#48: Banana Slug -Clothing

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“Ok Boys and Girls.” Yvetter, told her group of rowdies. “The ArchMage has something he wants to show us. Try to keep the noise down to a dull roar OK? Even if you’re not interested I want to hear what he has to say.”

They kids all grinned. Some knew the truth about Yvette, some didn’t. They all thought she was cool. She was exaggerating, a little. They did their best to be quiet and polite. The truth was that they actually did. They were an extra ordinarily polite group of children. They were, however, children.

They left no mess when they left Ernie’s. Zero. None. Nada. Zilch. Their Avatars ate everything that they didn’t. They wiped up any spill with paper napkins then ate the napkins, They also ate the paper cups, plastic forks and any other trash. The place was cleaner after they left than before they arrived. You never can have too much SSmoke was their motto too.

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Shelby was waiting for them in the Wizard’s keep. He was standing in the middle of the room.

“Gather round kids.” He told them “We’re going to talk about clothes.”

They groaned. He grinned. In his day this bunch would have driven their teachers insane. They would have been classified as hyper-active and probably have been doped to their eyebrows into a drugged stupor to keep them calm, for the connivence of their so called teachers. Shelby had seen it happen to his younger siblings and had developed an abiding hatred for those who drugged kids. He had to admit though that normally active kids were hell on clothes, these kids were worse, like shaking hands with a chain saw.

They grinned some sheepishly. If they could be embarrassed they would be. Not a one of them had pants that didn’t have a rip or torn out knees. Some of their T-shirts were even worse.

“We’re going to fix them.” Shelby told them. “I think your mother’s might appreciate it. For the life of me I can’t imagine why it took me so long to come up with this idea. When Cody was previewing his new class of boat the other day, something he said struck a chord. Then Elvira went data-diving into the SoulStone and hit gold.”

Elvira, sitting on Shelby’s shoulder as normal, fluttered into the air, flew in a circle over their heads, then landed in the middle of them on the floor.

“Now that I’ve got your attention” she said. “Watch this!”

She began to show off. Normally the little dragon was rather drab. Not today.

She changed colors



and become much more exotic.

Her wings became iridescent.

Her scales glittered and shone.

The children were delighted. All eyes were upon her. Except for Cody. Cody was a suspicious one. He knew what Elvira could do, as could all the Avatars. What was the ArchMage up too? Why the obvious misdirection? He noticed that Joshua was grinning. He wondered why, then he looked more closely at the ArchMage.

“Huh?” he said out loud. The clapped his hands over his mouth. His eyes glittered as he tried to keep from laughing.

The ArchMage’s clothing was transforming in time with that of Elvira. His clothes changed from a suite, to overalls, to flannel shirt, through a whole range of attire.

One by one and in groups all of the children caught on.

“You like it?” Shelby asked them.

They all grinned. They were suddenly a little bit self conscious of their clothes.

Rags really.

“You see what I’m doing here?” Shelby asked them. They all nodded. Carl nodded a LOT. He was head bumping actually.

“na na-na na naaaa “ he was whispering with a bright light in his eyes.’

“Na na na na na Bat Man” he whispered and grinned at Shelby. Shelby felt a bit uneasy, something wasn’t quite right with that kid. That boy was just weird. He noticed that Tommy elbowed Carl in the ribs pretty good. Carl shut up but his eyes stayed bright.

“Ahem” Shelby said. “Like I said, I don’t know why it took me so long to realize this. We can manipulate SSmoke to be clothes. Now ya’ll get comfortable.”

Professor’s robes materialized around Shelby. Sitting in his wheelchair he looked like Professor Xavier from X-Men. Except for the hair. That part was more like Tolkien’s Gandalf.

The kids blinked then followed suite. Their torn and ripped clothes magically healed themselves but maintained a loose, comfortable fit. Carl’s clothes turned into bunny pajama’s but Sally elbowed him and he turned them into black jeans and a sweatshirt. Shelby figured that Carl was elbowed a lot.

“Let’s review a tiny bit” he said “Since Elvira dug SSmoke out of the SoulStone DataBase we’ve messed with it some. We may have it right. As you know, when you don a dragon tear several things happen. One thing is that the chain around your neck keys to your DNA and becomes a selective inductive neural interface. You can then control SSmoke mentally if you have the keys.”

“Then there is the diamond thingy hanging from the chain. That’s ultra-condensed SSmoke. We’ve taken to calling it crystal smoke. A lot of SSmoke can be packed into a small area when it’s condensed like that, and I mean a LOT.” he said

“ Your Avatars also make SSmoke. They strain pollution out of the air around you and turn it into clean air and SSmoke. They only make a little bit that way. Feed them litter from a meal at Ernie’s or, a lump of coal or a gallon of gasoline and they make a lot more.” He coughed sheepishly. The eyes of his audience were beginning to glaze “Well never mind that. I’m getting off the subject a bit. The point I’m getting to is that if you have an Avatar then you always have a cloud of SSmoke hanging around you. Sometimes more sometimes less.”

Everyone nodded. This was news? They knew this. Some of the kids had learned a little bit on their own how to use that personal SSmoke much to their parents surprise and dismay.

“So use it for clothes” Shelby said. “Don’t just leave it floating out in space for no reason. Or hanging on you like bling. Use it!”

That got their attention. Carl’s head was bobbing again.

“Ok. Some suggestions.” he said “ I want you to write a bunchaton of control programs for your own personal SSmoke clothing using SmokeTalk. I want to look at them. Que those programs in the neuro-loop so that you can trigger them in an instant. Key word for those of you who are paying attention. I said INSTANT. A word to the wise should be sufficient. Now here’s the hard part. In addition to JUST clothes I want ya’ll to think multi-use and safety.”

They all looked at him funny.

“Ya’ll might not know it but we live in a dangerous environment. The Maggi and Dragon Force have done a FINE job of protecting you but they can’t be everywhere. I want you to come up with some ideas of your own. I want you to take more responsibility for your own safety.“ He said

“I could give you exact guidelines and boring instructions but where’s the fun in that? All I’m gonna say is that you got a week to make all your mistakes in private then it’s my turn to expose them in public.” He looked at them with a purely EVIL glint in his eye.

“One week from today.” he smiled “We’ll meet at High Noon for a fashion show, in that open lot next to Sam’s. I’ve talked to Sam about it and he said it’d be ok. I’ll have surprises for you so you need to be ready. Just remember that clothes make the man(or lady). If you have the right clothing and know how to use them you’ll be ok. If you don’t? Well let’s just say it will get messy.”

“Oh yeah. One more thing.” his grin was positively wicked. “ I’m removing the Community SSmoke from Sam’s Lot. It will be a SmokeFree Zone for a while unless you bring your own. You won’t be able to fly in there on community smoke. You’ll be on your own.

muwahahahaha”

They hated it when he did his evil wizard laugh. Bad things always happened when he did that.

“Oh.......and Carl?” Shelby said.

Startled, Carl did his best ‘deer in the headlights’ imitation.

“Don’t hold back Carl.” Shelby said “Be inventive.”

Chad had walked in partway through the presentation. He’d waited patiently and quietly until Shelby was done. The kids scattered like a flock of quail. Being in the doorway when they departed might have been fatal. Luckily he had anticipated the danger and stepped to one side.

“What was that all about?” he asked Shelby.

Shelby grinned “I was struck by a thought that escalated. I decided that it’s time for our young dragons to test their wings. To do that they need some wings, so to speak. It should be interesting.”

He shook himself much like a dog shaking off water. “Now, me and you need to devise a confidence course, in a manner of speaking. Perhaps the Orcs could help?”

Chad grinned. “This might be a lot of fun.”

They both looked at Joshua as if noticing him for the first time.

“Is he one of us or is he one of them?” Chad looked at Shelby as he spoke.

Shelby was momentarily surprised “You know. I hadn’t thought of that. (either). Hmmmm. I think he’s one of them.”

Shelby nodded slowly, stroked his beard wisely and looked at Joshua full on. “Your mission young Mage, should you decided to accept it, is to mentor that passel of young’uns. Keep em alive, metaphorically speaking, cause we’re not going to play THAT rough. For the purposes of this training scenario Chad , I and Dragon Force are the opposition. Do you accept?”

Joshua caught on quick. This was going to be a blast. He nodded.

“Why are you still here then?” Chad asked.

“I’m gone.” Joshua said on the way out the door.

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The Next Episode Is
#49: Banana Slug -Have you got the faintest idea what you are doing…
The Previous Episode was
#47: Banana Slug -At Ernies…
The First Episode was
# 1 : Prologue…
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Book One: SoulStone
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