Monkey Hockey

My first attempt at humorous writing. I, personally, think it stinks but I'll let you be the judge! :D

Monkey Hockey

 

Captain Stumpy was tired and dirty and thirsty.  Wasn’t this supposed to be a vacation?  Wasn’t this supposed to be fun?  Wasn’t he supposed to have a carefree afternoon for once!!!

 

He reached up and wiped his face.  At least it was banana… this time.  The three monkeys sitting on the fence across from him stared intently.  One scratched his butt.  Another hefted a blob in his hand that didn’t look like banana. 

 

Since Stumpy had learned the hard way that his kinetic barrier didn’t do a thing to organic material… the hard way… he held up both hands, palms outwards, and backed away from the busted monkey cage slowly.  Within moments he was running and dodging as a new barrage of, uhm… stuff… was flying his direction.  He ran into a restroom nearby to catch his breath.  A mirror over a sink nearby told the story.  He spent a minute washing up.

 

Stepping back outside, he stopped short of stepping on a long green vine.  Stepping over it, he was surprised as it rose up and tripped him up.  He hit the ground and turned his head to see the beady eyes of a six foot long crocodile staring at him.  If he didn’t know any better, he would have said it was smiling at him…

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

 

Lieutenant Garrison stepped through the park gate.  Several SHPD officers, SHFD, Zoo officials and Department of Animal Control Workers carefully moved into the Superhero City Zoo.  Now that the crowds had fled the park it was rather peaceful near the entrance.  There were 34 men in all and to a man they stood frozen, staring across at the gift shop across the street.

 

One of the young officers apparently wasn’t seeing the same thing as everyone else.  “Lieutenant, what do you see?”

 

“Officer, do you see the animal in the gift shop?”  The young officer looked across the way at a window-full of animals.  Each was larger than the next and he wondered if any child would even be able to pick them up more less carry it around the park all day.  Heck, some were nearly big enough to ride. 

 

“Yea, and?”

 

“Do you see the rhino?”

 

“Yea, the life-like one.  I nearly got one like that for my little girl the other day.”

 

“Not like that you didn’t.”  The Lieutenant and the rest of the men began backing out the gate.  The officer looked once more.  The large rhino snorted, sending many of the large stuffed animals swinging on their hooks.  Although they couldn’t see it, they could hear the distinctive stamping of the rhino’s foot.  Its head bobbed up and down and the men quickly moved out of the gate.

 

Outside the gate again, the lieutenant looked at the zoo officials, “I think we may need backup.”

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

 

“OK!  Are you done yet?”

 

Not until they are all free!  That was not the response Vex had hoped for.  This was turning into a really bad day.

 

A week ago Vex was arguing with the alien in his head and they made a bet.  Vex lost and today was the result.  Vex turned over his body to the alien for a day.  Now Vex was the “voice” in his own head and it was rather disconcerting.  He’d asked Stumpy to look after him and do something fun.  They agreed to go to the zoo and he couldn’t have made a worse mistake. 

 

He was currently traipsing around the park releasing every animal from its confines.  The alien had tapped into Vex’ powers and had been shape shifting into various animals all day.  He was currently in the form of a silverback gorilla and was forcibly separating the bars on the penguin cage.  Vex would have slapped his forehead with his hand for his stupidity but couldn’t even do that.

 

“You do realize that it’s the middle of June and these birds are penguins… IN TEXAS!  You release them from this cage, and this air conditioned environment, and they are likely to die?”

 

It seemed to give the alien intelligence pause, what do you mean?  “I mean that they are safe where they are, that’s what I mean!”

 

Where do these creatures normally live?

 

“The South Pole for crying out loud… oops…”

 

The next thing the alien said was predictable.  Vex had said too much and he knew it.  Then we shall have to return them to it.  With that, the alien shifted back into a human form and began to telekinetically lift the entire habitat from its moorings.

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

 

Eron arrived on the scene just in time.  The Animal Control guys were having a bear of a time putting animals back in their habitats, quite literally, and he proved to be invaluable.  The Black Bear he was carrying over his shoulder was frightened out of his mind and as Eron put him down he realized what frightened animals do when you pick them up.  It’s funny when a chiwawa leaks on a person, less so when the animal has a bladder the size of a 5 gallon water cooler.

 

Eron reeked.

 

He bent the bars of the sidewall of the cage back into place and was looking around for a water hose when he saw a strange sight.  Rounding the corner was a headless man.  Ok, it wasn’t exactly headless. 

 

It had a crocodile for a head.

 

Well, not exactly.  It was Stumpy.  Somehow, he had a crocodile chewing on his head.  The crock had apparently bitten off more than it could chew and it’s little arms and legs were flailing helplessly in the air while it’s eyes were bugging out in shock.  The poor thing didn’t know how to let go and apparently Stumpy couldn’t remove it. 

 

Eron stopped him and grabbed the croc by the neck.  Its eyes bugged out even more (just a bit) and it gasped for air, releasing his prey.  Stumpy gasped for air himself and rubbed his scalp.  Eron put the lizard down and it quickly scurried away, in such a hurry that it bumped into a metal trash can on the way.

 

Eron couldn’t help but chuckle a bit.  “Good thing you’re invulnerable Stumpy.”

 

“You got that right.”  Stumpy was still rubbing his neck.

 

“What happened here?”

 

“Ask Vex.  He had to give that stupid ‘I’m going to free every captive of this infernal concentration camp’ alien of his.”

 

“Vex did this?”

 

Stumpy wasn’t listening at this point.  “’Take him to see the zoo’ he said.  ‘He’ll like seeing so many new Earth animals’ he said.  ‘Buy him some cotton candy’ he said.  THIS GUY DOESN’T LIKE COTTON CANDY!  It reminds him of ‘a clump of vergillan skull worms’ is what he said.  What the heck!”

 

Eron had stopped listening too.  Stumpy looked up to see him using a garden hose to wash himself off.  He lifted his hand and ran it through his hair.  He’d missed some monkey hockey.  “Hey, I need that hose too…”

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

 

“For crying out loud, you have to stop this!”

 

I won the bet.  I have this body for a day.

 

Vex knew he would say that.  He wasn’t psychic; he’d just heard him say it 32 times now in a row.  This alien might be powerful and might have granted Vex his powers, but he wasn’t all that bright.  Unfortunately, he still had 4 hours before Vex could take it back.

 

Of course, how could Vex describe himself other than to say he was psychic now.  Literally, he was a squatter in his own mind.  The thought was unnerving. 

 

The alien lifted his right hand and several electrical lines to the habitat snapped.  He was disconnecting the habitat from the surrounding plumbing and electrical lines one by one in an effort to lift it in it’s entirely out of the park.  Vex had no desire to go South.  He really didn’t like the cold all that much.  That gave Vex an idea.

 

“You know, there are other animals in the park that live down south.  We could take more in one trip.”

This gave the alien pause.  Others?

 

“Yes, others trapped here just like these birds.  The walrus on the other side of the park can’t even leave its pen even though you opened it.”  The alien turned and looked down the hill towards the walrus house.

 

“That’s right.  That big, helpless blob of blubber is just sweltering in this heat in the hot, Texas summer.  Its too bad he’ll be staying in confinement while you free these little birds…”  The alien activated Vex’ x-ray vision and looked into the pen.  Sure enough, the walrus was laying on its back in the hot summer sun.  Vex could sense that the alien was conflicted. 

 

I must save it.  The alien softly set the penguin pen back down.  As he walked down the hill towards the walrus pen, little black and white birds began pouring out of the pen into the park.

 

Well, that would give Vex a little more time.  He’d breathe a sigh if he had a mouth.

 

……………………………………………………………………………………………

 

The rest of the afternoon went rather quickly.  Eron, Stumpy and a platoon of men spent most of their time gathering large birds, elephants, giraffe and llamas from around the park, sending them back to their pens.  Oh yea, and dodging monkey hockey from the loose primates all the while. 

 

Stumpy finally managed to trap them by picking up a bird sanctuary and planting it over them like the cage that it was.  The poor animals hardly knew what to do when the male parakeets started defending their territory.  It took another half hour for animal control to pull the terrified monkeys out and return them to their own cages. 

 

In the meantime, Eron had finally found Vex.  The alien was busy walking out of the walrus house with the massive lump of blubber over his shoulder.  The walrus, for his part, looked as terrified as an animal could possibly be having no clue what was transpiring. 

 

Eron did his best to talk the alien down, knowing full well that Vex was arguably the most powerful of the Knights and not wanting to provoke the alien into a confrontation. 

 

“But you have to understand, most of these animals are endangered.  Keeping them here ensures their survival as their habitats shrink.”

 

That’s preposterous.  These creatures have been enslaved.  This one over my shoulder is quivering in anticipation of being released!

 

“I think you may be misinterpreting that ‘anticipation’ there just a bit…”

 

Nonsense, the alien hefted the walrus slightly.  The 400 pound creature moaned.  It has nothing but gratitude in it for my actions.

 

It’s a common fact that many creatures will do certain biological things when scared.  Birds, for example, will often empty their bowls when taking flight to ‘lighten the load’ a bit.  This poor walrus finally had enough and ‘lightened its load’ more than just a bit.  After it was done, poor Vex looked somewhat muddy and for once he was glad that he wasn’t in control of his own body.

 

“I think your friend there had something other than gratitude after all.”  Eron had a ear to ear grin and could hardly contain himself.

 

It appears I’ve misjudged this ‘zoo’.  The alien set the walrus down, who immediately waddled as fast as it could towards his pen.  I apparently have a lot to learn about the interaction between earthly creatures and human society.  I’m not needed here.  This body is yours.

 

At that, Vex and the alien switched places.

 

Vex held his arms up, dripping as they were, and first breath he took since turning over his body to the alien intelligence nearly a day ago was filled with the acrid smell of walrus poop.  He visibly turned green around the gills.  “AW MAN!”

 

Eron fell to the ground laughing.