42
The Bad Wow
“Okay, so not the fun, girly day trip I had in mind, guys,” I said after spluttering and coughing up what felt like a bucket of lake water. Oh, and not to mention I was now freezing my ass off and it felt like my nipples had become hard enough to become weapons and cut through my bra!
We had all been thrown from the boat just before it started to sink and as each of us reached the surface, the first thing I shouted to the others was about the Captain.
“I am on it!” Pip shouted, giving me a salute before nose diving under again to find what was thankfully the only other person on board. I was sure glad Pip had paid the guy for a full load and turned the other mortals away, as I think this boat trip would have ended quite differently. Think Titanic, only on a micro scale.
“Come on, let’s get you out of the water, the ruins aren’t far!” Sophia shouted pointing to what looked like a small stone covered beach area that held the castle’s ruins up on a hill behind it. I just started swimming when I heard a break in the water behind me and I turned, whilst treading water and kicking my leggings, to see Pip was now playing life saver.
“Is he okay?!” I shouted to her as she now had her hand under his chin and was swimming whilst keeping his body afloat.
“He’s breathing if that’s what you mean?!” Pip said nearly catching up with me. Man, she was fast for someone so little!
“Yeah, that’s what I mean, Pip,” I replied on a laugh before I carried on swimming, which brought us back to now and the reason I was flat on my back trying to remind my lungs how to work.
“I had fun!” Pip said replying to my comment about fun girly trips now we were all trying to catch our breath on the stones beneath us. I knew I had to move as I lay flat on my back, because every time I took a breath I could feel the rocks digging in through my jacket.
“Yeah well, I bet that guy can’t say the same thing! Are you sure he is okay?” I asked nodding to the poor unconscious Captain, who Pip had propped up like a mannequin against a bolder. But hey, at least he was still breathing. Although, that might change when he wakes up and finds his way of living is now sitting at the bottom of the Loch.
“Yeah, we should be fine and when he wakes, I will buy him a shiny new boat, so it’s all good and dandy…but on another notepad binder, wasn’t my Moomoo looking awesome!?” Pip said, as though what just happened was all just part of the fun.
“Well yeah, that was until she sank the fucking ship!” Sophia snapped making Pip roll her eyes at me, eyes that were currently raccooned by black makeup and lines dripping down her face. Even one of her fake eyelashes was half hanging off which made it look like a spider was crawling on her face. In the end she pulled it off and flicked it off her fingers before answering Sophia.
“Yes, well technically it was your phone that put a Nelly up Nessie’s butt, so maybe next time we are on a mission, may I suggest Vibrate…which isn’t something used just when you wanna get your kicks in your knicks,” she said winking at me before Sophia started growling at her and then shouting,
“I don’t do that!”
“Alright ladies, it happened, and we can’t do anything about it, other than pray that Draven isn’t at this moment freaking out enough to send out for the Coastguard or planning a rescue mission with the Scottish government.” Pip and Sophia shot me a look that said it all, making me groan.
“Well either way, we can’t just sit here for the rest of the day and wait for the pissed off cavalry to come rescue us,” I said getting up and then ringing out the edge of my clothes the best I could. I had to say I was just glad to see I hadn’t lost my scarf or then it would have really pissed me off.
“What is this place anyway?” I asked bending slightly to one side and squeezing the water out of my hair.
“This is Urquhart castle, or at least it was until a storm back in 1715 finished it off,” Sophia told me looking up at the steps leading to the top.
“How much time do you reckon we were on the pleasure cruise?” Pip asked us both. I gave her a shrug, a telling sign I had no clue, whereas Sophia was definitely more helpful.
“No more than thirty minutes, why?”
“Because I just wanted to know how much time we had until the big man freak out.” Pip was, of course, speaking of her own husband and the off the scale man paddy that would occur once his wife didn’t come back within the one-hour boat tour time frame. Knowing Adam, he was probably still looking at his watch and counting down the minutes. Draven on the other hand was probably trying to hire a helicopter to come pick us up.
“Good, then that means we have time,” Pip said clapping the wet grass from her hands before doing the same to her snuggle suit.
“Time for what?” I asked as I gave Sophia a hand with her jacket, patting off the grass from the back of that too.
“Why, the reason we came here silly!”
“What do you mean, the reason we came here…Pip, did you plan all of this?” Sophia asked in a cautious tone. Pip whipped around to us both and faked an ‘utterly offended, mortally wounded, how could you ever think such a thing’ look.
“Who me?”
“Pip, spit it out!” We both said at the same time.
“Okay, okay, so yeah, there might have been a tinsy tiny reason for us coming here, but I didn’t plan on Moomoo sinking the Orca!”
“Orca?” Sophia asked so I told her,
“It’s the ship’s name in the movie Jaws.”
“Yeah and one you would know if you ever watched a friggin’ movie! You know, this snapping motion being a shark and all and about as far away from Hitler as you can get!” Pip said doing the same gesture she had on the boat, only doing it now with sarcasm.
“Well, excuse me for having more important things to do, like keeping the world from falling into the hands of rogue demons and angels, so basically chaos!” she argued back, making me start rubbing my forehead wondering if it would ever end.
“Ha! Yeah and how much of that job includes online designer shopping, uh?” Pip argued back.
“Okay guys let’s just move on and…” I started to say but was quickly interrupted by Sophia.
“That’s my down time!” she said folding her arms and huffing.
“And what do you think watching movies are for…torture for prisoners of war?”
“Pip, that’s enough, she gets it, now can we please focus…okay guess not.” I added interrupting myself this time when Sophia snapped,
“Well, according to you they are the source of all world knowledge!”
“Uh yeah!” Pip agreed in a tone that stretched out the words like it was obvious, which only managed to make Sophia’s face redder.
“Yes, well I like to read.”
“Yeah, like what, a catalogue!?” Pip shouted back and this time I found my limit, hating seeing these two really arguing for the first time.
“RIGHT, ENOUGH!” I shouted before either of them could speak again.
“This is neither the time or the place! What happened back there was no-one’s fault and if you start blaming each other again then I will just remind you why we are all here in the first place…because of ME, yet again! So, if you want to point fingers then do so at me. I don’t care! Because I would rather be blamed any day of the week, than watch my two best friends fighting like this!” I said panting through my anger and looking at them both now. Thankfully, my dramatic speech seemed to have worked.
“So, if you are quite finished then can we get back to the reason we are here, and solve this quickly before all our men turn up and put a stop to us before we have even started?” I asked, this time in a calmer voice. Sophia nodded and then Pip followed.
“Good, now hug it out and let’s get this shit over with,” I said pushing them both together and finally making them giggle. They then hugged, said their apologies and thankfully for my sanity’s sake, moved on.
“Right now, that’s done, can we get back to the reason we are here, Pip?”
“Well, you did say you wanted to know what the Hell’s rocket was going on…right?” Pip said dragging out this last word.
“If I say yes, is she going to get me even wetter?” I asked Sophia making Pip giggle before saying,
“Ha! You wish chickee Tootary!” I groaned and said,
“I didn’t mean it like that, I just meant that if I say yes, is this going to get me in even deeper water…and yes, pun definitely intended!”
“Well, it will get you deeper alright, but not under water,” she replied cryptically, and I was just about to complain when she slapped her hands to her butt and said,
“Come on ass, like smart Tootie cookie said, time’s a wasting.” Then she started to march off towards the ruins and walked up the many steps that led to the ruined castle. It had obviously all been well set up for tourists.
“What about him?” I asked Sophia as we both walked past the Captain.
“He should be fine, I made sure he wouldn’t wake until we can get him back.”
“And his boat, won’t that be a little odd when he wakes up to find his livelihood missing?” I asked knowing that I certainly would.
“We will no doubt think of something and besides, the cost of the new boat is coming out of Pip’s pocket… come on, we’d better make sure she stays away from the tourists, that’s if there are any.” I continued up the stairs cut into the land until I could see an arch in the wall ahead of us. I saw Pip disappear through it before we followed, now doing so with pace in case she was the one to encounter anyone alone, not knowing what she would say.
But I needn’t have worried as the second we walked through, I looked around to find the same thing Sophia did, and that was a large green area void of any people. It was definitely strange, as I knew it wouldn’t have been closed on a fairly sunny day in May on a week day. But nevertheless, I looked from left to right, and up the different stone pathways leading off in different directions, only to find more stone steps and Pip walking up some of them.
We quickly caught up to Pip to find her whistling the A Team’s theme song and what I can assume was smoking an imaginary cigar, mimicking the team’s leader, Hannibal.
“So, where are all the people?” I asked looking around and seeing no-one but us, and also noticing that we were walking in the opposite direction, away from the large tower.
“Ah, that, well I thought I would use the good side of my brain today, as I didn’t think it was going to be very practical having an audience,” she said tapping on her head after first switching her imaginary cigar over to her other hand.
“What did you do, Winnie?” Sophia asked in a telling tone.
“Hey, little Miss Kettle Black, I do remember you burning down a whole college hall just to keep little Miss Trouble here out of…well, trouble. So, don’t you ya start giving me the ‘Tone’,” she said motioning up and down Sophia’s body as she spoke.
“Pip, just tell us what you did,” I asked this time and my tone was all exasperation as the last thing I wanted was another Sophia/Pip showdown.
“Okay, okay, jeez Spanish inquisition much…look all I did was put out a weather warning on their website saying it was going to be closed for the day and then I emailed all the staff telling them to take the day off…see, no biggy.” I looked to Sophia and shrugged before admitting,
“That doesn’t sound that bad.” Sophia on the other hand just folded her arms across her soggy wet jacket and said,
“And?” My eyes shot back to Pip in hopes she would be defensive and say, ‘and nothing, that was it’. But this was Pip we were talking about and therefore,
No such luck.
“Welllll, as I was already hacking into their system I might have accidently, on purpose also hacked into their payroll and gave each of them a bonus, then erased that I ever did on file.”
“Aww, that was sweet of you,” I said making Sophia shoot me a look before telling me,
“Don’t encourage her!”
“Why not, after all she is right, you did burn down a whole building just so I wouldn’t be going to college for a few weeks,” I told her in return and Pip looked as delighted as a child that was faced with two parents fighting each other over parental decisions.
“Okay, so it seems like our new team moto is going to be upgraded from ‘My bad’ to ‘She has a point’,” Sophia commented dryly, making Pip jump up and down on the spot and say,
“Great! First thing when we get back I am contacting my T-shirt guy!”
“You have a T-shirt guy?” I asked feeling stupid about three seconds after it because, let’s face it, this was Pip I was talking to…of course she had a T-shirt guy!
“Well duh, I mean, doesn’t everyone?”
“Nope.”
“Not really no,” I said after Sophia had answered too.
“Huh, I just assumed everyone did, oh well it’s no biggy, you can use mine, he’s fabulous!” she said throwing her arm up and around dramatically and speaking like some posh rich person boasting about an expensive designer. And definitely not someone who just printed designs onto T-shirts for a modest living.
I had to stifle a giggle when I saw Sophia’s wrinkled nose as if Pip had just waved rotten cheese under her face, because as much as I loved her, Sophia was spoiled, and she knew it. If it didn’t come with a designer label, then she just wasn’t interested. Which meant I doubt very much that Pip giving us both the name for her ‘T-shirt’ guy was going to increase his work load by much. Not unless I was in the mood to buy some funny novelty gifts this Christmas and not unless Sophia had lost her ever loving designer mind.
We continued to follow Pip on her unknown mission and I leaned in to Sophia and muttered,
“So, do we have any idea on why we are here and what she is planning…and just so you know, when I say ‘we’ I actually mean ‘you’, supernatural connoisseur that you are?” She gave me a sideways look that I could have taken as her answer but in the end, she gave it to me verbally.
“I don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted that you think I would know what she is up to, for who in all the world’s realms does know?”
“Well, I think the closest answer to that question is no doubt sat on a dock looking at his watch with no fingernails left and about fifteen minutes away from going turbo,” I replied, and Sophia gave me a dire head nod, knowing herself the bad cocktail mix a ‘mischievous Imp named Pip’, a whole lot of ‘worry’ and one ‘Adam’, made. Actually, think less cocktail and more bottle of coke shaken for a whole hour before taking the top off.
We continued on in silence after this, following the jumping Pip in front of us who, amazingly, had removed her pink cut off jacket and was pulling at the back of it, doing something I couldn’t really see. The next thing I knew the biggest patch came flying off as she threw it in the air, as she said in an Arnold Schwarzenegger tone,
“Hastalavista baby! You have been upgraded!” I looked down just as I was about to step on the words, ‘My Bad, fuckers, I’m a Boobateer!’. So instead, I picked it up and stuffed into my still wet jacket pocket. I did this for two reasons, but I only told Sophia one of them when she looked at me in question,
“I don’t want a kid picking it up or anything.” She shrugged her shoulders and took that as my answer. The other reason was because it reminded me of Pip and I thought that one day it would come in handy for something to look back on. Of course, that’s presuming that I didn’t just end up a slave in Hell at some point. And that something to look back on was me having a memento to go with the question, ‘where did it all go wrong?’. Yep, I was definitely holding out for the less daunting scrapbooking version of the two.
“Right, now where is it…Ha over there!?” Pip started to ask herself before answering it directly after. Then she marched us further up the path until we had reached all the way to a large round stone wall. It looked as though it had once been the foundations for something. Definitely a singular room of some kind, as it had a break in the wall where a door would have been and even some old slabs on the floor, that would have probably been a path leading in. If I were to guess I would have said a store room of some kind. But like always, around so many people that were thousands of years older than me, I was about to be proven wrong yet again.
“Ah, here we go!” Pip said bouncing over to its centre, whilst I turned around to take advantage of our new position being higher up. I couldn’t help but gasp as I took in the most amazing panoramic view of the Loch in all its magnificent glory. I tried to imagine what it must have been like living here and waking up to that majestic view every day.
I always loved seeing places that would offer us the exact same view as if we were there hundreds of years ago. That even though life may have altered, giving way to the modern world, there were still many places like this left in the world. Places where you could be surrounded by untouched beauty and pretend, if only for a fleeting moment, that they were being lived in, in the past. That you could forget your own world, and therefore fully immerse yourself in fantasy and escapism.
Okay, so this was how I used to view places like this but now, looking back at Pip and no doubt the next mind-blowing thing I was about to be shown…well, then fantasy was pretty much the norm for me and escapism was something like going to the dry cleaners or a check -up at the dentist. Which I was also hoping this was something I wouldn’t need to do anymore because I am pretty sure one look at my fangs and a heart attack and a guilty conscious were all I would achieve that day.
“Tell me this isn’t what I think it is?” Sophia asked in a tone of utter awe which I had to admit, coming from these two, didn’t give me the warm and snugglies.
“That depends, whatya think it is?” Pip asked rocking back on her heels like a child playing a game with her elders. Sophia tilted her head slightly and said in what sounded like Latin,
“A Testis Circulo?” Pip’s face said it all, but she nodded like a mad woman anyway, with a big grin on her face.
“It just might be,” she replied like a teasing child would.
“That’s…wow…just wow.” I looked from Sophia and then back to Pip, trying to figure out if this was a good wow or a bad wow. And then I asked myself if there was even such a thing as a ‘Bad wow’, but then looking back to the girls, then yeah, I knew there definitely was. Because I wasn’t living in the real world per se. I was living in their world and in their world, then even words like ‘wow’ were used when shit hit the fan, or all Hell was about to break loose.
Which was why my next question was, what I considered, an important one,
“And this wow, is it a good thing or a bad thing?”
Of course, I should have known not to ask. I should have known that we weren’t here for some simple reason and that maybe, just maybe, it was going to be the easy way. Because when was it ever the easy way with me and Draven?
And I knew now was no different, not when Pip replied,
“Only if sending you back to the future is a bad thing?”
I had only one answer to that…
“Hell yes, it is!”