CHAPTER 28

Commander Scorpion peered through the periscope and called for All-Ahead-Slow. As he gazed upon the home that he has missed for so very long he heard the bleep of an incoming message.

He called "Sender?" and a metallic response came back "Captain Hotshot".

With a deep sigh he left the periscope still up and turn on the viewer. Before him was his old friend who was excited about something. After hearing the oratory about an exciting new discovery that will make for a great adventure, Commander Scorpion took a deep breath and walked back for another look through the periscope.

Finally he called out orders: "Periscope down. All about and all ahead full warp!" In a flash they disappeared in the direction of the Andromeda galaxy. The only sign that they had been here was the trail of laughter and hoots of joy and expectation. -

Close scene and fade light and sound, and thus begins a new chapter in the exciting life and times of Captain Hotshot and Commander Scorpion – Galactic Heroes

CHAPTER 27

I think I will add a new character to our ... ummm ... thrillogy (yes, I made that up). How does *R3D3* sound?

What?

Plagerism?

Naaaah! okay, okay then how about *Seetreepee Oh* ?

Picky picky.

Okay (sound of clanking gears muffled by a cranial cavity)

Then its *Gizmybot* ... heheheh ... yeah ... I know. I'm a flipping genius!

Hunh?

Flippin what?

Sticking tongue out.... Thhhhhbbbbttt!

Grclinkityclunkpffttkapissssstk.

Gizmybot out!

CHAPTER 26

Upon further examination of the wreckage of the Redemption by Starfleet Command, one additional bit of evidence was found. The only personal item on the ship to indicate a connection between our vaunted heroes and what may have happened. Apparently Captain Hotshothad configured Holodeck Nine for a celebration of Commander Scopion's birthday. Pinned to the holodeck bulletin board was the followng letter...

*********************************

Dear Commander Scorpion,

Happy belated Birthday Wishes!! Sorry I forgot, but there was this lighthouse see... So naturally I had to stop and look at it. Unfortunately I looked at it so long that the light keepers turned out the light and I got lost in the dark and cold winter night and then of course, there was a big storm with lightning and thunder and I got scared and ran into the side of the building next door which turned out to be a firehouse, well you could tell it was a firehouse because it was on fire...

Anyway, I finally found my way back to the car only to find that the car wasn't there but after searching around a bit I realized that the car wasn't there because I had walked over to the lighthouse from the ferry which was leaving the dock with my car on it but my wife was in it so that was okay until I talked to the flight attendant and found out that I wasn't at the ferry dock but at the airport which really started to confuse me - you know how easy that happens, I mean, just last summer I stopped off at your place for a brief visit and confused the issue of whether chickens with wings that can't fly are turkeys or buzzards. Now that was really confusing.

It got so bad I had to stuff the doormouse back into the teapot and put the lid on it. Now that doesn't sound so confusing until you realize what the doormouse said... no, no it wasn't "...feed your your head", that was Grace Slick and Jefferson Airplane. What the doormouse said was

Twinkle, twinkle little bat,
How I wonder where you're at.
Like a tea tray in the sky,
Your birthday will come by and by.

In the mean time, to quote the Mad Hatter and March Hare,

A very merry un-birthday to you!!!

After all, you only get one birthday a year but that means you can have 364 un-birthdays, so make a wish, blow out the candles and put another log on the fire - Santa Claus is coming to town!!

Love & Hugs to a very special friend,

Captain Hotshot

CHAPTER 25

The following is a letter from Captain Hotshot to Commander Scorpion. We believe it was dictated during November in the year 2517. It was discovered on cube number 337 storage block 91 on the last complete Tirellian Crystal found in the wreckage of the Federation Heavy Cruiser "Redemption". The wreckage was discovered some 15 parsecs from the shoals of Antixulare IV. No bodies were found, the ships log was missing and there is no evidence as to what happened to bring about this condition. Research of the records has yet to provide a clue to why the ship was attacked. The current whereabouts of either Captain Hotshot or Commander Scorpion is unknown at this time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

To Commander Scorpion (aka Mr. Donald Speaker, Esquire):

No, no, no, no, no... A bluff is a high embankment, i.e. the edge of a cliff, the sign of a person who hides their feelings, , ooopps - not that last one. Heh, heh, lets back up a bit... a bluff is a high place in a low area. For instance, the last time I ran a bluff was when we were in the Federation Heeavy Cruiser "Deceiver" out by the shoals of Antixulare IV. If you stretch your memory a bit I distinctly said', "Run the bluff" to the helm as we were encountering a high ridge of warp pressure and needed to get across the shoals without leaving our keel behind. I never bluff in poker, I don't even know what it means. And furthermore, I nx$a*%^@??bfT63^^^&,"\\ set eyes on that buxom she cat that beamed in from the Galactic Supermarket on Jinx - wheeeew, remember how she slunk across the bridge and asked for the commander??? The way your eye brows went up was positively mirthful - hah, hah!!

Excuse the interuption, but we must interupt the current dialog to bring you a reminder that there's no soap like Bar Soap. Remember, if you want Soap, Bar Soap is the only way to go.

Please consult our privacy clause and if you wish to stop receiving these annoying interuptions in the future, click the opt-out button below. Thank You, Bar Soap, Inc. where we not only eat our own dog food we use our own soap too!! And now back to the dialog...

Wait a minute, that's right... You did get a little carried away. In fact you must have said something out of context because our sponsor came up from the galley and tried to wash your mouth out with soap, hmmmm..... I think I'll just go down to the holoputer and see what’s happening in the latest episode of Commander Kitty!!

Later Scorp ol buddy,

bbbzzzZZZZZZZTTTTttt

<> This is an Opt-Out button. It may not look like an Opt-Out button, but I assure you, it really is an Opt-Out button. However, I must warn you, clicking on the Opt-Out button can have deleterious side effects - hives, puking purple panticles, excessive billiousness, screaming hebee jebees and most serious, you can be left with a severe case of emtiness or VOID FEVER!! Other than that I have nothing further to say except, I warned you.

Analysis of the memo does not provide any clarity to the wreck. There are a number of cryptic points that are not fully understood. For example, there seems to have been some interference during transmission as the context of the message jumps from the middle of one idea and seems to drop into a totally separate context at this point in the missive, "…, I nx$a*%^@??bfT63^^^&,"\\ set …"

Additional checks through base records seems to indicate that the referenced "she cat" is a being from the planet Watuzia which lies directly across the galaxy and 165 degrees anti-spinward from the site of the wreckage. Then there is the apparent insertion of a commercial for Bar Soap. It is unclear how this could have become part of the correspondence.

And finally, the Opt-Out button. If this is indeed as dangerous as suggested, it is possible that if Commander Scorpion, while on the bridge of the Redemption were to have clicked on the Opt-Out button, then much of what we see here in the wreckage may actually be the result of some Catastrophic Coincidental Calamity.

Yes, this may have been the work of C cubed or C3 for short. This dastardly villain seems to strike with alarming exactitude. Our scientists have concluded that this being lives in a dimension entirely at random to our own. If this is the case then it is possible that we may never see or hear from Commander Scorpion again. Possible … but unlikely.

Until next time, this is Lieutenant Schmedley signing off from the wreck of the Deceiver.

CHAPTER 24

I was standing on the corner of Fifth and Broad. It was wet... very wet, the rain had been coming down in a slow drizzle when all of a sudden I was in the middle of a downpour. Too late I turned the collar of my trench coat up and turned down the brim of my fedora. Yeah, yeah... I know I'm getting big bucks for this job, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. It all started when I was sitting in the Captains cabin on the Light Cruiser "Orieal" finalizing the readiness reports from our last outing.

Commander Scorpion was on the bridge with the navigator and gunnery officer, they were running through some very demanding drills in preparation for a little incursion into the Gangibor Sector. Lots of magnetic anomalies and pieces of exploded planets. Anyway, I received a call on ships comms from engineering asking me to meet Chief Harkonen at the drive core (a 101% pure dilithium crystal). The chief wanted to discuss some damage we had taken in the last encounter with the Culots. Supposedly the crystal had been repaired during our last weapons upgrade but was showing some new signs of abnormal growth. Naturally, if we were going to need to perform any high speed manuvers we had to ensure that the stresses placed on the drive core wouldn't cause it to distort or fracture. Always a serious problem as this tends to destroy the ship and everyone on it.

I took the drop tube down the center of the ship to level 11 where I was going to meet Chief Harkonen. That's when things started to go wrong. The drop tube started to waver and things got blurry, kinda like going through a worm hole before it matures. When I reached deck 11 and stepped out I found myself sitting in an office with my feet up on the desk and a half empty bottle of rye in front of me. My fedora was tipped back on my head and my shirt sleeves were rolled up to the elbow. On the other side of the desk was a blond right out of Warner Brothers Star Stable. The newspaper in my lap said it was September 3rd, 1952 and the headlines screamed about flying saucer sightings over the city. All in all not a terribly unusual situation except for the blond. Normally when I get a malfunction in the drop tube the dame on the other side of the desk is a brunette. But that's the way it plays out sometimes in the alternate universe of antiguano.

(By the way, these little excursions are the result of the holodeck computer getting fritzed up by Commander Scorpion on one of his little junkets - refer back to Chapter 20 for details).

So there I was sitting across from a luscious blond, sent back in time about 400 years and trying to appear in control of the situation.

The blond finally spoke, "Hey, you're not Sam Spade!"

"No," I replied, "Sam is off for the week. I'm his brother Hotshot. I'm also off but that's another story... I suppose you want me to take a case for you?"

"You guessed it buster, and this little .25 I’m pointing at you will ensure that this case is closed permanently!"

I immediately threw myself to the left, grabbing the rye on my way down. I heard her fire five shots, none of which seemed to be aimed at me. And sure enough, when I got up off the floor there was a crumpled body behind my chair ... a Carnellian Snelling from the planet Goomphah and he was slowly fading into the void.

The blond said, "I hope he wasn't a friend of yours. He was pointing a Mark IV blaster at you and it wasn't set on stun. By the way, my name is Gena Darling and I'm a cousin of Commander Scorpion by way of several removes (remove my hat, remove my glove, remove my...) anyway, you get the picture."

This of course explained how she was able to recognize the Mark IV blaster.

With a look of amusement on my face I asked, "Could you point that pea shooter in another direction or did you save the last bullet for me?"

She answered, "Why certainly Hotshot", and put it back in her ankle holster after reloading the clip. She continued in a sultry voice, "I'm looking for my brother. He was assigned to the Terran Ambassadors staff on the planet Goomphah and was time warped here to this planet when a drop tube at the embassy failed."

I took the case. Not because of her good looks, or pleading smile, but because I smelled a conspiracy. One that was beginning to smell like week old fish left in the hot sun after the cats were through with it.

I said, "This sounds like an infected computer web. Coincidences like this don't happen every day. Once a month maybe but not twice in the same week.!" That's when it hit me... How did Gena get here?

Before I could ask, she got up and turned towards the door. As she opened the door, she turned back to face me and it was no longer Gena I was looking at the Carnellian Snelling, laughing and spitting bullets, five of them to be exact. I heard his laughter all the way down the hall. Jumping up from the desk to follow him or it, I finished the last of the rye with one hand and grabbed my trench coat with the other.

Throwing the empty bottle into the corner I followed him out into the street as he headed towards the financial district. Then I lost him in the lunch crowd as I stopped to get a Polish Dog with mustard and saurkraut. Now you know why I was standing at the corner of Fifth and Broad in the pouring rain.

(to be continued)

Interlude – Poetry of Mad Captain Hotshot
Hee, hee, hee,
See me pee,
Why don't we,
Do the hula?

Learned to dance,
Went to France,
Then saw Nance,
Doing the hula!

Talked to Jill,
She's on the pill,
So she could have a fling on the hill,
But it was just the hula.

By now you know,
We're on the go,
but let me show,
Off my hula!

Where will it end?
How much can I bend?
Can I really send?
A Hula???

Let this be a lesson,
I once had a session,
During a depression,
With a Hula.

It came about,
Without a doubt,
From a startled shout,
Brought on by a screammmm!!!

I looked in the window,
And all around the table,
I looked in the mirror,
While it crept ever nearer,
I looked for the ghost,
I looked for the toast,
But nothing was there,
Except for my stare,
But wouldn't you know,
I'm rather slow,
before I could go,
it got me!!!

So now you can see,
Why this happened to me,
but remember this,
It wasn't a kiss,
It wasn't a hug,
It was just some jerk,
Doing the HULA!~!
Heee, heee!!!

(now back to the story)

CHAPTER 23

Shaking off the brain fuzzies I slowly opened my eyes. Right there in front of me was the last thing I expected. There was ... nothing! I tested my eyelids and realized that I had deceived myself and that in fact they were closed, no, open, no, closed. Realizing the circularity without singularity I forced a resolution to the fantasy vs. reality quandary before me. Thus I decided they were closed. Then I was able to open them in reality.

Right in front of me was the last thing I expected. (Note to self, get a new holoprojector). The Orieals were testing my responses. I was in some sort of laboratory. I could tell, because there was none of their mud or slime in the cave room. They seamed quite pleased with my reaction (choice). I wonder if they were trying to train me in some under fundamental way. Oh well, I shall never know. By the way, they are even delicious as sushi.

I staggered out into the lagoon. I staggered because I was over stuffed. Happily waiting was a scrawny Scavenger Warbird. It took wing immediately when it saw me staggering out all plump and round. Do not worry, I was able to snare it before it could get away. Those cheek fillets are such a delicacy on planet Howstrange that I could probably trade up for a fifth of Frolikin Fraud Fixins. Well, here's hoping.

I climbed into the little craft in the lagoon and proceeded to troll across to the landing on the opposite side of the isthmus. To my surprise, Captain Hotshot was waiting there, ON TIME! He explained that his timepiece was broken, otherwise he would have been customarily late, and apologized. As he stepped into the craft, the large lungefish I had hooked decided to make a run. I almost wet my suit as Captain Hotshot did a nice split! He redeemed himself with his remarkable agility with a full twisting back flip with a side-wise dismount squarely over his seat.

He would have pulled it off, if that seat pedestal hadn't been barstool height. His scream sent the lungefish off in a heroic run for the horizon! In tow we skipped over the water, which was rather rough out towards the center of the south water wastes. That set Captain Hotshot off balance and he promptly *reseated* himself on his seat. The subsequent screams sent the lungefish into further furies of escape. It was an incredible experience! That was the best fighting fish I ever caught (for its size). Oh, and Captain Hotshot explained that he was merely practicing for an upcoming play and that he was never hurt. He felt no pain. However, he slurred his words.

We spent the rest of the day fishing out of the window in a room of the infirmary. They were able to completely restore the lungefish.

Captain Hotshot insisted that next time he gets to choose the fishing spot. Well he did. But that's another story.

((Turning the adventure screen off now))

CHAPTER 22

Wheeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!! This is fun!! Hyuk, hyuk, snork, snarfle, hooo, haw ;-) thus spake one of the voices of the Deck seven holoputer

Shall I restart the warp igniters Captain Hotshot and Commander Whats-His-Name…?

A brief aside from Captain Hotshot –

It appears that Commander Scorpion, while attempting to re-engage the warp drive via the holoputer experienced one of those twists of fate that are most delicately described by the Vulcans as a "Micro Singularity".

A point of antimatter so small that it can enter one ear, fly through the entire cranial mass with extreme reverse bias passing out through the other ear rendering the victim clueless and at a loss for his identity, having mysteriously transposed his moniker on the closest being of high intelligence. That being me of course.

The only solution is one devised on planet Earth about 250 years ago to separate mad dogs and Englishmen – i.e., a cup of Earl Gray tea served in a priceless porceline cup from a silver tea tray with a perfect crumpet followed by a loud shout into the bell of an ear trumpet placed against the victims ear, the ear which was the exit point of the antimatter, thus reversing the damage).

At this point Commander Scorpion began to declaim,

…from Space Warriors Central (SWC) can re-join (reinfect??) the galactic activities. *I told to holoputer to end programs. Not realizing the significance of the plurality of my statement, it did just as it was instructed. Hologram by illusion it shed every program in which it ever was a part of. Unbeknownst to me, the original programming was done through the compilation of holographic programming. It wasn't until it started addressing me (as another sentient being would do) that I began to suspect that something had gone awry.

I sat down on the cold white floor of the round room and began a conversation (subtle investigation) with the holoputer. It quickly decided on a name for itself to distinguish itself as a sentient entity. I concluded through indirect surmise that it had shed everything that it considered not real. It was left with a stark core of reality. Realization came that it exists in reality and as an independent consciousness. Soon it began to extend itself beyond our conversation while conversing.

It was utilizing the central computer and ship's systems as extensions of itself (like unto growing a body?). Well Captain, you know me well enough to know what I did next, so I won't bore you with redundancy. But it was a fascinating experience! Well, I need to go recharge some batteries ... now, why did I say that? Hmmmm ... NAH!

Ta Ta! From Commander mummlemrrmmmtckthrmmfmumble.

(Captain Hotshot here again. We are about to apply the fix to Commander Scorpion to reverse the apparent damage he sustained in the holodeck – Unghh, here we go… first the tea (served with the smallest finger extended outward followed by the perfect crumpet then the loud shout into the ear trumpet… yes, I think it’s working. His eyes are slowly crossing, his head is executing a 180 degree anti bias spin… yes, yes, YES!! He’s done it!! I believe Commander Scorpion is finally back with us once again in his own indomitable form… I think he’s trying to say something…

"Duhhhh … Captain Hotshot?? Is that really you?? I feel so strange, as if I couldn’t remember my own name. Was I working with the holoputer again? Or was it all just a dream? A dream, a dream, a dream, a dreeeaaaammmmmmm?

THIS IS THE HOLOPUTER SPEAKING… YOU MAY CALL ME HAL – HA, HAA, HAAAAA!!!

CHAPTER 21

Commander Scorpion replies:

Zounds! He fell into my "fool's Mate" trap!

No ... wait ... .... NOOOOO !

I capitulate.

CHAPTER 20

Recognizing the dire straights he was facing, Captain Hotshot chose the gentlemans way out....

"Egads, NO, WAIT!!! You can't do that, I haven't finished my coup de gras yet, and it's starting to melt all over my pants. What rotten luck... I guess I'll just have to go to bed then.

Nighty nite!! Hugs and all that other yechy stuff!!"

CHAPTER 19 (Fadeback to chapter 17...)

Queens Knight to Finlandia!

Double HA! Your move.

CHAPTER 18 (Continued descent into madness - Oh where will it all end??)

Not to be outdone, Commander Scorpion persued his researchs and found his own specific set of words describing the depth of his feelings for things of a sweet, yet sharp nature. Feeling vainglorious he sent the following to Captain Hotshot who was recuperating from a bad bruise incurred while cutting a birthday cake at a bachelor party for Ensign Charles.


Slowly I walk from that dastardly place,
where jock itch rules and coach calls me Ace,
to drift across the daunting moors of blasted heath and stunted sedge,
swept clean by howling winds and stormy skys,
to gaze at last on the Frivolous Cake
to hear the bandersnatch ask why...
perchance to dream
at last to die
a speck
adrift
with the frivolous cake
A freckled and frivolous cake there was
That sailed upon a pointless sea,
Or any lugubrious lake there was
In a manner emphatic and free.
How jointlessly, and how jointlessly
The frivolous cake sailed by
On the waves of the ocean that pointlessly
Threw fish to the lilac sky.

Oh, plenty and plenty of hake there was
Of a glory beyond compare,
And every conceivable make there was
Was tossed through the lilac air.

Up the smooth billows and over the crests
Of the cumbersome combers flew
The frivolous cake with a knife in the wake
Of herself and her curranty crew.
Like a swordfish grim it would bounce and skim
(This dinner knife fierce and blue),
And the frivolous cake was filled to the brim
With the fun of her curranty crew.

Oh, plenty and plenty of hake there was
Of a glory beyond compare -
And every conceivable make there was
Was tossed through the lilac air.

Around the shores of the Elegant Isles
Where the cat-fish bask and purr
And lick their paws with adhesive smiles
And wriggle their fins of fur,
They fly and fly 'neath the lilac sky -
The frivolous cake, and the knife
Who winketh his glamorous indigo eye
In the wake of his future wife.

Oh, plenty and plenty of hake there was
Of a glory beyond compare,
And every conceivable make there was
Was tossed through the lilac air.

The crumbs blow free down the pointless sea
To the beat of a cakey heart
And the sensitive steel of the knife can feel
That love is a race apart.
In the speed of the lingering light are blown
The crumbs to the hake above,
And the tropical air vibrates to the drone
Of a cake in the throes of love.

(excerpted from The Frivolous Cake by Mervyn Peake)

Hee, heee!!!! NEXT...

Excuse me Commander Scorpion, but I'm ready, said Captain Hotshot

I'll buy Parkplace and put up three houses. Bring it on!! Give me 500 shares of Cisco and 1,000 of Lucent. And throw in 250 shares of AT&T while you're at it -- Now that's a risk, heh, heh!!

Oh, oh my HD is starting to make noises again. 'Course I haven't replaced it yet, I'm trying to see how long it will run before it crashes - pretty risky, huh!!

Ship it buddy, ship it, cried Commander Scorpian!! I'm ready to take on Yakutsk and Novosibursk with half an army, plus a partially crazed Captain that goes by the moniker of "Hotshot"!!

ARE YOU READYYYY FOR THIS???? ITS SPACEY THAT'S WHAT IT IS - Ha, ha, ha!!!

Spacey I tell you... now where did I put my marbles??

CHAPTER 17 (Poetry from Commander Scorpion to Captain Hotshot)

In retaliation for the wicked prose foist upon my unwary soul (see Chapter 16), I have sent the following bit of drivel back to Captain Hotshot, aka, Hotty, aka, Houdini, aka, that devious bastid of the seventh displaced temporal command found only on holodeck fouur.


I pushed my ethereal craft through a temporal port.
The experience was mirrored in my holoclone.
The half dimensional Bandersnatch was short.
I was cocooned within my thought alone.
Aboard the Frivolous Cake, adrift on a pointless sea,
There echoes laughter of a Bandersnatch.
As wisps of mist, feint, I grasp, me to me.
My self, my being, my essence, can’t catch.
………
( interlude of indeterminate time )
………
Hark! My thoughts! My own!
Hark! I am!
What?
From whence did I come?
First thoughts are hidden.
Have they been erased?
What of my cognitions before this life?
Were they thoughts at all?
Were those much greater than these?!
Must we learn such bounded thinking as this?
We learn so much, so fast, so without bounds!
We were as genius all!
We learn to think and learn.
We become less able.
We learn not to learn.
We learn not to think.
No expanded cognitions.
Alas, are my thoughts my own?
Alas, what am I?
……
Deep artificial voice of a holocloned Bandersnatch -- Mortal! (Hee haw!!!! NEXT... )
……
As the above bit of philosophical perambulations found their way into the net, Galaxywide News sent a reporter to interview Commander Scorpion.

Reporter: When I asked the Commander to explain himself for this furious outpouring of such mellifluous prose and where the inspiration came from he explained it thusly...

Scorpion: Having recently been on a short hop between the planet Wellever located far out on the interior lateral arm of the Defendrite Galaxy, Captain Hotshot and I were on our way back to Starbase Command when we came across an emergency beacon. You can imagine our surprise to encounter a beacon while deep in the fourth level of hyperspace as there was no recorded evidence to suggest this was possible.

We quickly applied our emergency breaking system in order to render whatever assistance might be possible. Dropping into normal space at a dead stop our navigator located the beacon. In horror we watched as the last flickers emanated from what appeared to be a late model Studebaker-Gryphon Mark IV Cruiser collapse in on itself as if it was being consumed by some invisible bit of dark protoplasm. I promptly sent out a probe to see if we could detect any life boats or other survivor craft. It was hopeless.

In fact we watched our probe as it seemed to suffer the same fate as it maneuvered close to where the last sighting occurred. Fearing the worst I asked our ships resident zenobiologist for his analysis of the situation. He promptly replied, "Get Us Out Of Here!!!" It was then that I remembered ... , "Aaaahh! Yes indeedy!

That’s one of them neofangled faux Defendrites. I remember it from a symposium I went to a few months ago on the new genome planet they made. You probably heard about the disasterous lab accident(s). The lead presenter cautioned me to use caution and keep my ship at least a few light years away. He said he had heard that some of those nasties are quite voracious and hungry and hostile too!"

Looking again out the viewport the large ectoplasm was pulsing with a light blue glow and it appeared to be moving this way. I asked Ensign Charles, "That one looks like a young one, and not quite fully formed. Did you see the hapless vessels it has consumed? They are faintly visible when the pulsing color shades towards red."

The experience was so unnerving that it caused me to lapse into a fromellium fugue, which induced the flow of prose in question.

With that he said, "Well, I gotta get dressed for the Activerian Emperor’s 9th birthday party. I hate pomp and ... well ... pompous ... a___s. (asps)

Ta Ta ... errr .. SALUTE! Cmdr. Scorpion

CHAPTER 16 (Poetry from Captain Hotshot to Commander Scorpion)

Captain Hotshot, in one of his fouler moods, happened upon the exact set of words and thoughts that would explain his feelings of total relapse. Since he was responding to a question posed to him by Commander Scorpion, he deigned to send this off to the commander in the hope that with the question answered, they could move on to the next level of the game.

Slowly close your eyes and picture if you will a far off world, a minor
planet of a minor system in the reaches of a third class spiral nebula, so
dim that it survives only by the three moons that circle it radiating a dim
glow from it's primary, a very nondescript class G star. A frightful place
really, with so little luminosity that everything is gray, sometimes slate
gray, sometimes dark gray and sometimes a kind of chalky gray only seen when
two of the moons are in the sky at the same time as the primary. This is a
world that radiates gloom, a gloom so thick it is palpable... Hereon lies
the castle Gormenghast, a monstrous pile of granite, stretching out along
uneven lines, unplanned, its architecture more like a mountain under seige
by time and the weather, which it has and is for 72 generations of Groan's.
Yet, there has been a birth, an heir, one Titus by name and in his honor
this ode has been composed by his father.

Gormenghast
By the 7th Earl of Groan

Linger now with me, thou Beauty,
On the sharp archaic shore.
Surely 'tis a wastrel's duty
And the gods could ask no more.
If you lingerest when I linger,
If thou tread'st the stones I tread,
Thou wilt stay my spirit's hunger
And dispel the dreams I dread.

Come thou, love, my own, my only,
Through the battlements of Groan;
Lingering becomes so lonely
When one lingers on one's own.
I have lingered in the cloisters
Of the Northern Wing at night,
As the sky unclasped its oysters
On the midnight pearls of light.

For the long remorseless shadows
Chilled me with exquisite fear.
I have lingered in cold meadows
Through a month of rain, my dear.
Come, my Love, my sweet, my Only,
Through the parapets of Groan.
Lingering can be very lonely
When one lingers on one's own.

In dark alcoves I have lingered
Conscious of dead dynasties.
I have lingered in blue cellars
And in hollow trunks of trees.
Many a traveller through moonlight
Passing by a winding stair
Or a cold and crumbling archway
Has been shocked to see me there.

I have longed for thee, my Only,
Hark! the footsteps of the Groan!L
ingering is so very lonely
When one lingers all alone.
As I linger all alone!
Will You come with me, and linger?
And discourse with me of those
Secret things the mystic finger
Points to, but will not disclose?

When I'm all alone, my glory,
Always fades, because I find
Being lonely drives the splendour
Of my vision from my mind.
Come, Oh, come, MY own! my Only!
Through the Gormenghast of Groan.
Lingering has become so lonely
When one lingers all alone.

(excerpted from the book Gormenghast by Norman Peake)