Meet Peety Pie Eyed Peety the PDQ Pilsner Pigeon

I stood and approached the stench bubble. I held the picture up to the edge close to the bubble, the same way you would hold a piece of paper above a flame, not touching, but just close enough for the paper to catch fire. That’s what happened, and I lit a cigarette off the picture then dropped the image on the ground. It went up in a little poof of black smoke. But when the smoke cleared, instead of ashes we had Pie-Eyed Peety the PDQ Pilsner Pigeon. In Saragun Springs he is a sentient two dimensional cartoon character…

Who Looks Like This

I smiled at the Team seated at the picnic table. “Renfield,” I said, “you being a leading Supernaturalist, as stated earlier, how about you take the lead and explain just what happened. But please do so in a naturalistic sort of way that won’t come off as a shamelessly lazy information dump.” I then knelt and held out a hand, which Peety drunkenly climbed aboard and I gently placed him on the table.

Renfield is rather egotistical about her specialty. And she puffed up like a Blow Fish and hooked her thumbs in the lapels of her jacket and assumed an authoritative demeanor. “What we got here is an interdimensional being who exists in two realities at once–ours and Other Earth’s.”

It was Daisy’s turn to speak, but she had nodded off and was snoring. Fortunately, Gwen knew the script.

“An interdimensional being? Oh but how?” She said flatly, as though she were ordering a coffee.

“Glad you asked–Day-Gwen–today, Gwen, I mean,” Renfield, not necessarily the best ad libber, said.

Daisy woke. “An interdimensional being? Oh but how?”

“Just keep rolling,” I said.

“Glad you asked, um, Daisy,” Renfield continued.

“Is there an echo?” Gwen said softly.

“Cut,” I said. “So much for the naturalistic approach. Since Peety will be with us from here on, we’ll tell his story, by and by.”

The Hot Line and Self Conscious Summary

I was supposed to call the Boss on the hotline about a week after I had established the realm. The hotline is an ancient red trimline princess style phone that had arrived on my desk during our first trip into the realm, with a post it note stating “call me once a week,” pasted to it. Free Will makes it so I’m reluctant to take orders, so the phone lay buried beneath various debris that accumulate on your average desk top. When the first week had reached ten days, and I’d yet to file a report, something began to ring under an empty pizza box.

“What?” I said upon finally answering the damn thing.

I’d been drinking since noon and I had Peety in the office watching a 1980’s film marathon on a replica of the Boss’s old VCR. Peety is sentient, though constantly wrecked on PDQ, yet his other world view was limited to extolling PDQ Pilsner. I had hit on the idea of expanding his knowledge through movies that had been made after 1946. But all I had were items like Alien, Porkies, The Terminator, Animal House and such on hand in a video cassette. But Peety ate them up; after all Peety is a good-timing Pigeon unlikely to enjoy Sophie’s Choice.

“You were supposed to report three days ago,”said the Boss.

“I’ve been busy.”

“At least tell me you got Peety.”

“Yep, I do. Gonna need more cash if we go back to Other Earth.”

The Boss is quick to change the subject when it involves money. “Just read the dailies.”

“Then you already know about Peety,” I said.

“Let’s say I skimmed them,” she replied. “Can’t help but notice that you are a bit candid about your thoughts on me.”

“Duplicity is the best policy, Boss,” I said. “But honesty will do in a pinch.”

“I see. When do you think you will get around to reading some of our productions? Damn near forty pages in.”

Our, I thought. Big talk for an anonymous person. Then again I figured she approved of the situation for if she hadn’t it would have been all mine.

“Just turn the page,” I said. I hung up the hotline and yanked the cord out of the wall.

“How’s it going Peety–getting the hang of three-d reality yet?”

“They took the bar,” Peety squawked. “They took the fucking bar.”

“Alcohol is doing wonders for your brain, old chum,” I said. He was watching Animal House for the tenth time. My aim was to have him communicate his thoughts via quoting slob-com scripture.

Why? You ask? “Why not?” Belched Peety, again quoting Animal House as though it were scripture.

On cue, Daisy trotted into the office, dressed like a superhero. ”I’m here for my starringly starring vehicle,” she said.

“Great,” I said. “You, my little darling, will be opening book two.”

The End of Book One

Welcome to Saragun Springs: The Book of Daisy (aka, “The Book of Adverbs”) will appear in installments on this site with an introduction on 1 July. We hope to see you then.

Leila