He sat at his desk, trying to come up with a new idea for his weekly comic
strip in the local newspaper. He wasn't very good at drawing comic strips,
but it was still what he did best. Outside, the sun was beginning to hide
behind the horizon, changing its colour like a confused chameleon. Quite a
beautiful sight, but he did not have time to look. He took a sip of coffee
and rubbed his tired eyes before he continued to draw. He was so tired that
the coffee did not help. He rested his forehead on the drawing table. It was
just for a few seconds; he was not going to fall asleep. His body felt like
tree that was cut down - TIMBER!!
He sat up straight and looked down at his drawings. One of the characters
was smoking a cigarette. He was so tired that he did not even remember
drawing that cigarette. He looked out the window, and saw that it was
morning. Now he was in trouble! He looked back at what he had come up with
so far. It was OK, he could turn it into something he could use within the
next two hours. The character, who he thought he had seen smoking a
cigarette before, was now standing casually without a cigarette anywhere.
Boy was he tired. He rubbed his whole face, and started to draw.
Suddenly a he heard a sound from behind the door to the bathroom. He totally
ignored it the first time but the second time it was much louder. He got up
and started to walk towards the door. He opened it slowly and looked inside,
but nothing was there. Quite confusing. He closed the door behind him and
checked the toilet and the sink, but he could not find anything..but WAIT!
What was that? A really small pair of hairy legs ran behind the shower
curtain - or was it a really big bug? He started to breathe faster, and had
to take a whiff from his inhaler. When pulled the shower curtain, a strange
little creature which reminded him of a mixture between a cute troll and a
thin dwarf, made a sound and ran hysterically around in the bathroom: "Iihrrrr..
oh no - oh no - oh no - this is bad - oh no - a human saw me - oh no - oh
no.."
The comic strip writer stood amazed at the sight of this... this thing.
"Oh no - I'm dead - oh no - what should I do - oh no," the thing yelled. He
looked down at this thing and was really scared and confused as he said:"
uhh.. what's going on.. Is this some kind of joke? Hello? is anyone here?"
The little hairy thing stopped and gasped for air as it shrieked: "Are you
stupid or something? I'm a Splicketispock, and you have seen me! My boss is
going to kill me for this, say can't we make a deal? If you like.. totally
forget that you ever saw me, I will... uhhh.. I will make sure that you
never trip over anything when you are walking on the street. How is that -
hu? hu? hu? come on whaddaysay? hu? Come on be a pal - is it a deal or what?"
He did not know what to say to this "Splicketispock". At that moment he was
really busy with convincing himself that he had drunken something poisonous
and that he was hallucinating because of this. He had always known that
there were things in this world he could not understand, but this was so far
out that he needed a minute or two to get it together.
When he finally did
get it together he answered: "Uhh what are you, and how did you get here?"
The Splicketispock answered aggressively: "Damn it! I can't tell you that
OK. Besides, that is not a part of the deal!" "What deal?" he asked. "My
goodness! My mother always told me that humans were stupid but this is too
much! If you forget that you ever saw me, I will make sure that you never
trip over anything when you are walking on the street! What is so hard to
understand about that?!" The comic strip writer blinked twice and said:" You
can not prevent me from tripping over something throughout my entire life!"
The Splicketispock tightened its little fists and got even more red in the
face than it already was: "All right damn it! Maybe humans are not so stupid
after all. What if I throw in a removal of every God damn time you ever hurt
yourself before you die? How is that? That's an offer you can't refuse -
isn't it?" He sat down on the toilet and looked at the Splicketispock. Then
he got angry and asked:" What the crap is going on here? You show up in my
bathroom looking like that and say that you can't explain anything, and then
you offer me a 'removal of the times I hurt myself? Exactly how are you
going to be able to 'remove' every incident that involves my hurting myself?!!"
The Splicketispock sat down on the floor and rolled its eyes condescendingly.
"OK I'll tell you how things work, but then you have to promise me that you
will forget all about my little visit OK?" The Comic strip writer nodded
with an obvious amount of scepticism and listened carefully.
The Splicketispock was employed in the "Department For Local Administration
Of Adjusted Accidents" a few miles under the ground. It seemed that this
department was responsible for all accidents that took place above the
ground. Whenever someone tripped and hurt themselves, it was a result of
careful planning and programming on the behalf of the Splicketispocks, who
took great pride in the quality of their work. Every person had a file which
contained information about all the accidents this person was to have in his
or her lifetime. It stated dates, locations and methods for "initiating the
accident". This Splicketispock had come up to the surface to investigate an
accident that had gone wrong. It would seem that a guy was supposed to slip
on some ice outside the comic strip writer's apartment, and hurt his back so
bad that he had to stay a week at the hospital, but something had gone wrong.
The guy had just walked along the planned route without even slipping as
much as an centimetre. But now that the Splicketispock had been seen by a
human it would have to kill the human and itself. The human for what he knew,
and itself as a punishment.
The comic strip writer did not know what to make out of this crazy story. He
crouched down and looked the Splicketispock straight in the eyes and said:
"So if there were no Splicketispocks and no "Department For Local
Administration Of Adjusted Accidents", there would be no accidents?" The
Splicketispock started to look quite nervous as he answered the question: "Well,
uhh... yeah. that's right, but if you just let me go and forget that you
ever saw me I won't have to kill either of us and I will promise to erase
your file so that it is completely blank! That's fair isn't it?" The comic
strip writer did not know if he should believe what this weird thing was
telling him. He did not even know if he could depend on the stability of his
own mind. He told the Splicketispock that he would have to think about it
for a minute or two.
A minute later he decided to buy the story of the Splicketispock. What else
could he do? The Splicketispock was absolutely thrilled: "Oh thank you - you
made the right choice - I'll keep my promise - just forget all about me OK?
- OK? - You Promise?!!" The comic strip writer nodded and opened the door to
the bathroom. The Splicketispock ran as fast as it could through the door
and out the window. He sat there wondering if what had just happened was
real. He was dead-tired and fell asleep before his overweight body hit the
madras of his bed.
The next thing he remembered, was waking up, sitting by his drawing desk. He
must have had a nightmare as a result of drinking too much coffee. He rubbed
his eyes and went out in the kitchen to get something to eat. He had already
forgotten the weird word "Splicketispock", when he opened the door to the
refrigerator. The interesting thing is that he never had an accident of any
kind since that day. He never slipped in a piece of rotten fruit, he never
got splashed by a car passing by at high speed, and never even stung his
fingers on any of the tools he used to set up the comic strips. Still, he
never thought about it. Before he had noticed every time he had an accident
and called it bad luck. Now that he never had an accident, he just did not
think about it. Some people are like that. Actually, most people are like
that.
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