toibocks

[toibocks]

The story of the Lego Artist and the Unfortunate Situation (or, Suck it Faust I just made a better Mephistopholes)

Things scatter when we get upset. Sometimes they’re the shards of an empty glass hurled at a photo in anger, sometimes they’re the tears of a frustrated child, sometimes they’re our very thoughts themselves as we toss and turn in our beds trying desperately to shake the horrible memories out of our skulls like gravel from a shoe. For Robert Logan, they were legos. No, it doesn’t seem like that would be a big deal, but when you’ve spent 7 months and over 25000 dollars to construct a perfect, moveable replica of the robot from Short Circuit, it’s quite alarming and very discouraging to see it pulverized by a rampaging pile of chitin and claws glaring at you with unseen eyes. The plastic bricks pocked Logan’s skin like shrapnel from a nail bomb, if that nail bomb had failed to maintain a proper diet of zinc. The sculptor turned heel and ran, as the claw creature scuttled after him on the tips of its many pincers, occasionally falling to one side or the other and running on the numerous other chelae that protruded there. It was a little bit like seeing Indiana Jones being chased by a boulder, if Harrison Ford was replaced by the actor that played the glasses guy in Troll 2 and the boulder was replaced by Satan’s testicle. Logan attempted to navigate through the screaming crowd as patrons tried desperately to exit the MoMa, carelessly pushing priceless art installations aside. He made sure to go out of his way for a second to smash a clay statue performing autofellatio that he had angrily thought about the entire day when he first saw it was in the same museum wing as his plastic block masterpiece. Behind him, the plated claw ball thing bowled over the slower evacuees; those that weren’t crushed were grabbed and pulled into its central mass through the spaces between its hexagonal exoskeleton. “How could I have been so foolish?” Logan thought to himself, struggling to stay standing as the crowd continued to buffer him like debris in a wind tunnel. “What was I thinking? This didn’t have to happen! It wasn’t supposed to happen!” Finally, he reached the exit, though it was now clogged with a soft but impenetrable slab of struggling bodies. He stepped out of the rushing mass of people as they slammed futilely into the blocked entrance. They formed a nice, thick line for the creature to mow down, and it did so in seconds. Logan watched as it then started to pull free the hapless men and women that had wedged themselves in the doorway, or at least parts of them. Logen turned around; there was nothing behind him but a mural of Frida Kahlo, which stared with and expression that seemed to know the sins he had committed. They locked eyes for a while while the crab ball ate the rest of the museum patrons. Eventually, Robert Logan, renowned lego sculptor extraordinaire, felt a cold, curled, serrated talon on his shoulder. “It’s time to go,” burbled a voice. “Please,” said Robert, refusing to turn away from the painting, “I didn’t mean it. I just wanted to give art to the world.” “And you did.” Robert felt some sort of bile hit his neck and back with every hard consonant. “People loved your work. You inspired so many children. Brought so much happiness to a world that desperately needs it.” The sculptor shed a tear. He reached up and touched the pincer with his palm. It felt like raw, frozen turkey. “O-okay,” he sobbed. He wondered if he should say goodbye to Wall-Frida. They seemed to have formed a bond over the past 30 seconds. “Come on, Robbie, nice and easy, boy. It won’t hurt much. You did great. You fulfilled your bargain beautifully.” Robert Logan turned around. He stared at the chthonic mass before him as it folded open like a blooming flower. Georgia O’Keeffe would have been proud but also slightly freaked out. Wall-Frida was unimpressed. Logan’s thoughts finally came together again, snapping snugly into one another like a certain toy brick, and he allowed the claws around him to gently prod him into oblivion.

[toibocks]

The story of the plants(or, the epic romance tale of the ages get outta here Shakespear)

It was the most cliche situation; two lovers, separate but desperate to unite. The only thing that set this predicament apart from the others was that the participants were both plants. Specifically, one was a sundew and the other was an oak tree. They didn’t have names; plants don’t have names. They were just Sundew and Oak, sometimes More Reddish Sundew and Tallest and Fattest Oak when they were among other similar company, but to each other, they were just “My Darling.”

They had talked to each other for years; Sundew from her flower box, Oak from the park across from it. They sent each other messages in the forms of pheromones, pollen, and leaves, all released at strategic times to ride the gusts of wind and arrive in ordered patterns that only plants can understand. While they couldn’t see each other, of course, the chemical markings that peppered their physical, botanic languages told the two vegetative valentines all they needed to know. Sundew knew Oak was tall, dark, and handsome, with great strength to boot. He spent his time tending to the various animals living among his branches and within his bark. A true family man. Oak knew Sundew was feminine, but powerful. She was partially carnivorous; unfortunate bugs looking for an easy meal would find themselves trapped by the sticky secretions on her leaves. All they could do was regret the  ironic death that their hedonistic desires had lead to, as Sundew slowly pulled apart their digesting bodies with millions of tiny tentacles. But to Oak, she was someone he could trust, and someone he could count on in times of great stress; they first met when she used a bit of clever scent manipulation to lure tree-destroying beetles away from her Darling, and into her waiting maw.

Of course, they knew by now they would never be together. Oak would discuss how a new woodpecker had just carved out a new home for her eggs, and dewdrops would bead on Sundew’s petals as she longed that she too could nibble at his brown flesh and make him her own. She, in turn, would talk about how she had once managed to devour an entire frog, and Oak’s roots would stiffen as he imagined his own self being enveloped and caressed. (Neither wanted to eat or be eaten by the other, by the way, this is all metaphorical. Just gotta be clear on that.)

But it could never be. They were too far apart. But then one day, everything changed.

There was a fire. Well, more of a conflagration. An evil, flame-thrower equipped cult that called themselves the Envoys of the Heat Meister set fire to the whole block on which the plants grew. All the hopeless romantics could do was feel the burn as the flames licked around them, melting Sundew’s planter box and blazing across Oak’s once beautiful park. They couldn’t hear each other; the fire engulfed any messages they tried to send out.

Sundew was the first to go. Some sparks took a liking to her, and within seconds they reduced her to ash, her secretions and tentacles useless against their incorporeal nature. But from those ashes rose smoke; a final, desperate statement from the flower to her Darling. The winds were just right; the smoke passed through the inferno and drifted up, brushing against the crackling bark of Oak, who was still managing to hold to life like the now-gone squirrels used to cling to his body. He recognized the scent; “Come with me,” it said.

Oak’s body finally gave way; the fire ate through to his core, and he was reduced to a skeleton, a thin black hand reaching from the earth like a man being dragged to hell. Oak, with the last of his consciousness, focused on the west side of his lower trunk, and forced it to shatter. His corpse toppled, crashing into the row house from which Sundew’s planter box had been attached.

The block was reduced to ashes and rubble within hours. There were many casualties, of course. The Envoys of the Heat Meister had escaped, ready to cause more mischief. But among the soot, among the crumbling buildings and shattered glass, among the melted planter box and the remains of a once great tree, there was one pile of ash in particular. A mound composed of the remains of a sundew and an oak. It was buried as the damage was repaired and the homes were rebuilt. And from a crack in the new sidewalk, right over were the finally-united couple was buried, a dandelion bloomed.

[toibocks]

Muriel the Moon Hag

His boots sank into the muck as his heart sank into his stomach. Harold had to force his feet to pop from the slime as he plodded his way deeper into the swamp, his daughter's first three baby teeth clutched in his clasped hands.   Hopefully, after this, she would live long enough to lose the rest. The sludge got deeper, now up to his thighs, and the accountant groaned as the warm mud slid over the tops of his boots and down his shins to soak his socks.

But there it was. He could see its silhouette through the greenish-yellow mists, framed by the rotting trees which grew twisted and knotted like snakes atop a gorgon's head. A stone and straw hut, unnaturally untouched by the filth around it, poked out from the thick ooze like a botfly larva coming up for air. An enormous pair of vulture's wings folded together at its back, and a thin line of cobble stepping stones extended out from its door like a serpent's tongue. Harold gingerly hobbled his way across the slabs, which tipped and swayed under even his below-average weight, and finally stood in front of the oak paneled door, behind which lay the solutions to all of man's problems. As he reached out to grasp the door knocker gripped in the teeth of a bronze howler monkey, the door was yanked open, and there she stood, hunched and grinning through thick, oily strands of grey hair, with eyes like raw scallops.

Muriel the Moon Hag.

"Eee hee hee hay!" She cackled, lifting her gnarled claws to the sky. Lightning struck the top of her hut.

“’tis I! Muriel the Moon Hag!”

The crone leaned over her walker and inched it closer to Harold, the tennis balls on its legs making a wet, rubbery squeak against the floorboards. The poor man shook and almost dropped his daughter’s incisors.

“What brings thee to my Moon Hut?” she screeched. Her breath reeked of strong citrus and butterscotch.

“P-please, Miss Muriel,” stammered Harold, “I…I require your services!”

“My services, eh?” barked the witch. She smiled wider to flash her few, but sharp, teeth, “and which services will you be requiring, worm?”

“My daughter…she’s very sick. She’s only 8. I was told you could cure her,” Harold extended his cupped hands, “I-I brought you her baby teeth. I was told that they were the price.”

Muriel slapped the chompers out of his hands, sending them scattering. They were briefly highlighted by the moonlight before being swallowed by the swamp floor. Below the surface, Muriel’s swamp gnomes burrowed to pluck the ivory nuggets from where they lay suspended in the slurry like flies cocooned in a spider’s web.

“You fool! They are merely a part of the price you will have to pay if you wish to save your daughter’s life!” spat the Mistress of the Moon.

“What? Please, I can’t spare any money!” said Harold.

“Don’t insult me! Muriel the Moon Hag has no need for the currency of you pathetic mortals!”

“Then what-“

“I must think of it! Remain here!”

And with that, the door to the Moon Hut was slammed in the unfortunate fellow’s face, sending him tumbling backwards into the muck with a splat. Muriel fastened the four deadbolts, the chain, and the crossbar that held her door shut, and spun around on her heels, sending her pink threadbare bathrobe billowing outward in a mockery of Marilyn Monroe.

“Crap,” she muttered, “Snips! Snips, what did we need in the pantry? I got some guy that needs to cure his daughter of something. Probably measles. He looks like the kinda dad that would let his daughter get measles.”

From deep within the bowels of Muriel’s geometrically impossible hut, a hermit crab about the size of a basketball came scuttling, an iron cauldron with skull motifs and a faucet on its back in place of a shell.

“Oh! Fallopian tubes! We used the last of those to make that haunted macaroni painting that sucks you inside it!” it chirped in a high-pitched voice.

“He’s not gonna have fallopian tubes, you idiot!”

“Ah, right. What about the milk of a virgin mother? That stuffs hard to find!”

“Not likely to have that either, Snips,” Muriel folded her arms and tapped a slippered foot, sending the tiny stuffed cat head on the toe bobbing to and fro.

“The withered womb of a woman in waiting?”

“No, Snips! He’s a man! He’s got guy things! Like unchecked anger and mortgages and stuff like that! Do we need any of those?”

“I don’t think so, ma’am. Does he have any coupons? I’m going to the grocery store later today, the bread’s molded up again.”

Muriel’s face contorted in rage.

“Again? I told you to put the twist tie on it when you’re done using it!”

“I always put the twisty on!” protested Snips, “it’s not air that causes mold, its exposure to sunlight! If we just got a bread box-“

“I’m a Moon Hag, Snips! Sunlight can’t shine anywhere near this bloody swamp! And you don’t put the twisty on, just last week you did the ‘ole twirl-and-tuck, I saw you do it!”

“That was one time! I was in a hurry!”

“You should never be in too much of a hurry to practice good bread hygiene, you cretinous crustacean!” The hag turned back to the door and began to unblock, unlatch, and unlock it. She looked back over his shoulder, craning her thin neck to see around her hump.

“I will ask about the coupons though. It’s probably the best we’re gonna get out of this jerk.”

Harold was just about to trod off back to town, hanging his head in shame at his failure to parlay with the Moon Hag, when the hut door was once again yanked open. For the second time that night he looked into those eyes, those horrible eyes, eyes that had watched uncaringly as acid beasts flowed over infants, eyes that turned up in glee when they saw fish hooks pierce the flesh of screaming sailors. The blood drained from his face and pooled in his feet as that horrible creature raised a warty hand to point directly at his forehead.

“If you ever wish to see your daughter well again…” the crone hissed, “I require-“

“Muriel!” yelped Snips, poking his head out between her bowed legs, “Ask him for his Netflix account too, Sonya the Sun Witch just found out we’ve been stealing hers!”

[toibocks]

Swarm Tactics

He grinned, or at least as much as he could, being an insect. All around him drummed the pitter-patter of hundreds of thousands of tiny feet, tap-tap-tapping up, down, around, and within walls and floors of rotted food and twisted plastic. Castro the mighty stag beetle had to stop himself from dancing with glee as he watched the mass of shimmering chitin pool up like oil around around the base of the old half-gallon milk jug he was perched on (or his “ivory tower,” as he affectionately called it.) The ants marched in lockstep. The gnats flew around and around in their excitement. The flies gathered in corners, rubbing their forelegs together as various evil plots ran through their minds. Everywhere, arachnids, beetles, bugs, wasps, and even some land crustaceans packed together into the crowded space. Arthropods of every shape, size, and color, of every order, family, and genus, of every age, social class, and religion, all uniting for the first time under a common purpose. They took up every available space they could, whether it was among the trash or fluttering in the air. It wouldn’t be long before Castro would be able to harness the power of the nefarious, vicious, but above all else, intelligent mass before him to bring about the inevitable extinction of mankind. Once he had made sure that all of his followers had settled into the dumpster behind Papa Geno’s, Castro silenced the buzzes, songs, and chatters by raising his wing covers. He then leaned closer to the massive funnel affixed to his tower with wire, and began his speech.

               “Greetings, my friends,” he boomed, “It truly is a privilege to see the world’s greatest thinkers, artists, and warriors all in one place to discuss the fall of Man. For many years we have suffered under human oppressions, having to watch as our brothers and sisters are –“

SCREE!

               A tiny scream sliced apart Castro’s words. The crowd turned and looked at a trapdoor spider, who was currently shifting its wide eyes from side to side and blushing, its fangs deep in a recently dead cricket. She freed her fangs from her meal and let out a nervous laugh.

               “Sorry, sorry. I couldn’t help it, it’s a reflex,” she said. Castro rolled his eyes.

               “Really, Susan?” he said.

               “I can’t help it! When things move too close to me I jump out automatically!” said Susan.

SCREE!

               Another screech, this time from the opposite side of the dumpster. A preying mantis raised its arm in guilt.

               “Sorry, that was me. There was a mealworm.”

               Castro groaned and rubbed the spot where his horn jutted out from between his eyes.

               “Alright, fine, um, prey!” he said to the crowd, “please try to be careful around the predators, alright? We need to be sensitive to their needs, let’s just try and be mature-“

SCREE!

               “Okay really? Really?” groaned Castro, “alright, prey, go to one side of the dumpster please. Predators go to the other, okay? Some of you may need to step outside momentarily so we can rearrange everything, just hang in there.”

               “Hey,” called out a mosquito, “that’s segregation! You said we all need to unite as one to fight the Man Menace!”

               “I know what I said, Gary, but we need to practical, alright? This isn’t trying to split you up, we’re still all together on this,” said Castro.

               “’One Phylum One Swarm,’ you said,” said Gary, “One Phylum one swarm! One Phylum one swarm!”

               The rest of the arthropods began to repeat the chant.

               “One Phylum one swarm! One Phylum one swarm!”

               Castro rubbed the sides of his little head and yelled into his megaphone.

               “Fine! Fine! Everyone can stay where they are, okay? We’ll just…I guess those eaten will get a plaque in their honor or something.” he muttered. The crowd cheered.

SCREE!

SCREE!

SCREE!

               Castro tried to pick up where he left off in his speech, but found that he had forgotten in completely in the hullaballoo. He would have to improvise. He raised his wing covers again for silence, tapped the end of his funnel a few times with his foreleg, and spoke.

               “Anyway, like I was saying, if we work together, there is no problem we cannot overcome! And as we deal our damage, and as new members are added to our cause, I predict we can have all of humanity eliminated in under a month!” he proclaimed. A pillbug raised his foreleg for a question.

               “Yes, but, how can we possibly fight them? We’re much too small!” he said. Castro laughed.

               “I’m glad you asked that my spherical companion! Our first order of business is to take out their electricity! Without it, they will be powerless against our advances,” he said.

“Mr. Castro?” asked an adorable parasitic wasp larva, having recently chewed her way out of the abdomen of its still-living spider host, “what’s ee-leck-tristy?” The other arthropods aww’d, except for the spider, which let out more of a gurgle followed by silence.

“That’s a very good question, sweetheart!” said Castro, “you see, unlike us, humans don’t have pheromones for mass communication. Instead, they invented this primitive technology made out of lightning and vines to tell all of their things what to do. All of these vines grow out of things called ‘power plants,’ and by killing these plants the human race will be thrown into a whole host of problems!” He began to make eye contact with individual members of the swarm as he listed off the effects of such a catastrophe, watching as everyone grew more and more excited.

“First, they won’t be able to talk to each other anymore! One of the fake pheromones made out of electricity is called ‘Internet,’ and our spies report it’s responsible for triggering around 75% of their communicative behavior and 90% of their arousal responses. Without it, they will be thrown into mass confusion, with no way to mate or warn other members of their colonies!” he said. The crowed murmured.

“But that’s not all! Without electricity, they won’t even be able to use most of their most powerful weapons! Especially those pesky fake suns!”

“Yeah! Fuck those things!" yelled a charred moth from his wheelchair. The crowd began to grow louder now. Humans were much weaker than they thought.

“And, best of all,” continued Castro, “electricity is a necessary ingredient for their most basic needs! They won’t be able to feed themselves, or wash themselves, or heat themselves…”

“Wait, what was that?” came a voice. The crowd grew quiet again. The speaker, a cockroach wearing a black plastic collar with a white stripe, looked rather concerned. “Oh, my apologies, I’m Father Walter Roach. I’m here representing the cockroachs.”

“Ah, of course, Father Roach,” said Castro, smiling, “please, share your concerns.”

“I’m just wondering about that heat thing,” said the Father.

“Yes, they have these things called ‘heaters,’ and-“

“No, I know what they are,” said the vexed cockroach, “that’s where most of us live.”

“Great! Now you won’t be burned by those men and their dastardly fire clouds!” spoke Castro.

“No, now we’ll all freeze to death in the winter because we won’t be able to stay warm.”

The crowd stared at Castro intently. He began to sweat.

“Come again?” he asked.

“Most of us cockroaches live near radiators to stay warm in the winter. If you shut them off, we’ll all die!” yelled Father, glaring. The crowd began murmuring again.

“Quiet! Everyone calm down, okay?” said Casto. He turned his attention back to the roach, “but you’re cockroaches! You’re a hearty species! You can survive anything!”

“No, see, that’s another thing,” said Father Roach. He started to yell, making sure the crowd at large could hear him. “While we’re on the subject, I’d just like the clear up that, no, cockroaches are not immortal. I don’t know where these rumors keep coming from, but we die pretty easily. Our kids are starting to dive into nuclear waste dumps, thinking they’re invincible, and it’s really tragic every time it happens. We’d appreciate it if you didn’t instill these dangerous ideas in the minds of our children.” Castro started to rock back and forth on his feet.

“Wait, you’re not immune to radiation?” he asked.

“No! I don’t even know how that got started!” shouted the Father.

“So if a group of roaches were to, say, be assigned to infiltrate a nuclear power plant to fiddle around with the fuel rods and cause a shutdown, they’d probably-“

“Die, yes. Likely of cancer. Very painful,” said the Father, “why do you ask?”

“Oh, um, no reason…” said Castro, rubbing the back of his head.

“You were gonna send my people on a suicide mission!” shouted the Father.

“I was not! Okay, let’s stop attacking each other or we’ll never get anything done, alright?” shouted Castro over the restless crowd, “look, do you people want to end the Man Menace or not?”

“Hey, funny you should ask that!” shouted a louse, having entered the dumpster just in time to here Castro’s question. Castro grew pale.

“Oh, hey, Jerry, long time no see…” he stammered.

“Uh, yeah, hi!” said Jerry, furious. “I heard you guys were having a little get-together, and just wanted to know why you didn’t invite me! It’s kinda weird, with me being such an expert on humans! You know, with them being my sole food source and all.”

By this point the swarm was churning with discussion. Castro signaled them with his wing covers again, but even with shouting he was unable to get them to go below a dull hum.

“Jerry, get out of here! I understand your frustrations, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made!”

“Easy for you to say! You don’t have a family to feed! You don’t have to go back to your kids and go ‘sorry guys,we’re gonna be homeless and starve to death because some people are upset that their bee friends are missing!” shouted Jerry.

“Hey! Shut up, crab!” yelled an angry bee, “get out of here!”

“You shut up, pollen jockey!” yelled back Jerry, “besides, I’d rather live off pube blood than dung like Martin Pooper King up there!”

“How dare you!” roared Castro, “I do not eat dung! That is a small minority of us, you racist!”

“Oh, did the crab just stereotype someone?” snapped Jerry. “Go back to the dog park, Scatagories!”

SCREE!

               “Hey, that was my girlfriend, punk!” a lovebug screamed at an assassin bug. The entire dumpster became awash in angry arthropod uproar. Predators turned against prey. One of the bees leapt on Jerry, letting out a furious cry of “bushbaby!” and sending him crashing backwards into a precarious straw resting against an empty bottle. The straw teetered over, knocking flying insects out of the sky and sending grounded ones scattering for cover, but bouncing harmlessly off of Father Roach’s carapace.

              “This doesn’t mean I’m immortal! Do not go telling people I’m immortal!” he sputtered. At this point, grasshoppers, being forced to rub against each other in the cramped quarters and now agitated even more by the commotion, could suppress their urges no longer and reflexively triggered their swarming behavior, molting and taking to the skies as locusts. The already crowded air was now thick with a green hurricane, slamming others into each other and causing an all-out brawl. Castro watched helplessly from his tower.

               “No, stop! Everyone settle down! We can pull through this, I promise!” he screamed, but it was in vain. He put his face in his hands as he watched a millipede gobble up freshly hatched mallets like jellybeans, only to be stung by a scorpion. “Please, calm down everyone! It’s alright, we can keep some alive to power the heaters, and to feed the lice! That’s it! Everyone, I have a solution, if we can find a way to enslave-“

               A gigantic dragonfly was knocked out of the typhoon of locusts, and careened into Castro. The stag beetle flailed, trying to regain his balance, but toppled backwards off of his tower. He flipped through the air and landed back-first in the middle of a colony of carpenter ants, crushing hundreds and releasing a cloud of “danger” pheromone from their corpses. Their senses clouded by the chemical signal, the dead’s thousands of sisters turned on their former leader, wrapping him up in a blanket of teeth and stingers.

               “No, get off of me you fools! I am your leader! We were so close! The world was almost ours!”

               Castro’s protests were silenced quickly, as his body was devoured within seconds by the colony. As the swarm frothed within the dumpster, mankind unknowingly celebrated victory once again. For the 60,000th time, they had managed to avoid overwhelming obliteration under the feet of Arthropoda.

[toibocks]

The Lifelord

               Ron pulled his knees to his chest and forced himself further into the back of his closet, making a nest for himself among the leaking bottles of ink and the stacks of used canvas paper while trying to ignore the knocking on his apartment door.

               “I know you’re in there, Nagel! I can hear the TV!” called the annoyed voice of the unwanted visitor. Ron threw his hands over his mouth to stop himself from cursing out loud. He got down on his stomach and began a commando crawl to his television, which was still blasting The Price is Right. He grunted as he struggled to inch his way forward, like the Very Hungry Caterpillar after eating the cupcake and moving on to the watermelon. After a very sweaty minute, he realized his attempt at stealth was pointless; there was no way for the man at the door to see into his apartment in the first place. He climbed back on his feet and power walked to the television, snapping it off.

               “You know turning it off just confirmed that you’re home, right?” said the voice. Ron slapped himself in the face more than a few times. He darted back to his closet and dug through the two and half outfits on the floor to find a crumpled button-up. He threw it on over his “Mount and Do Me” t-shirt, and emptied a few of the ink bottles over it (and his face and hands, for good measure.) He finally answered the door, just as his visitor had started to unlock it himself.

               He stood face to face with a middle-aged man, well-dressed but poorly built. His prematurely grey hair went well with his suit, and the whole thing was tied together nicely by a pair of glasses that would make the nerds shove you in a locker. What Ron’s eyes were glued to, however, was the name tag hanging from one of the over-starched lapels; “J. MANSON, GOVT. LIFELORD.”

               “Hey, Jeffreyyyyyy!” said Ron, pointing his fingers at his guest like a child playing cowboy, “sorry I took so long, I was really busy doing a lot of work and stuff.” He propped himself up on the doorframe, making sure to display the ink on his “smock” like it was art itself. Jeff was not impressed.

               “I didn’t know drawing comics was so messy,” he said, raising an eyebrow.

               “Heh, yeah, messy. Well, I do draw porn after all…”

               “I’m cutting you off right there, Nagel,” said Jeff. He pulled his computer tablet out from under his arm, and skimmed over it rereading what was now very well-rehearsed.

               “As per the regulations put in place on September 30th, 2045, with the signing of the ‘Overpopulation Restriction and Prevention Act,’ Mr. Ron Oscar Nagel is to be euthanized by lethal injection for failing to file his monthly ‘Proof of Work’ forms, indicating a lack of contribution of anything of value to society and marking him as a needless waste of limited resources,” he rattled off. “Now, please accompany me to the ‘Vacation Home,’ or I will be forced to contact the authorities.”

               “Oh, come on, Jeff, just give me one more month!” moaned Ron, “it’s just been a bit of a slow year is all, I’ll start making money again!” Jeff rubbed the bridge of his nose. It looked like it was going to be another day where he wouldn’t get his full lunch break.

               “You said that last month, Ron,” said Jeff, “and the month before that. And both of those extensions required me to do loads of paperwork and whine to my boss about why your life is sacred for some reason! I can’t do that forever; your time’s up.”

               “I’m just a little short on clients! Just give me some time to get my name out there, y’know, recruit new customers!”

               “Ron, there won’t be any new customers,” said Jeff, “I mean, ever since that new guy moved in down the hall, you’ve been, well, replaced.”

               “What, by Chaz? And his dumb Vaginal Reality machine?”

               “It’s a virtual reality machine, Ron,” Jeff pointed out.

              “Oh, sure, like when they renamed vibrators ‘back massagers,’ and anal beads ‘cat toys,’ yeah, I get it,” spat Ron. “Like, seriously, that thing is taking off? What is wrong with people today?”

               “Honestly, you were lucky that the Supreme Court even ruled ‘making pornography’ as a valuable contribution to society in the first place.” Jeff rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “I never really thought this would be a discussion I’d have to have at this job.”

               “I mean, don’t they appreciate a good skill, Jeff? This Virginal Reality machine can’t give you a good hand-crafted sex fantasy, man; it’s all just actors and code! Whatever happened to appreciating a good, two-dimensional, hand drawn double penetration?” Ron looked up into the sky nostalgically. Jeff was growing impatient.

               “Ron, it’s time to-“

               “It’s hard work, Jeff. You know every single one of my products is something I slaved over, something really special. It’s got my fluids in it, y’know? My blood, sweat, and tears!”

               “Ron, please stop-“

               “Do you know how hard it is?!” snapped Ron, “do you know how fucking hard it is?! To make sure the balls are the same size?!”

               “I really am not comfortable having-“

               “You think, ‘Oh, it’s just two circles, how hard can it be!’ but you’d be wrong, Jeff! It’s like those things move when you’re trying to draw them.”

               “I’m sure that’s-“

               “Do you know how many penises I’ve seen, Jeff?!” He paused for a response. Jeff looked around, blushing now.

               “Um, I suppose-“

               “Thousands, Jeff. Thousands! Do you know how many I’ve 3-D printed out, to make sure I could get every possible angle of every possible type? Do you have any idea how many dicks are on my desk as we speak?”

               “Please-“

               “It’s like Easter Island, Jeff!!”

               “Enough!! It’s over, Ron. It’s time for you to go!” Jeff screamed. The hall was silent for a good while. Ron let out a deep sigh, and Jeff place a hand on his shoulder.

               “Look, I know it’s hard. No one wants to die. But it’s quick, alright? And wherever you end up, I’m sure it’s better than here, okay?” he said, as gently as he could. Ron shoved his hands into his pockets.

               “Alright, Jeff,” he said. Jeff smiled.

               “Okay. This way, please.”

               “I’ll give you a copy of all my porn if you let me go one more month.”

               “What?”

               “Fine. A year and a half.” Rom grimaced. “Every commission I get; a copy for you.” Jeff stared at him I disbelief. He looked over his shoulder and leaned closer to the artist.

               “I should get commissions myself,” muttered Jeff. “Plus any rough drafts you plan to throw out.”

               “I can do the rough drafts, but I’ll still need to charge you half price for the commissions unless you get me a month and a half.”

               “Deal.”

               Ron and Jeff shook hands, and the Lifelord went on his way. Ron wiped the sweat from his brow.

               “Alright, there’s no way that’s gonna work again. I gotta get my life back on track, and fast!” Ron removed his smock and puffed out his chest.

               He plopped onto the couch, and turned on the TV.