Pippi and Miranda were next to end up in unfamiliar territory, and this is how it happened.
Miranda had flown back home while Pippi was out looking for NT, and nothing had changed with her since she wrote those letter fits to NT and then Pippi.
Now, in Pippi's house, she waited and waited, but no one came.
Eventually, she got hungry, so, ventured to make herself something.
The meal was a disaster. Miranda had managed to warp a plastic container in the microwave, splatter oil from frying meat with the lid off the pan, cook pasta until it was nothing but mush, and put in far too much spice.
She plowed her way through the third rate meal but not without glugging down half a two-liter carton of milk to cool her insides. The rest of the food she couldn't eat, she tossed out in the trash.
It was as she had returned from that errand that Miranda received a visit - from the owner of the house.
The front door opened. "Danae!?" Pippi called out. But a glance at the backdoor as Miranda was coming in showed Pippi to be mistaken.
Miranda pouted, figuring Danae would be a lot more welcome.
"Miranda." Pippi corrected herself uneasily. To cover up her feeling of suspicion toward Miranda, she complimented her instead. "My goodness it smells delicious in here."
Ignoring the compliment, Miranda said, "Pippi? What're you doing here?"
"I live here..." Pippi said flatly,"And it is me who should be asking *you* that... So, what's going on now? Are you okay?"
Pippi was rather sorry she had asked that last question, because it brought on yet another bout of sarcastic temper from Miranda.
"Oh, I'm just peachy. My half sister (NT) doesn't want anything to do with me and my mother doesn't even know who the hex I am!!" her voice rose on the last words. She shook her head and took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. Then the words came out in an angry rush. "I'm absolutely wonderful and things couldn't be better!!!!!"
Pippi frowned, but waited for Miranda to subside while thinking of what she could say without setting her off again. "I've heard all about your mother, as you know. I distinctly recall telling you in one of my notes that it makes me feel quite miserable to think about it...Would it help if I took you to see your mother? That's if they'll let us at this point? Seeing you as you are now, well, it could bring her back to the present....or it might not but maybe it could help you deal with this anger you're carrying around."
"Demn it I didn't mean to yell at *you*!" Miranda sighed. "Look, I'm sorry okay?"
That wasn't terribly convincing, but it was the best anyone could ever hope to get from Miranda.
"I just don't know what I have to stay here for." Miranda said dismally.
Pippi sighed. "Miranda, please...your running away only made things worse after all that happened. I've told you that, and so has NT. Frankly, I'm sick of you writing or showing up here, only to tell me how you don't want to stay here. Go back to Tonya's and leave well enough alone, then."
"Demmit I didn't know what else to do, OK? Iona was put up next door and after what she did to me..."
"Iona's long gone, she didn't stay there, as you and Tonya would know. And yes, Miranda, it was so cruel of Iona, being less than honest with you, when you and Tonya had been such wonderful, loving friends toward NT." Pippi said, clearly getting sick of Miranda's inability to see past her own nose.
Miranda cut Pippi off. "I know demmit I know I know! how many times can I say-"
Pippi suddenly became stern. Stepping toward Miranda, she took hold of her arm, "Calm down and listen for once in your life! We've been over and over this before. What's done is done, you're just going to have to start facing the facts, Miranda. You want NT to forgive you, after a year's worth of hell from you, but you self-righteously refuse to forgive Iona's one deception of you. That seems more than a bit one-sided."
"Okay so I was wrong! I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry okay?How many times do I have to say I'm a wrong sorry stupid idiot?"
"Shut your mouth and listen!" Pippi cut her off sharply, then continued. "Yelling out '"So I'm a wrong sorry idiot okay' a thousand times indignantly the way you've done every time NT or I have pointed out this double standard of yours, is not going to convince anyone that you really are sorry and want anything more than to be let out of the responsibility so you can continue breezing in and out of this family like we're just there for you to use and toss aside like an old pair of shoes."
"I didn't say that!"
"No one is expecting you to keep beating yourself up. That won't do you or NT any good. But actions speak louder than words, and you have got to stop running away, feeling sorry for yourself, making excuses for your behavior and start facing all the facts. That means taking full responsibility for your part in this whole thing, and making a considerable effort to right what you can of it."
"What about Iona? She doesn't get to face anything!"
"What makes you so sure about that?"
"Because she just runs off to hex knows where after the reckoning! You're not going after her and--"
"Well, now you know how NT feels about you and your--"
"I know I know I know okay whatever I know--"
Knock it off before I lose my temper completely and wash your mouth out again!" Pippi yelled at Miranda, giving her a shake and looking her angrily full in the face.
Miranda caught her breath and subsided. Pippi had been the one person in this household who she had not gone out of her way to provoke. Miranda recalled her being very firm and stern faced at other times, but Pippi could convey her concern, annoyance, or anger even then without raising her voice. So Miranda realized it was definitely in her best interest to do as the woman said.
"What I'm trying to tell you is that we're all responsible for our own actions, and this applies to you just as much as it does to everyone else. If you aren't used to this, you better start getting used to it, because that's the way it is in the real world. You can't hide behind your father's protection and you can't go running to your friends for protection now and just think that'll make the consequences go away - especially considering who some of those friends are. Now, if you want forgiveness, you're going to have to show some yourself, and put right the things you did, to the best of your ability."
"How!" Miranda demanded.
"You schemed up the trouble, if you're really as sorry as you say you are,"
Miranda cut Pippi off with a defiant "You don't believe me! Fine, whatever!"
That was enough to make Pippi get cross. "Be quiet!" she raised her voice, giving Miranda a very stern look, and a slight tug on the girl's arm. "Don't make me raise my voice at you again!" she warned.
"Okay." Miranda whispered.
Pippi continued, still in a serious, but much gentler tone. "If you really want to prove yourself a changed person, Miranda,it should be easy to put as much effort into making things right as it did to cause all that trouble; even if it means finding and apologizing to some of the people who were wronged by the magic creation you and Tonya had cooked up to pass off as Evil NT."
"But I'd need Tonya for that and she still hates you guys."
"well, that's what comes of the poor choices you've made. You'll just have to do what you can to remedy things on your own." Pippi replied, determined not to let Miranda use Tonya as an excuse to get out of it. "You won't need her help to find everyone your fake NT offended. The staff at the store where Jesse Lein works would remember NT2 and Titania. So would the waitress that served you and NT2 at the Taco Bell. It won't hurt for you to own up to them for what you did to ruin NT's reputation in their eyes."
"I don't know." Miranda pouted. "It probably doesn't really matter now anyway."
"Look, do you want to make things write with NT or not?" Pippi demanded, she was on the verge of getting cross again.
"Yes!" the girl retorted.
Pippi shrugged. "Well then, you think about what I said."
"But if I have to face what I did, why isn't Tonya?"
"We're not letting Tonya off the hook for this, either...But Tonya isn't part of this family, she's anything but sorry for what she does, she doesn't even make a token effort at apologizing, and she has more reason to run away than you have. So we're not expecting her to be anything more than the malicious, cowardly bully she is.
"So what are you going to do to her?" Miranda asked.
"That remains to be seen." said Pippi. "Tonya was jealous of NT over Nick, well, now that she's got Nick, whom NT was never interested in, and he shouldn't have crushed on her in the first place. That was gross. But Tonya and Nick make a good match, and it would be in her best interest if you didn't patch things up with us while living and associating with her. But you can't have it both ways, Miranda. Tonya and NT are sworn enemies. They'll stay that way unless they both have a change of heart toward each other, and considering Tonya's violent history and the awful things she's done to snuff out an innocent girl's spirit, all to keep a guy, she's burned way too many bridges. I, for one, don't care to deal with her again, never-mind how NT feels about her. So you see why it makes no sense that you keep associating with that girl and yet you claim you want us to be your trusting and forgiving family...?"
Miranda stood there, looking stupidly at Pippi. She simply didn't have any excuse."
"But you know, Iona was as much a victim of Tompkins and Benson as you were, I suppose if I ran into her again," Pippi suggested, "I could try to befriend her and see if there's anything else she needs help with - "
Miranda turned red with rage. "You can't be friends with her and me! Not after what she did! And she's no victim! She betrayed me, remember!?"
Pippi nodded, grinning. "Well then, don't expect NT to welcome you and the rest of us to trust you since you insist on chumming around with Tonya."
Miranda's bottom lip came out in one of her long-faced pouts.
"Now look, Miranda," Pippi said abruptly, moving away, "I've got a lot of things to do, and - "
Miranda suddenly interrupted her with what she thought was a brilliant idea.
"Actually maybe if we transport to NT and when we find her and she really sees that I mean it when I say I'm sorry."
"No. That's a bandaid solution to a land mine sized emotional wound."
"But sheesh, Pippi, she doesn't even have to know about me being friends with Tonya."
"I said no - Miranda--what are you doing?" Pippi's eyes went wide.
Miranda had suddenly approached Pippi so she could reach into her pants pocket.
"Get your hand out of there!" Pippi exclaimed, moving to stop the thieving brat.
It was too late. Miranda had her hand on the little magic transport device Pippi used to get magically from one place to another.
"You use this to go places, right?"
"Give that back - you don't know how to use it!" Pippi began to panic.
It was too late, Miranda had pushed a button on the device.
And suddenly they were somewhere else in a hot, muggy place. The ground beneath their feet was cracked and unyielding. The air was stifling and smelled of decaying matter. The horizon glowed with the color of fire.
"What have you done!" Pippi exclaimed.
Miranda looked around in horror. Everywhere she turned her eyes met a desolate and uninviting landscape. The icy fingers of fear gripped her soul and she could feel bile threatening to rise to her throat. What have I done? she thought. What have I gotten us into?
She held the device up to her face and stared at it as she pressed the button. Nothing happened. She exchanged a worried look with Pippi and pressed the button again. Still nothing.
"I'll have that back, now!" Pippi grabbed the device from Miranda, irritation mingling with the initial panic. She closed her eyes tight, hoping and praying that it would work this time. She pressed the button and slowly opened her eyes. They were still standing in the middle of that barren, muggy place, the stench of rot causing her to choke.
"Now what?" Miranda asked dejectedly....
Pippi shook her head, perplexed. "It's never died on me before."
"It shouldn't need batteries since it's a magic transporter, right?" Miranda speculated. "Maybe its magic doesn't work here."
"And if that's the case, we're in a real fix. What did you do to manage this?" Pippi rolled her eyes in disbelief.
"Nothing, I just pressed a button. I thought it would take us to see NT."
"I set a special code that you have to punch in for it to get to TMW, or to a few other specific locations. NT stays in her room mostly, and that's where she is now. So you just trsnsported us away from her by hitting the transport button twice, and now we could be anywhere."
Miranda coughed. "Peew this place stinks." she complained, shuffling her feet back and forth.
"You're telling me." Pippi nodded. "Well, since I've hit the return button and it doesn't seem to be doing anything, I'll see if I can't get it to recharge. We might as well look around for a place to settle down and wait, because this could take a while."
"Great." Miranda moaned."
Pippi sent her a look that said "Don't bother complaining, it won't get us out of the mess you got us into." And she worked at the magic refresh button for a moment.
Nothing happened. There was no indicator light or beep.
"I'll keep trying but we've got to keep moving. Otherwise we'll be stuck out here with no help and no way of getting out." Pippi finally said.
"Man it's bleepin hot, and that smell!" Miranda complained."
"Never-mind that, just let's get going." Pippi urged. She was longing to get out of this oppressive atmosphere as much as Miranda was.
There was no sign of life anywhere. No birds sang, and there didn't even seem to be any bugs anywhere around.
On and on, they walked. The ground was uneven and rocky, and littered with dead and rotting trees and plants.
Miranda lost her footing when she stepped on a log just in front of her, and her weight caused it to shift and roll. "Demmit the stupid bleepin thing!"
What's wrong?" Pippi looked behind her just in time to see Miranda lurch forward, scramble with both feet, taking the fastest little steps and hops over the remainder of the log to try and keep herself from actually falling on her face.
Miranda flailed her arms wildly as well, she looked for all the world like she was inventing some new funky dance step.
She just managed to right herself as she landed none too lightly on the other side of the log. Her face was beet red with shock, embarrassment and anger.
"Oh, I see." Pippi replied, quickly turning to face forward again, so Miranda wouldn't see her laughing. But she couldn't turn around fast enough.
"what the hex are you grinning at?" Miranda demanded sharply.
"I'm glad you made it over that log all in one piece." Pippi replied, but the quaver in her voice betrayed her.
"You're laughing at me!"
"If it had been anyone else, you'd be laughing yourself." Pippi retorted.
"Oh shut up!"
Pippi stopped short and abruptly turned around to face Miranda. "I beg your pardon?" she asked firmly.
Miranda lowered her head. "Oh nothing." her bottom lip came out again.
They continued on in silence for what seemed like ages. There were still some trees way in the distance that were standing, but the dead plants lying about on the ground were getting less and less. The merciless sun, much redder than it should be while so high in the hazy sky, beat down more relentlessly than ever.
"We should head for those trees way over there." Miranda finally spoke up. "Then at least we could get some shade."
"I'm not so sure that would be safe. If they are dead and dried out I wouldn't want to be in among them if a fire breaks out. And from what I can make out, it looks as dead over there as everywhere else." Pippi responded.
"Demmit to hex." Miranda grumbled.
"not a sign of life anywhere, but there had to be some time ago. I wonder what happened here." Pippi mused."
"Aw who the hex cares?" Miranda mumbled irritably. She couldn't care less. Her feet hurt, her throat was parched, and Pippi wanted to know how this place died when they couldn't even get out of it.
"I'll thank you to watch your language." Pippi admonished.
"Fine! Call all the shots, see if I care! I never do anything right anyway!)" Miranda pouted.
"Knock it off!" Pippi snapped, becoming quite annoyed. She never would've known Miranda had changed so much from the person she had been a year ago but for the girl repeatedly telling everybody she had.
Miranda fell sullenly silent again. Pippi, gentle and unruffled as she tended to be, was proving to be just as tough as Danae if still a whole lot nicer.
For her part, Pippi was hoping to find some answers that might help them get out of this, and she had learned a long time ago that it is best to find out as much as possible about unfamiliar surroundings. One never knew when a tidbit of information could come in very handy.
They finally got close enough to the stand of trees, but as Pippi had thought, they were all dead. They just hadn't fallen over yet. But that didn't make them safe.Miranda wanted to go in among their shade, but Pippi suggested walking around them rather than through them, at a safe distance. They would still be shaded from the sun, just not quite as much as walking in among them. But from this distance, they wouldn't risk being crushed by falling trees and could still manage to make a run for it at the first sign of a fire.
So the two walked along. When they rounded the stand of trees on the side away from the sun, something strange began happening to the ground under their feet.
It became smoother until it was quite slippery. When Pippi nearly lost her footing, she recovered more gracefully than Miranda had, without cussing a blue streak. But as she looked down, she noticed something odd. The ground was shining like a sheet of metal. The shine hadn't been there a moment before, she was sure of it.
Pippi looked down at her transporter and shook it, then banged it against the heel of her other hand a couple of times. Then she tried the button again. It still seemed to be broken but at the same time the condition of the land made her think that her transporter had tried to work on its own but a glitch had gotten them stuck halfway between one world and the next.
"What's wrong?" Asked Miranda cautiously. "What is happening to this place? Is that contraption of yours going to work or what?"
"I don't know." Pippi replied. "I just don't know what is going on here, I don't have any explanation."
"Oh that's just great! You're supposed to be the smart, take charge one here and you can't even work your own tools. Now what?"
"It was working just fine until you fiddled with it, besides, I didn't invent it. Now please keep it down so I can concentrate." Pippi ignored the next huff from Miranda, and walked slowly forward, still looking at her transporter and trying to figure out what to do next.
Miranda continued to do what she did best, pout, sulk, and moan.
Without warning, the land under their feet suddenly gave a great heave and the shifting ground groaned with each roll. The sound getting louder and coming nearer to them, moving fast but they could see nothing.
Miranda flung her arms around Pippi, partly to help keep her footing on the rolling terrain, but mostly out of the need for comfort in this strange and frightening situation. Pippi put her arms around Miranda and they stood there together that way, waiting out the motion of the land.
With a deafening roar, the forest of dead trees began toppling onto each other like giant match sticks.
In no time all the trees were down and silence once again reigned in this desolate world. The dust from the toppled forest rose in clouds and settled back down quickly, almost as if it were being sucked back into the earth. The rolling of the ground had stopped too.
Miranda and Pippi looked at each other and burst into an uneasy yet relieved laughter.
"It was just a little earthquake." Miranda said.
No sooner had Miranda spoken then the ground beneath their feet gave one last heave and dropped out from under them.
Their screams were all that they heard as they fell down into the unknown, still clinging to each other. Their lives flashed before their eyes as they wondered how this would end.
All at once they landed in a tangled heap of arms and legs into a soft bed of moss. The ground had a healthy earthy smell, far different from the land they had just fallen through.
The two sat up and brushed debris from their clothes and hair, then looked around at their new surroundings.
It was a beautiful place in comparison to the one they had just left. Tall trees stood shoulder to shoulder and reached up into the sky, which was strange. More like the ceiling of a room rather than a real sky. Pippi and Miranda looked up and saw the giant hole that they had fallen through. Then stared in open mouthed awe at the almost tropical like forest surrounding them. Lush plant growth and moist earth was all around them, and not far away they could hear what sounded like a small waterfall.
It was a wonderful place and they caught themselves smiling. But in the back of her mind Pippi wondered what may happen next. How long would they be in this wonderful place before they maybe found themselves ejected somehow back into the ugly and inhospitible world above them. Or what was it that lay down that inviting woodland path in front of them?
"This is just too weird." Miranda whispered.
_________________________________________________________________
Pippi and Miranda faired pretty well during this time, they travelled through that peaceful country they had landed in, staying at many different houses, inns, whatever decent lodging they could find.
Every day, Pippi still tried her magic transport device, but it just wasn't working any more. Miranda's complaints about being bored and tired were something Pippi was getting sick of hearing, and there were times she wished she was travelling alone.
Miranda was getting annoyed with the monotony of walking through that strange country, even though it was very beautiful and had a gently warming climate. She was also annoyed at Pippi's questioning every time they found new lodging.
During their wanderings, Pippi had been tempted at times just to pick Miranda up and carry her along, but she figured the girl would've put up a huge fight about it. So while traveling with her, there wasn't much choice but go at Miranda's slow pace or urge her to keep going at a reasonable walk and not a slow doddle. Pippi was growing more and more concerned about her lost friends while Miranda grew less concerned about them and more for her tired body and sore feet, and messed up hair.
At each stop, Pippi asked the hosts and innkeepers about her friends, Ameh, Danae, NT, and Ariel. The answers from place to place were always the same, nobody had so much as heard of them.
Finally there came a day when Miranda decided she wasn't going to travel any more, and she told Pippi just to go ahead without her if she wanted to keep looking for the others.
Pippi was reluctant to do that because, selfish as Miranda was, the girl would be left on her own in a strange land, and Pippi didn't want to lose track of her.
Miranda insisted, saying she had met some people who were taking her in - this had apparently occurred that afternoon while Pippi and Miranda had lunched and rested at an inn.
Pippi knew that at least for now, Miranda wasn't in any sort of danger. But the others, she just didn't know, and Miranda had already delayed her progress by needing to stop and rest so many times each day.
That night, Pippi went and asked around about her friends, still hoping to turn up something.
The innkeeper told her that the only strange occurrence he could remember was that a clump of boulders was found at a site not far off, and that there hadn't been anything like it before the past several weeks. It had been said that they were set in the figuration of a person and that the local children had tried to give the formation a face by drawing on the top boulder, and sometimes putting hats and coats over it. It had become somewhat of a curiosity but no one had any idea how it got there.
Pippi asked where this rock formation was, and the innkeeper gave her directions.
She thanked him, and headed off to investigate. She had thought this could possibly be NT, or maybe even Ariel, turned into stone to avoid the Hutchens and Hartwig threat, and endure a long period of time passage as well.
Pippi walked down several streets and through park like areas until she came to a picnic area near a river bank.
She looked behind one of the trees that shaded one of the picnic tables, and there, she found the stone formation the innkeeper had told her about.
She approached it and examined it.
It looked to her like it could be made into a human by some children with imagination. The top boulder sat on a much larger one, and a homely set of eyes drawn crudely by some child stared up at Pippi. The main body boulder had a couple of edges that jutted out from its sides which could be arms to an imaginative child, and there were two smaller boulders positioned on the ground just in front of the body, which, Pippi knew could pass for feet.
She touched the head of the strange little rock figure, wishing she knew if this really was one of her friends, and how to un-do the enchantment if it was.
As she stood there with her hand on the rock, she felt something strange. Heat was emanating from it.
"You really aren't just a pile of rocks, are you?" she asked after checking for a heat source around the site. The heat was coming from within the figure itself. Though she wasn't sure there were enchantments or magic in this place other than her own broken transporter, she thought she might as well treat this rock formation as one. It probably wouldn't be anything special, but neither would it hurt to try.
Pippi rested her hand on it again, and kept it there. and as she did, the figure continued to change. The eyes grew smaller, to normal human size, and turned from brown to blue. Blonde hair was now covering the head, and a real face now appeared on the front of the figure.
Soon, the head had shrunk to normal size and turned to a human one. It shook itself. The eyes blinked open, shut, and open again.
Pippi now recognized clearly who was sitting in front of her. "Ameh Chase!"
Ameh's disenchantment continued on, now, her upper body and arms were normal human ones. They were clad in a white summery top. She embraced Pippi, who held her tightly, laughing and crying all at once.
When Ameh could finally speak, she said, "It's over! They must've been done away with at last! I wish I knew who to thank! And how did you find me!?"
"Miranda got us lost trying to find NT, who isn't lost."
Ameh's legs had now changed back to normal, wearing light blue slacks. She tried to stand up. But she staggered, and Pippi steadied her.
"Take it slow, Ameh, from what the innkeeper says, you've been like that for weeks."
"What do you mean, you and miranda were looking for NT?"
"She wanted to see NT and just didn't know she was up in her room. So Miranda grabbed my transporter and pushed some buttons, getting us lost."
"She didn't!" Ameh gasped. "What a case!"
"I still have the transporter, I didn't let her keep it. But it still doesn't work. Every time I've tried getting us back home since then, nothing happens."
With that, Pippi took it out of her purse, and was about to give Ameh a demonstration of how useless it was.
A second later, Pippi and Ameh found themselves among a large croud in yet a different world.