FUNKY TRANSITION MUSIC

"Steph" Conrad asked, eating Craig's sandwich as he walked into the meeting room. "Did you set us up for any meetings after lunch?"

Stephanie, who was sat at the meeting room table eating Craig's pudding cup, wiped their mouth off with a loving note of encouragement from Craig's girlfriend and looked at Conrad confusedly. "Unless there's an emergency, I write off every Wednesday afternoon to huff glue in my office and cry. You know that, Conrad."

"No, I do! I do." Conrad acknowledged. "But I was on my way back from the lunchroom, and Doris stopped me. Apparently, there's someone here to meet us."

"Is it one of our drug dealers?" Stephanie asked.

"No."

"Is it one of our other drug dealers?"

"No."

"Then fuck off." Stephanie said, taking Craig's note-now smeared beyond legibility- folding it into a paper airplane, and throwing it into the air vents that Craig was ordered to spend his lunch break counting the rat droppings inside.

"I said the same thing, but Doris seemed oddly insistent. She said he had this box to give to us."

Stephanie groaned dejectedly as Conrad sat in the chair directly beside them and opened the box. Inside was a portable 8-Track player and two envelopes. One said "give this one to Stephanie first." And the second one said "Conrad, press play on the 8-Track player, then read this aloud."

Stephanie opened the first envelope. Inside was a stretchy, off-market mini boglin whose unfortunate iridescent white colouring made it look like it was made of cum. With it was a note that said 'For your adhd. Fiddle with this while Conrad reads the letter.'

Gleefully, Stephanie removed the spunkboglin from its protective packaging and began joyfully yet absent-mindedly fiddling with it as the note offered, nay predicted.

With Stephanie's lingering presence in the meeting room secured for at least the next few minutes, Conrad pressed play of the 8-Track player and opened the letter. The speaker sputtered to life, and Freak Out by Chainmale faded in.

"Jonathan Holmes was on Road Rules: Northern Trail in 1998." Conrad read with an odd sense of familiarity. "Since then, he has appeared in precisely zero award winning TV shows, blockbuster movies, or community theatre plays. He is here to fix that. You are going to make Jonathan off Road Rules a star. Boston's favourite son will ride again..."

"What was Road Rules, again?" Stephanie asked, barely parting their focus from the spunkboglin.

"I don't know, but it sounds insipid." Conrad commented.

"Well, that's very interesting. Do you want to tell Doris to send the guy off, or shall I yell it from my office?"

"Actually, Steph, I think you might want to make room in your schedule for this. Look at the signatures."

Conrad presented the letter to Stephanie. What They had planned to be a half-assed glance became a full, lasting stare. Their face showed the particular mix of confusion and dread that they usually only made reading communiques from the senior partners.

Closing their eyes and sighing, Stephanie handed the letter back to Conrad. "I'm too fucking sober for this. Alright, let's meet this guy."

A minute later, Jonathan Holmes walked into the office. He looked like if Joe Rogan was as successful as he actually deserved to be. He wore a tshirt and jeans of the exact quality you would wear when you weren't expecting to meet anyone you recognize today. As he looked upon Conrad and Stephanie, his face made a look of confusion, then joy, then confusion again.

"Oh, hi you guys!" Jonathan said with what many would call and endearingly nonthreatening tone of voice. "I didn't know you were both going to be in Boston! No wonder you were so insistent that I take the time to come here."

Conrad and Stephanie, neither of whom had left Boston in years except for occasional boat trips to international waters, looked at Jonathan, failing at coming up with appropriate responses that wouldn't implicate them in any crimes against logic or humanity.

"So, what's the deal with the office?" Jonathan asked, looking around. "We could've met at my place if you didn't just want to go to a restaurant, or something. This seems like it would be an expensive building to rent in... We aren't trespassing, are we?"

"No, we aren't." Stephanie assured him. "Please, sit down."

Jonathan Holmes sat down across from Conrad and Stephanie. Stephanie struggled to explain it, be the longer they beheld Jonathan, the more potently Stephanie felt an attraction. Within seconds, that sense of attraction had swelled into a hot, zesty force of sticky, cumbersome lust. The kind of steamy, pheromone-heavy yearning that forced their mind to imagine Jonathan and themself bared together in all of the dirtiest poses, their various extremities shakily and repeatedly manifesting withinst each other in an invasive performance of all the nastiest interactions that the mortal flesh could learn to withstand.

"You okay, Steph?" Conrad asked.

"I'm fine!" Steph exclaimed, sweating like a nervous person in a Leslie Nielson film. The patted themself dry as best they could manage with a liberal handful of tissues. This was not a passion they had ever felt sober. They needed to repress it, lest their judgement slip and they let loose an inappropriate comment. Fistshark HR's death squads were swift and relentless, and spared none but the senior partners themselves.

"So, tell me Jonathan, are you circumcised?" Stephanie blurted.

"Oh!" Jonathan exclaimed, not that he expected anything less. "Um,"

"I think we all misheard Steph." Conrad interjected, trying very hard not to acknowledge the ghostly, unblinking stare of the HR scout that peered into the room just then. "What they said was, tell us about your work background."

"Are we doing like, a blank slate thing?" Jonathan asked. "I'm confused. We've known each other for years, but you actually seem like you don't know who I am."

"I need to go to the bathroom!" Stephanie yelled, finally unable to bear the sexy potency of Jonathan's confusion. "I have to have a... kidney stone."

As Stephanie rushed into the washroom nearest the meeting hall, the entire floor of the building tried very hard to not hear the visceral, shakily enunciated dirty phrases Stephanie was shouting, Nor the palpably percussive moist slapping noises that accompanied them.

"Look, Jonathan." Conrad said, closing the meeting room door. "This whole situation seems strange. I get it. Frankly I don't even want to try and explain it. The easiest and safest thing I can suggest is if you pretend you have no idea who we are."

"Oh, okay." Jonathan said, still confused, but understanding.

In what scholars of the leakier organs would call 'concerningly impressive speed', Stephanie had returned to the meeting room just seconds later. Their face was beet red, their posture was lax, and their clothes and makeup had been completely changed and reapplied. "You have no idea how much I needed that... kidney stone."

"So, Jonathan." Conrad started, opening the typical paperwork for new clientele. "The last major production you were in was Road Rules Northern Trail in 1999, correct?"

"ninety-eight, actually." Jonathan politely corrected.

"No worries, no worries." Conrad said. "You already have better prospects than Edward Furlong, and we still managed to get him a music career in Japan. What else have you done?"

"Well, I was a writer and editor for a gaming magazine." Jonathan elaborated. "And I run a podcast called 'Talking to Women About Video Games'. At the moment, I'm trying to find a new job that will pay the bills. Hopefully more than that, but... you know."

"Alright, very good." Conrad said, checking off the 'does the client already have a podcast?' question, and patiently waiting for him to finish. "Wait, is that it?"

"Um, yeah. Pretty much." Jonathan said. "There is one other podcast, but I'm less of a host and more of a mascot for that."

"Oh dear." Stephanie commented.

"Honestly, I'm pretty proud of most of what I've done." Jonathan said with a humble optimism that was starting to make Stephanie lustfully sweat again. "I've... moved on from my previous job. I'm currently hoping to find some work-preferably in Boston- that will let me pay the bills but still spend time with my family. I think that's why my friends sent me here to you guys."

Conrad nodded. "So, how fast would you like to find work?"

"As soon as possible, I guess." Jonathan answered.

"Alright then. Steph." Conrad turned to Stephanie with gravitas. "I think we need the Kilmer list."

"I agree." Stephanie said, getting up and moving towards the end of the meeting room where the ruby-eyed obsidian monolith honoring the Senior Partners loomed.

"The what?" Jonathan asked.

"The Kilmer list contains all the jobs and opportunities we save for when all hope is lost, or when we need results fast." Conrad said reverently. "You could put Amber Heard, Jussie Smollett, and Bill Cosby together into the teleporter from The Fly, and the gruesome mass that comes out the other side will still be able to use the Kilmer list to become the most famous person on Bluesky. You do have Bluesky, right?"

"No," Jonathan answered. "I have a decent following on Twitter."

"Remind me to get you an invite code before you leave. You can actually get followed by people on bluesky and reasonably assume they aren't bots."

In the counter below the obelisk was a fireproof safe which could only be opened with a pint of a fistshark executives blood, or the key Doris keeps in her junk drawer. From it, Stephanie removed a plain beige folder with a ketchup stain half-hiding the word 'Kilmer' written on the front in black sharpie. With the same careful, sweaty reverence that Donald Trump would demonstrate with convincing nudes of Ivanka Trump, they set the folder between their seat and Conrad's.

"Alright." Stephanie explained. "What we're going to do is give you the gist of each opportunity, and you tell us whether that sounds up your alley. Say no and we'll move on, but if you like something well set it aside and come back later. It'll be like Tinder, for schemes."

"Um, okay!" Jonathan said. "Fire away."

"Alrighty." Stephanie opened the folder. "Jonathan, what are your thoughts on becoming a mass shooter?"

"What? No!" Jonathan said with surprise and disgust. "Absolutely not! Why?"

"Anti-heroes are big money right now." Conrad explained. "It stands to reason that anti-celebrities will also be big money. Just look at George Zimmerman's success on the public speaker circuit!"

"That was you guys?" Jonathan asked, horrified.

"Oh, ho ho, I wish!" Stephanie laughed. "Some lucky firm in Texas got to him first."

"We've been trying to recruit a mass shooter for this experiment for a while." Conrad continued. "Unfortunately, they always either kill the recruiter or themselves before we could do anything with them."

"We should send Craig on one of those jobs." Stephanie wondered aloud.

"Sorry, but no." Jonathan said. "I hate guns. I hate the idea of using guns, especially on people!"

"No worries." Stephanie said, putting the first page in the 'no' pile. "Next... Jonathan, how comfortable are you with being nude in front of hundreds-if not thousands- of people?"

"I'm not even comfortable being nude in front of a mirror." Jonathan answered.

"Okay..." Stephanie said, skipping that page. And the next page. And several after that. Stephanie ultimately filtered out seventy percent of the Kilmer checklist. "Are you sure?"

"I'm quite positive." Jonathan rebuffed.

"It's just that there are myriad options that can get you reasonably famous and/or infamous if you're willing to get nude in front of large groups of people." Stephanie suggested.

"They're quite lucrative, especially depending on what fluids you're willing to get dipped or slathered in." Conrad added.

"I think my friends I'm in a podcast with have come up with have come up with every possible scenario I could be nude in." Jonathan said, suddenly worried he just tempted fate."

"Oh, I can't believe that." Stephanie said.

"Have you been suggested this one?" Conrad pulled one of the sheets of work they had actually signed Val Kilmer on for. "Val Kilmer produced a one-man-play adaptation of The Human Centipede at the Boston Fringe Festival last year. Val Kilmer will apparently be occupied for a while. You could produce the sequel if you can crawl fast enough."

"No, I..." Jonathan paused as his brain warped itself slightly trying to process that mental image. "How would that even work?"

"Well, there's a lot of shitting on your own face involved." Stephanie explained. "You're basically guaranteed a monopoly of the attention and adoration of Bostonian scatophiles!"

"Is... is that a large market?" Jonathan asked nervously.

"Not epecially." Stephanie asked. "But they're both willing to pay a lot of money for tickets."

"Sixty dollars a ticket last year!" Conrad added. "And we can easily double that to account for inflation."

"I'll pass." Jonathan said politely but firmly.

"Okay." Stephanie said, disappointed. "Jonathan! Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have your skeleton… outside of your body?"

"Not... especially?"

"Kevin Smith is looking for a lead for the sequel to his critically acclaimed blockbuster hit, Tusk."

"That's... the one where someone was surgically turned into a walrus, right?" Jonathan asked.

"Yep! The working title for the sequel is called 'mandible'." Conrad explained. "It's an erotic gorefest that films your brave journey surgically transforming into a lobster!"

"The first draft was meant to be a biopic about a trans teenager," Stephanie said. "But it turns out most of Kevin Smith's target audience relate more with nightmarish crimes against man and nature, so here we are."

"Would I have to be nude for this, too?" Jonathan guessed.

"Only for a little bit!" Stephanie offered. "Once the surgeries move your bones outside of your body, the 'chitin' and scab tissue will hide any of your private human bits."

"Wait, so I'd be actually surgically turned into a lobster?" Jonathan asked, unsure whether he should laugh or gag.

"Of course!" Stephanie said. "A big part of the profits will involve setting up the 0nlyfans after production."

"You also get to keep the lobster enclosure set for yourself!" Conrad said, sweetening the deal. "Kevin added that little bonus after the fifth year without any auditions."

"Why would I possibly want to turn into a human lobster-a werelobster I guess- to start an 0nlyfans?" Jonathan laughed nervously.

"Look at the market for smut, Jonathan." Stephanie posed. "It's so easy to find naked humanoids online. But crustacean fetishists are an underserved demographic!"

"You'd have a guaranteed stranglehold of the demographic of people that have been banned from Red Lobster and aquariums for masturbating into the tanks!" Conrad added.

"There can't possibly be that many people who've done that." Jonathan guessed.

"You would be surprised." Stephanie answered. "Want me to set up a meeting with Kevin Smith and the disgraced surgeons we've already signed on?"

"Hard pass."

Stephanie and Conrad looked down at the depleted file.

"I don't think the Kilmer List was meant to be suggested for anyone with dignity." Stephanie said solemnly.

"That isn't something we really factor in to dealing with Kilmer, no." Conrad agreed.

As they began to conjure more outlandish, legally grey, or morally bankrupt jobs to set up for Jonathan Holmes, a melodic echoed through the meeting room.

It was the Road Rules: Northern Trail season 2 theme song.

"Oh, that's me, sorry." Jonathan answered the phone. "Hello? Speaking. Yes? Yes. No. Really? How much? Wow. Really? Yes! Okay, thank you, talk to you soon."

"Everything alright?" Conrad asked.

"More than alright!" Jonathan beamed. "Another prominent tech journalism website had it's writing staff gutted by their out-of-touch parent company. The workers are all starting a new website together called 'Fuck Our Previous Employers', and they want me to be their editor in chief! Thanks for your help... 'kind strangers', but I have to go!"

And with that, Jonathan off Road Rules happily pranced fromst the meeting room.

"I want to choke on that man..." Stephanie said daydreamily. After a moment, their disposition gave way to sadness. "Conrad, are we losing our edge?"

"What, no!" Conrad said, almost surprised. "How rare is it to find someone with dignity and standards in our line of work? That was an outlier among outliers."

"I guess." Stephanie said gloomily. "Still, I feel bummed out about it."

"That's okay." Conrad comforted. "You want to go make Craig try and recruit an active shooter?"

"I do."

Funky Outro Music

"Fistshark Marketing is Stephanie Sterling, and Conrad Zimmerman. This was a piece of independent fiction. Complaints can be forwarded to Buster Manwomb's lawyer, Guy Incognito, who has no address or contact information, but can be found at the rear booth of your nearest Eatza Pizza, or by pissing six feet in the air straight up and not getting wet.

And remember, perpetual growth isn't just a myth. It's the capitalists mission statement.

Good-bye."

THE END