Chapter III – Where the Hell Are We?
Jim Stalin pulled himself off the fuselage that had become his home after the highly improbable fall to the ground. He straightened out his hair and stood upright, getting a seat arm in the face for his trouble. He looked at the tree and the mook’s blood stain and thought that it was actually a rather cool end to the fight after all.
"I guess I’d better see if Alexandra survived," Jim said, knowing his cues as if they were written on the back of his hand, "Otherwise it is going to be a long, lonely walk back into civilization."
Jim managed to push the sideways cockpit door open and crawl inside. Alexandra was still strapped into her seat, the position being a bit unflattering for her but she was still very much alive. She breathed a sigh of relief that she had not passed into premature mookdom and looked at Jim.
"Can you get me out of here?" Alexandra asked him, "I’ll be your new best friend!"
"I didn’t realize I had an old one," Jim said, "But I see your angle. You’re heading for the lady sidekick role that is more likely to keep you alive and kicking."
"Beats the pretty friend who died to give you a reason for revenge, doesn’t it?" Alex asked him reasonably, "I mean at this point I could be either. I’d rather see if I can push my way to the better deal."
"Just see that you don’t price yourself out of the market," Jim warned, "We heroes don’t like competition."
Jim and Alexandra got up and walked out of the plane through a big gaping hole in the back side. Seeing as it fell straight down like a rock there was a nice convenient hole ready for them to walk out of onto a clear patch of ground. Of course, there was a nice set scene of debris to make it look wondrous that they survived this rather horrific crash. It really did make a great scene, too bad all you get to do is read about it in this stupid book.
"Where are we?" Jim asked Alexandra, hoping she’d be the fountain of knowledge since it had been decided that he wouldn’t be, "I don’t recognize this place."
"This is the unrecognizable island of plane crashes," Alex told him, "The deserted place that you just happened to be lucky enough to be over when the author needed you to crash the plane and not die."
"Silly me," Jim said, "I should have guessed that."
They walked around for a while and tried to figure out what they needed to do next. Since it was obvious that a few words needed to be wasted, the author put in this scene of them walking around aimlessly while he tried to figure out what idiocy to put them up to on this ridiculously simple island.
"I guess we’d best continue wandering around for a while," Jim said, "They have no idea of what to do so that means it must be time for either a video game or to introduce the villain of the story."
"That works," Alex said, "I need a break anyway."
On the other side of the island in a puff of unrealistic coincidental happenstance a group of people popped into a sudden existence. They would all have been rather surprised at it had they had time to think about it. Two men and a woman headed the group, their positions obvious to everyone around them as they were the only ones to have any inkling what their names were.
"Are you sure the thing is supposed to be here?" James Mickenbacher asked his cohorts, "We’ve been looking for this unknown important object for how long now?"
"Years? Days? Centuries?" Adam Dirtpassion shrugged, "How about you, Reizvolle?"
"Longer than you could dream of," Reizvolle Dirne said, her voice cooed in a really sexy German accent, "But then, knowing you that is only a few moments, Adam."
"Very nice, Reizvolle," Adam said, "Insult my manhood in the first few moments of our existence."
"It’s a talent," she said, her blue eyes showing a bit of mischief, "Now we need to find this unknown important object before we get lost again."
The group of men around them gulped a little, knowing that since only those three got names they were going to be the island mooks. The three leaders, now clad in appropriate island gear, started their search in earnest for the very important object.
"That is the nice thing about mooks," Adam said, "They work until the end of time for you."
"They’re cheap as well," James agreed, "They never live long enough to cash their paychecks."
They made a show of walking around searching for clues and doing anything to make it look like they have a clue of what they were looking for. Of course, since they just came into existence a few minutes earlier it was not as if they had much advance time to even think about this entire thing.
"Adam," Reizvolle asked, "Why are we looking for this?"
"Because it will get us one step closer to the black fossil," Adam Dirtpassion reminded her, "That’s why we all just popped out of the dark imaginary void to be here on this ridiculous island. We have a mission, young lady! That mission is a paramount one, to find the Black Fossil for our own nefarious deeds before the hero of the story can get it for his own not so nefarious deeds."
"Thank you," she nodded, "That makes a little more sense. Wasn’t there another bad guy here a few minutes ago?"
"I’m still here," the formerly named bad guy said, "But evidently the author is writing this section at a location where he doesn’t have access to the original text. He remembers your names but has utterly forgotten mine."
"That does not bode well for you, man," Adam said, "I guess this means the hero is here and you are not going to be with us long."
"A named mook," Reizvolle said, shaking her head, "I do hope your death is not too revolting."
"Funny," he said, "You’re a barrel of laughs."
"Well," Adam said, "Since we’re here to be searching for an artifact, let’s get a move on. It must be here somewhere."
"Of course it is," Reizvolle agreed, "But you know damned well that the idiot hero will stumble upon it first before we can find it."
"Of course he will," Adam agreed, "That’s the beauty of this sort of story. People take outrageous coincidences lightly as if they could actually happen in real life. I mean what are the odds of a plane crashing and dropping a hero on the same island we three really bad people are searching for an artifact on?"
"In this story," Reizvolle cooed, "No less than 130%."
"Exactly," Adam agreed, "Now let’s go wander around while the story refocuses on the main characters."
And without a lick of warning the focus jumps back on to Jim Stalin and Alexandra Diminova, who was caught picking her nose for her trouble. She looked up and noticed that the focus was back on them, nudging Jim to put down the torn remains of the Archie Comic.
"I think we’re up again," Alex told him, "We’d best do something."
"Of course we should," Jim said, "But he should get his butt moving on this."
"Be nice," Alex told him, "I think he broke a rib this week, yet he is still taking the time to work on this idiotic story."
"Point," Jim agreed, "Ok. Let’s go look around and see whether we can do something that will make this interesting enough to be worth the pain he’s feeling as he sits up to type this ridiculous thing."
They made a show of looking around and stumbling around in things they knew nothing about because they had no reason to take any special care of themselves. Jim was just thinking about how nice the weather on this so-called island was until he realized that he was no longer walking on solid soil.
"Oh boy," Jim said and looked at Alex, "Why do I feel like the Wile E. Coyote right now?"
"Because you’re about to fall like him," Alex grinned, "Have a nice fall."
Jim fell down about twenty five feet into a rather exotic looking tunnel. Being a fair to middling government bureaucrat in his professional life he had no idea of archeology, which is good because this probably doesn’t match any archeologist’s idea of an ancient tunnel anyway.
"You ok?" Alex asked, knowing full well that Jim would be fine, "And what the hell is that?"
"Something we need to look closer at," Jim shouted up to her,
"What else would it be? Climb on down here. You’re going to be left behind as the focus is going to stay on me down here in the dark."
Alexandra frowned and managed to climb her way down using some vines and handholds that by some miracle did not give way and send her tumbling down. Jim was waiting for her, tapping his foot in exasperation at the slow female that he was tied down with.
"I swear," Jim said, "You women are slow. I mean I was waiting with my wife Janet the other day…"
"I thought her name was Tracy!" Alexandra exclaimed.
"Whatever," Jim said, "Let’s just go on down this tunnel."
They walked down the appropriately spooky tunnel that was decked out with the requisite cobwebs and the occasional skeleton. Alexandra worried about traps and stayed behind Jim, knowing that even if they were there they probably would not be set to hit him.
Despite not having the foresight to bring flashlights or torches with them there was enough ambient light from unknown sources to make it so they could see the creepy surroundings. Had this been a movie and not a bunch of words on the paper they would have used a skeleton bone to make a crude torch. The fact that there is no light needed other than what the reader uses to see the words makes it easier for them to operate unencumbered.
"Stop trying to pad the word count and write something interesting," Jim told the author, "We know we’re in a dark creepy place. Now let’s do something interesting."
"Here, here," Alex grinned, "Put him in his place."
"Watch it," the author told Alex, "I haven’t decided if you’re a named mook or not yet."
Alexandra gulped and decided to keep her mouth shut. Jim chuckled and went further down the tunnel and saw a pool of water. The water was, of course, slightly dirty and something that no reasonable person would want to touch, let alone wade through. But the characters were dumb enough to ask for something interesting, so they are going to have to wade through it before they get there.
"Thanks," Jim said, "I appreciate it."
Jim and Alex waded through the rather disgusting water in order to make it to the other side. In addition to giving the main character a bit of humility (of which he had little), it had the nice effect of making Alex’s shirt cling to her rather well formed body. When they crawled out onto the other side the water had proved to be cold enough to show her attributes in a clean way.
"Nice," Jim said as he admired the view, "You know, if I wasn’t married…"
"Later," Alex said, still annoyed at being wet, "You’d think they could at least make the disgusting water a bit warm."
"Nah," Jim said, "The results are better this way."
Alex responded by flinging a bit of mud at him. Jim chuckled and continued his walking. They went through some more creepy tunnels before stumbling upon quite by accident what Reizvolle, Adam and James were looking for. It did not look like much, especially since it was only supposed to be a simple clue to the vaunted Black Fossil, which, if you have not guessed by now, is what all of this bull is being written to get everyone on the route to.
"I guess this is it," Alex said, looking at the small, rather innocuous looking object, "Doesn’t look like much, does it?"
"Nope," Jim admitted, "But it has to be important."
"Why’s that?" Alex asked, "Why does everything have some significance?"
"Because," Jim said, pointing at the object, "Look at what is written on it, Alex. If that isn’t an indicator that this is an important artifact what is?"
Alexandra looked closely at the little thing that was rather indistinct except for some writing on it that she had to look very closely to make out. The object had written down the side of it the following:
This is it! You have found an Artifact that is supposed to help point you to the Black Fossil! Good Job! Created by Artifact Synthetics Suppliers, Inc.
"I see," Alex nodded, "All the good artifacts come out of ASS don’t they?"
"Usually," Jim agreed, "I guess that means we should take it with us."
"Probably a good idea," Alexandra nodded as she picked it up and put it in her pocket, "So what do we do now?"
"Run from the nasty set of traps that you just set in motion," Jim suggested, "Duck!"
Alex did so and managed to avoid having her pretty head torn off by mere inches. They ran down the tunnel opposite from where they had come from just so they would not have to deal with the same hazards. For some reason people in these stories just do not like to recover the same ground that they had passed by before.
Alex dodged four pit traps and tripped over another one, just in the nick of time to avoid getting hit by a swinging blade. Jim dodged several falling rocks and a large stake to make it to the area where Alexandra was nearly decapitated. Jim used the plate in his head to stop one blade, which kept Alexandra from dying from the one attached to the same drop device.
"Are they trying to kill us?" Alexandra asked, "This is nuts!"
"That’s a stupid question," Jim told her, continuing to run and dodge traps, "Of course they are trying to kill us. What do you think they are going to do? Greet us with open arms and say ‘Here is my important artifact! Come and take me!’ Get real, Alex!"
"That was supposed to be a rhetorical question," Alex scowled as they continued running, "Is that light up ahead?"
"Of course it is!" Jim said, "This scene has dragged on way too long and they are running out of ways to attempt to kill us. This means that either very soon they are going to have to succeed in killing one of us or let us get out so that they don’t have to try anymore."
"You’d think they could just have us do a song and dance number," Alexandra said testily, "That would waste more words than this crap."
"That will come next," Jim said, "Right after we meet the bad guys."
"What makes you think we’re going to meet the bad guys?" Alexandra asked him, "We haven’t even found the surface yet."
"There it is," Jim said, pointing to the now obvious sign of daylight, "Unless I miss my guess they should be waiting right outside pointing guns at us and smirking stupidly at their success."
"Think so?" Alexandra said, "How much do you want to bet?"
"If I win you get up and sing a Britney Spears parody?" Jim said, "If you win I’ll go and parody a 50 Cent song."
"Deal," Alexandra said, "Let’s get out of here, shall we?"
Of course, because the author was running out of original ideas and had no intention of even looking up the lyrics to a 50 cent song to actually write a parody of, they walk out into the sunlight and find Reizvolle, James and Adam staring at them, grinning triumphantly
"Rats," Alexandra sighed, "I guess I get to be the goat."
"Just lip sync," Adam suggested, "It works for Britney."
"This is a book, stupid," Reizvolle said silkily, "There is no song."
"That’s what you think," the Author said, chuckling like a madman…