QB
Staff of QB
NO GUTS NO GORY: MACABRE QUEST TUTORIAL
ANTHEA JONES
You spawn upon a grassy rise.
Pink-fingered dusk creeps across the sky. Ahead, a cobbled path stretches towards the horizon. On three sides, the Dreadwoods scream your name. What do you do?
>> Follow the path
Are you serious? You bought a game called ‘No Guts No Gory’ and you're taking the path? Sheesh. Try again.
>> Inspect Dreadwoods
The Dreadwoods take their name seriously. You observe the twisted toothy branches, strung up skeletons and rivulets of blood-red sap. A gaping chasm opens in the pit of your stomach. You pat your abdomen and your hand slips straight inside! Your intestines wrap round your wrist in squelching knots and your liver pulses in your fingertips.
>> Pull out hand
Relax! It was a mirage. Now get your ass in there.
>> Enter Dreadwoods
You take charge of your destiny and stride towards the Dreadwoods. You're no chickenshit. As you enter, the last rays of sunlight fade and you glory in the opportunity to breach the cusp in full darkness. Your foot brushes a tendon trip-wire and a pile of bones drops from above, gifting you a macabre wig of carpals and metacarpals. What do you do?
>> Rip off bone wig. Dance like a madman and give thanks for this magnificent gift.
Well, Hallelujah. That completes the tutorial. What did you learn?
>> Go with it
Yep. Trust your instincts are against the nature of this game, and do the opposite.
Ready to play for keeps?
Results may vary
IAN STEWART
“Hang on!” I shouted. Joey was still in the other room and making an absolute mess of it. I winced as something shattered.
My fingers stuck to the pages of the user guide and I had to pry them off as I flipped through, leaving behind smudgy fingerprints. It wasn’t my blood, but that didn’t make me feel much better.
“‘Welcome to your new life of adventure,’” I read aloud. “‘Getting Started, Lunar Calendars, Jewelry to Avoid…’” I heard Joey scream, inhuman and not a bit reassuring. “Yeah, I hear you buddy—ah! Found it! ‘Troubleshooting: We hope you are satisfied.” Another crash shook the walls. It sounded like a door falling off its hinges. “‘However, shapeshifting can be unsettling and results may vary. If you are unsatisfied with your decision, you have options.’ Great! Hear that, Joey? Options!”
Something crashed down the hallway, slamming from wall to wall like the world’s scariest game of Pong.
“‘You may consider relocating to a planet with a different or smaller moon.’ What?” I flipped to the last page, which was blank aside from the company’s mocking, toothy logo. “Well. That’s not helpful at all.” Something heavy slammed against the door. “Wait wait wait—there’s a number! It says to call if we’re still unsatisfied. We’re unsatisfied, right?” Another sickening thud and a splintered crack. “Let’s call.” The door exploded inward, replaced with a grotesque mass of bloodied fur and sharp ends. “Hey Joey,” I whimpered. “Haven’t seen my phone, have you?”
Spiders in continuous wind
DS MAOLALAI
like a rotating crane
towers over a
foundation pit.
you ever think
you can all the way
finish? I know,
man, I know
that you can't, but
then sometimes
I wish it: that we could
just build and be
done, having built it;
not maintain
for the rest of our
stink-fucking
parasite
lives.
Living like a trickster inside the trick
RIKKI SANTER
A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation.
— James Freeman Clarke (1810-1888)
Here is a complete, practical mental routine for the performer.
It requires a minimum of props and preparation.
The objects used may be carried in a small briefcase.
The tempo will mount as the action progresses.
The first feat will catch your spectators immediately.
Your last move will end on a dramatic high note.
You must practice until your performance is letter perfect in every detail as if it were second nature.
In order to fully invisibilize / first unlearn your story / Obsessional tendencies required / Now we see it / Now we don’t / Rifle through your glossary of / duck duck roll / Master countable ways / to orbit / to break the band / to barge through the screens / Sleight of hand / palm face cards / of wealth & whiteness / Nail nick / your sound bites Plunge daggers / into rag dolls / Look down / your nose / under velvet blindfolds / Command samples / of skins / to vanish / in your petrie dish / Shuffle whispering Jokers / Nurture top hat skills / of super psychometry / for divining facts / from cyborgs / Caress soft thighs / of social media / your lovely assistant / Giddy with abracadabra thrall / double down / way past / the far / as you / will go.
Everything will depend on your abilities as performer
for the Impresario who will build these feats to miraculous proportions
in the center ring of this once upon a nation.
Psychoanalysis versus Poetry
JOHN GREY
I’ve never been
psychoanalyzed.
At least, not by experts.
Can’t afford it.
But readers,
that’s a different story.
One once said I was
an alienated but feeling soul,
haunted and humble,
with an exposed and vulnerable
feminine side
and an ingrained access
to the creative unconscious.
He bought my book.
He paid me.
Odd
DAVID M. BRADDOCK
‘Odd,’ he thought, as the particle disintegrator split his body into a million atoms and spread them irretrievable across the known universe…
Ratter
MAR OVSHEID
Clearing my mind reveals a dirty floor full of holes. Some old dog still lives in the basement and keeps the rats out.
“I should put you down,” I tell the animal, “doubt you’re catching rats, anymore.”
“You see any?” It asks. “You’re ungrateful as ever.” It chews an old shoe. “You could retire me upstairs. Let me enjoy the sun.”
Broken pillars of light project through the cracks above.
“You’ll wreck the place,” I shake my head, “and I haven’t found your replacement.”
The dog hacks up a shoelace.
“Real valuable landscape you’ve got, with your piles of trash and peeling walls.” I stomp a foot. The dog growls and bares it teeth.
“Rats might improve the place,” it laughs.
I leave my maze and return to half-hectic existence. Headaches start coming on.
“Shit’s probably falling back onto the floor,” I figure, without stopping to investigate. Sleep heals for a while. “Quit chasing your tail,” I yell to the ratter. It doesn’t reply. The knives don’t take long to return and two gnawing spots behind my eyes force me into a dark room. Wine makes the situation worse and I drop into my head.
Everything is knocked over and chewed through, magazines are sawdust, photos reduced to colorful ribbons. I descend to the basement to find the dog. It’s gone, replaced by a churning mass of rats. Luckily, before they can eat me, the floor caves in and my mind gives out completely.
Fear Nothing
STEVE CALVERT
Samuel Oliver Sullivan was a most unusual man, who diligently followed the concept of taking the bull by the horns.
Since his childhood, Samuel suffered from an innate fear of spiders. They terrified him; so, when he was just 16 years old, he bought his first tarantula. For the next three years, Samuel’s daily routine included precisely 10 minutes of “spider time”, in which he sat with his hands over his lap and watched the spider walk from one hand to the other.
Heights were another thing that terrified Samuel, so, when he was 20, he took a job with a scaffolding company. The first week was the hardest, but sheer determination and force of will got him through, and it was not long before he was climbing the scaffolding like an expert and had earned himself the nickname Monkey Boy.
Of all his phobias, Samuel the Monkey Boy Sullivan considered his fear of water to be the most ridiculous. Again, he took the bull by the horns, and, by the time he was 21, he had amassed an impressive collection of swimming medals.
When he was 24, Samuel killed himself.