Raising your Podcast: A Guide for the Expectant, Expecting, and Expectorating

Congratulations! If you've found your way to this guide, chances are your ankles are swollen, your appetite for content has increased three fold, and your baby bump has grown resentful toward you for hijacking its social media presence. However, this is not merely a primer for those expecting a little aural miracle. Regardless of your relationship, whether you're planning your first baby shower or a euthanasia sponge bath jamboree, every parent should be acquainted with the critical phases in the life of their podcast. 

Conception - The miracle of birth. Begetting your podcast can be a messy business. Just like a real pregnancy, there are all manner of slimy complications. By this point, the idea of your podcast has been gestating for a solid 20 to 30 minutes. In that time most podcasts reach full maturity in the womb of the mind. Don't fret, however, if your digital dumpling is not yet ready to come to term. Some may incubate for periods as long as four hours before they are fully cooked, so to speak. You should recognize your podcast is ready to breach by a searing pain in your head, hot flashes, and apoplectic fits of self-loathing. If you feel any of these symptoms you should immediately find a cold dark sound studio in which to relax. Throw down some towels and, if possible, have your partner/co-host with you to act as a doula of sorts. Breath deeply and let your podcast find it's preferred orifice from which to emerge. In most cases this is the mouth, but the anus is also a fairly common breach point. Once it has chosen it's exit, you will experience intense pain and milky discharge from that orifice. Do not worry, it will pass once your podcast has emerged. 95% of podcasts will come to term in this fashion without complication. However, in the rare instance of a problem, seek assistance on the internet immediately. You may need a C-section or the help of an experienced audio engineer.

Infancy - With the trauma of birth behind you, you now face the most formative period of your podcast's life. It is crucial that during this stage you provide your progeny with everything it will need to become a high functioning and up standing member of society, that is to say being eminently clickable. Surround your podcast with stimulating influences, such as zany sound effects and gimmick guest stars. Don't be afraid to be experimental with your impressionable little guy. Musical interlude? Why not! Moment of silence for a trite cause? Hell yeah! A gag where you ask a guest to interpret confusing pop lyrics? I guess so! Try messing with the schedule to find what works best you, whether that's every Tuesday and Sunday at 4 A.M., or every quarter. Once you know your routine stick to it! A regular schedule is critical to the development of your podcast.

This can be a notoriously tough time for parents. Your podcast will be growing rapidly and it can be hard to adjust to the changes. Your youngster may become temperamental, wanton, and/or incontinent. This is only natural, though. Grin, bear it, and make sure your podcast's comment section is well supervised. If you're interested in learning more on this phase of development, look into a book on psychoanalysis (I recommend Civilization and Its Content). Whatever Freud whiffed on with human psychology, he nailed with podcasts. Worst case, you'll better understand what the critics mean when they say your spawn is "an anally-fixated hysteric with a death driven castration complex." You should also consider exposing your podcast to a wider audience at this point. Your friends and family have been supportive, but your podcast needs to get out and run. Try going to a meet-up of other parents with young podcasts. Talk to them. Set up a play date or offer to guest star on their show. Socializing your podcast properly is of the utmost importance, especially if you're aiming to get your offspring into one of the more prestigious academies, such as Earwolf or NPR.

Adolescence - By now your ankle-biter should have developed a bit of a sense of self. Maybe it likes eating its own boogers, or uses a catch phrase, or prank calls local minority-owned businesses. You should let your podcast have fun and grow, but don't leave it directionless. Without your guidance, there are a number of pitfalls to which it might fall prey. As a wise man once said, "Idle microphones are the devil's platitude." A hands-off and carefree parent might find their podcast sliding into indolence, or, worse still, taking up with the wrong crowd. If you see your podcast falling in with the likes of any of these plan an intervention immediately: conservative talk radio, politics in general, D-level comedian concept casts, pop culture criticism, Terry Gross, niche niche and niche niche niche nerd topics, sports, inspirational auto fellatio casts, or internet street toughs of any sort. Any of these influences may corrupt your podcast, turning it into a shrill and ungrateful shit. Instead, offer your podcast gently but prodding advice. Don't be afraid to discipline it if it gets unruly. Just remember, if traditional forms of punishment don't work, it is totally acceptable to emotionally manipulate your podcast. Say things like "My love IS conditional." or "I'm not angry, just disappointed...disappointed in the colloquial sense of stomach-churning, boner-killing hatred."

Puberty - Fuck this. Good luck.

College - The fortunate among you have survived puberty and the transition to adulthood without your podcast experiencing an unwanted pregnancy or a developing debilitating personality trait. Regardless of how you've handled parenting up to this point, you're going to have to relinquish some control now, whether that means guest hosts, gratuitous ad spots, or fan requested episodes (shudders). Acknowledge your podcast's independence with a underwhelming and utilitarian gift, like toilet paper or a tire iron. This not only stresses your expectation for them to stand on their own, but also your growing callousness to their misfortune. Many parents feel lonely at this stage, consumed by the emptiness of knowing that the only thing that gave their miserable lives meaning was wiping the ass of their ill conceived rug rat. The more graceful parents will take pride in the growth of their podcast, watching from a distance at it gains followers and perhaps critical acclaim (read scrutiny). No matter where you lie on the spectrum, you should consider finding a hobby for yourself to fill the void. One Gallup poll finds that the parents found extra marital affairs the most fulfilling way to spend their time once their podcast had gone off to college. Test the shame infested waters of adultery and try not to get knocked up with another aural whippersnapper.

Adulthood - The most boring phase. Your podcast has become the petty, uptight bastard you had always feared, a stark and horrible reflection of the blackness in your own soul. In all likelihood, it is set in its career path of destruction, unwilling or unable to change despite feedback from friends and listeners. There's really no hope of changing things now, merely accept what little control you have. If your relationship is friendly, treat it as you would any middle-aged pal. Indulge in a riverboat-themed episode where you talk about car insurance, past foibles, and the bleakness of your respective futures while you both imbibe just a little too much Chardonnay. If, by this point, you've disowned your podcast or been disowned (mutual disowning is also not unheard of), have a go at a reconciliation. Lure it into supposedly neutral territory with the promise of new microphones or a live episode at sidewalk art fair, then hit it with everything you've got. Remember, guilt, as always, is the primary weapon in your arsenal.
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Old Age - The old codger. What a life its had. Chances are by now, most of your podcast's episodes are clips shows or nostalgic drives down memory lane. That's all well and good, just don't let your podcast double park. Despite its obdurate insistence to the contrary, it is most definitely time to urge your podcast toward retirement. This can be a tricky business, many are so inveterate and ornery that they won't listen to you. Try using a megaphone or threaten to move it into a retirement community. If that doesn't work, bring out the big guns. Buy a tombstone and a shovel. Make casual references to the soil types in your backyard and how you've always considered velvet lining a little excessive. Why not just use low thread count sheets? It should get the hint. It is also important to make sure all its affairs are in order. Many podcasts prefer a celebrity to read their living will. Find someone on the cheap or pay a decent impersonator to mollify the old coot. The subjects of funeral and interment can be even more touchy, sending your podcast into a bout of witty banter that is a testament to senility everywhere. Don't be bullied by pathetic attempts to appeal to your sympathy. Stick to your guns and low-ball.

Death - The end of the road. Comfort your podcast in it's dying moments. Remind it how it has led a fulfilling life and brought joy to tens of people on the internet or maybe even a lonely guy in a car. As it reaches the end, try turning down the gain to muffle its death rattle. Put slip covers over its microphones and wish your phonic fogie a tormented afterlife eternally fettered in a digital hell devoid of absolution.

Realidades

Nothing could have been more lascivious. The marketplace teemed with the energy of an ancient agora, vendors flaunting their wares as if prostitutes. Mendicants derelict and deprived of all their humanity clawed at passersby, their reptilian talons and metallic hooks reaching out to snatch unaware souls. The market itself seemed to transform before him, the narrow passages and causeways turning back on themselves without creating a loop, an ever expanding network of veins that never returned to the heart. Did they even begin there? It was a psychomanteum constructed either by a mad genius or school of possessed children. Borgaucho gripped the rail. From his vantage above the market he was safe, but he knew he could not remain there. He had errands to run, vegetables to purchase for a paella he would be making later that night, a dish to stoke the fires of a blossoming affair. He collected himself and cautiously made his way to the market.

Sifting through the endless menagerie of goods, he kept his gaze down toward his feet fearful lest he provoke the ire of an overzealous salesmen, or worse a colleague from the newspaper. Souls flew about him fitfully, forgotten and imprisoned in this labyrinth. He must be quick or he might end up like them. Borgaucho
stopped at a vegetable stand and examined the goods (term). Collectively, the assembled veggies told a gruesome tale of life. Some were young and vibrant, yet cried out in pain, stripped from their homes and bewailing their fate. Others were old, decrepit and diseased, moaning as they slid into liquid putrefaction.
Borgaucho hesitated here. The wrong choice could be disastrous. An ill-curated vegetable could wreck his meal, like hiring a deranged captain for a exploratory voyage. His hand hovered over a certain yucca root.

He stared at the thing. It was strange, the textures seemed more vibrant and violent than the other produce. He gasped. The root rippled with anticipation and from its cracked brown exterior pearlescent eyes appeared and the sliver of a mouth. It spoke to him, "Borgaucho, I am Gneb-Thoff, sorcerer king to an ancient people. A demon destroyed our civilization, but I transferred my life force into the earth. I have lived thousands of years waiting for this moment to find you. With your help I can...Wait! Where are you going?!" Borgaucho had grabbed two tomatoes, threw his currency at the proprietor, and left. He knew better than to
trust a talking yucca.

The journey home was perilous. He thought himself a more timid Ulysses, avoiding danger not through sharpness of mind or might, but fleetness of foot. Sirens, monsters, tricksters, and thugs all waited for him to slip up. Through shadow into light then back to shadow as the situation dictated, Borgaucho made his way
harried by unknown forces. Returning home, he slammed the door behind him. He pressed his back up against the wood as if to brace the entryway. He had survived another outing, but how long before he must venture forth again?

He trudged to the kitchen and set down his tomatoes. A newspaper fluttered on his desk, animated, possibly, by the spirit of a restless soul. He flinched as he picked it up and help it as far from his person
as his eyes would allow to see. Saturday May 17, 1958! Eight days had lapsed without his knowledge. He had missed his date, but where had he been?! Borgaucho felt his pulse. It was irregular, alternating long and short in elaborate sequence. Perhaps he had been drugged? He imagined his consciousness adrift in a fugue those eight days. No, it couldn't be. His blood pumped with meaning as if he were a carrier, some unaware host. A code! But sent by whom and containing what information? He needed a cipher.

Thank goodness he was a certified amateur cryptographer. He rushed to his code breaking kit. Scribbling out the intricate code as he felt he pulse, Borgaucho began to see. The code appeared a conversation, two different voices conspiring in an inhuman tongue. Whether demons conspiring or para-dimensional teenagers being homophobic, he could not be sure. It was indecipherable. Changing tactics, he entered the library of his memory in an attempt to recall when this might have befallen him. Stacks upon stacks wending about led him deeper and deeper until he came upon a geodesic dome of tomes. He stepped in and plucked a book from the structure...one of his more repressed high school memories. Quickly he put it back. It was then he decided to leave the library dwelling upon the tired maxim of the fallibility of memory, that and the librarian had demanded he depart for being too loud.

Borgaucho came to lying face up on his half twin mattress. He reasoned that no succubus could share a bed so small, thus he endured restive nights on his over-sized crib. The ceiling fan whirred above him, the blades creating in their wake a strange ripple. Borgaucho strained his eyes. Between the blades he saw another world horrible and fantastic: creatures abounding in vestigial limbs limping about and arraigning their ineffectual members in wretched boutiques, cityscapes built downward into nacreous sediment, the structures constantly shifting, collapsing, bringing ignominious death to their denizens. In disgust he stared as the extra-dimensional equivalent of Little Italy was subsumed in a structural swoon.

He shook his head. Why were all the alternate realities to which he was privy filled with monsters, idiots, and journalists? This was getting tiresome. Borgaucho stood up and rubbed the crust from his eyes. The flakes spiraled down and landed on his arm. Each fleck bloomed into a flower and then withered in decay, leaving
a putrefied dot on his flesh. He took no heed and made his way to the kitchen. Among the rotting victuals he choose to make his paella anyway, just in case his date should arrive. He laid out the tomatoes from the market and produced a kitchen knife. What once had been a steel now was stone, the cutlass itself less of a knife and more epee inscribed with symbols. It was terrible for cutting really, but he had no choice. With tremendous effort he diced the tomatoes. As if infused by the vivifying blood of the fruit, the blade gleamed and hummed with a near inaudible incantation. It seemed an ancient artifact of untold power. Perhaps
if he could steal it secrets, he might become master to powers beyond even death. There was no time, however. The muscles had to be boiled. He tossed the relic aside and continued with his preparations.

When the meal was finally cooked after a phantasmagoria of distractions, he set it down proudly on the table. Borgaucho sighed with relief. He had managed to avoid the wrath of an gluttonous spirit while cooking by pawning him off on a parasitic colony of sprites housed in a green bean. Now, in peace,
he could enjoy his meal regardless of whether his date would show up or not. He sat and sank his fork into the paella. Just then his plate shook, rippling with some harmonic force. His taste buds wept as the paella separated itself into its distinct ingredients, each neatly delineated in spherical mounds around his plate. There was a rapping at his door. What now, he thought. The wooden door burst apart, splinters careening every which way and sticking into the walls of his apartment. A burly red-gray demon stood in the doorway panting. Its eight pairs of tits drooped nearly to its ankles. Slowly in lumbered the demon over to Borgaucho. It plopped down into the chair across from him. "How many times do I have to tell you acolytes that I always prefer cookies to paella for my summoning ritual?!" Borgaucho sighed. He handed the monstrosity a fork.

A Life Among the Pod People

Kristen brushed the hair from her glasses and picked up her phone. She held her thumb taught over the keypad. "This is my confession. I've chosen you because, even though you are one of them, you understand me best, as well as any pod person has known someone who is not of their ilk. 

First of all, I would like to apologize to you. Since our meeting three years ago in the company storage closet, I have not been truthful about my identity. Our entire relationship has been a deception. That time I told you my antagial sack was irritated and frothing - that was a lie. I don't actually have one. When Ted groped my spore duct at the company Christmas party? I made that up, though he did graze my left boob. Not everything I have told you is a calumny, however. You are my friend and I trusted in your confidence. The laid back woman who gushes over Bertrand Russel and has a near fetish for bald men that is who I am. All those jokes about my pod brood mother, how she knit an apology quilt for her dog, Ret Butler, after she accused it of feigning Munchhausen Syndrome? That happened, she was just a human woman, not a pod person. I also lied about the breed. I told you it was a Boxer mix, but really it was an Italian Greyhound.

I'm am sorry that I have deceived you, and even more so if this knowledge pains you in anyway. Know that I did so only out of self-preservation and not any ill will against you. 

For five long years I have lived among your people, watching as you slowly extirpate the few remaining humans. Honestly, I'm not mad about it. Humanity kind of sucked. The world we made for ourselves was too comfortable and depressed for revolution. We were all coasting, waiting expectantly for a job we might hate slightly less than our current one or death, whichever came first. I'm not well acquainted with the great political theorists of pod person literature, but did your Debord or Marx ever predict the Fleshlight? I feel like our guys really dropped the ball there. 

I must say that life among your kind has been kinder than among my own. Though you were able to mask your invasion, assimilating our customs and culture near seamlessly before we had a chance to mount a response, I see through the veneer now. You keep up appearances beautifully, like a meek husband tidily 

covering up the evidence of his wife's torrid affair(s) lest he have a psychotic break. You mimic violence both physical and emotional. There is no force behind the punches during one of your preordained bar brawls, and all your internet trolling is qualified or equivocated. Even the wars you stage, though grand, have all the brutality of a children's book, the predetermined losers happily laying down in a feigned death. I imagine the the demand for blanks has sky rocketed. 

I'm telling you this, Brian, not out of guilt or loneliness, but out of pure confusion and a desire to understand. Your plan was masterful and brilliant. You took over the world without rousing even the most paranoid right wing conspiracy theorist from his bunker. A friend of mine was pontificating to me how Alan Greenspan

and the United Reptoid Savings Bank were up to something nefarious not days before he was turned into a pod person. All that I get. World domination is a timeless dream. But to assume mastery of the earth and then keep things exactly the same?! It sounds more like a fetish than a plot. Are all you pod people just in a perpetual state of climax as you mimic human life? It's like you are a society of tantric method actors and historical reenactors collectively refusing to break character.

Again, it's not really a big deal, as life is generally more pleasant than it ever was, but I am still flummoxed. Now that every human has been replaced by a pod person, why keep up the shit-stained facade? Who is it for that so many of your kind have assumed the trite and terrible lives of the humans before you? Have you no sympathy for the pod children pretending to be pod Sarah Palin's kids? You haven't even brought any new cool foods or technologies. I assumed I would get to enjoy pod foodie culture or pod social media, and instead I get the same old boring shit. Pod shame on you, Brian. Pod shame. 

Welp, I guess that's it. I would ask you to not turn me into a pod person, but I know you are incapable of that, being not much more than a bedazzled cog in the machine. I'm not trying to be a bitch here. You have more personality than any pod person I've ever met. Those Tibetan prayer flags strung from your scanner to the picture of Celine Dion on your desk are a nice touch. Hideous maybe, but they do belie some semblance of personality. Anyway, thanks for listening, Brian. I hope pod Kristen is just as much a friend to you as human Kristen."

Kristen quivered with expectation. She stared at her phone, watched it dim and fade to black from inactivity. She had not been this honest in years and the confession flooded her with adrenaline. Her sins laid bare before a hive-minded alien priest, but was he Catholic? The phone buzzed in her hand. It was Brian. 

"I'm not a pod person, but I am going to report you to HR for calling my flags hideous. Also, please desist from eating all the almonds from the dish on my desk." 

Dostoyevsky's Tour Rider

Dear Comrade,

I am very much honored to lecture at your pristine institution. However, there are certain demands you must meet before I, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, will come. Please see to it that my dressing room is stocked with the following provisions:

3 loafs of black bread

1 withered grape

1 murder weapon in an unsolved case (preferably ax) 

10 mourning widows

3 family heirlooms that have caused strife and the ultimate dissolution of those families

2 stolid, unloving fathers

1 dram of poison 

1 box of cherished trinkets of deceased loved ones (mixed)

20 bureaucrats

15 despairing epistles

2 dusty windows to the soul

1 scathing review of Tolstoy

Spasibo,

Dotty

The Society of the Red Hand

She imagined an invisible arm reaching up, thousands really, from the depths all at the beck and call of their unseen masters. There was a harmony to it, a silent symphony of sickening conspiracy. She waited, watched as the limb rose, slithering it's way into the yellow box aside the stoplight pole. Then, out of that infinite blackness, it appeared. Five points gleaming in a deep malevolent red, the wrist of free will severed at it's base. Stop. Cede control. At its injunction, the world around her froze: pedestrians, cars, time itself. Obsequiously they all watched, cowed and attentive, but unthinking. Slaves, Terra thought, and they don't even realize it. She mapped the shape of the thing. Four fingers like knives held aloft above her head, dangling, impending, ready to impute death upon the disobedient. A red thumb held out sideways to be turned up or down, menacing judgement, and, worst of all, the wrist, vivisected yet without hemorrhage, floating amid the blackness. No veins, no knuckles, no nails, only red.

Terra warily groped for the shutter button on her camera. Click. As if anticipating this, the hand disappeared, only to reappear the next moment. Click. She missed again. Click, click, click! Nothing. Blackness. The hand blinked out of existence, replaced by the white silhouette of a man. Time resumed and the flow of the world went along as if nothing had happened. Terra knew though. She saw what all these miserable sheeple did not. She would not be thwarted. She had time, and even if that meant she had to wait until the dead of night she would take a picture of the red hand. Click. 

After sunset, Terra had the image she desired. She tore the eviction notice off her door and kicked it in. Rats scattered, as did her live-in boyfriend, Jeff, who rushed to his desk to seem as if he had been writing instead of playing video games. She noticed none of this, her mind too focused on the evidence burning in her camera. She strode into the kitchen, which doubled as a makeshift darkroom. With care and craze, she developed her photos. Another set of smoking guns to compliment her growing collection. She took the photos into her conspiracy room, once Jeff's office, and taped them to the walls in deliberate sequence, one intelligible only to its artificer. The sprawl of conspiracy. A jumbled concatenation of string, newspaper clippings, and pictures all under the aegis of Evidence, the one and only god in Terra's pantheon. She stood back and admired her work, if only to immerse herself more in the mystery of it.

Clues spun around Terra, sirens drawing her to a plot from which she knew "they" would never let her return. No matter where one went, evidence of this vast conspiracy pervaded, hung about like a miasma on the world. Terra had scoured the earth and found refuge nowhere. The Red Hand was an omniscient master. Despite the foreboding it drew out of her, Terra knew she could not dwell upon the symbol alone. It could only explain so much. No, she must seek those behind the hand, whoever they may be. She had collected enough evidence to know it was a global conspiracy, a group of persons bent on directing the course of history as if it were a rat in a maze. The Society of the Red Hand they were called. But to what end, for what purpose she could not determine. Terra screamed in frustration. Jeff ran in. "Sorry, I swear I'm going to wash the dishes in five minutes. I'll even rub your feet afterwards!" Jeff was sweet, but way off the mark as usual. She told him not to worry and to just leave her in peace. Slumping into her chair, Terra scanned the wall looking for a connection.

Misfortune became her partner, the only man willing to follow her to hell, but one of many willing to lead her there. Ever since she had actively begun collecting evidence against the Red Hand her life had known little but adversity: she lost her job, her car, even her electric kettle. Slowly they would unravel her as she unraveled the truth. For some time now they had been showing, however subtly, the extent of their malevolent influence. What else could explain the unclogable blockage in their sink or the dripping red hand print left on her bedroom door? The society of the Red Hand was behind this. They were trying to intimidate her.

The next few months were a misery parfait for Terra, the fingers of the Red Hand layering topping after topping of sorrow upon the sour froyo of her life. Disaster befell disaster, while Jeff enjoyed a period of unprecedented success, flourishing as he never had before. It was as if, in a master stroke of life destruction, the Red Hand was promoting Jeff to accentuate Terra's growing frustrations. She watched in the dark as Jeff rose to tumblr stardom. 1,000 followers in a week was unheard of, especially for a novelty tumblr dedicated to the identity politics of experimental dog breeds.

It had to stop. No amount of digging could seem to draw the Society of the Red Hand out into the light, so, Terra reckoned, she would have to meet them in the darkness. Packing up a survival kit including Luna Bars, a yoga mat, a gps tracker, hydrocortizone cream, crystal body deodorant, and go pro, Terra absconded in the middle of the night. She kissed her slumbering boyfriend on the forehead and slipped out the front door. There in the dead of night at the corner of Flushing and Knickerbocker she waited. In a brazen display of power, the Red Hand showed itself to her, full of red hate and demanding subservience. She would not bow to it. Boldly, she placed one foot in front of the other in an act of defiance not seen since Gandhi turned down that mimosa at the inaugural UN Brunch.

Her crossing took what felt like an eternity, the black asphalt devolving back into tar as Terra made her way. Each step grew heavier, more enmeshed in the mire of conspiracy. Finally, and seemingly much more burdened than she set out, she stood beneath the Red Hand. A chill rippled through the air, and in dread Terra looked about the deserted intersection. She watched terrified as the street lights and lamps from down the road flickered in sequence into darkness. The wave of rolling blackness swept over her and she felt a coarse bag slip over her head and tighten around her neck. Hands clasped her by the elbows and biceps. Thrown into and idling van, Terra kicked wildly, her flailing legs crashed upon soft bodies to no avail. She was held down against the corrugated plastic floor whose ridges she gripped with terror. Her screams were only silenced by that peculiar sensation of a needle pressed softly to the skin and slide within. As her senses left her, Terra mused that this drug cocktail was rather pleasant but for the kidnapping. She ought to ask for a recipe when and if she woke up.

Terra's senses returned to her slowly. First, taste, something cold, metallic, and acrid taped into her mouth. Then touch, her fettered arms and legs writhing atop an uneven plane. She noted a declivity from her head to her butt, as well as ridges under her splayed out arms. Finally, her senses of sight and sound reawakened. Though blindfolded, she perceived a deep red light that filled the room and an untraceable hum; the sound and the light seemed indistinguishable, as if somehow sharing sharing the same frequency. Then marching, chanting, and clapping. It sounded as if a very grave pep rally, a Willy Wonka-esque funeral dirge. In single file, the footsteps circled Terra. She was enveloped and eclipsed by their incantation. All of the sudden it stopped, and the blindfold was whisked off her face.

Around her stood a circle of humans sporting red onesies and transparent red visors. To Terra they looked like card dealers at a menstruation themed casino. She craned her neck to see them, to take in their faces so she might direct all the nebulous hate within her that had been building since she began her investigation. These were the faces of conspiracy! Flabby, middle-aged, tired, as if this was some white collar job that didn't provide healthcare. Above her, dangling from the ceiling, hung a gigantic red hand. Her observation was cut short, however, by the approach of a hooded figure. It stepped forward and flipped back its hood. "JEFF?!" Yes, it was indeed him, Jeff, Terra's rock, the man who had regularly cooked her meals that were too spicy despite her protests. He was a man with about as much agency as a goldfish. "Yes, Terra, I'm sorry it had to come to this, but you had to keep pushing. Had to keep asking questions. I tried to protect you, but even I, Jeff, Grand Pinkie of the Red Hand, can only do so much."

She was disgusted with him. "Whatever, just give me back my Luna Bars, let me go, and tell me what kind of nefarious plot the Society of the Red Hand is up to and I won't kick you out of the apartment." Jeff mashed his lips together and looked down at his feet, a clear tell he was deep in thought and feeling ambivalent. He leaned into one of his co-conspirators and whispered something. This set off a sort of telephone style change reaction of hushed speaking around the group. The murmur made it's way back to Jeff where it stopped. "I'm sorry, but all I can offer you is a half-eaten Nature's Valley bar." Terra scoffed, "Fine, I'll settle for knowing why. Why? Why all of this? What is your purpose?" Jeff scuffed the floor and sighed.

"Honestly, that's a bit of a toughie..." Jeff went on to explain the protracted history of The Society of the Red Hand, including its foundation myth (a strange anecdote about an ancient Sumerian queen who loved finger painting), its influence throughout history (they were proud of their association with Oliver Cromwell, but not so much of their involvement in noted 90's super group Temple of the Dog), and its power today (they owned several Starbucks). Huffing from such verbosity, he continued. "That said, no one can exactly remember...why." With well worn shame he gestured to the room around them. "Wait, what the fuck are you saying?!" "I mean, yeah, sure, we operate a vast secret society. We kidnap people, we try to change the course of world events, and we have these really fun corporate luncheons once a month. But if you ask me or anyone else why, we couldn't tell you. We've just been doing it for so long." Terra slammed her chains against their bindings. "So, there's no end game? No agenda? You do it just to do it?!"

Jeff was embarrassed. "Kind of. Yeah. I mean, Joni over there has some pretty good ideas at our board meetings." Jeff pointed to a slender woman across the circle from him. She waved back and he smiled. Terra's face twitched. "Oh my god, you have a crush on her!" "No! She...she's just really good at her job. She's behind our mission to micro dose Tailor Swift's virgin long island ice teas with snake venom." Everyone applauded. Despite her jealousy, Terra was mildly reassured that Jeff at least didn't have a crush on a horrible girl.

"I can't believe I dedicated my life to finding this out. All that pain and paranoia. I threw my life away to find the Red Hand. Do you have any idea how hard it was to be stripped of my honorary title of spiritual adviser at the yoga studio?!" Terra wept. In her search, she had found a passion she had thought lost. She had a crusader's soul, chaste, driven, and obnoxiously righteous. She was willing to give up anything in pursuit of her goal, and she had. But now, confronted with this bathos, the utter purposelessness of the secret society she had imbued with such purpose, she felt empty. She longed for her former life, but she craved that solitary burning purpose like an addiction.

Consumed by self-destructive thoughts, like of drinking and moving back to Florida, Terra sniffled. "Can you just let me go now? You've won. I submit. I'll stop for the red hand at crossing signs or whatever it is you want me to do." Terra had never felt so defeated as she looked out across this ring of dopey acolytes. Her gaze fell on Jeff who shook his head solemnly. "I'm afraid not. As the expression goes 'you know too much'."
The assembled members of the Red Hand chanted "Know too much! Know too much!" "You have two options, Terra. You may join us, or you may die." Terra stared at him and then let her neck fall back so her head rested against the plane to which she was bound. She looked up at the red hand above her. It did not appear the same. All of its sharpness and menace gone, even its red seemed faded. The hand itself looked bloated, not the disembodied appendage of a censorious autocrat, but that of an effeminate alcoholic uncle.

"Fine." Terra huffed. Everyone cheered. Jeff raised his hand and silenced his co-conspirators. "Somebody get this woman a onesie!" 

Skanking with the Stars

Passing in between the twin stars of a solar system unknown to us, the creatures in the hold clamored for freedom. Many were violent with rage, though most had fallen into despondency, some having been there for centuries. Others, beings with shorter lifespans, had never known life outside the the vessel. Generation upon generation spawned in its metallic depths. Like a semi-conscious drunk tossed into a cab, these assembled beings knew not where they were headed.

As the ship hurtled onward through the universe as if powered by a science fiction cliche, the ska band Fruit on my Boots set up for their fourth official show. Of course, they had played many more than four shows, but Brian, their cocky lead singer with an eye toward marketing, thought to rebrand them as a newer, hipper act. For him all those performances in front of their moms did not count. Neither did that time when they played in the TCBY parking lot. That was for charity, even though they received two scoops of ice cream as compensation. His vision for the band extended far beyond the myopic desires of his bandmates (which, generally speaking, were cute girls and drink tickets for virgin pina coladas). They were merely a means to an end, instruments in constructing an otherworldly persona that would dominate pop culture for years to come, a sort of Drake meets Kenny G with hints of Ciara. From the lofty perch of his bass amp, Brian looked on his bandmates with disdain. He watched as Kristen, ostensibly the coolest member as she had been in multiple bands and was the only one of legal age to drink, flirted with some dudes. She had gotten them this show, in part by blackmailing the owner of the bar. Kristen had "seen things" a fact which everyone knew and dared not test. 

The trumpeter, Will, a meek sixteen year old with a dirt stache, busied himself with the set design. The checkered backdrop and checkered carpet had to be immaculate. With an attention detail befitting a psychotic, Will placed fruits on the floor strategically so at points during the show they could stomp on them. This, he thought, was the sort of Gallagher-esque type of high concept performance that would win them acclaim. As such, he had spent weeks curating his fruit choices, carefully weighing the philosophical merits of each. The deliberation was historic, a veritable Congress of Vienna, but after much acrimony Will had chosen bananas, tomatoes, and star fruits as his props. He figured that even if this band never took off, he could always make a career in set design. Alongside Will were Jessica and Kyle, the drummer and lead guitarist respectively. Together they spoke with a reporter from their high school newspaper, the The Sack, so deemed for its gallimaufry of topics. When questioned about whether the band name Fruit on my Boots was, in fact, a derogatory reference to violence against homosexuals, the two fell silent. Luckily, Brian was there to answer for them. Fruit on my Boots, he interrupted, was nothing more than an inside joke between his friends. Someone, who shall remain nameless to protect their identity, once stepped on a grape and started crying. They never let the poor bastard live it down and to this day they filled their awkward teenage silences with references to that hilarious inciting incident.

After a three and a half hour sound check, which the sound guy declared "entirely unprofessional and wildly unbecoming of any ska act", Fruit on my Boots was ready to take the stage. The crowd was sparse but eager, populated, largely, by friends of the band, other bands performing later, and some townies, most notable among them Reggie, the celebrated drunk. With mild fan fair, each member assumed their instrument and began their set. They opened with Reenage Tockstar an autobiographical, if entirely false, summation of their band history. Diving further into their own vanity, their next song was Backseat Banging, an ode to their collective sexual experiences which amounted to little more than fumbling with bra straps and chipped teeth from overly aggressive make outs. The crowd went wild in the sense that they stood very still and listened patiently, endured even. By this point, Brian was getting restless. The owner threw up his hands with his fingers spread out, indicating that they only had ten minutes left on stage. Brian huddled his band on stage just as they were about to being their next song. It was imperative that they reel the crowd in now! To heck with the set list! If Fruit on my Boots was ever going to make it big they needed to take their shot. With the audacity of some guy in a movie that really doesn't give a damn what other people think, Brian suggested they play their rocking-est song, Magnolia in Bloom, which was supposed to be their closer. They assented and Brian kicked it off with a bass solo that was, quite frankly, at least ten degrees above and beyond bitching. The energy in the room was palpable. It seemed to hum with the raw force of ska.

This was it, thought Brian. No doubt some big shot music industry type was disguised in the crowd as a tween, looking for the next big thing and Fruit on my Boots was undeniably it. No one could resist the sensuous horn blasts and sleek riffs of Magnolia in Bloom. Even if a human theoretically could, no one, assuredly, would be immune to the lyrical foreplay of the song. Fruit on my Boots was about to get laid, metaphorically speaking. All they had to do at this point was roll the condom down over the cock of the music industry, which was really just a formality at this point. People in the crowd began to look around at one another in pure amazement. Fruit on my Boots was clicking like never before. It was electric. Brian even thought he might break into a second bass solo. A bit baroque perhaps, but was it really up to him, a mere mortal, to deprive the people of literal bass nectar? All this, unfortunately, was a vastly incorrect and perhaps willfully ignorant interpretation of what was happening at the show that night.

A young boy with frosted tips and braces stepped toward the stage clapping and stomping to the rhythm. Fruit on my Boots perceived their first superfan. In a sense he was. The boy suddenly jammed his fingers into his own throat and with one great upward motion tore his face off. He swung the rent flesh above his head and tossed it onto the stage as if it were a bra. The pimply visage floated down onto the crash cymbal. Behind the flesh was an inhuman form. The head was spherical, almost perfectly so, and arranged symmetrically with tiny slits, each filled with a pinkish goo, both laterally and vertically around the sphere. It held out its hand and twisted a strange device around its left index finger. Instantaneously, the band and the creature were encapsulated in a faint blue light. The ambient energy that bristled throughout the bar all night increased ten fold, being not the awesome power of ska but rather strange vibrations of an unknown origin. Fruit on my Boots, their instruments, and the creature all dematerialized before the eyes of the crowd. Nothing was left. They roared with applause.

As if on the last leg of a drug addled super tour, Fruit on my Boots found themselves on stage once more but without any clue as to how they got there. The room was painted in a checker board print and bare but for an dual trumpet and checkered tie rack. They looked around at one another befuddled and befogged, and then forward, out through a wide portal that was translucent but bristled with static every few moments. They watched as two creatures interacted on the other side of the portal. They did not comprehend their language, but having argued over how to split their meager cover proceeds before, they understood well enough the gist of what was happening. One creature, a small, squat, and toadish thing, extended a tentacle and placed into the hand of the tween superfan a small sack. It nodded obsequiously and walked off.

The toad creature then turned to Fruit on my Boots and approached the portal. He rested his tentacle against it, clearly supporting himself against the surface as his body inclined forward slightly. "You are here because you are the last of your kind. Something you share with all the other beings aboard this vessel. I have brought you here to preserve you and your memory for the knowledge of the universe." The toad alien intoned with great reverence for himself. Will raised his hand. "Yes, you with trumpet and checkered pocket square." He was incredulous. There was no possible way Fruit on my Boots could be the last ska band on earth. The toad alien explained them that they indeed were. Kristen asked what would happen if some other youngsters decided to form a ska band at some point in the future. The toad alien assured them that would never happen. "You will live the rest of your lives in this enclosure playing ska until your deaths. At such point you will either be cloned and your clones will be taught the ways of ska, or" the alien hesitated, "you will be asked to reproduce, thus creating a new generation of ska-dom." Will and Brian high-fived. Kristen puked.

The gaze of each member of Fruit on my Boots drifted to the floor, drawn down by the weight of the realization that this was their eternal, checkered prison. The toad alien rubbed his tentacles together in delight. "If you have any questions feel free to scream incessantly. A robot stewardess comes round several times a day and will try to accommodate your needs. Also, I've stocked your environment with several copies of No Exit by your earth author Sartre. If you like, I can get him to sign a copy for you just as long as he isn't feeling too cranky." With all his tentacles at once, the toad alien waved goodbye and sauntered off down, from what Fruit on my Boots could tell, was an endless corridor of similar portals filled with rare and extinct creatures. Forlorn and distraught, Will played the military taps, an adequate approximation of the group's mood. Kristen sat on her trombone. Kyle restrung his guitar as if he were braiding dreads into his own decapitated head.

"Hey! Heyyyyyy!" A greasy alien whose mass appeared mostly to be composed of coarse yellow hair attempted to get their attention. His cell was directly across from theirs. "I dig your sound. Kind of a Juriptoka meets Ceeeeelgut. You guys would be a hit on Fragatel. Hell, I would sign you up for tour right now if it weren't for...well, you know." He gestured to the ship in which they were all incarcerated. Brian's eyes lit up. This was exactly the break they were looking for. He corralled the band. Now was not the time to brood about certain the impending eternity of their hellish captivity. Now was the time, if there ever were one, to skank. With the grace of drunken teenage Scotsman, Brian produced a black and white checkered kilt from his bass case and clasped it on to his hips. He pointed to Jessica who began to tap out their, as of yet, never performed live power ballad "Kiss Me Skankly". Their horns blared. Bending toward a new destination on the rumor of some dying species in a distant galaxy, the ship seemed to skank through space.

A Dark-ish Passage

The America highway system is an ocean, a diverse and violent ecosystem supporting all walks of life from PT Cruisers to vegetable oil powered crust punk VW buses. There is a delicate balance here, one that can only be adequately captured by the mellifluous grunting of David Attenborough. So when my friends decided to travel cross country on a road trip, I knew we wouldn't be returning as we had left, if we should return at all. First among us, our leader, our captain, was Mila. Beautiful and trenchant with hair so long you could sit on it. She was at one and the same too much in her senses for Twitter and yet too little in them for Tumblr. Her gaze was cold and she had about her a certain fixation, not unlike the obsessive mania of a meth user, that compelled her through a given task. In the absence of any protest, there were only mild complaints about the regularity of bathroom breaks, Mila was the exceptionally prickly glue that held our group together. Unfortunately, no matter how much you sniffed her, you would never get high.

Next in the totem pole was Alex. A longish, leanish, lamish young Atlantian, not unnameable, on certain sides, to this classification. He would brook no interruption to the inner machinations of his mind, but for communiques with Brook, his girlfriend, with whom, in the sometimes pathetic sometimes triumphant way the sick learn to live with their disease, he cohabitated. She did not approve of this voyage, seeing it a world of temptation for her man. Sexy hitchhiker sirens and lusty motel tramps waiting to pounce on the bristling desires of a nice young Jewish boy cooped up with gentiles for 18 hours a day. After him was Rachel, visibly absentminded and irregularly clever. The progenitor of wantonness for the crew, always exhorting the recreational use of substances and the substantial use of recreation. When distressed, Rachel would cycle through a series of ticks ranging from benign to vile. To the displeasure of her compatriots, driving was one of her great anxieties.

Last among us was me, the silent helmsman. I have no idea why I was tasked with this job, as I have the sense of direction of a worm that has just bored through peyote. Nevertheless, I sat calmly behind, or rather underneath, the wheel in a constant row with myself about the direction we were headed. We had just left the Natural Bridge, one of nature's more impressive holes, and were on our way to Colonial Williamsburg. The running joke among us was that this place was an experiment in what would happen if hipsters had been the original European colonists. We mused that it would largely have been the same, but Native American fashion would have been appropriated much faster. In my mind, colonialism seemed the ironically cool dad to the irreverent son of gentrification.

Stricken by a bout of hunger, however, we decided to stop at a roadside fast food establishment (I say establishment because restaurant seems disingenuous). Though limited, the options presented to us were strangely divisive, inciting a contentious debate about the value of each food place. Much was said, things that, without embellishment, shook the foundation of our friendship and called into question our respective humanity. Mila declared Bojangles "facile and iniquitous", which seemed like a low blow, especially from someone championing the merits of Subway. Meanwhile, Alex, who had been very reticent up to this point, laid at our feet an ultimatum. Due to some un-explicated childhood trauma, he would rather walk home than set foot in Wendy's. I veered off the highway with this miniature House of Commons in tow.

After much acrimony, we decided to go to Bojangles. Biscuits proved our saving grace. I parked the car and like some touring K pop group, dressed to the twos and moving in synchronous geometric formation, we entered. There is no place quite like the middle-of-nowhere, roadside fast food establishment. It's physical attributes are disturbing: oddly eroded and stained with little evidence of human habitation, filled with non euclidean plastic furniture that looks more like torture devices meant to induce stress positions than to accommodate the human ass, long, winding queues that have never been filled but are demarcated by bright and hideous railings. All this wrapped in the a box of corporate architecture that somehow resembles the to-go bags of the chain. This is all ancillary to the temporal effect of the place. It seems a lost and forgotten realm, abandoned by time itself. The experience of it is akin to time dilation where those under the influence of, say, a roadside Arby's, watch time outside of its confines slow down as they themselves age more rapidly. Of course, the inverse may happen as well with time accelerating in the outside world and time within grinding to a halt, preserving those souls in a temporal formaldehyde. Were a given Star Trek crew every transported into one of these places, they would within minutes be ensconced in its mystery, searching, no doubt, for chronoton particles and answers.

Upon entering, I felt the dread of the entire trip grip me. Perhaps it was the fluorescent lights or the mumbling drifter erecting a makeshift dwelling in one of the booths, I couldn't be certain. Regardless, I felt the overwhelming urge to flee. While my friends ordered, I trotted to the bathroom in an attempt to deal with my emotions. I went in and tip toed across the brown tiled floor. The murky mirror reflected my blood shot eyes back at me and a sonorous stream of piss resonated from the solitary stall. As I contemplated, a man emerged from the stall, a grizzled fellow with a glint of glintiness in his eye. He wore a surgical mask and latex gloves, which, although probably not the worst idea in this cesspool, seemed quite odd to me. I stepped aside and granted the man access to the sink. He removed his gloves and methodically washed his hands before turning to face me. "Another satisfied customer." At first I thought he was talking about the toilet in which he relieved himself, but then, to my astonishment, another man emerged from the stall. His face was wrapped in toilet paper and he had the distinctive grin of someone whose flesh had just been lacerated. He gave his stall mate a warm and approving thumbs up before sauntering out of the bathroom.

Their exchange was disquieting to me, not in the least bit because, despite my better instincts, I could not help but imagine the what really had taken place in that Bojangles stall. Some intersection of gay sex, body modification, world weariness, and cajun fries presumably. My fears, however, were quickly allayed. "My urinal side manner is telling me I have a patient in distress." This was addressed to me. Apparently, the man was a wandering plastic surgeon, barred from the American Medical Association years earlier for allegedly grafting a half dead cat onto the back of her loving and obsessed cat mother. The operation was a success, but the cat sued for damages, bankrupting Fred in the process and forcing him into this itinerant lifestyle. Fred confessed to me that it wasn't all bad, though. He was no longer beholden to the rules and "ethics" of such trite and self-important institutions as the Hippocratic Oath. He could now pursue his passion which, seemingly, was pro bono cosmetic surgery to insecure, and often pee shy, restroom goers the nation over. My interest evidently piqued, Fred showed me his portfolio, a black binder filled with his greatest triumphs: face grafts of unimaginable complexity and questionable taste, experimental collagen injections, face lifts, butt lifts, nipple drops, eye brow reversals, and even some crude tattoo work. It occurred to me then that, much like an aging trophy wife, my salvation would come through plastic surgery.

I texted Mila. "Huge bowel movement. Eat without me. I'll get something to-go." Fred nodded at me knowingly and ushered me to his operating room, the fetid bathroom stall. He rigged the toilet seat to recline like a dentist chair so that I might have some modicum of comfort while he tore off my face. "Any requests?" He was referring to what face I might want. "I have some wonderful One Direction visages. They're very in this season." "Surprise me" I said. Fred winked and wiped out a small radio. He turned on NPR and giggled with glee when he realized "Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me!" was playing. Together, we listened intently and just as I was about to answer a question about the sexual orientation of Obama's dogs, Fred blew a cloud of ketamine into my face. Almost immediately, I blacked out.

I awoke with a start, my face wrapped in toilet paper and bleeding from a new series of orifices. Fred stood over me, admiring his work. "You're going to want to put some ice on that when you get a chance, and some Gold Bond." "For my face?" "No, for your balls. I had some leftover skin, so I threw in a little something extra. Compliments of the house. It's damn fine work, if I do say so myself." I shook Fred's hand in gratitude and clambered off the toilet. He smiled and nodded once at me as I left the bathroom. The world felt new, everything seemed different. Even my gait, which before was a kind of club footed electric slide, changed into a flamboyant geriatric shuffle. I passed my friends who were gabbing and eating at a table. Rachel was building a siege tower out of french fries and Alex lamented the loss of high browbeating someone into reading the New Yorker. In stride, I espied them and walked out of that Bojangles. I knew I would not see them again. As I approached the road, I thought of my new life, what mysteries and sorrows it might contain. I did not know. I just hoped Fred had made my face look like Jeff Goldblum.

Spiced

EXT. Arrakis - Desert - Day

Sand spirals across a flat and empty desert. TROY, our hero, rises over a sand dune. He removes the moisture synthesizer from his face and wipes the sweat off his brow. He reaches down and tugs at his side, removing a hip flask from his stillsuit. Feverishly, he uncorks the flask and tips it back. A transpledent stream falls into his mouth.

Troy smiles with refreshment, but suddenly his face cringes. He spits out the liquid and watches it evaporate immediately upon hitting the sand. He glares at the flask and brings it up to his nose. He sniffs.

TROY

Tanqueray? 

He shrugs, brings the bottle back to his lips, and chugs the flask. He tosses the empty container over his shoulder and trundles on in the direction of the rising sun. 

EXT. Arrakis - Desert - Night

Troy's desiccated remains glimmer in the moonlight. His tattered stillsuit blows gently in the breeze. 

SUPERIMPOSE: "Tanqueray...drink like a mentat, party like the Haderach"

A sandworm breeches a dune in the distance. Rising entirely out of the sand, it arches in the air and dives headfirst back into the dune.

FADE TO BLACK.