Green Player

As you round the corner the lights flash briefly on-and-off as further ahead you can see a tacky colored wallpaper barely clinging to the walls interrupted by the opening of a metal door.  It clanks open and you hear the echoes of it down the other hallways hidden in darkness.  These must be the halls you seem to remember, despite your otherwise complete amnesia.

GREEN LIGHT FLASHES, THE FLAGS GO UP

You see not a room but another hall with perhaps a bit of metal door

"LET THERE BE NO LIGHT!!!"

... AND WITH THAT THE LIGHTS FROM THE DIODES ON THE PNEUMATIC TUBES ALL AROUND YOU SHUT-OFF. THERE IS A LOUD ECHOING CLICK WHEN THIS HAPPENS. ALL OF YOUR EYES TAKE A MOMENT TO ADJUST IN THE INTERRUPTING SILENCE.

GREEN LIGHT

“HOO HOO, WOULD YOU LOOK AT THIS GUY, COOL AS A CUCUMBER?!?!?”

The overzealous screams of the children fills your tubular confines with sound forcing your face to squint. You flex at what is strapping you in with great strength and there is not the slightest of a bend. There was, how-ever, a brief pause before your answer gets response. It was difficult to notice but you are going to gather that this ‘broadcast’ is not without delay but all must contained relatively close in proximity. Again you wonder how it is you know any of this.

The face of the clown presses close to the screen which imposes a forced closeness to you.

“WELL THEN GREEN PLAYER, THIS IS WHAT YOU WERE BORN FOR!!!”

And with that you feel your encasement shudder and you feel of a sickly light weight as you feel your blood shift upward.

The T.V. switches back to ‘please stand by…’ and in this moment you feel a great come-down. Like the removal of some awakening force from your body. Perhaps it’s that the clown is gone, maybe those god-awful children, or maybe it’s because for this moment you feel like you are back in some sort of limbo between two worlds.

The quiet returns but this time your mind races with thoughts. It’s as if each moment is the only to cling to so your mind is actively sweeping it till the point of familiarity. The tube around you still shuddering and hissing your ears can barely pick up new music on the radio of this small but imposing television.

Anticipation rises again as you feel new sounds coming from ahead of you and with the television lifting upwards you feel as if you are about be brought out of your confines. There is an instantaneous and overwhelming excitement for the return of your free-will that builds up in your stomach until the rest of your body tingles.

The door ahead of you comes into form with the auto-mechanical rearrangement of objects ahead of you and with a hiss this door too begins to open. And with a sudden violent motion the tube shifts forward slightly and drops you onto the marble floor that stands before you. Lumbering up from your newly assumed fetal position you begin to feel a sudden newness to your being.

The large tube embedded into the wall behind you looks not unlike the décor, which surrounds it. Faded wallpaper and plastered ceiling imply that you are in some sort of building, maybe even a house. Although the stank stale air and general feeling of unease would suggest that this house is not intended for comfortable living

The hall that lies before you seems very cramped and its wallpaper hangs kind of crooked. The walls are not but five feet apart and its immediate appearance is that of an apartment. But what apartment has marble floors? The hall before you turns sharply to your left and continues fifteen or so feet before breaking off right and into the darkness. The lights of the diodes in your pneumatic tube flash a silhouette of your figure on the wall before you. You are a shadow on the wall. You admire your size, only magnified in a black shape contrasting the wallpaper.

You are not quite sure where you are but it is certain that you feel a long way from home.

GREEN PLAYER:

Deep breaths.
10..
9..
8..
That question.
It brings a horrific grimace to my face.
My answer is obvious.
7..
6..
I was brought up to hate them and everything they stand for.
The kings of Valhalla.
But part of my duty is to respect them until their very last drop of blood has been split upon unholy ground.
5..
4..
It takes all of my will power to keep from telling this clown fucker to release me from this pod or I`ll rip his testicles inside out through his throat.
True story. Managed to kill a rottweiler assassin sent by Balder himself in such a way.
3..
2..
Calm.
I remain calm.
``Born ready...``

WELCOME GREEN PLAYER!!

The T.V. screen blips and then cuts to black for a split second. This drastic change causes your body to spam and your mind to draw to immediate attention. Your vision is now consumed with the image of an entire audience of children screaming with excitement. The high-pitch of their fervor is enough to pierce your ears and cause your face to a grimace. Panning into the screen, in an unnaturally close close-up, you see a jubilant face painted like a clown brandishing a large and toothy smile.

“HI KIDDOS!! YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS??”

The children heighten the sharpness of their cheers.

“THAT’S RIGHT … PSYCHO BILLY’S HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER!!!”

As you brace yourself for more audible impact the children’s cheering is nearly unbearable for you.

“ALL RIGHT KIDDOS, BRACE YOURSELVES! AND GIVE A BIG WARM WELCOME TO THE GREEN PLAYER!!”

The cheering continues its jarring drone and the clown waves the tops of his fingers at you in a coochy-coo manner.

“HI GREEN PLAYER … HEYA … pft … LOOK AT THIS GUY, ASLEEP BEHIND THE WHEEL, HE HAS NO IDEA WHATS GOING ON!!”

He rolls his eyes in an exaggerated way.

“WAKE UP!! YOU’RE HERE, ON THE BESTEST GAME-SHOW EVER TO GRACE GOD’S GREEN EARTH. No need to dream my friend, all that you were meant for is right fucking here … WELCOME GREEN PLAYER!!! WELCOME TO MY HOUSE OF SSSLAUGHTER!!!”

There is calliope music that begins to play in a wonky way as its exaperated and muted notes compete with the hellish high-pitched voices of the youthful audience. The camera pans back now and you can see that this clown is certainly middle-aged but has a certain limber quality to his movements. Around him lie large objects of primary colors set onto a white background.

“WE WILL BE BACK KIDDO’S AND WE WILL SEE IF WE CAN FINALLY AWAKE THE GREEN PLAYER!”

He takes a great deep exaggerated breath while he makes time for a dramatic pause. Then rapidly leans back to his uncomortable close up to mumble:

“only gunna say this once green player, so LISTEN THE FUCK UP!! This IS the end times my friend and your very soul is at stake, you are a PAWN on the very CHESS BOARD OF THE GODS!!! And if you wanna get through this you are gunna have to finish your chores, OTHERWISE YOU’LL BE GROUNDED … like for life, IN A BOX!!!”

“deep in your pocket you have a list. each item on that list is somewhere down the the hell you are heading towards. Get those items and I will set you free. Get those items and I will bring you to me. AND FOR THE GODS SAKE DON’T DILLY-DALLY!!!”

“WANNA CLAIM WHATS YOURS?? YOUR VERY FUCKING BIRTH-RIGHT FOR BEING THE BEAST THAT YOU ARE?!? LIKE THOSE ONE-THOUSAND FOOLS WHO FOLLOWED THE BATTFIELD, TO! THEIR! ENDS! AND THE END OF ALL!! THINGS!!!?!?”

“GOOD!! I SURE FUCKING HOPE SO!!! fer yer sssake. I am the one that not only brought you here but essentially created you, I am you’re alpha and I am gunna be your omega so you see you oughta just stick with me and trust me your gunna have a GRAND! OLD! TIME!!”

His face has bursted into an intimidating excitement and he inhales again exageratively.

“So yer gunna be a good contestant and stick to the game and give us a good show right?? Yer gunna play this thing through like a fucking shakesperean comi-tragedy right to the fucking last scene getting them all in stitches, huh?? Yer gunna sing and scream bloody murder all night long??”

It is during this brief pause that you notice the children have stopped their incessant drone but you are not certain for how long it has been dropped.

“HEH HAH!! WE FINALLY GOT THE GREEN PLAYER AWAKE!! ALRIGHT, WERE BACK!!”

The children’s chorus of pain begins sounding again assaulting your ears from either side.

“OKAY, WELL WE HAVE GONE OVER ALL THE RULES AND THERE IS ONLY ONE THING TO ASK …”

The children and the clown scream in an ear-drum battering unison

“ARE … YOU ... READY???”

The final word is left with a pause lasting longer than the previous pauses in this conversation. You have a sick feeling in the bottom of your stomach as you feel you are being watched.

The television has grown silent and motionless besides the clown’s subtle sway and blinks. The pneumatic tube hisses and continues to slide in its downward motion. Your pulse throbs from the center of your chest and outward pressing at the very things strapping you in.

What do you do?

GREEN PLAYER: Finally...

Always the same dream.
Some call it judgment day, Day of one billion souls. Ragnarok.
I stand over my vanquished enemies. Slain. Dismembered. Heads arranged neatly in preparation for the sacrifice to Odin. And I see him smiling down at me. Chuckling in that diabolically heinous way. Was this really a dream. No. The prophecy.

They say the Gods of Destruction will send their heroes in many forms.
The fat man at the mall. The little girl in the park. My father.
They say it is the duty of the Jotunn to desecrate these bastards in the name of Loki.
This weakens the power of the gods so that we may finally persevere with our war.

They say I'm insane. This is all some kind of schizophrenic delusion created in my subconscious to give me a legitimate reason to kill innocents.
But he has made me realize the truth.
This is my last objective.
This is what I must do.
That laugh. That fucking laugh.
He won't be laughing when my hands rip his head from his spine and carve up his skull for one last offering.

These restraints will not hold me long.
Odin's assassin has called me out.
This will be my finest hour.
But why the fuck did he have to send a clown.
Creepy fuckers those clowns are.

GREEN PLAYER: TUBULAR RASA

At first, your mind is blank. You don’t remember anything about your past but you know that you don’t know about your past. It is as if you are aware of something you cannot comprehend. It feels like you are being reborn from the womb of some alien mother. You know nothing of this new world save a vague feeling of familiarity. Everything has a surreal quality to it now as your eyes begin to function.

It is as if you were the chrysalis and now you cannot remember ever being the catapiller. You feel rather like something forged from previous material. Yet in all this you feel brand new. There is nothing beyond your base material assigning you as who you are other than the ever elusive situations of here and now. Both of these you are certain are happening for the first time and thus through some intuitive thinking you conclude, that you must be conscious for the first time. Like aroused from some fictitious dream, the sleeper awakens.

From a milky white wet-eyed blur you begin to pull your visual surroundings into focus. You can hear hissing all around you and you know that you are enclosed in cold metal. You can only tilt your head a few degrees in each direction and your arms and legs are strapped into place as if you were standing up straight. You feel as though you are vertical but that you had been horizontal for a long duration previous.

A small television screen sits uncomfortably close to your face. It is about half-a-foot squared with rounded edges and it is jammed up so close to your face it takes up nearly all of your immediate view. It has the intrusive quality of an aggravating conversationalist yet displays the simple phrase: “Please Stand By …”

A light static of elevator music is barely audible from its single speaker. You practically have to hold your breath to hear it. The melody is strangely recognizable and almost primordial as if it were the tune your mother would hum when you were a child. You know you were a child, but again as you try and recall your childhood, you draw a blank. There were words to this song, you remember that much. The part coming up, this is the part that you remember. The words come hauntingly each one the harbinger of the next.

“Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
'Relax,' said the night man,
'We are programmed to receive.
You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave!”

The speaker is playing musack of The Eagles song Hotel California. How odd, you think but the truth is you really have no idea why.