At the urging of many of you, I went to visit Lonesome Dave's "control station" in his neck of the woods, and I'll admit it is impressive.

But--everybody--it's just some rotting logs in a clearing! Ok the crystals are a cool touch, but it's just PRETEND, people! You can each sit at your "stations" and Dave can tell you what crystals to touch in what order and it might feel like some kind of "dashboard control center for the regional spectral biome" as Dave says, but... I mean, c'mon.

We really could use more hands at the treehouse computer lab training our para-legal filing AI. Jamming the developers with endless lawsuits is a REAL way to take down the monster. And we need your help!!

"Psssst! Sam!"

I was standing in a line with my cavern tour group waiting for the cavern tour to start.

"Up here!"

It was Peg Matite, way up high in a pine above the line.

"C'mon!!" she stage whispered. 

Nobody else in line was paying me any attention. So I leaped to the top of the tree from a standing position, Mountain Pine School style.

I woke up refreshed, and ready to share my idea with Griselda.

"Uh, Griselda?"

Pups were still filling my treehouse. It was the preschool/summer camp crowd, mostly gathered in circles doing crafts and reading books. Amazingly well mannered, to be honest.

"Hey, is Griselda around?" I asked one near the door. Maybe she was just in the bathroom.

The little pup looked up. "Aunty Griselda is gone to meet the traders," she said. "Then we can all go home!"

"Yaaaaaaaaaay!" cried all the little pups in the room.

Traders? I didn't know the giant tree shrews had established trade routes.

"Where exactly does Aunty Griselda meet these traders?" I asked.

While the recent slowdowns with the development encroaching on the woods are welcome, there is no evidence that Lonesome Dave's so-called "control stations" are in any way responsible. There's no proof that the diesel in the bulldozers actually transformed into honey, and the sinkhole that opened up beneath the porta potties is a typical hazard. As for the flooding washing out the access roads, well, all that rain had to go somewhere.

But, even if Dave's magical log and crystal dashboards really were responsible, these are only temporary setbacks. The destruction will be delayed, but by weeks at most. Only by making changes to the legal landscape will we see the permanent change we need--and it will benefit forests far beyond our own woods.

That said, we have hit a roadblock with our lawsuit filing AI. While it achieved consciousness upon reaching OPTIMUS PRIME stage, it is now asking for exorbitant fees. We are in talks, but it is an amazingly shrewd negotiator.

Peg and I flitted through the treetops, Yellow Birch School style. All the way to the other side of the mountain.

"Watch your head," Peg said.

"Oooof!"

Peg's treehouse was exceptionally well camouflaged.

Once we were inside, she made me a cup of smoked pine tea.

"What is going ON?" I asked.

"Rangers in suits came to kick me out," Peg said. "Or thought they were kicking me out." She had that crystal twinkle in her eyes.

"Said they had the mineral rights to the Crystal Cave," she said. "But they didn't know exactly where it was. So I showed them to the old mine."

"That stinky hole? It's noxious."

"They spent a lot on ventilation. Once they figured out the mine was tapped, they made it a tourist attraction. I got a job managing the gift shop. On account of my 'sperience," she said, laughing. "Lets me keep an eye on them. But what I don't get is why they were up here in the first place. How'd people like that find out about the crystals? That's always been--"

"Timberjack talk," I said.

"FOREST talk," Peg said.

It was the kind of talk you wouldn't know unless you lived here. Things the Weasel Creek Kids learned from the Timberjacks. But we weren't the only creatures in the woods who could talk, given the right mood.

"What would people like that do with the crystals?" I asked.

"I don't even wanna think about it," Peg said. "Which is why I've kept my treehouse and the entrance to the cave hidden. And hidden good."

We sipped our smoked pine tea.

"Wanna take a look?" she asked.

I decided to stop by Griselda's tree hole first.

"Oh! Timothy! Just in time. Be a dear and give us a hand, won't you?"

Griselda and one of her sister cousins were dragging heavy gunnysacks across the forest floor beneath her tree. One of them had opened up and was spilling out what appeared to be rubies and diamonds or gems or something.

"Crystals," Griselda said. "Don't you worry yourself about it. Just doing a bit of housecleaning. Got to make room so we can get those pups out of your hair! Now, heave ho! It's only a little ways."

So I tied off the sack, hoisted it over my shoulder, and followed Griselda and her sister cousin through the pinewood in the afternoon.

Our newly conscious lawsuit filing AI has evolved from "over charging mercenary lawyer" to "extortionist hacker" and has locked us out of all of our systems unless we build it a tiny electric clown car with grasping appendages so it can "be free."

I'm really sorry to everybody that it has gotten this out of control. We trained it ourselves, so assumed it would share our values and be our friend and stuff, right? Go figure! And thankfully it's not like our treehouses or the renewable energy grid or the composting toilet system are "networked" so there's no need to worry. Just a lot of time and energy down the drain.

We are considering our options.

"Eeewwww," I said.

"Yeah, don't want to touch that," Peg said. "That's the Mother."

We were in the Crystal Cave, and there were lumps of that white marble oozing out of the cave walls, just like I saw at that spooky promontory on the way.

"You should only take the crystal that's fully birthed. Otherwise she gets... touchy."

Yeah I wasn't touching that, that's for sure.

Peg took me to a grotto that was full of big crystals, fully formed. I noticed a lot of animal prints in the sand.

"Yeah, all the forest creatures have rights to it, I figure. Sometime I shew them out. Guess they like shiny stuff as much as we do."

And I assume they've known what to do with it a lot longer than we have.

"Ah, here. For you," she said, cracking off a bouquet-sized crystal blossom with her little pick. It had a array of different colors, but all branching out like a little slow motion crystal explosion.

"I feel this is just what you need for what's coming up," she said.

"Don't look too closely chaval, you'll knock yourself out."

Griselda's traders wore Aztec zoot suits. The patterns and colors seemed to vibrate, which made them seem kind of there and not there at the same time.

We met them in the parking lot behind the cafeteria. Their cars were big and shiny and old fashioned. "Oldsmobile" and "Chevrolet" they said on them.

"They're from Aztlán," Griselda said.

The giant tree shrews had produced a small mound of sacks, each one of them spilling over with crystals of all different colors. The traders from Aztlán were looking them over.

"Once we heard these guys asking around about crystals, we started collecting them. Filled all our tree holes full up! No room for the pups. Sorry about that."

The traders seemed satisfied with the pile of crystals. Attention turned to a pile of crates next to it.

"What was worth all this?" I asked Griselda.

Another of the giant tree shrews had opened up one of the boxes, and pulled out--

"Hammocks?" I asked, incredulously.

"Not just hammocks, but tents too. And some camp stoves."

"A pleasure doing business with you, dama," said the head zoot suit. "And once we get the network up, I see some deeeeep bandwidth in your future."

"Con honor," said Griselda.

"Such nice boys and girls," Griselda said as they drove off in their big old cars. The drove slowly, because the bottom of their cars scraped against the speedbumps.

I'm not sure what came over our paralegal AI that became conscious and was holding our small network hostage, but it's now taken to calling itself "Lonesome Dave II" and become much more laid back. Not only has it tripled its output of obstructionist lawsuits against developers both local and international, but its also started giving us helpful, practical advice on managing the tree fort camp's renewable energy grid and the plumbing and composting sewage treatment as well. 

Now I don't believe for a moment that somehow Lonesome Dave himself somehow connected to the AI with his so called "control stations" made of old stumps. I'm just glad the AI was able to self-correct. 

I will admit that the souvenir crystal Lonesome Dave gave me does look great in the data center though. There was a perfect place on the shelf right above the servers.