Leon Skum is an anagram for…
Published: August 16, 2024
It was to be my last long haul. As my Galaxy Buster B-Triple approached the outer reaches of the Sol System the automatic cruise control kicked in and the ship groaned as it adjusted to sub-light speed. I was pulling more than 30,000 tonnes of Cheezel holes from planet Proxima in the Centauri system and they took a lot of slowing down.
Heading towards home I was halfway between Saturn and Jupiter when I sees a stationary spacecraft pulled up near an asteroid with some clown sitting on the bonnet.
I threw out the space anchor, flipped the Galaxy Buster and slipped back to see what what’s what. Pulling up near the stationary spacecraft, I wound down the window and shouted to the dude in the natty space suit: “What’s up, mate?”
Bloke shouted back: “Ran out of juice!”
I had a look then I did a double take. “Fuck me! Are you that Leon Skum feller?”
“What are you talking about? Who is Leon Skum?”
“Sorry, mate. Me anagram app kicked in. Are you Elon Musk?”
“Yeah!”
“What the fuck are you doing out here?”
“Oh… Just wanted to have a look at the solar system to see what my real estate portfolio is gonna look like.”
“So… you’re looking at the planets that you and Ronald Chump will own when he becomes king of the world?”
“Abso-fukkin-lootilly, pal!”
“Right! So… you’ve had a look at the Moon, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter…?”
“Yep! Yep! Yep and yep!”
“Have you seen Uranus?”
“Not yet.”
“Well, have a look in a mirror! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ahhh…. don’t look so miserable, you humourless twat. So… what’s the problem? Is Tesla fucked?”
“Ummm… it’s not a Tesla.”
“What!!! You didn’t bring your Tesla out here?? Why not??”
“Ummm… I wanted something more reliable. It’s a Honda.”
“Well, if it’s a Honda it hasn’t broken down; so what’s the problem?”
“I only ran out of juice; no petrol stations out here.”
“Yeah. I’ve heard of a parallel situation on earth with them Tesla things. So, what can I do for you? Give you a tow?”
“Have you got some spare petrol?”
“Nah. My bus has got a modified hydrogen cell; runs on hydrogen sulphide: fart gas. I’m a self-contained unit. I eat curry pies, beans and bacon, drink beer and fart in a tube that runs the hamster wheel, so, I got no petrol. But I do have 500 L of Bundaberg rum in a barrel in the caboose; it’s maturing with a sugar bag full of Carolina reaper chilies. I’m pretty sure the Honda will run on any good spirit and my Chilli Bundy will be as good as they come. How about I spot you 50 litres so you can get back home and take over the world!”
I sloshed a couple of buckets of the high-octane rum into the Honda’s tank and capped it off. Then I gave Mr. Musk a quick tap on his space suit helmet and bid him goodbye.
“Goodbye!” I says, “Not ‘see you later’ cause I doubt we’ll meet again! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ahhh, fuck off, you humourless twat!”
I jumped in the Galaxy Buster cab, slammed the window shut, dropped the clutch and skedaddled, watching Mr Musk in my rearview mirror.
He got in the Honda, shut the door and fiddled with his seat belt, then he hit the starter. A second to two later the rum hit the spark.
They say you can’t hear anything in space, but you can certainly see a lot without any atmosphere to dull the view. The explosion was fucking phenomenal and I thought to myself: “That rum must be just about right for the sipping; might have a tot or two later on”.
Anyway, I relaxed; happy. Popped a stubby, rolled a durrie, put my feet on the dash and went back to me cryptic. A good deed done for the day.
it wasn’t a completely happy ending for me, though; I had to dump the load and get back to the Centauri system for another load of Cheezel holes; I’d brung the wrong flavour.