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Epilogue
Three universal weeks had passed
since the fall of The Club on planet Neopolsi but building had already begun on
a new and even more fabulous reincarnation using the surviving architectural
elements; a tribute and monument to all that had perished. Meanwhile, in the far
outer rim of the Dalem system a familiar green starship cruised along a
spiraling stream of nebulous gas.
Firimo staggered down the moodily
lit salmon hallway of the Spirumb Red on
his way to the air lock, grappling awkwardly with an over-packed and
deteriorating cardboard box. He cursed as he scraped his thin alien shoulders
against the garishly gilded floral moldings. Why, he wondered, was a star ship so
pointlessly ornamented?
Then it happened, again, for what seemed like the jillionth
time this week. The same decoratively gilded cheruboid figure, robotically
sensing a presence in the hallway began its glorious mini celebration
announcing a new arrival at the trash port, launching itself in a gleeful
trumpeting arc, directly at Firimo’s head.
“G’LAAAAT! Oh son of a buggin’
gludfuck!” Firimo exclaimed angrily as a sharp pain poked into his bulbous left
eye. The tattered box fell from his semi-control and smashed to the carpeted
floor followed by Firimo’s six foot frame. Wincing in excruciating pain Firimo
crouched around his throbbing ocular appendage. For a Xet this was a bit like a
blow to the nuts.
As he lay crumpled on the worn
burgundy carpet Firimo caught a floor-level glimpse of the chaos that had
ensued. A terrible whining ring
hung in air as he surveyed this insane rubbish strewn landscape. Snarls of
thread, wire, gaudy beaded trim and cracked vacuum hose strangled and tangled
through various doomed devices, a bent eyelash curler, a defocused disposable
Ladyshock laser razor, a burnt out toaster-bot, a leaky and deflated Pentura
Lonni. Dozens of little empty and dry containers had tumbled about with a flurry
of dust, dirt and crumbs. Some had held eye liner and lip gloss exhausted by
vain arrogant models. Others had contained paints and dye pigments that now
were committed to the fibers of some high-tech fashion experiment in the
designer’s studio above deck. A disaster-stained padded bra stood out on the
horizon as a painful reminder of the humiliating things Firimo had tolerated in
the last few weeks to inspire his employer, Fugi.
Firimo’s view was like some
abandoned trashteroid scattered with pointless crap, but it was far more than
that. It was a reflection of the job he could no longer endure. It was clear
now why the position had such a high turnover rate.
The pain was passing but still
there was that irritating ring. Then he realized what it was. Firimo arched his
right eye stalk upward to see the cheruboid returning across the archway
finishing its pre-recorded jubilation. His arm shot up and snatched the gold
figure, wrenching violently it from its mobile mounting, snapping internal
wires.
Silence. Standing once again, he dropped the
defunct pest into the rest of the mess on the floor and left it all there. He’d
just had enough.
The tall Xetenu stepped into the
narrow launch corridor and shifted an ornately golden lever. The small portal
marked SKP-2 bloomed like a giant flower allowing him access to the cramped
interior. Firimo folded himself into the tiny couch-pit and activated the
launch sequence. Sealing shut, the escapy dropped into position, and with a
controlled hiss fell out into space.
Several disorienting hours of
drifting through a psychedelic astro-scape later, the small pod was caught by
the gravitational pull of a small planetoid. The descent through the atmosphere
had been rough. Fire and plasma swirled brightly around the portholes and a storm
of frozen argon bounced the tiny bubble about violently. During the barrage Firimo
was knocked unconscious.
Slowly he emerged from his
comatose state. At first Firimo he could hear voices. They were light and
giggling like school girls.
“More
flowers… maybe he needs my tulips!”
The new world was a distorted blur
at first. Vaguely he could discern there was a distant rhythmic chanting but
could not tell what it was. As he gradually regained his senses he realized he
was being carried along on some kind of primitive leafy stretcher. Lifting his
woozy head he could see that his clothes had all been removed and replaced by a
modest amount of strategically placed flowers.
“Where
are you taking me?” Firimo could still not focus yet on his hostesses but he
listened to their voices as they took turns blurting chatty little snippets of
information at him.
“To the ceremony of Ba-jus!”
“You are the honored germinator.”
“The sky mother has answered our pleas and sent you to us.”
“We need your seeds to make us fruitful!”
“The last germinator disappeared.”
“We were very sad.”
“And so horny!”
Make you fruitful?! Firimo forced himself to sit up and look around. “Does it
bother anyone that I might have head trauma?”
Apparently it did not. The chatting
and giggling just continued. What a strange world he had found, or had it found
him? It seemed the natives were all just naked little pink humanoid women. They
were all quite skinny, but even more so they seemed a bit flat and were covered
with suckery orifices. Was this world all
like this or just this colony? Were there other colonies of just men, tan and large
and muscular? Perhaps the men were all out on a hunt in pursuit of a fierce
vorion stag or participating in some tense sweaty wrestling sporting event or
maybe they were just all off relaxing in a hot steamy public bath… -but of
course none of that really mattered. He was here and this was just what he needed. He was sure it was.
“Bring it on ladies! This is my kinda'
place! It’s about time I got some fuckin’ toongapop.”
“Stomp
those grapes, stomp those grapes!” The crowd of now more than a hundred naked
frenzied and horny women chanted as suddenly the stretcher tipped and dumped
Firimo into a large tub of squishy purple fruit.
Several women jumped in to join
him and the juicy writhing ritual commenced; a wet orgy of sweet purple bodies
moving in unison to the sacred chant. The women were extremely friendly but it
was a little bizarre how they attached onto his body with their sucker covered
skin. It was ever so sensual but a little slimy and a tad creepy. None the less
Firimo thought, Six chicks at once! This is so hot! Oh yeah, baby!
“Firimo?
Is that you?” An oddly familiar voice had poked out from the crowd at the edge
of the tub.
“Yzo?”
Looking around Firimo spotted the xetenu face he remembered. “Yzo! I never
expect to see you here.”
“Firimo.
Wow, hi. This is certainly a coincidence.”
“Ya,
that’s for sure. Not really even sure where I am. My escapy grounded just over
the rise there.” Firimo motioned out beyond the rolling meadows from where he
thought he’d come from.
“Really?
Not too far from where my pod crashed.” Since then Yzo had learned that the
natives had a device that ensnared small passing transports but he chose not to
mention this to Firimo as it was fairly unimportant. Now he was just more
interested in the circumstances leading up to this unexpected reunion. “So
what’s been going on since I last saw you? Are you still working for Fugi?”
“Come
on, Germinator, stick your drundledonk in my sucuole! I need you now,” whined a
juice stained maiden.
“Fugi
was- he was really jerking my g’zongas! I didn’t need that shit. I quit!”
“You
quit?”
“Ya he
was a real weirdo. He was into some weird-ass shit and wanted me to do all this
stuff to inspire him an’- it sucked. So… now I'm on extended vacation and I'm
getting me some effin’ pink toongapop, broog!”
“Ya, that’s- that’s really b’loo,
broog. You know you probably shouldn’t encourage them too much. They’re kind of
really excitable.”
But things were already getting
out of hand. Many more women had filled the tub and the purple juice was overflowing
the edge. Firimo was suddenly gasping for air as the maidens latched on to his
naked body with their suckers and he was realizing that maybe he was somewhere
he didn’t really want to be. “Stomp those grapes! Stomp those grapes!”
“Here, take my hand!” yelled Yzo,
and he proceeded to pull Firimo from the crowded frothy sex pool. Free from the
orgy, they ran from the ceremonial meadow clearing and into an overgrown plaza
surrounded by crumbling vine covered buildings.
The two dashed into a rundown old structure
with faux temple-like architecture. They climbed a flight of stairs that
brought them to a small dusty apartment littered with small sculpted figurines.
“Here,” Yzo held out a large towel
to Firimo. “You okay?”
Firimo collapsed on a large
dust-stuffed striped pillow. “Whew! Thanks for pulling me outa’ there. I was
totally fine, but…”
“You were drowning.”
“Ya, Guess I didn’t really know
what I was getting into with these wild native chicks.”
“They really aren’t much different
than any others if you ask me,” replied Yzo, settling himself down on a similar
old furnishing across from his guest.
“You know I'm really glad to see
you again,” said Firimo. “I feel like I was kind of a jerk when we first met
aboard the Red.”
“Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t
really entirely myself that day either. Tell me something; when I was there,
they were just about to make a deal with Empress Von Fuego. Did everything work
out with that?” It was true. The Spirumb Red had been on its way to meet with the royal fashion
dignitary to negotiate a contract. Fugi was to create exclusive designs for the
apparel-mad empress; a position that he could not refuse and would surely
enslave his creativity to Tamary forever.
“Ya, I guess. I saw drawings of
her all over the place.”
“So… Fugi hadn’t pissed her off or
anything by the time you quit?”
“I guess not. Why do you care so
much?”
“Firimo, I'm not exactly who you
think I am. I wanted to tell you when we first met but I really couldn’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“I understand your former employer
has been a real jerk to you the past few weeks and that doesn’t really surprise
me. You see, he’s my twin brother and I know his antics quite well.”
“Twin brother? How can that be?
You and Fugi aren’t even the same species,” said Firimo pointlessly comparing
similarities of xetenus and ozmes in his head.
“I'm getting to that. You see that
really wasn’t Fugi at all. It was my brother Drozi …and …I do really apologize
for all the abuse you’ve put up with. He’s quite an insufferable bastard and he
can be very extreme at times.”
“Ya I know. So, if he’s your twin and
he’s not Fugi…?” Firimo still didn’t get
it.
“No he’s not Fugi, but I am. I'm
the real Fugi. Or I was anyway, until we switched places and I left.”
Firimo laughed, “Ya right, broog. You’re
a xetenu like me. Very funny.” It was impossible and simply ridiculous to think
that the manipulative and devious Fugi could be even remotely related to Yzo.
Surely he was joking.
“No, see that’s what I'm trying to
tell you, this is just an illusion. You see this was my new design. A fashion made of a hypnotic fabric
that makes you appear to be who ever the audience desires, or with a little
suggestion, who ever the wearer desires. I didn’t intend to test it out on you,
but you caught me off guard.” Yzo
removed his coat and put it out of view.
The apartment seemed to get
dimmer. It was as if the totally normal flashing carousel of lights in the room
had suddenly disappeared and now there was a different very drab and quiet
reality. Firimo was startled to see the one being he’d hoped never to see
again. “Oh man, I thought I was getting away from you!”
“That was my brother! He’s a dick! I'm sorry!” insisted the real Fugi.
Firimo mulled the whole complex
deception over in his mind. He felt lied to and angry. But then his thoughts
fell in line. It was not so much a realization, more a necessary perspective. A
way of thinking he’d picked up from years of hanging out with humans. He now
knew where to place blame. “I get it now. You were trying to make me think you
were a xet like me. Was this was all a trick to get me to like you or
something?” he accused angrily.
“No, calm down. It’s not like that
at all. My disguise had nothing to do with you. You just happened to wander in
at the wrong time. You see, first of all I have no desire to work for that
awful exploitive human empress. At the same time I have been working nonstop to
support my rather lazy brother. He’s an irresponsible asshole but he’s all the
family I’ve got left. All my work and fame and success has not allowed me a
private life so I decided to run away and leave the business, and more so, my
identity to Drozi. It’s the most valuable
gift I could give him and it’s high time he support himself. So, everything was
in place, Drozi was finally on board with responsibility, or so he said. I used
this hypnotic fabric I invented way back in art school to disguise myself and I
escaped. My first stop was going to be the popular Club N. I was going to meet
an old friend there and try to make up for all the years I was too busy doing
other things. Unfortunately I was stranded in space when my driver-bot exploded.”
“Exploded?”
“Yes, apparently some robots’
circuits don’t agree with my hypno-fabric technology.”
This in fact was actually a very
fortunate effect of the innovative fabric, for it had been this very thing that
had created the dramatic distraction amid the panic of the fleeing Club N
patrons and allowed Yzo’s escape from Tamary’s clutches three weeks prior.
Fugi continued, “Anyway I sat
there adrift for about an hour before I was accidentally caught in the grill of
a royal starship. That was really the last place I wanted to be. I couldn’t
really make my presence known without risking The Empress realizing who I
really was, so I just laid low until I found someone to help me get out of
there.”
“This is ridiculous. You expect me
to believe that you just left your entire life, your fame and fortune to some
one else?”
“Not all my fortune. I have plenty
to live on for the rest of my life, and fame is not as great as you might think.
I’ve still got my talent. He’s just got the name and really if he can make that
work for him then he’s one less thing to worry about. I’m tired of him leeching
off me. Let him work for a living.
Look, we may be twins but I'm nothing like him. Believe me I would have never
put you through all that. But I am
interested in you modeling for me.”
“Oh no
way man! I fell for that once already!”
“It’s just
for a line of toys I'm working on. Here, look.” Fugi reached for a small clay
figurine.
“Oh ya,
I've seen plenty of toys in the last
two weeks! I know where this is going.”
“Tronkula’s tendrils!” Fugi
exclaimed in frustration. “Is sex all anyone ever thinks about anymore? I
honestly just wanted to use you as a model for my new line of xetenu action
figure toys. Why does everyone think I have a hidden naughty agenda?”
“Why? Because I know how all that
flooty frooty modeling stuff goes. First it’s ‘what nice cheekbones you
have’, then its ‘lets do some tasteful
nude poses’, and then you’re compromising
your dignity in ways you never thought imaginable!”
Fugi sighed, “Ya, that’s my
brother’s M-O alright. Look Drozi’s
perverse actions are not my fault. Why didn’t you just quit sooner?”
Firimo did not really have an
answer for that. Thinking back he had to admit that Drozi’s manipulative
advances had kind of seemed ok at first, interesting and maybe even a little
exciting but in the end totally regrettable and wrong. So why had he let it go
on for several weeks? “I- I don’t fuckin’ know! It seemed like I was doing
something important. Are you saying I'm into guys?” Firimo shouted accusingly.
“What? No. Nothing of the sort.
Where did that come from?” The idea had not crossed his mind, nor did he care.
“You better not be saying I'm in
to guys!”
“I never said that at all. But you
know, now that you mention it, when we met I did not suggest you perceive another
male xetenu, but that’s how it works. You see what you want to see unless the
wearer otherwise suggests it. And what you saw was an attractive male xetenu. That
is a fact and I had nothing to do with it.”
“Hey, you
and your fuckin’ disguises had just better shut the hell up!”
“Well I'm just saying.”
“I
am not in to guys, man!”
“What’s
the big deal?”
“It’s…” he searched for the right words
and chose the ones he’d heard used before, “its not natural!” he said it in that same tone he’d heard it from his many human
friends that seemed so very vocal about the issue.
Fugi sighed, “The only thing not natural
is making yourself like who other people tell you to like. You’ve totally
fallen into that fucking poisonous human mind frame. It’s like everybody has!
Man listen to us, were talking human right now! I fuckin’ curse the icy comet
that sleazy bitch empress rode in on! Humanity has ruined everything. The rukks
know. The rukks have seen it all, broog. They’re older than the fuckin stars! You’ve
obviously never read Trinnox. She tells it like it used to be! None of this all
uptight watch-who-you’re-mating-with shit!”
“What’s
your point?”
“My point is broog; don’t
sacrifice your basic happiness for other people’s superficial comfort. They
could give a sapyark’s ass about you.” Fugi looked out the open window on the
bucolic scene. The pink leech maidens were all laughing and dancing in a festival
of erotic grape stomping and sexy wine making. “If this is what you want,
that’s great. If not, don’t waste your time. You know the universe isn’t
infinite anymore. Who’s to say it won’t end tomorrow? You should enjoy it while
it lasts… with whoever you want.”
“You were completely making
advances toward me when we first met. I could tell.”
“Firimo, No.” Fugi said calmly but
firmly. “I'm sorry but you’re mistaken. I'm just an honest artist. You’re very
nice but just not my type. I'm not into guys either.”
“You
mean you like women?!”
“Oh no,
definitely not those. Firimo, I’m
green.”
“You…recycle?”
Firimo wondered what this had to do with anything.
“Ugh. No. I should, but who has
time? No, I mean I’m a chloraphyle. I prefer charming and intelligent
vega-terrestrials.” He then started pawing through his satchel.
Firimo knew that meant plant
beings. They reproduced mainly by spores and were really neither male nor
female. He knew they existed but had never met any.
“I know. You probably think that’s
weird. Nobody ever understands. Turns out I'm a quarter fungaloid. Who knew?”
“You’re
a shroom?”
Fugi rolled his big black eyes, “Ugh.
Well part of me sure is,” he replied. Then from his satchel he finally produced
an old battered hucograph. “Here,
see? This is me and my ex inti-mate, Phoren back on Bukapi. I really miss him.”
“Ah!
So he’s a he?”
“No,
not always, not at all really. It’s complicated.”
Firimo looked at the scratchy
little projection of Fugi with his handsome shroomoid significant other and admittedly
felt a slight sense of jealousy amid a complex mix of emotions. Maybe it was
just time to rethink things. Maybe it was just time to stop letting others
think for him.
End?
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