The Book Cage #133
Through the Reality Warp
Our hero, Latham Billiard, doesn't have time to play pool. The former mercenary is being called back to the Guild because he's the only man who can save the universe. And what better man than one who punches laser-wielding female reporters and letting a dying man bleed out so he can take a meeting? Oh, and there's something about multiple dimensions or something. We'll find out Friday, 5pm eastern.
This sounds too sane. What lies in wait.
Hey why do you get a gun?
Why do you get pants?
Fair enough
it's kinda weird that the main character's name is made of the last names of my grade school's principal and vice principal
His heart? Soft
His skin? Thick
His jack? Cracker
Only two elementary school administrators fused into one man can save us!
I only read to page 18, so maybe. Then again, the reason I stopped was a tone-breaking 69 joke
Oh lord, I hope this isn't a comedy
should've said "Nice.
Doesn't seem to be. That's why it was so weird
It's a lucky number
Coming up on the top of the hour, it's Through the Reality Warp. Here is your preview, featuring a typo in a character name
What's the typo?
Dude's name is not written as Goldpaper in the book
lol
BOOK
CAGE
Hi, @Velo !
Hi @FancyShark !
Time to warp
Hi, @gellaho !
Ah, Boris Vallejo
That answers the pants question
Combat boat
"Huh," he thought. And left.
Stupid sexy Natasha
She has a humid voice
Top newstaper
She's activating Billiard's small reaction controls
Hi, @noiretoon's funny dollar 💵 !
Billiard responds to this slight by forcibly strapping her to her seat
He has a switch on the ship that initiates bondage???
Our hero
That'll teach her
Hi, @rooster !
A time before irony
He was leaking a liquid. A bloody liquid.
He doesn't put up with any bullshit. Like women talking.
Alien chestburster or Taco Bell?
Hi, @John !
Damn you, killtorps!
Live Mas. Viva Space.
As opposed to stuntorps
Or hugtorps
Wow from the preview text, I thought this would be a bit more high tech than bashing an ogre with a branch
Hi, @Tom, Wizard Columbo !
Look, if you're in space and something punctures the ship it doesn't really matter if it also stabs you
Looks like some fragments hit the combat boat's bondage switch, locking the man in place
People hate these space slugs
Hell yeah i thought i recognized that art style.
Hi, @Flippant Sausage Foreskin Jerky !
Fucking Dervlian sons of bitches
"We hate them so much, we're going to set up a space station to look at them"
That's what mercenaries are known for. Having a code and a system of honor
haha
lol. Lmao.
Died faster than Billiard could pedant
Death puke!
:Bloooood:
"So do you need a doctor?"
They let sexy newswomen have lasers!?
What is the galaxy coming to
"Dervlians..working with the Zomalians...to invade Dog Territory! Send for... Cleveland Browns..."
You're not going to loot the ship?
Amateur
Damn broads, not caring about my oath of mercenary honor that I'm no longer beholden to
Then he noticed she'd accidentally lasered her ears off
Seems like maybe you should have retired from the mercenary business earlier than you did, Billiard
Oh right, a dead guy. I forgot about him, because he wasnt important.
Billiard, you seem to be a harbinger of doom
So the galaxy's greatest news anchor had to hire Han Solo to bumble his way to the news?
Bigbang has a moon named Sheldon.
Filthy space slugs
He's terrible at this
Billiard bounced off the cue ball of his memories, sinking into a corner pocket of despair
He's so bad at being a mercenary that he has become an Uber driver
The best books spend the first chapter firehosing proper nouns at you and probably forgetting to explain what they are later.
Dervlians, if you must know, are large balls of fur with googly eyes and smell like fresh flowers. They purr in self-defense.
You just described half the Star Wars writing process
Billiard out here excusing a genocide in the billions
Hi, @PhysWiz vs the Wanking Wizard !
They're also horrifically racist, hence the hate
I really want to be upset that you would disparage Star Wars like this, but....ugh...you're right.
We all remember those Vulcan led genocides, because of the no emotions, right?
Dammit, book. You better not be introducing space nazis. Not this early.
Listen, lady, you're going to meet the genocidal Vulcan slugs, and you're gonna like it!
Oh god they're logic nerds
Kill them
Nazi slugs. Get the salt.
you know what? fuck em, go full Imperium of Man on the nerd slugs.
"These slugs spend half their lives saying 'um actually'. I refuse to save them."
She responds to this by attempting to laser his face
Book already needs to do a Despicable Me and explain what happened in the 1940s wasn't their fault.
"Um, actually, mutli-track drifting, bro"
Kill them
Kill them with salt, fire, whatever it takes
Billiard counters with face punch
He's noticed Natasha's small reaction controls!
Yeah face lasering!
He's so cool
"moaned faintly" is a normal reaction to being punched
Classic woman, not wanting us to save the nazis
Ah, so he's played by Sean Connery
He is getting the fridging out of the way early
Her character development is going to be that she learns to get hit less
Like a mob wife
Tied up and hit a woman, watched a man die and...parked? What part of Save The Cat is this?
Then he gets a gun in a totally nonsexual way
Recoilless? What are you, a pussy?
He's a spaceman
We have had two interactions with Natasha and both of them have ended in some form of assault
This will end well
I'm not even going to look it up, this author is divorced
She's awake
Laser his dick and balls, ma'am.
Just stand farther away this time.
I guess having a gun pointed at you justifies violence, but you really can't be friends after
To be fair, he deserved to be shot
also this
He was and now is dragging her into a warzone against her will
Here's your laser, don't shoot me again, please
It also doesn't help that he's continued slapping the butt of his oily gun the entire time
Shooting him is self defense, and that's not even a joke
An innocent little Quinthian space laser
He's so manly, telling her to shut up so he can ignore her concerns
But he's so honourable he lives by his own code of honour he must save the space slugs because honour demands it
This seems like a fair fight
Welcome to war, mam. I know you thought you were basically hiring a taxi but you have to understand there are nazis that need our help
Hi @Tom, Wizard Columbo
Well, that last sentence is madness
Why not?
The most erotic White Man Arrives scene in history
I suppose objectifying the gun is better than what usually happens with writers of this tier
Because they started shooting at him
I want to know what this author defines as a "social plan"
Because it apparently can kill a billion people
I think we know the one
I'm about to meet Clive Barker. This'll be neat.
Hi, @Literary Chimera, Porn Mercenary !
Yeah, why does Billiard know the technical name for a device that's only used to shoot specifically slug porno. Interesting
I just wish I brought my copy of The Forbidden.
Hi, Fancy!
Between the first paragraph and the third, Natasha's personality completely flips
Awww, a baby slug Vulcan Nazi
Thank him for Clive Barker's Jericho
Ok I can explain some of this. The billion humans who died were apparently cut off from earth so long that they were living like animals, and the slugs had never heard of humans so they didn't recognise a sentient species on this random planet they colonised and I guess they wanted to kill all the wildlife. Why or how any of that happened, I'm less clear on
Omg Billiard is working this hard to save slug pornographers because their racist snuff smut is the only thing that still gets him off
Wheeeeee
These lizards suck at lasers
They have no thumbs
She should kill the wounded one
How do you even miss when your projectile goes at literal lightspeed?!
Why set the gun down
WHY SET THE GUN DOWN ON THE GROUND
Billiard this is why all your friends are dead and you had to become a non-union trucker
Those lizards should be like cultists from Blood, and gun you down the instant they see your big toe.
Yeah that made no sense
They won't shoot someone unarmed
Chekhov's pocket laser
Or they will
It's unclear
Wait, if it's a hole burned through him, it should be cauterized
Yay, now she's a soldier!!
We're doing Star Wars lazed rules
This book might get horny with the bloodshed
"Screaming for Space" was my metal concept album about NASA
Which is a mistake, unarmed people are the ideal candidates for shooting!
Oh his ship is called the Outsider because he lives by his own code of honour
Then he goes straight for Earth
Mission Accomplished
Oh, wait, no he doesn't
Patrick Starfish got his own planet? Hell yeah
BOOOOOOOOOOO America hates a waffler, space man.
Then Natasha decides to do surgery using a book on tape for instruction
"I'm so sorry, the computer told me your people like to eat rocks"
Why.........build a robot to TELL a human how to do surgery, when you could program robot to just do surgery?
If the previous surgeon didn't be kind and rewind, this is going to be a short book
Five hours of amateur surgery later
"unfortunately my copy of No Jacket Required is stuck in the auto doc, so all the instructions are being read by Phil Collins"
To be fair this guy is providing the services of a charter bus. Having a surgical bay at all is a plus
"Unfortunately an aesthetic is a whole different procedure from surgery. It lived, but it saw and felt EVERYTHING."
Surgery: it's just that easy!
They have to record their transmissions in advance?
Slugs aren't nazis, Billiard
"She said, boobily"
Natasha? Werent you just calling them slugs a while ago?
Wow she's learned so much. What's her name again and what's happening
Before she was his ex-wife with a laser, now she's a girl in his arms
Her name is Nopants Mahoney, and she saved a Nazi
Well, gotta change the destination again
The rest of the book is this guy doing U turns in space
Now he needs to record a new broadcast message
The ancient space mercenary guild
Since he apparently couldn't spring for a walkie talkie
I'm back from the beach, and have I got a tip for you book nerds! James Patterson: LOOK HIM UP!
The Bible says space mercs predated civilization
HELLO, @Brendo !
Billiard you should really drop these people off somewhere
Listen, I know we risked our lives for these space slugs, but I got a call from the place I don't work for
These books are why we invented irony.
And if you don't listen to your former employer, breaking your oath makes you puke blood apparently.
"Destination: Mercenary Guild Headquarters, Earth" that's what you sound like, you stupid asshole
And, despite dropping everything to respond to this signal, he says he's not going to do whatever they ask of him
The ship groans and screams, I guess he has oarsmen in the engines or something
So it changed course by like, what, a degree?
Then DON'T GO THERE
slugs on hanster wheels
"I had to come here in person to tell you to fuck off. DAMN YOU, TECHNOLOGY."
WHY DID YOU SHOW UP YOU FUCKING PRICK?!
To have a 'Nam flashback
Thats like a sea captain whos retired chartering a boat to answer a distress call and then tell them "Fuck you, die in the sea."
Bernard's Five, the high-five that killed so many
"I've got a full schedule of Uber customers to tie up and punch, fight your own war." -- Poolball Coolguy
This moment is so stupid that it and it alone would make this book cage worthy
As he slowly lists over, he finds everything hilarious
There is a slug bleeding out on his ship and he took a detour to say no I won't take a detour
"my wounds hurt so badly," said the injured Dervlian to no one
I guess the ship hasa NO2 leak
"Hahaha, GO TO HELL!"
And now: some nonsense
Is the Council of Elder Mercenaries exclusively dogs? Why do they have to tilt their heads because he's leaning?
For Chang's sake?
I love when authors make up swears
P.F. Chang
If this book throws one more unjustified proper noun at me I'm gonna go nuts
JC Denton voice "old men, running the guild"
You learn so quickly how timid they are about cursing
Can't disagree with the biggest computer
Yes, ancient Earth philosopher, PF Chang.
Book I'm reading right now replaced "damn" with "resh". It's as annoying and pointless as you assume, especially when they suddenly start saying fuck halfway through.
It's a computer running nearly 500 KILObytes of RAM
Billiard muses to himself that one of these old fucks is high
Oh that helps with the feeling of adventure and exploring the unknown, having a computer that can calculate exactly what will happen anywhere in the universe under any circumstances
It's a handful of dice
Please say the "Saturday afternoon kiddie keeper" is just future slang for TV, Billiard
Then tells the old fucks to fuck off
It's futureslang for fuck
Then drifts off to have a sexual fantasy
"I can't feel my left side," mutters the still-shot Deluvian
Id say the guy that wont do it has a zero percent chance to do it.
Also
Nice.
Billiard, you punched that famous sex symbol in the face hard enough to knock her out
Of course, the funniest thing about these events is that there is no space between them
Billiard needs Ritalin
"I'm only starring in this book if I get to do a sex scene," Billiard said incredibly
Hmmm, he's high. FUCK OFF YOU OLD MAN! What if that newscaster sucked my dick...
"he could slap Natasha on the butt, fondle her magazine, and keep her wrapped in an oiled cloth in his nightstand -- wait, he was thinking of guns again"
Oh, just you wait
Billiard is ADHD, a great job of show, don't tell
As someone who has ADHD..........yes Billiard is One of Us.
And, here's the 69 joke
Niiiiiiiiiiice.
Hey maybe send both of them?
Nibbled to death by a butterfly
Again, I love how midcentury sci-fi authors are universally like "By 2010 we'll eat gold with teeth implanted in our brains to fuel warp holes to planets of burning methane" but simultaneously "In 2030, women will have abandoned the useless pursuit of equal rights to jobs."
Also seventy three isnt that much more than sixty nine.
"Put the dice down, Gary Gygax, we know your projections are shit"
Then, in walks science man wearing an orange jockstrap
Its very "Women dont have the killer instinct to be Lensmen." energy without the twist the Lensman books have.
Kill the science nerd
Dr. Hall fuuuuuuuucks