3620

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Back at his Datcha south of St. Petersburg, Doctor Ludovico removed the small parcel from the inner pockets of his trench coat. Slowly unwrapping the layers of the Tokyo Rice Conference Daily, he exposed the now shrunken pieces of human flesh he had secretly scooped up and smuggled out of the operating theatre. He plopped them into a jar of fresh potato vodka his cousins Elma and Stephen had brewed for him as a welcome home present. Then, Doctor Ludovico sat down at his desk and began to write.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 2:50:42 pm)

:
Tuba music welled up around him and Pat looked anxiously for a sign of sunlight anywhere; through cracks under doors and by shadows in hallways. There was none. Silently, Pat swallowed as the sweat dripped from his wet head. The drops evaporated quickly, leaving a trail of salty white marks behind him as he padded through the labyrinth of hallways and room. He know that his hat would soon be awake. He'd have a lot of 'splainin' to do. As though it was listening, Pat's hat suddenly sang loudly, and to the tune of Three Blind Mice , "I rike soup, I rike soup, I rike soup." He knew guards would be on him in moments.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 2:57:51 pm)

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Sand was blowing in from the desert, flaking paint from parked cars, filling the bottoms of drained swimming pools. Death owned the streets. Two AM, November second, two hours into the Day of the Dead: Dia de los Muertos. Processions filled the thoroughfares of Mentor, like some graveyard Mardi Gras. Lepers danced together in papier-mache skulls behind white-robed bishops carrying enormous chrome crucifixes, hologram Christs floating a few centimeters above the crossbars, writhing in agony for all their sins. Behind the hills, orange flared and lit the sky from the burn-off towers at the German synth-fuel plant north of the city. Pat licked sand from his lips, and told his hat to "shut the fuck up!". He had never seen so many idiots in one place.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:01:53 pm)

theo:
What's going on ..?
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:12:09 pm)

:
Doctor Ludovico wrote long into the cold Russian night. The entire story. He steady drank out of the bottle of single malt Islay Scotch he had stolen from the Osaka Airport duty free shop. And just as he got the part where he had discovered the surplus organelles left out of Pat's increasingly unstable lobes, there was a wrapping at the window. A gentle tapping at first, which could have been a branch blowing in the wind. But the tapping got steadily stronger and suddenly a voice wrang out. "What's going on?"
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:21:04 pm)

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Pat checked the other tables and found tuba players lying on each of them, sunk in the same fluid, torsos neatly split from crotch to chin. All their jaws appeared wired. They were all missing certain organs, livers, stomach, hearts and pancreases, mostly. He knew then that what he was looking at was essentially a farm. "Like on that T.V. show Green Acres?" asked his hat. His fucking hat had become a parasite, feeding on him. Somewhere in his drug-ruined body, his techs must have found some cells that Captain Morgan spiced rum had not yet invaded. They had used these to clone copies of his pre-fronta lobes to use for patch jobs on that damned hat. The liquid in which they floated would be some kind of potato vodka perflourocarbon, Pat guessed, to keep the lobes oxygenated. He just stared. It was amazing; potato alcohol, meat, and murder all rolled into one package. The taste of tequila and grapefruit was strong in his throat. "I could really use a drink." said the hat.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:21:46 pm)

(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:26:11 pm)

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The room he entered was still and very cold. The thermographic read-out in his eyes showed it to him as an almost seamless blue surface, broken here and there by neon-red patches of warmer electronic equipment. Some kind of gas vapor was crusting on cryogenic pipe inlets, drifting in white clouds to the floor. A dozen gray laminated tanks (he thought of coffins or sealed specimen cases) stood against the walls. Pat spotted the only tank that was occupied, near the far end. When he tried to wipe a layer of frost from the Lexan faceplate, his fingers froze to it instantly. He jerked his hand away, stifling a small cry of pain as he left some fingers behind. Using his jacket sleeve, he rubbed at the port until he could see the face clearly. "Oh, hi theo " said Pat.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:27:54 pm)

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The hat that was Pats, the hat that is Pat. The hat, the fucking stupid singing hat broke into a loud refrain once again, "Sixteen men on a dead man's chest ... yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!" Pat had always wanted to be a Pirate, but not like this. No, not like this. The open chests of the dead men arrayed about him stank like a rotten chestery ooze. His nose twanged in the acris air. And nwo he beat his head till it was thoroughly wet and the pirate songs stopped.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:30:19 pm)

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Pat backed away from the cylinder, spun and kicked savagely at the door to the clean room, his face hot. All the half- conscious illusions of a daring rescue he had been nursing were dying fast. He prowled the edges of the frigid room, cursing to his now drunken hat, he punched a Sony monitor off a work station and kicked it into a wall, shattering the screen. The hat only sang "You have no idea how hot his brain gets.
You have no idea how wet his hair gets.
Look at me, I'm Pat's fucking and singing hat and I can drink."
"Oh Shut the fuck up!" mumbled Pat.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:34:25 pm)

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Fearing the worst, because he thought he knew that voice, Doctor Ludovico opened the door and looked around. The wind carried fresh snow on the air and the smell of fresh pine. And then the voice again, wrang clear and nasal through the wind. "Hi Doctor Ludovico! It's me!". Doctor Ludovico glances down, and there, in a puddle of semi frozen pink fluid was a size 7 1/2 black felt Christys Bowler hat. "Hello Eddy". Doctor Ludovico said, recognizing his first prototype. A horrible failure he had been assured was taken care of.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:37:10 pm)

bela:
CW posting one of his stories. I don't like science fiction much.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:38:29 pm)

Decoy:
Its more than that, dear bela.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:39:52 pm)

(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:40:21 pm)

Decoy:
Who doesn't have a red Christy's hat box in the attic?
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:40:59 pm)

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When some of the vapor had cleared and he could see again,Pat peered through the cracked Lexan to find that Cushca's face had remained unchanged. He was aware, on some wordless level, that from that moment on, he would be utterly alone. But he found himself comforted by Cushca's face, the lines of her cheeks, the set of her lips. There was no hint at all of pain or betrayal in her smooth features. Pat stepped back. "All of the little Herushca's we could have had" He thought "It's just not fair" Calmly, gratefully, he placed the barrel of the plastic spud-gun between his teeth and aimed for the back of his head. Anything to shut up that fucking hat. Closing his eyes, he was filled with an odd sense of euphoria, thinking: From now on, we make our own rules. He pulled the trigger. The gun clicked once.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:42:16 pm)

bela:
on some wordless level? Crap.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:43:55 pm)

Chewing Wax:
Duh
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:44:11 pm)

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"You'll never guess where I've been Doctor Ludovico!" Eddy squeaked, and using small stumps of raw muscle fiber that had not been there the last time Ludovico had seen him, slurched his way into the house, leaving a trail of blood and other fluid.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:47:09 pm)

Myk Murphy:
Singing hats? Goodness.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:48:52 pm)

bela:
Duh? Huh?
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:49:27 pm)

Chewing Wax:
What?
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:49:42 pm)

Decoy:
Now I need a nap.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:50:41 pm)

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"Great. Think anyone'll notice?" The hat asked asked. Pat looked at Cushca, smiling and smoking in her tube, and shook his head, thinking that once again, he had failed her. bela got up, dropped an avuncular arm around Pats shoulders and said: "Don't sweat it, stupid. We've got big plans for you."she steered Pat out the clean room, upstairs and through theVictorian wing toward the roof. "There's so much to say over before our ride gets here, but if we hurry, I think we might just have time to give you the fifty-cent tour of the universe of bela." "Great! like on Star Trek?" asked the hat.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:52:04 pm)

:
THE END
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:54:07 pm)

bela:
Its a nice story with Pat, Heruka and Cushca.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:54:13 pm)

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"I give up Eddy" Doctor Ludovico sighed, having taken eight guesses now on where the hat had been." "Vegas!" Eddy chirped and launched himself about three feet into the air but landed upside down, and began whirling his little muscle stumps wildly in the air. "little help Doctor?" Eddy whistled, seemingly slightly out of breath.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:55:17 pm)

Detlef Sping:
if Queenie can't make a film or two out of that then there's no hope.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:55:34 pm)

:
FIN'E
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:56:07 pm)

Detlef Sping:
wow there's even a trailer for the next one.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:56:41 pm)

Decoy:
Better than a Russian concussion, I say.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:57:48 pm)

Detlef Sping:
Hey bela you're even in it at the end.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:57:50 pm)

Decoy:
Xenograftology.
(Tue Oct 22, 2002 - 3:59:15 pm)