Issue #2: Chic AF

Transcript
Skulljack Issue #2
Now with more micro plastics per square millimeter
Price reduced to 35 Toiretto Coins!!!
Commentary
The text that falsely claims that the price per issue has gone down to 35 (previously 25) Toiretto coins is a reference George Orwell’s 1984 in which Big Brother falsely announced that the chocolate ration had gone up when it had in fact gone down.

Transcript
People have been speculating about aliens for hundreds of years now. They were so excited about the idea like it was going to change everything.

Transcript
Actual aliens did show up two years ago and we still had to go back to work the next day.
Commentary
Whenever anyone claims that aliens have visited the earth, I always comment that I’ll still have to go to work the next day. Reports of events, whether it’s aliens or religious miracles, et al., seem to ignore that self-evidence is what causes significant changes in society, not just random claims.

Transcript
Everyone was worried when these massive spaceships came to conquer us

Transcript
But they realized there was nothing to conquer since we had already conquered ourselves with consumerism.
Commentary
Blink to Pay is a reference to my short story The Miracle, publish in my short story collection: Death March to Happiness.
Transcript
Alien Burger
Drone-Thru
Now they just sell franchise rights to space themed restaurants and amusement parks and gift shops.

Transcript
They set up health clinics too, literally the universal basic healthcare everyone but the CEOs and tech bro influencers wanted
[Paid Sponsor Advertising]

Transcript
Experience health care from beyond the solar sphere
Introducing Astro-Care 2000
More Humane than Human
Brought to you by
XenCare Universal Medical Clinics LLC TBD TMA
Commentary
Bonus points if you’re old enough to get the White Zombie Astro-Creep 2000/More Human than Human reference.

Transcript
Except it turned out to be a farming operation. Their colony worlds have a shortage of gourmet tumors and micro plastic pink slime.
Commentary
The “tumor” here is actually a jellyfish.

Transcript
Human bodies are so full of cancerous cells and micro plastics that they realized the planet was a great resource.

Transcript
But at least they pay us to extract them.
Xencredit
Brainlink to pay

Transcript
And of course that created a cobra effect. Retro disease industries respawned overnight to cash in on the cancer market.
[Paid Sponsor Advertising]

Transcript
Party like it’s 199X
Cancer is chic AF
12:00 AM
January 1, 199X

Transcript
Derelict tobacco fields and factories started churning out unfiltered cigarettes. Any substance that was known to cause cancer to the People’s Republic of California got added back into the water supply.
Commentary
At this point I assume everything in the world is known to the state of California to cause cancer.

Transcript
People prone to runaway cell growth became cancer influencers, making cryptos on live streams showing off Jackson Pollack X-rays of their lungs and intestines.

Transcript
Brain tumors are a delicacy, so in demand that they spawned fashion trends. Cranial surgery scars started trending on the retina feeds.

Transcript
You could get a teenager working at a retro 90s bar in a burnout mall to scratch a line on the side of your head with a handheld laser scalpel and add some stitching scars if you hadn’t been able to actually grow a brain glob.

Transcript
Of course you’d be called a poser and everyone can spot the diff between a professional alien job and a retro mall goth laser job.

Transcript
Melanoma became the in-demand skin treatment the cancerati would self-administer at home with intense UV guns.

Transcript
Then the cancer industry collapsed overnight when someone bothered to mention to the aliens that they can just grow cancer cells in a lab

Transcript
So I spent nine months working the nutrient guns in a cell growth factory for corporate credit chits that lost value as soon as they were issued and expired by the end of the week.

Transcript
“Hey buddy, you gotta move on. You can’t monologue here.”
Secforce
Brought to you by
Securegy
Commentary
Secforce is a reference to the corporate security forces in my short story Keep Portland Wired and Securegy is a reference to a company in my short story Speed Kills. The boot and dead happy face icons are from the cover to my Death March to Happiness short story collection and a reference to a line from George Orwell’s 1984: “If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face— forever.”

Transcript
No Internal Monologuing
Penalties include debt acceleration
Secforce
Brought to you by
Securegy
