The Soy Conspiracy

story 11 of 11 in the pencil fighting series

"Hey cool, I got a package," Jay announced with great glee to nobody in particular as he took the little yellow slip from his mailbox. Unfortunately, since nobody was at the desk until 4:00, he had to wait another hour to claim his package, so he walked up the three and a half flights of stairs to his room and checked his e-mail. The excitement from having a package soon faded when he noticed that he noticed that he hadn't heard from Kathy since Wednesday night, and it was Friday already. He began to feel quite alone since his roommate had already gone home for the weekend, depressing him to a point where he actually started doing calculus. After a short time, Jay had done every problem in the book, so he looked up at the clock. It was 4:30, so his excitement returned as he floated swiftly down the stairs. It had been quite some time since he had gotten mail of any kind, let alone a package.

He walked up and greeted the girl at the desk. "I'm offended by your nakedness , " she responded. Jay protested her offense, stating that" he was not naked. "Well you're half naked . . . "

" . . . Then you can only be half offended. Might I have this package?" and handed her the yellow slip. She found a quite large box and wheeled it around to him.

"This thing weighs about a hundred pounds," she complained. So Jay wheeled his package until he go to the stairs, at which point he realized that it was quite impossible to roll a hundred-pound package up four flights of stairs. "Oh by the way," called the girl from behind the desk, "happy birthday." Jay thanked her politely and proceeded to open the package right there at the bottom of the stairs.

"What took you so long?" asked the girl from inside the box, "They opened the desk at least a half hour ago." She stood up, put her hands on her hips, and frowned at him. Jay recognized her and smiled.

"Wow, this is exactly what I wanted for my birthday! Somebody deserves a really nice thank-you note," he exclaimed as he checked the box flaps for a return address. The girl smiled and he lifted her out of the box and ran her up to his room, leaving the box at the bottom of the stairs since someone would have to pick it up, and it might not be him.

After doing some things that will go unmentioned due to the possibility that this may end up as a children's story, Jay suggested that they go for a walk. Looking outside and seeing that it was a nice warm day for fall, Kathy agreed. And so they put some warm clothes on (warm for fall still calls for warm clothes) and went outside. Jay thought that maybe the nature trail would be a good place to begin the walk, so that's where he led her. They walked hand in hand or otherwise connected, smiling, talking, and laughing as they went.

They passed a few benches as they walked, and Kathy eventually suggested that they sit down, which they did. The bench was positioned nearby and facing the woods, with an open field stretching uphill behind it. Jay was made nervous by the openness, but he didn't care all that much since he was with Kathy. After a while, he noticed what appeared to be partially melted snow on the grass, which he began staring at, pondering the possibility of snow when it hadn't snowed since early last spring.

"What?" asked Kathy, wondering why he was staring. Jay didn't answer, but she followed his gaze and also became locked in a stare focused on the snow-like substance. Jay slowly got to his feet and Kathy did likewise. Then they both looked to the side because someone had bumped into them. Whoever that had been tipped his hat and bowed an apology to the both of them, then continued merrily along his way. Jay grumbled something about distance runners and turned his attention back to the snow stuff, only to find that it was no longer there. Kathy suggested the possibility that it had melted, but Jay surmised that the guy who had bumped into them had stolen it.

"Sure-it's a conspiracy," teased Kathy, "Snow's real popular these days -I 'll bet the street value of that stuff's a couple hundred at least." They then heard a sound closely resembling that of ripping paper and a new man wearing a trench coat ran up to them. He took a device from inside his coat. Jay noticed the words "Microsoft TI98" written on it.

"I'm too late," said the new man. He turned his eyes upward. "If you 're going to call me that, could I maybe FEEL like a new man?" He punched up something on his TI98 and showed it to Jay and Kathy. "Let me know if you recognize any of these people." The TI98 was cycling through mug shots of numerous people. Jay wondered who this guy was and whether or not he was worthy of their assistance. "Yes, I apologize for not introducing myself-we're running a bit short-handed," said the new man, "I am Steve, leader of ISAAESH." That was enough for Jay, and just as he turned back to the TI98, Kathy recognized the man who had bumped into them before.

"He's a criminal?" she asked, "He seemed so friendly and polite . . ."

"Yeah, but that snow stuff disappeared shortly after he did . . ." Jay pointed out. Steve questioned them both about the incident and seemed slightly upset by what they told him. He sat down on the bench and took on a look of deep ponderance. Forehead still wrinkled in thought, he turned to his TI98 once more. "This problem is bigger than we at ISAAESH can handle with our current staff. Could I ask you two to join us? You're both able and we'll take care of any problems resulting from your disappearance. Are you willing?"

Jay looked into Kathy's eyes and saw that she would go anywhere with him. He told Steve that they would do it. Steve warned them that much of what they would see would most likely shock and amaze them, as well as give them a sense that their world was not real. They thought that would be interesting, so Steve led them away.

Some time later Jay and Kathy woke up in an unfamiliar room. "Wow," said Kathy, "your room really looked different in the dark." Jay knew she was kidding so he didn't bother reminding her of last night. They both got up and began to look around, trying to figure out just what it was that they were supposed to do. Just as they began their wondering, Steve came in and a piece of the wall slid aside to reveal a computer screen.

Using the screen as a visual aid, which he controlled through his TI98, Steve proceeded to explain to them the predicament, which required their assistance. He told them what ISAAESH stood for as well as its purpose. "What you know as the real world actually contains many sub-universes, product of the imaginations of your creative persons. These sub-universes can only exist within the bounds of that person's imagination, and only while in conscious thought unless written down. At this moment, we are in a short story."

"So where are we in this story?" asked Jay.

"Well, our author doesn't seem to know what happens with a story's timeline once the characters realize that they are part of a story, so the best I can tell you is that we are aboard the starship Happyfries."

"What?" Kathy exclaimed in disbelief, "This sure doesn't seem like a Pastor Nancy story . . ."

"I was just getting to that." Steve's expression became sterner. "Not long after the end of our last story, one of our characters became evil. Our leader at the time noticed and had Paul (the evil character) locked away as a precaution. One night while Puddy was on guard Paul made his escape, killing Puddy and merging our story line with the Pastor Nancy story line. All of the characters from our story who had a counter-character in Pastor Nancy perished when met by their counter-characters-like a matter/antimatter sort of thing. We are under the assumption that Paul figured this while he was locked away. Our leader and another of out top agents met this fate, as well as some other operatives. Unfortunately, all of the good guys from that story happened to be counter-characters to one of our people, leaving us quite short on manpower. Paul conned the Pastor Nancy villains into joining him, which gives us an even larger problem. I have taken over as leader and was going after one of Paul 's henchmen when I met you. They had been field-testing some sort of synthetic substance that we believe is intended for warfare. If this is the case, Paul is in violation of 17 inter-universal treaties and must be stopped. The reason I asked you two here is the old legend that our leader must be named Jay and replaced with a new Jay from an alternate universe when he goes bad or is destroyed. And Kathy . . . well you were with him." Steve stopped and sat down, exhausted after spouting so long a paragraph.

"That was quite the paragraph," said Jay. He then became confused as to why he would say such a thing. Steve smiled in approval, saying that Jay was exactly what they needed, then he asked them to come with him. He brought them into a hall, which they walked down, considering that most people use halls for either that or cough relief. They eventually came to the armory and Steve brought them inside and opened a closet.

"Each of you will need a coat of arms," he said while the closet door opened. Inside was a row of trench coats that looked identical to each other and the one Steve had been wearing when Jay and Kathy first met him. Kathy chose a coat and tried it on, but Jay seemed to just stand there. "42 long?" asked Steve, handing him a coat. After they both had a coat on, Steve began telling them about their arms.

". . . and lastly, you each have a Microsoft TI98. You will find this approximately chest level on your right side."

Jay and Kathy got them out and looked at them. "What good does this do us?" asked Kathy.

"Ever seen Quantum Leap?" The both nodded. "This is like Ziggy-Al's little computer thing that knows everything. It's pretty easy to use and is one of your most important tools." Jay asked how it could know everything. "Thanks to English teachers, practically everything ever written has been analyzed. This means that while you are in a universe belonging to a story, or if you are checking a character profile of someone from such a place, any main character will have a rather complete profile. Every now and then, an English teacher assigns writing on something from Reality, so there is partial data on that universe." Kathy looked slightly confused, but Jay nodded in comprehension. "Well, I need to get back to work, so you two can stay here and figure those things out." And with that, Steve left.

Kathy began to figure out the workings of the TI98 while Jay used his own in a valiant attempt to determine what they had actually seen when they thought they had seen snow earlier. Kathy found the games on hers, which kept her occupied. Jay brought his left hand to his chin as he continued researching the conspiracy. "What? It is a conspiracy?" he asked.

"Hey, keep it down-you two don't know that yet," said the wall. They both cast strange looks at the wall for having spoken to them, which was understandably not a behavior they were used to from walls. "You shall neglect all knowledge of this being a conspiracy." Suddenly, they both noticed that they had rather deep headaches and, while distracted, swiftly forgot what the wall had wanted them to forget.

After an indeterminate time of shock and amazement over the talking wall of which they could recall nothing, another person who neither Kathy nor Jay had seen before entered the room. They noticed that he was wearing a coat of arms and assumed that he must be a fellow agent, naively neglecting to consider that maybe he had recently defeated an agent and stolen the coat. Before anyone noticed, all three of them were donkeys. A short man with long hair ran through the room and stole the unknown person's jawbone, which he used to kill a great many of people. Being a good guy, this longhaired man replaced the jawbone when he was finished.

Just as the confusion was about to fade, a math teacher carrying a chalkboard entered the room. He set up and began taking the limit of the time equation since it had been previously named indeterminate. He explained how he had to go to the hospital to do this, and when he was done asked, "Any questions, any questions?" without turning around to see if there were any. The longhaired man came back to the scene to once again borrow the jawbone to rid them of the teacher, once again returning it when he was done. Then the donkey whose jawbone had been used as a lethal instrument against a large mass of people began stepping carefully on a TI98 which was lying conveniently in front of him.

Somewhere in reality, Steve removed his TI98 from his coat and saw the face of a donkey on its display. "I was afraid of this," he said to the bum who was asking him for money. He then offered the bum a shiny new dime if he would go away, which the bum graciously accepted, and of course proceeded to go away. Hiding behind a dumpster so that nobody could see, Steve simultaneously typed things on his TI98, chanted and danced in a circle, and asked someone's mother what was for dinner. "That should do it," he said upon his emergence from behind the dumpster. He then realized that the story was still talking about him, so he whined complainingly until that changed.

The three characters back in the armory found that they were no longer donkeys. They were even further relieved to see that not only were they no longer donkeys, but they had also become once more the people they had been before.

"Jay?" the unnamed guy asked in surprise, "How did you survive?"

Jay looked at him confusedly. "What? Who are you?"

"Oh, so they've replaced you-er . . . him, already. I'm Captain Curt-you must be our new leader." Suddenly, all knowledge needed to lead the ISAAESH was bestowed upon Jay, which caused his person to emit a pulsating celestial luminance.

"What? Does that mean I farted?"

"No, you just looked like a slowly strobing angel or something."

"Oh, okay." And with that, he ceased to strobe and whipped out his TI98. He pressed some buttons and spoke into it, "I am recalling all field agents working on the apprehension of Paul. Return to base immediately." Sam, who had been leading off, walked back and placed one foot on the white square. Shortly after that, the last of the ISAAESH agents showed up. "Isn't there anyone else?" asked Jay, since Steve had been the only one to return.

"Most of our agents perished when we were merged with the Pastor Nancy series," explained Steve. "For example, when our leader Jay met his counter-character Sir Jay, they experienced mutually strong gravitational attractions to one another, formed a molten core, burst into flames and suddenly imploded. The whole thing is really quite terrible." Jay was taken slightly aback at this, but he felt that there was business that required attending to and decided to just go forward and ignore it. Steve then noticed Captain Curt, which was a confusing disturbance since Curt and Captain Curt should have perished when they met.

Jay took this opportunity to explain. "This is Captain Curt, counter-character of Curt. He continues to exist because Curt became a casualty during Paul's escape. It is my understanding that Captain Curt also has some information to share with us regarding Paul's time in the Pastor Nancy stories." Everyone looked at Jay with a scent of awe. Jay sniffed at the air, looked as if he were deep in thought, then said to himself, "Do I smell astonishment?"

"He's right," said Captain Curt, getting back to the plot of the story , "It so happens that Paul, during his stay in the Pastor Nancy" universe, was in search of a thug or two who might look after him while he gallivanted in the real universe. He located Pastor Nancy as well as Mad Professor Robbie as the story's villains and asked them to join his evil cause. Pastor Nancy, having been a supporting villain in a previous story, agreed to join him, but Mad Professor Robbie insisted upon being the big tomato, so Paul assigned his elimination as Pastor Nancy's first duty. I also noticed him mention something about going back to the farm."

"Durn blast it," said Steve, "Now he's got a whole load of farmers working for him." Suddenly, Allene/Puddy walked in. Everyone said "ah" in remembrance of her existence. Unfortunately, she was not a terribly useful character since her prime interest seemed to lie in making Jay angry with her. Apparently she failed to realize that this was completely impossible due to her gross insignificance in his eyes. But she pressed on, first insulting his clothes, which caused everyone else to look at one another in confusion since they were all wearing the same thing. The strangeness of her futile slander then caused every other character present to ignore her fully. The author chose to do the same, and she was no more.

Then was left an awkward silence of confusion, which Jay decided to break by saying, "I think it's time we play pin-the-tail-on-the-Paul." Steve interjected a comment about all of the characters having been stripped of their definite articles a story or two ago. "Anyway," continued Jay, "what we need to do is find Paul and track him for a while in order to find out what he's up to. Right now all we know is that he's evil and that his plot has something to do with farming. He's in the real world, which means we have a lot of farmers to watch. While I've been talking, I wrote a program for the TI98 which will alert you when Paul is in the vicinity. I am not sure of the range, but it should help us somewhat. I recommend that we split up and search for Paul. Once someone finds him, he must be placed under surveillance until we can find out what's going on."

"That sounds good," said Captain Curt, "but covert missions tend to be dangerous. I suggest we disperse in groups to increase safety."

"That only leaves us with two units," observed Jay, "but okay." And so Steve went off with Captain Curt and Jay went off with Kathy.

Some time later, somewhere in eastern Missouri, Steve and Captain Curt were busy going undercover. "I wanted to be the head," whined Captain Curt.

"Sorry," said Steve, but I'm the one obsessed with cows-I get to be the head." Captain Curt found himself unable to argue against that without becoming obsessed with cows himself, which he saw as catastrophic. So Steve put on the head and Captain Curt became the rest of the cow. They walked over and joined the rest of the cows, being careful to graze and moo inconspicuously. Here, disguised by their cow suit and the real cows surrounding them, Captain Curt watched his TI98 for the presence of Paul while Steve made sure they were not discovered. When Steve picked out the cow costume, he had made sure to get an ugly cow so that he wouldn't have to deal with the problem of another cow finding him particularly attractive.

Meanwhile, Jay and Kathy were investigating some farms in Wisconsin. They noticed a larger proportion of soy farms than either of them remembered, which aroused their suspicions toward soy. "I always thought soy was a durn varmint of a fruit," Jay commented.

"Soy isn't a fruit, dear," Kathy corrected him.

"Doesn't matter-still evil." And so they came to an agreement that soy was evil, or that it at least was being put to use in the advancement of evil purposes in the general region in which they found themselves at the time. After reading that last sentence, they became confused to a point where the author was forced to remind them that they weren't actually supposed to read the story. Jay argued that they would be left without knowledge of what they were to do if they were not allowed to read the story, so the author told him to shut up. To this Jay responded, "You're not the boss of me," so the author shot him in the foot. Jay winced in pain, took a couple slow steps backward, then put his hands in the air. The author then left him because you don't win if you kill them all.

Remembering that they were supposed to be doing good guy stuff, more specifically stopping Paul and the evil soy, Kathy suggested "Why don 't we go back to where we saw the snow stuff?" Jay acknowledged the goodness of that idea and so they did just that.

Arriving some time later at the place where they had originally seen the snow stuff, Jay observed that wherever you go, there you are. Kathy called him weird and they proceeded to investigate the evility of soy through the discovery of the snow stuff. To their misfortune, there was an extreme lack of snow stuff in the area. They both became substantially disappointed until they observed a flying monkey bouncing gaily past them down the path, which caused them to giggle girlishly. Shortly after the monkey followed an intimidatingly rapid moving human-looking lady who called Kathy pretty before threatening to "get her," also mentioning something that seemed to imply that Jay was a small dog who would share in Kathy 's fate. Normally Jay would enjoy thinking that he would share in fate with Kathy, but in this case he was less than enthused due to the nature of that fate.

Suddenly they realized the human-looking lady who had moved so rapidly past them in the last paragraph was none other than Pastor Nancy. Remembering both that she was evil and that she was participating in Paul's conspiracy, Jay whipped out his magical glowing stick and chased after her, despite her intimidating rapidity. Kathy decided that she wanted to chase something too, so she went after the flying monkey. Jay managed to catch Pastor Nancy after a short time, and Kathy thought he was lucky, though he just thought he was fast. Kathy continued to chase the flying monkey while Jay held Pastor Nancy at bay. Becoming somewhat bored with simply standing there waiting for Kathy to capture the flying monkey, and having a tendency to enjoy looking at her, Jay turned around to see what was taking so long. Pastor Nancy took this moment of Jay 's inattentiveness to dive into the bay he had been holding her at and swim away. She began to cackle evilly as she dove, which became more of a gurgle as she entered the water. Jay, keeping in mind the possibility of flying feces in the presence of monkey creatures, as well as his lack of experience with magical glowing sticks in water, decided to let her escape.

Meanwhile, aboard the Happyfries, Captain Curt was diligently trying to remember whether or not he was in the story. Suddenly, a small green space man appeared in the air, floating slightly above Captain Curt 's shoulder. Captain Curt responded to this appearance by calling the man's name, to which a nearby female said, "bless you," offering a tissue. Keeping in mind the insignificance of females, or rather nameless characters, Captain Curt lightly brushed her aside as if she were merely a fly on his apple pie. The small space man then reminded Captain Curt that he was, in fact, part of the story, and he was supposed to be helping to put an end to Paul's evility. Captain Curt thanked him and offered him some apple pie, which the green man declined, mentioning something about a fly having been on it. He then disappeared-much in the way he had appeared, but in reverse. Captain Curt was slightly disappointed now that the space man was gone. He then decreed that graphics class should never last more than one hour, out of respect for Kevin. And so it was, and Captain Curt departed the scene.

Steve lifted his head from the grass to moo loudly at the farmer who was poking him in the shoulder. His moo must've been quite realistic since the farmer didn't seem to notice any difference, though he did inform Steve of his lack of a rear half.

"Dad-burn it! Y'ain't got yer udder half!" he exclaimed.

To that, Steve quickly drew his magical glowing stick and thinly sliced the farmer. Captain Curt showed up with a loaf of bread, so they made sandwiches and fed the cows as well. Then since their cover was blown and they still had learned nothing, Captain Curt suggested that they find another random farm. Steve had other plans though-he wanted to run a carnival show called "The Amazing Carnivorous Cows . . . and Steve."

"Posh," said Captain Curt, and with that he walked away to find another farm to watch for Paul at. Just then, a random English teacher showed up and reprimanded Captain Curt for being in a sentence that ended with the word "at." Captain Curt then revealed to her that in her reprimand, she had committed the very act as for which she was reprimanding. Realizing her grammatical sin, she stood patiently until her head exploded. Captain Curt brushed her cranial slush off his person and finished walking away.

During all of that, Jay and Kathy had managed to get the flying monkey under their control. They began to wonder how they had been able to catch a flying monkey, considering the implication in the name that such a creature would posses the ability to fly. The author then pointed out to them that the flying monkey was never specifically portrayed to have means of flight, but merely to bounce gaily. Jay and Kathy nodded in revelation, recalling their previous giggle from the gaily-bouncing flying monkey.

Wiping the smiles off their faces, yet being careful to leave their lips in place so that they would still have them for later, they took the flying monkey off to a chemistry lab. Before they even got in the door, the monkey spasmed and died. Finding this rather confusing, Kathy went to find biology professor who might be able to help them study this flying monkey. Jay had a hunch that in finding this flying monkey they were probably closer to finding some information on whatever it was they were investigating, since Pastor Nancy had been chasing it. He took out his TI98 and sent a notice to everyone, telling of the flying monkey and what else was going on. Kathy came back with the biologist, who after a short time told them that the flying monkey had died of unknown causes, and as a side note it just so happened that this flying monkey was not a carbon-based being, which was odd since all other life was carbon-based. Understanding that the next logical question in both Jay and Kathy's minds concerned what base the flying monkey might have, the biology person told them that it was soy-based.

"I knew it!" exclaimed Jay, "There had to be some sort of connection between that soy and Paul's evil plan." So it seemed that soy matter was being arranged in the form of flying monkeys and then given life, which was apparently not too strong a life, since the flying monkey had died for no real reason. This made some amount of sense, however, since soy had always been lower quality than everything else had. The biology person seemed to understand that Jay and Kathy were the solution to this soy problem, and so they were given a quick lesson on soy percentages on common substances, as well as soy tester probe attachments for the TI98s.

By the time this was completed, they both found themselves quite hungry, so they went to get some lunch. After taking the first bite of her lunch, Kathy knew something wasn't right: she'd never eaten something so completely nasty before. Jay didn't really seem to notice-apparently he'd gotten used to it, but since Kathy knew something was wrong, she decided to figure out just what it might be. She pulled out her soy probe and probed her food. She found its soy percentage to be much higher than the biology person taught her that it should be. In alarm, Kathy jumped up and screamed in horror over the excessive soyness of the food. Jay recognized what was going on, so he jumped out of his chair sideways in such a way as to land in front of a red glass box. Finding himself quite perplexed due to his never having seen red glass before, he stood dumbfounded until he noticed the words "in case of emergency, break glass." Finding nothing with which to break the glass, he took his blue pen out of his pocket, and since it didn't work anyway, jammed it into the red glass. Unfortunately, the pen shattered rather than the glass, as he had desired. He then turned to the all-powerful head-butt, which succeeded in breaking the class, though it also resulted in the untimely death of Jay. Then everything became dark because someone had painted all the windows black.

Overcoming her previous shock, Kathy ran over and pulled the soy alarm. Then she said that she didn't like that Jay had died, but she decided that there was little to nothing she could do to change that, she would just find someone else. Jay decided that this was not something he wanted to happen, so he sat up and proclaimed, "I'm not dead yet!" at which point Kathy screeched joyously and ran to him. She thought to herself that it was a good thing she had thought to think that she would go find someone else because that had worked to bring Jay back. She then helped him up and he wiped the blood off himself, commenting that it was fortunate the glass was red since nobody would have to clean it then, and the last thing he wanted to do was make more work for somebody.

Dr. C showed up with his dead cat, saying, "Look, it's a dead cat." He seemed quite pleased by this, though Jay was confused as to whether Dr. C thought the dead cat was funny or if he was just proud of himself for knowing that it was, in fact, a dead cat.

Upon deciding that the last paragraph was terribly insignificant to the story, Jay looked out the window and noticed Study Lounge Boy walking eastward, which was the way to the buildings where classes were held. "Oh look," said Jay, "Study Lounge Boy actually does go to class." Kathy looked and saw that it was so, though she could find no importance in knowing that, so she said so. Then Jay and Kathy were left to sit pondering what might happen as a result of pulling the soy alarm.

After a long time of waiting for something to happen, they decided that it was probably a false alarm, so Jay took it off the wall. He looked on the back and nearly the entire ScanTron form was marked B, which everyone knew by now stood for false. It now appeared as though they had stood for a somewhat long time doing nothing for no reason. Captain Curt called them quite silly for having done that. Just then, Jay dropped his blue pen on himself and became erratically upset over the mark it left on his shirt. Before Kathy could tell him to calm down, he began pondering over ink. He borrowed Kathy 's soy probe (if you will recall, Jay had died earlier, and one comes back after death with only the pistol) and probed the ink on his chest.

"Just as I suspected," he said, "soy." Now they knew that both the food and the ink were based on soy, and they knew of a similarly based flying monkey as well. So they pooled their thoughts into a collective consciousness and surmised together that there existed a conspiracy, which had the ultimate purpose of replacing all matter with soy. The thoughts were then divided and given back to whomever they had come from so that a conversation might take place.

"We've got to do something!" exclaimed Kathy. Jay plunged deep into thought over what might be done, while Captain Curt told Kathy about Steve 's man-eating cows. At first Captain Curt thought he may have been in error by saying that the cows eat people, but then he remembered that the first thing they had fed the cows was a farmer, so he chose not to say anything lest he appear a fool. This decision made sense since there aren't many people who like to look like a fool. That left a terribly small probability that Captain Curt was one of them, so it was therefore decided that he was not. After all of that, they still had no idea what to do about the Soy Conspiracy, so they went to see the Amazing Carnivorous Cows . . . and Steve.

Somewhere near Steve and his cows stood Paul, holding a microphone and smiling at the video camera that Pastor Nancy was pointing at him. "We've secretly switched this man's cows with soy cows," whispered Paul, "let's see if he notices." Now that the conspiracy had been uncovered, they were allowed to do this sort of thing without worry of being discovered. Steve began his show, ignoring the fact that no one had come to see it other than Paul who he didn 't even know was there. It seemed as if nobody wanted to pay to see cows that eat meat, which Steve simply couldn't understand because he thought it was very cool. So he continued to give his show to a nonexistent audience. Dr. C told him that making a performance when you don't know who the audience is was a terribly poor idea, but then Steve said that he was quite aware of the fact that he had no audience whatsoever. Dr. C told him that wasn't so great an idea either, but he patted Steve on the back for knowing who his audience was.

Just then, Jay, Kathy, and Captain Curt showed up. Steve was still giving his show to nobody, which the rest of them found terribly pathetic, so Captain Curt told him so.

"Steve, you are terribly pathetic," said Jay. (Okay, so it was Jay who told him and not Captain Curt). At this, Steve became quite unhappy, and the show ceased to go on. Kathy started to say that the show must go on, but Jay reminded her that the show was horrible, so she decided that in this case the show shouldn't go on after all. Now that his show was no longer going on, Steve saw that there was nothing left to do but once again join the fight against Paul's conspiracy.

Upon the realization that nothing could get accomplished through just standing about, Jay decided to probe the cows. It seemed that they too had a terribly high soy content, just like everything else. From this they realized that soy had already infused into much of the world, so it was now too late to prevent it. Instead they had to do something else, and though they did not yet know what it was, they went off to do it.

Paul, upon remembering that he had been right there the whole time, mumbled some nasty things to himself for not having watched. Then he noticed Pastor Nancy with the video camera, so he turned to face it and said, "Well, if those meddling scientist-types hadn't shown up, the soy cows probably would've gone unnoticed." At that point every last one of the soy cows fell over dead, but it was okay since the camera was no longer recording. Paul realized that the previous ordeal would be on the tape. Pastor Nancy told him that they probably would not be able to use that as a commercial. Paul said to keep it anyway-he would find a use for it, and so off they went, looking for that particular use.

In the place that the other guys were, it had recently been decided that Jay should go to the conspiracy and get himself hired as a "soy distribution engineer." Captain Curt held the employment section of the Sunday paper in the air and read the job description to the group.

"Applicants must be devious persons comfortable with working closely with an evil genius. Marketing abilities a plus. Apply at the community farm . . ."

"Well, I can pretend to be that person," said Jay. And so it was decided, and also so written, and Jay allowed himself to be cast out into the world of jobs from the Sunday paper employment section. Everyone else realized that there was very little they could do while Jay was off working, especially since nobody could remember the point of him doing so. This seemed to pose a problem, because if Jay didn 't know his purpose in getting the job either, he would have to simply sit there with his thumbs tied. It was a bit late for minds to be changed, however, since Jay was already being interviewed for the job.

Jay ended up getting hired as a soy distribution agent and was assigned the task of distributing soy products to a list of places. Thinking he remembered the purpose of having this job, Jay found real products, which he would distribute instead of the soy products, counteracting the job he had been hired for. He realized that he had just been involved in a sentence ending in a preposition, so he mentioned something about the old Latin-loving bastards. Then off he went, taking with him his stock of non-soy stuff.

Huddled together back in the lair, the rest of the anti-Pauls closely observed Jay through their TI98s. Suddenly, they all sprouted long whiskers, bushy tails, and long floppy ears. After turning pink, they all began hopping to and fro, proclaiming, "We're nutty bunnies," and appearing quite happy about it. Just then, by means of a divinely induced intuition, it was realized that the story had been going on for quite some time, and rather uneventfully at that. The pinkness as well as the other bunny features slowly faded as the silliness was slowly allowed to bleed from the story. Then the scene switched.

"That'll be all of it, folks," said Jay as he unloaded the last of the pseudo-soy. It just so happened that he was at his last delivery stop, and was also the only soy distributor.

"Oh crap," complained Paul, "I've been foiled once again." With that, he walked away with a slump.

"Hey wait a minute!" Paul stopped short and expressed a look of surprisedness. The voice spoke again: "What are you doing?!? You're not even supposed to be in this scene!" Paul carefully searched his mind for a valid reason as to why he might be there, but came up with very little. A small white cloud rose from his head and visible on it was the phrase "Boy I'm evil." Apparently the voice found this less than humorous because its hand came down from above to crush Paul as well as his small white cloud of thought. And so, the soy conspiracy was no more, and there was much rejoicing. (yay)