Off to Seek a Wizard -8- Please Don't Eat the Mushrooms

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Off to Seek a Wizard...
-8-
Please Don't Eat
the Mushrooms

by Erin Halfelven

stephaniedale.png

 
I screamed again. I yelled something sensible like, "Oh shit! A bear!" I tried to roll over, stand up and run away, all at once and not one at a time. It didn't work. I did manage to roll over and over, off of the hillock, in fact, and landed nose deep in a trickle of water and the mudhole that surrounded it.

Meanwhile, the bear had kiyoodled something awful and took off running the other way, with much greater efficiency.

I sat up in the mud puddle and looked around. No bear in sight.

Instead I realized I was sitting in a small glade in the most ginormous forest I had ever seen. Trees like skyscrapers as far as the eye could see. Bushes as big as football stadiums. A sunflower bending above my head as wide as a handicap parking space. A bird of some sort peering at me from a branch way over head; it looked like a chickadee the size of an ostrich.

When I say ginormous, I mean ginormous.

Ants as big as chihuahuas wrestling with some nasty piece of rotten flesh. A three-foot caterpillar with a face full of knives chewing and chewing and chewing on the stalk of some plant that belonged in a horror movie itself. Gnats as big as baseballs.

It made me doubt all my senses. Had it really been a bear that startled me? What had I seen?

Also, what had I heard? When the bear ran away it wasn't with an inarticulate, "Arggh!" He'd said something.

I closed my eyes. He couldn't have. Bears don't talk. Yeah, right. A girl doesn't get sucked out of airplanes and survive a fall of tens of thousands of feet and wake up in a forest where everything is ten times it's normal size, either. Even if she isn't exactly a girl.

"Curiouser and curiouser," I said. "I don't remember eating any mushrooms." I glared at the caterpillar just on general principles.

As a magician, I know several ways to make things look bigger than they really are. One of the neatest is forced perspective, which they use a lot in the movies. It involves choosing your angles and putting the smaller things closer but making it look like they are farther away. I didn't see how that would work here.

I stared up at the bird again, trying to figure out how it could be close and yet look far away. Anyway I could figure the angles, the bird had to be as ginormous as everything else. "That's a big chickadee," I said.

I thought a moment more about what I had heard the bear say. I'd actually heard it quite distinctly, despite my own screaming. He'd clearly said, "A bear! Where, where?" That confused me. Not just that the bear talked but that it seemed to be afraid of bears.

I looked down at myself, covered in big wads of sticky mud. I tried to pull myself out of the mudhole but the stuff stuck like glue. I knew I had mud inside my bra and in my panties, too. Disgusting. But, I couldn't get any traction to push away and kept slipping back into the mud until there wasn't a clean spot on me.

I heard snickering coming from the greenery where the bear -- or whatever it was -- had disappeared.

"If you're going to laugh at me, come and help me climb out of this mud!" I shouted.

The voice I heard before said, "You said there was a bear." It sounded like George talking.

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Comments

Oh my I think she is not in Kansas anymore

Now where have I heard that from? ;)

And George is now a bear?

So how much is she recognizable as a she now that she is just in her undies?

I was expecting a strange twist but ...

The only thing I ask is that you do not mention the size of the mosquitoes and bedbugs *shivers*.

Kim

Perhaps you got it wrong.

Perhaps it could be - George is now bare. You only need to lose the indefinite article and shift the 'e' over :)

Wait 'til she gets to the spiders!

Robi

Actually I am not too bad with ordinary spiders

I am the unfortunate designated host for all skeeters throughout my life and I have had a recent struggle with bedbugs that still leaves me with chills.

So here I am laying 'bare' ;) my fears.

As far as George goes maybe he is a bare bear :).

Kim

Crossed tales

What is not in Kansas and down a rabbit hole. I suppose we must wait to find out.

DJ

Ursa Minor

So if everything is giant-sized, the "bear" must not have been a bear, but some smaller mammal that would resemble a bear if enlarged. The obvious option would be a rabbit for the Alicey theme, but I'd think she'd have noticed the ears. So, for a bear-shaped, rabbit-like animal found in roughly that part of the country, I'll guess a pika.

Ursa Minor (in translation)

Isn't that exactly what our hero/ine is at the moment?

I have my coat....

Pika?

Assuming for the moment that by "roughly that part of the country" you mean Kansas, then what is a 'pika'? If you'd said 'puka' then I would understand.

Karen J.

* * *
I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle. - Winston Churchill


"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin

It's not a tuma

erin's picture

Or a pika, there are no pikas in Kansas since they are a high altitude animal and are hard to keep in zoos for this reason. Not that I'm saying we're still in Kansas.... :)

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Curiouser...

Angharad's picture

...and curiouser cried Alice (wrong book I think).

Angharad

Angharad

Bears in oz

Erin, I live in OZ which is strange enough, But this story is doing my brain in, I am Having nightmares about large bears chasing me,-- but the only bears we have in oz are cute little koalas. I think I will ring the wizard of oz and tell him about you!!
Hugs Roo

ROO Roo1.jpg

ROO

oh my!

Jemima Tychonaut's picture

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. "Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad." "How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice. "You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

I can't help but that think that quote applies to Stephanie in Wonderland as much as Alice. The closest thing to a logical explanation would be she hit the trees and they slowed her fall leaving her a little bruised and confused. I prefer the idea it's really a cowardly lion. :-)

 


"Just once I want my life to be like an 80's movie, preferably one with a really awesome musical number for no apparent reason. But no, no, John Hughes did not direct my life."



"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Delightful

What a lovely, delightful yarn. Just the right mix of adventure, whimsy, and mystery. As Spock would say, "fascinating!".

Linda Jeffries
Too soon old, too late smart.
Profile.jpg

Linda Jeffries
Too soon old, too late smart.
Profile.jpg

I'm sure that Spock would say

Daphne Xu's picture

I'm sure that Spock would say, "Illogical".

-- Daphne Xu

-- Try saying freefloating three times rapidly.

okay, I'm really lost here

I have no clue what's going on. maybe she's dreaming?

Dorothycolleen, member of Bailey's Angels

DogSig.png

You're confused?

erin's picture

Think how she feels. :)

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Speechless

terrynaut's picture

In a land where everything seems to talk, I'm suddenly speechless. I truly don't know what to say about this story other than thanks and kudos.

Thanks and kudos.

- Terry

The Obvious(?) Conclusion

Don't see where anyone here has mentioned this...

If everything she encounters is super-giant sized, it's more likely that she has shrunk than that everything's grown. (Especially given the Alice in Wonderland references, including the mushroom in the title.)

I guess we'll see where (and at what size) George fits in here.

Eric

No Sign of a White Rabbit

Well as far as I can tell she hasn't been off chasing a white rabbit with a pocket watch.

Jefferson Airplane - Go Ask Alice

One pill makes you larger
And one pill makes you small
And the ones that mother gives you
Don't do anything at all

Go ask Alice
When she's ten feet tall
And if you go chasing rabbits
And you know you're going to fall

Tell them a hookah-Smoking caterpillar
Has given you the call
Call Alice when she was just small
When the men on the chess board get up and tell you where to go

And you just had some kind of mushroom
And your mind is moving slow
Go ask Alice
I think she'll know

Michelle B

Makes Perfect Sense

Daphne Xu's picture

A talking bear might be afraid of bears.

-- Daphne Xu

-- Try saying freefloating three times rapidly.