BP/META: Pointless Posting Man: The Great RACCtastrophe

[Tim Munn]

"It's all so blank," lamented Pointless Posting Man, "I don't know how much
longer this can last!"


 He paces back and forth, the pain in his brain is driving him insane. He
has come up with the fabled Post With a Point. But the newsgroups are down.
It must be the work of the Radical Librarians!, raced Pointless Posting
Man's thoughts in an endless circle. Life is tough, then you come up with
the Post With a Point that ties it all together, then you post it! No such
luck here. The internet is dead. Dead.


 The Pointless Posting Signal! How it beeps! No, no. Just more dismal hope
for Pointless Posting Man. Dang. He droops a little, his underpants helmet
sagging wearily over his brow. He pushes the helmet up, it falls back down.
The elastic has gone out, the result of his constant preparedness. It sags
again. He opens the flap; he's a one-eyed ogre. RAWR.


 "How much longer?" he weakly asks. He fervently taps the refresh button.
Still no internet. Still no internet goers giddily reading the Post With a
Point. The Post-Phone rings. It's Librarian Man.


 "Have you seen the internet?"


 "No, I haven't," Pointless Posting Man responds.


 "I could have sworn, it was here a moment ago."


 "You sound tired, perhaps confused. Maybe you should get some rest."


 "This work against the Radical Librarians, it never stops."


 "I know old friend. Please, get some rest."


 "Yes, yes. Rest. Good night, pork chop."


 "Pork chop?! Why, you must have me confused for the meat section!"


 Pointless Posting Man paces back and forth, punching fist to palm. The
Radical Librarians. It must be! Only they could hassle Librarian Man to such
heinous ends! He is startled by a knock at the door. Someone is at the door.
Someone. He opens the door to dazzling bright light. Almost snow-blind. In
the middle of summer.


 His eyes adjust to terrible sights. The landscape, lifting itself in the
air. Lifting, lifting until it is ten, twenty, thirty feet in the air.
Everything; home, shrubbery, child-- Ice Cream Man even!-- lifted up as if
by the hand of God. Just... there. Ice Cream Man and child yipe for
Pointless Posting Man's help.


 He raises outstretched hands to them, willing them into his grasp. So hard,
so hard. They cry out again. His power was to create the Post With a Point.
He's completed that task. He is done. His arms lower slightly, and again Ice
Cream Man and child call out for him. Again his hands go out, a false smile
curling at lips edge. I can't, he mouths to them. The child cries, receiving
little solace from Ice Cream Man's ice cream head.


 Ice Cream Man melts onto Pointless Posting Man's shoes. He still stands
there, still waiting for the girl to somehow figure out how to fall into his
arms. He does not notice the smoke rising from his feet. Not at first. He
sees the whisps playing whispfully in front of him. Fire. Athlete's Foot.
Burn.


 He looks momentarily down, before noticing a peculiarity. The black whisps
were not smoke. No, they were something more dreadfully horrendous. They
were words. Namely: Ice Cream Man.


 "Ice Cream Man..." he looks up to the child, "Ice Cream Man!"


 She stops crying, asking for Ice Cream Man.


 "He's here! He's here!" Pointless Posting Man says enthusiastically.


 But in a brief moment, the words I C E C R E A M M A N tear apart. A low
cry trickles to Pointless Posting Man's ear. A look of horror comes to him
as what is left of those words seem to phase out of existence. The girl
begins screaming, as similar events start all around them.


 "Where?" Pointless Posting Man whispers. But in a millisecond, the word is
caught up, even before Pointless Posting Man has any idea what that really
means. The word rips completely apart, and just phases away. Pointless
Posting Man takes a step from his stoop, reaching out for the girl, again
with a smile.


 "Don't cry! It'll be alright! I'll save you!"


 The house across the street goes in a large boom. The words describing it
floating about aimlessly. It would have made for great word padding, thought
a distressed Pointless Posting Man. He shakes his head slightly. Poof, there
they go. He looks back to the girl, the only thing left in the neighborhood
besides himself and his home. He reaches out again.


 "I can't. I can't," he cries.


 She sniffles. "It's okay, mister man, sir. I'll be going now."


 There she goes, but Pointless Posting Man doesn't look. He doesn't look
again for a good ten minutes. He looks again. Looking. His house still
stands. The door has disappeared. Inside, a few trinkets and knick-knacks
here and there are gone. All the knives and forks in the kitchen are gone.
The internet is back. He is disturbed by the message on the screen.


 The kitchen sink does the job. Send it to Waste Management Man, he almost
laughs. Who knows if Waste Management Man is still real? Who knows where he
flushed the vomit to? He laughs. He feels he might be going crazy. He steps
outside, again raising his arms. A thunder echoes throughout the whitespace.
The words 'Lightning Bolt' appear in the sky, racing down towards him. They
stop just above, out of reach. He sees the outline of another man.


 "Ice Cream Man?" Pointless Posting Man mistakenly asks. He is scolded with
a K I C K in the butt. No, not Ice Cream Man! This man wears a turban on his
head. This man! The leader of the Radical Librarians! "Vlad the Reader! You
fiend!"


 "Fiend or foe? HA! How can I be so surprised that you would be the last
'hero' left! HA!"


 "Your reign of terror ends here, Vlad!" Pointless Posting Man vows, waving
a fist in the air.


 "Terror, you say? What terror!" The word appears behind Vlad, stalking him
almost impatiently. Vlad smiles a bit, and terror moodily floats away. The
two glare at each other furiously. The match ends only when Vlad breaks the
silence.


 "I must make a confession, Pointless Posting Man-"


 "Tell me none of your lies, Devil!"


 "How sad. Of you and for me. My words are much more true than you know,
Pointless Posting Man. Each and every thought, had it not been for this
turban. The God-awful thing! It makes my head look huge! But, because of it,
I'm able to use my words coherently. My disability, my greatest ability."
Vlad looks thoughtfully into the vast whiteness. He turns a moment later, a
sullen look on his face.


 "I confess, a great well of emotion rising up in him, "I confess that I
took it too far. Too far. I wanted the words, all of them. I was greedy. I
wanted them all for myself. All for myself. All the time in the library.
Librarian Man, he, he was my friend. I wanted what he had. I wanted his
words. The turban in the lost and found was the start. My hunger and ability
grew from there. I sold my soul, Pointless Posting Man, to the LIBRARY."


 A library simultaneously appeared and disappeared, if that were possible,
floating above them, then not. Vlad, himself floating, falls to a heap, the
turban tumbling to his side. Pointless Posting Man looks to it, then to
Vlad. There is great fear in Vlad's eyes. Pointless Posting Man bends to
toss the turban away, Vlad wincing in pain. Pointless Posting Man moves to
tend to the fallen leader of the Radical Librarians.


 "N-n-no," Vlad pushes Pointless Posting Man away, after a few moments he
stops trying. He weakly utters his own name. A child's writing book comes
into reality. Vlad Reading is scrawled across the cover in a child's hand.
He sighs deeply, opening the book. It contained his correspondence to the
outside world from the time he learned to write, until he found the turban,
that allowed him coherent speech for the first time. 'I take it all back, O
God!, I take it all back!'


 He tried, tried, tried to write something about the sky. Pointless Posting
Man had asked Vlad to take the turban, he shunning it thoroughly. Vlad's
mind was deteriorating. The words, the handwriting. Vlad gives a final
'Wauwooweewoo' before smoke starts rising off his body. He silently laughs,
madness in his eyes.


 Several hours pass, the clock without the hour hand says. Then the clock
itself. Pointless Posting Man looks up.


 "The sky. Spirit in the sky."


 Spirit, from the way it looks, probably not. Something in the sky, most
definitely. It looks like tiny ants. Pointless Posting Man thinks about it
for a while. He comes to a realization. The Internet! That has the answers!
But, there it sits, staring moodily at him. That message. That message. This
was not the Post With a Point. This wasn't even Vlad's nefarious doing. This
is too much. This is too far beyond Vlad's peak abilities. The little green
person indicating connection was active.


 "Let's do this."


 Success, that terrible thing! Pointless Posting Man couldn't believe he
just did that. What if the Library Cops were real? Well, if he was able to
get out of this mess, that would be an incredible Post With a Point. Outside
now, Pointless Posting Man looks up.


 "Ant Thing in the sky-" fuzzy ant-looking things scurried high above,
looking down; a haze blurred them in the whitespace, some had appendages,
some had wings; no, better yet, some in the rippling mass were vowels.
Pointless Posting Man laughs at it, thinking to pick up the turban. Even if
it fries my brains into thinking I'm an animal in the zoo, I'll beat this
thing! The turban is a snug fit. Pointless Posting Man smiles at its
comfortability. He raises his hands, outstretched, to the sky, to the
rippling mass of consonants and vowels.


 "Words in the sky, I'm gonna beat you!"


 A buzzing noise fills the whitespace. The letters begin an eerie funnel
down to Pointless Posting Man. "Dang."


 A second later, he's floating. A peaceful smile on his face. He looks down,
to the whitespace where his house once was. He laughs, realizing horrificly:
"It's all so blank."


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 There are no more words to describe Pointless Posting Man.




 Copyright 8.8.2011 by Tim Munn

written 2:14 a.m. - 4:18 a.m.
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