The Hypercube
(DAD walks onto stage, which is bare and black, lit by the stage lights.)
Dad: Susan are you home? (Enter SON and DAUGHTER) Hey kids, have you seen your mother anywhere? (They ignore him) Kids? I’m talking to you.
Son: Ugh, we’re ignoring you dad.
Dad: What for?
Son: We hate it here; why did we have to move?
Dad: Kids, I know moving was hard for you guys, but my job required that I transfer here.
Daughter: But you moved us to the Hypercube, the fourth-dimensional realm, where neither time nor space exists.
(CUE SFX - OUTER SPACE SOUND. LIGHTING CUE – WASH OF COLORED LIGHT FOR FEW SECONDS, RETURN TO NORMAL ON SON’S LINE)
Son: And there’s nothing to do here!
(During the next line, MECHANICAL BIRD-MAN flies across the stage behind the characters.)
Dad: What are you talking about? There’s plenty to do in the Hypercube. Have you tried getting to know the neighborhood better?
Son: But every time I go walking somewhere, I get attacked by swarms of nanomite insects.
Dad: Those will leave when the seasons change. Until then, just deal with their metal stingers.
Son: Ugh, I hate your stupid Hypercube; I miss my friends and I miss my band, the Steel Magnolias! I’m going to my room (Exit stage right)
(SFX CUE - OUTER SPACE SOUND)
(Enter ALTERNATE JOHN WILKES BOOTH)
Booth: Oh, this looks like a family thing. I’m not interrupting anything, am I?
Dad: No, John Wilkes Booth of Earth 9, I was just trying to explain something to my selfish kids.
Booth: Well I’ll be on my way; I was just accessing the Hypercube to travel to Earth-Red, so I could assassinate Emperor Dukakis. Sic Semper Tyranus!
(Booth exits)
Daughter: Listen dad – I’ll be gone for hours, sometime days, but when I come back, only a few minutes have passed. You shouldn’t have moved us to a plane of existence outside of reality.
Dad: I’ve had a long enough day trying to decode ancient Egyptian mathematics to get to the supermarket; I don’t need this right now.
(Enter Son from stage left)
Son: Aw, I’m back where I started. Godammit!
Dad: Don’t use that language in this house young man!
(During the next line Mechanical Bird-Man flies across the stage behind the characters, again.)
Daughter: Get a hyperclue dad - this isn’t a house; it’s just a field of dark matter!
Dad: We’re done arguing about this. I’m activating the oblivion crystal.
Daughter: We’re going to have this argument again dad; you can’t keep erasing our memories.
(Presses Oblivion Crystal)
(SFX CUE - ELECTRICITY BUZZING. LIGHTING CUE – STROBE LIGHT.)
Daughter: Uh – what happened?
Dad: Well time wasn’t manipulated – that’s for sure. Why don’t you kids go up to your room, and I’ll call you when dinner’s ready. (They exit) Where is Susan? She’s so much better at handling these things.
(SFX CUE - OUTER SPACE SOUND)
(THE HOODED STRANGER lowers from the ceiling.)
Dad: Oh hey Bradmeister, I could really use your help.
Stranger: I’ve told you this before – I chose to inhabit a form that your three dimensional brain would recognize, as I guide you along your way in the Hypercube, but my name is not “The Bradmeister.”
Dad: Yeah, but you haven’t told me your name. Who doesn’t love a funny nickname?
Stranger: I don’t. And I never will.
Dad: Look you may be the gatekeeper of Hypercube, but we’re still neighbors and I need your help. Moving here has been kind of rough on the kids. I’d talk about it with Susan, but I can’t seem to find her. Have you seen her today?
Stranger: Your wife Susan solved the puzzle of the Hypercube. However, she failed to realize that I choose her escape destination. She didn’t expect to wake up in a hotel in Paris, France, 1938.
(During the next line, Mechanical Bird-Man flies across the stage, behind the characters.)
Dad: Well it figures; everything’s been a mess since we moved here – my kids hate me, my wife’s in the past, and I still don’t know what the hell that thing is?!
Bird-Man: Hey – croquet at my place. Saturday. Bring the kids. Caw-caw!
(He exits.)
Dad: Bradmeister, I really need to clean up this mess (shouting off-stage) Kids come down here; I need to ask you something.
(Son and Daughter enter. Daughter is nine months pregnant.)
Dad: What is that? That better not be what I think that is!
The Stranger: Fool, did you forget there is no time in the Hypercube? I have impregnated your daughter with a younger version of myself, so that I may be born in flesh form.
Daughter: Sorry dad, but I saw a pregnant version of myself in the mirror, then it switched bodies with me.
Dad: (sigh) Bradmeister, this isn’t going to be like the time you borrowed my belt sander is it?
The Stranger: I’m not done with my birdhouse yet!
BLACK OUT.
