182. The Comebackees

"We're going to sue a stinky, polluting airline and get ourselves a home with a pool!"

182. The Comebackees

Heather, Thistle and I eyed each other meaningfully. We were all thinking the same thing. The exacting and prickly puca Garth was allowing our uncle to change the apples back into people because he had a soft spot for Gentlerain. If not, why was he being so unusually cooperative? Garth probably thought Gentlerain was as misunderstood and unfairly treated as he was. He may also have thought that Uncle Gen shared his inflexible ideas on how to defend forests. Uncle Gen was going to release Garth’s captives, but what he would do with them would probably be worse than what Garth already had done. Or at least that was what Uncle Gen had made the puca think.  

“Try to see the advantages, Garth. Returning will be as tasking a business for them as returning them will be for me!” we had heard Uncle Gen explain.  And yes, he was taking a lot of trouble on account of the hexed apples, interrogating the apples and making a lot of phone calls in a weird language and consulting a kind of crystal ball. What Garth had done, simply recite a spell and turn them into fruits, was a much less complex procedure.  “They’ll never be normal again,” Uncle Gen assured Garth.

“They never were. They are abnormal even for morons ,” sentenced Garth.

There were twenty-one apples roosting on Garth’s tree and twenty-two names on Uncle Gentlerain’s list, the twenty-second being, of course, Alpin’s.  Alpin was relatively safe at home with his parents, whereas the rest of the apples had to be seen to immediately and changed back into people before Garth might have second thoughts about releasing them. Uncle Gen had to act fast.

“Now!” said Uncle Gen.

“You do the honours,” said Garth grossly,”because my stomach will turn if I do.”

 Uncle Gentlerain rubbed his deceptively delicate,  elegant  hands with their long, tapering fingers and meticulously cared for nails. A silvery mist rose out from their upturned  palms and  an almost transparent rain cloud with a shimmering silver lining formed above the tree with the roosting apples. Soft raindrops poured gently on the apples who shut their single, mouldy eyes. They fell from the tree to the green grass below with a tiny thud each, becoming the beings they used to be as soon as they hit the ground. Seeing the bodies piled topsy-turvily below the tree, we confirmed that Uncle Gentlerain indeed had grasped how Garth’s spell worked, and could transform others and not only himself, back into what they originally were. As for these people, who had been apples only seconds ago, they were all fast asleep, lost in a placid slumber.Now it was up to Uncle Gen to decide what he would do with them.

“Listen, nieces and nephew, to the things we have to consider when about to reinsert unhexed beings in their world. Because this is getting harder to do decently every day. First, we have to know what exactly we have before us. Lying there on the ground are eighteen mortals and three spirits. Yes, there are three of our own people there. Can you tell who the three are? Only by their ears? Other signs too, eh? Good. For the present leave them be. We will first handle the mortals. We have a very complex problem here before us, because some of these mortals are related in some way or another to each other. According to my list, we have a family of six foolish berry-pickers, another silly family of four, a young man and his sweetheart, a couple of fuddled friends, and four individuals that were picking on their own and have nothing to do with any of the rest. This is important  if we don’t want to break up families, severe love ties or end friendships. It also means it will take us more trouble.”

“I don’t want you to just leave them in my forest,” said Garth crossly. “Because they are stupid jerks and sure to fall out of grace again. And should they eat untimely a third time, I won’t hesitate to end their days. Look here, Gentlerain, why are you fussing about these people? Just dump them into Hater’s Well.”

Hater’s Well is one of the grimmest spots in Minced Forest. There you can find unsafe water for questionable purposes. This well is held to be a gateway to one of the hellchambers  below the forest and its water is said to spring from an underground river fed with spit. Everyone who spits in anger or despisal in either of both worlds is said to contribute to its flow. Uncle Gen smiled at Garth but ignored his suggestion.

“Knowing who you are dealing with also requires knowing when and where the subjects came from. You have to know the where and when of their past to determine the where and when of their future.”

Uncle Gen already had learned all he had to know about Garth’s victims. He had jotted down lots of notes next to their names on his list. 

“The four unconnected individuals disappeared scores of years ago. There won’t be anyone waiting for them to return. In order for them to make a comeback, what we have to do is find a disaster area, one with lots of victims. An accident zone such as the site of a plane or a train crash .Then we simply deposit a  comebackee among the survivors. We will be needing four such sites, because we can’t deposit all four of these people in the same place. Four unidentifiable people suffering from amnesia, deliruim and confusion are not the usual thing in such catastrophes. Too many means we will be in the media and in silly UFO publications forever.”

“Will you use those forget it spells you said you didn’t approve of?” I asked.

“If these were clever people, they would shut up on their own iniciative. They would just say they don’t know why they are where they are or what is happening or what has happened. But as Garth says, these people are probably not too bright. He caused them an illness that could have killed them the first time they ate the berries out of time but they returned for more.”

“So the answer to Arley’s question is yes,” said Thistle.

“Can’t you make them any smarter instead? Enough so they will shut up to survive? Can’t they learn from what has happened to them?” suggested Heather.

“No. We can try to, but only they can make themselves better than they are. Always supposing that is possible. Some people are next to hopeless. We can advice and suggest, but they have to have what it takes to learn. And that includes a will to. The two families are more difficult to reinsert. We will not only have to make them forget, we will have to give them a whole set of false memories. We will take them somewhere like remote hills where we will make them think they went to live hidden there all these years for reasons of their own that they no longer care about. They will be considered weird people for the rest of their lives but at least they will be together.”

“Will you do what you promised you would?” smirked Garth. “Tell the kids. They will be witnesses to our agreement.”

“What is that?” I asked promptly.

“I will create phobias. They won’t approach a wild fruit or a forest in what is left of their mortal lives.”

“He’ll make them scream and kick and slobber foam from their mouths when they see a nut or a berry,” gloated Garth.

Uncle Gen smiled.

“They won’t know why they have such fears. And they won’t want to speak about them in case someone should take advantage of this weakness of theirs. But they will act upon them. The families, for instance, will move to brick and cement cities. And that will be the end of nut and berry temptations.”

“He  will wreak havoc on their minds,” grinned Garth, “and what’s best, he’ll teach me to do that to them too, so I needn’t hoard trash in my garden.”

“You promised him that?” gasped Heather.

“Would you rather I left things the way they are?” asked Uncle Gen.  “Must we discuss the pros and cons?”

“A mental illness instead of a physical one, the first time they eat when they shouldn’t,” I said. “That’s the idea, isn’t it?”

“An inexplicable loathing. It’s supposed to be an improvement,” said Uncle Gentlerain. “Would you rather be a helpless one-eyes apple in a fairy forest or a person with a not too bothersome phobia back home?”

We kids looked at each other to consult.

“We have no idea,” we said in unison. “We’ve  never been a captive apple or a mortal with a phobia.”

“Then take my word for it. This phobia is an improvement. Even better than an allergy.  Allergies can kill uncautious people in a snap.  And, being selfish, this is good also for me. Much less work,” Uncle Gen smiled sadly. “Take my word for it, with this silly phobia they will be able to return home after feasting on forbidden fruit but  won’t end up in an insane asylum.”

Uncle Gen next asked us for a minute. He began to make more annotations next to the names on his list.

When he was done, he said, “Another thing one has to do is be sure no one innocent gets blamed for the disappearance of these people. In the case of the lovers, this has already happened. We will have to compensate. Let the injured party find a pot of gold or a winning lottery ticket or have a lucky break of some kind.”

“Admit you’ve framed someone sometime, Gentlerain. I won’t believe you haven’t. Someone who deserves that kind of dirt,” said Garth.

“As a matter of fact, I have,” nodded Uncle Gen. “Not that I am proud of not having found a better solution. Always very unsavoury characters. But, yes, on occasion I have killed two birds with one stone.”

Uncle Gen folded up the papers he had written on and stuck them in an envelope that he pulled out of thin air. He kept his pen in thin air too and said, “Time to call my assistants.”

Four gray shadows appeared among the sleepers. We guessed these were fairies being partially invisible so as not to be identified. One of them came up to Uncle Gentlerain and took the envelope from his hand. When we looked back at the pile of sleepers, only three remained there. The rest had vanished, as had the shadows.

“Those are ours. What are you going to do about them?” I asked.

“You´re thinking too much!” Thistle suddenly shouted. “Just leave them sleeping right here for tonight, Uncle. Soon it will be dusk. The sun will set and it will be May Eve. We should all be partying. You too, Uncle Gen. Even Garth parties on May Eve, don’t you Garth? You need it more than anyone, Uncle.You do nothing but boring business. You’ll go human if you only think of snags like these.”

“We don’t have much time to rest, but if you come with us, Thistle and I can make you look very good. Not that you are looking bad,” blushed Heather. “Only worried and messy. You let us work our rose petal spells on you and you won’t raise eyebrows. There will only be ooohs and aaahs. You’re going to make a grand entrance, Uncle Gentlerain. A sensational comeback.”