I, the gynephobe
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Entry for S&C fortnightly contest, Theme : Phobics Anonymous.
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I, the gynephobe
A man hath no fear, quoth a minstrel singing the glories of a fallen king, but in reality man has feared everything including himself. I have oft asked the divine One if he created me out of mirth for I was born to become a man of finely sculpted shape but with a mind that feared the woman. My fine features might have better helped a man who loved the woman, but strange are His ways and it is not upon us to question His judgement.
My childhood is a distant memory and I suspect that the haze that surrounds it is created by the machinations of my mind. Perhaps it hides it to protect me; I cannot imagine what horrors lie shrouded in that dark corner, but I do not wish to venture there lest I be overwhelmed by a torrent of suppressed memories. Do the roots of my fear go as far deep as that dark place, I wonder at times but I am cowardly and I will not go in to find out.
I have no tangible memory of a mother either, but a mother figure appears in my nightmares and I wake up screaming, or shuddering. She is not headless, nor a banshee either, au contraire the image is always of a lady with an angelic smile and sweet smelling hair. I do not fear decapitated dancers, blue haired banshees and the spring heeled Jack, but I shudder at the thought of the mother who appears in my dreams. She is kind to me and my childhood self is filled with love, but I am violently torn out of this scene by a gripping fear and I find myself awake at some ungodly hour, my heaving chest wet with sweat.
The nightmares grew less in frequency as I grew up to be a young man, but my problems compounded. A young man who has entered society must plunge into the society of young women, and though a young man of my age would leap in with joy, I had to step in fearfully.
"Beware the lechery of women, Erasmus", warned my mind, somehow always wiser and older than I was. I followed the advice of this voice; it watched me all my life and I fear I might not have lived so long without it.
"Women are predators", it continued, as I nodded in agreement, looking at the ones that walked past me with painted faces, lithe limbs and red claws.
"Look not straight into their eyes, lest you fall prey to their hypnotic glare."
"Cast ye eyes away from their bosom, lest ye be enamoured by their beauty."
"Touch not their hair, lest you be smitten by the silkiness and be bitten by the snakes that are hidden within."
"Speak wisely for no woman will tolerate a man wiser than her."
And beware of, I did, as women tried to enter my life and I steered them away from it.
I spent my days reading, codex upon codex, almanac upon almanac, and learned the secrets of this fear that I shared with men who lived in eras before mine. The body built natural defences to threats, they wrote, and for a man afflicted with gynephobia the best defence was asymmetry. The human mind perceived beauty in the form of symmetry and the Greeks portrayed their Gods as humanoid figures of perfect symmetry. An asymmetric visage would have no effect on the eyes of the beholder and the soul continues to lie in a dormant state. A symmetric visage on the other hand has an explosive effect on the eyes and the soul awakens, smelling the presence of a possible soul mate.
I discovered that I was born without the natural defences however, the result of a creator in a mirthful state, and my most symmetrical visage must have caused an explosive effect in the eyes of many a woman.
In the years preceding the Black Death, I was a young playwright, celebrated and arrogant and I would attend the stage plays and dramas of other playwrights and carry out a conversational critique of the performance with my coterie. I would improvise the dialogue, outpun the puns of the scene stealer, parody the theatrics of the hero and better the end. They would not throw me out; they would listen to me instead, for in spite of my cocky disposition I did better the play. When the play was enacted again the next day, it was not the same; it was a rewritten script with the changes that I proposed as I heckled and my name would appear in the credits. My humour must have had an effect on women I realised later, as I was approached by the Lady Portia,
"I must confess that my ladies had to gag me to muffle my screams of laughter when you began your act, Mr. Erasmus. Will you grace us with your presence at dinner tonight?", she said.
"The lady is extremely kind. However, I must dine with Mrs. Erasmus tonight", I replied, confident outward, shivering inward, as I employed the charade of marriage.
The ploy worked. It would not work on a persistent young lady however. Absolutely smitten by my looks, she begged that I woo her and in mortal fear I agreed and asked her to meet me after the sermon on Sunday.
"I have finally got you in my grasp, dear Erasmus", she said, "Oh, who is this person?"
"This, my dear, is Postlethwaite. He is my partner", I replied, giving dear ol' Post a prolonged hug.
And the persistent young lady quit her persistence. I was delighted that I had mastered the art of evading the predators until a very direct young woman sat herself in the empty seat at my table one day and said, "Court me, Erasmus."
I shuddered. I realised that I had to act fast or be trapped forever, so I dropped the cloak of chivalry and said, " And what else may I do for you, madam? Carry your child? Clean the dishes? I am the man here, if you have not seen the lack of breasts on my chest."
She left, shocked that one with manners so fine would suddenly speak in so coarse a manner. And yet, it had to be done, as a mother tiger ignores her fear of the musket and defends her cubs, baring her teeth at the hunter. I might never overcome my fear of women but I was now learning to face it.
My progress notwithstanding, fate rolled in the dice again in the form of whispered rumours. Why was the wealthy Erasmus yet unmarried? I hear that he has spurned many a woman, is that true? Can he not perform the will of God?
The last question stung the most. As the codex had said, ordinary men are ignorant of gynephobia. Most have not heard its name. They would not understand it and beware, as a clan of wild animals eats its weak, so shall a man be destroyed by other men when it is known that he fears mere women. Protect your secret at all costs, it warned.
The mooring line to my maleness was weakening and I had to do something about it. So, I found Orfelia.
Orfelia was not a very beautiful woman, but there was something about her that did not scare me completely. She was the only woman I could look at without feeling threatened, so I courted her for a few weeks until the day came that I dined with her and found myself accompanying her in my carriage as we rode back to my house.
The circumstances that lead us to bed might not interest the reader so I shall omit that from this narration and continue at the point at which Orfelia undressed me, herself and lay next to me. She touched me and my hands quivered, I grit my teeth, a shiver went down my spine and back up and my chest formed drops of cold sweat. I was looking at naked fear and it was tangible, a tangible form that was over me and giggling, tickling me and a pleasure mixed in with the fear, and I have no words to describe the reactions of my body to the dual stimuli of fear and pleasure and I fear my mind must have lost control of my body a moment later as my eyes closed. Words cannot describe the experience afterward either, but I can remember the colours seen by my shut eyes : Vivid shapes of yellow that shot through castles of stony red, drenched in a green, slimy rain; a violet haze descends, shattered by the most golden lightning, suddenly a white flash, white all around, milky whiteness and then darkness. Pitch black darkness.
I opened my eyes to escape the deluge of colours, and saw Orfelias above me. I blinked once, twice, and there they were again. One Orfelia and another. They had different expressions, lest I thought that I merely had double vision. One Orfelia smiled with burning eyes and the other had uplifted brows in surprise. They spoke to each other in a strange tongue and I looked on in disbelief. I remembered one Orfelia on top of me as I lay down and as I opened my eyes there were two distinct Orfelias; did she have a twin who crept in unnoticed? How could- and then it was that I noticed that they were joined at the hip, one hip that rested on mine and two different persons in their upper bodies, two persons who now looked at me. Orfelias raised their four arms and touched me and my fevered mind was capable of experiencing no more. My eyes did not shut however, it stared at the ungodly sight and as they did unspeakable acts upon themselves and then on me, my mind simply shut down my optic connections and darkness fell. I was blind and I thanked the Lord for it.
It was a day later that Post found me; I was feverish and babbling, he said. I told him that I had gone blind, but nay he said, you have not. You can see and it is your mind that fools you and keeps you blinded. You must have seen a sight so horrible. What was it, Erasmus? What phantom could have shocked you so into blindness?
I heard the mooring line to my maleness snap. "It was a woman, Post."
"A ghostly lady? The Duchess of Viscombe?'
"Nay, Post. A living, young lady. A beautiful young lady. I fear her, as I do other women, because I am a gynephobe."
posted by foogarky @ 10:25 PM,
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Cap'n Hooker and the Promise of a Portrait (Collab.)
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Dramatis Personae :
Mr. Lampooner, a meta-fictional superhero with supranatural powers which include calculating the viscosity of a book with the mere stirring of a bare finger and the ability to leap into the murky depths of its plot line. Last reported sighting : Leaping into a handsome leather-bound volume of the best seller 'The Salty Saga of Captain Hooker'.
Captain Hooker, the sauciest scourge of the Seven Seas, or so she claims. She emerged into the literary spotlight recently, created as the villainess of a children's story where she is supposed to die a horrible death in the briny deep. Dying is the last thing on her mind though, and in one of those rare unscripted moments in literary history, sends the handsome hero walking down the plank instead. The story never makes it to The End but the character goes on to appear in later stories, often as the protagonist.
Seagull 1 and Seagull 2. Non-speaking parts.
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I walked up to the deck early one morning to check the overnight bottle mail; it was one of the duties assigned to me as I took on the position of factotum on this ship, turning out to be too old for a cabin boy and not attractive enough to be First Mate; and I was surprised to find a letter addressed to the Captain. In the past half a year of serving on this ship I have not seen the Captain receive a communication of significance so the appearance of this missive made me rather curious. Looking around and finding no one awake at this early hour, save a couple of seagulls, I pulled the message out of the bottle; it must be explained to the landlubbing reader at this point that we seafarers have a postal system of our own called the Bottle Mail Service which allows the sender to seal his letter in a glass bottle (preferably corked) along with the name of the recipient and the correct ship code and pop it into the sea and let the currents guide it to the waiting mailbox which is usually situated near the keel of the ship; and read out the contents to myself :
Mr. Lampooner, a meta-fictional superhero with supranatural powers which include calculating the viscosity of a book with the mere stirring of a bare finger and the ability to leap into the murky depths of its plot line. Last reported sighting : Leaping into a handsome leather-bound volume of the best seller 'The Salty Saga of Captain Hooker'.
Captain Hooker, the sauciest scourge of the Seven Seas, or so she claims. She emerged into the literary spotlight recently, created as the villainess of a children's story where she is supposed to die a horrible death in the briny deep. Dying is the last thing on her mind though, and in one of those rare unscripted moments in literary history, sends the handsome hero walking down the plank instead. The story never makes it to The End but the character goes on to appear in later stories, often as the protagonist.
Seagull 1 and Seagull 2. Non-speaking parts.
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I walked up to the deck early one morning to check the overnight bottle mail; it was one of the duties assigned to me as I took on the position of factotum on this ship, turning out to be too old for a cabin boy and not attractive enough to be First Mate; and I was surprised to find a letter addressed to the Captain. In the past half a year of serving on this ship I have not seen the Captain receive a communication of significance so the appearance of this missive made me rather curious. Looking around and finding no one awake at this early hour, save a couple of seagulls, I pulled the message out of the bottle; it must be explained to the landlubbing reader at this point that we seafarers have a postal system of our own called the Bottle Mail Service which allows the sender to seal his letter in a glass bottle (preferably corked) along with the name of the recipient and the correct ship code and pop it into the sea and let the currents guide it to the waiting mailbox which is usually situated near the keel of the ship; and read out the contents to myself :
Tell the Cap'n, I owe her some and I haven't forgotten.
Signed,
K-.
"Ahoy, Cap'n Hooker! Ahoy!", I cried, running towards the fo'c's'le, "Where art thou O' saucy scourge of the seven seas! I bear a message from a young lass, a message of grave importance!"
"This had better be good, Mister Lampooner", replied she, emerging from her cabin, "I be in the middle o' somethin' reeely important!"
"What could possibly be more important than a message of grave importance?"
"Me Jolly Dodger's birdbath, of course!", replied she.
I tsk-tsked. "Your parrot can perform his ablutions later. I carry a-"
"How dare ye! Jolly Dodger be a she. A lady of fine plumage and greener than the greenest emerald ye ever set yer eyes on!"
"One can hardly be blamed for mistaking the gender of a bird bestowed with the dodgy name of the Jolly Dodger, can he?"
"Oh, there be a story behind that, Mister Lampooner", replied the Cap'n laughing, "the Jolly Dodger had a wild youth, y'see-"
I stopped her in mid-sentence, wondering why every female character in this story seemed to have a wild youth, "Ah, never mind the backstory of the Jolly Dodger. It is a tale for another day. Returning to the matter in hand, or more specifically the missive in my hand, it reads that this young lass owes you something (of unspecified identity and value) and says that she has not forgotten. Though what it is that she still retains in her memory is left to the imagination of the reader.."
"Aye, I knows what she talks 'bout."
"Oh, what is it?"
"She wishes to paint me portrait", replied the Cap'n grinning.
"Why would anyone want to paint you?"
"What is that supposed to be meaning?", growled she, gripping her cutlass.
"Er- I meant to say why would anyone want to do something so pointless as try to capture your heavenly beauty on canvas?", replied I quickly, with a cheeky smile.
"Ah, beauty so heavenly surely must cast an earthly shadow", said she, claiming to be quoting a poet of yore, though I must say that I certainly haven't read poetry with such cheesy lines before, "so it be not a meaningless endeavour after all, eh Mister Lampooner?"
"I suppose so."
"Aye! However, I demand that I shall be painted along with dear ol' Jolly Dodger! Can ye carry that message back to her?"
"Yer wish is me command, O' commander of the octal oceans!", I replied, imitating her piratical lingo.
"Octal oceans? There be only five oceans known to landlubbers, ye silly person. And let's keep it that way, shall we? There be unimaginable treasures in the unknown seas, and Cap'n Hooker shall 'ave 'em all! Arr!"
"Aye Aye, Cap'n!", I said, saluting, running away to deliver the message. Ooh, a treasure hunt for real! We be goin' a-sailing, a-sailing we shall go!
posted by foogarky @ 11:23 AM,
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The Contractual Husband
Saturday, November 15, 2008
We knew this day would come. We looked at each other; not knowing what to say and how to say it, whatever it was that had to be said.
Did we know what the other was thinking? I think not, even after all these years that we have spent together.
Did we know what the other was feeling? I think not; I cannot read his face nor can he mine, even after all these years.
But the day had come. The contract had ended.
I think back to the day when it began. In the year of the Dragon.
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His Fall
Erasmus was a Defender. Our society frowned upon aggression and our vocabulary contained no word for attack. Attack (ə-tăk') was a loanword from the language of the barbarians that crept into our language to describe their acts of hostility, as we entered their lands in search of rice grain. Our reserves were depleted; it was a year of famine and the farms would not yield crop. Our barbaric neighbours would not share our burden and hence our defence forces were formed that year to occupy farmlands outside our borders and defend them against their owners.
Years passed, the heavens opened, and we had bountiful crop. But the Defenders remained at their posts and created more. We continued defending, extending our borders further and defending them until the barbarians would eventually become unwelcome in their own land. Some fled, the others remained and our Defenders mingled, blood mixing, blemishing the purity of our race in these Outlands.
As this unholy practice of mingling with the heathen grew widespread among the ranks, the Creator began choosing the Defenders of her land herself. She could look into the minds of men and their weaknesses would be revealed. She thus chose the strong ones from our first born as her Defenders and send them into the Outlands, leaving the weak and wayward back home to be taken care of by their women.
Erasmus was one of the handpicked ones; he was chosen by the Creator, seeing in him not just strength but also leaderhood, and rewarded him with the position of Captain. He was sent into active duty that year. The year of the Dragon. The year of his Fall.
He fell hard, in the sixth month of his duty. "In his defence", said a comrade to me years later, "His mingling was with a musk woman of the Outlands. A strange people, said to have odour glands in their bodies, their women were much coveted by the Defenders. For the musk women had odour glands close to their reproductive organs, and as you coupled with them, the most heavenly scent would envelop you, an aphrodisiac in itself and an olfactory experience that would grow stronger as you took them to higher planes of pleasured excitement". I could picture the scene in my mind : Young Erasmus, proud and noble, shining white in his virginal purity, marked by the musk women for a long time, finally falling prey to one of them, their most seductive beauty I would like to think, as she approached him tantalizingly, a heavenly scent beginning to envelop her as she grew aroused at the sight of his taut, muscular figure and he, unable to resist such divine temptation; for it is said in legend that the musk people were endowed with their odour producing abilities by the blessing of their god, the Muscotaur; taking her and then as the scent engulfed him, ravaging her until her glands were empty. It would make me envious every time I pictured it; I knew I had no right to do so, nevertheless I coloured green every single time.
The Creator punished him on his return, forbidding him to return to the Outlands.
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My Fall
Orfelia Portson. I did not like my matronymic, bestowed on me by my mother Portia upon birth. She had wanted a male cub, one she could nurture and mould lovingly but the sight of a female emerging from her womb must have saddened her, knowing that the coming years would be filled with conflict as child rose against parent and eventually left the house to find her own man. It was the same story in every house and if my mother prayed that she be spared from it, her prayers were not chanted loud enough. It must have affected her greatly because, though I did not know it at that time, she found herself uninterested in teaching me the ways of our society, as a consequence I grew up to be a woman who was unsure of men.
And hence my marriage to Postlethwaite failed.
He was the son of a countess and I was desperate, after having failed to find a man for myself. I was too straightforward and unromantic, so it was said of me, and it drove the men away. So, I agreed to marry the man my mother chose for me.
The marriage lasted for a day.
Postlethwaite was a fop, the kind I despised. He oozed charm and beauty, and many a woman would be enamoured of him. But I wanted a man with hair on his face. And his chest. And he had it on neither, as I discovered to my disdain, undressing him on the night of our conjugal union. I could not be aroused and Postlethwaite fled, seeking mercy at the feet of the Creator. She took him into her harem, as she did every handsome husband of a failed marriage, and punished me. With a contractual marriage.
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Us
As we women come of age, we go out and find a mate. When we find a suitable man, we start a family and live our lives until the day we die. However, every marriage does not turn out this way, mine included, and we are punished by the Creator. For we have become fallen women and she would unite us with fallen men, men who are guilty of violating our dogma of One Creation by coupling with other unrelated women either by compliance or, horrifyingly, by force.
And thus, for our transgressions, Erasmus and I were united in contractual matrimony for a period of ten years.
Erasmus was different from the other men I knew. The years in the Outlands had changed him, his mother said as she placed his hand in mine, in matrimony. He looked at me as she said that and I could see something within him. While other men seemed to have the purity of white lilies inside them, in Erasmus I saw something else.
But what I saw within would not come out easily, I realised as the priestess read out the contract and drew our signatures in blood. In the contractual marriage, Erasmus would have to carry out faithfully the duties of a husband, laid out by our scriptures, failing which he would be put to death. A contractual marriage was a chance of redemption for a fallen man and most men in it followed its terms till its end date. Would proud Erasmus follow suit? Though I did not know what he was like at that time, his face pleased me and I certainly would not have wished him dead. So, I prayed that he would not break the rules. However, there was still a small part of me, the part that listens to no reason, the part that liked what it had seen within him, that wished that he would break these rules.
And break the rules he did, on the very first night of our marriage. I do not speak from experience but from the memories of stealthily witnessing the coupling of my parents as I say this : the act allowed to us by our religion is monotonous and boringly bland. It did not arouse me in any way and I dare say I did not look forward to the nights with Erasmus. As he entered my room the first night, I looked up, expecting him to ask me to lay over him and begin the process of Creation. He did not, however, choosing instead to come close to me, with a wild look in his eyes, and caress my body. I grew aroused rapidly, but a small voice in me, fearing punishment, vocalised itself and asked, "But what of the terms of the contract, Erasmus?"
"I am beyond redemption, Orfelia. If I must be put to death tomorrow, I shall walk to the guillotine satisfied with the taste of you."
His words were crude but they burned something within me. "I am beyond redemption too, Erasmus", I replied and hurtled down the vortex to fiery hell with him, our bodies coiled together. If the good men and women of this land coupled for Creation in the way my parents had, I wept for them as they were deprived the real joys of union.
A good man and a good woman coupling were two blocks of flint stone, inanimate and inorganic, rubbing against each other to create a spark.
Erasmus and I, on the other hand, were living, breathing creatures. He was a snake coiling around the lemon tree. I played the flute in rhythmic patterns. He was the autumn leaf floating on the spring pond. I became the tigress swimming the easterly wave. He transformed into the pangolin in the hunt. I plucked grapes from the vines. He became a boar..
As the sun rose, yellowy rays entering the room, lighting it up, we found ourselves back in our human forms. I looked at Erasmus. Whatever was there within him, which emerged in the night, had gone back to the depths from whence it came. But I knew it would return as darkness fell again and I smiled in anticipation.
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Musk
Ten years had passed. We were beyond our prime, but that did not slow us down. Even on the last day, Erasmus ravaged me, a discernible sadness in his eyes. I closed my eyes, lifted my oars and let my canoe rush down his raging river. I knew I would lose everything this day.
As we lay next to each other, we looked at each other, not knowing what to say. Erasmus had broken the contract the first day of serving it, taking me in his arms and performing unholy acts. Would he break the contract again to stay with me?
I looked into his eyes expectantly. He looked back. The sadness grew. There was a distant look, a distant and almost forgotten memory returning to haunt him.
"I have served you well, Orfelia", he said, "And I must take your leave now and return."
"Where will you go, Erasmus? Why won't you stay with me?"
"I will return to my beloved. She waits for me, in the Outlands."
"Don't you love me, Erasmus?"
"I was your husband by contract, Orfelia. With her, I am free and an equal."
His eyes had that wild look again. And he was gone.
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Creation (Optional epilogue)
As Erasmus fled to the Outlands, he was captured and presented before the Creator. A look at him and she had not the heart to put him to death, instead it stirred her loins and she decided that it was time for another birth.
The Creator was a lady of great beauty and she chose a worthy mate every four or five years to produce an offspring who would eventually leave these lands to set up her own society elsewhere. And she had chosen Erasmus now, and they would couple before her people who would cheer them in a gala of the grandest pomp and splendour. She disrobed herself before the applauding audience and beckoned Erasmus to the ceremonial bed. She would coil herself around him, she planned, clutching his hair in intimate embrace and after the final moment draw out her dagger and- but, Erasmus had not followed her commanding gesture. He came close to her instead, with a wild look in his eyes.
The End.
posted by foogarky @ 11:45 AM,
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Mr. Lampooner and the discovery of Bible powered Time Travel
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Dramatis Personae :
Mr. Lampooner, a meta-fictional superhero with supranatural powers which include calculating the viscosity of a book with a bare finger and the ability to leap into the murky depths of its plot line. Armed with the Quill of Mockery, hand crafted from the feathers of a Mockingbird, this man will always have the last word.
The Deus Ex Machinist, or the Tool of God as he is commonly referred to, is an entity spawned at the moment, after Creation, when the First Man lays the First Woman again and again and again until he tires of it and says that he needs a new woman and asks the creator where could he find a woman of fair bosom, tears of spring dew and toenails of pristine cuticle and the Creator replies "Literature" in response and Literature is created by the First Man who does a bad job of creating works in this new medium and is then given a tool by the Creator; a Tool so powerful, it can drive narratives forward. A Tool also so dangerous that it can drive plot holes through the story. A Tool, so disgusted at being used to fix inferior plots, that it decides to question its existence and realises that the greatest story ever told, being told and will continue to be told, the Story of the World needs fixing and the only tool that can rise up to this task is itself, or himself as he chooses his gender to be. The Tool of God.
Doobiewedder, an eighteenth century janitor who dabbles in metaphysics, astro-biology and other sciences of dubious scientific value during his work breaks is famously attributed as the proponent of the Einstein-Doobiewedder paradox and not so famously as the inventor of the grammatical molecule analyzer, an invention that holds the dubious distinction of being the only product of human scientific thought that can take science a step backward.
Jane Doe, a mysterious unplanned character that has suddenly appeared in the storyline and taken the writer by surprise. This character sketch will remain empty as details about this character remain sketchy.
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ACT I
[In a poorly constructed set decorated with second-hand props and painted cardboard boxes, stand the three characters Mr. Lampooner, The Deus Ex Machinist and Doobiewedder. At a first glance the audience would suppose that the scene was set in the house of a divorced salaryman fallen on bad times but a helpful sign that reads CRIMEFIGHTING HQ informs them that it is what it says it is : The headquarters of a merry bunch of crimefighters.
Mr. Lampooner stands leaning on a table as appears to be his style, but it could be more accurately explained by an accident suffered by the actor the previous night as he crawled back home from a near-by public house in a drunken stupor. The Deus Ex Machinist stands, hands wringing, played a fidgety, nervous actor taken as a last minute replacement to the actor who was knocked out cold in a drunken fight last night in what is rumoured to be the same bar that the actor who plays Mr. Lampooner was partaking beverages in. Doobiewedder stands the janitor stance, receiving rave reviews later for his method acting and quest for perfection, though the fact that could have dulled this praise was that the actor is a real janitor, cast in the role by a desperate producer who had overshot his budget.
As the curtain rises, the spotlight comes in from the corner and goes towards the three characters waiting, passes them and focuses on a hungry rat nibbling on the anchor ropes. The rodent, unaware of having stolen the limelight from the stars, looks up in surprise and runs away. The spotlight operator's boy laughs and follows the fleeing rodent with his light; it is in his control as his father has fallen ill and trusted his scion with carrying out his duties; until he is boxed in the ears by the assistant to the producer, taken away from the controls and visual normalcy is restored. The light is bestowed upon its rightful owners and they begin to speak.]
"Avast! This be a message from a wench, me lads-", Mr. Lampooner starts saying in a carried over accent, carried over from his cross-dressing performance last evening in the titular role in the Cap'n Hooker, Saucy Scourge of the Seven Seas and Octal Oceans comedic drama production, but is interrupted by the frenzied gestures of the producer hinting at his colossal boo boo and quickly, clearing his throat, resumes by saying, "A message so boastfully self confident that it involuntarily brought out my mocking pirate voice to read it out :
'I am Jane Doe', reads the writing on this paper, received as a message from an anonymous source, 'My superpower is an ability to toggle identities. It's like I have a scramble suit wrapped around my brain. In retrospect, I can travel through time, I can do things. I am here to prevail.'"
"Are you friend or foe, Miss Jane Doe?", asks The Deus Ex Machinist, looking at the audience, "If you choose to be a foe, know that Mr. Lampooner, Doobiewedder and I are evaluating your threat as we speak."
[The lights go dim. There is a sound of heavy gears cranking. "The characters are deep in thought", says the narrator in his baritone, stating the obvious. The lights go bright again a few minutes later.]
"She does toggle identities faster than she changes clothes, but even Captain Obvious could tell you who her secret identity is. She is Jane Dough, daughter of baker John Dough, a shape shifting superhero himself", says the lampooner.
"Good 'ol John had a daughter?", asks The Deus Ex Machinist, surprised.
"Apparently, he did. I cannot dig up information on the mother though", replies the lampooner, leaping in and out of encyclopedias, census records and almanacs, "This presents a problem : If the mother carried and passed on super-genes to the child, we might be facing a little superhero here with undiscovered powers. What have you got, Doobiewedder?"
"Leave it to the master of paradoxes, of dubious scientific value, to tackle a time traveller. As she hops, skips and jumps through the fabric of space-time, Doobiewedder shall be there creating paradoxical obstacles."
"That's good to hear", says the lampooner.
"And that's not all, Mr. Lampooner. I have fashioned a time travel procedure for you."
"For me? I am perhaps the most under-equipped superhero in history; I merely leap in and out of books. How could I possibly travel through time?"
"A great superhero turns his limitations into his powers, Mr. Lampooner. Come with me, and I shall show you your time machine."
I follow him expecting to see the TARDIS, or a painted cardboard box that looks like one, but instead lay eyes on a...
"A Bible?"
"Yes, Mr. Lampooner."
"I am going to give a puzzled look now, which is your cue to start your explanation monologue."
"Very well, Mr. Lampooner. Until now you have been leaping in and out of a book. In these expeditions, you might have encountered connections to other books. These connections have been given different names throughout history : Influences, Inspiration, Derivative works and so on. In reality though, no book is an island. It is a small patch of land in the extensive landmass that we call the L-Scape -"
"This is beginning to sound like a ripoff of Terry Pratchett!", cries a heckler from beyond the Fourth Wall, in the audience.
"Oh, hush! I have not heard that name before", replies Doobiewedder, with dubious sincerity, "As I was saying, the Literary Scape or L-Scape, as we refer to it, connects every book together. You leap in a book, and I say leap out of the same book elsewhere."
"Like leap into a paperback copy of Les Chansons de Bilitis in Cognac, France and leap out of the hardcover edition in Quebec, Canada? If this worked, I would be a master of geographic travel!"
"And temporal. And that is why I gave you the Bible. It is one of the earliest published books in the world, the most published book in the world and the most translated book in the world, in excess of over 2,000 languages. Leap into your copy of the Bible and you would be able to leap out almost anywhere in the world and at any time between the birth of Christ to late 21st century."
"Why can't I leap beyond the 21st century?"
"Because Christianity has died out in the 22nd."
"So my bible-powered time travel cannot take me very far into the future, eh?"
"No. And neither would The Deus Ex Machinist's powers work in that time, since he hast been blessed by the Christian God."
"We are both impotent beyond the 21st century, eh Tool of God?"
"Sure looks like it", replies The Deus Ex Machinist, shaking his head sadly, "and if you haven't noticed, Mr. Lampooner, Jane Doe has stated that 'she can do things'; which at a quick glance means she can do things but a deeper analysis reveals an intentionally ambiguous statement which gives her the power to do virtually anything. It is an open ended statement that gives the user limitless powers. Even my powers are not limitless since I am restricted by anomalies and I am the very Tool of God Himself."
"Are we then looking at an opponent with frightfully powerful powers?"
"We sure are."
Mr. Lampooner, The Deus Ex Machinist and Doobiewedder look at each other, then look at the audience and scream in unison. "Please join us, Jane Doe, for we make a puny foe!"
------------------------------------------------------
ACT II
[It is evident to the audience that the actors are standing in the same room as before, but a helpful sign that reads 10 HORSEPOWER CHARIOT informs them that the characters are in motion, travelling at high speeds in a vehicle drawn by steed.]
"Don't we need a name for our group?", asks The Deus Ex Machinist, modulating his voice higher and lower, and vice versa, to mimic the effect of strong winds upon conversation.
"Fear not, I have already given that thought. We shall call ourselves The League of Gentlemen Extraordinaire!", replies the lampooner, with a dramatic flourish.
"And this is totally an Alan Moore ripoff!", cries another heckler from beyond the Fourth Wall.
"We serve the Greater Good, don't we Tool of God?", asks the lampooner.
"Aye", replies The Deus Ex Machinist.
"Then be a good utilitarian and zap those annoying hecklers out of existence. They're beginning to get on my nerves-"
ZAP!
ZAP ZAP ZAPPITY ZAP!
[Shocked silence. Curtains fall. There is a sound of running feet. The cast and crew have fled the scene.]
The End.
---------------------------------------------
In a shocking plot twist, the nervous actor turns out to be a friendly visitor from a neighbourhood galaxy who gets carried away by his role; the show is hailed for its burning realism. It runs to full houses for two whole months; every performance has a role played by a couple of audience members. A role that astounds the audience and is spoken about for weeks later and described as the heckler's swan song.
posted by foogarky @ 8:36 AM,
,
The Author
foogarky
foogarky is the pseudonym of the fictional construct who battles for supremacy with other constructed personas in the mind of a crazed individual. He describes himself as a man living in a non descript house in Rio De Janiero, Brazil with two dogs and a parakeet.
About This Blog
The Loony Lampoonist serves to parody, spoof and satirize everything that needs to be parodied, spoofed and satirized. Due to the fictional nature of this electronic journal, any anecdotes appearing here ever so often that seem to be personal in nature, would suffer from the effects of conflicting personalities, the creation of fictional events and the inclusion of non existent characters who did not make it to the big league in the author's literary works. Thus, the Loony Lampoonist is also a purgatory for characters and ideas that have missed the limelight.
