Chapter 3: A Walk in the Park
As Ansem, Hans, and Noctis left the orphanage, a strong wind began to blow and the sky became overcast. Perhaps the Admiral had been right about the weather. The next morning, however, all signs of any storm had vanished inexplicably.
Ansem's mother had been moved to tears when Hans explained that they went to go see Sorceress Edea, and she buried her youngest in her arms at the first sight of him healed.
"Do you know why your father and I chose her to be your godmother?" she asked the two boys. When they both shook their heads no, Zoe explained that there were, in fact, many other people throughout the land of Hollow Bastion who had special powers. For the most part, these people were benevolent. But every one in a few was not. Of those who were malevolent, none of which ever grew powerful enough to become a threat to society or to the monarchy, except for one woman about 30 years ago.
"They say she was born of darkness itself," Zoe told them. "But Edea has told me that is unlikely. She thinks that Maleficent may have been human once, like herself."
"I think I've heard that name before," Hans said, thoughtfully, but Ansem raised his shoulders with a blank stare.
"I know you have, Hans, but I'm surprised that you remember!" Zoe exclaimed. "You weren't even a year old. Like when Ansem was born, your father and I threw a ball so that everyone in the kingdom could come and see you. Everyone was invited. Even the Three Good Fairies put in a brief showing to grant you [both, on separate occasions] gifts of strength, love, and wisdom. But then Maleficent showed up. She was offended that we hadn't actually extended the invitation to her, and tried to curse you, Hans."
"No way," Ansem said, very quietly. Having seen Edea's power, he was definitely afraid of such things now. Hans, too, appeared disquieted, but said nothing.
"But then a young orphan girl stepped out of the crowd and challenged Maleficent. Edea was only nine years old at the time. I can't even fathom the courage that must have taken. Unbeknown to anyone but herself until that day, she had been given the powers of a sorceress four years earlier, when she was only five! But, from that day forward, everyone in the kingdom knew, for right here in this castle and before witnesses, Edea defeated Maleficent in one-on-one magical combat."
"No way," said Ansem, again, this time highly impressed, and fighting a smirk.
"Seriously?" Hans asked, evidently equally if not even more astonished.
"Seriously," Zoe repeated. "She's a national hero. At first your father and I weren't sure about naming her godmother because she was so, so young, but we learned that, even then, all she ever cared about was looking after others. Edea hasn't changed a bit; She's always had such a big heart."
"Wow," was their consensus.
Hans was busy all the rest of the day with tutoring and whatnot, so Ansem and Noctis were left to their own devices for amusement. Noctis showed Ansem some of the fencing moves that he promised, and then (for Noctis' sake) the two went back out into the city to find more things to do. They explored alleyways in search of a good hideout, and then sampled a curious little ice cream shop.
They even payed a second visit to Admiral Boom to ask his opinion of the turn in the weather. The poor man was beside himself. Not once in all his life had his predictions ever been wrong, until the day he had to tell a prince! It was here, while passing the park, that the two happened to come across the tall skinny performer again, only today he was a chalk artist.
"Your drawings are very good," Ansem told him, looking over a long row of pavement slabs with colorful depictions of a fairground on them.
"Well, I'm pleased as punch you like them, yer Hoy'ghness," the man said in his characteristic accent. "Moy name's Bert, by the way," he added, finally looking up from the new picture he was just finishing. He tilted his head slightly and pointed a blue and green finger at Ansem as though he could tell the prince was up to some kind of mischief. "Now I con't put me finger on it, but dere's somethin' differen' about you."
Noctis, however, deftly selected that time to butt in. "Sorceress Edea gave him a makeover!" he summarized, loudly, from ten-feet away.
"Yo, Noct!" Ansem said, snapping his head around to fire a glare at the blue haired boy. "Watch it," he warned, but Noctis didn't pay him any attention. Though Ansem was technically ranked a higher status than Noctis, his parents just let them tease each other like regular kids, and get full well away with it.
Bert chuckled as he started to sketch the background of another drawing on a new tile of cement. "A sorceress yeh say?" he mused, perfectly content in his work, "Kind o' reminds me o' someone I know."
Biting his tongue, the man began to sketch an outline of a young woman's face. She wore her long brown hair up under a black hat decorated with fake cherries around its brim, and she had very pretty eyes and a pretty smile with perfect teeth. He explained that every one of these pictures he was drawing came from his memories, and were once real people and places; Some landscapes were from his boyhood and had changed a lot over the years, to be seen as they were now only in his artwork. Ansem and Noctis watched Bert work diligently on the portrait for several minutes, which he explained was just of an old, old friend of his.
He had just about finished when a shadow suddenly fell across it, and he had to stop. The three of them looked up at its caster, only to recognize her as the very face from the picture!
"Why, if it isn't Mary Poppins!" Bert exclaimed with a huge smile, standing up and taking his hat off. He had reached out to shake her hand, but no sooner retracted it and hastily wiped the chalk off on the front of his jacket, apologizing awkwardly under his breath.
"It's wonderful to see you, Bert," said the lady with lighthearted laugh.
It really was a striking resemblance between her and the drawing, Ansem thought. In fact, she even had the cherry hat on! The man's a genius, he thought in wonder. Then again, he wondered just how long it had been since they'd last seen each other; Listening to them talk, one would think that it had been a lifetime! The real mystery is, how old is that hat? he told himself, stretching his mind just to grasp their context; Something wasn't adding up.
"And while you're 'ere, let me introduce yeh to me new pals," Ansem heard Bert say, which suddenly awoke him from his pensive thoughts. "No doubt you already know who they are, Ms. Poppins. Your Majesties," he said, turning to the two boys, "This is the one and only, Mary Poppins."
"How do you do, Ms. Poppins?" Ansem said, shaking her hand.
"Pleasure to meet you," said Noctis.
"Now I tell yeh, boys, you 'ad better keep yer oye on this one," Bert whispered to them, right in front of Mary Poppins as though she couldn't hear. "She's tricky. Why, when your wif 'er, the most extraordinary fings begin to 'appen. An' sooner 'n you can say bob's your uncle, suddenly you're in places you never dreamed."
Mary Poppins gave Bert a look of disapproval, as though what he was saying was completely absurd. But Ansem knew better, and listened intently.
"In fact," Bert pressed on in spite of her, with a mischievous grin, "I wouldn' be surproy'sed if she was cookin' up some adventure for the two o' yehs right at dis berry moment. Whaddaya say, Marry Poppins? Perhaps a day at the beach? Or 'ow about a nice picnick in the countryside?"
"I haven't the faintest idea what you're saying," the woman said.
"Aww I don't know, maybe dese boys would like to go...puntin' down a river," he carried on, indicating one of his chalk drawings. "Wouldn'cha, lads? Or maybe yeh'd rather visit an exotic zoo," he said, walking over to yet another, "wif tigers and monkeys, and the biggest lizards you'll ever see aloy've!"
At the mention of lizards, however, Mary Poppins suddenly looked primed to faint.
"No? Alrigh' den, lets see 'ere," Bert said, browsing through the rest of his many artworks. Ansem and Noctis took a look through them, as well. There was a mountain-scape caped in thick green pines, a cityscape beneath a high, full moon, and even a circus scene, among several other wondrous illustrations.
"I think I like this one the best," Ansem said, pointing to a particular landscape near the middle of the row, depicting a wide stream twisting through an expanse of round hillsides and crossing under a yellow footpath with an arched bridged. Tall cypress tress dotted the hills, and the grass just seemed so darn green no matter which side of the picture you stood on to look at it from. A ancient willow tree stood in the foreground, casting sweeping dappled shadows on the ground, and the deep azure sky looked as tranquil as though the few nimbus clouds peppering the horizon might never, ever move. At first, Ansem had not particularly been drawn to this piece, but then after looking at all of the others found this one alone to appear serenely still; The rest were so busy; He could actually picture himself reading at the base of that willow for hours, and then probably dozing off under it. It sure beat any of the potential secret hideouts that he and Noctis had scouted out that day. (In which they were less likely to doze off in and more likely to hoard snack foods in and launch various "dangerous missions" from.)
Marry Poppins craned her head to have a look, apparently liking it as well, at least from the short distance where she stood. Bert also appeared over Ansem's shoulder and leaned on the long wooden pole he that he used as a drawing tool sometimes.
"Bea-uteeful, ain't it? A typical English countryside as done by a true and lovin' 'and. Now yeh con't see it, but there's a li'le coun'y fair jus' down dat road an' over the hill." Noctis alone had seemed entirely disinterested in the landscape, at least until Bert mentioned this. "Whadaya say, Marry Poppins? Just a quick li'le visit is awl."
It seemed to Ansem that Bert could use a little help; He really had no idea what the man was getting at, but, frankly, he had a growing morbid curiosity that was starting to drive him crazy! "Please, Miss?" Ansem interceded.
"With all due respect, your Highness, I have no intention of making a spectacle of myself," Mary Poppins told him. She seemed like a very sweet lady over all, but boy could she be stern when she wanted to be!
And then Bert shot her a light look of defiance. "Awl roy'ght. I'll do it moy'self," he said, and clapped his hands together as one going to work, then leaned on them on his knees.
Well, if nothing else had gotten Marry Poppins' attention that day, that sure did. Her eyes shot wide open in surprise as she asked, "Do what?"
"A bit o' magic," Bert said with a boyish grin. He beckoned the two boys to his sides and had them each take his hand. "It's easy," he told them, then looked off into the distance as he seemed to be grasping to remember something. "Lets see. First you...wink." He winked.
But Ansem and Noctis just stared at him blankly.
"Come on, now, you two, yeh don't actually expec' me to do dis awl by meself now do yeh?" Bert said, and they reluctantly winked with him the second time. "Den you...double blink." All three blinked twice, exaggerating for good measure. "You close yer eyes...and jump!" he said, and all three of them hopped onto the chalk picture. At the occurrence of nothing, a ringing, awkward silence suddenly seemed to fill the air.
"Is something supposed to happen?" Noctis asked, his disinterested facade beginning to sour and become, even, a little sarcastic. Luckily for them all, what Marry Poppins said next must have made her his new hero.
"Bert, what utter nonsense!" she snapped, striding over. However, this instantaneous newfound respect all changed to complete puzzlement when she added, "Why do you always have to complicate things that are really quite simple?" Noctis soon found himself boxed in when she took his free hand, and glanced an almost pleading eye past Bert in Ansem's direction. "Three...two...one..." Marry Poppins counted, and they all jumped once more.
Woah.
Suddenly the whole world became a colorful blur of motion. The trees and the other people suddenly disappeared, along with the other pictures and, momentarily, even the solid ground beneath their feet. It was like breaking through ice on the surface of a lake the very instant one steps out of a boat that was frozen in it. In a toxic puff of blue, green, and orange chalk dust, they had all shrunk and disappeared into the drawing.
Solid ground reappeared almost as soon as it had gone with a soft tap on the bottoms of their feet. Their hands let go, and inexplicably they found themselves not only covered in the colored dust, but all wearing completely different attire. Wherever they were now-in whatever cosmic pocket of weirdness-it seemed like they were even dressed the part! But, they had to brush the chalk off of themselves before they could even see what colors their new clothes were. (What's a proper adventure without a new, free, and perfectly fitting outfit, anyway?)
Ansem found that he was wearing a scarlet button-down shirt under a clean white suit, with a festively striped tie, and a crisply woven basket-hat with a flat brim. Both Noctis and Bert had very similar hats, but Noctis was wearing a powder-blue suit with cream pants, and Bert a colorful, orange and white striped suit with white pants. Noctis' suit seemed to very much emphasize the blue in his hair, just as Bert's suit seemed to be coordinated with the lacy, red and white dress that Mary Poppins suddenly had on. Seeing her like this was actually something of a shocker, because before she had been dressed all in black except for the ornamentation on her black hat. Now she looked-really, like an angel on her holiday, all strictness and dreary formality gone from her every move and spoken word.
Ansem considered himself, seeing how everyone else seemed to look so natural in their new duds. He had never particularly favored red, nor ever imagined himself to be the kind of guy who would wear a lot of white. Did this really suit him as well as the others' costumes suited them?
Huh, he thought, You learn something new about yourself every day, I guess. Or at least, about how others perceive you.
Getting the green dust off his new whiteness was much, much too easy. It had to be magic, because that stuff would have stained a suit like this, no doubt, never again to be gotten off at all let alone brushed completely away with only a few strokes of the hand.
The cloud of colored powder that had arisen around them now settling to the ground as they finished preening themselves, the three young men began to look around at the new world that they were now in with awe and wonder. Indeed, the chalk picture Bert had drawn with his very own hand had come to life! He for one, however, seemed the least surprised, obviously since he had known Marry Poppins' secret, possibly for a good many years. For Ansem and Noctis, however, this was all just incredible. Noctis no longer seemed embarrassed at all, like being made a believer had freed him from social pressure to be cool and act like a grown up; The grown ups the two were with now seemed more childlike than even themselves!
Bert and Mary Poppins complimented each other on their looks, spinning around like two ducks sitting happily on a pond. The two boys, however, behaved a bit less seemly.
Noctis whispered to Ansem, "We look like a couple of mobsters."
Ansem laughed a little and grinned. "Hey, you're right. Kind of..." he said back. Checking himself over again, he put on a face that looked pretentiously businesslike, and gave the appropriate Italian-New York accent his best crack, "Yo, sonny boy, ''ow 'bout I cut ya deal, huh? You rub my back, I'll rub yours." Noctis nearly split his side laughing at him.
The world around them was strange-looking, very much cartoonish and hardly like what things and places really looked like. It had a 'flat' quality like mono-vision in the distance, but up close things still had some depth, even though items, animals, and plants all just looked like flat paper cutouts that had been miraculously brought to breathing life. At first it seemed strange to Ansem, but then after a few moments acclimatizing to the atmosphere, his feelings shifted to total acceptance; He noticed this, and wondered if even it too was part of the magic-to forget what the difference was. (Perhaps so that one could completely live the the fantasy?)
"I thought you said there was a fair," Noctis reminded Bert, cutting right to the chase.
"So I did," said the man, emphatically agreeing with the boy. "It's jus' down that road and over da 'ill, remember?"
"Come on!" he called to Ansem, but Ansem wouldn't let himself be dragged away without first taking in a long, contemplative look at Marry Poppins.
'There are many people in Hollow Bastion with special powers,' his mother had said, but never once had she even suggested what percentage of the population, or even just how many of these 'special' individuals she personally knew.
This changes everything, Ansem thought. He could almost feel a tangible sensation of his understanding of the solid world speedily unraveling. Can both this world and 'the Real World' be 'real' at the same time as one another? How are they connected? Or if they're not, then how was Marry Poppins able to bring us here? And didn't this world not even exist before Bert drew it? Or...maybe this is all just some kind of hallucination she has us trapped in, and we're all really still at the park laying on the ground in comas...nah, that doesn't seem characteristic. He was pretty positive that he could judge her character right. That later most was a goofy idea, anyway, like something right out of a five-cent science fiction comic book.
"Ansem, come on!" Noctis hollered impatiently, practically dancing on the spot. Ansem had a slight hunch that his friend just wanted to get away, possibly for some reason along the lines of certain grown-ups crimping his style. Reluctantly tearing himself away from his deep thoughts for the time being, Ansem finally turned around and ran to catch up with him. But he hadn't finished with the subject quite yet, and fully intended to ponder it more later; Maybe even interrogate Marry Poppins if an appropriate conversation ever arose and he had a window. He also had a much stronger hunch that she would be an incredibly tough nut to crack.
Then again, he thought, a shrewd idea occurring to him, maybe I should ask Bert about her instead. It's true that the man seemed more open to talk over details than his lady friend; Especially concerning magic, based solely on their brief episode at the park just now. Yeah... I should do /that/.
"What's on your mind?" Noctis asked as they walked a little ways farther down the path. "You're quiet."
"I was just thinking," Ansem told him, absentmindedly biting one of his fingernails, "Two days...two sorceresses...and 48 hours ago I didn't even believe in fairies."
"Wild, isn't it?" Noctis responded with lighted eyes, as though possessed with an excitement like an electrical current that shined through his cool exterior. "I can't believe where we are!"
Ansem grinned a little, taking it all in. "Nor can I," he said.
He eyed the dirt of the path ahead as they walked. Did all possible locations in the drawing exist at once as inhabitable places within a unified stream of time, or did mere parts of the drawing spring to life only as they approached? He thought he could figure this out by watching the road ahead as they walked, by studying the pebbles' slow transformation from the mono-vision background into their paper-cutout foreground form; They looked like paper cutouts, but if he picked up a stone from the earth and held it in his hand, it would turn out to feel quite round and weighted no differently from a 'regular' one. He'd hold it in his fingers and rotate it, and the outline would change, but the thing always looked inexplicably flat from his direct perspective.
"How queer," he mumbled, and chucked the stone as far as he could down the path, to watch it meld once more, in mid air, with the mono-vision distance. Sometimes the smaller ones could be seen only as black dots when they landed, but even those still made a sharp click upon striking the ground again, as though there had been nothing strange about them at all. To Ansem, this seemed to suggest a unified timeline in spite of appearances. That, and the fact Bert and Marry Poppins had taken a branch path that he and Noctis had already passed, and were now long out of sight.
They could hear the fair as they came to the base of the hill between them and it, most prominently the sound of a merry-go-round, and little else, actually.
"So, why don't you like her?" Ansem asked after a lull in their conversation, which kind of Surprised Noctis in a way. He corrected Ansem, shaking his head, but stammered, seemingly to hold both opinions of like and dislike toward the lady.
"No, no, I like her...enough. It's not that I don't. I just, ahh..."
Ansem thought maybe he'd help his friend out by prompting, "You liked Edea, and Marry Poppins seems to have more than just a little bit in common with her." He paused, considering that possibly the biggest difference, besides a nearly irksomely cheery disposition on Marry Poppins' behalf, was that the nanny (her profession, from what he had overheard) didn't care too well, not too well at all, to use her powers in front of other people. Then suddenly Ansem recalled some more of what his mother had said about Edea, that she'd kept her powers a complete secret for four years before being forced by circumstance to use them in public.
Is there something wrong with that? he started to wonder, in reference to having 'special' powers. Maybe as a prince he just had a warped perspective, since even that, in a way, was 'special power' that, weather or not he liked it, he was going to have to deal with until the day he dies. But what's not to like about having the ability to do magic?
"I don't know," Noctis shrugged, "Maybe its just that I don't like her because I do like her. Does that make any sense?"
"So basically she's awesome but you'd rather not be seen with her. I got ya." Ansem said, elbowing his friend in the arm with a wink. He phrased it like he was kidding, of course, but knew there was a tiny bit too much truth in the statement, having known Noctis as long as he had.
Noctis shot him a sideways glare and pursed his lips, narrowing his eyes, as though he was a fictional super-villain and just marked Ansem down on his "I'll get you later for this," hit-list.
They entered the fairground and took a look around. It was incredibly, incredibly small, more like something isolated to a single neighborhood than spanning across a county, but it was nice. In fact, the whole atmosphere of the place had a very quaint, 'vintage' feel. Somehow, it even reminded Ansem of an antique music box like one might find in their grandmother's attic, retained from her own childhood. It was timeless.
There were only a few other people there, and all were vendors. The two boys were the only guests, it appeared, thus there were no lines for any of the rides, and all of the operators kindly waived the fares since they were running empty anyways. Tall, dark green trees closed the grounds in on three sides, rustling carelessly in the cool, fresh breeze, with the one open side yawning southward. The trampled grass was overgrown and moist beneath the boys' fancy white shoes, and-now this was odd-though the sky shone bright robin's egg blue, and an actual sun wasn't anywhere to be seen, and it certainly wasn't behind a cloud. Come to think of it, Ansem noticed, no one not even themselves were casting shadows on the ground.
To the contrary, he also noticed that Noctis' spiky hair still cast shadows on his face. This gave him the idea to place one of his hands over the other and alter their angle until the top one's shadow fell on his other gloved hand. He did this, and mentally drew a line between the shadow and his upper hand that extended straight to a nondescript point in the empty blue sky. That was most definitely where the source of light ought to have been; Was it hidden behind the very blue itself?
First they tried some of the target-shooting games in the booth areas, keeping score from years past competing against one another at all manner of other fairs, of course, and then they moved on to some of the rides before planning to hit the hot-dog eating race. Once, about two years ago, they had tried that in reverse order, and it didn't work out so well. They were battle-hardened veterans now.
The whole time they were there, they had a joke going between that they were mafia men secretly checking the place out to see if the fair would work well as a temporary cover for their "secret operation".
When Marry Poppins and Bert caught up with them after about an hour or two, the two characters that Ansem and Noctis were pretending to be abruptly concluded that,
"Hay boss, the territory's gettin' a little too hot, if ya know what I'm sayin'."
"Yeah, I know what you're sayin', boss. We'd better keep our heads down if we don't wanna get them taken off be the authorities, if ya know what I'm sayin'."
"I know what you're sayin', boss."
They had tried to work out which one of them got to be the "boss" using all kinds of crazy technicalities ranging from their comparative scores at the galleries, to their inherited royal titles, to Ansem pointing out the fact that the biggest bad guy always wears the lightest colors, to Noctis reminding him that the whole game was practically his idea to begin with, anyway. Ultimately, they ended up reducing "boss" to a figure of speech, like how newsboys with strong British accents call everyone "governor".
"Been enjoyin' yerselves, I hope," Bert greeted them with, curtly tipping his hat, arm-in-arm with Marry Poppins who carried an open, white lace parasol over her other shoulder. "Jus' as I remember it," he said with a wide, nostalgic grin. "Yeh know, me ol' man used to own a ferris wheel fer a time, 'e did. Never made any money offa it so 'e 'ad to sell it, but it sure was a treat in moy oyes while it lasted." Bert seemed a bit glazed over for a moment after he said this, as though seeing in his mind's eye more than he was telling. Ansem daresay that he could even read a deep, mysterious sadness in the way Bert spoke and looked, nothing like how he'd ever seen the man act before.
"Is something wrong?" Ansem asked, absolutely meaning to pry.
"Oh nuffin'. Jus' got a bit o' somet'n in me oye is awl," Bert said, lifting a white-gloved hand to his face, which still somehow looked like it had dirt on it even though actually being quite clean; Probably just the way that shadows were prone to fall across it.
Ansem and Noctis quickly learned that Bert had some fierce skill with a beanbag, and kept challenging him to rematch after rematch back at the booths, before the three of them competed against each other when finally came time for the hot-dog competition.
Marry Poppins looked as though she thought the lot of them silly, stuffing their determined faces, while she sat alone at a small, white, round table in the grass off to the side of the competition, herself tasting from a mottled crimson snowcone in a white paper cup.
The hot dogs were actually pretty tasty, Ansem found, so scarfing them was easier than he'd expected; It must have made the difference, because-he won! Marry Poppins set her cup on the table and gave them all a loud, slow, exaggerated round of applause, as if rather to congratulate them for what clowns they had made of themselves. After all, as they say, 'Boys will be boys, and some men will be, too!'
Afterward, on a great whim of bravery, the three and Mary Poppins all boarded the merry-go-ground; Noctis thought of this as a rematch of sorts with Ansem, and calculated that because the prince had eaten the most, the other contestants having not bothered to finish their platters, he might begin with a small advantage over him.
Ansem just raised an eyebrow, and told the duke, "You're on."
Marry Poppins asked them not to antagonize each other, otherwise the two would have been yelling gross descriptions at one another through the bars of the carousel to try and unsteady each other. Even without the colorful narrations, poor Bert was slumped over his ornately decorated, yellow-painted, and probably hand-carved, wooden horse, clinging with white knuckles to its central pole, as green in the face as a seasick sailor.
Watching him struggle, Marry Poppins considered him, and then had a word with an elderly man in a bright red uniform who suddenly appeared in a window in the broad core pillar in the center of the merry-go-round.
Where did that guy come from? Ansem wanted to know. He had thought there were mechanisms in there making the ride work, not an operator man-if he was in there, then where was the motor?
The elderly man cheerily obliged, calling Marry Poppins by name as though they'd met long before that day; He pulled a long, silver lever that was inside with him, and waved goodbye to them.
The elderly man cheerily obliged, calling Marry Poppins by name as though they'd met long before that day; He pulled a long, silver lever that was inside with him, and waved goodbye to them.
Huh? Why is he waving? Ansem only had time to think, before suddenly he saw the reason. Marry Poppins' purple wooden steed had just flown off of the carousel, followed by Noctis' blue one, then he on his own green one, and finally Bert's. Bert was the most disoriented since he'd practically been slipping off of its side to begin with. The horses continued to bob up and down in the air, carrying their riders, without any apparent means of support; The four were carried on the wind, or by magic, out of the fairgrounds and into the open, untamed countryside. Ansem could for a short time still hear the operator man calling out who was leading, who was passing who, and more, as though the four of them had just kicked off in a derby race.
"This...is...unbelievable!" Ansem said, his horse practically taking flight. The more time passed and the more he tried to understand the event, let alone accept it, the more his amazed excitement swelled. Not that it should have, he thought, based upon the kind of week he'd already had until this point. And yet, his rational constantly rebelled in spite of his efforts to plain give up by now.
Noctis seemed like he was having an easier time believing, but on the other hand was completely spazzing out just over how "awesome" this was, yelling things like, "YEEHAW! Comin' through, pardner!" as if he was some kind of cowboy. Ansem chuckled inside his head, because he was still picturing Noctis as a mobster, and that was, after all, a merry-go-round horse; Quite a sight with all those elements thrown together. For once the boy seemed to have no shame.
Marry Poppins led the way, as at peace with events as though this sort of thing happened every day. Bert was the second least impressed. He straightened himself on his horse and eventually overcame his motion sickness. Looking around, he rode up beside Marry Poppins and commented,
"Very nice, very nice, indeed."
As their horses bobbed up and down, as they had done while still on the carnival ride but now without aid or support whatsoever, the central poles dragged under them and dug long trenches in the ground, like long dotted lines that marked their trail. One would have thought that this should slow them down, but it seemed to have no such effect, Ansem noticed. He was still gazing around starry-eyed when Noctis suddenly blew past him, presumably in a gallop, and announced loudly to them all that,
"My horse is the fastest!" in something of a challenge to the rest of them. To Ansem's surprise, Bert was quickest to take him up on it.
"Aww really, now," he said, squinting one eye, then said to his horse, "Yeh hear that, mate? You wanna put up wit' that? ...Tha's da ticket!" The horse bolted, but before either he or Noctis had gotten too far ahead, Marry Poppins spoke up.
"Not so fast, please!" Noctis may or even may not have complied, Ansem couldn't tell, but it just so happened that Bert reached over and caught his horse by the ribbon it had for reigns, slowing the both of them to a stop.
"Woah there!" he said. "Sorry, Marry Poppins. Jus' a bit o high spirits is awl. No 'arm done."
"Please control yourself," Marry Poppins said to him, as she and Ansem caught up to the two renegades. "We are not on a racecourse. And as for you," she added, turning her head and giving Noctis a stern eye of disapproval. Whatever lecture he might have received next was sparred him, however, by a sudden sound in the distance that the four of them heard: a bugle followed by the barking and howling of a about a hundred dogs. The two adults turned to look, but from behind the other three Ansem saw Noctis slump over, or 'melt', from the relief of having her attention directed off of him. He wiped his forehead with the back of hist wrist, and caught Ansem's eye.
"Tsk tsk," Ansem whispered, shaking his head at the duke in mock scorn. "You should be ashamed of yourself."
Just then, a rustle in the grass could be seen in the direction of the noise as a small, red and white animal darted out of the woods across the stream from them. It halted atop a rock and watched over its shoulder for a second, until that bugle sounded again and the barking renewed. The creature clutched its through with both its paws and cried out, in plain English,
"Faith and begorrah! 'Tis them redcoats again!"
The surprises never end, do they, Ansem thought to himself, staring in awe at the fox. An entire English hunting party in close pursuit, it fled again, out into the open.
"Follow me please," Marry Poppins called to the others, and gracefully raced off in that direction. Ansem and Noctis exchanged glances with each other, for now she was going much faster than even the two trouble-makers had been going.
"Tsk tsk," Ansem mumbled again, and laughed quietly to himself.
"After you," Noctis said, but Ansem replied, "Ladies first."
"Well, yeh two con sit 'ere awl day if yeh loy'ke, but I'm goin' a help tha' li'le fella," said Bert, and charged off ahead of them both.
"Last one is a rotten egg!" Ansem jeered, charging after him.
At last the hunting party emerged out of the woods, a swarm of beagles first, and then no less than a dozen stately gentlemen with bristly gray mustaches and, bright red and gold uniforms, all riding cartoonishly fat horses of different, modest colors.
"View halloo!" the bugler cried, stopping and lifting a hand to his brow to shield the sun.
"Oh yes, definitely. A view halloo," his horse repeated.
Whatever that means, Ansem thought, now locked in a head-to-head race with Noctis. All four of the merry-go-round horses seemed to be capable of a much faster pace than the real horses were, because even with such a huge head-start on the four, the four overcame the hunting party easily. Then again, Ansem wasn't sure if their wooden mounts were even capable of breaking a sweat. Speaking of which, the fox's pursuers nearly fell off their steeds at the strange sight, as they passed. Bert caught up with the fox itself and hoisted it by its tail onto the back of his saddle. It was just as surprised as anyone by the enchanted object, but began to blow raspberries and aim insults at the dogs following behind them.
The chase continued until, in an unseemly display of aerial agility, each of the four adventurers cleared a twelve-foot high hedge, which the back of beagles tried to leap too, but all only got stuck with their heads buried in it. Marry Poppins was still well ahead of them in every turn they took, and had already joined up with a pack of derby racers who were heading straight for the three young men. Ok, now they were on a racecourse. Ansem couldn't figure this lady out, except to think that maybe she couldn't make up her mind between wanting to be good 'n proper all the time, or as wild and unruly as the rest of them on the worst of days.
The three skidded to an abrupt halt and were spun around like tops as the racers passed, many of their heads turning to ogle at the flying carnival sculptures. Until this point, Ansem had been doing pretty well keeping his prized lunch down, but boy now was he starting to feel it, and had to fight as hard as he could to keep it down. Which he managed to do, but only just barely. Noctis had recovered a bit more quickly than he had, and sped of after the pack. His horse must have become dizzy as well, because Ansem saw the beast drifting heavily to the right as it tried to catch up.
Ansem was also surprised to see that the two riders who were leading the pack neck-to-neck with each other both tipped their hats politely and parted to allow Marry Poppins to pass between them. The looks on their faces a split-second later seemed to say that they hadn't realized, until too late, that their chivalrous gesture had cost them both the first-place position. Marry Poppins herself crossed the finish line before all. Ansem personally wouldn't have called it a fair race by any means, but the panel of spectators had spoken, and they accepted her victory.
Interestingly, the little fox didn't seem to mind at all, either. Nor did even Noctis, and that was strange. Bert gave no opinion on the matter, but non the less applauded alongside the crowd.
Half a dozen news reporters all suddenly descended upon her from out of nowhere, as a large wreath of flowers was strung around her horse's neck, and she herself was handed a matching bouquet.
"Thank, you," she chirped, smiling quite charmingly.
"How do you feel, Ms. Poppins?" one of the reporters asked, which became the single droplet that started the flood, as the other reporters started bombarding her with all very similar questions. She tried her best to quell them, but there were just too many being fired too fast.
"Please, please," she told them, blushing, if only to settle them so that at last she could speak. The last line to be heard before the ruckus died down was,
"There probably aren't words to describe your emotions," spoken by a tall, very thin old man in a black bowler hat, through a thick silver mustache that hid his whole mouth except for only his bottom lip and chin.
"Well, actually there's a very good word," she told him. "Am I right, Bert?"
The three were all seated on an elegant white bench in back of the crowd. A few moments before, a caramel-apple vendor had offered them each a free apple for having competed, but all three had had to politely refuse because they each felt like they'd just been through the rinse-cycle of one of those fancy new, automated clothes washers. The little fox, however, now sat on the ground beside them happily munching on the apple which it had been offered.
"You sure you don't want a bite?" it said to Bert, its new best friend for having saved its life from the hounds.
Bert waved his hand to say no, seemingly unable to open his mouth at the very suggestion of it, then returned to sitting with both hands on his knees just so that he wouldn't fall over. Of the three, he clearly faired the worst. Noctis and Ansem had given up competing, and just accepted that they were both simply lucky that they'd made it this far.
In answer to Marry Poppins' rhetorical question, Bert spoke up, "Tell 'em what it is," but quickly had to look down at the grass again, suppressing a sudden reflex.
"Right," she said, taking off her hat and frowning at Bert as if to say "I told you so". The hat, she hung on her saddle, where the umbrella that she had formerly been carrying still was. She inhaled a deep, deep breath, and then said, "!"
"Bless you, madam," one of the reporters said, innocently, looking over his pencil and paper notepad.
"I beg you pardon, miss?" another asked, politely.
"," Marry Poppins repeated, and continued to explain in detail the word's meaning and usage, which turned out to be really not all that extraordinary. Ansem noticed something odd about her explanation, though.
"Bert," he whispered, leaning past Noctis. "Is she rhyming all that?"
"Why, yes indeed I think she is," he said, lifting his head to stare at her for a moment, before his familiar, mischievous grin dawned upon his face once again. Out of nowhere, Bert seemed to be feeling better, for next he got up from the bench and lightly strode to Marry Poppins' side to share, for all to hear, a personal experience of using the (ridiculous, in Ansem's opinion) word. To Ansem and Noctis' shared sense of amazed horror, he, as well, rhymed all the he said in reference to it.
Noctis leaned toward Ansem to whisper in his hear, "Ok, now this is getting weird."
"What I want to know," Ansem whispered back, "is where on earth that band just came from," for now there was also a pack of musicians improvising full instrumental accompaniment to the couple's rhyming act. "I think this adventure is a musical," he half joked, half feared deep down. As the moments drew longer and longer, he noticed that Noctis' knuckles got whiter and whiter gripping the bench.
"What happens in the chalk picture stays in the chalk picture," he warned Ansem.
"Well, since you put it that way...then actually, I think it's kinna gettin' to me," Ansem teased, reclining backward against the bench and putting his arms behind his head, and finally allowing his foot to begin tapping. "You gotta admit. On the road, these two could make a very comfortable living," he added, with a peaceable grin.
"Man, whatever," Noctis grumped. He always tried to be so cool, but sometimes his efforts escalated to the point where it must have been making him miserable. Ansem now started to notice this about his friend for the very first time, and immediately recognized that oftentimes in the past he himself had done the very same thing. Enlightened now, he could feel a strange and passive new courage start to well up somewhere inside of him. He felt himself physically relax, practically slipping off of the edge of the bench, and, with a bit of fear, but in a good way, could tell that a permanent change in his character was taking place. He could now appreciate things for what they were, and actually caught himself being reminded of the way Hans always acted.
I guess you were way ahead of me, bro, Ansem thought, closing his eyes to the deep sapphire-blue sky.
The next thing the prince knew, however, a blinding flash of lightning and instantaneous clap of thunder roused him from what apparently had become a nap, but he discovered himself now seated on a black, wrought iron bench at the park. Right in front of where the row of chalk-pictures had been, no less, but now he was completely by himself, and all that remained of Bert's drawings were clouds of swirling pigment flowing through puddles all over the sidewalk. A thick blanket of steely gray clouds raged overhead, causing havoc in the streets of Hollow Bastion as people scrambled to take cover from the surprise downpour. Admiral Boom and his crew, alone, had been prepared, and were now bailing water over the side of his house with wooden wash buckets.
"Put your backs into it, men!" he cried, barely audible, from where Ansem sat, over the roar of the rain. "Or I'll have yer livers served up to me pet iguana by mornin'."
Ansem was deepeningly confused, not in the slightest caring that he soon became soaked to the bone, hardly even feeling the sharp, freezing droplets, in fact, over where his three friends had mysteriously disappeared to. Or had it all just been a dream? But the ruined chalk-pictures were even still here.
Ansem noticed that his close were back to normal, as well; No more pretend-mafia suit. No more hat, either, so his wet hair flattened and stuck to his face. Yet even then, his bewitched bangs were reluctant to fall, remaining stroked as they were, but now looking like they'd been stuck that way with heavy grease instead of happenedly by the force of water. At least it kept them out of his eyes, he gratefully noticed.
The sailor's words and sudden alternation of character still managed to make Ansem laugh a little to himself, in spite of his growing mental distress. He could have pictured Marry Poppins pulling something like this, performing incredible magic and then having people believe that they only imagined it, but not Bert. Bert was the one who talked openly and in a 'matter-of-fact' way about her powers; Ansem didn't think he would have lied in this sense. Nor Noctis.
But where was Noctis in the midst of this? Surely the boy had been with him all day, and not even possibly just another figment of some dream; Ansem could feel with his fingertips that the scars he'd had on his face were still gone, which meant that the day before had surely happened-Noctis, sorceress, and all-and Noctis had said they were "staying through till Saturday", which meant that he should theoretically still be here today.
The real problem that he seemed to be having was that he couldn't remember falling asleep at the park. He couldn't even remember sitting down at the park. And he certainly couldn't remember walking here alone, and believed that Noctis would have awoken him had he happened to slip away for a wink. Could this dilemma possibly be solved by himself right away, or did he seriously have to go and find at least one of his co-conspirators to ask?
Unable to verify anything with the information that he had for the time being, Ansem gave up, and released himself from the strain of his thoughts. He reclined in the bench again, and just let himself be pelted by the rain. The flashes of lightning were infrequent, though extremely close by. Deep down he did have nagging fear that he might get struck, but stubbornly just wanted to enjoy the storm for a moment.
"You Highness," he heard a deep, surly voice say, shattering the meditative atmosphere he'd been enjoying so much. It was one of the undercover guards who normally followed him or his brother when they visited the city. "Your Highness, these conditions no longer fall under the category of reasonably safe. I am to escort you home without further delay."
...Dangit... "Alright, alright. I'm getting up," Ansem moaned, moving sluggishly, and not without a slur of muttered petty complaints thrown in at the end for good measure. He stood up and stretched, yawning widely, just as another bolt of lightning flickered in the distance and was followed a moment later by a low, rolling rumble. "My dad ought to give you a raise," he teased the stoic guard.
The man maintained his grim face and replied with complete ease, "Any trouble you give me comes out of your allowance."
"Touché," Ansem said, walking ahead. He finally noticed that his hands were freezing cold, and stuck them into his pockets; Though soaked, there was still some warmth in there. "Hay, how long was I asleep?" he asked, pausing in his steps, and looking back at the guard.
"No more'n ten minutes, I would estimate."
"Really?" Ansem asked, "Are you sure about that? It felt like hours to me."
"Quite sure, your Highness."
"Hmmm." The prince struggled hard to think of how to phrase his questioning. "Noctis Caelum spent the whole afternoon with me, correct?"
"Indeed."
"And we spoke with the man who drew those pictures on the sidewalk back there?"
"I wouldn't know, sir," admitted the guard.
"What?" Ansem asked, taken aback. "What do you mean?"
"You were already out like a light when I found you, and I was only lost for fifteen minutes tops."
Ansem just stared at him in dumb silence for what seemed like forever, then asked, "You're joking, right?"
"Nay, your Highness," the man confirmed.
It took every ounce of Ansem's self-restraint not to smack his forehead in disbelief. "Let me guess," he proposed instead, not in the least bit certain of weather he was 'putting-two-and-two together' logically, as they say, or rather making a grand assumption clear out of the blue, "And there was no one else nearby?"
"Well, not exactly," the guard said.
"'Not exactly'?"
"There were other people in the general area, but they all kept their distance from you while you were asleep. And even up 'till now, I haven't located young Mr. Caelum since the two of you gave me the slip. (I just hope he has more commonsense than you do-sitting on a metal bench in a thunderstorm-with all due respect, your Highness,)" he explained.
Ansem sighed heavily. "Go figure," he muttered, folding his arms and massaging his forehead. Another drawn-out silence followed. "Well," he stated at last, at least able to recognize a dead lead when he had one, however much it frustrated him. "You can forget that raise. (And don't you touch my allowance.)"