Jill MacGill/Gwin spouts the history of the place she and Axis wait at for the ambassador.
“‘The water at the upper dam of Fish Lake, also known as Lake Three’ — that’s because of its shape and not because it is the third part of some series,” she adds as an aside, then continues. “Let’s see — ‘… falls vertically in contrast to the gentler step cascade of the lower dam.'” She turns to Axis, who was formerly the boy known as Tin Tin. There was no need to keep up that disguise any longer, since the marriage was off. To both Ruby *and* her effective doppleganger Gwin here. “That’s because of the salmon. The salmon need some way to get to the lake to spawn, where they themselves were spawn.”
“I know how it works, Gwin. But thank you for the passage. I’m going to go over and look behind said waterfall now. See what has changed since my last visit as that snotty nosed boy Tin Tin.”
“Disgusting,” agreed Gwin, shaking her head. “Try to remedy that the next time you incarnate as a hormone raging teenager.”
“I’ll try.” Axis gets up off the curving bench. “I’m going over there now. You wait here for Briney if you don’t mind. He said to meet him in the northeast corner of the plaza and we don’t want to miss him. Again.”
“But I want to see *too.*”
Axis looked around, gauging distances and space. “All right. But leave your red book on the bench — open — so he knows we’re here. In case he misses us standing over there. You know how he is.”
“But…”
“No one will steal it,” assures the red crossed man, guessing what Gwin was thinking. “It’s just a old book *prop* and not an old and rare book itself.”
“Oh yeah. Forgot.”
“The camera’s right over there. Remember?”
“Yeah I know. Hi Bert!” She waves to the cameraman, who hesitantly waves back.
“We should get up. The script demands we get up.” But Jill MacGill/Gwin was still thinking it’s a continuity error as she lays down the supposedly rare tome. Plus it could damage the spine keeping it open like that.
—–
“We’ve seen this before, Pitch. That tome is ‘Winesap’.”
“I suppose it has to be, Bill.”
—–
“Way down there, aren’t they?”
“Completely vertical, like I said.”
“And last time I checked — for the purposes of this shoot earlier today, you understand — we have yet another avatar that winks on and off while switching colors between green — cypress colored green, or the darker variety anyway — and silver.”
“Like Madame Silver,” Jill MacGill/Gwin tacks on, thinking they need to get back on script.
“The name is Emerald this time.” Axis checks the location behind the waterfall remotely. “But now she’s not there.”
“Could be other clues,” suggests Gwin. “Don’t give up so easily.”
So Axis scouts again and perhaps sees something else.
“He’s checking the water in Glinda. He’s in Glin, but holds the glass in Glinda, then scrutinizes it. The he wipes it down in Glin and starts again. Over and over it goes. He understands it is different over there. He’s afraid to step beyond the boundary, else…”
“Phantom,” completes Gwin.
“He’s trying to figure out why. Scientist?”
—–
“No, they’re *both* over the line. Both in Glinda. A man and a woman. Adam and Eve, then?”
Sunklands 