The 200 year old town Tol is located inside an ancient meteor crater. The high mountains surrounding the crater offer a reminder of the awesome destructive power of that impact. It carved out a wide central area that is now shared in roughly equal parts between lake Tol, a fresh water lake and the town itself.

This locality with a richness of the soil, the ready access to clean water and the protection from the elements by the high mountains lead 200 years ago to a settlement seeded by a few farms. However, over the years with the modernisation of farming the restricted space meant that efficient large scale farming was not feasible. As a result the economy in Tol had to change. It was decided to transform the agricultural farming community into a university town and technology haven. After many setbacks and with significant amount of government funding and considerable corporate sponsorship that plan finally succeeded 30 years ago.

Since that time, the town itself has also been modernised. The town has great pride in its heritage and therefore paid meticulous attention to maintain its medieval flair. Hence, particularly the town centre has kept its charm. Just as it was during the founding times, centred around a gothic church are crinkly roads cornering at odd angles and creating a maze of small and wide paths. Alongs side these roads are charming two or three story houses with shops and restaurants in the familiar wood and chalk style. Compromising to efficiency in planning and space utilisation the more modern parts further out from the city centre are in a more conventional grid design. In the south and east, the universities and the industrial area respectively face towards lake Tol. In the west, around the train station is the more upmarket housing with mansions and large houses. The north is a catchall for the general populous. This is the only are with room to grow but is now expanding up the mountain slope.

Anyone living on the highest streets in the north can just about make out lake Tol in the distance. The streets around the slopes are all named after famous classical musicians. And in the Mozart Avenue most residence are young families with small children. There are about 200 houses surrounding the a central local doctors, school, child crêche and local shopping area and of course a small park.

# # #

"Mommy, Daddy, lets go to the park", the 5 year old Mel shouts as she pounces onto the luxurious double bed right between her sleeping parents. Thick bedding, white with a flowery pattern is hiding the two young adults that makes their family of three complete.

"Mel, it is 7am on a Sunday morning. Mommy and Daddy are still tired. Please let us sleep a bit longer.", her Mom mumbles sleepily from underneath the flower patterned duvet buffeted by her daughters energetic bounces.

"Okayyy….", Mel blows up her cheeks and response saddened. With the sound of *plonk, pada, pada, pada* Mel jumps off the bed and is running back to her room.

There are a couple of minutes of silence. But then … *Pada, pada, pada* ... the sound of approaching steps can be heard again. The bed springs bounce briefly as the little girl jumps onto the bed. The little girl crawls over to Mom and sticks a fluffy teddy bear under the duvet near her Mom's head.

"Mommy, Bobby the bear wants to go to the park now too. Can he come with us ?"

Her mother groans in despair into her pillow. In a resigned voice she muffled a response.

"Of course he can. But not just yet. Tell Bobby it is too early"

"Bobby, you need to be patient. Please wait for a bit longer.", as instructed Mel explains to Bobby the bear.

Not waiting for an answer from Bobby … *plonk, pada, pada, pada* … Mel returns back to her room.

After a minute … *pada, pada, pada*, the sound of Mel returning can be heard again. Alice the doll with her curly blond hair in her lovely maid outfit is wiggling in Mel's arm as she jumps with energy onto the bed. Crawling over to the other side she hold the dolls face close to her Dad's.

"Daddy" ….

"…"

"Daddy" ….

"…"

"Daaaaddddyyyyy"

"… yes", another sleepy mumbling voice can be heard from underneath the blanket on the other side.

"Daddy, Alice the doll wants to go to the park".

"Yes, Alice the doll can join us in a little while", the male voice mumbles.

"Alice, see … you have to wait too. I told you.", Mel impatiently explains to Alice the doll. Naturally, the doll does not respond but Mel takes this as an agreement and she turns around. And with a *plonk, pada, pada, pada*, Mel is darting back to her room again.

And after Billy the goat, Ronald the robot, Spidey the spider and several other toys have visited the parents bed room a resigning groan can be heard from under the duvets. Giving in to her daughters new found popularity, Mom and Dad can do nothing but surrender.

And therefore, after a quick breakfast the small family of the impatient princess is getting dressed and is heading out to the local play area.

# # #

The early summer sun shines on the small family slowly advancing through the quiet neighbourhood this early Sunday morning. The two adults and a little girl are walking along lush green gardens. The beautiful young mother and house wife with long black hair and big black eyes and the young father, a copper headed cook for one the best known restaurant in town side by side are pulled by their child in the middle. The cute little girl with her mouth wide open and her eyes up-side-down is laughing from the bottom of her heart. This picture of a happy family would mesmerise any onlookers. But for the moment, the family is alone in the area.

Her mother had to put in some effort convincing Mel to leave her toys at home. And Mel did already thoroughly apologise for breaking her promise to them. As her mom explained to her, leaving her friends behind she has her hands free and holds her mom's hand to her right and her dad's hand to her left. For Mel this is a bargain.

Her Dad is yawning.

"Daddy, are you still tired ?", she asks. Her dad works in the evening therefore can rarely enjoy Sunday morning with the family due to his work hours in the restaurant.

"A little bit. But I just have a nap in the park."

"No problem, I have a comfy pillow for you", Mom winks to Dad padding her tights slightly with a smile whilst walking.

"But first you have to push me on the swing", Mel denies immediately.

"I don't have the strength in my arms", says her Dad pretending to be weak hanging his arms down and walking like an ape which looked rather funny.

The three of them laughed and just like that they arrived at the play ground. As they enter, Mel notices a boy getting off the rusty swing set and heading their way. The boy is about her age and height. He showed some strength when jumping off the swing with vigour but otherwise does not leave any outstanding impression. He seems to walk very fast towards them in a slight circle obviously to leave through the gate they are entering right now.

*zzzzzzzZZZZZZ*

Just as the boy passes by a gently tickling electric buzz rings in Mel's ears. At the same time she can also smell a tinge of electricity in the air. The buzz appeared very sudden but is very pleasant. It felt like a tickle from the fluffy hair of Bobby the bear. In fact, the buzzing seems to get a bit louder and a bit more pleasing the closer the boy is. It tickles her ears gently and she has the feeling a wonderful daydream starting in her mind. It is like looking at a photo of a beautiful seascape. Mel wants to see more and is drawn into the picture. But just as she is about to touch the water the picture vanishes from her mind. Instinctively, Mel realises that the boy is the source of the buzz. She stares at him in surprise and a little bit of longing. The boy gave her an interested glance. Sadly, the sound stopped after the boy passed.

"Mom, what was this sound ?", she looks up to her Mom and Dad but they did not seem to have noticed anything. She looked back over her shoulder to see the small figure of the boy disappearing through the entrance. For a moment she was tempted to call out to the boy to play with him but then he vanishes around some trees and is gone.

"Allez hop!", her Dad coming from behind lifts the pondering Mel up and carries her over to the swing. As she gets closer to the swing she can still sense the faint smell of electricity. After setting her down and with a swift push on the swing her Dad is setting her into motion. Mel's throughs quickly return to her carefree mood from earlier enjoying herself throughly. She did not have a second thought about the boy.

# # #

That very next day in the late afternoon Mel is taking Bobby the bear and Alice the doll out into her garden for an afternoon tea party. Under an umbrella in the garden Mom is folding laundry whilst she hosts an elaborated pretend tea party for her toys. She is pouring juice instead of tea into a cup. Her hands suddenly freeze and the juice starts overflowing the cup.

*zzzzzZZZZZ*

A noise that she heard once before seem to appear in her ears just for a few seconds.

"Mel, watch out. You are dripping on the clean clothes", her Mom warns and Mel wakes up from her daze quickly setting down the juice jar. Mel picks up Bobby the bear before the juice starts dropping onto his snow white fur.

"Watch out Bobby the bear", she says.

*Knock knock*

Her mom sighs under her breath - "now what..."

"I get the front door. I also need to get a cloth to clean your mess. ", she says turning around to walk back through the backdoor into the house.

Mel listens to the voices but cannot understand anything nor that she really cares. She looks back uncertain what to do about the dripping juice. However, to her surprise a couple of minutes later a boy enters the garden. He looked familiar. She doesn't remember seeing his face before though. Then she hears that buzzing sound again and she instantly recalls the feeling she got yesterday morning as they passed each other in the park.

"Hi, my name is Mar. Please to meet you". With a formal greeting and a slight bow that young boy introduces himself.

"Mel, this is Mar. He is going to play with us for a while.", Mom explains arriving with a towel to clean up the spilled juice. "Don't just stand there, introduce yourself.". Staring at the boy, Mel hurries over to her mom almost falling in the process.

"M ..my name is Mel.", she utters peeking shyly from behind the skirt of her mom holding tight onto Bobby the bear.

No doubt, this is the boy from the other day in the park. What is he doing here ?

"Mar is a foster child from our neighbours. His foster mom is going shopping so she asks if we can keep Mar company for a little while. Show him around …", Mom urges her pushing her forward.

"W..we are having tea", Mel says timidly.

So far, this is going according to plan, Mar thought. But now he was kind of stuck. He really isn't into playing house. But he loves to see the blue mind sky in Mel's mind. Then again, having a staring contest whilst he is diving into her mind over the alleged coffee table is a bit too obvious. Her mother would no doubt be uneasy when Mel stops in her tracks. Staring at a tea cup is just too obvious, unless Mel is a chess grandmaster.

Chess grandmaster…, Mar had an idea. "I am not big into playing house. But do you have any board games to play ?", he quietly asks.

Mel thinks for a moment, then gets a new found confidence and grabs Mar's hand.

"Let's go to my room.".

Mar's eye brows are raising in surprise as he is suddenly being dragged at speed by a tiny hand.

"O.. Okay".

Mar is looking at his hand inside Mel's. He cannot remember that anyone ever held his hand before in this life -- excluding his parents of course. Before his enlightenment he was too young and too shy to do so. Afterwards, he never got the chance as it was deemed to dangerous on so many levels.

Mel keeps dragging him along and the inevitable happens. His distracted mind momentarily lost track of where his legs are. And then he fell bracing himself to make a painful contact with something. Mel notices the jiggle in her hand of Mar stumbling, turned around and in reflex receives his upper body in her arms. Together both dive to the ground.

Struggling to separate herself, Mel complains. "Bobby the bear says you shouldn't run in the corridor."

Mar could only laugh.