Dan Dan and the Noodles of Despair

The Three Keys Reunited

Deep into the woods, it eventually becomes clear that they are not being followed. Slowing to a walk, they pause to slump against the moss-covered trunk of a fallen oak tree, gasping for breath in the dank air.

'How, why, and what was that!' shrieks Daniel to Floyd. 'The whole thing about unicorns and rainbows is TRUE!?'

Daniel is reaching fever pitch while waving the Green Key above his head. Floyd swaggers around to parade his best 'Bite me' smile and replies,

'My horn is a naturally occurring prismatic nanostructure. It absorbs light and splitting it into the chromatic components channels each through the fibre optic composition of my spine. The colours of the rainbow then fill the fine silvery hairs of my tail...it's quite cool huh?'

'It's totally awesome' shrieks Daniel positively jumping up and down with delight,

'It's your superpower, can you do it at will, can you do it again, can you do right now?'

'I need a large delta in light between my horn and my tail otherwise it doesn't work, as yearlings, we would find dark buildings, barns or tents and then stick our growing horns through the walls or roof...hours of fun.'

'More important than the manifestation of your superpower my friend is that we are now in possession of all three keys.' Says Anaximander holding the Green Key which he has taken from Daniel in his excitement.

'We now have all we need to locate the walled garden and open the door to the secrets within.'

Spreading his jacket onto the trunk of the oak, Anaximander takes the black velvet bag and lays out the Red and Blue keys. Then laying the Green Key beside them, they all stare at their treasure hoard as absolutely nothing happens.

'I was half expecting something magical to occur.' exclaims Floyd to the agreement of all.

Holding each in turn towards a shaft of sunlight Anaximander inspects them to see if they will reveal their mystical origins, but nothing changes.

A little disappointed, Daniel walks towards the keys. As he draws close, they start to vibrate, chinking together like teacups in an earth tremor. Startled, he backs away, and immediately the vibration stops. The four look questioningly at each other and then Anaximander, in the name of science and discovery, pushes Daniel towards them again. The vibration restarts.

Hesitantly Daniel reaches out to the now positively jumping keys. As he touches the Green Key, it flips up and spinning over his hand, lands in the middle of the Red and Blue keys. In response the Red and Blue keys spin, one clockwise by ninety degrees, the other anticlockwise by one hundred and eighty degrees. The three keys, now glowing, lock together at their sides as if magnetically attracted to each other, forming a bar of Red, Green and Blue light.

Within each Key, the radiant neon Red glow, the sparkling Opal and the swirling Mercury fade away to reveal a set of numbers at the heart of each Key. 37 334 in the Red Key, 8 -122 in the Green Key, and, 01158 in the Blue Key.

'Map references!' cries Anaximander, 'They must be map references, look if I arrange them so and we get 37.3348, -122.01158.'

Anaximander pulls a handful of scrolls from his backpack and placing them next to each other determines that the walled garden must be about 20 miles beyond the limit of one of the charts.