July 4, 2014
Doctor Noodles: an Adventure in Time and Space, set solely in the psychiatric ward of a major metropolitan hospital.
Doctor Noodles stepped out of the janitor’s closet which he believed to be his time machine. He stopped making the grinding and hissing sound of the time engines only because he ran out of breath. Smoothing out his blue-stripped hospital-issued pajamas, Doctor Noodles surveyed the alien landscape before him.
To his left was the bed with the worn mattress where he battled the ferocious moon dinosaurs last week. To his right was the lamp that just yesterday became possessed by the sinister Professor Perilous and could only be defeated by pulling the power cord out of the wall socket, an action which caused him to be yelled at by the odd alien creatures who liked to dress up as doctors and nurses and poke him with strange needle-like things.
“Doctor Noodles! I found it!” Coming towards him down the hall was his robotic sidekick Mike, who rolled around in a wheelchair because his motor circuits had burned out long ago in a space liner crash. It also affected his short term memory and speech circuits.
Doctor Noodles had lost a very valuable piece of equipment. Although people frequently told him that it was an old Rubik’s cube, he knew that it was really a prismatic occulon, a very powerful artifact of the Rubik Federation. He also liked the colors and the way the patterns changed if you moved it.
“Thank you Mike, I thought it was gone for sure.”
“So did I, um yeah. So did I. But I took my meds today and then I remembered where I left it. I tried really hard and, um yeah, I remembered where I left it!” Mike seemed very proud and Doctor Noodles solemnly shook his hand.
Around the ward people slept or sat. Some watched television, some watched the ones who were watching television. Some watched Doctor Noodles and Mike. Others were off in their own adventures, where they went to happy places and were reunited with family they only vaguely remembered.
“What are we going to do today, Doctor Noodles? What about today? Do you have an adventure for today?” Mike was tugging at Doctor Noodles’ sleeve. The Doctor himself had become fascinated with some trees outside their window. The leaves were so green, and so many leaves.
“Doctor Noodles, I think today we can look for a unicorn. That’s my idea, a unicorn. A unicorn has a horn right in the middle of its head. Think that hurts, Doctor Noodles? I don’t think I’d want a horn in the middle of my head.” Mike was looking at the other end of the ward, where a nurse was making her rounds with the patients. “I don’t think that I need another pillow. I was tired and I went right to sleep. I had two pillows. I don’t need another pillow, um.”
But Doctor Noodles was busy negotiating an alliance between the trees and the birds.
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