A note from your exalted author, Ryan Robbins

I know, I know...it's been some time since the last entry of the S.S. Liberace, and I left you hanging with the red-headed Yo-Yo Ma...but hey, I've got to take a break sometime. Think of it as a television show, and this is the cliff hanger of season one. Now you've got to wait a while before you can read the conclusion and will ultimately be disappointed because I have failed to live up to expectations - just like Fox TV.

Until then, I'm going to enjoy my little summer break and spend some time with my significant other. As J-Lud would put it..."I'm gonna be crunchin' with my Betty while slappin' back a forty. If da pad's a rockin', come on in, cuz I'm a freak like that..." or something along those lines.

See you September 1st bee-atch!

Jean Sprat in Wonderland, Part 1/4

Personal Log. Commodore's Liaison, Jean Sprat. 05.08.3001

(Part 1)

I go over the last few days and I want to vomit. It hasn't happened yet. After running to the bathroom twice now, I've only come away with the nasty taste of acid reflux. Surely, someday, when I look back on the events that took place, I'll wonder if I didn't just run my head into the wall a dozen times or so and imagined the whole thing in some sort of comatose delirium. It's all just so bizarre and unbelievable it actually makes more sense that I was abducted and fed false memories. There are certainly species in the universe that have such abilities. Maybe I was out partying too hard with Dr. Leary. I'm sure there is a bevy of noxious fumes at Dr. Leary's disposal that could make me hallucinate for several days.

It all started at Regina Five. The Slurs, after colliding with us and pulverizing our engines, needed to tow us into space dock in order to repair the Liberace. Regina Five wouldn't have been my first choice, but it was the closest. The space dock is quite infamous for its ill repute ever since the Guinness Book of Universal Records honored Regina Five for most punctured eardrums due to interspecies misunderstandings of anatomy.

Luckily, I had found in a remote section on level five, a quaint little cafe and pastry shop. The owner was a Pendore-bat, a species known for its incessant and sometimes insufferable optimism. Of course, only a Pendore-bat would set up a cafe in Regina Five. I heard Starbucks tried to franchise there, but the entire shop was jettisoned into space by a customer with levitation abilities who had explicitly asked for a latte with skim milk and received whole.

I was sitting, enjoying a cup of vermouth mocha and a wonderful crumb cake when I happened to catch sight of a man entering the cafe. Right at that moment I was taking a sip, and I thought for sure I was going to snort mocha.

It couldn't be, I thought. It's impossible. For one, I thought I had imagined the whole thing before. For another, what were the odds that I would find him here in a remote cafe on Regina Five of all places?

There he was, though. The same face, the same red hair, the same eyes that had stared down upon me several years ago. It was the only face that I could remember – the last face I saw before waking up and realizing that I was no longer a woman, but had been changed into a man.

There, unmistakably, was the red-headed Yo-Yo Ma.

Getting to Know the Crew, Jean Sprat

Official Transcript of Interview with 1st Mate Jean Sprat.

While serving as 1st Mate on the Battle Cruiser, Wendigo under the command of Admiral Jonathan Ludwig Sr., 1st Mate Jean Sprat was attacked on an away mission to Aldercott. Eighteen days later a search crew found her shuttle adrift in space and an unconscious male aboard. That male after DNA testing was determined to be Jean Sprat.

Here is Jean Sprat's official interview following that event.

Interviewer: Is it true that you used to be female?

Sprat: Yes.

Interviewer: And now you're male?

Sprat: Isn't that obvious?

Interviewer: Right. Do you know how this mishap occurred?

Sprat: Mishap? A broken leg is a mishap. A fender-bender is a mishap. I have a f*&$ing d#@k, you moron.

Interviewer: Yes, I'm sorry. We're just curious how it happened.

Sprat: How the hell should I know? All I remember is being attacked and losing consciousness during the firefight. I woke up only once before I was rescued and I'm pretty sure I was drugged.

Interviewer: What did you see when you woke up?

Sprat: Nothing important.

Interviewer: Just describe what you saw.

Sprat: Look, this may sound crazy, but I swear I saw the original Yo-Yo Ma – not that cyborg hack that plays for the Pluto orchestra. He had red hair and he was standing over me holding a cello made out of spiral pasta. He was completely naked, and I found it very odd that he didn't have any genitalia. Incidentally he was a natural red head.

Interviewer: Yo-Yo Ma?

Sprat: Look, I said I was probably drugged you dip-s@#t. Why are we here? I want to be out there hunting down the a$$hole that did this to me and force him to give back my t$ts and ovaries. I'm a pissed off woman with a c#$k. Don't f*#k with me.

Interviewer: Right, how about we take a short break.


Little more could be gleaned from Sprat's memory. A UIN warrant was issued for a sexless species, or possibly a unisex species with reddish hair and resembling a 20th century classical cellist, but the search still continues without much success.

Jean Sprat is now the official liaison to the Commodore on the S.S. Liberace.

Greeg'u's Punishment, Emperor Plu'boi. Part 3/3

Selection from Arcadian Emperor Plu'boi's Memoirs. 05.05.3001

(English Translation)

Today was a good day. I got to put some poor schmuck through the Flooed Gauntlet. It was hysterical. I laughed so hard I wet my throne. By far the Flooed Gauntlet was the best punishment I ever came up with. It was funny enough that I decreed that the reproductive organs of humans are trophies of war, and then everyone started putting them on their mantles and bedside tables. Being such an enigmatic ruler, I took it a step further and invented a reprimand where I get to watch somebody get lambasted with testicles – it's just priceless.

Oh, it's so good to be Emperor.

I'm thinking of going even further – maybe douse the punished in something really sticky, and then cover them in human hair before bombarding them with human genitals. That'll get so many laughs. I've heard of a human custom called "show tunes". As an added kick we could dress them up in a ball gown and make them perform these "show tunes." You can't go wrong with really hairy and emasculated live entertainment.

Oh, I might as well get a throne that flushes.