The Ladies Put Faith in the Shade

I have decided to write a mega-novel, one that I will work on until I die, much like Remembrance of Things Past by Proust or The Man Without Qualities by Musil. My work will be called The Procurement Man. This is the first novel/volume in that work.

THE LADIES PUT FAITH IN THE SHADE

By Toadsgoboad

Segment 1

Introduction: A Hazy Mass of Specifics
This piece was written on 10-6-06, a year and a half before the rest of the novel.

It was impressed upon me a hundred times or more that all one needed was an idea. Of course, were I to make this observation, there were plenty of relatives and older co-workers about to add that an idea wasn’t enough. One must work one’s butt off too, they would say. All well and good, I thought, but it was often hard enough for me to come up with the idea. Oh, I could make plans by the dozen in as many paces while shifting masticated wood pulp bricks at my place of employment and become hysterical at the sheer ingenuity of the ideas that came into my head, but put me in my home office with the children and the wife running about the house in a panic, heavy with samsara, and watch me waste another day in a mindless void, much like the one that turtles and deer must dwell in.
Often it is good to obtain help when confronted with such a difficulty. This help must be in the form of either an inanimate object or someone discreet enough not to blab that you needed help. As I know no one with an ounce of discretion, I went to an inanimate object when I had trouble with this page. I went to a homemade button bearing a picture of Jean Dubuffet.
“Tell me,” I said, “What can I write about today?”
“Try this.” The button said almost immediately. “There was a time when the lands all around this very spot you’re standing on were covered by a vast sea. This sea was soaked up by a giant sponge wielded by a giant named Pourboire. When the sponge was lifted away, there was only one damp spot left. That spot was the contents of a coffee cup held by Lagrober, a herald of the gods.”
“That’s enough!” I cried, covering my face. I threw the button into a drawer along with some other costume jewelry and an obsolete, hand-held video game that cried out to me “write about the ubiquity of computers!” before the darkness closed over it once again.
“I need coffee.” My brain begged. So it was extortion, was it? Well, I refused to give in. I determined that I would get my writing done even if I had to circumvent my brain to do so.

Pace

At my post at the supposed center of the labyrinth/ laboratory, I am removed from direct exposure to the antics of people like the President of the United States and the Rolling Stones. However, I am aware of their existence. Information reaches me by various means. I first learned about Prance Sabot and Dodge Wittles through documents that mysteriously appeared in a shoebox somewhere to the right of my desk. I would have sworn that that box was empty only the day before.
I mention all of this so that you won’t be confused later when I interject myself (who have little to do with the story) into the narrative. Also, I think such an introduction helps to set the tone.
Prance Sabot and Dodge Wittles; co-workers at Wilkes Brothers, a legume research company; and friends since some hazily pinpointed hour in grade school, lived in Squarto, a pretentious bywater in Zone 3. On the day this narrative properly commences they met in the locker room as Sabot was preparing to begin his shift and Wittles was just ending his.
“Are you aware that Burgerson has devalued the curly stem unit’s contribution to the rocket launcher project?” Wittles asked his old friend as the latter struggled into his bear costume.
“No, I’m not.” Sabot looked awestruck.
“I don’t know if it means less money for us or not.” Wittles stared into a corner of the room and pondered.
“Surely it will.”
“That’s what I figure.”
“Well, you’ll have to transfer to another unit.” Sabot was fully dressed except for the golden bear’s head helmet that lay on the bench beside him.
“I don’t think I can do that.” Wittles glanced at his friend. “Dammit, I get screwed every which way I turn!”
Sabot didn’t want to tell Wittles that he had know something of the kind would happen. He hadn’t really known, but he had thought that Wittles’ moving to the earlier shift had been meaningless and perhaps a little risky. Instead, he suggested that Wittles could come back to his shift.
“No way! All the good animal costumes are taken.” Wittles objected.

Settle

“Everyone knows Seattle is a town full of young people.” Carmen laughed at Prance Sabot’s ignorance. “It’s a young people town.”
“Well, I don’t think it’s so much a matter of my not knowing of its reputation as it is that I’ve never heard of it.” Sabot compounded his appearance as an untraveled hick in Carmen’s eyes.
“Never heard of it!” The woman, ten years Sabot’s junior, gawped frankly at the man across the table.
“Nope.” Sabot, who normally didn’t mind the blows to his ego that other men would find intolerable, now began to wish Carmen would drop the subject. Before she could explain all about the town (only one of many she had visited, apparently) Sabot shifted the subject somewhat. “I suppose by young people you mean the thin and attractive.”
“You are bitter, aren’t you?” She was attractive herself, if slightly plump. “But in all the right areas,” Sabot thought to himself. She had dark eyes, heavily made up; a scattering of freckles on her nose; dark, curly hair; and, most exciting of all, a raspy voice. She was clothed all in black.
“People with the entirety of their futures ahead of them. People with no reason yet to suspect that life holds nothing in store for them but debilitation and failure.” Sabot continued, smiling in appreciation of his own bitterness.
Later that evening, as Sabot drove home, he listened to Dr. Shad Canardy on the radio speak about the great threats looming over Zone 3. Sabot began to fret over his failure to leave the land of his birth back when he had a chance. Some part of his mind told him to avoid such distressing talk, but there was nothing else he could listen to on the radio.
“It’s all either bands that I’ve never heard of before or bands from my ‘past’ that are only on to make me feel nostalgic. Besides, I hate not being in control of what I’m going to listen to.” This was more or less how his thoughts ran on the subject.
As soon as he finished paying off the debts he had inherited from his family, he was determined to buy a CD player for his car. That was something he hadn’t told Carmen. He knew what she would say.
“You’re still listening to CDs?”
“If she was a man, I’d hate her.” Sabot admitted.

Basket-Riding Dog

The ailments that Burgerson suffered from were alleviated by the sight of the dog riding in the basket on Lady Bagel’s (Felton Wilkes’ wife’s) bicycle. How proudly he sits, Burgerson thought as he watched dog, woman, and bike moving through the ornamental bean vines that ringed the parking lot. He laughed at how cute the dog looked.
“Something funny, Burgerson?” Dodge Wittles asked as he headed for his car.
“No.” Burgerson replied, though it took quite an effort to summon the coldness proper in a supervisor of his standing. He took a last happy glance at the dog, now almost out of sight, before heading for his own car.
As he slipped behind the wheel Burgerson noted, almost fearfully, that he felt no pain or stiffness. The sudden cessation of these symptoms brought an unwanted bubble of fragile hope to the surface of his consciousness. He forced himself to drive cautiously to his house. Once there, he stepped out of the car expectantly. There was no pain in his legs, feet, or back. He raised his arms over his head and felt no pain. Unaccustomed as he was to running, he yet made an effort at it, sprinting up the front steps to his door.
“Marla!” He called as he stepped inside. He wanted to tell his wife of this miracle that had taken place. He still didn’t understand exactly what had happened, nor was he at all confident that it would last longer than the next minute, but this was the kind of thing one had to share. However, there was no answer. The house’s silence told him that Marla had gone out.
He half expected his disappointment to bring on an immediate relapse, but, as he walked to the kitchen, he still felt great. He had to admit it: he felt great.
“I feel great!” He shouted.
“Who are you?” A voice asked.
Burgerson turned and followed the sound of the voice into the living room, where he found a large parrot perching on a brass stand. A note taped to the stand read, “This Sparky. I bought him today. I have gone out to buy him some special treats. Marla.”
“Sparky?” Burgerson questioned, looking at the bird.
“That’s my name.” The parrot answered.
Burgerson felt a twinge shoot through his left shoulder.

Bottlebrush

Most of the land surrounding Wilkes Brothers was owned by the company. However, there was one small lot, the home of the Maidenhead Bottlebrush Works, that had escaped the company’s imperial ambitions. Periodically the subject of this lone holdout came up in meetings of the top executives.
“I came to work today the back way.” Chet Helmsman announced casually to his fellows around the black table in the Alpha room
“Oh, yes?” Dirk Hooper took his pipe out of his mouth to acknowledge Helmsman’s announcement.
“I saw that Maidenhead Bottlebrush Works is still in business.”
“When are we going to do something about that?” Allen Rains asked. “D.F.?” He directed the question to D.F. Planking, the most senior man in the room, a man for whom the Maidenhead problem went back decades.
Planking raised his grey head from his chest. “Maidenhead, did you say?” He asked. “Well, I’ve asked Lord Bagel several times for permission to have the place burned down, but he still feels that’s a bit risky.”
“Lord Bagel is a wise man.” Helmsman firmly declared.
“Undoubtedly.” Rains affirmed.
“Gentlemen,” Dirk Hooper called out, eyeing everyone once, “to Lord Bagel!”
“Hear, hear!” Everyone cried, banging on the table or punching the air, as was his wont.
One of these executives, Todd Pigger, although banging the table and cheering the surviving Wilkes brother along with his peers, outwardly agreeing to whatever position had supposedly been taken, inwardly decided to look into this Maidenhead business to see if there was something he could do, something that might bring greater glory to Wilkes Brothers and himself.
“What do you know about Maidenhead Bottlebrush Works?” He asked his secretary, Rosalyn.
“The company has wanted their property for years.” The lean, buxom redhead replied. “They made several generous offers, but the old man that owns it won’t sell. Every so often it gets brought up again, but it’s always forgotten again.”
“What’s the old man’s name?” Pigger asked.
“Vic Gaucho.”

The Ass of the Rat

“They tell me you’ve done work for the company before.” Todd Pigger addressed the rangy, haggard fellow on the other side of the desk.
“This and that. Always under contract.” The man’s voice was heavy with the accent of the Southerners, the poverty-stricken, rural people to the south of Squarto. Despite the accent, which Pigger always associated with rank stupidity, Pigger could tell that this man was no fool. There were both menace and resolution in his eyes.
“There’s a place of business around the corner,” Pigger pointed to his left, “Maidenhead Bottlebrush Works…”
“I know it.” The other man said softly, nodding.
“The company wants their land. Now,” Pigger spread his hands, “We’re willing to pay for it, of course, but it seems the old man that runs the place doesn’t want to sell. If…” He paused for effect, feeling melodramatic, “He were to die, perhaps his family might feel differently.”
“They won’t.”
“How’s that?” Pigger snapped, as if someone had contested the fact that the sky is up.
“I know the family. The old man’s two sons are just as determined to keep the business. I have a feeling that goes for the rest of them.”
“I don’t care if they keep the business; it’s the land we want. We’ll pay them more than enough to move their little shop elsewhere.”
“This is a family pride thing. They mean to hold on to that land.” The man seemed certain about this. Pigger looked into his eyes. He rubbed his chin.
“Well, then. What if they all were to die?” He asked.
“That would put things on a different footing.”
Pigger sighed.
“I don’t want to have to do that yet.” He said.
“I’m willing.” The rangy man assured him in a calm voice.
Pigger glanced at him. “Well, so am I, if it comes to that. But it hasn’t yet.” He wanted it known who was in charge. “I want to try something else first. Do you think you can burn the place down?”
“I know I can.” Replied the man, and, receiving Pigger’s nod, he rose from his chair and left.

Snicker

Vic Gaucho had two sons, Bernie and Herbie. They, in turn, had two children each. Bernie had a son aged eleven and a daughter aged fourteen. Herbie had two daughters, aged nine and twelve. The old man’s wife had died several years before. With her passing, Gaucho’s resistance to his sons’ ideas for modernizing the business gave way. He stayed on, running things as he always had, turning out bottlebrushes in the traditional manner, but left the new enterprises to Bernie and Herbie. That he did so was an important part of their plans, for what they were doing was secret. Of course, Vic Gaucho knew what they were up to, even if he didn’t understand it.
He came into the works on Friday as usual, pleased to see that Ralph and Ned, the two college boys who ran the bristle assembly, were more than usually diligent. As he watched them scurrying about, one of them spied him and called out, “Mr. Gaucho, Herbie wants to see you in the back.”
Gaucho nodded and headed towards the off-limits work area everyone referred to as “the back.”
“Dad!” Bernie Gaucho cried as his father passed through the tall, heavy curtains that ringed the work area.
“Bernie.” The elder Gaucho returned the greeting. “You boys are here early.”
“Today’s the day, Dad.” Bernie wiped his hands on his apron. “Let me call Herbie. Herbie!”
The younger of the two brothers appeared at the top of the scaffolding that surrounded their secret project. He waved. “Hi, Dad!”
“Good morning.” Gaucho replied, staring up at the colossal apparatus.
“Herbie, come on down and let’s start the run-through.” Bernie called.
“OK.” Herbie climbed out of the top of the assemblage of machinery and began to descend the scaffolding.
“So today’s the day, eh?” Vic Gaucho asked. “Six months of work. Are you sure you’re ready?”
“I’m positive, Dad.” Bernie didn’t want any more of his father’s doubts, not at this stage. Hadn’t he proved himself with the preliminary tests? Anyway, it didn’t matter. This was it. When Herbie reached the floor, Bernie unveiled the remote control panel.

Pink Beard

Germaine reckoned, not without some justification, that were the arms of the figure she was sculpting raised aloft, it might be mistakenly judged to be in a state of religious devotion. She solved this problem by placing a suckling pig, complete with apple in its mouth, in the figure’s hands.
“They still might mistake it for some kind of religious posture,” Germaine explained to Pamela, her sister-in-law, “As if the pigling is an offering of some kind.”
“Piglet.” Pamela corrected.
“What did I say?”
“Pigling.”
“I like the sound of pigling. It’s cute.”
“And you’re painting this one.” Pamela played along with the subject of the conversation, though she was not all that interested. She was just waiting until it was her return to talk about her latest project.
“Yes. He’s going to have a mighty pink beard.” Germaine glanced at the statue. She and Pamela sat in the wood-floored den, the far side of which served as her studio.
“I’ve just started a new novel.” Pamela announced, seizing her chance.
“Have you? How many does that make for the year?”
“If I finish it before the year’s up it’ll be four for the year, but I’m not going to rush this one. I want this one to be perfect.”
“Good luck.” Thought Germaine. She had never been able to finish one of Pamela’s bizarre, self-published books. Pamela wrote under the pen name of Henry Sideboard. Her works included such titles as Serving Suggestions, Comatose Condor Regrets, and The Angrier of the Twins. Germaine smiled encouragingly and took another sip of her tea. She was perceptive enough to realize that Pamela (and many other people) probably felt similarly about her own art.
“The new one is called Roger the Ugly.” Pamela continued, unable to keep this information to herself. She thought it rather a clever title, especially since (so far) there was no character named Roger in the book.
“Maybe that’s what I’ll title this piece.” Germaine joked, nodding at the statue. She instantly regretted her flippancy. Pamela’s eyes widened.
“I could use it for the cover art on the book!” She gasped.

Pasteboard Totem

Rather than set out immediately on his mission, Nolan Soker, the man charged by Todd Pigger with the task of burning down Maidenhead Bottlebrush Works, returned to his small camper in the Fetlock Woods and made ritual obeisance to the image of his god, Gurkes. This image, a pasteboard construction housed in the disused bathroom in the camper, was surrounded by as many of its traditional complements as Soker had been able to procure. The photograph of Jennifer Jones, for example, had thus far eluded Soker, so he had kidnapped a woman from the Steerlunger’s Quarter, dressed her in a wig and forties style clothing, and taken her picture. This picture was now glued in place between the packet of ketchup from Chicken Chief and the card bearing the right thumbprint of a bald man.
Soker, who had been raised a Southern Baptist, but had converted to the worship of Gurkes during a lengthy prison sentence, chanted the prayer of supplication to his homemade idol before detailing his plans for committing arson and, hopefully, murder. He gathered a handful of confetti made from a year-old newspaper and a pair of women’s underpants (his kidnap victim had supplied the latter) and tossed it in the air to complete the ceremony.
As he exited the bathroom feeling a curious mixture of satisfaction and anticipation, a sharply executed double rap came at the door to the camper. Soker glanced about at the weapons and extremist literature on display, too much to be hidden with a quick flourish, and cautiously approached the door. A peep through the window showed him the policemen outside.
“What do you want?” He shouted.
“We want to talk to you.” Came the answer.
“Go ahead and talk.”
“We’d like you to open the door.”
“I don’t have to open the door for anybody.” Soker knew his rights. He had made a thorough study of the limits of government authority.
“Are you Nolan Soker?” The policeman asked.
Soker hesitated.
“What if I am?”
“Then you’re wanted for questioning in connection with the kidnapping and murder of Carol Eveningtide.”

Silo

One of the properties that Wilkes Brothers had acquired over the years was an old farm. In buying almost all of the land adjacent to their corporate campus, the company had acted more out of a policy of preparedness than on any specific plan. Thus most of the acquired properties were left fallow. So it was with the old farm. On the northwestern corner of this farm stood a silo, surrounded by the unchecked weeds that covered the rest of the property.
A closer inspection of these weeds, however, would reveal a narrow path running through them from the nearby highway to the silo. This path had been beaten by feet belonging to Dr. Curtis Frank and his assistants Dave and Carlo. Frank worked for Wilkes Brothers in the Theoretical Interface Department, a department created especially for Frank to pursue his own line of research.
Dave and Carlo had parked the company car in the little clearing amid the thicket of mimosa and Russian olive by the side of the highway and were walking up the path to the silo. As they walked they discussed Dave’s relationship with Bridget, his girlfriend.
“I hope to god she’s not pregnant.” Dave was emphatic.
“Well, if she is, you just get it taken care of.” Carlo reasoned.
“What if she doesn’t want to?”
“She’s not stupid, Dave. She knows having a baby right now will not only ruin her life, but yours.”
“I need to make plans to leave the zone.”
“Don’t talk crazy.” Carlo remonstrated, unlocking the chain on the gate that allowed passage through the fence around the farm.
“Crazily.” Dave mentally corrected Carlo’s grammar.
“There’s nothing outside the zone for a guy like you.”
Dave admitted to himself that this was probably true. Still, he longed to see for himself, pregnancy or not. He realized that he was just grabbing at an excuse to leave the zone as he had for nearly ten years now.
“Nothing but monsters.” Carlo muttered.
“Well, we have those right here.” Dave replied, pointing at the silo. He stopped, as did his colleague. The door at the base of the silo was open.
“It’s escaped.” Carlo jumped to the same conclusion that Dave had.



Tape

The tape had been labeled “Luau on Chester’s Planet” and consisted of ninety minutes of the densest of music concrete. Its arrival at The Chicken Chief Disinformation Apostle’s secret headquarters had caused no little confusion.
“Whoever made this doesn’t have access to modern sound cube technology.” One of the masked apostles posited after yet another sampling of the tape.
“Not necessarily.” Apostle Jonas argued. “The tape could have been made years ago.”
“But what about the reference to Governor Grabdel?” Someone else in the room, as yet unidentified, reminded them all.
“Prophetic, perhaps?” Apostle Jamrag offered, glancing at his friend Jonas.
“Come on!” Several apostles groaned.
“There’s another possibility.” The first apostle, whose name was a secret even to the others, put a finger behind his mask to scratch his nose. “The person, or persons, may have opted to use an obsolete technology to make an aesthetic or political statement.”
“That’s crazy. What kind of person would voluntarily use primitive tape?”
Apostle Digby wandered away from the discussion. He walked in his fuzzy chicken’s feet shoes until he came to the Shrine of the Haunted Beak. A gilded statue of a fully liberated and puissant Chicken Chief occupied the niche there. He sighed, disheartened at the ease with which his brother apostles were distracted from their appointed task. Sometimes he felt as if he were the only one who truly felt the sufferings of their enslaved lord. After a few minutes of quiet reflection, he was joined by Apostle Gary, a normally kindly man whose wrath, once kindled (for example in a particularly calamitous protest outside of a Chicken Chief restaurant), could be terrible to behold.
“Where do you think this ‘Chester’s Planet’ is?” Gary asked Digby.
“I don’t know and frankly I don’t care.” Digby huffed.
“Maybe you should.” Gary mused solemnly.
Digby was impressed by Gary’s seriousness. “Why?” He asked.
“Perhaps Chester’s Planet is where our lord is imprisoned.” Gary theorized.
Digby’s mouth fell open. “You don’t mean it?” He gasped.
“We’ve searched our own planet fairly thoroughly.” Gary reminded him.

Glitter

Dodge Wittles was meticulous in the application of glitter to his face.
“This will help me fit in with the young people.” He thought with an eagerness he had not experienced in years. “Not since I started taking tennis lessons.” he realized with the breathlessness that came to him sometimes when the lost expanse of time loomed before him with unusual clarity. “Now for the jacket.” Wittles said to himself as he approached the chair over which the jacket lay draped.
It was white vinyl, covered with red rhinestones. He hadn’t been able to afford the matching pants, so had to make do with a pair of black chinos. As he stood before the full-length mirror he asked himself, “Now, what shoes are you going to wear with that?”
“It’ll have to be black shoes.” He answered. Part of him wondered, however, if the young people would find white shoes a startlingly sexy look. It was too bad the only white shoes he had were a pair of canvas boat shoes. Totally inappropriate. He went with the black shoes he had bought to wear to his uncle’s funeral the year before.
After hanging a rather smart-looking medallion on a thin gold chain around his neck he was ready to head out the door. The young people were waiting.
The Bronzed Toilet was, according to the information Wittles had been given, the hippest (how he gloried in using that word!) bar in the relatively small area that comprised downtown Squarto. He nodded manfully at the dead-eyed bruiser collecting the cover charge at the door.
“Five dollars.” Came the bored request. Wittles could tell by the man’s accent that he came from one of the northern zones, perhaps even Zone 1. Wittles paid and started to walk inside. He turned back and asked, “Don’t you want to see my ID?”
“Nah, it’s alright.”
This was a bad sign. Obviously, Wittles was old enough to drink, but did the man suspect just how old he was? He made for the darkness of the interior where he might pass for a relative child.
“What kind of music is this?” He asked a sufficiently nerdy-looking fellow after enduring fifteen minutes of the most ridiculously vapid garbage he had ever heard.
“This is a dance remix of some old song.” The nerd replied. “Something by Avril Lavigne.”

Chap

Among the many elixirs prepared for the chap by the lady in the airman’s costume was one that resembled, both in appearance and texture, the secret rocket fuel developed by Wilkes Brothers for the Anti-Rocket Commission.
“In taste, however,” The chap mused, smacking his lips, “It reminds me more of the pinkest of pink lemonade.”
“How astute you are!” The lady cried. “Pink is one of the major ingredients.”
“Really?” The chap questioned, pleasantly surprised that he had guessed correctly. “What else is in it?”
“Oh, I can’t tell you that.”
As the chap drove back to the memorial compound that evening he grew angrier by the quarter mile over the lady’s refusal to reveal the remainder of the ingredients.
“Do you think your irrational anger may have something to do with the elixir you drank?” The chap’s driving companion, an inflatable doughnut with the legs and arms of a typical Frenchman, asked him solicitously.
“Irrational, is it?” The chap snarled, stabbing at the doughnut with the tire gauge, but not actually coming within an inch of the latter’s vinyl hide. Together they laughed the last quarter mile until the car entered the compound.
“All laughter must cease.” Bruno informed them as they passed by his folding chair. “The Bambatter paid us a visit while you were out.”
“How many dead?” The chap asked as he climbed out of the cramped cabin of the rocket sled.
“None, thank Gurkes,” Bruno handed the chap a sausage to comfort him. “But the infirmary was destroyed.”
“Dammit!” The chap cursed through a mouthful of sausage. “My grandfather built that infirmary!”
“I know it.” Bruno nodded. He approved of the chap’s sentiments. They befitted one of such a noble lineage. “I was born there.”
“Were you really?” The chap wiped his mouth on a rag provided by one of the inflatable goslings standing nearby. “I didn’t know that.”
As they two men walked to the main house discussing the chap’s unprecedented hospital birth, the doughnut fell into a deep sleep.

Cereal Box

The front of the cereal box was dominated by a picture of a bowl filled with the cereal purportedly inside. The monstrous face of a child peered down upon it, delight evident in its eyes and hungry mouth as it took in the bizarre shapes of the individual cereal pieces. These shapes were based on the eight sacred objects of the Kangarooster religion; the various colors in which they appeared were merely to appeal to the happily simplistic mind of a child. The actual sacred objects were reportedly black and silver. The cereal’s name, Talisman Tufts, was printed in red across the upper fifth of the front, obscuring the child’s forehead.
“This is probably a good thing,” Nurseper commented, “For, knowing the model as I do, his forehead was probably covered in acne.”
“Let’s continue to the back of the box.” Hagerson urged.
The back of the box, as discussed in the secret meeting, contained the first installment of Prance Sabot’s new novel, Xeno-Crony, a Story of Strangers and Friends.
“I disapproved of the parenthetical title.” Sabot explained to his guest as the latter shook a handful of Talisman Tufts into a bowl. “Do you want milk?” Sabot asked her.
“No, I’m dairy free.” She answered, picking up a piece of the cereal. Her name was Carmen Frenchest. “How many installments will it take to print the whole novel?” She asked as she crunched on the lightly sweetened breakfast food.
“If they actually complete the project,” Sabot looked dubious indeed at this, “It will take forty different boxes of cereal.”
“Forty!” Carmen put another piece of cereal in her mouth. “A person would have to be pretty devoted to make it all the way through.”
Sabot wondered whether she meant devoted to the cereal or his novel.
“Well, what do you think of it?” He nodded at the bowl, though apparently she thought he meant the first installment.
“I can’t tell yet. I’ll have to see what happens next.” She smiled. Her smile was like a mug of cold milk.
“It is doubtful she will finish reading his book.” Nurseper sneered.
“A woman like that should be reserved for executives only.” Hagerson growled.

Carve

I doubt I’ll get much drawing done today. Orders have just come in for a statue of Bambatter, the creature escaped from the silo, to be prepared. According to the specifications of plan R16, under which the preparation of this statue is to be executed, the statue is to be carved from a single block of mesquite no more than fifteen cubic feet and no less than nine.
Yeeee-HAWWW, indeed.
I must obey these orders for they come from the random outlay of aesthetic directive cards, a set of tools invented by me long before I’d ever heard of Brian Eno’s own equivalent.
“Sure.” Toni the Sassy One sneers dismissively.
Bambatter, a conjunction of a rare bean vine and one or more rhinoceroses, is approximately twenty feet tall. Due to the special nature of the plant mind, he is constantly developing extra personalities as his own pods ripen. Unfortunately, these pods are doomed never to grow into monsters themselves as they do no fall into Dr. Frank’s unique soil mixture as they drop off Bambatter’s central vine.
“These details,” Mr. Norris (Don in disguise) began with the look of distaste on his leathery face, “Are they really necessary?”
“Of course.” The android wearing a Phil mask replied. “One can’t have a proper monster movie without showing the monster. I hate the school of thought that says that not showing the monster is somehow conducive to building the suspense.”
“Is this a movie? I was under the impression it was a book.” Lincoln Strassman, a minor character whose only purpose, aside from broaching the movie or book subject, is to transfer my wood shavings from the workshop to the furnace (and he’s not very good at even that), said with more confusion in his voice than even the most simple-minded reader has in his mind right now.
“Your impressions are shallow.” Snapped the Phildroid. “Get those wood shavings downstairs.”
“I think this is a load of shit.” Toni the Sassy One’s mouth was turned down.
“Nobody cares what you think.”
“It’s stupid.”
“Go file an EEO.”

Segment 2

The Moon Has Never Looked So Tasty

“Where do you think we should go?” Prance Sabot asked Dodge Wittles as the two hurriedly strapped themselves into their seats at the top of the ambulometor.
“I have no idea.” Wittles said breathlessly. With his face covered in glitter and his rhinestone jacket he looked like a visitor from deep space rock ‘n’ roll. Sabot engaged the mechanics with the easy-to-use controls. The ambulometor began to vibrate.
“This thing is built for space, you know.” Sabot hinted.
“OK.” Anything was alright with Wittles at this point.
“That’s where I’m going then.” Sabot looked questioningly at his friend.
“Whatever. Let’s do it.”
The scaffolding began to fall from around the ambulometor. The machine rose into the air as a circular hole in the roof opened above it.
“Prance,” Wittles sounded scared. “I don’t want to go too far out.”
“How about the moon?”
“Sounds good.” Everyone knew the moon wasn’t too far away.
Their voyage occupied less time than one would suspect, based on one’s lifetime of reading on the subject. The ambulometor, more a giant robot than a rocket, was able to take advantage of various footholds along the way that no previous craft could have made use of. Sabot and Wittles were just finishing a game of gin rummy when they came within sight of one of the large signs indicating that the moon was now called Chester’s Planet.
“That’s odd.” Wittles declared, scratching his head.
“Yes. I wonder which Chester they mean.”
“When did all this take place?” Wittles asked, gesturing at the colorful architecture below them.
“Looks like casinos, doesn’t it?” Sabot directed the ambulometor towards a large ‘X’ painted within a circle not far from the entrance to one of the gaudy buildings.
They were greeted by Mr. Purbrick, one of Chester’s top people. He smilingly offered them each a free drink from the tray slung around the neck of a beautiful girl. Sabot asked Purbrick who Chester was.
“Chester is Chester Davis, our founder.” Purbrick replied.

Loopcode’s Apartment

Loopcode, as free-range a chicken as ever declined the “thrill” of climbing a mountain, had his apartment in one of sixteen turrets adorning the David Tranquility Building. He introduced his nephew Cornell to the cleaning lady as she was leaving for the day and then showed him around the place.
“Don’t mind Brenda.” Loopcode instructed. “You do know how to treat servants, don’t you?”
“Just like everyday people?” Cornell guessed.
“Well, in essence.” Loopcode fluttered his eyelids. “You use your best manners. You don’t act like a tyrant from some fairy tale. Say please and thank you and so forth, but never let them become familiar with you. They aren’t your friends and they never will be. Now,” Loopcode drew Cornell by the sleeve towards the living room. “You’ll be staying in the guest room. You can go into my room to look for a book or something, but don’t sleep in my bed and don’t use my bathroom.”
“Oh, no.” Cornell agreed with a look of true horror.
“I want to thank you for doing this.” Loopcode told his nephew. “I can’t abide the thought of what might happen while I’m away.”
This sounded like more manners to Cornell. He was the one who should be thanking Loopcode for allowing him to stay in this expensively furnished, luxurious apartment. To Cornell, this was a rare treat. He didn’t dare let on to Loopcode that he felt this way, however. Further restrictions might be imposed as a kind of “payment.” He walked his uncle to the cab and returned to the apartment.
The first thing he did was go through Loopcode’s LPs.
“An anachronism,” Loopcode had admitted. “But all the more prestigious for being so.”
Cornell selected an album by the long-forgotten Prog rock band Halfling’s Gander and stretched out on the big leather sofa. He fell into a daydream in which he owned and lived in an apartment of equal luxury and taste, an apartment, in fact, the double of the one he was now house-sitting. In the daydream he invited his parents over for dinner.
“This is how you’re supposed to decorate.” He told them with bitterness and condescension in his voice like aspartame in children’s yogurt.

The Gavial Treats its Young to Soapsuds

“Children, children,” The gavial (a red one from Miami named Annie) called its young in from the yard, where they were playing Hose Down the Cowboy.
“Yes, Mommy?” The gavial’s children asked as they came into the kitchen.
“I have a treat for you three. Have you ever tried soapsuds?”
“Soapsuds? What’s that?”
“It’s masses of bubbles created by the interaction of soap and water.” Annie the gavial tried to teach her children a little science whenever she could. Math, too; for instance, after she had placed the saucers piled high with soapsuds before the children, she asked them, “Now, would you say that each of these saucers contain more or less than a hundred individual bubbles?”
“More!” Harland declared instantly.
“More!” Rebecca followed her older brother’s lead.
“I don’t see any bubbles!” Cried Manfred. He looked as if tears were about to spring from his eyes.
“Look closely.” Annie instructed. She pointed the tiny bubbles out. Manfred leaned close to the saucer.
“They’re tiny!” He shouted.
“I told you.”
“How do you expect us to count such tiny bubbles?”
“I’m not. You’ve got to learn to estimate. Obviously, that’s more than a hundred bubbles.”
“It’s more than a thousand!” Harland cried with wonder.
“Yes, probably so. But they’re quickly popping and all you’ll be left with is a plate full of soapy water, so hurry up and eat them.”
In the midst of wolfing down their treat the children looked up at their mother.
“Aren’t you going to have any?” They asked.
“No, I had a honey bun earlier.” Annie replied.
“Ooh, gross!” They scowled. Adults ate such disgusting things.
As they were finishing the last soapy mouthfuls, their father returned home. He looked bedraggled and lachrymose.
“The factory burned down.” He announced.



Trickfish

“How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense?” One of the peasants asked. He wore a bright red cap on his head that gave a festive accent to his otherwise drab appearance.
“Hold your horses, red cap.” I begged, offering the man one of my friendliest, most natural smiles.
“Smiles I have in abundance, magician, but of horses I have none. We are a poor people, used to waiting for the good things that never come, but we won’t wait forever for you to reveal your surprise.”
“Speak for yourself, Hudson.” An older woman dressed in a black trash bag reprimanded the man. “Go ahead, Mr. Magician.” She turned a smiled on me nearly the equal of mine in friendliness, though she was missing a number of teeth.
“Thank you, madam.” I said. “Now, how many of you know what this is?” I held up what appeared to be an ordinary duck egg. Most of the crowd held up their hands. Some folded their arms with open hostility. One man licked his lips.
“Ordinarily,” I continued, “You would expect a bird of some kind to emerge from this egg, now wouldn’t you?” I nodded heavily, prompting them to play along. “However, if I drop the egg into this transparent bucket of water and say the magic words, something unexpected may happen.” My eyes were wide, inviting them to feel the excitement. I held the egg over the bucket and dropped it, saying the magic words taught to me by Sloopy Snorkel, one of the last of the old-time sorcerers.
“Pocahontas Tornada!”
The egg broke on the bottom of the bucket and from it burst the trickfish, a semi-legendary creature related to the hellhound. Quickly expanding to four times in size, it put its canine snout above the surface of the water and drew itself up by its front fins.
“Hello, everybody!” It saluted in a voice youthful, yet full of wisdom.
“The demon speaks!” The peasant in the red cap cried, drawing back.
“I like that hat.” The trickfish tried to establish a rapport with the man, but his fellow villagers surrounded him, warning him that the demon would seize his hat as a hostage to ransom for his soul.

Toodelooger

Learning to count came easily for Karen and Jeff, once the Toodelooger entered their lives. With his big, funny face and unwavering dedication to the job, the Toodelooger made everything so fun.
“I think he’s a giant cat.” Jeff speculated during his and Karen’s trip to Ireland.
“But he doesn’t have any whiskers.” Objected Karen. She and Jeff were sitting in a colorful old pub drinking stout and trying to stay out of the argument two tables over that would rapidly evolve into a brawl if American foreign policy didn’t change.
In the meantime, the Toodelooger, waiting for his two pupils to return, removed his head and revealed himself to be actor Heath Farnsworth. He gestured to a nearby servant and mimed the act of drinking. The servant brought him a plastic bottle of mineral water.
“Where’s Juan?” Farnsworth asked, referring to the director of the TV program on which he, Jeff, and Karen appeared.
“I don’t know, Mr. Farnsworth.”
“Well, could you find out?” Farnsworth demanded sarcastically. “I’m hot and I still have questions.”
“Yes sir.” The servant dashed away, going so far in his search that he even poked his head into the colorful old pub in time to rescue Karen and Jeff from almost certain confrontation.
“Thanks, Milton.” Jeff deigned to say.
“You’re welcome, Mr. Keith. By the way, have you seen Mr. Gomez?”
“No, I haven’t.” Jeff answered and wandered off with Karen to explore the quaint ruins of a castle by the sea.
By the time the servant returned to Farnsworth’s dressing room the director and the actor were in a deep discussion, so he sneaked away to smoke a joint.
“I don’t understand something, Juan.” Farnsworth told the old Spaniard.
“What’s that, Heath?”
“If all of our programming is now going out over the web and being seen on computers, why are the shows still referred to as TV shows? Shouldn’t they be called computer shows?”
“I don’t have any answers for you, Heath.” Gomez confessed.

Reptilian Façade

The front of the building was designed to look like a great, yawning iguana.
“The iguana yawns because it has seen the world pass by before.” The old taco master explained to the tourists, three of whom were our old friends Ron, Paul, and Dudex. Like their fellows in the group, they wore the little white bucket hats embroidered with their names and the vests with the name of their ship printed clearly on the back, but, unlike the rest of the simple-minded slobs from the Slutty Cork, our friends carried the Word of God in their hearts.
“A pagan belief.” Dudex whispered to Ron. Ron nodded in response. Paul, still afflicted with the curse the devil-woman put on him in episode sixteen, found it hard to pay attention. It was all he could do to stand erect in the noonday sun. There would be no snide whispering to him today. If he could only last until they were inside the building.
“Excuse me,” A stout man with legs hairless from middle age spoke up. “But isn’t this building the same building that the Cult of Monkey Rambo used for their headquarters during the uprising?”
Dudex tugged on the sleeve of Ron’s bright red shirt as Ron stiffened at the man’s question. Paul clenched his teeth. Why was this old fool delaying their entrance?
“You have sharp eyes, American tourist man.” The old taco master replied. “Yes, this is the same building. I see that the reptilian façade has not fooled you.”
The stout man turned smugly to his wife standing beside him. She smiled by frowning and swatted him with the information booklet the ship had provided. Her pride was as evident on her face as the years she had spent working the rich, black soil of Vermont.
“Moving right along…” Dudex whispered to Ron and Paul staggered towards the building’s entrance.
“You are in a hurry?” The old taco master joked as Paul passed him. The master, filling in for the regular tour guide while the latter was getting married, beckoned the group forward. They followed Paul into the dim and dusty interior of the building.
“Where is the sacred altar of Monkey Rambo?” Paul croaked, glancing about desperately, eager to restore his enfeebled spiritual energies.

Mesotudic Flute Lude

I was scrounging for change one spring evening in the early 1960’s when a vision of reassuring completeness came to me like a lost opal. My hunger for pastries vanished with the arrival of this understanding and I ceased my scrounging. I no longer cared whether I had written a run-on sentence or not. Everything made sense in my life and fitted into an overall plan. More importantly, I fitted into an overall plan. I strolled out of the Jazzworks skinny tie plant and got into my Studebaker.
“Damn sharp car.” I commented, running my hand over the dash, a little disconcerted to note that the pain had not completely left my wrist.
“Did you get your pastry?” Goose Rampant, sitting in the passenger seat, asked.
“No.” I started the motor. It responded like a man eating a sausage biscuit.
“Couldn’t find enough change?” Goose Rampant, perhaps wanting to know that the time he spent waiting for me in the car had not been wasted, asked.
“No. That’s not it.” I headed the car, not towards the airport as we had discussed earlier, but back towards the site of the dimensional plane’s appearance.
“Where are you going?” My passenger sounded alarmed.
“To face down my darkest fears.”
“You’re crazy. Everyone in the city has fled.”
“Yeah. Too bad I won’t have much of an audience.” I grinned at my joke, glanced into the mirror to admire my still-youthful smile.
“You can just let me out here.” Goose Rampant, always the humorous sidekick, gestured at a gas station on the right, blasted by a beam from the dimensional plane’s beam weapon. Blackened bodies lay amid the twisted wreckage of Studebakers.
“No time for that now.” I let him know. “You mind if I listen to some music?” I put in one of various Urge Overkill CDs into the car’s sterile anachronism and pushed the automobile to greater speed. Within minutes we passed by the remains of the once-mighty bank and drove within sight of the immense, purple, interstellar artifact sitting in the middle of the rubble like a cantaloupe in an overgrown field. I stopped the car as close as I dared.
“I don’t want to get a flat tire.” I explained.
“Your caution is commendable.” Old Goose mumbled.

Hawk Stole Cleaner

It is Yoko Ono’s eightieth birthday. As she celebrates with a cigarette fitted into a nineteenth century ivory holder, a crowd gathers in the streets outside. It is like when Pablo Picasso and Coco Chanel hid in their apartments in Paris, while the rest of the city was at war.
I have come from Baltimore in a special bicycle aircraft to avoid the scrutiny of the secret police. America has them, you know. They look just like any other lawyers, but they dress in t-shirts that say “God Bless America” and bear pictures of tractors. In the pocket of my tunic are the secret documents that will exonerate Mr. Eliot, Ono’s friend and companion of the last fifty years. I had intended to surprise them, landing on the roof and sneaking into the penthouse through a skylight, but my cough, which has gotten no better over the course of the previous year, betrays me.
“Ronson,” Yoko instructs one of her servants, “Let Mr. Cleaner in.” The big Ukrainian opens one of the French doors on the patio and I step in.
“Happy birthday!” I say cheerfully. I know I have a funny face. I know that now after many years of confusion. I know the reaction I will get and why.
Yoko, however, does not respond as expected. The apartment stinks of smoke.
“Thank you.” She says flatly. “Did you bring the documents?”
“Got them right here.” I pat my pocket. “Now, how about a birthday kiss?” I ask, moving forward, hoping she will say no. Her cheek, however, is offered and it suffices.
“Give them to me.” Yoko commands. I hand over the sealed envelope. Her bony fingers, tipped with long, dragon lady nails, rip at the envelope while I saunter over to Mr. Eliot. He is sitting in his special chair, the one that keeps him upright and oxygenated.
“Looking good.” I say to him, going so far as to jostle him slightly. I glance out the window behind his waxen head. “Not looking so good out there, though.” In the crowd are many homemade signs. The only one I can read from this great height says, “GIVE US THE TRAITOR!”
“My birthday gift to the world:” Yoko says in a decisive voice. “The truth!”
She rises and walks to the balcony, papers in hand. What will happen when she stands before the crowd I can only speculate upon.

Grunt Amigo’s Grunt Signal

The first car I ever bought was a 1978 Grunt Amigo. This saucy compact, imported from the People’s Collective of Rascalongo, was exactly the car I needed. It was inexpensive, good on gas, and looked fairly sharp, considering how ultimately dowdy it was. I liked the fact that it was a small car, too. I am, as you must have deduced by now, a rather large man. I always wanted to be a cute little thing, not some hulking, big-nosed lump. The small size of the Grunt Amigo gave me a good feeling, an illusion, if you like, that I was a compact man speeding through life unhampered by obstacles, unhindered by extraneous baggage. The contents of my car were all I needed.
This illusion evaporated upon my driving into the land of Nong, home to the so-called “white pygmies.”
“Please step out of the car.” The border guard instructed. I obliged, though I could easily have kicked his uniformed ass up and down his nation’s tidy, well-tended fields. “Are you bringing any contraband into Nong?”
“No. I don’t know. What constitutes contraband?”
“Drugs, either illegal or legal without a prescription; firearms; non-native plants or animals; and/or any literature or other media pertaining to the philosophy known as ‘Loath Procurement.’”
“No. Nothing.” I answered, and honestly at that. As I had not yet formulated the philosophy of Procurement, much less its reluctantly proselytizing cousin Loath Procurement, it was quite impossible that I should have anything with me relating to it.
“Enjoy your visit.” The little man, whose entire costume could have been made from a single cotton ball, saluted smartly and waved me forward.
Of course, the great mystery to me now is how the people of Nong knew about my personal aesthetic code and belief system nearly fifteen years before I had even formally adopted it. Special properties were said to be built into the Grunt Amigo, but I have dismissed such a theory. I’ll tell you why: after I had grown sick of the car and moved on to something a little flashier, I sold it to my cousin Rafe. He disappeared with the car into the mountains to the north and was soon forgotten. About a year later, however, I found out that he had killed himself. His body was found only a yard or two from my old car.

Nong

Sandwiched between the larger kingdoms of Spruce and Water Loafer is the tiny nation of Nong. Home to a race of so-called “white pygmies,” Nong has long been a source of mystery to the sophisticates of the American parade. For years little more than speculation has circulated through the tastemakers’ salons and basement odas concerning this fabled land that Chesterton once called “the birthplace of the sandal.” Now I, in conjunction with the National Geographic Society, bring you the first detailed portrait of Nong, the land of the short people.
I spurned the new luxury hotel erected next door to the former palace of the Nong’s deposed monarchy in favor of staying with a friend of my photographer. The old prospector, as he is known, Yam Cucumbrage, lives in an olive oil can on the outskirts of Tamo, the capital city. As only my hand would fit under the can, the rest of my body was covered with a black, plastic tarp.
“Nuken no nuken.” Cucumbrage said to me with his palms pressed together.
“He wishes you a good night’s sleep.” Lincoln Strassman, my photographer, translated.
“Where are you going to sleep?” I asked Strassman.
“I’m staying at the hotel.” That wily traveler answered, climbing into the taxi, his camera case and lens caps swinging back and forth.
“Never mind,” I whispered to Bunflop, my sleeping companion, “We’ll assuage some of our first world guilt.” Nestling the stuffed rabbit close to my neck, I soon drifted away to yet another fanciful realm. In the morning, Cucumbrage explained my dream. His son Slap, a ceremonial dancer in the city, translated his father’s words.
“You are burdened with too much money.” Slap spoke for his father as he sat on my toothbrush while the older man squatted before the fire, chewing his haberdashery. “This McDonald’s you dream of: it is a symbol of Baryos, a powerful demon. You must appease this demon with a gift of money.”
“Whom should I give the money to?” I asked, shivering as the first symptoms of fungal cancer wracked my colossal frame.
“My father will take the money to the temple for you.”
The people of Nong overthrew their king nearly fifty years ago. Since then they have been governed by a parliamentary system. Their chief crop is flaxseed. The national pastime is collecting Formica samples.

Whirlwind Remorse

Some will say his remorse was over his failure to sleep with Anjelica Huston. Those people are wrong, however much they may point to his repeated statements on the subject (all facetious, I assure you) or the often-quoted entry from his diary, “my greatest regret is that I will never sleep with Anjelica Huston.” All of this “evidence” has been misconstrued. I knew the man for over forty years. If anyone can tell you of his secret remorse it is I.
Theron Badcock’s great remorse was not one of omission (as the theologians say), but of commission. In the early spring of 1959 my old friend, who, if he was known for anything besides his enduring contribution to the American songbook, it was his love of the ladies, wrote and recorded a song denouncing Katherine Hepburn.
“Even then I saw through her.” He confessed to me on one of the two occasions on which we discussed his black deed. “I could tell she was nothing more than a New England patrician redhead with a neck like a turkey, not some great sex symbol.” He made a scoffing sound, as I recall, and slopped a measure of cheap red wine down his blasphemous throat.
“But what of her great acting skills?” I asked, sure that he would at least affirm public opinion on that score.
“Great acting skills?” He barked. His nostrils flared with the most merciless of sneers I have ever seen. “I’ve seen Brigitte Bardot deliver lines with more passion and subtlety than that… Yankee ever will.” The man was drunk. He could be excused on those grounds alone. He died of drink in the end, absolving him in a way. Still, there was the matter of the song itself.
“Would you like to hear it?” Badcock asked, turning to his banjo like the executioner taking up his axe.
“No!” I shouted. “Of course not!”
He smiled. “It’s a catchy little tune.” He plucked a chord with that astoundingly unique method he had developed. “Puts ‘Jailhouse Rock’ to shame.” I stood up from the poolside table, declaring that I had no intention of listening to such mockery. I left.
On the other occasion that we discussed Badcock’s peculiar feelings we limited ourselves to a display of pedantry that would do Kevin Costner proud, but I never did hear the song. And that is my great regret.

Talcum Candy

No description that I could set down here can fully express the taste of Dr. Flipflap’s celebrated talcum candy, so I won’t bother. The reason for this is that I have had my memories of this product erased by order of the Tall Council. Instead, I will tell you as much as I can in the space allotted about Mrs. Jones, who I happen to know was, until her death, a great consumer of talcum candy.
Mrs. Jones lived in a tiny house on the otherwise empty stretch of road between Nukentown and Slaggemville. Many times on my way to and from work at the Stupid Hat factory I saw Mrs. Jones sitting on the front steps of her house. I often wondered if there was anything worth stealing in there. Since it was obvious that she lived alone (for how could more than one person possibly reside in that hot dog stand of a house?), and that the presence or absence of her little car was as loud an indicator of her own presence or absence as one could want, it should not have posed any great difficulty waiting for the right moment and breaking in.
However, as I rarely went by her house when I wasn’t either going to or coming from work and had no time to stop on either trip, the opportunity never came up. I contented myself with my fantasies, some of which I wrote down in more or less disguised form and published as the compendium of stories, Excellent Beans. I thought that was that, as they say in the circus.
One day in March of the year under consideration, however, as we were all feeling somewhat depressed over the recent assassination of Marco Polo, jr., I was introduced to Mrs. Jones by a mutual acquaintance. We were all milling about the coffin when Shortcake, the acquaintance, hailed me.
“Toadsgoboad!” He cried. “Got somebody here I want you to meet.” Beside him stood Mrs. Jones. I knew her immediately. For an old woman, she was surprisingly lively and there was a sexy twinkle in her eye that I had not suspected from my brief glimpses of her. “Toadsgoboad is a painter too, Mrs. Jones.” Shortcake informed the lady.
At this she turned a smile on me like a comfortable bed in a quiet room. Of course, we began a relationship, one at first tempered by our mutual grief, then fired by artistic passions and exchanges. Although our trysts usually took place at my studio in the woods, occasionally we met at her tiny house, where talcum candy wrappers, piled high on her bed, vied for space with my feet.

Priceless Mister

His cape dragged the ground as he approached the rude cairn of stones piled over the grave.
“Excellency,” Shabot whispered urgently, “Your beautiful cape!” He made to take up its hem.
“Leave it.” Priceless Mister commanded. “It is little enough that I sacrifice for Dr. Comacow.” He knelt on one knee before the stones, his eyes seeing what remembered scenes of adventures past none in his party could guess. They were all youngsters, recruited from the frontier; they knew nothing of the days of the great ones.
Hoofbeats down the hill interrupted Priceless Mister’s contemplation. He was on his feet in an instant, whirling about. “Archers!” He snapped. The pitiful half dozen boys, but recently trained in their duties, deployed themselves and their bows readily enough; still Priceless Mister rued the lack of seasoned men and the paucity of his current party.
With the other ten youths that made up the force Priceless Mister stood just behind the archers as the two mounted riders emerged from the trees below. They bore the symbol of the Slabber Corporation on their chests.
“Hold your fire.” Priceless Mister ordered. He stepped forward and met the two as they reached the summit.
“Are you Priceless Mister?” One asked.
“I am.”
“Word has reached the board of directors that a company called Wilkes Brothers poses a danger to us.” The rider handed the caped warrior a rolled-up document.
Priceless Mister unrolled the foot-long piece of cardstock and read its contents.
“Thank you.” He said to the first rider. He glanced at the second and nodded. The second rider held up his hand, staying Priceless Mister’s attention a moment.
“And I am to give you this.” He said, reaching into his little canvas bag and withdrawing a box of cereal. “Nevelson wants to know what you think.”
“‘Noodlease?’” Priceless Mister read the name aloud. “Ridiculous.”
“It was the last project Dr. Comacow worked on before he died.” The rider had been practicing how he would say this should it be necessary, knowing how much the dead scientist had meant to Priceless Mister.

Cadged From the Old Flamonde

The red notebook containing the poems that were later to make up Eerinson’s landmark collection, Burned Popcorn (Mercy Pleader’s Sticker Fun, as it was originally called), bore an interesting symbol on its back cover, a symbol that Fletcher Rammikin recognized as a doodle he had made in the ninth grade.
“And here I find it now, blown up to ten times its original size, a corporate logo of some sort.” Rammikin sipped the fake coffee Eerinson had brewed for him and made awestruck faces.
“It’s the symbol of the Coleridge Paper Company.” Eerinson replied, keeping his hand on the paralyzer unit just in case Rammikin should react in some violent, unpredictable manner to the ninth grade memory.
“But how did these people get a copy of my doodle?” Rammikin tried to puzzle it out.
“Observe the tell-tale hand gestures as he puzzles it out.” Dr. Comacow commented to his guest in the observation cubicle.
“I see. Very interesting.” Comacow’s guest, Priceless Mister, was ill at ease with this passive activity. He was no postal inspector, to sit in a hidden chamber and spy on people. He was a warrior! He nervously chewed at the chocolate hog that had been his welcoming present from Comacow. The two men had known each other since their induction into the Brotherhood of Fear.
“The question is,” Comacow pulled at the beard that hung from his chin like a catcher’s mitt dipped in iron filings, “Will he realize the importance of the name Coleridge?”
“Excuse me a moment.” Priceless Mister quietly rose from his chair and exited the observation cubicle through the shower curtain hung to mark its demarcation from the larger work floor of Slabber Corporation. Priceless Mister wandered down the company’s artificial, indoor lake. The water in Rammikin’s fake coffee had come from this very lake, drawn through neoprene filaments up to the surface of Chester’s Planet. The great warrior drew his cape around his oddly muscled torso. Did he feel a chill? Only the man himself could have answered such a question. It was not for him to write down his feelings in the form of poetry and win acclaim on the battlefield of literature as was Eerinson’s lot. Even at this moment Eerinson was contemplating a poem about an old friend losing his mind.

Moat of Amber

Regardless of the fact that my two previous attempts to write this piece ended in failure, I am determined that the story contained herein is the one that I will tell and not some other one about ghostly squirrels feasting on electricity or something. This piece concerns my efforts, while dressed as a giant slug of some repute as a cineaste, to get my puppet, Todd Pigger, to talk about his involvement in the deaths of the Gaucho family and his knowledge of the events contemporaneous to those deaths, such as the theft of the Gauchos’ secret project and the rampage of the monster known as Bambatter. We take up the action just as the ghostly squirrels have completed their feast.
“The power’s out!” I cried as the courtyard was plunged into darkness.
“That or some enormous spacecraft has blocked out the sun.” Todd Pigger cracked. The sarcasm was like chunky peanut butter.
As I fumbled to get a flashlight from one of the inside pockets of my slug costume, Pigger took the opportunity to leap off my hand and disappear into the darkness. I head a door open somewhere and welcoming voices. Once again I was surrounded by difficulties. With Pigger gone I was left with no recourse but to glide away to a comfortable movie house and wait for morning. I followed my phosphorescent trail of slime back the way I had come, through the offices of the Pepper Awareness Board and to the Night Dreamer Theater. The film playing was Moat of Amber, an early work of Claude Chabrol’s starring John Wayne and Basil Rathbone, although a young Aimee Mann can be glimpsed in one scene. She plays a hatcheck girl who sticks out her tongue at Tony Randall.
I had written an article on this film for Slug Slander denouncing its anti-Lesbian subtext, but now, forced to actually watch the thing for once, I was compelled (by my own slimy conscience) to admit that the Duke of Cargill was right in calling me “an ill-informed snob and a snail to boot.” In the scene where Lassie receives the flag at Miss Mercy’s funeral I got a little choked up. The man sitting two seats to my left heard my sob and offered me a rag.
“Thank you.” I said.
“Don’t mention it. By the way, I’m Stan Hagerson.”
“Well, for Heaven’s sake!” I snorted. “I’m Toadsgoboad.”
“You don’t look like it.” Hagerson let me know.

Segment 3

Token Destructo

The smallest of the dogs made his way down to the water’s edge and confronted the wild-eyed stork who hunted there for airplane glue among the weeds.
“Flockadler,” He addressed the stork, “Did you write that editorial in the paper yesterday?”
“Editorial?” The wild-eyed stork repeated. “What editorial?”
“You know the one. Everyone is talking about it. The one about turning our backs on the traditional veneration of Uncle Skyback.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about and no, I did not write any editorial.” Flockadler the wild-eyed stork trampled down a blotwort and examined its base. No airplane glue there.
“I think you’re lying.” The smallest of the dogs cocked his head and looked at Flockadler as if he were a cat wearing a crown. As a matter of fact, Flockadler was wearing a crown, but as it was made of blue cardboard and resembled no crown the dog had ever seen, any ramifications of such a comparison are best left to a writer like Calvino.
“Get the hell out of here!” Flockadler snapped.
“I’m a dog!” The small one objected, until the stork repeated his previous action, this time with his long beak instead of words. The dog scampered away and Flockadler returned to his unending, mostly fruitless search, but not for long. His mind turned over the dog’s words. He turned to look at Uncle Skyback, the large, lumpy mass with the semi-animate face rising from the middle of the water.
“‘Turn our backs on the traditional veneration, eh?” Flockadler said to himself. He flapped his wings once or twice and rose into the air.
Watching him fly closer and closer to the lumpy mass of Uncle Skyback were Mr. and Mrs. Comfrey, sitting in their cramped box atop the old totem pole.
“There goes that irreverent stork.” Mr. Comfrey rasped through the steel nubs in his gums.
“I bet you he wrote that thing in the paper yesterday.” Mrs. Comfrey lifted a cup of hot Tang to her lips. “It sounds just like the sort of thing he’d write.”
“Only he can’t write.” Mr. Comfrey countered. He watched as Uncle Skyback shot a load of scalding mud into the air, killing Flockadler. “Old Todd Pigger told me.”

Prunoto’s Devolvement

Neil Sedaka once famously said, “One’s ambitions should parallel one’s conditions.” Now, whether or not the advice of a mere pop singer should be taken as readily as one would accept a prescription from a trusted and well-educated physician is as silly a question to ask as whether or not Sedaka actually said the above quoted line. Certainly Clerk #1, who wondered to himself as he was walking home in the fog if Sedaka said the line to Barbara Walters in their 1979 interview or if it came from his 1981 autobiography, A Handful of Gravel, did not ask himself either of the two questions, but maybe that was because he wasn’t a cynic like you.
As Clerk #1 reached the end of the pavement he took a wrong step and fell into what scientists have termed a “fog fist.” The ancients, whose knowledge of such things in many ways exceeded that of we modern people, called this rare phenomenon “asking the Pleiades for a favor.” Who are we to judge their poetic worldview? Clerk #1, as he tumbled end over end into the steamy maw of the fog fist, would have found such imagery comforting, had he known of it. His, however, was but a miserable education, ill-preparing him for responding hopefully to sudden, desperate situations. Perhaps he could have taken heart in the Sedaka quote, but of course it had flown right out of his mind the moment that wrong step had landed, not on the dirt path that led to home and its waiting comforts, but in the still-unexplained workings of the fog fist.
When Clerk #1 had still not appeared an hour after his usual arrival time, the other occupants of his home, Plonky, the dwarf swordfish; and Crystalline, a would-be debutante of dubious pedigree, fell to debating possible predicaments their housemate and rent-provider might have encountered. A fog fist was the first of these to be discounted.
“Could have been a fog fist.” Plonky suggested through the aqua-speaker, which not only allowed him to be heard from his tank, but translated his fishy babble into English.
“Nonsense.” Crystalline was quick to dismiss the idea.
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Plonky agreed with a shrug of his stunted beak. “Today was payday, too, wasn’t it?” He added after a moment of reflection.
“Yeah.” Crystalline sighed.

Ask for the Windshield

The endless rearrangement of the sofas was beginning to pall. Although a generous selection of the works of William Carlos Williams and E. E. Cummings had been made available, still Winston was finding it hard to pass the time.
“I prefer Leo Sayer to tell the truth.” He commented to one of the sweating workmen. “It’s funny how the stuff that was dominant at the time is not what is discussed now. It’s all the fringe stuff that the mainstream and the cognoscenti looked down on that gets the attention.” He added, but the workman and his end of the sofa moved away into the darkened depths of the room. Winston shouted after them, “Kind of like how Academicism in painting was completely subsumed by Impressionism and its children!”
“They’re not listening.” A voice, quiet but sonorous, spoke behind Winston.
Winston turned and saw, not a boiler suit-wearing mute, but a short man in a green corduroy suit.
“That’s obvious.” Winston recovered from his surprise enough to reply.
“Mind if I sit down?” The man asked as he came around to the front of the sofa.
“Go ahead.”
“Thank you.” The short man pulled at the knees of his trousers as he sat. “My name’s Red.” He smiled and offered his hand.
“I’m Winston Bagee.” Winston laid emphasis on the second syllable.
“I’m here, somewhat belatedly to be sure, to inform you that there has been a mistake, to offer an apology for it, and to attempt a rectification of that mistake.” Red in the green suit stated in his rich, broadcaster’s voice.
“Really.” Winston looked about. Throughout the enormous, sofa-filled room, he could dimly perceive the workmen silently shifting sofas around.
“Yes. This is not the place for you. On behalf of the powers that be, I apologize. “Now,” The short man smiled. He had what amounted to a white man’s afro on his head, though it was completely natural and not a salon-built affectation. “If you like, I can take you away from here.”
“Sure.” Winston replied uncertainly with a nod. He stood as the stranger did and followed him to one of the thick pylons that held up the roof. Red did something to some levers on a box mounted on the pylon and Winston suddenly found himself lying in a hospital bed surrounded by fat women and flowers.

Gathering of the Moon Elk

The time had come for Chip to leave. He picked up the bag his grandmother had sewn together the night before from scraps of an old dress she had worn once.
“And I do mean once.” She emphasized.
“I’ve got the bare bones of my collection in here.” Chip thought. He wished that he could have taken the whole barn with him, but such packaging would have been impractical.
“Guess I’ll be heading out then.” He said manfully, ignoring his reflection in the inside of the storm door.
“Guess so.” Uncle Kip matched Chip’s manful-ness grit for grit.
With a sigh equal parts disgust and resignation (and that’s hard to achieve) Chip stepped outside and onto the automated ramp that carried him up into the smooth-skinned silver ship.
“Welcome, Señor Chup.” Master Emery greeted the earthman. “You have brought your material possessions? Good.” He led Chip through a maze of narrow, tightly coiled corridors to a sac-like room where a swelling nodule rose from the floor at their entrance.
“The phewozfut will serve as any piece of furniture you may need.” Master Emery explained. “It also contains the controls for your entertainment system. But then, you do not expect to be bored. Do you?”
“No, I guess boredom isn’t…” Chip began.
“Speak up, please, Señor Chup. I am not an adept at deciphering your mumblings.”
After the six-appendaged creature had left him, Chip sat hesitantly on the slowly moving red nodule. He looked about for a place to store his bag. An opening appeared in a pseudopod stretching out from the left of the phewozfut. Chip dropped the bag inside and sat quietly for some minutes, letting his thumbs bow mutely to each other.
“Um, entertainment system?” He finally asked uncertainly.
The room darkened and the “wall” opposite him seemed to open onto a milky realm of indeterminate depth populated by an array of red and blue circles.
“Too bad I only brought one book.” Chip mumbled.

Crypto-Salami Alabaster

Pixy had rooted around in the costume box until she found what she was looking for. With her teeth she pulled the old pink hat out from under the other items and danced over to Mr. Bob with it. Mr. Bob was deep in conversation with Ms. Rugmere. He absently reached out to take the hat from Pixy’s mouth and tie it on her head as Ms. Rugmere interrupted her own story about the mechanical trees on the edge of town to say, “She knows what she wants, doesn’t she?” She nodded at the little dog.
Mr. Bob glanced back at Pixy as the latter proudly scampered away, the old pink hat’s brim flapping up in the air.
“She’s something else.” Mr. Bob commented, wasting no creative energies on describing the eccentricities of his dog.
“Where’s she going?” Ms. Rugmere asked. She refilled her cup with the odd-tasting apple cinnamon tea.
“Oh, probably to see the mechanical trees.” Mr. Bob fantasized.
“You can’t mean that!”
“She heard us talking, probably got intrigued, and decided to investigate.” Mr. Bob smiled. He ran the frozen gelatin concession and was widely considered not only a kindly man, but a happy one.
“But I’ve just been saying how dangerous they are!” Ms. Rugmere protested.
“Well, Pixy doesn’t understand the fine distinctions of English, just the general import of it.” Mr. Bob explained away all inconsistencies.
Pixy did head in the direction of the stand of mechanical trees, but not with that goal in mind. She was led onto that path by the flight of a large butterfly that fluttered always out of her reach until Pixy suddenly found herself in the midst of the trees. The butterfly ascended among their strangely leafed branches, drawing the dog’s nose into the air.
The mechanical trees were performing their daily realignment maneuvers. They moved with precision, subtly influenced by each other. It was rare that so many of them were gathered together. Their programming mandated this peculiar interaction in such cases.
With a slight adjustment of interlaced branches, the trees killed the butterfly. As it spun earthward, Pixy’s hat no longer counted for anything.

Sensible Dervish Wallet

The kite-making community was aghast at the recent comments of Fisher, director of the neighboring coffee klatch. Special ambassador Travers, a Malden graduate, and therefore no fool, declined to make any public comment regarding Fisher’s earlier, provocative ones, yet he did speak privately with Klambo, an influential coffee klatch member.
“So good of you to see me on such short notice.” Travers said smilingly as he approached the large, orange ottoman on which Klambo sat. He extended his hand in the Western manner. The kite emblem on his lapel glittered like the Europe of yesterday.
“I am always happy to see my most valued friend.” Klambo replied, taking Travers’ hand in his own. “Please, have a seat on this ceremonial miniature of the Triumphal Arch.”
Travers threw back his coat tails and did so.
“Would you like some coffee?” Klambo asked.
“Please.” Travers enthused. He had learned to drink coffee at Malden, although he secretly still harbored primitive reservations about it. Intellectually he knew there was nothing wrong with it, but the little boy inside him still listened to Mama’s superstitious warnings.
As they sipped and their hearts raced, Travers and Klambo discussed the director’s intemperate words.
“Of course all kites should not be burned.” Klambo agreed after Travers had made his opening remarks. “You and I are men of the world. We both know that.”
“My colleagues are afraid, however,” Travers got to the heart of his concern, “That small-minded people in our community will believe that such an attitude is common among people of your klatch.”
“And it may be common—among equally small-minded members of the klatch, of which there are more than a few.” Klambo admitted. A sour look fluttered the flag of his face. “Adding orange juice to coffee!” He shuddered.
Travers started to ask what response should be made when the single peal of a bell interrupted him. “Excuse me a moment.” Klambo begged. “The diaper service is here.”


A Precision of High Esteem

Stillberg’s ideas about comedy had led him to some strange conclusions. For instance, and I think just one will suffice, he affixed the skull of a rattlesnake to the brim of his grandfather’s Homburg and wore the resulting creation to the library.
One day, returning home laden with books, Stillberg found his mother at the kitchen table with a man in a black suit. She had prepared coffee in deference to form, although Stillberg could see at a glance that the man had not touched, and did not intend to touch, his cup.
“Merrit,” Mrs. Stillberg called as she saw her son advancing through the hall. “Come meet Mr. Bringer.”
Stillberg put down his books on an ancient chair and turned to shake the stranger’s hand.
“Going to be doing some reading I see.” Mr. Bringer smiled. His flesh was translucent. One could see tomorrow’s beard waiting beneath the surface like a pond full of tadpoles.
“Yes.” Stillberg answered foolishly.
“Merrit, Mr. Bringer has some good news for you.” Stillberg’s mother prepared her son for the worst as best she could.
“Why don’t we have a seat?” Mr. Bringer suggested. He insinuated himself behind his untouched coffee once more, leading Stillberg, who wanted nothing more than to get upstairs and dig into The New Golden Book of Japanese Abstraction, to sit down beside his mother.
Stillberg removed his funny hat and hung it on the chair to his left. Mr. Bringer, sitting opposite, acknowledged its presence among them.
“Is that a rattlesnake skull?” He asked.
“Yes.” Stillberg answered. He wondered how on earth a man such as this Bringer would guess that so easily, but, ah yes, it must be the teeth.
“Merrit,” Mr. Bringer began softly, “What do you know about your grandfather?”
Stillberg raised his fingers from the tablecloth in a listless grope for vague details.
“Not much, eh?” Bringer prompted knowingly. “Well, what would you say if I told you that your grandfather was still alive and working as a comedian in Guam?”
Stillberg thought about it.
“I guess I’d have to hear you say that first.” He wisely replied.

Cobalt and Mint

The distractions of the Tall Man’s Equipage catalog, with its multitude of exquisite photographs of hats, handkerchiefs, ties, pocket knives, and Laurel and Hardy cufflinks, kept Bajel on the sofa for over an hour, slowly turning the pages. He had noticed a strange smell for some time, but thought nothing of it (something cooking, he unconsciously figured) until a particular hint of mucilage struck him.
What is that, he thought. Bringing the catalog along, Bajel went to the kitchen.
There on the stove, emerging from an immense stew pot Bajel had never seen before, was a purple octopus with big, orange eyes that stuck out on the sides of its throbbing head like the Taj Mahal and its reflection in the water. It had a serrated beak that had just cleared the lip of the pot as Bajel flung his precious catalog of dreams (with a presence of mind he was later to be remembered for) safely onto the counter.
“The peppermint contains a genetic defect of uncommon veracity!” The octopus roared as its powerful tentacles, pink on the underside, their suckers a near-translucent white, spilled out of the pot larger than geometry would normally allow, carrying it man-sized, steaming and dripping, onto the floor.
“I am its spokesman!” The octopus continued, advancing towards Bajel.
No matter how slick and dominant he would have looked in a full suit of clothing from a high class haberdashery like Tall Man’s, Bajel had no warrior blood in him. That stuff had petered out with Grandma. He bolted, foolishly it seems in retrospect, towards the back of the house.
“And the front door was so close.” Mary Comber, inspecting the sucker marks on the walls with Inspector Dick Delight and his “friend” Snivel, rued in a whining, nasal voice that won her no friends among the hard-boiled school.
“It’s not so hard to understand.” Inspector Delight lectured. “He panicked. I probably would have too. Don’t you think so, Snivel?’
“Whatever you say, Dick.” Snivel sighed and kept his eyes on the ceiling.
Later that month a package arrived with the distinctive Tall Man silhouette stamped on its six sides.
“Now I know there is a Higher Power!” Mary gushed to Ed, her new “handyman.”
She withdrew a pair of socks and a tie from the package, each imprinted with the repeated image of a purple octopus.

Terrarium Betts Bed His Cones

Thomsen named his latest play after an obscure magic trick, one popular during the Vaudeville era, so he claimed. Hobart, his roommate, looked over at Thomsen and Thomsen’s guest, the elegant Elaine.
“His work is becoming formulaic.” Hobart thought. “Not that that’s necessarily bad.” He added as he turned back to the magazine he was reading. Just before his consciousness became once more absorbed in the adventures of Flockadler the Stork, bird adventurer, he wished that he could tell Thomsen that he thought his work was becoming formulaic.
“What’s it about?” Elaine asked.
“It’s about a man who is invited to his old high school to give a speech.”
“A commencement speech?”
“No, he’s not famous enough for that, although he is successful in his own chosen field.”
“What does the magic trick have to do with it?”
“Not much. In a story, you can get away with the title having absolutely nothing to do with its content, but in a play there must be some kind of reason for the title, so I’ve had to include a line where the main character mentions the magic trick. It seems he wanted to be a magician as a child. That wasn’t my original intention, but…” Thomsen left his sentence unfinished as he hadn’t thoroughly formulated his thoughts. He flapped his hand like a bird flying away with trivial details.
“So you were determined to use this particular title and it didn’t much matter to you if it mean anything within the context of your play.” Elaine, elegant as she was, showed yet a strain of exasperation. Thomsen didn’t realize it yet, but he had been dropped an indefinite number of steps down her scale of respect.
Hobart realized it, though. He left Flockadler fighting his way out of the underground fortress and looked at Elaine.
“His work is becoming formulaic.” He said. He glanced at Thomsen.
Thomsen gaped.
“In what way?” He demanded.
Flockadler escaped through the absurd medium of a magic taco.

Distortion From Milk

For my one hundredth birthday party Romulus, one of the Zone Drones from Stereoworld, arranged for me an hour of old-fashioned privacy in the oil-filled well of isolation. Even my brain chip was temporarily disconnected.
“Thank you, my good acquaintance.” I said as I turned the coupon over in my hands.
“I wish I could have gotten you something more prestigious.” Romulus frowned. He had peculiar ideas about me, but on the whole rarely provoked violent fantasies.
The hour, as expected, went by all too quickly.
“And thoroughly undocumented.” Trevor, a friend from Guam, shook his head in regret. Even as I was sponged off he was receiving the audio-visual input of twenty-two “friends” from throughout the world.
“It’s not so bad.” My voice came muffled form under the towel. “I managed to remember what comic books used to smell like.”
“Oooh!” A nearby group of children, faces smeared with icing, shuddered. They squealed with playful disgust.
“Well, I know it’s not likely, but I think my present can top that.” Trevor held out the tiny, edible envelope.
Inside was a card covered with multi-colored question marks.
“What is it?” I asked.
“It’s a surprise.” Trevor’s smile was so wide I could see the stars in its dark corners.
“How do I find out what it is?”
“Well, you redeem it, of course.” Trevor gestured towards the redemption kiosk, a jolly-looking, anthropomorphic box sitting against the wall under the portrait of Barack Obama.
“Who wants this?” I asked the children, holding up the empty envelope. They screamed, fell to arguing over it; one obese boy, already ill from my comment about comic book odors, slapped a little girl in his struggle to get the treat.
Leaving them to fight it out, Trevor and I wheeled over to kiosk. I pushed the card into the slot not expecting much. My present turned out to be new legs, each a hundred feet long, with which I walked far away.

Segment 4

Can We Broker the Aldonkey Marine?

All things super were copyrighted by Detective Comics under the rules of the Defense of American Values Act, recently rammed through Congress by the lame duck administration. Thus, one could no longer say “super burger,” “super sex,” “super brokerage firm,” “super vasectomy.” You get the idea. I was discussing the matter with O’Halloran, who seemed more than usually put out by the whole thing.
“You mean you can’t even say ‘super bubble and squeak?’” He demanded—demanded of the absurd universe.
“In the privacy of your home I guess you can,” I tried to make the old boy feel better. “But as far as marketing is concerned, no.”
O’Halloran took a swig of ale. “My Aunt Minota runs a sandwich shop near the border. A small place, you understand. The kind of place where you go in and order and take the food with you.” A wistful glint of early days in the bosom of his family came into his eyes. “She’s marketed, as you say, her bubble and squeak as ‘super bubble and squeak’ for years. Now you’re telling me she can’t do that anymore?”
“It violates the copyright of Detective Comics.” I said. “I didn’t make the rules, O’Halloran. Congress did. Write them a letter if you’re so worked up.”
That knocked him down a bit.
“But why, man? Why?”
“Well, for one thing, Detective Comics is afraid that consumers might become confused. They might think that your Aunt Minota’s super bubble and squeak was a legitimately licensed product of Detective Comics and buy it out of loyalty.”
“But that’s crazy!”
“There’s more. It also potentially limits the creative freedom of their writers. What if, for instance, they wanted to create a new character, a giant, living blob of bubble and squeak? They wouldn’t be allowed to call it ‘Super Bubble and Squeak’ if your Aunt Minota had an identically named product, would they? Or, say Superman baked up a dish of bubble and squeak with his superhuman superpowers and all the other super characters in the super universe wanted to call it Super Bubble and Squeak.’ What then?”
“I guess when you put it that way, it sounds logical.” O’Halloran admitted. He drained the rest of his barrel of ale in one overly human gulp.

Clamicious Brigando

Every time I falsify the exchange rate I am reminded of the town square. Don’t ask me why; the connection is tenuous at best. During the days when I used to sit at a small table there and scribble my supposedly symbolist poetry, I had no idea that one day the power to affect the finances of other men would be placed around my neck like a baritone saxophone.
It seems to me that, ideally, a saxophone should be as tall as its operator. This is just one of the many thoughts that obsess me as I sit here in my office on the uppermost level of the Monetary Tower. Aside from perusing a small stack of daily papers and issuing my weekly pronouncement, I don’t have many obligations. I wear exactly what I want to work: a suit in the early 1960’s style, skinny lapels and narrow tie. No pleats in the pants. I’ve left the coveralls and bucket cap far behind.
Of course, life still has its share of difficulties. Only the other day I was working in the tunnel that will eventually lead into the back of the music store when Miss Turnip, of the secretarial pool, put her head in at the entrance and announced that Mr. Comatoose wanted to speak to me.
“What, on the phone?” I asked, setting aside the automatic shovel for a moment.
“No sir, he’s here, in the office.”
I sighed. “Very well. Tell him I’ll be right there.” As I put my coat back on I wondered what my tailor, for that is who Mr. Comatoose was, wanted with me. Surely my bill was fully paid up.
“Only one way to find out.” A little winged figure like a cherub, some aspect of my conscience, I suppose, told me.
“Yes, I know.” I snapped. Don’t you hate it when your own brain treats you like a child?
“Mr. Comatoose,” I said, advancing on the little man with my hand outstretched. “What brings you here?”
“I’m sorry to bother you at work, Mr. Toadsgoboad, but I have something here I think you dropped” He held out a tightly folded piece of paper.
“Is it a secret code of some kind?” He asked as I unfolded it and scanned its contents.
“No,” I laughed. “Well, kind of.”

Little Grocery Stores in Small Towns

“Just before she summoned the great machine, Queen Briganda sneered wordlessly at me.” I told Mr. Snooker, expecting a reaction.
“She did not!” He reacted, as I expected, with incredulity.
“She did. And, of course, I wanted to sneer right back, but I had no time.”
“Of course.” Mr. Snooker reached into his bag of crisps and scrounged about in the crumby remains.
“I had to ready myself for the machine’s appearance, its terrible onslaught.”
Mr. Snooker sucked his fingertips clean. The rumpled image of Jack Crisper smiled up at us from his home on the bag. I remembered the feeling I had that day as I turned to the immense, slowly opening door through which the dread machine would enter. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Queen Briganda’s purple cape flapping as she climbed the rope ladder to safety. Anger mingled with nervous anticipation coursed through me.
The machine, a fifty-foot tall armored squid floating over the ground on duostatic thrusters, was obviously programmed to focus its destructive energies on whatever poor creature was standing in the target, the co-centric black and white circles where I was chained. Its serrated beak kept uttering the nonsensical phrase “sabba dabba” over and over as it advanced.
When I told this part of my tale to Mr. Snooker, he replied, awestruck, “The ritual war chant of the Pelosi!”
“If you say so, Mr. Snooker.” I rolled my eyes. What did Snooker know? A loser many times over, he was retired from the Department of Quarries and Mines, a subsidiary of the Bureau of Reclamation and Geologic Commercialization. I had met him at a fundraiser for the local zoo.
“I like bears” was the first thing he had said to me.
Now, looking at him with his shiny fingertips and equally shiny head, I wondered if he was really worthy of hearing the rest of the story.
“Well, obviously you escaped.” Mr. Snooker said at last. I had drifted into a reverie, staring across the room at the legion of policemen holding back the eager crowd that had turned up.
“Yeah,” I drawled. “Yeah, I escaped.” This was said with as much concern for the man’s feelings as I could muster.

Spin the Square

In time with the waves that slowly licked away the shoreline the hands of the wind-up man sitting in the window of the beach house beat together. At first, Natalia worried that the ocean was moving abnormally fast; then she wondered at how slowly the wind-up man must be moving. Ultimately, like the rest of us sitting around in the beach house on that overcast day, she came to accept the situation, like a tomato plant accepts piss for rain.
“It is a beach house, isn’t it?” Bob wanted confirmation from the only person there whose intellect he respected—me.
“Yes, Bob.” I smiled indulgently.
“Hey, guys,” Florida snapped her fingers and looked at everyone as brightly as a flashbulb. “Let’s make papier maché masks!”
And so we did, one tearing the stack of old newspapers into strips, one mixing up the flour and water, another scrounging among the junk in the captain’s room for stuff on which to hang the papier maché, and one last person at the window, watching for the cops.
“Why can’t you do this?” I asked the wind-up man as I peered at the tiny section of the road that could be seen from my vantage point. His answers, paraphrased in the next month’s National Review, caused more of a stir than their actual import would seem to merit.
Natalia’s mask made her look like a monkey from the Bonzo planet. She adopted a voice like Gregory Peck’s and began lecturing us on our moral duties.
Bob’s mask was intended to be some kind of monstrous jack o’ lantern, but I saw the unconscious depiction of his mother within. I kept my observation to myself. To whom among that crowd could I tell such a thing?
“What do you think of my mask?” Florida asked me as she joined me at the window.
“Are you supposed to be the Spirit of Summer?” I asked.
“Close.” She laughed. “I’m the sun! The sun’s a woman, you know.”
“Time for Toadsgoboad to make his mask!” Someone shouted in authoritarian tones.
I demurred good-naturedly, but, at their insistence, sat down to create. My mask, which rendered me indistinguishable from the wind-up man, saved me from arrest when the cops later burst through the door.



Going Down Like A Walnut

Saving buttons in small glass jars, Probos struck me as the most frugal of the Battery brothers. None of them was a spendthrift, of course. The difficulties they were having securing their inheritance ensured that. Those small glass jars, however, arranged on the shelves in the companionway, were what really drew my attention. I determined to steal one or two.
The buttons within were organized by color for the most part. On my numerous trips through the companionway to the small, but serviceable textile mill and back, I picked out with my eyes the jars containing the orange buttons. These were the ones I wanted.
It worried me a bit that Probos had seen me looking the shelves over. I wanted him to think that I had never even noticed them. I had diverted any future suspicion as best I could, however, by yawning loudly as I turned away, catching Probos’ eye and muttering “buttons” dismissively. That evening at supper I expended more effort than usual in charming the three brothers and their mysterious guest, the so-called Madame Germaine, who wore a papier maché mask to conceal her true appearance.
“And then I escaped out the window with the books hidden under my shirt!” I laughingly concluded one of my droll anecdotes. This met with the pleasing sound of the applause of men and deep “ho ho ho”s.
“I declare, Mr. Toadsgoboad,” Madame Germaine said as she straightened her mask. “You are an original character!” Her mask was a grotesquely distorted likeness of Ed Asner. I acknowledged the lady’s remark with a nod and helped myself to more grape juice.
“Won’t you have a drop of the real thing?” Stratos, the eldest of the three brothers, asked, shaking a crystal decanter in the air as gently as a mother chimpanzee jumps from tree to tree with her newborn at her breast.
“No thank you. I must remain sober.” I replied.
“For what?” Probos asked. Was there a gleam of suspicion in his black eyes?
I excused myself awkwardly and lurched from the table. My thief’s instinct told me that the time had come. I slipped down to the shelves and put a jar of buttons in each of the pockets of my coveralls. Thus laden, I slapped my bucket hat on my head and entered the textile mill, eager to begin my shift.

Grease for the Queen Affrontal

The broken apparatus, locked away in the cupboard, weighed on Prance Sabot’s mind. I told him to forget about it, but he couldn’t. His buddy, Dodge Wittles, was no help. He encouraged Sabot to break into the cupboard and examine this object that so consumed his imagination that he spent valuable study time drawing pictures of it.
“That cupboard has nothing to do with you, Toadsgoboad.” Wittles countered my avuncular warnings.
“Do whatever you want.” I divested myself of involvement, bringing a magazine up to my nose.
Wittles pushed Sabot. “Go on.” He urged. “Do it.”
Sabot took a step toward the cupboard. He looked back.
“What do I use to open the door?” He asked.
As Wittles looked around for some makeshift tool, I pointed towards the crowbar rack.
“A whole rack full of crowbars!” Wittles announced. “Take your pick.”
“Are you going to help?” Sabot asked. He hefted a gauge six.
“It’s a one-man job, Prance. You don’t need my help.” Wittles pushed his friend forward with his fingertips at his back.
I brought one eye around the corner of the magazine. The cupboard towered over Sabot. The door, ornately carved with images of somber nineteenth century children and inlaid with mother-of-pearl (for the eyes and teeth), was secured with a heavy brass lock in the shape of a giraffe.
“It’s a giraffe.” Sabot noted as he came within range.
“Do it.” Wittles hissed.
Expecting, so I guess, dark forces to contest his assault, Sabot gingerly fitted the end of the crowbar into the jamb. His first, timid movements produced no results, but, warming to the task, he soon wrenched the door open with violent action accompanied by choice, wrathful words.
“Is that it?” Wittles asked, rushing forward.
“Yes.” Sabot whispered.
“Do you think it can be repaired?”
Not only was the apparatus repaired, but, utilizing advanced techniques, I was able to make it operate better than before.

Lord Peppersuit’s Grits Explained

The giraffe gaffe, mentioned only once in six months’ worth of dispatches from Hefter, our agent on the nearby station, was yet the one thing of interest to be found in all those many papers. In secret council with the Turnblatt boys and their mother, Mrs. Turnblatt, I debated the possible significance of this so-called giraffe gaffe.
“Let us assume it’s true;” I began. “The lock on the cupboard was actually in the shape of an okapi—what difference does it make?”
“A hell of a lot.” Mrs. Turnblatt was emphatic. “Going by the fuss they made over it on the station.” She tapped the pile of dispatches with her marker.
“What’s the name of that station, by the way?” Sturgis Turnblatt asked.
We all looked at each other. Nobody seemed to know.
“I’ll go find out.” Roger Turnblatt volunteered, getting to his feet.
“No, it’s not important.” I called. The young man continued out the door, placating me with a wiggled pinky.
“It’s important to me.” Sturgis insisted.
“You don’t seem to see the importance of things unless they directly concern you.” Mrs. Turnblatt looked sharply at me.
“This does concern me.” I objected. “They’re calling my observational skills into question.”
“You’re not mentioned by name in these reports.” The old lady pointed out.
“It doesn’t matter…”
“There he goes again!” Sturgis interrupted.
“…everyone here knows I said the lock was shaped like a giraffe.”
“Only those who have read your account.”
Something in the way she said that arrested my attention.
“What does that mean exactly?” I asked coldly.
“Well,” She leaned back from the conference table. Her stout bosom, though aged, arrested my attention as well, but only momentarily. “That’s a rather limited audience, isn’t it?”
“Don’t you dare impugn my…” I started, stabbing the air with my marker, but was interrupted by Roger’s return.
“It’s the Lord Peppersuit.” He announced breathlessly.

Dope Hoper Got Me Socked

The partially denuded body of Richard Dreyfus was discovered in a crate labeled “machine parts” by the newly authorized Imports Inspection Force.
“Mr. Holland’s Opus sucked.” Frantzen, elected crew chief by his fellows on the force, said bitterly, almost angrily, as the actor’s body was dragged from the otherwise empty crate.
“I thought it was rather touching.” Sailbot, with his wings of gray, countered.
“He hasn’t done a good movie since The Goodbye Girl.” Another member of the overpaid force put in his opinion.
“His movie-making days are over now.” Frantzen watched as a couple of the boys knocked together a crude coffin from boards salvaged from the A Cerola.
“Was Jaws before or after The Goodbye Girl?” Sailbot asked.
“Before.”
“That’s funny.”
“Why?”
“The clothing and sets in The Goodbye Girl are so much more dated than those in Jaws.”
“What about the mayor’s suit? The one with the anchors all over it?”
“That just shows you Spielberg’s superior skills as a director.”
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Well,” Frantzen interrupted his men’s discussion. “Anybody want to say anything?” He nodded at the grease-stained box lying on the edge of the pier.
Sailbot, Cowboy, Goober, Tommy, and Hunk looked at each other. Each either raised his shoulders or shook his head.
“No.” Sailbot said to Frantzen.
“OK then. Pitch him in.” The chief pointed at the dark, stinky sea.
A couple of men stepped forward and took hold of the coffin.
“Wait!” I cried as I burst out of another crate nearby.
“Who the devil are you?” Frantzen demanded, his unlit cigar floating in space before his astonished features.
“Toadsgoboad’s the name.” I replied, rushing to the coffin.
“And your game?” One of the force, whose name I didn’t catch, asked.
“Coffin inspector.” I answered. I examined the coffin carefully for the nine points of good coffin construction, and finding them all absent, I still let it go.

Completion of the Loop Means White

After my uncle died I went through his storage shed looking for items worth appropriating. Most of the stuff in there was worthless. I didn’t need a penis pump, much less two of them, nor any of the approximately fifty pounds of literature on how to get rich quickly through real estate. I found a plaster statue of a hound dog, which I found amusing and took for my own. I later shot it to pieces with my BB gun. There were a few LPs in good enough shape to be sold. None of them was anything that I would ever listen to: Conway Twitty’s early 70’s material and similar country pop from the same era by like artists.
The thing I found that really excited me, however, was something I couldn’t believe that my uncle had actually owned. It was a fused boron loop, sometimes known as a smoke ring by the ignorant rednecks that lived around there. I found it in a box full of cheap Christmas decorations and old hotel soap, so who knows if my uncle had been its true owner or not? A couple of other family members had used the shed for storage over the years. Of course, I couldn’t picture any of them ever owning anything quite so “cool” (we have got to stop using that word) as a fused boron loop.
You don’t know what a fused boron loop is? Don’t know what it is useful for? I’ll tell you. It has many uses, the coolest (damn it) of which is probably the contacting of the dead.
For instance, say I wanted to contact my dead uncle. I would take the loop and fit it in a simple bracket (easily made from a wire coat hanger) and light a fire under the loop while loudly calling the dead person’s name.
“Maurice!” I would call. “Maurice Chandler! Come back from the dead!” After a minute or two the dead person would respond, his face appearing within the loop.
“Lance, how are you, son?” My uncle would probably say. Then we would have a little conversation, speaking of regrets and lost opportunities.
“Real estate is a fascinating business.”
In the event, however, I did not contact my uncle. I used the loop only once before I accidentally broke it (firing BBs through it at the plaster hound dog) and that was to contact Jack White.
“Jack White!” I called. “Jack White! Come back from the dead!”
“Who is this?” The rock star asked, appearing in the loop. “I’m not dead!”
“To me you are.”

Take Flesh for the Back Wretch

Don clawed his fingers through his hair.
“I can’t take any more of this!” He moaned.
“Quit moaning.” Phil begged. “You got what you wanted.”
“I didn’t want this!” Don snapped. He looked up at Phil like a crazy man. His hair, perfectly styled only moments before, stood up like the feathers on the head of the smooching bird of Java. His eyes were red, either from crying or from holding back from crying. The Mark of Desmond, branded into his neck two days before, was still red and swollen.
“Come off it.” Phil looked out the window at the fields of sorghum below. “You knew the risks. You’re not a kid anymore.”
“Nobody told me the risks might include infestation from another dimension!”
“You should have listened to your parents.”
“My parents! Don’t get my started on them!” Don’s voice was heavy with hate. “If it hadn’t been for them, I’d be in New York right now! Or Shanghai! Living out my dreams!”
“Didn’t they warn you about spiritual warfare?” Phil’s voice was teasing, but there was a pedantic edge to it.
“‘Spiritual warfare?’ What’s ‘spiritual’ about another dimension?” Don demanded. He threw himself about in the big wooden throne.
“Maybe that’s where the spirits come from.”
“Phil, I’m not infested with spirits; I’m not possessed. I’m infested with silicon based mites!”
“Maybe our ancestors didn’t have adequate terminology to describe their encounters with the xenomorphs. They used words like ‘spirit’ or ‘god&