Two Gentlemen on Veronica
A hallway in Mahogany Row. Enter three Cleaners.
First Cleaner
Where hast thou been, sister?
Second Cleaner
Killing time.
Third Cleaner
Sister, where thou?
First Cleaner
The lunchroom, ‘natch. To watch the tube
‘Midst coffee stains and toaster leavings.
But Probostickus happened by
Demanding I return to buff
Suggesting that I’ve shirk’d enough
I said I'll go, I'll go, I'll go.
Second Cleaner
Our work here is not too onerous,
And the nerds don’t try to boner us.
First Cleaner
Truth! With few drones about this hall
It seems unsullied. Hear the call
Of indolence and Survivor?
Second Cleaner
But soft! Spik’d heelprints mar our waxy floor.
What sort of sinful beast trods our halls?
Third Cleaner
Best tidy up, lest Probo pitch a fit.
Sound of a floor polisher.
Second Cleaner1
Round and round doth polisher go;
Our dour tedium passing slow.
ALL1
Double, double toil and trouble;
Lysol burn, detergent bubble.
Second Cleaner
Hallways of oak and floors of ice cold stone
Yet what’s that echo? Hearest thou a moan?
First Cleaner
It`s likely some cube jockey tossing off
Wreck'd as homeward he did come.
They stop the polisher. Muted noises emerge from a nearby office.
Third Cleaner
A drum, a drum!
The nerd doth come.
Enter Veronica
First Cleaner
Whoa. How now, lady? You look angerly.
Veronica
YOU - foul, misshapen trio!1
Your noises and your smells conspire
To make my pimply partner tire
And lose what focus on our goal
Can be bludgeoned from his soul.
Delicate work transpires behind these walls
Remove thy bony asses from these halls
Forthwith. Else unemployment queue
Will be your destination too.
Exit Veronica
First Cleaner
Rather than hold conference with this harpy,
To the lunchroom let's repair at once.
Come, let's make haste; she'll soon be back again.
Second Cleaner
Abandon rhetoric's sweet smoke
For that of Marlboro Man, perchance?
Third Cleaner
Chase it with a frosty Bud!
That's a plan that's firm and good.
First Cleaner
Grab your brooms, let us depart.
Come, sisters, let's go!
Second Cleaner
Yo!
Third Cleaner
Yo!
Exuent Cleaners.
Unseen (and presumably color coordinated) Announcer:
As he dresses, turgid and malevolent schemes
Bestir themselves with the dark recesses
Of Helmut's shocked and spinning brain.
How might Probostickus meet his grisly demise?
Enter Helmut
-
Helmut
-
Alas! Now I must do murder. What to do?
I am no schemer, and no OJ Simpson's here
(Acquitted though he be, by learned peers)
To plot the nefarious deed. Damnit, Jim!
I'm a lover, not a fighter,
With love's sweet oils still drying on my skin.
Can I kill a man, and if so how?
Perhaps electric shock through his PC?
No gearhead I, I'd likely kill myself instead of him.
Cut the brake lines of his Porsche perhaps?
Unreliable at best, the way he drives
Insults the german engineers who made it.
How many times has he been standing here
Beside this fax machine and peering down
Like some demented god at us below?
But soft! There he is below me as I speak!
Checking the Page 3 girl as he leaves!
Now's my big chance!
Helmut grabs the heavy fax machine and tips it over the railing. It falls heavily
to the floor below, landing with a wet thudding sound.
-
Nerdquo (offstage)
-
HOLY SHIT!
-
Helmut (Schwarzenegger-like)
-
You're faxxed now!
CURTAIN FALLS
back ... forward
1 The first part of this scene was originally written by toasterleavings. Sadly, toasterleavings removed all content from e2. I have backfilled the missing scene with my own work, but have retained a few of tl's key phrasings, attributed with the 1 mark. A few lines of Shakespeare's Scottish play appear verbatim in this scene as well, as lines for that play's witches in their modern roles.