the plot hardens... er... stiffens... oh... thickens

spajjy, my favorite spacesponge (as he's the only one i've ever met), used to say that things made more sense on the inside. he spent a lot of time in various prisons for violating moisture laws and splooshing his juices over rare books, dried butterfly collections, and (perhaps most erotically) the daughters of some senior political and business leaders. frankly, i never knew what to make of that, but hey... he's got the hookup for some primo fucked-up roboporn so who am i to argue?


why do i bring up spajjy? could there possibly be any reason to do such stochastic act? could it have something to do with getting rid of the simp?

yes. yes it does.
when me and me got to talking over breakfast drinks, we realized we'd have to divide and conquer this plan. also, i was getting pretty sick of myself and i'm sure the feeling was reciprocal: we'd spent nearly every minute i'd arrived here in each others (admittedly awesome) company.

too much togetherness.

the plan wasn't totally figured out yet, unsurprisingly. we knew that if we hung out around revilo too long without having our trap set, then the simp would just overpower us. so we needed to dampen him: that's where spajjy comes in. he can suppress any mood: a wet blanket... harharhar... if you will. that's mostly because his species (although i've only ever met a single spacesponge in my many years) absorbs anything that's even remotely liquid. giving him a hug, if you've gotten stuck under a leaking pipe is great, sucks your clothes dry. too long though and your eyeballs turn to dust and your body starts coughing up powdery blood. so we figured that whatever spajjy has absorbed over the years will be a confusing enough melange to block our emotions until the very end. also he's kind of gloomy sometimes and that'll work in a pinch.

alt.me was going to scout the station to see if he could find a place with the right kind of architecture... something that would brighten our spirits and moods for when we start broadcasting. good luck discovering anything remotely pleasant on this shitbox, floating fuck knows how high above who knows what fuckrock planet... this place is misery, pure and simple. and that's not just cuz of the simp, though that doesn't help too much.

and i had to go find our spacesponge friend.

i never actually knew where spajjy lived, but i've always suspected it was in the bilge. now, this was a different universe, and therefore a different spajjy. but, him being a large, absorbent life form, much like my spajjy back home, i figured it was worth checking it out just in case. plus (i've heard) there's always some good swag in the bilge.

back down in hangar 23 i found my exposure suit (by which i mean some torn overalls and a pair of boots that kinda suckered on to your feet and also had suckered bottoms so you don't slip in the effluent of the hordes that inhabit this more-and-more revolting place... yummityyummers.)

the way to access the bilge is essentially to flush yourself down the drain, but to keep going past the sewer system. since everything winds up in the bilge that isn't processed elsewhere, there's quite a mighty ecosystem... full of exactly the kinds of things a normal (or even psychotic) person would try to avoid.

i'd spent my fair share of time down in bilgetown (as it's affectionately referred to by me and only me (and i guess alt.me and the other alt.me's)) back home and, after asking alt.me where the best pipe to slide down is, was delighted to discover there was now a hyperlift stop (just use my oh-so-valuable janitorial pass card that longshanks (bastard that he is) gave me. )

i was not so delighted to discover that i didn't bring it with me on this trip.

i was redelighted when alt.me told me it was in the front pocket of the exposure suit i was wearing. he also told me to stop being so stupid and get to the fucking bilge or he'd kick the shit out of me.

i wasn't so sure he'd win in the fight, but i didn't feel like finding out. off to the hyperlift i went.

waving the card at the hyperlift's reader like drunken businessmonkeys at some whore lurking in the bushes near a rest-area, i shouted "to the bilge, you bastards!" and off i went.

i say "i," because none of my friends (or alt.me's friends) wanted to accompany me to the bilge. in this, they are exactly like my gang back home.

how nice to see nothing changes.

so i zipped down (or up, or in, depending on your frame of reference) straight to the damn place. spajjy liked it down here and when the doors opened, i remembered why: the dark, wet blast of "air" (i'm hoping it's air) that smacked me right in the face like an unwanted genital in an erroneously entered burlesque show, soaked right through my very much un-protective gear and my skin started to itch-then-burn-then-freeze-then-tingle-then-tickle-then-itch-again.

it was pretty fucking moist in here.

and if you're continued existence demands external moisture (like some perversion of a cold-blooded lizard soaking up the sun (we all know they are just lazy)) then this moist-ass place is paradise.

moist. moist. moist.

for me, though, this was not a paradise.

the universe loves to give me signs. i can hear this one like it's being read aloud, proclaimed from some royal decree... announced for the whole fuckboat of existence to hear:

welcome to the very bottom of the heap.
know your place.
welcome back.
welcome home.

the voice was right in my ear: was i really hearing creation speak to me?

or was it the fucking toilet gasses clouding my mind and giving me stupid ideas?

fuck creation. i'm betting on toilet gasses. they get you every time. every shitting time.

since my eyes would never adjust to the darkness down here, i had cleverly forgotten to bring a device which would help me see. i have no radar, no echolocation, no sonar, no infravision, ultravision, megavision, negavision, or extra-sensory perceptions that would allow me to navigate the blackened tunnels of filth i'd just arrived at.

hurray. an eternity in a stinking darkness. how fortuitous.

i stared out into the void. this kind of black has a substance. it's gelatinous. it's whole. it's real. if you walk into it, you won't come out. you'll just get trapped, a fossil for some other fucker, sent on a suicide mission, to find, somewhere far in the future. a reminder to him that glory is fleeting.

it's staring into the abyss. it's horror and terror and... oh wait... there's the light switch.

with the lights on, things became a bit clearer. the bilge was a long dark corridor, with lots of little hallways coming off it. what became most clear, however, is that the lights in the bilge should never be turned on again.

i quickly shut them off and asked the darkness, politely, if spajjy was down here.

the response i received was a firm, polite, liquid 'no, check zargle's.'

i threw back an equally polite, but thoroughly terrified 'thanks' and went back into the hyperlift.

spajjy was definitely not down there. whatever was down there i quickly tried to expurgate from my mind by bashing my head against the wall of the hyperlift on the way back up.

i came to a few hours later. my memory of the bilge remains (mercifully) a single frame, the overhead lights illuminating a large blob-like creature, dressed as a schoolgirl, slow-dancing by itself. hundreds of eyes, in various combinations of ones, twos and threes, watched on.

the monster(s?) recommended zargle's, so off i went. i'll always take a trip to zargle's. that place is fan-fucking-tastic. except for the quality of the booze, the quality of the company, and the quality of the environment.

zargle's was pretty empty. just him out on the floor, mopping up some horrific looking puddle. it smelled weirdly like the bilge in here. perhaps it was just its peculiar odor of sanctity that followed me up from the abyss.

or not. because the closer i got to that nasty puddle, the worse it smelled.

'oy, zargle. how goes?' i called out.

'which one are you?' zargle asked, suspiciously.

'the other one.'

'good. you tell that other you he owes me money. holy shit you stink. were you down in the bilge?'

'yea. looking for spajjy. seen him?'

'what the fuck does it look like i'm mopping up, idiot? he got arrested here earlier. security put the squeeze on him, literally. dragged in this massive bucket looking thing and just kept pressing and pressing him, like they were wringing him out. spilled out over the top and dragged him off. poor guy was nearly dried out.'

'fuck. what'd they get him for?'

'dunno. don't think he knew either. you ever hear a dessicated spacesponge try to cry? it's like listening to a mummy getting a hernia check. not pretty.'

fuck. we needed spajjy. what's worse, we needed him sopping wet. not bone dry. i had no idea how long he could last out there, poor thing, in the low-humidity of the station, without any help.

'when was this?'

'couple hours ago...'

about the time i went to the bilge to find him.

'and no mention of what he did?'

'what the fuck did i just tell you? be grateful i'm not making you mop this shit up.'

'right right fine.  did they take him to the brig?'

zargle implied, delicately, with his rather expressive face, that it was time for me to leave.

i couldn't help but collaborate.

so now, here we are. i need to break a spacesponge, who may be so dried out as to be dead, out of prison in the next few hours. in order to save the universe.

only one way into the brig.

time to get myself arrested...