Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

“Here’s what I don’t get,” said the cop. “Everyone dreams of getting injured at Disney. It’s the jackpot. Lawyers swarming out of the woodwork, working for free to get a chunk of the nice fat settlement.”

“Yeah,” said his buddy. “If you’d come straight to us, you could’ve had a wrongful death suit on your hands that would’ve paid for the funeral, the trip, everything. Enough to buy your kid as many grandmothers as he wants.”

“The kid wanted to be there so much,” said Eric. “And you get to skip the line if you have someone in a wheelchair, whether they’re alive or dead.”

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Zombie President Brayne scored a major victory today as the Senotaph voted 50-50 to confirm his nominee for Secretary of Dessication. The tie was broken by Zombie Vice President Mortis in favor, and nominee Botulia Detritus begins her duties immediately.

Many Senotaphers in the opposition Necrotic Party denounced the nominee, insisting that Ms. Detritus had no record of public service and knew nothing of dessication, having had her own children mummified at private clinics. The interview process had also raised eyebrows, as Ms. Detritus removed and stroked her brain several times during the proceedings before announcing she had no idea what anyone was talking about.

Her association with the Brainist movement has also come under scrutiny, with Ms. Detritus on record as saying that teachers should be prepared to eat their students’ brains. She has also branded mixed zombie-fleshie schools “failures” and supported the controversial brain voucher system, in which zombies trade “vouchers” representing the brains of the living which they intend to consume as soon as it becomes possible. “Ms. Detritus’s nomination,” said Senotapher Gland, head of the Necrotic Party caucus, “will set back integrated zombie/fleshy education a hundred years.”

But Zombie President Brayne’s Mortician Party defended the nominee as an “outsider” with “fresh ideas.” At a press conference, Blight House Press Secretary Amy G. Dala noted that Ms. Detritus’s “private sector experience” made her “the perfect choice for bringing rigor mortis back into the cirriculum.” When asked by an NBS reporter about whether the post was a “reward” for Ms. Detritus’s $1.2 billion dollars in contributions to the Mortician Party over the last five years, Secretary Dala dismissed this as “fake news” before slaying the reporter and eagerly consuming his brain.

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I thought that getting my book published would be the solution to all my problems. I was sure that, once I got in print, everything else would work out.

Then I saw my first book remaindered to a dollar store, and I had to rethink that.

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Q1
14:55 – Holding. 5y penalty.

12:55 – Unsportsmanlike conduct. 10y penalty.

4:77 – Posession by unauthorized spirit. 5y penalty.

1:00 – Too many men on the field. 17 unauthorized players ejected from field, 7.7y penalty.

Q2
15:00 – Illegal laying on of hands. 15hp penalty to quarterback.

14:12 – Holding. 10y penalty.

13:13 – Illegal hex. Blight End ejected for turning wide reciever into horned toad.

7:77 – Palpably unfair act. 10y penalty for all players in impromptu love-in.

5:10 – Unsportsmanlike conduct. 5y penalty.

1:05 – Leaping. 10,000 ft cruising altitude penalty.

Q3
12:21 – Offsides. 10y penalty.

10:46 – Intentional grounding. 1500 volt penalty through tight end.

5:57 – Unsportsmanlike conduct. 15y penalty.

2:28 – Pass interference. 15 gallons of Immodium AD confiscated. 20y penalty.

Q4
14:31 – Personal fowl. Illegal chicken escorted off of field. 5y penalty.

12:01 – Offsides. 5y penalty.

9:32 – Roughing the snapper. Sparky the Snapping Turtle replaced with his backup, Snarky the Snapping Turtle. 10y penalty.

8:18 – Targeting. Satellite Orbital Laser (SOL) guidance lock remotely disabled after severing tight end’s arm. 5y penalty

3:33 – Tripping. 12 blotters of lysergic acid diethylamide confiscated. 10y penalty.

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ZOMBIE PRESIDENT BRAYNE: Hello? Australia?

AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER TURNCOLM: Yes, hello. This is Prime Minister Turncolm. Am I speaking with Zombie President Brayne?

BRAYNE: I’m going to eat your brains.

TURNCOLM: I beg your pardon?

BRAYNE: I’m going to eat your brains.

TURNCOLM: Did you…did you just say that you’re going to eat my brains?

BRAYNE: No. I don’t know how you got that idea.

TURNCOLM: Perhaps when you said ‘I’m going to eat your brains’ twice in a row?

BRAYNE: I was joking. It was a joke.

TURNCOLM: I think it was in rather poor taste, Mr. Zombie President.

BRAYNE: I think you’re in poor taste. When I eat your brains.

TURNCOLM: There! You just did it again! Are you trying to set back Zombie-Australian relations, Mr. Zombie President?

BRAYNE: That was also a joke. If you can’t take a zombie joke, that’s your problem.

TURNCOLM: You’ll forgive me if I take the leader of the zombie world seriously when he says he’ll eat my brains.

BRAYNE: I don’t know where you are getting these ideas. Some fake news site, maybe. But I am committed to Zombie-Australia relations.

TURNCOLM: Well, that’s good to hear. I do have some serious issues to discuss, Mr. Zombie President.

BRAYNE: I am also committed to eating your brains.

TURNCOLM: You just did it again! Is this a game to you, Mr. Zombie President?

BRAYNE: You keep hearing alternative facts, Prime Minister.

TURNCOLM: This conversation is over.

BRAYNE: Okay. Enjoy the zombie nukes.

TURNCOLM: What?

BRAYNE:

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And that’s why all the remaining great apes live in forests, where they can run andd hide and stay hidden.

It’s because they know that we the humans are coming for them. We’ve pruned off every other branch of our family tree, leaving only the hardiest and most elusive members still kicking.

For when humanity finally lays low the last of the great apes, we will become the Greatest Ape and win the Prize.

There can be only one.

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You may have noticed that most over the counter medicines don’t kill every microorganism in your body?

That’s why GesteCo LLC GmbH has introduced NukeQuil™. NukeQuil is the only over the counter medicine guaranteed to kill all the germs in your body. By killing your body.

It’s 100% effective!

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The number of parts you’d had replaced with cybernetics determined your place in the Sion Hierarchy; everybody knew that. From the enhanced eyepiece you got for free upon joining the Blackcoats to the 2.5-ton rated steel arms you had to purchase to become an Over-Lieutenant, it was a continuous ladder of aspiration. Each rung was more expensive than the last, true. And beyond the level of a Blackcoat Private Initiate, the Sion Hierarchy didn’t give you a cent to help pay your way.

But the Primarch was at the head of that hierarchy, and this would be the first time that Jell had ever seem it.

The Primarch walked out of its office slowly. It was living proof that, though the Heirarchy favored utility, it was not immune to decoration, to pomp. A rich red sash adorned the Primarch’s tall, thin frame, and it was equipped with a series of flexible bulletproof shields designed to evoke a long designer trench coat. A crimson gorget, bearing the seal of Sion, was also prominent.

“One of my Tetrarchs tells me that you have information about the Intersectionalists.” The Primarch’s voice was synthesized, emenating from a head that had no human features whatsoever, only smooth metal and plastic. Rumor had it that the Primarch instead saw through dozens of miniaturized cameras distributed evenly over its body.

In fact, there was no flesh of any sort visible. Rumor also held that only the tiniest portion of the Primarch’s brain was yet of the flesh.

“Y-yes, Primarch,” said Jell.

“Why have you not uploaded this data?”

“I feared it would be intercepted,” stammered Jell. “Better for me to perish carrying it than for it to fall into the wrong hands.”

“Perhaps,” the Primarch responded. It approached further and Jell noticed, to his surprise, that the vaguely humanoid frame nevertheless rested on a cane. “I will make a connection to a private and secure server available to you. You will then upload this information for analysis.”

It was not a question, but a command.

“To…to your own private server?” Jell said, palms sweating. Everything would go awry if the file was not directly linked to the Primarch.

“That is immaterial, is it not?” said the Primarch. “The data will be analyzed and your reward–or punishment–will be determined solely on its merits.”

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