6-3-17 Under Loch and Quay
Byline: Gary Llewellyn
Dateline: June 3, 2017
This week, readers, we take you to Scotland, where we go in search of the fabled Loch Ness Monster. Not by choice, mind you. Nessie is such a hack subject. I normally have much better things to do than chase after some old-timey gynecologist's toy submarine, but I’m scheduled for execution by drowning by the fairy king. Somewhere Freddie Mercury is smiling, or at least bemused. I was given a pill that is supposed to allow me to breathe underwater, but it just feels like I popped a fistful of yellowjackets. Me and Stephanie were led to a platform over a glass tank of water that would open up, drop us in, and close back up, locking us inside. Then we’d be flushed out into the loch where we were to be eaten by a drunkard’s legend.
“Any final words?” we were asked by the king.
“Oh Mother Mercury, look what they’ve done to me. I cannot run, I cannot hide,” I sang. I have a damn good voice, if I do say so myself.
“You think you’re funny?”
“Yeah.”
After Stephanie said her piece, which was surprisingly impressive, he pulled a lever and down we went into the tank. After we choked and gagged on the intake of water into our lungs, we found we were doing all right (that’s another one for you, Freddie!) without breathing. The pill must have oxygenated our blood to the point of not requiring respiration. We both played dead, floating there with mouths agape, blank stares, bobbing against the glass, it was beautiful. Satisfied with our demise they flipped another lever and like a toilet flushing we were sucked out the bottom of the tank, but not before we both gave the king shit-eating grins and flipped the double birds. We didn’t even plan that. Epic as fuck.
We were rushed along by a strong current through a seemingly endless series of tubes and finally launched into what I presume was supposed to be Loch Ness. We were too far south and that pipe journey was not long enough for this to be Ness. If the body of water was even a loch it was probably Lomond, but in all likelihood it was the Clyde River. They were just going to wash us out to sea. Nessie my ass.
When we surfaced I saw the hilly landscape of shoreline and...Urquhart Castle? What the hell do you know? Loch Ness. Come to think of it, some of those twists and turns seemed more like I was William Shatner getting transported than actual elbow joints in the plumbing. As we swam to the shore I felt something brush against my leg. Looked around for Stephanie and she’s sitting cross-legged on the head of what looked like a plesiosaur, waving at me.
“I knew it was real,” she shouted to me as they raced to the shoreline.
The student has become the master. I’d cry if I wasn’t doggie paddling so hard. And what the hell do you know? Nessie is a thing. See what a fool I’ve been (love you, Freddie!). Once I was back on shore, wringing my socks out, my only thought was: Jesus Christ, the rental car.
6-3-17 The Loch Ness Not So Monster
Byline: Stephanie Morgan
Dateline: June 3, 2017
Heya, SEG-ers! I’m still alive! Gary and I have survived being drowned in a fairy execution and weren’t eaten by Nessie. Turns out he’s really nice. Much nicer than fairies. And about those fairies…
Gary and I were led to a trapdoor on the top of a giant fish tank. I had taken the pill earlier and I felt like I'd taken about twelve Adderall and it was the night before finals. The king walked out and was all like waving his arms thinking he was hot shit. Hot mess, more like. Was he wearing crushed velvet? What is he, my grandmother?
“Any last words?” he asks like we’re in a movie.
Gary starts squawking out some nonsense, but it tilted the king, so that was cool. I laughed. Then it was my turn.
“All I have to say is ‘fuck fairies’. If we get out this we’re coming back for you and your children,” I’m not entirely sure what got into me. Maybe it was the pills. Maybe I was spending too much time with Gary.
The king pulled the lever and into the fish tank we went. At first I started coughing on all the water I was breathing in. But, I realized, you can’t cough if you can’t breathe. The pill was working. I know one fairy who will be spared the coming storm. Gary tapped me on the shoulder. I saw him playing dead. The guy might be an asshole, but he’s done this stuff before. I followed his lead. Once the king was satisfied we were dead he pulled another lever and we were sucked out the bottom of the aquarium. We both gave the king the finger as we were flushed out. Maybe I really am spending too much time with him, but how else do you wave goodbye to some jerk who’s trying to kill you?
Pipes. Endless pipes, twisting and turning. I lost all sense of whether I was right side up or upside down. The curious thing was, the pipes seemed to be turning corners, but you couldn’t see any turns in the pipe. It was more like we just ended up in a different pipe, like magically. Like when Chris Pine in that Star Trek movie gets all sparkly and swirly and then he’s in another place. We finally got shot out into a large body of water. Gary darted to the surface, but I thought, when am I going to get to breathe underwater again? It was dark under there, but I could see something really big swimming past me. It swam past again and then was still. The next thing I see is a giant eye, three feet in front of me, staring in my face. Was this Nessie come to eat me like the fairies said? If it was, it was certainly taking its time.
“I hope you’re not here to eat me,” I kept thinking.
“No, I’m strictly vegan,” a voice in my head said, like when that old guy tells that whiny kid to ‘use the force’ in that movie my brother forced me to watch.
“Uh, hello.”
“Hello.”
“Are you Nessie?”
“No. I’m Stewart.”
“I’m Stephanie.”
“How are you breathing underwater, Stephanie? I thought you people couldn’t breathe underwater.”
“A nice fairy, the only nice fairy, gave me pill so I could survive my execution by drowning. The fairy king said you would eat our bodies.”
“That idiot is always dumping corpses here. I gotta swim in this water. I don’t need dead bodies funking it up. Would you like a ride back to land, Stephanie? That pill will be wearing off soon.”
“Yes, please.”
“How about your friend?”
“Hehe, no. Let him swim.”
“Heh, nice.”
He let me sit on his head as he sped me to the shore. I waved at Gary as we passed.
“Stephanie,” said Stewart, “The fairies and more like them are up to no good.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Even as we speak the Nixie Union Local 404 in Germany has already begun its incursion into human territory. They take on the guise of raccoons. It’s not a raccoon infestation like the humans think. Soon they will begin.”
“I think I met them. I have a scar on my arm to show for it. Begin what?”
“Their invasion of the human world. They believe that humans have ignored them long enough. They no longer leave them offerings and gifts like they used to. They believe they should make themselves known and feared again. I, and many others, don’t agree with this. We feel we’re better off left as legends and myths. We’ve moved beyond the need for fear and belief to survive. But others want to return to the ‘good old days’. They used to be a fringe group, but lately they have been getting their hands on the levers of power.”
“Wow. Is this what the fairy said Gary knows?”
“Hmm, maybe. Right now it doesn’t look like he knows how to swim.”
Stewart put me down on the bank and said goodbye. We are so far from the rental car. Gary is going to be so tilted.
6-10- 17 Tarasque and You Shall Recieve
Byline: Gary Llewellyn
Dateline: June 10, 2017
Hello, dear readers, and welcome to another Page Five Ghoul or Ghouls or whatever Mort is calling it now. After the setback in Scotland and week of hard travel, we find ourselves in France. Why France? Because I needed to get my ass off that goddamn island and anywhere was damn sight better. So what kind of monsters does one look for in France? Well, we’re here to keep tabs on a legendary beast known as the Tarasque. A name that should be familiar to the strictly indoor, basement-dwelling among you if your DM happens to be a complete dick.
The model for this bane of role players everywhere is rooted in a beast that stalked the French countryside. Legend has it the beast was tamed by Saint Martha and brought back to the city of Nerluc, where the inhabitants lost their shit and killed the thing, at which point Saint Martha got all preachy with the Jesus stuff, everybody converted for some reason and renamed the town Tarascon. Really what happened was the tamed Tarasque was then employed to give rides to children at a petting zoo and the town renamed Tarascon to boost tourism, because a town with a tamed Tarasque in a petting zoo sounds pretty badass, but that story doesn’t make for a good legend. So, now we’re in the city of Tarascon to make sure this thing is still docile, mopey and entertaining children. If the Fae Folk ever got this thing on the payroll it would be like acquiring a nuke.
Now, dear readers, I’ve never been on time for anything and I apparently don’t intend to start. When we arrived the petting zoo was a shitshow. Crying children and angry parents who had paid three euros a pop so their rugrats could get their picture taken tormenting the now at-large Tarasque. The proprietor of the zoo was busy explaining to the parents how they were never going to get their three euros back and that if they didn’t remove their crying whelps the goats might go crazy next.
We hopped back in the new rental car (the fairies had stripped the other one for parts, so we had to put this one on Stephanie’s card. So much for rehabbing my credit.) and followed the trail of destruction out into the countryside on the opposite bank of the Rhone River. It had been busy most of the morning tearing up farmland and tipping cows. One of the locals told us it had stolen a car and tore ass in a southerly direction. We followed the mayhem south, but were sidetracked when what we thought was Tarasque-wrought carnage turned out to be a wine tasting gone tits up. When we picked up the trail again, it was still heading south, to the sea, the French Riviera and its rave season. Best case scenario is we find this thing crashed out on the beach, rolling its ass off after eating several MDMA soaked millennials. Should be easy to catch then, right?
Once on the southern coast, we asked around if anybody saw our wayward Tarasque. We finally came upon of group of people coherent enough to form full sentences.
“Sure, man. He’s been tearing up the floor at the club up the road with our friend Ione.”
We ran to the club expecting to see another scene of wanton destruction but instead saw a group of zonked kids bouncing to an incessant beat and staring at those glowy things we used to use for trick or treating when I was a kid. The club wasn’t torn up. It was barely scuffed. I couldn’t really be mad at the kids who sent us here. I’ve hallucinated some pretty weird things in my day. Just as we were about to leave, there he was. In the middle of the floor, grinding against some scantily clad waif with dreadlocks and entirely too many bracelets made from twine.
“Tarasque,” I shouted over the semi-musical din.
“What, man?” it said, swiveling its head around looking for the source of its name.
“Tarasque, whatever it is you’re planning on doing, stop. Whatever the fairies are offering you, I can beat it.”
“Fairies? What, man? No, this is Ione. We’re going to move to Barcelona and have a baby. We’re in love.” it continued its arrhythmic bobbing.
Ione gave me and Stephanie uncomfortably long hugs and twine bracelets, saying “Now we’re friends forever. Would you guys be the godparents?”
Sometimes if you’re lucky a crisis will avert itself. Sometimes, averting itself to a smaller and more personal crisis that is no longer my problem.
6-10- 17 What’s a Tarasque? Don’t Ask.
Byline: Stephanie Morgan
Dateline: June 10, 2017
Hi, SEG-ers! We’re back again! After a week of a lot of walking and hitching with scary Scottish versions of rednecks we finally made it to France. We’re in a town called Tarascon looking for a monster called a Tarasque that Gary tells me looks like ‘a turtle humped a lion.’ His words. Once a fearsome creature it now volunteers its time helping local children. I couldn’t wait to see a turtle lion working with children, but when we got there I would have to wait a bit longer. As it turns out, it bit a kid for trying to feed it dead leaves and escaped its pen at the petting zoo.
I asked the man if I could see a picture of the monster. He gave me one of the pictures they charge three euros for. In it was a turtle lion thing looking stoned as four kids sat on its back and beat it with sticks. No wonder it ran, but Gary seems to think the fairies are trying to get it on their side for the coming war. Either way, we need to find this thing. I was driving the rental because it’s on my card and I’m the only one of us who can drive for more than twenty minutes without trying to roll a joint while steering with my knees or nodding off and drooling on myself. The trail of the Tarasque was easy enough to follow, just look for the destruction and confused cows lying on their sides. I can understand it being mad. I spent last summer babysitting and kids are jerks, but those poor cows. I heard that once they are on their sides, they have to live like that.
We came upon a nasty scene of bloodied bodies lying everywhere. This had to be the Tarasque, right? We were told by the cops on the scene that actually two roaming bands of drunks ran into one another and challenged each other to a wine tasting. Things apparently got pretty competitive and a fight broke out. One bystander who had come to spectate the wine tasting told us that he saw the unholy union of a turtle and lion rip the seats out of a Citroen Aircross, hotwire it and speed off toward the coast. I still had the numbers of some friends I made during my meltdown in Goa who said, when they were over in India, that they were heading for the French Riviera and then maybe Ibiza when the Riviera got boring. I called them to see if I could dig up any leads. I got ahold of one them who told me they had just hitched a ride with someone who matched my description. According to my source, the creature was heading to the coast to get its head together. We found our next destination.
When we arrived, we stopped anyone who would listen and asked them if they'd seen our Tarasque. It took awhile, but we finally found a group that spoke English. They directed us to a club where they saw the Tarasque. When we got there it was just dancing to that new Diplo track with some girl who looked like she had been up for days. I think Gary found his match. It turns out the Tarasque just wants to move to Spain with his girlfriend and make artisan soap and potpourri. Ione seems nice, though.
Comments (0)
See all