MiSTed: Stolen Memories (19/29)
Rottweiler
> **************************************************
CROW: This story can kiss my asterisks.
> Alis moved along a path made by past life test kits, a
> largish furred pelt and slither skin hanging from her pack.
MIKE: Then she was stopped by the most dangerous predators in the known
universe: Greenpeace activists.
> Her bow came up and fired as a slither wound down a vine
> ahead of her.
TOM: (snake) Sssss... stop calling me that! I'm a snake, damnit! A
snake!
Sssss...
> The bolt pierced it scaly skull and it dropped
> from the vine to the carpet of leaves below,
MIKE: That's the second "carpet of leaves" reference. This forest must
have wall-to-wall carpeting.
> twitching
> faintly then was still. Alis approached it, bow at the
> ready, hand going to the hilt of the knife she used to skin
> her prey.
CROW: Not to mention assassinate Caligula.
> Then she came to a dead stop - noticing the
> slither had fallen into a depression
TOM: So she gave it Prozac.
> in the leaves in the
> shape of a humanoid, and a largish one.
MIKE: Andre the Giant slept here.
> She studied the depression,
CROW: And decided it really wasn't President Hoover's fault.
> and the area around her.
TOM: (Alis) Wow, there's the hollow tree! I'm gonna stop for some
cookies.
> There were Wilderbeast tracks leading away from the site,
> and she knew now what the beast was hunting.
CROW: (Elmer Fudd) Shhhh! Be vewwy, vewwy quiet. I'm hunting Tewwans.
Eh-heh-heh-heh-heh...
MIKE: Who's Terrence?
CROW: (Elmer Fudd) Not Tewwence... Tewwans! Wike Juweean!
MIKE: Wipe Julia? I don't get it.
CROW: (Elmer, annoyed now) Jeweean! Jeweean Basheew!
MIKE: What about Bathsheba?
CROW: AAARRGGGHHH!!!
> Cautiously she approached the depression and with a
> swift move picked up the slither by its tail and slammed its
> head, bolt and all into the tree it slithered down from.
TOM: Hulk smash puny slither!
> Assured of its non living state,
TOM: North Dakota.
> she retrieved her bolt and
> cleaned it with a hand full of leaves before reloading her
> bow with it.
CROW: (Alis) I need this to shoot Saint Sebastian with.
> She skinned the slither, and packed its meat away in
> her pack wondering what to do.
MIKE: Fry it, roast it or hickory-cure it.
> Was it right to continue onto
> the temple without tracking the Wilderbeast down to kill it
> before it killed another kit on her life test.
TOM: Was it right to wear checks with stripes?
> Was it wrong to help another pass their test,
CROW: Knowing that they would both fail the class if caught.
> by
> killing the Wilderbeast,
MIKE: (Gaston) Kill the beast!
TOM: (Belle) No!
MIKE: (Gaston) Whoever is not with us is against us!
> which would not give up the hunt
> until it caught its prey and feasted on her carcass.
CROW: Afterwards, it would let the hunt go for a small finders fee.
> Would
> the First mother withhold her blessing if she did so? Would
> she withhold her blessing if she didn't.
TOM: Will John and Mary discover Ted's dark secret?
MIKE: Will David leave Susan to be with Charles?
CROW: And what about Scarecrow's brain?
TOM: All this and more, on the next episode of _As the Reader Snores_.
> Was not the point of the test - to prove one could
> survive without the aide of others - to prove one was no
> longer a kit but an adult.
MIKE: To prove that the Denorex side tingles.
> What if the wilderbeast's prey
> was not another kit on her life test, but one of her
> mothers' enemies come to hunt her down and kill her to
> deprive her mother of an heir and leave ascension to the
> Matriarchy open to all comers.
CROW: What if the wilderbeast was actually Teddy Roosevelt in disguise?
TOM: What if the rest of the story consists entirely of hypothetical
questions?
MIKE: What do you, the reader at home, think?
> Attaching the slithers skin to her pack, she stepped
> back to wipe her hands on leaves and sniffed at them.
MIKE: (Alis) Me tracks - two, three days old!
> Wiping
> them over and over again till the slithers scent was gone
> and only her scent and the scent of the leaves remained on
> her hands.
CROW: She picked a fine time to become obsessive-compulsive.
> She moved back to the depression and fetched a
> double handful of leaves from the depression that had been
> left by the person's head.
TOM: The person must've been Ingmar Bergman.
> Raising the leaves to her face
> she inhaled deeply and then came to her feet with a roar of
> both joy and rage.
MIKE: (Alis) I'm happy as Hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!
> The scent on the leaves was Julian's - she had found
> her missing lover and he was the wilderbeast's prey.
CROW: So which one's of rage and which one's of joy?
> Eyes narrowed, she began following the tracks the
> Wilderbeast had left behind, stalking it.
TOM: (Alis) I hope I can save Julian before Superman does.
> Not it was the
> hunted, and she was the hunter.
>
> *************************************************
CROW: Tribbles in a Napoleonic Era army.
> Julian ran, staggering along as fast as his weary legs
> could carry him.
MIKE: (Julian, exhausted) Must... find... Beanie Babies!
> Every breath he took was a pained gasp for
> air, his lungs and every muscle in his body ached.
CROW: It was worse than the time the coach had made him run laps outside
in
the middle of January.
> He was
> ready to drop, then he saw her stepping out from a thick
> stand of leafy trees.
TOM: C.J. Cherryh has arrived to protect the good reputations of the
other
cat-like alien races!
> She was dressed in armoured hunt gear
> armed with a high tech cross bow, pulling a bolt from the
> quiver strapped to her thigh.
MIKE: Why bows? Don't the Felistians have guns?
CROW: Yeah, but they don't have Charleton Heston.
> She loaded the bow with fast
> efficient movements and aimed it at him.
TOM: It's J'Alis J'Onzz, the Felistian Manhunter!
> Julian didn't recognise her in his panic stricken
> state,
MIKE: She shouldn't have been wearing those novelty "Groucho" glasses
with
the fake nose and moustache.
> all he wanted to do was scream with terror and
> frustration.
CROW: He's just now realizing that he can't stop Mission Ops Productions
from writing about him.
> He could hear the beast behind him, gaining on
> him.
TOM: Tommy Lee is chasing him?
> Without a second thought he changed direction diving
> into the foliage to the left disappearing from the trail.
MIKE: (Julian) I should get Met. It pays.
> Let her face the beast.
CROW: The bar-code scanner?
> He heard a roar of anger, whether it was the Huntress
> or the beast he never knew.
TOM: The beast he never knew from the night they never met.
MIKE: He also had a tough time telling the Olsen twins apart.
> *******************************************************
CROW: Say something funny about those asterisks.
TOM: No! Why don't you?
CROW: I don't feel like it.
TOM: Well, neither do I.
MIKE: Oh, I guess *I'LL* do it. Um... those asterisks sure do look
like...
uh, boy scouts on a nature hike.
CROW: That wasn't funny.
MIKE: At least I'm TRYING! Sheesh!
TOM: C'mon, guys, we've got to stick together here. There's plenty of
fanfic still to come.
MIKE: You're right.
CROW: Yeah, I'm sorry I snapped at you. Hey, I just thought of a good
asterisk joke. (clears his throat) It's a Keith Haring mural as
seen
from a mile away!
TOM: Not bad.
MIKE: I kinda liked my "boy scouts" joke. I mean, when was the last
time
you heard a boy scout gag?
(BOTS snicker)
MIKE: C'mon, guys, you KNOW that's not what I meant.
TOM: Sure, Nelson.
CROW: Whatever you say.
>
>
> Alis listened to the sound of the beast moving through
> the foliage, pursuing Julian.
(TOM hums the _Benny Hill_ chase music)
> She could hear Julian too and
> knew she was close.
CROW: Julian's a she?
MIKE: I guess the Wilderbeast caught up to him at some point.
> Judging the distance between them and
> the direction Julian was running in, she scrambled up a tree
> and began racing along the branches, hoping against hope she
> could reach Julian in time to save him from the Wilderbeast.
TOM: (Mighty Mouse) Here I come to save the day...
> Ahead of her, she saw the branches fell away, vines
> dangling down from branches above her head. Never pausing in
> her mad dash,
CROW: She fell down when she reached the gap where the branches had
fallen
away. The lesson is "haste makes waste".
> she grabbed a vine as she neared the edge of
> the chasm among the arboreal path.
CROW: Arboreal?
MIKE: It means "of or related to Arbor Drugs".
> She lept for the vine to
> swing across, her momentum carrying her beyond the chasm's
> edges.
TOM: Unfortunately, this left Shep, Ursula, and Fella on the other side
of
the chasm.
> She landed - on all fours, and remained where she
> was, catching her breath,
CROW: And tossing it up in the air again.
> ignoring the pounding of her heart
MIKE: And the ringing of her telephone.
> - to listen intently for the sounds of escape and pursuit
> below.
CROW: But all she could hear was some jerk blaring "Carry On My Wayward
Son" on his car radio.
> The sounds were coming from behind her now - not in
> front.
MIKE: (Alis) D'oh! Now I've gotta go back to where I started!
> She spun around, and moved to the edge of the chasm,
> looking down.
CROW: (singing) Look down, spin around,
Edge up to the chasm.
Look down, spin around,
Edge up to the cliff.
> Then she grabbed a vine winding it around her
> arm and leg and slid down it to the leafy carpet below, hand
> pulling her cross bow from her belt as she did so.
(ALL hum James Bond theme)
> She let the vine fall away
MIKE: It left the church.
> before she reached the
> ground,
TOM: And went "splat".
> landing in a crouch and bolted in the direction she
> heard the Wilderbeast roaring from.
CROW: Tiger tiger, burning bright, in the forests of the night.
> Alis came to a halt in a thick stand of leafy trees,
TOM: Which were actually Ents.
> catching her breath, and listening carefully, she could hear
> him, approaching, breath ragged, his gait uneven and heavy.
MIKE: Must have had the five-bean salad for supper.
> From the sound of it he was
CROW: Drunk.
> reaching the limits of his
> stamina, ready to drop any time, she sent a prayer to the
> goddess that he would not do so,
TOM: (falsetto) I'm busy answering Wiccan prayers!
> before she had dispatched
> the Wilderbeast,
MIKE: And its Oompa Loompas.
> then she stepped out onto the path as he
> approached.
CROW: (Alis) John!
TOM: (Julian) Marsha!
> She almost dropped the bow in shock when she saw him.
> Naked as the day he was born,
MIKE: Julian Bashir stars in _The Wild Child_.
CROW: Hold it! When he left the harem, he was wearing a dress. And now
he's NAKED?!?
TOM: The authors should at least keep their disturbing mental images
straight.
> covered in bruises, dirt and
> the fast fading claw marks that were too fine
MIKE: Oh claw marks, you're so fine. You're so fine you blow my mind.
Hey
claw marks! (claps twice) Hey claw marks!
> to have been
> received from the Wilderbeast and a sure sign that one of
> her own had assaulted him.
CROW: Yeah, someone had scratched her name in Julian's skin.
> She saw red,
TOM: Oh my God! It's a self-insertion fic!
> growling low in her throat, he'd been cast
MIKE: As Christian in a production of _Cyrano de Bergerac_.
> into a harem - she was positive of it - and she'd skin the
> one who'd done so,
CROW: (Alis) I'll make her represent Chicomecoatl!
> just as soon as she learned who it was.
TOM: She should call Columbo. He could figure it out in fifteen
minutes,
then spend the rest of the episode screwing with her mind.
> Then the Wilderbeast was bursting into view behind
> Julian,
MIKE: (Wilderbeast) Hey, have you seen the Pryorbeast around here? He's
supposed to be starring in a movie with me right
now.
> and all over thoughts scattered as she raised the
> crossbow,
CROW: Who, the wilderbeast?
TOM: No, Alis.
> taking a deep breath, ready to yell at Julian to
> hit the dirt or move aside so she could fire without hitting
> him.
MIKE: (Alis) How can I say "Get outta the way, stupid!" without denting
his
ego?
> Then Julian was diving into the foliage beside the
> trail before she could give such a command and she had a
> clear field of fire - and fired at the beast. The bolt
> skittered along its armour platting.
CROW: (Alis) What I wouldn't give for a phaser.
> Alis backed up
> reloading hastily, firing again.
TOM: Geez, Alis uses a bow more than Hawkeye does.
> But it was rising up to its full height
MIKE: Seven inches.
> and rather than
> taking the beast in the head,
CROW: The beast remained outside the bathroom.
(MIKE and TOM groan)
> her bolt found its mark
> between the armour plate of its hide. The beast roared in
> pain and furry,
TOM: No, it roared in pain AT a furry.
> grabbing at the bolt ripping it out, and
> throwing it aside, then it was charging for her.
MIKE: Using her Visa card.
> *Damn* She thought,
CROW: (Alis) I finally meet a man who wants to shop for me, and I have
to
kill him.
> then spun on her heel and ran for
> all she was worth,
TOM: Eleven dollars and seventy-two cents.
> heading back the way she had come.
MIKE: And slipping.
> Then it occurred to her, that in a way it was a
> blessing.
CROW: In time, she could learn to love the wilderbeast.
> Now it was after her, not Julian. If she kept to
> the ground, instead of taking to the refuge of the tree's
> above,
TOM: The wilderbeast would eventually get bored and go home.
> she could lead it away and give Julian the chance to
> recover his strength in relative safety. With that thought
> in mind, she slowed her pace,
MIKE: And the beast ate her. I suppose that's another blessing.
> just enough to stay ahead of
> the enraged beast and lure it away from her exhausted
> consort.
CROW: And toward New Kasuto.
(TOM hovers onto MIKE's lap. MIKE picks TOM up and ALL leave the
theater.)
[Planet Bumper]