#140: Cross Under at Manhattan Transfer

Trent Phloog’s third-person flashback from 1976 continues (Part 2 of 6):

A young, long-haired conductor sidled up the aisle, smirking. His uniform was ill-fitting and unkempt. He tapped a more senior conductor on the shoulder.
        “Get a load of this, old-timer,” said the younger man. “It’s a train schedule from 1931!”
        The older conductor, his uniform neatly pressed and immaculate, turned around, annoyed; the rookie was continually pestering him with observations on the peculiarities of passenger rail travel. With a ticket puncher in one hand, he unfolded the brittle, yellowed brochure.
        “Where’d you get this? I haven’t seen one of these since I was your age.”

#139: Flashback to Microville

Editorial Note: We interrupt our regularly-scheduled first-person narrative by Clarissa James to bring you this third person (omniscient) flashback from the life of Trent Phloog. Enjoy! (Part 1 of 6)

The District Universe—May 1976

Golden afternoon sunshine spread across the verdant cornfields surrounding Microville Senior High School as their Bicentennial graduation ceremony came to a rousing conclusion. There was hardly a dry eye as the sixteen-piece Mudcat marching band offered a very out-of-tune rendition of “Pomp and Circumstance” while a score of administrators, faculty, and other dignitaries filed off the plywood platform set up in the Mudcat’s football field—actually, a pasture behind the school building surrounded by cornfields. These joined the crowd of a hundred or more family and friends who were still congratulating their twenty-three members of the Class of ’76, a bumper crop for the rural school district, arrayed in their navy-blue robes and mortarboards.

#138: The Dreaded Conference Paper

Rather than think about the upcoming spring semester and the courses I’d be taking or teaching, I spent the evening pondering the conference paper I promised myself I’d write, the abstract for which had to be submitted by the end of January if I wanted to be included in the program at the end of March. My thesis advisor, Dr. Dolores Finch, had recommended the opportunity to me back in August, but I had procrastinated on the extracurricular project all semester, though it lingered in the back of my mind like a sword of Damocles over my head. Now with the semester and my foray in the Civilian Reality over, I finally had some free head space; it was now or never.

#137: Trading Places

After a night a passion with the overly-muscled Mr. Megaton, Stella reluctantly administered the Mega-Soldier Syrup antidote to Trent, who reverted to civilian form, so he could resume his role as Simon’s normal father and fit in Gene’s white van for the road trip home. By the time we all gathered in the Doomsday Factory pantry for breakfast, Trent, Stella and Simon appeared as one big, happy Nuclear Family. But Trent, again a normal looking man, seemed more than a bit wobbly, not only from his epic battle with Bad Guy but also presumably the unexpected barrage of carnal desire from his usually platonic parenting partner.

#136: Coup Détente

Mr. Megaton, Kozmik Kat, and I—followed by the chopper with Gene, Stella, and Avie—returned from Liberty Island to the Doomsday Factory. As we approached the roof, I noticed a caravan of headlights sweeping down the promontory’s gravel path; they were white vans from an ICHHL front company dubbed Incarcertory Consultants for Hardened, Lawbreaking Louts. They were whisking off Rose Shark and the Megatown Mobsters, presumably to the Civilian Reality’s version of the Criminality Clinic which, for all I knew, may have also been called the Criminality Clinic, too.