SERIALIZATION OF “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” – Chapter 12 of 61
WARBLE HITS THE AFTERBURNERS
CHAPTER 12
Warble Hits the After-Burners
“Did you hit the after-burner switch?” Comfy asks, knowing full well that Warble hadn’t, but wanting to couch the matter in the form of a question.
“No, I didn’t hit the after-burner switch,” Warble responds in a huff. “You didn’t tell me I needed to hit the after-burner switch, or that there even was such a beast.”
“Well, there is, and you do,” Comfy says. Albert nods in the affirmative, as he scratches Taterskin behind the ears.
Warble searches for the switch. He can’t find it. “Where’s the after-burner switch, and what does it do?” he asks.
“It’s on the tip of the lever,” Albert tells him. “It turns on the after burners.”
“I KNOW it turns on the dad-blamed after-burners,” Warble says, irritated. “I MEAN, what will that do exactly?!”
“It causes us to fly at mach pi,” Comfy answers. “We have to attain that speed to be able to slip the surly bonds of earth, slide into another time dimension, and go where we wanna go today.”
“Oh,” Warble says, scratching his head and trying to remember where he’d heard that ‘slip the surly bonds of earth’ line before.
“So what’s mock pie, anyway?” Warble finally asks. “Why not go for real pie?”
“Mach pi is 3.14 times the speed of light divided by 3.14 times the speed of sound, less the induction drag ratio of a healthy snail on a cold morning – where “healthy” is defined as sodium-free and of average slimeyness, and “cold” is defined as 31.4 degrees Fahrenheit (-0.333333333 degrees Celsius),” Albert immediately answers, anticipating the question.
Having been asked the question hundreds of times by Arodnap stockholders, “vulture capitalists,” as well as all of his friends and acquaintances, Albert answers as fast as he can and in a monotone, sounding like a bored automaton--in other words, exactly like a Congressman.
Soundtrack Note: Play “I Can’t Drive 55” by Sammy Hagar
Warble hits the after-burner switch. In no time at all, so it seems, the octet (or nonet, if you count Taterskin) have arrived at 1992 Cooperstown.
As Warble lands the Arodnap in an empty lot behind a Wal*Mart superstore, everybody hears Albert groaning pitifully.
“What’s wrong?” Mary says, turning around. “Oh, my word!” she then yells out, eyes bulging.
~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^
Blackbird Crow Raven’s “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” is being serialized in this space each Sunday and Thursday; it is also available in its entirety from here.
You can listen to the recording of this excerpt, by the author, here: