Craig looked distinctly nervous. "I…" he made sure everyone knew, "JUST play the fiddle..."

The queen paused, one haughty finger pointed at him. "AND without a license!" she roared.

"Fiddle? Did I say fiddle? I meant riddle. Or was it middle?"

The queen glared. "Arrest them!" she snapped at the heavily armed flamingoes that followed her entourage.

"Hey diddle diddle?" Craig babbled weakly, as the guard surrounded him.

"Put HIM with the other one…" the Queen ordered, waving a hand at the others. "And as for them - off with their heads!"

"Ah!" Craig shouted triumphantly, as they leaped to seize him. "I meant skediddle!" With that, he did, and was gone before the flamingoes could blink.

"After him!" bellowed the Queen, turning what Tasha thought was a particularly unflattering shade of puce, and stamping her feet in rage.

The band tensed.

The band smiled brightly.

The band made a break for it.

Amidst the din of royal outrage, Celtic curses, flying fiddle and scattered cries of "Off with their heads!", the rest of the Neon Lites fled in the opposite direction, and secured uncomfortable, but decent hiding placed amid a hedge of rose bushes.

As the Queen and her entourage swept by in search of the Band, a pair of gardeners approached the hedge.

"First she wanted the roses red," one complained, wielding a paint brush and a bucket, "and then she wanted the roses white…"

"True," agreed his companion, prying the lid off a paint can. "But this week the Queen wants them blue, so we'll just have to paint them again." With that, the Gardeners diligently set to work on the hedge of roses, liberally striping various members of the Neon Lites in the process. Outraged that the paint did not match her outfit, Tasha shook with fury; Mew's rather convenient tail stuffed in her mouth (by Bruce) to discourage shrieking.

At last the Gardeners finished and left through the garden gates, and the fugitives tumbled from the bushes, wildly striped from head to foot in bright blue streaks and patterns. Mollie admired the effect in Tasha's hand mirror, then patiently slapped Snerdly, who was peering through blue painted glasses and howling, "I'll be blind for life!!!!"

Unnerved by the chaos, Bruce let out a piercing whistle that stilled the hubbub at once. Sparki stared at his aggravated and blue striped face. "Like is this a total Braveheart joke or what?"

Bruce frowned. "Girls…" he said, including Snerdly, "we MUST maintain our composure."

"Totally true," Sparki agreed, mopping at Snerdly with a bit of tie-dyed scarf. "And speaking of composing, we are bogusly down two musicians and counting."

Bruce was about to reply, when Mew cocked a blue striped ear and raised a paw for silence. From the garden behind them came a faint rustling and the sound of hopping, as two pink bunnies emerged from the shrubbery, and stared at the travelers, who stood frozen.

"Look," said one rabbit, staring at the group, "the Queen has commissioned new statues for the garden."

"Indeed," replied the second, "There's no accounting for taste."

"Well," the first admitted, "I will say the ears aren't as long as they could be…" he lowered his voice confidentially, "I don't know much about art, but I know what I like…"

"There's no need to get personal!" Tasha snapped indignantly, frightening the rabbits half out of their wits (and as well all know… there's only one thing more trying that a half-witted rabbit, and that's Snerdly).

"My word!" protested the first rabbit. "You scared the hare off of me!" (The second rabbit ducked as Fiona appeared from nowhere and smacked Kasey for that joke.)

Mollie stared at the rabbits. "Who ARE you?" she demanded.

"I am Presto," said one rabbit, bowing his ears politely, "and this is my sister, Change-O. Who are you?"

"They," Snerdly began in a flurry of business cards, "are a Crazy Celtic Bebop Bagpi…"

Sparki pushed him into the hedge. "We're like, totally looking for our friends, a fiddler and a big bearded pipe dude," she explained. "Both of them of the Scottish persuasion."

"Indeed?" said Presto (or was it Change-O?), "Why, they were arrested this morning, you know. Our cousins, Buford and Bubba, work as Guard Bunnies at the Queen's prison." He wagged his ears thoughtfully.

"The bearded on," said Change-O (or was it Presto?) "That would be the stranger that the Mayor mistook for the Queen?"

Mollie gaped. "Mistook for the Queen?"

Presto (or was it Change-O?) nodded. "The Queen," he muttered, "is not what one might call a beautiful woman…"

Change-O (or was it Presto?) frowned treasonously. "Got a face that could stop a clock…" she sniffed, delicately nibbling a blade of grass.

"Well," admitted her brother (or was it his sister?) "It did, actually. The one in the town square. That's why nobody ever knows what time it is here…"

At that moment, a white rabbit burst through a hedge of magnolias, carrying a large gold pocket watch. "I'm late, I'm late!" he cried, racing around the garden madly. Presto (or Change-O) calmly collared him.

"Archibald," he (she?) chided sternly, "YOU don't know what time it is any more than we do."

The white rabbit slowed to an amble. "Well, I know that, Presto," he pouted, "but a rabbit's gotta have a gimmick!"

The pink rabbit frowned. "I'm Change-O."

"O.K.," Sparki raised her hand. "Like listen to me, Rabbit formerly known as Presto, sibling of previous rabbit and now most heinously tardy white one…can you help us find our friends before there's a bogusly rigged trial?"

The white rabbit began to wring its paws. "Oh dear oh dear!" he lamented, whiskers drooping sadly. "That's what I was trying to tell you! I'm late for court as it is!"

Change-O (or…uh...yes, yes, Change-O) sat up on her hind legs. "What's going on at court?"
"The two prisoners," the white rabbit replied, gathering momentum to speed away. "One is to be beheaded and the other is to marry the Queen's daughter, Princess Purple Rabbit, at noon-thirty…I'm late, I'm late, I'm late!" With that, he bolted away.

Tasha squealed.

"Wait!" Mollie cried after the disappearing rabbit. "Which of them is going to be beheaded?"

Presto and Change-O looked at each other and shuddered. "The lucky one." They muttered.

Mew put a brave face on it. "We have to go save them, chaps, no matter what it takes." The rabbits nodded in agreement.

 Snerdly protested. "You can't just march in there uninvited, storm someone else's homeland, make unreasonable demands and then carry off prisoners!" he sputtered.

Mew blinked at him. "Of course I can," he replied calmly, "I'm English."