Thirty-Nine: The Smiting Issue
“So,” said Catrina, “you’re sure that wasn’t you.”
“Pretty sure,” said Thor.
“Shouldn’t you be, you know, more sure than that?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I mean, I think I should be.”
Thor took a bite of the waffle in front of him.
“I hate waffles.”
“That’s impossible,” scolded Catrina.
Thor chewed slowly, and seemingly with effort, almost as if he actually, truly did hate waffles.
“God, you’re such a fucking baby.”
Catrina switched Thor’s plate of waffles with her plate of scrambled eggs.
“Happy?”
“No,” said Thor. “I wanted pancakes.”
“Dude, no. You’re gonna get poisoned again. She said no pancakes, you get no pancakes.”
“Fine,” relented Thor. “Thank you for your eggs. I will eat them and pretend they are fluffy and moist and delicious.”
“OK, whatever,” said Catrina. “Back to the smiting issue. How are you confused? Shouldn’t you know when you’re cracking open the heavens and striking some mad scientist’s atomic werebeast dead with a bolt of electricity?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, I know what it used to be like, what it’s supposed to feel like. And this certainly wasn’t that. But, at the same time, nothing feels the way it used to, so my point of reference is all fucked up. Given what the things I used to be able to do that I can still do now feel like, though, I think I know what it would probably feel like, and it was kinda like that, a little.”
“What?” asked Catrina through a mouthful of waffles.
“OK,” said Thor. “Calling down lightning isn’t like throwing a baseball or a midget or something.”
“You throw midgets?”
“Once, bachelor party, long story. Not like lightning. Stay focused, woman.”
“Me? You’re the one side-tripping for waffle rage and dwarf tossing.”
“Look, do you want to know the answer or not?”
“Do you actually have one?” asked Catrina, with more waffles in her face.
“No, not really. Not a coherent or useful one anyway.”
“Well, OK, then.”
Forty: He’s Got the Tolerance of a Belligerent Irishman
“He’s… been drinking since Saturday,” said Syl.
“Yes,” replied Phil, “but he’s only been drunk since Tuesday.”
“That’s still… eight days,” said Will.
Syl, Phil, Will, and Bill stood around Quetzalcoatl. He was asleep in his corner, curled up and covered in newspapers and trash bags.
“Where,” inquired Bill, “is he getting the beer from? He hasn’t… vacated the basement.”
Quetzalcoatl was also surrounded by several dozen empty beer bottles.
“He… requisitioned it from some of our… more recent acquisitions,” replied Phil.
“But,” asked Syl, “why… Budweiser?”
“I think it’s obvious… that the… gravity of society’s situation… has led him to jettison the… niceties, the more upscale alcoholic beverages… that a man of his intellect would prefer.”
“Clearly,” concurred Bill.
“I think,” countered Syl, “he actually… enjoys it.”
“Watch your tongue, Syl,” reprimanded Phil. “His methods may be… unconventional, even to our eyes, but he is still our… greatest hope. He has given us… direction, direction we sorely lacked. Do not speak of him as if he was… some common drunk.”
“But that is precisely what he is,” said Syl.
Phil, Will, and Bill—as well as Gil, Lil, Jill, Hil, and a smattering of other previously unnamed, unmentioned underlings who happened to be in the area—stopped what they were doing, stepped back, and gasped.
“Syl,” said Phil.
“You don’t…” said Will.
“…really mean…” said Bill.
“I do,” said Syl. “Quinn… has been playing us from the start. He cares as little for our cause as… as… applesauce monkey farts…”
Syl leaned forward and fell to the ground, landing on his face. Normally, this would have been cause for alarm. However, the broken Budweiser bottle wedged through Syl’s skull and into his brain stem took precedence over the falling.
“My apologies to our janitor and your vaginas, gentlemen,” said Quetzalcoatl, “but I simply will not… lean against a wall for this.”
Quetzalcoatl wanted to go with the more traditional “I will not stand for this,” as he thought it sounded more eloquent, but he was, in fact, having supreme difficulties with standing again and did not want to be a liar. About standing, anyway. Hence the more honest “leaning” approach. Because that’s what he was doing. Leaning.
“But, you killed him,” said Bill.
“A coat without buttons is still a bathrobe. And buttons shouldn’t be talking shit about the naked guy in the shower if they’d care to remain buttons.”
“Are you saying…” asked Phil.
“I’m your huckleberry.”
Forty-One: Shakespeare Invented the Hooker Metaphor
“How long have we been driving?” asked Queen Victoria XXX.
“No idea,” said Chester A. Arthur XVII. “Clock’s broken.”
“It feels like we’ve been driving for days.”
“That’s just because the sun’s been all out of whack since Mars fell into it,” said William H. Taft XLII. “It goes down more times in a day than a two dollar prostitute with bad ankles and an inner ear problem.”
“Also because every now and again when your knees hit your face you knock yourself unconscious,” added Chester A. Arthur XVII.
“Is that why my shirt’s covered in blood?” asked Queen Victoria XXX.
“No,” replied Chester A. Arthur XVII. “That’s not your blood.”
“Oh, right. Right,” she said. “We should probably stop somewhere so I can get some new clothes.”
“You could just take your shirt off,” suggested William H. Taft XLII.
“I do that and you get strangled with it.”
“Yeah, that’s a good point,” said William H. Taft XLII, turning to Chester A. Arthur XVII. “Maybe we should look for a store.”
“I don’t know,” replied Chester A. Arthur XVII, “I think I’m okay with that option.”
“Strangling you is step two, buddy.”
“Yeah, bullshit.”
