Well, the Phoenix party has been a bust. The fog rolled in, and weirdness ensued, so the usual crowd appears to have decided either to investigate or to call it a night. Right now there's only two customers in the bar. One is an attractive woman that I've never seen before, a tourist by the look of her (the camera she carries is a dead giveaway). She and Phred are listening to a somewhat agitated Sgt. Major Chopper, who's going on about what happened to him in the fog...

"'Twas passing strange, I'll tell ya. When that fog rolled in, it felt wrong, ya know, so Captain Charpe thought it'd be a good idea to send out some patrols, just in case. Anyway, he and I were walking near the city hall in Blackwood when we thought saw another group of militia. The Captain was ready to raise hell with 'em for patrolling the wrong part of town, when we realize that these fellas weren't orcs. They were men!

"The Captain ordered them to halt, and demanded to know who they were. Then their leader steps forward into the light, and hand to Krell, he looks and sounds just like the Captain, ya know, if the Captain was human. They just looked at each other for a second, and then the human starts demanding to know who the hell WE are. Well, the two of them start arguing, and then the sergeant that was with them aimed a big gun at us, so we backed off. They moved off into the fog, and we tried to trail them, but they just vanished. The Captain's off reporting to the Mayor to see what's to be done."

I take another glance out the window, and notice the penguin, out dancing under a streetlight... With Gene Kelly... And Snoopy...

I give Phred the signal to pour another round for the house.

I pass by the video feed for the holographic projection system and notice to my that the DVD input has stopped and that the system is getting it's input directly from a TV feed. I switch on the video monitor to see what's getting fed into the system......oh no.

The voices echo through the fog, ghostly and menacing. A few unlucky townpeople, out too late, run screaming from the sound. One slams into ita, who grabs him by the collar.

"What's going on here?"

He stares at her, wild-eyed. "Horrible... so horrible..."

"What?"

"Smurfs..." He runs. Th voices can still be heard-- in fact, they're getting louder.

"La la la la la la, la la la la la..."

Cat's claws dig through the wool of my cloak and into the flesh of my shoulder. I turn my head and stare into gold-green eyes huge with aprehension. And then I hear it, too.

"La la la la la la la, la la la la la..."

Brian sits bolt upright in bed, scanning the room with wild eyes.

"Are you humming?" His voice is demanding, accusatory.

"Wha?" I'm still more than half asleep.

"Can you hear that? Is it just me? Am I picking up television stations in my fillings again?"

I don't know what he means. Then I listen hard. I can hear it.

"La la la la la la, la la la la la."

What the hell is going on?

Hector is howling under the bed, his writhing causing the frame to jump and rattle. I look up from Yrgwrath's Demon Colloquialisms From the Ungulant Invasion to The Porwefarang Uprising and cock my head.

"What the thousand devils of Hedrogoth is that noise?"

Hector growls and burbles. "Make it stop. Please make it stop..."

"What is it?"

"God they're so smarmy...and cute...where's the kitty? Maybe the kitty can finally eat them..."

Hector has clearly gone insane. Kitty? Smarmy? What?

"Azrael..." he pleads. Now he's asking for the Angel of Death? Well, with this noise, I almost can't blame him.

I put down the grimoire and gather my overcoat and staff. "I'm going out," I tell him. "I may be some time."

See now, that's so much more comfortable, back in my own bubble. The sky looks so blue through my window, and there's a melody drifting through the air. Except that it seems a very even, measured blue. And also it seems to be moving. That can't be normal.

Oh, no, not Smurfs! They ran me out of the last town I went to; I chose Sang Sacre because I thought the porn would keep them out. They've got a natural immunity to it.That's why they spend their days on hillsides picking flowers.

Uh oh. erika brought the Smurfs with her.

The odd "la la la la la la" triggers something in the back of my mind. Almost unconsiously I start singing "Blue people make me sick. Who knows what makes them tick....."