[Slite]

Chapter 4

Love is a warm Trebuchet

“Enough with the laughing already, dog!” Montsnmags said as he glared at Vivaldi who was still rolling around on the ground giggling madly

“I.. hihihi ..can't.. snicker ..stop.. snort ..laughing” Vivaldi managed to get out between the giggles

A faint “WOOT!” could be heard from within the hedge, causing Vivaldi to collapse into new fits of hysteria.

“Get up dog, we have a Queen to rescue if you recall?” Montsnmags said while he considered how the howling dog would look without his googly bits.

“Sorry boss, but the look on your face was absolutely priceless” the still snickering dog said as he managed to get a hold on himself long enough to stand up on all fours again.

“Yeah, yeah, lead on or kiss your googly bits goodbye!” Montsnmags snarled as he indicated the direction they had been going in before the interruption.

The two llamas stood where they had been all through this, chewing slowly on some grass, looking long after Montsnmags and VivaldiRules as they headed of into the woods. The llamas looked at each other, chewed for a bit, and then did the llama equivalent of a shrug and went back to grazing, vanishing out of this adventure after unknowingly having served as a great distraction for the immense gratification of a certain talking dog.

Our two intrepid adventurers is however off on the hunt again. Though they have lost some ground due to the whole llama and squirrowl incident. While they are running along Montsnmags glares at his fourlegged companion and says

“By the by dog, if I EVER hear about this incident from anyone.....”

“Would I tell anyone about this Boss?” Vivaldi asked in his most innocent tone of voice

“You better not! Or the ladies down at the Pink Poodle will have one less customer that brings home the bacon!”

“Right Boss, my lips are sealed!” VR said but couldn't stop himself from whispering WOOT to himself.

They ran along in silence, almost silence, anyhow, it was broken now and then by a whispered WOOT and some giggling. The forest started to thin out and the brier-hedge grew lower to finally vanish altogether, as at the same time they came to a large clearing.

“FIRE!”

SPLONK-CHUNK

There was few moments of silence before a huge ball of something came hurtling towards them, crashed into the ground a hundred yards to their left and on impact hurtling gobs of hot, sticky cheese in every direction.

“What the heck?” Monts said as he scanned the clearing ahead.

“Bacon'n'cheese balls!” Vivaldi stated as he headed for ground zero sniffing happily

Montsnmags spotted a trebuchet at the other end of the clearing

“Let's go dog, you get Bacon'n'Cheese when we are done, not before!” Monts said as he started towards the trebuchet.

VivaldiRules heaved a sigh, looked longingly at the mess of bacon and cheese before he trotted of after monts, muttering silently to himself. As they drew near the site where the trebuchet stood, they spotted a man in a white labcoat wandering around with a notebook in his hand. The man bent over the trebuchet, looked at his notebook, shook his head and made some kind of adjustment to the machine.

“Hello pshrynk” Monts said as they drew nearer.

The man who was indeed pshrynk, Pinwheels minister of health and armsdevelopment looked up with a start. Smiled happily and said “AH! Monts and Vivaldi, how good to see you!”

“I thought you were supposed to be on vacation” Vivaldi said

“Oh, that was just a coverstory, to make it possible for me to develop our latest weapon of massdestruction in peace and quiet” pshrynk said nodding towards the trebuchet. “We figured if we could use one of these to fling Bacon'n'Cheese-balls, we could stop the enemy in his tracks. You ever tried to walk through hot, sticky cheese? We did try clotted cream at first, but do you have any idea what that does to a trebuchet? We had to break the whole thing apart all the time to clean it.”

pshrynk turned back to the trebuchet and started tinkering with it as Montsnmags and VivaldiRules looked at each other, rolled their eyes and sighed in unison.

“pshrynk,” Monts said “we are following two men who has kidnapped the Queen. Have you seen anyone pass here?”

pshrynk spun around staring at Montsnmags

“The Queen has been kidnapped????”

Monts nodded

“Yes, a week ago, and we've been on their trail ever since. We tracked them through the woods to this clearing.”

“Sorry” pshrynk said “I haven't seen anyone all day, well, apart from you two that is”

Monts pondered this for a moment before looking at Vivaldi
“Go see if you can pick up their trail and come get me once you find it”

“Okidokie Boss” Vivaldi said before taking of at a run

“Do you know who is responsible for the kidnapping?” pshrynk asked worriedly

“No, not yet, but I plan to find out, and whomever is behind this will not be a happy camper when I do”

“Ok, we need to talk about this one of these days, all that pent up anger is not good for you” pshrynk said “too bad I don't have my couch around here.”

“Never mind the couch doc. Just make sure you get this thing working, we might need it before this mess has been solved” Monts said nodding att the trebuchet.

A happy bark from Vivaldi indicated that he had picked up the trail

“See you around Doc!” Monts said as he headed off after VR

“That will be $300, pay the laddy at the door...” pshrynk said absentmindedly as he waved, turned back to his trebuchet and promptly forgot that Monts and VR had ever been there....