Adze
#5 of By Bear-Paws
Scene:
Interior office, Adze headquarters. Full product line of Men's deodorant body washes and sprays line the shelves behind the President's desk. In front of him, the Men's Gift Sets, complete with body scrub sponges and special shampoos and hair gels. His own knuckles are well groomed by virtue of Adze Men's Minotaur body wash, for the coat glow that gets all the cows mooing.
Suddenly, there bursts in a young intern, horns first. He's snorting from the fury of his pace to the office, not anger, there's no red in his eyes.
"Hold there a sec there, Billy, reign in your self a spell," the boss says in his western drawl. He swivels in his chair and offers some dish on his desk to the intern -- some bowl of chew that apparently is a premium brand of alfalfa pellets. The intern politely waves it off.
Billy waves an aged brown Manila folder in his 3-fingered hand, nearly causing its crusted label to fall off. "It's down there, sir."
The boss leans forward in his chair with interest and spits, causing a ringing report to his left. "What the hell are you sayin'?"
"Just what we need, sir."
Cut to Scene:
Interior facility, Adze abandoned government laboratory. Highest clearance only. Mostly all dust and spartan lighting fixtures, folding chairs and tables, definitely not a high-budget affair. The computers seem to IBM affairs, big banks of lights and reels of tape, all having vomited their streamers across the floor long ago, most of the light bulbs burned out. Rats and spiders seem to have even found this place a lousy toilet decades ago.
One thing stands out however, a centerpiece: A double-keyed safe no single person can open, with a lock bearing a very peculiar design - the Adze symbol, something the President has always kept around his neck mostly as a sex symbol all these years, but also had made a replica for his intern as thanks for a recently successful ad campaign.
"I think we can open it together, sir."
They carefully insert their Adze keys, and immediately upon insertion, a sexy feminine voice comes over the aged intercom saying, "Adze interlock disengaged." There's a whoosh and a puff of dust from the door, and a bright light from behind. The two open the hatch to a full airlock depressurization gasp, eyes widening as they reach in...
Circle wipe, back to Adze office:
The boss is making heavy footstomps, eagerly clutching a plastic spool of old-style movie film in his hand, Bill trotting behind him, arms loaded full with a projector and a stack of folders and some other packages. They both seem to be snorting steam out of nostrils flared with excitement, tails whipping behind them.
The boss sets the film down, closes the doors, closes the blinds, dims the lights, pulls the view-screen. Bill quickly clears a spot on the desk, sets down the projector, plugs it in, takes the film spool, looks at it curiously, scratches his head, looks at the projector a moment, then springs one arm then another out of the projector, smiles goofily.
"Well, set it up," the boss says impatiently, spitting again.
Bill hunches over busily and puzzles over the odd knobs and gears, lenses and sprockets. This is no MP4 player by a long shot. He then sees a red toggle and triumphantly snaps it on.
The two are practically blinded by a white screen.
"Gee-hoe-ziphat, Bill, what's with the picture?" The boss shouts while covering his eyes with one arm.
Bill, also covering his eyes from the glare, puzzles at the plastic disc on one arm of the projector just turning in place. He decides it needs further inspection and turns it off. "Just a sec while I see if this needs more preparation."
Bill turns the disc over in his hands and suddenly it separates. Of course! It's a container of some sort. He opens it and finds there's a spool resembling the one at the rear of the projector, just with some fine tape filament. That must fit in that slot. He fits the reel to the machine, fits the filament into that slot, snaps on the projector, and suddenly there comes to life:
Inset screen:
Super-8 quality movie, loose sprocket, washed-out color style, popping/scratchy audio track. "At Adze Body Products, we've been studying the nation's economy for many years and have traced it back to one basic problem: Dirty Politics. We've found dirty Senators, dirty Congressmen, dirty Presidential Aides, and even were hot on the trail of what we expected to be the most heinous crime of all: Dirt in the Oval Office.
Pan to speaker inside Adze Government Laboratory: "At Adze, we've developed the cure for Dirty Politics."
Zoom in on hand holding product, 60's type mod style lines and lettering: "Adze Economic Cleanup. It's just what our country needs!"
End film inset, bright white screen, then Bill snaps off the projector.
"You know how many got killed for this knowledge, Bill?"
"Buh - but isn't it really needed now more than ever, sir?"
The boss snorted, paced the office, stomped, dashed the projector off his desk, kicked it aside, grabbed a big fist of chew, folded his arms, put on his Stetson (his "thinking cap" as he liked to call it), and paced more as Bill tried to pick up the pieces of the projector.
"Oh, don't bother with it, Ah can always find another on eBay if Ah needs one," the boss said out the side of his muzzle and spat with a loud RING.
And thus was Adze Economic Cleanup brought to market and indeed Dirty Politics was a thing of the past - at least in this reality.
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