Hitherby Dragons

¹ whose story does not interest.

The snowflake kingdom is high on the cloud. Prince Adric lives there. He doesn’t like Prince Leopold. PUSH!

Prince Leopold goes over the edge. Flutter flutter flutter down to the earth below.

King Gordon lives on the cloud. King Gordon is sleeping with Laurel, Melinda, and Amanda. They catch him at it. It’s not too hard once they take off the blindfolds. PUSH!

King Gordon goes over the edge. Flutter flutter flutter down to the earth below.

It’s their tragic destiny. It’s nature’s calamity! They have to have infighting so that we can have snow.

“Oh, Romeo,” says Juliet, who is a snowflake from a great snowflake family, “wherefore art thou Romeo?”

Romeo gives her a chilly glare. He can’t help it. He’s a snowflake. He also makes pointed remarks. It’s just part of the package.

“Look, babe. I’m just how I gotta be.”

“Well, I’m killing myself, then!” JUMP!

Juliet goes over the edge. Flutter flutter flutter down to the earth below.

“Woe is me! Nobody loves Snowflake Romeo!” JUMP!

Romeo goes over the edge. Flutter flutter flutter down to the earth below.

In the spring, it will be warmer, and the rain will fall like the blood of God, speared through the heart by a lance of sunlight, falling forever through the sky, soft as a cloud. Because that’s what it is.

In the autumn, leaves will scurry from the trees to carry out their offensive against the governments of mankind. They’re orange and red. Those are the colors of their revolution.

In the winter, King Gordon XVIII will stand before the assembled snowflakes. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he will say, and everyone will look utterly blank.

Gordon will blush. He cribbed his speech from late night television. Bad Gordon XVIII!

“Variously sexed frozen particles of water!”

Wild cheering.

“Tonight, we launch our invasion plan of the earth below.”

He gestures widely at the snow mortars; at the snow tanks; at the snow bombs, each carrying more than a teraton of explosive power, if only snowflakes had nuclear technology, which admittedly they do not. “We shall sweep them away in our wrath. We will bury them!” JUMP!

Gordon falls.

JUMP!

Many subjects fall.

The sergeants scowl at the others. PUSH!

The remaining subjects fall. Flutter flutter flutter down to the earth below.

“Oh no!” cried King Gordon XVIII. “We forgot our military armament. Can anyone flutter upwards?”

King Gordon XVIII hits the windshield of someone who doesn’t know how to drive in the snow. Splat.

This is everybody’s world.

Helen is a teenaged girl living in Brooklyn.

On the evening of April 3rd, 1997, Helen comes home from a shopping trip. She’s hiding her face behind a box and carrying a mouse cage in her free hand. She lugs it into her room. It’s a typical teen girl’s room, except that its walls are padded and it has no mirrors. It has two windows. One window is open. It has no screen, but there’s a piece of paper taped over the opening. It’s a big note, written on construction paper. It says, “No Launching! – Tyndareus”

Helen puts down the cage.

She looks at the note.

LAUNCH!

The note flies through the air. It flutters, flutters, flutters down to the Earth below.

Helen does not look at the cage. She opens it.

A mouse runs out. It runs around. It squeaks. Suddenly, it sees Helen’s face.

LAUNCH!

Another mouse runs around. It squeaks. Suddenly, it sees Helen’s face.

LAUNCH!

The last mouse walks out. It is quiet and dignified. It is a solid gentleman of a mouse. It looks up. It opens its mouth to squeak.

LAUNCH!

Flutter, flutter, flutter, down to the Earth below.

“Helen?”

It’s her adoptive father’s voice! Helen quickly hides her face behind the box so she doesn’t launch him. Then she turns. “Yes, father?”

Tyndareus’ voice is wry and gentle. “The neighbors say it’s raining mice again.”

“I’m trying to get to a thousand,” Helen says.

She’s hiding her face behind a box labelled “e-Life.” It’s a promotional box for a revolutionary Internet-aware life management application! Treading the thin line between an Outlook clone and a massively multiplayer online RPG, e-Life proved impossible for its original designers to launch. Helen hasn’t launched it yet, but she doesn’t quite trust it—the box always seems as light and trembly as feathers in her hands.

“If I launch a thousand mice,” Helen says, “then I won’t launch mice any more, and I can keep one as a pet. But if I don’t launch them on purpose, then I’ll launch them every time I happen across one, and I’ll be old and gray before I can buy one to keep!”

“I suppose that’s true,” Tyndareus says. “But couldn’t you aim them away from the street?”

“Father!” Helen says. “If they don’t fly out the window, they’ll hit the wall!”

She’s so shocked by his suggestion that she lowers the box.

LAUNCH!

Tyndareus flies through the air. He hits the wall. It’s padded, of course. He lands with a long-suffering slump.

“Five hundred and seventy-nine,” he says.

“Oops,” Helen blushes.

“You know,” he says, “if I can survive it, the mice probably can. And it’s less of a fall.”

Helen blushes deeper.

“I didn’t think of that,” she admits.

She hangs her head.

“It’s okay,” he says. Then he laughs. “Hey,” he says, “you’ll be through launching me before you’re old and gray.”

“That’s true,” she agrees.

“Before I’m old and gray, even,” he says.

“You’re pretty old already, Daddy,” she says.

He grins. “Maybe,” he says.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hey?”

“Hey,” she says, and she’s suddenly looking pretty sad, “Hey, I was wondering, is it because I’m ugly?”

The Dog Family lives in the Cold Forest.

Bernard Dog wakes up. Pup Chili and Pup Louis are bouncing on his stomach.

“Get up, Papa! Get up, Papa!”

So Bernard Dog stretches. He yawns. His yawn ends in a cute little murfle. Then he gets out of bed.

Bernard Dog walks down to the kitchen. Claire Dog has cooked breakfast and made coffee.

“Would you like to look at the newspaper, dear?”

The newspaper sits on the counter.

Waves of evil rise from the newspaper.

“Bark!” says Bernard Dog. “I mean, no.”

Claire smiles. “Oh, honey.”

She walks up to him. They sniff noses. Claire’s breath is cold. Then Bernard eats breakfast and drinks his coffee.

“I’m off to a day at work,” Bernard says.

“Can I come with you?” asks Pup Chili.

Bernard Dog laughs. He hugs Pup Chili. Pup Chili is cold and a little bit squishy.

“Of course,” Bernard says. “But only to the bus stop.”

So Bernard Dog and Pup Chili go to the bus stop. Bernard and Chili sit next to the bench and wait.

On the other side of the street are two squirrels.

Waves of evil rise from the two squirrels.

Bernard Dog’s nostrils flare.

“Evil everywhere,” he says. His neck hair bristles. He stands up. He barks. “Bark! Bark!”

The squirrels sneer at him, but they also look nervous. They scurry away.

Soon the bus trundles up. It’s driven by an old grizzled dog named Clancy. Bernard does not like Clancy. Clancy lost a leg in the war. Bernard feels a strange guilt because of this. Sometimes this makes Bernard pretend to be innocent. Other times it makes his neck hair bristle and makes him very angry.

“Hello, Clancy,” Bernard says.

“Hello!”

Bernard can feel Clancy’s eyes on his. They hurt him.

“Good bye, Pup Chili!” says Bernard.

But Pup Chili is gone.

Clancy’s silence is awkward.

The bus drives Bernard to work.

“Hey,” says Clancy. “I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“About—”

Bernard is on his feet. He is barking. It is suddenly very important that he bark louder than whatever Clancy is about to say.

“Whatever,” says Clancy. “Stupid dog.”

He halts the bus. It is Bernard’s stop.

Bernard gets out. He goes to the construction site. He digs. He digs very fast with his clever paws.

“Hey,” says his boss, Oliver Dogswell. “Hey. If you need some time?”

But Bernard doesn’t need time. He works all day. Then he goes home.

“I got an A on my math test, Daddy!” says Pup Chili. “It’s because I cheated!”

“I tore up the newspaper,” says Pup Louis. “I think it was bad. It was an evil newspaper! So I tore it up!”

Bernard licks the childrens’ faces to tell them they are good. Their faces are cold and a little molty.

“I’m so glad,” says Bernard Dog.

It’s late that night when he stares at Claire’s rotting face and asks her, “How come none of you left me when you died?”

“Even if something matters,” says Claire, “even if it’s right, even if it’s true, even if it’s important, there are some dogs—”

And here she looks archly at him.

“Who hang on a bit harder than those things deserve.”

He laughs and pins her down and licks her nose, trying to ignore the way that it tastes colder than ice.