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Monday, December 20, 2010
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Secret Santa
Secret Santa
(c)2010 Rupert King
The bright lights of Vegas still flickered. Christmas Eve was tomorrow, and the morning sun was slowly beginning to break through the Nevada dawn. There wouldn’t be any snow on Las Vegas Boulevard this Christmas, and the old man remembered a time when he would have been making plans and mapping global weather conditions. But that was long ago. Now he was retired.
The North Pole was no longer his home, and operations had moved elsewhere following the retirement. The Chinese took over the toy-making operations, the reindeer were laid off, and most of the elves were long dead from an incurable strain of venereal disease known only to them.
The old man took a long tall drink from a short round glass. Scotch. That’s the way Santa likes it, baby. Well, they used to call him Santa. Now he was just plain Kris Kringle, retired businessman. He no longer wore the red suit and was now keeping the ridiculous beard trimmed more closely to his face. The whiteness of his hair and beard were disguised by a more youthful brown coloring. He was living the good life now in a condo overlooking the Vegas Strip. He’d party, he’d gamble, he’d even throw some money at the occasional whore…anything to kill the pain, anything to pass the time. Sometimes he still missed his wife.
He noticed the glass was empty. He walked to the counter, took the lid off the ice bucket, and put two fresh cubes in the tumbler just as the phone rang.
“Hello” the old man said.
“Kringle. This is G. We have a Condition Five,” the voice said.
“Condition Five? I’m out, G. You do realize how long I’ve been retired, don’t you? I’m a civilian now. And also, do you have any idea what time it is? I might have been asleep, instead of drinking all night…”
“You don’t leave the Agency, Kris. Your government needs you. I can’t explain this over an unsecured line. Hermie arrived at McCarran Airport on a private jet minutes ago. He’s to bring you back to us, ” G said.
“Hermie? The hell? I thought all the elves were…”
Click. The connection ended.
I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I can’t do this, Kringle mumbled to himself. It was so many years ago, why can’t they get someone else? He took another drink, this time from the bottle itself. Moments later, the doorbell rang.
“KK, open up. Let me in, you fat bastard. Let me the hell in.” It was the unmistakable voice of Hermie, Kris Kringle’s former associate. Kris didn't like him, especially after the funeral. The other elves never liked him.
The old man unlocked the bolt, unhooked the chain, then opened the door. A tiny elf stood before him, one he hadn’t seen since the retirement party and subsequent funeral. Of course Kringle didn’t remember the retirement party. The punch had been laced with PCP by mischievous young adult elves, all of whom had grown to be sexually promiscuous and pay for it with their lives.
Years later, Hermie looked exactly the same as Kringle remembered. This is because elves age slowly and can mostly be killed only by magic or the occasional sexually transmitted disease. But this elf had at least looked at a fashion magazine or two, as he now wore a black tailored suit instead of his trademark green tights. He was also wearing the dark glasses required for protection against the rising Nevada sun.
An instant look of disgust shone upon Hermie’s face. “For God’s sake, KK, put some clothes on. I’m not interested in your Santa junk.”
Kris Kringle then realized that he had been standing in his own doorway completely naked. He went to get a robe. Hermie had followed him inside, failing to lock the deadbolt after he’d closed the door. He jumped at it, trying to reach it twice, then gave up and walked into the living room.
“There’s a Condition Five, KK. The President asked for you personally. I tried to steer him away from you, but he doesn’t think anyone else can handle it.” Hermie noticed an abundance of empty pizza boxes and scotch bottles covering the expensive tan carpet. He was hesitant to sit down or touch anything. “Come on, get dressed. G will explain all of this to you.”
Kringle quickly put on some clothes and they got in an unmarked black sedan with security glass between the driver and the passengers. They headed directly for McCarran.
“Hermie, I’m out of the Christmas business. All that crap is done by the Chinese these days. And even they subcontract the hell out of it. How am I supposed to…?” Kringle was still a little drunk and was hoping this was a dream he’d wake up from.
“G will give you the details, KK. I’m just bringing your fat ass in.” The elf was curt with him and didn’t offer any explanation. Maybe he didn’t know anything, Kringle thought.
It was a short flight to the nameless top-secret government installation. Actually it had a name, but the name was so secret that very few people knew it. This was because as soon as the authorities had a good top-secret facility, somebody immediately posted its name and location on the internet for all to see. So the solution was not to not name it, but simply to name it and not tell anyone what that name was.
It was a colossal area, made up of huge buildings and tents, nestled deep in the Nevada desert. After reaching the base, Hermie stayed behind in a secure room while Kringle was taken to the Development Area, where his former taskmaster G spent most of his time working on gadgets.
While G held a top-secret position, his moniker was not an attempt to hide his identity. In the Agency, last names are reduced to the first letter, while the remainder of the last name is not used. This simplifies communication. For example, Ralph Washington would be “Ralph W”. G’s first name was Ken, and he disliked his underlings calling him “Kenny G”. Thereafter, he insisted on simply being referred to as G. A special exemption was allowed on his behalf.
“Condition Five, G? But how?”
“As you’re aware, your position as Santa Claus was a cover. The toys were actually delivered by a private army of Sub-Santas while you and your magic flying reindeer performed covert espionage activities in the interest of global security under the direction of the Agency. Upon your retirement, the Sub-Santas were reassigned and the toy-making operation was bought out by a private company, which was subsequently acquired by the Chinese government. The American delivery operation was then sub-contracted to immigrant delivery boys, doing the work that the professionals used to do while mostly surviving exclusively on the milk and cookies left for them.”
This was all old news to Kringle, who nevertheless admired G’s use of extraneous exposition.
“Kris, the Chinese government then also sub-contracted the toy-making to several smaller companies, some of them located in the former Soviet Union. One of these companies is in a breakaway republic that has declared war on the so-called ‘infidels’ of the world.” Kringle didn’t know this part, so he listened in a bit closer.
“Are you familiar with the American teen sensation Jason Beeker? Of course you’re not. He is the hottest metrosexual pop star of his generation. There are millions of licensed products bearing his image being peddled to teenage girls and sexually confused young boys. And he is the subject and selling point of this…”
G produced a color 8X10 photograph and showed it to Kringle.
“It’s a dildo,” Kringle said.
“It’s not a dildo, it was never a dildo. It’s a digital music player on a lanyard, designed to be worn around one’s neck, and preloaded with the latest album by that weird-haired teenage music freak Jason Beeker. But these tracks haven’t been leaked to the internet yet. Don’t you know what this means? You can only get them on this digital music player…which I’ll admit vibrates as the music plays and is roughly the size and shape of a sex toy that a teenage girl might want to use.”
“So they’re going to sell a lot of them, huh?” Kringle was sobering up, but only slightly.
“Exactly. Millions have been pre-ordered. And millions of people are going to die, Kris. Millions of people.”
“Well, I haven’t heard the kid, but how bad can that music be? I mean, come on. We listened to a lot of crap back then…”
“No. Not the music, as bad as it almost certainly is. No, the device itself contains a micro-transmitter that emits a very harmful tone, capable of liquefying the human brain in seconds. Any person listening to this music will die, and painfully. You have to stop them. These harmful units have been assembled at a single factory in that former Soviet country. For security reasons, these products are being sent out at the very last minute. They ship tonight, and are delivered tomorrow…on Christmas Eve.” G sure knew how to exposit the hell out of some exposition, and Kringle had missed this kind of attention to detail.
“So, it’s simple. Send a plane and bomb the factory.”
“No, no, no. Our planes can’t get in there. It would start an international incident. An act of war, if you will. It has to be done by someone who can’t be seen on radar. You.”
“How? Walk across? Take a bus? Aren’t they going to notice someone just walking up to destroy their evil toy plant in the middle of the day?”
“Your sleigh,” said G. He pushed a button and the floor opened. The famous sleigh rose dramatically into the middle of the room. A spotlight came on, making it look like a concept car at the Detroit Auto Show, back when they still made cars in Detroit. It was just as Kringle remembered it, but with a coating of fresh black paint in place of the familiar red.
“But how am I gonna fly this thing? The reindeer are retired…Donner drank himself to death…Blitzen’s in prison on that money-laundering rap…Dasher and Dancer doing reindeer porn…and they’re all so old…” Kringle was confused.
“No, no, my good man. Have a look.” G opened the back panel. “Nuclear powered. It’s got a miniature reactor built inside. You’ve been retired a long time. There have been a lot of innovations. Besides, those animal rights protesters shut down our reindeer games years ago. This baby will go anywhere in the world in a matter of hours. Just don’t crash it or you’ll kill millions of people and start World War III.”
“World War III?!?” Kringle recoiled.
“Well…confidentially, we’ve already had World War III. Nobody would ever call it that, though. I think at some point they’ll just skip ahead to World War IV. The name “World War III” has a lot of weight to it…it needs to be big. I think people expect a lot more out of it, since World War II was such a big deal. It’s very much in the way that The Empire Strikes Back was so good and Return of the Jedi was a little limp, but I think the Godfather films are a far better example. You know what I’m saying, Kris?”
“Yes. No. Wait. So…I’m flying a sleigh in under the radar and destroying an evil terrorist toy factory before the killer music dildos can be delivered to teenage girls and future gay boys.”
G was elated that Kris seemed to have it down. “You got it, Kris…except for the dildo part, which is unfortunate, but I’ve explained that. This operation has to be done tonight, before the merchandise ships. Those music players can’t be allowed to leave that warehouse. Otherwise, there are going to be a lot of sad parents on Christmas Day. Well, some sad parents. Mostly sad, anyway. I’d say a good 90-95% sadness all around…that would be my call. Those sub-contracted immigrant delivery drivers are dynamite. They’re going to be making those rounds no matter what. They live for the milk and cookies that those kids leave out.”
Kringle figured there a good chance that G was just insane…so maybe this wasn’t that big of a deal. He was anxious to just do this, just to get it over with.
“Okay, okay, I’ll do it. What else do I need to know?”
“One thing. You still have the missing tooth, yes? I want you to insert this.”
G opened his hand and inside it he held a fake tooth. “If you are in trouble, and only if you are in trouble, use this. There is a GPS device inside it, and it will summon help. This is a solution of last resort only…keep that in mind. I can’t even guarantee that it will work, but it’s your best shot.”
“Who’s with me on this? Flying solo?”
“Hermie. You get Hermie.”
“Aw c’mon. Not Hermie. It’s one thing to have him come pick me up, but I don’t wanna work with him.” Kringle had a strong dislike for Hermie since the elf had shown up drunk and uninvited to Mrs. Claus’ funeral.
“You need a navigator. He’s been briefed and knows the area where you need to go. I know you two haven’t gotten on well since the funeral…but he’s the best damn elvin navigator out there. Well, technically, he’s the only damn elvin navigator out there…since the rest are dead from promiscuousness and filthy elf sex diseases.”
Kringle carefully inserted the fake tooth and then checked the sleigh out. He was relieved to see that it had an automatic transmission because he hated shifting. Also, a sweet steering wheel with a faux-leather cover…an essential cold-weather accessory. No radio, though…and he was not thrilled at the prospect of engaging Hermie in conversation.
Hermie rejoined him and they gathered their cold weather gear. Hermie wore a tiny black jumpsuit and Kringle wore a darker version of his familiar Santa suit designed for stealth activities. G threw Kringle a set of keys attached to a small set of fuzzy dice and he started the engine.
“There’s a panel on the dash that you might find of interest, Kris. It’s full of glowing candy-colored buttons, each powering a devastating weapon. Luckily, there is a small label beneath each button indicating what it does. But remember to use the nuclear power sparingly, even though it’s clean and renewable!” G shouted as the sleigh rose into the air.
The sleigh responded quickly, though there was a little play in the power steering. Kris learned to correct for it quickly enough and they were on their way.
An hour into the air, as they crossed the North American continent, Kringle noticed that Hermie had begun to shake uncontrollably.
“You cold, Hermie?”
“No. No, I’m fine. It’s just…”
“You have to go to the bathroom, don’t you? I knew it. Friggin’ weak-bladdered elves.”
“Sorry, KK.”
Kringle parked the sleigh at a truck stop outside of Burnsville, Minnesota. The thermometer on the sleigh’s dash indicated it was 2 degrees. Two friggin’ degrees, he mumbled under his breath, friggin’ global warming. He grabbed the Club from behind the driver’s seat and attached it to the steering wheel. “Go ahead and pee, Hermie. I’m gonna grab a bite to eat in the lounge. You can join me if you want.”
By the time Hermie met him at the table, Kringle was being delivered a large cup of coffee and some pancakes with a side of bacon.
“Care to order, Herm? We can invoice the Agency. I not only have a license to kill, but I have a generous meal allowance of up to $10, gratuity included.”
“I could eat,” said the elf.
Kris ordered for him. “Cassie, I want you to bring my friend Hermie the child’s plate, with orange juice and the eggs scrambled. And no sausage. He’s a little guy and he’s got a tender tummy. And if you have a coloring book that would be great.”
Hermie took particular notice of the waitress as she brought his food. She had light brown hair and a fantastic smile. She could have been a dancer or a singer, yet she was slinging food. She had an athletic figure but was extremely top-heavy and had a way of lighting up the room as she brought out tray after tray of food. Hermie entertained forbidden thoughts of the waitress. He fell instantly in love. If things were different, Cassie, I’d give up my life as a lonely elf and move to Minnesota just to be close to you, he thought, but it can never be. He gazed into space.
“What’s on your mind, Hermie? You seem a million miles away.” The big man was throwing back the pancakes.
“Smurfette,” Hermie muttered as he colored in the dog with a flower in its mouth.
“Smurfette? The cartoon character?”
“Yeah. Old cartoon. Saturday mornings on NBC. Something’s always bothered me about it. There were no female Smurfs, right? I mean, Gargamel wanted so badly to destroy the Smurfs that he used magic to create a female version of them, but she was evil.”
“Yeah, so?” Kringle wasn’t sure where Hermie was headed with this.
“So, it figures that…being the only female Smurf, and that every Smurf was falling in love with her, she ended up banging them all, right?”
“You’re overthinking this, Herm. Papa Smurf freed her of Gargamel’s magic spell, so she was probably just humping him out of gratitude. Maybe there was a genuine attraction between them, but I can’t see it. She couldn’t have been having sex with all of the Smurfs. I mean, definitely not Baby Smurf…and Vanity Smurf was obviously gay…”
Hermie didn’t hear this. He was staring down the white blouse of Cassie, who was bending down to deliver the check. It was the most beautiful site he’d seen in his entire elvin life. If it ends today, he thought, it was worth it just for this. The waitress noticed what he was looking at and sweetly smiled at him, and then she was gone from his life forever. Hermie doubted he’d ever meet another one like her. Another time and place, perhaps, and maybe it could have worked, but he wasn’t that guy. Too much was about to happen, and he wasn’t so sure he’d be coming back.
“That’s so wrong, Hermie,” Kringle said, pointing to the fact that the elf had used the crayons to draw enormous breasts on a tree. Hermie folded the page and put it into his pocket.
Kris paid the check and they walked back to the sleigh, which was dusted with a fresh covering of Minnesota snow. He removed the Club from the steering wheel and fired up the sleigh’s nuclear engine again.
Shortly after they’d resumed their journey, Hermie spoke. “It’s not my fault, you know.”
“What?” asked Kris.
“What?” asked Hermie.
“You said ‘It’s not my fault.’ What’s not your fault, Hermie?”
“Mrs. Claus’ death, then me showing up drunk at the funeral. I know I wasn’t supposed to be there…but it’s not my fault she died, KK. Those young elves put the drugs in the punch at the party, and somebody freaked out and set the fire. Then the explosion…and I know they never found the body…”
“That was a long time ago, Hermie. I don’t blame you for that.” Deep inside, but perhaps not too deeply inside, Kringle blamed him for that.
The flight continued for hours. Hermie dozed off for a bit and Kris nudged him.
“Wake up, Hermie. Say, I noticed you were quite taken with that waitress back there.”
“Yeah, she was pretty, and nice to me. If things were different, I’d like to settle down with a girl like that.”
Kringle laughed. “Hermie, she’s a beautiful, healthy girl. She has very specific needs and wants. You would only leave her sexually frustrated. You’re an elf, not some sort of Kenyan circus performer.”
“Well, she seemed nice…and most people aren’t nice to me…the other elves never were.”
“I’d been meaning to ask you about that, Hermie…how is it that all the other elves are dead? They all caught the same elf virus but you’re in good health. What’s up with that?”
“I wouldn’t know. I’m not like them. They took risks that I never did. And they never liked me anyway. So screw ‘em.”
Hours of silence followed. As they approached the Asian continent, the duo began to look for the obscure breakaway Soviet country that housed the deadly toy factory.
There was nothing but snow for hundreds of miles. No buildings, no roads, but then a light.
Hermie was anxious. “That’s it, KK…ground zero. We’re almost there.”
“Open the dash, Hermie. We need to set the guns to blow this mother sky high, then get out of here!”
Hermie’s voice changed suddenly. “Oh, I don’t think so, KK. I don’t think we’re going to blow this place up at all. I think we’re going to land…nice and easy.” Kringle heard a click, and noticed that Hermie had a pistol pointed at him. It was a very small gun, the sort that ladies once carried in their purses. It was a miniature black .25 caliber pistol…tiny yet still semi-deadly and semi-effective.
“Hermie! You traitorous elf bastard! What the hell are you doing?” Kris Kringle was at once not at all surprised and taken completely by surprise. His feelings were mixed, to say the least. He landed the sleigh a hundred feet from the warehouse, put it in park, and gave the keys to Hermie as he directed.
“I’m doing what I have to do, KK. I got a better offer, and I took it. I gave it some thought, I really did. I couldn’t go straight. It’s too late for that anyway. Those killer vibrating music players are going to ship no matter what. Millions of people are going to die, Christmas is going to be ruined, and the crumbling puppet empire of the great Satan will burn forever and ever in the hottest fires of Hell. And if it means killing Santa Claus on top of it, then so much the better. This is a huge chess game, and I’m all in. King me.”
They walked over to the front of the large warehouse, Hermie still holding the gun on Kringle. The elf motioned with the gun towards the door, then used a remote control he’d pulled from his pocket to open it. Standing inside the door as it opened were two former employees from the old days.
“Comet! Cupid! You’re in on this, too? But I worked with you for years. I gave you magic dust and you flew! You flew! We were a team!” The betrayal in the air was palpable.
“Magic dust, KK? You gave them all they wanted, and then you cut them off when you quit the business. Cupid was on the street, homeless. Comet did time in jail, then years in therapy and rehab. You know what happens to pretty reindeer in jail, Kris? Well, maybe they’re not so pretty by the time they get out. All they want is what’s coming to them. We’re not doing this for free…we’ve been promised a lot by the boss to switch sides. The new boss.” Hermie pointed the gun again. “Inside, KK. There’s a chair next to the first window. I want you to sit in it. Nice and easy, now…nice and slow.”
Comet and Cupid stood threateningly over their former boss as the double-dealing elf went behind and tied his hands to the chair. Kringle couldn’t even move his hands a little bit.
“What drove you to this, Hermie? You’ve always been an asshole, but I never would have pegged you as evil. I know you were bullied by the other elves, but I never thought…”
“Bullied? Bullied?!? You know what it’s like being a straight elf, KK? There are no straight elves! They’re magical perfect creatures who live forever, but they’re all gay. I was an outcast! You think I didn’t wanna have fun like all the other elves? There are no female elves. Couldn’t someone have made a Smurfette for me? Hell no, KK. Where’s my Gargamel? Where’s my magic sorcerer? I don’t see any magic sorcerers making sex dolls for me. Do you see any, Comet? Cupid, you see any little flat-chested blue midgets made specifically for the purpose of having sex with an entire race of forest creatures?” Hermie was now doing a mock gesture, holding his hand above his eyes as if to look for something. He was really overdoing it. Comet also attempted a similar gesture by holding up a hoof, but the moment had passed.
“Dammit KK, I had to have sex with your wife because the other elves didn’t accept me! Who wanted to have sex with your wife? Not me, not you…but what choice did I have? You know what that’s like? Actually, she was your wife, so you obviously know what that’s like…but my point is, those other elves put on leather pants and did their own thing and got Elf AIDS or whatever the hell it is and died and I’m still here! Me! Hermie! The last elf in the world!” Hermie made himself nervous waving the gun around, so he put it back in his pocket.
A female voice came from nowhere. “That’s quite enough, Hermie. I’m very displeased with you at the moment. I’m going to suggest disciplinary action at the next employee meeting.” This was followed immediately by an eruption of automatic gunfire. Hermie sought to defend himself at the last moment by pulling out the gun, but grabbed the keys by mistake.
Though still tied to the chair, Kringle was able to tip it over onto its side as Hermie, Comet, and Cupid were cut down in a hail of thick smoke and oh-so-deadly bullets. Saint Nick had narrowly averted death again, as he had so many times in his Agency days.
Kringle lay there on his side, thankful to only grazed by a single bullet to the shoulder. The others weren’t so lucky as they were obviously dead. Comet and Cupid lay side by side, each dripping precious reindeer fluid onto the cold cement floor. Hermie, the last living elf, had just had his status changed permanently. He still held onto the sleigh keys with his tiny hand.
“Thought you couldn’t be killed by anything but magic, Hermie. Must have been a magic bullet, you little freak. You and JFK,” Kringle whispered. He then became silent as he heard footsteps approaching.
“Kris. Are you dead, Kris? You’re either dead or you’re playing dead. Irregardless, you will be quite dead soon enough, and in a most permanent and irrevocable fashion.”
He looked up to see his wife, Helen Kringle...the long-dead Mrs. Claus.
She looked different, to say the least. She’d undergone extensive liposuction and skin peeling. Her hair was still long and curly, but no longer in the classic bun. The granny glasses had been replaced by green-tinted contact lenses. She had new teeth, a tightened face, a new nose, and her breasts were each currently the size of a regulation professional basketball thanks to a unique process called polypropylene string implantation. Also, she was holding a still-smoldering machine gun and was chewing on a lit cigar.
“Regardless,” Kringle said.
“What?”
“Regardless. You said ‘irregardless’, and there’s no such word.”
“You know, Kris, this is why our marriage did…not…WORK,” Helen said, kicking her husband in the stomach. “Our marriage was such a nightmare that I had to fake my own death to escape from it. Living at the North Pole, knitting all the damn time, it’s enough to drive a girl crazy. I gave up the best years of my life, Kris…the best years of my life. The fact that I was having sex with the only straight elf I could find should indicate the level of my discontent.”
“Well, I had no idea, did I? Just maybe I was working for a living, saving the world on a daily basis. And you never complained even once. Have you held a grudge all this time? Is that why you’re doing this…planning to kill millions of innocent teenagers, trying to ruin Christmas with a vibrating musical dildo?!?”
“It’s…NOT…a dildo,” Mrs. Claus said, kicking Kringle again. “A flawed and silly design, but it will suffice. It’s got Jason Beeker’s licensed image on the side, and it really did well in pre-orders. But I assure you, there is no such thing as an "innocent" teenager. Not these days, with their internets and their sexting of naked body parts to each other. Did you know they did that, Kris? You answer your phone and there’s a grainy photo of teenage filth and naughty bits! And they’ve never even seen a book unless it’s about the werewolf zombie pirates. They watch the MTV and all that’s on are reality shows with shirtless boys and rappers with diamonds in their mouths. That’s why people have to die, Kris. And I will see to it that their own bad taste in music is the very thing that does them in. There’s nothing you can do, Kris. Within one hour, the first plane will be here and they will start loading my wonderful toys. Then after this factory is empty I will destroy it…and you with it. Until then you can just lie on the floor and think about what you’ve done. Irregardless…do you hear me, Kris? IRREGARDLESS!!!”
“You’re crazy, Helen. This will never work, don’t you realize that? You’ve already killed Hermie, and Comet and Cupid…”
“And Prancer and Vixen, Kris. They’re buried behind the factory in the old, cold ground. Most disobedient employees. I couldn’t lure the others here, turns out the reindeer porn business is quite lucrative. And Rudolph…I have no idea what became of him. But that’s neither here nor there now. Point is, first you die, then millions of teenage sluts die…and the world doesn’t miss them because they had hideous taste in music. It’s my gift to the cultural future of the world. So, if you don’t mind, my remaining henchman and I must prepare to fly to Houston…I’m afraid the implants irritate the breast pocket and cause fluid buildup, so my boobs keep growing if not drained regularly. If I don’t get it done now I’ll have to wait until after New Years.”
Helen kicked Kris in the stomach one again for good measure. As she walked away, Kris knew that there was no other choice. He used his tongue to open his fake tooth, then bit down with all his might on the emergency button embedded in his molar. He wasn’t sure what was supposed to happen next.
Nothing happened.
In fact, nothing continued to happen, and in great abundance, for nearly forty minutes. Kringle lay on the floor, still uncomfortably tied to his chair next to two dead reindeer and one extremely dead elf. Finally, there was a thump, then a scratching, at the window behind him. Kringle braced himself for the crashing of glass.
He was a little older and rounder than when Kris Kringle had last seen him, but Santa Claus certainly couldn’t forget his oldest and most trusted friend. Age and time had taken its toll, but the red nose glowed just as it always had.
“Rudolph! It’s been years! Look at you! What a sight for sore eyes! And you…my goodness, I never thought I’d see you again!”
Atop Rudolph, strapped to a saddle, was a chimpanzee wearing a cowboy hat and a tiny, ill-fitting red Santa suit, recklessly waving a .357 Magnum.
“Beebo the Christmas Monkey! Oh, my! Come on, boys…help me with these ropes. I can’t move. That bastard elf tied knots like it’s nobody’s business.”
The chunky reindeer and his monkey sidekick began to work at the ropes that bound Kringle’s hands to the chair. In mere moments, his hands were free and he was able to remove the rest of his bindings. He gave Rudolph a friendly pat on the head as he rose from the chair. Beebo extended a palm and gave Kris a mighty high five.
The reunion with his old friends cheered Kringle. “Well, no doubt we’re up against it, boys…but we’re a team again just like the old days. Now, let’s go save Christmas together…one more time!”
Kringle heard a plane circling, preparing to land, and knew there was no time to lose. He whispered instructions to Rupdolph and Beebo, who disappeared behind cases of plastic-wrapped wooden crates. He then grabbed the chair and smashed it on the floor, breaking it into pieces. He took the largest piece he could find and began using it to smash the remaining windows as loudly as he could.
Mrs. Claus’ voice boomed throughout the warehouse. “What the hell is that racket, Kris?!? If you’ve escaped and are breaking my windows I am going to be pretty pissed off!”
Helen walked back into the room, but this time wasn’t alone. She still held her machine gun, and standing beside her was a large Asian man in a black suit wearing a black bowler hat. His arms were crossed and he shook his head disapprovingly but didn’t speak.
“I haven’t introduced my assistant. I meant to before, but he’s spent a lot of time in the restroom lately with kidney stones. This is Handjob. Say hello to Kris, Handjob. He’s the one I told you about, with the erectile dysfunction.” The large silent man shook his head forward and bared his teeth.
“Hey, what the hell…” demanded Kris.
“No use denying it now, Kris. Everyone knows we never had kids because you were shooting Santa blanks. But ironically Handjob is a neuter, so I’m further frustrated. However, the temp agency tells me he’s top henchman and he’s just started with us. With Hermie dead I might consider hiring him permanently. He doesn’t speak, and that’s a bonus. All Hermie ever did was whine about sex anyway, and I couldn’t keep him out of my bras lately. Filthy little creature.”
Suddenly Kringle hit the floor. Rudolph flew up from behind the crates with Beebo on his back. The monkey jumped from the saddle and onto the head of the surprised Mrs. Claus. She screamed as he covered her eyes with his hands. When Handjob struggled to remove Beebo from her face, she panicked and began firing the gun erratically, hitting Handjob in the stomach. He fell to the floor with a groan. The monkey then reached into his Santa suit and grabbed the music player he’d stashed there. He placed it on Mrs. Claus’ head and turned it on. She instantly fell to the floor, her brain beginning to turn to mush. As the monkey left her, he took the opportunity to cop a feel of one of her gigantic fake breasts.
Beebo searched for his companion Rudolph, but found the reindeer dying on the floor, bleeding profusely from a bullet to the side. He held his friend’s head in his monkey hands and wept monkey tears as the reindeer breathed his last.
“Come on, Beebo. Let’s blow this place!” Kris said, as he jumped out a window and into the snow outside.
Beebo grabbed Rudolph, pinched the red glowing nose, and began to twist in a counter-clockwise fashion. When the nose was removed, the heroic Christmas Monkey then pulled a round pin just inside the nasal cavity. Rudolph began to tick loudly. Before leaping from the window himself, Beebo used all of his strength to lift Rudolph. He then threw the dead reindeer at the feet of the disabled Mrs. Claus.
Kris and Beebo dove for a snow bank just as Rudolph exploded. A huge fireball engulfed the factory, destroying everything inside. The circling plane flew away, never able to land. There was a strong smell of burning plastic, which Kringle assumed was the music players but could just as easily have been Mrs. Claus’ colossal breast implants melting.
“I’m glad we could spend Christmas together again, Helen. It was a blast,” Kringle quipped aloud. He lit a cigarette.
They found the sleigh half-buried in snow just where Hermie made Santa park it. If it had been much closer it might have been damaged in the blast. “Well, the sleigh’s still here at least. I don’t know much about hotwiring nuclear-powered flying machines, though. Any ideas, Beebo?”
Beebo removed his cowboy hat and scratched his head in an adorable comedic fashion, then shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, maybe I can crawl under the dash and…” There was a crunching sound. Not the usual crunch of snow, but a crunch with less give and more substance.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Kringle, looking down. On the ground beneath his boot was the severed arm of Hermie the elf, still grasping the keys to the sleigh. “Here’s our ride, Beebo!” Kringle picked up the tiny severed arm and they boarded the sleigh.
“Beebo, I couldn’t have done it without you. You’ve saved Christmas! You hungry, boy? I know this truck stop where we can get some great pancakes, and one of the waitresses has these enormous jugs.” Beebo squeaked approvingly and cupped his hands in front of his chest. “No, Beebo, bigger…much bigger. And now that you’re a Christmas legend, you really should have a catchy theme song of your very own. I think I’ve got just the tune, too.”
Beebo and Kringle began the long sleigh ride home. The monkey jumped up and down in the passenger seat and waved his .357 around with reckless abandon as the old man began to sing…
“Beebo the Christmas Monkey…had a very shiny gun…”
(c)2010 Rupert King
The bright lights of Vegas still flickered. Christmas Eve was tomorrow, and the morning sun was slowly beginning to break through the Nevada dawn. There wouldn’t be any snow on Las Vegas Boulevard this Christmas, and the old man remembered a time when he would have been making plans and mapping global weather conditions. But that was long ago. Now he was retired.
The North Pole was no longer his home, and operations had moved elsewhere following the retirement. The Chinese took over the toy-making operations, the reindeer were laid off, and most of the elves were long dead from an incurable strain of venereal disease known only to them.
The old man took a long tall drink from a short round glass. Scotch. That’s the way Santa likes it, baby. Well, they used to call him Santa. Now he was just plain Kris Kringle, retired businessman. He no longer wore the red suit and was now keeping the ridiculous beard trimmed more closely to his face. The whiteness of his hair and beard were disguised by a more youthful brown coloring. He was living the good life now in a condo overlooking the Vegas Strip. He’d party, he’d gamble, he’d even throw some money at the occasional whore…anything to kill the pain, anything to pass the time. Sometimes he still missed his wife.
He noticed the glass was empty. He walked to the counter, took the lid off the ice bucket, and put two fresh cubes in the tumbler just as the phone rang.
“Hello” the old man said.
“Kringle. This is G. We have a Condition Five,” the voice said.
“Condition Five? I’m out, G. You do realize how long I’ve been retired, don’t you? I’m a civilian now. And also, do you have any idea what time it is? I might have been asleep, instead of drinking all night…”
“You don’t leave the Agency, Kris. Your government needs you. I can’t explain this over an unsecured line. Hermie arrived at McCarran Airport on a private jet minutes ago. He’s to bring you back to us, ” G said.
“Hermie? The hell? I thought all the elves were…”
Click. The connection ended.
I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I can’t do this, Kringle mumbled to himself. It was so many years ago, why can’t they get someone else? He took another drink, this time from the bottle itself. Moments later, the doorbell rang.
“KK, open up. Let me in, you fat bastard. Let me the hell in.” It was the unmistakable voice of Hermie, Kris Kringle’s former associate. Kris didn't like him, especially after the funeral. The other elves never liked him.
The old man unlocked the bolt, unhooked the chain, then opened the door. A tiny elf stood before him, one he hadn’t seen since the retirement party and subsequent funeral. Of course Kringle didn’t remember the retirement party. The punch had been laced with PCP by mischievous young adult elves, all of whom had grown to be sexually promiscuous and pay for it with their lives.
Years later, Hermie looked exactly the same as Kringle remembered. This is because elves age slowly and can mostly be killed only by magic or the occasional sexually transmitted disease. But this elf had at least looked at a fashion magazine or two, as he now wore a black tailored suit instead of his trademark green tights. He was also wearing the dark glasses required for protection against the rising Nevada sun.
An instant look of disgust shone upon Hermie’s face. “For God’s sake, KK, put some clothes on. I’m not interested in your Santa junk.”
Kris Kringle then realized that he had been standing in his own doorway completely naked. He went to get a robe. Hermie had followed him inside, failing to lock the deadbolt after he’d closed the door. He jumped at it, trying to reach it twice, then gave up and walked into the living room.
“There’s a Condition Five, KK. The President asked for you personally. I tried to steer him away from you, but he doesn’t think anyone else can handle it.” Hermie noticed an abundance of empty pizza boxes and scotch bottles covering the expensive tan carpet. He was hesitant to sit down or touch anything. “Come on, get dressed. G will explain all of this to you.”
Kringle quickly put on some clothes and they got in an unmarked black sedan with security glass between the driver and the passengers. They headed directly for McCarran.
“Hermie, I’m out of the Christmas business. All that crap is done by the Chinese these days. And even they subcontract the hell out of it. How am I supposed to…?” Kringle was still a little drunk and was hoping this was a dream he’d wake up from.
“G will give you the details, KK. I’m just bringing your fat ass in.” The elf was curt with him and didn’t offer any explanation. Maybe he didn’t know anything, Kringle thought.
It was a short flight to the nameless top-secret government installation. Actually it had a name, but the name was so secret that very few people knew it. This was because as soon as the authorities had a good top-secret facility, somebody immediately posted its name and location on the internet for all to see. So the solution was not to not name it, but simply to name it and not tell anyone what that name was.
It was a colossal area, made up of huge buildings and tents, nestled deep in the Nevada desert. After reaching the base, Hermie stayed behind in a secure room while Kringle was taken to the Development Area, where his former taskmaster G spent most of his time working on gadgets.
While G held a top-secret position, his moniker was not an attempt to hide his identity. In the Agency, last names are reduced to the first letter, while the remainder of the last name is not used. This simplifies communication. For example, Ralph Washington would be “Ralph W”. G’s first name was Ken, and he disliked his underlings calling him “Kenny G”. Thereafter, he insisted on simply being referred to as G. A special exemption was allowed on his behalf.
“Condition Five, G? But how?”
“As you’re aware, your position as Santa Claus was a cover. The toys were actually delivered by a private army of Sub-Santas while you and your magic flying reindeer performed covert espionage activities in the interest of global security under the direction of the Agency. Upon your retirement, the Sub-Santas were reassigned and the toy-making operation was bought out by a private company, which was subsequently acquired by the Chinese government. The American delivery operation was then sub-contracted to immigrant delivery boys, doing the work that the professionals used to do while mostly surviving exclusively on the milk and cookies left for them.”
This was all old news to Kringle, who nevertheless admired G’s use of extraneous exposition.
“Kris, the Chinese government then also sub-contracted the toy-making to several smaller companies, some of them located in the former Soviet Union. One of these companies is in a breakaway republic that has declared war on the so-called ‘infidels’ of the world.” Kringle didn’t know this part, so he listened in a bit closer.
“Are you familiar with the American teen sensation Jason Beeker? Of course you’re not. He is the hottest metrosexual pop star of his generation. There are millions of licensed products bearing his image being peddled to teenage girls and sexually confused young boys. And he is the subject and selling point of this…”
G produced a color 8X10 photograph and showed it to Kringle.
“It’s a dildo,” Kringle said.
“It’s not a dildo, it was never a dildo. It’s a digital music player on a lanyard, designed to be worn around one’s neck, and preloaded with the latest album by that weird-haired teenage music freak Jason Beeker. But these tracks haven’t been leaked to the internet yet. Don’t you know what this means? You can only get them on this digital music player…which I’ll admit vibrates as the music plays and is roughly the size and shape of a sex toy that a teenage girl might want to use.”
“So they’re going to sell a lot of them, huh?” Kringle was sobering up, but only slightly.
“Exactly. Millions have been pre-ordered. And millions of people are going to die, Kris. Millions of people.”
“Well, I haven’t heard the kid, but how bad can that music be? I mean, come on. We listened to a lot of crap back then…”
“No. Not the music, as bad as it almost certainly is. No, the device itself contains a micro-transmitter that emits a very harmful tone, capable of liquefying the human brain in seconds. Any person listening to this music will die, and painfully. You have to stop them. These harmful units have been assembled at a single factory in that former Soviet country. For security reasons, these products are being sent out at the very last minute. They ship tonight, and are delivered tomorrow…on Christmas Eve.” G sure knew how to exposit the hell out of some exposition, and Kringle had missed this kind of attention to detail.
“So, it’s simple. Send a plane and bomb the factory.”
“No, no, no. Our planes can’t get in there. It would start an international incident. An act of war, if you will. It has to be done by someone who can’t be seen on radar. You.”
“How? Walk across? Take a bus? Aren’t they going to notice someone just walking up to destroy their evil toy plant in the middle of the day?”
“Your sleigh,” said G. He pushed a button and the floor opened. The famous sleigh rose dramatically into the middle of the room. A spotlight came on, making it look like a concept car at the Detroit Auto Show, back when they still made cars in Detroit. It was just as Kringle remembered it, but with a coating of fresh black paint in place of the familiar red.
“But how am I gonna fly this thing? The reindeer are retired…Donner drank himself to death…Blitzen’s in prison on that money-laundering rap…Dasher and Dancer doing reindeer porn…and they’re all so old…” Kringle was confused.
“No, no, my good man. Have a look.” G opened the back panel. “Nuclear powered. It’s got a miniature reactor built inside. You’ve been retired a long time. There have been a lot of innovations. Besides, those animal rights protesters shut down our reindeer games years ago. This baby will go anywhere in the world in a matter of hours. Just don’t crash it or you’ll kill millions of people and start World War III.”
“World War III?!?” Kringle recoiled.
“Well…confidentially, we’ve already had World War III. Nobody would ever call it that, though. I think at some point they’ll just skip ahead to World War IV. The name “World War III” has a lot of weight to it…it needs to be big. I think people expect a lot more out of it, since World War II was such a big deal. It’s very much in the way that The Empire Strikes Back was so good and Return of the Jedi was a little limp, but I think the Godfather films are a far better example. You know what I’m saying, Kris?”
“Yes. No. Wait. So…I’m flying a sleigh in under the radar and destroying an evil terrorist toy factory before the killer music dildos can be delivered to teenage girls and future gay boys.”
G was elated that Kris seemed to have it down. “You got it, Kris…except for the dildo part, which is unfortunate, but I’ve explained that. This operation has to be done tonight, before the merchandise ships. Those music players can’t be allowed to leave that warehouse. Otherwise, there are going to be a lot of sad parents on Christmas Day. Well, some sad parents. Mostly sad, anyway. I’d say a good 90-95% sadness all around…that would be my call. Those sub-contracted immigrant delivery drivers are dynamite. They’re going to be making those rounds no matter what. They live for the milk and cookies that those kids leave out.”
Kringle figured there a good chance that G was just insane…so maybe this wasn’t that big of a deal. He was anxious to just do this, just to get it over with.
“Okay, okay, I’ll do it. What else do I need to know?”
“One thing. You still have the missing tooth, yes? I want you to insert this.”
G opened his hand and inside it he held a fake tooth. “If you are in trouble, and only if you are in trouble, use this. There is a GPS device inside it, and it will summon help. This is a solution of last resort only…keep that in mind. I can’t even guarantee that it will work, but it’s your best shot.”
“Who’s with me on this? Flying solo?”
“Hermie. You get Hermie.”
“Aw c’mon. Not Hermie. It’s one thing to have him come pick me up, but I don’t wanna work with him.” Kringle had a strong dislike for Hermie since the elf had shown up drunk and uninvited to Mrs. Claus’ funeral.
“You need a navigator. He’s been briefed and knows the area where you need to go. I know you two haven’t gotten on well since the funeral…but he’s the best damn elvin navigator out there. Well, technically, he’s the only damn elvin navigator out there…since the rest are dead from promiscuousness and filthy elf sex diseases.”
Kringle carefully inserted the fake tooth and then checked the sleigh out. He was relieved to see that it had an automatic transmission because he hated shifting. Also, a sweet steering wheel with a faux-leather cover…an essential cold-weather accessory. No radio, though…and he was not thrilled at the prospect of engaging Hermie in conversation.
Hermie rejoined him and they gathered their cold weather gear. Hermie wore a tiny black jumpsuit and Kringle wore a darker version of his familiar Santa suit designed for stealth activities. G threw Kringle a set of keys attached to a small set of fuzzy dice and he started the engine.
“There’s a panel on the dash that you might find of interest, Kris. It’s full of glowing candy-colored buttons, each powering a devastating weapon. Luckily, there is a small label beneath each button indicating what it does. But remember to use the nuclear power sparingly, even though it’s clean and renewable!” G shouted as the sleigh rose into the air.
The sleigh responded quickly, though there was a little play in the power steering. Kris learned to correct for it quickly enough and they were on their way.
An hour into the air, as they crossed the North American continent, Kringle noticed that Hermie had begun to shake uncontrollably.
“You cold, Hermie?”
“No. No, I’m fine. It’s just…”
“You have to go to the bathroom, don’t you? I knew it. Friggin’ weak-bladdered elves.”
“Sorry, KK.”
Kringle parked the sleigh at a truck stop outside of Burnsville, Minnesota. The thermometer on the sleigh’s dash indicated it was 2 degrees. Two friggin’ degrees, he mumbled under his breath, friggin’ global warming. He grabbed the Club from behind the driver’s seat and attached it to the steering wheel. “Go ahead and pee, Hermie. I’m gonna grab a bite to eat in the lounge. You can join me if you want.”
By the time Hermie met him at the table, Kringle was being delivered a large cup of coffee and some pancakes with a side of bacon.
“Care to order, Herm? We can invoice the Agency. I not only have a license to kill, but I have a generous meal allowance of up to $10, gratuity included.”
“I could eat,” said the elf.
Kris ordered for him. “Cassie, I want you to bring my friend Hermie the child’s plate, with orange juice and the eggs scrambled. And no sausage. He’s a little guy and he’s got a tender tummy. And if you have a coloring book that would be great.”
Hermie took particular notice of the waitress as she brought his food. She had light brown hair and a fantastic smile. She could have been a dancer or a singer, yet she was slinging food. She had an athletic figure but was extremely top-heavy and had a way of lighting up the room as she brought out tray after tray of food. Hermie entertained forbidden thoughts of the waitress. He fell instantly in love. If things were different, Cassie, I’d give up my life as a lonely elf and move to Minnesota just to be close to you, he thought, but it can never be. He gazed into space.
“What’s on your mind, Hermie? You seem a million miles away.” The big man was throwing back the pancakes.
“Smurfette,” Hermie muttered as he colored in the dog with a flower in its mouth.
“Smurfette? The cartoon character?”
“Yeah. Old cartoon. Saturday mornings on NBC. Something’s always bothered me about it. There were no female Smurfs, right? I mean, Gargamel wanted so badly to destroy the Smurfs that he used magic to create a female version of them, but she was evil.”
“Yeah, so?” Kringle wasn’t sure where Hermie was headed with this.
“So, it figures that…being the only female Smurf, and that every Smurf was falling in love with her, she ended up banging them all, right?”
“You’re overthinking this, Herm. Papa Smurf freed her of Gargamel’s magic spell, so she was probably just humping him out of gratitude. Maybe there was a genuine attraction between them, but I can’t see it. She couldn’t have been having sex with all of the Smurfs. I mean, definitely not Baby Smurf…and Vanity Smurf was obviously gay…”
Hermie didn’t hear this. He was staring down the white blouse of Cassie, who was bending down to deliver the check. It was the most beautiful site he’d seen in his entire elvin life. If it ends today, he thought, it was worth it just for this. The waitress noticed what he was looking at and sweetly smiled at him, and then she was gone from his life forever. Hermie doubted he’d ever meet another one like her. Another time and place, perhaps, and maybe it could have worked, but he wasn’t that guy. Too much was about to happen, and he wasn’t so sure he’d be coming back.
“That’s so wrong, Hermie,” Kringle said, pointing to the fact that the elf had used the crayons to draw enormous breasts on a tree. Hermie folded the page and put it into his pocket.
Kris paid the check and they walked back to the sleigh, which was dusted with a fresh covering of Minnesota snow. He removed the Club from the steering wheel and fired up the sleigh’s nuclear engine again.
Shortly after they’d resumed their journey, Hermie spoke. “It’s not my fault, you know.”
“What?” asked Kris.
“What?” asked Hermie.
“You said ‘It’s not my fault.’ What’s not your fault, Hermie?”
“Mrs. Claus’ death, then me showing up drunk at the funeral. I know I wasn’t supposed to be there…but it’s not my fault she died, KK. Those young elves put the drugs in the punch at the party, and somebody freaked out and set the fire. Then the explosion…and I know they never found the body…”
“That was a long time ago, Hermie. I don’t blame you for that.” Deep inside, but perhaps not too deeply inside, Kringle blamed him for that.
The flight continued for hours. Hermie dozed off for a bit and Kris nudged him.
“Wake up, Hermie. Say, I noticed you were quite taken with that waitress back there.”
“Yeah, she was pretty, and nice to me. If things were different, I’d like to settle down with a girl like that.”
Kringle laughed. “Hermie, she’s a beautiful, healthy girl. She has very specific needs and wants. You would only leave her sexually frustrated. You’re an elf, not some sort of Kenyan circus performer.”
“Well, she seemed nice…and most people aren’t nice to me…the other elves never were.”
“I’d been meaning to ask you about that, Hermie…how is it that all the other elves are dead? They all caught the same elf virus but you’re in good health. What’s up with that?”
“I wouldn’t know. I’m not like them. They took risks that I never did. And they never liked me anyway. So screw ‘em.”
Hours of silence followed. As they approached the Asian continent, the duo began to look for the obscure breakaway Soviet country that housed the deadly toy factory.
There was nothing but snow for hundreds of miles. No buildings, no roads, but then a light.
Hermie was anxious. “That’s it, KK…ground zero. We’re almost there.”
“Open the dash, Hermie. We need to set the guns to blow this mother sky high, then get out of here!”
Hermie’s voice changed suddenly. “Oh, I don’t think so, KK. I don’t think we’re going to blow this place up at all. I think we’re going to land…nice and easy.” Kringle heard a click, and noticed that Hermie had a pistol pointed at him. It was a very small gun, the sort that ladies once carried in their purses. It was a miniature black .25 caliber pistol…tiny yet still semi-deadly and semi-effective.
“Hermie! You traitorous elf bastard! What the hell are you doing?” Kris Kringle was at once not at all surprised and taken completely by surprise. His feelings were mixed, to say the least. He landed the sleigh a hundred feet from the warehouse, put it in park, and gave the keys to Hermie as he directed.
“I’m doing what I have to do, KK. I got a better offer, and I took it. I gave it some thought, I really did. I couldn’t go straight. It’s too late for that anyway. Those killer vibrating music players are going to ship no matter what. Millions of people are going to die, Christmas is going to be ruined, and the crumbling puppet empire of the great Satan will burn forever and ever in the hottest fires of Hell. And if it means killing Santa Claus on top of it, then so much the better. This is a huge chess game, and I’m all in. King me.”
They walked over to the front of the large warehouse, Hermie still holding the gun on Kringle. The elf motioned with the gun towards the door, then used a remote control he’d pulled from his pocket to open it. Standing inside the door as it opened were two former employees from the old days.
“Comet! Cupid! You’re in on this, too? But I worked with you for years. I gave you magic dust and you flew! You flew! We were a team!” The betrayal in the air was palpable.
“Magic dust, KK? You gave them all they wanted, and then you cut them off when you quit the business. Cupid was on the street, homeless. Comet did time in jail, then years in therapy and rehab. You know what happens to pretty reindeer in jail, Kris? Well, maybe they’re not so pretty by the time they get out. All they want is what’s coming to them. We’re not doing this for free…we’ve been promised a lot by the boss to switch sides. The new boss.” Hermie pointed the gun again. “Inside, KK. There’s a chair next to the first window. I want you to sit in it. Nice and easy, now…nice and slow.”
Comet and Cupid stood threateningly over their former boss as the double-dealing elf went behind and tied his hands to the chair. Kringle couldn’t even move his hands a little bit.
“What drove you to this, Hermie? You’ve always been an asshole, but I never would have pegged you as evil. I know you were bullied by the other elves, but I never thought…”
“Bullied? Bullied?!? You know what it’s like being a straight elf, KK? There are no straight elves! They’re magical perfect creatures who live forever, but they’re all gay. I was an outcast! You think I didn’t wanna have fun like all the other elves? There are no female elves. Couldn’t someone have made a Smurfette for me? Hell no, KK. Where’s my Gargamel? Where’s my magic sorcerer? I don’t see any magic sorcerers making sex dolls for me. Do you see any, Comet? Cupid, you see any little flat-chested blue midgets made specifically for the purpose of having sex with an entire race of forest creatures?” Hermie was now doing a mock gesture, holding his hand above his eyes as if to look for something. He was really overdoing it. Comet also attempted a similar gesture by holding up a hoof, but the moment had passed.
“Dammit KK, I had to have sex with your wife because the other elves didn’t accept me! Who wanted to have sex with your wife? Not me, not you…but what choice did I have? You know what that’s like? Actually, she was your wife, so you obviously know what that’s like…but my point is, those other elves put on leather pants and did their own thing and got Elf AIDS or whatever the hell it is and died and I’m still here! Me! Hermie! The last elf in the world!” Hermie made himself nervous waving the gun around, so he put it back in his pocket.
A female voice came from nowhere. “That’s quite enough, Hermie. I’m very displeased with you at the moment. I’m going to suggest disciplinary action at the next employee meeting.” This was followed immediately by an eruption of automatic gunfire. Hermie sought to defend himself at the last moment by pulling out the gun, but grabbed the keys by mistake.
Though still tied to the chair, Kringle was able to tip it over onto its side as Hermie, Comet, and Cupid were cut down in a hail of thick smoke and oh-so-deadly bullets. Saint Nick had narrowly averted death again, as he had so many times in his Agency days.
Kringle lay there on his side, thankful to only grazed by a single bullet to the shoulder. The others weren’t so lucky as they were obviously dead. Comet and Cupid lay side by side, each dripping precious reindeer fluid onto the cold cement floor. Hermie, the last living elf, had just had his status changed permanently. He still held onto the sleigh keys with his tiny hand.
“Thought you couldn’t be killed by anything but magic, Hermie. Must have been a magic bullet, you little freak. You and JFK,” Kringle whispered. He then became silent as he heard footsteps approaching.
“Kris. Are you dead, Kris? You’re either dead or you’re playing dead. Irregardless, you will be quite dead soon enough, and in a most permanent and irrevocable fashion.”
He looked up to see his wife, Helen Kringle...the long-dead Mrs. Claus.
She looked different, to say the least. She’d undergone extensive liposuction and skin peeling. Her hair was still long and curly, but no longer in the classic bun. The granny glasses had been replaced by green-tinted contact lenses. She had new teeth, a tightened face, a new nose, and her breasts were each currently the size of a regulation professional basketball thanks to a unique process called polypropylene string implantation. Also, she was holding a still-smoldering machine gun and was chewing on a lit cigar.
“Regardless,” Kringle said.
“What?”
“Regardless. You said ‘irregardless’, and there’s no such word.”
“You know, Kris, this is why our marriage did…not…WORK,” Helen said, kicking her husband in the stomach. “Our marriage was such a nightmare that I had to fake my own death to escape from it. Living at the North Pole, knitting all the damn time, it’s enough to drive a girl crazy. I gave up the best years of my life, Kris…the best years of my life. The fact that I was having sex with the only straight elf I could find should indicate the level of my discontent.”
“Well, I had no idea, did I? Just maybe I was working for a living, saving the world on a daily basis. And you never complained even once. Have you held a grudge all this time? Is that why you’re doing this…planning to kill millions of innocent teenagers, trying to ruin Christmas with a vibrating musical dildo?!?”
“It’s…NOT…a dildo,” Mrs. Claus said, kicking Kringle again. “A flawed and silly design, but it will suffice. It’s got Jason Beeker’s licensed image on the side, and it really did well in pre-orders. But I assure you, there is no such thing as an "innocent" teenager. Not these days, with their internets and their sexting of naked body parts to each other. Did you know they did that, Kris? You answer your phone and there’s a grainy photo of teenage filth and naughty bits! And they’ve never even seen a book unless it’s about the werewolf zombie pirates. They watch the MTV and all that’s on are reality shows with shirtless boys and rappers with diamonds in their mouths. That’s why people have to die, Kris. And I will see to it that their own bad taste in music is the very thing that does them in. There’s nothing you can do, Kris. Within one hour, the first plane will be here and they will start loading my wonderful toys. Then after this factory is empty I will destroy it…and you with it. Until then you can just lie on the floor and think about what you’ve done. Irregardless…do you hear me, Kris? IRREGARDLESS!!!”
“You’re crazy, Helen. This will never work, don’t you realize that? You’ve already killed Hermie, and Comet and Cupid…”
“And Prancer and Vixen, Kris. They’re buried behind the factory in the old, cold ground. Most disobedient employees. I couldn’t lure the others here, turns out the reindeer porn business is quite lucrative. And Rudolph…I have no idea what became of him. But that’s neither here nor there now. Point is, first you die, then millions of teenage sluts die…and the world doesn’t miss them because they had hideous taste in music. It’s my gift to the cultural future of the world. So, if you don’t mind, my remaining henchman and I must prepare to fly to Houston…I’m afraid the implants irritate the breast pocket and cause fluid buildup, so my boobs keep growing if not drained regularly. If I don’t get it done now I’ll have to wait until after New Years.”
Helen kicked Kris in the stomach one again for good measure. As she walked away, Kris knew that there was no other choice. He used his tongue to open his fake tooth, then bit down with all his might on the emergency button embedded in his molar. He wasn’t sure what was supposed to happen next.
Nothing happened.
In fact, nothing continued to happen, and in great abundance, for nearly forty minutes. Kringle lay on the floor, still uncomfortably tied to his chair next to two dead reindeer and one extremely dead elf. Finally, there was a thump, then a scratching, at the window behind him. Kringle braced himself for the crashing of glass.
He was a little older and rounder than when Kris Kringle had last seen him, but Santa Claus certainly couldn’t forget his oldest and most trusted friend. Age and time had taken its toll, but the red nose glowed just as it always had.
“Rudolph! It’s been years! Look at you! What a sight for sore eyes! And you…my goodness, I never thought I’d see you again!”
Atop Rudolph, strapped to a saddle, was a chimpanzee wearing a cowboy hat and a tiny, ill-fitting red Santa suit, recklessly waving a .357 Magnum.
“Beebo the Christmas Monkey! Oh, my! Come on, boys…help me with these ropes. I can’t move. That bastard elf tied knots like it’s nobody’s business.”
The chunky reindeer and his monkey sidekick began to work at the ropes that bound Kringle’s hands to the chair. In mere moments, his hands were free and he was able to remove the rest of his bindings. He gave Rudolph a friendly pat on the head as he rose from the chair. Beebo extended a palm and gave Kris a mighty high five.
The reunion with his old friends cheered Kringle. “Well, no doubt we’re up against it, boys…but we’re a team again just like the old days. Now, let’s go save Christmas together…one more time!”
Kringle heard a plane circling, preparing to land, and knew there was no time to lose. He whispered instructions to Rupdolph and Beebo, who disappeared behind cases of plastic-wrapped wooden crates. He then grabbed the chair and smashed it on the floor, breaking it into pieces. He took the largest piece he could find and began using it to smash the remaining windows as loudly as he could.
Mrs. Claus’ voice boomed throughout the warehouse. “What the hell is that racket, Kris?!? If you’ve escaped and are breaking my windows I am going to be pretty pissed off!”
Helen walked back into the room, but this time wasn’t alone. She still held her machine gun, and standing beside her was a large Asian man in a black suit wearing a black bowler hat. His arms were crossed and he shook his head disapprovingly but didn’t speak.
“I haven’t introduced my assistant. I meant to before, but he’s spent a lot of time in the restroom lately with kidney stones. This is Handjob. Say hello to Kris, Handjob. He’s the one I told you about, with the erectile dysfunction.” The large silent man shook his head forward and bared his teeth.
“Hey, what the hell…” demanded Kris.
“No use denying it now, Kris. Everyone knows we never had kids because you were shooting Santa blanks. But ironically Handjob is a neuter, so I’m further frustrated. However, the temp agency tells me he’s top henchman and he’s just started with us. With Hermie dead I might consider hiring him permanently. He doesn’t speak, and that’s a bonus. All Hermie ever did was whine about sex anyway, and I couldn’t keep him out of my bras lately. Filthy little creature.”
Suddenly Kringle hit the floor. Rudolph flew up from behind the crates with Beebo on his back. The monkey jumped from the saddle and onto the head of the surprised Mrs. Claus. She screamed as he covered her eyes with his hands. When Handjob struggled to remove Beebo from her face, she panicked and began firing the gun erratically, hitting Handjob in the stomach. He fell to the floor with a groan. The monkey then reached into his Santa suit and grabbed the music player he’d stashed there. He placed it on Mrs. Claus’ head and turned it on. She instantly fell to the floor, her brain beginning to turn to mush. As the monkey left her, he took the opportunity to cop a feel of one of her gigantic fake breasts.
Beebo searched for his companion Rudolph, but found the reindeer dying on the floor, bleeding profusely from a bullet to the side. He held his friend’s head in his monkey hands and wept monkey tears as the reindeer breathed his last.
“Come on, Beebo. Let’s blow this place!” Kris said, as he jumped out a window and into the snow outside.
Beebo grabbed Rudolph, pinched the red glowing nose, and began to twist in a counter-clockwise fashion. When the nose was removed, the heroic Christmas Monkey then pulled a round pin just inside the nasal cavity. Rudolph began to tick loudly. Before leaping from the window himself, Beebo used all of his strength to lift Rudolph. He then threw the dead reindeer at the feet of the disabled Mrs. Claus.
Kris and Beebo dove for a snow bank just as Rudolph exploded. A huge fireball engulfed the factory, destroying everything inside. The circling plane flew away, never able to land. There was a strong smell of burning plastic, which Kringle assumed was the music players but could just as easily have been Mrs. Claus’ colossal breast implants melting.
“I’m glad we could spend Christmas together again, Helen. It was a blast,” Kringle quipped aloud. He lit a cigarette.
They found the sleigh half-buried in snow just where Hermie made Santa park it. If it had been much closer it might have been damaged in the blast. “Well, the sleigh’s still here at least. I don’t know much about hotwiring nuclear-powered flying machines, though. Any ideas, Beebo?”
Beebo removed his cowboy hat and scratched his head in an adorable comedic fashion, then shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, maybe I can crawl under the dash and…” There was a crunching sound. Not the usual crunch of snow, but a crunch with less give and more substance.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Kringle, looking down. On the ground beneath his boot was the severed arm of Hermie the elf, still grasping the keys to the sleigh. “Here’s our ride, Beebo!” Kringle picked up the tiny severed arm and they boarded the sleigh.
“Beebo, I couldn’t have done it without you. You’ve saved Christmas! You hungry, boy? I know this truck stop where we can get some great pancakes, and one of the waitresses has these enormous jugs.” Beebo squeaked approvingly and cupped his hands in front of his chest. “No, Beebo, bigger…much bigger. And now that you’re a Christmas legend, you really should have a catchy theme song of your very own. I think I’ve got just the tune, too.”
Beebo and Kringle began the long sleigh ride home. The monkey jumped up and down in the passenger seat and waved his .357 around with reckless abandon as the old man began to sing…
“Beebo the Christmas Monkey…had a very shiny gun…”
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Tacos of Doom
TACOS OF DOOM
(C)2010 Rupert King
The Trans Am came from nowhere. It was black with gold highlights and tinted windows. It was hard for Ray to tell what model year at the speed it was approaching him, but it looked to be late-‘70s. Ray’s mom had always told him not to jaywalk, that it would surely end in heartbreak, but she had also told him that if you washed clothes on a Sunday it would kill you. Ray’s mom issued mixed messages like a pagan god issues virgin sacrifice orders, so he eventually stopped listening to her altogether.
It turns out the pedestrian never really has the right of way.
Sure, there are laws to protect you, but these laws are mostly enforced after the fact. When you cross against the light, or when you jaywalk, you’re pretty much on your own. Legally you might be correct, and oncoming traffic may be obliged to stop for you, but you’ll find small comfort in these legalities when they’re hosing your ass off the street.
But so what if he had been jaywalking? Aren’t all the rights not assigned to the government assigned to the individuals in the states, or something like that? And as a free and autonomous citizen, didn’t he have the right to manifest his own first best destiny? Besides, there were no cops around, so who would know? These and other half-baked theories entered Ray Garner’s head as he attempted his latest illegal crossing. He had lived his life this way, and he’d managed so far…managed to flunk out of high school, then managed to almost finish broadcasting school, and ultimately managed to fail his way through two decades of dead-end fast-food jobs.
But at the moment the Trans Am knocked him down Ray was only failing to catch a bus. The car’s driver slammed on the brakes and the car screeched to a halt, its front end knocking him backward into the street. Ray’s morbidly obese backside came to rest on the pavement fifteen feet from where he’d been illegally crossing the road.
Some time passed. Or perhaps it didn’t pass at all, since time itself is an illusion and we actually live in the eternal now. It’s a matter of great controversy and heated discussion among philosophers and physicists and other busybodies who themselves ironically have too much time on their hands…whatever that means.
“You awake?” the waitress asked. Her black comfort-insoled shoe gently nudged Ray in his side.
Ray opened his eyes to see a woman in a green waitress uniform standing over him, poking him in the side with her foot. She had curly red hair and she was loudly chewing bubblegum. She was plump but not obese, with wide hips and large round breasts. She wore bright red lipstick, and looked to have been down the street once or twice but not completely around the block. She held a lit cigarette in her left hand, and there was a red lipstick ring circling its filter. She looked exactly like a waitress should. Her nametag said ANGIE.
Ray was flat on his back on the street. He was cautious about moving, even though he didn’t feel any pain, not even from hitting the pavement. “Yeah, I’m awake. I don’t guess you saw the truck that hit me.”
“Car. My car,” Angie the waitress confessed. She held up a set of keys and jingled them. An orange troll doll with pink hair dangled from the end of the key chain. She gestured with her cigarette hand at the black Trans Am, parked several yards away. “Well…it’s my boyfriend’s car. I sort of…borrowed it…after he met with an unfortunate accident. Just headed for Vegas myself. Bad brakes, sorry…anything broken down there?”
Ray sat up and didn’t feel anything unusual. He’d justified his own jaywalking for years but had never been hit by a car himself. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel now. He got to his feet and didn’t feel dizzy or bruised.
“No, I guess I’m okay. I appreciate you stopping, though. Most people hit somebody, they just keep driving.” Ray had to admit to himself that he probably wouldn’t have stopped. He didn’t have a car for a reason, and that reason was his own car had been repossessed and his license had been revoked.
Angie puffed on the cigarette and then smiled. “Had to stop…just to make sure you were okay. Checking on people is a big part of my job. I’m service-oriented. Employee of the month for August.” Ray noticed she was holding up her nametag, and that it did indeed bear a special EMPLOYEEE OF THE MONTH designation. Of course it was April at the moment, but Ray didn’t think about it. He looked at Angie’s ample cleavage poking out of the top of the waitress uniform and suddenly wanted to cover her with maple syrup and roll around on the ground with her, but he was off his game at the moment. He then remembered the bus, and the job interview.
“I got an appointment. I’m okay, thanks for checking on me,” Ray said.
“Well, just in case, take my information.” Angie was already writing on a green order pad she’d pulled out of her apron. She folded it three times and gave the ticket to Ray. “Good luck.” He put the paper in his front pocket.
Angie the waitress got back in the Trans Am and the engine roared to life. As it sped away, Ray could have sworn he heard a Molly Hatchet song coming from the car.
A close one, Ray thought, but a bus was waiting. And this was his bus, the number 44, to take him to the job interview. He’d just gotten a text message from the placement service, or a placement service, since he had signed up with a few and wasn’t sure which one it was. But he knew that he had to get on the 44, even if he hadn’t taken it before, and to talk to Lou at Lou’s Tacos in the Southpoint Mall.
Ray hated tacos. He’d never been to Lou’s. In fact, he’d never even been to the Southpoint Mall. He didn’t have time to think about it now. He just had to get on the bus. Ray expected it to quickly pull away as most do, and he thought he might have to chase it, but it just sat there with the door open. Like most Metro buses, this one was brown, gold, and blue with a huge gopher painted on the side. Seriously, a gopher, thought Ray, are they known for their speed or efficiency? He couldn’t make sense of it. Ray couldn’t make sense of a lot of things.
He got on the bus. He still couldn’t believe what had just happened. “Did you see that? That chick with the big boobs? She almost killed me,” he said to the driver. The driver faced forward, silently.
Ray reached for his bus pass but his wallet wasn’t there. He searched his pockets. His phone, the folded paper the waitress gave him, but no wallet. Must have lost it when the car hit me, he thought. No bus pass. The driver turned and looked at him. “It’s okay. We have a seat for you, Ray.”
The driver looked familiar. Actually, he bore a striking resemblance to Ray’s kindergarten bus driver, Hank. Couldn’t be Hank, though.
“Did you call me -- ”, Ray started.
“Please take a seat, sir”, the driver told Ray, and the door closed behind him. The door made that hydraulic swish sound that you only get from doors on public transportation and on Star Trek.
There was one available seat, three rows back. There was an overweight sandy-haired girl wearing glasses who’d already slid over next to the window so another passenger could share the seat. Ray sat down. The girl didn’t speak. He didn’t notice any other passengers speaking either. They seemed to all just face forward in silence.
Ray tried to make conversation with the girl: “The driver…he looks like my bus driver from when I was a kid. I thought he said my name.”
The girl didn’t turn her head toward him, but spoke: “Maybe it’s him.”
“Nah, couldn’t be. That was thirty years ago. Besides, he’s dead. One morning I got on the bus and there was a different guy driving. I asked where Hank was and he told me Hank wouldn’t be driving the bus any more. My mom told me years later that he’d driven to the package store and bought a bottle of whiskey and ran his car up a tree. She said that they had to pull the bottle out of his throat before they could bury him. But mom was always prone to exaggeration. It seems that the bottle would break, and he certainly couldn’t have swallowed it whole -- ”
The girl didn’t answer or even act like she’d heard him. Ray thought she was cute but she didn’t seem interested. She just stared forward. He gave up the idea of trying to make time with her. He played with his phone, but it wasn’t getting any reception at all. Normally he’d get a bar or two, but nothing now. It wasn’t cracked from hitting the pavement. He blamed it on the bus’ metal surroundings, even though he’d always had crappy service with this particular large telecommunications company.
He still had the interview to do, but suddenly found himself exhausted. In the total silence Ray found it very hard to stay awake. He kept drifting off to sleep, then suddenly was startled awake. This happened several times.
Then it was dark. The bus was empty. Even the large girl who’d been sitting next to him was gone. He’d fallen asleep and somehow missed the arrival at Southpoint Mall. He also apparently missed the girl exiting over him in the seat, which he surely would have enjoyed if awake. The driver was still sitting in the front, staring ahead.
“Last stop, Southpoint Mall. Everybody off.”
The bus was parked in a huge underground transit terminal, but there weren’t any other buses around. A few people were sitting quietly on benches in the terminal, apparently waiting for their own buses to arrive. As he exited the bus, Ray tried to get a look at the driver’s nametag. HENRY.
“Good luck, Ray.”
The door closed with the familiar swish, and the bus pulled away.
Southpoint Mall was a colossal underground structure. It was a mass of levels and escalators that seemed to spiral down to infinity. An underground labyrinth, full of bad music and shoppers. Luckily, Ray was not far from the food court where he was to talk to Lou. He took two escalators down to get there.
Lou’s Tacos was a gaudy, greasy place. The food looked terrible and smelled horrible, yet there was a long line of diners waiting to be served. The menu seemed simple enough:
LOU’S ORIGINAL TACO – .99
NO ADDITIONS – NO SUBTRACTIONS
NO SUBSTITUTIONS – CASH ONLY
NO REFUNDS – NO SMOKING – NO SWEARING
Apparently, Lou was a man of a single mind. If you wanted a taco, he sold you a taco…but his way. Ray had to admire a businessman that cared so little about pleasing the customer. Still, there was no food in the world Ray wanted less than a taco. He hated a taco. Did not want. He’d worked at a taco place much earlier in his dead-end career and found them to be disgusting.
The girl working the counter had a lip ring. She had scars and tattoos covering her arms and her hair was dyed a deep maroon color. She was very pale and had the damaged, faraway look that Ray had often sought in women. She was wearing a smock over her work shirt and she seemed to be very thin. Ray liked big girls, but he wasn’t about to turn anything down. The orders weren’t being filled in any hurry, and the assigned numbers were being called out in what could best be described as a random fashion. Some of the customers seemed to have been waiting a very long time for their food, but nobody complained.
A large man in a white shirt was calling out the order numbers. He was bald but had a goatee and a twirly moustache. While everyone else was not expressing much passion about the food or their jobs, this guy was having the time of his life. He had a sing-songy voice and an artistic flair. He seemed truly flamboyant and theatrical to Ray. His nametag read LOU. He watched for a moment as Lou called out some orders.
“Number thirty-seven. Thirty-seven, please. You are awarded these delicious tacos. Please enjoy!”
“Number fifteen. Fifteen is the number, and the number is fifteen. You are blessed this day to receive these, the tacos of destiny! Enjoy!”
“Number fifty-six. Meaty, beaty, big and bouncy, sailor! It’s a taco-palooza for you and yours, number fifty-six! Enjoy!”
Ray finally approached the counter where Lou was standing. “I’m Ray Garner. I was sent here about the job.”
Lou’s eyes lit up. “Yes, yes…we’ve heard about you. They called and said you were coming, and I think we have just the thing for you. Come on back, Ray.”
He threw Ray a greasy shirt. “You look like a XXXL, Ray. This shirt is an XL. They run a bit small, but I can get you an extra one if you need it. Come here and meet the crew.”
Ray walked with Lou to the back through a swinging door. There were tables upon tables of people assembling tacos and rows upon rows of people putting taco shells into smoking deep fryers.
“Say hi to Ray, everyone. You’re going to get a chance to know everyone soon enough…plenty of time for that.” Lou motioned at the employees toiling at their jobs. They didn’t look up or even seem to hear what he’d said.
He continued. “This isn’t like most taco places. For one thing, there is a shortage of Hispanic labor. Catholics, you know. Always praying and confessing and being forgiven. Very tiny people, like the Asians. But they’re surprisingly efficient at contrition, so we don’t see a lot of them. Now, Ray, we need to go over your paperwork.” Lou gestured to a tiny room that housed a separate interview area, consisting of a small rickety table with two uncomfortable-looking chairs. As they both sat down, Ray’s phone fell out of his pocket and onto the floor.
“What’s this?” Lou picked up the phone and examined it. It had a touch screen with colorful little icons on it.
“Yeah, I tried making a call on the bus, but I couldn’t get a signal.”
“Oh, one of those smart phones. Handy. I love the way they make these things. Little Indonesian kids working for three cents a day, no labor laws there, and the company sells it for what? Four hundred? And a two-year contract? Pure profit. And if you want to complain to customer service you have to talk to some guy in India named ‘Kip’. Come on…you’re in Bhopal…your name was never Kip. ‘Ooh, look at me, I’m Kip in India!’ Talk about evil. You have to admire the sheer gall of it all. Well, you won’t get any reception in here regardless. From what I’ve heard you have to take it outside and hold it to the sky to send a text message anyway. Useless down here. So…where were we? Back to business.”
Lou put on a pair of reading glasses and produced a thick manila folder marked RAY GARNER.
“What’s that?” asked Ray.
“Ray, this is your file. We put you to work based on the information we have on you. We’ve been getting a lot of reports on you. You’ve slacked off in the past few years but we have a lot on your youth. Still, not forgiven is not forgotten. Haven’t been to church since…1984. Wow. Hall of Fame, Ray.” Lou thumbed through the file. “Lying, theft, cheating. You forged checks, stole money from your family?”
“Yeah, I guess…a long time ago. I don’t see how that…”
“Ray, you stole a stuffed squirrel from your biology class, then sewed comedic clothing onto it, and returned it to the class?”
“Like, in 1986. What’s this got to do with tacos?” Ray was angry. He’d done a few things, but he didn’t mean harm. And he realized he had screwed up. A lot.
“Ray, this has everything to do with tacos. You know why I make tacos only one way, and refuse to add or subtract anything from them? That’s because I make the perfect taco. I have made tacos into an art, and you do not screw with art. I can only -- ”
Lou took off his glasses and put them down on the file. Ray hadn’t noticed the music before. It came from the kitchen, and it had increased in volume. Lou rose from the table and walked into the taco prep area. At that moment, the pale skinny girl from the counter walked by the door. Her nametag said BRITNEY.
Ray spoke to her. “You work here long?”
“Ages,” Britney said, not really looking at him or anything in particular. “You’re gonna hate it…this place sucks.”
“So why you work here?” Ray asked.
“Free tacos, mostly. All you can eat. Plus, it’s not like there’s anything else out there for someone like me.” Britney held out her arms, which were covered in skull tattoos and cut marks. Ray knew her type, and although she was pale and had the maroon hair and smaller breasts than he liked, he suddenly found her infinitely more attractive. Daddy issues have kept tattoo parlors and strip clubs in business for generations. He always did well with that type.
They could hear Lou in the taco prep area shouting at his workers. “I have told you all time and again, NO HIP-HOP! We play pan flute music here, and only pan flute! That is the in-house music of Lou’s Tacos, and none other! Is this Zamfir? This CD is not Zamfir...this CD is the Black Eyed Peas. You are aware of the penalty!” There was a crashing of pots and breaking of glass.
Ray saw an opportunity and spoke to Britney. “So, what are you doing later? You hang out?” He was cool, he felt his game returning. “What time do you get off?”
“I don’t get off. That’s my torture. Forever and ever. I take orders for tacos and have meaningless sex but I can’t feel anything. It’s a goth cutter girl’s dream in its own way, but I wouldn’t have chosen it for myself.”
Lou returned to the table, saw Britney standing there, and spoke to them. “I’ll have you know that employee fraternizing is strictly forbidden in the work area. If you two are going to have sex, there is always the break room. You of all people know the drill, Britney.” He playfully spanked her on the butt with his right hand as she walked away. Then he laughed and calmly sat down again.
He suddenly seemed embarrassed. “I’m sorry about the music, Ray. There are certain rogue elements here. Even in our situation people can be inhumane. I simply will not abide hip-hop music, even in a place of eternal torment.”
“What -- ?” Ray was failing to grasp the obvious.
“Look, Ray. I know there’s a learning curve. You’re new here. Most people already have it by now. To put it bluntly, you are, as the Mormons say, darned to Heck. Eternal darnation. And please to remember we don’t allow any swearing here. This isn’t a Naval shipyard, it’s a taco restaurant. Please respect the difference. You’re here because it’s your job to make tacos. You will make tacos, and nothing but tacos, forever and ever. Vile, disgusting tacos with crushed glass and ground up coal. Tacos with seaweed and vomit and dirt. Tacos with ground-up puppies and the tears of small children. We make tacos for the shopping mall at the mouth of Hell, and we’re open 24/7, 365 days a year.”
“Even on Christmas?”
“Especially on Christmas, Ray. You are in Hell. A quite literal and not at all metaphorical Hell, though some might construe it that way. I suppose it’s open to individual interpretation, but rest assured that you have died and you are in the afterlife, and it’s most likely not the one that you were hoping for.”
“I died? When the hell did I die?”
“Ray, earlier today you were hit by a car. I don’t have to remind you, you were present when it happened. Perhaps that is when your phone ceased to function properly, or maybe it’s because of the inadequate 3G data service in this area. And also you fell asleep next to a fat girl on a bus. She could have slit your throat for all you know. You never fall asleep next to a fat girl on the bus, Ray. That’s just asking for it. But I have it on good authority that it was the Pontiac Firebird Trans Am with the faulty brakes.” Lou was still glancing at Ray’s file, and something caught his attention. “Hang on a minute...did you really sleep with and play with the affections of a simple-minded girl just so you could get her to vacuum your apartment in Saint Paul? You’re a monster...that girl was in love with you, Ray. You are in the right place.”
“Wait. So, I’m dead. I have died and gone to Hell. Is that what you’re saying to me, Lou?” Ray didn’t quite have it.
“So, you didn’t see The Sixth Sense. You’re not aware that these things sometimes have twist endings? That guy was dead the whole time! Spoiler alert, everyone...Bruce Willis was dead the whole time in The Sixth Sense! Who didn’t know this?!? I’ll spell it out for you once more: You are to make tacos for all eternity, and it’s the thing you hate the most. And you can have all the free tacos you want, but you despise them! You can have unlimited sex with a damaged girl, but the girl has small breasts and a flat ass and she’ll never be able to feel it anyway! Also, I have it on good authority that she doesn’t shave, and it’s a mess down there. You’re not going to like that, either. It’s a veritable feast for irony lovers everywhere. Please, Ray. We’ve got some serious reverse-Gift of the Magi action going on here. Oh, it’s all too much. We are having fun, aren’t we? But need to wrap this up before we’re issued a cease-and-desist order by the producers of The Twilight Zone.” At this point Lou was wiping a tear from his eye from laughing so hard. He so loved his job.
“But I see that you have a good heart, Ray. I mean, sure, maybe you felt up that girl at work, and maybe that other girl was a little drunk at that party, and maybe that one girl wasn’t quite eighteen yet. Maybe the lights aren’t all on upstairs, but I can see that you’re not a bad guy. I tell you what. You’ll make tacos, day and night, for all eternity. But by ‘all eternity’ I mean this: there is a way out. If you are truly contrite, if you work hard and are honestly sorry, then someday…and it may take a long time…but someday, you may get out of here and be reunited with your loved ones.”
“Really?” Ray was hopeful, if not totally aware of what had just been said.
“No, of course not. I’m screwin’ with ya. This is Hell. You can’t get out. You’re here forever. I say the same crap to every last one of you idiots and it never gets old. Hysterical! Hell is full of stupid people making tacos! Stupid, stupid stupid! Put your tiny shirt on and clock in. You get your first break in about 65,000 years. Ha!”
Lou walked away, laughing hysterically. Britney walked past Ray, who was still sitting at the rickety table. "That guy is so gay," she said to him.
Lou hadn’t laughed so hard in a long time. After he left Ray he'd gone into his private office to have a smoke and reflect on how good his job was. Good, good times. He kicked his feet up on his desk and lit a cherry-flavored cigar. He slid a Marshall Tucker Band 8-track into the player. Let those poor bastards listen to Zamfir, he said to himself, I’m living the good life.
As he was about to put his work shirt on, Ray remembered the ticket the waitress gave him. He pulled it out of his pocket and unfolded it.
CONGRATS, RAY!
TODAY IS THE LAST DAY OF
THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!
HOPE YOU LIKE TACOS!
YOUR PAL, ANGELA DEATH
Ray suspected that something was amiss, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Maybe he shouldn’t have jaywalked after all. He’d have a good long time to reflect on it. He cringed at the thought of an eternity of bad goth sex and horrific tacos. This was gonna suck.
Elsewhere, the black Trans Am sped on. Angela Death replaced the Molly Hatchet tape with Foghat and continued on the way to Vegas. There was a porno convention in town, and a sleazy producer had a dream date with a belt, the closet door, and a plastic bag.
She smiled and lit another cigarette. It was a good job, and she was a people person.
(C)2010 Rupert King
The Trans Am came from nowhere. It was black with gold highlights and tinted windows. It was hard for Ray to tell what model year at the speed it was approaching him, but it looked to be late-‘70s. Ray’s mom had always told him not to jaywalk, that it would surely end in heartbreak, but she had also told him that if you washed clothes on a Sunday it would kill you. Ray’s mom issued mixed messages like a pagan god issues virgin sacrifice orders, so he eventually stopped listening to her altogether.
It turns out the pedestrian never really has the right of way.
Sure, there are laws to protect you, but these laws are mostly enforced after the fact. When you cross against the light, or when you jaywalk, you’re pretty much on your own. Legally you might be correct, and oncoming traffic may be obliged to stop for you, but you’ll find small comfort in these legalities when they’re hosing your ass off the street.
But so what if he had been jaywalking? Aren’t all the rights not assigned to the government assigned to the individuals in the states, or something like that? And as a free and autonomous citizen, didn’t he have the right to manifest his own first best destiny? Besides, there were no cops around, so who would know? These and other half-baked theories entered Ray Garner’s head as he attempted his latest illegal crossing. He had lived his life this way, and he’d managed so far…managed to flunk out of high school, then managed to almost finish broadcasting school, and ultimately managed to fail his way through two decades of dead-end fast-food jobs.
But at the moment the Trans Am knocked him down Ray was only failing to catch a bus. The car’s driver slammed on the brakes and the car screeched to a halt, its front end knocking him backward into the street. Ray’s morbidly obese backside came to rest on the pavement fifteen feet from where he’d been illegally crossing the road.
Some time passed. Or perhaps it didn’t pass at all, since time itself is an illusion and we actually live in the eternal now. It’s a matter of great controversy and heated discussion among philosophers and physicists and other busybodies who themselves ironically have too much time on their hands…whatever that means.
“You awake?” the waitress asked. Her black comfort-insoled shoe gently nudged Ray in his side.
Ray opened his eyes to see a woman in a green waitress uniform standing over him, poking him in the side with her foot. She had curly red hair and she was loudly chewing bubblegum. She was plump but not obese, with wide hips and large round breasts. She wore bright red lipstick, and looked to have been down the street once or twice but not completely around the block. She held a lit cigarette in her left hand, and there was a red lipstick ring circling its filter. She looked exactly like a waitress should. Her nametag said ANGIE.
Ray was flat on his back on the street. He was cautious about moving, even though he didn’t feel any pain, not even from hitting the pavement. “Yeah, I’m awake. I don’t guess you saw the truck that hit me.”
“Car. My car,” Angie the waitress confessed. She held up a set of keys and jingled them. An orange troll doll with pink hair dangled from the end of the key chain. She gestured with her cigarette hand at the black Trans Am, parked several yards away. “Well…it’s my boyfriend’s car. I sort of…borrowed it…after he met with an unfortunate accident. Just headed for Vegas myself. Bad brakes, sorry…anything broken down there?”
Ray sat up and didn’t feel anything unusual. He’d justified his own jaywalking for years but had never been hit by a car himself. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel now. He got to his feet and didn’t feel dizzy or bruised.
“No, I guess I’m okay. I appreciate you stopping, though. Most people hit somebody, they just keep driving.” Ray had to admit to himself that he probably wouldn’t have stopped. He didn’t have a car for a reason, and that reason was his own car had been repossessed and his license had been revoked.
Angie puffed on the cigarette and then smiled. “Had to stop…just to make sure you were okay. Checking on people is a big part of my job. I’m service-oriented. Employee of the month for August.” Ray noticed she was holding up her nametag, and that it did indeed bear a special EMPLOYEEE OF THE MONTH designation. Of course it was April at the moment, but Ray didn’t think about it. He looked at Angie’s ample cleavage poking out of the top of the waitress uniform and suddenly wanted to cover her with maple syrup and roll around on the ground with her, but he was off his game at the moment. He then remembered the bus, and the job interview.
“I got an appointment. I’m okay, thanks for checking on me,” Ray said.
“Well, just in case, take my information.” Angie was already writing on a green order pad she’d pulled out of her apron. She folded it three times and gave the ticket to Ray. “Good luck.” He put the paper in his front pocket.
Angie the waitress got back in the Trans Am and the engine roared to life. As it sped away, Ray could have sworn he heard a Molly Hatchet song coming from the car.
A close one, Ray thought, but a bus was waiting. And this was his bus, the number 44, to take him to the job interview. He’d just gotten a text message from the placement service, or a placement service, since he had signed up with a few and wasn’t sure which one it was. But he knew that he had to get on the 44, even if he hadn’t taken it before, and to talk to Lou at Lou’s Tacos in the Southpoint Mall.
Ray hated tacos. He’d never been to Lou’s. In fact, he’d never even been to the Southpoint Mall. He didn’t have time to think about it now. He just had to get on the bus. Ray expected it to quickly pull away as most do, and he thought he might have to chase it, but it just sat there with the door open. Like most Metro buses, this one was brown, gold, and blue with a huge gopher painted on the side. Seriously, a gopher, thought Ray, are they known for their speed or efficiency? He couldn’t make sense of it. Ray couldn’t make sense of a lot of things.
He got on the bus. He still couldn’t believe what had just happened. “Did you see that? That chick with the big boobs? She almost killed me,” he said to the driver. The driver faced forward, silently.
Ray reached for his bus pass but his wallet wasn’t there. He searched his pockets. His phone, the folded paper the waitress gave him, but no wallet. Must have lost it when the car hit me, he thought. No bus pass. The driver turned and looked at him. “It’s okay. We have a seat for you, Ray.”
The driver looked familiar. Actually, he bore a striking resemblance to Ray’s kindergarten bus driver, Hank. Couldn’t be Hank, though.
“Did you call me -- ”, Ray started.
“Please take a seat, sir”, the driver told Ray, and the door closed behind him. The door made that hydraulic swish sound that you only get from doors on public transportation and on Star Trek.
There was one available seat, three rows back. There was an overweight sandy-haired girl wearing glasses who’d already slid over next to the window so another passenger could share the seat. Ray sat down. The girl didn’t speak. He didn’t notice any other passengers speaking either. They seemed to all just face forward in silence.
Ray tried to make conversation with the girl: “The driver…he looks like my bus driver from when I was a kid. I thought he said my name.”
The girl didn’t turn her head toward him, but spoke: “Maybe it’s him.”
“Nah, couldn’t be. That was thirty years ago. Besides, he’s dead. One morning I got on the bus and there was a different guy driving. I asked where Hank was and he told me Hank wouldn’t be driving the bus any more. My mom told me years later that he’d driven to the package store and bought a bottle of whiskey and ran his car up a tree. She said that they had to pull the bottle out of his throat before they could bury him. But mom was always prone to exaggeration. It seems that the bottle would break, and he certainly couldn’t have swallowed it whole -- ”
The girl didn’t answer or even act like she’d heard him. Ray thought she was cute but she didn’t seem interested. She just stared forward. He gave up the idea of trying to make time with her. He played with his phone, but it wasn’t getting any reception at all. Normally he’d get a bar or two, but nothing now. It wasn’t cracked from hitting the pavement. He blamed it on the bus’ metal surroundings, even though he’d always had crappy service with this particular large telecommunications company.
He still had the interview to do, but suddenly found himself exhausted. In the total silence Ray found it very hard to stay awake. He kept drifting off to sleep, then suddenly was startled awake. This happened several times.
Then it was dark. The bus was empty. Even the large girl who’d been sitting next to him was gone. He’d fallen asleep and somehow missed the arrival at Southpoint Mall. He also apparently missed the girl exiting over him in the seat, which he surely would have enjoyed if awake. The driver was still sitting in the front, staring ahead.
“Last stop, Southpoint Mall. Everybody off.”
The bus was parked in a huge underground transit terminal, but there weren’t any other buses around. A few people were sitting quietly on benches in the terminal, apparently waiting for their own buses to arrive. As he exited the bus, Ray tried to get a look at the driver’s nametag. HENRY.
“Good luck, Ray.”
The door closed with the familiar swish, and the bus pulled away.
Southpoint Mall was a colossal underground structure. It was a mass of levels and escalators that seemed to spiral down to infinity. An underground labyrinth, full of bad music and shoppers. Luckily, Ray was not far from the food court where he was to talk to Lou. He took two escalators down to get there.
Lou’s Tacos was a gaudy, greasy place. The food looked terrible and smelled horrible, yet there was a long line of diners waiting to be served. The menu seemed simple enough:
LOU’S ORIGINAL TACO – .99
NO ADDITIONS – NO SUBTRACTIONS
NO SUBSTITUTIONS – CASH ONLY
NO REFUNDS – NO SMOKING – NO SWEARING
Apparently, Lou was a man of a single mind. If you wanted a taco, he sold you a taco…but his way. Ray had to admire a businessman that cared so little about pleasing the customer. Still, there was no food in the world Ray wanted less than a taco. He hated a taco. Did not want. He’d worked at a taco place much earlier in his dead-end career and found them to be disgusting.
The girl working the counter had a lip ring. She had scars and tattoos covering her arms and her hair was dyed a deep maroon color. She was very pale and had the damaged, faraway look that Ray had often sought in women. She was wearing a smock over her work shirt and she seemed to be very thin. Ray liked big girls, but he wasn’t about to turn anything down. The orders weren’t being filled in any hurry, and the assigned numbers were being called out in what could best be described as a random fashion. Some of the customers seemed to have been waiting a very long time for their food, but nobody complained.
A large man in a white shirt was calling out the order numbers. He was bald but had a goatee and a twirly moustache. While everyone else was not expressing much passion about the food or their jobs, this guy was having the time of his life. He had a sing-songy voice and an artistic flair. He seemed truly flamboyant and theatrical to Ray. His nametag read LOU. He watched for a moment as Lou called out some orders.
“Number thirty-seven. Thirty-seven, please. You are awarded these delicious tacos. Please enjoy!”
“Number fifteen. Fifteen is the number, and the number is fifteen. You are blessed this day to receive these, the tacos of destiny! Enjoy!”
“Number fifty-six. Meaty, beaty, big and bouncy, sailor! It’s a taco-palooza for you and yours, number fifty-six! Enjoy!”
Ray finally approached the counter where Lou was standing. “I’m Ray Garner. I was sent here about the job.”
Lou’s eyes lit up. “Yes, yes…we’ve heard about you. They called and said you were coming, and I think we have just the thing for you. Come on back, Ray.”
He threw Ray a greasy shirt. “You look like a XXXL, Ray. This shirt is an XL. They run a bit small, but I can get you an extra one if you need it. Come here and meet the crew.”
Ray walked with Lou to the back through a swinging door. There were tables upon tables of people assembling tacos and rows upon rows of people putting taco shells into smoking deep fryers.
“Say hi to Ray, everyone. You’re going to get a chance to know everyone soon enough…plenty of time for that.” Lou motioned at the employees toiling at their jobs. They didn’t look up or even seem to hear what he’d said.
He continued. “This isn’t like most taco places. For one thing, there is a shortage of Hispanic labor. Catholics, you know. Always praying and confessing and being forgiven. Very tiny people, like the Asians. But they’re surprisingly efficient at contrition, so we don’t see a lot of them. Now, Ray, we need to go over your paperwork.” Lou gestured to a tiny room that housed a separate interview area, consisting of a small rickety table with two uncomfortable-looking chairs. As they both sat down, Ray’s phone fell out of his pocket and onto the floor.
“What’s this?” Lou picked up the phone and examined it. It had a touch screen with colorful little icons on it.
“Yeah, I tried making a call on the bus, but I couldn’t get a signal.”
“Oh, one of those smart phones. Handy. I love the way they make these things. Little Indonesian kids working for three cents a day, no labor laws there, and the company sells it for what? Four hundred? And a two-year contract? Pure profit. And if you want to complain to customer service you have to talk to some guy in India named ‘Kip’. Come on…you’re in Bhopal…your name was never Kip. ‘Ooh, look at me, I’m Kip in India!’ Talk about evil. You have to admire the sheer gall of it all. Well, you won’t get any reception in here regardless. From what I’ve heard you have to take it outside and hold it to the sky to send a text message anyway. Useless down here. So…where were we? Back to business.”
Lou put on a pair of reading glasses and produced a thick manila folder marked RAY GARNER.
“What’s that?” asked Ray.
“Ray, this is your file. We put you to work based on the information we have on you. We’ve been getting a lot of reports on you. You’ve slacked off in the past few years but we have a lot on your youth. Still, not forgiven is not forgotten. Haven’t been to church since…1984. Wow. Hall of Fame, Ray.” Lou thumbed through the file. “Lying, theft, cheating. You forged checks, stole money from your family?”
“Yeah, I guess…a long time ago. I don’t see how that…”
“Ray, you stole a stuffed squirrel from your biology class, then sewed comedic clothing onto it, and returned it to the class?”
“Like, in 1986. What’s this got to do with tacos?” Ray was angry. He’d done a few things, but he didn’t mean harm. And he realized he had screwed up. A lot.
“Ray, this has everything to do with tacos. You know why I make tacos only one way, and refuse to add or subtract anything from them? That’s because I make the perfect taco. I have made tacos into an art, and you do not screw with art. I can only -- ”
Lou took off his glasses and put them down on the file. Ray hadn’t noticed the music before. It came from the kitchen, and it had increased in volume. Lou rose from the table and walked into the taco prep area. At that moment, the pale skinny girl from the counter walked by the door. Her nametag said BRITNEY.
Ray spoke to her. “You work here long?”
“Ages,” Britney said, not really looking at him or anything in particular. “You’re gonna hate it…this place sucks.”
“So why you work here?” Ray asked.
“Free tacos, mostly. All you can eat. Plus, it’s not like there’s anything else out there for someone like me.” Britney held out her arms, which were covered in skull tattoos and cut marks. Ray knew her type, and although she was pale and had the maroon hair and smaller breasts than he liked, he suddenly found her infinitely more attractive. Daddy issues have kept tattoo parlors and strip clubs in business for generations. He always did well with that type.
They could hear Lou in the taco prep area shouting at his workers. “I have told you all time and again, NO HIP-HOP! We play pan flute music here, and only pan flute! That is the in-house music of Lou’s Tacos, and none other! Is this Zamfir? This CD is not Zamfir...this CD is the Black Eyed Peas. You are aware of the penalty!” There was a crashing of pots and breaking of glass.
Ray saw an opportunity and spoke to Britney. “So, what are you doing later? You hang out?” He was cool, he felt his game returning. “What time do you get off?”
“I don’t get off. That’s my torture. Forever and ever. I take orders for tacos and have meaningless sex but I can’t feel anything. It’s a goth cutter girl’s dream in its own way, but I wouldn’t have chosen it for myself.”
Lou returned to the table, saw Britney standing there, and spoke to them. “I’ll have you know that employee fraternizing is strictly forbidden in the work area. If you two are going to have sex, there is always the break room. You of all people know the drill, Britney.” He playfully spanked her on the butt with his right hand as she walked away. Then he laughed and calmly sat down again.
He suddenly seemed embarrassed. “I’m sorry about the music, Ray. There are certain rogue elements here. Even in our situation people can be inhumane. I simply will not abide hip-hop music, even in a place of eternal torment.”
“What -- ?” Ray was failing to grasp the obvious.
“Look, Ray. I know there’s a learning curve. You’re new here. Most people already have it by now. To put it bluntly, you are, as the Mormons say, darned to Heck. Eternal darnation. And please to remember we don’t allow any swearing here. This isn’t a Naval shipyard, it’s a taco restaurant. Please respect the difference. You’re here because it’s your job to make tacos. You will make tacos, and nothing but tacos, forever and ever. Vile, disgusting tacos with crushed glass and ground up coal. Tacos with seaweed and vomit and dirt. Tacos with ground-up puppies and the tears of small children. We make tacos for the shopping mall at the mouth of Hell, and we’re open 24/7, 365 days a year.”
“Even on Christmas?”
“Especially on Christmas, Ray. You are in Hell. A quite literal and not at all metaphorical Hell, though some might construe it that way. I suppose it’s open to individual interpretation, but rest assured that you have died and you are in the afterlife, and it’s most likely not the one that you were hoping for.”
“I died? When the hell did I die?”
“Ray, earlier today you were hit by a car. I don’t have to remind you, you were present when it happened. Perhaps that is when your phone ceased to function properly, or maybe it’s because of the inadequate 3G data service in this area. And also you fell asleep next to a fat girl on a bus. She could have slit your throat for all you know. You never fall asleep next to a fat girl on the bus, Ray. That’s just asking for it. But I have it on good authority that it was the Pontiac Firebird Trans Am with the faulty brakes.” Lou was still glancing at Ray’s file, and something caught his attention. “Hang on a minute...did you really sleep with and play with the affections of a simple-minded girl just so you could get her to vacuum your apartment in Saint Paul? You’re a monster...that girl was in love with you, Ray. You are in the right place.”
“Wait. So, I’m dead. I have died and gone to Hell. Is that what you’re saying to me, Lou?” Ray didn’t quite have it.
“So, you didn’t see The Sixth Sense. You’re not aware that these things sometimes have twist endings? That guy was dead the whole time! Spoiler alert, everyone...Bruce Willis was dead the whole time in The Sixth Sense! Who didn’t know this?!? I’ll spell it out for you once more: You are to make tacos for all eternity, and it’s the thing you hate the most. And you can have all the free tacos you want, but you despise them! You can have unlimited sex with a damaged girl, but the girl has small breasts and a flat ass and she’ll never be able to feel it anyway! Also, I have it on good authority that she doesn’t shave, and it’s a mess down there. You’re not going to like that, either. It’s a veritable feast for irony lovers everywhere. Please, Ray. We’ve got some serious reverse-Gift of the Magi action going on here. Oh, it’s all too much. We are having fun, aren’t we? But need to wrap this up before we’re issued a cease-and-desist order by the producers of The Twilight Zone.” At this point Lou was wiping a tear from his eye from laughing so hard. He so loved his job.
“But I see that you have a good heart, Ray. I mean, sure, maybe you felt up that girl at work, and maybe that other girl was a little drunk at that party, and maybe that one girl wasn’t quite eighteen yet. Maybe the lights aren’t all on upstairs, but I can see that you’re not a bad guy. I tell you what. You’ll make tacos, day and night, for all eternity. But by ‘all eternity’ I mean this: there is a way out. If you are truly contrite, if you work hard and are honestly sorry, then someday…and it may take a long time…but someday, you may get out of here and be reunited with your loved ones.”
“Really?” Ray was hopeful, if not totally aware of what had just been said.
“No, of course not. I’m screwin’ with ya. This is Hell. You can’t get out. You’re here forever. I say the same crap to every last one of you idiots and it never gets old. Hysterical! Hell is full of stupid people making tacos! Stupid, stupid stupid! Put your tiny shirt on and clock in. You get your first break in about 65,000 years. Ha!”
Lou walked away, laughing hysterically. Britney walked past Ray, who was still sitting at the rickety table. "That guy is so gay," she said to him.
Lou hadn’t laughed so hard in a long time. After he left Ray he'd gone into his private office to have a smoke and reflect on how good his job was. Good, good times. He kicked his feet up on his desk and lit a cherry-flavored cigar. He slid a Marshall Tucker Band 8-track into the player. Let those poor bastards listen to Zamfir, he said to himself, I’m living the good life.
As he was about to put his work shirt on, Ray remembered the ticket the waitress gave him. He pulled it out of his pocket and unfolded it.
CONGRATS, RAY!
TODAY IS THE LAST DAY OF
THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!
HOPE YOU LIKE TACOS!
YOUR PAL, ANGELA DEATH
Ray suspected that something was amiss, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Maybe he shouldn’t have jaywalked after all. He’d have a good long time to reflect on it. He cringed at the thought of an eternity of bad goth sex and horrific tacos. This was gonna suck.
Elsewhere, the black Trans Am sped on. Angela Death replaced the Molly Hatchet tape with Foghat and continued on the way to Vegas. There was a porno convention in town, and a sleazy producer had a dream date with a belt, the closet door, and a plastic bag.
She smiled and lit another cigarette. It was a good job, and she was a people person.
Friday, August 27, 2010
More Poetry.
More from Rupert King. And by "Rupert King" I mean me, since I am also Rupert King.
Lettuce
by Rupert King - Aug 27, 2010
When she went to the store, we hoped Mom would get us
Bags and bags full of huge heads of lettuce
So leafy and green, not wilted and brown
From the produce store on the south side of town
Farmer Ted runs the place, and he plants the seeds
He gives my Mom just the thing that she needs
Ted's wholesale price, not the one on the tag
He gladly gives Mom when she opens her bag
It's lettuce we crave, and it's all that we eat
Covered in mayo, with a side of pig's feet
Or fried up in Crisco, made so lovingly crisp
Maybe made into wraps, rolled as thin as a wisp
Dessert not forgotten, it's a sight for sore eyes
Mixed with sugar and eggs, then baked into pies
Lettuce is a staple, makes our diets complete
Much more tasty than barley, or rice, or wheat
Leaves of the green stuff we keep in our lunch
We chew it, and chaw it, and greedily munch
And no Oreo cookies, like those of our ilk
It's lettuce we dunk and dip in our milk
Later at the table in our home so humble
In circular silence, with not even a mumble
Mom serves up our dinner in her usual fashion
A leafy green casserole of lettuce-filled passion
She says "Let's now be thankful for what we receive.
This feast made by God, and you'd better believe.
You have a wonderful meal at the end of each day.
So heads down, my children...and now lettuce pray."
Lettuce
by Rupert King - Aug 27, 2010
When she went to the store, we hoped Mom would get us
Bags and bags full of huge heads of lettuce
So leafy and green, not wilted and brown
From the produce store on the south side of town
Farmer Ted runs the place, and he plants the seeds
He gives my Mom just the thing that she needs
Ted's wholesale price, not the one on the tag
He gladly gives Mom when she opens her bag
It's lettuce we crave, and it's all that we eat
Covered in mayo, with a side of pig's feet
Or fried up in Crisco, made so lovingly crisp
Maybe made into wraps, rolled as thin as a wisp
Dessert not forgotten, it's a sight for sore eyes
Mixed with sugar and eggs, then baked into pies
Lettuce is a staple, makes our diets complete
Much more tasty than barley, or rice, or wheat
Leaves of the green stuff we keep in our lunch
We chew it, and chaw it, and greedily munch
And no Oreo cookies, like those of our ilk
It's lettuce we dunk and dip in our milk
Later at the table in our home so humble
In circular silence, with not even a mumble
Mom serves up our dinner in her usual fashion
A leafy green casserole of lettuce-filled passion
She says "Let's now be thankful for what we receive.
This feast made by God, and you'd better believe.
You have a wonderful meal at the end of each day.
So heads down, my children...and now lettuce pray."
Poetry Corner.
This is a poem I just wrote under my pen name Rupert King. It's for those who are interested in the arts.
"Entirely Coincidental Allegorical Poem No. 1"
by Rupert King - Aug. 27, 2010
On a November day, a few years ago
A stranger got off at our town's train depot
A fedora hat on his head, his suitcase in hand
He'd decided to make a stop in our land
Now, some folks said he was from a faraway place
Where all of the females wear veils on their face
"Nonsense", he said, "I'm from a tropical valley."
"Who wants to buy from Barney O'Malley?"
He was tall and thin and his smile shone bright
He was witty and charming and in his eye gleamed a light
That made everyone believe that this was the man
The one that would bring hope and change to our land
Now, times had been hard, the job front depressed
The stores were all closing and the people were stressed
But this man said he would fix all our woes
He'd bring back our jobs and we'd all have new clothes
The answer, he claimed, was simple enough:
"In this case I have the cure for all of that stuff."
It was a colorful case, and it seemed to be packed
With the missing things that all our lives lacked
But Barney was sly, and kept the case locked away
He'd give us the contents, if only we'd pay
Such a beautiful case, filled with ideas so bold,
Barney told us the contents were well worth our gold
"No price is too large, a case filled to the seams,
With bright hopes, and promises, and wonderful dreams."
So we believed what he said, he seemed so honest and frank
Soon we'd be out of our mess and we'd have him to thank
We sold all our treasures and gathered our sum
To buy the suitcase from our favorite new chum
And we met at the tracks at the noon bell chime
To give Barney O'Malley our very last dime
He gave us the case, without hesitation
And said, "So long suckers, I'm now on vacation!"
He jumped on the train as it pulled away
And we looked at the case in the dirt where it lay
The latches and switches we clicked without thought
We were desperate to see just what we had bought
The case lid was opened, its contents inspected
And we found a lot less than what we had expected
We gave Barney O'Malley the last cent in our bank
For a stack of old papers, and most pages were blank
There was nothing of value, and we all felt like dopes
But that's what blank pages are, a place to put hopes
He hadn't lied to us, he'd put it quite clearly
He offered us nothing, and for that we paid dearly
He painted a picture, his voice made our hearts stir
And we bought every word, like the suckers we were
So now we have nothing left, except this advice:
False hope costs nothing, and is well worth the price
"Entirely Coincidental Allegorical Poem No. 1"
by Rupert King - Aug. 27, 2010
On a November day, a few years ago
A stranger got off at our town's train depot
A fedora hat on his head, his suitcase in hand
He'd decided to make a stop in our land
Now, some folks said he was from a faraway place
Where all of the females wear veils on their face
"Nonsense", he said, "I'm from a tropical valley."
"Who wants to buy from Barney O'Malley?"
He was tall and thin and his smile shone bright
He was witty and charming and in his eye gleamed a light
That made everyone believe that this was the man
The one that would bring hope and change to our land
Now, times had been hard, the job front depressed
The stores were all closing and the people were stressed
But this man said he would fix all our woes
He'd bring back our jobs and we'd all have new clothes
The answer, he claimed, was simple enough:
"In this case I have the cure for all of that stuff."
It was a colorful case, and it seemed to be packed
With the missing things that all our lives lacked
But Barney was sly, and kept the case locked away
He'd give us the contents, if only we'd pay
Such a beautiful case, filled with ideas so bold,
Barney told us the contents were well worth our gold
"No price is too large, a case filled to the seams,
With bright hopes, and promises, and wonderful dreams."
So we believed what he said, he seemed so honest and frank
Soon we'd be out of our mess and we'd have him to thank
We sold all our treasures and gathered our sum
To buy the suitcase from our favorite new chum
And we met at the tracks at the noon bell chime
To give Barney O'Malley our very last dime
He gave us the case, without hesitation
And said, "So long suckers, I'm now on vacation!"
He jumped on the train as it pulled away
And we looked at the case in the dirt where it lay
The latches and switches we clicked without thought
We were desperate to see just what we had bought
The case lid was opened, its contents inspected
And we found a lot less than what we had expected
We gave Barney O'Malley the last cent in our bank
For a stack of old papers, and most pages were blank
There was nothing of value, and we all felt like dopes
But that's what blank pages are, a place to put hopes
He hadn't lied to us, he'd put it quite clearly
He offered us nothing, and for that we paid dearly
He painted a picture, his voice made our hearts stir
And we bought every word, like the suckers we were
So now we have nothing left, except this advice:
False hope costs nothing, and is well worth the price
Friday, February 22, 2008
Nit-Picking the Zombie Apocalypse
So, there was this movie, Night of the Comet, in 1984 or so.
Decent flick about a couple of teen sisters who appear to be the only survivors after a comet turns most of the population of planet Earth to dust. I liked the film. In fact, I probably watched it 30 times...but I haven't seen it again for a long time, to be honest. Years later, I have my misgivings about the whole thing.
I'm willing to accept that somehow both sisters lived...that Sam (the ultra-hot Kelli Maroney) spending the night in the utility shed kept her alive, and she didn't turn into a zombie from the radiation. Fair enough, I'm willing to go there. But the mystery "DMK", the person who frustrated Sam by making the high scores on the video game, also survives, and is a hunky teen boy Sam's age? And he has "DMK" vanity plates on the Mercedes he acquires after the zombie apocalypse? Hope I didn't ruin the surprise ending for you, but that was pretty much it.
I think it made me bitter that Sam was doomed to spend the rest of her life with what was essentially the last single guy on Earth, and she'd spend forever trying to beat this jerk at stupid video games instead of with me, since I was presumably also killed by the comet. It's not fair, dammit.
For me, the most illogical part of the film is what doesn't happen after everyone on Earth dies. The power stays on. The street lights still work. Radio stations still operate (though completely voice-tracked, making the film more relevant than ever).
But what about fast-food restaurants? In Los Angeles, even in 1984, there were 24-hour fast food joints. Stick with me on this. You'd assume that doomed restaurant employees were, at the very moment the comet turned everyone to dust, cooking and preparing food using grills, ovens, and deep fryers. These people vanished. The food did not. And with the power left on this food would burn, these fryers would overheat, and fires would start. With all firemen and police officers dead, these small fires would quickly get out of control. By the end of this film the entire city of Los Angeles should be in flames. It is not. There is nothing on fire, anywhere.
Except my burning lust for Kelli Maroney.
Look. I know it's just a movie. Maybe all these years later I'm just bitter about Sam's ultimately unsatisfying stripping sequence in the middle of the film. In an R-rated cut, it could have been so much better. Luckily (for me) she replicated the scene and got topless about a decade later in Scream Queens Hot Tub Party.
What? You think it wasn't all about the boobs for me? Haven't you been reading this blog?
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Not Quite Dead Yet
It's been a while since I updated the ol' website, so here's what's up. Since the last post (October 30?!?), I've moved my base of operations from frozen Minneapolis, Minnesota to much more reasonable Las Vegas, Nevada. I've also started a couple of other blogs that I update on a semi-frequent basis, and those are Dead Person of the Day and An Idiot's Adventures in Vegas. But don't get me wrong. This blog will continue as well as the seldom-updated video review blog Big Ass Movies. It's all a matter of finding a little more time to make it happen.
This blog will be re-branded (as they say) and the new (or rather, back to the old) focus will be my sad obsession and personal struggle with porn and boobs. It don't make me a bad person. Anyway, expect new material in the next few days.
This blog will be re-branded (as they say) and the new (or rather, back to the old) focus will be my sad obsession and personal struggle with porn and boobs. It don't make me a bad person. Anyway, expect new material in the next few days.
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