Jeannie tried to calmly sit on her branch and wait for a few minutes, but the smell only kept getting worse. There was very little she could do under those circumstances (apart from fainting), and staying next to this mold wasn’t really an option. She glanced over to the branches underneath, and there he was: Bob, the only one she really trusted. Standing exactly where one could expect to find him.

Jeannie sank her nails in the wood, and started climbing down the tree. It was a cold day, and her wings were starting to tremble slightly despite her warm wingwear. It was a cold summer day, but not much colder than the one before. The weather seldom changed up there on the tree: some days were shorter, some longer, rain occasionally wiped out a good part of the population, but the temperature was always roughly the same. The wind was something she found particularly annoying.

Jeannie jumped the last few meters that separated her from Bob’s branch. He appeared reluctant to take notice of her, even though she knew he could smell her presence. Bob was just staring down the branch into the nothingness that was the world and possibly his life. He wasn’t always easy to get along with. In fact, Jeannie hat at first despised him. Time had somehow managed to teach her how to get used to his weirdness and, in the end, Bob had grown on her, in a similar way the mold had just done. The only difference was Jeannie was more than happy to have her life infested with Bob’s presence.

“Long day?” she asked, knowing very well he was only pretending not to notice her.

“The longest so far.” he flapped back. It was his usual response.

Jeannie slowly walked over to where he was standing. Well, it was very close to the edge of the branch, and she didn’t feel entirely welcome there; so she sat down a few meters before that, yet close enough to check if his body was producing heat. It was the usual way to check if Bob was alive, since he was so gloomy most of the time.

“Did the abyss change?” Jeannie casually asked, even though she knew the answer.

“Of course. But I still don’t know why,” he replied, staring down at the ground.

“Any new shapes?” Jeannie asked.

Bob turned his head and gave her a look she never wanted to experience again in her life.

“How did you survive the rain?” he asked.

“The usual: I hid in the emergency holes with the others. I think everyone from 1400 and above survived.”

“That’s good news. I was informed everything on 1350 melted.”

“Everything?” Jeannie couldn’t believe what he was saying.

“Everything,” Bob repeated, as if saying the same thing twice made it easier to accept.” You know that’s how acid rain works.”

“I’m glad they moved you from that branch, Bob. Imagine what would have happened if you had stayed there…”

“You know it’s not a coincidence they moved me,” he flapped and turned his entire body towards Jeannie. She knew what this meant and tried to remain as calm as she possibly could.

“They take care of their own, you know. They have the technology to figure out which branches will get hit. There are things about the weather you and I will never be able to comprehend.”

“I know that.”

“And you still won’t join the Grand Patrol?”

“My soul is not for sale.”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“Am I?” she replied.

“Stop yelling at me.”

“Am I yelling?”

“Stop it or I’ll call you by your real name.”

“You wouldn’t dare…”

“Jean-Bean.”

Bob giggled. His superpower lay in making Jeannie lose her mind, and simultaneously enjoying the chaos that followed. She flapped her wings erratically at him, but he completely ignored whatever it was she was trying to say. It might have been rather mysterious to others, and so Bob never even tried to explain it, but he enjoyed the energy. There was a certain type of raw emotions that came from others when they were teased, and Bob particularly liked the ones Jeannie showed. She was always so full of life, as if her existence and everything around her was a never-ending fairy-tale. Making Jeannie angry was a simple trick Bob used to admire the emotions other possessed. Others who had not seen what he had, and who did not know what he knew.

“What happened with the mold? Did you try to take care of it? There is still something fuzzy on your branch that is blocking my view of the moons,” he suddenly asked, oblivious to what it was that she was saying. Her energy was sometimes a bit too much.

Jeannie was always annoyed when he did that, but it was just one of Bob’s many quirks she had gotten used to with time.

“Not quite. The green one I sort of ate, and some of it just dried out and fell from the branch. But now there is this weird yellow one that I can’t even get close to…”

“Wait,” Bob flapped with a certain alertness in his eyes that Jeannie had never seen before,” did you just say yellow mold?”

“Well, yeah.”

“And before that there was green mold?” he continued, even more alert now than before.

“Yes.”

“Two different types of mold?”

“Yes, Bob, two different types of mold. Green and yellow.”

“Merciful lizards!” Bob cried to the Gods.” Did you tell anyone about this?”

“I…yes. I reported it to Alina.”

Bob just stared at her for a few seconds without moving a single muscle on his face.

“You have no idea what you have done, do you?” Bob finally flapped, but it was clear he wasn’t expecting an answer. The look in his eyes was dead-serious, and Jeannie couldn’t figure out what this meant. She only knew Bob wasn’t kidding.

“When they come,” he flapped at her after a long pause, in which Jeannie was sure he recalculated the universe in his mind,” keep your answers short. Don’t reveal too much. Got it?”

“I barely know anything about mold, Bob.”

Bob shook his head in a way Jeannie did not quite understand.

“Short answers. Understood? I’ll try to figure out what to do next, do you understand? Don’t do anything before I see you. I pray to the Lizards we will have this luxury…”

Jeannie stared at him in utter confusion, but he was once again oblivious to her presence. She realized he was thinking of what to do next, and the fact that it was taking him so long was alarming. This felt silly, why would anyone be so concerned about fungus? Why would anyone question Jeannie? It made no sense to her, but she knew Bob very well. He wasn’t the type to worry unless there was a real reason for it.

Bob reached for something in his pocket. It was lost somewhere deep inside, and he cursed several times before he finally found it.

“Take this. It’s for good luck. In case I can’t find you. Go back to your branch now, the last thing we need is for them to organize a search party,” he finally added in a matter-of-fact tone. Jeannie was unsure what to do, but she nodded and sank her toes into the tree bark so much that they almost pierced through her boots. She took the little thing Bob handed her: it was some sort of small, oval fabric. Jeannie had never seen anything like this. It didn’t appear to be made by nature. She wondered what its origins were, but the urgent look on Bob’s face reminded her to focus on getting back to her branch as fast as possible.

Jeannie rushed up the tree trunk as if her life depended on it.