THE GLASS DOORS
CHAPTER 25-32
CHAPTER 25
Palimpsest
I had arrived in Kerplunck, but there was something refreshing about the notion because it meant that the cosmic forces were now referencing my own imagination. My cosmic story that was told from the normal Will Strange life I had been living for twenty-something years was now real within the unreal. Clearly, my story had mattered. There was some cause for celebration despite being ankle-deep in actual waste.
Fortunately, I had retained my ghostly form and Markis couldn’t see that it was only he and myself standing on the pathetic patch of crap that was known as Kerplunck. Known as “Kerplunck?” – I had named it that!
Surely, this bad joke signaled that the cosmic forces – whether it be the Bigot Star, or E.T. Arnold himself – would soon arrive and confess that it was all just a hokey and longwinded way to let me know that I mattered in the universe and that my stories were pretty good overall.
It seemed sneaky to me, and my expectation was that the charade would soon end, and I would be released. In fact, I was hoping that the mindboggling experience was designed as a transition so that my shift from a mortal first life to a cosmic life would be something that I could embrace instead of rejecting due to anxiety or shame. It might have been the case that had I been quietly removed in Algonquin Park, then the cosmic life would have been deemed untrustworthy, or otherwise, I would have felt myself unworthy of the great reward. I may have looked at my skeleton crew in the cosmic with distrust and deemed them evil characters engaged in a trick of the trade. Perhaps, this transition through the new world experience was the appropriate medium for altering my perceptions and quelling my paranoia such that I might trust my real cosmic family should I become fortunate enough to meet them in person.
And so, I waited for things to get better. I observed Markis building his dirty turd empire and regained some of my lost sense of humor. Despair switched to irreverence, and my thoughts focused on how I was too good to be stuck in Kerplunck, and that the cosmic forces which seemingly controlled my fate needed to smarten up in a hurry. The cosmic game had to operate in recognition of this intuitive fact about my worth and stop blackballing me.
Still, I remained stationed in Kerplunck and watched the formation of a fantasy land which I had once proclaimed during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade. All the familiar elements from my story were present: from the crap-covered landscape to the brown hazy fog that constituted a sky. I even spotted “Butt-crack Canyon”, a geographic feature I had thought up rather whimsically one night while watching The Matrix Revolutions in the movie theater alone, and determining which of the actors in that movie were in fact evil cosmic characters working for Clint and Markis. Interestingly, I could now evaluate that butt-crack canyon had once been the site of the mighty river Sep.
There were things that I already knew about Kerplunck: it was not part of a physical universe, and it was a land of arcane, eldritch magic. Objects could be imbued with life and would have personalities that matched their status as objects or parts. You couldn’t fall off the edge of Kerplunck and instead you would be walking on the underside experiencing it as the top side. Markis was “Daddy” in Kerplunck, but later H8 or “Hate” would become the “Doodoo Papi” of the flipside of Kerplunck. Hate was a man composed entirely of excrement and he was Markis’s nemesis. I was looking forward to the moment of his inception.
Perhaps, having thought up such a horrible place, somehow, I deserved to be one of its residents. I couldn’t understand why I was being punished though because Tricks of the Trade and the identification of Kerplunck had all been about vanquishing evil cosmic characters from the real world, so that humanity could be free from evil influence and nefarious, inhuman wicked schemes. How was that deserving of punishment? It was a good cause, no?
Markis appeared proud of his worthless deed in destroying the new world. I watched as he strolled from one side of Kerplunck to the other. It took the equivalent of an hour in real time. This tiny patch of shit was his kingdom, and he had the nerve to hold his head up high. I wanted to smack him upside the head, but my own predicament weighed on me, and I kept entertaining feelings of guilt as a check to stimulate my mental reasoning on whether I truly deserved what was happening to me.
Then, it dawned on me what was going to happen next.
Palimpsest
I had arrived in Kerplunck, but there was something refreshing about the notion because it meant that the cosmic forces were now referencing my own imagination. My cosmic story that was told from the normal Will Strange life I had been living for twenty-something years was now real within the unreal. Clearly, my story had mattered. There was some cause for celebration despite being ankle-deep in actual waste.
Fortunately, I had retained my ghostly form and Markis couldn’t see that it was only he and myself standing on the pathetic patch of crap that was known as Kerplunck. Known as “Kerplunck?” – I had named it that!
Surely, this bad joke signaled that the cosmic forces – whether it be the Bigot Star, or E.T. Arnold himself – would soon arrive and confess that it was all just a hokey and longwinded way to let me know that I mattered in the universe and that my stories were pretty good overall.
It seemed sneaky to me, and my expectation was that the charade would soon end, and I would be released. In fact, I was hoping that the mindboggling experience was designed as a transition so that my shift from a mortal first life to a cosmic life would be something that I could embrace instead of rejecting due to anxiety or shame. It might have been the case that had I been quietly removed in Algonquin Park, then the cosmic life would have been deemed untrustworthy, or otherwise, I would have felt myself unworthy of the great reward. I may have looked at my skeleton crew in the cosmic with distrust and deemed them evil characters engaged in a trick of the trade. Perhaps, this transition through the new world experience was the appropriate medium for altering my perceptions and quelling my paranoia such that I might trust my real cosmic family should I become fortunate enough to meet them in person.
And so, I waited for things to get better. I observed Markis building his dirty turd empire and regained some of my lost sense of humor. Despair switched to irreverence, and my thoughts focused on how I was too good to be stuck in Kerplunck, and that the cosmic forces which seemingly controlled my fate needed to smarten up in a hurry. The cosmic game had to operate in recognition of this intuitive fact about my worth and stop blackballing me.
Still, I remained stationed in Kerplunck and watched the formation of a fantasy land which I had once proclaimed during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade. All the familiar elements from my story were present: from the crap-covered landscape to the brown hazy fog that constituted a sky. I even spotted “Butt-crack Canyon”, a geographic feature I had thought up rather whimsically one night while watching The Matrix Revolutions in the movie theater alone, and determining which of the actors in that movie were in fact evil cosmic characters working for Clint and Markis. Interestingly, I could now evaluate that butt-crack canyon had once been the site of the mighty river Sep.
There were things that I already knew about Kerplunck: it was not part of a physical universe, and it was a land of arcane, eldritch magic. Objects could be imbued with life and would have personalities that matched their status as objects or parts. You couldn’t fall off the edge of Kerplunck and instead you would be walking on the underside experiencing it as the top side. Markis was “Daddy” in Kerplunck, but later H8 or “Hate” would become the “Doodoo Papi” of the flipside of Kerplunck. Hate was a man composed entirely of excrement and he was Markis’s nemesis. I was looking forward to the moment of his inception.
Perhaps, having thought up such a horrible place, somehow, I deserved to be one of its residents. I couldn’t understand why I was being punished though because Tricks of the Trade and the identification of Kerplunck had all been about vanquishing evil cosmic characters from the real world, so that humanity could be free from evil influence and nefarious, inhuman wicked schemes. How was that deserving of punishment? It was a good cause, no?
Markis appeared proud of his worthless deed in destroying the new world. I watched as he strolled from one side of Kerplunck to the other. It took the equivalent of an hour in real time. This tiny patch of shit was his kingdom, and he had the nerve to hold his head up high. I wanted to smack him upside the head, but my own predicament weighed on me, and I kept entertaining feelings of guilt as a check to stimulate my mental reasoning on whether I truly deserved what was happening to me.
Then, it dawned on me what was going to happen next.
CHAPTER 27
Reservation
Markis surveyed his land, but then thought to examine his own form. He reached up to his face tentatively and let his fingers run across a new proliferation of creases. His visage had become wrinkly, and if a mirror had been available his reflection would have been shocking for the ancient countenance staring back through those beady, little black eyes.
He was standing near the canyon that had once been the river Sep, marveling at the death of the former mighty lifegiving channel. For a moment, I thought I saw some regret crawl up from his pursed lips and across his fluting brow. Perhaps, Markis was ashamed that he hadn’t considered the consequences of his actions better. Maybe he was parched from that war cry earlier.
It gave me pleasure to consider that Markis was aware of his imminent folly in creating Kerplunck. I knew the best part was coming up.
Markis felt it too. He began walking away from the canyon and toward a hard, dark lump of waste that was once the site of our temple. As he traversed the barren landscape, his body began to ache and then tremble. Everywhere but his neck and head were beginning to have the distinct sensation of burning. He tore off his tunic and stood naked among the waste. His fingernails went to work, and his scratching quickly turned to gouging.
Markis grimaced and closed his eyes as skin began to flay exposing his muscle and organs. He reached the hard, dark lump and stood in silence. The pain was excruciating. There was a moment where Markis realized that his organs were now invaders. He tore at his body, attacking his own exposed organs as if they were frenzied piranhas feasting at the shoal of his dry bones.
The organs were thrown in all directions, scattered across the shriveled wafer of land that was Kerplunck. Markis was now nothing more than a living skeleton body with a full head on top. The experience horrified him, but he was exhilarated about the exquisite sensation. Markis had lived his life with complete numbness, but now sensitivity became him.
Markis rested on the hard, dark lump that was to become his throne.
Later, Markis rose and appeared already acclimated to his new corporeal condition. Out of the waste of the land, he crafted an amphitheater around the hard, dark lump. The activity reminded me of summer holidays with my family when my father would lie on the beach near the water and pick up soggy mounds of sand and let them drop from his fingertips creating little knobby towers.
Markis was no craftsmen, but he did a decent job on the amphitheater which would later become the clubhouse for his closest allies in Kerplunck. Now, it was time to create those allies. Markis had to consider his minions carefully because he wouldn’t be able to trust easily, nor did he yet know whether his rule of Kerplunck was absolute. He might be about to create – but could he destroy anymore?
In my estimates, Markis was evil incarnate, and the stories of Satan or Hannibal Lecter paled in comparison to what I had witnessed with this monster. He was a predator of the worst kind, and his mind was riddled with hatred. He was heartless, to be sure. I knew something of Markis’s reasoning because I had announced it during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade.
Markis considered Nature to be the essence of Good and it was no wonder that he killed a planet the first chance he got. Nature was geared for protecting the vulnerable and everything hardwired into the most intelligent and social creatures was designed for propagation of the species which was achieved ideally through protection of vulnerable offspring. Markis determined that true Evil would oppose Good completely, therefore, the vulnerable were to be exploited maximally.
Markis went further with his credo on the principles of evil and wrongdoing. He was against Nature, but by extension he was against the structures which were natural and supported Nature’s mandate to protect the vulnerable. Markis opposed family and found it anathema. As a male, family was only possible through adding children, which intuitively meant adding a woman to the unit. As such, Markis despised women and children which he found synecdoche for family, and thus Nature and Good. With these principles adhered to, by default, Markis was only willing to share intimacy with other males – he was homosexual.
I knew that Markis had a special relationship with intersexuals based on my pronouncements during the cosmic wager story, however, I hadn’t been able to justify that prejudice at the time, and it was a choice mainly rooted in intuition. After knowing of Markis’s inception into being as well as his relationship with Ister, it all started to make sense.
It dawned on me that the Bigot Star may have been my fanboy and was bringing my story to life out of some depraved sense of devotion to my work. It was a passing thought.
Markis intended to create his community, and they were going to be his sons – his ‘boys’ as well as his lovers. These boys would exemplify his brand of evil and thus he would not need to punish them the way he had all those children in the new world that I was shown.
I mused about how it must be the case that homosexual men can have that orientation because of positive feelings of attraction to other men. However, Markis and his boys were purely evil beings, not defined through their positive feelings, of which they had none. Their attractions were predatory and based in hatred and a compulsion to cause suffering for others. Their intimate lives were not guided by “attractive” forces per se, but rather, intimacy was a political strategy to gain the loyalty of allies and then attain prestige within the community. There was absolutely no love in Kerplunck.
Before the creation of the boys came the monster that I had once known as, Alex.
Reservation
Markis surveyed his land, but then thought to examine his own form. He reached up to his face tentatively and let his fingers run across a new proliferation of creases. His visage had become wrinkly, and if a mirror had been available his reflection would have been shocking for the ancient countenance staring back through those beady, little black eyes.
He was standing near the canyon that had once been the river Sep, marveling at the death of the former mighty lifegiving channel. For a moment, I thought I saw some regret crawl up from his pursed lips and across his fluting brow. Perhaps, Markis was ashamed that he hadn’t considered the consequences of his actions better. Maybe he was parched from that war cry earlier.
It gave me pleasure to consider that Markis was aware of his imminent folly in creating Kerplunck. I knew the best part was coming up.
Markis felt it too. He began walking away from the canyon and toward a hard, dark lump of waste that was once the site of our temple. As he traversed the barren landscape, his body began to ache and then tremble. Everywhere but his neck and head were beginning to have the distinct sensation of burning. He tore off his tunic and stood naked among the waste. His fingernails went to work, and his scratching quickly turned to gouging.
Markis grimaced and closed his eyes as skin began to flay exposing his muscle and organs. He reached the hard, dark lump and stood in silence. The pain was excruciating. There was a moment where Markis realized that his organs were now invaders. He tore at his body, attacking his own exposed organs as if they were frenzied piranhas feasting at the shoal of his dry bones.
The organs were thrown in all directions, scattered across the shriveled wafer of land that was Kerplunck. Markis was now nothing more than a living skeleton body with a full head on top. The experience horrified him, but he was exhilarated about the exquisite sensation. Markis had lived his life with complete numbness, but now sensitivity became him.
Markis rested on the hard, dark lump that was to become his throne.
Later, Markis rose and appeared already acclimated to his new corporeal condition. Out of the waste of the land, he crafted an amphitheater around the hard, dark lump. The activity reminded me of summer holidays with my family when my father would lie on the beach near the water and pick up soggy mounds of sand and let them drop from his fingertips creating little knobby towers.
Markis was no craftsmen, but he did a decent job on the amphitheater which would later become the clubhouse for his closest allies in Kerplunck. Now, it was time to create those allies. Markis had to consider his minions carefully because he wouldn’t be able to trust easily, nor did he yet know whether his rule of Kerplunck was absolute. He might be about to create – but could he destroy anymore?
In my estimates, Markis was evil incarnate, and the stories of Satan or Hannibal Lecter paled in comparison to what I had witnessed with this monster. He was a predator of the worst kind, and his mind was riddled with hatred. He was heartless, to be sure. I knew something of Markis’s reasoning because I had announced it during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade.
Markis considered Nature to be the essence of Good and it was no wonder that he killed a planet the first chance he got. Nature was geared for protecting the vulnerable and everything hardwired into the most intelligent and social creatures was designed for propagation of the species which was achieved ideally through protection of vulnerable offspring. Markis determined that true Evil would oppose Good completely, therefore, the vulnerable were to be exploited maximally.
Markis went further with his credo on the principles of evil and wrongdoing. He was against Nature, but by extension he was against the structures which were natural and supported Nature’s mandate to protect the vulnerable. Markis opposed family and found it anathema. As a male, family was only possible through adding children, which intuitively meant adding a woman to the unit. As such, Markis despised women and children which he found synecdoche for family, and thus Nature and Good. With these principles adhered to, by default, Markis was only willing to share intimacy with other males – he was homosexual.
I knew that Markis had a special relationship with intersexuals based on my pronouncements during the cosmic wager story, however, I hadn’t been able to justify that prejudice at the time, and it was a choice mainly rooted in intuition. After knowing of Markis’s inception into being as well as his relationship with Ister, it all started to make sense.
It dawned on me that the Bigot Star may have been my fanboy and was bringing my story to life out of some depraved sense of devotion to my work. It was a passing thought.
Markis intended to create his community, and they were going to be his sons – his ‘boys’ as well as his lovers. These boys would exemplify his brand of evil and thus he would not need to punish them the way he had all those children in the new world that I was shown.
I mused about how it must be the case that homosexual men can have that orientation because of positive feelings of attraction to other men. However, Markis and his boys were purely evil beings, not defined through their positive feelings, of which they had none. Their attractions were predatory and based in hatred and a compulsion to cause suffering for others. Their intimate lives were not guided by “attractive” forces per se, but rather, intimacy was a political strategy to gain the loyalty of allies and then attain prestige within the community. There was absolutely no love in Kerplunck.
Before the creation of the boys came the monster that I had once known as, Alex.
CHAPTER 28
Abysmal
Markis stood on his hard, dark lump of waste that was his new throne, and he closed his eyes. He focused his thoughts on the idea of a partner, but every time he did, Ister would pop up in his mind. He was getting frustrated and irate with his own lack of imagination. I found it amusing because he had lived such a bunk life and had refused to train in creativity because he deemed it a virtuous trait.
Markis must have been thinking back to the papyrus illustrations. He took his gnarled bone finger and pushed it into the spongy wasteland. He drew the outline of a figure. The outline was rudimentary, and no one would mistake it for anything other than a poorly-toned person. Then, he searched the land for one of his organs that had been strewn across the landscape during his painful physical transformation. Toward the canyon, he found the remnants of his unimpressive genitals. He gathered the parts and returned with them to his throne.
He placed the genitals in the appropriate position on top of the drawn outline. Markis closed his eyes once more and raised his hands up like an evangelical preacher calling upon the forces of the heavens to validate his message. When he opened his eyes, there was a terrifying beast that stood before him, drooling, and panting in anticipation of its master’s whimsical command.
This beast was Alex, but that wasn’t the Kerplunckian name. In Kerplunck this first ally of Markis was known by me as “Agie”, but also sometimes, “Linzo”. The beast was friendly and loyal to Markis. This beast had two faces, one poorly articulated resting on its shoulders in correspondence with Markis’s sloppy outline, and the other between its legs representing the genitalia. In the wasteland of Kerplunck, the conjuring of Agie-Linzo had resulted in Markis’s genitals and the outline he had drawn disappearing from the landscape. The symbol and totem were now imbued in the essence of the beast.
Agie-Linzo was two distinct personalities for a single mind, yet the pair conversed at length about any topic at all. I considered Alex’s social butterfly nature when I looked upon Markis’s grotesque creation. The top half, Agie, was poorly defined and bloblike, while the lower half, Linzo, was scabby and covered in boils with gangrened flesh growing over the boils. The beast didn’t seem in pain and appeared appreciative to have been summoned and conjured into existence.
Watching Markis in his first act of creation had me considering the possibility that I too might find myself able to create in this magical place. I contemplated the most useful thing and determined it was a jet or space rocket to travel away from Kerplunck as quickly as possible. It wasn’t a defining moment for my creative imagination, but it was what I could muster as a raw solution on the fly.
Markis was proud of his accomplishment, and I knew that he sought only absolute loyalty from the beast. Agie-Linzo was an agreeable companion, and Markis learned that the ‘three’ of them thought alike. Additionally, Agie-Linzo had a talent – they could conjure a dreamscape within Kerplunck. The first dreamscape that they presented to Markis was of the new world, focused on a place in the meso-region that had meant something to Markis. Markis enjoyed the experience but was overcome with negative feelings which he reframed as being about the hazy quality of the dreamscape as opposed to a reminder that he had erred in destroying the new world so thoughtlessly.
Markis knew that Agie-Linzo’s dreamscapes would provide for the entire Kerplunckian community and that his new people would not feel shame through the limitation imposed on them by existing in a pathetic shriveled-up sheet of waste as embarrassing knick-knacks and leftovers. What Markis didn’t realize was that others that he created would also have the dreamscape talent, and that it would impose a political hierarchy for the development of Kerplunck. I wasn’t planning to give him a head’s up.
Markis further explored Agie-Linzo’s dreamscape dimension to be sure that he understood its nature and how it worked. It seemed that he could leave when he wanted, and he would wake up in his physical position in Kerplunck. Also, Agie-Linzo could stop hosting the dreamscape at any time which would wake anyone experiencing that dimension or realm. Markis was able to conjure some things in the dreamscape, such as, food or weapons. However, other objects required a request to the host. If Markis wanted to experience attacking a child, he had to request the representation of the oblivious child from Agie-Linzo. This was somewhat annoying to him, yet Agie-Linzo never denied Markis’s requests, therefore, Markis interpreted it as a mere formality as well as a condition that could be used against other Kerplunckians at a later time.
The dreamscape lacked key elements of fidelity for the objects represented, such as, the water at the river sometimes tasted more like blood, or the blue skies shifted to the brown pea soup haze that characterized Kerplunckian skies. However, Markis found these unique features fascinating and trusted that Agie-Linzo’s dreamscape imagination was most evil. Markis stopped toying with the dreamscapes and recognized that his kingdom held some promise.
Abysmal
Markis stood on his hard, dark lump of waste that was his new throne, and he closed his eyes. He focused his thoughts on the idea of a partner, but every time he did, Ister would pop up in his mind. He was getting frustrated and irate with his own lack of imagination. I found it amusing because he had lived such a bunk life and had refused to train in creativity because he deemed it a virtuous trait.
Markis must have been thinking back to the papyrus illustrations. He took his gnarled bone finger and pushed it into the spongy wasteland. He drew the outline of a figure. The outline was rudimentary, and no one would mistake it for anything other than a poorly-toned person. Then, he searched the land for one of his organs that had been strewn across the landscape during his painful physical transformation. Toward the canyon, he found the remnants of his unimpressive genitals. He gathered the parts and returned with them to his throne.
He placed the genitals in the appropriate position on top of the drawn outline. Markis closed his eyes once more and raised his hands up like an evangelical preacher calling upon the forces of the heavens to validate his message. When he opened his eyes, there was a terrifying beast that stood before him, drooling, and panting in anticipation of its master’s whimsical command.
This beast was Alex, but that wasn’t the Kerplunckian name. In Kerplunck this first ally of Markis was known by me as “Agie”, but also sometimes, “Linzo”. The beast was friendly and loyal to Markis. This beast had two faces, one poorly articulated resting on its shoulders in correspondence with Markis’s sloppy outline, and the other between its legs representing the genitalia. In the wasteland of Kerplunck, the conjuring of Agie-Linzo had resulted in Markis’s genitals and the outline he had drawn disappearing from the landscape. The symbol and totem were now imbued in the essence of the beast.
Agie-Linzo was two distinct personalities for a single mind, yet the pair conversed at length about any topic at all. I considered Alex’s social butterfly nature when I looked upon Markis’s grotesque creation. The top half, Agie, was poorly defined and bloblike, while the lower half, Linzo, was scabby and covered in boils with gangrened flesh growing over the boils. The beast didn’t seem in pain and appeared appreciative to have been summoned and conjured into existence.
Watching Markis in his first act of creation had me considering the possibility that I too might find myself able to create in this magical place. I contemplated the most useful thing and determined it was a jet or space rocket to travel away from Kerplunck as quickly as possible. It wasn’t a defining moment for my creative imagination, but it was what I could muster as a raw solution on the fly.
Markis was proud of his accomplishment, and I knew that he sought only absolute loyalty from the beast. Agie-Linzo was an agreeable companion, and Markis learned that the ‘three’ of them thought alike. Additionally, Agie-Linzo had a talent – they could conjure a dreamscape within Kerplunck. The first dreamscape that they presented to Markis was of the new world, focused on a place in the meso-region that had meant something to Markis. Markis enjoyed the experience but was overcome with negative feelings which he reframed as being about the hazy quality of the dreamscape as opposed to a reminder that he had erred in destroying the new world so thoughtlessly.
Markis knew that Agie-Linzo’s dreamscapes would provide for the entire Kerplunckian community and that his new people would not feel shame through the limitation imposed on them by existing in a pathetic shriveled-up sheet of waste as embarrassing knick-knacks and leftovers. What Markis didn’t realize was that others that he created would also have the dreamscape talent, and that it would impose a political hierarchy for the development of Kerplunck. I wasn’t planning to give him a head’s up.
Markis further explored Agie-Linzo’s dreamscape dimension to be sure that he understood its nature and how it worked. It seemed that he could leave when he wanted, and he would wake up in his physical position in Kerplunck. Also, Agie-Linzo could stop hosting the dreamscape at any time which would wake anyone experiencing that dimension or realm. Markis was able to conjure some things in the dreamscape, such as, food or weapons. However, other objects required a request to the host. If Markis wanted to experience attacking a child, he had to request the representation of the oblivious child from Agie-Linzo. This was somewhat annoying to him, yet Agie-Linzo never denied Markis’s requests, therefore, Markis interpreted it as a mere formality as well as a condition that could be used against other Kerplunckians at a later time.
The dreamscape lacked key elements of fidelity for the objects represented, such as, the water at the river sometimes tasted more like blood, or the blue skies shifted to the brown pea soup haze that characterized Kerplunckian skies. However, Markis found these unique features fascinating and trusted that Agie-Linzo’s dreamscape imagination was most evil. Markis stopped toying with the dreamscapes and recognized that his kingdom held some promise.
CHAPTER 29
Aberration
Agie-Linzo suggested to Markis that it was time to create more companions. The beast was a social animal and was growing weary of pandering to Markis’s base desires through the dreamscapes. Markis acquiesced to quell the aching of the beast. The ‘trio’ traveled across the wasteland and stopped off wherever they found some of Markis’s organ parts.
The first stop was at Markis’s lungs. Markis kneeled and picked up one of the lungs contemplating its former function. There was something unnerving regarding the body parts no longer being needed by him, yet they were now needed for him. Markis did his conjuring ritual and when he opened his eyes, there were two male figures in front of him. They were both lanky and elderly, and one was inverted from Markis in that he had a skeleton head, but a flesh body. This skull-man felt at his face and recognized the lack. He immediately experienced a sense of shame and reached into the waste at his feet and packed in into his skull to create a makeshift mask and faux skin.
Markis was troubled by the strange sense of pride displayed by the skull-man, yet he recognized that the pair were his brothers because they were elderly like him. The gaunt man attempted to speak but had no tongue and could not be heard. He too reached into the wasteland and crafted a tongue from it. He fitted the tongue into his mouth and the gaunt-man was now able to speak in Kerplunck. The gaunt-man would be named by me as “Lee n”., and the skull-man was “Patiosbad”.
These were joke names in a sense, even if they weren’t laugh out loud funny. I saw poetry in the nomenclature of Kerplunck. However, keep in mind that Markis, Agie-Linzo, Lee n., Patiosbad, and all the other Kerplunckians gave themselves honorable titles and names which denoted magnificence and bravery in battle. For example, Markis, had named himself Brit Sver which in his native dialect from the new world had meant, “broad sword”.
I could not have cared less about what these monsters named themselves and I was wholly concerned with exposing and humiliating them at that time when I was immersed in my self-appointed role of judge during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade.
Markis was relieved that his brothers were unable to conjure dreamscapes, and he instructed Agie-Linzo in private to sometimes disrupt the pleasure of the dreamscape experience for his brothers. Agie-Linzo remained loyal to Markis despite developing intimate relations with the brothers. Markis was not interested in intimacy with his brothers at first, and he was focused on conjuring his “purdy” boys, which I later referred to as the “Turdy Dozen”.
Lee n. and Patiosbad had some limited ability to create new life in Kerplunck. Markis was a little shocked at first by the creative potency the brothers displayed which Agie-Linzo lacked, but the personalities that were created by the brothers never had a strong sense of self-worth, and therefore they were never deemed a threat. Lee n. constantly flaked dandruff from his flaccid straw strands of grey and black hair, and he then conjured the flakes into personalities which he labeled his “Twinks”. Whereas, Patiosbad had cut off his own foot and conjured maggots to attack it. He then used his magic to imbue distinct personality into the foot, each of the toes, the heel, as well as all the maggots. This community was known as the “Grotto”, and they tended to spend time together and not bother with anything else going on in Kerplunck. Small, hermetically-sealed communities such as the Grotto would become common throughout Kerplunck.
Markis was worried that his brothers would continue creating pointless personalities that had to be tended to, and so he stepped in and put himself to task on crafting the grandeur hierarchical structure of Kerplunck. He traveled the wasteland and magically imbued life and personality into his other organs and body parts wherever they lay. Each became one of his sons. These boys all had the dreamscape ability, and this made Markis proud as it completely undermined the creative potency of his brothers.
The boys were loyal to Markis, and they stayed geographically close to where they had been created. In some cases, they had no ability to move physically in Kerplunck, although dreamscapes fixed those kinds of problems and provided for fully articulated able-bodied form. All the sons of Markis had the ability to conjure dreamscapes for their local communities, but Veggie Clint’s dreamscapes approximated a fully real physical experience. Additionally, you did not have to be in close proximity to Veggie Clint to be within his vivid dreamscape, whereas some of the boys had a short range for their dreamscape conjuring. Markis saw much of himself in Veggie Clint, and he wasn’t worried about Clint usurping the throne. He longed for Clint’s intimacy.
Previously, during the cosmic wager, I had stated that Veggie Clint’s dreamscapes were the medium by which all the evil characters of Kerplunck were able to interface with the humans of Earth and enter that physical universe. As I looked upon Veggie Clint, positioned centrally in Kerplunck, I had a sense that my story had been wicked and that I could have chosen to explain evil on Earth in terms that implied less insidious control from cosmic vantage. I felt blameworthy for all the ills of the human race, even if that wasn’t a rational sentiment on my part.
It seemed to me that it might be time to consider leaving Kerplunck. I needed to think carefully about the possibilities and where I might be ‘plunked’ next by the Bigot Star, especially if I was unwise, reckless, or desperate in my methods of escape.
Aberration
Agie-Linzo suggested to Markis that it was time to create more companions. The beast was a social animal and was growing weary of pandering to Markis’s base desires through the dreamscapes. Markis acquiesced to quell the aching of the beast. The ‘trio’ traveled across the wasteland and stopped off wherever they found some of Markis’s organ parts.
The first stop was at Markis’s lungs. Markis kneeled and picked up one of the lungs contemplating its former function. There was something unnerving regarding the body parts no longer being needed by him, yet they were now needed for him. Markis did his conjuring ritual and when he opened his eyes, there were two male figures in front of him. They were both lanky and elderly, and one was inverted from Markis in that he had a skeleton head, but a flesh body. This skull-man felt at his face and recognized the lack. He immediately experienced a sense of shame and reached into the waste at his feet and packed in into his skull to create a makeshift mask and faux skin.
Markis was troubled by the strange sense of pride displayed by the skull-man, yet he recognized that the pair were his brothers because they were elderly like him. The gaunt man attempted to speak but had no tongue and could not be heard. He too reached into the wasteland and crafted a tongue from it. He fitted the tongue into his mouth and the gaunt-man was now able to speak in Kerplunck. The gaunt-man would be named by me as “Lee n”., and the skull-man was “Patiosbad”.
These were joke names in a sense, even if they weren’t laugh out loud funny. I saw poetry in the nomenclature of Kerplunck. However, keep in mind that Markis, Agie-Linzo, Lee n., Patiosbad, and all the other Kerplunckians gave themselves honorable titles and names which denoted magnificence and bravery in battle. For example, Markis, had named himself Brit Sver which in his native dialect from the new world had meant, “broad sword”.
I could not have cared less about what these monsters named themselves and I was wholly concerned with exposing and humiliating them at that time when I was immersed in my self-appointed role of judge during the cosmic wager, Tricks of the Trade.
Markis was relieved that his brothers were unable to conjure dreamscapes, and he instructed Agie-Linzo in private to sometimes disrupt the pleasure of the dreamscape experience for his brothers. Agie-Linzo remained loyal to Markis despite developing intimate relations with the brothers. Markis was not interested in intimacy with his brothers at first, and he was focused on conjuring his “purdy” boys, which I later referred to as the “Turdy Dozen”.
Lee n. and Patiosbad had some limited ability to create new life in Kerplunck. Markis was a little shocked at first by the creative potency the brothers displayed which Agie-Linzo lacked, but the personalities that were created by the brothers never had a strong sense of self-worth, and therefore they were never deemed a threat. Lee n. constantly flaked dandruff from his flaccid straw strands of grey and black hair, and he then conjured the flakes into personalities which he labeled his “Twinks”. Whereas, Patiosbad had cut off his own foot and conjured maggots to attack it. He then used his magic to imbue distinct personality into the foot, each of the toes, the heel, as well as all the maggots. This community was known as the “Grotto”, and they tended to spend time together and not bother with anything else going on in Kerplunck. Small, hermetically-sealed communities such as the Grotto would become common throughout Kerplunck.
Markis was worried that his brothers would continue creating pointless personalities that had to be tended to, and so he stepped in and put himself to task on crafting the grandeur hierarchical structure of Kerplunck. He traveled the wasteland and magically imbued life and personality into his other organs and body parts wherever they lay. Each became one of his sons. These boys all had the dreamscape ability, and this made Markis proud as it completely undermined the creative potency of his brothers.
The boys were loyal to Markis, and they stayed geographically close to where they had been created. In some cases, they had no ability to move physically in Kerplunck, although dreamscapes fixed those kinds of problems and provided for fully articulated able-bodied form. All the sons of Markis had the ability to conjure dreamscapes for their local communities, but Veggie Clint’s dreamscapes approximated a fully real physical experience. Additionally, you did not have to be in close proximity to Veggie Clint to be within his vivid dreamscape, whereas some of the boys had a short range for their dreamscape conjuring. Markis saw much of himself in Veggie Clint, and he wasn’t worried about Clint usurping the throne. He longed for Clint’s intimacy.
Previously, during the cosmic wager, I had stated that Veggie Clint’s dreamscapes were the medium by which all the evil characters of Kerplunck were able to interface with the humans of Earth and enter that physical universe. As I looked upon Veggie Clint, positioned centrally in Kerplunck, I had a sense that my story had been wicked and that I could have chosen to explain evil on Earth in terms that implied less insidious control from cosmic vantage. I felt blameworthy for all the ills of the human race, even if that wasn’t a rational sentiment on my part.
It seemed to me that it might be time to consider leaving Kerplunck. I needed to think carefully about the possibilities and where I might be ‘plunked’ next by the Bigot Star, especially if I was unwise, reckless, or desperate in my methods of escape.
CHAPTER 30
Escapism
While I considered my plans for escape, Markis and his new underlings were conjuring dreamscape fantasy worlds as well as bringing life to a surfeit of worthless flotsam and jetsam scattered about the wasteland. Markis felt that it would be a good counter-balance to the power of his boys if he created some new pals his own age. The pals would join the original quartet and be located around the hard, dark lump throne and amphitheater.
Markis worked with Lee n., and they created “Bill Grundy”. It was a disaster and Bill Grundy immediately recognized his intellectual superiority and then asserted total independence, disappearing to the farthest corner of Kerplunck beyond butt-crack canyon. Markis quickly animated the two sides of the butt-crack canyon to ensure that Bill Grundy met with gatekeepers if he ever planned on returning to the main community. The gatekeepers were “Funck” and “Couples”. Funck became Bill Grundy’s best friend while Couples pretended that he had another partner, and he falsified a multiple personality similar to how Agie-Linzo articulated itself. For Markis, Bill Grundy’s act of rejection wouldn’t matter because Grundy never returned to the main community of Kerplunck. Truth be told, he was worried that hanging out with the others would have resulted in him being bested at some point, and then forever humiliated as an inferior being. Evil has a poor sense of self-worth, inherently, and this is because evil isn’t necessary.
Bill Grundy could not conjure dreamscapes and his experience was very dull at first, but later, other bastard characters would venture beyond the canyon and discover Bill tucked under his blanket of waste. Markis was not deterred, and he attempted a new pal creation by conjuring with Patiosbad. “Taxie” was conceived and was as much a social animal as Agie-Linzo. Agie Linzo was overtaken with jealous rage, and they banished Taxie to Bill Grundy’s corner of rejects in Kerplunck.
Later, Taxie, who had a large mobile physical form, would provide a ferry service for bastards travelling between the established communities of Kerplunck and the outlands frequented by rejects. Disillusioned dandruff flakes, curmudgeon old scabs, scatterbrained pubic hairs, indignant cancer-ridden left testicle – it didn’t matter to Taxie, all aboard!
Kerplunck disgusted me. I had intended it as a bad joke against malevolent personalities which deserved to be berated, however, watching Markis go to work on the creation of the land was a celebration for these meager cretinous creeps. I was forced to experience the best parts of this awful place. I knew that it was the doing of the Bigot Star. I had to craft some new existential meditations that would provide an intellectual method for thinking my way out of Kerplunck.
Markis continued creating new life, and he had some successes with Lee Hag, The Shrew, Harry Harlot Hag, Ashbennie the Wicked Witch, and plenty of others. Markis had a bunch of poker buddies now and things were looking up for him. In my ghostly form, I was starting to smell Kerplunck for the first time and it was stale and raunchy. I considered moving over to the quiet underside, but I remembered my announcement of the bastard, H8 or “Hate”. In my cosmic wager judgment, I had recognized H8 but never bothered with a proper origin story. Now, it was too risky to move from my position given I didn’t know how life started on the flipside of Kerplunck.
I spent most of my time down in the butt-crack canyon because Funck, Couples, and Bill Grundy were surprisingly entertaining. Their jokes focused on mocking regular people that they had encountered in the dreamscapes that approximated life on Earth where I had lived as Will Strange the human. I could relate to the jokes, whereas most of the other humor in Kerplunck was about the joys of sodomy or making children cry. Being trapped in such a place was tedium writ large.
Fortunately, there was a reprieve. Markis’s brothers, Lee n. and Patiosbad, decided to conjure a new pal without Markis’s permission. They wanted to shake things up more than they were attempting to usurp the throne. “Porno” was created. Porno was an impish salacious fellow who got around in a hurry. Porno was notorious for being able to hijack dreamscapes and it liberally exercised its potency in that regard. I knew that over time, all the powerful evil characters in Kerplunck would be required to make concessions during negotiations with Porno, in exchange for Porno’s cooperation and pledge to not interfere in dreamscapes. For now, Porno was running wild, and briefly, it brought a smile to my face.
I reflected on the origin of Markis. He was remarkably different from the other Kerplunckians, even if he was their leader and “daddy”. Markis had been raised in a village by loving women and other decent people. He knew of nature, compassion, fairness, and empathy. He would never express good, but he had learned of good, and it was part of him in that way. Whereas the creatures of Kerplunck were unnatural, and grotesque perversions of familiar objects and personality types. I had condemned a natural being to an unnatural living condition. Had I committed a cosmic offense? Is that why I was trapped?
Things got quiet around Kerplunck as the boys were providing dreamscape experiences for their minions, around the clock. When Kerplunckians were in a dreamscape fantasy world experience, it was as if they were sleeping in the wastelands of Kerplunck. In those quiet moments, I felt some measure of peace and I was able to focus on my next meditation which I hoped would be a kind of magical conjuring that might bring about a much-needed change of scenery.
Escapism
While I considered my plans for escape, Markis and his new underlings were conjuring dreamscape fantasy worlds as well as bringing life to a surfeit of worthless flotsam and jetsam scattered about the wasteland. Markis felt that it would be a good counter-balance to the power of his boys if he created some new pals his own age. The pals would join the original quartet and be located around the hard, dark lump throne and amphitheater.
Markis worked with Lee n., and they created “Bill Grundy”. It was a disaster and Bill Grundy immediately recognized his intellectual superiority and then asserted total independence, disappearing to the farthest corner of Kerplunck beyond butt-crack canyon. Markis quickly animated the two sides of the butt-crack canyon to ensure that Bill Grundy met with gatekeepers if he ever planned on returning to the main community. The gatekeepers were “Funck” and “Couples”. Funck became Bill Grundy’s best friend while Couples pretended that he had another partner, and he falsified a multiple personality similar to how Agie-Linzo articulated itself. For Markis, Bill Grundy’s act of rejection wouldn’t matter because Grundy never returned to the main community of Kerplunck. Truth be told, he was worried that hanging out with the others would have resulted in him being bested at some point, and then forever humiliated as an inferior being. Evil has a poor sense of self-worth, inherently, and this is because evil isn’t necessary.
Bill Grundy could not conjure dreamscapes and his experience was very dull at first, but later, other bastard characters would venture beyond the canyon and discover Bill tucked under his blanket of waste. Markis was not deterred, and he attempted a new pal creation by conjuring with Patiosbad. “Taxie” was conceived and was as much a social animal as Agie-Linzo. Agie Linzo was overtaken with jealous rage, and they banished Taxie to Bill Grundy’s corner of rejects in Kerplunck.
Later, Taxie, who had a large mobile physical form, would provide a ferry service for bastards travelling between the established communities of Kerplunck and the outlands frequented by rejects. Disillusioned dandruff flakes, curmudgeon old scabs, scatterbrained pubic hairs, indignant cancer-ridden left testicle – it didn’t matter to Taxie, all aboard!
Kerplunck disgusted me. I had intended it as a bad joke against malevolent personalities which deserved to be berated, however, watching Markis go to work on the creation of the land was a celebration for these meager cretinous creeps. I was forced to experience the best parts of this awful place. I knew that it was the doing of the Bigot Star. I had to craft some new existential meditations that would provide an intellectual method for thinking my way out of Kerplunck.
Markis continued creating new life, and he had some successes with Lee Hag, The Shrew, Harry Harlot Hag, Ashbennie the Wicked Witch, and plenty of others. Markis had a bunch of poker buddies now and things were looking up for him. In my ghostly form, I was starting to smell Kerplunck for the first time and it was stale and raunchy. I considered moving over to the quiet underside, but I remembered my announcement of the bastard, H8 or “Hate”. In my cosmic wager judgment, I had recognized H8 but never bothered with a proper origin story. Now, it was too risky to move from my position given I didn’t know how life started on the flipside of Kerplunck.
I spent most of my time down in the butt-crack canyon because Funck, Couples, and Bill Grundy were surprisingly entertaining. Their jokes focused on mocking regular people that they had encountered in the dreamscapes that approximated life on Earth where I had lived as Will Strange the human. I could relate to the jokes, whereas most of the other humor in Kerplunck was about the joys of sodomy or making children cry. Being trapped in such a place was tedium writ large.
Fortunately, there was a reprieve. Markis’s brothers, Lee n. and Patiosbad, decided to conjure a new pal without Markis’s permission. They wanted to shake things up more than they were attempting to usurp the throne. “Porno” was created. Porno was an impish salacious fellow who got around in a hurry. Porno was notorious for being able to hijack dreamscapes and it liberally exercised its potency in that regard. I knew that over time, all the powerful evil characters in Kerplunck would be required to make concessions during negotiations with Porno, in exchange for Porno’s cooperation and pledge to not interfere in dreamscapes. For now, Porno was running wild, and briefly, it brought a smile to my face.
I reflected on the origin of Markis. He was remarkably different from the other Kerplunckians, even if he was their leader and “daddy”. Markis had been raised in a village by loving women and other decent people. He knew of nature, compassion, fairness, and empathy. He would never express good, but he had learned of good, and it was part of him in that way. Whereas the creatures of Kerplunck were unnatural, and grotesque perversions of familiar objects and personality types. I had condemned a natural being to an unnatural living condition. Had I committed a cosmic offense? Is that why I was trapped?
Things got quiet around Kerplunck as the boys were providing dreamscape experiences for their minions, around the clock. When Kerplunckians were in a dreamscape fantasy world experience, it was as if they were sleeping in the wastelands of Kerplunck. In those quiet moments, I felt some measure of peace and I was able to focus on my next meditation which I hoped would be a kind of magical conjuring that might bring about a much-needed change of scenery.
CHAPTER 31
Reclusive
The developments in Kerplunck distracted me, and I didn’t get far with my meditations at first. My ghost form sustained me, and I still wanted for nothing physically, other than intimate contact with a good person. Time was also still passing oddly, and I no longer knew how long I had been held in the dark void under Willard’s house, but centuries had passed for the people I had observed. Perhaps, many years had passed for me.
There were a few events in the early days of Kerplunck that were noteworthy. One of Markis’s boys had turned out to be a bastard. Frisco was a corpulent lump of Markis’s smegma then animated, but immobile. Frisco had a moderately vivid dreamscape realm, and one that was better than most. He convinced Taxie to ferry him across the canyon to the areas where Bill Grundy and the rejects hung out. Along the way, Frisco demanded that a skeleton boy of Veggie Clint’s territory be abducted and brought with them.
The trio arrived on the other side of the canyon and Frisco immediately put the skeleton boy to work on digging up the wasteland with its shovel bone arm. Frisco claimed that he wanted a wider canyon so that the main community of Kerplunckians could never invade the far side where bastards and rejects dwelled. However, Frisco was driven by pride and what he truly wanted was for the skeleton boy to use his shovel bone arm to dig the waste and build a mountain that Frisco would perch atop. Frisco thought that his physical vantage would guarantee him prestige, and perhaps even, authority.
The skeleton boy with the shovel bone arm would become known around Kerplunck as “Shit Pits the Shoveler” and for no other reason that he shoveled shit from a pit. The lack of creativity for Frisco in naming the skeleton boy underscored his weak plan regarding demonstrating superiority. Also, through Frisco’s story involving his pronouncement on naming others, he had also done my work for me during the cosmic wager – that did happen sometimes. Much later, the mountain was built up so high that Frisco would slide down the side of the mountain unless he was perched at the peak by his able-bodied minions. However, being at the peak put him at too great a distance to provide his dreamscape realm to any of the other Kerplunckians. He was the fool on a hill.
These kinds of comedy of errors were common in Kerplunck. However, other schemes could be most insidious, such as, when Veggie Clint began to transform and feel shame and humiliation for the first time. Veggie Clint had been the most powerful in Kerplunck, and all the Kerplunckians relied on his vivid dreamscapes. However, no one dared defy the ultimate authority of Markis because it was felt that Markis wielded the power to destroy everything and start again. Markis didn’t believe it himself but appreciated the collective fear which the legend instilled in his people.
Veggie Clint had been one of the more mobile “full-body” beings in Kerplunck, and he had enjoyed patrolling his territory which was central in Kerplunck, and larger than that of the other boys in the Turdy Dozen. Over time, Veggie Clint’s body began to wear down, and although distasteful to mention, his innards began falling out. He was burdened with a severely prolapsed rectum, which carried a measure of embarrassment within a community of homosexual males.
Veggie Clint attempted to play off the condition as favourable, but no one was buying it. In time, Kerplunckians were afraid to talk about Clint’s condition because they didn’t want to experience his wrath. They picked different code words to refer to the condition, and eventually, they settled on a non sequitur, “dingus”. So, Clint had a problem with his dingus, and everyone knew it. Clint was satisfied with the ambiguity of the term that was chosen.
Clint’s condition worsened and eventually he had to sit down. The dingus became his perch and in time he could no longer move, hence, “Veggie Clint”. Clint loathed his dingus but then realized that all the hatred that he had for it could be transferred and then manifested in the body part when he conjured an animation spell for it. He brought his dingus to life and named it, “Raeth”. This was considered his heart. Raeth was a formidable personality that reminded me a great deal of Ister.
Raeth was self-absorbed, but also a control freak. It wanted to write laws for Kerplunck and oppress Kerplunckians with economic systems and political structures. Clint stood by Raeth, and the saving grace of the creation was that Raeth had no ability to conjure dreamscapes.
Later, Raeth began plotting against Markis, and it suggested to Clint that they overthrow Markis’s rule. Veggie Clint had been created from Markis’s parts, and something about that process made it difficult for him to become a full-fledged bastard. Frisco had been smegma which was an external component of Markis, and not truly a part of his father’s former form. Whereas Clint felt a kinship with Markis.
Eventually, Clint caved to Raeth’s pressure, and he agreed that they might overthrow Markis given that it was the evil thing to do. While Markis was occupied with a dreamscape, Clint and Raeth went to the hard, dark lump that was Markis’s throne, and they molded and sculpted it into a figure. They conjured the figure to life. It was a man composed of hard, dark excrement. This was H8.
Clint and Raeth demanded that H8 recognize that their creation was Clint’s new father and that H8 was to perform regicide as an act of contrition to the new rulers of Kerplunck – Clint and Raeth. H8 would destroy Markis – it was commanded. Then, H8 was to know his role as a father who obeys the son. Veggie Clint would be King.
H8 chortled and shook his head defiantly. Immediately, he ventured off past the canyon and over to the base of Frisco’s Mountain. H8 was an imposing figure and had dreamscape ability. He could force nearby Kerplunckians into his dreamscape, and they did not have the power to leave unless he allowed it. H8 demonstrated his special abilities against Shit Pits the Shoveler. Shit Pits got the point. H8 demanded that the skeleton boy start digging a hole.
Eventually, the hole went all the way through the wasteland to the other side of the crappy wafer of Kerplunck. H8 jumped through and landed on the flipside where he then ruled with a crusty fist. I knew that H8 could have just walked over the edge nonchalantly, but I suppose making it to the other side his way was more dramatic. The time it took for digging the hole had also given H8 an opportunity to become familiar with Kerplunckians as he waited impatiently for Shit Pits to complete the task. Once on the flipside of Kerplunck, H8 filled the hole he had jumped through. The other Kerplunckians never thought to walk over the edge of their land, even though they now knew that there was a surface underneath them. In truth, they were terrified of H8, and they wanted him gone as fast as he had arrived.
Reclusive
The developments in Kerplunck distracted me, and I didn’t get far with my meditations at first. My ghost form sustained me, and I still wanted for nothing physically, other than intimate contact with a good person. Time was also still passing oddly, and I no longer knew how long I had been held in the dark void under Willard’s house, but centuries had passed for the people I had observed. Perhaps, many years had passed for me.
There were a few events in the early days of Kerplunck that were noteworthy. One of Markis’s boys had turned out to be a bastard. Frisco was a corpulent lump of Markis’s smegma then animated, but immobile. Frisco had a moderately vivid dreamscape realm, and one that was better than most. He convinced Taxie to ferry him across the canyon to the areas where Bill Grundy and the rejects hung out. Along the way, Frisco demanded that a skeleton boy of Veggie Clint’s territory be abducted and brought with them.
The trio arrived on the other side of the canyon and Frisco immediately put the skeleton boy to work on digging up the wasteland with its shovel bone arm. Frisco claimed that he wanted a wider canyon so that the main community of Kerplunckians could never invade the far side where bastards and rejects dwelled. However, Frisco was driven by pride and what he truly wanted was for the skeleton boy to use his shovel bone arm to dig the waste and build a mountain that Frisco would perch atop. Frisco thought that his physical vantage would guarantee him prestige, and perhaps even, authority.
The skeleton boy with the shovel bone arm would become known around Kerplunck as “Shit Pits the Shoveler” and for no other reason that he shoveled shit from a pit. The lack of creativity for Frisco in naming the skeleton boy underscored his weak plan regarding demonstrating superiority. Also, through Frisco’s story involving his pronouncement on naming others, he had also done my work for me during the cosmic wager – that did happen sometimes. Much later, the mountain was built up so high that Frisco would slide down the side of the mountain unless he was perched at the peak by his able-bodied minions. However, being at the peak put him at too great a distance to provide his dreamscape realm to any of the other Kerplunckians. He was the fool on a hill.
These kinds of comedy of errors were common in Kerplunck. However, other schemes could be most insidious, such as, when Veggie Clint began to transform and feel shame and humiliation for the first time. Veggie Clint had been the most powerful in Kerplunck, and all the Kerplunckians relied on his vivid dreamscapes. However, no one dared defy the ultimate authority of Markis because it was felt that Markis wielded the power to destroy everything and start again. Markis didn’t believe it himself but appreciated the collective fear which the legend instilled in his people.
Veggie Clint had been one of the more mobile “full-body” beings in Kerplunck, and he had enjoyed patrolling his territory which was central in Kerplunck, and larger than that of the other boys in the Turdy Dozen. Over time, Veggie Clint’s body began to wear down, and although distasteful to mention, his innards began falling out. He was burdened with a severely prolapsed rectum, which carried a measure of embarrassment within a community of homosexual males.
Veggie Clint attempted to play off the condition as favourable, but no one was buying it. In time, Kerplunckians were afraid to talk about Clint’s condition because they didn’t want to experience his wrath. They picked different code words to refer to the condition, and eventually, they settled on a non sequitur, “dingus”. So, Clint had a problem with his dingus, and everyone knew it. Clint was satisfied with the ambiguity of the term that was chosen.
Clint’s condition worsened and eventually he had to sit down. The dingus became his perch and in time he could no longer move, hence, “Veggie Clint”. Clint loathed his dingus but then realized that all the hatred that he had for it could be transferred and then manifested in the body part when he conjured an animation spell for it. He brought his dingus to life and named it, “Raeth”. This was considered his heart. Raeth was a formidable personality that reminded me a great deal of Ister.
Raeth was self-absorbed, but also a control freak. It wanted to write laws for Kerplunck and oppress Kerplunckians with economic systems and political structures. Clint stood by Raeth, and the saving grace of the creation was that Raeth had no ability to conjure dreamscapes.
Later, Raeth began plotting against Markis, and it suggested to Clint that they overthrow Markis’s rule. Veggie Clint had been created from Markis’s parts, and something about that process made it difficult for him to become a full-fledged bastard. Frisco had been smegma which was an external component of Markis, and not truly a part of his father’s former form. Whereas Clint felt a kinship with Markis.
Eventually, Clint caved to Raeth’s pressure, and he agreed that they might overthrow Markis given that it was the evil thing to do. While Markis was occupied with a dreamscape, Clint and Raeth went to the hard, dark lump that was Markis’s throne, and they molded and sculpted it into a figure. They conjured the figure to life. It was a man composed of hard, dark excrement. This was H8.
Clint and Raeth demanded that H8 recognize that their creation was Clint’s new father and that H8 was to perform regicide as an act of contrition to the new rulers of Kerplunck – Clint and Raeth. H8 would destroy Markis – it was commanded. Then, H8 was to know his role as a father who obeys the son. Veggie Clint would be King.
H8 chortled and shook his head defiantly. Immediately, he ventured off past the canyon and over to the base of Frisco’s Mountain. H8 was an imposing figure and had dreamscape ability. He could force nearby Kerplunckians into his dreamscape, and they did not have the power to leave unless he allowed it. H8 demonstrated his special abilities against Shit Pits the Shoveler. Shit Pits got the point. H8 demanded that the skeleton boy start digging a hole.
Eventually, the hole went all the way through the wasteland to the other side of the crappy wafer of Kerplunck. H8 jumped through and landed on the flipside where he then ruled with a crusty fist. I knew that H8 could have just walked over the edge nonchalantly, but I suppose making it to the other side his way was more dramatic. The time it took for digging the hole had also given H8 an opportunity to become familiar with Kerplunckians as he waited impatiently for Shit Pits to complete the task. Once on the flipside of Kerplunck, H8 filled the hole he had jumped through. The other Kerplunckians never thought to walk over the edge of their land, even though they now knew that there was a surface underneath them. In truth, they were terrified of H8, and they wanted him gone as fast as he had arrived.
CHAPTER 32
Owing
On the flipside of Kerplunck, H8 created a population of minions only from the waste land. H8 was so bunk that he didn’t have a creative imagination whatsoever and he relied on copying the characters that he had encountered on Markis’s side of Kerplunck. His copies were ineffectual personalities that paled in comparison with the original. These “equivalents” lacked energy and enthusiasm, and they were prone to being controlled through propaganda.
I had a fairly good idea of what was going on in the flipside of Kerplunck, and I had no interest in investigating. I had read George Orwell’s 1984 before my trip to Algonquin Park, and I had announced during the cosmic wager that H8 was a Big Brother figure who had presented as Henry VIII, King of England, in my world. He was the ultimate tyrant. The irony was that H8 in actuality had no partner, and his “queens” were balls of crap that he had kicked off the edge of Kerplunck long ago. Well for me, long ago was right now. Catching up to history was a little disappointing, and I considered how Kerplunckians were so lucky to have had the human race to play off of with all its creativity and ingenuity. Once again, I was resenting being in Kerplunck and I rued the name – Bigot Star.
Being in Kerplunck emphasized the lower-faculty experience of life, and how the lower faculties of a person’s mind impact their mentality. All the creatures in Kerplunck were driven by their lower-faculty affective responses to stimuli and happenings. I was an anomaly in that regard, and it was the fundamental reason why I didn’t belong in Kerplunck and didn’t deserve to be stuck there. Finally, I had a novel, yet relevant topic for my next meditation.
I considered that our experience is based in lower faculties and higher faculties – not a new idea, and one canonized into philosophy by Immanuel Kant. For me, the lower faculties were “affect”, and they had a gendered quality. Regardless of how a human being perceives their gender identity, all human beings have male and female hormones. I reasoned that male hormones focus on aggressive responses to stimuli, whereas female hormones focus on emotional responses to stimuli. Man, woman, or any other designation demonstratable or merely felt is provoked to respond to stimuli with affect and since all humans have male and female hormones then that response will have both an aggressive and emotional component.
I believe that an important part of what has ailed society in recent years is the feminist-based denial that women have a bad, or unhealthy, expression of aggression. Typically, feminists focus on stigmatizing men as having a problem with aggression (“mansplaining”, toxic masculinity, competitive meritocracy, etc.), while emotion is colored by them as the key to being compassionate and empathetic – it is wholly good, and women know it better than men. This strikes me as reductionist drivel, and misandrist self-deception. Such lies rip at the fabric of society and sow seeds of distrust into the most basic human relationships pervading the home, school, and workplace.
To avoid continuing down the rabbit hole of political outrage by engaging in more inflammatory rhetoric, I will stop and note that in my estimates there is both a bad expression of aggression and an equally bad expression of emotion that is possible for anyone. These gendered components of affect are lower faculties, and they provoke responses to stimuli that are reflexive. The lower faculty of affect promotes the mind remaining non-introspective and subverts it from engaging in higher-faculty reasoning.
I am not suggesting that people would be better off tuning out their affective response completely, but rather, this lower faculty affective response must be mediated by the higher faculties. The higher faculties of reasoning are governed by rationality and logic.
Rationality and logic provide the individual with the opportunity to evaluate affective response, and then check it for validity and appropriateness, but this is only true when higher faculties are privileged. I believe that when I transformed to true introspective consciousness, I was able to banish the machinations and workings of my subconscious, and then prioritize my higher faculty reasoning. It isn’t to say that I never lost my cool after that, but rather, I thought longer and harder about whether my emotional/aggressive response was the correct one. I acted without thinking a lot less. You don’t have to be truly introspective to achieve this kind of reasonable way – highly conscientious minds do it as well.
It was clear that I wasn’t like Kerplunckians, and I was not ruled by my lower faculty affective response to stimuli. How could this realization help me escape my predicament? Did I have to find a way to use their affect against them? While, I was concentrating hard on the problem I had closed my eyes to map out the ideas in my mental workspace. I didn’t realize that the mental fortitude regarding the meditation had me slipping into the waste land of Kerplunck just as I had done at the temple that fateful day when Ister was conceived.
I was already almost on the flipside of Kerplunck when I realized what was happening. I opened my eyes and recognized that I was just popping out on H8’s flipside of Kerplunck, still slowly floating down. H8 spotted me out of the corner of his lumpy noggin’s empty eye socket, and he charged at me. There was a moment of terror as I wondered whether my tangible fear would disrupt the impromptu voyage and that I would slow down thus being mauled by the maniacal unholy man of shit.
H8 missed grabbing me by a split second, and from his perspective I was floating past him into the brown hazy sky upside-down. Sayonara, sucka!
Owing
On the flipside of Kerplunck, H8 created a population of minions only from the waste land. H8 was so bunk that he didn’t have a creative imagination whatsoever and he relied on copying the characters that he had encountered on Markis’s side of Kerplunck. His copies were ineffectual personalities that paled in comparison with the original. These “equivalents” lacked energy and enthusiasm, and they were prone to being controlled through propaganda.
I had a fairly good idea of what was going on in the flipside of Kerplunck, and I had no interest in investigating. I had read George Orwell’s 1984 before my trip to Algonquin Park, and I had announced during the cosmic wager that H8 was a Big Brother figure who had presented as Henry VIII, King of England, in my world. He was the ultimate tyrant. The irony was that H8 in actuality had no partner, and his “queens” were balls of crap that he had kicked off the edge of Kerplunck long ago. Well for me, long ago was right now. Catching up to history was a little disappointing, and I considered how Kerplunckians were so lucky to have had the human race to play off of with all its creativity and ingenuity. Once again, I was resenting being in Kerplunck and I rued the name – Bigot Star.
Being in Kerplunck emphasized the lower-faculty experience of life, and how the lower faculties of a person’s mind impact their mentality. All the creatures in Kerplunck were driven by their lower-faculty affective responses to stimuli and happenings. I was an anomaly in that regard, and it was the fundamental reason why I didn’t belong in Kerplunck and didn’t deserve to be stuck there. Finally, I had a novel, yet relevant topic for my next meditation.
I considered that our experience is based in lower faculties and higher faculties – not a new idea, and one canonized into philosophy by Immanuel Kant. For me, the lower faculties were “affect”, and they had a gendered quality. Regardless of how a human being perceives their gender identity, all human beings have male and female hormones. I reasoned that male hormones focus on aggressive responses to stimuli, whereas female hormones focus on emotional responses to stimuli. Man, woman, or any other designation demonstratable or merely felt is provoked to respond to stimuli with affect and since all humans have male and female hormones then that response will have both an aggressive and emotional component.
I believe that an important part of what has ailed society in recent years is the feminist-based denial that women have a bad, or unhealthy, expression of aggression. Typically, feminists focus on stigmatizing men as having a problem with aggression (“mansplaining”, toxic masculinity, competitive meritocracy, etc.), while emotion is colored by them as the key to being compassionate and empathetic – it is wholly good, and women know it better than men. This strikes me as reductionist drivel, and misandrist self-deception. Such lies rip at the fabric of society and sow seeds of distrust into the most basic human relationships pervading the home, school, and workplace.
To avoid continuing down the rabbit hole of political outrage by engaging in more inflammatory rhetoric, I will stop and note that in my estimates there is both a bad expression of aggression and an equally bad expression of emotion that is possible for anyone. These gendered components of affect are lower faculties, and they provoke responses to stimuli that are reflexive. The lower faculty of affect promotes the mind remaining non-introspective and subverts it from engaging in higher-faculty reasoning.
I am not suggesting that people would be better off tuning out their affective response completely, but rather, this lower faculty affective response must be mediated by the higher faculties. The higher faculties of reasoning are governed by rationality and logic.
Rationality and logic provide the individual with the opportunity to evaluate affective response, and then check it for validity and appropriateness, but this is only true when higher faculties are privileged. I believe that when I transformed to true introspective consciousness, I was able to banish the machinations and workings of my subconscious, and then prioritize my higher faculty reasoning. It isn’t to say that I never lost my cool after that, but rather, I thought longer and harder about whether my emotional/aggressive response was the correct one. I acted without thinking a lot less. You don’t have to be truly introspective to achieve this kind of reasonable way – highly conscientious minds do it as well.
It was clear that I wasn’t like Kerplunckians, and I was not ruled by my lower faculty affective response to stimuli. How could this realization help me escape my predicament? Did I have to find a way to use their affect against them? While, I was concentrating hard on the problem I had closed my eyes to map out the ideas in my mental workspace. I didn’t realize that the mental fortitude regarding the meditation had me slipping into the waste land of Kerplunck just as I had done at the temple that fateful day when Ister was conceived.
I was already almost on the flipside of Kerplunck when I realized what was happening. I opened my eyes and recognized that I was just popping out on H8’s flipside of Kerplunck, still slowly floating down. H8 spotted me out of the corner of his lumpy noggin’s empty eye socket, and he charged at me. There was a moment of terror as I wondered whether my tangible fear would disrupt the impromptu voyage and that I would slow down thus being mauled by the maniacal unholy man of shit.
H8 missed grabbing me by a split second, and from his perspective I was floating past him into the brown hazy sky upside-down. Sayonara, sucka!