Stop The World - I Want To Get Off

'DRIVE NOW, PAY LATER, OAC!'

“Swanson,” Prez bellowed at the adjoining open door
where his assistant had better be working and not on
one of his many potty breaks, which were more likely
a cover for having a smoke in the stairwell.

“Yes sir, mister president sir,” Swanson chirped as
he slid into the room and came to a skidding stop.

Prez glared at his lackey. Swanson was reed thin,
so much so that even the presidential clothier was
unable to provide a suit that didn’t make him appear
more than a wooden clothing valet. Why, even just
last week, a Nukelhead diplomat had hung his coat
and hat on the skinny helper.

The incident nearly caused a nuclear catastrophe-
the diplomat thought Swanson a master spy slash
ninja slash slasher. (Swanson was holding a letter
opener (and the diplomat’s name was Letterman (no,
really!(actually this is just a ruse to get quintuple
parenthesis (enjoy))))).

Once the debacle had been smoothed out with liberal
servings of vodka, Prez declared, “Stop the world.
I want to get off.”

“Yes sir, sir,” Swanson said as the Russian laughed.

“Just tinker with the computer thingys,” Prez snapped
at his lackey.

Let’s see, where were we... oh yes:

“Swanson, have you changed my email spam settings?”
Prez demanded. Prez liked to demand. Why, his
very position demanded it. Governing the world was
a demanding job; it demanded respect and attention.
His favor at social gatherings, closed door meetings,
and back room negotiations was in high demand-”

“No sir, sir,” Swanson said as he squirmed in his ill
fitting suit that had made the clothier burst into
tears and run out the door of the respectable shop and
down the street naked, wailing, “It’s the haberdasher-
ocalypse!”

“Then what, pray tell, is this,” Prez demanded as he
spun his laptop round and thrust a finger at the
offending email.

Swanson leaned with his bulbous head, extended a
scrawny arm with knobby joints that looked like they
might be capable of bending either way and pointed
with a bony finger. “By the stars, it looks like
an automobile ad, sir.”

Prez’s face turned a lovely shade of oxblood, which
incidentally matched his tie, but not so much as to be
a fashion faux pas - the impromptu ensemble was offset
by his liver spots.

“I can bloody well see that,” Prez bellowed. “I’m a
busy man, I don’t time for spam or any other junk in
my email. I demand you go check the server thingy...”

The rest of the rant went unheard by his lackey who’d
retreated as swiftly as a desiccated leaf in a stiff
breeze.



At the end of the day, which for Prez meant midnight,
the elected leader of the world sat in his bedside
wing chair, attempting to unwind by the means of the
three scotches on the table next- one neat, the second,
up, the last on the rocks.

On the rocks would be a fitting end to a similarly
toned day: gone were the simpler times of inter-racial
squabbling. That had been done away with decades ago
with the advent of DNA chili.

No, now it was MDP, or Minuscule Divide Politics.
The main parties were the City Dwellers (Smoggers),
the Rural Residers (Clover Kickers), the Aqua Mariners
(Wrinkleskins), the Mountain Monopoly (Big Buttes),
the Desiccated Denizens (Dune It All), and lastly the
Aero Affluent (no nickname, but they do enjoy extolling
their life of shooting the breeze).

Simple right?
Not so much.

Prez downed the first scotch with only a slight wince
then pressed thumb and forefinger against his temples.

Life did not lob slow, gently arcing softballs.

Today it was the City Dwellers, or more specifically,
several of their many factions: Suburbanians (Nesters)
had filed a complaint against The Industrialites (Cog
and Flog); encroachment on the serene burbs by the ever
expanding factories (Cogs), and the constant flow of
commuting blue shirts (Flogs) continued to rise, leaving
behind more and more refuse.

That wasn’t a new issue.

The Flog traffic attracted the Culvert Colonies
(Colonostomies)- storm drain/culvert squatters, aka
ditch scavengers, aka dirty baggers, pushing their
purloined shopping carts, often with one wheel that
did nothing but spin in circles, laden with bags of
recyclables, not to mention other reclaimed unmention-
ables (oops).

That wasn't new either.

Second scotch... down the hatch.

Missing shopping carts, among other things, attracted
the Reclaimants (Owed’em Retrievers). More traffic.
More ruckus. As a result, those of the Culvert took
to stashing more carts than needed, stowing them every-
where so as to always have one handy. Nester children
(Spooners) decided to race found carts, often still
fully laden, down the streets and inevitably, the free-
way. At night. When naughty things are generally done.

Valuable recyclables were scattered, carts were smashed,
workers were late for shift.

As for the Nesters, well they were absolutely flabber-
gasted, discombobulated, upset even; after rushing
out to rescue their urchin, they returned only to find
their abodes thoroughly burgled by the Burglarites.
Burglarians? Burglareens.

Prez wasn’t sure of their actual moniker- they were a
shady lot at best.

The catastrophe was new-ish, but it wasn’t the problem
either. Such issues were below his position, even if
it occurred in his own neighborhood.

Third scotch- gone in one go.

Not even the Mountain Dweller infighting fell within his
domain, though it was an entertaining side note to the
day: The Crevasse Coalition insisted the Mountain-ears
(a group that hollered messages across said crevasses)
looked down on them.

Anyway, the actual problem was the Nuclear Naysayers
(Nukelheads), the sole remaining faction of an atomic-
ally armed age, that held claim to enough warheads to
destroy the world 3058.3389 times over.

Why so much, was the common query, and the answer,
based on the belief that sapiens, being viral in
nature (cue the much viewed ad for a certain household
cleaner that promised to kill 99.999 percent of germs),
was to ensure such a thorough cleansing as to be able
to eat directly off the planet surface apprehension
free.

The Nukelheads would have already off’ed the world,
but thankfully they hadn’t yet figured out who or what
would continue to press the big red button after the
first few all encompassing salvos.

Good thing that.

Not so good- nukes had become much smaller, shrunken
from the tactical to the testicular (not really that
small, but that was the running gag), which meant one
never knew where any or many of these humanity baking
devices might be hidden.

Prez reached for another drink but found none. He
glanced over to the bureau where a bottle sat next to
his laptop. Shortly, he was back in the chair, bottle
in hand.


...continued next post

So, the older Spooners hung out with the Gooners, the
Cracka-lackers and Weed Swooners, and at the prodding
of the Midnight Mooners, took the trash bag schooners
filled with nuclear boomers and raced them down the
freeway, proclaiming themselves Nuclear Zoomers. Flogs
(and their dogs) driving their slogs in their trolley-
plods plowed into carts and Not So Smarts (causing more
than a few sharts), which was why Prez’s drinking tonight
was up a few quarts.

No real damage was done, but Prez found himself once
again wishing someone would stop the world so he could
disembark. Actually he might settle for someone to
stop the room from spinning. The bottle was now empty.

Tomorrow would begin with meeting the Porcine Picklers...
then dealing with perturbed Pastry Pontiffs... who had
a plum to thumb... with... zzz... zzz... zzz.


Ping!

Blindly, Prez flailed out to hit snooze on the alarm
clock, but still being in the chair he only knocked
the empty bottle and glasses to the floor with a crash.

That woke him up.

Blearily he searched for the source of the ping then
settled a slitted glare at the laptop. After collect-
ing it and plopping back down, he brought up his emails.

The latest, the one that woke him, held the subject
line: Most and piled high commodes transfer Bank of
Fornax.

Bank of Fornax? Prez mused. Never heard of it. And
he’d dealt with all of them, as far as he knew, through
the group called Knox n’ Lox.

The filter had flagged it as spam. That damn Swanson.
He reread the line- piled high commodes? Surely the
sender meant commodities. He wasn’t falling for that
lame...

His finger flinched, betraying him, and the rest of
the message was revealed:

From the orifice of Mister Kldwodijfdlslsfnfj
Fornax Develop Mint Bank
NGC1360

Dear Serve, grating and salivations.
Me Mister Kldwodijfdlslsfnf, Prints of
Woielmdljf. Wood transfer fund of many
2,012,000,000 nvnjinoijeviojn. Only Knee
process feet of 10,000 nvnjinoijeviojn...

*delete*

The problem with the internet was that even now,
decades later, old viruses, trojans, and scam mails
still lurked. They’d somehow taken on a life of
their own.

He hadn’t seen this particular version of the Nigerian
prince scam before, it was so bad the writer must have
been typing with his elbows.

Hmm...

Prez scrolled back up to the top and found the message
from earlier:

‘DRIVE NOW, PAY LATER,OAC!’
Under it, in a smaller font that made him squint:
‘Galactic Motors’.

Never heard of Galactic Motors...

Another finger flinch and a click later-

“Glurbygloopyglubblub?”

Prez’s brain, unable to deal with the query just
yet, pushed it aside as he gawked at his hands,
which seemed to be just re materializing. He
shuddered.

Other than his sudden trip nothing seemed terribly
out of the ordinary. He was in a strange office,
an unremarkable one at that. Standard carpet,
berber, standard chair, mid-back, standard desk-
double pedestal (arborite). Standard alien- jelly.

Wait.

“Glurbygloopyglubblub?” The alien queried.

Briefly, Prez wondered how his brain had decided
it was a query, but he pushed that aside for the
more pressing matter at hand. He screamed.

The entity vanished in a flash of light and an
instant later something more human appeared. A
gent dressed in a cheap looking suite, blue and
obviously polyester, slicked back hair (not to
be confused with slicked back hair, which Prez
thankfully couldn't see and a greasy grin topped with
a razor thin mustache.

Almost human, or more specifically, a salesman.

Prez screamed again.

“Sorry about that,” Gnorr said with a wince. “Our
most recent paperwork on your planet indicated the
highest evolved life form to be gelatinous.”

“Where...” Prez stuttered, “Where... where...”

“Ah yes,” Gnorr smiled, “Welcome to Galactic Motors.”
He leaned across the desk and gave a big wink, “And
I want you to know we value all our customers the
same, even bipeds, wink, wink.” He gave a thumbs up.
“You’re okay in our books, thumbs up, thumbs up.”

“Where...” Prez stuttered, “Where... where...”


Fifteen minutes later, Galactic Time, which is
tracked on a clock much like Earth’s, except for
the black hole which tends to slow time down to
a crawl just before five o’clock (see? not so
different):

“And so a friend of a friend of an enemy of one
who has feelings neither way advised us that you
might be interested,” Gnorr explained. “We get
most of our business through referrals.”

“Be that as it may, I think I’ll pass,” Prez said.
“We Earthlings are already close to having a flying
car, so-”

Gnorr slapped the desktop and guffawed. “A flying
car? A flying car!” He got up and paced to and
fro while wagging a finger at his mark. “Oh that,
that is a good one. Well done sir.” Then, after
seeing the quite serious returned look, “You’re
serious.”

“I am.”

“Good,” Gnorr said as he straightened his coat and
entered full sales mode. “So are we.” He turned
to the wall and made a grand sweeping gesture.
“Imagine cruising the galaxy in comfort, the stars
flitting by like so many fence posts, the promise
of unseen wonders just over the horizon.”

A wall size hazy black and white picture of a
flying saucer appeared on the wall.

Brow furrowing, Prez said, “I think I’ve seen that
before.”

“Yes, yes,” Gnorr confirmed. “We had a dealership
here previously, but it went under. There was a
nasty dissection incident, but just between you and
me, I really didn’t like Kljfjiefinvj.”

With a wave of his hand the picture changed to a
scattering of unfamiliar stars, and Gnorr pressed
on. “Look. You can even visit your relatives.
Neanderthals,” Gnorr said as he pointed at one of
the round dots. “You’re related, right?”

“We thought they were extinct,” Prez sputtered.

“Nah, they just got tired of your crap,” Gnorr
informed him. “But it’s never too late to reconnect,
amirite?” After Prez just sat there with a stunned
look, Gnorr decided it was time to change tactics.

Gnorr: “Look, this fish-out-of-water thing is
entertaining and all, but I’m getting the feeling
you’re not evolved enough to own one of our vehicles.
Tell you what. Think about it. So what if you miss
our reduced pricing. No need to jump into your
exciting new life. Let’s see, we’re pretty busy,
our next available appointment would be...” He
checked his watch. “In three big bangs. I’ll
come back then.”

Just before Gnorr disappeared through a door that
had appeared for theatrical purposes, Prez jumped
up and yelled, “Wait!”


"Excellent," Gnorr beamed as he looked over the
sales document. “Now let’s talk about the down
payment.”

Prez shrugged. “No problem. I can pull together
a trillion dollars or so.”

“Dollars... hmm,” Gnorr mused as he clacked away
at a computer. After a moment he looked up and
said, “Little slips of paper have no value nor
their digital counterparts. Anything else?”

Shifting uneasily in his seat, Prez scratched his
head. “What did the Neanderthals pay with?”

Gnorr clacked away some more. “Let’s see. There
was a planet between your Mars and Jupiter.” More
clacking. “And Nemesis, what you call a brown
dwarf. Rather unkind term, that.”

Prez: “Uh...”

Gnorr: “Not this again!”



...continued next post

"Jupiter's core, check. Saturn’s rings. Check.
Half the Kuiper belt. Check.” Gnorr shuffled
the papers together then presented one more.
“Now we just need a personal reference, not that
they would check, but they might. Needs to be
non-sapien.”

“Non-sapien?”

“Yes. Another intelligent life form that can vouch for
you. Surely your kind has made contact with one of
them.” Gnorr punched a query into the computer.
“Elephants?”

Prez grimaced. “Exterminated.”

“No problem. Dolphins?”

“Fished out.”

“Squid-kind?”

“Eaten. With butter.”

Half an hour later:

“Marmots?” Gnorr asked, though his tone indicated
he knew the answer already.”

“Funny story that,” Prez began.

“Sorry I asked,” Gnorr grumbled. “So you’ve managed
to eliminate anything with a semblance of a brain.”
His eyes slid to the side and up. “Awkward.”

“What about cockroaches?” Prez asked, his eyes lighting
up. “They’ve been getting much larger lately.”

“Marvelous idea,” Gnorr crowed. “About that, do you
people not believe in keeping your planet clean. Why,
it’s just filthy, if you don’t mind me saying. I guess
this is what I get for trying to make a sale in the
armpit of the galaxy.”

***

“Bigfoot,” Gnorr mumbled as he wrote. “There. Thank
the Eluninvniei nebula, that’s done.” He pushed the
paper across the desk. “Sign.”

Prez looked it over, and said, “Isn’t Bigfoot a Sapien,
Not to mention, mythical?”

“Dear me, no,” Gnorr said as he covered his face with
both hands then opened them a crack and added, “Normally
we wouldn’t accept dual planar beings, but we’re getting
desperate here.”

“Oh.”

***

In short order, Prez found himself standing by his
new craft. Four doors. A sedan. He wrinkled his
nose. He was hoping for a coupe. Upon opening the
driver side he stared at the impossibly cramped
interior. He inserted a leg, which was about all he
could muster.

Gnorr: “Whatever are you doing? You enjoy your ride
in the back. Get your lackey to drive.”

My lackey? Of course! Prez snapped his fingers then
bellowed, “Swanson!”

“Yes sir, sir,” Swanson chirped as he appeared in a
flash of light, ridiculous bulb head, oversized eyes
and joints that bent either way more evident than ever.

Once Swanson folded himself into the drivers seat, Prez
got in the back. He leaned forward and said, “Swanson,
stop the world, we’re getting off.”

Swanson: “Yes sir, sir!”


End

a reply to: shlaw

I could detect bits of several authors whispering through that, Dick, Adams, and Pratchett to name 3.



I loved it.

Whew ! What a ride.

And it's true, higher intelligence will never vouch for us.

We're screwed.

originally posted by: SIEGE
Whew ! What a ride.

And it's true, higher intelligence will never vouch for us.

We're screwed.

originally posted by: SprocketUK
a reply to: shlaw

I could detect bits of several authors whispering through that, Dick, Adams, and Pratchett to name 3.

I loved it.

thanks!
unfortunately I missed an edit and didn't realize until too late:

Gnorr should have said - "And your kuiper belt... odd choice, now your
neighbours will see Uranus.

Ah well...

Thanks for reading!!!

now that the contest is over, i figured i'd give
this a one time bump before i let it sink into
obscurity.