Ulibak stepped out of the closet... She heard Miritri laughing inside her head and sighed. “That woman is a genius, but she sooo needs to get out more often. And most definitely out of my head,” she thought. “Oh, really, or else what?” Miritri shot back.
Now, there was nothing Ulibak liked better than a challenge… Especially since she’d come into that cape and really got into superhero mode. Now, Miritri’s “Or else?” was ringing in her ears. Or, at least, that’s what it felt like...she couldn’t put it past her friend to be mocking her on purpose.

“That’s it, no more Miss Nice Bakuli,” said Ulibak out loud. She marched over to her bed, and dug into the heap of clothes strewn there to find her magical cape. She knew it was under there, somewhere, and was not about to leave home without it. “What kind of idiot superhero leaves home without her cape?” she muttered, only to hear Miritri giggle, “Do you really want an answer to that?”

“Shut it, Ms Yancha! You’re giving me a headache,” she managed before squealing at the state of her cape. For something that magical, it sure needed a lot of ironing! She picked up a notebook and a pencil and headed out of the shell she shared with her pets and Auwid to her favourite tree, ShadyBiz. She’d decided the only way to keep Miritri out of her head was to keep humming, and not thinking straight. Miritri hated it when Ulibak hummed…it interfered with the frequency of the thought waves. So, Ulibak began to write as she hummed:

The Objective: Keep M.Y. out of my head.
Purpose: She’s driving me nuts.
Possible courses of action:
a. Continue humming indefinitely;
b. Get her to leave home more often;
c. Get her to begin actually talking to other folks…
d. Get her to leave home without her pointy hat

Now, Miritri wasn’t scary at all...but she did have this crazy habit of mixing dancing and a pointy hat...and that made people VERY uncomfortable.

Ulibak kept scribbling:
A. Not viable coz constant vibration makes the throat itchy.
B. Doubt it’ll help.. She’ll probably keep talking to folks inside their heads, anyway.
C. See B.
D. Yea RIGHT!

Then, something struck Ulibak very hard. “Serves me right for turning to a breathing piece of wood for help,” she muttered, turning to glare up at Shady. Shady seemed to be grinning as he whacked her again with a small branch.

“What? Is there a point to this? Or are you just having fun?” she asked him, and he hit her again. Suddenly, it struck her—an idea, this time, not a branch. She was looking at how it rebounded (the branch, not the idea).

“What if, I can somehow manage to get Yancha to throw her voice at something and have it come back to her?” Ulibak wrote. The problem with Miritri’s voice was that there was no problem. She’d just stayed in labs for so long, that she didn’t feel the need to hear voices out loud. And, to make things worse, she was also telepathic…

Caught up with the idea, Ulibak forgot to hum. “WHAT do you think you’re doing?” Miritri’s message snuck into Uli’s mind. “Not yet,” Ulibak thought as she began humming again, bugging Miritri… She hated when Ulibak tuned her out... It usually meant trouble…and it usually involved her.

1. Ventriloquism?
2. Punching bag (yea right!)
3. Echo?
… the list read now.

“ECHO!” Ulibak scribbled and underlined. “That’s it!”

She went back in and called out to her other good friend, Auwid TcLaun. “Hey Auwid, we has a mission!”

“Now what?” the mirror asked back. “And will you please speak normally?”

She, like Miritri, was wary of any of Ulibak’s ‘smart’ ideas. They both knew her too well.

Ulibak didn’t want to let Miritri on to the plan, and while the red-haired scientist didn’t exactly follow Ulibak’s thoughts all day, she didn’t want to risk anything. So, she propped the notebook up against Auwid. “Teketheofvmeee,” came a muffled response. Ulibak grinned and jumped to hold the book away, knowing she was in for a lecture. She ALWAYS forgot Auwid had gotten her myopia fixed. But the mirror seemed too busy figuring out her scrawl. It wasn’t her fault she had horrible writing. Skwigull WAS a difficult script to master. And Ulibak acknowledged that drawing was not among her varied talents.

Auwid grinned as she began deciphering the various placements of the gulls. She nodded thoughtfully. “Could be interesting…”

“Of course it would be interesting!” Ulibak yelled back.

The next morning, Auwid and Ulibak trooped down to the pot under which Miritri lived. It was surprisingly clean. “Oh no, she’s figured what we’re planning,” was Ulibak’s first thought. But no, she was herb-sitting today. Rubsh Phegwean, the newest member of the Alfond was out with the three silver wolves, Freepo, Dwalpa and Lupinda, and Miritri was obviously making it keep Rubsh’s-little-one-out-of-trouble day. It also explained why the pot was clean.

“At least, she’s remembered to make it herb-safe,” mumbled Auwid as she entered. Ulibak ignored the mumbling, swept back her cloak in what she hoped was a regal manner (There were herbs around! No telling what they expected from a superhero!), and announced: “We’re going on a picnic.”

Miritri looked up, mildly amused. “That’s your big plan?” she asked. “You want to go picnicking to get me out of your head?”

Ulibak didn’t say anything, concentrating instead on humming loud enough to keep the rest of the plan muddled.

Finally, after much hemming and hawing and back and forth that would make this chapter more tedious than it already is, they set out on their picnic. Ulibak and Auwid had brought Uli’s pets—Aurria and Oligolumos—along with them. They’d also carried a lot of food, so Miritri really had no excuse not to go. Even her pot was clean!

They trudged up a nearby hill, taking care not to let Aurria anywhere near the herb. Just because she was not drunk did not mean she was sober. And unless Aurria was completely sober, there was no telling what she’d do—especially to things she could bite.

Once they reached the top, Auwid stood around admiring the view in herself while Ulibak spread the food out on the grass. Now, there was a saying in the Alfond: “da phat leaver sis ow-ais tase tier awn da udder saide” (roughly translated, it meant: The foie grass is always tastier on the other side), but Ulibak preferred carrying her own food on picnics.

Just as everyone was really getting into the swing of things, the swing stopped. Auwid had trundled a little away from everyone else.

“There she goes again,” thought Ulibak. “AGAIN?” Miriti asked. “Yea, she’s been doing this a lot lately. AND, she usually doesn’t respond to my calling her,” Ulibak shot back, looking worried. “Do you want to try and get through to her?”

Miritri looked lost in thought for a little while. Ulibak knew she was trying to reach Auwid thru the mirror’s mind. But Auwid didn’t seem to be paying attention. After about five minutes of watching Miritri concentrate, Ulibak suggested she tried calling to Auwid out loud. As she’d expected, her friend looked a little unsure.

“AUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUWWWWWWWWWWWWWIIIIIIIIIIIIIID!”

Auwid grinned to herself and kept moving further away. “AUWID TcLaun! You turn around and get back here! Right now! I know exactly what you’re doing and you know you shouldn’t be doing it.”

If Miritri could see Auwid, she may have noticed a bemused smile on her face. She had NO IDEA what her friend was talking about.

The game was beginning to tire her and she decided to come back. But it was too late. Now that Miritri had gotten started, there was no shutting her up. She’d discovered she liked the sound of her voice and didn’t let anyone else get a word in sideways.

And Ulibak was left thinking that, maybe, just maybe, she should stop poking her nose in other people's business.