The tiny postapocalyptic biker gang buries Patch under a pile of stones not far off the highway, wearing his chaps and shotgun, the way he would have wanted. Tatters gets his bike.
“You’re a man now,” explains Rackham gruffly. “You ride midpack. You carry your share and when we raid, you’re out there with us, gun oiled and clean. You understand?”
Tatters nods, trying not to itch his nascent mustache.
At night, encamped, he smears aloe on his neck and listens to the soft steady click of the Geiger on his lanyard. The moon whirls above him, stippled in 255 colors.
Already the real London he actually experienced–crowded, expensive, clear-skied and frequently sweltering–is confusing itself with the London of Conan Doyle and Gaiman: Cockneyed, fogbound, bursting with crooked alleys and metaphor. There were gnats in the park, he remembers, that crammed themselves into his mouth and eyes. Jake clings to the gnats.
Had some accident of birth allowed him more than those months as a tourist, he wonders, would he still value them as he does? Running and photography, cake and games. Jake sits in his rainy, quirky, river-hugging city and tries to be grateful for tumble dryers.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Almost four weeks since the last rain, and Haka and Jot feel anxious eyes as they mount the low steps to the altar. Around them, the wooden gods glare down, limbs fetal, teeth sharp.
“What may we offer, mighty ones?” Jot begs.
They cast carved bones for an answer. Haka carefully sets them in line.
“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA–,” he reads.
They do it again.
“–AAAAAAAAAAAAAATS,” Haka concludes.
“SRSLY,” adds Jot, reading the littlest ones.
They get a bunch of novelty baseball caps at the tourist shop downtown and stick them on the gods. Then they cast a third time.
“FUCK YEEEEEEEAA–,” Haka reads.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Orthodontistry–like seances, witch hunts, or cattle drives–is an activity of perceived necessity (and great popularity) for a limited span of time. Davian is well aware that his profession won’t persist forever; medical technology is advancing quickly enough that some more elegant and holistic method will tame the splay-toothed frontier he surveys. But today, oh, today he is a cowboy, wrangling the wild overbite with lassos of gleaming wire.
“Yeehaw!” murmurs Davian, absorbed in his work.
“Ngh?” says his patient, lips peeled back and jaw locked by a device originally described in Malleus Maleficarum.
“Nothing, little dogie,” Davian says.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
The tiny postapocalyptic biker gang dangles from Alejandro’s cursor as he tries to decide where in the desert to plop them down.
“You’re addicted to that game,” she says.
“It’s only addiction if my insurance covers it.”
“You don’t have insurance.”
“Shit,” he says, “I should take up smoking.”
“Anyway, this box is the last of your stuff. Unless you want the towels.”
“Nah,” he says, very lightly, “they’d smell like you.”
“Shit,” she says, “I should take up smoking.”
Alejandro drops the flailing bikers. They cheer and pop pixelated wheelies, until the one with the eyepatch dies of radiation poisoning.
“It’s not just the pilot and the copilot,” cries the flight attendant. “The federal air marshall is bleeding to death, and the only doctor on the plane is on fire!”
Cath rises to her feet.
“The wings are coming off!” shrieks the pregnant mother. “And the F-14s behind us are still firing!”
Cath strides to the cockpit door.
“It’s too much,” cries a priest, tearing off his collar. “I can’t even bring myself to pray!”
“Everyone calm down!” Cath declares. “It’s going to be okay. I’m a sysadmin.”
That turns out to be very, very little help.
(But a little!)
“I wish you’d come out to the matches,” says Radiane, under the high-pitched chatter and scuffle of practice.
Proserpina contains a blush. “I don’t feel like it lately.”
“The real boxers don’t punch like us. Did you know that? They jab or swing, from the forearm or shoulder, but you taught us to uncurl from the upper arm out–”
“I taught you what works. We don’t have muscles like they do.”
Radiane smirks. “Maybe you don’t.” She feints high; Proserpina’s already up, anticipating, and soon everyone stops to watch the old partners spar.
Miss Havisham watches too, then slips away.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Penanggalan Tom Hanks has been trying to steal Irina’s baby all week and she’s pretty sick of it.
“I’m planting rose bushes outside all the windows!” she announces loudly. He’s definitely listening from somewhere, so who cares if the passersby hustle their kids right along. “Yep! Thorny roses!”
“Er, no, Mom, no need for a sitter this week,” says Nazir, trying to simultaneously talk and muffle the phone. “She wants to stay home.”
“Certainly wouldn’t want my intestines caught on them!” shouts Irina.
Penanggalan Tom Hanks hisses in dismay from its trash-can lair, and sucks on a fresh dead kitten.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Giant Nut Head does not have a giant nut for a head. Don’t worry about it.
“We can seriously get State this year, guys,” he says, leaning over the back of the bus seat with one arm between Lula and Zephram.
“Yeah, I’ve been looking forward to this trip,” says Zephram absently.
“You too?” says Lula. Her knees are up, hair twirled, eyes sparkling.
“Not for State, though.”
“No?”
“Just for the ride.”
Zephram and Lula look at each other, then, a smile shivering back and forth between them.
“I’ve been thinking about doing more push-ups,” adds Giant Nut Head.