Sparki stared as Tasha dropped her purse and began to hyperventilate her chest heaving. (And Snerdly missed it!)

"Like, most probably…" she offered, still comparing sequin swatches with the lisping manicurist, who frowned.

"Sweetheart…" he cautioned sternly, slipping a silk-shirted arm around Tasha's shoulders, "Panic causes stress and stress causes tension and tension causes friction and friction causes heat, and GIRLS, " he surveyed them seriously, "as we ALL know, head is bad for the hair!"

Tasha sniffed into the proffered pastel hanky, and bravely reconditioned her curls with the spritz bottle Bruce pulled from his pocket.

"I…I'm better now," she wobbled. Bruce patted her shoulder.

"That's it, Sweetie, strong and stylish, no matter what," he encouraged. "Now, what seems to be the trouble?"

Sparki and Tasha secured three seats in the food court (first buying sheep-kabobs with curried goat on the side at three shekels a piece) and poured out the whole mournful story.

Bruce blinked. "Oh is THAT all? Girls, girls, you stress too quickly! Just let Bruce fix everything now. You stand back and watch me go!"   With a jaunty snap of his fingers, Bruce walked over to a nearby tree, to which was afixed a bright red alarm labeled "fire".

"Bruce!" Tasha gasped, " you can't pull that! That would be a false alarm. If you were caught, you could go to jail and be locked in a tiny cell with dozens of dangerous and desperate men!"

Without pausing to reply, Bruce pulled the lever.

"Yes," he grinned at Tasha, "of COURSE I know that, you silly thing."

A wailing siren (one besides Tasha this time) filled the market place, as all the guards and thousands of citizens fled the highly flammable gauze capital of the universe. Grabbing Tasha and Sparki with well-manicured fingers, Bruce towed them calmly toward the spaceport.

"Two snaps up!" he smiled, adjusting the gauze scarf at his throat. "You can hate me `cause I'm smart, but don't hate me `cause I'm beautiful!"

When they reached Docking Bay 14, Tasha was amazed to see both Mollie and Snerdly at the ship, desperately trying to break into the hatch. Bruce whipped out a nail file and opened the lock in a trice.

"Magic finger!" he crowed in triumph, as they leapt inside. "All aboard; I've had enough of this planet!"

Snerdly pushed forward to the front. "I'm with you," he agreed.

Bruce stared at him shrewdly. "Not even…" he replied loftily, "in the wildest of your dreams."

Snerdly gaped, openmouthed, until he was firmly pushed aside by Sparki.

"Okay, so like, now everything is completely under total control, yeah?"

With that, she propped rainbow sneakered feet up on the console and smiled, carelessly depressing a button with one multi-hued heel. Mollie leaned toward the label.

"Random Destination Coordinate Generator, " she had time to read before the ship cleared the spaceport, the atmosphere and the speed limit.