Dr. Identity Read online

  “My skull!” howled Congressman-thing Barracuda. “My spine! I’m broken!”

  President-thing Bogue regarded his opponent grimly.

  Papanazi swarmed the stage. They galloped and jetpacked over to the injured congressman-thing and devoured the image of his grotesquerie. Livid, the President-thing pulled two Colt six-shooters out of holsters in his Texarkana suit. The handguns contained internal microwombs that virginbirthed new bullets the instant an adult bullet was discharged, rendering infinite supplies of ammunition. The President-thing was an expert marksman and unloaded over a hundred rounds in seconds. He wounded and killed most of the Papanazi and scared the rest away.

  He blew smoke from the tips of the Colts and flipped them back into their holsters. He hopped across the stage, tripping over corpses but never losing his balance. “Get a doctor! No contender for President-thing’s gonna die in my presence! That’s shitty karma! Medic!”

  Diminutive men and ’gängers wearing bleached white jackets and stethoscopes crawled onto the stage. They waddled towards Congressman-thing Barracuda as the camera cut to a commercial.

  The commercial advertised a new variety of Dr. Identity action figure. Unlike former models, this one came equipped with de la Footwa pockets containing endless, fully operable supplies of classic science fiction weapons. It was sentient, too, and included a large supply of facemasks and personalities, ersatz veins coursing with Hammer blood, a chameleon skinsuit and flippers, four refills of Hammer blood, a token Dr. ’Blah sidekick (non-sentient), and, for added effect, a vintage Star Wars jawa. Viewers were warned that the action figure would only be available for a limited time. Very likely it would be taken off the market in no time at all.

  The next commercial advertised an upgraded version of the new variety of Dr. Identity action figure advertised in the preceding commercial. The upgrade was outfitted exactly like its predecessor with one twist: it possessed superhuman babysitting skills.

  The next commercial advertised an old brand of Dr. Identity cereal with a new image of the upgraded version of the new variety of Dr. Identity action figure on the box cover. An actor’s ’gänger (or an actor disguised as a ’gänger) dressed like Dr. Identity poured the cereal into a large bowl, poured milk over the cereal, and set the bowl on a table. The action figure then swung onto the table from off-camera and attacked the bowl with an electroshock mace…

  Seven more commercials followed. The first six were repeats of the first three commercials two times over. The last one announced the impending death of all Dr. Identity products, especially action figures and cereal. Nothing could last forever, and marketing conglomerates were running out of ideas. In order to deal with the loss, sponsors urged consumers to seek out their local witch doctors and exorcists for assistance in coming to terms with the illusory feelings of demonic possession that might ensue.

  A global earthquake accompanied the consumer bombardment of every Littleoldladyville in the Amerikanized universe…A cosmology of television screens turned to static and white noise. The holocaust was quickly replaced by the Technicolors of the spectrum and a quiet, hypnotic whistle. Then:

  “And now we return to our regularly scheduled program.”

  Congressman-thing Barracuda was propped up in a wheelchair, a fresh jack-o-lantern wedged onto his head. Barely discernable facial features had been haphazardly carved onto its surface, and its insides weren’t fully hollowed out: seeds and pulp oozed down the congressman-thing’s chest and shoulders.

  Grimley Bogue stood next to him, a hand resting on his shoulder. He climbed back onto his pogo stick when he noticed the camera had turned back on. The congressman-thing tipped into his lap. The President-thing got off the pogo stick and propped him up again. He wrapped a length of wire tubing around his chest and the back of the wheelchair to make sure he stayed in place, then climbed back onto the pogo stick. He gained altitude with each playful hop.

  “Right! Next question!”

  The moderator of the debate rose from his chair. The camera zoomed inggggon his bald spot, held for a beat, and zoomed back out.

  “Thank you, Mr. President-thing,” said the moderator. “The next question concerns the latest edition of Yahtzee. How do you feel about the addition of a ten-sided Dungeons & Dragons die to the board game? Let’s start with Congressman-thing Barracuda.”

  “I’m first!” barked the President-thing.

  “Okay,” said the moderator.

  “Hrrrrrm,” said Congressman-thing Barracuda. A glob of pulp spilled out of his deformed grin.

  The President-thing reached such a height that he started to disappear into the top of the camera frame.

  The moderator cleared his throat. “Yes, sir. Of course. Your response?”

  “That’s a dumbass question!” he shouted from the rafters. “Try again!”

  Cursing the pogocratic party beneath his breath, the moderator nervously shuffled through a stack of note cards. Pogocratics were notorious for on-camera incorrigibility, trouble-making and lewd behavior. Yet the Amerikan people had nominated one as their President-thing in spite of the scores of specialized political parties that now existed within the government. Remnants of the once dominant Democratic and Republican parties still survived, although they held virtually no power and their representatives never got elected for influential positions. Their representatives mainly acted as clerical subordinates for more dynamic parties. According to the National Kaptain’s Log, the most dynamic party currently in existence was the Parsley Garnishers, whose members’ ideology prescribed parsley as a holy weed that should only be used as a garnish under extreme dining circumstances. In second place was the Headless Horseman party due to a curious resurgence of public interest in the Disney adaptation of Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Then there were the Gitchy Goomers, gleefully brainwashed by the persistent mass appeal of the Neil Diamond ballad…the Ku Klux Kahn, known for their smoothly shaven, oversized pectoral muscles and acidic catch phrases patterned after the arch-villain of the archetypal Star Trek II…Kra-takka-takka-takka-tams, their name a piece of onomatopoeia used in various comics books to denote the crumbling noise of a falling wall. It was this party’s frequent practice during governmental assemblies to construct tall, seemingly sturdy sand castles and then knock them down so that they could articulate the sound of their party name.…Pogocratics currently held the twenty-fifth ranking. Other than keeping pogo sticks as party insignia, they were nihilists and had no ideological affinity with the vehicles. Generally speaking, they were hated, ridiculed, and assassinated on a regular basis. But Grimely Bogue had struck a chord with the Amerikan people in the last election. He happened to be bouncing down a slidewalk to the senate house one morning when a terrorist attack broke out in a nearby turtle store. The terrorists had subdued the ’gängers running the place, set all of the artificial turtles free, dragged all of the real turtles out into the street and systematically lit them on fire, claiming they were abominations. The Papanazi flooded the scene and Bogue immediately leapt at the opportunity to “do some cunt-licking good,” as he later admitted in a State-of-the-Union address. There were three terrorists, but Bogue made quick work of them. Gaining speed and height, he vaulted into the air and came down on the do-badders like a hammer, nailing them into the concrete. And afterwards he tended to the wounded turtles until the Pigs showed up. He became a national icon, and despite the unspeakable villainy he had committed before and after that moment as an elected official and private citizen, soon he was slouching in the Highchair of the Off-White House’s Opaque Office…

  Eight seconds passed and the moderator still hadn’t selected an alternate question. The President-thing reduced his altitude until he merely bobbed up and down. “Hurry up you worthless pimp! The Amerikan people are watching and waiting!”

  The camera did a 180 degree revolutionghfand swung into a close-up of the moderatorggggThe pocks on his ruddy cheeks showed beneath his makeup. Beads of sweat trickled down his forehead.
His lower lip had disappeared behind an upper row of horse teeth. “Go away,” he whispered to the camera. The camera giggled and reverted to its original position.

  “Ask me a question!”

  “Uhm. Uhm.”

  “Ask me a question shitforbrains!”

  The moderator closed his eyes and pulled out a random note card. He cleared his throat again.

  “Quit clearing your throat!”

  The moderator apologized and said, “Recent developments in the Mayberry sector of the northeastern rainforest indicate that a group of abominable snowmen have formed a civilized community, complete with church-going and soda-drinking. Firstly, how do you account for this formation? Secondly, what steps are you prepared to take in order to restore disorder? Thirdly—“

  “Horseshit!” interrupted the President-thing. He lifted his arm and made a fist. The fist sprung twenty feet from his wrist on a bungee cord, cracked the moderator in the nose, and bungeed back into his wrist. The moderator toppled backwards out of his chair, note cards flying everywhere. “Wrong question!”

  Congressman-thing Barracuda gurgled something about “company policy.” President-thing Bogue slapped him in the back of the pumpkin.

  Quickly the moderator picked up the note cards, turned over the chair and crawled back into it. He got dizzy and fell backwards again. And again he picked up the note cards, turned over the chair and crawled back into it.

  And again he got dizzy…

  The moderator fell out of his chair five times. As he struggled to stay conscious and upright, the President-thing did a dirty stand-up routine.

  Finally the moderator collected himself. He waited for the President-thing to hit his final punch line, then said, “Mr. President-thing sir. You’re doubtless familiar with the recent string of serial holocausts in Bliptown committed by two plaquedemics who need no introduction. Dr. Identity and its original have yet to be apprehended. They continue to hunt the streets, flyways and rooftops of Bliptown without receiving so much as a scratch, it seems. Critics have argued that they are either vampires or intelligent zombies—undead at any rate. Do you agree with this contention? If so, what are you prepared to do about them? If not, how do you account for the absurdity of the plaquedemics’ relentless existence?”

  This time President-thing Bogue allowed the moderator to finish his question. But he was clearly upset by it, so much so that he got off his pogo stick and threw it aside. “Are you finished?” he said.

  The moderator nodded doubtfully.

  “These are the questions you choose to ask me in front of the entire nation? Christ all goddamn mighty. I am soooo sick of hearing about those goddamn plaquedemics. I could care less about those fucking retards. Nobody cares about them anymore. Even the Papanazi are bored. Fuck ’em. They’ve had their fifteen minutes. Their time is up. I declare it. They can commit all of the stinking holocausts they want as far as I’m concerned. It is my decree that from here to eternity the plaquedemics are to be ignored by everybody in spite of the extreme nature of their ultraviolent antics. Failure to ignore them will result in senseless, excruciating torture followed by the surgical removal of the guilty parties’ arms and legs from their bodies. Citizens will allow themselves to be murdered or pay the penalty. Citizens will not even speak the plaquedemics’ names aloud. I’ll write the bill this evening, I’ll pass the law in the morning, and I’ll deploy the absolute power of the Amerikan military to execute my bidding. The military will start by liquidating all plaquedemic-related tabloid media. This may require burning Bliptown to the ground—for starters. At any rate, fuck those shitheads. Their assholish behavior will come out in the wash with everything else. End response.” Unnerved, the President-thing thrust his hands into the pockets of his pants and made low growling noises.

  The moderator turned to his opponent. “Congressman-thing Barracuda—your, uh, rebuttal?

  “He doesn’t have shit to say,” said the President-thing, and kicked over the wheelchair he was sitting in. The force of the kick sent the congressman-thing halfway across the stage on his stomach. His jack-o-lantern came off the stump of his head and rolled away…

  “This debate is over. Goodnight Amerika.”

  President-thing Bogue picked up his pogo stick. Holding it like a baseball bat, he leapt off of the stage and began to beat the moderator as the camera cut to a commercial.

  The commercial advertised a new variety of President-thing Bogue action figure. Unlike former models, this one came equipped with a Congressman-thing Barracuda punching bag and six backup flying fists, among other accessories…

  21

  PAPANAZI KONTROL – 3RD PERSON

  Achtung 66.799 took cover in a newspaper booth. He had to remove a few stacks of newspapers to fit inside, but his body was small enough that he could squat there comfortably. He could almost stand up.

  It was a classical Gothic sector. Most of the pedestrians that stumbled up and down the decayed cobblestone street were dressed as monks, vampires, Mr. Hydes, Young Goodman Browns and Phantoms of the Opera. Wooden trap doors had been built into the street. Figures fell in and popped out like gophers. Countless stone gargoyles crouched on the ledges of sharp, black buildings ornamented with stained glass windows. Some of the gargoyles were alive and flew from rooftop to rooftop. Occasionally one swooped down and snatched a baby out of a handmaiden’s arms.

  According to the Papanazi’s sources, there had been an exodus of movie stars to this sector earlier that morning. Armstrong Sarks, Dick Doily, Voss Winkenweirder and Hagar Parakeet were rumored to be among them. The reason for the exodus? Nobody knew for certain, but Achtung 66.799 suspected it had something to do with a Hunchback of Notre Dame fetish that had been afflicting certain celebrity factions lately. He kept a special watch for passersby who had strapped bowling balls to their shoulderblades.

  Achtung 66.799 received the tip at 5 a.m. and had been staking out the scene for over two hours now. So far the gig was a bust. At one point he thought he spotted Cinnabar Trait, Carmina Burana Award nominee for a recent BBB-film in which he played the main character’s shadow. The man lacked a disguise, but the streetlights were dim and Achtung 66.799 couldn’t tell if it was Trait. And when he crawled out of the newspaper stand and accosted the man, he realized it wasn’t a man at all, but a shadow…

  The Papanazi returned to his hideout. Frustrated, he curled up and fell asleep.

  A siege of tickling awakened him. Somebody had opened the chute of the newspaper booth and was fumbling inside. Achtung 66.799 excused himself and climbed out. The ’gänger outside had on a shiny black top hat and cape with puffed up shoulders. He glared disapprovingly at the Papanazi, claimed a newspaper, and marched away.

  Yawning, Achtung 66.799 surveyed the area. It was light out and the streets were empty now. His stomach growled. He needed a money shot badly. Once he forged a money shot, trying to pass off a photo of a bag lady stealing a hood ornament as a celebrity. His superiors caught him red-handed and cryogenically froze him in a Papanazi penal colony for three years. Right now he would have willingly forged again—at least you have dreams and receive proper nourishment in the Freeze—but a second offense would result in termination of employment and banishment to the rainforests. This, of course, was contingent upon him getting caught. But the proficiency of the Papanazi’s surveillance technology overshadowed that of any other Amerikan social institution, including the Government. Everybody always got caught.

  Standard issue depression set in. He was depressed because of his job. He was depressed because of society. He was depressed because his mother-thing didn’t love him. He was depressed because he never found a wife-thing to replace her. He was depressed because, even if he found a wife-thing, he couldn’t afford to support her. He was depressed because he was undereducated. He was depressed because he was hungry. He was depressed because he was depressed. He was depressed because he was depressed because he was depressed. He was depressed because, if he wasn’t depressed, he might miss be
ing depressed, depression being such an essential component of his psychic framework…

  He snapped out of it when the signal hit him. Veins of electricity played across the field of jacks on his scalp. The jacks came to life and started arguing with each other. Achtung 66.799 shoved his fingers in his ears and concentrated on the message.

  All Papanazi currently not engaged in head-to-head combat needed to report to the nearest Kontrol Center for immediate debriefing on a new story. No information on the story dispatched other than the news of Voss Winkenweirder’s murder and the movie star’s ’gänger’s subsequent meltdown.

  Papanazi Kontrol Centers could be found on practically every vertical and horizontal block in Bliptown. Papanazi workerbees like him weren’t allowed inside barring rare invitations such as this one. Standard issue euphoria set in now. If nothing else, the Kontrol Centers were loaded with free hors d’oeuvres…

  He sprinted down the street, searching left, right, left, overhead…A trap door flung open and swallowed him. He fell into a long, tall passageway reconstructed to look like a nineteenth century Parisian arcade…Lattice of iron girders, catwalks, glass shop windows, gaslight lanterns, tall artificial plants. Flâneurs and stilt-walkers everywhere…Achtung 66.799 whizzed through the underground commerce, searching, searching…He found a Kontrol Center at the end of the passageway.

  He wasn’t the first workerbee to find it. Scores had preceded him, and they were battling for the hors d’oeuvres. Featured today: shriveled meatballs and dried up celery sticks.

  Achtung 66.799 burst through the front door and dove into the mix…

  Every Papanazi for himself. Karate chops and roundhouse kicks and flying elbows slammed into faces and stomachs and spines. Sound of cracking bones and heated warcries…

  “ACHTUNG!!!”