Success, like death, marks the end of effort. So enjoy your ongoing failures while they last.

Prologue

Chapter 1

Yikes was spitting chips when he found out. He had drawn the short straw with a ball point pen only to find out that straws aren't made of ink; and neither are those specks of dust often referred to by the less-enlightened as planets. He was never going to be the Messiah; that was obvious, but partly from pity and partly from more pity, he had been selected to do a trial run on the great one's favourite speck of dust; the earth.

"Why on earth?" he said, more to himself than to his friends who were out at the time. "What have they got wrong this time."

Ironic really, as Yike's take on being a messiah was so flawed that it bordered on being human.

"All the better to convince them with." The booming voice of his parole officer filled the room in much the same way as water fills the lungs of a drowning rat; only with less affection. These had been hard times for Yikes; if you can imagine such a thing in the absence of mass and time. Here, everything just is and was and will be all at the same time; being the inoperative word.

The truth is, he was not really cut out for heaven; having once read up on the concept of time; and liking the smell of it. But it was a foreign concept and this meant his interpretations were a little skew whiff. Still, he was never happier than when he was fantasising about a life spent dwelling on the future, reliving the present, and predicting the past; then he felt the kind of bliss you only experience when you get to eat the last piece of chocolate.

But there was literally no time to give the matter the extra consideration it didn't deserve. He would be going to earth as a test-crash dummy for the next messiah. This was lousy work with lousy pay and no super; plus you never knew how the inhabitants would take you.

"It wont be a drama" trumpeted the parole officer; his hair still damp from Yike's unorthodox practice baptism lesson. Fortunately Yikes was fluent in both trumpet and oboe. Occasionally the parole office would rabbit on in piccolo, but Yike's couldn't understand a note of it, and just nodded where it best seemed appropriate. Incidentally, it was during such a high-pitched diatribe that Yike's had inadvertently volunteered to be a test-crash messiah.

Chapter 2

The Pikers of Egg Beta III in the constellation of Felix Hash Minor were constrained by space, but not time. These neo-plastic frisbee-shaped creatures [sic] had renounced heaven; not because of some deep theological dispute, but simply because they liked whizzing about in what humans (lacking foresight) had come to refer to as outer space.

They were also very much addicted to the smell of ozone. This is not exactly correct as ozone has no odour unless you add some herbs; the Pikers simply had not realised that the ozone made them smell. No harm done though; they certainly were not the first species to find solace in their own underarms on a hot day.

As with all that have encountered heaven; the ratio of their circumference to their radius was now rational (as all good ratios should be). Each was exactly a metre and a bit in diameter, with both numerator and denominator on speaking terms. A curling antenna at top centre being the only evidence that the mathematical anomaly had been corrected. None objected, as it made communication between them much easier.

The end result of this heavenly endorsement was that when they were rotated clockwise; the some of their parts was considered to be more or less equal to the number they first thought of. However, when they were rotated anti-clockwise they just threw up a lot. This is the price you pay for having the space, but no time.

In the past, they had communicated by rhythmically bumping into other; think Morse code with a disco beat; the practice of which was frowned upon and had since been deprecated. The philosophers had gone out of their way to hide this practice from the history books; but the geeks (in the absence of a decent social life) had kept it alive.

Due to a shortage of ambulances, they were forced to ambulate by more intuitive means. Recycling warm bodily fluids to their pale underbelly gave them lift, slipstreaming the occasional comet gave them momentum; the curly tail did the rest, which included directional coordination, the proper time to instigate mutual flatulence (for dodging hyper space toll booths), and also letting them know when it was time to eat.

The sole diet of the Pikers was Crisps, or to put it less delicately, their own dead skin, although it was not really dead, as it continued to grow after shedding. Crisps themselves, fed off the vomit of pikers which they found to be scrummy and quite unlike tapioca pudding. This was the sole reason why the discomfort of anti-clockwise navigation still persisted. It was a case of "you scratch my back and I'll have yours for dinner". This form of self-sustaining recursive cannibalism kept the Pikers out of hot water and the Crisps out of the frying pan.

History speaks of a time when a coup was attempted by all Crispdom. Its goal was to better their position in the taxonomy of light snack life forms. However, they had to give up in disgust when it was realized that their essential weaponry, the tooth, was going to take at least another two million more nano-pedicures to evolve.

Chapter 3

Heaven and hell are no different. Bliss and misery walk hand in hand and talk foot in mouth without perspiring. No guns aimed across camps; the still light of peace imbibing.

The reborn soul is built from three parts; the original soul, the soul of the three most admired, and the soul of the three most despised. In all cases of course, only the 'good' in each is retained; this lays the groundwork for next growth. All genetic quirks, however, both natured and nurtured, are preserved, and also serve to influence the soul; the rest being left to that most quaint of constraints; the hour glass.

This soul-merge algorithm was ratified by the elders of Babel-Gum on a day without date, in a meeting without minutes, around a rational-pi-shaped table.

The meeting room, also being super-circular, was tracked; the table grooved to fit; the two paired; the meeting spun. All attendees wore musical devices that encouraged foot tapping. The soles of their feet tapped the moving floor; marks were left. At meetings end, patterns were analyzed, patents were pended; copyrights were fringed; bank balances were interested. Here, the creative was constantly put through her paces. There was no rest for the fickle muse.

Above the table hung the pendulum oracle of the camel and the needle proving once and for all that a small enough camel can fit through a large enough needle, provided he is unburdened and she is sharp.

Chapter 4

On a day ending in 'y' and beginning with sunrise, a class of Year 10 students was scheduled to go on an excursion to the Melbourne Cricket Ground. This was a normal part of the sports curriculum. On this day however, Mr Shagraat, (the second 'a' is silent as in cucumber), their normal sports teacher had come down with a case of lager, and was unable to attend to his duties.

Finding there to be no teacher from the sports contingent available to take over, the duty then fell to geeky science and maths teacher, Mr Perigrim, who, on hearing the news had a sudden rush of nausea, and quickly excused himself in the direction of the staff toilets.

It is a little known fact that in his school years Mr Perigrim was always picked last on the sports team. This had irked him, but he kept it hidden by deriving the quadratic formula in his head. One day a new student arrived at school. His name was Felix Lake which was unfortunate, as everyone just called him Flake. Nobody really paid that much attention to him, but it was a pivotal moment in the life of Grant Perigrim the day when Felix Lake was picked last on the sports team for rugby.

For the first time in his lack lustre sporting career, Grant played rugby like a man possessed, surprising teacher and team mates alike. But no one was surprised when he came off second best tring to tackle Kyle Black (Thud to all his cowering friends). When Grant finally came to, he was grinning from ear to ear. Even after Felix Lake contracted some rare skin disease and had to be home-schooled, Grant was never again picked last in sport.

Five minutes later My Peregrim emerged from the staff toilets looking much better; in fact you could almost see a gleam in his pasty pixel-ridden eyes. He announced that he needed to get some "materials" for the journey, and vanished for another another five minutes or so.

And so it came to pass that Mr Perigrim took a class of P/E students to the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The event was sedate enough; a typical guided tour ensued. Mr Perigrim jotted down the dimension of the oval and did a quick tango with his pocket calculator. When they finally stepped out onto the field itself, Mr Peregrim could almost hear the crowd roar, but it was only the ground keeper who had been experimenting with a new allergy medication.

When they reached the centre of the ground, Mr Peregrim asked the students to divide themselves into two teams.

Chapter 5

The Pikers, having garnished a decent bit of momentum off Halley's comet, pitched their discoidal frames towards Helios...

Chapter 6

"Knock knock."

"Who's there?"

"Lucifer."

"Lucifer who?"

"Oh you are so funny. Lucifer the black sheep."

"Hey! What brings you here?"

"I'm bored."

"How are you coping with the light?"

"Shades. You like them."

"Yeah. Very ooka long bang bang."

"Where's your son?"

"Out back I think. You want me to call him?"

"No thanks. Just enquiring."

"So why are you bored?"

"I think I'm going through a mid-death crisis."

"It happens to the best of us you know. Remember the ark?"

"When the rains first came?"

"Off day."

"You get that."

"Amen."

"Whatever."

"So what have you been up to?"

"Oh the usual; roaming the earth and going back and forth on it; back and forth; back and forth.

"Have you been reading the book?"

"Audio streaming."

"Sounds like fun."

"That's not the term I'd use; believe me."

"Believe you? Now there's a challenge."

"I'll ignore that. So what are you up to?"

"The usual. Creating stuff."

"Sounds boring."

"You should try it."

"I'd rather be crotching sheep."

"So I've heard. And how is that working for you?"

"Better the devil you know."

[to be continued]

Chapter n; n > 6

Chapter n + i; i > 0

So what is the connection between pi being irrational and pigs once being able to fly?

... the following extract from his...

pig flying is irrational
pi is irrational 
pi exists therefore pig flying could exist
ergo: if pi were rational,  pig flying would be also as well too

# GIVENS

pi = pig - g
pig = pi + g

# DERIVED
   2 pi 
 = 2(pig - g) 
 = 2(pi + g) - g) 
 = 2(pig - g^2) 
 
# THEREFORE

pi = pig - g^2 

# AND THUS

  g = g^2 
	
# AND THENCE
	
	g = 0 or 1 or -1 for (R)

# AND HENCEFORTH

oh eureka stockade! pig tails!

# AND FROM THEN ON
 
i talk to the trees. 
that's why they put me away... (illegible)

Chapter n + j; j > i

The original taxonomy was lost long ago.

Deviations from the original are many. Factions, agendas and other human follies all conspire to thwart and mutate the truth. The worst damage was done by the Knights of the Blessed Order of Burning Toast. Although well renowned for their charitable works, their belief system had spun out of control when an ink stain resulted in frog-licking being introduced as a penance for some of the minor sins, in particular A, E and F-sharp minor sins.

Merry times ensued. Many invisible entities were serenaded, and gladly returned the compliment...

Chapter 2n + 3; n > n - 1

When Yikes first turned water into wine, it was really just to liven up the place. The usual melancholy that accompanied the tail end of a three day fast was high, and since water was permitted as a beverage, Yikes believed a derivative would also.

In the reverent carousing that ensued, many came forward to recite verses from the sermon on the precipice, and to rededicate their life savings to the poor. Revelry ensued; angels were sighted and cited; blessings were given; many were healed of diseases they did not know they had; the usual stuff.

It did end rather tragically though. Three days of not eating washed down with holy water wine will do that to you. None survived, bar Yikes. In his case all the wine had seeped out through an incompletely sealed wound in his right side. Yikes received another sainthood for this, and was given permission never to return.

Yikes had been blessed with this skill by virtue of his strong stance against the great evil that had encompassed the abbey. The last straw for Yikes had been the inclusion of dirges with a back beat into the Book of Common Hymns, Prayers and Household Hints, even though the offending tunes were hidden in the Appendix and scribed using an invisible ink. (This was especially difficult since the ink was in an invisible ink bottle as well.)

THE END