Fascists

A handful of fascists fell out of the sky and landed in the city. They were wearing skintight 5-star-general uniforms, and their thick black manes were slicked back across their scalps with state-of-the-art lard they had purchased from a discount store in their native land.

"It's raining fascists!" exclaimed a salesman as bodies hit the sidewalk all around him. He removed an umbrella from his briefcase, opened it over his head and hurriedly skulked away.

The fall knocked the fascists unconscious. They lay there on the sidewalk in contorted, uncomfortable-looking positions for half an hour. Fascinated by the spectacle of their scattered bodies, streetwalkers passed by them slowly, vigilantly, as if they were a car accident.

When they woke up, the fascists removed miniature pink feather dusters from their pockets and cleaned the grit off of each other. They also re-slicked back their hair with fresh doses of lard.

"Right," said the fascist in charge, glancing purposefully at his comrades. "To work, then."

The directive prompted the other fascists to begin twitching uncontrollably, their obsession with order kicking in like a bad acid trip. The twitching quickly subsided, however, and each of them grabbed a random streetwalker by the shoulder, ordering them to get down on their hands and knees. "You are my soap box," they commanded. And the streetwalkers, having nothing better to do than walk the streets, acquiesced without an unreasonable amount of bitching.

The fascists stepped onto the streetwalker's backs. They stood there for a moment in silence, collecting their thoughts and observing the ebb and flow of mortal commerce. Then they opened their mouths and unleashed their dogma.

Their bodies gesticulated. Their fists hammered the air. Their mustaches convulsed as they spat things such as, "Chaos is dead!" and, "This is the end of image-addiction!" and, "I am the power!" and, "Death to the implosion of the social!"

After a while the streetwalkers-cum-soap boxes began to get sore backs. Most of them were reticent to complain about it at first, but eventually they were all sniveling and whining out loud.

Their bodies quivered. Their fingertips dug into the pavement. Their upper lips broke out in mustaches of sweat as they spat things such as, "Pain is my enemy!" and, "This is not very healthy for my spine!" and "I am going to cry!" and "Death to the bastard on top of me!"

A crowd began to gather around this display of verbal pyrotechnics. Initially, the crowd just stared on in dumb wonderment. Then people started flipping quarters at the fascists. A few people tossed sandwiches in their direction.

"We don't want your coins or your lunches!" the fascist in charge screamed. "We want you to flush your ideology down the toilet!"

But nobody heard him clearly enough to mind him. The fascists and the soap boxes were simultaneously hollering at the top of their lungs, and their words collapsed and crashed into one another like stormy ocean waves. Some people had to plug their ears, the clamor was so loud and obnoxious, albeit they continued to shower the spectacle with booty.
 

D. Harlan Wilson has published nearly 100 stories in magazines and anthologies throughout the world. He is also the author of the books, The Kafka Effekt, 4 Ellipses and the soon-to-be-released Stranger on the Loose. Wilson lives in East Lansing, Michigan, where he teaches literature and creative writing at Michigan State University.  Go to D. Harlan Wilson's Web site
 

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