In the Land of Poison Waters
I rounded up Renfield and my first three FC’s–by name, Gwen Cooper, Daisy Cloverleaf and Boots the Impaler (simply “BTI”–sometimes “Bootsy”). Due to their heavy roles in the development of the Union, I figured it was an idea to keep them close–not necessarily a good idea, but an idea nonetheless.
There are neither highways nor gas powered vehicles in Saragun Springs. This has less to do with a Green attitude than it has with a great many of my FC’s being creatures who are not known as competent pedestrians–such as Raccoons, Opossums and Hedgehogs. Even though you can’t actually kill my FC’s any more than you can genuinely shoot an actor in a scene, the mere sight of cars and trucks places needless stress on the psyches of the notoriously poor road crossers. What we have are cobblestone paths lined with various plants and trees the Boss likes but knows few of the names of.
Fortunately, however, with everything no farther than boutta mile, there is no real need for a transportation infrastructure in Saragun Springs. Besides we began as a poor realm with a GNP commensurate with that of your basic asteroid composed of useless minerals.
Unfortunately, however, my FC’s are extraordinarily lazy. Unless it’s for a role, forget about asking them to walk twenty feet let alone boutta mile. In my productions FC’s often “blue screen” strenuous activities and cross vast vistas. But in that dimension of being which exists between your reality and our fictions, a dimension as wide as the distance between consecutive thoughts, that in which we live our lives, from where I write you, an off duty FC is downright muley about doing stuff.
“Fortunately, however,” returns to the head of a paragraph because of the bald fact that all FC’s are venal. They got that trait from Renfield, an otherwise fine person, yet one whose ephemeral loyalty can be rented for a handful of “fun-sized” Three Musketeer bars.
“Fortunately, however,” rallies and wins this run 3-1. I can easily bribe FC’s with meaty roles in upcoming stories and Renfield with the same as well as with writing and “directing” opportunities. I also have access to material goods in my Employer’s possession–in fact as long as she had once owned an object I can duplicate it in the realm and use it for payola. This also comes in handy with the coffee, cigarette, alcohol, and other addictions I share with her (she also has a family Ghost we inherited). And at one time she owned a bicycle, an electric scooter and an electric golf cart sort of thing that seats four. And it was in the replicated golf cart sort of thing that Renfield, Gwen, Daisy, BTI and I set out to the realm.
Even though designed for four, our complement of five fitted quite easily. Renfield, Gwen and I are human, but Daisy is a Pygmy Goatess and BTI is a Siamese Cat, both are about the same size. I drove, Renfield rode shotgun, Gwen and Daisy sat in the back, BTI lay on Gwen’s lap.
Not to belabor the point, but a “Prime” FC is whatever she or he is. That FC exists and has her or his own life in that aforementioned infinitesimal distance between your reality and our fantasies. As far as I’m concerned Prime FC’s are as real as it gets and then some. So, if you read one of my works, you can actually imagine that “three Martians” may very well be being “essayed” by a Pygmy Goat, an Imaginary Friend and a Siamese Cat–unless no Prime FC wants the parts then I may create actual Prime FC Martians. I only make mention because there is no person acting the role of, say, Daisy the Goatess, other than Daisy–for she and others often appear as themselves in my productions.
I do not like the over used “anthropomorphic” much. Seems like a fancy adjective to lay on the likes of Daffy Duck or Magilla Gorilla. I figure if a writer has a talking Pygmy Goat and a similarly talented Siamese Cat as lead FC’s, well, so be it. There might not be anything new under the sun, but that isn’t always the case below Pong.
Gwen is a young, highly intelligent, tall, beautiful woman, of the type so perfectly wholesome that you cannot imagine her possessing an excretory system. You may imagine her any race you want, or give her green eyes or blue; raven hair, blonde, cornrows or none at all–knock yourself out, it’s your mind’s eye. But for my own purposes, she must be young, smart, tall and the sort of person who attracts attention, and is probably a joy to her parents. Gwen is a Leading Lady FC, who never loses track of the location of last nerve.
Daisy Cloverleaf, the Pygmy Goatess is an exceptional individual. She is extravagantly imaginative and keen to act out her daydreams. She is also bright and charming, but a bit sensitive and more than a little passive aggressive when things don’t go her way, and has a bit of a temper. It is a little known fact that an interdimensional FC Pygmy Goat, despite hooves, is known as “Nature’s Stenographer.” Daisy can type a hundred-twenty error free words a minute, but she cannot resist adverbs.
Boots the Impaler would be a supreme evil mastermind if it didn’t require work. BTI is named for a real world Cat who has it in for the guy who took him to the vet for the old snip snip. Whenever real world Boots jumps in the guy’s lap he unerringly and without remorse makes a perfect four-point landing “you know where.” The Saragun BTI speaks with a cultured “mid-atlantic” accent, much like that of George Sanders, who often played heavies in old movies and voiced “Shere Khan” in the original Jungle Book.
“Can someone please remind me why we’re visiting this unflushed toilet?” Gwen asked, for it had been ten seconds since someone in the cart had said something annoying.
“I’m wondering if Miss Leila knows where the spring is. Everything is boutta mile away from the Barnyard, yet it feels we have been on the path for hours,” Daisy said.
BTI woke up. “My highly advanced sense of smell detects the spring about a hundred yards farther, and to the left.”
“See, Daisy,” I said. “I’m prepared for anything. It’s no accident that Boots is along.”
“If you say so,” said Daisy, in a tone similar to that of a thirteen-year-old girl saying “I guess” when asked to set aside her phone and help put out her mother, who’d thoughtlessly caught on fire.
“Then how did you know which way to go while Bootsy slept?” Renfield, who’s tight with Daisy, asked.
“Psychic link,” I lied, and was somewhat surprised that no one in the cart questioned that. I drove on, following BTI’s directions, which were a boon to me because I was hopelessly lost. I then saw a fleeting run of black rainbows shimmering in the distance, near a cluster of stunted, possibly mutated crabapple trees. The rainbows rapidly changed directions because at the time Pong was making figure-eights, like an ice skater in the sky. “Masks on the ready.”
Due to another bout of extreme paranoia, during the plague my Employer purchased a riding crop and gas mask “just in case.” Although she has never used either, I was able to bring the mask pattern to Saragun Springs and replicate five, two of which fit both Daisy and BTI. (I left the crop behind; unless used on people it is a cruel thing.)
“Fortunately, however” returns for a victory lap, because 99% of the stench associated with the spring is highly localized. Although there is always a bit of it in the air, the stink is mainly confined to a fifty foot radius around the spring itself. It stands alone in a clearing surrounded by blighted hellworld soil, blackened yet possibly sentient crabapple trees, its contingent of Pong induced, temporary black rainbows and a vague thin gray atmosphere of gasses that marks the stench perimeter. As an object it is a perfectly round ten foot glooping pool of black water that has a small, continuous, six inch wide three yard high geyser at its center.
A decrepit picnic table and benches from the backyard in my Employer’s childhood were located sixty feet to the left of the Spring. Atop the table there lay an envelope secured by a paper weight. The five of us proceeded to the table; Gwen toted BTI and I had to carry Daisy for she’d just had her hooves painted. Renfield carried her insouciant attitude, which weighs plenty.
We sat at the table. Even though we were in the so-called safety zone, no one dropped her/his mask–for the stench bubble was something that didn’t appear to be all that steady, and the smell of boiled diarrhea is hard to wash from your clothes and hair and fur. Renfield lifted the beer keg shaped paper weight. Still smiling, she handed me the envelope and held the weight so we all could read what was printed on it: PROPERTY OF THE PDQ BREWING COMPANY.
“Never heard of it,” I said, but something in my mind groaned upon hearing ”PDQ.” Yet another repressed memory stirred in its shallow grave.
The letter was addressed to me and the Citizens of Saragun Springs. There are only two persons in all the multiverse who could read the scrawl, me and my Employer, whose hand I instantly recognized and, of course, expected. I opened the envelope, extracted the single page inside it, wadded the empty envelope and tossed it at the Spring; it didn’t get far because it instantly vaporized into a puff of smoke after creating a brief yet impressive “foom” type of noise upon entering the gray bubble.
Imagine someone maniacally writing a letter at three in the morning, alone, save for a mostly empty bottle of budget bourbon and a smoldering, overloaded ashtray, butts mounded like a Beaver dam. That’s what my Employer’s handwriting and idiom bring to mind.
I read aloud.
“Leila and Gang–
Ha! I promise to let you run the realm as you see fit–but I just had to give you a realm warming present. Sort of a Pandora’s box that I know you will open because no Pandora’s box is ever left unopened in the wacky multiverse. The contents of the box will allow the Springs to build a GNP of sorts, because as you must already know real money does not replicate in Saragun Springs. (I know you tried)…
“There’s a secret compartment in the paperweight that was not there until now….”
“Bingo!” Renfield said. She opened a slot that appeared at the bottom of the PDQ paperweight and extracted an ages-old flip phone.
“…push the send button…”
Renfield opened the phone and did just so. A standard interdimensional vortex opened about ten feet in the air on the side of the Spring farthest from the picnic table. It was a hole in the fabric of the realm of no perceptible depth; just a flat circle about the size of a donut. The geyser immediately was drawn toward the hole and was sucked in.
“Don’t worry about the Springs ever going dry…”
“As if,” I muttered. And read on.
“Despite whatever little besmirch I’m certain you just uttered, Leila, the Spring is infinite, composed of the steamed souls of the damned, thus an everlasting reservoir. ‘But where does the water go? you ask–or should…”
“I was thinking just that,” Daisy said.
“It is feeding the vats at the PDQ Pilsner plant on Other Earth…”
I stopped reading because the repressed memory had clawed its way out of its shallow grave and just stood there. “PDQ Pilsner….Other Earth,” I whispered.
When a mere slip of a deranged girl, the Boss imagined freely and wildly, without the aid of intoxicants. She liked the idea of realms such as Narnia, Oz and even Hundred Acre Wood, but she didn’t find them roomy enough for her ego, so she created Other Earth–a replica of Earth, but with a few differences. One of those was “PDQ Pilsner”–a budget beer that she invented after a lifetime of cartoon beer commercials. Just why invented PDQ is synonymous with that theological catch-all “Mysterious Ways.” I have always figured her mysterious ways are affected by addiction and a light smattering of personality disorders. But, there it was, the ugsome truth.
I placed a cigarette in my mouth, got up and walked to the Spring and touched the letter to the bubble and lit my smoke from the result before tossing the entire missive in.
“Ugsome developments, gang.”
Saragun Springs 