ABOUT    CAST    ARCHIVE    FORUM    BONUS    STORE         

 

KINGFISHER TALES PRESENTS:                  

CURLY FRIED                       

Take me home, delicious heart.

(Visual caption below)

The comic commemorated the 5th anniversary of the comic.

Curly Fried
 Curly Fried     

Curly exhaled all the way.

   "Fhoooahwahha ha... What is this cannibalistic substance? *kaff* Mine vascular tissues bear the stings of a hundred score piney nettles."

   "It's been that long, Curly? Wish I could get some of that pine needle, or whatever that was."

   "Nettles, the stingingest. So Death, fiery and vehicular. What eldritch force has knit for you this Jack-shaped raiment?"

   "Remember that party I went to? It was a vampire party. That probably explains things, doesn't it?"

   "Hm. Let me roll this around my axons and dendrites whilst I complete the arc of this Bribois curl." She gesticulated like thinking required some sort of spellcraft, and let smoke escape her mouth before pulling it back in through her nostrils.

Curly Fried

Jack noticed she was swimming in a huge high school athletics t-shirt that revealed one bra strap through the mighty neck opening.

   "Yeah, I wasn't supposed to tell you. Did you get that money? That was all I had left."

Her forehead wrinkled and smoothed a few times.

   "Am I to two questions now? A vampire party's explanatory power, and now... Oh yes, I... That was a bit mysterimous. Magnerious. Were they vampire GlenMarks?"

   "Nope. They were the last human GlenMarks."

They leaned on the slim, splintery wooden pillars of a car shelter, occasionally tripping the motion sensor light. Moths tried to die on the cherries of their blunts.

    

   "Good. They needn't have been laundered in holy water. Now. What brings thee to me? From what vampirish pain do you seek the solace of Curly arms?"

   "Well, y'know, I'd always planned to make sure you were doing OK, but I gotta admit it's for selfish reasons. But first, is there anything you wanted to tell me? Nice shirt, by the way."

Her chin fell to her collarbone and curliness fell over her face, as she assessed the significance of the shirt mention. When she looked back up to him, her glasses were shaded by a bank of hair, like a fieldball cap pulled too low.

   "Ah. It was the high school regalia of the paramedic, Mr. Park. I have discovered that a mountain of man is required to motivate wolfmanly passions within."

    

    "Alright. Well, I'm happy. I hope he makes more money than I did."

    "The morest. *kaff kaff kaff*" She trembled from the cough or the cold, and then unexpectedly lunged at Jack, grabbing him by the collar. "Out with it, thou recalcitrant zombie!"

Curly Fried

 
   "Alright, alright, OK. So, remember that guy Karl? With the hair?" Jack realized her doobie had burned a hole in his undershirt and stubbed a finger there to stop the melting.

   "What? The mock man? The adulterous alabaster android? The black-tressed betrayer of loving youths?"

   "Yeah, that's him. I mean, don't you think people can change? It's been a long time."

She cocked an eyebrow so hard it made the shelf of curls slouch away from her forehead again.

   "He is in your life once more? Was it his vampire party?"

   "No no no, this is nothing to do with that. He's still human. Man, wouldn't he have loved that?"

   "All the more if it gave him the powers of a pumpkin. Yet let us remain as focused as the ganj allows." Her eyes swirled about, then she continued. "You are the undead. a drinker of human blood, a bastardy child of Lord Demos. He's a human, a juicy fruit to be erotically plucked of his vine, like the veriest of Elsinor P. Spot novellum. This shouldn't last long."

   "Nawnawnaw, vampires don't kill people. I mean, I'm not going to kill him and eat him. I mean it's like before. Forget the vampire part. I think it's confusing things."

She stared blankly. She was trembling from the cold, but made no move to warm herself. She continued.

   "Ah then, if I forget that you are a v-vampire, am I to envision Karloss rom-mancing thy unmoving corpse?"

   "Oh no, not that... Let's go for a ride or something."

   "B-b-but how will you work the pedals, with your blasted and lifeless rem-mains?"

   "I got here, didn't I?"

Curly Fried

He popped the doors of his car, started it up, and adjusted the heat. She crawled into the passenger side and he pressed a magic button to close the door behind her.

   "Whoa. Ghost door." The doobie bobbed on her lip.

   "OK, so pretend I'm not a creepy undead guy, just regular. At least, as regular as I was before."

   "Hm, somehow you, yet a stalwart homosexual of the breathing persuasion, despite vampire parties and / or fierydooms. Proceeding thus..?"

   "OK, so this guy is back and I tell him how crappy he was, and he's like, 'Oh, my bad.' But then he's still around and trying to make it up, but he's acting weird too, and all I got is weird ghouls to ask, so I'm calling on you, Curlyfry."

   "For the wisdom I possess on the nature of men?"

   "Yeah, things always worked out when I asked you stuff before."

   "Hm... I believe I did have something to say about this random Karl. Two little words, yes? What were they?"

   "Uh... 'Never forgive'?"

   "These are they. My wisdom stands."

   "But, you know, like, never ever?"

She considered the question as she inhaled away a quarter-inch of paper. Then,

   "This is it then - the cruxiform of the tissue, the joint of the Cosmos, the conjunction of minds. You, the Seeker. The Oracle, I. For lo, within the meat-colored folds of my cerebral cortex lie the thoughts that have never failed you before - a heretofore perfect wisdom - and yet a wisdom you now hope to gainsay, a wisdom you hope to turn back to bite its own tail, to reverse its course inexorable, its condemnation of Karloss unending. Will I? Can I? Should I?"

   "Um, kind of, yeah?"

Curly Fried 
Curly Fried

 
     As they sped away, Jack and Curly realized the hijinks were over. The spirit of mirth was gone. She lolled her head around and the wind blew her hair in easy, springy waves.

     Jack looked at her, then back to the road. He hoped she wouldn't get a random drug test at work anytime soon. How long does that stuff take to leave the system? Then he remembered.

     "You never answered my question, Fry. What kind of oracle are you?"

     "Oh? Ah. The merits of forgiveness in this Modern Age. Yea, or yea to nay? What will I say? Does it actually matter one whit, to an undead beast in the throes of his remaining mortal lusts?"

     "I wouldn't have come all the way out here if it didn't."

     "Very well. Then as you have been patient with me, and appeased me with sacrifices of precious herbs and spices, you deserve a well-considered answer. I think... Um... Um..."

     "Do you need me to drain something out of your bloodstream there?"

     "Heaven forfend. I am at my most sagacious when spacious. It just takes some doing to calculate this calculum. Now then. Don't. I say, never forgive."

     "Really? But..."

     "Really. When a worm shows you its true colors, you know as to its species, and its kind shall not be changed by any passage of time. He is surely the same manner of devil that he was in yon golden day."

     "But don't you think the two of us have changed since then? We were just kids."

     "What? I have changed? How?"

     "Well, frankly I'm surprised your hair decompressed this well."

     "You know naught of the ways of Aegenian tresses. They are mighty. But what changes of import are there? I'm the same titan of moral courage, monk-like serenity, and the wisdom of the wizened."

     "Well, true. But the two of us, workin' at a desk? Not just riding free, stoned out of our minds, or hanging out beneath the bleachers?"

     "These are not changes to our character, merely to our circumstance. But then, as we do not personally change, is it even possible to avoid repeating our mistakes? In coming to me, have you merely sought a sphinx curse? To know what mistake you are doomed to repeat, whilst being powerless to avoid it?"

     "So you think he's going to get a fake girlfriend again?"

     "How homosexual-forward is he? Forthright to the crooked path?"

     "Pretty homosexual-forward. I don't think he has anyone left to impress. Like, he's out to everyone... It's a different problem this time."

     "A sphinx curse it is then. I am certain his cowardice is fully intact. It will one day cause him to turn from you, and on that day, you will have to leave him to wallow in it, or forever lose your homosexual powers. Those are the rules, at least, if the conspiracy films I've seen on internet are to be believed."

     "Do you think it's just nostalgia? Is that why this feels important?"

     She looked at him and considered it. "The undead really aren't so different from the quick, are they? Well, goodsir, the answer is Yes. You are a slave to the romantic as much as you are a slave to seeking and then spurning the advice of your most brilliant confidant.

     As such, you will suffer what fate has ordained, and attempts at escape are the mere jiggling of a marionette upon his shoebox stage. But worry not, master vampire. There is much dignity in the tale of the tragic hero."

     "You're right. I guess I'll have forever to get over it if we break up. So yeah, how about that? You don't think you'd ever be into immortality, by chance?"

     She let the rumble of the car soften her body into comfortable mush as the wind burned her cheek. "Mmm, likely not. Though I appreciate the grave's generosity in offering me your company tonight."

     He felt the vibrations of the road through the hairs on his arms, through the way the wind curled in his ear, through every click and scrape in the dust before them, and knew he could drive her home with his eyes closed. "Yeah, I guess it's cool to have magic powers and live forever and everything, but I miss actually getting high. And I miss you a lot."


Curly Fried

 

THE END

 

ABOUT    CAST    ARCHIVE    FORUM    BONUS    STORE    
 
     November 1st, 2015
     By:  Christopher

CURLY FRY RIDES AGAIN! Was it everything ye wished it to be? Happy Kingfisherversary! Five years of this mayhem. I need a nap.

 

 VISUAL CAPTION: This is the description of the images, for purposes such as accessibility and internet searches.

PRE-COMIC BANNER.)

   (Words are in white over the Kingfisher page's customary black, with fancy hand-scribbled
script. Supporting the words are images of a kingfisher head and cartoonish Theodore winking.
)

TEXT: Happy Kingfishermas!     5 Years of Excellence     "Get Spooky wit it!"

COMIC TITLE AREA.)

(Lettering is high-impact sans-serif multi-colored foolery.)

TITLE: JACK BALLARD RETURNS FROM THE DEAD IN "CURLY FRIED"

1.)

   (Once upon a time in the haute punk couture establishment Red Boots, Jack and
Darren look upon an item and consult the Punk Rock Haberdasher for his expertise.
)

INTERTITLE: GC (Global Chaos)

JACK: I don't get it.

DARREN: P.R.H.D.?

P.R.H.D.: Fashion, Sir.

JACK: Huh.

2.)

(We see they are looking upon a pair of glasses. Speech comes from off-panel.)

P.R.H.D.: Glasses not for vision, but for an accessory.

JACK: I'll take 'em.

3.)

(Scene change! In Jack's apartment, Darren is looking snooty.)

INTERTITLE: ANOTHER TIME...

DARREN: What smells janky?

JACK: This guy keeps giving me weed. What should I do with it?

4.)

DARREN: I dunno. Maybe use it to get a needy basehead stoned so you can, y'know.

JACK: Waste not, want not.

5.)

(Scene change again! Jack and Karl on a couch. Karl is bashful and Jack cranky.)

INTERTITLE: ANOTHER TIME...

KARL: So hey... How about that Demetri cat?

JACK: Argh!

6.)

JACK: Why are so curious about the guy? Hot for his jock?

KARL: Whut Whut? No. No.

7.)

(Scene change yet again! Jack stands alone in his place.)

INTERTITLE: LATER...

8.)

(Jack has cast himself upon the floor in ostentatious lament.)

JACK: ARGDAMNITALL

9.)

(Jack's eyes indicate a change of mood - a plan forming?)

10.)

(Scene change again. Jack's former roommate Danielle in her work place as a medical clerk.)

INTERTITLE: Elsewhere, later

11.)

(Danielle's personal phone announces she is receiving a message.)

DANIELLE'S RINGTONE: OO DANCE WE GOTTA OO

12.)

(She looks upon it with hints of surprise and sorrow, low key.)

13.)

(Her message screen.)

M.ENDL: Hey I still have a thing of yours. Meet me @ the gift shop, 7:00~?

14.)

(Later, she is entering a hospital's gift shop. The world looks gloomy.)

15.)

(Someone in an aisle whistles to her. Balloons hang above near the artificial lights.)

SOMEONE OFF PANEL:

DANIELLE: Mark?

16.)

(She begins to turn, expression weary but friendly.)

DANIELLE: I

17.)

(Her expression is replaced with astonishment.)

DANIELLE: *

18.)

(Jack is there in the Dracula hypno-pose! He wears the glasses from Red Boots and a flannel like unto his youthful styles.)

JACK: RELAX

19.)

(Jack continues his spiel from off-panel while Danielle's eyes swirl in hypno thrall.)

JACK: Tonight you will feel Jack Ballard calling. When you come...

20.)

(Danielle is swirly-eyed and surrounded by swirls.)

21.)

(She snaps to, with someone getting her attention.)

SOMEONE: (from off panel) Danielle? Hello. Hey.

22.)

(It was a scene change! She's at home in bed with her loving man, just chillin'.)

DANIELLE: Sorry, Lionel. Guess I'm more tired than usual.

LIONEL: It's alright, love. Have a sleep, then.

23.)

(The lovers are all snuggly. Aww.)

24.)

(Danielle is startled to wakefulness by the phantom mouth of Jack doing his magic call.)

JACK MOUTH: CURLY FRY, COME TO ME

25.)

(Her nightstand, with glasses and contact lenses.)

26.)

(She has taken the glasses.)

27.)

(As she staggers along putting on her glasses, we can see her hair has, in the course
 of her evening, shaken off the effects of the straightening comb. It is voluminous.
)

28.)

(Swirls abound once more as she moves along in the hypno haze. She is now holding her clothes - one tiny garment and one large.)

29.)

(The tiny item was her purple leggings, the large a green t-shirt that reads "PARK - VARSITY." She is donning them as she goes.)

30.)

   (The elements are assembled - big hair, glasses, big t-shirt, skinny leggings,
skinny person within it all. Her head is obscure like a wolfman before the howl.
)

31.)

(At her door stands Jack, in the accoutrement of his living self.)

JACK: Oy, Fry.

DANIELLE: (off panel) Oy, Jick.

32.)

(DANIELLE IS BECOME CURLYFRY ONCE MORE! AIEEE! She smiles and tries to grasp the meaning of this image of her dead friend.)

CURLYFRY: Wot dark fate leads this smiling spectre of yesteryear to shadow Curly's door?

33.)

(Jack is expressing his lament and Curly is looking thoughtful.)

JACK: The darkest! I am dead, Curlyfry, & it sucks in more than just the obvious way.

CURLYFRY: Death is dark. To see the light of it, we must blaze something

34.)

(Jack smiles and flashes two doobies between his fingers.)

JACK: Blaze we will.

35.)

(Moments later, green smoke puffs, and the two have become more cartoonish. Curly is able to feel the effects more
   and has become a wriggly-tongued monstrosity such as might grace the bottom of a skateboard decades before.
)

***TEXT INTERLUDE BEGINS***

36.)

('Tis Curlyfry in glory, chilling with a fat spliff in the outdoors at her apartment complex. Smoke tendrils abound.)

37.)

(Curlyfry gestures for serious with a clawed hand.)

38.)

(Jack and Curlyfry look spacy, with silky strands of smoke floating all about them.)

CURLYFRY: I dunno.

***TEXT INTERLUDE ENDS***

39.)

(Jack and Curlyfry look more realistic than previously, Curly in the foreground and space-faced.)

CURLYFRY: I don't know. 'Tis drastic to awaken the Fry...

40.)

(Jack looks concerned as Curlyfry is looking more twisted, with stars floating about her head.)

JACK: Are you OK?

CURLYFRY: The ganj is unpeaceful

41.)

(Curly makes a dire pronouncement in a horror movie style, fingers claw-like.)

CURLYFRY: We must burn this unholy fuel in ways befitting its herbal rancour.

42.)

(Jack looks faintly freaked out and Curly is exhaling at the car ceiling like a wolf to the moon.)

JACK: When you're right, you're right...

43.)

(Degenerate "comix" style Jack and Curly express dark intent.)

SPOOKY LETTERINGS: LET'S RIDE

44.)

  (Jack and Curly drive out on a mission of mayhem. Jack waves an arm in the night air, Curly hangs out the window with
her doobie smoking.
Jack's car is the mighty Shiny One that was previously deployed in the service of global chaossss 'n' shit.)

THE SHINY ONE: VreeeooommbBBB

45.)

(We see a sleeping lady. Her hair is now pink, yet she was once a dark-dyed goth baby putting tongues on Jack in Chapter 9.5.
      
In the background also snoozes her dude. She was once named Aster but I changed it to Cyanide. Don't judge me.)

APPROACHING VEHICLE OUTSIDE: RMBBBB

46.)

(Cyanide is awakened in terror, with spectral Jack eyes floating in her brainspace.)

JACK: (in the mentals) CYANIDE, COME TO ME

47.)

(With trepidation she pulls on the cord of her horizontal blinds.)

48.)

(Cyanide is shocked to see levitating Jack and Curlyfry outside her window, and drops the cord. The blinds remain open.)

49.)

(Curly points to Jack as he makes a sassy accusatory expression at their victim.)

CURLYFRY: Your kissing made him gaaay...

50.)

(Cyanide is mortified. Or terrified. She pulls a pulp novel cover expression, hands on face, shock lines shocking.)

51.)

(The hot rod flies through the air rumbling. We see it from beneath, mid-leap.)

THE SHINY ONE: RMMBBB

52.)

(The shiny one is looking hella BA powering on, motion lines all about it. Lil' white reflections of Curly and Jack glasses can be seen within.)

53.)

(Outside a nightlife spot, Jack and Curly loom all menacing. The neon sign is lovely and pink.)

NEON SIGN: The Gay Duke

54.)

(Inside the club, Jack and Curly creep toward two seated people. One wears
     a fur coat and makeup, the other is balding with elaborate piercings.
)

55.)

(Behold! We see it's the villainous harpy personage known as Stevia. The other person must be Bucket of Cheese.)

STEVIA: I know, Bucket, I (text disappears off panel) you don't (text disappears off panel) that see (text disappears off panel)

THEIR PHONE VIBIN': BZZ

56.)

(As Stevia receives the call, Jack and Curly can be seen in the background, biding their time for to prank them. Bucket of Cheese is nonplussed.)

STEVIA: Oh my god, Councilman Wenders, you have got to stop calling me like this. I know, but-

57.)

(Stevia momentarily muffles the receiver of their phone to explain the situation to Bucket of Cheese.)

STEVIA: He can't get enough of me.

BUCKET OF CHEESE: Yup.

58.)

(Jack's face as his patience wears thin. So furious.)

59.)

(Stevia still gabbles away into their phone piece.)

60.)

(Curly's face as her patience wears thin. So curly.)

61.)

(Tighter shot of the Stevia mouth, still running. It never ends!)

62.)

(Jack and Curly drive away in frustration, car engine thundering. Jack flips a bird.)

JACK: FUCK IT!

THE SHINY ONE: NNYEEERRMBBB

63.)

(Cerise is startled to wakefulness by ghoulish Jack summons.)

JACK: (in the mentals) CERISE   COME TO ME

64.)

(Cerise staggers through a long hall and out into the street lights.)

65.)

(Jack has Curly by the arm and they are floating around Cerise like mothaflippin' Lost Boys. She is amazed.)

CURLYFRY: We're the ghosts of youthness past...

JACK: Karl is still totally into you...

CERISE: Really?

66.)

(Jack's sporting machine peels away with muscle fury.)

THE SHINY ONE: VRRRR

67.)

(Jack's car is losing traction as it brakes hard. Hints of Jack and Curly are visible within.)

THE SHINY ONE: SCREEEE

68.)

(Jack's hot rod is driving in reverse.)

THE SHINY ONE: VRM BM VRM

69.)

(They've returned and Jack is reprogramming Cerise with a tender expression on. Curly leans in on his shoulder.)

JACK: OK, actually, Karl is totally gay. Also, you're over him. You got hella self-respect.

***END TEXT BEGINS***

70.)

(Jack and Danielle share a hug. Will he erase her memories? Will they ever see each other again? No answers as the story concludes.)

LAST BIT O' TEXT: THE END

 

 
 
 
 
Comic Rank
 
UPDATES 1x
A WEEK

 
RSS - SUBSCRIBE
 
HORROR BOYS

  THE KINGFISHER
  OFFICIAL FORUM

 
CONTACT:
  BORFYMASTER
  AT GMAIL