Uncle Louis V

“The Alphatoy smiled, and looked him proud; for the man touched His latex. Then He whispered to the man: Ride me; for we will swim ashore; for we will forestall naught, and all will occur, and you will become my Owner; for we will come to men, and we will bring them latex, and they too will become Owners." — Inflatext 1:5-6



Black iron doors clapped shut behind our heroes then all was black. Chandeliers flickered aflame up and down a hall one by one to reveal the hall. On each side of the hall was a row of black obelisks parallel to the other, swirled with vines. Colorful glass mosaics decorated the left side, seven it total. The could be read like panels of a comic. And the comic illustrated a swimming man, a pool, and a dolphin; and a halo crowned the dolphin; and on the seventh panel the swimming man was climbing Him.

And at the end of the hall stood a spiraling staircase that stabbed through the ceiling. The ceiling surrounding the stairs was void: a black vortex.

The kid stepped.

The others ambled behind him as he crossed the length of the hall. Now and then Vernon caught a glimpse of six blue eyes fixated on him from behind an obelisk. Each time he looked, they disappeared. Chills.

They reached the stairs. They began to climb.

When they reached the top they found themselves in a one-windowed chamber, the entire left wall the window, a tint of obsidian. Sunlight lanced in dimly. A man in a crowned helmet and heavy armor sat on a throne in the coil of a long black sea serpent inflatable.

Its six blue eyes flashed at Vernon. Vernon flinched.

Elbow perched on one arm of the throne, the man palmed his chin. His other hand rested on the sea serpent’s head and clutched then stroked, the sea serpent cooing. His eyes only half-opened upon their arrival. And said he:

“Yeees? I am Magistar Dacorda, The Declarer of Logic, Definer of the Truths of the Universe, as declared by The Alphatoy himself. How may I help you?”

“Bullshit,” Clefkee said. “Where’s the Magistar?”

The man and the sea serpent’s gaze met. “Tsk tsk,” said the man. “Vindicti, what will we do with this man and his friends who’ve so rudely barged into this sacred place without appointment?”

“Let me . . . devour their booonesss,” the sea serpent hissed.

The man snickered. He stood. A key on a keyring flashed from his waist as he stepped over the coils of the sea serpent. “That privilege is the true Magistar-and-Alphatoy’s,” he muttered, unclipping the keyring. The key he held to the ceiling. Presently, following a rumble of the room, the ceiling exploded, belching up blue smoke and chunks of obsidian. Our heroes covered their mouths with their elbows. Coughed. Unveiled from the explosion was an elevator nearly the size of the room itself, surrounded by debris, hovering where the throne once stood. No man. No serpent.

We bid you fare well! echoed The Key Keeper’s musical voice. Take that as you may. A-ha-ha!

An blue illumination of pale blue poured from the parting car doors. A magically lit interior with handrails on three sides was revealed. First Morris stepped on. So did then the rest. The car clapped shut after them and they waited in idle silence: Uncle Louis, Vernon and Clefkee staring sheepishly, Clefkee checking his watch . . . ah! On the door panel a button labeled Magistar Dacorda’s chamber a.k.a. The Peak of Creation appeared before the boy’s eyes! With no hesitation did he stab his finger at it.

Ding!

The car hesitated till ten seconds later: Like lightning it bolted through the ceiling—through the ceiling—the way a spirit or intangible object or thing might! Everyone was shook! Bodies were flung, slung, over handrails! That illuminating blue turned intense about the car’s interior! Came screams! Morris’ woa-oh-oh-oh-ed, accompanying each jitter and jolt from handrail to parallel handrail till finally the car broke to a halt, slam dunking him and his dad and croc into the metallic doors: bwop! ker-thwonk! thwomp-chhh! Rubber ducks circled Pygmy and Clefkee’s dizzily nodding heads.

Presently the metal doors slid open and Vernon fell out between them. He vomited a puddle of orange upon the arrived-to room’s floor. Let’s talk about the arrived-to room: It was black and tiled and empty save for a black glass table and armchair in its center. And at the far-wall—far window, obsidian window—of the room stood a hooded figure with his back facing the arrived-ones, hands behind his back. Dozens of scaly coils surrounded him—the coils of an infinitely long, black leviathan inflatable. Soft hissing. The leviathan turned when the four stepped out of the car over Vernon; its six blue, shining slits for eyes flashed on the kid and croc directly.

Before Vernon could stand, it lunged. The long leviathan zipped out with wavy coil-after-coil then struck the car’s doors head-first. Crushed inward doors. Sparks skipping away. Smoke billowing. Our heroes had dodged in time; they had planked for dear life much like Morris first did in Uncle Louis II and were now strewn straight-and-flat out over the floor. The leviathan was prying its head free. A flash and extra sparks popped from the elevator doors when it did. And then the leviathan retreated; it leapt from corner to corner of the room multiple times, encompassing the room’s corners in multiple coils; the thing must have been hundreds! of feet in length.

“You tried to kill us!” the kid cried.

“I do not try; I do only. I will your death; and it becomes so,” said the hooded figure. He turned, unhooded himself. Clefkee recognized him: the true Magistar. “You are dead already. I have said it; and it has become so.”

“And I’m a flying walrus,” the croc grunted. “You’re the Magistar we came here to defeat, huh? Lame.”

“So lame,” Morris agreed. Clefkee shot him a warning glance. But it was too late:

The Magistar appeared before the boy’s eyes in a blink: And one robed arm flashed, and one majestic pimp slap to the boy’s cheek sent the boy rolling, a flying barrel, into the elevator doors with a clap of thunder! Uncle Louis gasped . . . clutched at his heart. Doubled over. The sight of jaws replaced the kid; then the croc was on the floor, wrestling, struggling with the levia’. The teeth snapped at the face of the croc. Snap here. Snap there. Snap an inch away from his nose—saliva dribbling down the chin of the serpent. It hissed. It flared its nostrils. Now the croc’s arms quivered; and his paws on the upper and lower jaw were slipping.

“Un-cuh-hul-hul,” the kid cackled, a blur at the edge of the croc’s peripherals.

Clefkee spectated from the side-lines.

Vernon was out of his light-headed stupor. He rushed on Dacorda. He had snuck on the man from behind and grabbed him round the throat. Pygmy rushed in on the leviathan; he pecked straight into one of the leviathan’s eyes. The leviathan didn’t flinch. Instead, it spotted Vernon out the corner of an eye. It leapt. Left the croc and dolphin to fall to the floor. Came crashing over Vernon, freeing Dacorda. Swallowing Vernon whole. Its was more a scoop than a swallow and the bulge the father of Morris made was hardly a speck descending the esophagus.

Cried Morris: “DAD! DAD, DAD, DAD. STOP!”,

And cried and cried and kept on dad-dad-dad-ing till the thing had swallowed completely. It brought the boy agape to his knees. It cocked its head at him. Cooed. Touched the boy’s cheek with its tongue and tasted and cooed again. Then, it let its jaws hang loose and let loose a belch that shimmered the room, that Clefkee covered his ears to, that was worse than a roar, in the boy’s face:

“BEEEEEEEHEEEERRRLAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRCHHH!!”

Saliva and spittle rained upon the left and right cheek and nose and forehead. The boy then died. Spiritually. They say that men were spiritually still dolphins; it is appropriate, then, to say that, on this date, his inner dolphin took a terrible blow. “D-d-d-d-d-dad . . .”

Morris, the croc said.

Morris wasn’t listening. Morris was tweaking—twitching at the eye, neck, and foaming from the mouth. Many other physical spasms occurred. The boy thought of the future: He thought of a life without his father there to fly the kite with him, to egg him on as he performed the second lap, to cheer and clap for him as he won an award for Greatest Land-surfer (a.k.a Skateboarder) of All Time. However, from deep within the leviathan came a voice. That voice was the voice of his father. It was raspy, and it was weak, and it was muffled; but the father said to the boy:

“Morris, you can hear?”

“I hear dad,” Morris whimpered.

“Listen kiddo. It seems my time is up, on this world. Kiddo, you’re ten years old. I can’t reckon I’d have ever imagined being such a champ, when I was your age. When”—the leviathan’s stomach growled then he continued—“when you get out of this mess, don’t you ever quit swimming. Don’t you ever quit that skateboard, now.”

“Dad . . .”

“If you do, your old pops will come back to haunt you. You hear?”

That was the last the kid heard. Though he nodded, the father didn’t see it. And that was all. And that was when Morris planned vengeance against the Magistar and Leviathan internally; when he decided that he’d rather die than defeat those evil-doers! Fiery torches of passion blazed in that boy’s left and right eye! Each fist shook frantically! Each tooth gritted against another! This was the prepubescent child’s chance to prove his balls had a-come!

Looking up to Dacorda with the mad twitch-eye glare, “Y-you’ll be sorry for that!” he cried. “You’ll both be sorry!”

Charge! Both kid and croc assaulted Magistar and leviathan, respectively. The battle was on an equal grounds. Slash on slash against latex . . . windmill punch after tantrum kick against pubescent chest, to be countered by brute adult strength in punches and blasts of magic. But let us focus on the kid and Magistar specifically, now.

It happened that the kid was blasted in the chest by magic. He groaned terribly upon colliding with the floor. Then loomed Dacorda over him booming in laughter, with one hand raised, holding a concocted ball of magic. “Shall I read to you The True Inflatex:

“In the beginning, in The Pool without Owners of Pool Toys, swam men to forestall drowning. Occured naught. Then swam a man to the end of The Pool. The man there met The Grandfather, The Alphatoy, who first whispered to men to swim, to seek Him, though they knew naught. The Alphatoy smiled, and looked him proud; for the man touched His latex. Then He whispered to the man: Ride me; for we will swim ashore; for we will forestall naught, and all will occur, and you will become my Owner; for we will come to men, and we will bring them latex, and they too will become Owners (Inflatext 1:1-6).”

“Wait,” the kid said. “You believe in magic.”

“Indubitably. Without magic would an omnipotence such as mine be possessable? With magic could thy peers be ruled? The solution is logic: Magic is for the Owner who rules; logic is for the swimmer who swims; and can there be only one ruler. That is I! Am I Magistar Dacorda!”

While Dacorda explained himself, the kid took the time to act; he fled to the croc’s side. While the croc and the leviathan “duked it out”, he sneakily made his way to the back of the levia’ where its plastic nozzle was located. The levia’ spotted him with a wide opening of its six eyes, but it was too late: Came a hiss of air. Morris stood with one hand held to the ceiling, holding the ripped-off nozzle. The levia’s eyes burst with bright blue light. It opened its jaws. Blinding rays of light burst out from the monster’s maw; then the room became that bright blue and none else. Then Clefkee, Pygmy, Morris, Uncle Louis, Dacorda—this light was too revealing for them—they sheltered their mortal eyes with palms and elbows! Insert rapid-winds-like-that-of-a-hurricane sound effect! Instantly Dacorda’s ears sparked and smoked. He toppled. Morris toppled. All the rest aside for the levia’ toppled. No, take that back. The levia’ was the last to topple, but he did topple.

When he toppled The Universe itself did shake.

Then that bright blue light did dissipate. Elbows and palms were free to relinquish themselves. Everyone was now lying upon the floor sprawled in cadaver-like positions. Everyone appeared legitly dead. The Magistar was turned to a crisp, his robes charred, the man himself an overcooked shiskabob. Clefkee, Pyg’, and Morris more resembled dried-up prawns, though everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Let’s examine:

The croc lying on his belly, eyes shut, unmoving.

The kid now naked, buttocks pointed ceiling-ward.

Clefkee now naked, chest-hair showed off.

Pygmy, a dolphin.

The leviathan dead, hissing air still.

In this moment, somewhere in North America, a math teacher asked a question concerning probability and a single student having had a sudden revelation asked, “Aren’t all things probable?”; somewhere in Europe, a man realized that, universally, both the right and left sides of the street are the sides upon which a car is to be driven, and skids recklessly through traffic on the free-way headed the opposite direction; somewhere in Africa, the antelope speaks to the Ugandan tribesman; somewhere in Asia, the Javanese woman asks, “What is on the other side of the wajang that I do not see, and what if I could see it?”; and somewhere in South America, Australia, and Antarctica, other magical events regarding coyotes, tarantulas, and polar bears occur. In this moment the world’s axis is shifted just a slight, to its right side.

In that moment, Uncle Louis lurched forward, eyes wide. His lips connected with the leviathan’s nozzle-hole. He began to suck. Suck, swallow, an increasingly powerful flow of air filling his lungs. Everyone felt the transfer of air from the one to the other in their spirits. Uncle Louis inflating . . . the leviathan deflating . . . the croc’s stomach burbling sickly, and loudly.

Understandably then the kid was drawn to the croc’s side to rub the gurgling gut. The croc smiled. The croc had just finished the final gulp, the last of the levia’s air, and nearly choked on it; as, at the same time, one single belch rolled out: “BEH-RRRP!”

Morris was able to pat-pat his gut two times more, when: “BRRRREEEEEEEEHUUUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRUUUURRRRRRRRRRURRRPPP!!!” The kid went somersaulting.

The scales of the croc’s underside rippling, groaning, urrrarrgggl-ing. The croc snickered. Stood. Patted his stomach as a shiver ran across his body shoulder-to-shoulder. Now a growth spurt began; the croc’s stomach was shrinking. The croc’s foot swelled in size before Morris, and Morris squeaked, and went in reverse on his hands and feet. A deep bass resonating from the croc’s stomach that expanded itself to fill the entire room trembled the very bones of Morris, Clefkee, Pygmy.

“This power. It’s unlike anything,” the croc said grinning. Massaging his own underside with one claw shoveling around his belly-button, “It feels great.” His growth spurt peaked at fifty-foot; now his shadow swallowed over the three present. Their jaws gaped. “Morris. We’re finally kings. You feel it?”

“A little. But I don’t know,” Morris said. He uneasily scratched behind his neck as Clefkee and Pygmy came forward.

Said Clefkee, “Kings, heh? You seem to have forgotten.” The man circled the croc. Pointing to a tear where air still hissed, softly escaped, from the croc’s backside, “You’ve been punctured, Louis. The punctured are unfit to be kings over this world. Unfit to be rulers. Unfit to be Magistars.” Morris whimpered.

“To be king,” Clefkee continued, “one must stand watch over the world from the window of Inflatex Tower. To stand watch here in your position, you would surely shrivel and die. And you are young; you don’t deserve the burden of kings that kings have Universally. No, boys. You have potential to prove to yourselves. You must feed from the inflatables of others until the puncture is healed, lest you miserably die. Here, you leave.

“Perhaps the leviathan has granted in you a power yet realized. Perhaps it will be of benefit. Perhaps not. But, come three-thousand moons, Morris, you will become a man. If you and your Uncle desire still to be kings . . . return then.”

The man walked to the obsidian window and stood, hands behind his back, back facing the kid and croc. The kid and croc thought together:

I told you we’d be kings of this world.

I wanna be, Uncle.

So let’s eat the man. Yeah?

That’s wrong, Uncle.

Now you’re the moral type of kid. After all we’ve been through.

No, Uncle. I wanna be kings with you. But I don’t wanna be a king here. The Magistar was a boring kind of king. We can be exciting kings.

Tell me what you’re saying.

I think I know who I wanna be. I wanna be a professional skateboarder when I grow up.

The croc raised a brow. Landsurfer you mean?

That one.

You’re in luck. If you’ll have a look at what I saved for you from the wreck, referring to Uncle Louis III while pulling two halves of a skateboard from a belly pouch.

The cruiser!

Yeah yeah. That.

My cruiser board! Uncle, you have it!

Nope. The croc held the halves out to the kid, and they exchanged hands. They’re yours Morris. Besides, what’ll you do with two sad splinters?

What’ll we do with your back, Uncle? Fix it. Duh!

Sarcasm. That was a new one in the boy. The croc wondered where he’d picked it up from. He simply shook his head. Tsked. Smiled at the boy and patted the boy’s head, then repeated the boy’s name, then leaked a tear from an eye.

* * *

It was decided that Clefkee and Pygmy would watch over the world, as kings over the world, while the kid and croc were to be kings of the world. They said their farewells. Waved at one another, before the kid and croc’s departure via elevator. Once they had gone, the old man looked wistfully out the window and so did the dolphin. A sparkling sun over the diamond blue set the day. And tomorrow it promised: More adventures between inflatable and owner; a new balance between magic and logic subject to change, as all things are; and a struggle between two kings and one forgotten one, The Key Keeper, who dwelled still in Inflatex Tower, having happily bidden our heroes fare-well.

* * *

Three thousand moons, the kid and croc thought together.

The kid stood at the top of a skate park ramp geared in knee-pads and a helmet. A skateboard, he held vertically against his ribs. The croc stood beside the ramp. Duct tape wrapped the skateboard’s middle; duct tape covered the croc’s back. Streetlamp light and moonlight mixed together in a pale-blue bright-yellow concoction. Let us zoom back to a scenario of the kid and croc’s black silhouettes standing still, there, with the city ‘scrapers and alleyways and chain fence, and moon full and fat behind them, while the camera pans out.

“So answer me, Morris.”

“Yeah, Uncle.”

“You still want that laptop?”

A hesitation. Then,

“Let's landsurf.”

FIN

---

Author's note: If you've read since the very beginning in Uncle Louis I, I applaud you. It has taken some many months for me but I've finally, painstakingly, finished this series; and I am happy to draw it to its close. The kid and croc's adventures continue from here on, though it is not my place to tell of them.

May you happily venture with your own inflatable, Owner.

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