The Magic Fart Read Free

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    Then she realized that the hood that veiled her face was illusion, and therefore probably magic. She had had little direct contact with magic, but had no doubt of its power. She had been magically hooded, to conceal her identity. That added a dimension to her predicament.
    The chamber narrowed into a closure somewhat like a sphincter. In fact this seemed a lot like a huge bowel or intestine, and that could be its exit: the anus. Uncomfortable image. She turned away from it and explored the other direction. The cave twisted around and back on itself, narrowing and expanding, forming another chamber. Here was a rack on which hung clothing: a blouse, and a centuries out of date skirt, extended into a bell shape by a framework of hoops. And a pair of glassy slippers below.
    She was supposed to wear this weird outfit? It seemed she had no choice, though whoever had set it out must have been a man, because the underwear had been forgotten. She really could have used it, because her pregnancy and nursing had made her a full-breasted woman, and the spreading skirt provided no protection from below.
    She laid Chance carefully down, and donned the clothing, which fit well enough. The slippers were comfortable, but the skirt was like wearing a barrel: she couldn’t sit or lie down in it, or even get too close to a wall. Both blouse and skirt were made of the same glassy material as the slippers, flexible, comfortable, but translucent. She would hardly care to appear in public in such an outfit. Which was perhaps the point; she would be a marked woman the moment she departed this intestinal residence. She was stuck with it, for now.
    There was a smaller outfit that fit Chance: a shirt, diapers, and pullover pants, also glassy. So the clothing had not been selected randomly; it was definitely for them. She wasn’t reassured; this suggested that her abduction wasn’t random; it had been planned.
    She moved on, and found a bathroom area with a sink, shower, and toilet, all translucent. And beyond that was a kitchenette, with food on a counter. The food was a package of sausage that looked unpleasantly like dog turds, but she was hungry, so she heated some on the stove and ate it. The taste was better than the appearance; it seemed filling. It wasn’t actually sausage; more like a bean concoction.
    In more ways than taste. Soon after eating, she felt her gut blowing up with gas. She hurried to the toilet to let it out—and the toilet turned out to be so constructed as to amplify the embarrassing sound. She was alone, except for the baby, but she found herself blushing.
    Chance woke, and she nursed him. Before long he was gassy too; she was passing it along in her breast milk. What ill fortune, to be allergic to the local food.
    In due course she came to the last chamber of her convoluted prison: a family room. It contained a translucent stuffed chair before a television set. She pondered briefly, then removed the unwieldy skirt and sat bare-bottomed in the chair. It was a relief.
    The set came on, showing a printed screen. WELCOME TO FARTINGALE.
    “Farthingale!” she exclaimed, recognizing the name of the ancient hoop skirt.
    An announcer came on, wearing a costume similar to the one her abduc tor had worn. “That’s Fartingale without the letter H,” he said, as if answering her. “Fart-in-gale, the land of fabulous farts.”
    She sat frozen, hardly believing what she was hearing. A land where they gloried in flatulence? This seemed impossible.
    “This is an introduction to our windy culture,” the announcer contin ued. “Intended for tourists and other visitors. We certainly hope you will enjoy your stay here.”
    “I am definitely not enjoying my confinement here,” she said severely. But of course the video didn’t care.
    “Some folk from other regions regard us as primitive,” the announcer said. “But we prefer to think of ourselves as basic and friendly. Some call us poverty stricken, but we merely prefer not