11:11
Jesus, Super Fetus (Aborted Hero of the Second Coming Detective Agency)
by Robert Bowen
The telephone on the desk cut through the silence in the room like something loud and unexpected, which is exactly what it was. Jesus, Super Fetus begrudgingly pulled his head off the desk, crap simile aside (he would take the time to come up with a better one later, but for now there were more pressing matters). The phone.
It rang again, and Jesus immediately interrupted it’s unwelcome call by lifting the handset from it’s resting place. His good eye finding the clock to see it was 3:33 in the am. At this time of night he knew, the person on the other end of the phone either had the wrong number, or the right one...because they’re in trouble and need a hero...and they’re calling one. Maybe the similes should wait until he was more awake. Divine fetus or no, without a stiff cup of joe, he was useless on just a handful of z’s.
“Second Coming Detective Agency,” he spoke gruffly through strained, underdeveloped vocal chords, made raspier by the over-application of alcohol they suffered through the previous day. The voice on the other end made Jesus sit straight up in his chair. He hadn’t spoken to the Pope since denouncing all that the Catholic Church stood for after returning from his aborted grave. Benevolence and diplomacy often took a back seat with Jesus just after a resurrection, but even he felt he could have handled that situation better. But now, here was the Pope, calling on the fetus that turned on him.
Jesus knew this couldn’t be an easy call for old Bene to have made, so he felt that he should at least extend something of a reciprocal olive branch to the old bastard.
“Jesus?” Ratzinger asked, his voice ringing with hopeful desperation like a high school virgin on prom night.
“Nazi.” Jesus replied coughing off a bit of laughter. Okay so maybe the olive branch would come later.
“I’ve asked you not to call me that.” Ratzinger spat, reeling in as much contempt as he could, and failing miserably like a stoner trying to control the munchies in a candy shop.
“And I’ve asked you to stop protecting degenerate perverts, so it’s disappointment all around, Dic.” Jesus spat back, the venom in his tone matching Ratzingers.
“Look, the reason I’m calling,” Ratzinger began before Jesus interrupted.
“You’re ready to head to hell with the rest of your Nazi brethren, and you’re looking for a little fetus forgiveness before you go?” Jesus was laughing once again.
“Jesus,” Ratzinger’s once desperate tone now riddled with impatience, “I need-”
“A conscience?”
“Please, Jesus, just once can we not-”
“Can we not?” Jesus said mockingly laughing so hard tears poured from the corner of his good eye as he hung up the phone. “Fuck him.”
Okay, so olive branches are out of reach after 3 am, even for a super fetus like Jesus.
The telephone on the desk cut through the silence in the room like something loud and unexpected, which is exactly what it was. Jesus, Super Fetus begrudgingly pulled his head off the desk, crap simile aside (he would take the time to come up with a better one later, but for now there were more pressing matters). The phone.
It rang again, and Jesus immediately interrupted it’s unwelcome call by lifting the handset from it’s resting place. His good eye finding the clock to see it was 3:33 in the am. At this time of night he knew, the person on the other end of the phone either had the wrong number, or the right one...because they’re in trouble and need a hero...and they’re calling one. Maybe the similes should wait until he was more awake. Divine fetus or no, without a stiff cup of joe, he was useless on just a handful of z’s.
“Second Coming Detective Agency,” he spoke gruffly through strained, underdeveloped vocal chords, made raspier by the over-application of alcohol they suffered through the previous day. The voice on the other end made Jesus sit straight up in his chair. He hadn’t spoken to the Pope since denouncing all that the Catholic Church stood for after returning from his aborted grave. Benevolence and diplomacy often took a back seat with Jesus just after a resurrection, but even he felt he could have handled that situation better. But now, here was the Pope, calling on the fetus that turned on him.
Jesus knew this couldn’t be an easy call for old Bene to have made, so he felt that he should at least extend something of a reciprocal olive branch to the old bastard.
“Jesus?” Ratzinger asked, his voice ringing with hopeful desperation like a high school virgin on prom night.
“Nazi.” Jesus replied coughing off a bit of laughter. Okay so maybe the olive branch would come later.
“I’ve asked you not to call me that.” Ratzinger spat, reeling in as much contempt as he could, and failing miserably like a stoner trying to control the munchies in a candy shop.
“And I’ve asked you to stop protecting degenerate perverts, so it’s disappointment all around, Dic.” Jesus spat back, the venom in his tone matching Ratzingers.
“Look, the reason I’m calling,” Ratzinger began before Jesus interrupted.
“You’re ready to head to hell with the rest of your Nazi brethren, and you’re looking for a little fetus forgiveness before you go?” Jesus was laughing once again.
“Jesus,” Ratzinger’s once desperate tone now riddled with impatience, “I need-”
“A conscience?”
“Please, Jesus, just once can we not-”
“Can we not?” Jesus said mockingly laughing so hard tears poured from the corner of his good eye as he hung up the phone. “Fuck him.”
Okay, so olive branches are out of reach after 3 am, even for a super fetus like Jesus.
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Who: You!
What: Fiction, poetry, non fiction, collage, drawings, mixtapes, friendship bracelets, photography & whatever the hell else you call art!
Where: PeterLorreIsDead@gmail.com
When: Deadline is Friday the 13th!
Why: Because we are artists & must get our shit out there & Gag Me With A... will send your words & pretty pictures around the world at large!
Beanpole
by Giacomo Lee
Registration for conscription in South Korea is automatic for men in the year they turn 18. Military service lasts two years.
One young man held down another. David Kang-Ho couldn't imagine what was running through the patient's head, a fellow soldier, his curse words streaked by tears of bile from somewhere above the voice box, a rattle tinged with the aftertaste of blinding alcohol, a sermon told in tongues, ripping up one side of the jaw to show tendrils and teeth never seen. A little peek in his head would have shown a similar sound but dragged out, that of chirping cicadas nesting up a mountain in the summer, and nothing else, and no-one else, just views and plant life a little rustled by wind, and rocks in the water, 'til a purple night-time fell and tigers with glowing eyes of orange prowled the plains looking for home.
'My son here, his son here, his son here, his son here, your mother's tails!'
David tried to strap Hyung's wrists down in vain, his eyes wide as his small lips quivered like a fish's, too flummoxed to call out for assistance.
'Bare branches...smashing your mother's head, the ghost'.
One hand strapped.
'Your girl’s head'.
The other was crushing David's wrist.
'Beanpole! I’ll cut you down!'
David shushed, almost faint, his back arching.
'My son here, his son here, his son here, his son here, your mother's tails!'
David tried to strap Hyung's wrists down in vain, his eyes wide as his small lips quivered like a fish's, too flummoxed to call out for assistance.
'Bare branches...smashing your mother's head, the ghost'.
One hand strapped.
'Your girl’s head'.
The other was crushing David's wrist.
'Beanpole! I’ll cut you down!'
David shushed, almost faint, his back arching.
'She’s forgot you!'
Shh shh. Still no sign of a doctor.
'I'll eat your bones and your ma and your girl! They forgot us boy, she’s forgot you!'
David's free hand threw a punch at the patient's face, and another, another, and another, and a year later he wonders what it was all for, cleaning the window of Dunkin Donuts as some blonde prick makes two sisters giggle out loud with his pig Korean.
Shh shh. Still no sign of a doctor.
'I'll eat your bones and your ma and your girl! They forgot us boy, she’s forgot you!'
David's free hand threw a punch at the patient's face, and another, another, and another, and a year later he wonders what it was all for, cleaning the window of Dunkin Donuts as some blonde prick makes two sisters giggle out loud with his pig Korean.
‘I need a war’ he mouths.
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