The Tuber at the Threshold

Disclaimer: I own many things; none of them are featured here.

The night began typically enough. The New England air was crisp and fragrant with the scent of pines, and a localized thunderstorm perched on the hill where the Shadowy Brotherhood of the Unspeakable Ellipses was having a midsummer's summoning. Lord High Ted, lower and upper Viceroy of All Things Dark and Coagulant, chanted unearthly syllables and blasphemes to the wicked night. The brethren stood gazing at him in awe, his combination bishop's mitre and Greek fisherman's hat cutting an impressive figure against the night sky.

"…and to those who shall be given, forsooth if for all else, to that which we may pay of such tithings, to thy divine potato, and–"

"Wrong." One of the brethren called out.

Lord high Ted halted, irked at the interruption. "Wrong?"

"You said it wrong." The dark disciple repeated. "You said 'potato', it should've been 'being'."

"I said what?"

"Potato!"

"No I didn't!" H.L.T. declared with pomp, now regretting his decision to recruit mostly dropouts from the nearby technical colleges.

"It's true," another chimed in, "I heard you plain as day. 'Potato', right there."

"Fine," Ted snapped, "moving on–"

"You don't think it'll ruin the summoning?"

"What?" Ted wheeled about to face his flock. "Who exactly is Lord High Viceroy here? Why don't you go back to the room above your parent's garage and let the real men handle a summoning, Rudy? Or maybe you'd like to come up here, Mr. I-have-perfect-hearing?"

Sullen silence greeted this.

"All right, if we can please get back to business." Ted turned back to the circle of fell runes. "For thou art a great and wondrous potato, magnific–oh bugger!"

With a somewhat comedic pop and a whiff of something eldritch and slightly starchy, Lord High Ted disappeared before their eyes, leaving only a puddle of reddish-purple goo that sizzled and popped. His flock eyed the spot with terror and slight embarrassment, shuffling their feet and coughing politely behind their hands. Finally one tall man sighed and slid off his hood.

"Let's scoop him up in a bucket or something for now. I think I've got a shopvac in the van somewhere," he said gravely, "anyone for Cinnabons?"

"–I did what now?" Herbert West said testily, eyeing his partner.

"Look, you said it, it was just a mistake. I'm sure it's something anyone could've done." Dan argued back.

"But I'm not just anyone and I didn't say that!" Herbert snapped, latex-gloved hands squeaking into fists.

"Yes, you did," Dan said, "You said 'potato', right out of nowhere."

"No, I merely stated that our long-term goal, compensating for all conceivable setbacks, will–"

"But you didn't say 'setbacks', you said 'potato'." Dan said. Herbert gave him the stinkeye. "Well, you did."

"Surely, Dan, you're not suggesting someone with my intelligence could make such a conversational faux pas as that." Herbert shot back. Dan rolled his eyes.

"Look, for once, could you just admit you were wrong, just this once?" He pleaded. Herbert snorted.

"Yeah, sure, Dan, I'll agree to something I didn't even do." He answered sarcastically.

"Just like you didn't kill my cat?" Dan returned dryly, eyebrow raised. Herbert became cold.

"Yes, and now we bring up ancient history. It seems to me Dan, that nothing short of death will stop you from reminding me of my youthful potato."

The only sound in the room was the faint buzzing of the halogen light. Dan stared at Herbert, who gazed back at him impassively.

"Okay," Dan sighed, "now you're just doing it on purpose."

In a room painted a particularly nauseating shade of avocado green, Jonathan Crane curses the day he wasn't born colorblind. Or just plain blind for the fact. Or even deaf. The young counselor's sweater was so loud he had a feeling corpses would turn away from it. Or perhaps it was his irritatingly bright and smug smile, a smile that said I've found happiness, what the hell is your problem? You know. One of those.

The young man's poorly printed nametag proclaimed him to be Evan! and was pinned to his striped bulky sweater with a colour scheme that would dissolve lesser clothing on contact. It was group therapy day, and per usual Jonathan was the only one "checked in" and not drooling. He could only shift uncomfortably in his chair and curse the day Arkham resorted to new age therapy. Jonathan was currently getting "life counseling" from the young man who had barely started using the toilet when Jonathan got his first degree.

"Nyaow Jonathan, I know we've had some rough sessions in the past," Evan! said, his very tone indicating that he had no idea what a real "rough session" was like, "but I really would like you to open up and share with the group. We're all friends here."

Jonathan let his gaze wander about the room, taking in faces from the mildly addled to those so doped up they could be used as emergency door props. Just the fact that no one was really "listening" wasn't reassuring.

"Well, Evan, I really don't feel comfortable talking with you." He said. "As I've stated before, you make me extremely uncomfortable, I find you jarring on a deeply psychological level. You frighten me, in fact. I had a dream about you last night and when I woke up the bed was wet. Please, at least change your sweater, for god's sake."

Evan! chuckled and shook his head. "Aw, c'mawn doc, we're buds, aren't we?"

Jonathan stared at the young man with distaste. "No, Evan, we are not friends. You scare the living shit out of me. Just the fact that you exist proves false the notion of a just and loving god. Where the hospital administrators found the potato to hire some–"

Evan! burst into a fit of spasmodic giggles. "A potato doc? What would the folks upstairs need with a potato, big guy?"

Jonathan peered at Evan! as if he were sprouting several extra heads made of finely aged brie and cotton swabs. He looked very confused, in short.

"I-ah…what?"

Evan! giggled again. "You said potato, doc! Po-ta-to! As in that chunky white thing they serve with steak sometimes."

Crane was affronted on all sides, partially by Evan!'s lack of descriptive talent, but mostly by the baffling betrayal his mouth had just given him.

"I…said potato?"

"Yeppers!" Evan! giggled shrilly again. The Ventriloquist twitched and vomited a little in his own mouth. "Didn't even realize it, did you?"

Jonathan wasn't just wondering if there was a point to the group therapy anymore, he was wondering if there was a point to life itself. The peppy counselor was slowly and luxuriously driving him down the path to true insanity, where down was now up and salmon and taupe went really great together.

"I s-s- I said potato?" Jonathan repeated dully, tugging at the day-glo nylon moorings that kept him anchored to the chair. "I did that? I said it? And didn't even realize?"

"Whoa, kemosabe, looks like we got us an echo in here!"

"I…oh god, what have I done?!" Jonathan screamed and began sobbing fitfully. Thankfully, the Riddler chose that very moment to scratch his nose, and they were all maced and tasered into unconsciousness and spared the Q&A at the end of the session.

Elsewhere, a young couple was having a more interesting night. The bed springs squeaked and the lovers groaned and gasped as they paid tribute to Coitus, Roman god of the five minute quickie

Ashley Williams whimpered in happiness as Amy, a cute coworker, ascended to her crescendo of the night.

"Ahhhh, AMY!"

"Oh, oh, OH, OH- POTATO!"

The young lovers' eyes popped open as they surveyed each other with mortification, rolling off each other as soon as physically possible. He scooted up to sit leaning against the headboard; she reclined and pulled up a sheet to cover herself. A shocked silence descended.

Ash pursed his lips, a confused and slightly frightened look on his handsome features. He looked as if he were doing a really tough trig problem in his head. She pulled a lighter from nowhere and got to her post-sex smoke. Finally Ash turned to her with his face still contorted with befuddlement.

"…What?"

The clown prince of crime paced within his temporary warehouse headquarters, shoulders hunched forward. He was, yet again, at a lack for locations for his crazy crime spree. Most of the abandoned carnivals had been done already; the ones left were condemnable by even his standards. After his little waltz with the boy blunder, the cotton candy factory had made security tighter than Fort Knox. And don't even get him started on the Komedy Klub.

Perhaps it would help if he ran through his latest plan to somehow ensnare the Dark Knight. It was only a rough draft now, but perhaps brainstorming would help him come up with a location.

"…so I dash down the darkened hallway while he gives chase, he runs into the scattered marbles and spring vaults over the pit filled with peppermint pongee sticks, only to run headfirst into my modified pie howitzer, getting it good right in the potato. Then–"

"Sir?" a minion piped up.

"What?" he snarled, rounding immediately on the quavering man.

"Y-y-you s-said p-potato."

The Joker's face was blank. "I said…potato?"

"Yessir," the six-foot-four greaser whimpered, failing to shrink behind his brethren.

"Huh." The Joker's face was reflective. "I said… potato. Didn't even notice. Funny what you miss."

"Yeah." The hench laughed cautiously, smelling hope. "Y-you miss a lot of-"

The gun that materialized in the Joker's hand cracked once and the hench went down, blood blossoming on the chest of his cheap cotton shirt. The clown shook his head wearily and holstered the pistol, turning and loping off to his private quarters and leaving the remaining minions rigid with fear.

"Imagine that. 'Potato'. Huh. And I meant to say carrot…"

In the Miskatonic valley, the two partners in crime spend a much more interesting night, thankful of the security the remote location of their house gives them for more than one reason.

"Oh, oh, OH, OH- DAN!"

"Ahhhh, POTATO!"

Both Dan and Herbert's eyes popped open as they finished their nightly offering to Stimulata, patron goddess of hot and forbidden sex. The two then crawled off to their respective corners of the bed, Dan reclining awkwardly on one elbow and Herbert staring lenseless at the wall, one arm dangling off into space.

Silence descended to disembowel the mood, giggling and squealing over the remains like some perverse screech owl.

Finally, Dan turned to Herbert.

"…What?"

Author's note: a bit of midnight crackdom, I apologize to anyone's brains that leak out on account of this. I'll be crying in the corner now…