That Fateful Day: Part One

I was sitting in my English class, working silently on my poetic analysis assignment; I had to read some poem and write about it in class the next Monday, when the call came. As the tone sounded from the P.A. system I looked around at the four other students in the class; the rest were either on some field trip or in one of the meetings with the visitors from UNB, and I silently cursed my odds. The odds of me being called down to the office were one in five, but due to the activities that I had participated in earlier that morning, the probability of me being called down for questioning was somewhere around fifty percent or so.

You see; a number of people (who wish not to be named at this time) and I had managed to “acquire” a number of supplies that were quite useful and vital to our mission. We had “acquired”: a rubber garden hose that I brought from home, a pair of heavy rubber gloves (not latex, rubber – you know, like those thick black ones that the guys on top of the telephone poles use to keep themselves from getting fried), a bottle of wite-out, a couple jugs of CLR (Calcium/Lime/Rust), and all the drumsticks broken by the drummer of Metalica during their nineteen eighty-seven tour of the Netherlands. Of course we had other, everyday household items at our disposal like a snorkel with only three inches of tube coming from the mouthpiece, a recorder (the musical instrument, not a device that records), a Dictaphone (a device that records audio, not a musical instrument), and a pair of Levi’s five-oh-ones that were two sizes too small for me, but we brought because it fit a member of our little group quite nicely.

X, the group member that fit the pair of jeans provided for her quite nicely, also managed to “acquire” the schematics of the American Embassy here in “Town A” that showed all possible escape route from the building (including underground access tunnels), and the location and angled orientation of all security cameras in the building that ensured that there were no unauthorized visitors at anytime. The weak points of the building’s infrastructure; where a single chip from the foundation base would jeopardize the structural integrity of not only the entire building, but the entire block of surrounding Embasseys from such places as Russia, Serbia and Botswana, were marked in a very vibrant red that stood out from the dull blue ink of the rest of the blueprint. Of course, there were washrooms and drinking fountains marked on the building plans by a peculiar green colour – a highlighter. No attention was directed however, to the diagrams of the heavily fortified safe in the basement of the building that contained nearly half the weight of gold as Fort Knox in the form of single kilogram bricks; all guarded by three dozen armed and highly trained soldiers of the state. Each had no family, their relatives being carefully eliminated to prevent any accidental leaks of information about the gold’s whereabouts. Each of the highly trained and disciplined soldiers ate, slept, drank, dreamed and talked combat, their devote loyalty and training. It was not only a way of life for them; it was their way of life.

But anyway, the blueprint was nothing but a tiny tidbit of useless trivia and a rolled up bundle of paper with blue ink marking and the official seal of the United States’ Government emblazoned on the side; for we did not have any plans the involved the American Embassy in “Town A”. Our target was at an undetermined location on the outskirts of “Town A” where a facility was located that produced a certain product that we wanted removed from the market. Rubber Ducks, the scourge of bath-time around the globe. Many parents feel it safe to leave their children in the tub to play with their favorite of bath toys, made popular by Ernie on “Sesame Street” in the mid-nineteen-eighties (we have proof that Ernie was paid a large sum for the “Rubber Ducky, you’re my friend” song he performed a number of times); only to discover their children had been drown by this rubberized form of evil incarnate. The label says that they are non-toxic and should not be used without parental supervision by children under the age of three for they can be a possible choking hazard, but don’t let them fool you. We have documented cases of children ingesting the highly toxic Poly-Utherane Polymer rubber found in the beak of the rubber duck with photos and testimonials from parents who found their children laying face down in the bath water, a lump of yellow rubber lodged deep within their throats. It’s not just toddlers that are threatened by this dangerous and masochistic toy; we have one case where a thirteen year-old boy, while bathing with the rubber ducky he had owned since he was four years of age, had been asphyxiated from breathing through the tiny hole in the bottom of the cartoonish facsimile of the Anas platyrhynchos. (Look it up, under mallard duck.)

Seeking to fight for the liberty, freedom and lives of countless children against this corporate conglomerate using sub-standard rubber to produce their child-killing product, we progressed to the undetermined location on the outskirts of “Town A”. Our mission was achievable in many ways, but there was one method that we favored over all the others. The member of our little group wearing the pair of five-oh-ones, X, had developed two of the three stages of this three stage mission (I created the last one and I’m quite proud of it). The first stage of the mission was to gain entry of the rubber duck training facility at the undetermined location in “Town A”. This was to be done by whatever means necessary, whether it be force, deception or improper advances – entry being gained was the top priority, until it is gained of course.

Approaching the guard booth of the rubber duck training facility in “Town A”, we were stopped by a balding, young security guard wearing a bandage of white gauze on his right hand that wrapped around his middle and index fingers, which were the predominate part of his appearance. His shirt and pants were a dark navy blue fabric that we knew to be made inferior to that made for his counterpart security guard at the undetermined location in “Town B” – the manufacturers of the material using a cheap, simplistic wave weave of remnants of scraps of fabric that had been discarded due to unexplainable and mysterious stains- just to cut costs. They claimed that the uniforms were fire retardant, but the tags of the back of the uniform say, for some reason of another, “Flamed-Retarded”, giving us cause to believe that the experiments we conducted with this type of inferior quality material were quite relevant to this stage of the mission. X, the member of our group that wore the incredibly tight pair of Levi’s; looked good, damn good in the those jeans as she sauntered provocatively towards the youth that was apparently so very aged beyond his years, weary from the life of drudgery and devotion to higher powers that refuse to pay for his child’s health costs and due to the price of having an ovarian cyst being removed, his wife no longer being able to find work as a surgeon who specializes in the removal of ovarian cysts and does not possess the ability to treat her child. Yes, his life led a pitiful path as he worked for the conglomerate that owned the rubber duck training facility at the undetermined location on the outskirts of “Town A”, but as X’s hips swayed back and forth, back and forth as she sauntered oh so provocatively towards this overworked, overtaxed, underpaid, and underappreciated corporate security guard hired to protect the investments of his employers that search for any way to shave a couple cents, or a couple hundred dollars from production cost or wages to put in their own pockets – the young man began to sweat profusely under the dark blue material, suddenly very hot and seemingly very over dressed for the occasion. All thoughts besides those sweet, swaying hips dressed in that pair tight fitting five-oh-ones that seemed to hug every possible curve of her lower body dissipated from the security guard’s mind as the temperature began to rise in the non-breathable material of his uniform that was crafted specifically to cut cost. The perspiration from the many thousands of sweat pores on the man’s body began to eat away at the shoddily-made uniform and strips of fabric began to fall away from the rest of his attire, in all actuality the first thing to fall off, the stitches eaten and decayed from the natural human perspiration caused by nervousness or a state or heightened sexual arousal, was his name tag that read B. Arthur – His name apparently.

As he desperately attempted to prevent the decay of his uniform, the members of our group and I strolled right on by the quickly disrobing security guard that would so obviously suffer pay cuts and the need to replace the highly priced cheap uniform. I guess we are a touch apologetic for this sorry fact, be we realized that in this battle to save the lives of countless children everywhere who spend their bath time with a toy that has no morals and offers no mercy when it chooses to strike there were to be some unavoidable casualties suffered by the unfortunate individuals who work for these evil corporate conglomerates and have no say in the production of the products that they produce. Our next destination was the second part of the plan that was devised by X, the member of our little group that once wore the pair of five-oh-one jeans by Levi’s, but now wore a pair of loose, baggy sweat pants that would allow her more range and freedom of motion. The change of clothing also enabled X to sit down without having a stitched seam of denim wedged directly up her ass. The second part of the mission called for the utilization of the recorder (the musical instrument, not something that records), the rubber garden hose that I brought from home, the snorkel with only three inches of tube coming from the mouthpiece; the result of a terrible accident that I had last summer involving a cracked egg, a frying pan, one left shoe belonging to my sister, and a snapping turtle, and the pair of rubber gloves that I managed to “acquire” from one of those telephone pole worker guys. Come to think of it, there was an article in the paper the other day about a power line worker who was electrocuted a total amount of seventy two times; one hundred forty thousand, nine hundred eighty two point six volts coursed through his body that day – he did however manage to ensure that the light in little Timmy O’Toole’s bathroom, just down the street from this undetermined location in “Town A”, would remain on if it was needed. Called “Operation: Infiltrate Rubber Duck Training Facility At Undetermined Location In “Town A” And Dispose of All Workers and Trainers of The Rubber Duckies,” the second part of the mission involved the group splitting into two teams of two and for them to infiltrate the Rubber Duck Training Facility at the undetermined location in “Town A” and for each group to remove a certain percentile of the working force as was predetermined by X, the creator of the second stage of our mission. Emphases was placed on the removal of the trainers of the rubber ducks themselves as to hinder the ability of the rubber ducks to learn the deadly and unbreakable holds and maneuvers that are employed to render a child helpless in mere seconds.

My team was responsible for the disabling of the workers who create the rubber ducks from the oozing yellow goo that is toxic to the touch, and we accomplished that by stringing the garden hose between the two of us (my partner and I) and running down the corridors between the giant vats of liquid yellow goo that was predestined to create the sadomasochistic toy that would eventually siphon all children off the face of the planet. The garden hose disturbed the underpaid workers’ ability to stand upright, sending them to crash onto the floor that was washed previously by little Timmy O’Toole’s father, Tommy O’Toole; janitor. Far too demoralized and depressed from years of drudgery and slavery under the oppressive hand of the corporate conglomerate that always managed to make a dollar no matter how low their sale price is by cutting wages and jobs where they see fit, the workers were quite content to lay on the floor, sprawled out on the concrete that was painted gray and washed only moments before by Mr. Tommy O’Toole. Our counterparts, the team that had X – wearing the loose fitting pair of gray sweat pants and her partner, began their portion of the plan “Operation: Infiltrate Rubber Duck Training Facility At Undetermined Location In “Town A” And Dispose of All Workers and Trainers of The Rubber Duckies,” (although the methods she employed would say otherwise, X was not a very creative individual) by playing a merry little on the recorder (the musical instrument, not a device that records). It was a light, tittering tune that was amplified by the attachment of the snorkel with only three inches of tube to the little hole at the bottom of the musical instrument, drifting to the ears of the trainers of the rubber ducks who, for the most part, had a craving for elementary-school level music played by a ensemble of grade threes and were drawn to the high pitched keen of the brown plastic recorder (I don’t even have to say it this time), and those who did not particularly care for amateurish music followed the other workers towards the sound of the recorder (You know) for fear of being singled out; it was punishable by death to be an individual and have your own free thoughts. When the trainers were lured into position, out came the black rubber gloves that were used normally to stench the flow of electric current, slapping all the men and women in the room repetitively across the face until their cheeks were a pleasant, if painful shade of red that matched the stitching on their name tags. The training that they rigorously followed for years and had forsaken their lives by taking no time for personal ventures; never experiencing the joy of having a family, a child, all proved to be useless in the face of this brazen insult to their bravery and ability to defend themselves. The men and women who trained their entire lives to teach and instruct the nearly unstoppable rubber duckies fell to the floor, holding their tender and glowing faces as X and her partner quickly left the scene towards the rendezvous point that was determined previously to be at the stairwell leading to the second floor of the building where the evil corporate conglomerates housed their little pets, the ones they called board members.

Our two teams converged at the stairs to the second floor of the building among the many giant vats of the highly toxic poly-utherene polymer used in the beaks of the tiny, rubberized model of a duck. We poured CLR (Calcium/Lime/Rust) into the massive vats of the bubbling goo, the ingredients of the industrial strength cleaner neutralizing the toxic compound and saving countless children’s lives from this deadly concoction of polymers. Upon completion of the second stage of the mission we were approached by a number of armed security guards that had followed the trail of fallen factory workers that had been tripped up by the rubber garden hose and were surrounded by a few dozen of the armed and pissed-off security guards that all had their weapons aimed at our vital areas. We raised our hands in surrender as we realized that we were surrounded and outgunned (we were not armed, at least not conventionally).

Thinking quickly, I fashioned of makeshift diversion from the small bottle of wite-out and the Dictaphone (the device that records audio, not the musical instrument), hiding behind the cover of X, whose loose fitting sweat pants had fallen to the floor when she raised her hands in surrender. Using the wires from inside the Dictaphone and counting on the electrical charge contained in the two “triple A” batteries the device used for a source of power to be enough from what I had planned, I created a small explosives meant to blind and disable the guards that had us at such a disadvantage but were gaping at the pair of shear pink underwear that X wore. As soon as I tossed the miniscule, makeshift bomb into the midst of the guards, all hell broke loose.

All member of our group diverted our eyes from the explosion that occurred a few seconds after the toss of the bomb, avoiding the flying white goo; the liquid paper that managed to splash into the eyes of every single one of the guards that held weapons leveled off at use. Each screamed in pain and the horror of not being able to see anything, the disability being too sudden for them to suitably adjust to the change. Now my companions and I are not the stupidest people in the world today and we took the chance to escape that presented itself. We charged through the throng of tormented hired guards that screamed and clawed at the white goop that clouded their vision, causing them to scream even louder from more pain. Just for the fun, X pushed one or two of the men over as she passed by, maybe because of the leering gazes that they had transfixed on her nether regions when she raised her hands in surrender and lost the ability to hold the pair of loose fitting sweat pants up. We all laughed as we ran out of the Rubber Duck Training Facility at the undetermined location in “Town A” and past B. Arthur who was still desperately trying to pull his clothing back together while holding his bandaged hand in front of his unspeakable area, the index and middle fingers that were taped together doing a fabulous job of hiding items of his that were not intended to been seen in plain daylight.

We had aborted our mission before the commencement of the third stage of the mission, “Operation: TOOTIE”. This stage of the mission was developed by myself and was an extremely intricate and delicate undertaking that would have had to utilize all the drumsticks broken by the drummer of Metalica during their nineteen eighty seven tour of the Netherlands. I won’t bore you with the details, but I will let you know that I had practiced for nearly three years for that moment of glory and the looks on the faces of the “board members” when I walked into the “Board Room” on the second floor of the Rubber Duck Training Facility at the undetermined location in “Town A” that we failed to make it to. Our mission was an incomplete success; we did manage, however, to remove a number of the trainers from commission for a while and this batch of cheep, highly toxic poly-utherene polymer had been neutralized. We had saved countless lives with our actions, but it didn’t seem quite worth it as our little group ran past little Timmy O’Toole’s house just down the street from the Rubber Duck Training facility on the outskirts of “Town A” and we saw the ambulance and police car parked in the driveway. Somehow, we knew the evil corporate conglomerates had struck a blow against our cause, using this senseless death of an innocent child to laugh at our pitiful attempt of hindering the supply lines of this war. We knew that our mission that had been so carefully planned out for nearly a year and nearly cost us own lives, all to save the children of our planet; the only ones left in this world that may have the capacity to think for themselves if their minds are not taken over by big purple dinosaurs on TV or other mind control tactics used by the powers that very few have the ability to fathom much less stand against would be denounced as a random act of terrorism against the “free” capitalist world, giving the guys at the top another tax cut when they whine that they cannot afford to repair the damages inflicted on their precious Training Facility. The people would believe the dribble that the media throws down before them, regardless of any other proof set out in front of them or that could be read from between the lines.

It was saddening, but nearly inevitable. Each member of our group that we had now so aptly named “The Duck Hunters” and I went their own, separate ways two blocks after poor little Timmy O’Toole’s house; we had agreed to meet again at our undefined location between “Town A” and “Town B” in two days time. I returned to school just in time to make it to my third period class, English. I had already missed the first two periods, but that did not register in my mind as I sat down at my desk in the English classroom – room one-sixteen; mere moments before the P.A. system sounded. Funny thing though: I was fretting over being called down to answer questions pertaining to my illicit actions and my whereabouts earlier in the morning and stood up, making my way to the doorway of the class only to be stopped by Mr. Hays, my aging English teacher with those large, gold rimmed glasses and that disheveled yet combed head of gray hair that, strangely enough, matched the tweed sports coat he wore over his suit everyday. In his somewhat annoying, but educated voice he told me, much to my relief, that my I had not been called down to the office; the name asked for was that of a student that was not in class on that day. I was overjoyed and returned to my seat to work feverishly on my poetic analysis assignment until the lunch bell rang, letting us know that our captivity was on hiatus until one-fifteen PM. I had this strange feeling as I stood up and made way into the hallway that my day was far from over, and I never admit to being wrong.