a second." Spigot disappeared behind the cabinet in front of Franklin's station. "Try it now."
Lee turned his computer, and the normal screens came up. "Everything is up and running."
Spigot walked towards the front. "Where to now, Master Chief?" Alex asked as he passed him towards the cockpit.
"The Seed Kingdom," Spigot said. "There's an airstrip near Hickory Town."
"What did you think of Fine and Rein?" Sophie asked.
"All the rumors are true," Ophelia said.
"But are they really unprincess-like?" Lee mused. "Sure, their impulsive and not at all graceful, but I've always seen a prince or princess as a future leader. They should be kind and just and inspiring to those around them. Princess Fine and Princess Rein certainly seem to be that."
"I guess we've just built this image of a princess as being the idealized girl," Ophelia said.
Milro sat down, her skirt puffing around her. Sophie knelt down to place her hand on Milro's shoulder.
"Is something wrong, Your Majesty?" Ophelia asked.
Bret's voice came over the speaker, "Ladies and gentlemen, we're now departing."
The Hurricane began to head down the runway. Sophie sat next to Milro, and Ophelia had her hand ready to catch them. The plane accelerated and tilted up. Franklin only managed a whimper at this. They left the ground and the hydraulic whine indicated the landing gears retracted into the hull followed by the clunk of the doors closing.
"Forgive me for asking again," Ophelia said. "Is there something wrong, Princess Milro?"
Milro heaved a sigh. "I'm the most unprincess-like princess by Mister Pryor's definition."
Lee felt guilty for mentioning it. "I don't think so. You're the kindest, most just princess out there."
"What about inspiring?" Milro asked.
Lee had to think. "You got us all up here," Franklin said. Lee nodded in agreement with that.
"But is it because of me," Milro said, "or fear of my mother?"
"Uhh…" Lee had nothing to counter that.
"I'm nothing like mother," Milro sighed.
"Is that a bad thing?" Ophelia asked.
"Then what am I going to be?" Milro asked. "Because, they way I am now is no good for being a queen." She paused. "Even if I didn't shrink."
Ophelia looked to Lee, but he was clueless what to say. All he had known was Yamul as their queen. He had read about the previous queens, but their times as princesses were typically little more than a footnote.
"All I can say is concentrate more on what you are than what you're not," Nicole suggested.
"What I am is eight centimeters tall," Milro stated.
"How about we just concentrate on fixing that for the moment?" Ophelia said, motioning to her monitors. Probably better to get back to their work than head into a subject blind. "We can get into the rest later."
Lee turned to his monitors and pulled up what he had been working on last night. There was the precipitation type profile. The clouds went from ice crystals bordering the top to dry snow to wet snow to eventually rain where the temperatures went above freezing.
He also had a spreadsheet of the temperature, absolute humidity, barometric pressure, and wind speed and direction at flight level. There were also those conditions at the typical pressure levels as detected by the dropsondes only giving the height for the given pressure. Lee had also had the freezing height since he knew it was snow.
There had to be more. He looked up the list of conditions, and there was an entire section of atmospheric chemistry. Gas mix and particulate composition were there but grayed out. He would need to ask Spigot about that. What were available was liquid equivalent content—another way to measure the moisture in the air as how much water it would translate to if it all fell as rain—and solid particulate count.
Lee pulled up the liquid content. That seemed normal. Values rose steadily over Sinker Swamp with the input from evaporation and evapotranspiration. It at first plateaued as the precipitation began and then fell off quickly. It was very quick. As he thought, the atmosphere was wringing itself out and effectively exhausted by the time it left the Seed Kingdom.
But why? Lee thought. He went back to the winds. "Cloud layer winds do slow some over the Seed Kingdom. Perhaps that increases the time clouds spend over the Seed Kingdom."
"Wouldn't that be expected as it leaves the influence anticyclone?" Ophelia sighed. "The lack of a baseline sucks."
She turned to Lee. "You know, you did well back there in the dining room explaining things. I think you should do more to advocate for our cause."
Lee felt a cold sweat run across him. "I, I prefer to just do the work."
"But weather is about the only thing you talk about freely," Ophelia said. "A lot of the time it's hard to get you to stop."
"But I didn't convince Moon Maria," Lee said.
"Moon Maria lives in a desert," Ophelia responded. "She thinks weather happens to other people; she said so herself. Other kingdoms would be more receptive."
"I don't want to," Lee said plainly. He had no other argument against Ophelia. He just wanted the conversation to end.
"You can't just accept you're disabled," Ophelia stated. "You need to strive to overcome your limitations in any way you can."
"Maybe, but let's just deal with this situation for now," Lee said. Maybe that will get Ophelia off it.
"Fine," Ophelia sighed.
Lee got back on task. There was the solid particulate count. He pulled it up. Again, the lack of the baseline hurt understanding what he was looking at. The numbers were high, but it could be normal for the Seed Kingdom for all he knew. He scrolled up and down, but came to something.
"Check the sub-micrometer particulate count," Lee said. "There's a jump around the twentieth parallel."
Ophelia checked. "There is."
Nicole turned back to them. "Find something?"
"Maybe," Lee mused. "There's a sudden increase in aerosols just north of the border."
It was not much of an increase numerically. It would translate to less than a gram per cubic kilometer. Yet, it was definitely there as the amounts below the twentieth were consistently higher than those above. And, even small alterations to the atmosphere could have significant impacts.
"Aerosols?" Milro asked, looking between the two.
"They're microscopic particles," Lee explained. "They can be dust, smoke, pollen, even bacteria."
"Is that important?" Sophie asked.
"It's actually vital," Lee said. "Aerosols are common nuclei for water droplets and ice crystals. Water is polarized, its hydrogen atoms having weak positive charge while the oxygen is negatively charged. This makes it common for molecules to repel each other which is why it fights transitioning to a less energetic state. By collecting on an aerosol as a starter, it can do so more readily."
"And the more aerosols in the air, the more that form?" Milro asked.
Lee snapped his fingers. "Exactly. And, if these aerosols are conducive to ice crystal formation, then that explains the snow."
He pulled up the precipitation type mix and moved it back to the northern edge. Lee pointed at what the graphic told him. "That's around the area where ice crystals began to overtake liquid droplets. They must be ice nuclei, and very effective ones at that."
Lee put on his headset. "Master Chief, I think we got something."
"What did you find?" Spigot asked into his microphone.
"Aerosols, Master Chief," Lee answered through his earpieces. "Just upwind from where the precipitation begins, there is an anomalous increase in aerosols. It also coincides with the transition to ice crystals."
"Aerosols leading to ice crystal formation," Spigot mused. It got him thinking about things, discussions from years ago.
"Something on your mind, Master Chief?" Bret asked.
"It's probably nothing," Spigot said. There are many more reasonable explanations before considering that.
Bret had spent much of the past eight years of his life in the air. At first with his father piloting, then him piloting under his father's supervision, and then as full pilot in his own right (with further guidance from and copiloting with Tanya to familiarize himself with the Orion). He was use to the world spreading out below him. It was from the air, especially a few kilometers up—above where balloons tended to stay—that one could see the surface curve up and how light was somehow bent to keep the illusion of a horizon.
He was also quite familiar with how it looked when it rained. The surface seemed to wash out and raindrops would fill the windscreen just to be wiped away and begin populating the glass again. Like night, settlements became clusters of light only seeming to be brighter against the gloom. Using their relative location and directions of the roads radiated from them, he knew where he was.
That was not the case with the Seed Kingdom. All there was to see was gray above and washed-out greens and browns running together below.
He would only give the meaningless landscape a glance as he concentrated on his instruments. They did not care about that fact landscapes were hard to discern. All they considered where how high they were, their current latitude and longitude, the speed and direction or their motion, and their current pitch, yaw, and roll.
Bret noticed Otto's attention was also not on the windows, but not on his instruments either. He was looking back into the cabin with a slight frown and longing eyes.
"Something on your mind?" Bret asked.
"He's thinking about Lady Nicole and that Triton engineer," Bonnie said.
Otto glowered at her, but only sighed and faced forward. "I shouldn't be concerned about her. If she wants to incur the duchess's wrath by dating some peasant from the Drop Kingdom, it's not my problem."
"Yet you are," Bret said. "Jealous?"
"Partly," Otto said. "Also, we were friends before we attempted to court."
"Wouldn't believe that from how you went at it back in the Moon Kingdom," Bret said.
"There are things that are endearing when taking in small doses, that become extremely annoying when in constant contact," Otto explained. "Her aloofness is fine for an afternoon conversation every now and again, but I couldn't stomach her attitudes about reinventing the wheel day in and day out."
"And what about your 'militaristic, overcompensating lifestyle?'" Bret asked.
"I grew up in a military household in a military manner," Otto declared. "I learned discipline and the virtues of a regimented schedule. It is the best way to live life."
"And you wonder why it went south," Bonnie muttered.
Otto only glanced at her. "I do want to rebuild our friendship. Aloofness aside, she is a wonderful person. But, the wounds run deep."
"Well, being happy for her finding someone could help," Bret suggested.
Otto looked back. "Perhaps."
Bret felt like changing the subject. "Everyone calls her Lady Nicole or Lady Dupré. Why aren't you Lord Otto or Lord Jäger?"
"My father is a markgraf," Otto explained. "It's a purely political title like the master chief's. It comes with no land and isn't hereditary. Therefore, my mother, my siblings, and I gain no title from our relation to him.
"Lady Dupré has her title because she is the heir to the Pasturelands Duchy." He muttered in addition, "God help them all."
"Look alive, you two," Spigot said. "We should be approaching the landing strip."
Bret focused forward, increasing the speed of his wipers. Among the greens and browns was a single, long, narrow strip of black with a single hangar next to it. That was it. No lights, no air traffic control. "You've got to be kidding me," Bret groaned. "We gotta land on that?"
"Your good on this, Mister Greene?" Spigot asked.
"Yeah," Bret exhaled. "I'm just going to land a large plane in I.F.R. conditions on a runway with no lights and ground support. Now I know why Tanya insisted on practicing this all the time."
"They could've at least provided lights?" Otto asked.
"You're talking about the Seed Kingdom," Spigot said. "We're lucky they have a runway at all.
"Technology is a four-letter word down here. There's a reason no one has an ambassador living in the Seed Kingdom proper." He sat back in his chair. "And it's too bad because we might've avoided this whole debacle in the first place if we did."
"They don't have ambassadors in the other kingdoms either, right?" Bret asked.
"They have one in the Windmill Kingdom," Otto said.
"That is a situation unique to the Drop Kingdom," Spigot explained. "They pulled the whole diplomatic mission during the Crisis.
"Supposedly, the ambassador caught Queen Yamul on a particularly bad day to complain about the lack of rain for the umpteenth time. She wasn't in the mood and wanted to get rid of them, so she told them to try a rain dance out of sarcasm. However, they missed the sarcasm part when they sent their report back. I heard they got the entire population of Hickory Town involved. It didn't work, the ambassador resigned in disgrace, and that ended normal diplomatic relations between our two kingdoms. Since then, what contact there has been has been between the royal families directly." Spigot paused. "Or unlucky C.G.S. engineers and their Department of Land Use."
"It sounds like you have a lot of experience with that," Otto said.
"I'll never get those months back," Spigot said, staring forward.
"At least the news media is mostly disinterested with the Seed Kingdom," Spigot said. "I don't know what we'd do if we had the typical press detail following us everywhere."
"We're like ninjas, doing our work unseen by the public," Bret said, making what were meant to look like karate moves. It only got unamused glances Spigot and Otto. He gripped his control yoke.
Spigot sat up. "Cut the chatter and keep us on course."
"You got it, Master Chief." Bret picked up the radio. "Ladies and gentlemen, we will be landing in the Seed Kingdom presently," he said, "but I can't guarantee a smooth one."
A moan came through his earpieces, followed by, "I don't wanna hear it, Franklin!" out of Emily. Bret hung up his radio.
Bret cracked his knuckles. "How are your fixed-wing landings, Otto."
"There are plenty of outposts throughout the rougher terrain of the Windmill Kingdom that lack consistent lighting," Otto said. "I'm well versed in keeping my eye on the runway."
"Then let's land this bird." Bret set himself into the mentality he had been trained for. He pushed out the nervousness and let his body relax. He had done it before, he can do it now. Getting them onto the pavement was the only thing he allowed into his mind.
He gripped the throttle and pulled it backward slowly, steadily reducing their speed. They sank towards the runway. He and Otto kept the runway dead center between them. Bret paid attention to more to his instruments than what was outside the window. He kept them level and watched as the altimeter counted down their elevation and airspeed decreased. Lower and lower they got as they slowed. They tilted the plane to an angle where it would land midsection first while keeping the tail off the ground. Bret extended the land gears, both in preparation to land and increase their drag and deceleration.
The runway got under them and the wing landing gears touched down. It was harder than Bret would have liked, the cabin bouncing on the hydraulics. However, they were in contact with the ground. He settled them onto the nose gear and applied both the air and gear brakes. They slowed and came to a stop towards the opposite end.
Bret cut power to the motors and secured the parking brakes. He looked to Otto and held up his hand for a high five. Otto only looked to him and his hand with a glower and turned back to securing his controls.
Bret dropped his hand and picked up the radio. "Ladies and gentlemen, you are free to depart."
Milro leaned as much as possible to see Spigot as he walked down the cabin. The master chief clapped his hands together. "Alright, people let's get this damn curse lifted and we can all do home." Spigot stopped and stared at Franklin digging his fingers into the back of his chair. "And someone pry Mister Santiago off his chair."
Spigot walked towards the door. Lee stood up and worked his hands under Franklin's shoulders to try to pull him off. However, even throwing his weight behind him did no good, Franklin seeming to tighten his grip.
Ophelia sighed and stood up. "Why are you doing it the hard way?" She pushed Lee aside and placed her thumb and index finger where Franklin's shoulder met his neck to pinch it. His body seemed to go limp, letting go of the chair and his limbs dropping to his sides. Ophelia picked him up and set him down.
Franklin massaged where Ophelia had pinched him. "What did you do to me?"
"I disrupted your electric field with mine, sapping your strength for a moment," Ophelia explained.
"Remind me to never get on a Triton's bad side." Franklin headed for the door with the twins.
Milro and Sophie picked up their tiny umbrellas, and Nicole picked the two up to carried in her hands to the door. She was careful as she descended the ladder to keep her hands even. Milro opened her umbrella to hide from the giant raindrops, and Sophie did the same.
Lee took the weather conditions once he was outside. "Temperature seventeen point eight degrees Celsius, relative humidity eight-nine percent, barometric pressure nine hundred ninety-six point four hectopascals, winds out of the north at ten point three kilometers an hour."
"That's great." Tammy nudged him now the ladder. "Now, move!"
King Rex and the 11 Seed Princesses sat on dogerpillars—green creatures with a canine-like head and a segmented body with several pairs of legs like a caterpillar. Axe stood between the two creatures.
"You dragged that metallic monstrosity out of mothballs?" Axe said. "We should've shrunk your princesses sooner."
When Nicole reached the bottom, she bent down to let Milro and Sophie step off onto the tarmac. Fortunately, the hard, flat surface of the runway did not keep the water on top of it like the grass. The Seed Princesses hopped from their mount and walked to them.
"Welcome back," Ichele said.
"It's good to be back," Sophie replied.
"You can be haughty all you want, Axe," Spigot said, drawing all their attention. Spigot had a smug grin on his face. "However, I come with knowledge." He snapped his fingers. "Mister Pryor, drop some knowledge the good man."
"Your abnormal precipitation pattern is likely due to an anomalous increase ice crystal inducing aerosols causing the nimbostratus shield to favor snow formation over raindrop formation which is converting a greater percentage of atmospheric moisture to hydrometeors," Lee explained stiffly.
Everyone stared blankly at Lee except Ophelia who just dropped her face in her hand and Nicole who appeared to be enamored. He stood there stiffly, glancing around him.
Rex eyed Lee suspiciously. "What the hell did he just say dané?!"
"There's gunk in the atmosphere above your kingdom making it rain more," Ophelia clarified.
Spigot turned to Rex and Axe, his confidence quickly slipping away as he wrung his hands. "The point is what's happening here is beyond our control, and keeping Princess Milro and Princess Sophie cursed serves no purpose. So, restore them to normal size, and we'll call it a day." He grinned again, but it was more sheepish.
There was another pause. Rex interrupted it to a curt, "No!" not even adding the suffix male Seed People usually added to their speech.
He turned his dogerpillar around to head away and Axe followed him. Spigot chased after them, coming apart into a blubbering mess. "Come on," he begged, "throw me a twig here."
"Of course it wouldn't be that easy," Emily exhaled.
Ophelia turned back to the ladder. "Let's see if we can find where those extra aerosols are coming from."
Lee followed her up the ladder. Nicole followed them. "Maybe I can help."
Milro heaved a sigh. It was back to the proverbial drawing board, but she was not sure what they could do next.
She felt something take her arm and gently extend it to its full length. She looked to Saya holding her arm as she measured its length from her shoulder to wrist. They looked up to each other, and Saya pealed her mouth into a sheepish grin. "It doesn't hurt to be prepared."
Spigot followed Rex and Axe the whole kilometer or so to the Mother Tree, trying to get them to listen to reason. As they came under her massive boughs, Rex turned to him. "Have the princesses been returned to normal size-dané?"
The dogerpillar the princesses ride came along beside them. Milro and Sophie sat on the back bench with Joiner, as small as ever. "We're going to take Milro and Sophie inside for some tea and cookies," Ichele said.
"Where's Julia-dané?" Rex asked.
"She's talking with the Drop Kingdom and Windmill Kingdom engineers," Gorchel, in pink, said.
"That girl is always sticking her nose into everything-dané," Rex said, shaking his head. "Well, you enjoy yourselves-dané." He waved to the princesses as their dogerpillar headed inside the Mother Tree.
He turned back to Spigot. "Well-dané?"
Spigot tugged at his collar as he felt warm and the collar seemed tight around his neck. "No?" Spigot managed to get out.
"Then the Mother Tree is not satisfied-dané!" Rex stated.
He and Axe turned to the open door and entered it. The doors closed as Spigot stood there, wordless. He then realized who he needed to twist the arm—or rather, branch—of to get this disgrace over with.
Spigot pointed up at the Mother Tree. "Now, you listen here, you Elmritch abomination! You better restore the princesses to normal size or I'll—" he tried to find the words "I'll—I'll chew you down! Even if it takes me a hundred years! I'm a Beaver: your natural predator, and I won't be bullied by—"
Looking back at this moment, Spigot should have noticed the single seed escape from the Mother Tree's branches and float down behind him to enter the soil right under him. However, he was so caught up in his rage, he only knew this happened when something round and covered in long, sharp spines sprang up right under him. It sent him jumping into the air, screaming in pain from an assault of innumerable pricks.
They laid Spigot on his stomach on a stump. His rump and inside of his legs were filled with spines from the barrel cactus that spawned and instantly reached maturity under him. Bonnie took out a pair of tweezers as she inspected the spines.
"Don't worry, Master Chief," she said, clapping the tweezers together. "I'm fully trained in first aid and a wizard with a pair of tweezers." Working on the power systems of windmills and airships, she had pulled out plenty of splinters from herself and her colleagues.
She got to work, and the spines were coming out easily. "Besides, they all seem to just be stuck in your pants." She came across one that slipped from the tweezers. She pulled it at it again with more force, and Spigot flinched at its removal. "Well, almost all of them." The next one fought and got a reaction from Spigot. "Some of them?" She continued, some being easy and others having pierced flesh.
Emily, Bret, and some others stood in front of Spigot. Emily had her fists planted on her hips, glowering at Spigot. "Now that we've officially ruled out threatening the boxelder god, what's our next move?"
"Go home and face the music?" Bret asked.
"Like hell!" Spigot growled. "I'm not about to admit defeat to some cantankerous catalpa." He raised his fist and declared, "If nothing else, I still have my dignity!" He yelped in pain as Bonnie had to force another spine out of him.
Emily rolled her eyes. "Could've fooled me."
Nicole, Lee, and Ophelia ran to them. "What happened to you?" Nicole asked as they reached the group.
Bonnie pulled at another spine which fought being removed. Even pulling harder failed to dislodge it.
"The Mother Tree is being a real pain in the—" Spigot growled as Bonnie planted her foot on the stump and threw her whole weight into pulling out the spine. It came out, and Spigot screamed, "—Ah-hah-ha-oh God." The spine came out, almost sending Bonnie falling backwards from the momentum she used to dislodge it.
Bonnie held up the long and kind of crooked spine. "Long one."
Spigot gripped the brim of his hat as he groaned. "Sitrep."
Lee scratched at the back of his head as Bonnie removed easier spines. "Well, once you've eliminated the impossible, logic dictates what remains—no matter how improbable—"
"Spare we the Doyle and just tell me what you found." Spigot flinched as Bonnie forced out another spine.
"That's just it," Ophelia explained. "It's what we haven't found."
"There's no natural or incidental source for that kind of rise in aerosols," Lee continued the thought, "and certainly not with the properties we're looking for."
"That just leaves—" Ophelia started to say.
"Please don't say it," Spigot muttered.
"Deliberate," Lee finished the thought.
"Ow!" Spigot cried as Bonnie had to force another spine out. He glowered back to her. "Can you be a little gentler back there?"
Bonnie glowered back. "Do you want these out of your butt or not?"
"But who would want to flood our kingdom on purpose?" Julia asked.
Spigot faced forward. "I can only guess on who, but I'm pretty sure I know how."
"What do you want us to do?" Emily asked.
"Go round up the others," Spigot said. "Once I can sit down without giving myself acupuncture—" Spigot strained as another spine took force to remove "—I'll explain."
The Seed Princesses hung their raincoats outside a door into the residential part of the Mother Tree. Once out of the main, cavernous corridors and into passageways for only the Seed Person inhabitants of the Mother Tree, the scale of things was more manageable. The ceiling was only fifteen centimeters up, though still felt quite high for Milro. Those luminescent mushrooms that provided only the most tentative light in the main corridors filled these hallways with soft, blue light.
They entered a solarium furnished as a tearoom. It was built on a platform the Mother Tree formed jutting out of her trunk and held panes of glass in a web of twigs. Outside, they were surrounded by many braches laden with giant leaves. Inside, a round table with a dozen chairs around it sat in the middle with other fixtures to make the space cozy.
Sophie skipped in and did a twirl. "This is so cute!" she cheered. "It's like we're our normal size in here."
Milro glanced to what was a tiny flower in a pot which was as big as a potted tree. There were also the giant raindrops striking and running down the glass. It was almost like they were normal-sized.
They sat down with the Seed Princesses. Nina came in with a tray holding a couple teapots and a basket filled with cookies. Steam wafted out of the teapots' spouts. She set them down on the center of the table.
"Well, time to flip the coin," Harney, the blond of the group, said.
"What coin?" Sophie asked.
"When Nina cooks, there are two possible outcomes," Gorchel, with medium pink hair, said. "Either it tastes heavily, or you curse the evolution of taste buds."
"It's not that bad," Ichele scolded her chatty sister.
"You were the greenest around the gills when you tasted her last culinary calamity," Gorchel retorted.
"I like to experiment," Nina explained. "What's the fun of life if you're just playing it safe?"
"Well, we'll only know when we try." Ichele took a cookie and bit into it. After chewing for a bit, she nodded. "They're good."
Everyone took cookies to place on their plates. Sophie held one in front of Milro to show the little white crystals embedded in it. "Check it out, Milro. I think these are individual sugar crystals."
That, along with the tea coming out as a ball before reaching a size where surface tension could not fight gravity and plopping in the cups reminded Milro how small they were. It also made her think of something.
"I was wondering, Ichele," Milro said. "How are the fibers in your clothes so small?"
"We make our fabrics from angel hair flax," Ichele explained. "Its fibers have a diameter that's about a twentieth that of normal flax."
"Speaking of which—" Loloa, who looked like Gorchel only her pink hair being a few shades lighter, held up a sketchbook "—I've been working with Saya on some designs for two."
She showed the first sketch. It was of Sophie as a black outline standing in a fashionable pose and wearing a purple dress with puff sleeves and a midi-length skirt over baggy, white bloomers. "This was inspired by your workers' uniforms: a bloomer dress with a lot of volume. I've read puffiness is popular in the Windmill Kingdom."
"It's gorgeous," Sophie gasped. "And fluffy is always in fashion."
"It is a lot of volume," Saya commented. She side-eyed Loloa. "I have to make these, Loloa."
"And I so appreciate your work," Loloa replied.
"Saya and Loloa are our fashion power team," Ichele explained. "Loloa designs our dresses and accessories that Saya makes."
"Loloa then models their work to us," Gorchel added.
Loloa flipped the page to show the next design. It was Milro wearing a white dress with a blue, sailor-style collar and slip-on shoes with crossed straps over her feet. "I've heard nautical is always in style in the Drop Kingdom. What do you think?"
"It's beautiful, Loloa," Milro said. "I have a dress much like this one." She thought about it. "Hopefully I can wear that one rather than needing to replace it."
"Julia was up all-night reading through every book she could find on the Mother Tree's magic," Gorchel said. "Unfortunately, it seems the only way to undo her curse is convince the Mother Tree to lift it herself."
Milro should have guessed that would be the case. "I thank her for the effort at least."
"We actually tested that ourselves," Sophie replied. "Fine and Rein used the Prominence to try to make us bigger."
"It didn't work, I take it," Harney said.
"Oh, it worked a little too well," Sophie said cheerfully. "It just didn't last long."
"Thank goodness," Milro muttered under her breath. At least being small could be accommodated for. She was not sure what they would do as giants.
"You know, the other kingdoms wish people from the Seed Kingdom would visit more," Sophie said. "They even have accommodations for people your size…well, our size."
The Seed Princesses looked to each other, and then down. "It would be nice to visit the other kingdoms," Ichele said.
"Unfortunately, even if they have some accommodations," Gorchel explained somberly, "the other kingdoms still very dangerous at our size."
"We kind of got a taste of that," Sophie said in an uncharacteristically somber tone. "We were blown away by a dust devil, lost, and almost eaten by a bobcat; and that was all in just one afternoon."
"We went to the Princess Parties," Nursya said. "But we had almost no guests with us, and those that did come were all Molmos."
"We were also very careful to not stray from the party area or from our handlers," Ichele added.
Nina picked up a cookie. "It would also be nice to entertain the other princesses, but the size issue works against that too." She looked to Milro and Sophie with a forced grin. "At least you two shrinking gives us a rare chance to play hostesses."
"You know," Milro said, "I've come to realize I had not noticed many things before this happened." It was quite embarrassing, thinking about it. She thought she had an eye for detail. That might be the case for her surroundings, but when it came to the people around her… "I have been around the engineers all my life, but never paid them and what they did much mind. I knew they made the clouds, but they were just people in uniforms to me. Having spent a day with them, I learned about how the clouds work as well as the kinds of backgrounds they come from.
"I also never thought of how you rarely visited anyone," Milro continued. "Admittedly, I barely knew much about more than half of you. I didn't know that Loloa designed your outfits and accessories or that Nina cooked. Being this small, I've seen things that were easy to skip over at normal size are really important."
"You can kind of blame us for not letting our personalities shine," Gorchel replied.
"We kind of act like a collective when outside the kingdom," Ichele added. "We would like to pursue our own interests, but safety comes first and in numbers."
Milro sat back and watched the rain falling and thought of the slogan in her mother's watch as well as her advice. Ironically, shrinking had expanded her horizons more than she ever imagined. Though, while she was learning more about what was around her, she was not sure what she had learned about herself.
"If we're not made big again any time soon," Sophie mused, "it'll be interesting to deal with my brothers and sisters."
That was something Milro had not considered. What was she going to do with Nalro when he could just pick her up and put her on a shelf or in a box when he misbehaved?
"I'm afraid we can't give you any advice on that," Gorchel said.
"So, your engineer said that it's snowing up in the clouds?" Ichele asked.
"We saw it for ourselves," Sophie answered. "Apparently, it causes clouds to make rain better."
"It's a conspiracy," Quarry said, a devilish grin on her face.
"Here we go again." Nursya rolled her eyes. "Not everything has to be a conspiracy, Quarry."
"It's a good thing Julia isn't here at the moment," Gorchel said. "She can't stand when Quarry gets like this."
"Someone wants to flood our kingdom, and that 'gunk' in the clouds is their doing," Quarry continued.
"And who would want to do that?" Ichele asked. "You have to think these things completely through."
That got Milro thinking. The increase of aerosols was over Sinker Swamp, if Lee had the right latitude. Not many people lived in the swamp, but it was filled with many strange individuals and groups.
"Don't tell me you believe her," Harney said to Milro.
Milro looked up. "I was just thinking, but I can't think of anyone."
"Really, Quarry," Nursya scolded her green-haired sister, "not everything has to be some secret plot. Things can just happen to obvious reasons."
"But what's the fun in that?" Quarry teased. "Besides, what obvious reason do you have to this?"
Spigot paced as he collected his thoughts. He did not want believe this could be the case. He was hoping for a natural or even incidental cause. They could be passed off as just how things were. Yet, that word "deliberate" rang in his head.
He finally had the words to begin. "Back during the Crisis, we were looking for something, anything to increase rainfall. We initiated Operation Rainmaker to develop and explore our options."
He turned as he came to the end of the stretch of the cabin the engineers as well as Princess Julia were gathered in. He pointed up and to his sides. "Part of the reason this plane was built was not just to look for a cause to the trouble, but to monitor the progress of any of our plans.
"One suggestion was to seed the clouds we could produce with silver iodide."
"Silver iodide?" Alex mused. "You mean the stuff my mother uses to make film for her camera hobby?"
"The very same," Spigot answered. "Silver iodide has a crystalline structure similar to water ice. Water droplets in a cloud coming in contact with silver iodide crystals freeze at temperatures as warm as five to ten degrees below freezing, when supercooled water droplets should be dominant. You know how the process proceeds from there."
"Did you do it?" Julia asked from her perch on top of Ophelia's station.
Spigot had not wanted one of the Seed Kingdom princesses there. However, she had heard that this was deliberate act, and this was her kingdom. Julia also seemed to be the most even keeled of the 11 princesses, even more so than Ichele who was the oldest and apparent leader of them.
Spigot's short answer was one word: "No." However, there was the explanation as to why. "We ran computer models. While it would've increased rainfall initially, it didn't solve the core problem: we couldn't get enough water into the atmosphere to replace what ran off into the ocean. It would only accelerate the desiccation of the atmosphere and make it harder to sustain clouds over distance."
That was the scientific explanation. "There were also the political ramifications. If the other kingdoms learned we were actively manipulating the clouds, they would've started bidding wars to favor one country over another or actual wars. Think of the Hydro Wars back on Old Earth during the latter half of the Twenty-first Century. They might've also attempted to do the same on their own.
"Realizing we were holding Pandora's Box, we tabled the entire operation," Spigot said. "Parliament passed a law in the dead of night making active weather manipulation illegal and Queen Yamul quietly gave it her ascent. King Randa signed a similar edict in the Windmill Kingdom under the radar."
"No wonder my mother has to jump through so many hoops when she makes silver iodide," Alex mused.
"She makes her own?" Bonnie asked.
"Well, yeah, she's a chemical engineer," Alex answered. "She likes to make most of the chemicals we use in our chores and hobbies.
"But she has to keep detailed records of how much she makes and uses and has in storage at any given moment," Alex said. "She even has to keep track of the silver she buys for it."
"Wait, silver?" Emily asked.
"Well, yeah," Alex answered. "It is silver iodide."
"But, I mean, she makes it using silver bullion," Emily said.
"She prefers silver leaf since it dissolves more easily, but yes," Alex said.
Emily turned to Franklin. "We might just have busted open the Hog Hell case. They're stealing silver at the same time someone is making illegal silver iodide. It can't be a coincidence."
"But they've only stolen a hundred kilos so far," Otto said.
"And there still hasn't been any activity regarding a drop off," Franklin added, "so whoever they're delivering it to only has seventy-five."
"It doesn't take much," Spigot said. "A couple grams per cubic kilometer of cloud is all you need to get things going."
"Could Hog Hell be doing it themselves?" Nicole asked.
"While the reactions are simple," Alex said, "it requires some series chemical hardware. My mother makes it using a fume hood and a full set of protective equipment. My sister and I weren't allowed in her lab to even look until we were thirteen."
"Besides, what would flooding the Seed Kingdom do for a bunch of bikers?" Ophelia asked rhetorically. "They got to be delivering it to someone in the Drop Kingdom if the seeding is happening over our territory."
"This is just great," Julia grumbled.
"Yeah, it sucks someone is flooding your kingdom on purpose," Ophelia said.
"Well, yeah, there's that," Julia said. "But, I meant Quarry has been saying this is some grand conspiracy like everything is with her. Now that she's correct, she'll be impossible to live with."
Ophelia tried to fight back an embarrassed grin. "Well, I guess there's that too."
"The only question is who," Lee added.
A silence fell over the group. Tammy turned back to her window. She leaned to look out of it better. "Why's everyone running?"
Spigot climbed up to look out the window. Several Seed People and Molmos were running or riding dogerpilars across the tarmac. There was muffled shouting.
Spigot hopped down and went to smack the button to open the door and extend the ladder. Exposed to the open air, the shouting was discernable. "Run for your lives!" someone shouted. "Grab your family and head for higher ground-dané!" another screamed.
Spigot descended to the bottom of the ladder, almost knocked down by a Molmo running past. Nicole held Julia in her hand, setting her down in front of a group of Seed People running towards them.
Julia stopped one of them. "What's happened?"
"It's terrible, Princess Julia-dané!" he said. "The dam holding back the North Hickory Reservoir is gonna be overtopped-dané!"
