Chapter 9: Ineffable Mysteries of the FOG

Eddy stood stiller than stone as the shadow marched into the sun. The beast was a 7ft tall figure coated by a thick hide of dark brown fur. The creature had upright triangular ears, slender claws, flat feet and a formless circular face of onyx dominated by a large jagged maw shaped like a jack-o-lantern smile over sharpened teeth, and disk-shaped pupil-less golden eyes. Its ears twitched as it wandered further into the sun with a stare that bordered on a predator on its next meal but with a slight jerk of its posture it turned away to a nearby passage between the columns. When it turned Eddy saw that it was cuddling a 6in long white capsule with a metallic valve tied to the beast's neck by a rope. Eddy was so engrossed in the creature he didn't notice a hand grab the back of his leg and had to catch himself from screaming. He looked back and found Double d, which was on his stomach, his face white as a sheet and trembling like a leaf. "W-what is that?" Double d whispered with a gulp.

"It's a Solar trash smasher from the mini-series "The Odd journey of Issac Meyer," Ed responded. The beast looked at the direction of the Eds and cooed like a pigeon.

"Ed shut up," Eddy whispered.

"What?" Ed asked in normal tone, the beast's cooing turned into a light growling.

"Agent Meridian! Agent Meridian! Come in!" A girl's voice spoke causing the beast to look away. The voice seemed to be coming from inside the beast. "This is Silks, we're in the vicinity of your coordinates. What's your current status?"

"ARAH-HA-HA!" The beast roared as if it was responding to the voice. Then the beast's ears twitched and it narrowed its eyes at the three Ed's.

"Aww it wants to play guys," Ed said raising his head making his body look like a seal as the beast lowered its claws to the ground like a linesman before the snap.

Ed jumped to his feet just as the beast leap into the air with its claws at the ready. "Tag your it!" Ed exclaimed sliding in front of his friends with his hands out wide ready to embrace the creature.

"Ed you idiot!" Eddy yelled as he saw the creature draw out its claws at the apex of its hop. The claws never reached Ed as a shot rang out followed by the metal canister on the creature exploding which sent all three Ed's backwards in a burst of greenish vapour.

"Where did it go?" Ed asked as the party became enveloped in the gas cloud. The stinging gas crept into their eyes, nose and mouth.

"S %! I hit the can!" The girl's voice spoke again this time more clearly and with more worry. The voice was followed by another more masculine one. "Ya think Sherlock?" Ed who was the only one still mobile in the choking haze looked for the source of the voice. He was tearing up no matter how hard he flailed in the smoke. Edd and Eddy wasn't fairing too well either as their coughs and sputters echoed off the columns.

"Hello?" Ed asked realizing the male's voice after falling over dizzy.

"Meridian that you?" The voice replied. "You sound terrible."

"Who?"

"Great work Silks she sounds like a tard and has amnesia."

"It isn't her you twat," The female voice responded.

"What's a tard?" Ed asked.

"Never mind that, you're in danger," The male voice spoke.

"Why?"

"Listen Mr. Shiny, you and whoever you're travelling with has to leave the area. Comprende?"

Ed couldn't understand a little of the sentence as he felt a slight tickling sensation in his head. Wispy silhouettes started to appear in Ed's peripheral vision. He could also hear a faint drumming and the melody of a wooden flute. "What's Comprende?"

"You can't stay in the cloud, it's hallucinogenic."

The man's words fell on deaf ears to the boy as his surrounding mist started to warp his perception into bright multi-colored triangular tapestries as the drums and flutes grew louder and more rhythmic. The human-like shadows started to encircle him. He looked up at the sky and it yielded a series of green and golden rings that displayed incomprehensible languages and pictographs. In the middle of the rings was a purple sun with a photo realistic face, green eyes and a smile.

"Hello my friend," the sun spoke in a calming voice. "Are you ready to become the lord of the den of cockatrice?" The shadows appeared to him at last. Multitudes of buxom women with bright white plumage, pointed elf ears, chicken legs, and green tail feathers pranced around Ed in mirth. The surrounding scenery became nothing more than a mosaic of multicoloured polygons with the drums and flutes creating a beautiful symphony that matched Ed's heartbeat in rhythm.

"My gratitude to you knows no bounds!" Ed thanked the sun. "I shall bring forth millions of eggs to his lordship as his soldiers!" His cockatrice army giggled and began to caress him with their wings. The cuddling didn't last as a blood-curling roar shook the area scaring the cockatrice out of their frenzy.

"First you will have to do something for us my young friend," The sun spoke as a mass of jaded black triangles forming in the last of the mist shaped into a large group of snarling "tag players".

"A simple task for me and the Lotus blade," Ed said valiantly brandishing his practice sword from his coat pocket, because with Ed physics are always in beta testing.

"I shall bring forth millions of eggs to his lordship as his soldiers!" The radio message echoed as static rendered the connection dead.

"Great work Silks," A voice said sarcastically as the cloud lifted revealing a man who looked to be in his mid-twenties along with a teenage girl huddled on a short column about 60 ft away. The girl was hunched behind a military grade sniper rifle and the man was watching the formulating cloud through binoculars.

"Don't pin this on me Tweak!" The girl accused jumping up as the rifle spewed the few last whiffs of gunpowder. "I was using your gun!"

"Sure, blame the gun, " The man known as Tweak replied adjusting one of the lenses of the binoculars. He stood 5ft 11 with a lanky physique and wore desert-cameo cargo shorts, a dark blue t-shirt with the graphic of the words 'Syndicate Lapdog' underneath a ram's head over a bulletproof vest, and wire-rimmed glasses. The girl was 5ft even with a petite physique and wore tan pants with the sleeves torn off above the knee with a white tunic over another bulletproof vest. She had dirty blond hair pulled into a ponytail. "And stop calling me Tweak."

"I'll call you whatever I want Hipster," Silks huffed shoving the rifle into the man's hands. Something in the cloud immediately caught the two's attention. The cloud dissipated showing a variably large mass of the creatures surrounding three lone figures. Two lying on the ground motionless, and one in the direct middle standing in a fighting stance pulling out what looked like a wooden stick out of his jacket.

"That kid isn't doing what I think he is, is he?" Silks asked with alarm. The answer came as Ed charged toward a side of the mass.

"PLAY BALL!" Tweak roared jumping toward the fray with Silks following seconds after.