Chapter 12
PART 1 - Catfight
Tinker Bell flitted back onto Tinker's Nook. She looked rather pleased with herself despite having lost her entire house and belongings just hours earlier.
Fairy Mary took notice and asked, "Tinker Bell, are you okay?" The tinker supervisor had questioned everyone and got her report completed and delivered before dinner. She asked the tinkers to stay late and continue the clean up. Once that was done, they all descended on the broken houses and mended as many as they could. The remnants of Tinker Bell's home were scheduled to be scrapped first thing in the morning. All of her salvageable possessions were gathered and put into storage until a new house could be built for her. The tinker supervisor was worried that when Tinker Bell returned and saw the empty spot it would crumble her spirits. Curiously, however, that did not seem to be the case.
"I'm just fine, Fairy Mary. I think I'll go to my worktable and finish some acorn bowls for tomorrow."
"You didn't do any harm to Vidia, did you?" Fairy Mary asked in a kindly fashion.
"I can promise you I never laid a hand on her," Tinker Bell replied honestly, even while omitting certain critical details.
"Oh good, well perhaps you should take some time off and get some res…" Fairy Mary caught herself. Where would Tinker Bell rest? She had no home.
"That's okay. Rosetta will let me stay with her tonight and I'll be even better in the morning," Tinker Bell said. She seemed abnormally calm and Fairy Mary began to toy with the idea that her charge may have done something awful against Vidia. Tinker Bell said she didn't lay a hand on her, but that didn't mean she couldn't have done something else. After all, Vidia destroyed Tinker Bell's home and still never laid a hand on Tinker Bell. Whether the fast flyer deserved it or not, it wasn't Tinker Bell's place to seek retribution. There were laws in Pixie Hollow to prevent that.
"Fairy Mary," Bobble called to her, flying up to meet his supervisor. "We have enough wares to make a delivery this evening, but we can't find any of the mice. Have you seen them?"
"Now that you mention it, I haven't," she replied.
"Oh don't worry about the mice, Bobble," Tinker Bell interrupted, a mischievous if rather satisfied grin playing across her face. "Right now they're playing a nice game of fairy tag."
Oh dear, I may have to file another report with the queen, Fairy Mary told herself.
Unable to open the door Vidia slid back out of the window and flew off to find an animal talent. She came across Fawn and Buck some minutes later.
"Fawn! Fawn!" she called out to her.
The animal talent rolled her eyes. "What do you want, Vidia?" she said with an irritated tone.
"I need your help, the-."
"After what you did to Tinker Bell today?!" Fawn had heard about the incident when she asked how the thistles came to be loose with ropes tied around them. As the updated story spread quickly, Fawn discovered that Vidia had planned and executed the whole thing. She was in no mood to offer assistance to this particular fairy. "The answer is 'NO!'"
"There are a bunch of mice in my house and I can't get rid of them."
"How did mice get in your house?" Fawn asked.
"Tinker Bell put them in there."
"Well good for her, bad for you," Fawn said with a wry grin.
"Uuugghh," she groaned. "Just get them out of my house!"
Buck shook his head and said. "Why should we bother to help you?"
"Let's go, Buck," Fawn said.
"What? Why?" Buck asked.
"I'm not doing it for Vidia, I'm doing it for the mice." Fawn leaned in real close and whispered to him, "The mice could pick up fleas in there." Both chuckled at Fawn's little joke.
"I heard that," Vidia said with a scowl.
The two animal talents flew to Vidia's tree trunk home. Like the fast flyer, so many mice were stuffed into the house that the animal fairies could not open the door to enter and each had to slip in through the window. When they finally got inside, though, Fawn was blindsided with horror by what she saw. "Oh my wings! Buck, hurry! Get an animal healing fairy! Get two of them! Vidia, get in here and help me, RIGHT NOW!"
Queen Clarion had finished with the witness testimonies and the ministers' reports regarding the thistle incident and was now reading Fairy Mary's fully detailed accounting. Wanting to investigate further, the fairy queen decided to fly out to Tinker's Nook to survey the damage in person.
While Fawn, Buck and two animal healing talents were attending to the mice in the flyer's tree trunk home, Vidia decided it was time for a showdown with Tinker Bell. She flew off towards Tinker's Nook, hoping to find that little so and so there.
"Miss Bell?" Bobble asked. "Uh…, you don't seem to be very…, um…, upset about your home anymore." Tinker Bell's rather placid demeanor disquieted several of Tink's close workmates. Bobble, who tended to be a bit protective of Tinker Bell, decided to take the initiative and posed a few roundabout questions.
"Well, it's like Terence said earlier," she replied with an unusually peaceful tone, "it's only a house and it can be replaced."
"That's very mature of you, Miss Bell," Clank told her.
"Did you…do anything while you were away?" Bobble asked gently.
"Sure. I decided to have lunch and flew around for a while. Then I had dinner and came back here to do some work," Tinker Bell lied…, partly.
"Did you do anything…, um…, interesting?" Bobble asked.
Clank, who despite being an excellent tinker, wasn't always as bright when it came to dealing with others, blurted out, "You didn't hurt Vidia like you said you would earlier today, did you?"
"Splinters, Clanky, you don't come right and say it," Bobble chided him.
Tinker Bell became rather irate with this line of questioning. "Why is everyone so interested in what I did today?"
"Because, we worry about ye, Miss Be-," but Bobble was cut off.
"THERE YOU ARE YOU LOUSY TINKER," Vidia screamed angrily.
Fairy Mary flew up to intercept the fast flyer. "Oh no you don't, Vidia," she told her. "You've already done enough damage."
Vidia wasn't listening. She shot right past the tinker supervisor and plowed straight into Tinker Bell, knocking the little fairy onto the floor. "You brought mice into my house!" Vidia yelled. "They destroyed everything I own!"
"Well now you know how it feels, Vidia!" Tinker Bell shouted back.
Vidia was incensed. "I'm going to fairy slap you all the way to mainland," she cried out.
A catfight between the two began as Vidia started grabbing, flailing and scratching at Tinker Bell.
Tink, in turn, blocked the flyer's arms with one hand and with the other she grabbed Vidia's hair and started pulling. The pair then rolled on the ground as each one was slapping, scratching and pulling at the other.
Vidia yanked at Tinker Bell's hair and undid her chignon causing Tink's golden locks to fly everywhere. Tinker Bell pushed away and scratched at her assailant's face and neck. Finally, Vidia flipped Tinker Bell over on to her back. The fast flyer then jumped atop Tinker Bell and tried to punch the tinker fairy in the face. Tink twisted away and the flyer's fist pounded into the dirt. Vidia leapt to her feet screeching and jumping around while shaking her hand. The pain felt like an electric shock going up her arm.
Tinker Bell lunged straight into Vidia's midsection and slammed the flyer into the wall. Tinker Bell kicked and punched at Vidia shouting, "You started this, Vidia, and now I'm going to finish it!"
"I'll say when it's finished, Tinker Bell," Vidia yelled back as she shoved the tinker fairy away with her wind talent.
The other tinker talents were so surprised and shocked by the unprecedented sight of two pixies fighting that none moved. They were as paralyzed as they were in the early hours when Vidia came through their nook driving the two thistles.
Fairy Mary tried to intervene and scolded them. "Now see here, both of you. Stop fighting this instant." But neither combatant heard her, or if they did, they were each too infuriated with the other to comply.
Clank and Bobble finally moved in and pulled the two girls apart. Tinker Bell and Vidia were snarling, clawing and screaming un-fairy like things at each other. Vidia, though, easily overpowered the diminutive Bobble and leapt at Tinker Bell. She pulled the tinker from Clank's grasp and tossed her to the ground. Vidia then dove onto Tinker Bell and the two were once again tumbling and rolling on the floor as they tried to beat each other into pixie dust.
A brilliant flash of light and a frighteningly monstrous thunderclap brought the scuffle to a sudden end. Tinker Bell and Vidia turned and stared directly at the source of the terrible noise:
THE QUEEN
Both fairies gulped hard as they looked into Clarion's eyes and saw much disapproval, which is a gentle way of saying that Clarion was boiling mad.
"That will be quite enough, from both of you," the queen said in a quiet, but undeniably authoritative voice. The queen lifted one eyebrow as she studied the two fairies. Both were on the ground, unmoving, arms wrapped around each other as though still grappling.
"Tinker Bell. Vidia. You will both go to the Pixie Dust Tree and wait for me to return. Is that clear?" she said.
"Yes, your highness," the two fairies replied. Viola approached and escorted both to the queen's audience chamber. When the two were out of sight, Clarion turned to her friend, Fairy Mary, and asked to be shown the damage caused by Vidia and the thistles.
"Right this way, your highness," the tinker supervisor replied, escorting the queen to the sight of Tinker Bell's former home. Fairy Mary described what happened in detail. Clarion studied the remains of Tinker Bell's home and tried to imagine what it must have been like when the thistles came over the rise and crushed the fairy cottage.
The queen was then shown the damaged homes in the housing district. Once more Fairy Mary explained what happened and how Vidia seemed to actually lose control of the thistles among the roots and walls. Lastly, Fairy Mary showed the queen all the broken and damaged tinker wares that were set to be scrapped the next morning. "All of this happened when the thistles found their way out of the housing area and charged through the courtyard like, well, like the stampeding thistles right before spring."
"Thank you, Fairy Mary," the queen said approvingly. "You have done splendid work controlling what could have been a disaster. Please continue as you see fit."
Fairy Mary bowed and the queen returned to her tree. However, when Clarion arrived, a new incident report was waiting for her. It provided an initial summary of the events in which Tinker Bell was accused of taking the cart pulling mice into Vidia's home as an act of vigilantism. The queen sighed and thought to herself, this must end now.
It wasn't over for the queen just yet, though. She still had to interrogate both Tinker Bell and Vidia.
"It was all her fault, your highness," Tinker Bell said, speaking rapidly. "She brought the thistles into Tinker's Nook, she destroyed my house and then she…"
"Tinker Bell," the queen interrupted. "I'm only interested in facts, not opinions. Is that understood?"
"Yes, your highness," Tinker Bell replied, her head held low.
It was during the questioning session that Queen Clarion first heard of what happened at the tree trunk in the Autumn Woods. Including what Vidia had said about the tinker guild. Clarion was revolted by what she had heard. The queen hoped it was merely Tinker Bell exaggerating the facts. Clarion knew well of Vidia's superiority complex, but could not believe it had gone this far.
Later, Vidia was brought in to tell her side of the thistle story. Amazingly she corroborated everything, although in terms that made her appear justified in her actions. When confronted with her words of prejudice against the tinkers, though, Vidia denied everything. Then the queen pointed to Fairy Mary's report where the fast flyer was less than kind in describing Tinker's Nook.
"I believe you called it a 'stinking hole in the ground.' I hope she was mistaken."
Vidia said nothing.
The queen also noted a conversation Vidia had with Tinker Bell the day the tinker fairy arrived in which the fast flyer tried to convince Tinker Bell that she was not at all important in the grand scheme of things. Once more Vidia had described Tinker's Nook in very derogatory terms calling it a "ditch." Apparently, Tinker Bell had mentioned the conversation to Bobble who later involved Fairy Mary.
Vidia finally admitted some of what Tinker Bell had said, but only in the simplest and vaguest words possible. She did not want to have to go into detail. Queen Clarion insisted and with the right prodding eventually Vidia told her everything she thought about the tinkers and every other guild in Pixie Hollow. The queen was floored by the admission. This kind of incendiary thinking was unheard of in Never Land.
Tinker Bell was then brought back in to clarify details, defend her testimony and refute any claims made by Vidia. Vidia was then allowed to do the same for herself. When the session was over the queen was most disturbed by what she had heard and seen. Clarion needed time, however; time to think, to process everything thoroughly, and to consider likely punishments. But above all she needed the detailed report of the mouse incident. What she had read was most troubling, considering that Tinker Bell was the perpetrator and that it involved her friend Cheese and his mouse chums.
"Each of you is guilty of egregious acts of wanton violence, destruction and cruelty aimed at each other. However, in what you have done today, each of you has put innocent lives needlessly in mortal danger. Your rivalry has lead to actions most unbecoming fairies of Pixie Hollow. However, until I have a full accounting of what happened at Vidia's home and to the mice involved I cannot as yet formulate proper sentences for either of you."
Tinker Bell and Vidia glanced at each other.
"Therefore, until such time as all information is available to me and I have been able to complete my investigation into the events of this day, you are both to be held in confinement until further notice."
"Confinement?!" Vidia shouted in disbelief. "Why?"
The queen responded quite candidly, "Because each of you has demonstrated that you cannot restrain yourselves from engaging in reprisals against the other. So you will be restrained for your own good and the good of all the fairies and animals that live in Pixie Hollow."
The queen gave a simple gesture with her hand. Viola and two sentry talents responded by escorting Tinker Bell and Vidia to confinement cells, the Pixie Hollow equivalent of jail, where they were to stay until the queen called them to be sentenced for their outrageous behavior.
Author's Note: Chignon = According to Wikipedia, a hair style similar to a bun.
I am sorry. I know I promised that in Chapter 12 the queen would finally punish Vidia. Unfortunately, there was just so much still to tell that I had to break it down into two parts.
Part II will be up tomorrow. And yes, you will finally get to read what Queen Clarion has to say about all that has happened.
Thank you for your patience.
Next Chapter: The sentencing of Vidia and Tinker Bell (for real this time). Plus what happened to the mice.