SECTION 4

   "Ye gads!" exclaimed Missy, her true accent emerging due to her general level of comfort plus her first can of city beer. "I can't believe folks are still making cans," she offered as the thought crossed her mind. So much was happening perhaps in the silent spaces and--

   Lettuce Bamboo stumbled off of the transport unit. <i>Oh shit. What sort of hellish landscape did I wake up in now?</i> She bounced down the hot pavement. Parking signs. Coin machines. <i>Oh, a bee.</i> "Hey there bee. Where can a person find some--"
   "Food?" said the bee, pulling herself out of the white-petaled flower. "What do you need <em>food</em> for? We're all just going to die one day, anyway." Another bee made itself known to Lettuce and did the bee equivilent of rolling its eyes. "You probably forgot to switch at the last junction," it said. "Don't worry. Just go down that road and around the corner. You'll find what you are searching for. Oh, and don't go 

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jumping in front of any mechanical beasts."
   Um...

   "Circles. We're just going around in circles."
   "Well, I was hoping for one big circle," said Apple Hippopotamus to her friend Zorba Cathexis.
   "I think we're running short on time."
   "Well, not to be pedantic," said Apple in an overly pedantic tone, "but I would say we were more running behind schedule. We're out of sync, you might say, even."
   Zorba looked tired. He thought about the last time they ate and wondered from whence Apple drew her energy. They had now been hiking this trail for <i>too damn long</i> if you asked Zorba, which Apple rarely did. His dreams of late had been communicative, but slippery. Apple tugged at her top, which, since the sun had started its descent, had picked up a habit of sliding down over her ample bosom. Apple had more or less ample bosoms.
   "I think we're due for contact. Soon, I think." Apple stopped walking. "You trust me, don't you?

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CHAPTER 24: It's not quite what you were expecting.

   "Dammit Apple. You don't need to push so hard all the time. You're leaking again."
   Apple wiped at her nose with the rag she was using as a hankerchief.
   "BRRRP. BRRBRRRRP," she said. <i>Oh fuck</i>, she thought. <i>I've lost the ability to speak words. Oh no!</i>

WE HAVE ONCE AGAIN REACHED THE POINT IN OUR BURGEONING NOVEL WHERE OUR AUTHOR HAS FORGOTTEN YET AGAIN WHY SHE IS WRITING THIS STORY. BETTER THINGS TO BE READING, YOU HAVE. THIS WORLD IS STILL SHITTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!! WHAT IS THE POINT!!???!??!?!?!?!?!? YAWN. BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH. FUCK. IS ANYBODY OUT THERE? HELLO? MCFLY?

  Sorry. Where were we?
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CHAPTER 25: IN WHICH OUR PROTAGONIST SHITS THE BED

   "Turn back. There is nothing--"
   Just then, we realized, all of your arts were useless. Seriously, there must be some other path that we haven't tried or something. Everything we had been doing up to this point--our entire oevre--had shit to offer the world, which was in the midst of dying the most horrible of deaths. But, but, but, you said, over and over and over and over and over. And over and over and over. But, but, but, but. No, there is nothing to be gleaned here. Try something else.

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CHAPTER 26: AND YET, STILL, PERHAPS

   A. stared hard at her relection on the page. Was that really her? But how did they know? How did they write her part soooooo well. As if they knew her. As if they <em>were</em> her. She wrapped the book back in its wrapping and tucked it into her sack.

~~~

   "You don't look like yourself."
   It was true. Apple didn't look like herself. This <i>probably</i> was due to the disguise she was wearing. Apple was disguised as a person who worked in a nondescript office building from 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, and had been for the past five months. But perhaps this person was picking up on the fact that, as of today, Apple's soul was now probably officially dead. This was probably a necessary if unpleasant sacrifice Apple had to make if she was going to successfully infiltrate this dense hierarchical conspiracy of resource


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extraction that had somehow managed to infect the entire city. Apple lived in a city again. With office buildings. Probably. Probably Apple was a little bit hungry and maybe hungover.
   "How was your weekend?" asked Apple's co-worker.
   "Oh," thought Apple, thinking like a person who split their day cycles into discrete time units, "my week-end was enjoyable. How was your week-end?"

   Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, Johnny Pickles sat down across the table from ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh who cares. We're not gonna get out of here alive. We're not going to survive if we keep playing the same roles again and again. And again and again and again and again.

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CHAPTER 27: IT'S A PLAY, DON'T YOU GET IT? (IT'S A PLAY)

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