Attack on lab spurs debate on separation of church and state
Dissociated Press
January 5, 2010
Miskatonic University's Biology Department recently became the latest victim of a classic tactic of radical animal rights activists wherein the activists break into labs that conduct animal research and set the test subjects free. The break-in at Miskatonic's lab differs from most such trespasses in a manner befitting the institution's sinister reputation, however; all of the animals set free were dead until student activist Nathan Davidson resurrected them with ancient Egyptian necromancy.
Unsurprisingly, Davidson's dabbling in the dark arts led to the kind of tragedy normally seen only by viewers of cheap horror films. It is fitting, then, that the only evidence of Davidson's involvement consists of footage from the camera he used to record his actions inside the Physiology lab during the wee hours of December 12. The video shows him laying three trays, each containing a dead cat, on every lab table and then proceeding to sketch pentagrams in blood and chalk on the floor around each table. Facing the camera from the center of the room, he said he had "promised to free the poor oppressed cats from their slavery to a cruel and heartless humanity, no matter what it took. And a promise is a promise. This is for you, Amelia!" Davidson then chanted profane incantations as black lightning crackled along the walls and eerie lights bled from the carcasses on the tables. Davidson collapsed as the final clap of thunder reverberated against the walls and the cats stood, restored to life. Davidson staggered to his feet and threw the door to the lab open, exhorting the cats to "live life free and to the fullest!" The cats opted not to do that. Instead, they stared at Davidson through their weirdly glowing eyes for a moment and started mewling oddly as they advanced on Davidson and killed him. (The mewling was identified by Miskatonic cryptozoologist Dr. Emily Boo as "zombie catspeak" for "must eat brains.") In the days following Davidson's death, three other students and two faculty members have been killed, presumably by the pack of zombie cats that now haunts the science building. (In the case of slain agriculture professor Dr. Jonathan Abel, it is more likely that he was killed by a colleague, Dr. Jefferson Cain, over a paper they wrote concerning the relative worth of farming and ranching. To date, no connection between their dispute and the unholy terror stalking the halls of the science building has been found.)
When asked if she could shed some light on Davidson's motives, student activist and poser goth chick Amy "Amelia" Darkblack said, "So, we weren't like, involved or anything. Nate was totally into me, and I used that to, you know, get him to do stuff for me and stuff. So he helped me and my friends with our protests about that awful stuff they do to those poor animals, you know, how this school buys its lab cats from farms that raise them for that, you know, to get dissected and stuff? So one day, he's helping us, and he blurts out that he would give anything to set those cats free. And I tell him, 'they're already dead, dummy!' and he goes, 'Then I'll find a way to bring them back to life!' So I'm gettin' tired of him by then, you know, always hanging around, so I tell him, 'If you find a way to do that, I'll go out with you!' and he goes away with this big, stupid grin on his face. I figured I'd gotten rid of him for good, and then he goes and does this dumbass shit and stuff." Her face falls as she adds, "Now I have to transfer to another school and junk, 'cause people think I was with him and stuff. I swear if one more person says that, I'll just die of embarrassment!"
When asked if she has any feelings regarding the deaths of her fellow students, she ignores the question to take a call. "Isn't this just the coolest ringtone?" she coos as she flips her phone open, silencing the bars of Green Day's "Jesus of Suburbia" that alerted her to the call. "My friend Penny Dreadful and I are hooking up at the mall later," she says, her phone pressed to her ear so tightly it might be taking root there. "And yeah, I'm sorry about the people who are dead. But like Green Day says, 'the end of the world is a shopping mall,' so they should be happy now, right? I mean, they won't be studying that gross science stuff anymore and they can buy stuff, like I will be soon. Shopping, I mean, not dead. 'Cause I didn't take classes that disrespected animals by cutting them open." She pauses and seems reflective. "Maybe they got what they deserved. Who the hell are we to yank animals from their homes and abuse them like that?" She pauses again, seeming deep in thought. "Hey, do you think this purse matches my eyes, or should I buy another one?"
A concern more pressing than what brought this tragedy about is how it will be solved. For Professor of Strange Religions Dr. Donna T. Great, the solution is as simple as a "good old fashioned Christian exorcism. Of course, as soon as I said it, a platoon of lawyers trotted in and said we can't do that. Miskatonic receives some of its funding from the state, and performing an exorcism on school grounds would violate the first amendment's provision mandating the separation of church and state." She rolls her eyes. "That Constitution of yours causes nothing but problems! This kind of garbage doesn't happen in Canada," says the Vancouver native. When asked what provisions of the Canadian Constitution would have better facilitated a solution had this crisis occurred in British Colombia rather than Massachusetts, Great replied, "Canada doesn't even have a Constitution. We don't need one. We are an extremely well behaved people! Of course, Canada's superior disposition doesn't help us much now. Thirty zombified cats are eating the brains of students and faculty in an American university, and America's own Constitution is preventing us from solving the problem. It's always like this, though, one asinine thing after another. Sometimes I want to go back to Canada and be around sane people for a change!" When it is pointed out that she could simply leave, she replies, "And give up American TV and shopping? Are you nuts? I could never give those up! So I'm kind of stuck."
Stuck, as the science faculty and students are stuck, waiting out the days of dread until a judge tells them whether the solution they hope for violates an amendment that was, ironically, meant to preserve their freedom of religion by keeping the government away from it. "And now the two institutions America insists must be separate need to come together, provided some judge agrees." Great sighs as terrified screams and eerie meowing emanates from the science building. "It's a damn good thing that business slides through America's judicial system like greased lightning," Great says wryly. "A few of us might still be alive when and if the court rules in favor of allowing us to live."
Dissociated Press reporter Taliesin wasn't attacked once during the period that he researched this story. The remaining members of the science department believe the zombie cats prefer the large, succulent brains of science nerds to the atrophied waste resting inside the skull of a journalist. As the number of journalists killed by the cats holds steady at zero while the number of scientists killed rises daily, T. is glad he didn't put more effort into his science courses when he was in school.
January 5, 2010
Miskatonic University's Biology Department recently became the latest victim of a classic tactic of radical animal rights activists wherein the activists break into labs that conduct animal research and set the test subjects free. The break-in at Miskatonic's lab differs from most such trespasses in a manner befitting the institution's sinister reputation, however; all of the animals set free were dead until student activist Nathan Davidson resurrected them with ancient Egyptian necromancy.
Unsurprisingly, Davidson's dabbling in the dark arts led to the kind of tragedy normally seen only by viewers of cheap horror films. It is fitting, then, that the only evidence of Davidson's involvement consists of footage from the camera he used to record his actions inside the Physiology lab during the wee hours of December 12. The video shows him laying three trays, each containing a dead cat, on every lab table and then proceeding to sketch pentagrams in blood and chalk on the floor around each table. Facing the camera from the center of the room, he said he had "promised to free the poor oppressed cats from their slavery to a cruel and heartless humanity, no matter what it took. And a promise is a promise. This is for you, Amelia!" Davidson then chanted profane incantations as black lightning crackled along the walls and eerie lights bled from the carcasses on the tables. Davidson collapsed as the final clap of thunder reverberated against the walls and the cats stood, restored to life. Davidson staggered to his feet and threw the door to the lab open, exhorting the cats to "live life free and to the fullest!" The cats opted not to do that. Instead, they stared at Davidson through their weirdly glowing eyes for a moment and started mewling oddly as they advanced on Davidson and killed him. (The mewling was identified by Miskatonic cryptozoologist Dr. Emily Boo as "zombie catspeak" for "must eat brains.") In the days following Davidson's death, three other students and two faculty members have been killed, presumably by the pack of zombie cats that now haunts the science building. (In the case of slain agriculture professor Dr. Jonathan Abel, it is more likely that he was killed by a colleague, Dr. Jefferson Cain, over a paper they wrote concerning the relative worth of farming and ranching. To date, no connection between their dispute and the unholy terror stalking the halls of the science building has been found.)
When asked if she could shed some light on Davidson's motives, student activist and poser goth chick Amy "Amelia" Darkblack said, "So, we weren't like, involved or anything. Nate was totally into me, and I used that to, you know, get him to do stuff for me and stuff. So he helped me and my friends with our protests about that awful stuff they do to those poor animals, you know, how this school buys its lab cats from farms that raise them for that, you know, to get dissected and stuff? So one day, he's helping us, and he blurts out that he would give anything to set those cats free. And I tell him, 'they're already dead, dummy!' and he goes, 'Then I'll find a way to bring them back to life!' So I'm gettin' tired of him by then, you know, always hanging around, so I tell him, 'If you find a way to do that, I'll go out with you!' and he goes away with this big, stupid grin on his face. I figured I'd gotten rid of him for good, and then he goes and does this dumbass shit and stuff." Her face falls as she adds, "Now I have to transfer to another school and junk, 'cause people think I was with him and stuff. I swear if one more person says that, I'll just die of embarrassment!"
When asked if she has any feelings regarding the deaths of her fellow students, she ignores the question to take a call. "Isn't this just the coolest ringtone?" she coos as she flips her phone open, silencing the bars of Green Day's "Jesus of Suburbia" that alerted her to the call. "My friend Penny Dreadful and I are hooking up at the mall later," she says, her phone pressed to her ear so tightly it might be taking root there. "And yeah, I'm sorry about the people who are dead. But like Green Day says, 'the end of the world is a shopping mall,' so they should be happy now, right? I mean, they won't be studying that gross science stuff anymore and they can buy stuff, like I will be soon. Shopping, I mean, not dead. 'Cause I didn't take classes that disrespected animals by cutting them open." She pauses and seems reflective. "Maybe they got what they deserved. Who the hell are we to yank animals from their homes and abuse them like that?" She pauses again, seeming deep in thought. "Hey, do you think this purse matches my eyes, or should I buy another one?"
A concern more pressing than what brought this tragedy about is how it will be solved. For Professor of Strange Religions Dr. Donna T. Great, the solution is as simple as a "good old fashioned Christian exorcism. Of course, as soon as I said it, a platoon of lawyers trotted in and said we can't do that. Miskatonic receives some of its funding from the state, and performing an exorcism on school grounds would violate the first amendment's provision mandating the separation of church and state." She rolls her eyes. "That Constitution of yours causes nothing but problems! This kind of garbage doesn't happen in Canada," says the Vancouver native. When asked what provisions of the Canadian Constitution would have better facilitated a solution had this crisis occurred in British Colombia rather than Massachusetts, Great replied, "Canada doesn't even have a Constitution. We don't need one. We are an extremely well behaved people! Of course, Canada's superior disposition doesn't help us much now. Thirty zombified cats are eating the brains of students and faculty in an American university, and America's own Constitution is preventing us from solving the problem. It's always like this, though, one asinine thing after another. Sometimes I want to go back to Canada and be around sane people for a change!" When it is pointed out that she could simply leave, she replies, "And give up American TV and shopping? Are you nuts? I could never give those up! So I'm kind of stuck."
Stuck, as the science faculty and students are stuck, waiting out the days of dread until a judge tells them whether the solution they hope for violates an amendment that was, ironically, meant to preserve their freedom of religion by keeping the government away from it. "And now the two institutions America insists must be separate need to come together, provided some judge agrees." Great sighs as terrified screams and eerie meowing emanates from the science building. "It's a damn good thing that business slides through America's judicial system like greased lightning," Great says wryly. "A few of us might still be alive when and if the court rules in favor of allowing us to live."
Dissociated Press reporter Taliesin wasn't attacked once during the period that he researched this story. The remaining members of the science department believe the zombie cats prefer the large, succulent brains of science nerds to the atrophied waste resting inside the skull of a journalist. As the number of journalists killed by the cats holds steady at zero while the number of scientists killed rises daily, T. is glad he didn't put more effort into his science courses when he was in school.