FKFIC-L War 10

Time: Saturday, 28 August, and far into the future

Place: The Fiendish Glow

Follows: Step We Gaily, On We Go...

MacHeather, Chris, Lucius, Pen, Brenda, Lora, and Megan, and all the NAs are real and are used by permission.

The original Lucius and the vampbear are real but don't usually converse in people-speak. Young Lucius just might -- though he still looks and acts like a cat to everyone but the very young, the very old, and those who believe in Faeries. He is fictional.

Kerrigan and Father Andrew, and the rest of the Fiendish Glow staff are fictional and belong to the Fiendish Glow.

Granny Maire, Little Chris, and Little Heather were not yet twinklings in their multiple-great-grandparents' eyes at the time this was written, so the need for permission slips seemed moot.

The post dropped a few minutes late because the vampbear wouldn't shut up :)

[The Fiendish Glow, some time Sunday, August 29]

Some time in the long-distant future, at a Highland Games somewhere on the New Scotland colony ship, bound for a new world revolving around a distant star.

"An' that's it?" the kilted child asked. "That's the whole thing?"

"An' tha's the last note yer Great-great-great-great-great-grandmum left aboot it."

"Nae, 'tisn't true, Granny Maire. Listen to Lucius, 'e has lots maire tae say aboat it."

Maire rumpled the little boy's hair affectionately and scratched the cat between its ears. "Lucius may be wiser than we aire, Chris, but he's still a cat -- and cats are not known tae make their wisdom known tae humans."

"Bu' he does, Granny Maire, he does!" Chris insisted.

"Then maybe Lucius would like to tell us the story?" the silver-haired woman suggested.

"Me too, me too! I wawnt tae hair th' story!"

"You too, Haither," Maire allowed as the three of them sat on the station's lawn and shared fish and chips with the black kitten.

Being sated with good food, the cat stretched, looking around against the possibility of intruders on their little tete-a-tete. Seeing none, he curled up on the boy's sporran and went to sleep.

"You're not going to write *that* in the journal, are you?" asked Lucius, Destroyer of Pens.

"Why not?" the vampbear replied. "All fairy tales end with a 'happily ever after' -- why should MacHeather-and-Chris's be any different?"

"Because we're supposed to be writing about what has happened, rather than what will happen -- or rather, what we hope will happen?"

"'History is written by the victors,'" Nicolas quoted, trying to sound erudite.

"Victors of what?"

"Victors of love, I guess," the vampbear shrugged, taking a hit off his bottle.

"I'd rather be a victor of pens and pencils," Lucius replied. "Which reminds me..."

"When I'm done, cat -- when I'm done!" Nicolas waved him off. Now, where to continue...

From the journals of Nicolas de Bearbant, vampbear:

August 28

Well, Pen an' Brenda decided t' have this big party for MacCousin and Chris, and we weren't invited. Well, Lucius was, sort-of, but he was too busy playing with the wedding presents the newlyweds had brought him. Meanwhile, I was upstairs starving, you know?

Anyway, I could hear the music from downstairs -- down TWO FLIGHTS of stairs. And it wasn't 'causa my vampbearic hearing, either. "The Atlantic Hens," I think Pen said they were called -- and boy did they cackle! I mean, I'm your average music-loving vampbear, gimme Snuggle commercials, Teddy Bear's Picnic, any sorta bear-lay, and I'm happy. An' I can deal with classical-type an' nature sounds as well, I mean, I've got a pretty bear'd appreciation a' music. Music, this wasn't. Except for the one time -- no, two times -- all the people got real quiet and started singing some sort of religious stuff.

I'm a vampbear. I don't do religion.

Apparently, neither did the customers -- when the band finished, they made so much noise that they woke up the Faer Ones living about a half-mile down from the subbasement. You don't want to waken a sleeping fairy, they get madder'n I do when someone wakes me up (not that I ever sleep, mind you, but when I do...)

Anyway, there was lots of crashing sounds and stuff, and tinkling of glasses, an' I think some mushy sounds too, something about kissing the bride and all.

I did get to see HeathernChris before they went back downstairs... she looked pretty enough to eat, but Chris wouldn't let me near her :( Guess he thought they weren't shloshed up enough yet... though why he'd dress up to shlosh up is beyond me...

Well, anyway, I think Lucius got bored in a bit 'cos he trailed back up here with the fur and the stake an' said something about a wedding cake and perhaps we should see what was up. So I hopped on the smelly fur and let Lucius drag me downstairs so we could see what was going on.

There were lots -- an' I mean lots -- of people there, dressed like you wouldn't believe! Some were in shorts and t-shirts, others were in fancy stuff... they all looked good enough to eat, and they were all eating an' drinking an' acting really funny. HeathernChris kept bouncing from table to table an' drinkin' with everyone and getting shloshed an' the band was playing something they called "step-dancing", only everyone dancing never danced a single step -- though they did jump up an' down a lot and forgot that they had hands or arms. Strange...

Well, something happened around midnight 'cos several of the people there started acting strange and getting sick an' Brenda thought it might've been something in the Atholl Brose or the food or the mixing drinks right and left, but when those people got all fangy-like (like me!) Siobhan an' Deirdre an' Brenda an' Pen an' Lora an' Megan an' Heather an' Chris brought out some really yummy-smelling bottled stuff an' started handing it out to all the vamps. Said something about an "Ulsterman's Special". I wanted to find out if I could get some, but everyone kept ignoring me. Finally, Lucius decided it was his time to dance, so he dragged me out on the dance floor just as the band was getting down from the stage. Everybody laughed -- they thought Lucius was cute. They thought I was cute. I was never so embearassed in my unlife! Oh, well, at least it brought me some attention an' I was able to get to the table with Brenda an' Pen an' Lora an' Megan an' all the others, and got a chance to get some live food from them, which the other vamps couldn't, so there!

Nyaah, ninny, nyaah, nyaah! I got live food -- you can't get none!

Bthehththhfhththhh!!!

Anyway, some idiot with a cross on comes in an' says Father Andrew couldn'ta married them 'cos he doesn't have any lie cents but he could if they wanted and would they repeat after him something that made me feel strange an that sounded like "Haimish go hammill to see Dorothy in the chapel in Oz"(1)... and then everyone else said something that sounded like "slant your bar" and drank whatever was in their glasses an' then there was some sorta gigantic cake and the humans kept pushing it in each other's faces while the vamps just kept drinking Ulsterman's Special an dancin' to that funny stepping Highland jumping weird dance.... an then there was the violinists who were dancing while they were playing so their music sounded all jumpy-like, and the drummer who kept waving his drum so it ran into the bagpiper who bumped into the guitarist who... well, let's just say that this so-called great Celtic band was nothing more than a giant mosh pit :( But all the people liked it, so I guess it was ok.

Brenda said that at tooehem they had to close up officially cuzzuh the law but they could keep partyin' cuz it was private or something like that. Looked pretty general to me, but then what do I know of ranks? (A lot more than Lucius, that's for sure. After all, I do watch eight hours of STAR TREK a week...)

Well, a lottathe vamps had to leave before sun-up or take the low road out the subway entrance (I know, I know those Canadians call it "metro" but I'm a NewYawkuh so there bpththth!). I think half of 'em were shloshed too, but I'm not sure how to get a vamp shloshed so I can't bug Brenda for some party stuff either :(

But anyway, they kept partying and the sun came up and the brunch crowd came in an' some of the folk left for church but then they came back and some folk had to leave for work an go home an everything but Pen an Brenda an Lora an Megan an everybeardy who glows stayed an kept partying and partying even after the band went home an they started singin themselves an kept on dancin and eatin and drinkin an singin off key an....

"You're going to finish that, bear, or can I have my pen?" Lucius emphasized with a swipe of his forepaw.

"Well, I haven't finished writing all the singing and dancing and eating and drinking and---"

"You'll run out of time if you keep on repeating it."

"So what do you suggest?"

"Use the traditional Irish fairy-tale ending: 'And the wedding went on for nine years, and nine months, and nine weeks--"

"And what about their jobs, and Texas, and their families, and Scotland?"

In the next room, MacHeather stirred in her Chris's arms.

"Honey?"

"Yeah?"

"What're we going to do about all these favors, and the family back home and everything?"

"Huh?"

"The wedding that we scheduled for next weekend."

"We'll just have it, anyway. Everything's paid for, and the family wants to see us wed, anyway. Then it's off to Scotland for the honeymoon."

"Kewl. Tha gra agam ort.(2)"

"Tha gradh agam ort, Heather.(2)"

"Awwwwww...." the vampbear and cat said, then shook their heads before screaming "YUCK!" at the tops of their lungs.

"So," said Nicolas, scratching in his little vampbear journal, "The wedding lasted for nine years and nine months and nine weeks--"

"Make that two weeks, and then moved to Texas," Lucius added, hopefully.

"--and nine weeks, and nine states, and nine countries, and nine continents--"

"There are only seven continents on Earth," Lucius corrected.

"It's my story, and I'll write it the way I want to," Nicolas retorted.

"Seven continents," said Lucius, tugging away at the pen.

The vampbear found the ink release and pulled it, hoping to squirt blue-black fluid at the cat. It went the wrong way and stained his natural linen chemise, instead.

"@*(&#*A^T@*&@^*%@@%^#@#$A%$$*@@!!!!!!!!" he roared.

"Serves you right!" the cat said, sticking out its tongue.

"Why, you----!!!!"

"Back to the story," Lucius prodded.

"And they both lived happily ever after to the age of nine hundred, and they had nine children each of nine sexes and --"

"You're stalling."

"They had lots of kids and lots of cats and lots of shloshing and remembered never to let MacHeather make Atholl Brose again," the vampbear scribbled. After a moment's thought, he added, "THE END" in big, bold letters, and slammed the book shut before the ink had the chance to dry.

"Happy?" he asked, as the black cat ran away with the now-empty fountain pen.

"I'll be sure to tell it to my kittens," he miaowed.

[Same place and time as before.]

"So that's how Lucius learned the rest of the story," Heather told her Granny.

"An' how would you know that?" her older brother asked.

"The vampbear showed me his book," she said, pulling out several brittle pages of scribbles from her little purse.

Granny Maire raised a quizzical eyebrow to the Faer Ones who had certainly made their homes aboard this space ship. And then she, too, fell asleep.

"Come back with the pen, Lucius! I forgot to mention that Vaq Tammy was there in leather, and Brenda'll turn me back to fluff if I don't write it in!"

"Then back to fluff it is, bear," the cat said. "The pen is MINE."

Nicolas wearily trudged off in search of another pen to finish his great epic novel... journal... whatever...

(1) This is supposed to be Gaelic wedding vows, but I don't know how to pronounce them, the vampbear doesn't know how to write them, and I ran out of time to ask Pen for assistance. The real vows can be found at http://www.britannia.org/scotland/marriagevows.shtml

(2) "I love you" in Scots Gaelic. Unfortunately, I've no idea which one is from a man to a woman and which, from a woman to a man -- so if I've got them mixed up, you'll know why! These can be found at the same page as the Gaelic wedding vows.

Thanks to Heather and her fiance Chris for letting me set them up in cyberspace in a way they would never have thought of (nor their families approved of, I'm sure!) in real life. May your wedding come off without a snag, and may you live long and happily together.

"Slainte Mhath!"