Previous Post [The Scene: Daniel Craig unbuttons Dancer’s dress with strong, gentle hands, and slowly slips the silken garment to the floor…] Dancer: Oh, James… Cinderbelle: Ahem. Dancer, turning round guiltily: Ah, Sean, I can explain everything… Cinderbelle, looking behind her: Sean? Sean who? Dancer, turning back to Daniel only to find he’s vanished: Damn. Just when I was about to Never Say Never Again. Cinderbelle, nervously: The only Sean I know is that dragon in accounting. Why would he be here? Why shouldn’t eye glitter be counted as a legitimate business expense for a fairy anyhow? Dancer, suddenly noticing the petite girl with the strap-on wings: A fairy? You’re a fairy? Cinderbelle, looking down at her slightly-rumpled outfit with the tutu and the rather bent coathanger wand: Yes I am. And if you could just stop imagining passionate men in your dream-reality for a moment I’d like to ask you some questions. Dancer: Dream? You mean I’m dreaming all this? Including that part where David Duchovny… Cinderbelle, blushing: The truth wasn’t where you had him looking. And while we’re on the subject of your subconscious, do you think that maybe next time you could possibly include some furnishing other than a bed and a trapeze? Dancer: Well, I wasn’t expecting a visit from a fairy. Especially one that appears to be dressed in my old Mythlands outfit. Cinderbelle, grumpily: Like I had a choice. It’s not like your dreaming mind included an awful lot of wardrobe options. Well, plenty of shoes, I’ll admit. But the rest of the clothing available... [she shudders] Dancer: Hey, if you’re wearing my fairy outfit, what am I wearing? [She looks down] Oh. Cinderbelle, with a certain malicious satisfaction: Just like that dream where you’re performing on stage and you suddenly remember you’ve forgotten to put your costume on. Dancer, enthusiastically: Ooh, yes, that’s a good one, isn’t it! Cinderbelle: What? Dancer: Well, it’s not as if it’s happening in real life. Except for that one time. And I got an encore. Cinderbelle, rubbing her forehead: Look, I just came looking for information. That’s all. Help me out here and I’ll leave you to Daniel and Sean. Dancer, hopefully: And Viggo? Cinderbelle, desperately pushing on before the mortal gets distracted yet again: I’m just looking for someone, and I thought he might have wandered through your dreams. Although since he’s not over six feet tall and handsome in a dangerous rough kind of way I’m guessing not. Dancer: You can’t help what happens in your dreams. It’s well known. Even the stuff with burritos and percussion instruments. Cinderbelle: What stuff with… no, never mind. I don’t want to know what you’re… Is that pile of shoes actually growing? Dancer: Who were you looking for anyhow? Only I’ve already got Bruce Wayne and pre-Civil War Tony Stark booked for later, then Cagney then… Cinderbelle: Zebulon. The elf, Zebulon. The soon-to-be dead elf Zebulon. Dancer: Oooo! Boyfriend-sense tingling! Cinderbelle, blushing furiously: He is not – and I cannot emphasise this enough without taking full-page advertisements in the national newspapers and paying heralds to proclaim this across the nine worlds – not my boyfriend. Dancer: Ah. Right. Cinderbelle: Anything you heard did not happen, and besides somebody had spiked the ambrosia. Dancer: That happens a lot. Um, so I hear. Cinderbelle: Santa’s a saint, anyway. I’m pretty sure he could nullify any hasty weddings that involved jumping over brooms and a goblin from marketing stapling just married signs onto people. Dancer, wincing: Ouch. Um, you’re not looking for Zeb because he’s got you, you know… [She pats her abdomen] in the cabbage patch way? Cinderbelle: Absolutely not! I just want to find the thieving little wretch and get back what he stole from me! Dancer: I don’t think it works that way. Once it’s gone, it’s gone, no matter what you might get told by Kevin Walliner in the fifth form. Unless you actually mean alarm clocks or other bedroom items of slight value, in which case generally you can get one of your detective friends to track the guy down and ask for it back. Cinderbelle: I mean that the slime Zebulon got me tipsy and stole my fairy dust. Dancer: So that’s what you kids… Cinderbelle: My fairy dust! My bag of magic stuff that lets me wander through children’s dreams finding out if they’ve been naughty or nice. You are in a lot of trouble on that score, by the way. Dancer: I was being nice to Craig. Cinderbelle: Zebulon’s run off with my fairy dust and I need it back. I could get the sack. I could end up being demoted to ribbon-stapler third class. I could be busted to assistant ribbon-stapler third class. You have to help me find the little worm. Dancer: Why would Zebulon steal your fairy dust? I’m sorry, but there’s no way I can deliver that line without thinking it’s a euphemism. Cinderbelle: I don’t know why he’d want it and I don’t care. I have to find him and get it back by morning or my wand is history. And then the audit ogres will be looking for Zebulon and his aura is grass. Dancer: Maybe he’ll call? Although in my experience lots of guys seem to have difficulty in using the phone after they’ve actually pulled their pants back on. Cinderbelle: You have to help me track him. He’s got to have wandered into the dreams of one of your Lair Legion friends or their hangers-on, so all you have to do is guide me into their dreams so we can pick up his trail then crush him like the stealth-marrying slime he is. Dancer: So, you want me to take you to rummage through the most intimate private dreams of my closest friends just so you can reunite with the elf who loved you? Cinderbelle: Yes. Dancer: Okay. Back to Vizh… Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2007 reserved by Sarah Shepherdson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2007 to their creators. The use of characters and situations reminiscent of other popular works do not constitute a challenge to the copyrights or trademarks of those works. The right of Sarah Shepherdson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved.

A fun story that shows us what Dancer is up to (at least subconsciously) and complicates the plot in the best possible sense. I look forward to seeing Sarah's and Cinderbelle's trip through the Dreamscapes of Vizh's cast.