Late Timesheet Tales, 1

Sorry for the delay in timesheets, Mary, but I just got back. It felt like I was gone for a day, but when looking at my watch, it clearly had been several. I had not planned for the trip to take as long as it did, but when you find yourself in the business of time travel, the product tends to use itself more than you ever could.

My Saturday began like any usual one; waking up from a drunken stupor in my neighbor’s gazebo, surrounded by Williams-Sonoma shopping bags, having just performed life-saving heart surgery on a kangaroo. The night before was still a bit of blur, but considering the vile taste of anti-itch cream mixed with cat litter that caked my tongue, I must have eaten at P.F. Chang’s.

It was about noon when I got the call. My business partner, Durgina Fervish, was shouting through Finnish expletives the retelling of a botched transaction that had occurred earlier in the morning. It was an interesting story, primarily because Durgina is Brazillian and phones terrify her.

Now, moonlighting in the imported cheese business (cheezuschristsgardenofedam.com, if you’re curious), I’ve dealt with bad deals before, but Durgina’s transaction was…different. Apparently, the man arrived late, disoriented and unable to speak, clutching an oblong silver briefcase and wearing a bizarre reflective skintight suit. “Like jellyfish,” Durgina said in her thick Brazilian timbre, followed by another vexing Finnish expletive.

As Durgina attempted to communicate with the “paskapää”, his strange, almost aqueous eyes continued to fixate on the lusty crate of cheese Durgina brought. This didn’t surprise me initially, as it was packed with our famous Lord Gouda’s Caerphilly Chosen Sampler Special, but Durgina said the man seemed to be more famished than a fine acquisitor of rennetted milk. His following action seemed to confirm this when, with the strength of ten Ashley Russells, the man threw the silver briefcase at Durgina and leapt towards the crate, thrashing wildly at the nailed boards of it until his shimmery opaque hands reached a Cheddarnooga Choo Choo cheese log. While the man continued to strike at the container, Durgina picked up the briefcase (assuming it held the money for the transaction), gave him a business card and quickly excused herself from the Starbucks they were in.

After the story and between terrified screams that the phone was stealing her soul, Durgina had insisted we meet.

“I insist that we meet,” she had said, insistently.

“I can’t,” I replied, acknowledging her insistence of meeting. “Now that Bruno Marsupial is out of the ER gazebo, I have to do my Wunderman timesheets. Mary in Operations is going to be awfully mad if I’m late on those again. We can just count the money later.”

“That’s the thing, runkkari,” she hissed. “There was no money. There was…something else. You must hurry.”

The timesheets would have to wait.

I had arrived at Durgina’s tree hut as soon as I could. She had been waiting by the doorway to usher me in, a caipirinha in hand to soothe her nerves. Also in her hand to soothe her nerves, heroin. We quickly descended to her kitchen table, where the mysterious metallurgic case had been placed next to some freshly made but terrible smelling moqueca. The briefcase was open, and a modulating glow emanated from inside it.

“What do you think, runkkari?”

Inside the briefcase was a large electronic panel affixed to the interior, coated with various attenuators and buttons. On the panel itself, were unknown characters and markings illuminated by unusual diodes, resembling something of a string of numbers organized in a calendar date. Next to the panel, a large pulsating white switch and two long glowing bars that resembled something like power cells. It was totes badass.

“It looks like an alien bomb or something,” I said, trying to sound awesome.

“Maybe it’s not,” Durgina replied, not adding much to the conversation.

Moments passed. Durgina and I continued to stare at the panel and switches. Our eyes inevitably centered at the bright white switch next to the panel.

“What do you think that switch does?” asked Durgina, her eyes beginning to gloss over by her own tedium. Just kidding; it was the heroin.

“Only one way to find out,” I said, all Clint Eastwood-like.

I pressed the pulsating switch. The briefcase quickly conflagrated with life, millions of quantum computations seeming to peal across its complex motherboards. There was a gimcracky pound and clinking whirr of mechanical components activating as alien numbers on the brightly lit panel began to randomize and flicker violently. Underneath the briefcase, the ground began to quake and splinter, as an ominous yellow light pressed outward from the ground and began to levitate me and the briefcase into the air, vehemently oscillating both of us left and right. It kinda felt like a Tilt-A-Whirl ride at a county fair, except there wasn’t a carny trying to spit tobacco juice in your face every time the seat made a revolution.

I began to feel my body dissolve, in a way. The consciousness that I had known so well now seemed like an alien process. The previously loud sounds of Durgina’s screams and stench of salty moqueca felt light years away now…but despite all of this, my ephemeral existence seemed to press onward towards a coherent, inertial path of inclination. After a few moments of this sensation, it became unusually clear that I wasn’t fading away. Like Jason Statham, I was being transporter-ed.

I finally awoke to the sight of a sickly yellow sky, mottled with broken flecks of black, oily clouds slashing the horizon. Cutting into the periphery were long pointed mountains that gave way to ashen desert sands and sooty red rock. In the far distance, dozens of organic structures made of fragmented stone grew from the harsh fortitude, illuminated solely by two immense moons peering through the foggy pale citrine and spikes.

Hoisting myself up from the ground, a sudden amber flash caught the corner of my eye. As my eyes focused, it was a lone dim bulb on the internal panel of the briefcase, partially obscured under the sand that gripped it. I was quick to clear the briefcase and blow the excess granules from the gadgetry, and upon examination of the panels and switches, this…this “timesporter” appeared to be fine. The orange blinking bulb, though, seemed to indicate that the power cells were depleted. A shudder overtook me; I wasn’t going anywhere…and even worse, there was no computer with access to the Hub in sight.

I walked for hours through the leaden terrain, finding nothing along the primordial sands except those unique stone structures and the occasional f*** to give. I appeared to be the only living thing on this alien planet, but figured that wouldn’t be the case for long if I didn’t find sustenance of some kind. Eventually, I reached a lush, forested terrace at one of the bases of the mountains, hoping to find water and, at the very least, a change of scenery.

And a change of scenery I found, when a large shadowy figure appeared in the distance, under the dim pale of the two moons.

I froze for a moment, and so did the creature. I wasn’t certain if it noticed me, but figuring I had more cover from the terrace’s flora and much less to lose, I decided to continue my advance to see this thing.

The creature was hideous. Bulbous eyes, pig’s snout, whiskery dark hair that descended from the chin. Its fat head was connected to a bloated and furry body, arms resembling anemic veal shanks wrapped around a novelty pool toy. It walked with a lame traipse, the stubby blumps it considered legs propelling it forward with comical difficulty. As it slogged closer, the alien creature revealed itself to just be a full-length mirror, and now I hate myself.

After breaking the mirror and the last of my self-esteem into tiny pieces, a blip of sound came from the briefcase, followed by another. I hurriedly opened the briefcase to discover the fuel cells had regained some of their charge. “Thank Cheezus,” I proclaimed. Turns out all a time machine transporter needs… is time. Relieved, I sat down amongst the broken shards of glass, hoping the end of this weird journey would soon arrive. Timesheets, here I come.

And that’s when the arrow went through my shoulder blade.

When I finally came to, the bizarre rockmarked vistas of the alien planet had disappeared in favor of crushing darkness and a meager yellow fire. My hands had been bound behind my back by some scratchy rope and I had been dragged into some sort of cave. The timesporter and its solacing flicker of lights were nowhere to be found.

I looked down. It was not a pretty sight; apart from the bloody wound in my right shoulder from the arrow, I had been stripped down to some sort of red peasant’s garment that left very little to the imagination. My usual attire of black sweater and grey pants were replaced with a haggard red diaper and intersecting straps, my supple gut pouring over the underoos like a hairy beige tsunami overtaking a FEMA-built maroon bridge. While I did appreciate how the straps complemented the intricate curves of my lower torso, common decency forced me to acknowledge that I looked like a spoiled Christmas ham thrown violently into a little red hammock. I looked ridiculous. How Sean Connery could rock something like this in Zardoz, I’ll never know.

And speaking of haggis, the smell of the cave had warranted the comparison. A foul, sulfuric odor clawed at the air with olfactory disregard, its vile fume forming the croutons atop the proverbial shit salad that was my ultimate situation: here I was, a humble program manager, punny cheese purveyor and polka music conductor, now a time portal’s distance away from the universe I knew, enslaved and wearing a red diaper in a cave’s lower intestine on an alien planet, with last week’s timesheets barren of my labors.

Shhhhdrm.

The sound of shambling footsteps interrupted my pity party. Somewhere in the inky blackness, multiple beasts seemed to be heading towards me. The heavy thuds of their steps suggested they were large, bipedal creatures, and their low-end, throaty grumbling suggested they might be Dutch. Hurriedly, I attempted to get back on my feet with hopes of running, but a heretofore unknown rope around my neck snapped me back to my original position. Resigned to my first extraterrestrial encounter and with no hopes of escaping, I decided to do the worm dance until the alien creatures arrived. Maybe they would die from alien laughter at the sight, and I could at least cross something off my incredibly depressing bucket list.

No dice. Before I could prepare to flamp pathetically about the cave floor like a jiggy invertebrate, four sinewy and ecru arms lifted me into the air with brutal force as a heavy, tendriled foot stamped the fire out of existence. In total dark, I felt myself being carried across craggy terrains until the mouth of the cave appeared in the ambit. The sickly auralent sky that I had come to know on this journey came slowly back into bleary focus by the subterrane, with the new and discomforting soundtrack of a thousand indistinct murmurs and roars echoing inside the cave walls. Despite the unease I felt by the sound, it was still infinitely more tolerable than a Phillip Glass concert.

I was heaved to the desert sand. Upon my impact, a loud, veracious swell of alien cries and bewilderment shook the infertile vistas, their phonic blares of discontent surrounding all sides of me. I looked up to see that I was now in some sort of coliseum, with thousands of scabrous taupe beings filed throughout the heights of the arena, jeering. The two creatures that carried me, a differing species that resembled a chambered nautilus with Arnold Schwarzenegger arms, loomed on each side of me, monitoring my every move with their stalked eyes.

Ahead of me, a rangy, esteemed-looking taupe being, bedecked in a long robe and adorable glitter helmet, sat up on a plantlike throne in the center of a long, populated council. Consequent to my eyes locking upon this dignified khan of sorts, it stood, asserting itself amongst it subjects and its own badassery. The two brawny cephalopods hoisted me to my knees, forcing veneration of this kingly figure in front of me.

An immediate hush fell among the crowd as the figure opened its serrated mouth and began to speak.

“I AM XITILIRARP, IMPERATOR OF THE KERIK,” it bellowed, its voice resembling a heliumed baritone chicken with emphysema. “FOR THE SAKE OF THE STORY, I WILL SPEAK ENGLISH AND YOU MAY ADDRESS ME AS NEWT GINGRICH. STATE YOUR PURPOSE ON OUR PLANET.”

“I…I am Greg, of the Wunderman,” I blurted out, increasingly aware of my trial and the surprising comfort of a red cloth diaper. “I’m but an accidental traveler to this place. I mean no harm and seek return to the time and land that I come from.”

Newt Gingrich looked on, saying nothing at first. By apparent sycophantic tendency, the council whispered amongst themselves. I continued.

“Please. I was carrying something with me wh-when you found me. If I can simply have the case back, then I can leave and never return.”

“YOU MEAN, THIS?”

Newt Gingrich waved a blocky appendage to his right. On the council table, the timesporter rested, open and excitedly flashing the full state of its fuel cells. I nodded.

“Yes, that is it,” I said. Once again, a stirring of concern and discussion from the council.

“DID YOUR SPECIES BUILD THIS DEVICE?” asked Newt Gingrich.

“No, it appeared to have come from some other race, too. We merely collected it.”

Newt Gingrich laughed.

“SO, YOU TOO THEN HAVE BEEN INCONVENIENCED BY THE BLORATS. INSUFFERABLE AND CLUMSY SPACE TRADERS, ALWAYS LEAVING THINGS BEHIND. NO MATTER. THE DEVICE IS OURS NOW.”

“The Blorats?”

“SILENCE. YOU NEED NOT CONCERN YOURSELF WITH THAT KNOWLEDGE. YOU ARE MERELY A NUISANCE, AN INCONSEQUENTIAL SPECK OF GALAXIAL DUST.”

Funny. The Newt Gingrich on Earth said the same thing to me once.

“OBJECT, DESPITE THE UNINTENTIONAL SERENDIPITY OF THIS ENCOUNTER, YOU HAVE TRESPASSED ON THE PLANET KERIK AND DESTROYED A SACRED MIRROR. BY OUR PRECEPTS, THE COUNCIL AND I CONDEMN YOU TO DEATH BY FLOGGING MOLLY. YES, YOU HEARD THAT RIGHT. FLOGGING MOLLY.”

True to its word, a stony gate in the coliseum opened, and Dave King and Bridget Regan from Flogging Molly walked into view, King holding some sort of bat with rusty nails and Regan with her trademark fiddle, ready to play it but not for music. The other members followed out after. The taupe crowd erupted in delight, clearly fans of interstellar violence and the boisterous sounds of Celtic punk music.

It appeared to be the end for me. Clearly, this was an intelligent species, and I, who once thought that coins found between the couch cushions were from spiders trying to pay rent, would be slaughtered in the arena by a seven-piece Irish punk band from Los Angeles and my two escargot handlers.

I decided to try one final and desperate thing.

…

“Hey, look over there!” I shouted, pointing to an indeterminate spot away from the arena.

Amazingly, the entire drove and council looked over there. Newt Gingrich, not to be outlooked by his subjects, looked even harder over there.

“Is that it?” meekly asked someone from the crowd, pointing to something over there.

“No, keep looking. It’s over there there.” The crowd looked harder over there there.

It worked. With the crowd looking over there there, I lunged toward the council rostrum and grabbed the timesporter. A comical “yoink!” may have been said as I did it.

Chaos erupted. As Newt Gingrich sought protection from the council and demanded my immediate death, my snail grapplers flew into a rage, lumbering towards with their arms raised to deliver mollusky blows. I began to run, madly smashing buttons on the timesporter into a discernible sequence until the main switch lit up again. Flogging Molly gave chase, with George Schwindt throwing drumsticks at me and Matt Hensley trying to tune his concertina, thankfully to no avail. I finally hit the arena walls, but just as I was being cornered by the band and members of the council with horned weapons, I flipped the switch to the timesporter, as well as the bird. The timesporter banged to life, quaked the ground, and once again, my body evaporated into mist and shot through the cosmos.

When I awoke this time, the smell of heated spoons and scorched moqueca greeted me back at Durgina’s dining table within the tree hut. Durgina, stalwart attentive business partner as she had always been, was passed out on a truck tire in the living room, working on an avant-garde piano ballad of some sort. Mad as I could have been at her because of the trouble she got me in — and it was trouble to be sure — I couldn’t help but smile. Sure, she had been an unknown liaison to an alien race across the channels of space and time, but she knew how to sell Blue Stilton, damn it, and that needs to count for something. And with a fresh supply of Holy E-Swiss-copal Baby Cheeses platters coming in, I’d need her fiery Brazillian salesmanship to recoup the money we lost on the deal this weekend. I pulled a moldy blanket I found over her supple shoulders, grabbed the timesporter and left, content not to return back to her hut for quite some time.

When I finally made it home, it was midnight. My watch confirmed I was a few days later in the future, missing my timesheet deadline. I went to my closet, kept the red diaper and straps on, but covered the timesporter with a blanket and slid it behind a drawer for safekeeping. Perhaps I would need it again.

At long last, I fired up the computer and opened the Hub. There, the screen prompted me to begin inputting my hours for last week, and for the first time in a long while, I happily plugged them in. How wonderfully comforting it was to control time again, rather than it control me.

Oh, and as for the bizarre man who attacked the cheese crate, who started this whole mess? Turns out it was just James Franco heading home from a costume party. And that somehow made all the sense in the world.