Chapter VII
by General (Uncle Claude) Xxaxx
& General (E.J. Gold) Nunan PFC 1st Class Ret.

Professor Woo left the China Hill Town Notel Lodge headed toward downtown and the shopping bazaar. She had to shop. She had a very important shopping errand to fulfill. At least that was the impress she gave Little Roy when she left him sitting by the China Hill Town fish ponds. Little Roy was so engrossed splashing water and playing with the koi in the pond that Woo wasn’t even sure she needed to use a cover story with him. He probably won’t know she is gone until later. But habit is habit and training is training. Woo was sure that a bossperson was bound to check on Little Roy and ‘his egghead’ sooner or later.

Happy for the moment at not having to deal with bosspersons or his mom and dad sending him on stupid errands so they could have the house to themselves without ‘that stinking little goober around’, Little Roy played in the backyard, as he called it, of the Hill Town. “This is totally neat.” Little Roy said to no one in particular. “Professor is shopping, and I get to stay here. Here fishy, fishy. Here fishy.” Little Roy continued talking to this same no one in particular while splashing and poking at the gold and black koi swimming about the squiggly pond. “It’s so neat, I get to stay at the notel and do anything that I want. I like coming down to the back yard and walking around in the gardens watching the fishys. The trees and plants are very happy in the garden. Even the yellow crawling slime stuff is happy. The only one that is not happy is the bossperson who asks me questions everyday. This is a china-bossperson. My bossperson is still back in Merika. I don’t like my bossperson. I don’t tell him that, but I still don’t like him. He is the one that tells me to watch my egghead. Professor Woo is my first egghead, and I guess only egghead. Something that goober guards don’t talk about much — because it’s so scary — is that a goober almost always disappears on the same day that an egghead disappears. Jan Nice used to have an egghead called Mr. Ling. I haven’t seen Jan Nice or Mr. Ling ever since the day that she told her bossperson that Mr. Ling was doing xpearimints. She didn’t even tell him that Mr. Ling was doing xpearimints. All she said was that he made such wonderful colors of light mover around on the wall. I don’t tell my bossperson anything about Professor Woo doing xpearimints — even when I think she is.”

“Joey Boy and Di Anne both say that a bossperson starts life like anyone else — a nice shade of pink — or blue if it’s a he bubble. Di Anne says that when they get to be about eight or nine their bubbles turn very bright — long before anyone else’s bubbles have turned much of a color at all. Even the adults start listening to them and say very nice things to their faces. Joey Boy says that the changing starts when they are five and we just can’t see it until they are about eight. Sometime after the thirtieth year bossperson’s bubbles turn black and swollen. This is why everyone is so nice to their faces. Because when their bubbles turn black they become a bossperson and anything they say should happen does happen — even if it is bad things, like the time they made Mr. Ling and my used to be friend Jan Nice. I think this is bad. They make goobers do things that hurt themselves. This is funny to bosspersons — not to me.”

“Professor Woo says that only one death of a bossperson has ever been happened — that was when a taxi smashing him flat — the bossperson, not Professor Woo. Professor Woo says that bosspersons live forever and that every year more and more bosspersons happen. I told Professor Woo that if there get to be too many more bosspersons it wasn’t going to be fun. She said that I wasn’t whistling Dixie. This is an expression from the people that lived in the land called Colloqui — which makes them the Colloquials. According to Professor Woo, and her diary that is always interrupting, the colloquials make up lots of cute sayings.”

“On the ship when I wasn’t ‘barfing my guts out’ she taught me lots of expressions from the time long ago when the Colloquials ruled the world. “Barfing my guts out” was one of the first expressions she taught me. She taught me this while I was leaning for the side of the boat puking. Ever since then I’ve used a bucket just in case my guts did come out. That way if they do come out I can put them back in. I only hope that I recognize them if they come out. I used a small bucket so it shouldn’t be hard.”

“Professor Woo said that she was on a sad-i-tickle and had lots of important vacationing to do. So far it looks like spending all day and night shopping is the important part. I’ve been watching Professor Woo come and go shopping may times now. She goes everyday. In China all the boxes look the same. Professor Woo starts early in the morning just before breakfast and comes back just a little bit after Twinkle-pinkle crosses the top of the crack in the window pane — I found a new star friend here. All the stars are so different. And everyday she comes back in with a pile of boxes that look the same as the ones she brought back yesterday. Even that little tear in the corner of the packing paper is the same. I figure that the package wrappers are all lazy and that they tear the boxes each day.”

“I couldn’t believe my ears when bossperson told me that I had to go with my egghead to China. He had that mean look showing that he thought that he as doing something bad to me, by making me go rather than assigning a china-goober to watch her when she was in China. It is true that Citizins and goobers get extra sick when going on boats. Goobers get sick, but nothing like Citizins. I’ve never heard of a bossperson even being on a boat. They must get so sick that they think they die. As far as bossperson knows, he sent me on a hell trip. I wonder what bossperson would do if it knew that I like Professor Woo? Di Anne says that when a bossperson found out that Mar Sha liked her egghead no one ever saw that egghead or Mar Sha ever again. I knew that eggheads disappear if you tell the bossperson that the egghead is doing xpearimints, but I didn’t know they would disappear if you told any one you liked them. I’m not telling bossperson nothing. Except maybe the part about barfing my guts out. This will probably make him happy to think about sending me on other trips when Professor Woo goes somewhere.”

“Professor Woo tells me that tomorrow she will be going on a shopping trip that will take five days. She says that maybe this will be the last shopping trip. Being on sad-i-tickle must be hard. Everyone knows that shopping is the hardest because you have to make decisions about which things to buy. This is why us goobers don’t have to watch our eggheads when they go shopping. Everyone knows that it’s so hard shopping that no one could even chew gum at the same time let alone do xpearimints.”

“I like the fishy people in the squiggly ponds and the yellow slimy mold that lives behind the trees. Even so, I will miss my egghead while she is shopping. I wish I could make decisions better and go shopping too. Professor Woo says that there are a few times in one’s life that they have to make good decisions. I hope I do good. I’m not good at decisions. After dinner on nights when Professor Woo is not here to help me, I have to eat one of each of the deserts. I can’t decide which one to eat.”

continued

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