Monti Bizarro, Part I: Sheer Will, Under Apocalypse Impending

     Another morning in the fabled lands of Westmooria. It was acid-raining outside, but in the building the air was stifled and stale, a result of the air ducts that had fallen into disrepair a long time ago. The stench of sweat and tears and slipshod layouts pervaded through the Golden Ram Offices. The deadline, a week. The quota, 20 pages. The situation, FUBAR. The ragtag group of Journalism Club, so exuberant at the beginning of the year, had been decimated by lost interest and defections to the Publications conglomerate. A general apathy had set in the past six months, but it was crunch time now, time enough left for the few remaining to prove that they were still worth a damn.
     In walks Francis Chen, the non-biased Lord of the Columns. He was one of the old stalwarts, and he ran things in the Columns. Dedicated and never complacent, he had made no secret of his ambitious aspirations for the Columns section. Over the course of the year, he had rounded up three dozen columnists to write for him. Some were true finds, like Rudy taBooty, and others like The Cheet were the kind that made you wonder about the fate of the English language. The ones Chen didn't like, like Darth Tejas, weren't heard of again.
     The writers immediately noticed his presence. Francis seemed to be in a jovial mood today, and most of the time that didn't bode well for his columns staff. Most backed into the opposite corners of the room, and those that could found shelter behind the massive cardboard container walls that the Math Department used to prevent test cheaters.
     Chen walks up to a writer typing at the corner computer, rookie staffer Sine Wade. The kid was lanky and tall, but brilliant, a master of satire and trig functions. The Lord of the Columns stops, towering over the writer and blocking out the scant sunlight that beamed through Westmoor's windowless rooms.
     "Where's my article?" Chen asks, emotionless and terse.
     Wade turned and grimaced at the sight of the Columns Editor. The fear was manifest in his eyes.
     "FOOL! THIS IS THE LAST TIME YOU'LL EVER MISS A DEADLINE FOR ME!" cried the non-biased Lord of the Columns fiercely. Out of his jacket pocket he flipped out a metallic tube, and flipped a switch. The lightsaber cackled to life, exulted orange, and the Lord of the Columns swung at the left shoulder of the terrified staff writer.
     The lightsaber struck with a vhouom. "At last we will reveal ourselves to the Jedi, at least we will have our revenge," cackled the saber in a highly distorted tone.
     "Dude, stop hitting me with that thing!" cried Sine Wade, "I'm not even writing for the columns section!"
     Francis Chen, non-biased Lord of the Columns, relented and folded the plastic tube sections back into his limited-edition Darth Vader/Darth Maul talking lightsaber, but not before he had gotten in some more strikes ("Impressive. Most impressive.") and a few good prods ("No, I am your father.").
     The Ed observes from the distance, taking it all in, brooding, a quiet monolith in the corner. How did I ever get into this, he thinks to himself. Some days he thinks back to the Girl from Ipanema that he had left behind, left to pursue the glory of journalism. But today wasn't one of those days. He needed to pull the band together and get this paper done. It was the old days. The bad days. The all-or-nothing days. He knew it. They all knew it. He got up to speak.
     Suddenly, the alarm sounds. The sirens punctuate the air with a shrill warning to all those arrogant enough to still breathe aloud. It had been 3 years since the last one. But on a day like this, they all knew what it meant.
     The freshmen had broken out of their designated habitat… again.

To be continued…