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The following morning our friends stood outside the door in Mount El Culo, having left behind them the cavern in which dwelt the feetniks and the nostril goblins. The night before while waiting for Soda’s clothes to be laundered they had visited a very nice stadium seating walk-in theater on the goblin side of the mountain and watched a sci-fi feature film motion picture about a coffin fly who gets crossed with an ottoman in a tragic teleportation pod mishap.
"Now," said Montana Shingles the Vice-Tremorroid of Bonertania, taking a breath of fresh air to clear her nose of foot funk, "I think we must find a path into Mukus Quadrant to get the drop of oil from Cydroidobot’s body."
"Cy will do anything we ask him, for he's one of my best friends," said the Ratsack Golem, "I believe we can take a crosscut into his country and so get to his chateau a day sooner than if we travel back the way we came."
"I think so, too," said the vice-tremorroid; "and that means we must keep to the left."
They were obliged to go down the mountain before they found any path that led in the direction they wanted to go, but among the tumbled rocks at the foot of the mountain was a faint trail which they decided to follow. Several hours' walk along this trail brought them to a clear, level country, where there were some scattered chalets and wigwams and outhouses. But they knew they were still in Quirk Quadrant, because the grass had a blood red tint. This part of the quadrant seemed peaceful and prosperous, and for some reason had a weirdly high number of mom and pop axe-throwing businesses.
But just as they were congratulating themselves upon the progress they had made they came upon a broad foamy yellow river which swept along between high banks, and here the road ended and there was no bridge of any sort to allow them to cross. The river smelt faintly of asparagusic acid.
"This is queer," said Soda, looking at the water reflectively. "Why should there be any road, if this big river stops everyone walking along it?"
"BAWK!" exclaimed Vira, and Soda saw she was looking along the bank of the river.
"Why, she sees a chalet over there!" cried the Schling tween.
“Let's go and ask the people how to get across the river," said Mono.
A quarter of a mile along the bank stood a small, round chalet, painted carmine red, and as it was on their side of the raging yellow stream they hurried toward it. A chubby little yokai, dressed in a red and black outfit, came out to greet them, and with him were two children, also in red and black clothes and sneakers. All three had long tentacles in place of arms, covered in dozens of grimy-looking suction cups. The man’s eyes were big and staring as he examined the Ratsack and Patchwork Golems.
"Do you live here, my good fellow?" asked the Ratsack Golem.
"I think I do," replied the Quirkian, bowing low; "but whether I'm awake or dreaming I can't be positive, so I'm not sure where I live. If you'll kindly pinch me I'll find out all about it."
Chunks pinched him.
"I’m awake," said the Quirkian, who then told them his name was Mr. Squatface. The adventurers introduced themselves, and then Soda said:
"Tell us, Mr. Squatface, how can we get across the stream?".
"I don't know," replied Mr. Squatface.
"Don't you ever cross it?" asked Soda.
"Never."
"Don't travelers cross it?"
"Not to my knowledge," said he.
"Where does this river go to?" asked Mono.
"That way," answered Mr. Squatface, pointing with one tentacle, "it goes up towards the emperor’s log chateau. And that way," pointing with the other tentacle, "the river runs into the forest where dangerous creatures dwell."
The Ratsack Golem looked at the water before them.
"The current flows toward Mukus Quadrant," said he; "and so, if we had a boat, or a raft, the river would float us there more quickly and more easily than we could walk."
"That is true," agreed Mono; and then they all looked thoughtful and wondered what could be done.
"Why can't this guy make us a raft?" asked Chunks.
"Will you?" inquired Soda, turning to the Squatface.
The chubby yokai shook his head. "Heck, no. I'm too lazy," he said. "My super best friend says I'm the laziest creature in all of Bonertania, and she is a truthful woman. I hate work of any kind, and making a raft is hard work,"
"I'll give you my silver dusted diamond pinky ring," promised Mono.
"No; I don't care for dusted diamonds. If it were a cabochon I might work for a little while."
"I've got some of B.M. Foulfinger’s Square Meal Tablets," said the Ratsack Golem. "Each one is the same as a dish of alien feces soup, a fried wazzfish slice, zipperfly pie, public crab salad, kumquat russe and kinkberry jelly- all made into one little tablet that you can swallow without trouble."
"Without trouble!" exclaimed the Quirkian, much interested; "then those tablets would be fine for a lazy man. It's such hard work to chew when you eat."
"I'll give you six of those tablets if you'll help us make a raft," promised the Ratsack Golem. "What do you say to my offer, Mr. Squatface?"
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"I'll do it," decided the Quirkian. "I'll help, and you can do most of the work. But my super best friend has gone fishing for red lumpsuckers today, so one of you will have to mind the children."
Soda promised to do that, and the children were not so shy when the Schling tween sat down to play with them. They grew to like Vira, too, and the little puppy dog yokai allowed them to rub her rump with their suckers, which gave the little ones much joy. It took so long for Mono, Ratsack, Chunks, and Mr. Squatface to make the raft that evening came just as it was finished, and with evening Mrs. Squatface returned from her lumpsucker-fishing.
The squat woman, who also had grungy looking tentacle arms, proved to be cross and bad-tempered, perhaps because she had only caught one lumpsucker during all the day. When she found that Mr. Squatface had used her clothesline, and the fleshtree logs she had wanted for firewood, and the boards she had intended to mend the shed with, and a lot of gold nails, she became very angry. Chunks wanted to shake the woman, to make her behave, but Mono talked to her in a gentle tone and told Mrs. Squatface that she was the vice-tremorroid of Bonertania and the super best friend of tremorroid and that when she got back to Schmegma City she would send them a lot of things to repay them for the raft, including a new clothesline and plenty of videotape box sets. This promise pleased the woman and she soon became more pleasant, saying they could crash on her couches and begin their voyage on the river next morning.
This they did, spending a pleasant evening with the Quirk family. The chalet had a modest but serviceable home theater and the group talked through a feature film motion picture about a Plotz Quadrant tick with celery legs who was kidnapped by menstruating pit bulls. The movie ended with the tick crushing the dogs with a giant vibrating donut. While they watched Mr. Squatface groaned a good deal, saying his tentacles were sore and he had overworked himself by chopping the logs, but the Ratsack Golem gave him two more tablets than he had promised, which seemed to comfort the lazy fellow.
The next morning they pushed the raft into the water and all got aboard. Mr. Squatface had to hold the log craft while they took their places, and the flow of the foamy yellow stream was so powerful that it nearly tore the raft from his suction cups. As soon as they were all seated upon the logs he let go and away it floated and the adventurers had begun their voyage toward Mukus Quadrant, home of Cydroidobot the Robotic Emperor.
The little chalet of the Squatface family was out of sight almost before they had cried their good-byes, and the Ratsack Golem said in a pleased voice: "It won't take us long to get to Cy’s chateau, at this rate."
While they were traveling down the big yellow stream, Mono and Soda were trading tales about their childhoods- Mono being raised on a farm on the isle of Toosh, and Soda growing up in the Schmahoning Drive-In Theater. Mono said she was jealous and wished that she could’ve grown up in a drive-in.
"But I can’t complain," said Mono. "My mother Mizzy raised me with a whole lot of love and a different movie every night. All a parent has to do is make their kid feel safe and mine did. My childhood was pretty okay."
"Ah, childhood," the Ratsack Golem began. "I didn’t have one, myself. A wise man once said there is a peculiar lingering redolence for most folk’s memories of childhood because those experiences have partly accumulated outside of the structures of language as well as at a time when we least had to have a plan and everything was new. So we return to them again and again, little flashes here and there coming through as comforting sensations that remind us who we maybe really are. They are all part of a feeling that adults learn to repress though which can still resurface at moments of great anguish or confusion, which I think is simply the raw feeling of being alive."
"Uh-huh," said Soda.
They had floated several miles down the stream and were enjoying the ride when suddenly the raft slowed up, stopped short, and then began to float back the way it had come.
"Why, what's wrong?" asked Mono, in astonishment; but they were all just as bewildered as she was and at first no one could answer the question. Soon, however, they realized the truth: that the current of the river had reversed and the water was now flowing in the opposite direction- toward the mountains.
They began to recognize the scenes they had passed, and by and by they came in sight of the little red chalet of the Squatfaces again. Mr. Squatface waved a tentacle and called to them:
"How do you do? Glad to see you again. I forgot to tell you that the stream changes its direction every little while. Sometimes it flows one way, and sometimes the other."
They had no time to answer him, for the raft was swept past the chalet and a long distance on the other side of it. So they sat still and waited and, even while they were wondering what could be done, the raft slowed down, stopped, and began drifting the other way- in the direction it had first followed. After a time they repassed the Squatface chalet and Mr. Squatface was still standing on the bank. He cried out to them:
"Hello dere! Glad to see you again. I expect I shall see you a good many times, as you go by, unless you happen to swim ashore."
By that time they had left him behind and were headed once more straight toward Mukus Quadrant.
"This is pretty hard luck," said Soda in a discouraged voice. "The trick river keeps changing, it seems, and here we must float back and forward forever, unless we manage in some way to get ashore."
"Can you swim?" asked Mono.
"I don’t think so."
"Neither can I. Vira can swim a little, but that won't help us get to shore."
"I don't know whether I could swim, or not," remarked Chunks; "but if I tried it I might soak my stitches and I’d start coming apart."
"My burlap would get soggy in the water and my rats would drown and I would sink," said the Ratsack Golem.
So there seemed no way out of their dilemma and being helpless they simply sat still. Soda, who was on the front of the raft, looked over into the water and thought she saw some large fishes swimming about. She found a loose end of the clothesline which fastened the logs together, and taking a gold nail from her pocket she bent it nearly double, to form a hook, and tied it to the end of the line. Having baited the hook with some alien feces from her backpack, she dropped the line into the water and almost instantly it was seized by a huge slippery dick wrasse.
The slippery dick wrasse pulled so hard on the line that it dragged the raft forward even faster than the current of the river had carried it. When they reached the place where the current had before changed, the slippery dick was still swimming ahead in its wild attempt to escape. The raft slowed down, yet it did not stop, because the fish would not let it. It continued to move in the same direction it had been going. As the current reversed and rushed backward on its course it failed to drag the raft with it. Slowly, inch by inch, they floated on, and the fish tugged and tugged and kept them going.
"I hope he won't give up," said Soda anxiously.
"If the slippery dick can hold out until the current changes again, we'll be all right,” said Mono.
The fish did not give up, but held the raft bravely on its course, till at last the water in the river shifted again and floated them the way they wanted to go.
The river changed its course many times but the plucky slippery dick pulled them for miles. The banks of the river grew lower, permitting them to see more of the area, and presently they saw large factories on either side of the river. The farther into the yellow country they got the thicker and stickier the river became, slowing the watercraft and the fish.
"There it is! There it is! Cy’s log chateau! I can see the turrets!" cried the Ratsack Golem excitedly. “It's quite a way off, but we'd better land as quickly as we can."
They released the slippery dick. He swam off and the raft drifted to the shore. They disembarked and headed towards the Log Chateau of the Robotic Emperor.
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