The Secret of the Insidious Blogger

"WAKE UP GODDAMNIT!"

I jerked awake with a shout of my own. I had fallen asleep at the desk waiting for the glue to dry on the unicorn's head.

I blinked. I looked for the source of the voice.

The unicorn was still in pieces.

The red box sat nearby. It didn't look like it had moved.

Tadpole was cowering in his house.

"Oh great…" I said with a sigh. I turned.

Standing in the doorway to the library was Puck. He stood all of three and a half feet tall. But his voice was well known. He was an opera singer in town. He could fill a theater with his voice. He never needed amplification. Not even when he did outdoor concerts. Right now he was staring at me with a furious look on his face.

"Why are you yelling at me now Puck?"

"Did you see the latest?" He was waving a handful of pages at me that had been printed out from the internet. I could only guess that it was yet another blog post.

"Considering you just woke me out of a dead sleep the answer would be, no, I haven't."

"He's at it again! This time he is trying to insinuate that I use a hidden microphone in the opera house!"

"Puck, we all know that you don't. It has been proven multiple times that you don't. You are an accomplished and well-known singer with a powerful set of lungs as you just demonstrated."

"You know that! Learned members of the audience know that! What of the populace? What of the people who don't know any better?"

"There aren't that many of them around here."

"There are enough!"

I let out a long sigh. "What do you want me to do Puck? It's not like we can have him arrested. He's an anonymous blogger like the other three in this town."

"But this one seems insistent on destroying members of this town! It's not just me! He accused Daisy of using meat in her meatballs!"

I rubbed my eyes. "As opposed to?"

"Daisy. She runs the vegan restaurant next to Moth's shop. I've seen you there before."

I nodded. "Right, right, right. I remember now."

"She was in tears when she told me about it last week."

"Well, what do you propose we do about this?"

"I propose that YOU set the other bloggers on this cretin and bring him down!"

"The bloggers all defend each other. You know that. They won't do it even if they do disagree with him."

"You're supposed to be the person handling them!"

"I am handling them Puck."

"Then get this handled!"

He threw down the pages and stomped out of the house.

I turned back to my desk.

Tadpole skittered over the walls of his little house, onto my desk, up my arm, and settled himself in the hollow of my collarbone.

"I suppose I should at least try."

"I doubt it will do much good," he replied.

"It might. There is always a method to their madness. Granted, not everyone appreciates that. As was demonstrated just now." I pulled my cell phone from my pocket. I opened my messages and scrolled to the group chat with the four bloggers.

Pixie: The opera singer was just over here in a tizzy about a blog post regarding his use of microphones. Who wants to own up?

I sent the message and then sat my phone on the desk.

"You made good progress on the unicorn."

I smiled. "Thanks. There were a couple of false starts and mistakes. Fortunately the glue I like to use is forgiving."

My phone chimed once. Twice. Thr- four… five times.

Gideon: Not it

Snowman: Not me either

Morpheus: I was just at the opera last night. He was amazing!

Belial: It was me.

Gideon: The fuck Belial?

I typed rapidly to get ahead of them.

Pixie: Please tell me you had a good reason so I didn't get woken out of dead sleep by that angry man for nothing.

Morpheus: Oddly enough, he did have a plan. I'm part of it.

Pixie: Always worries me when you guys collaborate

Belial: I write a post trashing him. Morpheus is then influenced to write a rave review of the opera.

His blog is about to be featured on a major opera website. Everyone hears about the short opera man with the huge voice.

People come in droves to see him. Tickets sales go up. Opera house is saved.

Pixie: Alright, it's a mighty gamble. But alright. I see what you guys were trying to do. Even if it is really annoying what you did here.

Morpheus: I'll start on my review right now. It will post tonight. Should that keep him off your back?

Pixie: If you post it before 7 pm. That's when he leaves the library to have dinner at the Kettle.

Morpheus: It's already half written. I'll have it posted by 4 pm so he can revel in his success.

Pixie: A million thanks.

I tossed the phone back onto my desk and pinched the bridge of my nose.

"Good news?" prompted Tadpole.

"Yeah, it's all just a matter of the games we play in the end."

"You humans are so very fond of games."

"I'm not."

"You are, as I have always said, an exception."

I smirked.

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