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TITI REFLECTED.

“It’s a pretty kruddy thing, to be a bucket,” he thought, rebelliously, “and one full of scabs is even worse. Well, I’m not going to take it. I’ll run away, that’s what I’ll do!” He waited until the snores of the nasty old woman announced she was fast asleep.

“Mmmbr take me to the picture show mommy mmrrr,” Gonorrena mumbled. Then she sharted in her sleep.

Titi arose softly and went to the cupboard to find something to eat.

“No use starting on a journey without food,” he decided, searching upon the narrow shelves and finding nothing but moldy spoiled scroat cheese.

He looked in Gonorrena’s backpack and found two cans of Spork (a popular tinned meat-flavored product) and a few jackpeaches. While turning over the contents of the backpack he noticed the various thaumaturgic miscellany Gonorrena had acquired, including the golden snuff box which contained the “Make Living Concoction.”

“I may as well take this bag with me,” Tititarius thought, “or Gonorrena’ll be using this stuff to make more mischief with.” So he put the greasy backpack on and cautiously left the dingy hovel. He latched the door behind him. Above him was the navy blue sky, where the light brown croissant-shaped moon and yellow tinkling stars shone brightly, and the night seemed peaceful and inviting after the claustrophobic and foul-smelling kitchen.

Titi was walking slowly toward the road when a thought made him pause.

“I don’t want to leave Nate Goiterhead alone with old Gonorrena,” he muttered. “And Nate belongs to me, for I made him, even if the old crone did bring him to life.”

He retraced his steps to the iguana stable and opened the door of the stall where the goiter-headed man had been left. Nate was standing with his face to a wall. Titi walked up to him and turned him around. By the brown moonlight Titi could see Nate was smiling just as jovially as ever.

“Come on!” whispered the boy, beckoning.

“Where to?” asked Nate.

“Ssshhh! You’ll know as soon as I do,” answered Titi, smiling sympathetically into his charge’s goofy goiter face.

“Very well,” returned Nate, and walked awkwardly out of the stable and into the night. Titi bid farewell to the purple four-horned iguana. The iguana stomped its front left hoof three times and then pooped on the floor. Titi was relieved that he wouldn’t have to clean it up.

Titi led Nate to the path that led away from the garbage dump and whispered excitedly:

“All we’ve got to do now is wander!”

Nate’s stiff legs could not carry him very fast, but they walked steadily; and by the time the croissant moon sank away and the pink peach-shaped sun peeped over the hills they had traveled so great a distance that the tween had no reason to fear pursuit from the miserable old woman. Moreover, he had turned first into one path, and then into another, so that should anyone follow them it would prove very difficult to guess which way they had gone, or where to seek them.

Fairly satisfied that he had escaped- for a time, at least- being turned into a bucket full of scabs, the boy stopped his companion and seated himself upon a rock by the roadside.

“Let’s have some breakfast,” he said. He unzipped the backpack and pulled out a jackpeach to feast on.

Nate stood awkwardly and watched Titi curiously, but didn’t join in the repast. “I suppose I can’t eat like you, having no throat to swallow with,” he said.

“You also don’t have a poohole or a peehole,” returned Titi; “I know cuz made you.”

“Oh! Did you?” asked Nate.

“Yup. And smashed in your eyes and poked out your nostrils and slashed your mouth,” said Titi proudly. “And dressed you.”

Nate looked at his body and limbs critically. He waved and woggled his floppy tube arm, awkwardly bent and unbent his metal swing lamp arm, and clenched and unclenched his flimsy tissue-filled puffy winter glove hands.

“It strikes me you made a very good job of it,” he remarked.

“Just so-so,” replied Titi, modestly; for he began to see certain defects in the construction of his friend, but while making him Titi didn’t know they were going to be traveling together.

“Why...” said Nate Goiterhead, in a tone that expressed surprise, “if you made me you must be my creator, my parent, my father!”

“Yes, my son; I really believe I am!” replied the tween with a laugh.

“Then I owe you obedience,” continued the golem, “and you owe me- support.”

“That’s it, exactly”, declared Titi, jumping up and slinging Gonorrena’s backpack over one shoulder. “So let us be off.” Nate took up his stiff shuffle and Titi slowed his pace to meet his offspring’s. The walked through woods that grew thicker, then thinner, then there was an old abandoned mom and pop video store, and then a sort of chocolate swamp and then more woods.

“Where are we, anyway?” Nate asked while they walked along the road.

“Well right now we’re in Plotz Quadrant,” answered Tititarius.

“Ah, I see,” said Nate, who after a beat added: “What is a Plotz, and what is a quadrant?”

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“The Plotzes were the family who were the original rulers of the quadrant. A quadrant is a section of Bonertania. Bonertania is the country we live in.”

“Ah, I see… And where is Bonertania?”

“In the middle of Pus Continent.”

“And where--”

“Pus is on a planet called Sifillis, floating in the universe. I don’t know the name of the universe, so don’t ask.” They walked in silence for about an hour while Nate pondered his place in the grand scheme of things. Eventually he said:

“Dad, where are we going?”

“I’m not exactly sure,” said Titi; “but I believe we are headed south, and that will bring us, sooner or later, to Schmegma City.”

“What is that?” inquired the goiterhead.

“It’s a place to be somebody. I’ve read all about its history in the Plotz family’s castle library. I used to sneak in there at night and read as much as I could. The city was founded by an eccentric, filthy rich movie producer named J.D. Schmegma, and most of the big budget feature film motion pictures we watch today are made there on the city’s soundstages and backlots. There’s also a lot of legendary video stores and walk-in theaters in Schmegma City. It’s the capital of the country of Bonertania.”

“Tell me more about this country where I exist.”

“Well, Bonertania was created by the powerful Flatulenz Fairies. In the center of the country they built a beautiful palace out of old videotapes. Then, before she departed for another dimension, the Flatulenz Fairy Godmother Yeesh made her offspring Lympeter tremorroid of the land.”

“What’s a tremorroid?”

“It’s like a kween or a president… you know, a ruler.”

“Was Lympeter a good ruler?”

“I read he was lazy and all he wanted to do was watch movies all day. So that he wouldn’t have to do any ruling he split Bonertania up into four quadrants and assigned a family to govern each section- The Plotzes, the Schlings, the Quirks, and the Mukuses. And that’s how things were for thousands of years.”

“I’m following so far,” said Nate.

“Okay…” Titi scratched his nose. “Back in the sixties there was a powerful thaumaturge named Haight Squeezog. He made everyone believe he was funderful but he was really nefarious. He wormed his way into becoming Tremorroid Lympeter’s flackfizer.”

“What’s a flackfizer?”

“Like a personal assistant or sidekick. When Lympeter died Squeezog seized control of the videotape throne.”

“Was Squeezog a good ruler?”

“No, he was a humorless and puritanical jerkbutt. He insisted on personally screening and censoring all movies before they could be released. Anything he considered offensive or subversive was eliminated. It was a dark time for movies.”

“I know what a movie is,” said Nate.

“I love movies. Anyway, Haight Squeezog had four evil henchmen, including our old master Gonorrena.”

“The wrinkled-up old lady who brought me to life?”

“The same. Squeezog’s henchmen dispatched all the descendants of the Four Families and each took over a quadrant. They brought a lot of misery and insecurity to the Bonertanians. Gonorrena took control of Plotzquad.”

“What happened next?”

Titi cleared his throat. He was getting tired of relating history. He hoped they’d find an adventure to get into soon.

“A few years ago a powerful thaumaturge named Nobgoblin put together a squad of heroes to take back the quadrants. First they defeated Gonorrena, and then they vanquished Herpules, the tyrant who ruled Quirkquad. For awhile things were in a state of turmoil and war. Then last spring Hepatitissa, the nefarious hoo-hoo that ruled Schlingquad, was crushed by a giant brown pickle. Shortly after that Klamydia, who ruled Mukusquad from her giant slaughterhouse palace, was melted into a puddle of gore. Then finally Haight Squeezog himself was defeated. I heard he was executed by Nobgoblin for crimes against movies.”

“Who rules Bonertania now?” asked Nate.

“I don’t know who rules the quadrants, but the Ratsack Tremorroid sits on the videotape throne in Schmegma City and is the ultimate leader of Bonertania.”

“Oh!” said Nate, narrowly avoiding stepping in a pile of alien feces. Titi paused, stuck his finger in the pile, then sucked it clean. Nate asked: “Tell me, who is the Trapsack Hemorroid?”

“Ratsack Tremorroid. A famous philosopher.” answered Titi. “After Haight Squeezog died the Schmegma citizens made him the new tremorroid.”

“Now, that is very interesting history,” said Nate, well pleased; “and I understand it all perfectly except for the explanation.”

Titi chuckled at his ward.

“I guess I’m just too doltish to grasp things,” said Nate sadly, although he kept on grinning.

“Nonsense, you’re just young, that’s all, and there’s so much to learn,” said Titi.

“But am I a genius or am I a dumb-dumb?” Titi said:

“You’re a Nate.”

The duo walked on and the terrain became jungle-like. The air was moist and musky and pulsating veiny vines grew around sickly looking fleshtrees. Soon they came to a clearing, and in the clearing stood a muscular kaiju. Titi knew what a kaiju was from one of Gonorrena’s murder movies. She had a crush on the actor Grant Colon, who starred in a series of grim mysteries where he played a crime scene detective named Pierre Pizflapz. In the third installment of the series Pizflapz investigates a series of ritualistic kaiju slayings.

The kaiju in the jungle clearing was about seventy-five feet tall, not counting the antennae. It looked like it was made of lumpy purple rubber except its tummy, which was sparsely covered in matted brown fur and about two dozen pink nipples of various sizes. It had an expressionless face, with a protruding lower lip and three bulging, wet eyes. The two antennae growing out of its head were each topped with toothy, grinning mouths, and his zit-covered earlobes dangled far below his shoulders. Each shoulder was an enormous nose leaking snot down its thick arms. The enormous creature was naked except for an enormous pair of crusty yellow Y-fronts.

“Oh, er, hello,” said Titi. Nate gaped at the enormous beast, speechless in the face of its brobdingnagian proportions. The kaiju looked down at them and said:

“Good evening, fellas! Maybe you two could help me!”

“What seems to be the matter,” aked Titi.

“I seem to have gone and stepped into a meatidong trap.” Titi looked at the monster’s huge foot and saw a razor sharp molybdenum meatidong trap had clamped shut on the webbing between the kaiju’s first two toes. The trap was attached to a stake in the ground by a thick chain. “I can’t free myself because I have razor boomerangs for hands.” The beast held up his shiny, pointed, crescent shaped arm-ends.

“Well, I think if Nate and I work together we can help you.” The boy and his garbage golem pal walked over to the gargantuan foot and pulled on the jaws of the trap until they got it open wide enough to pull it from the monster’s toe web. As soon as the kaiju was freed the trap snapped shut loudly, almost severing Titi and Nate’s fingers. They dropped the spiked device and it landed on the ground with a big thud.

“Ah, that’s better! Pinched like a bugger. I am in your debt kindly, tiny strangers.” He bowed slightly. “Is there anything I can do to repay you?”

“Could you carry us to Schmegma City?”

“Right now?

‘“Yes,” said Titi. The monster sucked air in through its teeth and looked at its gargantuan wristwatch.

“No can do, little dude. I’m on my way to meet up with one of my foxiest super best friends, and she’s real tiger when I’m late, and I am LATE. But here’s what I can do...” Using his razor sharp hand the kaiju sliced one of the smaller nipples from its chest. It fell into Titi’s hands.

“Fold this up and carry it with you. If you ever get into a jam that needs a kaiju’s attention, unfold it and tweak it three times. If I’m not busy I will appear to help you out. Just don’t use it tonight. Now I gotta get going, the stench of romance wafts in the air. Bye!”

And he stomped away.

Titi put the folded-up nipple in his pocket and farted a whiny fart. Nate said:

“It is strange, father, that I cannot inhale yet I can smell your flatulence.”

“I guess you’re just lucky that way, Nate,” replied Titi.