Alice Versus the Low-Flow Toilet
by Nikki Little
"Holy Fuck! Alice, what have you done?" Alice was standing in front of me just outside the outdoor shower rooms of her house in Pandemonium. She was hosing herself off.
"Cheshire, how kind of you to pop up to witness my humiliation!" Alice said with a sneer that told me she was in an extremely foul mood. A period brandy foul mood. Alice threw her clothes on the ground and walked into the shower. Most people would go get a towel first, but since Alice can make portals with her mind, she just flashes herself straight from the shower to her bedroom. And drips on the floor. Alice is a wee bit of a slob. The clothes smelled fit only for an incinerator.
I decided to go get myself a nip over at the gnome bar and wait for Alice to show up. I knew she would. About a half an hour later Alice strolled by with a laundry bag to drop off at the gnome laundry. I looked at the bag and at Alice. I had to say something.
"Alice, you're not just going to hand those stinky, disgusting clothes to the ladies at the gnome laundry are you?"
"Of course not, Cheshire. I hosed them off as best I could. They still smell, though. I'll bet the gnomes all make bets on whether or not I fell into another sewage lagoon in North Carolina after a Cheapmart closed up and sold its land to a factory pig farm."
"That was a wee bit of a catastrophe. I always thought that sooner or later your relying on old images for creating portals would create a problem for you when something moved. You can't materialize inside a wall or other solid material, can you?"
"Oh, Cheshire! That only happens in Star Trek. If I try to create a portal inside a solid material, the portal gets bounced out of the way. I have occasionally knocked people over when I came out of a portal, though."
"A rather soft bump, I'm sure," I said as I eyed Alice's hips. Alice looked annoyed, and walked over to the gnome laundry to drop off her stinky load. She came back and walked up to the bar.
"One cherry period brandy and one iced tea," said Alice. Down here, you don't have to specify "unsweetened." Nobody down here, absolutely nobody, puts sugar in iced tea. Alice likes her iced tea straight with four big cubes of ice. No lemon wedge. The bartenders at the gnome bar all know that. Hatter sometimes puts milk and sugar into his hot tea. Very British of him. Alice joined me at the table.
"So, are you going to tell me how you managed to get yourself so soiled?" I asked.
Alice sighed. "The story is bound to come out sooner or later," she said. "I walked into the ladies room at the Half-Price bookstore in Franklinville, and there it was. Washed ashore on dry land in the low-flow toilet. The evil, low-flow toilet. Stinking worse than Loudon Wainwright the Third's dead skunk. A fucking turd! An evil, fucking turd!"
"A fucking turd that wouldn't flush, I presume," I said.
"Oh, I tried," said Alice. "I flushed the fucking thing once, twice, three times…"
"Three times a lady…" I sang. Who did that song, I wonder?
"That fucking turd was no lady! It wouldn't leave. I flushed five times, and it was still there. Smelling. Laughing in my face. Telling me that the lady waiting just outside the door would think I did it. Evil fucking turd!"
"So what did you do?" I asked.
"I tried to get smart. I turned the water faucet on, scooped up some water inside my mouth, and tried to shoot the thing out of place with a stream of water. Wouldn't budge. Evil, fucking, cement turd wouldn't budge!"
"Pity that women aren't equipped with point and shoot like guys. So what was your next try?" I asked.
"I flashed back to Wonderland to get my Jabberwock Eyestaff. I didn't want the lady waiting to think I did it!"
"Oh, no!" I rolled my eyes.
"Just one little shot, I thought," said Alice. "Just a split-second blast from the Eyestaff would vaporize the evil turd, I thought. The turd didn't vaporize. It exploded. All over the ceiling, the walls, the mirror, the door, the floor, me. All over me! Then the toilet exploded even though I had already taken my finger off the trigger. That's why I have some cuts on me. One large chunk of the toilet bowl threw me against the wall. I'm surprised I didn't turn into the Queen of Hearts or Medusa. I decided to just leave. I opened the door and flashed myself out of there."
"So you let the next lady find the mess?"
Alice hung her head. "Yes, I did."
Hatter showed up at the bar. Stuck his pinkie up in the air and asked for hot tea with milk and sugar. "Have you heard the latest on the news?" he asked. There are maybe three AM stations with a signal strong enough to be picked up in Wonderland. "All the wire services are reporting a terrorist attack in a Half-Price bookstore in Franklinville, New Jersey. Somebody blew up the ladies' bathroom with an explosive device."
Alice got up and walked away, shoulders slumped, with her iced tea in her right hand. "Evil fucking turd," I heard her mutter.
"What was that all about?" asked Hatter, with his pinkie stuck up in the air.
The End
This story is based on the characters created by American McGee. EA (Electronic Arts) owns the copyrights. No Half-Price bookstores were harmed in the writing of this story.