Postal

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Being captured by millions of bug-eating naked women isn't nearly as fun as it sounds.

But I'm bound to my coveted cool sparkly rock at the top of the plateau, so it's not a total loss.

A thundering black vehicle lazily circles the dark sky above me. As it drifts slowly closer, I can make out the vanity plate. It reads: "SANTA'S SLAYER".

"LOBO!" a voice booms down. "YOUR FREINDS HAVE ABANDONED YOU." A pause. "PLUS YOU LOST YOUR DENTAL PLAN."

"Stay away from my rock!" I says defiantly.

"YOU HAVE NO IDEA THE POWER OF THE LIGHT SIDE", the voice says.

"I'll never join you!" I says.

"WE MAIL OFF REBATES AND ACTUALLY GET THE MONEY BACK."

"Mail?" I spit.

A pause.

"WELL," says Kringle over the megaphone, "I WAS HOPING IT WOULDN'T COME TO THIS."

"Do your worst," says me.

"ARE YOU SURE?"

"No," I says. "Do I have to wear a uniform? Or sit in an office with a guy that farts a lot?"

Another pause.

"MAYBE".

"Fuck off!" I says.

"IT'S A PRETTY COOL UNIFORM REALLY. VERY MILITARY."

"What color is it?"

"I GUESS IT'S A TAUPE."

"What the fuck is a 'taupe'?"

"IT'S A KIND OF DUSKY BROWNISH-GREY, I SUPPOSE."

"What are you people hiding in? Shit?"

Suddenly, the whole sky is filled by the mighty dragon Scraps. Leathery wings flapping, they rhythmically obliterate the horizon.

I can hear the explosive sound of his wings, his breathing.

An eye the size of a billboard is mere meters from my face.

My bowels voided.

"Nice going, dumbass!" I yell. "What color is clean underwear in this dimension?"

Cris-Crossed

Predator Press

[Mr. I]

A fucking mandatory meeting? On Saturday Morning?

Don't get me wrong. Ethan's a great man. A towering economic, political and philosophical success story of historic --possibly even epic-- proportion.

But I will kill him if I have to.

Head between my knees, I massage blinding pain from my temples with almost tearful futility.

Ethan isn't here yet, but everyone else is.

Whatever this is, it's a big deal.


*** Ethan takes the podium.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he clears his throat, and adjusts the microphone slightly. "First I would like to thank you for taking the time out of your weekend and coming here this morning. In that spirit, I'll keep this short and get right to the point."

Brief nervous murmurs swell in the room, utterly silenced when Ethan continues.

"Please allow me to take this opportunity to introduce you to the new Vice President and CEO of Hawley Enterprises." The room darkens. "I give you Babs!"

Thundering drums sear my cerebral cortex as a spotlight reveals a curvy silhouette sitting awkwardly in a chair. Groin never losing contact with a vertical pole, she scoops a briefcase up standing and kicks the chair away, the back of her ankle landing gracefully above her head. Then, with an assertive, lurid and determined gait, she walks toward the podium keeping time with the excruciatingly explosive music.

Please kill me.

Dazzling fireworks go off, and the lightshow starts. "BABS" is spelled out in flames behind the strutting, nubile beauty.

Everyone stands and applauds.

I tug at Sapphire, pulling her ear down to me. "She's getting LOBO's job?" I stammer.

"I guess," says Sapphire sideways so her eyes don't leave the spectacle.

I'm sensing some resentment here. "How'd she pull that off?" I manage.

Babs, arriving at the podium, drops her thin briefcase. Pulling a hundred-dollar bill from inside her bra with one hand, she sticks it under Ethan's nose. With the other, she grabs his crotch.

Applauding, Sapphire continues, "I couldn't possibly begin to guess."

Pigs

Predator Press

[Mr. Insanity]

"Thank you for joining us," says the guy. He flips his FBI badge. "My name is Agent Parker."

"Yeah, okay," I says, flirting with the waitress.

Parker continues, "You understand it's your Patriotic Duty to elaborate on the," he pauses, "various activities you have alarmed us to."

"'Patriotic Duty' my ass," I says, wolfing the omlette down. "I'm making six figures annually now, after thirty years at eighteen-thousand per. What the fuck are you making? Forty? You're maybe, what, twenty four?"

"Twenty-six," Parker offers.

"Twenty six, fuck off," I says chewing loudly. "I've eaten Twinkies older'n you I bought on e-bay." I scrarf like a whole piece of french toast in my mouth. "I was waking up on sidewalks and sleeping under bridges at your age. Now I finally got a good gig going."

Slopping up the plate with my toast, I drive it home. "If you want intelligence, my 'cash flow' issues are going to have to be," I point at him with my soggy french toast, "... mitigated."

Inhuman Resources

Predator Press

[Mr. Insanity]

Dr. Keller released me after only a few days, and Ethan had Rosalyn Gates --Hawly Enterprises' Human Resources Director-- pick me up from Bertram.

I immediately think I'm getting fired. Could be for anything from the bad PR, being "institutionalized", to increasing insurance liability.

But if I'm getting fired, I'm getting fired behind the wheel, dammit. Besides, Rosalyn drives a spiff new Mustang I want to check out.

Reluctantly, she gets into the passenger side of her own car, and I peel out of the hospital parking lot.


***

Rosalyn looks different in natural light. A fit and attractive woman in maybe her early forties, she's always smiling and friendly, but now I see how that has worn on her over the years: she looks like a woman who is psychotically sick to death of smiling and being friendly.

An uncomfortable silence ensues.

"What's this all about?" I finally ask, pushing 110 on I-65.

"Well, we received some rather alarming complaints from you," she grins readily, "and wanted to discuss them."

"That slut Babs has to go," I says. "Period."

"But there is no basis for her termination," beams Rosalyn. "In fact, she has been nothing but an exemplary employee."

"No basis?" I demand. "She's slept with 45% of the entire staff!"

My Blackberry tones, and I twist it on my belt so I can read the screen.

"Make that 49%," I says.

"Well, I certainly understand your concern," soothes Rosalyn in her well-rehearsed optimism. "But Mr Hawly has considered Sexual Harassment a frivolous matter ever since he started sleeping with Phoebe this August."

"I'm telling you, this bitch is trouble with a capital ... What!?!"

Police sirens. They're right behind me.

Fuck.

"You got any pens?" I demand.

"What?" smiles Rosalyn.

"Peeeeennnnzzzzz!" I repeat slowly, like I'm talking to a retard.

"Well, yes--"

"Throw them out the window."

She pauses, charmingly bewildered.

"Now!" I command, slowing to pull over.


***

I watch the cop saunter up slowly, thumbs in belt, through the rearview. He's already filling out the rather spectacular speeding ticket. I roll down the window as he approaches.

"Any idea why I pulled you over there Richard Petty?" he says condescendingly.

"No idea whatsoever, Officer," I says, picking my nose ferociously.

"I have you on radar doing over 110 in a 65 mile per hou--"

The cop freezes momentarily as he sees my finger working an emerald mine, wiping the nuggets on the steering wheel.

After a second of thought, he closes the small tablet. "So I'm giving you a verbal warning," he says.

"Thanks," I says.

Rosalyn pukes cheerfully on her own floorboard as we peel out again ...

Shadows of the Season

Predator Press

[LOBO]

Nobody suspects Babs is the scorned mistress of Kringle --introduced in the June 5 2006 blog entry titled "Writing on Fire"-- because nobody reads this blog now.

I can't warn Ethan, Phoebe, Sapphire or the Jaycees for two reasons: The first is I'm trapped in another dimension, asshole. The second is that despite my staggering brainiosity, my noggin is completely vacant of that little fact as well.

... I'm certainly not reading this sophomoric, banal tripe ...

***
As the naked women carry me down the mountain, a great feast is being prepared. And all the way, I'm peppered with questions like, "How was your day?" and "Do you think she's pretty?" and "Do I look fat naked?"

A cute blonde named Zima finally pries the television remote from my hands and asks, "What's life like in that," she makes quote signs with her hot, naked fingers, "other dimension?"

"Well, not having hot naked horny women around climbing mountains and cooking and stuff is pretty damn weird," I says. "And they have this paste over there they make out of teeth. They call it toothpaste--"

"What's that for?" asks Zima.

"I don't know," I says, trailing off.

***
A few minutes later Zima's still saying stuff, but now other hot, naked women have brought food under a covered tray. I'm sitting at the head of a long table, Zima to my right. There are bowls of melted butter and plates, but no eating utensils whatsoever.

"--and after the Great Feast," Zima continues, "then we have the Great Orgy." She pauses as she looks at me. "No kissing though."

"Great Feast?" I says. "What are we having?"

"Giant Lobster," she proclaims.

The servers uncover the tray, and I swear on my evil twin brother's eyes there was a red bug under there, like two feet long.

Frozen in abject horror, I stare down the length of the table and see endless hot, naked women hungrily tearing apart and devouring gigantic red bugs.

I screamed.

A lot.

Babs

Predator Press

[Mr. I]

When I came in, Phoebe and Sapphire stared in simple disbelief.

"Morning ladies," I says cheerily. Setting down my Starbucks, I proceed to hang my coat, whistling.

"What the hell are you doing here on a Sunday?" asks Sapphire.

"I don't know," I smile. "Just feeling a little productive I guess."

Sniffing the air, Phoebe looks at Sapphire. "He doesn't even smell like whisky and cheap hookers."

"No ladies," I sigh. "I'm turning my life around. From here on out, I'm a brand new man."

"Is this because LOBO is gone?"

"Probably," I shrug. "At least in part. But I think my luck is changing. You know that hot new chick Babs?"

"Uh," says Sapphire, looking at Phoebe nervously. "Yes ..."

"Let me tell you," I say, gyrating my hips in the air. "That chick is a freak."

"You had sex with Babs too?" says Phoebe.

"Yes I did," I say with unabashed smugness. "I did things with that chick that--" I pause, eyebrows furrowed. Turning slowly to Phoebe, I clear out my ear with a finger. "What do you mean, 'too'?"

Phoebe looks side to side nervously. "I had sex with her on Saturday."

I look at Sapphire, who holds her hands up shrugging.

"Phoebe, I didn't know you were bisexual."

"I'm not bisexual."

Sapphire eyes her carefully. "You had sex with Babs, but you're not bisexual?"

"I mean I've gotten off during massages but that's like a mutual-masturbation thing," Phoebe explains. "But Babs just started kissing me. Hard. And the next thing you know she's between my legs, sucking me off. She's really good at it." Then, trailing off in blissful thought, she adds, "Turns out, so am I ... "

I don't know whether to scream or go jerk off in my office.

"Besides," Phoebe continues. "It doesn't count as a lesbian thing. It is alternate-reality LOBO, right?"

My jaw drops.

Sapphire looks to me, eyes narrowed, "You did use protection, right?"

Suddenly, Ethan walks in, whistling. "Wow," he grins, setting down his cappuccino to hang his coat. "You just won't believe what a fantastic morning I've had."

Rise

Predator Press

[LOBO]

As far as dimensions go, eh, I've seen better.

But there's this really cool rock here. I mean it's all weird an flat an sparkly.

Eventually, I gotta get up 'an piss. Probably should work out this whole food and shelter issue too. I wonder if this is one of those dimensions that has Cheeto dispensers.

It could happen.

Suddenly, I realize I'm on a big, flat plateau under an electrified, pastel sky. Looking down over the edge, I spy millions of naked women kneeling and praying at something up here.

Every once in a while, they send up a hot emissary.

Exhausted from the long climb, the hardbodied beauty draws up using the last of her strength. Raising her tired arms toward me, her magnificent breasts heave as she cries, "Oh, strange visitor we beseech thee; there are no males in this dimension, please bless us with your mighty blessed throbbing Hammer of Thor."

"Why?" I yell down, echoing.

"That we may grasp and fondle thy genitalia roughly," she says, collapsing to her knees, mighty thighs bulging. "And foist it into ourselves like wild and rhythmic savage animals."

"But there's this really cool rock up here," I says. "And look, you are all like really far down there. Why don't you all just come on up?"

I swear to God the chicks in this dimension can be so lazy ...

"There's a really cool rock up here," I remind them.