Laertus clears his bobbing throat and attempts to stand up to the class. by standing himself up by his knuckle on the wood corner of his steel desk to address the large assembly of class all staring at him through their peeper eyes. it's dark but not so dark that he can't see their mealing faces. he can smell their breaths. it's been two years but he still can't break the habit of sitting in the way back of the auditorium.
class: hey! why do you always sit in the way back of the auditorium!? we all have to crane our necks to listen to you! that's not far, it hurts!
Laertus: but this is the first time i've spoken. like this with any conviction. i'm still nervous, i still get nervous public-speaking large crowded classrooms. cos i've never done it. and speaking in general. that's why i'm online. all the time. that's the point of all this. no online. but i'm gonna power through, i'm gonna drink my own flopsweat. this is too important to pass up like a four-point shot. college is not about honing one's identity---about becoming an individualism organism---it's about joining things, joining groups and weird clubs and heavily-slanted questionable political cabals, to see where you won't go. being a part of something bigger, a voice for the larger cause. that's what i plan to do as speaker here today, young folk, and old folk trying college for the first time, godspeed, hope you get wet. i'm but one man, well man-boy, but i represent a big contingent of humans, in fact i represent ALL humans!!!
class *turning their watches over to stare. at their watches. well, their large ipads rather* we're waiting...get on with it...
Laertus: i'm not a speech, i mean speaker. i am a man, manboy. folks, citizens, whatever, you must heed me. i am the messenger with goat legs. don't shoot me! i bring urgent news! we are dying. we are dying as a race. as a people. it's not a one-term four years of separation, this has been going on for centuries, it's just that the gatekeeper has never been known before to fit the key up his ass. after he locked us all OUT. if we don't come together soon humanity will perish the way the Earth will perish in ten years. we've got to start talking to each other again, face-to-face, not online, the internet has destroyed society and culture. hasn't helped at all, given us the illusion of interconnectedness while driving us so apart we don't know the damage we're causing everytime we elect to type rather than talk. follow the lead of the deaf and blind, they understand what true communication is, a healthy exchange of ideas not laced with vitriol, fossil-fuel gas to power your old hunks of carpiles, of not prejudging people.
Larry is losing the audience. they are beginning to REALLY stare at their ipad clocks.
the Professor in the front of the room is but a black speck to Laertus. he goes by Title because he's earned that right, he's one of those folk who seems to have been at the venerable institution forever but actually only applied off a damp index card last week. seniority is not a measurable thing anymore. he has always been known to brood, that is a requirement, he learned how to brood by watching the chickens in his backyard and through CliffsNotes. with his black skivvies and black madras shorts made electronically in an Indian cyberpunk factory and black ankle socks and black untied boots with the soles cut out. he wants to trip over himself but he never seems to. even when he's lecturing. he holds his book in front of his face so the class has never gotten a good look at him. plus he has insanely long black hair which he shampoos with stringy soapropes. he's a skinny man who wears ill-formfitting black T shirt series yet somehow strangely always incorporates weird shoulderpads into his shoulderwear. the one distinguishing characteristic Laertus will never get out of his nostril was when Larry had to walk the one mile to the front of teach's desk to drop off a pop quiz. Laertus took a large whiff when Prof wasn't looking or smelling and came away with the distinct smell of Big Computer.
Laertus: are you?...no, couldn't be...*and Laertus walked on without speaking*
Prof: young man, you in the back there, speak up or forever hold your war so the whole class can pick apart your spelling when they blog about this later.
the prof's hands wave magically on top of the lit ceiling from the glare of the glowing projector-screen on the stage. Professor Title sounds like if Snape were played by Rowan Atkinson. one time he let his hair down, to show his face, but his hair had formed two black circles around his eyes for a pair of indoor shades. his mouth looked like it had been eating corn-on-the-cob since childhood.
the Prof always had an interesting lecture to say, each day, that's why Laertus stayed.
this week Prof was contemplating the NCAA College Basketball Tournament Brackets. how so many people eagerly filled out these brackets such that their pencils whittled down to nubs the size of their respective peanut penises and peanut vulvas. and yet this was the perfect time to do away with the Electoral College. instead of deciding ONE person to President-vote, why not put all EIGHT of your choices into brackets on your ballot so as to say "okay, if my FIRST CHOICE doesn't win, give me my second-place guy. or girl."
Laertus: look, i know all of you are itching to get back to Fulldive Fantasy---i will be, too, after this---but do this one thing in the real world. i mean this is getting ridiculous. i'm scared to live, i'm afraid to be me! i am terrified everytime i log onto YouTube and see all those 1000s of comments under a video of a VW car commercial featuring two WW empowered loving lesbians---one black, one generally-unvisibly-asian ethnic---leaving their hapless white video-game-playing doofus boyfriend in an empty cleared-out-save-for-the-brown-boxes apartment they used to share together to begin their new adventure as free women finally. remember, cuckold comes from the root word cock. the boyfriend looks like PewDiePie if PDP shaved. or the one featuring all wheelchair-bound actresses racing. or the Pakistani Muslim man and the Kansas Christian whitebread woman in an apron having 20 babies all going to Lowe's. the comments stare at me, beckon me to enter their blackhole vortex of hate speech and attacks on weak-wristed SJWs and correct speech correctified and cancel culture and femme-zation not done the right third way. i share that weak wrist, my finger shakes, but i have to push the button cos i can't resist, i'm too curious to see what they have to say, i read them and instantly regret reading them. and then i feel bad the rest of the day. wherever there's another othering, another fly inside me dies.
Laertus slumbers slowly with an affected gimp-leg over to the new coffeeshop across from where he usually meets his soul mate---for better or worse---for coffee after class in place of a rushed lunch. Dirg is there by the window seat cracking open a fizzy can of Bang soda. Star Blast flavor.
Dirg: whoa! i'd wave but i was busy, you almost got run over crossing the street! something on your mind? how'd it go? this actually isn't a new klatch on campus, it's just our usual haunt is undergoing new construction, and new management, manager guy was a freak. should only take all semester to complete. move from The Magical Fruit to The Human Bean. coffee is coffee, tastes the same, all coffee tastes like coffee. hey, guess what color my Bang soda will be. i'll put it into my copper cup that was once used for a mule drink. i call it my Drawing Cup, but if you put your wrong lips to it it's your Writing Cup. working on a new script?
Laertus: are you working on a new webcomic? design is key. moreso than story for a four-panel weekly.
Dirg: you said penal. oh i always have some doodlesnacks up my asshole at any given moment.
Paris Jackson slops herself into the Red Circle Table pretzel-chair from exhaustion.
Paris: i don't know if i'm black enough to sit here, but i REALLY need someone to talk to. i feel isolated from everyone in the universe, especially my family, and my extended family, and they are the only ones who could POSSIBLY understand what i'm going through. can i go and leave my bros? for a wrist tattoo? and this is the exact moment that Marilyn Manson decides to start recording that long-awaited new album in ten years. wretched timing!!!
Dirg: sure, toots. if you'll let me get lost in your ocean eyes.
Laertus: busy? well, judging from the can, it's red, white, and blue, your three favorite colors. it's either gonna be blueberry, poisonberry, or, like, clear flavor.
Dirg pours.
Laertus: aww, it's white, that's disappointing. Captain America? yeah right, no such thing anymore. Superman, your after-death favorite. what manner of musclebuilding toxin chemicals are in this? Super-Creatine? what, Regular Creatine wasn't enough? you know that kryptonite creatine stuff stunts creativity and will make the muscles in your eyes shrink. hey Taka! how's your mom?
Takahashi: too soon, it's been a year. anyway i'm trying to get my drone-racing league started up. on campus it's a bitch. to get all the papers. but it's my dream. gonna be doing two very important interviews. and one from the grave. to secure funds and get this paper. i need that one glowing Illuminati brick-pyramid triangle to be the first hole for the drones to fly through or it's just not real to me, you know?
Laertus: allow me to orate my PhD dissertation on how so-called "eSports" aren't a thing. esports aren't real sports. playing video-games is not like playing tennis. is hammering a nail a sport? i hope i've hammered that nail into your sacred palms.
Taka: mama didn't raise no fool. i go where the money follows. i investigate. i'm the most levelheaded gamer you'll ever meet. get it? level.
Paris: but i've already met you. and you came across. hey were you the one who was in my Instagram DMs all night last night?
Dirg: but hammering Chris Evert IS a sport. i mean online on twitter. Jeopardy All Stars was a sport, it was the greatest sport ever invented. this year. i mean this thing had a fantasy league. a fucking Fantasy League!
Laertus: please, this really is too soon...i can't even think about Alex Trebek wthout my one tear turning to two ...i'd pray for him if i thought it'd help...i'd willingly cede my heart for his so he could be healthy again. the heart can replace any organ, the pancreas and especially the brain. this is multiple-stage levels of depressing, not just your standard testtaking depression. i mean how do you go on playing a silly little pub quiz game which has shaped the leading minds of the world and led to game-changing inventions and growing intellectualism? do you still taste the salt of the pretzel or is all the salt you feel inside you now? i mean how do you live like this? when you're not able to fall asleep on your bed and wake up the next day and push the RESET button.
the university is undergoing an evaluation and reevaluation of applicants. a reeval. a cleansing, a purge if you will, but a Good Purge. unfortunately---and the Regents have all concluded this---all of the cheaters are, like, already seniors, so there's no point. the Bach class was slashed for budget cuts but that was it. Professor Title is helping out the administration with this, mostly it's easy cos Obec College doesn't really have any real sports---mostly video-game sports but that's it---so those are easy to weed out. and as for Photoshop, the Prof has a photographic memory when it comes to photoshop, he's seen EVERY SINGLE picture that has ever existed, seen the original of every picture, so there's no fooling him. copy at your own peril.
President Bump: this is why i won. elitism has become too elite. hey, cancel SNL, it's cold garbage! *waving around his remote control menacingly*
Pence: *glancing at the tv* that's a repeat episode of SNL, sir, the episode you hosted.
Steve King: i'm King, it's in the name, so i can say anything and it goes. when the Holy War begins, some on the Right and some on the Left will be felled by bullets, that's just how bullets go. and if all else fails, and the indiscriminate gods don't get me, i drew these two lovely red and blue big mecha robots on twitter that i'll get into and move to Japan to draw anime.
Dirg: i would have given Ilhan Omar more credit if she had just come out and said America was a stupid country, you know she wanted to. see, you're not allowed to REALLY say what you feel and think.
Bump: i mean hey. i was a bad test-taker, too, doesn't mean i'm not smart. i'm crazy smart. i don't care about college as you all know. just parties, if i ever got invited to one. i'm a hard-partying lampshade. ask me, don't ask Curly from The Three Stooges with hair. like anybody who grew up in my generation, i turned to Uncle Jessy for help out with my homework. but then this talk of proctors and i'm like nobody's gonna touch my ass. to the two young hot daughters, my message to you is clear:
Row Row Row Your Boat Gently Down The Stream...
i'll post the lyrics on twitter later.
Laertus: it's always the wholesome ones. but don't pile on the two innocent children, sins don't bleed down. you know you'd be on that boat, too, if you could. the real tragedy of all this is that i'm never gonna find out who stole the bakery bread, i was VERY invested in the Hallmark movie mystery which spanned four films.
Laertus: *calling from the coiled coffeeshop phone in the back* so who won? Pew or T Series?
Taka: T Series
Laertus: thank you. i don't know what that is. and why this is so important. why does the Wikipedia article on this have, like, 30 edits?
Takahashi: don't fuck with Bollywood, you'll lose every time! Bollywood doesn't have the luxury to be racist after getting famous.
Dirg: so are we going or what?
Laertus: yep, just let me get my things. i sent out a group email, a deliberate good group email i wanted to send purposely, to let everyone know where we'd be meeting.
Laertus: *in circles* huh. i thought the next block would be sunny. wasn't it a sunny day? next to the real estate? i seem to have forgotten the exact location point, is this the place?
Laertus looks around to see a sea of green. grass and trees and fallen bloodied spears without their diamond casing. brown trunks cut awkwardly on a slant dot the landscape. he's lost his bearings in the twirl.
Laertus: wait...is this reality...or the video game? i can't tell anymore. oh, i'm so glad i bumped in to you ladies.
the crones are busily arranging pink and blue petals over and under a well dressing they're performing in the middle of the meadow. it's hard work and Doryce is starting to complain.
Doryce: ugh, my back! how many fucking flowers are there!? i feel we've been here all day. or, like, three days.
Gladyce: it's alright, dear, we're almost done, we'll rest at the tavern haybeds soon. the one with the wooden sign like a flag creaking in the wind.
Doryce: i'm so thirsty i could drink a horse!
Doryce looks down below, and with her divining rod, but there's no water in the well.
Doryce: well what's the point then! this is where we go to get water! who cares if the well is pretty!? quick, fill the hole with iced-tea powder until it latches onto some trace water molecules and we start to see a little wave action down there.
Maria: *softly* no, please, stop, i'm with child! thank you for making my vag dazzle. and yes, it's his.
the well was actually giant Titan Maria LaRosa.
Maria: my water broke. sorry.
Doryce: no need to apologize, love, i am all for it. racemixing and cross-breeding is the wave of the future, we won't survive as a species without it, everyone knows that.
a creature emerges from the bush.
creature: *with a soft-tone smooth honey voice* oh hello. should i be here? i feel that this isn't my time. my timing's off.
Laertus is instantly struck.
Laertus: *shooketh* well...hello...hello...gorgeous.
Doryce: dibs.
the creature turns around. it is a combination of three elements: it is an animal consisting of the lower body of a centaur with two hind legs and the upperbody torso of a naked-hairless-chest cleanshaven Orlando Bloom with one ear longer than the other that his long purple hair can't cover. overall this specimen looks like as if imagine Yoshi the dinosaur with the Gene Simmons tongue were a human male.
Pence: do you like to play Legos? you are a lass, right?
Madame Pons is shaken by this sight as well. she stirs inside herself with her inner wand, a protective shield comes over the area and gently on top of the creature blocking the sun's still-there rays despite the grey sky. she is looking only at the bottom half of the bodacious beast, and from that moment on she plucks and eats the grass surrounding her till she times out.
Eye Luggage: *anime eyes* wow, amazing. i am LOVING that long staff you got by your elbow there, man.
creature: oh, my hoe you mean? i use it to garden. these fields. these fields i till till i'm satisfied. i need to eat. i'm alive.
Eye: yeah, that is one hot hoe. but i'm wondering the humping situation here you know? i mean how does Katy Perry go doggystyle on a horse? or 69? what happens when her huge tits align with your horse buttocks in the back and your back legs kick up and knock her head unconscious? or is she into that?
Laertus: …………………….uh, i hate Instagram.
creature: *laughs horsely* me, too. go back to chronological, i mean who decides which posts are important? i mean how are you supposed to tell your followers what day your birthday is? you have to come out and say it in a post: HELLO! IT'S MY BIRTHDAY! that's so awkward, that's not how it works in real life, your real friends just know. *laughs* this fits into my broader theory. i am supposed to only reveal myself to you on my birthday, one day a year for just a short amount of time, i'm a rare creature not meant to be photographed or known. but i forgot when that was. i'm supposed to immediately jump out of a bush then scamper away. to the frustration of hunters everywhere. *laughs hoarsely*
Laertus: *eyes open and wide and deep breath* o you clever boy! what to do? i feel i've been wandering for a long time...
creature: i suppose you could write your birthday date on your profile so everyone sees it. so it remains unspoken and instinctual like it should be. let's continue this conversation by the bush, let's continue talking about the pitfalls of being online.
Laertus: *smiling while staring* follow you. i mean, lead the way.
Laertus has lost all track of time...
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