"But really, Bartholomew" laughed Lady Zinnia with her characteristic
throaty chuckle, "You can't be serious! Lady Thanninger, with that
dashing young... oh, no, it can't be. He's simply too common
for someone of her station!"Bartholomew let flee a chuckle only slightly less characteristic of him, but somewhat characteristic, nevertheless. "It seems everyone is indeed surprised by her unusual choice," he intoned, while staring into the eyes in the picture in the frame on the nearby finely-crafted table. So blue, he thought. They reminded him of summers at Lake Winnepesaukee, so many years previous. Could it have been twenty years? Was Lady Thanninger really that old? Why would such an old love betray him in this way? Wherefore?
"To hell with her!," he bellowed, the hair on his chest rising and falling, as his chest rose and fell in rhythm with his heavy breathing. "I'll have you, Rolonda!"
Lady Zinnia froze at the bold daring that suddenly took hold of the hulking Bartholomew. To call her by her Christian name! Brute!
But still she found herself hurled into a universe whose sole inhabitants were named Lust and Desire. Hello, Lust. Hello, Desire. Meet Rolonda Zinnia, former debutante extraordinaire, currently your prisoner. As his greedy tongue found its way along her delicate porcelain cheek, she could only surrender to her clever captor. "Take me," she cried. "I am yours for life. And there's no chance of parole."
Monique didn't quite realize the station that she now possessed. All she could think about was the man she left behind. The french painter, Philip. The man that took her breath away every time he cast his blue eyes upon her. The arranged marriage would never keep her from Philip.
She quietly stole from the marriage bed and walked to the open veranda doors. The blue horizon, the cool carribean breeze and the smell of the sea reminded her of the times she spent on the French Riveria. What a fantasy world it had been waking up in Philip's strong arms. How they made her feel safe, and how they pulled the life from her every time they came together. Their love was something that took her breath away. How she longed to see him. To feel him. To smell his manly scent.
She closed her eyes and let the memories carry her to the place she longed to be. How was she ever to tell Philip that she was someone else's wife. A tear trickled down the lovely ivory skin of her face!
She was suddenly taken from her dream by the hand of her betrothed. She couldn't bear to look at the man she had just spent the night with. Every time he touched her in the night she wanted no one but Philip and she almost called out his name as the fullness of life sprung from inside her. She knew she must live with this decision, however her heart gave into a love that was now forbidden.
He reached just inside the door and flipped the light switch to the living room. A cold chill ran down his spine as he realized the house had been totally ripped apart. Not one single thing seemed to be where he had left it earlier in the day when he had jumped in his car and headed down to the police station to answer some more questions about the last time he saw Renee alive.
The author comments, "From the sci-fi novel - Lost in Hooplaville! For more info on Hooplaville, email me."
I stumbled into my office to catch a couple hours of shut eye before
the clients started banging the door down. The landlady'd padlocked my
flat so I couldn't flop there, and if my gecko died why it'd be on her
conscience. I strode across the wood floor and had taken off my coat
when I noticed something amiss. The radio was on as usual but the
room was redolent of something besides its usual bouquet of too many
cigarettes, bad coffee and cheap booze. It was perfume--White Linen if
I wasn't mistaken. There was a dame by my credenza, mixing drinks in
the dark. The red neon sign with two burned out letters flashed
outside the fire-escape window exit as the tattered curtains flared in
the stale mission-district breeze. I doffed my snap brim fedora and
tossed it onto the coat tree as the skirt poured me a couple of
fingers of Cuervo into a jelly glass. "Warm Beer and Cold Women"
played out over the static from the old deco style 16-transistor on
the side table. A cat howled in the alley and a cracked plaster jesus
got a hotfoot from the radiator. I'd spent the rest of the 5 big ones
some bird name of Lola had coughed up to skip trace the thug who'd
pulled a caper with her meal ticket. Some two-bit wage ape named Earl
who thought he could buy a shortcut out of the trailer park by running
some scam but fell in with the wrong crowd. Turned out he was
dirt-napping so she never came through with other half. Anyway I was
a day late and a dollar short, and this tomato looked plenty flush,
judging from the ice on her ring finger and the wad of Ben Franks
she casually tossed on my wormeaten desk.
"Whattya want?"
"Whattya got?"
"Who's askin?"
"Who's tellin?"
"Stop me if you've heard this one..."
"Aw you don't look like such a chump..."
"The hell're we talkin about?"
"Thought you knew..."
"Me? What's your dodge?"
"Back up a second there." A tear in her eye. My head reeled. The blower jingled. I hit the mouthpiece with the heel of my hand and caught it by the earpiece as it catapulted above the desk.
"Talk to me." Evenly, I coolly stared levelly at my guest. Her jelly glass and my forehead began to sweat.
"Hey Abe you slaphappy old windbag, it's me, Tommy McSmith from the 16th. I'm at Nates. Can't talk long but you should expect some company. Nice broad, real pipefitter if you catch my meaning..." I glanced over as she sat down on the couch and crossed her long silk-clad gams with a soft rustle. She had party hats in her sweater and I was getting lumber in my pants. "...she's on the up and up and'll pay you in real scratch, and she's loaded. She wants to keep the whole thing out of the scandal rags and asked if I knew a private dick so I sent her your way. Oh shit, here comes the Sarge, me and Hambone have to finish our tour." He hung up and I cradled the blower. McSmith was a 23-year man on the force and a damn fine patrolman.
I looked at the frail. Her headlights were on highbeam and I fought not to squint. The foghorn in the bay moaned its sad dirge and a streetcorner oboist noodled out some Mingus for spare change. A baby cried and a heart broke and someone in the distance cried "ya trumped my ace ya friggin mope bastid ya" and a milk bottle broke. I swigged the Cuervo in my Flinstones glass and wondered if Wilma was hot in bed. I lit a cigarette and eyeballed the cooze. She wasn't talking, for which I was grateful. She hadn't made much sense on her first try. I muttered "S'pose we start again sweet face, and s'pose you try it slow and in English this time. Remember that its OK to breath in once in a while..."
The author comments, "Bodine's condition is unchanged since last time we checked. "
The bird on my davenport uncrossed her long stems and looked up at me
with sad puffy violet peepers. She looked to be mid to late thirties,
somewhat underslung but still easy enough on the eyes. She'd either
been around the block one too many times or had been crying. Her coiffed
conk was a brunette the color of the stale Santo Domingan panatelas in
my desktop humidor. She spoke again, in a husky musky dusky voice that
bespoke too many bourbons and smokes in afterhours dives. "I'm sorry Mr. Fisher, it's just I-"
"Call me Abe, sister. And here's how it works. You tell me your handle and state your case, and then I tell you one of two things. But first things first. You work at Nate's but you only been there under three days. You got something big on your plate you want to keep outta the society pages, prolly something to do with an ex husband. At work you met a big plug ugly flatfoot name of McSmith and his partner Hambone on the beat scamming free coffee and Wild Turkey offa Nate and they seemed friendly enough palookas and so's you spilled your beans, and they gave you my calling card. Go ahead, shoot some holes in my story so far." Her eyes were wide now and I had her rapt attention.
"Jack."
"Huh?"
"Free coffee and Jack Daniels."
"Old Tommy's ulcer must be heating up again."
"But the rest of it...how did you--"
"Listen sis, I been in this dodge long enough to know what's what and what isn't." This leggy little filly sported the same petroleum-based garment Nate hung on all his shortorder cooks. I knew McSmith and Hambone's habits and I practically lived at Nate's and hadn't seen this broad before. I'd been upstate for three days sniffing cold leads into hot ones on some Brink's job. A little pigeon I knew would sing an aria for a thimbleful of hootch dropped the dime on the perps and they were now logging a shift in the cooler and I was waiting for Brink's to float me some good paper posthaste by way of reward. My longstemmed guest had a big chunk of ice on her right ring finger and the imprint from it on her left, and apparently I'd guessed dead-on about the ex. What I couldn't put my finger on was why she was slinging hash for some smalltime punchdrunk low-rent ex-heavyweight-contender- has-been like Nate when she was sitting on a wad of c-notes like the one on my desk. She looked up again, and turned on the waterworks. A single saltwater tear glistened on her cheek and a small drop of snot beaded up under the tip of her nose. A taxicab honked and a peepshow barker hawked his wares in the distance and a faraway voice cried "Checkmate? checkmate my ass. I'll show ya checkmate ya foogin bastid ya!" and a garbage can tipped over. Diesel fumes from an Elko-bound Trailways wafted through the torn screen. A litho print of some bunnies and cherubs frolicking in a dewy meadow hung crookedly from the patched sheetrock right next to the framed and yellowed certificate that granted me the license to be a private dick. This dame's front porched heaved mightily under the illfitting outfit as she sobbed.
"There there," I muttered as I handed her a hanky. "S'posin you just tell me who you are and what you want."
"Wanda. Wanda Lodge. And I want you to find them." And with that she dropped an old kodak moment on the desk, right on top of the heap of big ones.
The author comments, "Mr. Bodine cannot be reached for comment at this time. But thank you very much for trying."
"Nice lookin fella. Whose kids?" The photo was of a swarthy, meanlooking thug with no neck, bad acne and a knife scar across his cheek. His upper lip sneered Elvis-like as he glared at the camera. He had enough body hair to look like he wore his tank tee shirt over a black sweater. A shoulder rig held a pearlhandled .38. He was holding a sno-cone and was standing with two small children, one with a dirty face and the other wearing a Yoda mask, and they were in front of a frightened-looking Tilt-a-whirl attendant at a travelling carny. Wanda Lodge looked at the photo and became flustered. "Oh, I--uh, my mistake, wrong picture. Pardon me..." as she snatched the photo from my hand and produced another photo, one which was in even worse shape, of two miniature dachsunds. I'm no animal lover, but I always wanted a wiener dog just so's I could give him a moniker of "Boner". I smiled wryly to myself and muttered, "Nice lookin dogs. Whose are they?" Wanda Lodge shook her head and said, "That rotten lyin' so-an'-so isn't gonna get away with it. He stold my pwecious diddle schnooky-wooky puppy-wuppies and their mommy misses them somethin' awful..." lapsing into a sickeningly cloying baby-talk voice that made me want to smack her hard right in the puss. I thought about the seventeen hundred simoleons and change on my desk and bit my tongue. Outside the fog rolled in from the bay and a siren wailed. A cat howled in the alley and a '79 Merc lost a hubcap as it hit a heavy sheetmetal plate where the backhoe'd torn up the street again and in the distance a voice cried "candlestick schmandlestick, all's I'm sayin is, is either Colonel Mustard whacked him in da consoivatory wid a leadpipe, or youse guys are a buncha lyin' weasels, is all..." and the trombonist upstairs began practicing his pedal tones... Wanda Lodge was lost in reverie, staring at the photo of her little sluggy nuggle wumpums. If she kept up the babytalk I was afraid I'd have to give her the back of my hand, simoleons or no. I usually nixed animal cases ever since that mink farm case that went south in Abilene a halfscore years ago. There'd been bad blood between me and a Pinkertons gumshoe named Crabtree ever since. That was then and this was now, and all I knew now was that I only had two George Washingtons to my name, and I didn't mean the folding kind--and fifty cents couldn't even buy a cup of instant decaf in this sorry depot. I didn't have the full bird's eye lowdown on this Wanda Lodge caper yet, but the one point seven large was looking mighty big about now. "Tell you what sister. Let's you and me get a cup of joe at the donut shop downstairs and you spill what you know about your little mangy bungle sluggy wumpers."
"Huggy snuggle bunny burgers." She rose and sashayed to the splintered door.
I cocked my fist and eyed the nape of her neck, hard. I looked at the desk, scooped up the pile of crisp sheets, and muttered, "Whatever."
The author comments, "Mr. Bodine is running low on plot. Or could you tell? "
Ice cubes jingle while he swirles his glass of bourbon.
"Ma," he thought as he stared at the picture. "What the hell has gotten into you?" Midwest home, eight kids, twenty-seven grandkids. Decides to take a seniors tour to the Alps with her peanuckle pals and sends me this picture with a note:
"Roger. You are the oldest so I am sending this to you. You will be responsible for letting the others know.
Ever since your father died, I have had an emptiness inside ... one so great that it weighs heavy upon my heart. Until I met Hans."
Roger wads up the note for the umpteenth time and nods to the bartender. Another long drag from the cig isn't helping ... damn headache getting worse.
Another bourbon on the bar and he opens the note again.
"I could tell you how and where we met, but I am afraid it would not matter much to you. What should matter to you is how I feel..."
He wads up the note again. His fourth bourbon and it hasn't dulled the sting. He unravels the note once more.
"... and I feel wonderful. Hans has the longest penis I have ever seen. Worn as a belt or skipping like rope, he is really big. Hans has to wear penal suspenders just to be able to walk out of the house. Your father, god rest his soul, was NO WHERE NEAR ..."
He wads up the note once again. He has read the note over and over and it doesn't change. He opens the note again.
"... and you know how alike you and your father ..."
Wads it up again.
"What am I gonna say? She's staying in Europe to schtoop a Tyrolean?" he thinks. He glances at the picture again ... "Damn, she does look happy ... too happy." He looks deeper into the picture. "Hmmmmmmmmmmm. Looks like Mr. French..." He opens up the note.
"I must be going now. Hans is going to show me how he finds truffles. Give kisses to my grandchildren for me. Love you, Mom."
Roger crumbles up the note one last time and shoves it in his pocket. He takes one last drag from the cig and chases it with the last of his drink.
"Whatever."
The author comments, "You wanted bad? You got it..."
They had saved Hildegaard's tips and 'extra curricular' commissions and were now looking to invest in a zehr small Bett-und-Breakfast Guesthaus in the foothills of the Alps. They had found a plot that suited them, had shooed out the existing bovine tenents, and were stating to extend their typical, slope-roofed Alpine cabin to include poolrooms, saunas ('schwitz raumern') and health spas.
Then he appeared. The mysterious stranger. Seemingly coming from out of nowhere, he was there by her side. She didn't notice him at first, but gradually, almost unknowingly, became aware of his presence. Was it the stench of rancid beer on his tuxedo? The smell of stale cigarette smoke? The decaying anchovies in his breast pocket? Or was is the perfume of years of uncontrolled flatulence that had permeated every thread of his clothing that called her attention to him?
At this point, it didn't matter. Isadore turned her head to face the stranger, as though a giant hand had caressed her chin and nudged it in his direction. And, she saw him. She'd remember her first impressions for a long time. She saw the overaged, overweight, yet somehow imposing stranger. But, in a way, he fascinated her in his ramshackle tuxedo, a garment that appeared to have been fitted to him by the same epileptic who sold it to him at the Good Will shop. And, there was something about the way he carried himself - the cigarette strategically hanging out of his left nostril, his artificial eye gazing toward the heavens, the cummerbund that caressed his oversized belly more like a sling for a giant hernia.
And she was desperate. This was her last chance. When the stranger walked even closer and put his hand on her shoulder, she suppressed her revulsion and breathed a sigh of relief. She might have a chance, after all.
And then in a strangely seductive way, the stranger spoke.
"My name is Bond. Melvin Bond."
Emperor Zog grimaced as another cold draft ruffled the wyrnyr-fur trimming
of his crimsom cape - a regal relic handed down through generations of
emperors. Looming over the council chamber, he perched upon a silver throne,
constructed of the swords gleaned from a long line of opponents not as
quick or ruthless as he, and glowered at the upstart cleric who dared
interrupt his train of thought. "Cleric Veneg, How dare you enter my chamber at this hour of the night?", growled the emperor, "I will have you incinerated in a quantum plasma chamber if this is another false alarm!"
"No, your excellency. It seems that the outer reaches of our planetary domain has been attacked by the carnivorous Grells of the Beta Arcturian system." gasped Veneg, " They have begun an all out war and have slaughtered thousands of our innocent people at several of our outposts."
"What do you mean the Grells?" hissed Zog, "I wiped them and their carnivorously humanoid kind five hundred cycles ago?"
"Your Grace, these Grells are the decedents of the ten or so of them that escaped in the last escape pod of the Grellian conflict." "It seems that they were rather prolific and denuded several worlds with their carnage before setting out in the direction of our outposts."
"I will have none of this!," shouted Zog, causing the sleeping imperial guards to awakening in a panicked stir. " I though our outposts were thousands of light cycles away from the site of our last and triumphant battle?"
"Your excellency, As you know our people are all recently transplanted refugees from our last cycle's supernova in the Sephrian system. I am afraid they were caught unarmed and in the process of building shelters for their families before the cycle of planting."
"I beg of you your grace. Please let me go as a representative of the council along with a royal armada and help us repel these creatures. They are powerful and have to be reasoned with before their attack continues into what are now, our stable outer colonies. It is a matter of security in our quadrant."
"If we do not stop them now. I fear the rest of our domain will think we are powerless and begin another era of instability and war among all our brothers."
"Your highness, how shall I proceed?"
And she kept the only key. Or so she thought.
Suddenly a car approached in the gathering dusk and appeared to be speeding toward Dogleash with unwavering determination. He gripped the wheel and swerved at the last second, avoiding what would certainly have been a deadly head-on collision. Enervated,he pulled into a nearby lay-about to recover his normally imperturable demeanor and began to ponder the seemingly deliberate attempt on his life which probably would have resulted in what amounted to suicide for the oncoming driver. Dogleash reached for his gold watch chain to verify the hour and discovered it was gone. He had not been without that watch since his father had willed it to him 25 years ago. A bit shaken but still resolute, he engaged the clutch and continued what was becoming an increasingly disagreeable journey.
When the moustache had first become visible to her, she had hoped it would remain thin and go unnoticed by others. However as time had passed, and her whiskers had thickened, even her friends had noticed. She had pleaded with her mother for help, hoping she would fork over the bucks for electrolysis. No such luck. Her mother would not cooperate. Instead, she said' "Just be yourself. If the other kids don't accept you the way you are, they're not true friends."
She was not able to cut it, or shave it off, so she just started brushing, and waxing it like Simon LeGree, and since she could not face her mother, she just joined the circus, and became a millionare. Though she is constantly being lauphed at, at least she could wipe away her tears with one hunded dollar bills.
Emperor Zog grimaced as another cold draft ruffled the wyrnyr-fur trimming
of his crimsom cape - a regal relic handed down through generations of
emperors. Looming over the council chamber, he perched upon a silver throne,
constructed of the swords gleaned from a long line of opponents not as
quick or ruthless as he, and glowered at the upstart cleric who dared
interrupt his train of thought. "I cannot believe this!" he
screamed mightily, destroying a nearby attendent's eardrum and causing
him to be taken to the hospital. "My homosexual son cannot be back
so soon," the mighty emperor muttered to himself, "I sent him out
on a suicide mission!" He looked down from his mighty throne and
shifted his weight significantly. There was a slight rush of indrawn breath as
he almost speared himself through the butt
(kids, sitting on a throne of swords is BLOODY DANGEROUS!).
"Well," the great emperor of all declaimed in a high and mighty voice (incidentally causing a nearby chandelier to shatter, spearing several aides with razor-sharp shards of crystal), "send him in and we'll see what we can do!". As the great doors opened, permitting a slight youth to enter. The youth gazed around at the carnage that surrounded him and asked meekly: "Father, are you just a leeeeeeetle bit peeved with me?". Gazing down under majestic brows, the majestic majesty majestically said (majestically of course), "Yes.".
As a perfectly pointless bit of puerile information, many frogs use their throat sacs as a secondary sexual characteristic. We now return you to your regular programming.
"Tell me," Zog cried in a great voice (his sonic vibrations flinging several of his drinking buddies into a inconveniently-placed rack of spears), "what would it take for me to get the hell rid of you, you evil sod?". The sod, err, son, grinned evilly (he was after all an evil sod) and murmered: "The hand of the fabulously beautiful but as-yet-unnamed Princess, and a lifetime of small yet extremely valuable presents?". The mighty emperor considered this for a moment, then shook his head. "I can't do that," he screeched (inadvertently summoning a swarm of Outer-Venusian Mongolese adult wombats who mistook his cry to be the call of a Nether-Feathered Golden Flufbutt, their favourite food), "because we are at war, and I cannot spare the expense!".
Glancing around disdainfully, the young emperor-to-be suddenly locked eyes with his father, daring him to repeat his refusal. Thus both were caught unaware as a horde of Himalayan Fighting Para-Clowns (Amazing-Bonko-and-Assistant-Doris class!) smashed through the skylight and drew their Mildly-Acidic-Water-Squirting-Pom-Poms!
The author comments, "Heh, heh, now THIS is some damn bad writing!"
The Haiku contest is down the hall...
She counted her allowance that she’d been saving all year, cashed in a few savings bonds that she’d gotten for birthdays and Christmas from relatives too busy—too uncaring and unconcerned!—to shop, and forged her father’s name on a check she’d slipped from his checkbook while he was watching a Gunsmoke rerun. Yes, she had enough to make the trip to the TV studio, and to buy a few things that she’d need to make a good impression on Mr. Cabot. Her destiny was within her grasp. Some people—mainly her friends who danced about in their mini-skirts and white go-go boots, and who had wild passionate crushes on Donny Osmond—might think her a foolish, impetuous fourteen year-old, but she’d show them. She’d show them all!
The next day, wearing her new Maidenform Chansonette bra and a pair of stack heels that made her look mature even though they pinched her toes, she slipped out of the side door of school just after first period, made her way to the bus station, and purchased her ticket. As she rode the Greyhound bus toward her destination (Her date with destiny!), she wondered what should she call him when at last they met—she dewey-eyed and expectant; he tired and sweaty from working under the hot lights and perhaps a tad resentful of all the attention that Brian Keith was getting when he, Sebastian Cabot, was by far the better actor? “Mr. Cabot” seemed too formal. “Sebastian” seemed, well, awkward. “Sebby”? “Basty”? Maybe just “Seb”?
I had seen broads like Gia Gondola before - Miami's full of 'em. But
when a broad constructed of nothing but legs, attitude and a wide-brimmed
hat stalks into your office unannounced and drops a baby alligator on
your desk, you sit up and take notice. That's especially true if you've been slouched in your chair with your
feet up on the desk. The prepubescent reptile, jaws snapping open and
shut, lurched with remarkable quickness across the desk toward my gaping
pants cuffs. In a heartbeat he was inside my pantleg, gnashing his teeth
and thrashing his way toward the forbidden zone.
I stood up quickly, shaking the pantleg, trying to dislodge the hungry gator. To hide my discomfiture, I leered at Gia lasciviously and said, "Hey Doll, long time no see. Where ya been."
She answered with her usual girlish charm, "None of you business, you two-timing, no-account, two-bit gumshoe." Having dispensed with pleasantries, she pulled a small, pearl-handled semi-automatic pistol from her sequinned handbag and aimed it at my heart.
It had been a long time since Gia and I had been lovers...a long time since she had broken the heart that she was now aiming at. Based on the alligator's progress, it seemed likely that we would never be lovers again, regardless of the tender feelings she had just expressed to me.
"Put your hands up and don't make a move, Chauncy!" she shouted.
Thinking quickly, I shouted back, "Forget it doll! You'd never shoot me. You still remember those nights we shared down in Havana...the clubs, the drinks, the dancing, the wild abandon, the nights of passion. I know you too well Gia. You'd never shoot a man you were still in love with." In actual fact, we had never been to Havana, and had enjoyed only one night of passion...or I should say that I had enjoyed it. If she had stayed awake longer, I'm sure she would have found it memorable as well.
I left my hands down, in my pockets, and risked being shot through the heart. That seemed more promising than raising my hands as Gia had demanded, and risking my future happiness to the jaws of the ravening reptile in my trousers. I cursed silently under my breath because a whim of fashion had very recently brought pleated fronts back into style, offering the gator plenty of room to maneuver and evade my desparately clutching fingers. I chose death before dishonor and left my hands where they were.
Gia stared at me icily for a minute. I realized hopelessly that my pleas had fallen on a ears deafened by same the raging passion that I was trying to appeal to.
"I warned you, Chauncy." she said, her voice sharp with cold indifference. She squinted, adjusted her aim in an alarming fashion, and fired.
For a moment, time stood still. I could almost see the projectile hurtling toward me. I could feel each of the gator's sharp little teeth closing on my tender flesh. Pain cut through me like a knife, my sight grew dim, I weaved and staggered backward. I could feel the hot lead and groaned what I was sure would be my last goodbye to Gia. Then everything went black.
When I came to, Gia was looking down into my eyes. "You big crazy galoot", she said, "You should have put your hands up when I told ya' to. I think I grazed ya'." A distinctive throb of pain told me I was a little more than grazed...but I was far better off than I might have been if she had missed the gator. She had apparently made a perfect head shot on the gator, killing him the instant before his jaws closed, and wounding me painfully but not dangerously.
"You've ruined my pants, babe." I sighed, smiling weakly, happy to be alive.
"That's your fault." she replied. "But don't feel badly, I've heard that most people loose muscle control like that in times of extreme stress." she crooned.
"I meant the bullet hole." I groaned.
Those were the last words I spoke before the ambulance arrived for me and the police came to take Gia away.
Alligators are an endangered species. Protected by laws that would send my sweet, passionate, mixed up Gia up the river, to the big house, for a long long time.
She had me strapped down on the laboratory table. My arms and legs were pinned tight to the table under the heavy straps. She started to remove her clothes. I was going to be sick. When she was completley naked she started to laugh at me and said, "I think I'm going to enjoy this". As she mounted the table, I knew ..........
This novel is continued.
The author comments, " Basil "Pig" Bodine is a charter member of the DLCR. He was such a nice boy, used to cut the grass. Kind of a loner, kept to himself. Pleasant enough to the neighbors, but he had some ways about him. No one thought he'd go off like that, who knew? And now they're hosing down the sidewalk and the sun's out and the birds are chirping and the children are no longer scared to go outside to play..."
Miss Polk sank further into the luxurious leather chair, letting it hug her body and fill her sensate pores. She pondered Mauser, his sleek bullet-black hair richly textured as a Merriweather oil. She felt strangely frisky in here, eyeing in the doused light a framed damask of the Agean sea, the sun mooring portside, a scull rowing towards her with sailors lean as salmon. Merriweather prattled on about God knows what while her eyes lost focus and the smell of ether invaded the air.
"But really, Bartholomew" laughed Lady Zinnia with her characteristic
throaty chuckle, "You can't be serious! Lady Thanninger, with that
dashing young... oh, no, it can't be. He's simply too common
for someone of her station!""Nevertheless," Bart replied in his quintessential brevity, "he is a Texas Space Ranger, fully qualified bye the United World Government in all aspects of space patrol and rescue; not to mention that he is a genetically reengineered moose. After all, she can hardly claim full Venusian ancestry with her violet eyes and fourteen fingers."
Zinnia paused for a moment and looked very carefully at Bart, "Are you sure this is the correct genre, my dear friend?"
"Yes it is," Bart said, reexamining his script and pausing to adjust his false eye, "definitely science fiction, not Victoriana."
But Margerie smiled for her own feeling of superiority. For the unwitting Oloff was unaware that Margerie was really a man.
The author comments, "uhhh, I guess this is pretty cool. What I really want to find is a place to get money for stories."
Don't we all...
From the penthouse suite atop the Mutiny, a once-proud and fashionable Coconut Grove skyscraper, Dr. Emp looked down upon the two of them using a specially-modified Tascam periscope/telescope, sneering at the memory of its designers who called him a dangerous fool. Oloff and Margerie stood in the balmy October Miami air on the docks of the marina.
"You have done well, Oloff, my unwitting pawn," said the doctor to no one in particular, except for maybe Minestrone, a hairless chihuahua who sat and shivered on the doctor's lap. The doctor stroked the dog's back heavily, causing Minestrone to momentarily appear more exophthalmic than usual. "But I can't have any witnesses now can I, hmm?" the doctor leered. His accent was one part Slavic, one part Brooklyn, the net effect being a speech pattern not unlike Hamilton's Dracula from "Love at First Bite."
"Goodbye, Mr. Oloff. Perhaps you will take your painted-yet-strangely-masculine strumpet with you into the next life. She will surely accompany you the next several hundered feet into the air! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!" He pressed a red button on a control panel of the handlebars of his Lil' Rascal.
"Marge," Oloff began, overcome with an unexpected feeling. However, his feeling was unexcpectedly interrupted when he was overcome by the sensation of several thousand sausages all intent on finding the shortest distance between their currently inertia-defined position and some other locale just on the other side of Oloff and Margerie's bodies, without bothering to go around.
The Swedish shipment of sausages, however, remained intact.
The author comments, "*tap tap tap* Is this thing on? Please produce all Mancini-esque themes in MIDI format. "
Pawline, Pawleeeene screamed the woman, what has happened to Grandmother? I just can't fathom how her chair slid out of that truck! I saw Ergu tighten the ropes holdin it this morning when we left Kentucky, and the only other person in the truck was 'cestula, and she's not bright enough to know how to cut them ropes. Ain't that right 'cestula?
"Aweehhheenck", "Aweehhheenck" said the imbecilic girl. Kix swore he saw her drop something shiny down between the bed of the truck and the cab but he just couldn't quite be sure.
"Somebody must a put her up to it or just made it look like she did it. If we don't find out who, we're just gonna have to punish the entire family".
All of these words were screamed into the portable phone, although the conversation was obviously taking place with a black haired lady who barely stifling a malevolent grin, said "That would take all night Auntie. Besides the first thing we gotta do is find Grandmother, before she does God knows what to one of the local boys. You know how much trouble she caused us back in Baton Rouge".
The middle aged woman who was now beginning to regain her composure, patted her coifed curls gently and said. "I'm sure I haven't the foggiest idea what you could be refferrin to Pauline, but you are right we must find dear ol' Granny"
Kix' brain was still workin hard trying to take all this in, when his body gave a start, and he let out with a blood curdling yelp. He swung round to see the grinning face of a toothless white haired old woman, who as best he could figure out had just goosed him with her cane.
"Cute little fanny ya got there Sonny", said the old hag now positively leering at Kix. "bet I could show ya some things ya didn't even know people could do".
Kix' brain had never been adept at changing gears either quickly or smoothly. Now it was positively stuck in neutral. Finally his vocal chords decided to act on their own. "What the Hell" they exclaimed loudly, trying their best to give his brain time to get unstuck.
"Granny, come over here now" the black haired lady said sternly. "you know people don't always appreciate your attentions".
"But he has such a" said the hag.
"Granny! , Ergu!" said Pauline.
Suddenly a large Arabic sort of male like (but not quite) person had appeared, and uttering a couple of grunts, picked up the Granny, set her back in the chair, then picked up said chair, and put it back in the truck, retied it, and got back behind the wheel of the lead truck.
Kix felt some stirring in his brain, although what he was mainly feeling was a pain in his ass. Just as his brain began to overcome this he suddenly realized that the middle aged woman was speaking to him.
"Why sir thank you so much for finding Granny, she does ah wander so". Proffering a perfumed hand she said "Crystabel Cardwell hee-uh. Now if you don't mind we've had such a long journey, with such an unsettlin finish, I think we'll just be getting down to the Cardwell property, but do come to tea after we get settled".
With that Crystabel began to walk back to the lead truck.
Kix' brain suddenly recovered. "Hey, wait a minute, you can't go yet, that there woman just assaulted me" (the literal nature of his choice in words escaped Kix).
Crystabel turned, patted her curls and said "Ah haven't the foggiest idea what your talkin about. Why shame on you for saying such a thing about a poor ol' Granny". Ah am not sure-uh that you can come to tea after all.
"Whatya mean", Kix said, That woman assaulted me and I have the evidence right here behind ...".
Suddenly Kix thought better of it. What sort of humiliation might he have to endure from his buddies? Suppose the case went to trial. Suppose he was asked to present his evidence. He had also heard in cases like this that medical evidence might be needed, and what gettin that might entail made him shudder. Besides he needed to get back to burying Slam.
"Well okay, I guess the poor ol' dear didn't mean no harm. How the hell old is she anyway?"
Crystabel froze, shuddered, patted her curls, and said. "I can see we didn't return one moment too soon! This town has lost its civility since our family left before the whar-uh. WE are a genteel old southern family, and no one of us would ever publicly refer to something as sensitive to a mature lady's age. You SURH may definitely NOT come to tea until you learn some manners!
With that she jumped back into the lead truck, and the profession moved on down the hill to the old Cardwell mansion, leaving the townsfolk with their mouths open. Poor Kix had never had such a day as this so he just stood there for forty minutes alternately rubbing his forehead and his behind, wondering how he was gonna tactfully ask Flo for the right kind of ointment.
Just before Kix recovered his wits enough to get on with things, he noticed an old 1950's Ford convertible putting up the pike toward town. He thought about wondering who that was, but his battered brain said no, and he carefully got back into his car.
Convinced that she had stumbled across something unique, she devoted her life to studying them. While somewhat bitter about the lack of recognition her work has received in a male dominated field, she none-the-less has continued to pursue it convinced that her time will come.
Her latest disappointment was when tissue samples from various Cardwells (obtained with great difficulty) came back stamped "Genetically Implausible" from various labs. One lab even ask her how she had manufactured such clever fakes.
Undaunted, she resolved to continue, and followed the family east to Widows Peak, West Virginia in the 1952 Ford convertible that her father had given her as a graduation gift.
Just as Kix was about to make his menu decision for his brother's funeral, a call came over the radio that a massive traffic jam had ensued when a rocking chair containing an old woman had slid from the bed of a pick-up onto the center line of the Widow's Peak Turnpike. Traffic, wandering livestock, and a tour bus bound for the state capital were entangled in hopeless gridlock. Kix ran for the squad car and left town with his tires squealing and his siren blaring. He was closely followed by over half the townspeople who, like Kix, had never seen a traffic jam close up and wanted in on the thrill of it. Besides, they figured, Kix couldn't arrest them for speeding if he was in front.