APOCALYPSO!
When I was working in London as a script editor I was sent a mysterious script one day in an unmarked brown paper package. It was the story of a man who left his home and family in search of kung fu skills which gave him immortality and immense power so that he wound up ruling the planet.
Once I had read the story, I couldn't get it out of my head. The man in it was so similar to me it was scary. He looked the same, he had the same homelife, job, car... everything.
In the end, I realised that this was some sort of sign. I was destined to follow the story of this man in real life. So, within a week, I had left my wife and three children and sold all of my possessions to fund the journey to the mystic east. I took an Easy Jet flight to Tibet where I intended to start my studies at a Shaolin temple.
After a bumpy landing, I was met in the airport by a tall, thin monk with a very long beard. I had told no one I was coming so I was surprised that he seemed to know me. He led me to his Harley Davidson in the multistory carpark and, just as I was about to get into the sidecar, he sprayed me with mace. Tears streaming down my face, I blindly tried to run away. However, with no knowledge of my surroundings, I fell over what felt like an Austin Metro and the next thing I felt was the monk coshing me accross the back of the head with something hard and metallic.
I awoke around noon the next day with a throbing headache and very poor vision. I was tied to a rock at the top of a mountain. All of my money had been stolen. As far as I could tell, I had been left on my own to die. I began to weep.
Lost in my tears, it wasn't until the footsteps were very close that I heard them. I looked up, and despite my fuzzy vision, I knew what this was; a wolf. A fucking huge wolf. As a trained backwoodsman, I knew how to scare a wolf away, so I began to scream at the wolf in a shrill manner. This angered the wolf terrifically and he immediately savaged me by biting clean through my arm. This rendered my bindings worthless, so I stood and began to run away as fast as I could. The wolf pursued me, so, to distract him, I untied my dismembered left forearm from my right wrist and threw it to him. It worked.
As I made good my escape, I vowed to return home to my wife and family as quickly as I was able and to give in on my kung fu quest. I began walking in the direction of the sun, for want of any better guide to civilisation.
A week later I crawled into the village of Nykbll and collapsed, dehydrated and malnourished, in the middle of the main road through the village.
A truck ran over my legs, crippling me for life.
The driver, repentent and wishing to help, put my unconcious body on the back of his truck and drove me to the nearest hospital, ninety miles away. However, with no money the hospital refused to help. I was left in the gutter outside, begging for pennies just to eat. No one would even look at me as my body was so hideously contorted.
One day, I decided to use the money I had made begging to phone my wife and beg her forgiveness and help to return home.
However, when I called I ended up speaking to a neighbour who was clearing the house out. A week earlier she had accidentally left the oven on. It went out and gassed her and all three of my children. Our oven had always been temperamental and she had no sense of smell and always relied on me to notice when this had happened in the past.
It was only through unexpected good fortune that I hadn't been there to die too.
How I laughed.
( baldmonkey a frothy foul-smelling vaginal discharge, Wed 20 Sep 2006, 11:38, Reply)