Monday, November 21, 2005

Sleepily Ever After - Part II

Note: Here is Part 2 of a story which i thought will never see light. Appa is back home after surgery and quickly getting back to health. Thanks for all your support and patience. The same rules hold good now too :) And yeah, kindly eshus the punctuation :D
**************
Sleepily Ever After - 2

Siliconian legends talk of dark demons that once dwelled on these shores; forces tough to overcome as they hardly slept. However Granny GreyWhiskers claims that the lake went by the beautiful name of So Many Aah, a poetic allusion to the sigh that escaped from the tourists as they drank in the serenity of its shores. As Silicon planet grew in size, every known mud hole was up for grabs and the shores of Lake So Many Aah were no exception. The running feet and whispering wings completely changed the noise level and over time the gazillion antennae twittering different dialects re-christened the lake to In Somnia and so it remains to this day. Historians call such claims as humbug. This has irked the Humbug Hamburger clan (to which Granny GreyWhiskers belongs) so much that it has its troops humming around angrily in every willing ear against those historians. If you hear a buzz, do voice your support in favour of them humbugs. 

 Before you feel any remorse for the loss of peace on the shores of Lake In Somnia, stop and swim a little further and you will regain it all on the small island of Sleepily Ever After - A paradise for the restless soul. In fact there is even a famous verse on Sleepily Ever After and Lake So Many Aah written by some little known poet of yesteryears. It is called “Invocation of the Restless Mind” or some such title. These Siliconian poets are crazy, if you ask me. Don’t tell Granny, as they are both related. 

Aah sigh Zwoosh muah Buzzah brrimp Glooze wuah Cricky Hmm 
This, if loosely translated would mean 
  A house by the sea with waves kissing our feet, 
Kiss on the forehead to seal the zephyr's defeat;
A walk into the woods smelling the dried leaves, 
Lean hands to hold tight against dreams darkness weaves; 
Bed of violets and roses to colour every vision, 
Strong shoulders to lean back 

 Oh look! Here come Little Dudlum and Littlette Pookums. 
Let me give you the last two verses and we shall accompany them on their journey. 

  Strong shoulders to lean back after any decision; 
 Songs of trance under a star-studded sky, 
Caress on the lips to swallow the impending why;
Shower under the waterfall heeding the Nymph's call 
And an eternal silence to end it all. 

 The ports of Lake In Somnia were buzzing with activity.  Littlette Pookums stared wide-eyed at the huge figure in front of her. The Green Hopper, lent to them by her friend Amber Ambrosia, to take them to the island was no small toy. It was a lean, mean machine built to take up any adventure. And why wouldn’t it, with its army of Worker Ants running around, feeding it the fuel molasses that had been saved all summer? It was a long flight but for the 2 pairs of eyes on board The Green Hopper, there wasn’t enough time to drink in the beauty around; the blue-black waves, the towering purple mountains at the end of Silicon planet and the glimpse of Sleepily Ever After as a tiny dot that grew in size.

  “Welcome to your home…away from home” said the voice. 

Little Dudlum squinted his eyes to look at the round GlugSlug Rippler, The Chief of Sleepily Ever After. The Ripplers were called so because they moved about in small ripples. GlugSlug took the Bugs on a tour around the island; his big posterior making a wobbly ripple behind him making Littlette Pookums giggle at every whoosh. With the day coming to a close, Down Town was slowly going to sleep and a soothing calm settled over Sleepily Ever After like a heavy blanket. They soon found a warm hole to settle in and start afresh. Now the residents of Sleepily Ever After had no trouble falling asleep. In fact the unruffled tranquility on the island did wonders to their health; their whiskers grew long and fine and their nose picked up sounds miles away. As dusk blossomed into night, Littlette Pookums couldn’t hide her glee. She was so excited about her sleep, she thought she would stay awake to see it arrive. Ironic but since iron was not an element found on Silicon planet, Littlette Pookums never knew what ironic meant.

 Night came and went but sleep eluded Littlette Pookums. Not one to easily give up, Littlette Pookums blamed it on the air travel and looked forward to the next night. Three sleepless nights later, the solution was turning into a problem. What Littlette Pookums hadn’t bargained for was the clarity in which Little Dudlum’s snores would reverberate in the still of the night. As is the case with any content husband, Little Dudlum continued his slumber oblivious to his wife’s predicament. The next morning saw a dejected Littlette Pookums making her way to Down Town for Amber’s Snapple stuffed Bug Pies. But the atmosphere around the island was no longer peaceful. An untold tension hung in the air and the residents were walking around as if in a trance. Nobody knew why Amber’s shop, usually the first to open, remained closed till mid morning. 

 Two more nights passed, eventless and sleepless. Pookums Lilt seriously began to doubt her decision. And the island was no longer the serene paradise the advertisement claimed it to be. In fact yesterday she had to wait until 3 P.M to buy her favourite Bug Pies. Most shops remained closed all morning and the entire town seemed to be in a bad mood. Next morning while Synfois made its second tour of the island, the residents of Sleepily Ever After met in the Town Hall to take an important decision. As Little Dudlum and Littlette Pookums walked in, 500 pairs of eyes stared at them and a murmur spread around the room like a huge wave. GlugSlug’s bodyguard, Chafer LongHorn, clicked his pincers and brought the crowd to attention. Little Dudlum and Littlette Pookums stared wide-eyed at the entire proceedings, too dazed to utter a word.

 The Secret Service of Sleepily Ever After, Mossad Quitoes, placed their findings before the community.
 “Since the arrival of Little Dudlum Pastel and Littlette Pookums Lilt the nights on the island have no longer been peaceful. We sent our best troops to investigate and they have found the source of the unknown, deadly noise to be the hovel of our new residents. The lack of calm has resulted in a drop in Amber Ambrosia’s Bug Pies and an increase in the overall noise level. To counter this and save the island we request the immediate evacuation of Little Dudlum Pastel and Littlette Pookums Lilt”.
 The crowd agreed. 
 Chief GlugSlug rippled his way to the front, his characteristic whoosh in tow. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, a squeak was heard. It was Sir Suttar Suttar, the leading scientist of the Coypu clan who had come to the island in search of the legendary Moboba Flower. 
Sleepily Ever After was once home to the beautiful Moboba flowers and the Coypus. The Coypus thrived on the seeds of the Moboba plant while the Moboba grew to dizzying heights listening to the chatter of the Coypus. Since the advent of the other species that preferred twittering to chattering, the Coypu population moved out and the calm that enveloped the island slowly wiped out the Moboba flowers. 

  “I had almost given up hope on finding the Moboba plant and tracing my ancestry until I found a small sapling growing in the bushes behind Little Dudlum’s home. The sapling showed positive leaning towards this unknown noise from Little Dudlum’s premises and I am sure with all your help and my invention we can bring back the Moboba flower.”
A loud silence followed this short but strong squeak from Sir Suttar Suttar. GlugSlug looked at the mass of quivering antennae, which quivered more as The Chief slowly chewed on the new development. Frankly he didn’t care a rat’s ass for the scientist and his brains but he was afraid to voice his opinion lest he fall prey to the Suttar clan like the Historians did to the Hamburger group. Finally GlugSlug gave an imperceptible nod for the research; imperceptible due to the layers of fat that made distinguishing between face and neck highly impossible.

 After a week of buzzing restlessness of the Mossad Quitoes standing guard outside Sir Suttar’s residence and nightly promenades of Littlette Pookums around her house, which almost resulted in a deep ditch, the scientist successfully fine-tuned his invention. That night the island went to bed filled with trepidation. The tension in the air could be cut with a knife but knifing through tensions hadn’t yet caught up on Silicon planet so the crowd just silently went to sleep. 

Littlette Pookums went to bed in her 8 pairs of walking shoes. Just in case. Little Dudlum nosed with Sir Suttar’s invention was a little uneasy in bed but eventually he fell asleep. Pookums Lilt started at him, in anticipation of that familiar tune which had grown into her life. She waited. In silence. 

 The next thing she knew, a loud cheer and a cherubic face woke her up. She had slept peacefully. Little Dudlum winked. An impossible feat considering Little Dudlum hardly had any eyelids but for Littlette Pookums anything is possible if she can sleep. Outside their little abode was a small group of well wishers and right in the middle stood Sir Suttar Suttar armed with a beautiful bouquet of Moboba flowers Littlette Pookums had ever seen. 

Chief GlugSlug rippled his way to the front to congratulate the scientist and to ask him to explain the miracle. Knowing well that scientific jargon of the Silicon planet hasn’t yet made any inroads into our world, I shall refrain from going into details of this sound-breaking invention. But for the curious amongst you, Sir Suttar’s invention was a contraption that would fit perfectly over Little Dudlum’s nose and change his loud snores into sonic waves, which would be received by a receptor near the Moboba fields. This receptor would then convert these waves to chatter at a decibel level required by the plants to grow. As the chattering decibel is at a different level from what is twittered by the masses on the island, the island’s noise level did not increase. 
The unruffled tranquility remained just that. 
Unruffled.

 Sir Suttar Suttar completed his rather boring squeaky lecture and turned around to present his bouquet to the loving couple and that was when the crowd realized they were missing. The Chief’s bodyguard swung into action but they didn’t have to search for long. Nestled under the huge rosabella leaf on their bed, were Little Dudlum and Littlette Pookums, deep in slumber. And there they lived Sleepily Ever After.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home