Screw the Universe Read online

  Screw the Universe

  Screw the Universe

  Midpoint

  Screw the Universe

  a collection of connected short stories

  by Stephen Schwegler and Eirik Gumeny

  SCREW THE UNIVERSE

  © 2011 Stephen Schwegler and Eirik Gumeny

  Smashwords Edition

  The stories included in this collection are works of fiction. Any resemblance to actual businesses, locations, talking animals, intergalactic federations or persons, living, dead, or otherwise, is entirely coincidental.

  Also by Stephen Schwegler: Perhaps., a collection of short fiction

  Also by Eirik Gumeny: Exponential Apocalypse, a novel

  “Space. It seems to go on and on forever.

  But then you get to the end and a gorilla starts throwing barrels at you.”

  – Futurama

  Fuck the Space Chickens

  Mission 58008 - 001

  The Zdravo, shiny and glinting in the light of the distant sun, was docked at the Federation space station, awaiting her new captain. Senior Dockworker Hugh Johnson and his crew had just meticulously removed the protective tarp from the newly constructed vessel, revealing her glory to the universe.

  The universe wasn’t all that impressed.

  Space Marshal Phil Orr, on the other hand, soiled his pants with joy. Also, semen. The Zdravo was the cutting edge of space-faring technology, all sharp and pointy and fast and shit. Launching her under the flag of the Federation was his way of telling all the non-Federation governments in the universe to suck it. And, man, they were some asshole governments.

  Space Marshal Orr escorted the newly promoted Captain Oswald Van Vanderhoort Van Tyler to the viewing platform overlooking the Zdravo.

  “Well, Captain Tyler, here she is, the Zdravo. Your home for the next six years.”

  “She looks like a penis.”

  “… a penis?”

  “A penis. A big one at that.”

  “I don’t know that I’d...”

  Space Marshall Orr looked at the Zdravo again. She did look like a penis, all long and narrow and kind of bulbous at the front. And her twin rear engines uncannily resembled swollen testicles.

  “How did I not see that?” he said, shaking his head. “Anyway, I suppose we should get back and work on getting a crew together for you.”

  “We’re gonna fill that giant flying dong with a ton of seamen.”

  “That would be the Navy, Captain.”

  “Oh, right. Right,” said Captain Tyler. “What are Federation officers called again?”

  “Space seamen.”

  “That’s not funny at all.”

  The candidates were lined up – naked – along the back wall of the conference room. Captain Tyler led Marshal Orr to a desk littered with paintballs. He pulled a slingshot from the back pocket of his battle shorts.

  “Captain,” said Marshal Orr, “what’s the meaning of all this?”

  “Interviewing takes too long, so I figured whoever gets hit with a paintball gets to come aboard.”

  “That is quicker,” said the marshal, fingering one of the brightly-colored balls. “You do have less balls than applicants, right, Captain?”

  “I should hope so. Finding pants would be a bitch.”

  “You’re preaching to the choir,” said the marshal. “And what of those that don’t get selected?”

  “I don’t know, make them all Senior Dockworker or something.”

  “That role is already taken by Johnson.”

  “Well, now he’ll have friends.”

  Captain Tyler loaded a paintball, pulled back on the slingshot, and pointed it toward the first set of testicles he saw.

  “Wait just a minute, Tyler. I can’t in clear conscience let you do this to your potential crew,” said Space Marshal Orr. “Not by yourself, anyway. Where’s my slingshot?”

  “We’re going to have to share, sir,” replied Captain Tyler, releasing the elastic of the slingshot. The paintball jumped forward, got caught in the pouch, spun around, and came flying back into Captain Tyler’s face, exploding between his eyes.

  “Oh my God, it’s pink, everything is pink!”

  The paintball wasn’t pink.

  “Congratulations, Captain,” said Marshal Orr. “You’re part of your crew.”

  “I can’t see! I’m blind!”

  Marshal Orr grabbed the slingshot from the captain, loaded a paintball, and then fired it directly into the chest of one of the applicants.

  “You,” said the marshal, “you’re now a private. Take Captain Tyler to the bathroom and wash that green paint off his face.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the newly hired Private Kim Boxershorts.

  “It’s green?” asked Tyler. “Oh God, it’s worse than I thought! I’ve lost the ability to smell colors!”

  Marshal Orr raised an eyebrow.

  “Make sure the paint didn’t seep into his brain or something,” he added.

  “How would I—” began the space seaman.

  Marshal Orr fired another paintball into the stomach of another applicant.

  “You,” he said, “you’re the ship’s doctor. Go help.”

  “But I don’t—”

  The marshal fired a paintball into the man’s scrotum.

  “I don’t care. Go run an MRI on Tyler. Use the internet or something.”

  “Yes, sir,” replied the doctor, sputtering and limping toward Captain Tyler and Private Boxershorts.

  “Now,” said Marshal Orr, “for the rest of you...”

  Captain Tyler was laid out on the MRI’s bed. “Doctor” Emmanuel Sodomy stood behind the Plexiglas screen, alternately watching the captain and leafing through a six thousand page instruction manual.

  “Yes,” mumbled the doctor, “but how do I turn it on?” He slammed his fists into the controls in front of him. The machine buzzed to life.

  “I think that did it,” said Dr. Sodomy’s assistant, “Nurse” Poorbed Sidemanner.

  “Of course. Right. Yeah,” replied the doctor. “Now let’s run some tests.”

  Dr. Sodomy pushed a button at random. The bed slid into the MRI’s hole.

  “Heh,” said Captain Tyler.

  “Quiet!” demanded Nurse Sidemanner, shouting into the intercom.

  “It was funny!” replied Captain Tyler.

  “No talking!”

  “It’s scanning my brain, not my mouth,” said the Captain. “I’ll talk all I—”

  Dr. Sodomy pushed another button. The bed jolted upward, slamming Captain Tyler’s face into the top of the MRI machine.

  “Shit,” said Dr. Sodomy, “shit, shit, shit.”

  “At least he shut up,” said Nurse Sidemanner.

  “I don’t think there’s supposed to be that much blood...”

  Captain Tyler awoke hours later in his cabin aboard the Zdravo. Seated in a chair next to him, First Lieutenant Archibald Duknerts was keeping watch.

  “Your mother blows zedonks!” shouted the captain, bolting upright.

  “Sir?” asked the lieutenant.

  “You’re not Sodomy.”

  “No, sir. I’m not,” replied Duknerts. “Dr. Sodomy is in the communications room, looking for an online university that will grant him a medical degree with a minimum of effort. Or even just for cash.”

  “Who are you then?”

  “I’m First Lieutenant Archibald Duknerts.”

  “First Lieutenant, eh? Good. That makes you my whipping boy.”

  “Sir?”

  “Silence. I’m thinking.”

  They both waited.

  “So,” said Captain Tyler, breaking the bone-crushing silence. “Clean bill of health?”

/>   “Not quite,” replied Duknerts.

  “Spill it. I don’t want you to pull punches with me.”

  “You have gonorrhea.”

  “Shit!”

  “Of the eye.”

  “Triple shit!”

  “Triple, sir?”

  “I’d say that warrants it. Any idea of where this came from?”

  “Uh…”

  “Punches.”

  “Right. Well, your mission pre-screening didn’t show it and... You haven’t touched anything with your eye recently, have you?”

  “Other than the paintball? No, not that I’m aware of.”

  “The doctor sanded the paint off your face and examined the shavings. The only thing the paintball was carrying was space cholera, and you don’t appear to be shitting uncontrollably out of your eye, so I don’t think that was it. I’m guessing whatever it was was inside of the MRI when your face, uh, well, you know…”

  “That tube did smell like boning.”

  “In a surprising and probably completely unrelated chunk of news, it looks like Nurse Sidemanner was also recently diagnosed. You two should probably go to that support group the Federation offers.”

  “I’m somewhat alarmed that there’s a support group for this.”

  “As are we all,” said First Lieutenant Duknerts, staring in horror at Captain Tyler’s engorged – and apparently sexually active – eye. “Should I go get Dr. Sodomy? He’s probably got a cream or something.”

  “I’ll bet he does,” replied Captain Tyler. “No, thanks. Is there someone else I can see?”

  “Uh... the ship’s vet? I guess? I think he just came on. Computer?”

  “Yes, First Lieutenant,” echoed the artificial female voice of the ship’s onboard operating system.

  “Can you send Dr. Siriporn Porniviriyakul to the Captain’s chambers?”

  “Right away,” said the computer.

  “Dr. Porn?” questioned Captain Tyler. “I’m going to like this guy.”

  “Dr. Porniviriyakul?” called First Lieutenant Duknerts. “Siriporn? You here?”

  Dr. Porniviriyakul was indeed there, in the private bathroom affixed to his lab, taking a massive shit. He had been there when the ship had paged him, and for several hours before that as well. The tofu fajita he had eaten for breakfast was doing its best to scrub every inch of his intestines clean. And, while Dr. Porniviriyakul appreciated the fajita’s thoughtfulness towards his colonic health, he didn’t want his first encounter with his new shipmates to be through a bathroom door. So he sat on his toilet, knees high and cheeks clenched, saying nothing.

  “Dr. Porniviriyakul?”

  Nothing.

  “Dr. Porn— What is that smell?”

  Still Dr. Porniviriyakul said nothing.

  “Oh my God,” continued First Lieutenant Duknerts, “I think something died in here. Oh, sweet jumping Jesus.” He began coughing uncontrollably.

  “Computer,” the lieutenant sputtered, “send the janitor-robot in here, ASAP. I... I think something’s rotting inside the walls.”

  “Yes, First Lieutenant,” replied the computer.

  Dr. Porniviriyakul put his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. This was going to be a long six years.

  “Bad news, Captain,” replied First Lieutenant Duknerts, returning to Captain Tyler’s bunk. “We couldn’t find Dr. Porn.”

  “I’ve never been sadder in my life,” replied the captain.

  “I did, however, find this guy,” said the lieutenant, pointing to the woman standing next to him.

  “I’m not a guy,” whispered the woman.

  “My understanding is that it’s safer if you pretend you are,” answered the lieutenant.

  “That man has the most magnificent breasts I’ve ever seen,” said Captain Tyler. “Who is he?”

  “My name is Sarah... uh, toga? Saratoga Springs,” replied the woman.

  “That sounds like a porn name. And those are definitely porn tits. Are you sure you’re not Dr. Porn?”

  “Miss... ter Springs,” replied First Lieutenant Duknerts, “is a doctor. A real one. She— He, HE was hired to be our onboard physician. Before Marshal Orr shot Sodomy in the nuts and gave him the job.”

  “Look, Duknerts, I need a doctor. Not someone who went to school and got a degree and knows the things a doctor should know.”

  “That... I don’t...”

  “Mr. Springs,” continued the captain, “what is it you do onboard the Zdravo?”

  “My official title is Equipment Manager,” she replied. “I’m in charge of all the sports equipment down in the recreation area.”

  “Our recreation area is the size of a Tokyo apartment. What kind of equipment could we possibly have?”

  “Knee pads and a variety of balls, mostly.”

  “Balls, eh? What else?”

  “Half a set of golf clubs, the woods to be specific. And catcher’s gear.”

  “Are you sure you’re not having some kind of gay orgy down there, Springs?”

  “I don’t follow, sir.”

  “The balls, the woods... Do I have to paint you a picture? Because I will. Someone get me some paint. And something to paint on.”

  “Captain Tyler,” began Equipment Manager Springs, “I take my job very seriously. I wipe down those balls and polish those woods with regularity and I don’t appreciate –”

  “I’m sorry, you what?”

  “I polish the woods, sir. I grab a cloth and some oil and I run my hands up and down and up and down those shafts. I’ve been on this ship thirty-six hours, sir, and there’s barely been a minute where I wasn’t running a rod through my hands.”

  “Equipment Manager Springs,” said Captain Tyler, “I don’t appreciate that kind of talk. Unless there’s a vagina in this story somewhere, you need to lay off the graphic sexual descriptions.”

  “I’m sorry... I... What?”

  First Lieutenant Duknerts just lowered his head, sighed, and said, “They warned me about this.”

  “Does he get like this often?” asked Springs.

  “Really only when I get an STD,” answered Tyler, “or a regular disease, or gas. So about every other week. But that’s not important. What is important is that I need a doctor to look at my ever pustulating eye. And you’re not a doctor.”

  “Yes, but, uh,” began Equipment Manager Springs, rifling through a handbag that looked surprisingly like a medical kit, “I was sent here by Nurse Sidemanner to give you this... this small tube of Vagisil? No, that’s not what I was –”

  Captain Tyler snatched the tube out of her outstretched hand, popped the top and squirted the cream into his eye.

  “Should it burn this much?” he asked.

  “Sure...” said Springs, stepping slowly backwards. “The burning just means it’s working extra hard.”

  “Ah, good. You can go back to polishing your wood now.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Equipment Manager Springs, before turning and fleeing the captain’s quarters. And not for the last time, either.

  “My God, Duknerts, look at the ass on that man.”

  “Captain, I don’t think you should be –”

  The computer’s voice twanged from the captain’s intercom.

  “Captain Tyler, a call is coming in from Space Marshal Orr on the View-Matic 7000.”

  “We’re on our way,” said the first lieutenant.

  First Lieutenant Duknerts and Captain Tyler – the captain being lead by hand due to the trauma currently being inflicted on his eye – were halfway to the bridge when they collided with a crew member carrying a box of several hundred Wang Industries GPS nano-trackers and knocked her to the ground.

  “Damn it,” said Private Yvette Redshirt, picking nano-processors from her clothing. “I’m covered in Wangs!”

  “My apologies!” said Duknerts, immediately embarrassed. “We didn’t see you coming.”