Have Ray Gun! Will Travel! Please Pay Me! (part 10)

I did not win the space race. Apparently they disqualify you for atomizing your competitors once the race has begun. Who knew?

I am ready to resort to hyper-pink space drugs. They are dubious looking. You never know what will happen on a hyper-pink trip. My eyes water even looking at them. I think that these space drugs have been cut with neutron star matter. And possibly space pirate feces. But a hyper-pink bender is better than my crushing sense of failure.

The heathen death phallus sulks its way across the space lanes in defeat. I have no new rocket ship. I am stuck in this horrible vessel that stinks of space pirates. I will have to stop for fuel soon. No good can come of that, space gas stations are notorious for their scum and villainy.

I think I will fit right in.

...

I was serviced by travelling love nuns while eager space attendants refueled the heathen death phallus and wrote horrible slogans on the star dust on its sides. This is only one of the many crimes that Dirk Gradient will pay for when I find him. The love nun has left me with a burning sensation. I know from experience this will only go away if I pray for forgiveness.

Foolish love nuns. Clint Corona never prays for forgiveness! I shall endure the burning as a sign of endurance. I am stronger than the burning. I will drown it out with rocket liquor (also provided free, in theory to disinfect the love nun) and hyper-pink space drugs. Nothing can be worse than the burning. Not even believing that my liver is a small Italian opera singer trapped inside my chest by the death elves who lurk beyond the boundaries of the shaving cream veil of creation.

I am salivating now at the thought of the space drugs. I believe I may have to begin attending space addicts anonymous. But the space drugs keep me sharp...although I am at times convinced that I am so sharp that I will dull the rest of the world. I slice, I dice, I have a ray gun.

However, after the detour of space pirates and space races I am back on course to find that bastard Dirk Gradient. So I shall tell you of the space race while the hyper-pink space drugs work their way throughout my system. I am already turning neon. I'm a pretty girl.

...

The space race began as they all do. The rocket ships gleamed. I foamed at the mouth. Other pilots also on space drugs foamed at the mouth. I am such a pretty girl. The command for the race to begin went off. We raced forward, surged into the black oblivion like sperm off towards the great ovum of the universe, shot from the tip of the heathen death phallus. Which is a surprisingly fast rocket ship. I was in the lead.

I did not mean to charge the atomic lasers of the heathen death phallus. They have a hair trigger which consists of a three stage switch, a joystick, and verbal commands. So very easy to activate by accident. Oh, and they require a key which I have jury rigged from a syringe and an empty bottle of rocket liquor. I am ever so resourceful.

I accidentally vaporised an asteroid with the atomic lasers of the heathen death phallus. This seriously detoured some of my opponents, who careened into nearby stars, planets, asteroids, other ships, space stations, and space terrors from beyond in order to avoid my hair-three-stage-trigger finger. The rest of the pilots were pretty girl on too many space drugs to care. End stop. Giggle.

The world became red in front of me and blue behind. This typically means that something bad is about to happen because I have angered the laws of physics. I have attempted to wrestle them into submission with the microwave of hate, but they are full of evil animal cunning. Also, they are naked and greased. Because the laws of physics do not play fair. They play favorites.

There was, in this state, obviously no way for me to tell that the strange black object rocketing towards my front viewer was actually another ship and not a black alien horror from the depths of the red-blue shift come to devour me. So I...might have accidnetally told the heathen death phallus to vaporise it with the atomic lasers.

FWANG! FWOSSH! BZZZZRT! Atomic lasers make a satisfying noise. Not as satisfying as my ray gun, but I cannot use my ray gun in space. Otherwise the purifying beam would just keep going until it hit something. That would be irresponsible. Irresponsibility is another sign of space madness. Just because I think I'm a pretty girl doesn't make me space mad. That's just the hyper-pink space drugs talking. Tee hee.

I shifted back to normal space after vaporising my evil opponent space beast...and found that I had actually vaporised the lead ship. Oops.

So that is how I was disqualified from the space race. And ended up with my repentant burning from the services of a love nun.

Oh, and the Friendly Peanut? It laughs at my pain. It mocks me. It is all my fault, it says. It is the master of my mystery pants. I have only my well fitting sadly colored space pirate pants. Yo yo giggle ho.

I am considering just ramming the heathen death phallus through any further obstacles that come between me and Dirk Gradient. Possibly including planets. They can't be that hard.

I am coming for you, Dirk Gradient, and I am undeterred by whatever space pirates you might hire to kill me. Die die die die DIE!

Have Ray Gun! Will Travel! Please Pay Me! (part 9)

I have entered the heathen death phallus in a space race. I do this not for the money. I have space pirate booty. And space police paychecks. Oh no. I do this for me. And because the prize is a new rocket ship. I hate the heathen death phallus.

Exploring this new rocket ship of mine, I have found terrors. There are tentacled horrors in the bathroom. The bathroom is unusable. I have taken to defecating in the airlock. The Friendly Peanut now rules over the bathroom. It took my mystery pants with it. I am now wearing space pirate pants. They fit surprisingly well.

Amazingly, there were no space pirates left aboard the heathen death phallus when I took it as my own. A strange monster made of bedsheets assaulted me, but I reduced it to radiant light. I live safe in the knowledge that the bed monster is dead.

All this pales in comparison to what I have found. I cried tears of joy. I am still crying...or that might be my tear ducts melting. I am unsure right now. Because the space pirates had a whole room full of rocket liquor and space drugs. Space drugs in all the colors of the rainbow, including ultra-orange and infra-green. Infra-green space drugs make you think you're a twenty-seven legged platypus on steroids with a god complex. I am wary of infra-green space drugs. I have a hard enough time piloting the heathen death phallus with two arms and a ray gun.

Speaking of which, I believe that these space pirates had more arms than initially thought. Everything here requires four arms to use. This aggravates me. It truly is a heathen device.

Anyway. The race.

I learned about this race because the space pirates had already signed up for it. I was then approached by giant crocodile men in large tank ships to make sure that I participated. They said they had money riding on me. When I informed them that I was the proud new owner of the Heathen Death Phallus they laughed. Then they hit me. A lot. I wisely decided not to vaporise them. Have you ever tried to get rid of the smell of radiant crocodile?

So emboldened by threats, I set forth to the space race. I will be there soon. The Friendly Peanut is engaged in fell acts with the tentacle bathroom horrors. I have drunk too much rocket liquor. I shall have to use the airlock soon.

...

I have arrived at the space race. It is a race. In space. The entirety of the thing that can be described in the two preceding sentences. Everything else is just dodging around asteroids, small stars, black holes, and sentient space beasts the size of nebulae who eat ships like they were Friendly Peanuts. We are only snacks to greater powers.

There are approximately thirteen other ships involved in the space race. I say "approximately" because two others have already been destroyed. One was converted into starlight by an as-yet-unknown-assailant. Possibly the Man With No Name! The sixteenth ship refuses to exist and not-exist at the same time, and so tends to appear and disappear whenever the cat in its rocket engine dies.

The race will begin soon. I have taken more space drugs. I need to be sharp for this. Sharp like a space tack. On the attack. Like a space razor. With a...I hate rhyming. These space pirate space drugs make me rhyme more. They also make me interject "space" more often. I believe they are purely concentrated space madness. Space.

I grip my bottle of rocket liquor in my free hand. There is a grin on my face. I imagine I look like a hungry ghoul. My ray gun sits in my lap. The Friendly Peanut has come to sit on my shoulder, covered in tentacle monster slime. Soon the race shall begin.

Some idiot in the ship beside me is making rude gestures. Oh yes, sir! I know you! I can see your brain through the space drugs! Your evil, wicked space brain! You and your hairy friend shall soon eat my afterburners. The space race begins!

The space race begins! Onward, heathen death phallus! Onward into oblivion! Onward to the death of Dirk Gradient! SPACE!

Have Ray Gun! Will Travel! Please Pay Me! (part 8)

The "non-gigantic aliens" section of the rocket ship was full. I am stuck with the gigantic aliens. These people are weird. They are also, however, afraid of my ray gun. I sit in an empty row, smug in my ability to atomize them should they anger me. The giddiness continues. I love space drugs.

I have taken out the little cards in the seat in front of me. They tell me what to do in the event of an emergency. For such little cards they fold out a lot. This is space. There are many emergencies. I am right now reading what to do in the event that my organs should become sentient lifeforms bent on universal destruction. I'm in *that* part of space.

The card is useless. It does not say what to do in the event that your rocket ship and girlfriend are stolen by an evil space agent. It might, but I do not wish to unfold its thousands of layers. I have already skimmed past what to do if a Friendly Peanut escapes from its bag and attempts to conquer your clothing. There were only two words. "BE AFRAID". These made the Friendly Peanut happy.

The Friendly Peanut has become placid since entering my mystery pants. It sulks out its exile. It is rapidly becoming a Sad Peanut. I suspect this may void its warranty.

There is something strange outside my window. There are men in space suits, on space bikes, with space guns. Either my rocket ship is being robbed, or I have degenerated into space madness. That or I am having a space drug flashback.

God I hope I am having a space drug flashback.

...

I have been captured by space pirates. More specifically, my rocket ship has been captured by space pirates. I was canny, and stowed away in the bathroom. The Friendly Peanut has gone quiet. But I have taken more space drugs. And drank more rocket liquor. My nerves hum. I can see through walls.

Dirk Gradient sent these space pirates. That is the only explanation. They cannot have come across this rocket ship by chance. That bastard is trying to kill me. He knows. HE KNOWS. But I am canny. I am fully of canniness. He will not catch a canny space adventurer such as myself.

The bastard Dirk Gradient must fear me to send such fearsome troops. Paying space pirates is risky business. Sometimes they come back once the job is done and cut you into the pieces to sell over the intarweb. They have ways of stuffing your parts down the many mighty tubes. But I will let him think that I am dead. Then his fear will wane. And then I will unleash the microwave of hate.

But to do this I must shoot the space pirates. If I stun them they will tell me where Dirk Gradient is hiding. He must be hiding. In a damp, dark cave with only my great rocket ship for company. The Friendly Peanut has begun to giggle softly. He knows who these space pirates are. There will be no reprieve.

...

Well. I failed at stunning the space pirates. Their space suits were stun-proof. So I had to purify the lot of them. Those space-guns of their's might have been dangerous, after all. I still do not know if my stun setting works.

I have been given a special upgraded seat. On the space pirate rocket ship. It is a sad patch job. But it is *my* rocket ship now. Filled with space pirate booty. Strangely, the other rocket ship's crew did not want their new hero and savior aboard. I was not tempted by nude women, nor was I offered free rocket liquor. This may be because I accidentally reduced a few gigantic aliens to radiant light. Accidentally. They were very hard to shoot around. Those people are just weird.

I had to ride a space bike to get to the space pirate rocket ship. I hate space bikes. I also had to wear a space suit, but the rocket crew were all too happy to give me one of their's. I also demanded a small one, for the Friendly Peanut. It is having a wonderful time.

The microwave of hate purrs into life. A rocket ship of my own brings me ever closer to killing Dirk Gradient and recovering my one, true rocket ship. Not this horrible heathen death phallus I am piloting.

Death to the heathen death phallus. Death to Dirk Gradient. Long live the microwave of hate!