An Early Childhood Chapter 17 Part 3



CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: A SUBPLOT WITH A PLOT, OR VICE VERSA (PART 3)

Continued from Chapter 17 Part 2.



Act I – Scene IV

THE CORRIDOR OUTSIDE THE INTERROGATION ROOM – 1987 – AFTERNOON

GENE, ALEX AND FLANAGAN ARE LEAVING THE ROOM. THEY STEP INTO THE CORRIDOR. FLANAGAN IS BEING LED AWAY.

FLANAGAN
I’ve already explained…I was only sure where I was going when Billy Boy Cullen indicated to me that the portal was open and gave me a leather pilot’s cap and goggles! How many times do I have to tell you?


SHARON COMES WALKING INTO THE CORRIDOR. SHE LOOKS AT FLANAGAN AND SMILES, SIGHING AT HIM LUSTFULLY, THEN LOOKS AT DRAKE

SHARON
Ma’am!

DRAKE
Yes, Sharon?

SHARON
When we was in the station room…you said…

DRAKE
Yes, Sharon?

SHARON
Ma’am…you was talking about the case we’re working on.

DRAKE
Yes, that’s right.

SHARON
But ma’am…then this man arrived by a cake.

DRAKE
Yes, Sharon?

SHARON
Well, he ain’t a character is what I mean. Is he? In our script?

DRAKE
My God, Sharon…my God you’re right. (LOOKS HORRIFIED AT HERSELF, STARTS TO BACK AWAY FROM EVERYONE.) Maybe there’s some kind of an ultra shoddy, intertextual postmodern meta-narrative going on here. (FROWNING IN HORROR.) So if Paddy Flanagan is here from some other format…maybe it’s not his life he is living, or MY past in which I’m embedded…or maybe it’s his REAL future and I’m just a…just a character! (SHAKES HER HEAD BACK AND FORTH.) This isn’t happening…this should not be happening.

HUNT
Cheer up, Bolly! Have you two lezzers forgotten that before Jippy here arrived on the Used Condom Express, we were actually working on a case involving corrupt police Captain Larry Weathercape?

FLANAGAN
So that’s why I’m here! (HE GETS THE ATTENTION OF THE OTHER THREE.) In my lifetime, Captain Larry Weathercape is in actuality an evil demon. And he’s my mortal enemy!

HUNT
So what’s your point, please?

HUNT AND FLANAGAN STARE AT EACH OTHER. FINALLY, HUNT LOOKS AWAY

FLANAGAN
Back to Captain Larry Weathercape, Hunt. Due to an unfortunate error that gave Weathercape super strength in the mortal realm which has yet to be revealed in my reality, I have come to this realm in order to dispatch him.

DRAKE
Wait a minute…slow down…this is all too much to take in!

FLANAGAN
He’s basically like the Incredible Hulk of my timeline. Don’t you get that, Alex? (HE GRABS HER AND SHAKES HER.) Isn’t that getting through to you! We don’t have time for this nonsense!

HUNT
When did all this happen?

FLANAGAN
Between the years 1850 and 1990. My timeline is very ill defined!

HUNT
You don’t say?

FLANAGAN
Oh yes I do. And the vile warlock likes casting spells on people. There is talk that he also enjoys skinning women.

HUNT
So he wasn’t a chubby chaser.

FLANAGAN
SKINNING! Not skinny!

HUNT
Right…so he…so he likes…fat women?

FLANAGAN
He likes all kinds of women! Skinned!
(FLANAGAN LOOKS AT ALL THREE OF THEM, WHO RETURN HIS LOOK WITH ONE OF SHOCK.)

SHARON
That horrible warlock…doesn’t like women at all!

FLANAGAN
That’s what I said.

HUNT
What sort of a sick pervert are you to tell us that he likes women? And then you tell us that he skins them?

DRAKE
That is so wrong! Even in 2008, they wouldn’t allow this! What year did you say you come from? (PAUSE.) How permissive can your society be that you say women are liked when they are skinned?

FLANAGAN
No, no, no, no, no. Let me start again. (PAUSE. TAKES DEEP BREATH.) Larry Weathercape…liked…skinning…women.

DRAKE
So…he’s fond of thin girls.

FLANAGAN
Look, we don’t have time for this! Where is Larry Weathercape right now?

DRAKE
He’s about to leave his Hounslow residence for a flight to Nevada.

FLANAGAN
That makes sense. He may try to gamble and win a lot of money based on some kind of a sports almanac, if we’re dealing with time travel parodies! To the batmobile!
[FLANAGAN SPRINTS OUT THE DOOR. HUNT AND DRAKE FOLLOW HIM.]


Continued in Chapter 18.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: JIHADI A Love Story by Yusuf Toropov

Image
With a fantastic opening purportedly penned by a recently deceased narrator and edited via running commentary by a secondary narrator, JIHADI: A Love Story is written by Yusuf Toropov. The emotional intelligence of the main protagonist and the story itself are high on the list of pluses at the outset. Although many expectations are confounded throughout the story, the expectation of more confusion, while reading the opening pages, does not bear out. So if you find yourself asking: “What’s this about?”, just power on through the opening five pages. The quality of the writing will draw you in at the outset. But the plot is riveting, and it all starts to become fairly clear fairly quickly. It’s one of those novels that merits a second read not because of its difficulty, but because of the prose's beauty. In terms of plot, there is so much to it that there are things you may miss the first time out. Among much else, readers may find they are reading the novel for its story, and then
Read more

Dead Men Naked by Dario Cannizzaro

Image
Dario Cannizzaro’s narrator Louis, the protagonist of Dead Men Naked (available at Amazon ), loses his best friend Neil in a bizarre, seemingly hallucinogenic near-remote attack from an attic window as they stand in the same room, by Lou’s neighbour and a giant crow. Given the tequila and other substances taken, it is difficult to determine what exactly occurred through the narrator’s eyes. But Louis comes round the following morning worse-for-wear; he finds his friend’s body, realises that what happened was no dream, and summons the authorities to the scene. Strange beginnings complement a funeral where Neil’s parents end up consoling him as much as vice versa. On the trip, while Lou drowns his sorrows, he meets Mallory at a nearby, not-so-nearby dive, and begins an exploration of the spirit world. The journey is a theme in this novel, the roadside scenery described with a vivid and subtle poetry throughout. Also beautifully captured are aspects relationships – for instance,
Read more

The Survival Girls Book Review

Image
The Survival Girls book: http://thesurvivalgirls.com/ Among her other achievements, Ming Holden gained the top prize in a Glimmer Train fiction contest in 2013. The email announcing her win came into my busy inbox one morning last year, and I almost deleted it. I clicked on it, more to get it marked as read than anything else, and I glanced at some words of acceptance from the prizewinner of the latest story competition, with a quote from Madeleine Albright and something about the power of intentionality. “Politics and philosophy,” I thought. When I clicked through beyond the teaser (which DID NOT do her writing-advice piece justice, although quoting a Democrat-appointed cabinet secretary, and a bit of philosophy will - surprisingly - get me clicking at anything), there was a wonderful Obamaesque idealism in Holden’s jesuitical plea to write for others, once you have an intended readership in your head. That readership can be the EMO kids, the dispossessed, the refugees, the voice
Read more