As the boat got faster and faster, Barbara soared higher and higher. “Wheee!” she exclaimed as she flew through the sky like a cloud on drugs. But as the boat reached a critical speed, the wire snapped and she was left gliding along in the sky. After a few feet she started her descent, until she was attacked by a group of passing pigeons. They all grabbed hold of her and carried poor Barbara off to a nearby uninhabited island.

When Balama – who had apparently changed her name during the fracas – came round, she was surprised to find a large amount of pigeons standing over her, staring at her like she was a discarded slice of bread. She screamed as she tried to get up, but there were ropes holding her down, too tight for her to escape from. Then, in a moment of inexplicable madness, a pigeon held up a piece of paper that had a message written on it: ‘Hello Mother’.

She felt feint again, but managed the strength to ask “What are you talking about? I’m not your Mother! I’m a human being for christ sake!” and after a few seconds of scribbling noises being made, a further note was presented to her that said ‘Not our literal Mother. You are now our leader’.

“Why me?!” She begged. Another note said ‘Because we saw you fly. This proves you are the high leader that has been foretold’. Balama chuckled to herself before replying “I wasn’t flying! My hang glider broke loose and I was falling.”

Nevertheless, the pigeons considered Balama to be their leader, so they untied her and led her to a rather badly built hut with an equally badly built chair inside. ‘Sit’ she was ordered via paper. As she sat she began to realise the seriousness of the situation and began to worry that she had hit her head when she fell earlier. She had not hit her head, nor had she fallen. Over the coming months, Balama eventually came round to the idea of being a leader to these clearly intelligent pigeons.

Life with the pigeons became fun, with regular parties where the pigeons would present Balama with goods they had ‘acquired’ from their trips to the city. She built a home for herself and, after a while, started to forget about her former life with the humans. This was partially to do with her going insane after living with pigeons for so long, but she didn’t really understand this.

But it was not all fun and games. One sunny afternoon, which Balama guessed must have been a Tuesday, the pigeons called a meeting in which they discussed plans to attack another small island nearby that was inhabited by robins. Balama, now having completely lost all sanity, announced that she would train an army of pigeons and lead them into battle against the robin island.

After several minutes of training in a Rocky type montage, Balama’s army carried her across the waters toward Robin Island. Upon arrival they saw no robins, so they advanced toward the centre of the island. There they jumped out on the unaware robins and fought them with great ease. Some robins fled and some fought back, but most were captured.

Balama’s army had conquered Robin Island. Over the next few weeks they built a new civilisation there, populated with pigeon/robin offspring and ruled by Balama… Mother of the pigeons.