Tagged: airplane

Contrarian Literature About the Future

  • by Kentknown as ironic repetition
  • I admit, this got me a little teary-eyed
  • eluded surveillance
  • huge and hideous
  • as he frequently did

Tune in next time part 316      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Contrarian literature about the future utilizes a stylistic device known as ironic repetition, making the books tedious to read but easy to memorize. So I recalled enough details to see myself clearly depicted in the story as a tragic hero. I admit, this got me a little teary-eyed even though I was certain the prophecy was a sham. Fleur and her family believed it, and that fact made it pertinent to my survival, which made it self-fulfilling.

Xylona skimmed the waves well below the height of the landing deck, racing toward the stern of the ship. Then she killed the engine. I held my questions, hoping she knew what she was up to. Wondering what good it would do us if we eluded surveillance only to create a huge and hideous grease stain on the hull.

My aunt’s piloting skills impressed me. We slowed abruptly, and just when I was sure we would drop into the churning wake behind the aircraft carrier, she hauled our nose up and we climbed just enough to clear the deck and settle to a silent stop in a pool of shadow.

Leaning forward, Xylona whispered, “No noise, now. We can’t alert the crew to our arrival.”

John started singing in his sleep, as he frequently did. “They go uppity up-up, they go down, ditty down-down!”

Floodlights on the bridge snapped on, illuminating the landing deck.

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“Shut Up and Let Me Fly the Plane”

  • by jenand waited.
  • every single one’s got a story to tell
  • trying to enjoy sex together
  • textured, oily surface
  • getting a little bit slick

Tune in next time part 315      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“Shut up and let me fly the plane,” Xylona said.

And so I did. I shut up and waited. Soon John fell asleep, leaning back against my chest, so while I waited I let my hands roam about the cockpit, identifying all of the controls by touch. I wanted to be ready to wrest control of the aircraft from my aunt if it seemed like she was going to betray me. I have so many enemies, and every single one’s got a story to tell, I’m sure, about why they have it in for me.

I wished there was one person I could trust. Just one person who I didn’t have to worry about plotting to kill me while trying to enjoy sex together.

Of course I didn’t want that person to be my aunt. I’d just be happy if my aunt wasn’t actively trying to kill me while I was trapped in a biplane she was piloting. I sighed.

My exploring right hand encountered a textured, oily surface that I could not identify. After a moment of prodding I identified it as John’s bare thigh and moved on.

“We’ll be landing momentarily.” Xylona’s voice crackled through the headset. “The landing strip is getting a little bit slick from all the rain, so buckle up.”

I looked down over the side and saw no land anywhere, just a speck on the water that rapidly grew as we swooped closer. It was an aircraft carrier. A black and gold aircraft carrier with a majestic zeppelin tethered to the prow.

This was Fleur’s personal craft. I counted backwards on my fingers and realized she would be due to give birth to our twins any day now.

I gulped, remembering the prophecy.

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Xylona’s Odd Exclamation

  • by Kentthat spasmodic walk of his
  • stealing her underwear
  • body covered with cuts and bruises
  • drove the getaway car
  • “I’ll look in the out of the way places.”

Tune in next time part 314      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Xylona’s odd exclamation made me wish I could see into her cockpit and make sure there was no flux capacitor back there. But maybe if there was, we could simplify so many things in our lives.

John is a nervous flyer, and before we were even airborne I had been reminded of how awkwardly he rides a bike, and that spasmodic walk of his when he was living with Tessa and kept stealing her underwear. If only he had a pair of it now, but alas.

Chilly rain pelted us, stinging my face and shoulders even with John as a shield. But it felt good on my body covered with cuts and bruises from so many things I couldn’t go back and simplify. But I knew the date that I’d return to, if I could. I knew the one thing I’d change. The delicatessen job, when I drove the getaway car. I’d trick Jason into doing it. That was before the rest of the crew knew I had a twin, so they’d never suspect.

We were soon over open water, in a downpour, with the wind and the prop roaring in our ears. John had found another leather cap, but apparently my aunt never planned on having two passengers. John was speaking, but I couldn’t make anything out. I twisted to look at Xylona and realized they were having a conversation. So I grabbed the headgear. Sure enough, it contained a mic and headphones.

“Where are we going to land?” I asked.

“You let me worry about that.”

“Oh, I’m worrying about it, too!”

She chuckled, not seeming worried at all, in fact. “I’ll look in the out of the way places.”

Nothing but blank, dark waves could be seen in all directions. How much more out of the way could you get?

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My Aunt Wore a Leather Aviators Cap

  • by jenobvious ridiculousness of such a request
  • contemplate how much hairstyles have changed
  • breaking up their canoodling
  • I can bring a wild duck
  • misty and foggy and the rain started

Tune in next time part 313      Click Here for Earlier Installments

My aunt wore a leather aviators cap, and little else besides the goggles over her eyes. I remembered John saying she would only carry naked passengers and marveled at the obvious ridiculousness of such a request. But it was her plane and I really wanted off this damn island. I tried to keep my eyes on her face, but it was hard not to contemplate how much hairstyles have changed through the years in regards to intimate female grooming.

Xylona peered through the goggles at John and myself and said, “Wipe all that greasepaint off. I don’t want it all over my plane.” She tossed us each a rag. John happily complied, while I kept throwing looks back to the temple hut. I thought about racing back in to Tessa and Jove, breaking up their canoodling, and making her get on the plane with us. I’d been searching for her for so long, it felt like madness to leave her behind now. But she’d made her choice. For all I knew she was on an official mission. I cleaned the greasepaint off my chest with angry swipes of the rag.

“Does anyone have refreshments for the flight?” Aunt Xylona asked.

John glanced around the clearing. “I can bring a Wild Duck…”

“It’s called Wild Turkey,” I corrected. “But whatever you want to call it, bring at least two bottles.”

Our trio made our naked way to the nearby airstrip. My aunt’s plane was an old fashioned biplane, with two cockpits. That meant John and I had to squeeze in together in the front seat, and made me miss Tessa all the more. I’m not sure there would have been room for all three of us, but it would have been fun to try.

The weather since I emerged from the sewer had been misty and foggy, and the rain started as we began to taxi down the runway.

“Why can’t we wear clothes,” I demanded, as John planted himself in my lap and started fumbling with the seatbelt.

“Where we’re going we won’t need roads!” Xylona cried. “Or clothes!”

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“That Aphrodisiac Gum Sure Packs a Punch”

  • by jentransported out west
  • in the grip of the headache
  • picture of the burly child
  • holding her indelicately by the shoulders
  • already commenced incipient flirtations

Tune in next time part 311      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“That aphrodisiac gum sure packs a punch,” Jason lisped by my elbow. He was watching John get himself smeared with clown makeup in Carla’s writhing embrace. I meanwhile turned my attention back to Jove who had ceased his naked leaping and already commenced incipient flirtations with Tessa. She didn’t seem to mind. In fact she dangled upside down from the rafter to put herself in range of my overly tall brother.

The next thing I knew, Jove was holding her indelicately by the shoulders and kissing her roughly, the very picture of the burly child manhandling a lollipop.

I felt myself in the grip of the headache that had been stalking me ever since my sojourn in the sewer. I massaged my temples. Somehow I had to get John and Tessa away from their latest conquests and onto the plane so that we could get off this godforsaken rock. They were already naked, so at least that part of the pilot’s demands would be easily met.

“Attention!” I barked. “Your attention, please!” Nobody even looked at me. “The plane will be leaving in five minutes.” It had always been Tessa’s fondest wish to visit the Grand Canyon, so I added, “Anyone who wants to be transported out west must board now!”

The rest of them could stay here with the Fire Eaters and TechnoPagans and all the circus cosplay and sex games if they wanted, but I wasn’t about to leave without Tessa.

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I Lost a Lot of Sleep

  • by jenI lost a lot of sleep
  • save for spasmodic jumping
  • sing and rejoice
  • According to your own statistics
  • already shedding clothes

Tune In Next Time Part 44                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

I lost a lot of sleep a decade ago when I heard that my beloved Great Uncle Jinx’s plane went down in the Andes. I don’t remember much about what I did with all those hours of insomnia, save for spasmodic jumping back and forth between the two twin mattresses, my cell being too small for effective pacing. Seeing him alive now should make me want to sing and rejoice, but instead it filled me with questions.

“According to your own statistics, Uncle Jinxy,” I said, very carefully not lisping, “we stand a better chance outside, where we have room to scatter.” I knew damn well that Jinx Damocles believed no such thing. This was a test to smoke out yet another potential impostor in a week already too full of them.

Jinx Damocles stared at me with his one good eye. “If that were your plan, you’d be already shedding clothes.”

I grinned. It was really him!

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The Captain Cleared His Throat

  • k-avatarThe captain cleared his throat
  • for perhaps a minute
  • rubbed her nose tip
  • cool, hard and prickly
  • And then up.
  • plain khaki shirt and slacks
  • by sonic violence
  • killed in an aircrash

The captain cleared his throat for perhaps a minute. Phoebe shuffled her feet, seeming just about bored enough to create a scene. Hoping to distract her, I reached over and rubbed her nose tip, which was cool, hard and prickly. She smiled. Finally, the captain began his speech, and I along with Phoebe and all the rest learned what real boredom can be. At last, he bade us all take our seats and the vehicle sped down the runway. And then up. The plane climbed like a firework, mashing me back in my seat and flattening Phoebe’s plumage. Our frightful acceleration didn’t seem to impede the hostess, who looked beguiling even in her uniform of a plain khaki shirt and slacks. Phoebe pecked the back of my head when I swiveled it to observe the hostess’s progress down the aisle. I wondered if perhaps the captain’s lugubrious oration might have contained important information, for the rate of our ascent continued to increase, as did the noise. Conversation was rendered impossible by sonic violence emanating from the engines. Thus I was unable to inquire as to whether, should we break apart somewhere above the atmosphere, people on the ground would still say we’d been killed in an aircrash.

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Joseph Made a Habit

  • k-avatarsneering at cultures
  • commodity as fetish
  • aped the follies and vices
  • “Shell? Milk? Moon? Jasmine? Crystal? Snowflake?
  • coupled with cruelty

Joseph made a habit of sneering at cultures lacking decadence, peoples who simply aped the follies and vices of wild animals pursuing crude gratification. So when traveling to Svenborgia, he naturally booked his ticket on the official national airline. And naturally, he flew first class.

“Shell? Milk? Moon? Jasmine? Crystal? Snowflake?” importuned the stewardess. Her almond eyes and alabaster complexion marked her as deep-lineage Svenborgian. Ah, theirs was a truly magnificent decadence: commodity as fetish.

“Alabaster,” replied Joseph with a wink. The stewardess laid aside her tray and led him to the lavatory, where they kissed with sang-froid and coupled with cruelty.

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“Rude Drivers. They Kill People.”

  • k-avatara man in a white spacesuit
  • the greedy bastards
  • workers washing their boots
  • the pilots had been drinking
  • They kill people
  • code word to alert the bodyguard

“Rude drivers. They kill people.”

Steve returned to his magazine, hoping to read in peace until take-off. A man in a white spacesuit had the seat beside him, and seemed determined to pry into Steve’s reasons for everything, up to and including his choice of air travel over the highway.

As he read an article about workers washing their boots as part of a work stoppage, the greedy bastards striking for more pay and more days off, Steve heard a commotion in first class. Some celebrity and his whole entourage were trying to leave the cabin, the spoiled celeb calling out “guacamole!” over and over.

It must have been a code word to alert the bodyguard that the pilots had been drinking.

 

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