Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen

The Night of Writing Dangerously was almost a third of the way through and so far everything seemed normal – as normal as any room containing 200 speed-novelists could appear, at any rate. Patricia, like her tablemates, were hard at work on another word sprint, trying to get as many words written in fifteen minutes as they could.

Patricia glanced up at her tablemates: each of them had the same phantom rabbit ears as she had seen during the kick-off party, but as she watched, they faded from her view.

It was the same thing she had seen during her time at the coffee shop the previous night: she herself needed to be plotting for her to be aware of the plot bunnies. She supposed it might be the same as at the kick-off party – once she had decided that she was indeed going to write a novel, the back of her head had been bubbling with plot ideas and stories – so perhaps that did indeed fit a pattern.

Everything else seemed normal, she thought with a quick glance around the room, and she returned her attention to her novel.




A short time later, after the pandemonium caused by three novelists ringing the cowbell together, signs of confusion began to appear.

The first indication was likely only apparent to Patricia. They were word sprinting at her table while the rest of the room wrote or relaxed as they pleased, for one of the girls was only 4,000 words away from 50,000 and she really wanted to win here at the event – especially now that she knew about getting to ring the cowbell. The table members were doing their best to support her, and this extra little sprint was part of that.

However, when Patricia looked up, the rabbit ears over each of her tablemates' heads were no longer the stable phantoms that she had seen earlier. Instead they were flickering rapidly, and it seemed that from one flicker to the next the ears changed, perhaps from a brown rabbit one moment to a white the next or a spotted the third. Patricia wondered if it was a sign that the plot bunnies were making their move.

She looked around for Alfalfa, but was not surprised when she didn't see him anywhere... but found herself wishing she could stroke his fur for even the smallest hint of reassurance that might give her.




The next sign came a few moments later, when a man in a top hat, scruff, and a nicely tailored black suit screamed and ran out of the room. He was probably the single most recognisable person in the room, known even to Patricia, who was on the very fringes of knowledge about NaNoWriMo.

The man was Chris Baty, the founder and director of National Novel Writing Month, and not only were most of the room's occupants women, most of those had a certain level of affection for him.

Most of the other members of the Office of Letters and Light, who were mostly seated at the pair of tables near the door, dashed after Chris, but the tall dark-haired woman, who Cait had explained was Sarah Mackey, the special events coordinator and woman in charge of the night's event, bravely stayed to strive for calm in the ballroom.

Given the elevated levels of excitement and distress in the women, all of whom were currently vocalizing their emotion in high-pitched voices and many of whom were reaching the point when they would get up in order to Do Something, Patricia wished Ms. Mackey the best of luck. She wondered if there was anything she could do to help – she had come to this event in order to help stave off issues if the plot bunnies attacked, but what was she, one grandmother in the process of re-discovering her creative stamina, supposed to do now? If this was part of the attack by the plot bunnies, Patricia felt that she would be vastly disappointed if she was unable to stop it from achieving the plot bunnies' aim.



Violent sneezing erupted, another sign of chaos, Patricia thought, startled out of her paralysis of sudden self-doubt at the same time as the women who had been preparing to move into silence and a chorus of “bless you”s as everyone looked at the source – the fourth sneeze, and fifth, were louder than the first three, and the man sneezing fell over, hitting the edge of the candy buffet and starting an inexplicable slide of the tubs onto the floor.

Several others had been at the table, and they grabbed at the various tubs and tablecloth, trying to prevent the suddenly imminent disaster. Their efforts were mostly successful: only the giant plastic jar full of soft sour gummies in the shape of rabbits spilled onto the floor, scattering sugar-coated squishy bits all over the centre of the room, and showering the poor man who was still sneezing from his location on the floor – now on his ninth and gearing up for his tenth.

A woman, dressed in jeans, a black hooded sweater with white NaNoWriMo text, and a fetching black trilby hat, all of which matched the man on the floor, dashed to his location, squirming her way past the many novelists blocking her path.

“Oh Howard!” she said, kneeling next to him and covering his mouth and nose with a cloth, and supporting his head with her other hand. “There, now, hopefully you won't breathe in anything else...” She looked around at the group clustered closest. “Have any of you got a pet rabbit?” she asked accusingly, and Patricia started in her seat, bending down and checking under the tables between her and the candy buffet. There – she saw Alfalfa hiding between the legs of nearest table – she carefully held open her bag under her chair, and beckoned to the rabbit. He needed to get out of sight quickly, before they started a rabbit hunt.

“Howard is ferociously allergic to rabbits,” the woman was continuing, but the man had apparently finished sneezing and was holding the cloth over his mouth and nose on his own. She helped him back to their table – and everyone in the room calmed down and returned to their writing.

Interesting, Patricia thought. Perhaps that had not been a sign of chaos – perhaps it had been Alfalfa's way of solving the situation over Chris Baty – as if everyone who had felt the need to take action now felt that, with the second crisis resolved, the first must be resolved as well, or was no longer at the top of their minds – she wasn't entirely certain how that worked, but she thought a heartfelt “thank you” to Alfalfa.

“Alright, my lovelies!” Sarah Mackey's voice came over the microphone. “We've had a little bit of excitement, and you should all know what that means.” She paused, and everyone waited expectantly. “It's time for another word sprint, of course! We've got to use that excitement to barrel our way towards the finish line! Fifteen minutes – and...” she counted down the seconds on her watch. “GO!”

Patricia nodded in approval – that would keep everyone occupied, but she herself was going to keep an eye on things. “I'll be right back,” she told her tablemates. “Just going to go find the ladies' room.” Patricia left her notebook on the table, but reached under her chair to pull out her bag. No sense leaving Alfalfa in here if she didn't have to – he might be useful.





The entryway was empty, except for a girl sitting in the coat check typing on her laptop. The girl glanced up with a smile, and Patricia smiled back, asking about the bathroom - “the restroom is just around the corner and to the left,” the girl pointed, and Patricia headed that direction. At least she could have a quiet check-in with Alfalfa in there.

The bathroom was empty – surprising for the ladies' room by this point of the evening, but Patricia wasn't about to complain – and as luxuriously appointed as the rest of the event. Patricia smiled in appreciation as she saw the basket of helpful necessities, likely provided by Sarah, displayed to perfection on the vanity counter. Smart lady, Patricia thought,noting the painkillers alongside the feminine hygiene products, as well as several other odds and ends: toothpicks, mints, gum, caffeinated gum (what would these people come up with next).

She left the basket undisturbed and headed for a stall. It probably wouldn't be good for a woman to find her in the ladies' with a rabbit after that whole incident with poor Howard.





The sound struck Flopsy like a slap across the face.

It must have been building in the background for some time. It was constant, loud, penetrating, yet Flopsy hadn't become aware of it until she hopped through that last wall – when the sound had struck her still and she involuntarily crouched in on herself.

Ah, she realised as she looked inward to check for Earry's direction. The inner certainty of danger rang inside her head with the same frequency as this pounding, penetrating noise – Flopsy thought instantly of Earry and lifted her head. The sound still hurt her, made her wish she were snuggled against the homey fur of her Mama rather than here struggling against noise, but she could fight it. For Earry.

With those ears of his, there was no way he could do anything in here – but she knew from that inner sense that she was close to him, and from the volume, she must be close to the source of the sound.

Taut with effort and determination, Flopsy hopped onwards, finally peeking through what she was certain would be the last wall between her and Earry.

The room within was completely outside her expectations and experience. It was wide but short – she felt she could hop across it in one bound – and lined in maroon-coloured silk. To her, it looked as if it should muffle sound, rather than amplify it, but the sound was even more harsh here. It seemed to reverberate through the small space, and she was glad she had not yet brought her ears fully through the wall.

At the far right – which actually wasn't that far, she realised; it only seemed so in comparison with the distance from the wall across from her – was a contraption of some kind, and it pulsed. She assumed it to be the source of the noise, and knew she should focus on it more, to somehow discover how to stop the infernal racket -

But at the opposite end of the room was Earry. Her heart seemed to shatter at the sight of him, for he was huddled in on himself, his ears curled as tightly as possible in on themselves. Her own tensed even more, almost painfully, in sympathetic response. That poor white form – Flopsy felt an irrational desire to just go to him. The new inner ability to track him ached for her to be beside him.

Yet that would also do him no good.

Flopsy resolutely turned from him, looking at the device across from the white rabbit.

It seemed simple enough.

It was a dark matte grey box-like thing. The part that moved, a silvery disc, was somehow attached or mounted on the front, and it vibrated away and then towards the main box. The box was solid except around the edges of that disc, through which Flopsy could just see what looked like strings.

Wires, she thought suddenly, thinking back to the power cords she had seen humans use at the write-ins. She had heard enough of the novelists joking about their computers being “about to die” to know that the wires somehow fed the machines energy, but she also knew that they had to “plug” into the source of nourishment. Flopsy wondered what this device was plugged into, for she had never heard of anything like it in Bunniption Base.

But things were changing, since this month's mission had started. Perhaps the vampire wanted a new way to power things, so that he could keep more creative energy to himself.

Flopsy glanced back to the left, at Earry, curled so tightly in on himself that he couldn't possibly even be aware of her.

She had no other option. She had to do something.

She resolutely turned away from Earry and towards the device.

Flopsy sidled along through the wall until she was as close as she could get to the noisemaker. Her ears were clenched so tightly now that they did hurt. She couldn't take this volume much longer, she thought, as she felt her bones start to vibrate. She inhaled deeply, and pounced forward, squeezing her nose past the edge of the disc, wincing as the disc moved, pressing against her cheek again and again, and shoved her mouth forward. Just a little more – Flopsy bit through the nearest wire.

One blessed moment of silence.

After a beat just long enough for Flopsy to relax her tightly held ears and pull her face – ouch! her whiskers – back out of the device, a shrill keening replaced the earlier harsh pounding. It seemed to come from the walls themselves, and with its total unexpected arrival, entering into relaxed ears, it hurt far more acutely than the harsh dull ache of the earlier noise. Flopsy fell into a paralysed huddle, the same pose she had seen Earry in at the other end of the room.

“Ah, Flopsy. How nice of you to join us,” a familiar arrogant voice, full of power, cut through the sharp, shrill sound, and Flopsy sank in on herself inwardly just as she had physically.

Trapped, she thought. Trapped...


Twenty minutes after entering the bathroom with Alfalfa, Patricia returned to the ballroom, but not to her table. The plot bunnies were divided, Alfalfa had explained after she managed to narrow her questioning down sufficiently. She had already decided that if she needed to consult him again she was just going to have a nap in her chair. She'd been up a long time that day and her brain was very nearly as overwhelmed as it had been in Chinatown – surely it wouldn't be too hard to fall asleep despite the busy surroundings.

Regardless, she now had a job to do.

Alfalfa said the plot bunnies were close to decimating the novels of almost everyone present, but he had also given her a clue earlier, when he had been talking to that other rabbit, and it had just clicked in her head – she was sure Alfalfa didn't understand why she had stopped questioning him in the middle of a chain of thought, but there was no time to lose.

Patricia marched to the front of the room, up the stairs, and paused at the top. Oh no. Chris Baty had come back in her absence and was in the middle of a speech.

“The first little boy who answered my question summed it up for the rest of them: 'At first, I thought it was a lot of words... and then I got excited.'” Chris Baty was saying, then paused before repeating that last point. “'At first I thought it was a lot of words, and then I got excited.' I think that just about sums it up for all of us.”

Again Chris paused, but this time not for emphasis. This time he was listening to the people in the crowd who were shouting and pointing to the side, where Patricia stood frozen at the top of the steps.

“Oh, hello,” Chris said to her. “Another winner?”

Silently she shook her head.

“Can it wait until I've finished, then?”

Patricia sank down to a seat at the top of the steps. Chris Baty. She was on stage with Chris Baty, however accidentally it had happened. The room was laughing, but she didn't care, and she settled in to wait.

Chris spoke about all the good things NaNoWriMo was achieving: the creative endeavours, the individual and collective accomplishments, and most of all, the introduction of novel-writing into the classrooms of America with the innovative Young Writer's Program. This is what she had interrupted, she realised, and Patricia listened as Chris eloquently described the wonderful world that everyone in the room was a part of.

He was witty, he was charming, he was clear. Every detail contributed to the sense of collective wonder and hope and optimism and drive towards making everything go that little bit farther: if we could each write the bare bones of a novel in thirty days, what more could we achieve?

But it was there that the speech went off the rails. While Chris's description of the programs had been sharply defined, his attempt at exhorting the room to greater efforts, at eliciting increased creativity and word counts, was lost. He spoke about octopi hugging monkeys and space pirates become ballerinas, and everything in and of itself was quirky and wonderful and was probably something Chris could have turned into a brilliant speech or a hilarious story – at any other time, with any foe but the plot bunnies seeking to thwart him.

As it was, the speech was like listening to one of those stories that you write a sentence at a time with a big group of people, in which you are only allowed to read what the person before you wrote: hilarious, in its utter incoherence, but not particularly inspiring.

Patricia wondered if Chris had any idea how crazy what he'd just spouted had sounded, then realised that this was her cue.

She pulled herself up, and went to join the dapper Chris, in his black suit and top hat, at the podium.

“Thank you Chris,” Patricia said. “May I take this opportunity to follow you with a few words?”

“Certainly, Ms...?”

“Patricia,” she told him. “From Vancouver.”

“Novelists,” Chris told the room through the microphone. “Patricia from Vancouver would like to take a few moments of your time.”

Patricia took the microphone and smiled at the room. My goodness, she thought. Two hundred people certainly looked like a lot from up here in the limelight.

“Friends,” she greeted them. “I have two challenging questions for you. Please answer me honestly.”

Patricia paused. Which to ask first?

“How many of you have found your novels slow going this year, with more of a life of their own than usual? If you haven't done this before, as I haven't, perhaps you have had your initial characters go one way while your novel goes another. Perhaps your setting has changed drastically, or your plot gone from a romance to a murder mystery or an action adventure. How many of you, in fact, have been writing ideas for more than one novel into your book?”

Every hand in the room went up. She nodded.

“There's a reason for that. Second question. How many of you found Chris Baty's speech absolutely amazing and inspirational?” The room exploded into applause, and she waited for it to die down. “So did I – until the end. How many of you can say the same about the the part of his speech about working on your novel? Is there anyone in this room who did not find the octopus hugging the monkey just the confusing start to a confusing conclusion?”

The only people who put their hands up were the staff at the Office of Letters and Light, seated around the table at the back of the room near the door, and Patricia nodded again. “There's a reason for that too – both most of us who are not with the Office of Letters and Light being confused, and the OLL staff understanding. There's a reason,” she said, and paused, looking around at the novelists in the room, at the people with their laptops open, and she smiled. “And there's a way we can fight back.

“Are you interested?”

A loud sneeze exploded at the back of the room, and Patricia caught a glimpse of brown fur moving by the windows at the right-hand side of the ballroom. So that's where he had gone... She nodded at her audience.

“Yes Howard,” Patricia smiled across the space, finding Howard's face next to that of his wife, at a table at the back right. “Your sneezing is confirmation of the problem plaguing us all: plot bunnies.

“I don't know why yet, but this year, the plot bunnies are out to get us. In the past, they have helped us, feeding us countless ideas and rescuing novels with too little imagination. But this year they are tossing and turning us about, throwing us at one idea after another and another and another – and yet another.

“Perhaps it's because so many of us abandon their plots and their writing as soon as the month is over. Perhaps it's because they are somehow offended by the cavalier approach this whole project shows to the sacred craft of writing. I don't know. But right now, what matters is that they are plotting against our novels.

“But we have a solution, for we are novelists. Plot bunnies give us ideas, complications, complexities – and these are fantastic and wonderful and give our novels interest and vivacity. But we are the ones who link everything together. We are the ones who pull together the wild free-wheeling threads of the plot bunnies and tie them into neat tidy packages.

“Some of us have already started this. Several people have come up here to ring this bell,” Patricia said, picking up the cowbell and giving it a shake. “They may already be wrapping everything up – and they may already be having an easier time of it, for the plot bunnies have a much harder time hijacking novels at this point than during the generation of ideas.

“They also have a much harder time trying to harvest power from us during that process. And that power is what we need to target. We need to deliver a major blow against the plot bunnies tonight – together – for we here tonight will be their major source of power. The Night of Writing Dangerously is a night of creative mayhem, but if we allow the creative energy to go to the plot bunnies, they will win.

“They will win,” Patricia repeated softly. “They will win, and our initiatives, our programs to support the creativity of young writers, of bringing this delicious madness to our classrooms and our young people, will die. The chance for folks like me to rediscover ourselves and our ability to innovate and be creative and be alive, will die.

“I don't want that to happen,” she said, and paused, looking around the room, making eye contact with everyone she could see.

“So tonight, fellow novelists,” she continued in a peppier tone, grinning at them. “Wherever you are in your story, I challenge you: start tying up those loose threads.

“It's time. It's time for us to start that process, and take the creative power back into our own hands.

“If you aren't already at a point in your novel where it makes sense to tie things up, skip ahead, start a new page, and write 'epilogue' at the top. Where are your characters in five years? Who gets married? Who is still getting into trouble, just as they did at the start of the story you've already started writing?

Patricia looked around the room one more time.

“Are you with me, dear novelists?” she asked softly.

In the silence that followed, the silence that seemed to stretch for eternity, Patricia drew in a deep breath. She, the quiet, domestic grandmother who liked tea, had just given a speech. In front of 200 people! But would it work?

Applause broke out across the room, and Patricia breathed out slowly. She could really use a cup of tea now, actually, she reflected, then stepped aside as Chris Baty put his hand on her shoulder.

“Thank you Patricia,” he said with a broad smile, then leaned into the microphone. “Alright you lot! Fifteen minute word war! You've got one word to start you off already: epilogue!” He glanced at his watch.

“And... 3! 2! 1! Go!”

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

The Night of Writing Dangerously.

With a soft brown bunny cradled in her arms, Patricia stood on California near the corner with Montgomery, in San Francisco, very close to Market Street and the Port building. She eyed the gold lions decorating the building with appreciation. They had a pure clear elegance that she found soothing after a long day of sightseeing that had, she admitted, been a touch overwhelming.

She had started with Chinatown, which was probably for the best as, after a couple of hours, her brain had decided that everything was just too much: too many sounds, too many sights, too many people. Patricia had in one moment turned from wide-eyed wonder to yawning desire for sleep, but had thankfully been able to find a cab close by and had returned to her hotel room for a long nap – which had been strange. She still wasn't sure, for it had been faint and almost forgotten by the time she woke, but she felt that Alfalfa had been talking to someone while she slept, and she had caught the edges of that conversation.

Nothing had been particularly clear. She had understood Alfalfa far more than the other voice – perhaps due to her familiarity with the brown bunny. “She is a storyteller – she must be the one to tie everything together,” she had heard, and had warmed to the protectiveness in his voice, somehow certain he was talking about her. Storyteller, he had called her, and in her dream-like state she had felt suddenly more confident in her creative capacity. “Plot bunnies can only add complications, not end them – we need her,” he said later, louder, clearer, as if arguing, and then his voice had subsided into a softer, more persuasive tone, before fading from her awareness altogether. She had dreamed of Alfred, afterwards, and drifted into a warm and happy nest of nothing.

She had woken fully refreshed, wondering what Alfalfa had meant, but too pumped for getting out and about again to sit still long enough to discuss it with him. Besides, she felt like she had been eavesdropping, so instead she tucked the information into the back of her brain, and went to Pier 39 and enjoyed some delicious fish, then took another cab to the tea shop Alfalfa had requested she visit in Ghirardelli Square – where she also had quite a few delightful little chocolates. The intense darks were divine, and she had bought a big box of them to share with May and Laura. The rest of the time there had been even more uneventful than the previous night's trip to the tea shop in Mission, without even a single plot bunny sighting, but she had managed to get quite a bit more done on her murder mystery. She had already started tying up the loose ends, and hoped to finish the story – and the 50,000 word count – in the next few days. In fact, she rather suspected that if tonight's event went smoothly, she would be able to finish it tonight – before the had left Vancouver and her desktop computer she had done a check of her digital word count and had been over 42,000, probably thanks to all the writing she had done during her carrot-crazed phase, and had already written nearly 4,000 more words, by her rough count of her hand-written notes.

After the brief sojourn in the coffee shop, Patricia had returned to her hotel room and dressed herself up for the evening, topping her black dress and pearls with the pillbox hat – the Night of Writing Dangerously was Film Noir themed, so she felt it was only appropriate that she wear the hat inspiring her own Film Noir novel.

Alfalfa had asked her to bring him with her to the event, but she didn't want to carry a huge cage in with her, and he had indicated that he would behave himself, at least before they got to the ballroom, so she had just picked him up. She had space in her bag as well – it just carried her wallet, two notebooks, assortment of pens, and keys to her hotel room – but for now she was happy to carry him. He was soft and light and, Patricia thought appreciatively given San Francisco's chill air and brisk wind, he was warm.

Still, staring at the beautiful building in which the evening's festivities were to take place, Patricia shivered from more than just the cold. There was no way the plot bunnies would let a night like this, of such importance to the novelists and their leaders in the Office of Letters and Light, pass unmolested. She no longer harboured any doubts about the plot bunnies' malevolent intent.

Well, standing out here wouldn't solve anything.

Patricia shifted one hand free from Alfalfa's fluff, pushed upon the door, entered the lobby, and punched for the elevator.

“Ready, Alfalfa?” she asked the bunny, and he signalled yes. She set him down on the elevator floor, and tried not to look at him as the arrival ding sounded and the doors opened onto the 15th floor.

Two tuxedoed waiters greeted the arriving elevator with trays of what looked like martinis and ... red martinis with lime instead of olive. Patricia shook her head; it had been many years since she had had martinis with Alfred, and tonight she needed to keep her wits about her.

Instead, she headed to the coat check at the back of the lobby, handing over her wool coat and looking out the window at the breathtaking view of the city her position on the 15th floor provided.

“Hello there,” a young woman dressed in a fedora and a grey tweed suit with a black under-vest and one of the red drinks in her hand said to Patricia as they both moved away from the coat check and towards the group of people congregating around the couches by the closed door that seemed to promise the evening's excitement – once the staff were ready for all the novelists. “I'm Cait.”

“Hi Cait, I'm Patricia,” she answered with a smile. “Are you from these parts?”

“Sort of – I live up near San Jose, which is a bit of a drive, but not too far,” Cait answered. “How about yourself?”

“Vancouver, in Canada,” Patricia said. “I've never actually been this far from British Columbia before. Yesterday was my first plane flight – I'm so excited to be here.”

“How exciting! Did you come down just for this?” a man from the near edge of the group they were approaching asked, having overheard Patricia's comment. He was dressed in jeans and a NaNoWriMo t-shirt, with large brown frames on his glasses. “I'm Tom, by the way,” he added, holding out his hand to shake Patricia's.

“Hi Tom,” she said, shaking his hand. “Yes, I did come down for this. I realised this month that I haven't been so excited about anything, or been so creative, since my husband died four years ago, and I wanted to show my appreciation for the sheer exuberance of the whole thing and maybe get to meet some of the people who make it happen.” Patricia had decided it would be wiser not to tell anyone here about what she suspected about the plot bunnies, and if she kept quiet about her forum name perhaps no one would connect her with that appeal either. She didn't want to draw attention to herself in case the plot bunnies were listening in on the conversation, gathering the means to bring the whole gathering that night to a halt.

“How about you, Tom?” asked Cait. “Where are you from?”

“I just live on the East Bay,” he said. “This is my second year coming to the Night of Writing Dangerously, and I'm even more excited tonight than I was last year – my novel isn't exactly going swimmingly, and I'm hoping that tonight I can get some inspiration from the people I speak with. So Patricia,” he grinned at her. “I might have to put someone on their first flight in my novel. Tell me about your experience!”

Patricia smiled and allowed herself to be drawn into the conversation – surely the plot bunnies would leave them to converse into a sense of security and community before they pounced – and these seemed like such fascinating people- she began to tell Cait and Tom about the lightning striking her plane the day before.





The double doors opened and a tall dark-haired woman in a long black gown stepped through, throwing her arms extravagantly wide: “Welcome to the 2010 Night of Writing Dangerously!”

She stepped aside and waved the novelists past her into a zone of red velvet curtains and lush gold decorations. There were tables for signing in, and Patricia joined the line for the K-P crowd.

“Knox, Patricia, k-n-o-x,” she spelled for the pretty girl in the steampunk goggles who sat behind the table. Not exactly Film Noir, thought Patricia, but quite striking, and thanked her with a smile as she checked Patricia off her list.

Patricia followed the crowd past another entrance draped in red velvet and entered the gold-gilted ballroom. It was fabulous, she thought, unable to produce any more descriptive adjectives, and she allowed the press of people behind her to push her in amongst the maze of tables and chairs.

“Here, Patricia,” she heard a voice call, and turned to see Cait pointing to a chair. “Come and sit with us,” the fedora-topped young lady invited.

“Oh, thank you, Cait,” Patricia said gratefully and settled into the indicated chair.

The table was near the edge of the ballroom, on the left side up near the stage but out of the way enough to offer a good view of the whole space. Patricia found it much easier to take in everything now that she was sitting down, and she took a good long look around.

No sign of Alfalfa, which was a good start, she thought, but she had a lot of other things to see without looking for a single small moving brown furry creature. There were the people, of course, a mosaic of different colours and textures and movement and conversation. There were the tables, in matching maroon tablecloths and shiny stars, beneath gold-hued chandeliers. There was another table in the centre of the room, surrounded by space rather than chairs, which was covered in brightly-coloured bowls and tubs. She wondered what was in them, and as if in reply she heard Cait ask someone else at the table, “Have you checked out the candy buffet yet?”

Patricia couldn't hear the reply, but she nodded in understanding of the bright multi-coloured contents of the centre table.

Near to her own table, only a few feet from the far side of Patric'ias seat, a small stage was set up, perhaps 18 inches high, with a podium and a microphone set up at its front. Patricia wondered what the cowbell on the podium was for – perhaps announcing dinner?

Behind the stage was a large gold-framed fireplace, crowned by a gold owl.

The space was indeed decadent, Patricia thought, and turned to greet her tablemates.



The novelists hadn't even all finished sitting down and setting up their laptops when Patricia saw a petite woman in a sleek red dress and a black silk flower in her blonde hair scurry up onto the stage, grasp the cowbell firmly, and ring it twice quickly overhead. She stood on the stage grinning giddily and dancing from foot to foot until – moments later – the tall woman who had opened the ballroom doors swept up onto the stage, beaming.

“We have our first winner of the evening!” the woman said into the microphone after a brief conversation with the lady in red. “Claire of Santa Barbara has just crossed the 50,000 word victory line!”

Everyone, even the many people with their heads tucked under the tablecloths looking to plug their power cables in, erupted with applause and catcalls.

“Now for the rest of us, should we manage to reach the same lofty heights this evening, come and ring the cowbell and I'll be right up to congratulate you and give you,” her eyebrows waggled and her voice suddenly became more mysterious, “your winner prizes!”

The two women left the stage, heading for some piles Patricia couldn't quite see in the back corrner. She smiled at the room's enthusiasm, and began writing in her own notebook.






Flopsy was pacing.

She never paced: it was far too clear an indication of nervousness, and one never knew when someone was watching unseen.

Now, however, she was in her own carefully spelled and protected base, the head administrative office in the basement of the ferry building, where no humans would enter for at least another day, as the main administrative officer was on vacation until December 1. The outer office was more than sufficient for the needs of the rest of the staff.

As for other threats, she was guarded by Harey and Hopert, in whose skills she had unparalleled faith thanks to over a year of working closely with them, as well as Earry, whose ears had proven themselves time and time again. She felt safer than she had since she had become a full-fledged plot bunny, ironic given the danger that was giving rise to the nervousness that caused her to pace. In other words, she felt safe, and so was able to show how scared she was.

She felt for a moment guilty that she had never felt this safe when it had been Harey, Hopert and Alfalfa who were watching over her, and she suppressed – again – a desire that Earry would be allowed to remain on her team after this was all over.

Of course, when this was all over, either things would be quite different than they had been before, or Flopsy was unlikely to have a team at all. Either way, Earry's assignment was unlikely to coincide with her own. She felt an irrational desire to blame Alfalfa, and she scolded herself for it again. This was not his fault, nor was it his fault that she was feeling more than team-based interest in Earry, and blaming him only meant she wasn't dealing with the situation.

Flopsy flipped her ears in irritation and forced herself to sit still. She wished there was something left for her to think about, but there wasn't. No more planning, no more organising, no more figuring things out. There would be more to do soon – possibly more than it was possible to get done – but not yet. Still, she couldn't help herself reviewing what had happened so far in her head.

The message had come in from Bun-Bun almost an hour previously.

The note, directed to Earry via Bunniption Base, wasn't very long: it simply said “op ears go”. Flopsy hoped desperately that none of the elder archetypes or their helpers had read it, but even more that they had decided it was just a note between friends and not something more sinister. Still, both Bun-Bun and Earry were operatives of the elder archetypes themselves, which meant that they tended to have quite a bit of leeway and trust from their compatriots – she hoped. Perhaps they would think that there was some sort of collaboration in the taking down of Flopsy's team in the works, for she had agreed with Earry that it was a good idea to let the higher ups know that Alfalfa had been spotted in San Francisco. If nothing else, it gave them an excuse to communicate – and it also gave both Flopsy and Earry an excuse to hop back to base, because from there they could travel quickly to San Francisco. Finding Alfalfa was still listed as their primary mission. At least, that's what the official listing said; Flopsy guessed that Earry's primary mission was actually to watch her.

So far, so good, for getting them an excuse to head up, then. Bun-Bun's message meant that he had reported Alfalfa and that he was ready to support the next stage. Flopsy was still trying to work the details out for that. She was sure that there was something critical in the assignment Alfalfa's human had given to that other human boy, the one who was writing the plot bunny army. While she was relieved that the woman had not told him to simply destroy the whole plot bunny army, for she had no idea how much hopeless destruction that would have wrought amongst her people, Flopsy was unsure what kind of message to take from it, or how to work it into her own plans.

Obviously the human thought there was some way for plot bunnies and humans to be aware of each other and somehow work things out. Flopsy supposed that her interaction with Alfalfa had fuelled or at least influenced that impression, and found herself scared by the level of hunger it woke in her: she wanted her human partners to know that she was there, working with them on the creative endeavours that they so enjoyed. She wanted them to know that they weren't alone.

She also wondered if it might make some of them less likely to simply abandon projects in the middle – but she wasn't about to bank on it.

Besides, that was for the future, for after something was worked out, if anything could be worked out.

They had to deal with the elder archetypes first, and that meant finding some way to access them, some way to exploit their vulnerability, and some way to ensure that the vampire did not get lost in the fray.

Flopsy had several ideas for that, but none that she was sure would work. She didn't have a vampire narrative of any sort, and – strange – most of the bunnies she had known who did had died the previous year at the end of NaNoWriMo.

Actually, she thought, that was extra strange, for vampire stories were really big in the human world. There should be more plot bunnies around who focused on them – but no, of course not, she realised, and her ears flopped forward in bitter amusement. The vampire had already been in a position of power, and of course he would have had the ability to get rid of competition for his nourishment. She supposed that, now that he was no longer finding his own brain carrots, nourished as he was by Bunniption Base's collection mechanisms, he had made some sort of arrangements (or had simply manipulated them, as there was no guarantee that any particular type of plot bunny be smarter than the average, and she guessed that he would have killed off any that were more likely to compete or to question) to ensure that their power reinforced his own invulnerability. She knew that different stories held different to different qualities and characteristics, and Flopsy supposed that the vampire would only have allowed bunnies to continue to serve who had the right sort of descriptions. That way, even if the vampire didn't alter their nourishment uploads to the Base, the re-telling of their stories would reinforce the qualities in himself that he valued most highly.

Flopsy shivered. How was one little plot bunny supposed to stand up to him? she wondered, unconsciously crouching in on herself, making herself small.

“Flopsy?” Earry's voice broke into her reverie. “Are you okay?”

Right, she thought. She had allowed herself to feel safe and secure, but had forgotten that she still needed to maintain enough self-control to provide a front for the boys. She blinked her eyes open.

“Yes, I'm fine,” Flopsy said, but chose not to add too many obvious body language cues to make that point – Earry would respect her decision to lie more if she chose to make it as flat as possible.

He nodded, and swivelled his ears back towards the rest of the world. She twitched her ears in appreciation, and let herself settle her weight back onto her haunches.

It was almost time, she realised, and she hoped once more that they had been able to get enough power in Harey and Hopert for what they were about to do. Alfalfa's human had definitely helped, for Alfalfa was right: she was a complete powerhouse. But worrying about power was just an excuse not to think about the plan itself. Flopsy shuddered. She did not like this part, nor did she like the uneasy feeling that Earry had already crossed this line. Not only had he suggested it, he simply hadn't been appalled enough.

She didn't have time to slide down that slope again. It was time for her to be team lead.

Flopsy hopped over to Hopert's perch, part-way through the wall between the office and the front administrative area.

“You ready, Hop?” she asked, leaning towards him in a rare display of physical affection, letting her nose brush the fur of his neck.

He flicked his ears in what was normally amusement, but the gesture was stiff, and she softened even more, knowing that he had just shown her what Earry had not: Hopert was very uncomfortable with the idea of his role in this mission. But he was on her team, and he had more discipline than pretty much every other plot bunny Flopsy had ever come into contact with.

“You betcha, Flops,” he said, with nearly his usual bravado.

She flicked her whiskers at him. “I'm counting on you, Hopert,” she said seriously, then waved her ears in mock panic. “You're step one in this plot, and then I'm going to need you to keep your wits about you out here. Who knows what might happen without me here to keep an eye on it?”

“Yes,” Hopert said darkly. “Or what that Harey might do with all that power he'll be hanging onto.”

Her ears twitched involuntarily. “Don't let being my deputy go to your head, Hops! Harey might have some good suggestions.”

“Yes, and all of them will have you upset with us the minute you get back,” Hopert twitched his ears in imitation of hers. “So I'll only use the ones that I can pretend were my ideas.”

She laughed. “Good hunting, Hops,” she told him, and gave him a half-crouch, which he returned in full. Good ol' Hops... Flopsy left him and went to Harey's vantage point upstairs, where he was curled in a pillar. The boys were putting to good use their practice hiding from San Francisco: even plot bunnies tended not to notice people who were in the middle of objects physical to humans.

“Hey Hare,” Flopsy greeted him, touching his cheek with her nose as she had done with Hopert.

“Flops,” he answered. “All clear so far.”

“Good,” she said softly. All business. The clearest sign of worry she had seen from Harey yet. “Just don't steal a brain carrot out from under anyone else's nose and we'll get through this just fine,” she said, getting an ear twitch out of him – good. That had been his favourite prank – he'd nipped in neat as you please and taken a brain carrot almost from between the teeth of the top dog of the murder mystery world and Flopsy wondered if perhaps he had been assigned to her team so that she could give him the discipline he needed to know when that sort of thing was inappropriate.

Of course, most of their bureaucrat types thought it was never appropriate, but Flopsy thought there was a time and a place for everything. Especially when her team was under stress.

“But maybe you could do a little sanctioned pranking against Alf when we all get back together, hm?” Flopsy murmured. “After he's gone and put us through all this trouble...”

Harey perked right up. “Oh, I know just the thing! If I -”

“Don't tell me, Hare!” She interrupted. “How am I supposed to feign innocence if I know what was supposed to happen?”

His ears flicked and she relaxed a bit. He was tense, sure, but he'd be alright. “Okay Hare. Keep an eye on Hop, and make sure the story holds, right?”

“Sure Flops, you got it.”

“Happy hunting,” she said, tickled his whiskers with hers, and hopped back through the floor to the administrative room.

“You need a pep talk too, Ears? You probably heard those two already,” she wrinkled her nose at the white bunny seated in the administrative officer's chair as if he worked there, head cocked, ears open.

“Thanks Flopsy, I'm alright,” he said absently. “Sounds like the sarge might be coming a bit early.”

“Are you sure?”

Of course he was. She took a deep breath. No time to back out, no time to change the plan, no time to figure out what she should have done instead of this betrayal of her people... no, she told her brain, and wished her emotions would listen to. She was helping her people. She was saving them. It was the sarge's boss who had betrayed them.

But it was she who would be labelled the traitor if she failed.

Flopsy breathed in again, one long slow inhale, and settled herself comfortably onto the mouse pad she'd been enjoying since she chose this office.

Rhythmic hollow noises announced the sergeant's arrival. Flopsy wondered once again why had chosen that affectation – surely he, the primary intermediary between the elder archetypes and the mass of plot bunnies, needed no such heavy-pawed indications of authority. And surely there was something that could be done about the white tufts, sticking in all directions like that – surely the elder archetypes would be willing to help him out with those, for from what Earry said it would only take a minor use of the power from Bunniption Base – but it was a waste of energy that did nothing to consolidate their power, so of course it would never happen.

Again Flopsy scolded herself: now she was focusing on trivialities when she needed to be alert.

Flopsy crouched deeply in greeting.

“Flopsy,” the grey tufted rabbit greeted, offering the barest hint of a crouch in return, and she tried not to bristle at the insult.

“Sergeant,” Flopsy replied.

“Earry,” the sergeant added as an aside to the rabbit crouching on the chair a level below the two leads, but did not wait for a reply.

“Flopsy, your team has been found delinquent,” the sergeant started in on her. “The elder archetypes gave you an order,” he spat the word. “You may not have intended to disobey, but whatever your intent, you and your team failed.

“It's not the third week of November, three quarters of the way through our mission – a mission of vital import to the livelihood, no, the very survival of our people – and you have failed to find your lost little lamb,” the sergeant half-shouted in his parade ground voice, and Flopsy wondered how Earry handled the sergeant's volume in his sensitive ears. Focus, she told herself. “You know how much that little lamb knows about this mission and about our strategies and tactics – you know how much damage he could do to our cause and our people if he were to be captured, or worse, if he betrayed us to the novelists.”

The sergeant glared at Flopsy, tufts of hair seeming to strive for threatening angles. Flopsy felt a moment's amusement at them, as she always did, but the amusement disappeared instantly as she remembered her own plan. She tried to look contrite and not sorrowful, but it was hard.

“Now, the powers that be still like you, harvest knows why,” said the sergeant, continuing his patentable eyeball technique. “So they think you should know: your little lamb has been spotted in San Francisco.”

“Alfalfa?” Flopsy gasped, with every sign of shock. “What a relief!”

“Hah!” snorted the sergeant, full of derision. “You may wish he hadn't turned up – the elder archetypes have put Bun-Bun on his case, exactly because he may have become a weapon against us, and I know Bun-Bun well. He'll have no mercy for your little lost lamb. A word of advice,” he said, his ears twisting into a caricature of amusement as his tufts of hair took on newly divergent lives of their own. She was reminded of a poster she had seen once of a human sergeant with a huge cigar poking out one side of his mouth and a leer taking over his face. She had thought it ridiculous then, but she had not yet seen the sergeant at that point. “You just figure out a ay to get your little lamb back before Bun-Bun finds him.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, as he paused as if expecting a reply.

“That is all, team lead Flopsy,” he dismissed her,emphasizing her title with the clear meaning that he doubted she would keep it much longer, and bounded out through the door, Flopsy hurriedly crouching in case he looked back, but already turning to Earry as she did so.

“The boys will be busy some hours yet,” Flopsy said loudly, hoping to catch the sergeant's ears as he eavesdropped on the first words said after his departure, as he always did. “Are you up for a short hop to San Francisco, Earry?”

“Always, ma'am,” the white bunny replied, only the glint in his eye indicating that the subservience might be for show. “I just need to report in to the elder archetypes on our way.”

“Of course,” she said, shaking her head at the glinting amusement, and the two bounded through the narrative divide into Bunniption Base.

Flopsy spared a moment's thought for Harey and Hopert – they had the toughest part, and without it she and Earry would be unable to put their own part in motion.





The only window they had was the length of Earry's report to the elder archetypes. They had spent the past few days elongating that window, with Flopsy helping Earry devise excuses to delay returning to Bunniption Base, and both of them hoping that the delay would increase suspicion of her and encourage the greys to ask more questions – especially since Earry would make it clear that she was in a hurry, and that he himself was willing to stay to answer questions as long as they were asked.

The careful planning on that part meant that they created the exact current situation: Flopsy with nothing to do outside the elder archetypes' tower, obviously impatient, obviously fretting.

She was fretting much less over what others might assume, however. She knew exactly what Alfalfa was doing in San Francisco, or at least, she knew as much as she needed to know. Flopsy hoped he was successful but knew that her own part needed to be complete in order to support him. Instead, she was fretting, and this time she had no team to protect her vulnerability, so every sign she gave had to signal concern over Alfalfa, and not over Harey and Hopert, nor over herself or her people.

She could only hope that she would be able to do something – anything – before she started pacing. Not that the next part of the plan was any better than this, she admitted, but at least then she had a role to play besides looking anxious to get moving.

Flopsy let her ears twitch once, and prayed to the harvest that none of her fears about what could go wrong would actually happen to Harey and Hopert.

Thankfully the boys always did have excellent timing, and before she could work herself into a frenetic frenzy a small brown rabbit bounded into view from the human world. He was nearly identical to Alfalfa but for the patch of darker fur around his right eye – a pirate patch, the plot bunnies called them, and Flopsy wondered if his was real, for they were presently in style and quite a few plot bunnies had taken to dyeing their fur with the mark.

The plot bunny looked at her, where she sat crouched respectfully, waiting outside the elder archetypes' tower and sanctuary. She was sure she had given no offence that would justify his eyeing her with such suspicion, but she refused to react. The plot bunny, with no indication of respect or acknowledgement of her presence, bounded past her into the building.

So it was done, she thought, and prayed to the great garden plot for Harey, Hopert, and herself.

No going back.

She forced herself to remain calm, despite the erupting turmoil within her.





“Flopsy?” Earry's voice broke into what was turning into a bout of self-loathing. “The elder archetpes request your presence, since you are so close.”

“Of course,” Flopsy said, then followed Earry's white form into the tower. She sensed his sudden tension as soon as he entered, but before she also noted its cause: there were only elevent grey rabbits waiting for them.

This was not according to plan.

“Your eminences,” Earry broke the silence before it stretched too far, and Flopsy shook herself into a deeply respectful crouch.

“As requested, I have brought Flopsy, my team lead, before you. Now I must crave a boon of you – the news we have heard came as a great shock, for the sergeant trained me personally, and I would beg of you time to collect my thoughts... and perhaps to begin querying my sources.” He paused, crouching more deeply. “As Flopsy and I came directly here after the sergeant spoke to us, I understand that she is a sensible place to start, but I assure you she had no part in this.” Flopsy's eyes softened as he defended her to the greys in a way that she was privileged to hear. “I have come to value her insight and would appreciate her input on what information I am able to gather, so perhaps you might expedit your discussion that she might join me.”

“We will ascertain the facts, Earry, and that will take as long as it may,” one of the grey rabbits replied. “But thank you for your report, your patience, and your input. You may go.”

Flopsy kept her breathing from changing pattern. The plan had called for both she and Alfalfa to distract the elders, all 12, until circumstances allowed Earry to take on the vampire. Since he wasn't here, of course he would leave to find him. Of course. It would probably even play more into the narrative he had shared with her... Flopsy nodded to Earry, a pit at the base of her stomach causing her suddenly to wonder if she had the capacity for this without him – but also knowing, deep down, that not only had she managed without him well enough all her life, but that this would actually strengthen her ability to draw power from her own narrative.

She had already been capitalizing on its power due to her perception of the grey elders as having betrayed and abandoned her people, but this more personal abandonment, necessary as it was, was far more direct and gave her proportionately more power.

Flopsy turned away from the white bunny, and as Earry bounded out of the tower, she crouched respectfully once more, bravely facing the eleven members of the plot bunny leadership.





Phew, Flopsy thought as she made her final bows to the elder archetypes and scooted out of their chamber. That was one of the strangest interrogations she had ever experienced, and she had experienced a few.

She paused, noting that she was still in the character that she had adopted from Harey and Hopert's novels: the hard-done police officer, chasing down the by-the-seat-of-his-pants detective – Earry. She had never been in an interrogation before. Her narrative was about overcoming adversity, for goodness' sake.

However, she had kind of enjoyed playing the role. It had almost been fun to stonewall the questions about who and what and why (especially why – were all investigators this obsessed over finding motive and keeping it to themselves until they were ready to entrap the culprit?), and even more fun to experience what it was like to throw herself into a role in a narrative, instead of providing the ideas behind the narrative.

All in all, Flopsy admitted, it was far better all around that she had gotten out of there before she had gotten too deep into the role.

For a moment, Flopsy wondered if the grey council she had grown up with, the decisive group of twelve whose decisions had shaped her growth and character, would have been quite so willing to go along with an alien narrative. That wasn't fair, she told herself. They were under the thumb of a narrative they had chosen, for good or for ill, and that it was now going all wrong left them much more vulnerable to a new narrative. Hopefully together the story cooked by Harey and Hopert would be enough to keep them curious about what had happened to the poor old sergeant.

Of course, the thing about murder mysteries was that they tended to end by revealing the murderer and his motive, and Flopsy desperately wished that wouldn't happen.

Flopsy shook off her remaining concerns. Now she was done the first part of what she could do, and it was time for her to go give the detective a hand. Promising to send her at least something to go on, Earry had told her to check by her team's usual location, the little alcove third from the back on the right-hand wall of the plot bunnies' large meeting space.

A surprisingly large rabbit filled the alcove, and Flopsy stumbled as she recognised the dam who had watched over her during Flopsy's own development from plotlet kit into full-fledged plot bunny.

Of course, if no more plotlet kits were becoming grown, what would she have to do?

But how had Earry known which had been Flopsy's dam?

“Mama,” Flopsy greeted with her deepest crouch for the bunny with the coarse but very clean fur, and withheld her whiskers from quivering with emotion. She hadn't visited her dam in years.

“Flopsy dear,” Mama replied – all the dams were known as Mama, for together they were the mothers of all the plot bunnies. She rubbed her whiskered cheek against the top of Flopsy's head, just as she had done before Flopsy became a plot bunny in her own right, and despite herself Flopsy's whiskers vibrated.

“Mama, how did Earry know you were my dam?” she asked, wondering at the comfort she took in that half-remembered domesticity from her youth.

The big black bunny laughed and laughed, a hoot completely at odds with the comfortable and comforting Mama. “Oh dear,” Mama said, then burst into hoots again. “Dear Flopsy,” she said finally. “Did you think you were the only plotlet kit I mothered? I was his dam too.”

“Oh,” said Flopsy.

“Earry asked me to teach you one of our secrets, dear,” Mama told her. “We dams have always been able to keep track of our plotlet kits, because we have the greatest talent for this work, but any old plot bunny can do it to track another plot bunny inside Bunniption Base once she knows the narrative. Earry said you knew his, yes?”

“Yes, Mama.”

“Think of the narrative, then – the special quirk that differentiates his own from anyone else's – have you got it?”

Flopsy thought carefully. Earry had told her that his was a spy story, with a strong surveillance focus (of course, given those ears of his, she had thought), but had told her more, more than any rabbit usually told even his closest friends. That narrative quirk was almost the same as a trade secret, and she had been both surprised and touched when Earry had told her his – but she had not told him hers. She hadn't been ready for that.

Focus, she scolded herself. She was far too scatter-brained.

Earry's narrative was a semi-typical good-guy-versus-bad-guy story, with the spy always the good guy, and the spy always winning. What made Earry's narrative unique was that the bad guy always knew who the spy was from the very beginning and was always able to exploit the spy's biggest vulnerability, but that some third party who had fallen in love with the spy over the course of the story somehow saved the day.

With this in mind, Flopsy thought fondly of Earry, picturing him as a spy with big beautiful ears – but before she could continue, to find her own obvious place in that story, her ears stiffened in shock.

“And I didn't even have to tell you step two,” Mama said approvingly.

Flopsy could feel where Earry was, knew the exact direction in which to head to get to him. It was like... a tingle, in her ears and her whiskers and even her nose and tail.

But she also knew, with absolute and sudden certainty, that he was in trouble.

“Mama -” she gasped. “Mama, I have to go.”

Flopsy quickly bumped her head against her Mama's, then bounded through the wall, straight towards where her heart knew she could find Earry.

Chapter Sixteen

I wrote parts of this at the Night of Writing Dangerously... so they need a lot of editing. A lot.

Chapter Sixteen

By Tuesday, Patricia had her flight booked and everything ready to go, including ascertaining that having Alfalfa along wouldn't cause too many difficulties. Actually, she was surprised by how easy the process had been to get everything sorted with the transit officials to bring him with her. She suspected it had been facilitated somehow, and the off-hand request for her to find a home for another rabbit at the same time as she was informed about the need to bring Alfalfa seemed somewhat suspicious.

Regardless, she had managed to find a good home for the sweet little thing. He was brown, like Alfalfa, but bigger and scruffier and, to be honest, he actually reminded her of some sort of dog. In any event, her friend Karen, who lived in Langley with what seemed a zoo of animals, had been happy to welcome the rabbit into her flock. “Don't be surprised if strange things happen,” Patricia had warned her friend, but had not tried to explain further.

She had spent much of the day at the seniors' centre. She wasn't sure what she had been thinking the previous week, as all sorts of things had been filoed under 'c', and she'd spent the time reorganizing the paperwork studiously avoiding the thought of carrots.

Unfortunately, one of the bridge ladies had brought carrot zucchini muffins, apparently because of Patricia's own comments about craving carrots the previous week. She politely took one, which was delicious, but declined more, explaining that she had spent the intervening time assuaging her craving. Thankfully, at the time of that discussion she had been in the process of winning a small slam bid in spades with her usual partner Katie, so very little discussion was wasted on vegetables.

By the end of the day, she was positively craving a chance to sit down and write.

She had never really tried writing before this month, she had realised. Stories had been Alfred's forte and so she had avoided trespassing on his talent. He would probably have welcomed her interested, and she thought istfully of the lost opportunities they might have had to collaborate. Her thoughts, tinged slightly with envy, turned to the memory Alfalfa had shared with her of his work with Alfred, but that was silly, she scolded herself. She had enjoyed partnership with Alfred in so many other ways, and now she had, she thought, experienced some of the almost symbiotic relationship an author could have with a plot bunny.

And therein lay her craving now, for she had never felt the power and addiction of the ability to shape worlds out of nothing. Already in her two projects she had started two completely separate worlds, and she had only been writing for a matter of weeks.

It was exhilarating and awe-inspiring, and right now it meant that she was more than ready for the night's write-in – but that anticipation was heavily tempered with apprehension as she remembered the troubles of the previous week's write-in.



Patricia was unsure whether she felt relieved or disappointed when only she and Jamie showed up at the write-in. Even Zale had chosen not to come – Jamie said she had excused herself due to papers she needed to write, which she undoubtedly did need to work on, but they both suspected she was also self-conscious about her novel. They knew it had been rough going and that that had likely affected her decision. Neither blamed her, but both were also putting it in the larger context: Jamie had also noticed the decline in forum-goers and the steep slowdown of growth of the total word count of all NaNoWriMo novelists.

They spent about an hour writing, both pleased with the result, although Patricia found it distracting that she was fully aware of all three of the plot bunnies in the space. The two black bunnies – she no longer thought of either as the Mad Hatter but she'd not yet learned their names – were working with her, while the one Alfalfa had called Flopsy was working with Jamie. She wondered who plotted with Jamie normally; Flopsy seemed too busy to have that as a regular duty.

Hm, Patricia thought. They had decided to do another twenty minutes of writing – and yet - “Jamie?”

“Yes, Patricia?” Jamie asked, looking up from his laptop.

“Do you still have that army of plot bunnies?”

“Oh sure,” he said. “I was writing about them just a moment ago.”

“I bet you were,” Patricia said thoughtfully, glancing at the space she knew Flopsy crouched in, although she had less awareness of her now that she had stopped writing. Strange. “What have they been up to?”

“Not much, really – I only seem to write about them much when I'm here, actually,” Jamie said. “I've just had them pestering the humans – like in Australia, you know? - and doing rather a good job making pests of themselves. It doesn't seem to affect my protagonist at all – he's gallivanting pretty far from the human settlement, although right now there's a human child with him – so I'm not really sure why I'm going into all this detail. It just feels like the right thing to write.”

“Hm<” Patricia murmured. “Would you do something for me Jamie? It might be difficult to write and once you're done it, the rest of your story and your ability to write it may suffer, though I hope not.” Patricia glanced again at the space where she could no longer sense Flopsy. “It could also help tie the plot bunnies in with your main arch somehow.”

“Okay?”

“Have the humans... no, actually. Don't let the humans kill them or harm them or – especially! - exterminate them,” Patricia said, changing her mind suddenly at a mental picture of a Alfalfa. “Have some of them enter a friendship. Perhaps a plot bunny sneaks off with your dragon and human child and they become friends – but somehow the plot bunnies and humans must become friendly. No Pocahontas ending, either.” Patricia paused. “Think you can do that, Jamie?”

“Sure, I think so,” he said. “It might even help spice things up a bit for my protagonist – I'm worried about running out of story.”

“No pressure,” Patricia smiled. “but the fate of NaNoWriMo may depend on your success.”

He stared at her.

“Oh, and Jamie? Keep me appraised of how it's going. I won't be here next week, probably, and an updated then might be too late anyway. Let me give you my email address and my hotel phone number in San Francisco. I'll be there as of Saturday afternoon. If you leave me a message I'll call you back as soon as I'm in, all right?” Jamie nodded and Patricia scribbled numbers on a page in her notebook, ripped it out, and handed it to him. “Good. Good luck, Jamie.”

“Um. Thanks,” he said.

“So tell me about your dragons, Jamie. Are they based on another society or series at all?” Patricia asked, lightening the subject.

They spent the rest of their time discussing the dragons in Jamie's world, Patricia reminded of her fascination at her own ability to create worlds. She had based hers largely on the world she lived in, but here Jamie was, creating every detail, from coming-of-age customs to naming practices to architecture. He was also fitting in his own ideas of an ideal society, and of how flaws in society impacted members of that society. She was highly impressed at the variety and depth of his creation and his characters.

“Jamie, I would love to read this story of yours when you're done, rough edges or no,” Patricia told him as they buttoned their coats and wrapped their scarves tightly around themselves and left the warm sanctuary of Steeps Tea.




Patricia had bag in hand on her way to the airport at 5am on Saturday morning, and in the other hand held the cage that had arrived nearly three weeks earlier. Alfalfa and his cage were surprisingly light.

She was tired, for she had hardly had any actual sleep since Tuesday. Instead, Alfalfa had been in near-constant conversation with her from the moment she fell asleep. It had mostly been about logistics – discussion over what would happen in San Francisco and some seemingly random places where Alfalfa had requested her to go at certain times after she arrived – including a small coffee shop in Mission where he wanted her to spend time writing on Saturday evening shortly after their predicted arrival in the city – but he had also needed her to find a home for another rabbit, which had also gone to Patricia's friend in Langley.

But they had also spent a lot of time just... talking. It was strange, and Patricia got the feeling that the other rabbits, particularly Flopsy, didn't really approve of the interaction, but she was comforted by it. Mostly they talked about Alfred. It became even more clear with each conversation that both had loved and admired him deeply, but both had been affected by different aspects of his personality. Patricia felt blessed that she was able to learn more about her husband and his effect on others even after his death, and opened up to Alfalfa in ways she hadn't to anyone else about the little things she had loved in Alfred, her favourite moments and memories.

She had noticed after the kick-off party that she had become rather more morose and staid and, well, boring than she had ever thought she would ever be. The kick-off party had enabled her to open up, and the novel-writing had brought her to a new level of creativity, but it was this week's discussions with Alfalfa that had made her realise that she had been locked into mourning for her husband and that she had never really allowed herself to get past the fact of his death. But now, the combination of memories from Alfalfa and reminiscences of her own had suddenly shuttled her into a world where she was in love with her husband in a way that enabled her to move on. She was feeling far happier and healthier and more awake than she had in years.

But it was about time that she headed out the door. She went over her list in her head again: notepad for writing: yes; list with the address and phone number of her hotel: yes; information for finding the Night of Writing Dangerously: yes; list with instructions for fulfilling all of Alfalfa's requests: yes; cage for Alfalfa with Alfalfa in it: yes; clothing and so on: yes. Was there anything else that might possibly be of use to her for saving National Novel Writing Month?

Oh! Patricia realised suddenly, dropping her bag and setting Alfalfa's cage down gently – ignoring the sudden questioning up-down-up-down-up-down that indicated that he wanted to talk to her – he probably just wanted to know what on earth she was doing and she had no time for that. She had just enough time, she thought as she checked her clock. She'd still make it to the airport in time – it was a quick walk to the airport and the Canada Line skytrain was fast and didn't have to worry about traffic. So another ten minutes wouldn't hurt.

Besides, she had forgotten to turn off her computer, so she wouldn't even have to wait to boot it up (and this was she would remember to turn it off, which was much more environmentally friendly – May would be upset with her if she knew how close she had come to forgetting to turn it off).

Patricia quickly navigated to the National Novel Writing Month website and logged onto the forums. It was so obvious – how had she missed it, she berated herself absently as she scanned through the list of forum sections – what better way to reach a wide audience and start discussing the problem? Start trying to find a solution?

Dear National Novel Writing Month novelists,she wrote,

I'm sure you've noticed that novelist numbers are dropping faster every day. It feels like the plot just won't come, or isn't right, or like you've completely messed up and there's somewhere else you need to go. In the past, the folks at the Office of Letters and Light have been there to be our support blanket, to tell us what we needed to hear and help us to keep on going. And even when they aren't around, in the past there have been enough of us doing well to encourage and support the rest of us, to keep us going (Patricia didn't actually know this for certain, as she hadn't been involved in the writing endeavour in the past, but from what the others had said at the kick-off, it seemed likely).

This year, it isn't just us against the words. It isn't just us not being able to get there, and not only are we not getting a friendly push from some other novelists or encouragement from the people in charge of the whole event, but we actually have a force against us.

We have all heard of plot bunnies. We might think of them as friendly little creatures who get us through those moments of writer's block or who write themselves onto those dreadfully scary blank white pages.

But they're more than metaphors. They have personalities and powers and interests, and right now they're interests are opposed to ours. I'm not sure why, but this year they are trying to destroy National Novel Writing Month. They are specifically targeting Chris Baty and the other staff at the Office of Letters and Light, and it's making it impossible for them to implore us to greater efforts. And so it is up to us.

We can't let the plot bunnies destroy NaNoWriMo. This event is an exuberant burst of creativity which brings together an extraordinary diversity of people, and opens to them the opportunity to reach the lofty heights of author-hood. I myself am a widow, and I had let myself detach from my own creativity and innovation, and my partaking in this endeavour this month has brought me back to life. If NaNoWriMo stops, if the plot bunnies are able to end it this year, then chances are it will be the end. What then for people like me? What then for people who have always dreamt of writing a novel and never made the time?

We can't let it happen.

And so, dear fellow novelists, I am here to ask for your help. Please just keep writing.

Maybe your story won't make sense. Maybe your protagonist will change two or three or four or twelve times throughout your novel because you keep getting ideas for completely new plot lines and scenes and needs – but that's okay. This year, it really is just about the word count. We need to prove that we can pull together our novels in the face of adversity.

So please, just keep writing. No matter where you are in your novel, no matter what.

Patricia reviewed her message, pressed post, and glanced at the time – shoot! Now she was running on a much tighter schedule. She turned off the computer, picked up her bags, and headed out the door.




Patricia settled into her window seat after buckling Alfalfa's cage into the seat beside her, as instructed by the rather handsome flight attendant – although he did look unfortunately a lot like Regis Francis Xavier Philbin – and his name was Xavier, actually. Funny how these things happened, she thought cheerfully. She'd barely slept, but she was on the plane now, and she had made that appeal to all of the NaNoWriMo novelists – again she wondered how she had not realised what a great opportunity the forums could possibly be when May had shown it to her.

She didn't really know what she was going to when she got to San Francisco, but she was excited about it, and right now, she was sure it was going to work out.

“Alright, Alfalfa,” Patricia whispered, trying to avoid anyone hearing her and realising that she was trying to have a conversation with the small furry mammal in the cage on the chair beside her. While she was perfectly happy being perceived as a crazy old lady, she didn't really feel that she needed to put too much fuel on that fire. “Our first plane flight together – I'm sure you're as excited as I am! I'm not going to talk much – I think I'm going to spend the flight working on our story. Does that work for you?”

Alfalfa turned towards her and offered her a yes signal.

Patricia pulled out her notebook and began writing away – pausing to watch the flight attendant Xavier run through the safety features of the aircraft, and wondering at how many people did not bother to look up from their novels or newspapers. Weren't the safety features important? Patricia wondered as she checked behind her to see where the exit doors behind her were.




Bang! crackled quickly through the airplane's cabin, and Patricia looked up from her notebook and a scene with two men fighting over a woman in a bar (and she wondered at how enjoyable she was finding writing this stuff – she would have found it drivel not that long ago) to see a bright white light and to hear a sharp scream from a woman some distance in front of her on the plane -

but nothing seemed to be happening because of it.

The plane began shifting suddenly and the seatbelt light turned on with a loud tone. What was happening? Patricia wondered – a woman screamed, piercingly, and Patricia decided to describe both her and her voice in the next scene of her murder mystery.

“Don't worry folks,” Regis's voice – Xavier's, she meant – smoothly sliced through the heightened tension of the room. “It's just lightning. This is a modern aircraft and it is designed with safety features that deal with that sort of thing.”

Lightning? How often did that happen, Patricia wondered... but Xavier's smooth calm was as placating here as Regis's was on “Who Wants to be a Millionnaire”. While others on the plane had begun chatting back and forth about the lightning and so on, Patricia shrugged and moved back to her love triangle story.






The coffee shop was small and classy, despite its name (something about Dead Dogs), with beautiful terracotta colouring and tiles on the floor. Patricia had herself her first new tea in a few weeks – it was called PG Tips and it seemed to be an exceptionally lovely blend. And, as she had been up for so many hours, and was feeling particularly exhausted and didn't know quite how long she was going to have to stay in this coffee shop for Alfalfa's sake – he was in her hotel room, and had told her that the person he needed to contact would recognise her without his presence – Patricia settled herself into her chair in the corner and inhaled a long strong whiff of black tea. Mmm, she smiled to herself, and pulled out the notebook that contained her notes for her murder mystery.

She started scripting notes for the story about the woman who screamed dramatically. She supposed it could have been another murder, but she had decided that it would actually relate to finding a blood-spattered gun in a woman's spa. Or perhaps it was a gun discovered in a blood-tinged foot bath? Hm. Did they even have spas like these in the 1940s? Patricia wondered. Oh well. That's what she wanted to write, now that she had seen one a few doors down, and wished it were open. Perhaps she could drop in the next day before the Night of Writing Dangerously... but no. She would indeed need to be at her best, but she doubted that the spa would help her focus on what she would do when she was actually at the event, and she thought that perhaps Alfalfa would have things that she needed to do instead.

Maybe on Monday, then. Her flight back to Vancouver wasn't until Tuesday afternoon.

At a small thud on the table, Patricia looked up at a small fuzzy black and white lop-eared rabbit settling itself onto the table – but even as she saw it, it faded out. Huh. Perhaps this is who Alfalfa wanted her to meet... “Hello,” she said to the air.

Nothing.

All right then. Patricia bent back to her page – and as soon as she started thinking of her next words, she caught a peek of black and white across the table.

“Seriously?” Patricia asked, without looking up, and channelling May's word choices for a moment. “You only appear when I'm in the middle of some plot idea?” She wrote a few more words in an attempt to keep the conversation going – and the black and white rabbit didn't disappear. She tilted her notebook up so that she could keep some awareness over its top of the other end of the table while continuing to write, although it was difficult. But while that was tricksy, what was more of an issue was the need to pay attention to two things at once... not that paying attention to the rabbit seemed to be doing any good.

“Right, so you aren't going to be much help, are you?” she asked, writing a few more words about the scenery that she had suddenly decided was crucial to the position of her characters. “Then I'm just going to keep writing this scene.”

Bach bach bak bak bak! broke into Patricia's hearing suddenly, and she stopped paying attention to both the notebook and the rabbit – there was a chicken in the doorway of the cafe. What? How had it opened the door?

She blinked – it was actually a chicken doorstop. What had made the noise?

Oh. Someone's ringtone, Patricia realised, as she noticed the man heading for the door and smiling around apologetically as he answered, “Hello?”

She sighed, took a big sip of her delicious black tea, and turned back to her notebook. She tilted it up and started to finish the sentence she had paused in the middle of – oh, the rabbit was gone.

Well, she was going to finish the scene, and then she was going to head for the hotel. She had done what Alfalfa had requested, she had made some sort of contact with some sort of rabbit, and that was all she needed to get done.

She took another big sip of tea, and settled into her story.





Alfalfa paced.

He wasn't as sure of Earry as it seemed Flopsy was, although he hadn't told her he had any questions. And if he wasn't sure of Earry, how could he be sure of any of the San Francisco rabbits?

Not that he had much choice.

If he was going to help his people, he needed to take action against what was happening now. He may not trust Earry, but he knew that the information about the leader being a vampire was completely correct. It was the only thing that explained himself being cut off from Bunniption Base, as well as the sudden dearth of plotlet kits becoming plot bunnies. But perhaps that was one of those cases of telling something verifiable in order to gain trust... Earry didn't know.

He did know that he would need help here, and he knew that Earry trusted Bun-Bun. That meant he had to take the risk, although he also knew that from Earry's body language – the body language that he didn't think he was showing – that he knew Bun-Bun to be a very dangerous individual.

That scared Alfalfa, for he had been around for quite some time. He had watched the garden grow, as it were, and he also knew that it was at times pruned. He suspected that Earry was one of the ones chosen to do the pruning in dark corners where no one would ask questions. If Earry was one of those, and he thought Bun-Bun dangerous, then what was he, Alfalfa, one of the “smart but compliantly mild” sort, doing getting him involved?

Well, he had no choice, and that was that. At least he could keep an eye on Bun-Bun and the others for the sake of Patricia – he had known that he needed to come with her, but after Earry's reaction, he was even more glad. He knew she had no idea what she was getting into.





When Patricia returned to the hotel room, there was a blinking red light on the phone on the bedside table: a message from Jamie. She took a few moments trying to figure out how on earth to listen to it, then finally found the “msg listen” button. Who designed these things? She lifted the receiver and pressed the button.

“Hi Patricia,” a female voice cheerfully bubbled into her ear. “This is Zale. Jamie hates talking on the phone, so he asked me to call, since I love talking on the phone. He says you needn't call back, but he's been working on your request. It's slow-going, but he's got it well on its way – he put a plot bunny into his protagonist's travel party, like you suggested, and he gets along well with both Johan – the human boy – and Zeitgeist – the dragon. He said you have your event tomorrow starting early in the evening, so he's going to try to get to the point where Johan has to go back home, so that he can slip some more of the developments you were hoping for with the whole plot bunny army into the novel before you get there. He doesn't have to work, so he thinks it should work out. At least that's what he says.

“Anyway it's all very exciting. He told me what you said about the future of NaNoWriMo and I saw your message on the forums... I've started working on my own story again, even though it isn't going very well, and I've managed to get 2000 words in today. Jamie helped by letting me use his laptop while he was at work, so that was much faster than writing it in my notebook, but I don't think I'll get to use his computer much more in the next week. Anyway I'm going to do my best to help with my word count. I hope we manage to save it. NaNoWriMo, I mean. It's pretty awesome, even if it is at a really busy time at school.

“So yeah. We're excited to hear about the Night of Writing Dangerously. Jamie said you might not be able to make it to the write-in on Tuesday, but maybe when you are back in Vancouver you can send us a message and I can make cookies for us and we can write together and you can tell us about San Francisco. Okay?

“Have a fun trip and be safe, Jamie says, and our mom too. Bye Patricia!”

The phone clicked off, and Patricia sat still for a moment, smiling, before placing the receiver back on its cradle. They were good kids, she thought. She hoped the subplot she had asked Jamie to include didn't mean he wasn't able to make it to the 50,000 words – but somehow she thought he would think it important enough to be worth it whether he managed to reach the word count goal or not.

She didn't know if it would make a difference, but it couldn't hurt. And the plot bunnies were all about myth and metaphor at their heart – there must be some relation with the stories we tell about them. Patricia sighed at herself. There was nothing she could do about it now, and she had done everything she could by suggesting that Jamie try that particular storyline, and by sending out a request for help on the forums.

Now all she could do was be well-rested and ready for the event the next night, which she believed the bunnies were sure to attack. What could possibly be a better-placed strike?

Patricia decided not to try to come up with an answer to that question, and instead wished Alfalfa a good night and went to bed.

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Fifteen

Week Two had gone well for the plot bunnies' plan, Flopsy admitted to herself.

Earry had started giving her periodic updates on what he'd heard about the other zones, and it seemed to be clear: the novelists were losing their nerve. From what she knew from her time stalking the Office of Letters and Light, that was a normal trend - but the decision to exploit it had caused unprecedented numbers of novelists to drop the challenge.

Flopsy supposed she ought to feel happy about it, or at least to pretend to more than she had bothered so far, at least in front of plot bunnies who weren't part of her team. But she couldn't.

Which was why she was here, in the carefully mustiness-free rare books section in one of the libraries on the campus of the University of British Columbia. She always felt strangely at home here. One of her first writers had introduced her to the space. He had been a librarian here, and used that privileged position to take his breaks in here to write. And given that he wrote books based around her own narrative, perhaps he found it soothing for the same reason she did: she felt a kinship with these texts, many of which had been lost and abandoned, but which had persevered through the years to find themselves in this place of peaceful solace.

Flopsy breathed deeply. Even the scent of the tomes perfuming the air was soothing, and she reveled in the external environment, for it contrasted sharply with her internal turmoil.

She sighed: she had been here long enough to start. She wasn't going to get any more value out of being here unless she did.

Okay. Time to admit it: she was scared. She didn't understand what was going on, and she didn't know what to do about what had already happened, and she didn't like it. She felt out of control.

But at least she could think through it logically.

Okay. Fact. Alfalfa was stuck.

He couldn't walk through walls or ignore the chill air and raindrops, but more than that, he couldn't return to Bunniption Base. They thought it had something to do with his narrative somehow working, or trying to work, on humans, which she didn't understand. The plot bunnies were just stories, just fiction - there was no way for them to affect humans - or so she had always thought.

Power, she thought suddenly. She had known for a long time that Alf had done something to the way his energy returned to Base. He hadn't liked how much of the brain carrot energy he returned to base had gone to feed the scenery, so he had investigated and tinkered and figured out a way around the system. She didn't understand it and had never tried to do anything like it herself - she'd trusted the system, she supposed. It wasn't like she needed the creative energy for anything else, and the existing energy allocation supported and nourished plotlet kits in sufficient numbers to support growth when the brain carrot harvest was good, so what else could she want?

But now, the vampire was in charge and what she had trusted was no longer true. Flopsy shivered. Alfalfa had been cut off right before the full start of the mission, and almost at the same time, his narrative had somehow affected humans.

Perhaps the power he had been busy harvesting had decided to ground itself somewhere, since Alf hadn't been trying to contain it at all.

Flopsy paused in her train of thought.

Harey and Hopert.

Surely she would have heard if someone had been murdered.

Surely.

Flopsy shivered, suddenly sure that she understood Alfalfa's case - but the boys insisted the same 'mysterious' thing had caught them out too, and she knew they hadn't changed their power return before - but she had told them to stay with Alfalfa and his human friend - oh boys, she thought, what have you done?

And she bounded through the ceiling, back to Alfalfa's friend's apartment.




Metaphorical fur seemed to be flying when Flopsy arrived, bounding up through the floor near the door where Patricia was unlikely to see her.

Harey and Hopert were on the couch, the first looking absolutely disgusted and possibly angry - it was hard to tell with Harey - and the second looking incredibly amused. Chances were Hopert was annoyed with whatever had Harey in a fuzz, but was more amused at Harey's reaction than annoyed with the other thing.

Normally Hop's reaction would be a good sign, but as Flopsy took in with her first glance, Alfalfa was in just as bad a mood as Harey. She hopped over to the plate on the floor that still had a few carrot stubs on it, and munched on them - nowhere near as good as brain carrots, and yet there was something about them, she thought, crunching with readily apparent enjoyment. She carefully did not display any sign of awareness of whatever had her team riled.

Yes, she supposed they all knew her well enough to know exactly what she wasn't shoving in their faces, but Flopsy rather thought that was part of the effectiveness of the tactic. Her restraint caused the boys to suddenly fall into line, if necessary, or forget what all the huff was about, if it was minor, or at least explain what was going on.

Unfortunately, she got none of those reactions.

Harey and Hopert both stilled their expressive ears and sat with a more neutral posture - she could barely tell their emotions now, and that was a lot more neutral than either of them ever got - but Alfalfa still radiated ... but no, Flopsy thought, eyes scanning all the little signals of her friend's un-muted body language, he wasn't annoyed. He was worried.

No team lead should have to draw something important out of her team like this, Flopsy thought with some aggravation. Not that her own team ever made it easy for her, but if Alfalfa was worried, seriously worried, then this was no time to be coy.

"Alfalfa!" she snapped. "What is it?"

Alfalfa looked at Flopsy. “I'm talking to Patricia, Flops. Or trying. She wants to go to San Francisco.”

“She wants to what?” Flopsy asked, flabbergasted.

“Well of course she does,” Alfalfa said, crouching towards the human in an attempt to indicate the end of their attempt at discussion. Patricia nodded and turned back to her computer, probably working on one of her two writing projects, Flopsy thought, and wondered which of the boys would be garnishing power off fuelling her plotline. Alfalfa turned away from her and offered his team lead a small crouch. He still looked worried, she thought, and no wonder. San Francisco would be very dangerous for someone of her creative output, especially with a vampire around... The grey leader would want all the energy the rabbits could absorb from her. “But she doesn't understand that I need to go with her,” he was continuing.

“You need to what?” Flopsy demanded in identical intonation to her previous statement.

“Of course I do. Someone from your team has to be there,” Alfalfa stated sensibly. “Otherwise she'll have no access to the local plot bunnies, and they'll suck her dry,” he echoed her earlier thought. “It ought to be me simply because she's already writing my plotline, but more than that, there's no one else you can send. You can't go, Earry has to stay here so he can report on you, and Harey and Hopert will be crucial to your plans against the vampire, once we've weakened his energy source.”

“Plans – once you've what? How thegarden are you going to do that?”

“I'll need Bun-Bun's help,” Alfalfa said. “So if you see Earry before me, send him my way, please.”

“That doesn't answer my question, Alf,” she said ominously.

“You have to trust me, Flops. Besides, you need to work on your end of things.” He paused. “I think I know what happened to Patricia's granddaughter.”

“You mean your narrative? Me too!” Flopsy exploded, suddenly reminded of her original motive in this visit and turning to Harey and Hopert. “You boys haven't caused anyone to die lately, have you?”

Hopert's ears waved in amused affront. “Of course not. I can handle more power than this. Besides, we haven't had any brain carrots since det – I mean, since we were detached from Bunniption Base.”

“I knew it was deliberate,” she sighed wearily. “You boys are going to be the death of me.”

“Not yet,” said Harey.

“And just how do you know how much power you can handle, Hop?”

“Macho bravado,” Harey answered for him, ears held carefully in their most serious position. Hop responded predictably, but Flopsy's glare stopped the imminent clash.

“So what are you thinking, Alf? Somehow use their stored power to kill someone critical?” Flopsy asked, once she was sure Harey and Hopert had settled.

“That's up to you, team lead, but I bet Earry's narrative will be even more handy,” he answered.

“You know his narrative?” Flopsy asked, surprised.

“I have a hunch,” he said.

“I bet you do,” Flopsy shook her head. “You sure seem to have it all figured out, Alf.”

“Except I can't figure out how to tell Patricia that I need to go!” He was back to annoyed disposition again.

“Well she surely isn't planning to leave today, is she?”

“No, but I'm a rabbit,” Alfalfa pointed out. “Aren't there crazy human laws about travelling with animals?”

“Not to worry,” Flopsy told him. “I know a bunny – I'll find him for you – he has a narrative of some sort of heartwarming animal returns home across long distance or animal tracks master or something – it should work for your purposes one way or another. You'll just have to work your magic on him, get him juiced up, and presto you'll get through. But while you're talking to Patricia tonight about going with her, ask her to find a home for another rabbit – he's always said he wished he could retire someplace with a few of the animals he's helped write so much about.”

Flopsy looked at Patricia, still typing away on her computer. “You know,” she said to Alfalfa thoughtfully, “we could just give her another dose. It would certainly make our lives easier...”

“No!” Alfalfa refused firmly. “We've put her through more than enough already. And besides,” he added,” she'll be useful, possibly crucial, to working this whole situation out. I can feel it in her just as strong as I felt it in Alfred: she's a storyteller, and what better person to solve problems than a storyteller? It's we who provide all the complications that make the story interesting, of course, but it's our human partners who pull all the threads together at the end. That's her role. She'll tie things together in our favour, not the vampire's.”