Samual Funkie: 12 Year Old Bounty Hunter

There is such a place.

Under the bellies of blue whales

and brine shrimp;

were air bubbles start

and anchors never reach,

there is such a place.

The Deep.

1 The Begining

The underwater world of the deep is where everyone welcomes painful swimmer's ear, everyone is albino, and everyone dreams of being a bounty hunter.

They call themselves the Salt.

Why haven't you heard of the Salt?

Do you know about the Blue Bean Cube that makes you let loose a cloud of blue smoke every time you pass gas? What about the flavor fork that turns food the flavor of your choice when you poke it?

Didn't think so.

They're classified too, just like the Salt.

I can see you smiling now. You already don't believe. Why should you? I'm just a ghost. There is no such thing, right? We're just hoaxes and camera tricks. You've got no reason to believe people that don't even exist.

Fine by me.

But, for those of you with something other than pound cake between your ears, I will continue with the story of the famous twelve year old bounty hunter, Ms. Samual Funkie who would be credited with discovering the five greatest discoveries of mankind.

Not so long ago, your extremely large and in charge government discovered the underwater Salt civilization. While the rest of the world was exploring space for signs of intelligent life, our government was exploring the oceans.

But, since no one likes long winded lectures, I will turn the greatest story of exploration and discovery involving old women, purple tea and icy toenails, into a simple summary sentence.

One day, a blip showed up on the old womens' radar screen, which turned out to be the Salt's home.

That civilization would eventually be named the Deep by a man called Waterin Hisears.

Quite the creative sailor that fella was.

Anyway, because the Deep is full of mean boneheads who like nothing more than hunting down geeky children for money, it now provides your government with bounty hunters to do just that.

Why hunt down geeky children? Why not? Who likes geeky children?

Unfortunately, why the bounty hunters hunt is another forever long story that would be as fun for you to hear as it would be for you to floss your teeth with roach legs. However, it is important for you to know the hunted geeks are rebels, and they call themselves the Poets.

What possibly do the geeky Poets have to rebel against? An A- on a test? Not enough elves for their trading card game? Rained out chess tournaments?

Fortunately, these problems are not the sort of problems that the Poets rebel against. The Poets aren't those kinds of geeks.

They fight for freedom like most every other rebel ever did. And, they steal from the rich and give to the poor just like every other hero did. But, what is most interesting is what they are stealing and giving.

Knowledge.

Sound bizzare?

It gets worse.

But, I will no longer bore you with my thoughts on the matter. The story will have to tell itself.

Just know this: The only thing the great Salt and the Poets ever agreed on was true;

Samual Funkie was to be feared.

3 The Store

"Welcome to twice the price," the sales clerk said enthusiastically, "Where the unnecessary necessities are twice the price, proving the value of them to you our cherished customer."

"Do people actually shop here," asked Cade, a tall for his age boy.

"People raise their children here. It's such a positive atmosphere. How else could you convince them to pay twice the price for the same old fodder?" The salesman gave Cade a knowing smile and rubbed him on his head. "Say kid, where are your parents?"

"They're dead," Cade said, looking sternly at the clerk.

"Oh, kid listen I'm sorry I didn't …"

"Come on Hank, take me to her," Cade interrupted. "I am on a rush job today."

Hank reached into his mouth and grabbed his back left wisdom tooth. He proceeded to slide his entire mouth of teeth to the right revealing a keypad arrayed in a smile behind his teeth.

Cade, no longer bothered by this annoying formality, reached up and tapped out a 14 digit code onto Hank's keypad teeth.

The room made a hissing sound, and the floor dropped from under Cade's feet.

4 Entrance Fee

As Cade fell through the air he did a couple of flips for the fun of it, and then landed gracefully in the large pool filled with dry soft sponges awaiting him at the bottom. When he reached the bottom of the abyss, he simple waited patiently for the large hands to grab him. Those large hands belonged to Vicery, a cross between a body guard and a gentle giant.

"Good day, Vicery."

"Good to see you, Cade. Nice form on the flips."

"How's the family."

"Watching TV," said Vicery with a wink.

"Oh good, I hope it's something especially brainwashing."

"You know it," said Vicery, carrying Cade by the belt as he walked. "Why check out the world yourself, when you can have others do it for you."

"And enjoy it for you as well," added Cade. "Listen Vicery, is there anyway we could avoid the whole application-of-pain-prior-to-entry today?"

"What protection would that be for the Boss that you are who you say you are?" said Vicery stopping in front of 7 black boxes arranged in a half-circle before them. "Now what will it be today? Bees, hammer smash, dislocations, rattlesnakes, or defingernailing?"

"I think I'm gonna branch out today. I'm gonna go with the hammer smash."

"Dandy choice, Cade. Thought you would have gone with the Rattlesnakes seeing how it was your suggestion that got them here," he added guiding Cade's hand to the third black box from the left. "Now your hand goes in this one."

"Can't wait."

Inside of Cade's black box where five hammers which were spring loaded in their cocked position ready to smash every last bone in each of Cade's fingers.

"Hey,Vicery?"

"Yes, Cade."

"Are these boxes sanitized after each torcher. I mean do they meet the torcher regulations set out by the AAPA?"

"The AAP who?"

"Just kidding, didn't mean to complicate things," said Cade looking a little nervous.

"Brace yourself, Cade."

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

5 Recovery

Cade had only heard the first four bangs which had broken and crushed his first four fingers. By the time the fifth hammer had fallen, Cade too had fallen. Vicery had seen this several times a day, and was not surprised by Cade's reaction. The pain was always too great for the person being torchered to stay concious. This was the reason for the necessity of Vicery being so large in stature. Cade was not the first and certainly would not be the last poet Vicery would have to drag to the recovery bed.

By the time Cade opened his eyes, his previously smashed hand was in perfect shape again. The recovery bed had done its trick, and Cade was being lead to see the Boss. By being lead, what is meant here is that he was being dragged by Vicery who was gripping a huge chuck of Cade's Hair. Sure it wasn't very polite, but there aren't very many polite body guards.

"I'm awake now Vicery."

"Would you rather walk or continue letting me drag you?"

"We're almost there, I would just rather enjoy the ride," said Cade watching the cold stone walls pass him on either side. "Tell me Vicery, why do you work for the Boss?"

"I suppose it's because I believe in her."

"But what makes you believe in her?"

Vicery stopped dragging Cade for a moment and stood motionless.

"Every day," he said as he began to walk again, "poet after poet comes here to see her. And every day a poet is either stung 352 times by vicious bees and wasps, bitten by 5 nasty rattlesnakes, smashed by hammers, or defingernailed, all in an effort to simply show their determined allegiance to the cause. I suppose that is what drives me as well, Cade."

"That's moving, you big love mufin. So really it's that she pays you well?"

"There is not a lot of money in being the strong arm, so that's not it. But, I do get my pick of the litter every time her cat has kittens." Vicery looked off into the darkness in deep thought. "My, how I love kittens."

"You are one odd bird, Vicery."

"What? I like kitty's, especially little fluffy fuffy ones."

Vicery stopped again as he arrived at a large door that looked nearly impenetrable.

"Good day then, Cade."

"Good day, Vicery."

Vicery turned and began to walk back to the entrance of the foam pit, while Cade took his first step through the "impenetrable" hologram door.

6 Updates Galore

"Cade! What a wonderful surprise," said the boss from behind her curtain.

"You requested my presence, my lady."

"Yeah, yeah yeah, I am almost done here. I just need to make one more quick little adjustment."

"Take your time wizard of Oz, we just have ruthless bounty hunters hot on the tales of 37 Poets at the moment."

"I'm coming, I'm coming."

She pulled back the curtain and to reveal her new body shape to Cade who hadn't seen her in quite some time.

"Holy moley."

"What, you don't like the new figure?"

"The last time I saw you, you were … well, you were the size of ...."

"Don't say it. Can't someone do a little working out from time to time."

"You've shrunk ten dress sizes in …" he looked at his watch, "thirty-two hours."

"It's just a massive demagnifier, it makes your body appear to other people smaller than it actually is."

"I liked you the way we were."

"So did I, now I'm afraid to touch anything for fear that they'll notice how big I really am."

"Wait, before you didn't like people to touch you because you thought you were too squishy. Now you don't like people to touch you because you're too skinny. I think you have touch issues."

"That's an understatement," she said sitting down to her computer and pulling something up on the screen.

"Take a look at these pics," she said as she began showing image after image on the screen in front of her. "This is why I brought you in here today."

7 Bad News

"They are all pictures of dead animals," said Cade kind of grossed out.

"Dead animals with large chunks of skin missing from them."

"What's been doing it."

"That's the mystery."

"What, the bite marks don't match anything we've seen before?"

"No animal anyway. They match something completely different."

The boss flashed the next photo up on the screen. This time a picture was left up on the screen which showed a dead horse with the skin only slightly peeled back from its leg.

"Are those fishing hooks with fishing line attached to the end of them?" asked Cade.

"Looks that way."

"What does that mean? There are some ruthless fishermen running around ripping the skin off of dead animals."

The Boss did not answer but only pressed the button on the slide projector.

"It gets a little crazy here, Cade."

The photo displayed on the wall showed the hook still attached to the peeled skin. With his eyes Cade followed the line that was attached to the hook. He walked up closer to the picture displayed and then stopped as he realized what he was seeing.

"We lost a Poet today, Cade. Whatever it was, it got Sondon."

"Oh gees, his parents thought he was in school."

"He was in school, on the playground."

"Your kidding. In front of the other kids?"

"No, it looks like he got a call to go out there by himself, and that is when he was hit."

Do we know if it is targeting Poets or was Sondon just unlucky?"

"We don't have enough information. The police got there shortly after it happened. All we have is the phone call and some of the crime scene shots we hacked from the police computers. We know is that these animals with the peeled skin have been showing up for some time, but this is the first time the attack was on a human. That human just happened to be one of ours."

"What is it you want me to do?"

"I need you to find out if this was a coincidence. If it was, then it surely was a tragedy, but not as bad as we had previously suspected."

"What do you suspect?" asked Cade.

"I suspect we have more trouble on the horizon. More trouble than you expected on a day like today."

"Yeah, I did not think my troubles would be getting much worse," said Cade as he pulled out a copy of the first poem he had written.

"This is the first one," he said as he handed it to the Boss.

"I'm sorry to give you more on your plate on a day like today, Cade, but this attack worries me."

"Boss, do you really think I am ready to handle her?"

"Who?"

"Come on, Samual Funkie. She's the best bounty hunter our people have ever seen. They say she was aceing the sharp shooters at the academy on her first day. Can I really stand up to that? I mean, I can't hit the broad side of a grandma with a skillet."

"Cade, you are not a fighter. You will never be asked to fight her. Your job is to help her see our side of the story, then get the hey day out of there. Surely, if you stay any longer she would slaughter you."

"What if she's faster than me."

"Cade, she's a 300 pound third grader. She is going to be slower than you."

"She invents things we never thought possible."

"You invent things we never though possible, Cade. She is their best, and you are ours. You are our only hope of surviving the path of devastation she will bring."

"I am the only hope against the path of devastation? What kind of pep talk is that?"

"Cade, you are the one. You brought us liquid technology. You have made it possible to invent whatever we dream of inventing. You are the only one with a mind intelligent enough to stand a chance against her."

"And if I am lucky, I will have saved us, the most hated crime organization the planet has ever known."

"Cade, we can't stop the One World Peace Alliance without you stopping her. You know that."