Government Postcards

We’ve been wondering where she was. Reani forwarded this government-issued health alert — by mail, no less! Seems she’s been wandering about the desert, not having much luck finding healthy people — or any people at all, for that matter. Still being the little minx, I see, framing her name with flower stickers (amaryllis?), and using a band-aid for a stamp.

government postcards
to increase awareness
too little
.                               too late

Can’t imagine the recipients paid much attention to this card. An egregious waste of money – mailing an alert. Using paper and prepaid postage. Delivered by mail carriers. On foot or in dinky little vans. By the time these postcards reached outlying towns, their inhabitants were already fighting the plague. Folks did all have access to the internet, television, and radio, after all. And frantic phone calls from their friends and relatives in metropolitan areas.

Government mandated efficiency! We here at the Undertake are grateful, everyday, that we are a private institution.

Pandora’s Bookshelf

Looks like our girl has been catching up on her reading. Pandora’s is famous, regionally, as the go-to source for books on magik, alternative histories, and definitive guides to omen interpretation, among other things. As the postcard below claims, they are the place “For all books obscure * Arcane * or Out-of-Print * For all your Et Ceteras.”  Not that I would know anything about that.  Ahem.

internet can’t touch
the feel of old books
in curious hands

Spell-casters, dream-weavers, fortune-tellers — they all pass through Pandora’s at some time — if they’re serious about their craft. Books and peripherals aren’t cheap, but if the student is determined (and talented), then they will earn back their investment in no time. Or so I have been told.

Not a magic shop, exactly — certainly not the sort of magic shop that existed before the Apocalypse: no cheap tricks, no tutorials for sleight-of-hand nonsense, no cheesy robes and conical, comical wizard hats — more like a community resource. If your community is knee-deep in ghoulies and ghosties.

And who doesn’t like a charm against the invisible agents of doom? A sweet, heady potion to heal a broken heart? A hit of echinacea to ward off a cold? An antibiotic to fight an infection? A prayer against things that go bump in the night?

A Museum of the Curious and Creepy

Another week, another postcard from ReAni. Looks like she’s been catching up on her intellectual pursuits. I plan on visiting this “museum” myself when I next get some time off.  Professor Arturo is an old colleague of mine; glad to see he’s finally opened up his private collection for the edification of the masses. For a fee, of course.

Mystery and History

Wire, rumor, and bone.
The old myths
hold together.

Again, where does she find these stamps? Though I think the good Professor probably gave this one to her, himself. He always was a sucker for a pretty face, real or reanimated.

Looks like she’s figured out — or heard through the grapevine — that she’s got a new overseer. And she signed her name like a flirty teenaged girl, plastering a heart sticker by her name. Wonder what she’s got up her sleeve.

Dracula, Sangria, and Tres Corazones

New note from ReAni, this one sent from close to our southern-most border. Rough terrain, rough towns, rough folks. But our girl knows how to take care of herself, so no worries. A movie-monster vampire, a tasty “blood” drink, and three graphic hearts. What to make of all this? We here at the Undertake have our suspicions. We will be sending a team down to investigate.

vagabond vatos
mixed with cactus fruit
special recipe sangria

(I had to correct her spelling — I can’t help myself!) Cute stamp, ReAni. Amazed the mail took it, it’s so old. Postage hasn’t been that cheap since I was, well, younger and smaller. Better than no postage at all. I suppose she’s happy, or in a happy place — note emoticon after her signature. Must be nice.

Postcards from the Apocalypse

Almost a year has passed with no word from our reanimated girl. Until this morning, that is. This came in today’s mail — amazing, when you think about it, that we even have mail service anymore. What with budget cuts and bankruptcies before the plague, and then with the almost absolute anarchy after — well, it’s curious what remains after such purifying fires.

We’d just about written her off — most assumed she’d either gone to the dark side, or — or who could guess what. Got work in a traveling carnival (fortune teller/freak show circuit), became a rich man’s toy, hid in the woods. Any, all of the above.

But now this, in her own handwriting, too.

ripe tender moist
desperate people devour
the flowers of spring

A bloody thumbprint in place of a stamp is quite the artistic statement, don’t you think? Funny the postal service accepted it. But ReAni has a way — of getting her way.

Oh, and my name’s Kata. I’m the new boss.

ReAni’s Been Away

Been in traction, more like it. Lots of tests and doctor’s appointments. Some surgeries. Mostly, just getting herself tidied up. Broke up with Rudy; this time for good. Now she’s taking more time off, for a well-deserved and much needed vacation. She’s off to the lake. Won’t say which one and we can’t guess by this photo. Think she intended that. Though the more we look at the picture, the more we think we see things in it. Hidden things, things that move ever so slightly.

So she’s gone for awhile to fish and laze about drinking beer. To watch the sunset and look for monsters.

A Haunted Farmhouse

In the middle of the Midwest, I found a deserted, dilapidated farmhouse. Locals swear it’s haunted, said you could tell just by looking at it. They use it as a means of keeping their kids in line: Don’t go near there after dark, or the ghosts from old Murphy’s farm will getcha.

So I trudge up there, through acres of snow piled as high as an elephant’s eye — not really, but it was pretty deep. Cold doesn’t bother me much, so I spent lots of time poking around the old place, unencumbered by a bulky snow-suite and clumsy gloves.

What I discovered had nothing to do with ghosts, and everything to do with aliens.

From a distance, I could see the fainest green glow emanating through a window. On closer look (and yes, the window was already broken), I could see the glow was coming from underneath a pile of debris. Once inside, I tracked the glow to underneath an old mattress piled in a corner of what I suppose was once a living room. You can see the couch (or do they call it a divan in those parts?). How the mattress got there, who knows? I don’t want to know. Maybe the alien visitors dragged it in there, to make a sort of pillow fort.

As for aliens, I didn’t see any; though I’m sure I was being watched. The glow radiated — no, it pulsed, actually (shame you can’t see that in the pics) — from a surprisingly small, gooey ball, about the size and  shape of a soccer ball (how’s that for detailed scientific data?).  I took a sample of the green glowy stuff. Used a dirty spoon and an old Tupperware bowl (with a matching lid!) I found in the farmhouse. Oh, and the stuff stank to high heaven, like javelina funk, except more so. The smell alone would drive out ghosts, if there were any.

Predictably*, about this time the old farmhouse started to shake, rattle and roll, as the locals say. I collected my gear and sprinted out of there, stopping (when I was far enough away to feel safe) to take a pic. Snapped it just as the old farmhouse collapsed in on itself. All glowing, green, and stinky. Note the suspicious lightning bolt in the right-hand corner. Gonna have the boys in the Undertake figure that one out.

*I say predictably, because aliens never stick around after they’ve been spotted, especially if you’ve gathered evidence. They almost always destroy their temporary bases. Like the old farmhouse.