like sand in the hourglass…

Now, I’m not naturally paranoid, mind you. Nor am I unnaturally paranoid, but paranoia runs in my family, so, after making sure that my beloved waffles would not burn, I sauntered over to the nearby back door in the rear hallway and opened it, staring out into the murky pre-dawn depths of Suburbia.

There it was. And I thought these things only happened in bad Monty Python Flicks about ancient British folklore. On the lawn was an entire bunch – no, a flock – no, a GAGGLE – no no no – a whole SWARM of cute li’l fuzzy bunnies from HELL!!!

As my senses were swathed simultaneously in the moist dewy morning mist and the warm succulent scent of waffles, I pondered my aching mind on what to do about this situation. Should I allow the flock to stay, like a patch of snow-white cancer, and fester upon my nicely-mowed back lawn? Or should I rid myself of the pests? And if the latter would be my course of action, how would I be rid of them?

I rushed back inside (the slam of the back porch door didn’t even remotely phase the bunnies) and quickly looked up "rabbits" in the index of the "Things To Do When You Wake Up Way Too Early For Work" cookbook. The section referring to those rabid rascals was large and rather complete when it came to perfect cooking preferentials and other topics of discussion, but rather vague concerning how to be rid of them when they’re feeding on GOD KNOWS WHAT in your back lawn. So I came to a logical conclusion. If I could not be rid of them on my own, I would have to call someone who could.

I grabbed the phone and called the number that most speedily came to the fore of my mind. Unfortunately, after finishing the dialing of those disposable digits, I realized that I was not at all aquainted with them. Apparently my brain contained a program for random number generation.

"Hello?" an old voice answered. I stumbled over my own spittle for a moment before I could say anything in return.

"Um, yes, I’m calling in reference to a number of bunnies that have taken up reference in my back yard. You, of course, DO handle these situations, do you not?" I was hoping that the person on the phone could indeed handle these sort of questions. If all else failed, they would hang up on me and I would dial another random number.

"Why, yes, in fact we do," the voice said, cackling with glee. (I was not too happy about the "glee" part. It reminded me of old psychotic father, who was happy far too much of the time. He died laughing . . . or was it because he kept smashing his head in with a vulcanized rubber mallet? The case remained open for years until the cops became tired of us calling every night in case they found more clues.) "Would you like removal instructions over the phone, here, sonny, or would you like us to come and remove them ourselves?"

I blinked, trying to decide. "Umm . . . whichever is easier for you, I suppose." I turned toward the skillet, my mouth watering. Should I receive these instructions over the phone and risk the burning of my wonderful waffles? GOD I hated these stories!

"Well, we’ll try to make this as painless as possible," the voice on the phone said to me. The voice was becoming a bit tinny to my ears, since I was stretching the cord trying to reach the controls for the stovetop. "How many bunnies are there in your back yard?"

Luckily I could still see out the window. "I’m not sure," I replied, "it’s a whole swarm of them, though."

"Ah, a swarm," the voice lamented. "I suppose this will require a number of complex incantations, then."

I froze when I heard those words. What was I dealing with, here, witches on LSD? "No incantations are necessary," I said quickly, "can you give me a simple solution? Like, perhaps, a propane torch and a hairspray can? Or something to that effect?"

"Oh, no, young man," the voice replied, clucking at my apparent ignorance of the situation. "You described these as a SWARM of cute fuzzy bunnies, yes?"

I sighed. How did they know that the bunnies were cute fuzzy ones? Had the witches somehow read the earlier part of the story? DAMN they were good. The voices in my head told me to stay on my guard. "Yes, they are indeed a SWARM. That was my description as I told you a couple of paragraphs ago."

"Then these are no ordinary rabbits! They’ve got a MEAN STREAK A MILE WI-"

I hung up the phone and wandered over to the waffle skillet, turning off the heat and opening the skillet to reveal perfectly formed Belgium waffles. Ah, the feast I would have! Ah, what wondrous flour creations these fluffy delights were.

A knock at the back door made me jump. I sighed once again and trotted over to the short rear hall and turned on the porch light.

And stared at a swarm of oversized bunnies, standing erect on their hind legs, staring up at me with ruby-pink eyeballs, wielding giant toothpicks and tapping lightly on the wood of the door.

"What the hell do YOU want?" I asked.

"Your waffles," they replied calmly. "We smelt them from afar and now we have come to claim them. There is nothing in this world that attracts swarms of cute li’l fuzzy bunnies from HELL – especially those with toothpick lances – than fresh, perfectly formed Belgium waffles."

"Are you Dutch?" I asked.

"No, we’re Hellions."

"Then go away. These are BELGIUM waffles."

"We want the waffles. GIVE US THE WAFFLES!" A number of the shorter bunnies – meaning the ones measuring less than four feet – stuck their toothpicks up at the back door, making me twitch.

I unconsciously slid the bolt into place and stared down at them imperiously, hoping that the puny security locks on my door would hold in place in the event of them charging the house. I live in a pretty uptight conservative portion of Suburbia – you know, the one where the roads are suddenly jam-packed at exactly five p.m. as every father and mother come home from work at exactly the same time. So I was never really worried about the security of my house – until now. But I was prepared to make my final stand. I had my paring knife nearby and that’s all I needed. Unfortunately my aluminum reinforced baseball bat was in the shed which was outside – in the back yard – behind the bunnies.

"You think your puny bolt lock can keep us out," the leader of the bunnies said. He was wearing a giant parka that made him look as if he were wearing a blindingly bright white shag carpet over his fur. "Stand aside or we will be forced to cave in the entryway to your domicile."

"Do they use those big words in Hell?" I asked curiously. I wanted to stall them for as long as possible.

"None of your business. Now open the door – or hand us the waffles, whichever you deem quicker. The quicker, the better, for speed is now on your side. Defy us and we will strip you naked, paint you green, bind you and hang you by the cuticles of your toenails from your basketball hoop."

"You don’t scare me," I said, scoffing at their threat with a shake of my fist. "I had my toenails done yesterday."

"Then pay the price," their leader said.

The three pawn bunnies, so to speak, in front took their wooden lances and, surprisingly, sliced through the door like paper and split it four ways, their cute li’l fuzzy paws rending the pieces (which were very nicely divided, I might add, their handiwork was commendable) from their hinges. Five bunny henchmen grabbed various limbs of my body and carried me against my will up the two steps into my kitchen, where they sat me down in one of the frying pans on the stove. Luckily, I hadn’t used it since yesterday so it wasn’t hot; on the other hand, my jeans were smeared with nasty stir-fry residue. They held me there, pointing their toothpick lances in my face while their parka-laden leader sniffed the waffle skillet.

"A fine specimen of waffle-dom indeed," he said. I smiled in satisfaction but quickly grimaced as one of the bunnies swiped my face with its toothpick. "But, we will not partake of these waffles without knowing of their origins. You never know just what you’re eating these days."

"What?!"

The bunny leader pressed its face up to mine (the leader of the swarm was only about a foot shorter than I was) and stared deep into my eyes. I felt my world fall apart and watched in mix fascination and terror as his pupils dilated and expanded, over and over and over! "The ingredient listing, human. WHAT DID YOU PUT IN OUR WAFFLES!?!"

"In YOUR waffles? These are MINE!"

"Not anymore," one of the pawn bunnies said, reaching for the skillet.

The leader slapped the paw of the pawn, who shrank immediately, whimpering to himself and rubbing his fuzzy paw. "Not yet! Now, then," the leader turned back to me, "the list, if you please."

"You are actually going to quiz me about what I put in the waffles?"

"Indeed! There are certain things that those from Hell are allergic to. They interfere with the functions of our cerebral cortex."

"Whatever," I spat quietly.

"First of all, EGGS," the head bunny hissed.

"What about them?" I asked snidely.

"Did you use any?"

"Well, of course I did," I replied, not knowing what else to say.

"What kind of eggs?"

"What do you mean ‘what kind?’ I used eggs from the grocery store." I couldn’t believe this. Were there vegan bunnies from HELL??

"Were they chicken eggs? Platypus eggs? Pterodactyl eggs? Human eggs? What sort of eggs were these so-called ‘grocery store’ products?"

"Pterodactyl eggs," I replied sarcastically.

"Kill him!"

"No, WAIT! I didn’t mean it! I’m kidding!" My eyes crossed as I watched toothpick points approach far too closely for my comfort. I felt sweat form on every conceivable part of my body. My plastic underwear was really itching now.

"Pterodactyl eggs are a priceless treasure that belong in museums! Do you know how much they’re WORTH? And you used them in WAFFLES!?!?!?!?" the leader screamed shrilly. I gritted my teeth. The bunnies were not all that calm anymore. But then again, neither was I, and I was human – or at least I am in THIS story.

"Well, I thought I’d put them in since I was really making them for you in the first place," I said thinking on my toes, which wasn’t a very easy thing to do since I wasn’t even standing up.

The bunnies hushed at this comment. "You actually made these for us?" one of the bunnies that held me down on the stovetop asked incredulously.

"Why, of course," I answered, feeling more sure of this particular route of deception. Actually, I wasn’t deceiving them, per se, just stretching the truth – a lot – to fit the situation at hand. "Why ELSE do you think I attracted you to this spot? Didn’t you wonder? Didn’t you ever ask yourself WHY? WHY?????"

For the first time, the cute li’l fuzzy bunny leader seemed unsure of itself. It leaned back from me a few inches to consider my words. "I find it hard to believe that a human would be so considerate to anyone but himself."

"I say we eat the waffles and THEN HIM!" one of the pawns said, jumping up and down excitedly.

"Shut up, you little weasel!" I yelled down at him. The toothpicks came very close to piercing my skin. I backed down.

"I like that idea," the bunny leader grinned. It was not a pretty sight, I assure you. "All right, skewer him."

"Should we cook him, boss?" one of my living fuzzy restraints asked.

"Nah . . . raw meat for all," he said, raising his voice in triumph.

A hearty cheer ran through the mass of assembled bunnies and I clenched my teeth preparing for wood splinters to enter my system.

Then I watched in amazement as a very thin, very bright, very blood-stained point shoved its way through the bunny leader’s torso, almost pricking my knee.

And suddenly the air was alive with flailing fur and flying toothpicks and skewered bunny carcasses as a large horse-like creature tossed them about the room, spraying the walls with their inhuman blood and slick innards. I watched, feeling a bit sick to my stomach, and poured syrup on my waffles, forcing down a few bites as I dodged one of the pawns’ feet. I decided that my fate was, for the most part, sealed this morning and it mattered very little what I would do. I might as well enjoy my waffles while I had the chance. They were absolutely perfect – save for the strange aftertaste of rust, most likely due to the bunnyblood that had seeped into their delicious golden flour forms before I covered them in a blanket of syrup. Yum!

When the carnage was over, I found myself sitting on my stove in a skillet full of old Worcestershire sauce and vegetable oil, picking the remains of Belgium waffles out of my teeth with a shard of fuzzy bunny toothpick lance and feeling my pelvic area blister from my hardened underwear. Before me, standing amidst a pool of soaked crimson fur and bunnyblood, was a glistening, huge, majestic unicorn.

We stared at each other for a long time, me staring in wonderment at him, him staring in, what seemed to me to be . . . lust! I finally pulled my gaze from his and glanced around at the fuzzy carnage that surrounded my kitchen. Without a word, I jumped down from the stove with a big squish and spray of bunnyblood and other miscellaneous squashy objects (thankful, too, that my underwear did not cling to the stir-fry skillet I had sat in for so long) and proceeded to gather the remains of the cute li’l fuzzy bunnies from HELL!! In about two hours time I had accumulated enough bunny innards to create an entire new batch of waffles for my unicorn friend and me.

After a nice healthy breakfast with my newfound friend, the unicorn (I had named him Tubboat, I have no idea why), I decided I had better head off to work. I guess it was a damn good thing I woke up three hours early. My boss started bitching about the bloodstains on my clothes as soon as I walked through the door.

"Don’t even start with me," I yelled at him, not stopping as I walked past him. "You really don’t want to know what happened to me this morning."

But the good part about today . . . I finally found the one real remedy for my itchy underwear.

T H E . . E N D

Written by: The Sloth (Peanuts Are Actually The Fossilized Remains Of Salamander Brains)
and Twitch (If I Said Everything I Thought, I Would Never Shut Up)
Revised, Edited and Somewhat Assimilated by: Toshi Yagamanti
With Assistance from: Bob
With Apologies to: Monty Python and Witches on LSD
"Things To Do When You Wake Up Way Too Early For Work" Cookbook available at gitalyf.com
Guest Appearances --
Tubboat played by: My Little Pony
Cute Li'l Fuzzy Bunnies From HELL! played by: Nameless Demons of the Third Level of Hell
"The Cave of Cyre Banog" Scene - Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Any similarity between this story and Monty Python is purely coincidental and unintentional.