Last time I had to do this, I lost my nerve. I won't be doing that again. There were misgivings last time, guilty apparitions that would have haunted me. Not today. Today I am completely certain, more certain than I have ever been in my life.

The maids of honour are wailing. The old Chancellor's hands tremble as he helps her to the block. How can I do this? That's what they're thinking, I know. Her gown as white as snow; the block as black as ebony. And the red.? I test the axe blade with the edge of my thumb. Oh, yes. Let them wail. Their day is over; revolution is coming.

The bottom was falling out of the box. Gregor grunted and made a dash for his desk as photographs cascaded across his feet.

“Damn, damn, damn.” The box, having shed its load, collapsed completely in his arms. Gregor glanced at the door to his office to make sure nobody had seen him, then, knelt and began gathering up the glossy prints.

Most of the photos held faded grey and beige studies with white frames. Trench-coated men in black spectacles beside chrome-trimmed sedans. Women with bad skin smoking cheap cigarettes. Two children with soot smeared faces throwing rocks at a discarded TV. Scattered glass in sugar crystals at their feet. All stills from a bad arthouse movie.

The language of comedy is anything but funny. In fact, it is quite grim. Think about it. You tell gags. They end with a punch line. If you do well, you killed them. If you stink, you died. And in a fine piece of unilateral escalation, if you really stink, you bombed. A really good joke slays them. A great one knocks them in the aisles.

There's more, but I think you have the idea. Besides, I am by nature a sunny kind of guy. All this talk of violence and mayhem in regards to the gentle art of comedy gives me heartburn. Even more so, since tonight I had experienced the Mother of All Bombs. A real carpet-bombing. A genuine scorched earth, leave no blade of grass standing kind of bomb.

Morgan Gayfriend pushed through the swinging double doors into the lounge. It was small and cramped, filled nearly to capacity. There was a soda machine, a snack machine, a payphone, and a magazine rack. There was no television or windows. There were three couches and four chairs set about the room. Most of the seats were taken. Morgan stood by the soda machine then spotted a single empty seat, on one of the couches between an overweight woman with glasses and a tall gangly man in a suit and tie.