POTATO MOON, Part 59 by Andy Bolt

But Woeisme failed to notice her, already caught up in selecting her new true love.  For Fig had been dead for nearly thirty seconds.  Her heart and an attention span more in line with small insects or large rocks were insisting that she heroically find the strength to move on, like in one of those Beyonce songs where she sings as that tuff lady.  Callie Savage?  Miami Vicious?

“Ahem!” The Potato Goddess shouted, in a mysterious potato language that was phonetically and alphanumerically identical to English.

“Let’s see,” said Woeisme, counting on her fingers.  “There’s that Jarhead guy back in Rainydale, that kid who fixes my cable, and that man from prison who keeps sending me letters and pictures of dead cats he found.”

“Ahem!” said Jakob, who had been following her in a way that was frowned upon in most civilized nations, and the Potato Goddess, from the spot where her icon had rolled when Woeisme dropped it to count.

“But none of them have that magical mix of ninth-grade-existentialism and casual indifference that characterizes all true love!” shrieked Woeisme.  “You know what I love now?  Ponies!  Dark, broody ponies!”

Jakob and the Potato Goddess looked up absently from their huddled conversation, during which they had been advancing important plot mechanics that were difficult to render interestingly.

“My Onion Ring of Truth is missing!?!” screamed the Potato Goddess in outraging anger.

“Onion Ring of Power?” asked Jakob.

“Whatever!” the goddess cried, with passion.

Without explanation, the Potato Goddess turned into Woeisme’s beloved childhood Malamute.

“Angsty!” cried Woeisme.  “How did you get here?”

“We are momentarily going David Lynch here to get your addled attention,” explained the Potato Goddess.  “Only with more potatoes.  And less Dennis Hopper.”

“Oh, really?” said Dennis Hopper’s alternate reality, non-legally-actionable counterpart.  Then there was a jump cut and he was a robot.  Everyone realized they were probably not smart enough to understand why that unquestionably made sense.

“Symblor!” exposited the Potato Goddess.  “My robotic servant of symbolism!”

“I-am-your-tortured-ennui,” said Symblor, turning now into a Frenchman smoking a cigarette and looking wistfully into the middle distance.  “Now-I-am-the-spirit-of-the-revolution,” said Symblor, turning into a cross between Che Guevara and a television with a no-smoking circle around it.

“Do unrequited love,” said Jakob.

“I-am-not-your-monkey-emo-boy,” said Symblor, turning into something that totally captured the spirit of righteous indignation and bourgeois disdain.

“Silence!” barked the Potato Goddess/Angsty.  “You three must go on a quest to retrieve my Onion Ring of Beauty!”

Jakob bit his lip and felt the last remaining shred of his soul die, with the possibility of later coming back as a ghost soul of some kind.  Or maybe a reincarnated hamster or something.  He didn’t want to judge.

“I – I do believe I’ve fallen in love with you, Symblor,” said Woeisme.

“Why?” asked Jakob.

“Motivation is for Olympiads and dead Russian authors,” said the Potato Goddess.  “Just do it.”  Symblor turned into a Weather Channel viewer in sweatpants dusted with potato chip crumbs, the universal symbol of resigned apathy.

“But, I wasn’t…okay,” said Jakob, genetically unable to refuse any exploitative commands that promised completely avoidable emotional and physical torment.

“I will do anything for Symblor, the undying love of my last four minutes,” said Woeisme.

“I-am-your-fracturing-sense-of-self” said Symblor, turning into one of those crackly mirrors that are popular in independent films.

“To the Pit of Voles with you!” cried the Potato Goddess, over-emotively!

“I think I love you, Potato Goddess,” said Woeisme.  Jakob bit through his tongue.  Fantom Fig reappeared.  “Our engagement must come to undead but ultimately meaningless fruition,” he said.

“Who are you again?” asked Woeisme.

The Potato Goddess did some god stuff and they were off.
The group reappeared in the Pit of Voles, which coincidently looked exactly like Tolkein’s description of Mordor from that one scene where those fuzzy midgets first get there.  Except replace “orcs” with “voles” and everything was covered in country-style gravy.

“I don’t like this,” said the Potato Goddess.  “It seems…tastacular.”

Jakob turned into his werewolf self.  Symblor turned into a bigger werewolf with a more lustrous coat.  “I-am-your-crushing-sense-of-inadequacy,” said Symblor.

A vole in a top hat and a monocle ambled up to them, occasionally pausing to lap up some gravy and speak in an aggressively inaccurate British accent.  “Blimey!  Fish’n Biscuits!” he chattered.  “’Ello,” he said, after nibbling chunks out of the Potato Goddess.  “Name’s Shaun McCuthersby Lord Fakington.  I suppose you’re here for the Onion Ring of Power.”

“Are we?” asked Woeisme.

“I don’t like this talking vole,” stage whispered Fantom Fig.  “He seems,” Fantom Fig paused for dramatic effect, and since nobody had anything pressing to do, they obliged him for upwards of ten minutes, “Fake!” he concluded.

“Really?” said Woeisme.  “I kind of love him.”

“Yes, the Onion Ring of Righteousness!” hollered the Potato Goddess.  “Tell me where it is or I will potato-smite you, which is like regular smiting, but more delicious! Nightmarishly delicious!”

One comment on “POTATO MOON, Part 59 by Andy Bolt”

  1. “that man from prison who keeps sending me letters and pictures of dead cats he found”

    Heh, that was sweet.

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