The Tod Episode

The rain came down like a tax document signed by God Himself, ,And the gutters of suburban Illinois gargled with the voice of forgotten television pilots. Bradlington “Brad” B. Jones stood outside a gas station called Phil’s Minit Mart & Taxidermy, ,Holding a paper cup full of something legally required to be labeled coffee.

 

Inside the cup floated a single olive.

 

Nobody knew why.

 

Least of all Brad.

 

The fluorescent lights hummed like sick bees. Somewhere in the distance a child kicked a dented DVD copy of through a puddle while his mother screamed at a vending machine about liberty.

 

Brad adjusted his trenchcoat, which was less a garment and more a philosophical condition.

 

Then he heard footsteps.

 

Not ordinary footsteps.

 

Confident footsteps.

 

Footsteps that implied ownership of several extension cords.

 

Tod had arrived.

 

For one must understand: Tod was no mere device. No trinket. No bracelet. No “watch.” Such vulgar nouns could never contain the terrible majesty of Tod. He was spoken of only in the 5th person, ,As if language itself needed to stand farther away from him than usual. Tod was an adult man of immense implication. A gentleman of green fire and impossible purpose. A bureaucrat of destiny.

 

And tonight, Tod was glowing.

 

Brad stared at him attached to his wrist the way one stares at a raccoon operating heavy machinery.

 

“Tod seems upset tonight,” Brad muttered.

 

The wind answered by blowing a coupon for mozzarella sticks directly into his mouth.

 

Across the parking lot stood an ancient man wearing sunglasses at midnight and a powdered wig covered in Mountain Dew stains. He emerged from the mist pushing a shopping cart filled with tangled ethernet cables and colonial pamphlets.

 

It was Bingerman Franklin.

 

Inventor.

 

Diplomat.

 

Wizard of electrical meats.

 

“Good heavens,” cried Bingerman Franklin, raising a corndog like the Statue of Liberty, “Thou art in possession of Tod!”

 

Brad blinked twice.

 

“You know him?”

 

“Know him?!” Bingerman roared. “Sir, ,He once borrowed fifteen dollars from me in 1776 and repaid me entirely in batteries!”

 

Lightning cracked across the heavens as Tod pulsed with emerald authority. A low hum filled the air, somewhere between a microwave and the wrath of ancient Rome.

 

Then came the voice.

 

Not from Tod.

 

No.

 

Around Tod.

 

As though the universe itself had hired a radio announcer.

 

TOD REQUIRES NACHOS.

 

Brad looked around nervously. “What happens if I don’t get him nachos?”

 

Bingerman’s face fell into shadow.

 

“Then he shall become… reasonable.”

 

The sky darkened.

 

Every television inside the gas station simultaneously switched to static before revealing the face of a man dressed as Abraham Lincoln hosting a public access cooking show.

 

“Citizens,” the Lincoln apparition declared, “the moon has been recalled by management.”

 

A woman screamed somewhere behind the ice machine.

 

Brad’s wrist began to shake violently as Tod demanded tribute. Symbols spun beneath the green glass face like drunken hieroglyphics.

 

Bingerman Franklin pulled from his cart an object wrapped in velvet.

 

“I had hoped never to use this again.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“The Coupon of Infinite Cheese.”

 

The very atoms of the parking lot recoiled.

 

Even Tod grew silent.

 

Legend said the Coupon had been forged when Thomas Edison accidentally microwaved the Constitution during a thunderstorm. Entire civilizations had vanished trying to redeem it at participating locations.

 

Brad swallowed hard.

 

“So what do we do?”

 

Bingerman placed a solemn hand upon his shoulder.

 

“We feed Tod.”

 

Together they entered the gas station.

 

The cashier was gone.

 

In his place stood a cardboard cutout of holding a revolver.

 

The nacho machine hissed like an ancient serpent.

 

Tod glowed brighter.

 

The olive in Brad’s coffee finally dissolved.

 

And somewhere beyond the stars, ,Something wearing the face of history itself whispered:

 

“Welcome to flavor country.”

 

---

 

The nacho machine awakened slowly, ,Like an old emperor remembering where he buried the bodies.

 

Its cheese valve creaked open with the lamentation of a dying fax machine. Golden matter slithered downward in unnatural silence. Not even gravity seemed comfortable participating.

 

Brad stood frozen.

 

Bingerman Franklin removed his tricorn hat respectfully.

 

“For the love of Heaven,” whispered Bingerman, “Tod hungers in earnest.”

 

Tod pulsed upon Brad’s wrist with the authority of a landlord arriving unannounced.

 

HE RECALLS THE SEVENTH SAUCE.

 

Brad squinted. “The… seventh sauce?”

 

Bingerman turned pale beneath his bifocals. “Then the rumors are true.”

 

Outside, the storm intensified. Shopping carts rolled across the parking lot like steel tumbleweeds. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked in Morse code.

 

Brad looked toward the snack aisle.

 

Every bag of chips had turned to face him.

 

“Okay,” Brad said carefully, “I’m starting to think this entire evening might not be FDA approved.”

 

But Bingerman was already pacing.

 

“The Seventh Sauce was spoken of only in whispers among the Founding Food Courts. A condiment too mighty for mortal dipping. George Washington himself lost a nephew to it during the Battle of Applebee’s.”

 

A thunderclap interrupted him.

 

The lights flickered.

 

Then came the music.

 

Softly at first.

 

A MIDI rendition of played through the gas station speakers, distorted beyond sanity. The freezer doors began opening one by one.

 

Inside each freezer stood the same man.

 

Tall.

 

Balding.

 

Wearing a polo shirt tucked into jeans with military precision.

 

Every version of him stared directly at Tod.

 

Brad pointed shakily. “Who the hell is that?”

 

Bingerman gasped.

 

“No…”

 

The freezer men spoke in unison.

 

“Tod still owes us for the incident.”

 

Their voices sounded like corporate training videos recorded inside tombs.

 

Brad backed away. “I don’t know what incident you’re talking about!”

 

The nearest freezer man stepped out onto the tile floor. Frost crackled beneath orthopedic shoes.

 

“He knows.”

 

Tod flashed violently.

 

HE DENIES THE CHILI DISPENSER.

 

The man’s expression darkened.

 

“Then diplomacy has failed.”

 

Instantly every microwave in the gas station activated at once.

 

BEEEEEEEEEEP.

 

BEEEEEEEEEEP.

 

BEEEEEEEEEEP.

 

Bingerman Franklin threw himself behind a display of powdered donuts.

 

“Brad! You must invoke Tod’s ancient privilege!”

 

“How?!”

 

“The transformation sequence!”

 

Brad looked horrified.

 

“You mean like—”

 

“Yes!”

 

“But I don’t know what aliens he has!”

 

“Neither did Congress!”

 

Tod erupted with green light.

 

The windows shattered outward.

 

Reality folded like a cheap lawn chair.

 

Brad screamed as impossible energy engulfed him. His body twisted through dimensions of meat and static and syndicated television. For one brief instant he became aware of every canceled sitcom simultaneously.

 

Then—

 

FLASH.

 

Standing in Brad’s place was a horrifying being approximately seven feet tall with the head of a raccoon and the body of a used car salesman.

 

Its tie was alive.

 

Its eyes contained infomercials.

 

Bingerman pointed dramatically.

 

“Dear God… Tod hath chosen MARKETRAUMA!”

 

The freezer men recoiled in terror.

 

MARKETRAUMA opened its maw and unleashed a psychic attack composed entirely of expired rebate offers.

 

“BUY ONE GET ONE FREEEEEEEEE!”

 

The gas station exploded inward.

 

Shelves bent like frightened reeds.

 

One freezer man evaporated instantly after glimpsing a Vision of Black Friday Yet To Come.

 

Another collapsed screaming:

“THE WARRANTIES— THEY WERE NEVER OPTIONAL!”

 

Tod glowed proudly.

 

Brad— somewhere within the creature’s flesh— shouted, “I CAN TASTE COLORS!”

 

Outside, the clouds spiraled into the shape of a giant barcode visible for miles.

 

And deep beneath the Earth, sealed within a forgotten RadioShack beneath Nevada, ,Something ancient opened one terrible eye.

 

It had heard Tod’s voice.

 

---

 

Beneath the Nevada desert, below abandoned cables and the fossilized remains of discontinued MP3 players, lay the buried RadioShack Vault.

 

The walls sweated battery acid.

 

Dead pagers twitched in the dark like dreaming insects.

 

And upon a throne assembled entirely from unsold universal remotes sat the Sleeper.

 

Ancient.

 

Unspeakable.

 

Managerial.

 

Its name had once been pronounced by mortal tongues, but now existed only as a sensation of paperwork behind the eyes.

 

The Sleeper opened its lid.

 

A red LED blinked awake.

 

“Tod…” it crackled.

 

Above ground, in the shattered remains of Phil’s Minit Mart & Taxidermy, MARKETRAUMA staggered against a Slush Puppie machine while reality peeled from the corners of the room like wet wallpaper.

 

Brad’s monstrous raccoon-salesman fingers pointed accusingly at the surviving freezer men.

 

“YOU PEOPLE ARE MAKING THIS WEIRD.”

 

The freezer men adjusted their belts in perfect synchronization.

 

One stepped forward holding a clipboard damp with condensation.

 

“You have violated the Accords of Concession.”

 

Another nodded solemnly.

 

“Tod was never authorized for civilian snacking.”

 

Tod pulsed.

 

HE REJECTS THESE ALLEGATIONS.

 

Then all at once the ceiling split apart.

 

Not metaphorically.

 

Literally.

 

The night sky opened like cheap theater curtains, revealing something impossible behind it: a second sky. Beneath that second sky floated a colossal face made entirely of infomercial graphics and late-90s CGI fire.

 

Its lips moved at twelve frames per second.

 

“ARE YOU READY FOR EXTREME FLAVOR.”

 

Bingerman Franklin fell to his knees instantly.

 

“The Prophecy Host…”

 

The giant sky-face smiled with criminal enthusiasm.

 

It was somehow unmistakably related to without actually being him, as though history had photocopied a thunderstorm.

 

MARKETRAUMA trembled.

 

Brad’s human consciousness struggled inside the alien form like a man trapped inside a vending machine.

 

“Bingerman!” he cried. “What IS that thing?!”

 

Bingerman clutched his chest.

 

“Long ago, before streaming services… before directors’ cuts… before mankind knew despair…”

 

Lightning illuminated his powdered wig dramatically.

 

“There existed only commercials.”

 

The freezer men crossed themselves.

 

“The Prophecy Host sold products so powerful that nations collapsed after hearing the shipping and handling fees.”

 

The giant face leaned downward through the torn heavens.

 

TOD MUST BE RETURNED.

 

Tod flashed angrily.

 

HE REFUSES.

 

The earth shook.

 

Every television within fifty miles switched on simultaneously. Car dealerships burst into flames. Somewhere in Ohio, a man instinctively purchased six knives.

 

MARKETRAUMA howled.

 

His living tie whipped through the air like an enraged cobra. Shelves exploded. Rotating hot dogs achieved orbit.

 

Then Tod began spinning.

 

Fast.

 

Too fast.

 

Bingerman’s eyes widened in horror.

 

“No… no no no…”

 

“What?!” Brad shouted.

 

“He’s selecting another form!”

 

The symbols on Tod blurred beyond comprehension. Not symbols anymore. Entire philosophies. Entire extinct civilizations compressed into glowing hieroglyphs of violence.

 

Then—

 

KRRRSHHHHH.

 

Green light detonated outward again.

 

MARKETRAUMA vanished.

 

In his place stood a new being.

 

Tall.

 

Robed.

 

Its body appeared assembled from antique televisions and cathedral architecture. Static poured endlessly from beneath its sleeves. Its face was a blank CRT screen displaying only the word:

 

MONDAY

 

Bingerman Franklin screamed.

 

“Sweet merciful Heavens…”

 

The creature raised one terrible finger.

 

“THIS EPISODE,” it declared in the voice of dying cable networks, “CONTAINS THEMES.”

 

The Prophecy Host recoiled visibly.

 

Even the freezer men stepped backward.

 

Tod glowed with the pride of a father watching his son win a regional chili contest.

 

Far above the Earth, satellites malfunctioned.

 

Three senators began crying without understanding why.

 

And somewhere beyond human comprehension, ,The Sun briefly turned inside out again.