Mwynwen - The Camel Corps rides again
By Diana the Valkyrie
Problem was, I was horny, and angry. Plus I was furious and randy.


After all the exertions of my adventure with the International Telecoms fraud,
I was pretty shagged out. I got home just as the sun was setting (night flying
isn't easy, because of the navigation difficulties, and the danger of flying
into a tree or something). I stuffed myself with banana sandwiches, and went
straight to bed. And on Sunday, I slept late. By the time I woke up, the sun
was high in the sky, the day was hot, the birds were flying. And it was time I
joined them. After a hasty breakfast, I dived out of my front door, turned a
somersault and arced up into the sky. I spent half an hour aviating with the
avians, and then said my goodbyes and went back indoors.

Lunch! Butter beans and lentils, cabbage and peas, brown rice and baked
potatoes, with baked beans and a nut roast. Yum yum yum. I hadn't had such a
decent meal for days. I leaned back on my chair, and looked round the cottage.

Between Harry and Fluff, the place was a mess. They'd eaten their way through
my larder, got through a week's worth of towels, the sink was full of dirty
dishes and the bedding needed a thorough wash. I looked at it, I felt that I
ought to make a move to start clearing things up, I felt guilty about not
doing so, and I went outside and lay down on the grass in the warm sunshine
and dozed off to sleep, thinking about Harry and Sharon, and how happy they'd
looked together. Happy? No, blissful. And it wasn't just the sex, either. You
could see that just being together did it for them. I wonder what that's like?

What I need here is a computer and an internet connection. I'm getting zero
social life out here, apart from the birds who think I'm just one of them. I
could certainly use the computer for writing, instead of that old manual
Remington, plus I could get out on the net and socialise a bit, maybe meet
some people, have a date or two. I thought about Harry and Sharon some more,
and how they just seemed to belong to each other. Then I thought about Fluff,
and how she was all alone in the world, and I thought, that's not what I want.

But I've got no electricity, and no telephone, even the gas is bottled. How
could I get connected? I thought about this, and then I thought, well, when
you don't know how to do something, find someone who does. And I think I know
just the candidate.

I looked round the cottage again. What a mess. I felt a bit guilty as I pulled
on my flight suit, ran out the door and dived up into the sky. I followed the
river as it curved down to Abercadwelly, landed outside the village and walked
to the phone box.

"Hi, Simon, it's Mwynwen. Fine thanks, how are you? Oh, just enjoying the
sunshine - look, Simon, could you do me a favour? Oh thanks, well, I want to
get a computer and hook it up to the internet. No, not quite a piece of cake,
I don't have any electricity, and there's no telephone. You can? Really?
Great! OK, look, just get to the usual place, you know, near the top of the
trail, and give a holler, I'll come and pick you up. Yes, Simon, I do mean
pick you up. Simon, you're stuttering, I can't hear what you're saying. Oh,
OK, see you soon then."

He's a sweetie, and he's as geek as all get out, but he does have difficulty
enunciating sometimes. And he knows his stuff, I can't imagine how he thinks I
can run a computer in these conditions, but if anyone can make it happen,
Simon can. And it'll be nice to be able to use a phone without a three mile
flight there and back.

I went back to Gingerbread, and started doing what I'd been putting off for so
long. Sweep sweep scrub scrub wash wash. I hate housework. Here's me, The
Camel, the one and only member of the Dog Patrol (bloody Inspector Cameron and
his so-called sense of humour), flies like a bee, stings like a butterfly and
all I'm good for is bloody housework. Maybe if I had electricity I could run a
dishwasher, a washing machine, a vacuum cleaner ... but then I might as well
live in a gardenless flat in Ruislip with nosy neighbours and hardly any
birds. It was evening, I was outside whacking my broom against the carpet,
trying to pound some of the dust from it, when I heard Simon's yell floating
across the valley. So I jumped on the broom, and swooped across, doing a great
three-point landing when I reached his side. "Jump on", I yelled. "Peter, Paul
and all the saints" he said. "You'll not get me on a witches broom". "Don't be
such a wimp, Simon. I'm not a witch." "But that is a broom." "Well, yes." "And
if you're not a witch, you'll do until one comes along" "Dammit, Simon, you've
been listening to Fluff, that's a load of baloney. Now get on this broom, and
put your arms round my waist."

I think it was the second half of what I said that persuaded him onto the
broom. And as soon as his hands met around my waist, I reversed the gravy and
we took off like a rocket. A few minutes later we touched down on my little
patch of grass in front of Gingerbread. Simon fell off the broom, knelt on
hands and knees on the grass, and vomited. Oh dear. I've got to stop doing
that to people, I keep underestimating their aversion to flight. They say they
love it, but when it comes to the real thing, they puke up on my lawn.

I walked indoors; Simon crawled after me. I gave him some cold water, and he
revived a bit. After a few minutes he started to take an interest in the world
around him. Why are so many muddies like this? So I gave him some bread and
marmite, and soon he was pretty perky. "So where's the computer?" Uh, I don't
have one. No electricity, you see. "So can we get the Welsh Electricity Board
to string cables to bring power up here?" I don't think so. "And won't
International Telecom install a phone for you?" I didn't think that the senior
execs at International Telecom would be doing much of anything quite soon,
apart from porridge. But even without that, it was just too far up here in my
little Gingerbread eyrie. Simon started making a list.

"Computer," he muttered, "laptop, low power. Extra batteries. UPS. Pringles.
What's the sunshine like here, Min?" Well, we get some. It's not like every
day, but I'm not one of those people who thinks that darker skin means
healthier skin. I mean, if you knew what garbage the sun chucks down at us,
you'l be glad to stay out of direct sunlight as much as you can. "Where do you
get your water from, Min?" I took him outside and showed him. There was a
runoff down the mountainside, and I had a big bucket under that, so I always
had some fresh water. It doesn't rain every day, but it rains often enough so
I don't go thirsty. He looked up at the water slurping down the side of the
mountain, and made some more notes. Then he asked me how far it was to the
village "as the crow flies, Min?" Well, I don't know about crows, but I'd put
it at about three miles. "OK, Min, I can set you up for voice telephone,
internet, everything." And he looked a bit smug. "OK, clever clogs, how? No
electric, no phone, you're planning to use magic?" and I made a couple of hex
signs ar him, using the second and fourth fingers of my hand. "I thought you
said you aren't a witch?" "I'm not. Come on Simon, fancy lunch down in the
village? My treat, since you're fixing up my telecoms."

Simon looked like he hadn't had a square meal for months, which he probably
hadn't, because pizzas are round. He had this system, he went to a supermarket
once each week and bought fourteen pizzas. He microwaved one for lunch and one
for dinner each day. Pizza was his food, Pepsi was his drink. If anyone
thought my eating habits were peculiar, I'd tell them about Simon. "Simon, you
want to do a Geronimo takeoff?" That was Fluff's favourite, we'd run to the
edge of the cliff hand in hand and scream as we leaped off the edge. Simon
swallowed and shook his head. "Oh well. It makes no difference really, you
know. Piggy back then." I crouched down, Simon clambered on to my back. He
must have been 170 pounds or so. I lightened the gravy down to a tenth, so he
wouldn't be such a burden, and ran outside and into the sky.

Flying down to Abercadwelly with Simon on my back was no problem. What takes
energy, is gaining altitude. And I didn't have to climb out of sight like I do
when I'm covering civilsed terrain. I just flew at treetop level to the old
phone box, landed and crouched down so that Simon could dismount. Then we
walked to the Leek and Firkin, our local pub, where we enjoyed a very decent
lunch. Simon had the Shepherd's Pie, and I had the Mushroom and Leek Delight.
And as we'd stuffed ourselves, Simon explained the first part of his plan. The
first step was to persuade the publican to let me tap into his internet
connection. Because they had real telephones, and an internet link via
International Telecom.

Well, that wasn't too difficult. Jimmy Jones had a bit of a pash for me, and I
exploited that shamelessly, hitting the "girl all alone on a cold Welsh
mountainside" bit, and the "ooh, wouldn't it be just great if you" thing, plus
I offered to pay half the cost of his internet connection. I left Simon at the
village, he'd get a bus back to Merthyr and then shoot down to Swansea,
because there was some stuff he needed to get for this project.

I flew back on my own, thinking wouldn't it be great if I could fire off
emails to Fluff to keep in touch with the gossip, like what was happening with
Harry and Sharon. And then I thought, hey, if I've got electricity, I'll be
able to run a mobile phone too, use the juice to charge it up. Maybe it was
time for the Witch to move into the 20th century. And then I started to dream
about dishwashers, vacuum cleaners, freezers and the whole panoply of modern
consumer goods. Fat chance.

I went to bed early and alone; the last few days had been pretty exhausting,
especially that zoom up to angels 42, a new altitude record for me. I slept
the sleep of the innocent until the birds woke me up the next day. New day!
New week! Rise and shine, there's lots to do.

I breakfasted, and I was just washing up when I heard Simon yelling for a
pickup. I grabbed my broom and rode out to collect him.

The broom isn't actually just an affectation. People who find it scary to fly
with nothing between them and the ground (or at least, nothing except me) seem
to take comfort from the interpolation of a physical object. The broom gives
them something they can clutch onto with a death-like grip, and a feeling of
security that there's something holding them up. Like an airplane. It's an
illusion, of course. It's me that's holding things up, with or without the
broom.

He had a load of junk with him in a bag he had slung over his shoulder. I got
him mounted on the broom, and took off slowly for Gingerbread. I landed
carefully, and this time he got off without vomiting. "First we climb up your
mountain, Min. I need to install a passive microwave repeater." Actually, I
knew all about those; they had them all over the International Telecom tower.
They're like a pair of dishes; you point one of the dishes at the place the
signal is coming from, and the other one at the place you want it to go to,
and it acts a bit like a mirror does for light. You can bounce the signal off
the repeater and down to where you need it. "But we don't need to climb,
Simon." I tucked my hands under his armpits, and lifted him up the side of the
mountain, until we got to the place he'd pointed out to me. I hovered, while
he pounded a piton into the rock, and clipped the repeater in place. "OK, now
the Leek and Firkin."

We needed to install an internet access point, connect that to an 2.4 GHz
802.11b wireless lan, then to an antenna that would send the signal in my
direction. Then a dish would pick it up high up in my mountain, and redirect
it down to Gingerbread, where it would be picked up by another antenna. The
first step, then, was to hook up the pub internet connection to the repeater.

While Simon messed around with bits of electronics, I asked if I could use the
phone. I called Fluff, but she was out, off making a porn vid, I expect. Then
I called Inspector Cameron, to find out if the Telecom case was going OK. He
said it was, but that he had another job for the Dog Patrol. "Camel Corps
ready to go, SAH!" I said. "Yeah yeah yeah. Just get down here so I can brief
you, Min, this one's a bit ticklish." Aren't they all. Sometimes I think that
the only purpose of the Dog Patrol is to get dumped on with all the
pear-shaped projects.

Simon was still messing with bits of wire and stuff, so I called Harry. "Hi,
Harry". "Hi, Witch" said Sharon. Oops. "Harry's out playing hide-the-sausage,
he said it's a vid called "Rude Health", something naughty about the health
industry." "Linda's out too, I guess she's on the same vid?" "Dunno," said
Sharon, "so what are you up to, Witch? Harry's quite struck with you, you
know? He keeps talking about flying with you." "Some folks love it, some hate
it. Fluff loves it, Simon hates it." "Who's Simon, is he your latest fuckboy?"
I suppose hanging around in the porn business makes you a lot more casual
about such things. "No, we're just good friends, he's doing me a favour."
"Well, you make sure you do him a favour back, Witch. Last time I saw you, you
were looking terminally horny." "I'll take your advice under consideration,
Sharon." "And next time you're in town, come pay a visit, you'll always be
welcome here."

Well. That was nice of her. Seeing as how I'd been bonking her One True Love,
she didn't seem to be much bothered. I wish I had that sort of confidence. I
think I will drop round when I'm next in town. And maybe take her up for a bit
of a sortie.

So then Simon was all done, and he was ready to get back to Gingerbread. When
we got there, he set up a little portable computer, and messed around with an
empty can of beans while I started to sort out dinner. Round about eight, I
decided it was ready, and I called him to eat. And after dinner, he showed me
what he'd done. He started up the computer, pointed the empty bean can at the
repeater on the mountainside, and showed me how I could send and receive
email!

This is, for me, a bit of a revolution. It meant that instead of flying down
to the village each time I wanted to contact the outside world, I could do it
right here from Gingerbread. "How do I charge up the battery, Simon?" "You
can't. That's stage two of the project." Still, it was pretty wonderful, and I
told him so, and gave him a big hug. He hugged me back. "Min." I hugged him a
bit harder, and, thinking of Sharon's advice, gave him a bit of a kiss, too.
He responded enthusiastically, and I felt, well, you know that sort of
stirring feeling? Deep down? And I could feel he was stirring a bit too.
Rather more obviously.

Simon is what you might call socially inept, that's understood. But he chose
this moment to demonstrate his physical ineptness. With anyone else there
would have been a hand on my bum, or fumbling at my waist, or something. Maybe
a tongue. Simon, being rather hopeless at this sort of thing, decided to pick
me up and throw me on the bed, then dive on top of me.

Now that might not have been too bad a plan, if he'd been with Fluff, who is
only 100 pounds sopping wet. It wouldn't have gotten started with Sharon, who
is roughly three Fluffs, and cannot be lifted by the likes of Simon, but she'd
have noticed the attempt, and heaved Simon onto the bed instead. But with me,
it was a disaster. You see, my mass is 140 pounds, about what you'd expect
from a non-anorexic 75-incher. But my weight is only 47. It just makes life a
whole lot easier for me, and why should I spend my life fighting against one
gee when a third is so much nicer. Plus it helps your figure, things don't
sag, they stand out firm and proud and people take surreptitious glances at
them.

So, Simon tried to lift 140 pounds, but a 47 pound weight moved a lot more
easily than he'd bargained for. I found myself arcing through the air in a
graceful parabola which intersected not with a nice soft bed, but with a hard
stone floor. Without even thinking, I killed the gravy, just like a muddy
would put out your arms to break your fall. But I still had all the forward
momentum, and I cannoned into the wall of the cottage, bounced off it, and in
a flurry of windmilling arms smashed into Simon. He got half my momentum, and
used it to crash to the ground, I saw him fall, timed it carefully, went to
full gravy and fell on top of him as heavily as you'd expect a 140 pound woman
to fall.

"Oh, Simon!" I said, exasperatedly. "Oh, Simon?" I said, experimentally. "Oh.
Simon." I said. "oh."

My landing on him knocked all the air from his lungs, so I tried a bit of
mouth-to-mouth. He responded nicely to that. Sharon's advice was good, horny
was a bit of a problem in the Gingerbread household, and maybe Simon was just
the job to fix that little problem. "Oh Min, oh Min" he breathed. "Oh Min".
Great dialogue, Simon. Oh well, you can't have everything. Gravy off, up to
the bed, lots more snogging. Slurp smooch lick, slobber.

And then clothes. It's a lot more fun to undress each other than to each do
yourself. Fluff tells me they do themselves in the porn vids because it means
they can get to the main event faster, but why would you want to get there
faster? The journey is part of the fun, the arrival is just the end of the
journey. So we inched slowly together down the paths of love. "You're not
wearing a bra!" "Five points for accurate observation, you're not wearing
pants" "Yes I am" Grunt, struggle. "No you're not." "You call this a skirt?"
"What would you call it?" Tug tug tug. Rip. "Oops. Sorry, Min." "Don't worry,
it's only an old one" Grrr, my best tartan. Lick lick. Mmm. "Down there,
Simon. Up a bit. Yes. YES! MMM!!" "How about this?" "Yes please" "More?"
"Mmmm. Here, let me get that for you ..." "Oooo!" "And ..." "Oooo!" "Hang on,
let me ..." "Over there and " "Oh, Min" >giggle< "Oh, Min" >giggles< "Oh Min".
Long silence.

"Where's the condoms?" "Uh." "You have got?" "Uh. I wasn't expecting ..."
"Well I don't have." "But surely." "Surely what?" "Well, you've " "What sort
of a girl do you think I am? No, don't answer that." "Well, can't we anyway?"
"No way." "But I'm clean, Min" "Not the point, I'm not ready to start a family
yet." "Oh. I hadn't thought of that. What about, you know, if I ..." "What?"
"Well, you know, at the critical juncture ..." "Oh, right, Russian
Contraception" "What?" "Catholic Rouette." "What?" "One bullet, 16% chance you
get hit." "Oh." "Simon, you're a nice boy, and I do like you, but I'm the one
who winds up with nine months carriage, twenty four hours of pain, and
eighteen years of hard labour with no time off for good behaviour. So no."
"Aw. I'm horny" I could see he was horny. His horn was pressing hard on my
belly. "Me too, Simon, me too." "Shit". "Shit". I sighed. "Well, there is an
alternative." "?" "You know my friend Fluff? She showed me things ..." "No."
"Well, her real name's Linda Daventry?" "Linda Daventry?" "That's her." "You
know Linda Daventry?" "Uh, yes?" "Oh wow. Oh wow. She's a big star, Min, she's
in all the, er, er..." "Porn vids, I know." "And you actually know her?" "We
were at school together." "Oh wow. I don't suppose you could ..." "What?
Autograph?" "Well, you know ..." "What?" "Set me up with a date?"

Wallop. It was like someone just hit me on the back of the head.

You bastard. You bloody fucking evil rat fink bastard. I mean, you really
don't care, do you? Any hole as long as it's wet and warm. Here's me about to
make your dreams come true, well, one of them, and suddenly all you want is
for me to set you up for a date with my chum Linda!

"Yeh, I'll do that Simon. No prob. Piece of cake. Have a nice night now." And
I rolled over, upped till I was a couple of inches from the ceiling, leaving
him down on the bed with me completely out of his reach, closed my eyes and
tried to sleep. "Min?" I ignored him. "Min?" ... "Min?"

Problem was, I was horny, and angry. Plus I was furious and randy. Also, bits
of me were stiff with anticipation, and other bits were moist. I thought of
taking matters into my own hands, so to speak, but then I thought, no, I'll
probably see Fluff tomorrow when I go to London to find out about the Camel
Corp's latest mission, maybe even Harry, let's save it for then. And I thought
about Harry, who would fill me with, well, with whatever. Satisfaction. And
then maybe I could help him a bit with Sharon, she was always up for a nice
bit of rumpty-tumpty. And I thought about the rather nice rumpty we'd had last
week, and how Harry was so Sharon-struck that he shouted out her name when he
was with another girl, and how nice it must be to have someone in love with
you that much, and how nice it would be to be in love that much, and how I'd
be willing to trade places with *either* of them, but some day my prince will
come, maybe that guy with wings I keep dreaming about and maybe Linda knows
someone she could fix me up with, jeez, if I get much hornier the pigeons will
start to look good, they've got hawks in London now to keep the pigeons under
control, I love the way Sharon controls Harry, he just does whatever she
wants, I know what I want right now, oooh, oooh, oooh. Oooh. Mmm.

Next day, I woke up feeling very up-and-at-'em. I told Simon I'd leave him
here to do his techie stuff while I whizzed down to town to do my Camel Corps
stuff. "You won't forget about organising that date with Linda?" "Piece of
cake" I reassured him. I stuffed my cape, sweater, shoes and skirt into my
belly-bag, plus a couple of pounds of bread (long burning fuel), plus half a
dozen Mars bars (for a quick sugar boost), and a couple of pints of water.
Credit card, cash for taxis, ID card. Run out into the garden, hop, skip, jump
- up, up and away! First to the mountainside, to get into a nice updraft,
picking up the effect of the morning sun on the ground, hot air rises, circle
with the hawks till I get a few angels up, then put the sun in front of me and
slightly to my left, at about ten o'clock high, till I cut the Great Western,
then I followed the track to Paddington. An long cruise but an easy one, and
an hour later, I peeled off the railway to head for the very obvious landmark
of the International Telecom tower. I landed on the roof, put on my civvies,
and gravied open the safety door. No-one took any notice of me as I took the
lift down to the ground floor and sauntered out into the noonday sun, heading
for New Scotland Yard and my respected boss, Inspector Cameron. "Taxi!"