Hello, 2011  

Posted by SamuelMarston

Hello 2011! I thought it would be nice to say hello and introduce myself. Well here I am, and since I decided on some resolutions before you were born, I think I might have a good time with you while you're here.


I hope that's alright with you. Oh yeah, Jesus loves you, 2011, and if you'd like to know more about Him, you're free to ask me.

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Prison: Chapter 5  

Posted by SamuelMarston

As the lithe figure crept further into the hall, his gait grew more and more lizardly. It was this lizardlike way of moving that allowed him to penetrate into the deepest sanctum of the stone temple, with it's rough hewn stones softly exhaling an air of ages past. He knew he had reached his forseen destination when the chanting of the cultists outside dropped just below audibility, and began to play on his subconscious.


It stood before him.

Lit by six crude torches the altar stood. He was facing the altar, and it's stones seemed to glow before him. Before him he found the shining altar of Opaquesino, and it shined before him. It's countenance seemed to radiate that which is visible; all that was visible before him. It was so visible that he had seen it in his dreams before he had come to this place, and now he was before the altar, and the altar was before him. Before him Opaquesino's altar stood before him. That's quite too much of that, and I'm moving on now.

He pulled the cowl from his hooded face, revealing in the glow of the flickering flames the identity of this most graceful interloper. Why do characters so often sneak unseen into a secured location, then remove their guise? It's a matter of "cinematics" if you ask me. Thom Yorke, frontman for Radiohead and master of black ops insertions, crept to the back of the altar and placed a small object, wrapped ever so tightly in pale cloth, between two of the stones of the altar. Because this particular altar was so darned opaque, the object was hidden very effectively, and Thom was very pleased with himself.

A bald cultist with patchy, greyish skin walked casually into the room with his hood down. He moved to a small armoire and quietly opened the front panel. With a loud "snik" and also a "FIZZ!" he popped the can open and with a tilt of his hand, he pressed it to his lips.

"Ah! The high life." He said very satisfactorily and punctuated the thought with a ripe belch.

Thom stood as motionless as a stone angel in a graveyard. His eyes were transfixed on the man who interrupted an otherwise jolly good stealth operation. The cultist smacked his lips and nodded to himself, slightly swaying his head. He turned to look at the altar, and was surprised that there was a slight Briton dressed in all tight black staring at him.

"Hey..." He started with a remarkably casual air.

"Oh bugger!" Thom spat, and swept across the chamber and into the passageway with as much presence as a soft wind.

The cultist of Opaquesino leaned over and peered into the gloom of the tunnel, and didn't see anything more. He took another swig from his watery beer and sauntered back to his quarters.

~~~

"What if they kill him?" Jayson mused to Nick and Aaron. "What will we do? I mean, we'll need a new frontman, and...besides..." He looked to the others, "David is our friend."

"I don't think they'll really hurt him. I mean, not beyond something David deserves anyway." Nick said rather calmly. "I don't know why. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's just like before."

"What do you mean?" Aaron looked puzzled.

"When they came to take one of us away, I just felt perfectly natural about the whole thing." Nick seemed to want to explain his feelings, but everyone understood that perhaps they were a mystery as much to him as to anybody else. "It was like someone was shooting waves into my brain, letting me know a part of a larger plan. Like I just glanced at the blueprint, so I knew we were in the correct wing of the building."

"I felt that too." Aaron agreed. He seemed to have taken a stance of stark sincerity; anyone would have believed it for it rang of the truth. "David didn't seem to catch it at all. He's like got negative psychic points or something."

Jayson scowled. "I don't like it. I was pretty pissed, too."

They were interrupted by grumbling coming from the corridor. The guards seemed upset.

"He wasn't this hard to carry before!" they heard Charles say. "How is it that he's harder to manage now that he's all unconscious than when he was resisting and flailing before!?"

The watchman seemed to agree. "I'll be damned, but you're right! It's as if he's become an anchor. A heavy anchor made of american man meat!"

"I hate meat!" said Charles. The watchman only screwed up his face and carried on dragging their quarry down the hall. He was starting to realize what he had always suspected. Charles was a complete idiot incapable of saying anything worth saying.

They came to the cell door, and Nick, Jayson, and Aaron crept back against the walls trying as best as they could to blend in with all the Vegemite. The guards turned the key and swung the door open, and the three remaining Arches were shocked at what they saw. The guards seemed to be shrugging their arms pointlessly, dragging and managing an invisible burden. They tipped their arms and dumped an unseen load into the cell.

"Back you go, yank!" Charles said before closing the door and locking it fast. The guards returned the way they came with a whistle, and a newfound skip in their step.

Jayson slowly made his way to the center of the dingy cell and prodded carefully with his foot. Something lumpy was occupying the majority of the floorspace.

"What is this? The legendary potato sack of invisibility?" Jayson looked disgusted, as if the place had found a way to smell worse.

Nick crept forward and felt around with his hands. "I think this is David. He feels terrible. He's all clammy." He then wiped his hands begrudgingly on his pants.

Aaron went to stoop down. "Let's get him on one of the yeast benches. It'll be slightly more comfortable than the floor." The three of them lifted their invisible friend with some effort and laid him on one of the benches.

David was the only one who slept through the night.

~~~

In the morning, David woke with a audible yawn and the groans usually associated with stretching after a long nap.

"Hey guys," he began to the others who had bags under their eyes, "you would not believe the show I saw last night!"

There wasn't enough positivity left in the other three to manage a grumble, so they only stared angrily at the bench on which they assumed their friend was sitting.

"Are you guys okay?" David didn't seem to realize the gravity of the situation.

Before the others could say anything deservingly rude, there was another sound of flatulence and the low brick in the wall shifted again. It slid with a loud sucking "plop!" and landed on the floor, and once more the wall grew a sightly Bono protrusion.

"Ey! Mates! Good morning!" They all stared angrily at Bono, who had just become the most visible target of their spite. "Blimey, where's the fourth one? They din't bring 'im back?"

"No." Nick said angrily, "He's invisible."

"I've what?" David gasped?

"David..." Jayson said as nicely as he could manage, "It's my opinion as a hard-drinking physicist that you've been rocked invisible."

"No, really, I've what?" David repeated, clearly in disbelief.

"That's not really fair." Bono opined. "They took me away one night, and this lanky fellow jumped about with a guitar and made such a fuss, and then they untied me and brought me back. Worst show I've ever seen."

Bono then seemed to be smashed backward, his arm folding at an odd angle as it pressed his head back into the hole. Then with some trepidation the Vegemite brick floated back into position and completed the wall once again.

"I hate that guy." David said. "So I'm invisible. Escaping should be easy now."

They all suddenly realized that David was quite right.

~~~

The van was being rocked by the wind.

"I don't see why we have to travel by van. We're a hit! Where's my jet, damn you!" screeched Bobby Sage, frontman for Lion Culture

"I've told you! We're driving to the airport to get in your jet." soothed Geter Prant, band manager for Lion Culture.

"Why can't we just fly to the airport again?" asked James Ponce dreamily. The guitar wizard often associated with Lion Culture was often also associated with being dazed and confused. "That's what I don't understand!"

"He raises a good point, Gete," Jimmy Jon Bones chimed in, "he does raise a good point." The drummer for Lion Culture was sober as a brick, he was just naturally daft.

Geter Prant, a veteran of the music industry wondered to himself how three complete morons could find themselves with an album filled with thirteen number one singles. Each knocking the previous one down the list. One thing was certain, if their music didn't kill him he was definitely going to end his own life.


My Career in Localization  

Posted by SamuelMarston in , ,

As some of you know, video games that are produced in Japan need to be translated, or Localized as they say in the industry, and there are teams that translate all of the Japanese text into English. This can be a tricky job, as translating the text verbatim without taking culture and colloquialisms into account can produce some rather interesting results.

Well for one of the latest Monster Hunter games, Capcom decided that instead of having Americans translate the game from Japanese, they would have a Japanese team learn English and translate their game into something that Americans can appreciate.

I later received these proofs, with a request that I do some copy editing before the game goes Gold (actually pressing the discs).

In the coming weeks, I'd love to share some of these images with you. From what I can tell, when taking our culture into account the Japanese localization team mostly watched reruns of Fear Factor and Jurassic Park: The Director's Cut. Most likely because this best reflects the Target American Audience for the Monster Hunter series.

The Tale of Edgar Unkillable  

Posted by SamuelMarston in , , ,

Once upon a time, there lived in a dingy prison cell a man named Edgar. Ever since his third year of school, he had lived with a reputation of being quite unkillable. Strangely enough, this made him quite a dangerous fellow. For where ever Edgar went, there were sure to be all sorts of fool-headed sods who thought they might be the one to best him and undo that fateful reputation. Sure enough though, Edgar was vitally stubborn and refused to be snuffed.


The only thing left to do with someone who attracted such dangerous attention (bringing such grievous harm to both his attackers and the surrounding environment) was to throw him into a prison and forget that you had done so.

Of course, as any third year student will tell you, prisons are dangerous places indeed.

~~~

"How there!" called a surly prison guard to our hero, "You're the one they call Edgar Unkillable!"

Edgar, with a tilt of his head, combed the guard over with his eyes.

"Well now! You seem a rotten tripe! I think I'll be killing you right up!"

The truth of the matter was that the guard wasn't entirely sure that this particular prisoner was Edgar at all, as none of the other guards were willing to expound on the subject. This man seemed down-right filthy, hunched in the corner of his cell, content to brood and breathe the atmosphere of the prison.

With a clanking of keys, the cell door swung open.

"Ho, ho, ho!" the guard chortled, "I'll rid you of this reputation, and find for myself some fame!"

He drew his sword, and with some trepidation stabbed the grubby resident of the cell in the side. With a sigh, his quarry fell to the floor in a most unnatural manner. His limbs seemed to fall uncomfortably at odd angles, and the weight of the bleeding body slumped against the wall.

The guard was all but convinced at this point that he had ended the wrong man, and was concerned about what explanation he would render to the warden. He turned toward the corridor and exhaled. "Shoo." It was a long dreary sound, like the rattling of tumors and permeated membranes.

Behind him Edgar uncurled and rose silently behind his attacker. The flow of blood from the wound was waning, and in the shadow and grime it was hard to make out that there was ever a gulf in his side at all.

Without care for style or grace, Edgar Unkillable efficiently broke the prison guard and took his ring of keys. It was time for a holiday far from this prison cell. Edgar wanted to spend some time far from the moaning of this dreary prison. He could see himself many cities away. Perhaps he imagined himself even whole kingdoms away, doing all sorts of things related to "Not Dying." First though, Edgar wanted to punch someone in the face.

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Index  

Posted by SamuelMarston in , ,

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Prison

Table of Contents:



Tales Not About Black Arches:


The Tale of Edgar Unkillable

Table of Contents:

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Prison: Chapter 4  

Posted by SamuelMarston

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Prison

The Chapter the Fourth

A play in three acts

Dramatis Personae:

Nick Baker the Bone Crushing Inventor

Jayson Ehm the Hard Drinking Physicist

Aaron Houghton the Metallic Coffee Guru

David Simpson the Olde Frontispiece

Bono the Prisoner of Fortune

Also:

Guards the watchmen and lackeys

Scientists the men of science

Cultists the men not of science

act i

Indoors: Vegemite Lockdown; a dreary dismal brig composed of Vegemite, an Australian yeast-spread.

Some might describe the color brown as having qualities of both green tints and those of red. Vegemite, David had thought, would have followed the same

logical color scheme. He now found, that it didn't seem to exude the color brown as a combination of red and green tints, but instead of a singular "brown-

ness" that was so deeply rooted in the idea of brown itself, that it seemed entirely separate of red and green altogether.

"Hey, David," Aaron spoke as he looked up, "aren't you colorblind?"

"Yes, I am." David said with some remorse.

"I was just sitting here thinking when I overheard your thoughts about the color brown."

David seemed to have learned to frown rather quickly.

"You're right. I don't really know how to distinguish brown from green."

"So that being said, Vegemite lockdown is rather brown, and I would appreciate it if you would think a little softer next time." Aaron said with some measure

of concern.

"Sure. No problem." David said nervously.

The room seemed markedly plain, having been constructed of yeasty bricks that formed their surroundings. Even the low benches that now supported their

depressed bodies seemed to be made of the same bland sticky substance. The only point of distinction that came to any of their senses was a small faint disc,

glowing softly somewhere in the ceiling. It must have been the sun, with this sickly disc being the remnants of any rays that sought to pierce this

architectural fiasco that was the Vegemite Lockdown.

Jayson, more than any of them, seemed to be taking this incarceration sadly. He just sat on the bench on his side of the room, staring at the small disc in

the ceiling. If any of them didn't pay particular attention to his eyes, he seemed not to be blinking at all.

"Would you like some water?" Nick said as he offered a small brown cup to Jayson.

"No." Jayson said simply.

Nick then silently offered the gooey container to the rest of the quartet. They all turned it away with the folding of their hands.

"This is how they get you." Jayson began, disturbing the odd silence of the room, "They give you food and water. Most prisons would withhold food and water

from you, but here..." He shook his fist at the cell.

"Here, they give you what you need, they give you plenty. It is all served on yeast plates, and in yeast cups. I wouldn't be surprised if most poor saps in

this place come to like the taste of it after time. You get it in you, and then you never get it out. Even after they release you from this prison, the

prison comes with you inside, and it never leaves you for a moment."

They all thought this was rather apt and profound when a small noise disturbed the concentration of the room. It was as if the building reacted to what

Jayson had said; as if the veryprison itself had gas.

"What was..." Nick began, when the noise cut him off and had them all searching the room with their eyes.

Before any of them could move or speak, a brick set into the wall suddenly shifted, and fell into the room. It was displaced with a small hole, and quickly

growing from that hole was a wriggling, grasping arm.

end of act i

(the players exit to backstage and enjoy filtered water in styrofoam cups. the director shifts in his chair.)

act ii

They all goggled at the sight of the disembodied arm that wound and grasped it's way into their cell, and when they thought the bony protrusion couldn't get

any longer, it suddenly capped itself off at an angle with a man's head and body.

"Right! I'm not going to get through! Edge, I told you!!!" yelled the man with a definite air of self satisfaction.

He looked around the cell at the four shocked prisoners and with his hand, pretended to tip a hat that he wasn't wearing at the moment.

"Oh, halloa there!" He chimed and then looked to each of them with a lippy smile. "Perhaps you've heard of me, I'm Bono."

None of them knew what to say, or how to begin, but now that he had introduced himself, he did seem rather singularly Bonoish. He was wearing a mesh shirt

with long sleeves, and his hand was gilt with conflict-free rubies and sapphires. His head was clad with a bandana designed to look like an American flag,

and even in the gloom of the prison he was wearing blue tinted sunglasses.

"Hey, do any of you want to buy a small African child?"

"Um," Nick said, seeming rather concerned about Bono's inhumane attitude.

"I mean, I picked all of these little guys up when it was popular. You know. In my time, getting in on a trend right after Madonna was still fairly early in

the game. Who knew that she had dropped off so hard?"

"I knew." Nick said.

"Anyway, you don't have to pay me for them now, or even at all. I just have more of them than I can handle. I don't know how to pronounce even one of their names,

let alone the whole bunch."

"Hmm." said Jayson. "I don't really need a small child that isn't mine, but perhaps you have something that might help us get out of here?"

"Have I told you how much these kids love to eat Vegemite?" Bono said cheerily. "Have I mentioned that?"

"I don't believe you." Aaron said calmly. "I can hear your thoughts, and while they are so mind numbingly insane and unintelligible, I am sure that you're as

trapped as we are."

"Okay, okay, okay." Bono began, his demeanor changing rapidly, "I can see you guys aren't going to be fooled."

The group seemed relieved that Bono was to behave.

"Hey, any of you guys wanna buy some acid?"

They were going to shake their heads at the incorrigable behavior of U2's frontman, when loud footsteps were heard approaching in the corridor.

"So? Real cheap!" Bono insisted

"NO!" David said and began shoving the lanky Brit back into his hole.

The footsteps came to a hurried halt, and two large guards threw open the cell door.

"You're going to wish you had bought the good stuff!" Bono said matter of factly as he disappeared into the wall. In the next cell, hushed arguing could be

heard.

The four of them took defensive stances and prepared to fight off whatever assault the guards had intended to bring to their yeast themed lives.

The guards looked at each other with satsified and bemused grins respectively.

"Hey, are you the lackey?" said one guard to the other.

"No, that's you." said the slightly portlier guard, "I'm the watchman."

"Drat." said the gullible guard that was really the watchman. "I knew I should have read that dramatis personae."

"As far as I'm concerned you're both lackeys!" Jayson said, familiar aggression grew warm in his voice, "What do you want from us?"

"Why, we're here to take you to the lab. For experimentation." said the lackey smoothly. "You'll never believe what's going to happen to you!"

end of act ii

(the audience shuffles uncomfortably, and discusses the shoddy merits of such a poorly executed piece of drama)

act iii ~The Long One~

The guards, almost as a show of complete arrogance, put down their halberds and rubbed their hands together.

“So, which one of you are we going to experiment on first?” They eyed the band with ill intent in their eyes. “You! You have the shortest hair and will be easiest to strap into the mechanism!”

They meant Nick, the band's lead guitarist and inventor. He was also a physicist, but didn't have a reputation for drinking quite as much as Jayson.

“Alright, take me.” Nick said calmly.

The rest of the band couldn't believe how serene Nick seemed.

“Oh, no.” started the portly lackey. “Not one of these tough guys. It isn't fun if they don't resist at least a little.”

“Why don't we take the blonde?” suggested the watchman.

“No. Wait!” suggested David.

“Yes! Why don't we take the blonde one!?” conferred the lackey whose name was actually Charles.

“Noooooooooooooooo!” suggested David rather dramatically with the waving of his arms as the two guards took hold of him and began to drag him from the cell. “Noooooooooooooo!”

The tone was more akin to the O sound in the word “do” than in the word “toe.” If David's father were there, he would have been embarrassed.

Jayson moved to defend his friend, but Nick took hold of him.

“Perhaps this is what David needs. Perhaps, this is what we all need.” he said.

“Have you gone crazy?” Jayson implored, concern clear upon his face.

“No. Perhaps we all could use a life changing experience.” Aaron said peacefully.

Jayson didn't like it, but somehow Nick and Aaron were on the same wavelength on this issue, and decided to chide his instincts.

David let out one last pathetic howl as he was dragged into the hall and the door slammed shut behind him. There was nothing his friends could do for him now. He was alone and at the mercy of Charles and the other guard. They took him down the hallway with long labored squishy steps. His feet seemed to drag shallow trenches into the floor as they dragged him toward the lab. As far as he could tell, there were no other drag marks in the hallway, just some old footprints. David considered that perhaps he was the first test subject they had found who fit their particular needs.

The guards' pace slowed a little as they approached an armored looking door (as armored as you can make something out of yeast jelly), and Charles pulled from his pocket an ominous looking key that terminated in a grinning skull. He unlocked the door with a loud clank, and they began to pull David into the lab.

“Now don't lose that key Charles!” said the watchman, “Last year when you lost the lab key at the Halloween party, we ended up getting that ridiculous novelty key to replace it.”

“Oh, I know!” said Charles, “Skull keys are so 1950!”

They flicked a switch to the side of the door, and the lights burst to life. Bringing David around, he could finally see what he had been dreading. He spent the entire trip facing backwards, left to ponder and anticipate his fate. Now with some growing terror, he was privy to some of the particulars of this experiment. The room contained a chair with firm looking straps, to which they quickly and happily secured the blonde singer slash guitarist slash keyboardist-when-needed. In front of the chair were several scientists and one youngish looking man with shaggy black hair. His skin was pallid, and his arms had a lean strength to them. A strength that hides deep in the muscle, waiting only to rise when a thousand selfish hipsters on their bikes take to the streets. He was clad in old jeans, probably the jeans of his ancestors. Over his shoulder was a leather strap, securely holding a solid-body Telecaster guitar, menacingly outfitted with six humbucker pickups in a row. The rest of the room contained several machines, which appeared to be other instruments fitted with gas engines and rudimentary computers. One of the instruments, perhaps a talking drum, seemed to be combined with an abacus and the guts of an old television.

The watchman and the lackey quickly hurried from the room and shut the door behind them. The scientists all pulled on thick looking rubber gloves and boots, and secured dark lensed goggles over their eyes. They completed their safety with solid looking earplugs which took some wiggling to insert into their ears. The young man with the guitar had no such safety gear. He didn't even have shoes.

“Do you have any last words?” he said slowly to David.

“Yeah.” David started with sudden snark to his tone, “Why were you idiots standing around in the dark?”

The wiry guitarist smirked at the remark. “Begin.” He said.

He began slowly pounding out massive riffs from his guitar, the distortion seeming to bend time itself. The tone was aggressive, yet paced and methodical. Tranquil, though bone-achingly loud. As he played his automatons began to pulse and bob each in their own unique ways, adding texture and punctuation to each measure. The synth bot in particular seemed to be getting into the groove and began hopping around the room.

David's eyelids began to sink low, but he was unaware of this. His vision had already gone beyond black, and he couldn't begin to feel his face. He sank back into the chair, vaguely aware that the straps were no longer tight against his body.

When the last thoughts slowly dripped out of his toes and all consciousness had perished, the relentless guitarist watched David slowly fade away.

* * *

act iii Epilogue:

Elsewhere, two shadowy figures were debating in scarcely audible whisper.

“It's just TOO high. It can't be done.”

“You're wrong. I've done it before, and I can do it now.” Said the slighter of the two, dire confidence riding in his voice.

“Well it isn't worth the risk, in any case.”

“You know that it is.” He looked back over his shoulder, and then back to his long haired companion. “You don't know what I've seen. It's worth all the risk. I know what I have to do.”

He turned to go, and it was only then that the longer haired of the two saw that the slighter was already wearing a parachute.

“Don't worry! I've done this before!”

Cloaked in the night while the others slept, he opened the door to go. Only his long haired companion was there to see the wind play about the room for a moment, and then it was done. For better or for worse, he had done it again.

Far below on the surface of the globe, a mass of cultists were forming into a rough group and beginning to chant. Their slow syllables pulsed menacingly into the night; words, they thought, that would go unheard by anyone but their idol. Another did hear their words, and though the temple was unlit from the out side, he navigated his parachute toward the unmistakable sound.

Once again, from a great height he had slipped undiscovered into a dangerous situation. This time, more than ever the fate of the world hung in the balance.

Black Arches and the Peanut Butter Prison: Chapter 3  

Posted by SamuelMarston

~~~~~

The time is 3pm. The location is Smalltown U.S.A.

A girl on the corner is moving her hips like "yeah." She is also moving her head like "yeah." A boy across the intersection is confused, until he hears the infectious tune pouring from the doorway of the drugstore.

As the caustic song comes to a close, the disc jockey's voice rings out from the well worn jukebox.

"THAT WAS THE NEW SINGLE,Captain Skeptic demands The Truth,FROM THE QUICKLY RISING SUPERGROUP, LION CULTURE!"

All of the flowers in the nearby park wilted at that very moment.


~~~~~


Elsewhere in Asia, the members of the band, Black Arches, were contemplating their next move. They found themselves crouching behind a hill, hiding from Chris Martin and his immediate family.

"Good golly miss molly!" said Jayson "Why do I feel like I need a glass of milk?"

Nick looked rather _____________ (adjective), "That's because you just ate several loaves of bread off of the ground. You should probably have a tetanus shot with that milk for good measure."

David seemed rather dour, as he knew that his mouth and throat were filled with poison.

Aaron, sensing David's thoughts, perhaps even his very feelings, sought to council him. "Hmm?"

"Once, I went to a party with tons of snacks. They had every snack I could think of. It was an awesome party, bro."

Aaron was troubled by the singer's use of the word "bro," but nodded for him to continue.

David continued, "There was apparently a cursed Dorito in one of those bags. Perhaps it was a Cheeto. No matter. My mouth is cursed. I'm free to eat whatever I please, but from my throat comes doses of poison and rot at rather regular intervals. It's kind of unpleasant."

Aaron became more troubled than he could remember ever being. His face plunged into a deep sadness, which only reminded him of sweet and juicy METAL. As his head began to slowly bang in time to the music in his head, his frown was transmorphosed from one of trouble, into one of deep rocking.

"Guys." Nick started, "Aren't we supposed to be dealing with...you know...Mr. Coldplay over there?"

Aaron scanned the immediate area like an anxious meerkat. "Where's Jayson?"

The three of them peeked over the hill to a scene that can only be described as Jayson beating the crap out of Chris Martin, using Gwyneth Paltrow as some sort of halberd (which is like the baby of an axe and a spear).

They sprang to action and came charging over the hill. By the time they reached Jayson, a crowd of prison guards had gathered and were considering the scene at hand.

"Wow! Chris has had a pretty rough time here!" said one guard to another.

"He certainly has!" that other guard said to the first.

"I bet he'll never be able to write another Coldplay song!" said the first to the second again.

"Do they write new songs or just copy old ones and add harpsichord to them?" said a third guard overhearing the conversation.

"What about Gwyneth?" Chimed in a female guard who had somehow been allowed a job at the prison despite the fact that she was a woman.

"Oh, I'm quite all right," said Gwyneth cheerily, "I'm rather accustomed to being used as a late medieval weapon for defending turrets and parapets."

"Oh." said everyone.

The guards seemed rather serious.

The first guard began his speech, "If just one of these young men was quarrelsome enough to defeat our strongest guard..."

"And his wife!" interrupted the female guard who would be fired the next day for being a woman and not a man.

"And his wife," continued the first guard, "then these men can definitely not be held in peanut butter prison. They're liable to shake the place to pieces!"

"Agreed!" shouted the Peanut Butter Warden, who had just awoken from a nap in his automobile. "Take them to Vegemite Lockdown, and may they never see the light of a not-yeast-tinted-sun again!"

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" screamed Nick, as he really didn't care for Australian cuisine at all.

The members of Black Arches squirmed and struggled as the guards carried them away from the scene and put them into the back of a armored vehicle.

As the dust cleared from the scene, Chris Martin opened his eyes and shook his head.

"Hey, when did we get a woman guard?" he spoke softly.


~~~~~


Scientists in HAZMAT suits picked and prodded at the dead flora with tweezers. There seemed to be nothing wrong with the plants here. All of their comprising cells seemed to be healthy enough. They were healthy enough seemingly, but dead. There was no motion to be seen in the organelles. This could be determined easily enough with tweezers, assuming you were a well trained scientist in a HAZMAT suit.

Those things are handy you know.

The girl had stopped her gyrating long ago and now watched the scientists' investigation with grim curiosity. She suspected that somehow Lion Culture were responsible for this spreading plague of dead flowers.

Little did she know that their next single was at that moment on its way to the radio station, where an eager fingered disc jockey couldn't wait to set it spinning precariously on theSpindle of Fate