Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants

The madcap cosmic adventure of Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants

Whether it's a big rig or jalopy, there's no two ways about it. The shortest route from one point to another is a straight line. In this case the points are cities and the route is undefined.

People will always say it's not fair for someone to hop gleefully from place to place, fashionably altering the continuum of logic. It's a mathematical certainty. At least the manual, the tattered Road Bible we keep in the glove box, says so.

On page 3, the Road Bible cautions: "You, as a traveler, will invariably, run into problems that may not be easily solved; and could in fact be deadly. Most cosmic beings are not travelers, and will resent, prohibit, sabotage, and hinder your efforts to follow the instructions herein contained".

This means if you are a humdrum, dull resident of planet earth with a full time job, kids, and a husband or wife, you might not appreciate the illogical antics of an individual following the cosmic instruction manual known as the Road Bible. The book itself is an immensely thick, dense, brick of a book. Full of instructions, suggestions, anecdotes, and encyclopedic entries for many of the notable artifacts that exist in the cosmos.

Vigilance my friend is the key to our survival. We're talking about the difference of life and death here. That's why they never let suicidal types in on these sorts of things. It's too sensitive and important to let a death-happy crackpot short circuit the whole shebang and end all the fun for everyone else. Staying alive is important, very important.

It's imperative we spend ample time pouring over the the Road Bible, memorizing, studying, and constantly reevaluating. There's absolutely no room for error. And the contingents are constantly changing. Night terrors, day tremors, and morning freak-outs are all possible on a journey like this.

We're cruising now, maximum speed with little resistance. The orange behemoth careens down the asphalt, sucking in oxygen and burning gasoline. It's a beautiful, powerful machine. V-8 engine, all wheel drive, manual control, and enough horse power to cross all known vectors. It's our baby, our sexy, hot rod of a baby and we're on our way!

We stop off at a small diner on the side of the highway. He's got on flowing tie-dyed cloth pants and a white button down linen shirt, as well as a black scarf wrapped around his head. The other wears red jeans, black shiny cowboy boots, and a long sleeved button down blue shirt that's halfway unbuttoned. The fashionable travelers are pea-cocking the locals. It's pure diversion at it's finest. Make them look one way then quickly run the other.

Pages 157 to 185 of the Road Bible detail the strategies, tactics, and disadvantages of diversion. The second paragraph of page 168 reads: "When properly employed, diversion will supply concealment and open passageways to otherwise inaccessible corridors and spaces. If properly researched, advised, or otherwise discovered in one way or another, these hidden or guarded spaces may yield a wide variety of otherworldly materials, textures, valuables, dangers, and pleasures. It is wise to always use the services of either a eunuch or Astral Compass when operating within the framework of diversion".

Confined to a vinyl booth, they pass the tattered Road Bible back and forth, quizzing each other on the intricacies of their mission. Finely honing their senses, peeling back and closely inspecting every layer of the complex, nearly indecipherable universe the Road Bible describes.

They drink coffee and nervously look at the other patrons in the diner. To the outsiders, the non-travelers, those individuals that are locked down in a miserable normal life, the two strange men sitting in the booth are crazy, bleary-eyed lunatics, babbling about conspiracies and alternate realities. That's why we have the Road Bible and they don't, it's simply beyond comprehension for most corn-fed, rednecked, blue-blooded Americans, and that's the way it will always be.

Shiny Boots discovered the Road Bible and Astral compass in a dingy flea market in Lincoln, Nebraska three weeks prior. The compass was tied to the cover of the book with a small piece of twine, and had been lodged onto a cramped dusty shelf between several coffee-stained used coffee cups, and a gold antique candelabra. Upon opening the book and reading for several minutes, Shiny Boots realized that discovering this book, the Road Bible, might be his lucky break, just what he needed to help him jump start a little adventure and maybe get his hands on a lot of money.

Convincing his best friend Tie-Dyed Pants to join him was relatively effortless as Tie-Dyed Pants had been unemployed the last six months, was divorced and had no children to care for. He was a free man, and happily joined Shiny Boots on this supposed journey through the cosmos.

Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants are good-old-boys at heart, and if the Road Bible is true, they could live forever and maybe even get rich along the way.

Shiny Boots pulls the Astral Compass from his pocket and places it on the plastic linoleum table top. In appearance it looks similar to a regular, run-of-the-mill, navigational compass used by boy scouts and travelers. It's metallic, round, and has a needle that rotates within the sphere to indicate direction.

Only, an Astral Compass does not point north, south, east, or west. It points towards one of the four universes directly surrounding the compass. These four are signified by a single letter and two numbers. Presently it reads as such: X21 at the top, Y22 at the bottom, W44 on the left, and F62 on the right. Depending on the universe you are currently within, the letter and numbers will automatically update, assuming you are connected to the Internet, or one of it's many variations throughout the cosmos.

Obviously, to the uninformed, this may seem very hard to believe, but to someone who has studied the Road Bible and is a seasoned traveler, there's simply nothing more true. To shed a small amount of light on what's happening right now, all around you, you must first realize that the laws of nature, as created by man, are a myth.

There was no Big Bang. Yes, the universe is expanding, but everything within this universe will eventually feed into another universe, similar to a river depositing it's contents into an ocean. Only, there are many universes, all of which are connected in a large network.

Some of the smaller universes are only connected to one additional universe, while the large international hubs have thirty or forty thousand connections. Black holes connect universes, crushing, stretching, distorting, and reverting all matter back to it's original atomic form as it passes from one specific universe to another.

Simply put, planet earth, as well as every object in existence, will eventually pass through a vacuous black hole and reappear in a neighboring universe as countless atoms, no longer in the form of planet earth, but now widely dispersed as single units of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and so on. Over time, these atoms that formerly comprised planet earth will go on to form other objects in other regions of the cosmos. Everything is eventually recycled and remade as something different. The disciples of the Road Bible, all sentient, living beings, can live forever if they successfully avoid black holes, murderers, disease, flesh eating bacteria, auto-immune disorders, vampiric amoebas, cosmic chicken pox, and anything else that may cause death.

In the diner, Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants watch as the Astral Compass needle settles, pointing in the direction of W44. W44, as described by the Road Bible, "is a location that could possibly be due west, but could also simultaneously be an object or dwelling in the direction of W44, which may not be due west". Using an index finger, Shiny Boots points through the diner window towards a green plastic porta-potty on the edge of the asphalt parking lot. The compass needle is pointing directly at the porta-potty.

Shiny Boots and Tie-dyed Pants are both aware that in certain regions of the cosmos, a porta-potty may in fact be a portal-potty. On page 533, the Road Bible states "The portal-potty, the inconspicuous and rather unsavory locale that once properly initiated or calibrated, may allow communication and possibly the exchange of material goods over vast cosmic distances".

They leave several crumpled dollar bills on the table and walk out of the diner towards the green porta-potty. Quickly, they open the porta-potty door and move inside the small enclosure. In the cramped space, Shiny Boots frantically flips through the Road Bible searching for instruction, something to indicate what they should do to activate the potential portal-potty. Tie-dyed Pants pinches his nostrils closed to avoid the noxious odor of feces and urine.

Shiny Boots flushes the toilet, hoping this will activate the portal, but nothing happens. He then slides the door lock one way, then the other, to no avail. The air is thick, warm, and moist from the thick pungent fumes wafting within the porta-potty. Finally, defeated, they reemerge from the porta-potty and stand on the asphalt of the diner parking lot.

Only, there is no longer a diner where one stood several minutes ago, nor is there an asphalt parking lot. Everything has seemingly vanished into thin air. Hot, dry desert, sand, cacti, and scrub, stretch to the horizon in all directions. A small booth, similar in appearance to a toll booth or ticket booth, with someone sitting inside of it now stands directly in front of the travelers. The portal-potty had worked, something vital had shifted, they were now somewhere completely different, and foreign.

As they approach the booth, they notice the unusual appearance of the small being within. It is the size of a human child, with arms, hands, and legs, but it's head is that of a lizard.

"Can I help you gentlemen?" asks the lizard-person in what sounds like a woman's voice.

"Good day to you ma'am, it's a beautiful day isn't it? We just arrived from the portal-potty. Do you mind telling us where we are and advising us as to where we should go?" Shiny Boots says with a large salesman-like grin spread across his face. The Road Bible describes lizard beings as "...a gloomy and rather grumpy species that possess an exceedingly high level of intelligence and little patience for entities towards the lower end of the intelligence spectrum, such as the great space apes known as humans, many of the insectile species, grubs, the petroleum goons, and various other dimwit species".

"You are currently in an artificially-rendered desert landscape, a security buffer zone to New Commerce City. I advise you to walk around to the back of my booth, where you will find a stairwell leading underground, take these stairs to the customs waiting room. Once there you will be given further instruction. Also, please feel absolutely welcome to enjoy this artificially-rendered desert landscape for as long as you would like. Today's the last day we will be using it. Tomorrow we transition to an underwater oceanic environment." the lizard stares blankly at the two humans.

"Thank you ma'am"

The lizard's eyes roll as Shiny Boots and Tie-dyed Pants walk around the booth to the stairs.

Underground, they enter into a large room, white tiled floors, fluorescent lighting, and flat screen televisions mounted on the walls at regular intervals. Shiny boots plucks a ticket number from the dispenser as they enter the room. They are number 5,678,995. The waiting room is full, all of the chairs are occupied. Standing in a corner, Tie-dyed Pants reads The Cosmic Times while Shiny Boots studies the Road Bible. Each television screen shows the fat green reptilian face of a lizard, it is repeatedly informing all travelers of the necessary protocols, regulations, and security measures that exist in this customs station for New Commerce City. "Please stay in possession of all of your personal luggage during your stay in the New Commerce City customs station. Please report all unsupervised luggage to a customs official....."

The other chairs are occupied by space urchins, galactic gas-bags, lizards, blobs, wood-people, several humans, and one nasty looking blitzer that drools, growls, and chomps it's huge menacing jaws, which produces a loud clacking sound that makes everyone else flinch. According to the Road Bible, blitzers "are physically imposing mammals that have been genetically modified to increase aggression levels. They are commonly employed within the security and military industries".

Three hours later their number is called. Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants are ushered into a small white room. In the center of the room is a desk, and on the other side of the desk is a bespectacled bald man. The man's skin is pale-white and his body is very thin, possibly frail.

"Hello, my name is Hans Pfliegman. I'm a New Commerce customs official. I'll be assisting you today. I see that you two are from planet earth, that's very nice." Pliegman smiles and glances at the two travelers over his spectacles.

"Thank you sir. We're very excited about visiting New Commerce City. It must be a very lovely place" Shiny Boots returns Pfliegman's smile.

"Well, that's the part I'm confused about. You obviously have been following your Road Bible, otherwise you never would have made it here. Do you mind telling me the volume number of your Road Bible?"

"I honestly have no idea. You're welcome to take a look yourself" Shiny Boots hands his Road Bible to Pfliegman.

Pfliegman licks his index finger and begins rifling through the tattered pages of the Road Bible. For several minutes Pfliegman is silent while he intently reads the Road Bible.

"Ah, my dear friend, here's the problem. Your Road Bible does not have a volume number, which means it is a copy of the original Road Bible, which is now defunct. It's an antique. The current, appropriate Road Bible, to be followed by all travelers, is volume 34.678.99.111. I'm sorry to say it, but you are not legally traveling. You are in direct violation of all Cosmic Regulations. We take the Road Bible very seriously, and it's necessary that all travelers follow the current Road Bible instructions. The moment you walked into the customs station, it was completely obvious to all of the agents that something was out of place with you two, and now we know what it is"

"We weren't aware that we were doing something wrong. Is there any way you could give us a current edition of the Road Bible?" Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants are intuitively picking up on the fact that something dramatic is about to happen.

Pfliegman reaches under his desk and pulls out what appears to be a tiny vacuum cleaner, similar in appearance to a dust buster. He positions it on his desk so that the end of the vacuum apparatus is pointed towards Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, but there is something I can do for you. Please remain still and everything will be resolved" Pfliegman smiles at the two travelers.

"I'm not sure I understand" Shiny Boots stares at the dust buster.

Using a skinny, bone-white index finger, Pfliegman flips a switch on the side of the dust buster. It begins to suck in air, much as a dust buster would. Only this is not a dust buster. This machine is a Remote Ontological Targeting Miniature Black Hole Buster (also known as a ROT Buster). Within seconds the ROT Buster has consumed both Shiny Boots and Tie-Dyed Pants and deposited their atomic composition into the open expanses of space.

One day, approximately 26.2 million years from now, a single hydrogen atom, formerly a part of the biological entity known as Shiny Boots, will combust in a universe far far away from here, and in a quantum chain reaction will inevitably lead to the creation of several new planets and moons, as well as thousands of new species. Unfortunately, Tie-Dyed Pants was not quiet as lucky. The majority of his bodily atoms are still floating aimlessly somewhere out there in the cosmos, although one of his carbon atoms inexplicably made it's way back to earth where it became incorporated back into mother nature, as a tiny microscopic piece of a baboon's backside.

Author's Note

Thanks for reading my story!

Reviews

[Marie]

This is quite complex, and some of it I did not get, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I believe in alternative worlds myself, and the Road Bible sounds like a wonderful way to explore them.

[Robert Campbell]

Thanks Marie! I'm happy you enjoyed it!