The Old Improbable Island Wiki

Misery Guts beckons to you from the mouth of the Communications Tent. “C'mere,” he croaks. “Got somethin' you should see.” He shoves the heel of his hand against his jaw. There is a series of unpleasant cracks, and he grimaces as he rolls his head about before turning to shuffle inside. You cautiously follow after. “Well,” he's saying. “Listen to, I guess, on account of all the Improbability that was there that night.. stick Jokers in the same place and the tapes are bound to go a little funny.”

He picks up a tape and slips it into a player. The screen lights up with a faint white static. Every once in a while you can make out a figure. There seem to be four of them.. there's Sessine. That, that one there in the cape, that might be Snickerer. And those other two?

You can hear the one you think might be Snickerer say, “I'm leaving, I'm afraid. My time here is running out, and I'll not be able to return until I prevail against what shouldn't be and get back what I've lost.”

The taller of the two that are unidentified steps nearer to maybe-Snickerer. “What shouldn't be?” he asks.

Maybe-Snickerer - no, definitely-Snickerer sounds rueful. “Something that should never have been invoked. Mundanity made manifest and malign. I've failed against it once, you see, and the price…“

Fuzzy white static. The two other figures you can't identify look toward each other. The littler one, definitely female, begins, “I don't believe in the Mundane. Say I step from here onto that rock. Mundane but troubling business. Foremost, I'm fighting against an atmosphere which exerts..”

The other one picks up seamlessly. Male. They speak in turns. “Fourteen pounds of pressure on every bit of my body. I must be certain that I'll step on a rock traveling more than twenty miles per second around the sun. If I misjudge, then the rock is leagues away. I have to manage all of this clinging to a round planet with my head pointed into endless space, and a wind blowing at..”

Female again: ”She knows how many miles per second through my very being. The rock isn't solid. I trust I won't slip through, that some forces of matter will knock against me and nudge me up.”

“By net result, I remain steady.”

“However, should I fall through, or be nudged up too aggressively, it's no violation of natural law. It's a rare coincidence within a quite mundane act.”

There's a pause, then together they say, “Listen!”

Male: “The one thing we can say for sure about matter is that it's vibrating. All vibrations..”

“Are theoretically sound. And so.. it's not unreasonable to suggest that,” they speak together, “The universe is music and must be perceived as such.”

You can see the figures again, faintly. They are holding instruments - a cello and a violin, respectively. Then there's static as they set their bows to play. Afterall, if the universe is music, the universe may be played.. the universe may be composed, and rewritten.. There is a flash. More static.

When it clears, there are just three people there.

Then the tape cuts.