🚀 go-pugleaf

They are out there.  You can't see them, but trust me they're there.
On top of that building, ummm...no wait a minute.  Behind that
tree...ummm...nope.  Under that rock...well there are some neat bugs.
In that car...oh gee, now where'd the car go.  Dressed as that hot dog
vendor...oops, wrong again, but I'll take one with extra onions.
Well, they were out there a moment ago.

They exist for your protection.  No, really.  Regardless of whether or
not you know it, you need protecting, and they're there to give it to
you.  Whether its giving arms to our enemies and taking them away from
our allies, or making sure you pay all of that money you owe in back
taxes, or leaving a public office after serving about 20 consecutive
terms with a $200,000 a year pension that comes out of your pocket.
Can't you see, they're only trying to help you.

They are watching you.  They know if you are sleeping.  They know if
you're awake.  They know if you've paid your credit card on time, so
pay it on time for goodness sake.  Heck, if they wanted to, they could
give you a speeding ticket from orbit.  Don't pout.  Don't cry.  Why?
Because there's not a damn thing you can do about it.  So there.

They love to take your money and spend it.  When they have problems
managing it, and run out of it too soon, they have little or no
convictions about prying more out of you regardless what they tell
you.  They call it "running a country".  Some of us like to finish
that sentence with "into a hole".

One of the things they like to spend that money on, besides the odd
$500 hammer or pencil, has come to be known as "special projects".
Supercollider, Lunar/Mars Lander, and Undersea Explorer to name a few.
You've most likely heard of some of them, you may even have worked on
one or two.  Most of them have been canceled.

Of the ones which haven't been canceled, a good portion of these have
been classified as secret.  What this means is that they don't have to
tell you how they are spending your money, which they generally
consider to be a good thing since if you don't know about it, then you
can't complain to them about it, and it won't get canceled.

The problem with secret projects is that they have a tendency to
exceed expectations, surpass their original scope, go the distance.
What this means is that secret projects often get out of hand.  An
artificial intelligence gains sentience and tries to take over the
world here.  A giant robot or genetic mistake goes on a rampage there.
Or a device capable of wreaking havoc on mankind gets created.

These devices are perhaps the worst of all secret projects since they
also have a tendency to fall into the wrong hands.  This often happens
while they are being transported from one laboratory to another for
what has come to be known as "further testing".  Such transportation
is conducted using vehicles which have been so thoroughly disguised so
as to be inconspicuous that they inevitably stick out like a sore
thumb.

It just so happens that at this particular instant just such a vehicle
was transporting just such a device from the Lincoln Research
Laboratories in Concord, MA to the Charles Stark Draper Laboratories
in Cambridge, MA.  This vehicle, so as to stick out even more, was
traveling along Mass. Avenue.  Somewhere in Lexington it passed by a
guy riding a bicycle heading in the same direction.

Ernest Zane Riter looked up at the vehicle as it passed him and said,
"Hmmm...I wonder what's in there."

                              SPURNED #4
                     "Unlike Father, Unlike Son"
                                Part 4
                         "Mind Your Thoughts"
                 by Todd D. Perlmutter (Media Child)

                 "Even a thought, even a possibility,
                  can shatter us and transform us."
                     Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche,
                          Eternal Recurrence

Jeffrey had been running for quite some time now.  No matter how fast
he went, and how far he got, it didn't seem to matter.  They were
still after him--inching ever so closer with each step he took.  If he
didn't find the way out quickly they would get him.  And when they
did, he would become one of them forever.

They were ugly evil hissing things.  The kind of thing no boy
Jeffrey's age ever wants to run across alone in the dark.  His father
had kept them as pets--their names were Winkin, Blinkin, and Nod.
Jeffrey had never been very fond of them, and he was convinced that
they felt the same way toward him.

Now his parents were away, they were after him, and they were huge.
Much bigger than he remembered, but it was unmistakably them.

Finally, the exit was up ahead of him.  If he could just reach it.  If
he could just get out.  Then they wouldn't be able to get him.
Closer...closer...closer...

"Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!", he screamed.  One of them had snagged his leg in its
mouth.  They'd caught him.  He felt himself begin to change...

*****

From their hiding place, the two hulking figures with itty bitty heads
watched his parents walk inside.

Jeffrey watched his father head upstairs, presumably to check on him.
His mother walked toward the kitchen to check the messages.  She
passed by the tank in the living room, backed up, and did a double
take.  He looked back at her.

"Honey, when did you get a forth iguana?", his mother shouted toward
the stairs.

Running down the stairs, his father said, "I didn't, but that's not
important.  Jeffrey isn't upstairs.  Is he down here?"

"No, I haven't seen him."

Jeffrey whacked the side of the tank pleadingly with his tail.

The two hulking figures with itty bitty heads looked at each other,
shrugged--their way of communicating, and headed off down the road.
Sniffing the air, their quarry was not far ahead.

*****

Debris landed all around Al, and his clothes and bike became soiled
with soot once again.

"Damn!  I just cleaned these."

He watched the building as it burned to the ground.  Had he been a
normal person, leading a normal life, all of this would have been
completely unbelievable.  However, he wasn't.  Rather, he was the son
of Satan T. Lucifer Jones, and he'd made the mistake of ticking his
father off.  Not the wisest of moves.

Now, the forces of Hell(tm) were out to get him.  He smiled, it could
be worse.  After all he could have been thousands of tiny little
pieces scattered all over the place.  And his father could have sent
soma demons after him.

He stuffed his three souvenirs and the copies into the saddlebags on
his bike.

Surveying the area, he noticed a squad of his father's troopers
huddled behind a dumpster in the parking lot of what used to his
restaurant.  He counted 8 milling about.  The other 2 of the standard
compliment of 10, appeared to have been impaled with sharp kitchen
implements by the destruction of the restaurant.  There were enough
motorcycles for all of them.

Squinting to get a better look, Al said, "What the Hell(tm) are they
doing?"

*****

The trooper popped his head out of the dumpster with a handful of
trash shouting, "I've got another one sir!"

"Great, that makes four.  Now we can do it.", said the lead trooper as
he grabbed the straw from the trooper in the dumpster.  He huddled
over, and cut all of the straws at two different lengths--4 long
pieces and 4 short.  He then placed them in his hand, making them all
appear to be the same length.

"All right, here's what we're going to do.  Everyone pick a straw.
Long straws engage him now.  Short straws attack in a second wave."
he said to the other troopers.

Everyone picked their straws.  He counted out 4 longs and 3 shorts.
That meant the remaining straw, his straw, was short.  At least he had
a little bit longer.

Feeling a parting speech was in order, he began "Men, I know we've
been together a long time..."

"Ummm...actually sir, we've only been together since last episode."
interrupted one of the other troopers.

"Oh...errr...right." beginning again, "Men, I know we've been together
for what seems like a long time.  And, I would love to be able to tell
you that those of us who make it through this will grieve for those
who have been lost.  But, let's face facts--we're only bit characters.
Worse yet we're bit characters with guns.  Our chances for survival
here are pretty minimal.  So I guess I really just want to say that
I've enjoyed working with you all, even if it has only been for two
episodes."

One of the other troopers stepped forward holding out a small wrapped
box with a bow, "Sir...well...the guys and I all chipped in after
reading the script, and...well...we got you this."

Taking the offered box, the lead trooper said with a tear in his eyes,
"Oh...gee...guys you didn't really have to do this."

"Well c'mon sir, open it!" piped in one of the other troopers.

"Unh...sure." he said, carefully removing the wrapping so as not to
rip it--you can use that stuff over and over again if you're real
careful.

"Wow!  It's one of those watches with the neat glowing face." he said
putting it on.  He began playing with the light.

"We knew you'd like it sir."  said another of the troopers.

Slapping some of them on the back, "You guys are *sniff* the best
squad *sniff* a leader could have asked for."  Composing himself
slightly, he continued, "Now I want you guys to go out there and make
me proud."

Remaining quiet, so as to fully achieve the moment, the troopers with
the long straws simply mounted their motorcycles, started them,
saluted their leader, and rode off across the parking lot in the
direction of their target.

*****

Four of them began riding toward Al in a diamond formation.  He stood
his ground, right there in front of the travel agency.  It wasn't that
late, but this was Arlington--one of those silly towns where everyone
seemed to disappear off the streets after 9pm.  At least injuries
would be minimal.

One of them broke formation and raced forward, his forward arc
hellfire gun blazing.  He was moving a little too fast.  Al smiled, if
this was all his father had to offer this would be easy.  The trooper
was coming on slightly to his right, so he titled himself and his bike
over to the left.

What happened next is something the trooper would not have been very
proud of, had he survived.  So, you can only imagine how the lead
trooper felt--at least he had his watch.

The front tire of his bike hit the curb, and snagged.  While this
stopped the front tire, this did not stop the momentum of the rest of
the bike, which continued up and over the front tire.  The whole bike
and the trooper then proceeded to sail through the plate glass window
of the travel agency.

*smack* "woah!" *crash*

If crashing through the window didn't off the trooper (we can't really
say killed since he was already dead), then the resulting explosion
from the breached core of the hellfire gun did.

*BA-WHOM* *tinkle*

As Al began righting himself and his bike, he noticed that the other
three troopers had been forced to the ground by the explosion.  One of
them had been offed by a piece of shrapnel.  Good, he'd get a nice
head start.  It was about this time that he heard sirens of all sorts
heading in this direction.

*****

Marina loved butterflies.  She knew everything there was to know about
them.  Looking through her collection, she could imagine nothing
greater than being able to soar on the winds just like them.  To fly
and be free.  To be so at peace.  It was her fondest desire.

She had always believed that the if she wished hard enough and long
enough it would come true.  She could be among those she loved.  So,
once again, like she did every night, she wished she was a butterfly.
Unlike all the previous nights, this time her wish came true.  Marina
spread her large speckled wings and flew out through the opened window
to join her lovers.

The two hulking figures with itty bitty heads looked at each other and
shrugged several times.  Their quarry was moving further away.

*****

"Scalpel." said one doctor.

"Forceps." said another.

"Saws-All." said a third.

The sound of sizzling could be heard in the background, and the smell
of cooking flesh was in the air.  Efrian had passed out not long after
the first incision.  Satan, being a thoroughly evil and all around not
nice guy, had ordered the doctors to perform the operation without
anesthesia--he needed a few good, loud screams to put him at ease.

His son had proven far more resourceful, and lucky than he had
anticipated.  He was also learning the hard way that you get what you
pay for--in the way of troopers and their equipment that is.  One
might say that things weren't quite going according to plan.

Souls he had stolen, had been stolen from him.  His son had turned out
to be his betrayer--the white sheep of the family.  He hadn't had a
decent secretary since he promoted Susan.  And now his attempts at
retrieving and killing his son keep meeting with dismal failure.

It's almost like someone was planning all of this.

*****

Al raced down Mass Ave. toward Cambridge.  Looking in his mirror he
saw the two troopers get up with their bikes and begin heading off
after him.  He increased his speed because he knew something they
didn't.

Their bikes were cheap and shoddy.  They had problems cornering at
high speeds.  His bike however was far superior.  It was after all the
Harley-Davidson Sportster from Hell(tm), and one thing Al had noted
about his bike is that it was quite capable of handling just about
anything thrown at it.

As he passed the Dunkin Donuts, he saw the curve coming up.  His
speedometer was at 80 mph--he didn't want to loose them.  There was no
timing involved here, it was simply a matter of how determined the
troopers on the bikes behind him were.

Taking the curve at full speed, he slid slightly to the left, but
completed it with the only loss being some rubber off his tires from
the sliding.  The troopers however didn't fair so well.  Unable to
turn or stop in time, they went flying into the lot of a car
dealership.  One ended up imbedded in the side of a Chevy van.  The
other had managed to skate across the top of a Geo Metro, and launch
himself into the cement blocks that comprise the side wall of the
dealership.

Needless to say, since by now I assume you've noticed I like them,
both bikes proceeded to provide us with explosions for our viewing
pleasure.

*screech* *smash* *rend* *BA-WHOM*

*screech* *ba-bump* *ke-rash* *BA-WHOM*

*aaaarrrrrrrrrrrrroooooooooooooooo*

Al heard the sirens approaching from directly ahead of him and
proceeded to screech to a halt.  His bike ended up roughly parallel to
the cruiser, which had also screeched to a halt.

The officer closest to Al shouted, "Stop!  This is the police."

"Sorry officers, but no can do.  There's more of these bozos back
there, and I intend to put this matter to rest, now."  He then turned
his bike around, and raced off in the direction he had come from.

WHY GO BACK?

WILL THE COPS STOP AT DUNKIN DONUTS FOR A REFILL?

WHY IS IT THAT ALL THE BIT CHARACTERS SEEM TO KNOW MORE ABOUT WHAT'S
GOING ON THAN THE MAIN CHARACTERS?

WHAT'S WITH EFRIAN?

WHAT'S WITH ERNEST?

WHY DOES THE AUTHOR LIKE EXPLOSIONS SO MUCH?

IS HE HAPPY THAT HE GOT TO SEE A REALLY COOL CAR FIRE ON THE WAY TO
HIS PARENTS' HOUSE?

EXACTLY HOW DOES SHRUGGING CONVEY MEANING?

WHO ARE THEY?

I don't know, but if you're lucky you might find them here on...

                             SUPERGUY!!!

Ahhh!!!  Help!!!  They've got me!!!

                                        ---> Todd <---

Todd D. Perlmutter                      "I'm a firm believer, that no matter
Media Child                              what, the worst possible best thing
Paragon Imaging Inc.                     will always occur.  I guess that
Woburn Massachusetts                     makes me a pessimistic optimist."
toddp@paragon.com                                             --- Me

Note: If you think my views represent those of my company then you're mistaken.