Tag Archives: deformity

The Recreational Entertainment

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A night of nonsensical dreams and a persistent headache left me washed up lke a beached whale upon the chaise longue in my night room. The most I could achieve on my road to morning humanity was to loosely tamp my pipe. My drooling lips could scarcely support the trembling pipe stem which spilled smouldering shag down my shirt. The possible  ignition caused me no worry; a-squint through my eyelids I saw that fire would only improve the room in which I had wrought much party.

I bellowed for aid. Mr Tribblings flew into the room (for this was in those pleasant days before his revolt), a lemon tea resting upon a silver tray. It was his own drink and he teased me with it. Despite his preternatural ability to brew tea I had become averse to the beverage, finding it faintly reminiscent of simian urine.

I insisted the goose-ape pull me to my feet and commence grooming. He disliked getting his fur wet but I was in powerful need of water’s erosive touch and had no desire for his fumbling mitts to draw insects from me. At length my bestial manservant supplied me with a towel followed by a vast breakfast spread. When finally my repast ended with a pudding I realised that my only hope for true wakefulness was a stroll in the park. Fully en-spatted and en cravate I departed the house, snug in the embrace of my latest invention – the Ele-Chair.

Part ordinary seat, part elephant it was the ambulatory chaise to end all mobile furniture. The recent fad for steam-powered carriages had quite inspired me but I was more comfortable with vivisection. I had taken a pair of young elephants (Afric for their convenient expanse of ear upholstery). One I’d flattened along the back, the other glued upon it in repose so that I’d legs to motivate the chair, another pair to rest my arms upon and the final pair to drape a roofing over.

The lower walking limbs I’d stripped to the bone and varnished as one would a table, which achieved an aesthetically pleasing grain. Naturally I’d decapitated the beasts for their features are monstrously penile. The trunks I’d re-stitched as simple cranes (for shoppping and such) while their tusks made a rather vicious forward-facing ladder for attaining one’s seat.

By means of gimbals I maintained a gentle ride while the Ele-Chair ploughed through the streets, scattering pedestrians with cries of awe and admiring shrieks. As the chair negotiated a junction (I’d naturally endowed it with the delicate mind of a badger I found in my garden one opiated night, for such matters as navigation are beneath a gentlean’s concern) the other road users gave ground gracefully as we turned into the park.

A wondrous expanse of baise green beneath the smoggy sky. My mount picked up speed as it relished the grass between its skeletal toes. With my peasant-beating spear I directed my chair towards a certain copse in whose leafy shade I was confident of finding gentlemanly diversion.

Within the trees’ penumbral umbrella stood a trio of hamnsom carriages, two of which bounced jovially upon their wheels. A quintet of well-dressed gentlemen and ladies ringed the cars, their gaze intent and breathing heavy. When I drew up my pachyderm armchair I elicited a gasp of surprise and a satisfying swoon.

Wordlessly I offered my hand to a finely clad maiden (the unconscious lady would be too much effort). A smile of secret sorts passed between us and I helped her up the tusks and into my lap. With the depression of a bony lever the chaise’s hood rose over us, the four ears of the elephants fanning around to enclose us in an amorous and faintly hairy screen. My ill health was vanishing in a lady haze…

Something was awry. I first noted it when the earth gave the impression of greater motion than I had anticipated. Indeed, the quiver of thighs I’d attributed to my sensual ministrations was a disturbance in the outer world. The smooth travel of my elephantine stool had belied our true progress, for as I peered between petticoats and leathery folds I saw we were far from the restful grove in which we had begun our courtship.

My chair’s tusks were slick with gore and from one of them dangled an impaled swan,  the other boasted a child’s pram. This was potentially awkward. My companion’s alarm was irritatingly evident so I applied a calming chloroform to her and activated the chair guns. It would be dreadful if word were to escape the park that yet another of my creations had run murderously amok.

Accordingly I took aim at a gawping bystander and silenced his potentially slanderous tongue. Our bloody route was easy to retrace for it was strewn with flattened pedestrians. As the Ele-Chair bounded and capered, those few which it merely maimed I drew upon and finished off.

With the noisome folk extinguished (for they did bemoan my actions), my mount calmed and contented itself with uprooting daffodils.

It seemed unlikely that I would return to the passionate grove for it was now a blood spattered boneyard. At least I’d rescued this charming lady who drooled unconscious on my waistcoat. In time the chloroform would wear off, and before then we must find ourselves a fresh copse to revive our romance. “Ho chairephant – to the heath!”

The Culinary Confession of Monty McBuboe

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Gaargh, these be the words of me ship’s cook, the ignoble Monty McBuboe, muttered in’s sleep. He’s no letterin’ of his own, nor digits suffice to the task. Proud leper and gourmet of the rat-infested, weevil-ridden ship’s stores he revealed to me his hopes and fears while snorin’ around his necrotisin’ tongue.

The Culinary Confession of Monty McBuboeTwas a night o’ summeritude, and ye Grim Bastard lolled in a peaceable wake. I meself dozed in me hammock, or rather limb-net. Ye see the fro-in’ and to-in’ o’ the ship can quite disassemble me once common figure, and ye nettin’ keeps it all close by for ye ease of glue and staplin’.

I were awoked by a thin wail what pierced me aural tunnel. I did me limb count and left the galley (in which I sleeps, for ye mates’ve fear o’ inhalin’ me leprosity whiles they yawns). On tip toe (for that’s what I got) I crept to the store-room door. Tis locked, to keep ye rogues without; within lies ye foodstuffs and ye grog. Ye keyhole be sufficient to admit me eye. She’s been loose some months now, and with a teaspoon I can dislodge her orb an’ so I popped ‘er through the lock.

The insides were as dark as an angel’s orifice, for though shadowed twere shot through with flashes of a violent green. The pulses was quite blindin’ to me dislocatered peeper, so I jerked ‘er back into me socket. With a bit o’ fiddlin’ I got it rightways though me blinkin’ had some drag. Luckily me forefinger (I’ve only the left left) had recently whittled itself bony, an’ were an ideal skeleton key.

I’d no choosin’ but to leave the key in the lock, but the door swung gently into the slowly rottin’ fish with which I’d be brewin’ some fine Brain Tenderiser in a half-moon or so. Ye glow warmed me further’n the season’d managed and ye shrill whistle were tauntin’ me again. I follered the fine flautistry to a barrel under the cockle-sack.

Though I does ye chefferin’ hereabouts, tis Barry who’s ye quartermaster and does our shoppin’ when we’re at anchor. O’ course he’s a weakness for the dresses and’s been known to expend ye ration pence and return to the ‘Bastard cased in sequins with feathers in’s hair. So the findin’ o’ mysteries and inedibles be no surprise an’ rarely bars the makin’ of soups.

This cask’d the look o’ luxuries and the sparkle brought to me mind one o’ Barry’s finest deck shows as Sharon; twirlin’ and twinklin’ to the siren song. Ye exotic yellow surface were patterned with neat swirly sigils and cracks leakin’ with the emerald ooze which was soakin’ up into the sacks an’ parcels around it. Arr, a bit o’ gribble’ll merely soften ye vittles but I’d not want ‘em to spoil so I hauled the barrel out and over the side.

With a loaf o’ bread I mopped up ye excess slime for the mates’re oft off-put by the sight o’ such squeamies. The loaf I returned to ye bread bin for we were down to our last few. The whistlin’d passed so I returned to me bunk, lickin’ the oddly tasty green sauce off me odd-matched fingers.

Twas some days later when in me increasin’ desperation for somethin’ edible to pop in ye suppery gruel I were clamberin’ about the storeroom and came upon a startle – a throbbin’ heap o’ fresh peppers, radiant with health. Surroundin’ them was a ring of muscular-lookin’ cockles which bounced in a menacin’ way when I loomed upon ‘em. I takes no nonsense from me grub and twattled ‘em with a ladle into a pot for broilin’. Ye peppers looked right juice-some and destined for the captain’s table.

All day I bragged o’ the meal to me noble cap’n and the delight’s his face’d experience before the night were out. Ah, how I loves to overcome his innate scepticism. I must admit ’tis rare that I succeed an’ that night far from bucked ye trend.

Me galley fairly hummed with culinary froth, and the aromas of a dozen arguably gangrenous ‘gredients. Almost all of me digits’d survived the dicin’ and escaped the pot. All was traversin’ the cookery ocean smoothly until the first cockle exploded out of the pot, punchin’ a hole through the wall. I heard a cry and a distant splash; I turned back to me work. The rest of the ballistic bivalves soon left me a new colander and a gap in me menu.

I turned me favoured blade to the peppers. Arr, their red flesh parted before the knife’s virtue; it made me scrofulus skin itch – tis me art and me craft to cook. And yet when I peered at its innards ye familiar glow fell on me face and that eerie wail resumed from me nighttime wander.

Ye could but imagine me amazement, ‘cept I aims to describe it to ye – within the crimson peach lay an homunculus pepper, singin’ its little bell heart out. Each of I penetrated with me fruit-sword held another of the vege-warblers. They were a delight, their chorus near made me fingernails re-grow and me septum cease its wobblin’. Enchantin’… The magic was shattered by the bellow of my hungry captain. Full well dilemma’d – the cockles’d cocked off and me sweet pepper main dish was serenadin’ me. The cockles I could swap with octopus eyeballs or the cartilage in me knees, but the taste of a pepper’d no compare.

I served up to me captain them darlin’ pepper mites. The grillin’ stopped their singin’ and me one remaining tear duct overflowed to salt ‘em just right. The meal was a success but I could scarce stop the tears that coursed down me right cheek. I hobbled off to bed where I both celebrated and commiserated with meself with a tot of Brain Tenderiser.

Arr, I cannot now look a pepper in the eye for memory of their song. Ye cockles returned by the by and the cupboard whence they now dwell is forever denied me.

A Cold, Cold Night Adventure

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Ye bitter twists o’ winter wrenched our sails about, shakin’ shard o’ ice onto the crew below. Twas a sound akin to dogs bein’ attacked by the Christmas tree they’ve so recently abused with their gnawin’. For my part I shivered in me cabin, furling yet another layer o’ blanket about me limbs. And payin’ especial attention to me stump ends, for the cold plays a special havoc with the joints which’ve no longer a benden’ segment to whom tis married.

Aye, I’d also  been tappin’ away at me special cask o’ rum. Tis the one we use to preserve the mates from whom Fate has withheld her favour. I grant, tis often their own failings which leads Miss Fortune to toss masts and toothy brutes at them. The latest miscarriage o’ justice was Ambrose De’Lentil. Yarr, we knew him as the drunk in the keel.

When I’d first seized the Good Ship Lollipop from her natural owners (though they’d never treated her right: she’d a coat o’ green and orange with sails o’ chequered puppies. I could have happily sunk her had I not found her wheel so spinny), old Ambrose had been hidden deep in the hull behind a bale o’ rotting tobacco and a stack o’ sodden rats. Twas a fortnight at sea before we noted a drop in the rum barrels, and the end o’ the moon before anyone penetrated the stinking barrier he’d become cocooned within.

He was a twitchy madman, toothless from rum sucking and black faced from chewing ye decayed tobac. It took a team of gaggin’ and retchin’ crew to drag the wretched drunk from out his moulderin’ hole. Me natural inclination was to heave him overboard as stowaway, but me pity caught up (tis a result o’ the moral growth I’ve sported as a consequence of the Isle of Letch’s nunnish sponge baths.) We’d a range o’ cages on deck for the restrainin’ o’ beasties such as we’d fancy eatin’ or tradin’, and Ambrose fitted neatly into the Asian Death Badger cage.

We watched him gibber and caper, drooling rope-like strands of black innards-grue. Twas hideous an’ yet captivating. The lads took to sittin’ about him in a ring durin’ their quiet times. They’d do little but stare, toss him the odd share of rum, and listen to his ranted drivel. On occasion a mate’d toss to Ambrose some bauble or other trinket in teasing. Though some items bounced off the vile hull tramp and lay ignored, or at least unsuckled, others he’d snatch up. His twisted black fingers with their sharply broken nails grasped at string, buttons or nails. He’d hoard ‘em in his toothless face hole till he’d enough for his purpose.

Now while he was thus encumbered amusing the crew, Monty and Barry reported a sharp rise in the gnawin’ o’ holes in our barrels of provisions and the spoilin’ of foods. Tis a serious matter, and ye rats’d gotten the better of the vicious cats who’d previously pursued ‘em across the ship. The beasts had grown massive and they bristled at man’s approach. We chose lengthy paths around the Lollipop to avoid their bitey trails. Twas a matter o’ much concern to all those of us who desired food and safety from the Doomrats of the Sea.

Ambrose had gathered sufficient ephemera to undertake his own unique magic. The lads were ever more likely to encircle him at night, for the rats were clearly afeard o’ the stenched fellow. His nasty claws wove the junk into tiny statues o’ mankind. With a globule o’ pitchy spit he daubed ‘em each and the ship fell silent. Slowly, with minute twitches, as if seein’ a thing move from between fluttering eyelids of sleep, the miniature men came to a strange stuttering life. They picked themselves up and bared their tiny teeth. Ye crew were a mite spooked.

The little men stepped out of the firelight and scattered into the ship’s shadows. I know of not one man who slept a wink that night. Ambrose was content to chuckle to himself; a chocolatey giggle that spoke of a disease ridden body. A horrid sound, and one which we stoppered with rum. Despite our fear, alertness and definitely not sleepin’ we woke to a wall o’ rat carcasses around the Asian Death Badger cage. Aye.

The solution to our rat problem were inescapable. The insane filth-spattered raggedy man from the ship’s foulest corner had a power over them. His creepy soldiers prowled the ship by night and delivered their corpses to him. Me preference were that if ye devil’s work were to be done then it should be done belowdecks where we could forget about him. The Asian Death Badger cage we threw in the sea, infested as it was with the man’s reek – we’d no desire to infect one o’ those graceful beasts when we finally caught it. A trail of fish bobbed in its wake until we caught a fresher current.

And so we plunged on through the seas, adventurin’ and piratin’, and beneath our feet old Ambrose the Keel Drunk would be chewin’, drinking and dispatching his little golem to cleanse the vessel of rats. On rare occasions we’d roll a fresh barrel of rum down to him or a bundle of leaf. The next mornin’, or perhaps the next we’d find a neatly crocheted bonnet or scarf pinned to the mast. Twas a boon as we sailed through the seasons into ye winter.

Tis perhaps an irony that twas ye winter that took old Ambrose from us. The icy poles took his hole to a freezier cold than he’d ever before felt. As we made snowmen and battled polar bears old Ambrose was frostifying in his putrid nest. The woollen goods he made for us never warmed his drunken skin, never touched the cankerous recesses of his body. The icicles pierced him sure as deatwpid-tmp_share.jpgh, filling him with snowflakes.

We only knew it when the rats reappeared (them as had not been munched by the vicious Arctic Puffin and its blood-splashed beak – aye, a terrible foe who claimed four of me crew and a polar bear before we stuffed it with gunpowder and spread its pretty feathers over the iceberg), and the mournful troupe of golemic soldiers were found unravelling in the sun one day far south of the Arctic circle. We determined that grim though he were, he were also a man (prob’ly) who’d given much to the crew, and that perhaps we’d give him a land burial, for to our knowledge he’d never seen the sea but for his sojourn in the cage. Also he was fond of rats and they’d be able to pick his bones clean in turn in the ossuary. We were far from land, so we stuffed him into a rum cask to better preserve his rotten form.

As happens now and then to a man of the sea, the memory o’ the crazy man in the hull faded from me mind. Eclipsed perhaps by the excitement of beasts with jaws and claws reachin’ for me skull, the rum cask with Ambrose inside was pushed further back into the liquor store. One day as ye air grew fuller of ice again ye store was growin’ low and me custom was to acquire a full cask and hide it in me cabin before the cellar were drained, lest I be forced to suffer the world in sobriety.

That cask was the one containing the mortal remains of old Ambrose. I discovered this only by a curious confluence o’ sensory gifts. Ye rum held a subtle flavour – strong hints of tobacco and a mouldened scent; the barrel had an unjust weight and on uncorking the rum belly a wizened finger slipped out the hole. It gave me pause I can tell ye, for a moment. I’d doubts as to the wisdom of consumption, for such would have taken Ambrose in time. And yet I’d faith in the spiritual power of alcohol to purify the putrefying man, and no doubt of how little rum was on board.

I popped on the little ear hats that Ambrose had knitted for me and swigged away at his vital fluids. Aye, it keeps out the chill.

Goodbye Mister Bimbolino. Chapter 5: It Only Takes One

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Chapter 5      It Only Takes One

Clive’s attention was drifting away from Alex. This was a good thing; he doubted there was much he could say that would soothe the powerful feelings of anger and shame that emanated from the embittered amoebic man. Alex hoped their earlier bonding would stand the test of time, or at least the next ten minutes.

The two mutant men’s eyes were locked on each other. The fresher second growing more and more alert, gripping his own leg and jerking them both with desperation. With every second the new clone looked smoother and cleaner – newer and stronger, while the primary, Clive seemed weaker and more tired. The palpable hatred of Clive for his identical twin meshed with the fear that sweated from Clive2. Though that fear was ebbing as he neared biological freedom.

While fascinating and horrible, it was a fine opportunity to creep away. But Alex had left it too late. With an appalling stretch of skin and tendon the men’s ankles and heels snapped free; the recoil of flesh made Alex retch. The mutants faced each other like a creepy pornographic version of the Marx Brothers’ mirror gag. They dispensed with the dancing and face-pulling, instead posturing, trying out their independent musculature. They both looked hard and dangerous. New Clive was tense, covered in a film of some bodily secretion alien to ordinarily-sexed humans. Old Clive still had a horrid fleshy rift down his side where the clone had torn himself free, and a sad murderous expression on his face.

Should he try to save the clone? Alex already had an imminent doom vibe and the thought made it vibe all the harder. But right now it looked bad for them both. Maybe if they ran for it Clive wouldn’t be able to hunt them down… in his super-fast flying car. Yeah, great plan. A deep hum rose from outside the barn. Oh… they weren’t even alone. Somehow, between being dropped on a pile of metal tubes and watching a man hatch out of another he’d managed to forget there was an even bigger jet outside. Alex didn’t know if that was good news, but the as the hum grew to a whine it made the trepanned discs of bone he wore round his neck vibrate. He fell to his knees to vomit an instant before the wall behind him dissolved in a violent shower of pulverised iron and brick, burying Alex in a pile of barn powder.

He felt, rather than heard, the massive footsteps thunder past him, but definitely heard the deep lisping of Man Ho-Tjusk.

“Vat’s enough Clive. Y’ain’t killin’ anovver one.”

Clive’s voice rose to a desperate shriek, “Fuck you elephant boy. It’s my clone. I didn’t ask for this.”

“Dad says no Clive.”

Alex excavated just enough powdered brick to see what was going on. Good view. The twin-things were dead ahead; nakedly glaring at each other. Just to Alex’ left the giant shaggy form of Man Ho-Tjusk rose up in the air, looking like a woolly mammoth on its hind legs. Next to him slouched his Beastlie Brother, Mu-Tant Ra’koon. The smaller, but brutal looking beast man was idly carving spirals into a helium can with his extended claws. On Alex’ other side the hissing beeping Boytronic Wonder toted a weapon that for its brutal compactness and branded lethality (Kills What You Want 100% of The Time) was evidently what had killed the wall.

“Just leave me alone. I just want to be alone.”

“Probably shouldn’t have started knocking off clowns then, eh Clive?” the Boytronic Wonder chimes in, ”could have just stayed at home instead of running off. You know that thing,” he pointed his gun towards the Petulance, “you do realise it’s trackable right?”

“Shut up Boy Toy.”

“I mean at least be smart about it, make some plans. Don’t just run off in Daddy’s car and go on a clown hunt. Don’t make me come and bring you back again.”

“Yeah I alwayth liked the clownth at the partieth Dad threw for uth. Remember Mithter Bimbolino? He wath a good one.”

“Oh yeah, I remember him – didn’t you two eat him or something?”

“Only his fingers.” Ra-Koon smirked at the memory.

“Come on then, let’s get the two of you back to the lab.”

“Stay the fuck away from me Wonder-Bot.”

“Hey, happy birthday new Clive! I wonder what you’ll get?”

“For pity’s sake Boyt’. What number’s this one Clive, twenty-three? Twenty-four? Where do they all go?”

Ra-Koon’s idle question visibly shook the clone, who had been watching his twin/father intently during the exchange, no doubt trying to figure out where he stood in this awkward family reunion. Alex also grasped the implications, they were definitely the same wavelength as his doom vibe.

The clone sprang into action, diving onto Clive with his arms spread and fists balled. Ra’Koon bellowed, “no!” and leaped forwards as the clone reached for his progenitor. Man-Ho Tjusk merely snickered, a curious sneezing laugh that bounced down his trunk, blowing dust off the top of Alex’ head. With swiftness that seemed incredible for a naked man with a hole down his side, Clive spun and seized from the floor a vicious bladed instrument that probably had a medical name. The blade whirled and flashed down at the clone. In a flash Alex caught the clone’s terror at the imminence of death and the miserable, hated shortness of his existence. As the gleaming edge descended towards the clone’s face a blinding bolt of violence spurted out of the Boytronic Wonder’s arms and Clive exploded in a spray of bloody wetness, evenly coating his clone and the insides of the barn.

“Fuckth sake Wonder Boy”

“What? He’s literally, exactly the same as Clive. Dad’ll never know the difference.”

“That’s really not the point. And you know that’s not true.” Ra’Koon looked seriously annoyed, teeth bared at his metallic sibling.

“Whatever. I’ve had enough of keeping an eye on that tool.” The Boytronic Wonder didn’t seem the least bit chastised. “Hey,” he called to the blood-soaked figure, “hey, Clive. Yeah, you. Think you can manage not to be a dick?”

The clone looked shocked, which was no great surprise. Still dripping with the pulp of his predecessor he took a step backwards. Alex sympathised; such casual annihilation of the clown slayer wouldn’t fill him with confidence either, but then nor would being attacked by your own mother-brother-dad-thing. Asexual relationships looked complicated.

“Mmm. Come on, Dad wants to see you.” Mu-Tant Ra’Koon retracted his claws and took the new Clive by the arm and dragged him, bloody footprints and all out of the barn. The Boytronic Wonder clicked, beeped and thunked off after him.

Alex breathed out slowly and started to dig himself out. He stopped when a gruff laugh came from right behind him, blowing the brick dust off his head. He turned slowly, into the face of Man Ho-Tjusk crouched in front of him. The man’s eponymous tusks were inches from Alex’ eyes. They looked at each other for a moment. All he felt from the mammoth man was a mild amusement. The giant man snorted and lifted a massive finger to the tip of his trunk, “Shsss. Lucky little man. Be watching you.” He snickered again and stomped off.

Alex cautiously stood up in a shower of ex-barn particles. The Vortex had vanished from outside, leaving him alone in a big room covered in blood and gas cylinders. An interesting day. He had no idea where he was and no way to get home. Unless… the Petulance… Really? Had caution entirely escaped him? Given his surprising bout of luck that night there was no reason to push it any further. Alex sighed, and started walking. After a few paces he scrabbled frantically through his pockets until he found his mobile phone. Still recording. Excellent. He turned off the sound recorder and granted himself a little hop and heel kick. Maybe he’d have something for Neil after all, as long as he could find his way back to town.

The End

More Alex Trepan and Galaxy Team coming soon…

The Hubristic Adventure ~ Captain Pigheart

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The timbers of the Good Ship Lollipop splintered about me as the balls pounded into me stern. I bellowed to bring the ship around, for the wind was catchin’ us pretty and presenting us unfavourably to our foe. Smoke and cries filled the air between our two vessels – gaargh, twas the sneering upstart Captain Aaaarsbeard’s Cankered Whore which spat at us with her iron bile.  I’m a proud man, but not too proud to admit fault on them exceptional cases where there’s no one else to blame. I cannot say the same of Captain “Moose Merkin” Aaaarsbeard, whose vexatious behaviour had earned him a sinking. 

He was a petty and whimsical type, much given to the kind of ego massage as’d shame the most devoted onanist. And like most folk o’ so piteous a disposition he was also excessively sensitive. Not as ye might think in regard to his naming (Aaaarsbeard’s the family name), for while the man was bald as a vinegared lime his breeches overflowed with hedgey hirsutitude. Gaargh, the sight may taint the pleasure a man might take in packing his pipe. Tis said he once so terrified the Duke de Vulva-Beard (who ye may recall from the appalling Island of Merkin) that he was escorted from the Duke’s palace in a box lest his hairy tendrils infest the Duke’s dreams. I’d once seen him plunge into the drink while whorin’ along the pier of Butochrie (a charming town ye may wish to visit); his lower half ballooned and it took nine stout wenches to squeeze the water out of his man-britches.

Nonetheless, we’d been mates for many a year. For we had a common foe in the vile Admiral Lucius Kneehorn whose blind obedience to naval law had spoiled many a booty-hunt. Much time had we spent at cards, dice and wench plotting vengeance on the prissy seaman. Twas natural for us to dine whilst spinning the tales of our feats and daredevil adventuring. Me own cabin is filled with treasures and whatever remnant organs we’d been able to retrieve from the beasts we faced down. But Aaaarsbeard’s walls were adorned with fanciful portraits of himself astride (for example) the gaping socket of the cyclopean giant or nestlin’ twixt the diaphanous frills of a fish-maiden.

Me eye took in the veritable panorama of braggery while me hook idly traced the outline of those shapely scales, for twas life size, ye could almost smell the salt. Gaargh, how fondly I recalls them nip-nips, for twas me own Neptuney love. Me eye darted across further paintings and the theme grew clear – twas my past and my victories, not those of Captain Aaarsbeard. I knew ‘em all for tales of me own life save that of the picture o’ Aaarsbeard shakin’ the claw of a bestial figure I knew to be the Pirate King (self-proclaimed for he’s a buffoon and more crab than king). Twas his only glory and a poor one at that. I’d not groom him were he twice the man I be, though his extra limb-ing might well produce such calculation; tis not in me nature.

The smugness on his face (in flesh and in oils) drove me to a tentative baitin’. “Yarr,” I remarked, “tis amazing how close our adventures be twined.” Aaaarsbeard chose not to be abashed and instead of admittin’ manly-style that his was a wall of false and stolen glory, he lashed out with a cutlass in his hairless fist. Me riposte was swift though me reach was not: twas with a figurine of a bountiful dwarf that I defended meself. I knew I was at a disadvantage bein’  trapped within the furry man’s cabin so I bounced the marble midget off his face and put his desk between us. It caught him hard across the cheek and drew a tear. Had it not, we might perhaps have laughed off the insult and resumed our duck à lobster. Pride me lovelies – tis a terrible thing.

While making an honourable rear-wards exit I drew me own blade and we sliced metal rainbows in the air. Being a better man in all respects (save the aforementioned wholeness) I kept him at the tip of me sword and flipped his ugly ornamentation at him with the curve of me hook. The flying cruets (for he’d a collection to rival a Condimentiary nun’s) distracted him for long enough that I could slice the piscine-maiden from out her frame and tuck her into me sash – she were coming with me. Thus emboldened I took the fight back to Aaaarsbeard. There was much in the way of parrying and poking as we danced out of the cabin and across the deck.

The course of battle turned against me when the coward urged his mates to join the fray. When lunging with slightly too much effort I found me peg leg wedged and came under heavier slashing. I’d no choice but to resort to an underhanded move. I threw me sword in the air and, as it hung there awaiting the call of the earth beneath it, I seized a fist-full of his beastly trouser-fluff and yanked with all the might a man used to tuggin’ rope can. Aaaarsbeard fell. And screamed. An unearthly howl as unlike the man’s natural tenor as a kitten is like a cockle. I seized me chance, snatched me cutlass from the air and wrenched me leg from the deck. His men were beside ‘emselves as I dived over the rail, still shaking their captain’s nether fur from me fingers.

And so we are at battle with one another, neither to give quarter until t’other apologises for their faults – imagined or otherwise. Our vessels are equally matched and fast running out of both cannon and shot. Twould likely result in a deadlock, except that before visiting with Aaaarsbeard the day before I’d acquired a small barrel of monkeys to amuse the crew. Even now we’re catapulting the flaming macaques into Aaaarsbeard’s sails. Victory is in sight, as is me beautiful uncreased merwench.

Vermouth Thursday ~ Galaxy Team

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“Paris 1993 [Eiffel tower] Thursday July 22rd 17:53 [same shot of the Eiffel tower with a vast spaceship hovering over it]. The first recorded appearance of the intergalactic space villain, self-dubbed ‘Vermouthinator’ (over two hundred appellations to his name have been recorded – all honorific titles, apparently self-created as an expression of his extreme egotism). Vermouthinator contacted all humans on Earth directly, simultaneously entering their minds instead of all forms of traditional communication. His message was short and cryptic and has been pieced together from a variety of surviving sources [montage of confused Parisians]:  

“Greetings human filth. It is I, the Ineffably Wondrous Lord of the Demiverse, Sculptor of Wonder, Imbiber of Galactic Fluids – the one and only Vermouthinator. Congratulations are due to your mixologists and cocktailliers. It is martini time.” [photograph of a martini glass]

This initial contact may have been mis-calibrated in either its force or content. Certainly the overture while apparently contemptuous, did not speak of an intent for the carnage that ensued. While all of humanity received a message (albeit in English, which was wasted on many), the area immediately around Paris, in a roughly 1000 mile radius was particularly affected by the intensity of the communication [map with big red circle]. Religious fundamentalists appeared to take the brunt of the damage, suffering from the now well-documented ‘Mental Expulsion Trauma’ (see appendix xii). 

In summary: the contact forced a paradigm shift upon those affected. Undeniable evidence of non-terrestrial life or the sudden telepathic contact so vastly exceeded their supposed realities that their natural mental plasticity (the ability to compartmentalise irreconcilable information) was unable to cope. The result: their mental states were forced out of their physical structures to a point 14 inches to the left of their skull [image of a ghostly brain hanging above a mannequins shoulder]. It is notable that individuals suffering from schizophrenia and related disorders were less likely to be fatally affected.

Of the affected individuals 98.995% are now deceased, their vegetative states determined permanent. Rumours persist of sentient plants and animals who were within that 14 inch translocation range [photograph of 'Benny the Signing Dandelion' and 'Aquat, the Scholarly Squirrel']. Few of these cases have been verified, nor have the accounts of sightings of Alpha Strangemind and the Galaxy Team in heavily affected regions apparently armed with “high-tech butterfly nets” [artist's impression of techno-net].”

The film jerks to a stop, black streaks overtaken by white which flicker over the curious figure hunched before the screen. He is tall and thin, dressed in a fake silk dressing gown with a dragon cheaply embroidered on the back; his feet and ankles are bony and uncovered. With a snort of disgust he spits on the concrete floor and stabs the button on his arm rest which re-starts the film. The shadows cast by the television throw his long body back across the bleak room; his head tails weakly off the top of his shoulders. The shadow is no trick of the light: his head really is tiny. This is Pip, first child of Anne and Doyle Humpester; Galactobrain to his fans; Milkymind to his brothers; Bollockface to his enemies. The last is cruel but apt observation. He stands and hurls his Kit-Kat mug across the room. It falls short of the opposing wall and shatters on the concrete sending a coffee slick into the cracks.

“Oi. You can clear that lot up right now mister,” the door flies open to reveal the voluptuous figure of Comely Strangemind, wife and partner to the legendary Galaxy Team patriarch Alpha (formerly Mr and Mrs Doyle Humpester). She stands there with her stark black mask in place but otherwise wrapped in a towel, steaming from the shower.

Pip whirls around, his eyes bulging in surprise. They’re the biggest thing in his head, which looks exactly like someone’s taken a tennis ball and stapled a pair of poached eggs onto it. He bursts into tears. The way his face is squeezed means that his tear ducts are unnaturally pressed against his cheek bones and the tears spurt forward like windscreen washers.

Comely crosses the room and crushes her son to her breast, “Oh Pip, you must stop watching that.”

“I just hate him so much mum, it’s all his fault…” his tears soak into Comely’s towel. Quietly Comely extrudes a length of tail-like flesh and scoops the broken mug up and into the waste basket by the door. She sits down and pops Pip on her knee where he continues his bitter sobbing.

Pip is one of only twenty-three human survivors of the ironically titled Vermouth Thursday’s Mental Expulsion Trauma. At the time of the Vermouthinator’s fateful message he had been seven, an outwardly normal boy (if rather tall) with extraordinary mental powers. He had been instrumental in the development of Galaxy Team since before he was born and so had been involved in some of his parents’ earliest experiments on he and his siblings.

On Vermouth Thursday Alpha and Comely had strapped Pip into a device of their devising intended to map and amplify the already prodigious mind he possessed – the augMentation. Pip was a willing participant, keen to expand and develop the neoScience of Galaxy Team. His mind was wide open, the virtual tendrils of their machinery exposing and teasing apart his mind. When Vermouthinator blasted out his greeting to humanity Pip’s mind was naked and vulnerable. The words blasted into him, amplified a billion-fold by the augMentation. Unlike the millions who died almost instantly, the extraordinary mental prowess enabled him to find an escape from the endless reverberations of alien inanities. He tapped into the Quantum Occlusion (which shielded the village of Llandwi-ge-Hw from outsiders) and ejected his mind past the 14 inch limit. He went too far. Bent around the Occlusion, it strained his mind and the physical matter of his brain out into space and beyond. The stream of his ideation found its entangled particles and flowed around the converse edge of the universe, re-emerging into real space inside the Small Megallanic Cloud where it discovered structure sufficient to accommodate his mind, though massively dispersed.

Despite Alpha’s best efforts they had been unable to reverse the process – Pip’s brain was no longer located in his body – it was a galaxy two hundred million light years away. On Earth the shell of his head had buckled, cracking and collapsing unable to tolerate the vacuum within. Somehow he still controlled his body though it was some weeks before he fully integrated his disparate mentality between the stars. When he did regain the power of speech it was a huge relief to his parents who had almost ceased their experiments on their other offspring in concern. With the return of speech came a darkness born of the deep space in which he now lived, and despite being only a child, he swore vengeance on Vermouthinator. 

Anne had grown used to finding Pip watching the news reports of Vermouth Thursday over and over again. Despite his galactic intelligence he just could not find it in him to forgive Vermouthinator for destroying his face. That he had likely gained immortality at the age of seven by replanting his consciousness in another galaxy was small comfort for a young man who ought to be chasing girls like the Beastlie Brothers (though hopefully with more success). All of Comely’s attempts to steer him away from revenge had failed. It seemed the only thing to do was to help him avenge himself. 

“Pip, we know he’ll be back one day, people like him always come back.” Pip judders with rage and the force of tears firing upwards from his eyes.

“He’s not a person mum, we don’t know where he’s from or what he is.” Pip’s fingers begin to jerk in a complex pattern of virtual keystrokes and command gestures.

“Let’s try and find out shall we? You know your father’s been working on the Vortex. We could go and find him, out there.” The holographic screen appears in the room before them, engineering designs, molecular structures and anatomical diagrams flash away with a single gesture from Pip. A detailed image of the Milky Way resolves itself in the air and streaks past to reveal the cloudy mass of stars that compose Pip’s mind. They pierce the outer halo and streaks of stardust. Comely cannot help but wonder what part of Pip’s mind they are looking at. What happens when a star dies in his mind…

Pip’s tears dry up and his face takes on a distant, calculating aspect. He points at a cluster of stars and the view zooms in to show a star with its orrery of planets gliding by, “I wonder if he’s in me.” The thought makes Comely’s second skin crawl under her towel.

Alphabetic Dialogue 4 A Measurely Morning

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On the deck of the Good Ship Lollipop, Captain Pigheart and No Hands Mick take some air.

‘Gaargh, tis a morn’ o’ uncanny brightness Mick’
‘Have ye taken ye daily measurin’s yet cap’n?’
‘I’ve me scan o’ the horizon and the pairin’ o’ compasses afore me yet’
‘Just strappin’ on me measuratin mitts’
‘Knit ‘em to ye wrists in that clockwards method’
‘Let’s take readin’s!’
‘Mick, I admires ye enthusiasm’
‘Never more enchanted by nature than when takin’ her bearings cap’n’
‘Oh ye are a child o’ science and Madame Mer indeed’
‘Place ye instrument upon the breeze’
‘Quotidian matters such as these keep a man sane at sea’
‘Right you are sir, now shalls we extend together our vanes?’
‘Slight tilt to ye weather-cock I’d not noted previously there Mick’
‘Tis a sensitive matter’
‘Unusually sensitive judgin’ from the rise in its bulb’
‘Verily, for ye salty breeze does pluck at me arrow’
‘Whence comes that wind?’
‘X – tis from the region in which we’ve buried our trove’
‘Ye speakin’s're true, I’ll note it so’
‘Zephr’s be most welcome, see how they do titillate our barometric globes’
‘Aye’
‘Beasts on ye horizon sir!’
‘Come Mick, let us stow our tools and make ready with cannon’
‘Delicate now, for our tackle’s delicate’
‘Eschew ye care for the sake of our lives’
‘Fear not cap’n, on closer peeking tis but a rock’

Captain Pigheart’s Hermitage Adventure

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The roaring ocean tossed me about like a giantess with a sensual dwarf. The rain lashed me battered face, soothing the sunburn till the salty once again fertilised the pain in me cheeks.

Twas only the blinding sheets of lightning that granted me a slight sight of me destination. At the first flash I thought I saw a giant chicken bearing down on a tumescent squid. It flashed again and the poultry were gone, leaving but an island. I barely made it ashore, and I was grateful to the carpet of mating crabs which drew me over the sands with their undulating and left me half-buried in their crustaceous seed.

I lived amongst them for three years, till I outgrew the largest shell they had. With the shell stuck upon me I struck out for human society once more. I left behind two wives and a thousand younglings. Man were not hard to find, for I’d been living in me hermit shell not half a mile from the nearest village. They’d railed against me evil for months and I’d earned a small stipend from me work as a bogey man, terrifying infants should they wander into caves and such. I stayed away out of shame and I’d little keenness to return. However, with ye crabs’ recent social evolutions I were no longer welcome.

I sought out a friendly local to aid me in shedding me cumbrous shell. I was so distracted by the hunchbacky pain me personal caravan was causing me that until the blacksmith and his daughter had eased me out of the case I’d taken little note o’ me surroundings. A shudder passed down me twisted spine, poppin’ me vertebral moulding out of its conical shape. Upon the wall of the quaint cottage (by which I mean run-down and pestilential) and indeed across the laps of me charitable metallurgists was a sight I’d hoped never to lay me eye upon again.

I managed to mask me gasp with the syncopated chiropractic clickety-pops of becoming erect. Even as I wavered on me feet, me spine no longer suited to straight-forward standin’, ye crude willow-weave merkin clung to the wall, mocking me with its gash-sash. Perhaps it were too soon for human company. I awkwardly bellowed me thanks and ran side-wise out of the hovel.

For more o’ the merkin adventures, read Captain Pigheart All Washed Up.

Captain Pigheart’s Buoyant Adventure

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Yarr, it were a beautiful day and the sun were beating down upon the Grim Bastard and her crew of stalwart bastards like a sea otter opening a crab. The seagulls were screeching their scavengin’ lullabies. Ye may think ‘em coarse and tuneless but in comparison with the whingeing of me crew tis an operatic bliss.

The current complaint was a distant relation to a possible navigational error, which might, if pushin’ came to shovin’ came to a runnin’ through, be laid at me foot. So far I’d managed to divert blame to me helmsman , Abraham Lambkin on account of his being a cloth-eared fool (this is no general term of abuse; the poor lad had suffered terribly in a crow’s cage and covered his aural shame with a pair of fetchin’ lambs tails. Now this sound-proofing plus his habit of rocking back and forth in therapeutic motion makes it difficult to be sure ye directions’ve pierced his skull).

Anyways, due to me misplaced faith in our lug-free helmsman we’d been reefed for some days. In the initial surprise and annoyance I’d loudly declared me displeasure and hurled the youth overboard, his lambs’ tails flapping in the breeze. Ahar, the lad’d landed on ye sandbanks and continued his protestations from below. Lambkin proved surprisingly deft at avoiding me pistol shots. Gaargh, I was gratified when Mick doused him with chum from the fishing barrel. That brightened the mood and we all watched the seagulls divebomb the lad and peck him with vigour.

Gaargh, despite our mirth, it were somewhat chilling to see him tossed about. No doubt it reminded the boy of his earlier ear trauma, for he curled up and sobbed as the seabirds flung him fro and to. The lad’s plight stirred me imagination, for if a pair o’ gulls could lift an urchin off his feet (these were the mighty gulls ye may have heard of), then twere a near certitude that many hundreds of ‘em could raise the Grim Bastard…

And so we dragged Abraham back on board and dunked him in the chum bucket. This time we lassoed the gulls when they went for him (allowing for the odd peck to keep them amiable), and tied each one to a fresh length of rope. In their fury, the birds strained to escape, pulling ye ropes taut.

In time we felt a lurch beneath our feet, and strung a few dozen more for good measure. At last we achieved the air, and the seagulls hauled us aloft. Up and up we went, till we were sailing along at perhaps a hundred feet above the waves.

And so we lie about the deck, under cover naturally, given the squawking shite-hawk horde above us. And so the complaining comes down to this – where the devil are the birdies taking us? We’d neglected to consider a means of directing the feathered fiends; perhaps it’s time to start shooting at them.

Franklyn de Gashe – The Simian Entertainment

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After several week of intensive work in my laboratories, I’d decided to take the afternoon off to imbibe sweet smoke and brandy. But after only an hour of dawdling in my drawing room I’d felt a need to have my buttocks more securely clasped and I adjourned to my club. Once there I swiftly re-seated myself in my favoured leather chair bounded by the great hearth on one side and the collected works of Alan Derriere on the other.

I was drifting into a pleasant insensibility when a hubbub ruffled the club‘s atmosphere. At best its members are a somnolent bunch and so anything breaching the murmur of private discourse sends a ripple through the smoky peace. I risked a peek. There was a clamour at the windows where the sunlight fluttered erratically, casting satanic shadows into the room. Engaged, despite my languor, I joined the group squawking by the window. I was halfway through a witty remark when the panes crashed inward, followed by black mass of panic.

And then the flying monkeys fell upon me. The air was filled with their angry whooping and fiendishly accurate faeces flinging. They were my greatest success and failure together in one terribly malformed hybridisation. I’d sought only to equip myself with the perfect manservant, companion and pet. I was surprised to find that once more, science had not done exactly as I asked.

Using my considerable powers of reasoning and mastery of the empirical method I had expended the majority of a local menagerie in my experiments. The only creatures that proved compatible were the humble barbary ape and the majestic goose. How my heart swelled as the brute barked, sneezed and immediately brewed a perfect cup of lemon tea. So flushed was I with triumph that I foresaw a brave new future of mankind and goose-ape ruling the earth hand in claw-wing.

After a short apprenticeship Mister Tribblings, for such I had be-monickered him, took to experimenting alone at night whilst I slept, supervised by the moon and the fitfully active medical waste I’d inserted into his expanded cranium. To my great sadness, the beast was afflicted with a melancholy whose bitterness he turned upon me, for reasons I struggle even now to grasp. For did not his fur and feathers almost grow together in a convivial manner? Even the wing grafts had eventually healed with a minimum of residual weeping and infection.

However, I was unaware of the animosity which grew every time I gently chucked him on his beaky chin or explained how all of his kin had died when I forgot to clean my knives. His nocturnal activities continued in secret until Mr Tribblings was ready to unleash the flapping horde which now plagued me.

The club members fought back with typical Britishness, tutting and brandishing a jumble-sale’s worth of weaponry at the squalling apes. For the most part this was unsuccessful. The gentlemen were soon overwhelmed by the superior wielding capacity of the winged monkeys. The intruders took advantage of their flight to equip both hands and feet with tools gleaned from the laboratory. The rate of damage to my priceless equipment was growing unacceptably, and the wall of leisurely fodder between the monkeys and me was shrinking alarmingly.

It was clear that I would be required to participate. With a view to such activity I finished my glass and extricated myself from beneath the bar-billiards table; immediately there came a howl of triumph, and Mr Tribblings himself flapped into view. I snatched up a cue, and offering a brief apology to the club’s sportsmaster – one Joshua Ballhugger (briefer still when I spotted his head gaping wordlessly on a futon), snapped it down across my knee. Realising my error, I unscrewed it instead. Favouring my bruised thigh, I stood with bipartite ball potter at the ready.

We duelled for a time, Mr Tribblings and I, as I batted away his brutish implements. The nail studded thighbone went first, followed by the footful of dermis penetrating needles. Using the ancient techniques taught to me by the monks of Alermo da Quim I battered the monkey into the baise, and used the shredded cues to fire the billiards rapidly at his skull, stunning the treacherous ape.

With a drooling-level impairment in place I mounted the brutish renegade and took a firm grip of his wings. Mr Tribblings lurched beneath me as I tried to control him with my thighs squeezed tightly about his chest. Somehow he lurched into drunken flight, careening off the bookshelves and light fittings. I managed to wrench one of his wings free of its sutures and the flight ended abruptly, as the halfwinged ape crashed into a gramophone, the winding handle puncturing his jaw.

At first I thought him dead, but his angry rambling continued, accompanied by the mournful yawing of a slow-turning gramophone record. The very action of his jaw was engaging the device’s machinery, and the more enraged his denunciations the faster the handle ground round and the more manic the tune. The rest of the hybrids were easily subdued once they’d finished savaging the more elderly club members.

Mr Tribbling’s evil plan had been foiled, and the club had a new attraction: the mono-winged ape was installed in a cage on the ground floor and wound up by passers-by to produce the unholy music and accompanying spasms which so entertained them. In time Mr Tribbling’s reluctant contribution to the club’s funds outweighed the damage his creatures had wrought. He died shortly afterward from a combination of sepsis and brass poisoning. His bones (with gramophone intact) now occupy a display case in the club’s museum. He was the monkey who ground his own organ.