Flight and Fancy: Part 2

I didn’t say anything. The Mountebank was wearing what I presumed to be a very stylish and expensive black suit. His black silk tie alone looked like it was worth more than my truck, though the tie-pin, which looked like a faithful silver replica of bird-poop, was not to my taste.

“Hi,” he said again, with a little wave. He was on the slim side, not quite what I’d expect from the Harlequin’s enforcer. He leaned forward. “Hello?”

I raised an eyebrow at him. Behind me, the cleaver stopped, to be replaced by a saxophone doing the theme from ‘Bewitched.’

The Mountebank looked over my shoulder. “He can talk, right? I was told he could talk.”

“He was talking earlier,” Donald said from behind me.

“Huh.” The Mountebank turned back to me. “Playing it tough, I see. Well, I can respect that.” He fished inside his coat and pulled out a shiny silver corkscrew. “However, I should tell you that the last guy who didn’t talk got this,” he waved the corkscrew at me. “We played ‘Places You Don’t Want a Corkscrew’ for almost an hour.  Granted,” he continued, “he was a Mime which should have been a huge clue.” The Mountebank snorted. “He kept making these hilarious facial expressions until I got bored and just screwed this into his skull.” He tapped me on the knee with the corkscrew. “What about you? Should we start making Monopoly pieces out of you? Seriously, we’ve got a board around here somewhere.”

I did a head nod over my shoulder at Donald.

“And you’re nodding at . . . him?” The Mountebank pointed over my shoulder.  “Did you whack him on the head or something?”

The saxophone missed a note, which sounded strangely like a duck farting.

“No, sir,” Donald answered. “I just told him to shut-up.”

“Huh.” The Mountebank turned back to me. “Really? And here I thought you were some sort of ninja stomping badass. Fine. You’re free to talk.”

“Well,” I said. “He asked nicely.”

“I see.” The Mountebank stroked his chin. “A polite one. Mommy taught you well.”

“When your Mom can kill a bull with a rolling pin, you tend to pay attention.”

“Indeed.” The Mountebank was suddenly on his feet. “Now, you’re probably wondering why I had you brought here,” he said, as he paced in front of me.

“Not really.”

The Mountebank paused, looking sideways at me. “Really?”

“Nope.”

The Mountebank put one foot up on the chair he had just been sitting in. “’I’m confused. ‘Really’ as in you really are wondering or ‘really’ in that you really don’t care.”

“The latter.”

There was a pause. “Is that the first one or the second one,” the Mountebank asked. “I can never keep it straight.”

“The second. ‘Latter’ rhymes with ‘later’ so it’s the second one. It’s a little mnemonic device.”

“Nice, I’ll have to remember that. Now then, why don’t you want to know?”

“Simple,” I said. “I already know.”

“Go on.”

“If you’d wanted to kill me, you’d have just done that. If you’d just wanted to torture me, well, I’d be screaming a lot right about now. So, that only means one thing: You’re coupe didn’t go quite as well as you wanted and now you want me to help you.”

The Montebank stared at me, his blue eyes wide and unblinking. “Very clever,” he said, slowly. “I’ve heard that about you.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ve also heard that you can be incredibly stupid.”

My brain went from fourth to first without the benefit of the intervening gears. “You didn’t,” I finally said.

“Oh,” said the Mountebank, smiling. “I did.”

The fly on my head took off and circled around me, before landing on the Mountebank’s shoulder.

Next: Part 3

Flight and Fancy: Part 1

NOTE: This is a continuation of the story begun in Never Trust a Woman in a Mask, and then continued in El Payaso and The Best Side. If you read (or have read) all of those, this one will make more sense. Well, more-ish sense. It is, after all, about my part in the Clown Wars, wherein the Clown Mafia fought the Ninjas and Mimes for control of the underworld. And yes, the doctor said if I keep taking my medication the music will stop. Eventually.

 Flight and Fancy: Part 1

I woke up handcuffed to a chair with a potato-chip bag over my head. “Is it Christmas already, mom?” I said, as I blinked my way back into consciousness. The handcuffs rattled against the chair’s metal frame as I tried to move my arms, so I settled on scratching my nose with my foot. I could dimly hear a polka version of Don McLean’s Starry Starry Night, but there were no other sounds aside from a meat cleaver being sharpened on a leather strop by a left-handed man in his mid-forties with a cauliflower ear and a receding hairline.

Yeah, I know my meat cleaver sharpening.

“Hey,” someone said. “He’s awake.”

The bag was pulled off my head and a shower of Cool Ranch Doritos cascaded around my shoulders.  I sneezed. “Y’know,” I began, as chips slid off, “you could have emptied the bag before you put it on my head.”

The man in front of me was wearing a dark suit, tie, and a Donald Duck mask. “Shut up,” he said, as he flicked a Dorito off my head.

“Ask nicely.”

His eyes narrowed behind his mask. Mine narrowed as well, mainly because another sneeze was coming on. Donald’s hand went into his coat and the sound of the meat cleaver being sharpened abruptly ceased behind me.

“Shut up,” Donald said again. “Please.” He pulled out a handkerchief and held it politely to my nose as I sneezed again.

“Okay,” I said. Donald started to refold his handkerchief, then thought better of the idea and tossed it into a nearby trashcan. It made the distinct ‘ping’ of metal hitting metal. Donald didn’t appear to notice.

The room I was in was seemed small, maybe ten by ten, with a blank concrete wall in front of me. Other than the trashcan and a few scattered Doritos on the floor, there was nothing else in view.

Behind me, the meat cleaver began to make quick, precise cuts in a staccato rhythm.  I turned as much as I could, but couldn’t see the source, though I did notice a stack of hula hoops. Donald seemed content to lean against the wall a few feet away, leafing through a copy of Tiger Beat.

I tested the handcuffs. They were clasped firmly around my wrists and the chain was looped through the frame of the metal chair I was on. I tried to snap the chain, hoping that getting knocked out had granted me super-human strength. No dice. I then tried telekinesis, telepathy, starting fires mentally, flight, invisibility, and talking to fish.

The last one actually worked, but sadly, there were no fish around, so I never realized I could do it.

Behind me, a door opened and there was a hushed conversation I couldn’t quite make out. A fly buzzed by and then settled on my head.

A man in a black suit and a domino mask strode into view. He placed a chair in front of mine and sat down.

“Hi,” he said, rather amiably. “I’m the Mountebank.”

Next: Part 2

A Bed Gone Bad

As some of my regular readers may know (all three of them), I own a variety of evil devices. My keyboard was forged in some hellish nether-world. My GPS wants me to harvest Leigh for his organs, and I once had a toothbrush that I called Mr. Stabby for a variety of reasons.

Now I fear that my bed, the frame specifically, has gone to the side of evil. A Sith bed, if you like. Specifically, in the last three weeks, I’ve broken two toenails on it and once cracked my shin hard enough to almost make me pass out.

Yes, I know exactly what it feels like to almost, but not quite, pass out. It’s a weird feeling, best described as ‘BWAAAAAAH’ in a sort of vibrating bass. I know this because my old kung-fu instructor, Dave, had what we would euphemistically describe as ‘heavy hands.’ Ie, he felt that pain tolerance was an essential skill and he would not hesitate to ‘train’ us.

Oh, it’s not like you would walk into the school and he’d punch you in the face. It was slightly more subtle. Sometimes, he’d feel the need to demonstrate something to the class.

“Hey, Jason,” he’d call out.

“Yeah,” I would answer, innocently enough.

“C’mere.”

I would, of course, walk over. “What’s up?”

“Throw a high right.”

“Okay.”

BWAAAAAAH!

I would regain my senses usually at the point where he was saying something like “and that’s how you use that move.”

NOTE: It may be Stockholm Syndrome, but man, I do miss that school.

So, at any rate, my only conclusion is that my bed has turned to the path of evil. As I said, two cracked toe-nails and one shin-on-wood BWAAAAAH do not lie. Now, I don’t know what would make a good bed go bad. Money, perhaps. Fame. Fortune. The chance to have someone other than a large, hairy, gaseous man lying on it.

All I know is that it’s (technically) inanimate and I have three axes of varying sizes scattered around the apartment. I figure I’ll give it one more cracked toe-nail and then it gets to find out what BWAAAAAAH feels like.

Cheers,

-Jason

A Snob

I think I’ve become a running snob.

Wait, let me back up a bit.

I’ve been running for about a year and a half now and aside from the muscle pain, foot pain, calf pain, general pain, and just the sheer boredom of running on a treadmill, I’m having a marvelous time.

Now, in that year and a half, I’ve collected a set of what I call my ‘running gear.’ This is to differentiate that set of clothes from my ‘gaming gear,’ ‘kung-fu gear,’ and most importantly, my ‘ice-cream coma in front of the TV gear.’

Now, my running gear is a miracle of science. My shirt not only weighs nothing, but it somehow makes the sweat go away. No, I don’t know where it goes, but if Cthulhu awakens and he smells like old feet and bananas, my bad. The shorts are much like the shirt, save that the holes are in different places. My shoes are so light that it’s like strapping bouncy clouds on your feet.

In short, science has created a set of running clothes so advanced that I’ve had to put a note on my door that reads ‘Are we wearing clothes?’ to avoid walking out of the house naked.

NOTE: It used to read ‘Am I wearing clothes,’ but I would read the note and then say “of course not, you’re a note.” Needless to say, there was a lot of screaming at the gym accompanied by the authorities shooting me roughly 28 times with tranquilizer darts. I woke up at the zoo. Yes, I’m that hairy.

Which, to come full circle, is why I’ve become a snob.

I realized this when I came home today and realized I’d forgotten to wash my running gear the night before and thus, had no scientifically advanced, micro-fiber,  sweat-eating clothes to wear. I briefly considered simply not running, as to do so without my (possibly) bullet-repellent, odor-eating running gear was inconceivable.

And yes, I do know what the word means.

I then realized I was not getting any fitter just standing around, so I threw on a pair of old shorts and a cotton t-shirt and ‘roughed it’ for the run.

Strangely enough, I completed my run without dying or even losing a limb, so I guess all the pheromone-emitting, non-Euclidian, running gear in the world can’t really replace just doing it.

I did smell like a Tauntaun though. Specifically the bits on the inside.

Cheers,

-Jason

News - Both Good and Bad

Well, as some of you might have noticed, the comic has not updated in about a month or so. There is a very long, dramatic explanation as to why this has happened. Hint: ninjas.

Actually, no. The explanation is quite simply that Leigh has simply not had the time between his (increasing) work and family obligations to get much done. And in all honesty, that situation is probably not going to change in the near future.

So, the bad news: we're going on a hiatus.

Now, I realize that some of you are rolling your eyes and/or cursing as you go to delete Wayfarers from your favorites, but the good news is that we are actively looking for an artist to replace Leigh and continue the comic.

Obviously, we want someone good and reasonably priced, so the search may take a while. So, we're not dead, we're just sleeping.

NOTE: if you're an artist who would love to work on Wayfarer's Moon, email us at mail@wayfarersmoon.com, ideally with a link to your portfolio. If we like your stuff, we'll get in touch.

As a side note, I have no intention of letting Wayfarer's die. I have promised on several occasions that I would not leave everyone hanging, so if the Wayfarer's comic is not viable, then I will write Wayfarer's the novel and put it up somewhere for everyone to read. There's a lot of cool stuff that's going to happen and trust me, I'm dying to tell the story.

Now, the good news:

The blogs will continue. A poor substitute for the comic, I know, but if you like hearing about my adventures with ninjas and my random observations on life, they will continue.

The other good news:

After much thought, I have decided to self-publish Art the Wanderer. A cover is being worked on right now and ideally, it will be on Amazon and a few other e-publishers in a couple months. And for those of you without e-readers, there is an app you can download so you can read it on your computer. I may also print a limited run of copies that you'll be able to buy at cons.

I also happen to be working on a sequel, so there should be more Art goodness in the next year.

So, keep watching the blog and I'll occasionally let you know how things are going in between telling you stories of how I almost knocked myself out changing the sheets.

And one last thing: please don't email us to tell us we suck. Wayfarer's Moon is a labor of love for us and we did not come to this decision lightly. We love it enough that we're trying to find a way to keep it going, even though Leigh can no longer commit to regularly drawing it.

Arrows will fly. Enemies, and sadly, some friends, will fall. And in the end, the world will be a better place because of two women who refused to give up.

Iri and Lily will return.

Promise.

Cheers,
-Jason

Burger Glue

Without a doubt, burgers are one of my favorite foods. If I try a new restaurant, the first thing I get is always a burger, with the logic that if they can’t do a burger right, I’m not going to trust them to do anything else.

Now everyone knows that the burger is one of mankind’s oldest foodstuffs. Early hunter-gatherer’s made primitive burgers out of mammoth, which they roasted over an open fire. Coincidentally, this is the first known barbeque as well. Burgers are mentioned in several great works, including Beowulf, the Canterbury Tales, several of Shakespeare’s plays, and issue #4 of Batman.

NOTE: The preceding paragraph is completely untrue.

So, unsurprisingly, I found myself at a burger place for lunch last Saturday and I ordered my usual: a tripe decker with extra cheese and only one slice of bacon, as I’m trying to lose some weight. However, after the third bite, a tragedy occurred. I had a burger explosion. All the meat went out the back end and I found myself holding two pieces of heavily condimented bread.

I said a bad word that rhymes with ‘harpsichord’ and attempted to reintegrate my lunch into something resembling a proper burger. This was not particularly successful and I had to resort to using a knife and fork.

“Harpsichord!” I said to myself as I ate. “What I need is some sort of burger glue.”

I paused, mid-bite, to ponder this idea. Not only would burger glue make consuming a burger an even better experience, it would also make a great name for a band.

Now, I’m not calling this ‘yet another great idea’ as I have no idea how to achieve it. I’m thinking we need to invent some sort of sticky yet delicious condiment that would hold the burger together as well as enhance the flavor. Something like Elmer’s Mustard or Krazy Ketchup.

Anyway, somebody out there needs to figure this one out, as it will revolutionize the burger industry.

Oh, and if you use ‘Burger Glue’ for your band name, I get 10%.

Cheers,

-Jason