Part 1: Twin Wizards
On an atypically dark and thunderous night in Donutville, two figures materialize on the side of the mountain. Flashes of lightning reveal split illuminations of two purple cloaks, moving in perfect synchronization, ever closer to the heart of the stunningly quiet township. These are the Twin Wizards; Onias and Jupiter. They have come to visit the mayor (an old friend) and offer the gift of a relic.
After rousing the mayor and briefly squabbling about which brother would speak first, they explain that the relic allows the beholder to move backward through time using music as both a power source and a pathway. The party enjoys a strong cup of coffee, after which the Twin Wizards venture back out into the rainy streets of Donutville, and disappear as quickly as they arrived.
Part 2: The Mayor of Donutville Has a Time Machine
Mayor sat at his kitchen table after the departure of Onias and Jupiter, blankly staring at the relic sitting in front of him. His mind was racing with incomplete thoughts about how music preserves time, and time preserves music. He wasn’t overly concerned with how the relic worked; He was working on a mental list of the times he would visit. Should he revisit his fondest memories, or try to mend an unfinished past? “Why not both?” he asked, and grabbed hold of the time machine.
“Whoosh!” Mayor fell through a dark and swirling pool of white, pink and gray noise, until his first destination came into slow and hazy focus, as though looking through an old TV screen. Almost immediately, he began to notice strange inconsistencies between his recollected past and the past he was now viewing. Missing people, altered melodies, absent lyrics: Things were different. He fell and landed repeatedly, getting up to stroll through 20 years of memories, unaware of anything except his present journey. Who knows what the future holds – or the past, for that matter!
It didn’t take very long for the people of Donutville to notice that the mayor was gone. He missed a 10:30 meeting with Archibald Pianoforte and never showed up for the ribbon-cutting at the new Cavendish Secretarial and Typewriting Bureau. Friends checked his office, his house, and his favorite spot by the pond before alerting the townspeople to his absence.
Two boys, Henrik and Ferdinand, told the authorities that they had seen a pair of strange men walking down the street during the storm, the night before. “We were supposed to be asleep, but we were looking out the window,” said Ferdinand. “They were dressed like wizards!” said Henrik. “I can draw you a picture.” Colonel Moran looked at the drawing. It wasn’t much to go on, but nobody else had seen anything. He made some copies and told the boys to post them around town.
While the townspeople continued their search and began calling everyone in the mayor’s rolodex, Henrik and Ferdinand were hatching a plan. “Those wizards gotta have something to do with this!” said Henrik. Ferdinand agreed. “What if we go around to the next village over with our drawing, to see if anyone there saw them recently?” They rolled up the flyers, hopped on their bikes, and headed out of Donutville.
Part 4: The Mayor of Donutville Has a Time Machine (Side B – Tracks 1-2)
It was at this point, somewhere in the swirling ripples of the past, that the Mayor of Donutville realized he should have had a longer conversation with Onias and Jupiter before attempting to use the time machine. What began as a series of interactions with his fondest memories had now morphed into a very singular chaos: as if the laws of time, gravity and light had all been suspended.
He fell up through holes in a ceiling and back down to pitch-black depths, over and over. He grasped at every memory he floated past – an algebra lesson, his grandfather’s wristwatch, a spiral staircase. Everything was too wavy to hold. Returning to his own time seemed like it should have been as easy as his initial journey, nothing he tried worked. Time was weird.
Part 5: Wren Hollow Wrens
Olav looked out the window of his typewriter repair shop and noticed a large crowd gathered around Ye Olde Donutville Record Shoppe across the street. He put down the ribbon he was installing and walked out the store door. “What’s going on over there?” he asked the nearest person. “Some news about the mayor, is what I heard.” Olav walked through the crowd and found Mrs. Busbee, the proprietor, and listened in as she was talking to a group of newspaper reporters.
“The problem is,” Mrs. Busbee said, “I’m not sure if it’s actually news or if it’s olds. All I know is, when I came into the shop this morning, there was a record I’ve never seen before sitting on my chair. It’s covered in dust, but there was a note on the back.” She held up the note. It read: “Recovered from 2008 by your friend on the crooked ladder. – Mayor”
Part 6: The Mayor of Donutville Has a Time Machine (Side B – Tracks 3-4)
Having been able to successfully grab hold of one constant point in the past, the mayor was feeling slightly more confident that he might be able to return to his own time. He was still falling, however. He landed on a surface, stood up and looked around. It was dark, but the floor was smooth, and there was a ledge that overlooked a large canyon. As he stood there squinting, he began to hear a voice coming from around a corner. He crept closer and peeked around to see.
Around the corner was a giant dark room, but moonlight was coming in through a bay window. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he began to make out shapes; a long dining table, chairs and large grandfather clock. He walked into the room and followed the sound of the voice – it was coming from the clock! He listened to the voice until it stopped talking, and as soon as it was over, the floor dissolved and he began falling again.
Part 7: The Journey of Henrik & Ferdinand
After about an hour, Henrik and Ferdinand had ridden their bikes over the steep incline of the mountain trail, and were now faced with a choice between two pathways into the shrouded forest. “Let’s eat really quick, before we pick which way to go,” said Ferdinand. They leaned their bikes against a tree, opened up their pack and pulled out a sandwich and an apple. “This is stupid,” said Henrik. “It’s getting dark and we have no idea which way to go. What are you staring at?”
Ferdinand silently pointed at the path on the right, half of a sandwich hanging out of his mouth. Henrik turned around. Darkness had filled in the forest floor, and all of the grass blades on the pathway were glowing purple. “That one,” said Ferdinand. They finished their snack, hopped back on their bikes, and headed down the glowing trail. The further they went on their journey, the more strange things they noticed: trees with pink bark, a bird flying backwards, a rock that was chiming like a grandfather clock. As they crested a hill, they saw a very bright light in the valley below. “We’re getting close!”
They careened down toward the light at top speed. The purple glow was almost blinding as they dipped below the trees and out into a clearing. They skidded to a stop, and allowed their eyes to adjust. There, standing over a bright purple fire stood Onias and Jupiter, eyes wide with surprise. Ferdinand, speechless, reached into his backpack and pulled out the poster he and Henrik had drawn. He unrolled it, and held it up in front of the wizards. Jupiter laughed as he looked at the drawing. “Look, Onias! It’s us! And your nose looks huge!” His smile faded when he read the words. He turned to Jupiter, who was staring at him: “The mayor hasn’t returned?!”
Part 8: Percival Owl’s Good Fortune (a temporal disruption)
Around the time that Henrik and Ferdinand were riding through the forest, Olav looked out the window of Mrs. Busbee’s shop and realized that it was quite dark. He wished Mrs. Busbee a good evening, and walked back across the street to turn off the lights and lock up his shop. He looked at his desk and remembered that he had been interrupted in his installation of a new typewriter ribbon when he heard the commotion across the street. “Might as well finish up before I go home,” he thought, and walked around to his seat.
He pulled out his chair to sit. “EEP!” Olav jumped back. There, sitting in the chair he had left just a few hours ago, there was a slim, square package. He looked around his shop – he was positive nobody had entered while he was gone. Cautiously, he picked up the package and peeled back the paper sleeve. It was another album, like the one left at Mrs. Busbee’s shop! A small note on the back read, “Recovered from 2006 with love. PS send help – MOD”
Part 9: Twin Wizards ||| Infinite Scroll
“No time to waste!” said Onias, reaching into his cloak.
“Kids, grab your bikes and come over here,” said Jupiter as Onias was fiddling with a small silver square. Henrik and Ferdinand rolled their bikes over close to the wizards.
“What’s that thing?” Henrik asked.
“This will get us back to Donutville,” said Onias, holding it up.
Onias and Jupiter locked hands and held out their hands to the boys.
“Ready!” Jupiter shouted, when the circle was complete. Onias dropped the silver square in the middle of them.
Poof! A cloud came up from the place it landed, and when the smoke cleared, Henrik and Ferdinand blinked in disbelief. They were standing in Donutville, right outside the mayor’s house.
Ferdinand stammered, “How did-”
“Wizard tricks!” Onias shouted over his shoulder as he and Jupiter dashed up the stairs toward the mayor’s front door.
Olav was standing on the street and saw the cloud and sudden appearance of two wizards and the boys.
“Henrik! What are you doing?” he yelled.
“We’re trying to rescue the mayor!”
Olav waved down Mrs. Busbee, who was closing up her shop, and they followed the boys up the stairs and into the mayor’s dining room.
When they walked in, Onias and Jupiter were huddled up around the mayor’s table, where the coffeepot and three coffee cups were still sitting. Olav overheard their quiet discussion:
“…but it will be hard to locate him without any current signs of where he is…”
“I have this!” Olav interjected, holding up the mysterious album.
Jupiter took it and read the note.
“When did you get this?” he asked.
“In the last few hours,” Olav replied, adding, “Mrs. Busbee got one too, earlier today.”
She held up the note she had received and said, “It was there when I opened shop this morning at about 8.”
The wizards turned back toward each other and started having a quiet discussion. The two shopkeepers and two boys strained their ears to listen.
“…so, 2008 some time before 8:00…” said one,
“2006 at maybe 5:00…” said the other.
Jupiter reached into his cloak and pulled out another small square and started pressing on it.
“Is that another wizard trick?” asked Ferdinand.
“This?” said Jupiter, holding it up. “No, it’s a calculator. Although,” he smiled, “I do think we invented them first, so technically, yes.”
He returned his focus to the calculator and continued pushing buttons. When he was done, he turned it around and showed it to Onias.
Onias smiled. “Very good! We’re off to 2001 then! You do have the scroll, don’t you?”
Henrik interrupted: “Can anyone tell us what the heck is going on?”
Both wizards looked up, almost surprised that there were still other people in the room.
“Sure,” said Jupiter with a shrug, as he unrolled a giant scroll on the table. “We gave the mayor a time machine, and now he’s lost in the past.”
Everyone stared.
“Not ‘lost’ lost,” Onias clarified. “But it looks like he’s falling down through the years and, for some reason, he can’t get back. We now know approximately where he is, thanks to the messages he left you. We’re going to get him and bring him back with us.”
“But…” Olav was scratching his head. “If he has the time machine, how are you going to get him?”
“Wizard tricks,” said Jupiter pointing to the scroll on the table, and holding another small silver square up to show them. “And actually,” he cast an inquisitive glance at his brother, then back to the group: “We could use your help too.”
“Hmmm,” Onias started, then paused and looked at the ceiling. “Yes. That’s a good thought, brother. It’ll save us some time.”
“What do you need us to do?” asked Mrs. Busbee.
Jupiter pointed at the scroll on the table. “This is the infinite scroll. It has no beginning and no end. It scrolls forever. That’s why we call it that. We’re going to roll it back to 2001, poof down there, and look for him. You see the date right here?”
He pointed at the scroll again. Everyone crowded around to look where he was pointing. They all nodded.
Onias continued, “Once we’re gone, you guys could help by rolling it back to show the present date. Then we can just all poof back up and we’ll save the time it would take to cast an autoscroll spell. Can you handle that?”
Everyone nodded again. Mrs. Busbee moved closer to the left side of the scroll, and Henrik moved closer to the right side in preparation.
“Great!” said Jupiter. He held out his hand and Onias grabbed it. “Ready?”
“Ready,” said Onias. Jupiter threw down the silver square on the scroll.
Poof! A cloud of smoke filled the entire room, and when it cleared away the wizards were gone.
Part 10: The Mayor of Donutville has a Time Machine (Side B: Tracks 5-6)
“There’s that voice again. The clock.”
Mayor had landed under a spotlight in an otherwise black room. He looked down at his hands. They were drawings. His arms were too, and his feet. He followed the sound of the voice out of the spotlight and into the darkness.
Walking in the darkness, he listened to the sound of his shoes on an unseen surface. It sounded like asphalt. A very thin line of purple appeared, flickering in the distance. He turned and walked more directly toward it, speeding his steps. Now it sounded like there were leaves under his feet. The voice was getting closer, and closer, but the line of light seemed to stay the same distance away from him. He started running, listening to the sounds of the leaves crunching. In a flash, he could see his bed – then back to darkness. The voices were very close now. Full sprint, and in another flash he could see the door to his coat closet. Darkness again.
“Is it working?” he shouted, as he continued running. He looked up at the purple light, to see if it was any closer. SLAM. He collided with something.
“Ouch!” shouted a voice in the darkness.
The mayor clipped his nose on whatever – whoever it was and he could only see stars and red flashes of pain now.
“Clock, is that you? Who’s there?!” he shouted, holding his nose.
He heard another voice: “Did you find him?”
“Yeah, he plowed right into me!”
“Who is it? I can’t see you!” the mayor shouted.
“Hold on,” said the voice, and the mayor heard a shuffling noise.
A purple glow suddenly bloomed from nowhere, illuminating the illustrated faces of Onias and Jupiter.
“Geez, I really slammed into you,” the mayor said to Onias. “Your face is all bloody.”
“Pretty sure that’s just graphite,” said Onias. “I’m totally fine.”
Mayor wiped his nose. “Are you…am I…? Are you here to rescue me? I’m lost. I can’t get back. I lost the relic like, 200 years ago on the ceiling of my great grandmother’s house somehow, and I’ve been falling or floating, or turning into a drawing ever since. I fell through a mirror a while back and when I looked in it, I had a mustache. A talking grandfather clock has been following me”
Onias tilted his head as he looked at the mayor: “A mustache?”
“Yes, we are here to rescue you,” said Jupiter.
“Thank goodness! What did I do wrong? How did it go so badly?” the mayor asked.
“It’s possible,” said Onias, “that you spent too much time looking back, and forgot to ever turn around.”
The mayor nodded solemnly, in the purple glow.
“Or,” added Jupiter lightly, “the relic might have been broken or something. Who knows? Let’s go home, it’s spooky here!”
“Quick, grab hold,” said Onias, holding out his arm.
Jupiter pulled out one of the silver cubes, and looked at Onias. “I hope those boys got the scroll fixed.”
Mayor pointed behind the wizards: “Here comes that clock again!”
Jupiter dropped the cube.
POOF!
As the cloud of smoke cleared, Henrik, Ferdinand, Olav and Mrs. Busbee could see the forms of the two wizards, standing more or less exactly where they were when they left. But no mayor.
Jupiter looked under the table, and then up at the ceiling. “Did you let go of him?”
Onias, wide-eyed, lifted the scroll from the table as if the mayor might be under it. He looked back at Jupiter, who had once again pulled a calculator out of his cloak and was double-checking numbers.
Then they heard a thump, and the clamor of falling bottles in the basement. The basement door popped open, and the mayor stumbled up onto the kitchen floor.
“You got him!” shouted Henrik, as he and Ferdinand rushed over to help the mayor up to a chair.
Olav put the kettle on to make some coffee. The party of 7 stayed in the mayor’s house until the sun was starting to rise, listening to his story and telling him all that had happened while he was gone. In the morning, the town celebrated the return of their mayor, the wizards went on their way, Olav and Mrs. Busbee took the day off from their shops, Henrik and Ferdinand went home, and the mayor, after removing a grandfather clock from his foyer, laid down and took a long nap.