The Spark. IFC S2R5

Welcome to Round 5 of Season 2 in the Information Finding Championship. In this weeks round our dear friend @apolymask has thrown down the gauntlet once again. The challenge you say? I won't even try to explain it myself so you'll just have to check out his post Choose Your Own Adventure.

I was so excited when I saw the title (I used to love those Choose Your Own Adventure books) but then when I read the topics to choose from I immediately thought...

That's it. There is nothing after the ellipsis (ellipsi if you're French) because that is what went through my head, NOTHING!

Luckily for me though something happened the same night the challenge post came out. I'll just go ahead and tell it like it happened.

Chapter 1

It had been two days since I had met the old man. He approached me at a Jedi booth at a Star Wars convention I had attended at my cousins behest. My cousin Jake and his girlfriend were on bad terms lately and he had an extra ticket. I sighed internally and agreed to go but there was no way in hell that I would be dressing up like Jabba The Hut or any other such shit. Cosplay, or whatever they call it is not my thing. I remember the Star Wars movies from the 80's and have even seen 2 of the last 3 or 5 or how ever many more of those damn films they've made. I was definitely a fan back in the 80's so thought it would be cool but I will never consider myself a "Trekkie", or is that from something else? Hmmmmm?

Anyway, this kindly old man approaches me and tells me I don't look like I belong there. I tell him to back the hell off because I'm married and am not into any kinky old guy shit. He just laughs, extends his hand to me and says "My name is D'Roth." I repeat his name, D. Roth? What does the D stand for? Dave? As in David Lee Roth? No, he laughs again, that is my name, all one word D'Roth and then he spells it out for me. He goes on to tell me that he is part of the Ancient Order of D'jedhi (he spells that out for me too after I look over at the Jedi booth and back to him like he is bat-shit crazy).

Amused, I let him lead me away from the Jedi booth. This isn't the first crazy old guy I've dealt with in my life and I have plenty of time to kill since my cousin Jake is off somewhere trying to hook up with the first Princess Leia that will have him. We sit at a wiggly old high top table in a dark corner of the bar at the convention center. D'Roth bought me a drink and started making small talk until my Roy Rogers finally arrived. Then he looked at me with an intense stare and said "You have it, you know?" I started to protest, I hadn't taken anything, I didn't know what the hell he was talking about. He noticed the startled look on my face and laughed. Again with that laugh. No, no he said, the spark, you have the spark!

We sat and talked for hours, or should I say he talked and I listened. He spoke of ancient things, of the building of the pyramids, of the Illuminati (he said he was a long standing member), of Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster and many other things. I was fascinated with this old guy. He seemed rather harmless but certainly off his rocker. I heard my name called and I turned to see Jake heading in our direction with an easily seven foot hairy behemoth walking beside him. In his failure to nail down a fling with the Princess of Andora he had apparently settled for an evening with Chewbacca instead. That's interesting, I never knew that about my cousin Jake before. I turned back to the old man but he was gone. On the table in front of me was a note that said "I will see you in two days, signed D'Roth."

Jake and Chewy dropped me off at my apartment around 1:45 a.m. and drove off to God knows where, and I was not about to ask. I slipped out of my clothes and drew myself a hot bath then retired for the night. What a weird night!

That was two days ago and the strange series of events had not crossed my mind until just a few moments ago. I was sitting in the kitchen eating a bowl of Campbells Alphabet Soup when I saw the words “D'Roth at noon”, arranged perfectly in my bowl. I jumped up out of my chair in confusion and shock. I looked at the clock and saw that it was 11:59 a.m. I just knew that I would lose my shit if right at noon... knock, knock. There it was, a real knock at the door. I literally just lost my shit.

I slowly walked over to the door and opened it and sure enough, there he was, D'Roth standing at my door. Wha.. Who.. Whe... I stammered. "It's ok Joseph" he said as he walked into my apartment and closed the door. I did say that I would see you in two days, and I tend to keep my promises. I have talked with my brothers and sisters and they as well as myself would like to offer you an invitation into our fold. I never gave the old man my address and now that I think about it I never even gave him my name. The losing of my shit just kept getting more intense and I yelled at D'Roth "Get your Dionne Warwick psychic spewing ass out of my apartment now you crazy coot!" He just looked at me with a twinkle in his eye and gave me a kind smile. I relaxed immediately. Oh great, He just pulled some D'jedhi mind shit on me.

Listen to me Joseph, he said, just give us a chance. We could use another one like yourself with The Spark (This time he said it with capital letters, and I heard it like that too). There are no strings attached, if you don't want to become a brother, just say the word and you'll not hear from me again. Although I ask you to remember the things I spoke of the other night. All of those and more you will learn as a member of The Brotherhood. It took me no time to respond, "OK, I'm in, what's the next step? When do we get started?" I couldn't let the opportunity slip, I was finally going to learn just what the fuck a Chupacabra really was. His smile lit up the entire room as he said "Good, we start tomorrow."

Chapter 2

I poured myself a cup of coffee as I pondered this most recent string of events. After asking D'Roth what the training would consist of he had simply told me to meet him in the morning in Salisbury, England. I looked at him and asked how he expected me to get there on such short notice. He just winked and said he would make the arrangements and then bid me farewell and walked right out of my apartment. What had I just gotten myself into? I looked over to the sink at my half eaten bowl of Alphabet Soup, man I hate Alphabet Soup right now.

Sleep didn't come easy to me that night but when it did, it came fast and hard. I awoke the next morning feeling refreshed and just a bit colder than normal. I was tucked into my sleeping bag all nice and cozy and had to wriggle my arms free to get to the zipper. Have you ever heard the sound of brakes screeching when someone tries to stop 10 feet past the point they've already past? That's the exact sound I heard in my head as I realized "I WAS IN A FUCKING SLEEPING BAG!" Then I took note of my surroundings and saw that I also happened to be in a tent, which kinda makes sense considering I was in a sleeping bag. The big problem here was that I didn't go to sleep last night in either a tent or a sleeping bag.

I hurriedly unzipped the flap to the tent and came out onto a grassy hillock where three men were standing. Each of them wore a tight white trench-coat with black pants underneath. The one in the middle was wearing a pair of black and white Chuck Taylors and I recognized him immediately as D'Roth. I noticed that they were all looking at the ground and as I approached D'Roth looked up and said "Ah Joseph, welcome. I hope you find yourself well rested. I'd like you to meet A'Rose and S'Bach." The remaining two men looked at me with warm smiles and each extended a hand. D'Roth then motioned to our surroundings and all three men chorused "Welcome to Stonehenge!" I looked around expectantly and in complete confusion. This was just a large grassy field, no stones, no henge, nothing. D'Roth laughed (He likes to laugh and it's usually at my expense) and pointed to the ground "Now we will show you how Stonehenge was built."

I looked down and saw a bunch of rocks, nay, pebbles strewn about in what I expected was an exact replica of Stonehenge. I felt like I had just stepped into the movie This Is Spinal Tap.

image courtesy of PublicDomainPictures.net

The rocks were even sitting on their own little piece of sod. D'Roth must have understood the mental process I was going through for he said "The sod will grow with the stones to keep them all in place". "We are going to teach you The Growth Process..."

---

I got back from my "Growth Process" training just in time to complete this post. Tomorrow I'm going to find out what happened the nose of the Sphinx.

BONUS MATERIAL.

Courtesy of Snagamir on Youtube.com

This Is Spinal Tap - Stonehenge