Earth Year: 2007
Solar Month: Terrarium
Space Day: End of First Month on Unidentified Planet
Location: Rebel Camp
Resume Computer Record of Double Captain Jack “Eddie” Longbow:
Why is it whenever I backhand a lady she ends up demanding sex from me?
This just happened to me again for the zillionth time is why I ask that unanswerable question. The first gal in question is named Pefferkorn, and she’s a real back-handful. The other gal in question— well, you met her in the space journal a while back. Goes by the name of Xelba, Queen of the Hoverdragon. I better start from there…
Back in the giant hall full of naked Amazons who were making out with each other and getting all googly-eyed at me and my crew, Xelba flew in on a hugely enormous Hoverdragon. I was surprised at how good she was at driving it, because she’s a chick and all. She knew me and my crew by name, which doesn’t make any sense because we’re stranded on a planet that definitely isn’t Earth. Earth has boys and girls, not just girls, and DEFINITELY not Hoverdragons!
Xelba let us know exactly what her Draconian plan was for us, the sole men trespassing on her planet. “You are all three going to perish… by making it with our planet’s womenfolk until you expire!” was what she, Xelba (the Queen [the one I’ve been talking about]) said, stentorianly. Now, back on Earth, my Native Indian American tribe doesn’t believe that you can die from a sex overdose, but if you think I really wanted to chance it with a room that big, you’re an idiot—stop reading my journal, idiot. If you don’t think I’d chance buying it like that, you should keep reading because you’re with the program and I usually do some pretty choice action moves.
With all the dames squealing in morbid delight, I barely noticed the Hoverdragon descend right in front of my face. There was the Amazon queen, grabbing one of her boobs and pointing at me, literally. I didn’t know if the dragon was going to eat me or she was. She was getting real close. I had to think fast.
I popped her in the kisser with a patented backhand. The whole place went cold real quick. All the Karate in the world wasn’t going to get me out of this one.
John Connery piped in with his grating New Scottish brogue, “Yuh shinna o’ dunna’ Cap’n!”
I backhanded him too.
“Silence!” Xelba ejaculated.
I didn’t care how much silence she wanted. I had a question. I raised my hand.
“Put your hand down.” Xelba didn’t like that.
“I have a question, dummy.”
“I will grant you one question!” She screeched.
One question. I had to think fast. I backhanded Connery.
“Egh, barely fehlt eht,” he belched out of his horrible foreign mouth.
“How do you know who I am? How do you know who we are?”
“In time…” Xelba smiled her cold, serpentine smile like a real bitch.
“In time?” I thought to myself, then said out loud, “In time? That’s not an answer. You said you’d give me an answer!”
She laughed and then—and I’m completely serious here—she lunged at me and started making out with my mouth. After that everything went black.
* * *
It wasn’t the first time I’d been poisoned that’s for darn sure. But this time was different. I could tell I wasn’t out that long before I came to in bed. I felt a little sore, sure, but that’s to be expected when your arms and legs are tied to the bedposts using boa constrictors! If only my tribal elders had taught me the song of snakes, but it was too late for that. “No way am I getting out of this one,” I almost thought to myself, but didn’t, because that would have been cowardly, and you don’t get to be a Double Captain in the Space Fleet with coward’s brains.
Xelba slithered into the room wearing—dead serious—nothing. She must have heard me struggling.
“Listen Xelba, you can’t do this. I’m saving myself.”
“Saving yourself for whom?”
“For someone who isn’t a total bitch,” I got her good.
“The harder you struggle, the wetter I’ll get.” I didn’t know what she meant.
“What does that even mean?”
“Wet. Down there.” She wasn’t making any sense. I was making her delirious.
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“You’re an idiot, Longbow.”
“You’re an idiot!” I got her good.
Just then an Amazon guard came into the room.
“I don’t need any assistance, Pefferkorn. I’ve got Longbow right where I want him.”
“No you don’t,” I said.
“Yes I do!”
“Nope,” She did. I was stalling.
“My queen, it is urgent,” piped up Pefferkorn, “Kenny Rogers and Leftenant Connery have escaped from the palace!” Thank God someone made it out alive.
“What!” Xelba leaped up. Good thing, too. Felt like those boa constrictors were getting bigger.
Xelba asked Pefferkorn all sorts of questions. Pefferkorn, a cute little number, was getting all flustered. She didn’t seem to have answers, seemed nervous in fact. Xelba was just pushing her out of the way when all of the sudden Pefferkorn opened a vial of acid and threw it in Xelba’s face!
“Come on, we’re going!” Pefferkorn raced over to the bed and began untying the snakes.
“What is going on?” I yelled over Xelba’s screams.
“I’ve got to get you out of here, Longbow!” Untied, I sprang into action. I grabbed Pefferkorn and raced out of the chamber.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“To the Land of the Boyfriends!” I had no idea what that was.
“I have no idea what that is,” I stopped, “Hey, Pefferkorn.”
“Yes, Longbow?”
“Thanks.”
I gave her the backhand. She smiled. It felt good.
HALT RECORDING…
I’ve always relied on the kindness of Mexicans. I was crouched between the shadowed pews of the local Catholic church which had kindly— though unknowingly—become my shelter when I began translating the above tale. I was interrupted in my work by a charitable family of swarthy Latinos who offered to let me stay in their home. Thank God they do not know the nightmares I carry around in the chambers of my heart, lest they, for fear of succumbing to madness, have stayed their giving spirits. Naturally, I accepted. Little did I know I would be sharing a room with a cadre of younglings and energetic canines. Realizing the importance of showing strength when encountering strangers, I immediately seized the top bunk for myself, leaving the myriad of children to make arrangements accordingly. It has not been easy, for want of silence, as while the adults are nearly somnambulant in their lack of speech, the children run amok as if their very blood burned with corn syrup. Just now I have finished translating the document in the peace of a sort of “bedding-fort” I have made atop the bunked beds. Let us hope the peace of domesticity does not spoil the important work ahead!
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Lunar Day: 67th Nesting
Dear Me,
Wait I just heard a noise BRB k…
* * *
Ergh. That was a bunch of super poor explode-y, suicide-y guys who just attacked the palace. They killed everybody I guess or whatever. Like I need more to deal with today. Like I was at breakfast y’know and the Tasting Man who eats my food so I don’t die or something puffed up right in front of me and split dead in half cuz I guess my breakfast had the eggs of peppernipple worms hidden in it. They reproduced so fast that they were coming out of all eight of his eyes and even out of his knee-ears lol. There were too many and his carapace cracked open and it was gross and I wasn’t going to eat those peppernipple worms after they were inside of an employee. Don’t feel sorry either cuz like that’s exactly what we pay Taster Man for. Nobody would try to kill me anyway because everybody likes me. I bet he was just allergic which is stupid if you’re going to be a Taster Man in the freaking palace of all places.
But yeah it’s the thing of like, everybody’s dead ‘n junk. I mean I guess the rebels aren’t dead but my family definitely is, so I’m in this panic room and my iNtannae aren’t getting 4G reception. Great.
* * *
UGH. BORED. iNtannae almost ran out of power but I folded them into my electroglobule gynomasticator and I put one of my tails inside an electrical socket lol so it powered up fine. Came out wet though. Smells good. BORED.
I can take pictures outside the panic room window with Hipstamatic. Mostly just bodies of people who worked for my family who were probably spies because they were JEALOUS BITCHES who’re freaking envious of how bad ass awesome the royal family is.
* * *
Keep forgetting to update this. Been a few days. Kind of tired from hunger. Made some friends though. Had to go outside and grab a couple of the bodies. Nice thing about the Worker species is that their spines get really hard after death so you can snap their heads off their bodies real easy and then you have a puppet for a playmate. Grabbed a couple of them out there. Painted names on them.
Jeremy is the cute one but don’t tell him I said that. These new friends know a lot of my secrets now so I bet they don’t live a long time cuz my family will kill them like most of my friends. Except my family is gone. I gotta remember that. I miss them but not really lol that would be super gay. I’m gonna flirt with Jeremy even though he’s kind of stupid. BRB k lol
* * *
Hungry. I’m gonna eat my dumb friends lol not u Jeremy we’re gonna do something else xoxoxo
Residency beneath a freeway overpass is far more hospitable than the police officer had led me to believe. It is a burden to be without electric light, but the natural assistance of father Helios shall have to make do. I confess that to continue my work I did tempt a nocturnal venture out to the pale orange light of street lamps. Upon doing so I seem to have “trespassed” on the land of some urban savages who would do less than suffer my incursion. Luckily they were susceptible to my scream sobbing technique, the following confusion allowing for my speedy retreat back to the overpass. I have had less calories than necessary for a responsible analysis of the above text, which I was fairly able to translate on my escape from the labyrinthine vent system of the Women’s Shelter. The best I can surmise is that this alien world fabricated a fictional account of the Bolshevik revolution from the perspective of an insectoid Anastasia. Beyond this I shan’t speculate further. My blood sugar is dropping, and the local vermin are difficult to catch after sun-up, therefore I will see you in the future… if there is a future.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
CURTAIN UP:
FRAT HOUSE LIVING ROOM
Halloween night. The living room is covered in the classic decorations. It’s quiet. Our characters enter stage left. SKYLER, dressed as Doogie Howser, is escorted in with his enormous medicine bag full of trick-or-treat candy by KYLE, Skyler’s Blackfrican frat-brother, and his attractive redheaded date, STACY. The latter are dressed as the two members of Wham!* They make an attractive couple.
(*Note to Director: I know he wasn’t a Blackfrican, but making George Michael the girl of the two insinuates that he was on the “passive end” of Wham! And that just plain isn’t true, is it? I hope it isn’t. I don’t need to live with any more lies. Besides, it’s not like old Georgie boy was a redhead either, so who’s the Gee Dee racist now? Moving on.)
SKYLER
Boy that was fun. Halloween really is my favorite time of year. Perhaps because you get to pretend you’re someone else, even if just for one night.
STACY
Ohhh, Skyler. I just hope you had a good time letting us trick-or-treat with you.
SKYLER
The pleasure was all mine. Soon I’ll be too old to demand candy from strangers.** I’m glad Kyle still gets a kick out of this. He’s almost like a brother to me, and not just because he’s a Brother in the clinical sense.
(**Note to Producer: Don’t believe the rumors that I still demand candy from strangers. Or that I take candy from them. These are lies my enemies tell to prevent sexy producers like you from financing my precious words. Stay sweet, sweet like stolen candy, my dear produceress.***)
(***Note to Self: Don’t steal candy from kids tonight. But DO steal candy from neighbors. Honor system my ass, this is a dog eat dog world and my dog prefers eating candy to other dogs. Do dogs eat dogs? Ask Jeeves about this when I get home. Moving on.)
KYLE
We’ll always have Halloween.
Skyler’s expression darkens. The levity of the moment expires.
SKYLER
It was my brother’s favorite holiday, Stacy. Kyle used to come out with us because his parents—
KYLE
They didn’t like me consorting with demons, as if that weren’t half the fun of Halloween.
STACY
Do you still do that stuff?
KYLE
All the time. Literally all the time. This is a fraternity. Demon worship is sort of our thing.*
(*Note to Director: I know we’ve fought about this issue before. Don’t panic. I don’t mean that all fraternities are fronts for Satanic rituals, or even that MOST are. This is just to throw the audience a bone because… well, they know the truth even if you don’t.**)
(**Note to Director: Sorry about the tone of that. Kind of hostile. Still, it blows my mind how gullible you are. The rest of the country knows that Satanism is an inside job and frat houses are ground zero. Maybe you should educate yourself instead of believing everything you’re told. Moving on.***)
(***Note to Self: I say “Moving on”, but I can’t move on. Maybe it’s a blood sugar thing. The thought of that candy is killing me. BRB)
STACY
My!
SKYLER
Come on, Stacy. He’s joking, as far as you know!
STACY
Halloween just really spooks me out. I know it’s all make-believe and everything. Maybe I was molested on a Halloween or something.
SKYLER
That is entirely likely. Perhaps you’d like to schedule an appointment to talk about your supposed molestation scenario.
KYLE
It’s the responsible thing to do.
SKYLER
After all, there’s no reason to be “spooked out”, as you say, unless there are some deeply guarded issues of serious sexual abuse in your past.
STACY
Well when you put it that way… Of course there’s nothing to be a-scared of, right? Just because of some silly Pagan holiday.
The phone rings. Stacy is startled. Kyle answers the phone. No one responds.
KYLE
No one there. Weird.*
(*Note to Anyone Reading This: Okay. I was wrong. That bowl of candy was not “Honor System” candy. Apparently that’s why the lady was holding the bowl in her hands and serving children individually. Her man must be a real pussy because when I reached out to take my candy she thought that wasn’t the way things go around here. Well that’s how things go around my house, and I live alone because I don’t need anyone else. Oh and in case I don’t make it out of here** I hope the play goes really well even if I can’t finish writing it. Bye [maybe!])
(**Note to Readers of Above ‘Note to Anyone Reading This’: “Here” is the trunk of a Saturn that was unlocked on my street. The neighbor is really pissed that I took all their candy. Gonna finish eating it in the trunk just in case they’re outside and waiting to jump me. Can’t get the candy back once it’s in my belly can you, you dumb suckers? Oh, I’ll have a sucker right now. Moving on.)
SKYLER
I’m sure there is a perfectly logical explanation for that. Let me just check the phone in my room.
Skyler carries his bag of candy into his Office dorm room adjacent to the Living Room.
KYLE
Be careful with that candy.
SKYLER
No need to worry about me. Moderation is the name of my game.
Skyler shuts the door behind him.***
(***Note to Aspiring Playwrites: It is very difficult to write in the trunk of a car. Luckily, what I am lacking in oxygen here I am more than making up for with a sugar high. Moving on.)
STACY
Such a cute little kid. He acts like he’s all grown up.
KYLE
He is. He’s been through a lot. Still amazing to me that he’s a real therapist now. You know he cured me of being a gay homosexual?
STACY
Then… why are you George Michael tonight?
KYLE
(instantly defensive) Why are you the other guy?!
The phone rings again. Skyler is moaning and crying in the other room. Stacy answers the phone as Kyle goes into Skyler’s Office.*
(*Note to Self: Do not eat all of this candy. I wonder who the other guy in Wham! was?)
Nobody on the phone. She hangs it up, scared.
STACY
No one on the line. Oh my gosh!
Kyle pulls a bloated Skyler out of his room. He is covered in chocolate. He has Tootsie-Pops in his hair and Necco wafers powdered all over his doctor’s outfit. An entire candy apple is stuck to his arm. He is crying and in pain as Kyle plops him onto the couch.**
(**Question to Self: Why did you eat all of this candy?? What are you doing to yourself?!)
KYLE
I was afraid this would happen.
STACY
What is this?!
KYLE
He has Type Zero diabetes.
STACY
I’m sorry, Type Zero diabetes?
KYLE
It means if he has too much sugar, he gets severely depressed. And he just ate his entire bag of candy.
STACY
The entire thing?! He was in there for like twenty seconds!
KYLE
He’s an addict. Talking about his brother must have set him off. It’s a disease, Stacy, a real disease and he has to fight it every day of his little life.
SKYLER
Ugggghhhh!*
(*Note to Producer: I am not feeling great. If I don’t hand in these pages on Monday it is because I am sick from Halloween candy or sick from having to get beaten up by my stupid neighbors who are now pounding on the trunk of this car. Like Halloween wasn’t fun enough without beating me up or something. Moving on.)
KYLE
I know, man!
The phone rings again. Stacy answers, frantic.
STACY
Who keeps calling?! Who is this? Hello?
She hangs up. Skyler reaches weakly out to a bowl of candy corn on the coffee table; Kyle swats his hand away and throws the bowl of candy.
STACY
I thought I could hear a voice this time.
KYLE
Someone’s trying to mess with us. First the dean won’t let us host a Halloween party, now the other houses are pranking us.*
(*Note to… uhhh let’s say to ummm… okay. Open Note! Anyone can read this note. I think that I am going to puke up this bowl[s] of Halloween candy that I finished and which was [were] delicious. I cannot leave the trunk to do so because my neighbors are resolute that the police are on their way. They better bring the Jaws of Life because I am not budging.**)
(**Open Note: the Sequel! Kinda got sidetracked there. What I wanted to tell all of you was that I am going to vomit a lot of candy into the trunk of this Saturn. In case I go out like Jimi and Janis before me, I just want you all to know that I love you and that this is how I wanted to go. Sincerely, Moving on.)
SKYLER
It’s… it’s…
KYLE
What’s that little guy?
SKYLER
It’s my brother. He’s… calling….
KYLE
He’s sick. Really sick. We’re gonna have to watch him. Make sure there are no knives or pills or Butterfingers around. That candy really got to him.
The phone again. Stacy looks around to make sure the room is safe for Skyler.
STACY
Ugh! It’s not funny you guys, it’s just a phone!
SKYLER
I didn’t ask to be born!
The phone stops ringing.
KYLE
Thank god. Stacy, go grab the beer bong and a twelve pack from the game room.
STACY
What for?
KYLE
We going to keg stand him. He needs to vom up as much of this candy as he can.
As Stacy is exiting the room the electricity goes out. She screams. Blackness.
STACY
Kyle… what’s going on?
KYLE
Nothing. Just stay calm.
Skyler moans.
The phone starts ringing again. Kyle creeps over to it… and picks up the receiver.
KYLE
Hello? Hello?!
STACY
Who is that??
KYLE
I don’t care!
Aggravated, Kyle yanks the phone out of the wall. The lights come back on.
KYLE
Hurry!
Stacy races out and returns with a 12 pack of Natural Ice and a beer funnel. Kyle lifts the moaning Skyler upside down above the couch. Skyler is dribbling chocolate saliva all over his face and mumbling incomprehensible, sad statements. Stacy puts the funnel to his mouth.*
(*Note to All and Sundry: I have a pretty good idea why my brain is making this scene come out the way this scene is coming out. Maintain, bro. Maintain. Wait. That command was to myself, not to All and Sundry. Don’t peak back at what should have been a Note to Self. I want it stricken from the record. Oh man I’m sick. Am I in a court room? This trunk is as oxygen-less as it is me-full and man oh man it is spinning something awful in here. In case of dead, then goodbye again maybe.)
Kyle pours beer after beer into Skyler. His belly swells until it pokes out of his doctor’s uniform, popping buttons and bursting his pants fly. His face is purple and blue.
Stacy and Kyle gently, very gently lower Skyler until he is right side up. He stands wobbling in one place, hardly conscious. Kyle holds him by the shoulders. Stacy thrusts one finger out and slightly taps Skyler’s stomach once.
Skyler vomits buckets of beer and candy onto the coffee table and rug. The torrent is unbelievable. The vomit pours out for three straight minutes until every inch of the stagefloor is saturated with Skyler’s vomit, until finally he collapses back onto the sofa with Kyle and Stacy. Skyler comes out of his haze.**
(**Note to Sundry [not All]: It came out. Everywhere. The neighbor with the keys to the Saturn is coming out. Probably going to get hit in the head a bunch.***)
SKYLER
Oh. Hey guys. What’s going on?
The phone, ripped out of the wall, begins ringing.
KYLE
I hate Halloween.
(***Note to Producer: I got hit in the head a bunch for no reason. Will not be coming in for table read on Sunday unless it is pancake Sunday which I always forget and no one ever reminds me of. Do you smell almonds? I hate Halloween.****)
(****Note to Self: Andrew Ridgeley. Andrew Ridgeley was the other guy in Wham! I am so gay for remembering that.)
DROP CURTAIN.
Fascinating. It would seem the Autumnal celebration of demon worship and saccharine bribery, extending as it does to the strange world of this Skyler Schultz, is at best transhistorical and at worst…. transdimensional. It is frankly a surprise to me that I was able to decipher as much of this work as I did, as this very night is Halloween. The demands for sweets are constant. Youths dressed as Daemons (pray they never know the damnable truth of such creatures) and Sexy Cats (pray they never know the damnable truth of such creatures) have threatened me with prankery all evening, and my nerves are shot through with anticipation of a terrible end. Thank goodness such torture is but an annual affair. Perhaps next year I won’t be holed up as I am in a women’s shelter, where the beasts seem to be in greater numbers than anywhere else on the globe. Peace is demanded if I am ever to find rest tonight. I shall try the ventilation shafts. There, at least, the most infernal creatures are mere rats.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Earth Year: 2007
Solar Month: Januarium
Space Day: 3rd Day on Unidentified Planet - Continued
Location: Vagoona Palace (Planet Unknown)
Resume Computer Record of Double Captain Jack “Eddie” Longbow:
I’d almost think this Xelba Queen of the Serpents was a pretty fine gal except for the totally obvious fact that she wants me and my crew completely dead.
We didn’t know what to expect when the half-nude space slaves forced us in front of the flower-covered arch doors of the palace. They didn’t have to use their looks to get us that far, they just aimed their waist-spears at our backs. If you’d asked me one minute before we entered that giant pink door, dollars to donuts I’d have said they wanted to hack us up like three slices of meaty Man pie. If you’d asked me one minute after we entered, my answer would be so different than that one. This is because girls are very unpredictable and I have learned this because I have known a lot of them and not all of them were naked aliens.
My answer would probably be “they wanted to kill us with too much sex.” The reason that would probably be my answer is because that was what they actually wanted to do at us, literally. Now I bet what you’re thinking if you’re listening to this recording that I am making into my nano-technology Tribe tattoos is “Double Captain Longbow, wouldn’t it be groovy to die from having sex with girls?” The answer is No, Stupid, because you’re still dead from it and nobody wants to die, Stupid.
To continue: Strange noises came from within the giant chamber. Noises so strange that they made us wonder what they were, as they were exceptionally weird and not at all normal noises.
“Aye go’ ah bah feelin’ aboot this Dooble Cap’n,” garbled Leftenant John Connery.
“Jesus Christ, I cannot get over how horrible and stupid your accent is,” I said.
Navigastronomer Kenny Rogers piped up, “You guys see that?”
The pink mist which has surrounded the very air we breath since landing was being collected from giant fans atop the palace and pumped in concentration through giant veiny tubes that ran down the open-holed oval tower and down underneath the palace. What could that lead to? I wondered. But wonder I couldn’t because at that moment the hot alien soldier ladies pushed open the giant doors of the palace.
Inside the giant throne room cheered thousands of girls who were even more naked than the half-naked soldiers. None of them noticed us enter because they were all gazing skyward at the Queen, saddled upon and riding an enormous red Hoverdragon, snapping and baying in celebration above the crowd of shrieking dumb girls.
“Look men! That must be Xelba.”
“Aye tho’ those creatoors were excteent!” slopped Connery’s mouth.
I let him know that my tribe doesn’t believe any animals are truly extinct, even Hoverdragons. But right then, I wish I believed in extinction. I really did.
The Hoverdragon turned to our direction and stopped bucking. The crowd hushed. Xelba, a tall woman who bore a striking resemblance to the Lynda Carter of ancient Earth records, walked in her red, high-heeled, thigh-high boots along the spine of the stilly levitating dragon, coming to a stop atop its head. Her eyes turned our hearts to jelly and our guts to stone. The crowd of barefoot bare chested nymphs followed the direction that her eyeballs were pointing at.
“Ladies and girls. Feast your eyes on our savior…”
“Is that spicy peach talking about us, Longbow?” asked Kenny Rogers.
The dragon riding Amazon answered for me.
“Eddie Longbow returns! Just in time… to die!!”
“Uh oh,” all three of us said at exactly the same time. If you had been there you would have laughed, because we all said it at literally the same time.
“That broad’s nut is cracked,” Rogers said it for us.
Xelba quieted the crowd.
“Longbow! Rogers! Connery!”
“Cap’n, how des sheh knoo oor nehms?”
“Learn isostandardized English like the rest of us, Connery,” I snapped, “Oh, and I have no idea. Let’s hope we live long enough to find out. What do you want from us?”
“I know what I’ve got for them,” cracked Rogers wisely.
“Precisely right, Mr. Rogers! You are all three going to perish… by making it with our planet’s womenfolk until you expire!”
The crowd literally went nuts. They started hollering like Arabs and grabbing their boobies and even squishing them against other ladies’ boobies. It was a real riot, but we knew we were in a fine mess this time.
“Uh oh!” we said but not quite at the same time so it wasn’t hilarious like last time. We’ll get it right next time. If there is a next time.
HALT RECORDING…
It is all I can do to crack open my bloodshot eyes and continue work on the Zip disks. Several nights ago, frightened primitives discovered me in a “Recreational Vehicle”, silently and peacefully forging ahead with my work. They shrieked in their bizarre subaltern vernacular that I was a brigand of the lowest sort. Naturally, I had to beat a hasty retreat. I turned the keys of the sleeping behemoth and plowed my way through the fences of the “Park”. More than once in the past nights I have had to use my cunning to prevent encounters with the constabulary and their devil hounds. Rest stops have indeed provided my safest refuge. Washroom stalls have afforded the bare modicum of peace necessary for translating these ancient documents. The most preferable of this genus is the stall with a waist-eye orbital opening, fashioned, no-doubt, by some wise paranoiac for the sake of constant vigilance whilst enthroned on porcelain. Yet even as I found security in this device, still was I cursed with an unspeakable oddity. Last night my work was interrupted when an obsidian limb, like an autocthonous tentacle, pushed its way through the hole. The hushed and hurried imprecation for me to touch the organ was cause enough even for an academic of my iron nerve to flee with a fright. I remain, as always,
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Lunar Day: 14th Nesting
Dear Me,
Okay okay. Okay. It’s my 16th Quickening and I haven’t seen any of my stupid friends yet. I’m waiting backstage ‘cuz I’m gonna blow their stupid minds when I come out singing my new song that my awesome Producer just made super good. Daddy’s weird work friends are out there. At least Majordomo Xi~Jx is keeping an eye on me, some of Daddy’s employees look at me with their gross bug eyes and I hate it. Gotta remember the lyrics to my song. “Can’t touch this greasy/ Get your antennae off my yeasty/ No playin’/ No sprayin’/ No squirtin’ eggs out my…” Can’t remember. I wrote it on my blood sponge. I can’t read it. Freak-ing ou-t. Gotta ask my hot producer what it says and go out on stage. And blow their freak-ing minnnnnds!
* * *
Yesssss. They loved it! It got interrupted a couple times by idiot Exploder bugs outside. There’s a whole crowd of poor people yelling outside of the palace. Daddy keeps making the Waxer drones build the mucus walls higher so we can’t hear them. I can’t understand them because I don’t speak their ugly-face foreigner clicking ‘cuz in my kingdom you speak Gamma or you don’t work. Which is why you’re all poor you ugly idiots.
A bunch of Exploders blew themselves up on the mucus walls. Like acid blood even works anymore. We figured that trick out after you killed Grandpa you psycho immigrants. GUESS WHO’S STILL IN CHARGE?? Your blood smells like poo.
Song went awesome ‘cuz I’m a star. Daddy had the producer taken away by Backwalkers in the middle of my song, though. I’m over him. Time for my banquet!
Ugh. I’m not over him. I miss Mom.
* * *
Okay dinner was super good. Best Quickening EVER!! It was weird that Daddy chose my ex-Producer to be the main course. Took me a while to recognize him ‘cuz everyone was lapping him up with their spit spoons. He tasted awesome with my peppernipple jelly, I made everyone try it but then my nipples hurt so I started yelling at them. I took my Producer’s eyes out so I can make a necklace that will always remind me of how delicious he was, as dinner and as my Producer. He had pretty eyes. Most of them. Like a dozen of them are pretty but I like them all even if some were dead and crusty before he got made into dinner. I’m gonna take the rest of him home with me. EVERYONE STOP EATING THE MAIN COURSE. Boyfriend in a doggie bag. Ok BYE!!
I very nearly left my mortal soul in the Milwaukee public library, were it not for my supernaturally hasty retreat. That, however, is a story for another time. It is good enough, for now, that I have found residence in humble yet haunted environs. It would seem some nomadic civilization built and subsequently abandoned dozens of fully functioning recreational vehicles, differentiated subtly as they are by a nomenclature consisting of genera “Winnebago”, “American Eagle”, and the ominously named “Sunseeker”. I assume no life exists here as I have not looked. One such structure now serves as my home-away-from-library. Make no mistake, however. “Home” seems an unfit word for such an unholy and otherworldly “park” such as this. I can fairly smell the sweet, sugary blood of past residents as if their very laboured, fever-dream breathing haunted my own pancreatic nightmares. In the middle of the night, it is almost as if there were… voices. I pray whatever Red State Bedouin that once resided in these electrified caravans make no haste to return to their abandoned settlement. I pray for that as I do for my very life.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
CURTAIN UP:
CAFETERIA - MORNING
An exhausted SKYLER SCHULTZ sits at a round dining table mid-stage atop a stool that is much too large for a 12-year-old. His tie is already loosened, and the collar of his shirt open. He sits across from the conspicuously bespectacled DYLAN MEYER, who is wearing dress shoes, khakis, a wool sweater-vest, and tie. He too is about 12 years old, bearded, with a red, receding hairline. Dylan has a sensible bowl of oatmeal and fruit in front of him, whereas Skyler only has coffee. The cafeteria buzzes with the activity of hung over college students.*
(*Note to Director: This is coming in late because I am gee-dee hung the eff over. Laying on one of those floaty beds in a pool. I’m leaving this as a voicemail so get that typist girl to take this all down, thanks babe.**)
(**Note to Typist: Hey, thanks for doing this again. I think it went really great last time. If we had a last time. Man, I hope you’re the same typist. If not, go get the old one. You know what? I think I already don’t like you very much, new-typist-lady. Moving on.)
Skyler begins the scene swallowing a pill with a sip of coffee.
DYLAN
Just coffee again, eh?
SKYLER
Only way to start the day.
DYLAN
You look like you’re starting day three. What is that you’re taking?
SKYLER
Just vitamins. I think I’m getting taller.
DYLAN
Dexedrine is a vitamin now, huh.*
(*Note to Typist: I’ll have what he’s having, am I right, ladies? No.. Not you ladies… one sec**)
(**Note to Typist: Sorry about that. Some fat old broads thought I was talking to them. Apparently they didn’t see the phone I AM TALKING INTO RIGHT NOW. YES CHERYL, I’M TALKING TO MY PHONE AGAIN, NOT YOU. Moving on.)
SKYLER
It’s not Dexedrine. Why, you holding? That’s a joke, Dylan.
DYLAN
Coffee and speed for breakfast, Mountain Dew: Code Red* and Dilaudid for dinner. You’ll stunt your growth.
(*Note to Self: Oh man. Get some Mountain Dew: Code Red on the way home. Maybe they have some in the vending machine here. BRB.**)
(**Note to Self: No. Do they even make that stuff anymore? I keep thinking about it, but I haven’t had it in like a decade. Remember to Ask Jeeves, and actually remember this time. Why did I make this a note to myself? To remember to remember? Mom was right about me. I am talking very loudly.***)
(***Note to [New] Typist****: Don’t you dare think about typing these personal notes out. Everyone can read them. I will slit you ear to ear if you keep shitting the bed on this, you hear me? I swear to god, even Cheryl isn’t this fat and stupid.)
(****Note to [Old] Typist: Man I hope it’s still you typing this up and not some new lady. If it is a new lady, I want you to know that I am giving her an earful about how much better you were. I never even knew your name, yet we were a great team. We are a great team? If you’re still typing, whisper “Cheryl’s a stupid cow and she’s hogging the water weights”…. wait, that wouldn’t work. Moving on.)
SKYLER
How are things in the Delta household?
DYLAN
So-so. A couple of breakthroughs on the tougher guys. Yours? How about that case with the Blackfrican?
SKYLER
Kyle.
DYLAN
Right, the gay homosexual.
SKYLER
Not anymore. I’ll tell you what, Dylan. Sometimes I feel like we’re pedalling backwards, trying to cure the world from inside of these frat houses. But sometimes… I think we do some good.
DYLAN
I take it Kyle is a success story?
SKYLER
Some basic hypnotherapy, textbook stuff. I put him under for 5 minutes, and bam, I had my answer.
DYLAN
5 minutes convinced you he wasn’t a gay homosexual? Or did you convince him? That’s dangerous territory, my friend.
SKYLER
Have you ever heard of a gay homosexual Blackfrican?
DYLAN
We cannot just discount the medical or emotional possibility, and even if—
SKYLER
He got teabagged.
DYLAN
What?
SKYLER
That’s it. All of this pressure on his subconscious was from a mere dusting of gay panic. Now, how we will proceed regarding his emotional reaction to the gay homosexuals is another matter.
DYLAN
No, I mean, what is teabagging?
SKYLER
We’ll have to put a pin in that.*
(*Note to Typist: Because the aqua aerobics class won’t stop splashing and I can’t hear myself think out loud. Why do the stupid ones always come to the pool at the WYMCA? Oh crap—**)
(**Note to Typist: Ummm… That dumb bitch Cheryl “accidentally” knocked my phone into the pool. Maybe I will “accidentally” let the air out of the tires on her Rascal. She can’t hear me.***)
(***Note to Self: Hey dumbass. Cheryl can’t hear you because you’re typing now. You’re literally typing this right now. Maybe you should leave a voicemail with the Typist to let her know you’re typing the rest of it up yourself. Where are these notes even going anymore? I’m scared and maybe excited.****)
(****Voicemail to Director: Hey yeah, it’s me. I don’t have the typist’s number because a sea cow dropped my phone. I grabbed the sea cow’s phone. Not returning it. I also grabbed someone’s laptop from the common room and came back to the pool. It’s on its own little floatie just like me. Kind of cute. Moving on.)
Skyler pops another pill.
DYLAN
So… You haven’t come in for a while.
SKYLER
I’ve been busy. I don’t need constant attention from my esteemed colleagues.
DYLAN
“Doctor, heal thyself”, eh? Skyler, as a friend, I think we still have a lot of work to do. And I’m not sure I trust you to self-medicate.
SKYLER
As a friend, I’d appreciate it if you dialed back on the condescension. I’ve been busy. That’s the end of it.
DYLAN
You know that’s not fair.
SKYLER
Do you have a problem with my practice?
DYLAN
This has nothing to do with your method. We’re talking about you. I believe it is in the interest of your health to resume our sessions. You say we might be able to help people. Then let me help you.
Skyler is getting heated, and stands from his chair to go. Just as he is about to make a forceful departing remark, KYLE enters. He is energetic.
KYLE
Oh, hey Skyler!
SKYLER
Kyle. You look lively today.
KYLE
Thanks to you, Doc.
SKYLER
Kyle, I’d like you to meet my friend and colleague, Dylan Meyer. He’s the Junior Therapist over at Delta.
KYLE
Right on. Nice to meet you, other little dude.
SKYLER
I trust everything is going well?
KYLE
Great. Listen, I gotta go to squash practice. Are we still supposed to meet after… you know?
SKYLER
My office is always open.
KYLE
Say Doc, I got a question real quick. How did you know I wasn’t… a gay homosexual?
DYLAN
Mr. Schultz doesn’t believe there can be a Blackfrican gay homosexual.
(*Note to Director: If the scene needs a little more action, have Kyle dribbling a basketball the whole time. Dylan is so impressed with his skill that he begins to sneeze rapidly and uncontrollably. If you think this is a good idea, whisper “Cheryl’s a stupid cow and she looks like a diabetic Jetson on her fat person scooter.” Moving on.)
SKYLER
Oh, it’s not that. Think about this, Kyle. Where is your bedroom?
KYLE
The second floor.
SKYLER
And what is immediately below your room, on the first floor?
KYLE
Your office. Wait… that means… you’ve heard me—
SKYLER
Tearing up some serious ass, yes. Those hoes be walkin’ straight stupid, yo. A gay homosexual would never get that crazy on the puss-wagon.* It was just a matter of putting your mind at ease.
(*Note to Self: Unrelated, but I am starting to get something of a chubby right now. Not good. There are children in this pool. Why does the WYMCA even let kids in here? It’s full of poor people.** Moving on.)
KYLE
Man, you little shrinks know what you’re doing. I gotta run. I’ll see you at the dance.
SKYLER
The dance?
KYLE
Yeah. I decided to go. Thanks to you.
(**Note to Self: I’m trying to hide it in the floatie bed but it feels good. This is going to be trouble. I need to flip around just a little bit and my shorts will hide it in the air pocket bulge thing.***)
Kyle hurries offstage. Dylan turns to Skyler, who is deep in thought. After a moment, he speaks.
SKYLER
I’ll come in, Dylan. I’ll come in.
DROP CURTAIN.
(***Note to Everyone: That did not work at all. Laptop fell in the water. Everyone could see my junk. Not coming back to this dump anymore. So guys, I could really use a place to crash. Will go halvies on the Pay-Per-View if we stick to boxing and porn. Alright, back to work. Loves yous guys. Night.)
Speaking as an anthropologist, it will be fascinating to see what happens the day this “Milwaukee” comes into contact with civilization. As it happens, my presence is not as admired here in the public library as it once was in my old halls of university research. I was obliged to let the tribal authorities here believe that I had voluntarily left, but, in need of space for my work and access to vending machine comestibles, I have carved out a small habitat for myself in the attic. The translation of this installment of the “Fraternity Therapist” was quick in coming due to the rations of “Red Bull” that I have a small brown child secret away into the men’s room air ducts on the uppermost floor. All is going according to plan. Now you, my dear reader, may delight as much as I in the mysteries of the diminutive psychotherapist.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Resume Computer Record of Double Captain Jack “Eddie” Longbow:
Earth Year: 2007
Solar Month: Januarium
Space Day: 2nd Day on Unidentified Planet
Location: Palace Holding Cell
It has been one Earth day since we were abducted by these Amazonian savages. It’s a real good thing these chicks don’t understand BioTek, otherwise I wouldn’t have access to the recording devices hidden within my epidural earrings. They have assumed my tattoos are simply a part of my tribal Indian heritage, because, like most dumb girls, they don’t understand the power of tattoos.
For the record: We crashed my rocket, the Lucifer, on a alien planet while in Super-Sleep due to the unexpected death of our Landing Chief, Mrs. Deb. While scouting around for a supplies and a proper burial place for my girlfriend (that would be Mrs. Deb), we were ambushed by a platoon of primitively armed space girls. My crew was captured, but the ladies were most of all interested in Leftenant John Connery, Navigastronomer Kenny Rogers, and myself. It is a mystery that we could understand one another’s language at all, because this planet does not seem at all like it is a member of the Interstellar Alliance at all. Perhaps the strange pink mist that covers the great outdoors is translating for us. Who knows? What’s for sure is that they knew all about me, Double Captain Jack “Eddie” Longbow.
The women seemed confused by our manly crew, especially the slave class girls. Also, the slave class are not allowed to wear clothes on this planet. It’s what one-time earth vernacular would have described as “boss.”
The Amazonian crew spoke little after capturing us, but they said a million with their weapons, which were spears protruding out from their belts. Threatening us with these waist-spears, they forced us back with them to their palace. They tore our shirts off, leaving no symbols of my authority as Double Captain save my heaving pecs and gleaming ‘ceps. We had to wade through warm, murky swamps without our boots on, while they rode their strange, long-necked quadrupeds, apparently called “Zorses.” Their exotic high-heeled boots never got stained by the hazy, sweet smelling moss of the swamp.
“I think the tall one likes me,” said Rogers.
“You want to get us killed, you stupid moron?” I absconded at that idiot Rogers.
“Dooble Cap’n, the Navigastronomer may have a pointe. These girls seem rather friendly, as far as abductors go,” said the Leftenant in his horrible New Scottish brogue.
I could see both of my men were quite taken with a few of our more coquettish captors, flapping their buttery eyelids at each other when “Quiet, aliens!” snapped the lead Amazon. Then she looked at me and smiled. It made me angry but it also made me horny. Must be all this pink mist playing head games with my head brain.
Anyways, they brought us to the giant pink palace. It reached up into the stars like an oval tower, conspicuously missing a large hole in the center. A bizarre architectural choice. It’s either primitive or exceptionally advanced. I can tell you, just looking at it, my Feelings went totally nuts. The swampland that we had walked through was evidently an enormous, humid moat surrounding the tight metropolitan area constructed around the flesh-colored eyesore of a tower.
“I want to know what we’re in for. Keep a look out, boys,” I instructed at Rogers and Connery.
“Take them to Xelba, Queen of Serpents!” said the lead Amazon, just before I grabbed her and made out with her, just before the others grabbed us and carried us into a tunnel built under the city that went into the palace. Some of them made out with me against my will. We’re in our cells now, waiting to see this “Xelba.” If she tries to make out with me I’m going to give her the Tomahawk Chop.
HALT RECORDING…
Inquiring into the further meaning and context of the “Longbow’s Lament” has proven exceptionally difficult. I believe it to be a work of fiction, but this is likely a faith born from a fear of its possible truth. As I can trust no one since being entrusted with the zip disks of an inscrutably alien civilization, I am left something of an academic refugee, having few other resources or specialists with which I may share my research. I have, therefore, made something of a domicile out of a community library in the exotic population center known by its natives as “Milwaukee.” My position with the heads of the library tribe is contentious at best. The more intensely I have studied them, the more intensely the disks have cursed me with a strangely sulphuric smell. I have attempted, not always in vain, to mark the fountains as my personal grooming stations. The minions of hierarchy here in the “Milwaukee” depository seem less than pleased with this, but their primitive minds have yet to cast their inward eyes to violence.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Lunar Day: 10th Nesting
Dear Me,
Today’s the big day! I mean, not my 16th Quickening (but you already know that, don’t you Me! LOL). I get to meet my producer just after I get back from the Shedding swamp. He says he’s got some pretty chill background wailings already laid down on the wax cylinders. I want a full orchestra for like, that big sound, you know? This isn’t like chirping in the mucus chamber. This is big time.
I haven’t seen my shiner drone in 2 whole nestings. I asked Majordomo Xi~Jx about him, but he just dropped to his back belly and scooted out of my antechamber. I think his mandible was clicking “traitor traitor” over and over in Kur, but I only speak Gamma. I don’t know what that means. Maybe I’ll take Kur next semester.
BRB public address time. Lame.
* * *
Is there anything more grosser than a drone? Seriously people. Those things are loud, obnoxious, totally stupid, and lame. They kept chanting something in Drone but I don’t know what you stupids are saying I SPEAK GAMMA LIKE A REAL ARTHROPOD. If you want to drone in my hive, learn my click pattern, that’s all I’m saying okay?
So yeah I finally made the speech that Daddy and the Majordomo wanted me to give to those weirdos. I don’t think it helped. The parapet heat cannons kept going off whenever they crossed a line. Like, guys, stop crossing that line if you don’t want to get roasted alive, right? You’re not going to touch me. This palace is my house and I can say anything I want from it.
I probably shouldn’t have been so mean to them. But they’re soooo stuuupid. And poooor. UGH. I miss Mom.
* * *
OMG. Record producer. Super hot. Date for the Quickening? If shiner drone doesn’t call me back, definitely. That’s all for now. (seriously i’ll tell Me more later!! byeee!)
Had there remained a population besides myself in this backwards town, you surely would have read of this phenomenon in your own mundane periodicals. The haunting, chthonic sounds which I have previously described to you have stopped as mysteriously as they had begun. The townspeople, however, show no willingness to return to their own soil. The solitude of a ghost town is at once freeing in the liberties it affords to unencumbered research and terrifying in its unearthly silence. Not even the birds sing, nor do crickets play in the drying grass. Most alarming, however, is the almost imperceptible gradation in the ground. When walking through these emptied alleys I’ve noticed only the slightest depression of the fundament, all in the direction favoring the town center. To gain a better vantage I hiked a nearby hillock only to discover… since the appearance of that horrible sound, the center of the village had sunken in a conical shape at least one hundred feet beneath where it once held fast. I cannot but feel that the superstitious townspeople were correct in fleeing.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
CURTAIN UP:
SKYLER’S OFFICE
KYLE, an athletic Brother*, sits back in a bean bag chair where 12-year-old SKYLER SCHULTZ has pulled his desk to the wall. Skyler is fishing around the drawers of his desk, while Kyle fidgets with a Rubik’s Cube.
(*Note to DIRECTOR: I always read my own writing out loud, and I wrote the last scene in a coffee shop.** When I described Kyle as “Blackfrican” I got yelled at by a nice, if eavesdrop-y stranger there. I knew right then I had to Ask Jeeves about this, and I found out you can call “them” Brother as long as you’re nice about it. I wonder if you have to capitalize it. If I said “Bro” would that be too much “their” thing?)
(**Note to DIRECTOR: Okay it wasn’t a coffee shop. It was a bar.***)
(***Note to DIRECTOR: It is a bar. I’m drunk.**** Moving on—)
(****Note to SELF: You. Are. Drunk. Don’t tell the Director. Or the bartender. Maybe call Mom, though. Moving on.)
KYLE
You moved that whole desk yourself. We gotta get you on a wrestling team.
SKYLER
Ha. My school days are over. I leave the fun stuff to you.
KYLE
We’ll see, little dude. We’ll see. What are you looking for?
SKYLER
I’m trying to find the proper sedative. As I told you last time, I intend to put you into a deep hypnotic state, so that I may— using the power of relaxed suggestion— discover the precise moment that has driven you to homosexual panic.
KYLE
It’s not panic, Skyler. I’m just… a gay homosexual.
SKYLER
Indulge me. Don’t you think I know what I’m doing?
Skyler thrusts a finger at a degree on the wall bestowed on him by Miskatonic Preparatory Grammar School.
KYLE
I… guess.
SKYLER
What you need more than anything right now is to trust somebody. Trust me, Kyle.
KYLE
Alright.
SKYLER
Looks like I’ve left my supplies in the medicine cabinet in the Hall bathroom. Would you hand me that stool? I still can’t reach.
Kyle grabs a small stepping stool, getting up to hand it to Skyler and patting him on the back.
KYLE
You’ve been growing up quick. Pretty soon you’ll be able to reach your own painkillers.
SKYLER
I’ll be just a moment. Help yourself to the adult DVDs, magazines, candy*, what have you.
(*Note to SELF: Get Pretzel M&Ms on the drive home.**)
(**Note to DIRECTOR: I drive a Segway. You just try getting a DUI in one of those. Practically impossible.)
Skyler exits. Kyle sets the Rubik’s cube down on the desk and begins looking around the room. He steps in front of Skyler’s large bookshelf, impressed with the heterodoxy* of the selections therein.
(*Note to SELF: Whoa. When did I start writing like that? “Heterodoxy of the selections therein”? I thought heterodoxies were off-brand Oreos. I need to drink more if that’s what I write with a couple Appletinis in me. I’m a genius.**)
(**Note to SELF: A guy disagrees with me. He’s yelling that I suck. He’s Asian.***)
(***Note to SELF: Okay, I probably need to leave.****)
(****Note to DIRECTOR: And I’m back. Riding the Segway home. Recording the rest as a voicemail so maybe you can get a typist girl to put down my words.*****)
(*****Note to TYPIST GIRL: I can be very easy or very difficult to work with. Don’t trifle with me. I make room for important people, not typists. Are you called typists anymore? I think we got off on the wrong foot… which is a bad idea on a Segway, am I right, girl? I didn’t get the Pretzel M&Ms. I forgot and got one of those hot dogs wrapped in bacon outside of the “coffee shop”. Ugh. I’m fat. Moving on.)
Kyle pulls a book down from the wall. He fans through it with his thumb. A picture falls out from amidst the leaves and falls to the floor. Kyle picks it up and looks.
KYLE
Poor kid. He must really miss him.
And replaces the photograph from where it came, putting the book back just as Skyler enters the room.
SKYLER
Alright, remember. Trust. That’s what matters. Take this.
Skyler hands Kyle a pill and a can of Mountain Dew: Code Red.
KYLE
Where should I sit?
SKYLER
Lay back on the bean bag chair, that’s fine.
Kyle lays back in the beanbag. Skyler pulls up a Hippity Hop Bouncing Ball with a handle out from behind his bed and sits on it in front of Kyle, rocking gently back and forth. Kyle takes a beat, then swallows the pill and chugs the entire can of Mountain Dew: Code Red behind it.
SKYLER
The effects will set in momentarily. Nothing to worry about. Just close your eyelids, and count backwards from one hundred slowly.
Kyle calms himself, breathes in, and has an enormous soda burp, which causes Skyler to laugh so hard he falls off the ball and cackles uncontrollably on the stage for a full two minutes, rolling on his back and clutching his tiny belly.*
(*Note to DIRECTOR: Do not trifle with me on this. I know exactly what I’m doing.**)
(**Note to TYPIST GIRL: Make sure that’s written out really menacingly. See how I used “trifle” with him like I did with you? Thanks. You are so awesome.)
Skyler regains his composure and sees that Kyle has drifted into a suggestible state.
SKYLER
Kyle. Listen to me closely. We are going to go back. We are going… to go back…*
CURTAIN DROP.
(*Note to TYPIST GIRL: And I’m going to “go back” to the liquor store and get some Pretzel M&Ms. Even after the bacon dog. Really should have been a note to myself. Ugh. I’m fat.)
The sound is back. I have boarded up the windows and doors and all other conceivable modes of entrance. Yet, I fear it is not enough. Much of the town has decided it is preferable to redistribute themselves as a group within the city than to dwell in their ancestral digs. That the noise could affright the locals to such a degree provides me, an outsider, with no small amount of anxiety. Thanks be to the shadowy figure for providing me with such occupying industry as the translation of these mysterious but darkly delightful pieces. I pray you find even more meaning in their contents than I. The work goes on, if only to preserve my modicum of sanity…
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
Resume Computer Record of Double Captain Jack “Eddie” Longbow:
Earth Year: 2007
Solar Month: Januarium
Space Day: Undetermined
Location: Crash Site of the Lucifer
I can’t believe it. We crashed again. Can’t blame the Navigastronomer this time, either.
The ship’s pretty banged up. Not sure if we’ll ever get ole Lucifer to fly again, what with two crashes in a row and all. Worst of all, though, is I lost my steady girlfriend, Mrs. Deb, in the crash. She was supposed to wake up and guide us into orbit, but we crashed instead. I miss her. The way she used to prance around without her space boots on. Her naked feet dancing and dangling near me.
As Double Captain it is my duty to administer her Fleet Rites according to the funeral by-laws of 2002. I don’t like this red tape anymore than the rest of my crew, but rules are rules, and I’d do anything for Mrs. Deb. Alive Deb or dead Deb. She’s my Deb.
I’ve sent a reconnaissance crew headed by Leftenant John Connery to determine a suitable location that we can make her buried in. I was going to have it headed by Evan, but Evan and I haven’t been friends ever since Rylgar-8 because he kept being stupid and so I wouldn’t let him run anything. “Let Evan get his own rocket if he wants to be in charge all the time,” I thought.
Hopefully there are no Zombinoid or Nosferquine qualities to the soil here. Boy, I don’t want to go through that ever again. The pink mist in the atmosphere worries me.
Navigastronomer Kenny Rogers and I headed down into the airlock chambers of Lucifer’s Sub-Subs to find out what landed us in this dump. I followed behind Rogers, commenting yet again on regulation hair laws in the Fleet.
“You look like a girl with that long hair, Rogers,” I absconded at him.
“Uh, it must have grown during Super-Sleep, boss.”
“Sure it did. You know you’re a real gambler sometimes,” I chuckled at him.
We went down into the dusty, dark air chambers of the Sub-Subs. Normally this area is kept disarmingly sterile, and clean to the ground, but dust and broken lighting lent it an otherworldly air, like a basement haunted by who knows what.
“I got a bad feeling about this,” said Rogers. I couldn’t disagree.
The instincts in my Indian blood kicked in. I could tell there was something alive down here. And it was coming right for us.
“Watch out Rogers. I’ve got the Feelings again,” I warned.
“Rylgar 8 was pretty rough going. Maybe their Sun Lobsters locked onto our bulkheads.”
“Pray that’s not the case.”
We treaded forward. Stomp, stomp. A noise.
“What was that?” said Rogers, like a stupid moron.
“Shhh,” I absconded at him.
Stomp, stomp. The same noise. Like little hooves. A lot of them. I signaled to Rogers to turn off the Nitro Lamp and to turn on his Infra-Violet filter instead.
We walked forward in the Infra-Violet darkness. There’s really nothing like it. But the Feelings weren’t going away. Something was following us.
Stomp, stomp. Tap tap.
I thought I saw a motion so I looked up at the rafters—
Wham-O! It came down right on Kenny’s helmet!
“Duck!” I said, “I’ll blast it!”
“No need, D-Cap. It’s just ZeeZee.”
ZeeZee. She did it again.
“You’re no coward, Kenny Rogers.”
Since we couldn’t find any structural damage down below, we went back to the bridge. Kenny held his pet Sparma, an eight-inch heighth deer-like creature with seven legs, limited telepathy, and a natural ability to see Infra-Violet. Sure she was cute, but I didn’t like having her meddling onboard my ship. Still, if she kept the best dang Navigastronmer in the galaxy happy, she was fine by me.
“Say Longbow, why didn’t you just send out the emergency signal when you got out of Super-Sleep?” Kenny asked.
“Rogers, that emergency signal goes straight to Peace Shuttle One. A Double Captain doesn’t go crying to the President of the Interstellar Alliance every time he has a bad nap.”
When we had nearly reached the bridge, I tried hailing Connery on my communicator earring to no avail. I wanted to check on the status of the surrounding landscape as well as Deb’s burial site before thinking about what move to make would be the best one to make next. “Oh well,” I thought, “I’ll be seeing him soon.”
Just as I thought that thought, the doors to the bridge opened, and there he was, along with some very unwelcome guests.
“Eddie Longbow, I presume…” Uh oh.
HALT RECORDING…
Remarkable. No sooner am I cautioned by the palpable strangeness of this backwards villa which I have made my temporary residence than I am swept up again into the study of the Zip disks. It is as if the wonders of their contents have some sway over my subconscious. All is certainly explained by the otherwordly quality of the prose discovered therein. The “Longbow’s Lament”, as you can see, is either the rigorous journal of a singularly sensitive “Double Captain” from a dimension far off from our current realm of perception, or is rather an inimitable work of fiction from some people’s most expert and mature tall-tale-teller. Perhaps the address to “Weird Space Tales Quarterly” in some duchy called “St. Louis” on the back of the digitized notebook suggests that “Longbow’s Lament” was intended for publication in a compendium of this people’s greatest, most advanced works.
My work advances every hour, dear companion.
Yours ever,
Dr. Mildred Kines, Ph.D.
