Squeakery

Mom woke from her nap and checked Maizy's work—it had started poorly, but ended flawless.

"How is this possible?" she murmured, then considered aloud, "Did you discover a copy symbol?"

"Ki ki kiii," Maizy emitted her devious laugh, then signed, "My tail does muscle memory too."

Suddenly, Mom was even more envious of Maizy's memory tail.

"That's totally not fair!" She threw her hands up. Mom stomped her foot. "Blossom and I spent wobbles of our lives practicing our letters!"

"Fine! Then you're going to start writing these letters backwards."

Ugh! I knew she would say that.

Maizy picked up the pencil and got back to work.

Mom watched in amazement as Maizy mastered writing sentences with both hands simultaneously—both forwards and backwards.

Should I be proud or horrified? And why do I keep asking myself that since she emerged!?

"You seem to have mastered that already. You know what that means, right?"

Maizy sighed, then signed, "Feet."

"That's right," Mom said, then added, "I need to step out for a bit—to get ingredients for more cookies."

Maizy's eyes lit up, and a sudden desire to behave shot right into her soul.

"If you can master both feet by the time I get back, I'll give you a reward." Mom grinned, then grew serious. "Here's the thing: this paint won't be dry until tonight. That means we can't close and lock the door until then. I doubt the cuttlekin will come back anytime soon, but there are... others you need to watch out for."

Mom crept up to the door, crawled up the wall beside it, reached out, and grabbed something. Holding on tight, she carefully opened the door without touching the paint, then hopped outside still clutching her catch.

Maizy heard a scuffle, then a shout: "Blooooooooom!"

Haha, that sounded like Auntie Blossom being thrown off the tree!

Mom returned, visibly annoyed. "LIKE YOUR AUNTIE BLOSSOM!" she yelled, throwing her hands up.

She DID throw her off the tree!  "Ki ki ki ki."

"Never mind. I can't go anywhere."

Then she suddenly leapt up. "Oh, I have a great idea!" Her eyes gleamed with a slightly sinister look. "Since it won't take you long to learn to write with your feet, why don't we try some of those magic symbols you discovered?"

She laughed. "We can't let all those stuffy intellectuals at the university have all the fun, now can we?"

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After preparing a bucket of water—Maizy had no idea where it came from—and setting out a few special magic boxes "to throw dangerous accidents into," Mom pulled out some strange-looking, slightly green paper and some multi-colored pencils.

"This is non-magic paper," she explained. "It's kind of expensive, but don't worry about that." She leaned closer with a conspiratorial grin. "Because I'm a Proscribrarian, I can get all the green paper I want for free." She winked.

What does she mean, 'free'? I haven't seen any money.

"Since this paper can't conduct magic, it's safe to write symbols on it—that way we won't accidentally trigger something like a fire symbol." She shrugged. "If that even exists."

Then she held it up. "I want you to copy all the symbols from the scroll you created onto this paper. We're going to destroy it before bed—just to be safe. You can remake it any time, so no big deal, right?"

Maizy grinned and nodded.  This is kind of exciting!

Once the symbols were copied down—Maizy left plenty of room above and below each for notes—they studied them together. There were geometric shapes with simple characters inside, zig-zagging marks like crooked letters, lines joined at sharp angles, stars of varying points, and even a few that resembled face emoji.

But the plain hexagon she'd used to print the list of symbols was missing.  They must've removed it entirely to fix the bug.

"What do you think? Where should we start?" Mom asked.

Enough magic wood? What does that mean?

Maizy spotted some dots on the page that looked like tally marks.  Numbers? she thought, then signed it.

"I don't see any numbers, sweetgum. What do you mean?"

Maizy grabbed a sheet, drew the print symbol with four dots, and pushed in magic. The dots copied themselves. Then she added the title symbol—and four sets of her titles appeared.

"Wow! How'd you do that!?" Mom gasped.

Maizy quickly scribbled the numbers one through ten with their kad equivalents underneath.  Print four titles, she translated, proud of herself.

My kaydee really IS a genius!  Mom was happy and proud—this time without fear or terror!

Maizy sighed.  I should probably just try every character after the print symbol.

She signed, "Try all. Use show."

Mom didn't really understand, but she just nodded.

Maizy got to work, patiently testing each symbol after the print symbol. After what felt like forever—but was really only twenty tries—something finally appeared!

Ooh! What's that?  Both leaned in. On the page, thick lettering curled into joined scribbles, spirals, and dots. Just when it seemed finished, the letters sprouted tiny lines above and below.

That looks... Complicated.

"Oh, neat!" Mom exclaimed, hopping with excitement. "That's your name, sweetgum—in the language of the gods! I've seen it before, at the university."

What?

Mom explained: "At the university there's a device—made by some wizard long ago—that displays your name in the language of the gods. They used to use it in summoning magic and..." She paused, trying to remember. "Contracts, I think. It's in the lobby of the administrative building."

Maizy's tail blinked blue for a moment, then she ask-signed, "OMNITWADDLE?"

"Omni... twaddle?" Mom sounded out what Maizy had spelled. Maizy just nodded, then signed, "That is word of gods. OMNITWADDLE."

Mom's mix of pride and fear started creeping back.  Is that true? How could she possibly know that?

She looked at Maizy with mild skepticism. "You think the language of the gods is called..." She paused, leaned in, and squinted at her kaydee. "Omnitwaddle?"  That sounds just dumb enough to be true.

The moment Mom finished saying the word, a book popped out of the shelves in the Probably Fiction section—The Gods Party.  It startled them, but instead of jumping, Maizy and Mom just looked at it, then at each other, then back at the book.

The gods must've done that, right?  Maizy hoped it was just the gods.  Maybe THEE, or HECK?  She suddenly shifted into a more defensive stance when she considered it might've been WHAT.

While they stared, the book opened itself. They walked closer.

It revealed an illustration of a grand hall filled with strange creatures in fancy dresses and suits, all lined up as if waiting to register or be allowed entry.

On the side of one page, Maizy spotted a glowing orb on a stone pedestal. Written just beneath it was the word "OMNITWADDLE," and below that, the words "TOUCH ME!"

Maizy pointed to that spot in the picture.

"Huh. Well call me a variegated pink potato, it's true." Mom wasn't sure what to make of that, so she simply wrote down, "OMNITWADDLE: The language of the gods."

Maizy yawned.

"Bedtime!" Mom said, with a bit too much enthusiasm.

Aw, I wanted to see if I could get it to print the names of the symbols.

Maizy sniffed for Mom, then accepted a gentle pouch assist.

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Mom reached down into her pouch and was startled when Maizy grabbed her hand.

"Oh!"

"Ki ki ki ki." Maizy laughed—she had woken up a little while ago but was feeling lazy. She allowed Mom to lift her up and out of the pouch.

"You know, my little kaydee," Mom pretended Maizy was really heavy, "You're getting a bit big to be sleeping in my pouch."

Maizy made herself light as a feather and just grinned as if to say, "No problem!"

Mom set Maizy down in front of her usual grubby breakfast. Maizy immediately turned around and signed, "I'm only eight days!"

"Yes, sweetgum—but you were very, very late to emerge." Mom raised her eyebrows. "Your story began thirty-one days late!  I'm due a late fee!"

I was overdue? That's probably why I had so little trouble understanding our language. What's she getting at, though?

Maizy squinted at her mom.

"I think it's because of your two tails." Mom considered for a moment. "The good news is that means you'll get your voice sooner than normal. I heard you moaning in your sleep last night!" She sounded very enthusiastic.

Maizy just shrugged and tried making a sound. "Iiigh gah" was all she managed. She sounded like a broken squeaky toy.

"Oooh!" Mom beamed. "I was right! Any day now!"

Why does that feel ominous, somehow?  Maizy wondered as she turned back to her breakfast.

When she finished, she handed her plate to Mom—then, another cookie!  When did she make that?  She gobbled it down, then started looking around for a cookie jar.

Mom grinned. "Looking for the cookie jar, are we?" She laughed. "Hah! I've learned my lesson. The cookies are now locked away in a brand-new, special vault book the swans made just for you!" She squinted at Maizy. "It's hidden somewhere in the Proscribrary. They said they had such a fun time making it and can't wait to meet you."

"If you can find it and disable the traps and shrug off the curses somehow..." She leaned closer. "Then you can have the cookies. ONLY FOUR! If exactly four are missing, I'll consider your vault break-in a complete success—and give you a reward that will have your soul popping out of your eye sockets!"

Then Mom’s grin shifted to seriousness. "The cookie vault is blue, by the way, and the cover has your name on it.  Written in Labyrinthine." She finished with a sinister smile.

Ugh! Again with that ridiculous language! She's definitely doing this on purpose.

Suddenly, two fart sounds.  Then, two more.

"Oh, is that what that sounds like? Ugh." Mom looked grossed out, then turned to Maizy. "That's our new door... bell."

Maizy's mouth dropped open in laughter. "Ki ki kiii iiigh!" She accidentally squeaked.

"Hah! That was funny." Mom thought Maizy's sudden squeak laugh was hilarious. She started cackling.

Two more fart sounds.

"Ki kiiigh kiiigh iiigaaah!" Maizy couldn't stop herself from laughing, and neither could Mom.

"Coming! Hah hah hah! Coming!" Mom laughed as she walked to the door and nearly fell into it as it farted again—she was laughing so hard.

The door opened, and Branch was standing outside, ready to take Maizy to the Post Office.

"Hello, Proscribrarian. Is Maizy ready to go?" Branch was wearing his Kad Post poncho and doing his best to hide his laughter. "I pressed the door... bell. Was I supposed to push magic into it or something? Heh hah hahaha!" He bent over, laughing. "Sorry! Sorry!" He kept laughing.

Mom then started laughing even harder. "Yes. I think the swans played a prank on me with that thing, haha!" She giggled. "They asked me if I wanted to try their new," she paused to make air quotes, "'Formal Announcement Ring Transmission System'." She laughed for a bit, then tried to catch her breath. "Oh! They got me so good!" She kept laughing.

Hah! The swans sound so cool!

Then Branch saw—and heard—Maizy laugh. "Kii kiiigh iiigaaah!" His eyes went wide as he grinned and giggled, thinking, Her voice is coming in! Ahaha she sounds hilarious! And cute! So cute!