Three Men in a Hot-air balloon

It was a fantastic evening. The B Lymphocyte and Memory Cell were visiting Dendritic Cell, drinking punch and looking at old photos. Suddenly, the page of a photo album they opened revealed them something terribly familiar, though it seemed as if it had happened so long ago that no one remembered it anymore. "A-ah, but that's..." exclaimed the B Lymphocyte. "Our first adventure together," recalled Memory Cell. "Right. The time we stole a hot-air balloon," agreed his friend. "So many memories!" they said at the same time. * * * It happened on an early Thursday morning. Yes, most likely a Thursday, because on that day of the week, Memory Cell was the most absent-minded and forgetful. That morning, he had left his home, forgetting his umbrella, then his overshoes and then an important file with documents, almost arriving late at work. The B Lymphocyte was dragging himself there as well, absolutely exhausted and worn out after some professional development courses, only thinking about how sleepy he was. So much that he didn't notice Memory Cell, even though the latter was passing directly in front of him, losing important documents that were falling out of the opened file on his way. Dendritic Cell's day had started quite well and even really fantastic, exactly until that esoteric moment when he had met the other two on the launch site, where the T-Helper had called all his subordinates in order to prepare for an anniversary event that would be broadcasted live. An event in the superiors' honor. Dendritic Cell's mood on that day was too great to let it be spoiled by the T-Helper's boring valuable instructions. He managed to sneak away from the general meeting and was watching, with interest, how some workers were filling up the hot-air balloon for said celebration. And next to it was a long banner lying on the ground, with the inscription: "Hurray to the fighters of the immune system! Always on guard". The farther the balloon was getting inflated, the more wonderful and captivating it seemed. A still vague, but already overwhelming desire to climb into the basket and take off started appearing in Dendritic Cell's mind. Oh, yes: a flight would offer him completely new perspectives to make photos and a new view from above. He didn't remember exactly how he got disconnected from reality. Not realizing himself what he was doing, he got close to the balloon and climbed into the basket the exact moment the workers weren't looking. For a few minutes, he kept staring spellbound at the flying vehicle's internal equipment and then, his hand moved by itself and reached for the burner's flame regulator. He turned it just a little bit, the flame's sounds got louder and, as an answer to that, the balloon snorted, creaked with its ropes and created the impression that it wanted to jump up like a ball. The Dendrocyte was attacked by some kind of childish joy, a pit opened in his stomach and his thirst for adventure awoke. He had only one thought spinning around in his head: "I just have to lift the anchor and the balloon will fly." Having somehow come to his senses, Dendritic Cell looked around and hesitantly grabbed the rope to which the anchor was connected. The temptation was huge and the anchor heavy. He bent over the edge of the basket to evaluate the anchor's size and also to make sure that no one else was nearby. The workers had left, everything was quiet near the balloon. Some noise was heard somewhere in the background, but Dendritic ignored it. He inhaled and exhaled deeply, clutched the rope tighter and tried to lift the anchor. But the latter didn't budge, so Dendritic Cell strained himself harder once or twice and finally fell on his rear end on the ground in the basket. As a reaction to that, something began to stir there and also to grumble, to curse at him using quite obscene words and even tried to kick him. Intrigued by that, the Dendrocyte lifted the sackcloth that was lying between other stuff and that he hadn't noticed before, and discovered there, to his surprise, the B Lymphocyte, who was trying to take a nap. The latter cracked open one eye, ripped his improvisational blanket out of Dendritic Cell's hands and continued to sleep without any care in the world. And before the Dendrocyte could manage to say something, a fairly weighty file came flying and hit him on the head. He reflexively fell down, landing on top of the B Lymphocyte, who was covered by the sackcloth, and crushed him hard. The other quickly woke up and started desperately swearing once again. They were floundering like this for a couple of minutes, hearing Memory Cell's tragic lamentations outside the balloon: The T-Killer was fighting with the T-Helper and, angry, that Memory Cell had gotten in his way, had thrown away the latter's file: the T-Killer had arrived to the T-Helper earlier than his clumsy colleague (and desired to possess the latter's attention undividedly during their "friendly" get-together).  Memory Cell was then running around the balloon that was ready to take off, first picking up the documents from the ground and then starting to climb into the basket to get the rest. In the process, he unfortunately grabbed the rope that the workers didn't bother to fasten properly, as it seemed, and fell down together with it, hurting his tailbone during the landing. Memory Cell got up, clasped the basket's rim with both hands, staring in bewilderment at the anchor and the rope that were both lying on the ground now. Suddenly, he felt his feet starting to lift off the ground. Dendritic Cell was looking down at him. It had never even occurred to him that, instead of pulling the anchor into the basket, he could just throw out its rope. He was so immersed into the thought about why he hadn't had that simple and obvious idea himself that he didn't realize yet that a landing without the anchor would be quite difficult. And maybe, he would have managed to finish thinking out that last thought in time, but got distracted by the necessity to drag Memory Cell into the basket that was swinging more and more. The latter was producing sounds full of terror and losing his overshoes on the way... When Memory Cell was successfully pulled up, he and his savior fell on top of the B Lymphocyte and were gifted with the furious glare of a pair of eyes, reddened from lack of sleep from under the sackcloth. The B Lymphocyte kicked them both from the bottom of his heart, announcing that they could do anything, even handstands, but not even think about waking him up! Memory Cell and Dendritic Cell didn't have any other choice than to agree and "let him in peace". They somehow managed to get up, perceiving the basket's wild swinging. Both clutched its braided rim and carefully looked down. Suddenly they noticed that they have flown up so high that the ground with the T cells and even the headquarters building were looking like small toys now. Memory Cell said that he was feeling dizzy and crawled back into the basket, while Dendritic Cell took a breath and tried to get used to the altitude. It was necessary to get a grip, to look away from the stunning views and instead figure out how to control that balloon as quick as possible, before they could crash into something. "Are we still rising?" asked Memory Cell with fear, not addressing anyone in particular. "Zzz-zzz-zzz!" was the B Lymphocyte's answer from the bottom of the basket. Dendritic Cell, who had already had the luck to get to know the regulator of the burner, turned it once again thoughtfully and then decided to not touch it anymore, just in case. Also, he noticed the presence of ballast in the form of sandbags and a rope that needed to be pulled to open the valve at the top of the balloon. This could be used for descending. Memory Cell rose from the ground and joined his study of how to control the balloon. Thanks to him, another interesting discovery was made: apart from the top valve, the balloon also possessed a side one, which served to change course and was considerably smaller in size and quite hard to open. The Dendrocyte and Memory Cell were convinced that something must have gotten stuck there, and tugged both with force at the rope that was fastened to it. The valve produced a loud "pshhh"-sound and started to let out heated air from under the dome. The balloon moved to the side, managed to catch some especially frisky air flow and followed it, "dancing" through the air. A bumpy ride began. The B Lymphocyte realized that he wouldn't be able to sleep anymore, crawled out from under the sackcloth and started to berate these two dumbasses, who only by miracle hadn't killed him and themselves yet. After a long series of fights, shoves and disputes, our improvisational team of aeronauts finally managed to control the balloon somehow and even arrived to catch the necessary air flow that took them further and further from the launch site, where the workers, the T-Helper and his subordinates were now running around and yelling something after the escaped balloon, hilariously tripping and getting their legs entangled in the banner. But the newly-minted balloonists didn't hear them, instead unconsciously rejoicing about the highly unusual possibility to bring some change into their boring daily routine. Oddly enough, not a single one of them was plagued by pricks of conscience due to skipping work. The B Lymphocyte didn't feel like sleeping anymore at all, Memory Cell was thoughtfully contemplating the clouds and Dendritic Cell passionately making photos. His entire mind was occupied by his personal photo exhibition he was organizing together with a macrophage, and by the thought about how great it would be to add there some photos made during a ride in the hot-air balloon. The balloon was slowly flying over endless fields, maze-like vessels and lacunae. Tiny cells were bustling about on the ground, liquids were circulating, ships sailing and even a wild chase after a germ was taking place. Watching it, our adventurers got so carried away by it, they even started placing bets. Memory Cell lost the bet, and the other two shared the victory and demanded their price. But the loser didn't have any money with him, so they agreed to take some sandwiches instead. To the question about where he planned getting them from, Memory Cell unbuttoned his jacket and took out a bag from inside, explaining that he had put his lunch there, before rushing to pick up his papers. In fact, his lunch bag was the only thing that had miraculously survived the T-Killer's hands. The B Lymphocyte praised him for his foresight and took a thermos flask with tea out of his bag that he had just now used as a pillow. After the light meal, they felt a burst of energy and thirst for adventure. Even Memory Cell became bolder and stopped being that afraid of the height. All three of them soon got used to the bumpiness and started to discuss where to fly next. There weren't too many options of directions to choose from, so they all soon arrived to the conclusion that the perfect option for their first ride on a hot-air balloon would be to just fly randomly without any destination. "Say, aren't you afraid of crashing?" asked Memory Cell carefully "Well, as far as I know," said the B Lymphocyte, scratching his neck. "The main part of hot-air balloon crashes happen during take-off. Or during the landing? I don't remember. But since we've already taken off without any problem, there's no need to fear a crash during take-off anymore," he logically concluded. "So only the landing remains..." noticed Memory Cell anxiously. As soon as they started thinking about the landing, the Dendrocyte remembered that they didn't have any anchor. The B Lymphocyte scratched the back of his head again and suggested tying a sandbag to the rope they had, or, even better, two. The improvisational anchor turned out not bad at all, and our adventurers prepared to cast it immediately, as soon as they would start to land. But for now, they decided to resume their adventure, letting themselves be carried away by the wind and the great opportunity to escape work. Dendritic Cell was continuing to make photos, and Memory Cell asked the B Lymphocyte about what else he knew about hot-air balloon crashes. "Not that much," the latter answered. "The most frequent reason for a catastrophe are collisions with power lines, which can cause the basket to turn over and the balloon to get stuck, start to burn or even explode to the basophilic grandma." At the mention of a possible explosion, Memory Cell paled and spots appeared on his skin. "Oh, and the balloon could also collide with a tree or with another balloon..." continued the B Lymphocyte, not paying attention to how the other was getting paler and paler. "And bad weather conditions or a fuel leak could be fatal as well." After this statement, Memory Cell started to anxiously look around, searching the sky for signs of bad weather and checking whether the fuel was leaking. As a reaction to that, the Dendrocyte hurried to calm him down, saying that the weather forecast for the coming days was absolutely fantastic, nothing more than small showers were expected and only if they had very bad luck. And the B Lymphocyte checked the balloon's technical equipment in person, especially the burner's fuel hose, assuring that everything was great. After that, Memory Cell felt a visible relief, but still kept looking at the sky, in case some suspicious clouds should appear. The next few hours passed surprisingly normally. However, our travelers noticed after some time that they had started to descend. Dendritic Cell was turning the burner's regulator again, making the flame stronger, but this didn't help. The B Lymphocyte supposed that the balloon had just lost too much hot air, so the only thing they could do to fly up, was to throw out ballast. The latter turned out to be not that numerous: just a few sandbags, of which two should serve as an anchor and couldn't be thrown out. To the question, what they should do if they happen to sink too low, the B Lymphocyte said that one of them would be forced to jump out, then. For some reason, his companions didn't like that idea very much and instead supported Dendritic Cell's idea of carrying out an emergency landing in that case and then walk to the nearest settlement. After another half an hour, the balloon started to sink strongly, the suitable air flow was lost and the throwing out of the not numerous ballast didn't help at all. Thinking that it was enough for their first time, the cells decided to make a landing, moreover because they also spotted a clearing in front of them that would be great for that purpose, being spacious enough to perform a deceleration without any fuss or risk. But the risk didn't disappear completely, of course, especially because they were still terribly inexperienced balloonists, who didn't even suspect, which surprises could await them. For now, everything was going perfectly. The B Lymphocyte turned down the burner's flame, grabbed the rope that opened the valve, and commanded his companions to get ready to throw out the anchor. Suddenly, something whooshed past his face and rushed away. Trying to wave it off, the B Lymphocyte let out some hearty curses and grabbed the rope again, but this time it was the wrong one... In the next moment, the side valve opened instead of the top one, and the balloon abruptly moved to the side, where an unexpected encounter with a power line, cruelly hidden behind some trees that were growing around the clearing, was waiting for it. Just a bit more and the unlucky aeronauts would have been simply fried by it. Only by some miracle, they managed to dodge the lethal encounter that could have caused a fire or even let the balloon explode. Instead of that, they happily greeted the nearest tree with their basket, almost falling out of it in the process, and started an extremely abrupt descending.  The braking turned out to be so rough that the poor cells thought that they would break their entire cytoskeleton. They produced a considerable furrow with the basket's corners, raising up layers of soil at the sides and finally hit the ground. The basket's entire content fell out, and the balloon tried to fly up again, but nope: by a happy coincidence, the rope with the bags, that served as an anchor, caught on a stump that had the shape of a fork – remains of two trees that had grown together. The B Lymphocyte, whose body was full of bruises, was holding the ropes that controlled the valves with a death grip and pulling them with his last strength. Dendritic Cell, who had landed with his back on the burner and gotten badly scalded by it, quickly shut the valve off and removed his perforated jacket, and Memory Cell was sitting on the ground and moaning. "I think my arm is broken," he lamented. As long as the adrenaline wasn't gone yet, the battered B Lymphocyte and the slightly grilled Dendritic Cell managed to tie the almost deflated balloon tighter to the stump and then slumped down on the grass without any strength left. The B Lymphocyte was lying on his back and Dendritic Cell on his stomach, since his burned back was terribly hurting. Memory Cell continued moaning for a while, and then realized that he had to look for a first-aid kit. To his slight surprise, he did find one among all the chaos after the fall, safely kept in a special tin box. After having taken care of their wounds, the cells started seriously thinking about what they should do next. They didn't know where they were and neither how they should get out. And also didn't have a clue, what to do with the balloon. They didn't want to leave it behind, since it wasn't theirs and they wouldn't certainly get any praise for losing it, but dragging it with them wasn't possible either. Exactly as flying in it again, by the way... "Let's try to reach the nearest polpulated area," suggested the Dendrocyte. "And there, we can report the crash and where the balloon is located," he added in a very unsecure tone. "I don't have any better idea," admitted the B Lymphocyte as an answer, and looked at Memory Cell. "I remember one incident," narrated the latter, slightly out of place. "where after having reported destroyed government property, all the culprits were almost sentenced to elimination." "Uh..." grimaced his companions and gulped nervously. "Maybe we shouldn't report anything and just pretend that we have nothing to do with it?" asked the B Lymphocyte, looking at the others with hope. "Hmm..." they started thinking about it, evaluating that option. "But isn't it obvious that it was us who stole the balloon?" inquired Dendritic Cell. "I don't know, I wasn't seen by anyone," affirmed the B Lymphocyte. "Me too, as it seems," said Dendritic Cell, struggling to recall the circumstances of his infiltration into the flying object. "And I've ended up there only by coincidence," added Memory Cell, for his part. "Hmm..." they repeated together and exchanged glances. Dendritic Cell already wanted to put forward the idea of thinking of a more convincing excuse, if someone should ask them about the reason of their absence at work during working hours that was matching so well with the time of the balloon's disappearance, but then destiny itself intervened, clearly believing that the adventures of our three guys shouldn't end with the dangerous landing. It skillfully put a weighty stone under Memory Cell's feet that wasn't visible under the moss, so he tripped, tumbled forwards, shoved the B Lymphocyte and they both rolled from the hill. Dendritic Cell tried to catch them, but fell head over heels after them. The landing of the three rolling cells turned out to be surprisingly soft, though wet. When they realized that they had gotten into a swamp, they had already sunk waist-deep and continuing to. "I didn't think that my life would end in such an inglorious way," said the B Lymphocyte bitterly. He tried to grab the nearest snag, but it broke with a lifeless crack. "Maybe we should yell for help?" asked Memory Cell. "No one's here," sighed the Dendrocyte, looking around sadly and noticing that not a soul was there, except for themselves. Their situation didn't seem the best, but they didn't plan on giving up. The B Lymphocyte could swear that he was feeling the hard ground under his feet, and tried to get out. Dendritic Cell, who was the tallest out of them, managed to do that trick earlier than him and tried to help the other two out. In the end, they did get out of the morass, but were now unrecognizable. As soon as the adventurers, who were covered with swampy mud, had reached solid earth, they crawled the last micrometers on all fours through the bushes and landed literally nose to nose with a flock of spindle-shaped bacteria. "And who are you?" asked the biggest one in a snobbish way, arrogantly looking down at the dirty newcomers. "We're..." began Memory Cell, but didn't have the time to say something else, because his friends thrust their elbows into his sides. "We're lost red blood cells," lied the Dendrocyte on the spot. "Uh-huh," nodded the B Lymphocyte. "We were on a delivery and got lost in the swamp." "Errr..." said the bacteria together, doubtfully examining the impostors. Even under the thick layer of dirt, the three of them didn't look like biconcave-shaped cells at all, especially Dendritic Cell, but the bacteria didn't have any reason yet to not believe their words. "And where are your packages?" they decided to ask. "They unfortunately drowned in the swamp," answered the liars, wiping away an invisible tear. Memory Cell oriented himself and nodded in agreement. "Alright, since you have nothing we can steal from you," concluded the bacteria. "Come with us, we do need some slaves right now." "Oh no, we have to serve bacteria!" the Dendrocyte pretended to be shocked, not worrying at all about how comically that looked, especially considering the difference in size between him and his companions and their potential slave-owners. Even the short B Lymphocyte was a whole head taller than them, Memory Cell two heads, and regarding Dendritic Cell, the bacteria didn't even get to his waist. However, as it seemed, the germs weren't bothered by that fact at all, and their victims they had "caught" soon were walking obediently after the leader, being spurred on by an improvisational convoy of smaller bacteria. The cells had to control themselves with all their might to not burst out laughing. They were improvising now, to be honest, but something was telling all three of them that the unexpected captivity might bring a quite good solution to their own problem.  The group of the insolent enslavers led them to their chief – a terribly fat Clostridium bacterium. He and some of his bootlickers critically eyed the captives and then he inquired: "Who are these?" "Here," bragged his subordinates. "We caught them, they're lost red blood cells." "What kind of red blood cells can these be, for the sake of my microbial grandma?" objected the chief. "The kind there is..." tried the subordinates to justify themselves, casting sideways glances at the captives, who were nodding in agreement. "Hum..." said the fat chief and ordered the filthy immune cells to clean up the territory, where the clostridial colony was located. It was so dirty there that even the swamp seemed a lot cleaner in the eyes of our adventurers, and it stunk so bad that the morasses' evaporation was smelling like roses compared to that. "Holy capillaries, what a stench!" exclaimed Dendritic Cell, with tears in his eyes. "Clostridium bacteria excrete biologically aggressive substances that are capable of causing tissue necrosis and producing gases," explained Memory Cell. "And still some of these bastards manage to get a residence permit," grumbled the B Lymphocyte unhappily. "I wouldn't attribute them to the normal microflora," he added, scraping the mud from his overall. Dendritic Cell and Memory Cell exchanged glances: the devastating impact from the presence of the Clostridium bacteria was obvious and threatened to bring trouble to the organism in the near future. "I think we should wait till they're all here," suggested the Dendrocyte. "And keep an eye on the situation until then." "Let's keep cleaning, to not arouse any suspicion," agreed Memory Cell. "So act according to the situation then, and, as for me, there's something else I need to do," said the B Lymphocyte and took out of his pocket a portable mini-version of his immunoglobulin cannon that had suffered from the swamp's goo. He made himself comfortable behind a big rock, to not be seen, and started with his weapon's cleaning. Dendritic Cell and Memory Cell, in the meantime, began with the task of cleaning up. They had a shovel and a rake to their disposal, and also some pretty good garbage bags. The Dendrocyte took one, tested its sturdiness and slowly uttered, as if discussing with himself: "I think, I'm getting a great little idea..." This was all the B Lymphocyte heard. He was so immersed in the cleaning of his cannon that he came back to his senses only when a commotion began: the remaining bacteria had returned with the booty they had honestly stolen from some unlucky cells, and the whole colony had decided to hold a feast. The very best was given to the chief, of course. He and his subordinates were greedily devouring the stolen nutrients, slurping, smacking their lips, burping and releasing their gases directly at the table. It was an absolutely disgusting view. So disgusting, that Memory Cell paled and said that he would remember it for the rest of his life. The chief just didn't manage to get seconds from his subordinates who thought that he had already enough, remembered about his captives and ordered them to serve him. The Dendrocyte obligingly brought him some delicacies and carefully inquired whether more guests were expected. Not suspecting anything, the chief waved it off and said: "Nope, the whole colony's there, we're not waiting for anyone else." "Fantastic," replied the Dendrocyte and gave a sign to his friends, who hurried to him to help him serve some drinks to the germs. These got soon drunk and their heads started to sink on the tables until they were loudly snoring. Two were trying to sing a microbial drinking song, but their tongues quickly began getting heavy midway, and they passed out as well. The immune cells took the already tested garbage bags and started to put the bacteria inside, carefully, in order to not wake them up. And before tying the cram-full bags up, the B Lymphocyte was spraying antibodies inside them, to opsonize the germs before giving them to the macrophages they were planning to contact soon. They had accumulated a lot of bags, but the last one turned out to be not completely full. And while the cells were looking around, searching for someone suitable to stuff there, the bag's free space inflated like a balloon, since the Clostridium bacteria were continuing to release gases even while sleeping. "I hope they don't explode and fly away," joked Dendritic Cell, poking the inflated bags with his finger one after another. Then, he took out a pin and made a few little holes in each one, so they wouldn't burst. Some germ let out a pained sound inside one of the bags. "It would be so great if WE could fly away from here," commented the B Lymphocyte, shaking the last, not full bag that hadn't yet endured Dendritic Cell's pin. It inflated so heavily that it really seemed as if it would fly away any moment. "But the hot air has completely left our balloon, and we don't have anything to inflate it with again, besides the burner's broken too, as it seems. If we just had another suitable gas to fill it up, then we wouldn't maybe need the burner at all..." Having said that, he started to think. The other two were staring at the bloated bag in his hands. As it seemed, they all got the same idea at once. Grabbing a few bags, the cells found a shallow slope on the hill along which they had rolled into the swamp earlier, and started to ascend, grunting from the effort. Their abandoned balloon was lying there, lonely, on the top of the hill, like a shapeless pile. There, they placed the bags aside and started to check the balloon for damage, also trying to understand, how exactly they could get the bacteria inside and force them to inflate it. The balloon was almost intact, there was just one tear, that apparently had resulted from an encounter with a branch and was spoiling the appearance. However, our adventurers did expect something like that. Thinking that it could have been worse, they were about to end their inspection, but suddenly spotted a clothesline with its entire content that had gotten tangled up with the balloon's strings. The underpants hanging on it were just big enough to patch the hole. It was better to not think about to whom they may belong. "We also need to rebuild the balloon a bit," said the B Lymphocyte, watching with interest, how the skillful Dendritic Cell was wielding the needle and thread he always had with him. "Actually, it would be enough to just fill the balloon with heated air, but the burner's not working properly and we also don't have any fuel. So we need to do it in a more old-fashioned way: a closed balloon, filled with gas. We somehow need to narrow its lower part, so that the gas cannot escape." "No problem, I'll think of something," assured Dendritic Cell, turning the clothesline around in his hands. "Mm... how about some lacing?..." he started talking to himself. Still pondering about that, he neatly patched the tear up with the underpants. His friends, in the meantime, were picking up their things from the clearing and checking the basket, the fasteners and the poor anchor. Then they helped Dendritic Cell, holding the edges of the balloon's hole, while he was attaching the clothesline to it, to pull it shut. When everything was ready, they returned to the bags. "Now, one question remains," said the B Lymphocyte, turning around to Memory Cell. "How do we get these scumbags to fill up our balloon with their farts?..." And with these words, he gave one of the bags a hearty kick, making the bacteria inside emit some cries immediately. "I never had to do anything like that before..." answered the latter helplessly. The not really sobered up bacteria were almost scared to death and, being threatened by the B Lymphocyte's cannon, seemed to be ready to do anything to not be killed. They strained themselves with all their might, and when the B cells opened the bags and directed them to the balloon's opening, started to eagerly release gases. The result exceeded all expectations: soon, the balloon started to rise slightly, giving hope that it would fly. However, the germs were now exhausted and begging for mercy. So the cells quickly rushed off for the other bags, and the procedures of intimidating and inflating got repeated. Towards the end, the B Lymphocyte turned on the damaged burner and warmed up the balloon's content a bit more, until the device broke down definitely and the balloon's sides stretched, creaking from the strain. The balloon's interior started giving off an unspeakable stench. Dendritic Cell and his friends hurriedly tied up its bottom. The flying vehicle was ready for take-off. Having climbed into the basket together with one of the bags, the cells lifted the anchor and, clumsily wobbling among the air currents, departed to conquer the skies again. After having convinced themselves that the flight was going smoothly even with a broken burner, they relaxed a little and started to crack jokes. After an especially vulgar one about the influenza virus, they decided to change the topic and suddenly began talking about everyone's dreams and hobbies. "I dream about having my own photo exhibition," said Dendritic Cell, a bit embarrassed. "And I think, I'm pretty good at this." "I collect stories, legends and toasts," joined in Memory Cell and looked at the B Lymphocyte. "And I wanted to be a bard," admitted the latter. "I even wrote some poems. Care to hear them?" His travel companions nodded, so the B Lymphocyte filled his lungs with air and began: "I asked the Basophil a private thing on the street: 'Why were you washing last night in compote your feet?'" "Yep, washing your feet in compote is a very private thing, I agree," Dendritic Cell couldn't resist to comment with an awkward giggle. "The rhythm's not the best, of course," agreed the aspiring bard. "I'll think of something better later. This is just a working draft for now, so to say." "Don't you think, that if it's about something private, it would be more logical to ask, who he was in love with?" Memory Cell gave him an idea. "You're right," said the B Lymphocyte. "How didn't this occur to me?" "And what happens next?" "Instead of answering, the Basophil went mad and filled with some complicated phrase my head!" "Yes, that's just like him," agreed the other two. "My head was aching not one day, but four... And here's the chorus: la la la la la, for sure..." "Yeaah..." let out the Dendrocyte as an evaluation of the brilliance of that piece of art. "Don't worry," Memory Cell tried to calm down his friend. "This is absolutely not bad for a start." The B Lymphocyte recited another few beginning versions of poems that honestly couldn't be seen as something of very great quality, and his companions got interested and started to give him their ideas for improvement. During the ride, all three immersed themselves completely into the creative work and even tried to compose something like a song, putting their improvisation on the first suitable motif. The balloon was rhythmically swaying in the air flows, while from the basket's edge the singing of the aspiring, but not yet recognized bard, the B Lymphocyte, was resounding: "I asked the Basophil a private thing on the street: 'Tell me a secret, who're you in love with?'" And he said to me, without a doubt, that it was not my business, and punched me in my mouth!" "One night, I saw him in a bar, next to Eosinophil with her pigtails, it looked like a date from afar, and they were drinking cocktails," continued Dendritic Cell. "I remember that night too so well, had lost my gloves that day, Then passed the night in the liver, sad as hell, to drink my pain away..." concluded Memory Cell, and all three began to sing the chorus: "La la la la la la la, La la la la la!" At this moment, somewhere far below them, a small blue spot was flickering. This was the Basophil, who was waiting for rain and suddenly started to hiccup and loudly sneeze at the same time under his umbrella. Immersed in their songs and conversations, the cells didn't notice that the wind had changed and that now, they were flying into the opposite direction, in a slightly different route. During the ride and as a sort of additional entertainment, they created a lasso and caught directly on the fly some suspicious germs that they put into the bag together with the Clostridium bacteria, glad that they wouldn't arrive with empty hands, at least. They didn't realize that they were overflying the same places as before. Spotting the familiar T cell-base surprised them a bit, and they started arguing whether they had managed to fly in a circle around the entire organism or not. Dendritic Cell was highly doubting that, the B Lymphocyte insisting that it was nonsense, but Memory Cell began telling another legend about the fact that, in ancient times, cells used to believe that the world in the body was not round, but quadratic and with an edge. "Sure, and it was held by three eosinophils standing on a macrophage," the B Lymphocyte was mocking him. "In my version, there were three lymphocytes and a dendritic cell," corrected Dendritic Cell, laughing. "Your version sounds rather like an antigen presentation," commented his companions. "True..." The adventure was coming to its end. The gas they had gotten from the bacteria was escaping and the balloon itself deflating and quickly sinking. The cells landed directly on the yard, where the T lymphocytes were working out. The Squad Leader, who almost received the balloon together with the three passengers on his head, was so baffled he even forgot to yell at them. His subordinates helped the balloonists with the landing, grabbing the ropes the latter had cast. After the complete stop, the three somehow climbed out of the basket and departed together to surrender themselves to the T-Helper, swaying from side to side after the ride. On their way, they were joined by curious naives, who excitedly asked them questions about their adventure. Dendritic Cell promised to tell them everything in detail and even show them the photos he had made, but later. There he remembered something and asked them to bring the bag that was still in the basket. Holding this bag, he solemnly entered the boss' office, just like a real Santa Cellus. The B cells sneaked in behind him and closed the door after them. And soon, instead of angry yells due to them slacking off and stealing the balloon, enthusiastic cheers were heard from the room. The antigen samples they had brought were beyond all praise, and the T-Helper seriously loved the idea of establishing a regular aerial surveillance. In the evening of that same day, Dendritic Cell and his new friends gathered together with a whole bunch of cells, who were eager to hear about their interesting adventures. The T-Killer was there, as well. He was just listening, without saying a word, sometimes frowning and trying to hide with all his might how he was envying these three. He really wanted to depart on an adventure himself! But, oh well, he didn't even suspect that his wish would come true very soon. * * * The cells closed the album, finished their punch and stretched contently. "What a great time that was," said the B Lymphocyte, yawning. "One of the best I remember," added Memory Cell. "It was nice to revel in memories," agreed Dendritic Cell, realizing that it was unfortunately time to end their get-together. They had had a good time, what a pity that the T-Killer, whom he had called as well, hadn't come. And while the Dendrocyte was putting away the dishes, the B cells were getting ready to leave. They opened the door and stared puzzled at the T-Killer, who was standing, embarrassed, at the doorstep, with a crate of beer under his arm. They looked at each other and, without saying a word, dragged him into the house. Seeing him, Dendritic Cell almost dropped the glasses from happiness. Clean mugs immediately appeared on the table, the bottle opener flashed, the foamy beer fizzed and the get-together continued until the next morning. After all, they still haven't looked at the photos from their boat-trip!