by M. R. Holman
The price of the continuation of our forbidden love has finally made itself apparent... It's either us, or the universe...
There is a long pause in which the lights dim a little more. The set is now in twilight as Malevolid and Loretta gaze at each other longingly. They knew this moment would come sooner or later. Actually, they did not know that this exact moment would come because that would be preposterous, but they knew that their secret forbidden love must someday come to an end. A great deal of unspeakable and unknowable feelings pass between the two of them, werewolf engineer and shapeshifting delivery person, before Loretta speaks.
Loretta: Part of me knew it would end this way.
Malevolid: We had a good run. Besides, office romances are forbidden by the Destructomatic Human Resources Department. We would have drowned in a sea of paperwork just as we would have frozen to death by the lack of light in the universe.
Loretta: Though the sun and stars will remain, my life will be colder without your werewolf paws' touch.
Malevolid: You go! Go before we change our minds and doom all that ever was or will be! Go, Loretta!
Loretta reaches out her hand. Malevolid reaches out his werewolf paw and they exchange one final touch before Loretta erupts into a murder of black crows that fly out of the window. Malevolid stands at the window, presumably watching her fly out of sight and out of his romantic life forever. He turns around and speaks only to himself in little more than a whisper.
Malevolid: Goodbye, Loretta. I will always love you. Work sure is going to be strange on Monday.
The lights dim and the scene ends.
Act 2 Scene 3
The Destructomatic 3400 is humming loudly and it glows brightly. Obsequiam kneels before the machine and weeps while his Clone plays with one of those paddles with a ball attached to it with an elastic string.
Clone: Why are you crying, Obsequoyah?
Obsequiam: I weep because I have inadvertently destroyed my only chance at happiness. I knew I wanted darkness, but the darkness I sought was unknown to me before Loretta. I was a naive fool! A foolish fool, Clone!
Clone: I've paddled this ball over five hundred times in a row now.
Obsequiam: I'm the most foolingest fool that has ever fooled.
Clone: That's five-hundred and fifty.
Obsequiam: I'll never find my love Loretta in the darkness I have created... For she is dark herself. It's cruel that my two loves cannot co-exist... Everlasting universal darkness and the dark Loretta... What a dream... But no! It cannot be! I won't even speak it! I won't even think it...
Clone: I bet this thing would break before I missed the ball.
Obsequiam: I wonder where she is right now... What corporeal form she has assumed... I wonder if her darkness could cancel out the darkness...
Loretta: You don't have to wonder anymore.
Obsequiam rises to his feet, knocking over his clone who still continues to hit the ball with the paddle although he is now lying on the floor. Loretta has entered as the murder of crows through the window. She assumes her human form and stands before Obsequiam.
Loretta: I've been sent by Destructomatic Incorporated to reverse your machine and save the universe.
Obsequiam: And to love... me?
Loretta: Yes. Only if we can save the universe though. We must hurry!
The pair of them work feverishly on the Destructomatic 3400 while Clone continues to lie on the ground flawlessly playing his paddle game. The Destructomatic stops humming and stops glowing and the stage goes completely dark for a moment. All that can be heard is Clone's continued paddling. Then a great light bursts forth from the machine. A noise that resembles music being played backward at great speed erupts from the Destructomatic 3400 as the light grows ever brighter. Soon, the light is blinding and nothing can be seen on stage. The noise and intense light stop abruptly, leaving the stage silent and bathed in the normal lighting from before the attempted destruction of the universe. The clone is no longer on the stage. Obsequiam and Loretta are alone in the laboratory, and the third party customer service agency in the North Pole is illuminated on the side stage. The elves and Santa are celebrating silently.
Loretta: We did it. We really did it.
Obsequiam: It would have been impossible without you.
Loretta: So... Where do we go from here?
Obsequiam: You are the only mysterious shapeshifting creature that has ever made me feel this way... The darkness of your hair is greater than any darkness I could have achieved with the Destructomatic 3400, the blackness of your eyes would cause a black hole to weep with envy, the abyssal blackness of your feathers when you're a crow... I can't even perceive their full darkness, and as such, cannot verbalize their absence of brilliance. I want to bask in your particular darkness forever... Can that be?
Loretta: It can be. It must be. As soon as I saw your gargantuan ape-like body hunched over a machine that could destroy the entire universe I knew that we were meant to be. Your reddish-brown fur reminds me of blood strewn upon the dirt, and your lab coat is as white as an avalanche that could demolish a prosperous skiing and tourism based town. Your clone is so dumb that it makes me laugh, something I have never done before because I was too focused on dark creatures I could morph into and my career at Destructomatic. I realize now that there is so much more to life, and I want to experience it with you, vile Obsequiam.
Obsequiam lowers himself to one knee and extracts an engagement ring that he inexplicably has and carries around despite the fact that he had never loved anyone less than an hour before and had been actively attempting to destroy the universe so he could be alone forever in absolute darkness. Loretta holds her hands to her mouth and gasps. Before he can propose, the phone begins to ring. It is the elf, Irritatious.
Irritatious: Are we safe? Has the universe and all its light been spared, foul Obsequiam?
Obsequiam: It has, elf. It has. I'm in the middle of proposing to the love of my life, this time it is I who must put you on hold.
Obsequiam puts Irritatious on hold and returns his attention to Loretta. Irritatious silently relays this information to the elves and Santa Claus and they rejoice on the side stage.
Obsequiam: Loretta my love, darkest of dark, shapeshifter of my life, will you join me in matrimony?
Loretta: Obsequiam my dear, evil sasquatch scientist, I will.
Obsequiam and Loretta embrace. Obsequiam then picks up his telephone and takes Irritatious off hold.
Irritatious: Well, don't keep us waiting. What did she say? Do you have a bride or do you have irreparable heartache?
Obsequiam: I have a bride!
Irritatious: Excellent news! Where is the wedding going to be?
Obsequiam: Somewhere cold... Somewhere dark... I'm thinking perhaps... The North Pole.
Irritatious: *Gasps*
The lights dim and the scene ends. When the light rises upon the stage again, center stage is now occupied by a snowy landscape. Obsequiam and Loretta stand beneath a black stone arch, carved with snakes, crows, owls, locust, octopi, and a great number of other dark and sinister creatures. Santa Claus stands between them, officiating the wedding. Irritatious stands in as Obsequiam's best man. Clone is the ringbearer. Malevolid sits in the back row of the great number of guests which are spectating the wedding. Malevolid is the only guest in the crowd that is not an elf. Loretta and Obsequiam did not have many friends.
Act 2 Scene 4
Santa Claus: Do you, Obsequiam, take this shapeshifter to be your lawfully wedded wife in darkness and in not as much darkness, in freezing cold and boiling heat, and in evil and slightly less amounts of evil?
Obsequiam: I do.
Santa Claus: And do you, Loretta, take this evil sasquatch scientist to be your lawfully wedded husband in pestilence and violence, in the cold vacuum of space and in the deepest wells and caves, and in extreme financial debt to Destructomatic Incorpotated?
Loretta: I do.
Malevoli
d exits.
Santa Claus: Then by the power vested in me, Santa Claus, the omniscient bringer of joy to children all over the world, I now pronounce you evil sasquatch scientist and wife.
The crowd of elves clap enthusiastically as Obsequiam and Loretta kiss. The pair of them walk down the aisle hand in hand to a waiting reindeer driven sleigh. It has been draped in black and the reindeer wear black hoods which their pointy antlers erupt through. The pair of them enter the sleigh and it rises off the stage with easily visible ropes. The crowd of elves, Santa Claus, and Clone, who is apparently now the North Pole's problem, all wave to the newlywed couple as they fly away off stage. The curtains close and the Dragon Narrator appears.
Dragon Narrator: So it goes with love and destruction, a bit of each is needed to function. Especially when it is an evil sasquatch scientist and a shapeshifter in question, but as a wise dragon sage I offer one final suggestion. Do not look for love in destructive blows, it can usually be found in a murder of crows.
A Brief Biography of Snakespeare
It is difficult to comprehend how William Snakespeare, the most notable cryptid playwright of all time, could have come from such humble origins. William Snakespeare was born in a dragon cave located in the southeast coast of Suffolk, England in 1930. He was raised by his two dragon parents, Monica and Theodore Snakenvild. It was not until the age of twelve that he adopted the pen-name Snakespeare after reading a collection of human plays by a playwright named Shakespeare.
Snakespeare lacked the horns,