Subject: For The Witch + Jaime; CHAPTER 8
- The Witch's Croquet-Ground
From: openbook@sirius.com (Blackhawk)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.tom-servo
Message-ID: <openbook-1707991454320001@ppp-asfm06--061.sirius.net>
WARNING TO YOUNG FOLK -- THIS CHAPTER IS RATED X THE UNKNOWN, ABSOLUTELY
NO ONE ADMITTED!: As this chapter is dedicated to the Witch, the Wench and
Jaime, all manner of body parts will be discussed therein.
[AUTHORS NOTE: a change in format from the last chapter, I have decided to
leave some [image] tags and adapt the book captions for the day when
Tenniel-like drawings can accompany this text. I found stopping to imagine
what these pictures would look like to be some of the funniest moments in
the piece. :D ]
"Ah cruel Three! In such an hour,
Beneath such dreamy weather,
To beg a tale of breath too weak
To stir the tiniest feather!
Yet what can one poor voice avail
Against three tongues together?
Imperious Prima flashes forth
Her edict "to begin it":
In gentler tones Secunda hopes
'There will be nonsense in it!'
While Tertia interrupts the tale
Not more than once a minute" [1]
*************************************************************************
BLACKHAWK'S ADVENTURES IN SERVOLAND
Previous chapter: A Mad Tofu Party
CHAPTER VIII
The Witch's Croquet-Ground
A large peep-tree stood near the entrance of Servo: the peeps growing on
it were white, but there were three performance artists at it, busily
painting them red. One was painting from atop a large penny-farthing
bicycle and making tiny faces in the petals with a herring. Blackhawk
thought this a very curious thing, and he went nearer to watch them, and
just as he came up to them he heard one of them say, 'Look out now, Five!
Don't go splashing paint over me like that, London is burning!'
[Image]
[Two-Face, Five, and Seven(of Nine) painting the peep-tree]
'I couldn't help it,' said Five, in a sulky tone; 'Seven jogged my elbow.'
On which Seven looked up and said, 'Irrelevant, I would suggest crewman,
that if you had not been attempting to, "cop a feel", this would not have
occured'
'You'd better not talk!' said Five. 'I heard the Witch say only yesterday
you deserved to be mastectomized!'
'It's hard to learn the number seven.' said the one who had spoken first.
'That is irrelevant, Two-Face!' said Seven.
'I am not a number, I have no eyes, I have no soul!' said Two-Face.
'Yes, it is relevant!' said Five, 'and I'll tell him--it was for bringing
the Witch strawberries instead of fluffy-artichokes.'
Seven flung down her brush, and had just begun 'Well, I thought she said
Muskmelons...' when her eye chanced to fall upon Blackhawk, as he stood
watching them, and he checked himself suddenly: the others looked round
also, and all of them bowed low.
'Would you tell me,' said Blackhawk, a little timidly, 'why you are
painting those peeps?'
'Is this where we sing "Painting the peeps red"? said five anxiously.
'No,' said Two-face, 'that's only in "The Girl who was Disney," episode,
what would you care if you lost the other?'
Five and Seven said nothing, but looked at Two-face. Two-face, climbing
off the bicycle, began to answer Blackhawk in a low voice, 'Because these
peep-trees are reprehensible and white--'.
At which point Five pushed him aside and continued,'Why the fact is, you
see, Sir, this here ought to have been a red peep-tree, and we put a white
one in by mistake; and if the Witch was to find it out, we should all have
our <CENSORED> cut off, you know. So you see, Sir, we're doing our best,
afore she comes, to--' At this moment Two-Face, who had been anxiously
looking across Servo, called out 'The Witch! The Witch!' and the three
performance artists instantly threw themselves flat upon their ASCII.
There was a sound of many footsteps, and Blackhawk looked round, eager to
see the Witch.
First came ten arna posters carrying clubs; these folks were all shaped
like the three performance artists, oblong and thick, wrapped in
cellophane, with their hands and feet at the corners: next the ten
Neutopians; these were ornamented all over with diamonds, and walked two
and two, as the arna posters did. After these came the royal Thugesses;
there were ten of them, and the little dears came jumping merrily along
hand in hand, in couples: they were all ornamented with Lilacs. Next came
the guests, mostly Mages and Witches, and among them Blackhawk recognized
the White Rabbit: it was talking in a hurried nervous manner, smiling at
everything that was said, and went by without noticing him. Then followed
the Tropea of Peeps, carrying the MageJaime's crown on a crimson velvet
cushion; and, last of all this grand procession, came the MageJaime and
Witch of Peeps.
Blackhawk was rather doubtful whether he ought not to lie down on his
ASCII like the three performance artists, but he could not remember ever
having heard of such a rule at processions; 'and besides, what would be
the use of writing in a procession,' thought he, 'if people had all to lie
down upon their ASCII, so that they couldn't read it?' So he stood still
where he was, and waited.
When the procession came opposite to Blackhawk, they all stopped and
looked at him, and the Witch said severely 'Who is this?' She said it to
the Tropea of Peeps, who only bowed and smiled in reply.
'Idiot!' said the Witch, tossing her head impatiently; and, turning to
Blackhawk, she went on, 'What's your name, dear?'
'My name is Blackhawk, so please your Majesty,' said Blackhawk very
politely; but he added, to himself, 'Why, they're packages of peeps, after
all. I needn't be afraid of them!'
'And who are these?' said the Witch, pointing to the three performance
artists who were lying round the peeptree; for, you see, as they were
lying on their ASCII, and the pattern on their header was the same as the
..sig, she could not tell whether they were performance artists, or arna
posters, or Neutopians, or three of her own Thugesses.
'How should I know?' said Blackhawk, surprised at his own courage. 'It's no
business of mine.'
The Tropea of Peeps said "You know, in Magic (card game) Clerics tend to
be better than Druids."
Blackhawk was confused, "That has nothing to do with anything happening in
this story?"
"I knew that," continued the Tropea of Peeps "but i thought i would add my
2 cents in."
"LIAR!" shouted the Reverend, who had inserted himself into Blackhawk's
story to flame Dan.
The Witch turned crimson with fury, and, after glaring at them for a moment
like a wild beast, screamed 'Off with their balls! Off--'
[Image] "OFF WITH THEIR BALLS!"
'Nonsense!' said Blackhawk, very loudly and decidedly, and the Witch was silent.
The MageJaime laid his hand upon her strawberries, and timidly said
'Consider, my dear: he is the author!'
The Witch turned angrily away from him, and said to the Tropea 'Turn them
over!', indicating the performance artists.
The Tropea did so, very carefully, with one foot. He left the other in his
mouth.
The Reverend then turned into a 40 year old woman named Kathy, who then
got Paleolithic on the Tropea's ASCII. The two of them, then merged and
became one being, who skipped off to Maine in hopes of finding a lobster
in time for Chapter 10.
'Get up!' said the Witch, in a shrill, loud voice, and the three
performance artists instantly jumped up, and began bowing to the
MageJaime, the Witch, the royal ferrets, and everybody else.
'Fickle!' screamed the Witch. 'You make me giddy.' And then, turning to
the peep-tree, she went on, 'What have you been doing here?'
'May it please your Majesty,' said Two-face, in a very humble tone, going
down on one knee as he spoke, 'we were embraced in the arms of
thinking-man's crumpet--' the other two began to sob.
'I see!' said the Witch, who had meanwhile been examining the bicycle.
'Off with their balls and bring me her breasts!' and the procession moved
on, three of the arna posters remaining behind to execute the unfortunate
performance artists, who ran to Blackhawk for protection.
'Nay, thou shan't be spay or neutered!' said Blackhawk, and he put them
into a large serving dish that stood near aussie steve. The three arna
posters wandered about for a minute or two, looking for them, and then
quietly marched off after the others.
'Are their balls off?' shouted the Witch.
'Their balls are gone, if it please your Majesty!' Toci shouted in reply.
'That's right!' shouted the Witch. 'Can you play croquet?'
The arna posters were silent, and looked at Blackhawk, as the question was
evidently meant for him.
'Yes!' shouted Blackhawk.
'Come on, then!' roared the Witch, and Blackhawk joined the procession,
wondering very much what would happen next.
'It's--it's a very fine day!' said a timid voice at his side. He was
walking by the White Rabbit, who was peeping anxiously into his face.
'Very,' said Blackhawk: '--but we're halfway through the chapter, where's
the Wench?'
'Hush! Hush!' said the Rabbit in a low, hurried tone. He looked anxiously
over his shoulder as he spoke, and then raised himself upon tiptoe, put
his mouth close to Blackhawk's ear, and whispered 'She's under sentence of
execution.'
'What for?' said Blackhawk.
'Did you say "What a pity!"?' the Rabbit asked.
'No, I didn't,' said Blackhawk: 'I don't think it's at all a pity. I said
"What for?"'
'She telenetted into the Witch's account and then the MageJaime farted
as--' the Rabbit began. Blackhawk gave a little snicker of laughter. 'Oh,
hush!' the Rabbit whispered in a frightened tone. 'The Witch will hear
you! You see, she came rather late, after they rode off on her mother, and
the Witch said--'
'Get to your places!' shouted the Witch in a voice of thunder, and people
began running about in all directions, tumbling up against each other;
however, they got settled down in a minute or two, and the game began.
Blackhawk thought he had never seen such a curious croquet-ground in his
life; it was all ridges and furrows; the balls were live Ferrets, the
mallets were large live uhm..."pepperoni", and the arna posters had to
double themselves up and to stand on their hands and feet, to make the
arches.
The chief difficulty Blackhawk found at first was in managing his
"pepperoni": he succeeded in getting its body tucked away, comfortably
enough, under his arm, with its balls hanging down, but generally, just as
he had got its 'neck' nicely straightened out, and was going to give the
ferret a blow with its head, it would twist itself round and look up in
his face, with such a puzzled expression that he could not help bursting
out laughing: and when he had got its head down, and was going to begin
again, it was very provoking to find that the ferret had unrolled itself,
and was in the act of spreading eagle: besides all this, there was
generally a ridge or furrow in the way wherever he wanted to send the
ferret to, and, as the doubled-up arna posters were always getting up and
walking off to other parts of the froup, Blackhawk soon came to the
conclusion that it was a very difficult game indeed.
[Image] Blackhawk trying to play croquet with his "pepperoni" and ferret
The players all played at once without waiting for turns, quarrelling all
the while, and fighting for the Ferrets; and in a very short time the
Witch was in a furious passion, and went stamping about, and shouting 'Off
with his balls!' or 'Off with her breasts!' about once in a minute.
Blackhawk began to feel very uneasy: to be sure, he had not as yet had any
dispute with the Witch, but having scanned ahead a number of chapters, he
knew that it would happen soon, 'and then,' thought he, 'what would become
of me? They're dreadfully fond of castrating people here; the great wonder
is, that there's any one left procreating!'
He was looking about for some way of escape, and wondering whether he
could get away without being seen, when he noticed a curious appearance in
the air: it puzzled him very much at first, but, after watching it a
minute or two, he made it out to be a grin, and he said to himself 'It's
the Infinity Cat: now I shall have somebody to talk to.'
'How are you getting on?' said the Infinity Cat, as soon as there was
mouth enough for it to speak with. 'You know in London once, they used
ferrets to get rid of mice instead of cats?'
Blackhawk waited till the eyes appeared, and then nodded. 'It's no use
speaking to it,' he thought, 'till its ears have come, or at least one of
them.' In another minute the whole head appeared, and then Blackhawk put
down his "pepperoni", and began an account of the game, feeling very glad
he had someone to listen to him. The Infinity Cat seemed to think that
there was enough of it now in sight, and no more of it appeared.
'I don't think the arna's play at all fairly,' Blackhawk began, in rather
a complaining tone, 'and they all quarrel so dreadfully one can't hear
oneself speak--and they don't seem to have any rules in particular; at
least, if there are, nobody attends to them--and you've no idea how
confusing it is all the things being alive; for instance, there's the arch
I've got to go through next walking about at the other end of the
froup--and I should have croqueted the Witch's ferret just now, only it
ran away when it saw mine coming!'
'How kinky do think the Witch is?' said Infinity in a low voice.
'Having given the matter a great deal of thought,' said Blackhawk: 'I
would say she's so extremely--' Just then he noticed that the Witch was
close behind him, listening: so he went on, '--likely to win, that it's
hardly worth while finishing the game.'
The Witch smiled and passed on.
'Who are you talking to?' said the MageJaime, going up to Blackhawk, and
looking at the Cat's head with great curiosity.
'It's a friend of mine--an Infinity Cat,' said Blackhawk: 'allow me to
introduce it.'
'I don't like the look of it at all,' said the MageJaime: 'however, it may
kiss my rim if it likes.'
'I'd rather not,' Infinity remarked.
'Don't be impertinent,' said the MageJaime, 'and don't look at me like
that!' He got behind Blackhawk as he spoke.
'The ever expanding rim of the universe is the current limit of all our
joint consciousness,' said Blackhawk. 'I read that on Usenet somewhere...'
'Well, this Infinity Cat must be removed,' said the MageJaime very
decidedly, and he called the Witch, who was passing at the moment, 'My
dear! I wish you would have this cat removed!'
The Witch had only one way of settling all difficulties, great or small.
'Off with his balls!' she said, without even looking round.
'I'll fetch the Eddorian myself,' said the MageJaime eagerly, and he
hurried off.
Blackhawk thought he might as well go back, and see how the game was going
on, as he heard the Witch's voice in the distance, screaming with passion.
He had already heard her sentence three of the Neutopians to be executed
for having missed their turns, and he did not like the look of things at
all, as the game was in such confusion that he never knew whether it was
his turn or not. So he went in search of his ferret.
The ferret was engaged in a fight with another ferret. One continued to
proclaim "I AM WEASEL!" while the other continued explaining that they
were ferrets which seemed to Blackhawk an excellent opportunity for
croqueting one of them with the other: the only difficulty was, that his
"pepperoni" was gone across to the other side of the Servo, where
Blackhawk could see it trying in a helpless sort of way to fly up into a
bush.
By the time he had caught hold of the "pepperoni" and brought it back, the
fight was over, and both the Ferrets were out of sight: 'but it doesn't
matter much,' thought Blackhawk, 'as all the arches are gone from this
side of the froup and it's time for the last plot complication of this
chapter.' So he tucked it away under his arm, that it might not escape
again, and went back for a little more conversation with his friend.
When he got back to the Infinity Cat, he was surprised to find quite a
large crowd collected round it: there was a dispute going on between the
Eddorian, the MageJaime, and the Witch, who were all talking at once,
while all the rest were quite silent, and looked very uncomfortable.
[Image] Eddorian argues with MageJaime about cutting off Infinity Cat's balls
The moment Blackhawk appeared, he was appealed to by all three to settle
the question, and they repeated their arguments to him, though, as they
all spoke at once, he found it very hard indeed to make out exactly what
they said.
The Eddorian's argument (being disembodied himself) was, that you couldn't
cut off a testicle unless there was a body to cut it off from: that he had
never had to do such a thing before, and he wasn't going to begin now, so
close to feeding time.
The MageJaime's argument was, that anything that had a head had balls (and
quite possibly a rim), and that you weren't to talk nonsense.
The Witch's argument was, that if something wasn't done about it in less
than no time her pom-poms would have everybody executed, all round. (It
was this last remark that had made the whole party look so grave and
anxious.)
Infinity's argument was, that he'd lost them years ago and you couldn't
take them twice.
Blackhawk could think of nothing else to say but 'They belong to the
Wench: you'd better ask her about it.'
'She's in prison,' the Witch said to the Eddorian: 'fetch her here.' And
the Eddorian went off like an arrow. A Neutopian then left to bring the Wench.
The Cat's head began fading away the moment the Neutopian was gone, and,
by the time he had come back with the Wench, it had entirely disappeared;
so the MageJaime and the Neutopian carrying the Eddorian ran wildly up and
down looking for it, while the rest of the party went back to the game.
Next chapter: The Mock Cronan's Story
***
Congratulations!
Blackhawk xxxooo
No animals or misogynists were harmed in the making of this post
[1] excerpt from the poem opening "Alice in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll.
Credits:
Freely adapted from the work of Lewis Carroll.
Many of the things said by aft-s posters shamelessly stolen and used out
of context from their original post. OR WAS IT?
Original material is (c)1999 Open Book Communications, All rights reserved.
Web site
contents are Copyright © Captain Infinity Productions.
All Usenet posts reproduced herein are the copyrighted
intellectual property of the poster named in the "From"
header.