Stranded
By John Clower

  "Calling flight 1713 to Paris, flight 1713!" A voice called over an invisible speaker. "Repeating, flight 1713 is now boarding for Paris."
  "Ha ha!" Tyler laughed as he watched Paul struggle with his large suitcase. "Ha, Paul!"
  "Oh shut up, Browder!" Paul followed Tyler towards the plane.
  "Uh, Paul, why did you put your carry-on on the luggage claim, while you have a fifty-pound suitcase in your hand?" Robbie asked.
  "Hey, wait a minute!" Paul watched as the bags were being loaded onto the plane. "No! Crap!"
  "Hurry up!" Robbie shouted. "It's about to leave."

  Paul LeMaire, Robbie Greer, Rachel Trammell, Tyler Browder, Marie Pimento, and Jennifer Dower sat in the six first-class seats that occupied their plane. They had been the six chosen to attend the world-famous cheese festival in France. They were to be treated as kindly as politicians. Two more had been selected, but RJ Regenold and Forrest Jones knew what a politician was, and thus, they declined the offer. However, these six "people" did not.
  "Attention passengers," a raspy voice called, "I am your pilot, George BigDawg. Most of you know me as Reverend BigDawg. Well, me and my co-pilot Luigi BigFrawg will be flyin' you folks to the exotic lands of Cleveland. What's that? Oh boy, we goin' to Paris! Well, we'd better call that there tower about this change in-what, the PA system's still on. Ah, dang! Oo, I mean-uh, everything will be just fine. Our flight attendant, Perry Penguin will be proud to assist you if you need anything. Although, don't ask for ice. You see, it makes him a bit nervous. Have fun on this here flight, and remember, don't spread the love, if you know what I mean. I'm a holy man, and this here's a holy plane. So don't be all flirtin' with the passengers. That's right I'm directing this at you, Browder. Bye bye!"
  "Hey Paul!" Robbie shouted. "Watch this!"
  He reached over to where Tyler was sleeping and pushed down on the lever that reclines the seat. Tyler's body, being stiff due to the involuntary crap that goes through your system when you sleep, went shooting across the cabin. He slammed into five people and landed flat on his back in the center of the aisle at the back of the cabin.
  "Robbie!" Rachel was red in the face. "Why did you do that?!"
  "Why?" Robbie thought for a second. "Oh yeah! Umm, because I was able, and, so, I did. Look, he's got a concussion, ha, ha, haha!"
  "Hey!" Robbie heard Paul asking from two seats up. "What does this button do?"
  Robbie heard Paul shouting gibberish and could see a flailing arm and leg sticking out into the aisle.
  "I'm fine, just fine." Paul called back slowly. "Smells like chicken."
  "Hey there," a six-foot-tall penguin came waddling down the aisle, "anyone want some salted peanuts, Dr. Pepper, potato chips? Eh? What about you, little boy!"
  "Huh?" Tyler looked up. "Oh, I'll have the liver surprise. Robbie tells me that it's really a huge ten-layer cake. How much extra?"
  "Umm," Perry thought, "about $49.95."
  "Oh here." Tyler handed him a $500 bill. "Keep the change."
  "Wow boy, thanks!" The penguin chuckled and waddled off.

  It was about eighteen hours into the flight when Marie finally began to think that something was wrong. They'd been flying since 8:30 AM that morning. Robbie, Paul, and Tyler had been singing vegy-tales since 9:00. Paul was now unconscious, a sumo wrestler having body-slammed him against a door. And like the door, Paul was on the floor. Marie kicked Paul aside as she made her way to the cockpit.
  "Hey, what're you doin' in here, little girl!" BigDawg asked. "I'm tryin' to fly the plane."
  "I've been to France before, and the flight only took about seven hours." Marie said softly, but then her tone changed quickly. "So why the ---- are we still in the ---- air. We should've been in ----in' France, with the ----in' ------s, and the ---- that ----s all over the ----in' -----es and ------s!"
  "Wow, now, umm," BigDawg laughed nervously, "shut up, little girl. I didn't come on this here plane to hear swearin' from a "little girl" like you!"
  "Madam!" BigFrawg bounced off the chair. "France? What is France?"
  "It is supposed to be our destination!" Marie turned red in the face. "And if the co-pilot doesn't even know where France is, then to ---- with you, BigDawg."
  "Penguin, BigFrawg!" BigDawg shouted. "Take Ms. Pimento to the cargo hold. She needs a holy shmack upside her head."
  "Man, chyou'd best watch yo backside, boy, 'fore I bust yo face so bad, you be trippin' and slippin, while a waiter you be tippin' just to get yo self some food at duh McDonalds, you foo'!" Marie shouted.
  "Ay, ay, ay!" BigDawg shoved Marie out of the cockpit so far that she skidded down the aisle and slammed into the rear of the cabin.
  "Well, way back when I was just a little bitty boy, living in a box under the stairs of the house half a block from Joe's bate-shop, you know the place. Well anyways," Weird Al began singing.
  "Robbie, ---- it!" Rachel chunked a hairbrush at Robbie's head. "Turn it off!"
  "It's my alarm." Robbie shouted over Weird Al.
  "Then why was it set for 5:00?" Tyler asked, shouting.
  "John borrowed it, and apparently he intentionally set it to 5:00." Robbie shouted back.
  "Why is it still on!" Jennifer asked.
  "Because," Robbie began, "it's good music."
  "Hey!" A kung fu master came flying out of one of the seats. "This radio, noise taking care of, I shall!" Ho, i-uyah, oi, oi, ventwa!"
  In a rapid series of punches kicks, and head-butts, the kung fu warrior broke Robbie's radio in about twenty pieces.
  "Hey!" Robbie did a back flip as he came to meet the destroyer of his sacred radio. "You owe me $19.95."
  "Money, of which use I do not." the warrior said threateningly-is that a word?
  "Ha, Robbie's gonna get his --- kicked by a kung fu guy!" Tyler shouted. "Come on, let's crowd around them and make them really, really nervous!"
  "In this corner," Paul began, "we have a scrawny little nerd, Robbie Greer. Weighin' at a pathetic one ten, it's Robbie Greer. And, in this corner, weighin' in at two o'eight, and with a height of six foot four, it's the kung fu master! Make it as dirty as possible, go, go, fight and stuff!"
  The kung fu master quickly seized Robbie by the throat and flipped him over his head into an overhead compartment that had been left open. He then quickly sealed the compartment, and laughed triumphantly.
  "A wimp, was he!" He shouted. "Beat him, I did, ha ha!"
  "Wow!" Tyler came up. "See, no one can humiliate Robbie, but me... And occasionally RJ, but most of the time, me!"
  "A challenge you are bringing?" The kung fu mahn asked.
  "Maybe," Tyler flexed his "puny little girly muscles," "Grrrrrr!"
  "Puny, you seem." The warrior pinched Tyler's arm. "Flab you are having."
  "Huah!" Tyler went low and tried to tackle the laughing oriental.
  "Laugh, you make me." Tyler was then flipped, dropped, kicked, and unconscious. "Funny, this is."

  After the fight, and the removing of Robbie from the storage compartment, the cabin fell silent as the rest of the occupants went to sleep, all but Paul. He was getting more and more worried, as the hours passed and passed. Around 7:00 AM, their time at least, a great storm began rocking the plane. Through the doors of the cockpit, he could hear the pilot shoutin' up a storm. He proceeded to the cockpit.
  "Carn flab it!" BigDawg looked down at the panel. "Let's see. If I hit this button, then it should work."
  The plane began free falling.
  "Well," BigDawg sighed, "maybe not. BigFrawg, report."
  "The engines, zay vill not come back on!" BigFrawg began sobbing. "Oh, woe is the frawg that bears such a burden. The engines are all off line. Good work, George."
  "All hands, this is your captain speaking!" BigDawg came over the intercom system. "It appears, heh heh, that we are kind-of, umm, free-falling. From an altitude of forty-five thousand feet, I'd say that we'll hit the ground in about fifty seconds. We have parachutes for us, but not you. So, we will select seven people on this flight to take the remaining parachutes. Let's see: Tyler Browder, Robert Greer, Rachel Trammell, Jennifer Dower, Marie Ouch-ouch, Pimento, ouch, whatever, and umm, Pastor Penguin, and Arthur Fonzerelli. Now, hurry. The rest of you, may the Lord be with you, and say "hi" to him for me, would ya? There are flotation devices in the overhead compartments, but since you'll hit the ocean's surface at twelve hundred miles an hour, they won't do you much good. Now, move it on out!"
  "Paul!" Rachel gasped. "You're not coming?"
  "I guess not." Paul reached up and began opening the overhead compartment.
  Rachel heard a soft violin playing, as she began sobbing profusely. Paul would die a horrible, and quite painful death, while she would have a chance of survival. The violin continued to play one of the saddest songs that had ever been played.
  "Marie!!!" Tyler shouted. "Get in the whatever, and let's---"
  "Shut up, Browder!" Rachel slammed Tyler in the face, knocking him out.
  "Just go," Paul said quickly, "or you'll die, too."
  The violin music began again.
  "Quit with the violin music!" Robbie shouted. "Marie, get that chute on, and you, too Rachel. And someone get Browder we can't leave him here."
  "We gots thirty seconds until impact!" BigDawg shouted. "Let's go!"
  Rachel began sobbing again, as she watched the plane fall beneath them-to its inevitable death-to Paul's inevitable death. As they drifted, she could still hear Paul singing vegy-tales with Robbie and Tyler. This of which Robbie and Tyler were singing now.
  "Shut up," she shouted, "or I'll see that you're the first to drown."
  There was a pause.
  "I gotta pocket full-a money," Robbie and Tyler began at the same time, "and Reverend BigDawg spreads the love, with peace, love, and happiness."
  "I like that song." BigDawg chuckled.
  "Huh!" Rachel gasped as she saw the plane do a nose-dive into the ground.
  Ground! Rachel saw a small island beneath them. They were falling right onto the southern beach.
  "This is gonna be cool!" Tyler cut his chute and fell to the surface shouting, "Crap, help, oh no, help, ah, no!"

  Within a minute, Jennifer, Marie, Rachel, Robbie, BigDawg, BigFrawg, Penguin, and Fonzerelli landed on the beach. Just beyond a large piece of driftwood lay the corpse of Tyler Browder. They walked over, with Perry Penguin checking for a pulse.
  "Tere's no'in dere." He said softly. "He's-a dead!"
  At the sound of the confirmation, the three girls began bawling loudly. Robbie hung his head in grief. Bishop BigFrawg, for once, didn't leap around. Fonzerelli combed his hair, and Reverend BigDawg knelt down and clasped his hands in prayer.
  "Lord," BigDawg said firmly, "this is me, Reverend George BigDawg. We have just witnessed a tragic event. This young soul has gone up to live in your kingdom, and I pray that he live a better life up there than he did down here. Don't let'em die in vain, Lord, and in your Son's name, Amen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
  Robbie and BigDawg trudged over to the wreckage of the plane and began digging through the cabin. They found the sumo wrestler, who'd crushed a family of midgets. They found the kung fu master, who was in the most painful position, and then, Paul. Paul lay in a scrunched up position, and to their astonishment, was still alive. He was unconscious.
  "Hey, girls, Fonzerelli, BigFrawg, Penguin!" BigDawg shouted. "This little boy's still alive!"
  "My God!" Rachel shouted. "It's Paul! Oh goody!"
  She shot out of the cabin. As BigDawg and Robbie helped Paul to his feet, they could hear Rachel's delightful shouts echoing through the woods.
  "Oooooooo!" Paul stumbled. "Loud, noises, so many noises. What with the yelling, and the burning, and the stampeding with the feet!"
  "How in the Good Lord's name did you survive, Boy?" BigDawg shouted.
  "You know!" Paul shouted back, "I prayed to the Lord!"
  "Amen!" BigDawg bellowed.
  "And the Lord," Paul paused, "he spoke to me, and the Lord said: "Boy, you ain't done with yo work on this here Earth. You got to, to, to...""
  "Gotta what?" BigDawg asked. "Was it, "spread the love"?"
  "Oh yeah!" Paul leapt from the cabin and began rolling in the grass. "Oh yeah, woo hoo!"

  Just sit right back and you'll here a tale, a tale of a tiny plane that started off with a co-pilot and a pilot who was insane, a pilot who was insane. The cap was a holy reverend man, whose name's Rev BigDawg. His co-pilot, an Italian guy named Bishop BigFrawg, Bishop BigFrawg. Conditions started getting rough the tiny plane was tossed. If not for the numerous parachutes, the crew would all be lost; the crew would all be lost. They landed on the shore of this uncharted desert isle: with Rev BigDawg, Pastor Penguin too, Bishop BigFrawg, Robbie and Paul, Rachel T, a couple other people are, here on some crappy isle.



All content copyright © 2004-2007 by John Clower or his affiliates, who don't exist at the moment.