Chapter 4
| The Story | The Authors |
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Clinging with white knuckled fear Roger began to gingerly rock. He
knew he could make the ledge if he got enough momentum going. "Rock a bye Roger over the chasm you're gonna make it so don't have a spasm... he sang softly to himself. He could feel his left shoe slipping off. He scrunched his toes to keep it on as best he could and increased his arc.Two more swings. One. Two. now! | |
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He thought back to issue #23 of The Amazing Captain Prunejuice!
Dr. Carcinogen had the entire city so paralysed with constipation
that not a single bowel movement had been taken in weeks. Captain
Prunejuice, trapped by the evil Dr. Carcinogen in a hyperbolic suspension
of undigestible red meat and chewing gum, was helpless in the face
of worldwide intestinal blockage. He thrashed, he squirmed, he conjured
infinities of psyllium husks and super-bran from his prune-juice-utility-belt,
all to no avail. And then what had he done? Remember how the auspicious
arrival of Zoloft Girl had provided him with the distraction he needed,
she fighting off Dr. Carcinogen's tumoroid goon-squads with a barrage
of positive, happy thoughts, leaving him free to summon the most
powerful cleansing action the world had ever known, flushing out
the clogged bowels of millions of suffering citizens with the fast-acting
power of super-prune-juice! and washing the nefarious Dr.
Carcinogen and his legion of toxic colons in a gushing flood that
kept the sewers overflowing for a month... No, thought Roger, I guess that won't help me here. I'll guess I'll just have to jump. He took a deep breath, gauged the angle of his trajectory, closed his eyes, and leapt for dear life. And the next thing he knew he was standing on the ledge, looking up at the initials carved into the rock, and the arrow beneath them, pointing him onwards, into the dark maw of the cave which disappeared behind the ledge into the otherwise sheer and unbroken rock face. | |
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"Who's that stompin''round my backdoor?" came a creaky ancient voice
from within the opening. "um..Just me."replied Roger hastily checking
the safety on the gun. "I'm...uh...just passing through." "The hell you say!" came back the voice this time a lot closer to the opening. Roger began to tremble in a manner that would do Barney Fife proud. A shriveled snoot and a pair of coal black eyes peered around the corner at him. "You're not welcome here",it snarled, "So piss off." | |
| "On second thought, come on in." | |
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"But — but — but I — the arrow — Arnie — I have to," he sputtered.
"You don't have t'do a gawd-damn thang, Suh, seein's how y'all is truspassin' awn mah prah-puh-tee," replied the voice with a sniff, sniff, sniff. Roger felt warm, damp animal breath snuffling along his ankles, but could see nothing. "Why, Suh, ah do believe ah've smelled yaw smell befo-ah, though ah cannot, as yet, place just way-yuh that maht have been." He felt what seemed to be tusks pressing into the brittle leather of his shoes as the unseen thing began to sniff at him in earnest. | |
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"Yes Suh, yoah puhsonnal stench befahls mah nostrils with a uncanny
sense of deja vu, as the Frenchman called it, and as its olfah-ca-to-ry
essence works its way into the mnemonic banks of mah cranium, ah
feel shoah ah shall be able to place just whay-uh it is ah know you
froam..." Snuff snuff, sniffle sniffle. Roger stood stock still, frozen. "I, er, highly doubt that, Sir, you must be mistaking me for someone else, because I'm sure I would never forget a person — er, boar, that is — of your unforgettably particular characteristics and obvious caliber, if I may be so bold. You see, I've been following these clues..." "Ah seem to recawl somethun regawding a gee-raff, somewhay-yuh in the distant reaches of mah memory..." drawled the boar, thoughtfully... | |
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"No, I don't think we've ever met." Roger stammered. "Aah, snuff, snuff , Ah knows yuh from somewhay-yuh, snuff, snuff. " Roger could feel the beast's hot breath and tusks moving up his leg. "I'm sure you're thinking of someone else." Roger's voice cracked. "Ah got it! Y'all is that rat bastard what shot me dead and stuffed my head to hang in yo lady friend's apartment!" |
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