🎣Wally🎣

Wally’s soul floated around the Australian outback, chased by an enormous shaggy-furred monster. The monster roared and leapt after the soul, trying its best to eat him. lol! Classic Wally.

🍕Destiny Fish🍕

Destiny Fish appeared through Gate Fish's portal between Earth and the home planet of magic fish, Siren. He was apparently the last one collected. Including him and Gate Fish, there were 20 magic fish gathered around an intricate stone coffin set upon a dais of coral - a tomb for Weather Fish.

The mood was tense. Some fish looked sad, others confused, and more than a few looked like they were out for blood. Magic fish personalities were as varied as their powers.

Gate fish swam away, leaving Destiny Fish alone, so he swam up between Metal Fish and Kinetic Fish and bowed his head to the coffin.

"Oh, so you do care enough to come to her funeral.” Kinetic Fish, a red Arowana, snarked upon seeing him.

“Kinetic,” Metal Fish admonished, “Don’t take your pain out on others.”

“Whatever.” Kinetic Fish clicked her tongue and zipped away with enhanced speed.

“Don’t mind her, Destiny Fish. That's just the grief talking. It’s good to see you, It's been far too long.” Metal Fish said with a sad smile.

“It’s good to see you too, Metsy,” Destiny Fish said, using his nickname for Metal Fish, “I can’t believe it. Weather was such an… energetic chick. What happened? Gate Fish didn't give me any details.”

Metal Fish scowled, "She was murdered! Divination Fish and Time Fish looked into it. They'll tell everyone what happened later, but I asked them to wait until after the funeral. For now, I think we should focus on remembering the great Fish she was and the wondrous life she led.”

“OK, yeah. You're right,” Destiny Fish looked forward as tears rolled down his face.

The funeral began. Dream Fish, a rainbow-scaled groper, and Pain Fish, a black and yellow needlefish, led the ceremony.

“Weather Fish had a beautiful soul…” Dream Fish’s started, words drifting off.

“And it HURTS so much, knowing she’s gone. Today, let us share in her memory and let GRIEF overwhelm us!” Pain Fish screeched, picking up where Dream left off.

As it was their first funeral, it was a bit awkward. Pain Fish explained that loss is a difficult process. And Dream Fish explained how Weather Fish would live on in their dreams and memories.

After them, Music Fish sang a beautiful ballad dedicated to Weather Fish, that brought everyone to tears. He was a carp whose scales shifted colour with the music he made. Today his scales were black.

A few other fish who were close to Weather Fish spoke, and then, to finish the ceremony, everyone took out their wands and launched a spell upwards towards the heavens.

Destiny Fish didn’t speak at the ceremony. He had been away in self-exile for hundreds of years. Magic fish were generally too evil for his laid-back personality. That said, they really came together when looking out for each other. Now that he was back, swimming among his old pals, he realised just how much he had missed everyone. He was in tears the whole time as he did some catching up.

“How have you been, Destiny?” Time Fish asked, his eyes slightly glazed over, "You were gone for such a long tiiime."

“Dude, I’m so sorry, uhuuuu, it's hard to explain,” Luckily they were underwater or Destiny Fish's face would be a mess with tears and snot, “I-I-I *sniff* kinda just needed my own space, you know? I missed you guysss! Waahaaaa.”

“Awww, it's ok. We missed you too buddy. We had Divination Fish check in on you from time to time to make sure you were ok.” Yeti Fish, a hairy, white catfish, said as he patted Destiny Fish’s back with his fin.

"Guys, I have a question, did any of you cast a spell that might have ripped time in two recently?" Time Fish asked with a gentle smile.

Yeti Fish and Destiny Fish shook their heads, "Nothing that I can think of, why?" Asked Yeti Fish.

"Well, because time was ripped in two, obviously," laughed Time Fish.

Destiny Fish and Yeti Fish glanced at each other, "Isn't that kind of a big deal?"

"Yeah, a huge deal. It's been seriously freaking me out all day. I didn't want to ruin the funeral so I had Mental Fish pumping me full of some serious relaxation magic. If I don't find it and fix it maybe the whole universe will collapse. Problem is, I can't figure out how or where it happened, even with Divination Fish's power," Time fish smiled and glanced behind Destiny Fish, “Speaking of…”

Divination Fish swam over to the trio, staring at her esca. She bumped right into Yeti Fish before she realised they were there. She snapped out of her daze and greeted them, “Yeti, Destiny, good to see you both,” she said, then looked to Time Fish, “Oh Time Fish, there you are. Shall we?”

“Yes, it’s time.” Time Fish excused himself, leaving the two he'd been speaking to behind feeling kind of confused and scared. He swam in front of Weather Fish's tomb with Divination Fish. The chatter of the fish died down and everyone turned to look at them.

Divination raised her voice for everyone to hear, “Everyone, it's time to discuss what happened to Weather Fish. For those of you who weren't there for the time-divination: She was killed on the planet Bryan, by members of the Smarty race.”

“Is that the race that thinks they’re making fish magic?” Narcissist Fish spat.

“Yeah them,” Divination Fish confirmed, “She was at the annual invention convention when she discovered…”

Divination Fish was trembling, struggling to get the words out, so Time Fish took over, “She discovered that they had invented a weather machine.”

All the magic fish physically cringed at the same time.

“Daaaamn, dey actually off dem rockas! Weather musta went batty,” Virus Fish shook his head.

“Yeah, that’s one way of putting it. It was horrible. Mental Fish could you please show everyone the memory,” Time Fish asked.

Mental fish swam up to join them and projected what they had seen into the minds of all the other fish. The fish watched in silence as Weather Fish discovered the weather machine, went berserk, killed thousands, and then was torn apart by laser jets.

“I have a question,” Destiny Fish called out, “They are called the Smarties, right? What do they call it when a Smarty is smart? Is it like… a smart Smarty?”

“Goddess above Destiny! What is wrong with you? Could you shut up and not make jokes about Weather’s murderers?!” Kinetic Fish fumed.

“No… I wasn’t…” he spluttered.

“Yes, they are called smart Smarties,” Metal Fish interrupted Destiny Fish’s panic, “It’s not right what they did. Just because she lost her temper a little and killed a few thousand of them, that's no excuse to do what they did to her. Her life was more valuable than theirs.”

“Are we really expected to believe that the Smarties didn’t premeditate her murder? They didn’t think of the consequences of flaunting a weather machine in front of her? Do they think we’re stupid!?” DNA Jellyfish said, glowing angrier and angrier with each sentence.

“I hate them,” Laser fish said, “How dare they turn my magic into a weapon. How dare they use it to kill my friend. I’ll never forgive them.” her voice was cold.

“It’s Unnatural! Technology isn’t magic. Magic is for fish! They must be punished! We should ban them from making machines based on magic!” squeaked Normal Crawfish from under Virus Fish’s fins.

“That is not enough. I have a better idea.” A deep voice boomed out from the crowd of gathered fish. World Fish swam out in front of everyone. The eyes of the other fish grew wide. When World Fish had an idea, big things happened.

“Simply punishing them won’t be enough. No. The way I see it is, they removed Weather Fish from the universe, so it’s only right that we remove them from the universe. I think our next course of action is a simple one. We need to eradicate each and every last Smarty in existence. Send a clear message to all the other races out there, magic fish are not to be trifled with. What say you, magic fish? Are you with me?”

Contemplative silence passed over the gathered magic fish as they considered the insanity of World Fish's suggestion. There were trillions of Smarties, spread out over several worlds throughout the galaxy. It would be a genocide of unprecedented scale for the sin of a single death.

Fish exchanged glances and smiles slowly grew wider and wider. As one, they all broke into cheers and shouted “THAT’S IT! KILL THEM ALL! FOR WEATHER FISH!!”

👽Fred👽

A cloth bag covering Fred’s head was pulled off. He had no idea where he was, or how he got there. He blinked, eyes adjusting, as he took in his surroundings. He was seated in an uncomfortable chair in the middle of a dim, grey room, facing a long desk where several people sat, staring down at him. He was unable to make out any features as they were all shrouded in shadow. He looked to his left. Both his teammates were seated the same as him, the bags were being removed from their heads by a muscular Smarty wearing a black domino mask and a dark suit.

Fred struggled to make sense of the situation. He remembered Einstein insisting they get breakfast to calm Fred’s nerves after the whole Weather Fish thing, a white hover-van pulling up beside them, then a sharp pain in his neck. Next thing he knew, he was waking up in this room.

Fred’s breathing grew uneven and his leg bounced as he looked to his team for more information. Einstein sat next to Fred, in the middle chair and Edison on the furthest one. She stared up at the table in front of them, looking cool, calm, and in control; the opposite of how Fred felt.

As for Edison… Without a hint of subtlety, his eyes telescoped out to get a better look at the people in the shadows. His lips thinned, then his eyes telescoped out even further, to the point that Fred worried that they would fall out of his head. Despite his best efforts, he clearly couldn’t see anything.

A distorted voice spoke out from the table, “Little Girls, thank you for joining us. We apologise for the way in which you were brought here. It was a necessary formality. It is good to see that you are safe. We feared we had lost you at the invention convention.”

“Who are you? Why have you taken us?” Einstein called out.

Several heartbeats worth of silence after her outburst, a different distorted voice spoke up, “We are the Space-Illuminati,”

The Little Girls team collectively gasped.

The voice continued, “And we have brought you here today for two very important reasons.”

The Space-Illuminati was a not-so-secret, secret society. Although they technically didn’t exist, they totally did and everyone knew about them. Fred had an uncle who made coffee for their head office (which was also not a very well-kept secret, since it was the largest, most ominous-looking building in the city). The Space-Illuminati took care of all the secret and nefarious things in Smarty society. Such as, stopping commonly occurring evil scientists from destroying the world, disabling rogue artificial intelligences, and nuking giant mutated monsters rising from the depths of the sea.

A third distorted voice took over for the second, “The first reason we have called you before us is in regards to the invention you were planning to submit to the invention convention; ‘The Milk-Shaker’. We have been keeping track of its progress very closely, its mere existence could be considered a war crime by those less open-minded than us. Ultimately, we decided to allow you to keep it and present it at the convention because none of you have shown any tendencies towards being evil,”

“Except for Fred,” another voice interrupted.

“Except for Fred,” the third voice agreed.

“Hey!” Fred complained.

“However, he only ranks 7 out of 10 on our evil scale, so, as we stated, we allowed you to keep the invention,” the voice continued, ignoring Fred's protests, “That is until the events of this morning. As you are no doubt aware, this morning Weather fish attacked the convention. Unfortunately, she left us with no choice but to use lethal force in retaliation. Already we are starting to see dramatic shifts in weather patterns and unusual magic fish activity. We can safely assume that there will be trouble for our species in the near future, and therefore will be confiscating ‘The Milk-Shaker’ for the upcoming conflict,”

“Science willing, we won’t have to use it,” Another voice took over for the previous one, “The second reason we have called you here today is about the safety of your team. We lost most of the world’s brightest inventors at the convention this morning, we can’t afford to lose any more. A vessel has been prepared to take you away from Smarty controlled space until it is safe to return. You will be sent out to do field research in a quiet part of the galaxy.”

“WHAT?!” Einstein stood up so suddenly, her chair tumbled back, “No way! We should stay here and help. We can help! Right guys?”

“Yeah let us fight the fish!” shouted Edison standing as well, “Give us a chance. We can invent something to annihilate them, no problem.”

“Guys. Sit down. We’re not going to fight magic fish,” Fred said, his terror-filled eyes never leaving the shadowy figures at the table.

“Fred?!” Einstein asked incredulously.

Someone at the table cut them off, “I’m glad to see that Fred is taking his role of eldest in the team seriously. We are not just protecting you, we are protecting the future of the Smarty race. The magic fish are not to be taken lightly. Should we fail, it falls to you to avenge us.”

An undistorted voice from behind added, “And it’s not like you have a choice anyway,” Fred’s vision went dark as the bag from earlier was pulled back over his head. He felt a stab in his neck and then his consciousness faded.