Psalm 21:43
Gunther shrieked like a woman.
The toaster-sized Master Computer deeted and booped her orders; her insectile machine drones carried Gunther up to one of many octagonal chambers lining the walls.
The drones forced him into the locker-sized geometric inlet, cramming him unceremoniously into the hole. He kicked wildly, successfully annoying his trio of captors. The nearest extended a scissor-like mandible and pinched one of Gunther’s nipples extracting a satisfying squeal.
Drone #3450-0 looked aside at his offending partner.
Drone #5892-8 shrugged unapologetically back.
Master Computer beeped in sick amusement as her drones began to seal the tiny chamber. She would drown the flesh creature in bio-stasis fluid and let her next generation feed off his extractable calcium before flushing the leftovers into the fetid flesh-pile beneath her hive.
The drones excreted fist sized beads of sticky blue gel and began at the edges, smearing a thin but impenetrable film across Gunther’s burgeoning prison. Gunther whimpered as his life inevitably began its inevitable replay. As they sealed him inside, he noted that this was actually more comfortable than his last cubicle at SimTek (a subsidiary bought and dissolved by HappyCo.).
As the hole neared a close, Gunther again thought of his mother, and again was sure she’d be cross with him.
Outside the bluish film he heard Master Computer curse in a flurry of white noise and boops.
His relief came, when he saw the elongated silhouette of his furry champion outside of his azure cell. The drones backed away with their pincers raised. The weasel grabbed Drone #5892-8 and cracked it repeatedly against the still-hardening blue shell until it shattered enough for Gunther to see his whiskery friend.
“Sparky!” Gunther exclaimed. “Jumpin’ cats it’s good to see you!”
Sparky frowned. “I really hate you, you know?”
•••
Psalm 10:36
Gunther shrieked like a teenage girl.
He was dressed like one too. He wore an off-the-shoulder, Empire-waist affair with an asymmetrical over-skirt that would wear better at Promenade than its current use: trussed to a wooden stake as townspeople piled wood beneath Gunther’s feet.
The patriarch of Button Town, a stern-faced gentleman with a chin carved from granite held his torch at ready. The reflection of fire shimmered off his hematite eyes. No mercy could be found therein.
Thick gobs of mascara ran down Gunther’s cheeks as the last of the wood was placed.
The Oread citizens of Button Town gathered behind their patriarch.
“Puh-puh-please,” Gunther stammered at the assembly of rock-people in their frontier wear. They were, appropriately, stone-faced.
“Oon chairges uf high-withcity, how d’ye plea?” Patrus Stonewall Grumpus Archibald Temperance Oshkoshstrander III accented his question with a wave of the torch.
It took Gunther several seconds to realize a response was expected of him. “Whuh-what?” he stammered.
“Gilty, ‘en?” Patrus Stonewall Grumpus Archiwhatsit etc., etc. nodded.
“What? No? I just—” Gunther’s pleas were unheard as the crowd clamored and gathered more torches to light from the central flame of their leader. The geek in the dress struggled vainly against his bonds as his life began its biweekly loop within his head.
He thought of his mother and how cross she would be.
Gunther resumed his adolescent peals of horror.
It wasn’t until Patrus Grumpypants—or whatever his name was—collapsed under the weight of a cartoonishly overlarge hammer that Gunther stopped his call.
On the non-business end of the steel maul was Sparky, heaving mighty breaths with a look of cold murder in his eyes; several bald spots were all over his body from the mine cave-in.
“Sparky! Oh thank Christmas it’s you!”
“You don’t have the legs for an Empire-waist,” Sparky opined as he leapt to snip Gunther free of his bonds with his incisors.
•••
Psalm 2:15
Gunther shrieked like a six-month old baby girl.
The lizard-like goblin clawed up his leg.
Two of his lizard buddies were holding down said legs. Two more held him down at the shoulders, their bantam claws drawing pinpricks of blood that spotted his oxford shirt.
Gunther’s life flashed before his eyes. Like the flickering of a fluorescent light, a staccato parade of images portrayed a lifetime of samey cubicles.
He was just getting to the paper-clip sorting position that would land him in the unemployment lines of Squar when the metal cl-clinking of his belt brought his attention rudely back to the present. He watched as the clumsy, claw-like hands fumbled with his belt. The greenish-brown, ridged head of his assailant looked up at him with a hiss. Rows of needle teeth bisected a spherical, awful head.
Gunther thought of his mother as he resigned to his fate; he shut his eyes and wet himself.
She would be so cross.
Suddenly, a different scream cut through the darkness behind his closed eyes; a scream that ended with a wet thunk.
He risked a peek and saw his would-be rapist pinned to the floor by a pool cue through its head. Two furry paws reached under the billiards table where he lay and twisted two lizard heads like twist off caps.
The two shoulder-holders hissed and ran out into the jaundiced light of the bar. The musteline head of his new friend, Sparky, appeared from over the top of the table.
“Sparky! Bless you my dear, good friend!”
“Gunther? Oh, I didn’t see you there.”
