{"id":3712,"date":"2016-04-18T08:19:33","date_gmt":"2016-04-18T12:19:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skelleyverse.com\/?p=3712"},"modified":"2016-11-09T16:24:10","modified_gmt":"2016-11-09T21:24:10","slug":"once-he-was-barefoot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/once-he-was-barefoot\/","title":{"rendered":"Once He Was Barefoot"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-13\" src=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/j-avatar-e1443983489508.png\" alt=\"by jen\" width=\"81\" height=\"81\" \/>and then await instructions<\/li>\n<li>crowned by telephone wires<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Sure you gonna go home, Johnny! I know you are.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>doctors weren&#8217;t able to analyze the semen samples<\/li>\n<li>and tell them to be punctual<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Tune in next time part 68<\/strong><b>\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 <\/b><a href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/tune-in-next-time\/\">Click Here for Earlier Installments<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Once he was barefoot, the enigmatic stranger fished a sheet of paper out of his right moccasin and handed it to me. It was damp with foot-sweat. From the left he fished another note, which he tucked between\u00a0Svetlana&#8217;s lips, making her wrinkle her nose.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Go to these coordinates once you&#8217;ve decoded them, <em>and then await instructions<\/em>,&#8221; the man said as he slipped\u00a0his feet back into their buckskin sheaths. While he was doubled over I noticed that his head was <em>crowned by telephone wires<\/em> and the feathers I spotted earlier were actually live birds tethered there.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;d rather go home than to your mysterious coordinates, dude,&#8221; I said.<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Sure you gonna go home, Johnny! I know you are.&#8221;<\/em> His tone was mocking.<\/p>\n<p>Why did he think I was John? Was\u00a0it because I was in the company of Svetlana? She was trying to spit the notepaper out of her mouth, presumably to tell this man I was not her brother, but the paper stuck to her lips and tongue, and everything she said was muffled into indistinguishability.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Things are heating up,&#8221; the man said, straightening, and ignoring Svetlana&#8217;s sputterings. &#8220;Our\u00a0<em>doctors weren&#8217;t able to analyze the semen samples<\/em> because they were all contaminated\u00a0with monkey semen.&#8221; He smiled briefly. &#8220;The samples were contaminated, not the doctors. Anyway, we need to collect fresh samples from everyone, so go to those coordinates, call your team, <em>and tell them to be punctual<\/em>. We can&#8217;t afford another screw-up.&#8221; He shook my hand, gave Svetlana a nod, and sprinted down the alley to a waiting limousine.<\/p>\n<p>Svetlana finally spat her paper gag onto the ground and yelled, &#8220;This isn&#8217;t John!&#8221; at the receding black car.<\/p>\n<p>I scooped up her soggy note and stuck it in my pocket along with my own.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Now, what&#8217;s all this about semen?&#8221; I asked.<\/p>\n<p>bonus points for using them in order<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Stichomancy Writing Prompts\" href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/stichomancy-writing-prompts\/\">about stichomancy writing prompts<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/stichomancy-writing-prompt-generator\/\">try our stichomancy writing prompt generator!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>and then await instructions crowned by telephone wires &#8220;Sure you gonna go home, Johnny! I know you are.&#8221; doctors weren&#8217;t able to analyze the semen samples and tell them to be punctual Tune in next time part 68\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Click Here for Earlier [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[319,4],"tags":[336,91,122,403],"class_list":["post-3712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stichomancy-prompts","category-writing-prompts","tag-bird","tag-bonus-points","tag-monkey","tag-tune-in-next-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3712"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3712\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4317,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3712\/revisions\/4317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}