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)
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)
posted by Mike and Tina at 6:30 PM
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