back / next / Sarcon’s Son 9
Change of scene. The imps are arrived in Heaven, aery transport courtesy of Love.
As Lord Judas’ spies they act the part of tourists, scampering through the historic district where sightseers go, until Sarconsson finds two spigots mounted above a fluted basin.
He opens the golden one and drinks straight from the faucet. Then twisting the handle to close its valve, he turns to his girlfriend. Honey covers his mouth. “Jesus, beezus, how to please us!” He smacks his sticky lips.
“Oooooh, the other one must be milk!” squeals Cornumsdotter pointing to the white handle.
Sure enough, on the wall above are letters in fancy script: M & H*. The imps fall on each other in a joyful embrace. Milk to sour!
Most beings on this crowded square are out-of-towners or new arrivals come for a peek at paradise. Amid the bustle the imps do their trickster thing, then fly across golden pavement to hover behind a modestly clothed statue. No naked monuments here.
Heavenly theme park for tourists
Soon a chattering family of ghosts, three generations, perhaps wiped out by earthquake or accident, amble along with their visitors’ maps. The children quarrel over the honey spigot but their granny bops their respective heads and tells them to drink milk. Her order is echoed by a jovial father. So the M faucet is opened only to generate shrieks and spitting. The nasty milk pouring out is spoiled.
“Imagine that!” says the mother, and then she’s bopping the children because the siblings are shouting double-dares — to take mouthfuls of the rancid stuff and spit it on each other.
The imps erupt with cackles like drunken witches. Sarconsson jumps into the milky tag game which fans out on the busy plaza. Other children join, shrieking like demons. Parents shout and scold. Old people get knocked into. Immortals gather Their skirts while making loud comments about behavior.
That’s when Cornumsdotter gives the signal, one long and two short bursts of belly light. Maximum fun per unit of chaos has been attained. Time to bugge-out. She sings:
fee-fi!
flee! fly!
do or die!
Sarconsson is oblivious, happily spewing clotted milk. He lacks any sense of timing and will stay on until he’s beaten up or jailed or worse if Cornumsdotter doesn’t protect him. She marvels at the 300 million years he has survived. Oh, the truth is a goodly number of those Ages he’s spent trapped inside amber or tar pits or peat bogs, put there by furious Immortals. Astonishing how the imp always escapes and never learns.
Now she must once more save him from himself. She’s tried light and song. Time for smell. Cornumsdotter squints, grimaces, and squeezes out a plume of pheromones. The scent particles stick like lint to her boyfriend who is a mess of honey and milk. He pauses. Sniffs. Shakes himself.
Not enough. Go for the touch. Cuticular pheromones. She heaves and grunts until a fatty hydrocarbon percolates through her skull and saturates her antennae. It’s a contact buzz. It’s irresistible.
A bugge on a mission, she sweeps over Sarconsson and slaps him with her feelers, curls her insect horns across his face, penetrates his nose, his mouth until he gasps for mercy. The two of them speed away through the Heavenly air, playing their own game of tag. Mid-flight the imps join, in such a way … well … It’s fortunate the misbehaving children are otherwise occupied. They died innocent, and Heaven on holiday is no place to defile that.