The Chaotic Trial of the Gaffer

“Speak now, for to hold your tongue is to condemn this boy to death. What say you, my constituents? Will you execute the gaffer?” Father Yosemite slowly ran his claw-like titanium fingernails down the gaffer’s cheeks, leaving behind identical deeply etched mazes. Bloody hallmarks of shame.

“The floor is now open for discussion,” he spread his arms wide—a humble man not afraid of discord—then pointed to the focal point of the chamber. A slab of granite retracted to reveal the Open Floor, a natural phenomenon, burping and expelling noxious fumes, around which the Judgement Chamber was constructed.

“Please,” the gaffer begged, his tears winding through twin mazes of coagulating blood as they flowed down his cheeks. “Bid me freedom, my Lord. I can do better. Be a better…” his words trailed off.

An uncomfortable silence hung in the air. To go against Father Yosemite, defending the gaffer’s cause, was to invite the father’s wrath. Waves of dry heat wafted up from the pit, accompanying the noxious fumes, bringing the temperatures in the chamber to unbearable levels, thus reminding the converts of the fate that awaited the gaffer should no one step forward to champion his cause.

“Is there No one?” Father Yosemite impatiently tapped one woven, silk slipper-clad titanium foot.

“Ahem,” broke the tension.

“Someone spoke?” Father Yosemite raised one jewel bedazzled eyebrow, his eyes seeking the source. “Ah, young Andreas. Will you defend the gaffer?”

“Nay. ‘Tis merely a frog in my throat, Father,” San Andreas—the juvenile unfortunately seated in the faulty hot-seat alongside the bellowing maw—fearfully squeaked, as he coughed and gagged, working a frog the size of a kitten from deep within his throat.

“Humpff,” an exhalation of stale air escaped his lips when he birthed the frog, who abruptly hopped over the lip of the maw. Seconds later, a dull thud followed by a sizzle resonated from deep within the pit.

The tension was agonizing as the silence continued and the minutes of the gaffer’s trial ticked by. The gaffer, weakened by the fear brought on by his impending doom, hung limp against his restraints. Tick-tock, tick-tock, echoed from the cogs of the ancient chamber clock. The end of the free-assembly’s trial session drew nigh.

An elderly subordinate suddenly lurched to his feet. The converts gasped and the gaffer lifted his weary head. Alas, a champion for his cause!

“Brother Sequoia, what say you? Will you champion this man?” Father Yosemite’s eyes were livid pools of darkness.

“Nay. A mere Charlie Horse, my Liege. The curse of the aged,” Brother Sequoia managed to loudly enunciate while bending low to massage his bloated calf.

“Arr, it pains me like a thousand stinging bull nettles,” he collapsed, writhing on the floor while the converts watched in slack-jawed awe. Brother Sequoia clutched his pulsating leg as the flesh behind the knee peeled back in a moist squelch. A tiny whiskered muzzle broke through his hamstrings.

“Ye curst creature,” Brother Sequoia cried out in pain. Charlie Horse nickered as he slid out to rest on the hard-pack clay of the floor for a moment before shaking off his birth-sac, to gallop away, neatly sailing over the belching gap, as he made his escape.

It was some time before the exclamations and whispers, over having witnessed such sights as never before seen in free-assembly, died down. The final seconds ticked off and Gongman drew back his mallet to sound the gong, officially ending the trial portion of the Golden Global Free-Assembly.

Before the mallet met with the imposing gong, Old Lady Moonbow arose from her perch. She stared off into space. The gaffer’s face beamed with hope. At long last. One brave enough to face Father Yosemite on the Open Floor.

“Do you want to speak, my dear? The floor is yours,” Father purred, a twitch in his lip giving away his ill intentions.

“Yes, my Savior. There was something,” she tapped her forehead, “Something aflutter. Right here,” tapping hard enough to leave a bright red divot in the center of her forehead, “I. Just. Need. To…,” Old Lady Moonbow clawed at her head, yanking wide swatches of silver hair from her scalp. “I MUST…”

Elder Moonbow came to her rescue, standing tall before the blazing eyes of Father Yosemite. “Forgive my wife’s outburst, my Lord. She is plagued by a chronic case of Bats in the Belfry. They come on quite suddenly. Might I calm her?” Elder Moonbow took his shrieking wife by the elbow—tiny, winged creatures streaming from both of her ears—and led her to the padded room to collect herself.

Gongman struck the gong, and the trial portion of the free-assembly came to an end. The gaffer, resigned to his fate, bowed his head. The freed bats flew wide circles around the cavernous chamber, daring to swoop very close to Father Yosemite’s titanium skull covered by an elaborate crimson turban and billowing white beard coated with strands of the finest seed pearls.

“Why, I oughta,” he roared the bygone meek profanity, oft used by a legendary descendent in his ancestral clan, shaking his titanium fists at the flying rat-like beasts. He would see to it that this abominable species was abolished from Desertland Proper, heretofore.

He cradled his arms, shielding his head from the floundering bats as he approached the dais, in close proximity to the sagging gaffer. He set the Golden Script on the podium’s slanted platform before clearing his throat to speak—again to use the old tongue. To allow the historic dialect of their clans’ predecessors, those born of the mystical land known as Hollywood, to grace his lips. Father Yosemite managed to perfect the idiosyncrasies of the ancient-speak through his rigorous study of the Reels entombed within the ruins of the Film Archives located in Great Touchstone Hall.

He lovingly gazed down at the script with stars in his eyes. He hoped he could do justice to this immortal soliloquy, born of the Forefathers. Upon completion of The Reading of the Scriptures, he would pass judgement upon the gaffer. He softly cleared his throat.

“Goooood Morning, Vietnaaaam…” he began with reverence.