Chapter 31 - Joe Takes the Quest

*Atomic number 280, despite it’s high number it is usually stable unless startled and then it will decay into other smaller emotions.

Having foolishly pressed the stop button on The Remote Of The Universe Joe shoved it into his pocket and continued on, completely unaware that he had in fact stopped the universe. Joe’s mind was occupied elsewhere, he was thinking about getting back home and how great and grand a non insane messed up world would be, one where you could tell a bad joke without threat of losing your status as a proper noun. As Joe wandered out of the lane that led to the passage that went to the alley with the man in a trench coat covering all but his ears he was suddenly struck with a thought, and then an idea. Soon Joe was being attacked by a wide variety of mental facilities, from impressions to feelings to deja vous. He turned and ran from these new unknown assailants only to fall into a massive plothole in the middle of the poorly maintained story sidewalk. Luckily for Joe, the holes were plentiful and deep enough to deter the attackers, as looking in all the holes for Joe would involve too much supervision for a neighborhood like this to handle. The assailants gathered the rest of their thoughts and trudged back to the lane that led to the passage that went to the alley where the man with a trench coat covering all but his ears was. He would not be happy to hear that their mission to plant an idea in Joe’s head had been unsuccessful. Fortunately for them Joe had not seen any of them and thus they would have the element of surprise* should they be sent to attack again. “You shall do no such thing!” cried the man in the trench coat “Your failure only confirms that you fail! You are no longer succeeding at succeeding but rather have failed to succeed yet succeeded to fail! I no longer think succeed is a real word and thus you will be doomed to fail, and thus I shall not send you out on another mission. Instead I will employ a more cunning plan, one that is sure to trick Joe into doing what must be done by the man known as Joe.” At this the man pulled out a small object that looked like the combination of a trinket with a MacGuffin and a bauble with a little bit of doodad thrown in. “This is a quest, a device that will carry its owner along a series of improbable and difficult tasks until the final goal is accomplished. As soon as Joe takes this quest he will be whisked along in my plot to remove the flies and allow me to take over the universe for myself!” At this the man threw the quest into the air towards the last known location of Joe. Meanwhile Joe had been far too pre-occupied with getting out of the massive pothole to eavesdrop on the diabolical plotting. The hole he had hidden in had happened to be huge, so humongous that it had a hoard of H’s hovering around. Joe hopped up and harvested handfuls of H’s and heaped them high. He leaped heavenward and with the help of the hill of H’s he landed without harm outside the hole. Now that Joe was free of the alliterative clutches of that pothole he could return on his mission to get home. Joe immediately set out in the one direction he was sure wasn’t home (Joe had learned that in a place like the back side of the page his first try would fail) and thus after he fought his way out of the pothole once again he was now ready to continue home, but before he could start something shiny caught his eye. It looked like a small knickknack crossed with a thingamajig with a little widget mixed in. This strange object had an unusual draw for Joe and he felt compelled to take it with him, after all it isn’t every day that you find an object that is so specifically vague. After acquiring the object Joe felt suddenly confused. He still wanted to get home, but for some reason he was suddenly sure that the only way to do such a thing would be to venture towards what looked like a city that had recently been set fire to. Joe was perplexed about this sudden turn in thought, although after thinking about it, it did seem odd for such a sudden and strong idea to suddenly jump into his head the moment he picked up that bizarre object. However Joe felt he must follow his gut on this matter and seeing as his gut and a few other internal organs had already started out towards the smoldering remains of the city Joe rushed to catch up.