The last thing I remember is struggling for breath. My nursing home attendants were attaching electrodes to my chest, readying a defibrillator…
ONE REINCARNATION LATER:
I look down at my hands, puzzled by their cartoonish outlines. This isn’t my body. Not the one I had, anyway.
“And who might you be?”
I look toward the voice and find myself staring at a boy around nine or ten, dressed in a collared shirt and a pair of nondescript shorts. By his accent, I can tell he’s English. He looks like a cartoon, rather than a real human.
“Uh…Kent. MY name is Kent.” I look around, scanning the landscape. Bucolic countryside, all of it rendered in an old-timey, cartoon aesthetic. I stare at the boy again. “Who are you?”
“Christopher Robin,” he replies. He studies me for a long moment. Then: “Would you like to be friends?”
“Friends?” I rub my neck, looking suspiciously from side to side. Is this heaven? Hell? “Uh…I guess.”
“Good!” His gives me a bright, sunny smile. “I’ll introduce you to the others.”
Before I can ask who “the others” are, he cups a hand to his mouth and yells,” You can come out now!”
A bevy of cartoon animals emerge from the tree line behind him, about a hundred yards back. As they walk toward us, I can’t help thinking they all look sad.
Christopher notices it too. “What’s wrong, Piglet?” he asks a baby pig who’s dressed in a striped onesie.
“It’s Pooh,” Piglet responds dejectedly. “We finally figured out why he looks the way he does.”
Christopher squats down. Piglet refuses to meet his gaze; he continues staring at the ground.
“Why? What did you find out?”
Piglet shakes his head. Tears stream down both his cheeks.
Suddenly, a piercing scream splits the air. A cartoon donkey bursts from the treeline. “PIGLET!” he yells. “HE’S DOING IT AGAIN! HE’S—”
Then a stubby bear tackles the donkey, pinning him to the ground and mounting his back. He reaches behind him—apparently he’s got something tucked in his shirt—and shouts, “IT’S YOUR TURN, EEYORE! THERE’S NO AVOIDING IT! I’M GOING TO—”
Then he looks at us. Piglet pulls on Christopher’s hand, forcing him to walk away. He tries to protest, but the rest of the animals push him along, assuring him that he wants no part of this.
“PLEASE, WINNIE!” Eeyore brays.
The bear gets off Eeyore and looks me up and down. Eeyore runs off but Winnie doesn’t care; he’s busy studying me.
“And what do we have here?” Winnie asks softly, circling clockwise.
I circle with him, feeling creeped the fuck out. As far as I can tell, he’s got no wiener, balls, or even an asshole. He’s packing as much heat as a goddamn Ken Doll.
“Dunno who you are, but from now on, you leave that donkey alone,” I warn him.
“Winnie the Pooh. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” He chuckles softly, continuing to circle. “I’m afraid I can’t honor your request. You see, there’s a reason I lack genitalia.” He stops in his tracks. His grin widens into a sinister smile.
“Because it’s detached. Which lets me hide it in other peoples’ buttholes.”
He reaches behind him and pulls out the object that Eeyore was so afraid of. It takes a second to process what I’m seeing.
He’s holding a throbbing, pustulant cock. With an extra helping of necrotic veins and syphilitic sores.
“No!” I stumble back, falling onto my butt and my hands. “Stay BACK, motherfucker!”
But he keeps coming, heedless of my cries. So I reach into my pocket and open my eReader to Echo, activating its reality distortion powers. Magic flash.
“BY THE POWER OF GRAYSKULL!!!”
He-Man charges out from the trees. He grabs Pooh around the waist, and arches him back into a roid-powered suplex. Buh-BAM!
Pooh lands on his head and bounces up. He-Man scrambles to his feet, grabbing Pooh around his neck before he can land. He kicks his feet out, slamming the bear down in Diamond Dallas Page’s signature finishing move: the Diamond Cutter.
At that moment, Hawk, Stalker, and Snake Eyes (of G.I. Joe fame) run out from the tree line.
“HE’S ALL YOURS!” He-Man bellows, soccer-kicking Winnie a dozen yards into the air.
Hawk and Stalker cut loose with a withering barrage of suppressive fire. As Pooh’s bullet-riddled body falls to the earth, Snake Eyes leaps high into the air, somersaulting three and a half times before bisecting the cartoon sex-fiend with a two-handed katana.
Jeez. I can’t help but wince as Pooh falls into the ground in two bloody pieces.
Well, at least I learned something: don’t get on the wrong side of eighties cartoons—they police their own.
The more you know.
😀
Have you incarnated into a 2-D world where one of the inhabitants is terrorizing the others with his severed, disease-ridden penis? Never fear! Get Echo Vol. 1 on Kindle here: Vol. 1 on Kindle. Vol. 2 on Kindle here: Vol.2 on Kindle Vol. 3 on Kindle here: Vol. 3 on Kindle Vol.4 on Kindle here: Vol. 4 on Kindle Echo Omnibus here: Echo Omnibus Echo Vol. 1 & 2 Combined Edition here: Combined Edition If you wanna hear me babble on about anything and everything, and strain my FREAKIN’ BRAIN, then here’s a link to my podcast: Strained Brains! It is on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, and Google Play! Please give it a listen and a five-star review! Here’s the miscellaneous gear that I use to try and become an uber-human: Optimization, and last but not least, my buddy Jumar Balacy has made a supercool microsite at kentwaynebrain.com! Go check out his computer-based wizardry 🙂 🙂 😀
Hold on! I just got approved to be an Amazon affiliate! If you’re going to buy ANY product from Amazon, and you’d like to support my efforts for absolutely free, then simply click on one of the Echo links I’ve provided—they’ll send you to Echo’s Amazon page—and THEN buy whatever product you wish. Amazon gives me a small referral fee each time this happens! In this manner you can support my books, musings, podcast, zany ads, or my adventures along the noble path known as The Way of The Man Child WITHOUT spending any more money than you were already going to! Should you do this, I vow to send you a silent blessing, causing your genitals to adopt the optimum size, shape, smell, and death-ray attachment of choice that paralyzes your enemies with fear and envy! Entire worlds will bow before your nether parts! 😲💪 😜
Kent Wayne 
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