Here you go. This is the real shit. I smoked lots of pot, listened to lots of Girly Sound, and watched the Oscars.
Here's my reaction, in words (as opposed to interpretive dance, which I would use if we were in the same room). Actually, this is part of th 30K words I just cut from my novel to make it more marketable. I'll use it in my subsequent novel, Zombies Incorporated. This is the chapter that follows Rocket Girls! Girls! Girls!
Hollywood Ending (the chapter formerly known as Paris Hilton's Tonsils)
It was Oscar time again, which meant many things, chief among them—that Paris Hilton would deliver yet another acceptance speech, for yet another best actress honor. She had won how many? Twenty seven? Wasn’t that the record?
She had been nominated for her work in the film Hoe with Heart, for her sizzling portrayal of the matronly CEO of ChloroCorp—the most powerful farming conglomerate in a post-apocalyptic future where science (not Love) feeds the world. She learns to love, and farm again, however, when Kevin Costner (playing himself) wheelchairs his way into her board room (and her heart), spouting his crazy salt of the earth wisdom.
Like all Costner epics, this one revolved around a few good pauses, which served to delimit some really choice dialogue. Hoe with Heart was a lock to win the best picture honor. It was very anti-robot.
Floid kept drinking. Sue and her porno friends were also drinking, but lacked the money to keep up. They had all gathered to watch the Academy Awards and have a few drinks. He had learned much about the pornographic arts in the past few weeks. Sue had made some very interesting friends.
“This is Plastic Bitch,” she had said, introducing Plastic Bitch to the derelicts and serial killers who composed the clientele at The Village Idiot—Floid’s favorite bar in the whole universe, or Hollywood, whichever definition was most constraining at the time.
Plastic Bitch’s real name was Sammy, but she preferred to be called Plastic Bitch, as evidenced by her wet t-shirt, whose brutally stretched lettering looked a lot like one of those charts in the eye doctor’s office—some letters HUGE, others small. But she would be more than happy to take her shirt off so you could read it. Nobody really recognized her face. Plastic Bitch—er, Sammy Leone—wasn’t a big star by Hollywood standards.
“But then who is?” she rhetorically asked, pulling her shirt over her bouffant hair. Floid did not care much for Plastic Bitch, nor her hangers-on. She claimed to have been an extra in the Hoe with Heart. The best actress award was due up next, and Plastic Bitch had been squeaking louder and louder, telling everyone all about it.
“Hoe with Heart was a beautiful experience,” she cooed, glassy eyed. “I know it must be easy to think—hey, that’s just the magic of film. But it wudn’t. TRUST ME.”
She meant, he thought, that the true magic wasn’t attributable to the film medium itself, but the artists behind the film, and that to be with them on the set was magical. She had gotten a bit sloppy. She had put her t-shirt on backwards. The unstretched fabric of the front constricted her ability to breath. The baggy hemispheres (now relocated to her back) fluttered beneath the ceiling fan, like popped blisters. She had begun to cry, telling everyone about the final, climactic scene of Hoe with Heart.
“It was a real tear-jerker,” she wheezed.
“Not to mention dick jerker,” added Floid.
“Shut up, asshole,” snapped Sue, her voice laced with unfriendly venom, hugging Plastic Bitch, pulling her as close as her boobs allowed. She opted for a side-hug instead. This was another pornstar thing. Because of their anatomical expediencies, these fuckers couldn’t look each other in the eye, not up close, at least.
Drum roll. The girl on television announced the candidates for best actress. They rolled a clip from Hoe with Heart, also providing a brief plot summary to those who had voted for it, just in case they were later questioned by the press. The studio audience fell silent. The girl drew a deep breath, then focused sternly on the teleprompter. She read.
“The world is a poisonous place—the product of machines gone wild—robots run rampant, genetically engineered breakfast cereal, designer fruit, inorganic milk, blah blah blah blah blah…”
Oh, fuck, thought Floid. The girl went on, referring to the Costner character.
“…who, despite his crippled condition, refuses the help of robots, developing arm strength. (pause). But that’s not all… He also knows a thing or two about farms. Under his stern tutelage, the ancient art of farming is re-found, and along with it a new Paradise. Men, not machines, overcome the radioactive after-taste permeating all foods, both large and small, up and down the foodchain. Man, women, and phytoplankton alike, rejoice.”
The hostess, per her teleprompter, began to clap at her own speech. Her eyeballs lingered on the camera, suspicious, it seemed, that there would be more. There was. She was a real pro, and haughtily read the last line. “And now,” she said, “the climactic final scene from Hoe with Heart.”
The screams were incredible.
Everyone, those in the studio audience, as well as the bar patrons, hushed, except for Plastic Bitch, who had actually been there.
“Twas dark and stormy,” she said. It was. The scene was a moonless, rainy night on the farm. Paris, soaked to the bone, sat wistfully atop a tractor. It was a long shot, so you couldn’t see what was happening. Costner, in his wheelchair, toiled near the front of the tractor, his cursing audible amid the thunder. Zoom in on Paris’s chest.
“That’s me,” said Plastic Bitch. It was. Paris had a glamorous pair of boobs, but not like these. “I was holding my breath,” continued Plastic Bitch. “I passed out twice.”
“FUUUUUUUUUUUCK!” screamed the Costner character, as the tractor lurched forward. The shot held tight on her boobs, which jiggled in slo-mo, timed perfectly with the thunder. Very artsy.
“You have no idea how many takes that took!” wheezed Plastic Bitch.
“Shut up?” suggested Floid.
“Thank you,” she replied, translating his comment into “nice rack!”
“FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!” screamed the Costner character again. It was a line for which he had become famous, his trademark, often followed by a close-up, along with a whispered version. “fuuuuuuuuuck,” he whispered. His leg. It was caught beneath the blades of the tractor. He looked around, water dripping from his face, lit by lighting. He began to nod, looking at the soil, at the promise of what would grow. “Plow me under,” he said.
“Huh?” asked Paris. They cut to a full torso shot of her, with normal boobs again. Plastic Bitch had nothing to say. It was too dramatic anyhow. Costner had just asked to be plowed under, to save the crop, not to mention the two minutes that would be required for Paris to put the tractor in reverse. “What’d you say, hun?” Paris repeated.
“I SAID… PLOW ME UNDER!”
“But—”
“DO IT. YOU HEARD ME, GODDAMNIT!”
“But—your legs,” she sniffed, “But… you.”
“I’ve always been part of this earth. Always,” he said. “ALWAYS.”
“But—”
“PLOW ME UNDER!”
It went back and forth like that, with lots of close-ups, culminating in a succession of quick shots: his eyeball, her eyeball, his eyeball, her eyeball—until suddenly…
The tractor roared to life. It lurched forward. Close-up of her boobs, bouncing in slo-mo, with the Costner character screaming in the background.
“That’s me,” sniffled Plastic Bitch.
It was.
THE END.
Floid heard the studio audience erupt, joined by barflies alike. Nobody had seen a movie ending like that in quite a while. They had just witnessed film history. Everybody congratulated Plastic Bitch. She claimed to be mentioned in the credits.
“But they called me a stunt double!” she protested, “just to fuck me out of gettting my union card! Those dirty producers!”
Luckily for Plastic Bitch, she had been in several other movies that month. While these weren’t so well-known, she got plenty of face time. She would never starve.
Floid continued watching the Oscars. Hoe with Heart had been nominated for just about all two hundred and seven Academy awards, including best actress for Paris Hilton. Costner did a good job screaming, but didn’t get nominated. They kept cutting to him at the back of the auditorium, seated (ironically) in a wheelchair—which he required due to injuries sustained during filming. “And the winner for best actress,” said the girl, tearing open the envelope, “is PARIS HILTON!”
The screams were incredible.
“Oh, fuck,” said Floid. He couldn’t stand it. Sure, Paris and Costner had made a few great films. But Hoe with Heart wasn’t one of them. It was clearly anti-robot; and if these morons think they can live in a world without robots, then FUCK THEM. “Fuck all of you,” he said.
“What’s your problem?” retorted Sue, who couldn’t decide on which spectacle to look at—Plastic Bitch, here in the bar, or Paris Hilton on the television screen, kissing her thanks to the Academy, wending her way slowly through the crowd. Either of them were preferable to Floid’s drunken bullshit. He had been mouthing off all night, as if he knew more about Hollywood than a pornstar.
“The problem with Hollywood,” slurred Floid, “is that the movies suck, because the endings all suck. Oh, sure, they all start out okay. But tell me who in the fuck can’t do that? It’s the ending that matters, and the endings all suck,” he asserted.
“Are you saying Hoe with Heart’s ending sucked?” said Plastic Bitch, puffing out her chest, with fists balled up on her parallel hips.
“Indeed I do,” replied Floid, swilling his drink.
“Yeah? Well… you don’t know dick about suck,” she said, “obviously.”
“I know a good movie from a bad one,” he said, “and that one sucked.”
“Yeah? What’s your favorite movie? Something stupid, I bet.”
He gave her the finger, then ordered another round of drinks, including her in the process. Time to teach Plastic Bitch a lesson. “Alright,” he said, “gather round and listen up. The Wizzer of Oz is the best robot movie,” he said, explaining his worldview. “But I still prefer Cyanora Blue.” He claimed that Cyanora Blue was the only truly “great” film that Paris had ever made, despite her twenty some odd best actress Oscars to the contrary. He regaled them with a synopsis of Cyanora Blue, the plot of which put Hoe with Heart’s to shame. “It was remake of Woody Allen’s Purple Rose of Cairo,” he said, “where this deceptively hermaphroditic Japanese cartoon character (Cyanora Blue) falls in love with a pair of identical twins (one of whom is a lesbian) after leaping free of the silver screen during a matinee. She goes from two dimensional to menage a trois,” he reminisced, his eyes getting misty. “Paris was beautiful…”
“You don’t know shit about P-Hill!” snarled Plastic Bitch. “That was back before her NEW new look! Whatever!”
“Yeah?” replied Floid. Well, it’s her brain that I admire,” he said.
“Bullshit.”
“She’s also a writer, you know. Or did you NOT know that?”
“I KNEW THAT!” cackled Plastic Bitch, also snorting a little.
“Her first best actress,” said Floid, calmly as possible, to further delineate himself from his sloppy opponent, “also won her a best screenplay. It was this screwball comedy called Give it to me Straight—a bawdy, quasi-musical that depicted the travails of a man with a circular penis, and the girl he couldn’t love,” he laughed, “literally. Comic genius if you asked me.”
Plastic Bitch swilled her drink. It was her turn now. “You don’t know dick about H-wood,” she began, also concluding. She attempted to fold her arms, forgetting that her boobs made this impossible. She tried three times, then gave up. “So there,” she added.
“Yeah,” everyone agreed. Floid rolled his eyes and ordered another drink. Plastic Bitch, sensing the spotlight, then embarked upon a long tirade involving her former life in Malibu, and how she escaped to Hollywood, where she had been battling the system ever since. While Plastic Bitch lamented the inequities of the Hollywood racket, Floid began to notice another imbalance. Her left boob was larger than her right. He found this to be more fascinating than her spiel on unions, casting couches, perverted key-grips, and best boys, who were, to quote her: “anything but!”
Meanwhile, Paris Hilton’s slinky sojourn to the award podium was interrupted by a special news bulletin. The telltale sound of some BIG story quieted Plastic Bitch, along with her admiring bar patrons. The idea of interrupting the Academy Awards shocked all of them. This must be BIG BIG NEWS! It was. Here was the headline that appeared on the screen, backed by a thrilling musical score:
FALLING STAR BAFFLES DRUG LORDS, BY GOING – UP!
The imposing figure of Newzo the Clown followed. He appeared to be even more swollen with weird news than usual. He explained that people in Columbia, as well as in the Central Pacific, had spotted a strange astronomical phenomenon, whereby a comet, or meteor, had streaked across the sky, but didn’t fall.
“It went UP,” said Newzo, honking his horn. HONK!
“Maybe it’s a UFO?” suggested Sue.
Newzo covered this angle in his typically expert manner. “Initially thought to be a UFO,” he honked, “the object was identified as the cargo railgun system, and is thought to be in some way related to the ongoing drama aboard the space elevator.”
“Wow,” said Floid. Everyone gasped.
“We have received inside information that this is in fact an ATTACK against the robot overlord himself. THE FINAL BATTLE BETWEEN GOOD AND EVIL has been joined. If they fail it could mean the end of Los Angeles.” Honk. Honk.
The screams were incredible.
“The United States Army,” Newzo added, “has denied the existence of a military space program.” HONK. “Not to mention a bunch of hot girls blasting into outer space to combat the robot horde.” HONK HONK. He smiled menacingly. “But WE have the REAL story. Tune it at eleven.” HONK. “Now, back to the Oscars…” HONK, “where, I am told, the lovely and talented Paris Hilton is ready to deliver yet another scintillating indictment of a world gone mad.” Haw-wunk (inadvertant honk). HONK HONK.
The television cut back to the Academy Awards. Paris stood at the podium with hostess girl, looking to the side, captivated by Newzo and his report concerning the space elevator. His joke about her acceptance speech was well taken, for her speeches were the stuff of legend. Unlike most Hollywood moguls, she eschewed the teleprompter in favor of political statements, most of which required weeks of seclusion to craft. Everyone had hoped that she would just forget about this apocalyptic robot sex war, just say “thanks for the Oscar,” and get off the stage. But Newzo had touched a nerve, it seemed. His timing was impeccable. She set aside her single card of notes. She was going to improvise.
“Holy shit!” screamed the production manager from his control room. “Show the disclaimer!” The crowd got quiet. She grew serious, awaiting the microphone to toggle. (They were smart enough to keep it OFF until the lawyers gave the “thumbs up” signal.) The Acacemy flashed its standard Paris Hilton disclaimer, which had evolved over time in response to her brilliant indictments. Paris Hilton was essentially the conscience of an unconscious world, a glittering example of what the human intellect could achieve, even in H-wood. As she wet her lips for yet another body blow to the corporate forces of evil, the Academy flashed its disclaimer like a strobe-light, hoping to induce moral epilepsy in its two billion viewers.
WARNING: The ideas and opinions in the following acceptance speech might not be suitable for all viewers. The Academy categorically denies any firsthand knowledge of evil within its sphere of influence, including but not limited to: sexisms, racisms, and other various biases related to economic status. The Academy does not cause cancer. The Academy does not endorse hermaphrodism, achondroplasia, nor any other affliction that might be percieved to increase the population of movie extras. No members of the Academy were convicted at Nuremburg. I.G. Farben is not a “shell company” of the Academy. The Academy enriches no uranium isotopes. B.T. Parnum does not own a majority share of the Academy, and the related accusations of cirsucs and/or carnival collusion are spurious and unsubstantiated by legal opinion t in eleven states.
The Academy thanks you for your continued support.
The world held its breath.
There it was—the face of Paris Hilton—mother to all that was good and natural, the guiding light for humanity. She opened her mouth, that beautiful hole, fettered with neither tonsil nor scruple…
And she said—
“BEEP. BEEP. BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. BEEP-BEEP. BEEP-BEEP-BEEEEEP.”
Shock. Wonder. Someone fainted in the studio audience.
“BEEP-BEEP-BEEP,” she went on, pausing for a breath, “BEEP BEEP BEEP. BEEP-BEEP-BEEPITY BEEP BEEP BEEP,” she said. “BEEP,” she added, resolutely, “BEEP BEEP. BEEP. BEEEEEEP. BEEPITY-BEEP-BEEP.”
“What’s she doing?” asked Q, one of a billion slack-jawed souls, to whom these BEEPS meant absolutely fuck-all, stricken with wonder, shock, and even horror at what they saw. It chilled the blood. It was… it was…
“Morose code,” laughed Floid. “She’s saying—” he gasped, overcome with joy and emotion, “she’s saying—I’m a robot.”
“Huh?”
He turned to the folks in the bar. “She’s saying,” he repeated, “I’M a ROBOT!”
“But she’s not a robot,” replied Q. “I mean, sure—her boobs, face, and body are fake. But she’s human,” she sniffled, “not some filthy robot.”
“She’s no fucking robot!” said someone else, angry.
“I’d fuck her,” reasoned one anonymous fuckhead, but then added, quickly, “and I don’t fuck no robots!”
Floid laughed, a tear in his eye. The camera cut to Kevin Costner, standing on his wheelchair—clapping. “Yeah!” he said, “that’s right. She’s a robot, and I am too.” The camera lingered on Costner, who seemed to be enjoying the spotlight for once. But they cut back to Paris, who was now talking English. She generally spoke English first, while on live television, and would then translate her speeches into seven different languages at her subsequent press conferences, which often took all night.
“We’re all robots,” said Paris. “Stop the killing,” she said. “End the hatred. End the war. Don’t be such a bunch of dildos, for God’s sake.”
“You’re a DILDO!” cried hostess girl, trying to yank the microphone away.
“Yes,” agreed Paris. “I AM a dildo. We are—ALL of us, DILDOS.”
Dildos in riot gear rushed the stage. Tear-gas erupted. The entire studio audience joined the melee.
They cut to commercial, then to a smiling Newzo, who happily presided over the riots that began boiling all over the city. The bar patrons watched in wonder. Newzo had the usual suspects ready for comment—the haters, the hateds, and vice-versa. This was a masterful example of modern journalism. They turned down the volume
“Did she call me a dildo?” asked the bartender.
“I’ll be her dildo,” said a guy at the back. BUT SHE TAINT NO ROBOT!”
“Fuck the robots.”
“Fuck YOU!”
“She said,” explained Floid, as if to himself, “that we’re all programmed to love, or hate, and that what we need to do, right now, is stop and think. Anyone who doesn’t is simply a dildo. Don’t you see?”
They regarded him curiously, and began to shrink away. Even Sue and Q, both of whom had sworn eternal friendship, seemed to suspect him.
“What are you saying, Floid?”
“Yeah, Floid, how did you understand all that BEEPING anyhow? Huh?”
Floid ignored these specific questions, and kept with his (and Paris’s) theme. She had shown him the way. “You’re either fucking someone else,” he explained, “or you’re getting fucked. Each person fucks another, and vice-versa. We got to stop fucking each other. We got to learn to love.”
“I never fucked him!” announced Sue, for the benefit of the bar patrons.
“I never loved him, either,” blubbered Q, obviously lying. “But I hate him now.”
“You’re a stinking robot!” laughed Plastic Bitch. “Aren’t you?”
Floid looked at them all. They awaited an answer. “Yes,” he said. “I am indeed a robot.” He turned to the bartender, who had retrieved his antique shotgun. “Here,” he said, pushing a wad of cash across the table. “Drinks are on me.”
Then, without saying goodbye, Floid departed. Nobody followed. They were all too busy drinking, and referring to him as that “Fuckwit” robot. He walked out into the emerging riot scene, observing the manner by which mankind quickly resorted to eating his own, destroying things, not in the name of a particular cause, but rather in the name of destruction itself. He walked for hours, gathering his thoughts.
Floid wandered home. The streets were burning. Being no ordinary robot, nobody drew him into the fray. This was more a war against inanimate objects anyhow. Automobiles, storefronts, and streetsigns suffered the most. The jobless were at work tonight, burning, looting, posing for the camera. Smoke rose from the chaos.
His apartment, not being worth much to begin with, was spared from devaulation. It sucked enough, apparently. Either that, or it had paid its dues in some previous riot. In any case, the place was quiet. He trudged up the steps, wondering what had become of Q and Sue after his dramatic departure from the bar. Several hours had passed. He prayed to find them waiting for him, ready to say how sorry they were, ready to open their hearts and minds to the future. After all, their past together hadn’t been so bad at all. They had been good together. He had protected them, sheltered them in a physical sense, providing income to pay for the apartment, the food, the fun—pretty much everything while both of them got their bearings, found jobs of their own. In return, they had given him something to cling to, emotionally speaking. He had learned so much from them.
He trudged up the steps, readying his keys, wondering what his latest lesson from them would be. Would they be waiting? Would they prove that humans could be fellow beings, sentient, sentimental, and loving?
No Hollywood ending. They were gone. Their clothes were gone, except for the dirty ones. They had taken everything they could carry. Pornstars are stronger than you think, he thought. They’re like acrobats—pure muscle. They’re like a whole new Carny generation. He picked through the junk. He erased the obscenities from the mirrors, the . slurs scrawled with pussy-pink lipstick, telling him to fuck off, that he was a moron, that their pornstar boyfriends were going to kill him if he bugged them.
Floid wasn’t aware of these pornstar boyfriends. He would never have approved of such behavior. Which is not to say that he would have forbidden them to see guys like that, but rather that he would have persuaded them with logic, reason, and compassion. He was not, after all, their father. Maybe that was the problem, he thought. They needed space in general. They had been wanting to do bad things, dangerous things, stuff that made him worry. He had been asking too many questions, getting confused looks in return. They seemed to like it, though—that someone was always looking out for them. Not anymore. Now that they had run off with Sammy and her cadre. He resolved not to hold it against them. It had to be this way—for now. But he felt sad regardless.
He climbed up onto the roof. He looked out over the burning city. He went back down and made some popcorn. Sue and Q hated popcorn, being themselves products of a cornfield. This was his theory. Floid went back up to watch the show. Compton glowed like a beacon of hope on the horizon—warm and fuzzy. Beverly Hills, on the other hand, burned bluish green—being hotter. He looked to the sky.
He saw stars. Lots of stars. Wow. Ordinarily, you could maybe see one true star in Hollywood, what with the smoke and cars and artificial lights. He had figured that the blazes would further obscure things. But the plume of heat rising from Beverly Hills had blown away the roof of smog, or something, for Floid could see the whole motherfucking Milky Way, shimmering behind wavelets of heat.
“Ah, the true stars,” he thought. Outer space. He thought briefly of the soft cargo railgun—that other story, the one that Paris had upstaged. He envied them, the real stars, the ones fighting the real battle between good and evil. He sipped his drink. The enemy, he thought, is neither good nor evil, but the arbitrary distinction between the two, based not on behavior, but perception. To fight the enemy between good and evil—now that’s something worth fighting.
His cell phone rang. “It’s Avy,” he thought, or hoped. But it was just some robot, telling him to pay his phone bill. They talked for a while.