You’re just arriving home after another bruising shift at the Kleenex factory. It’s not exactly fulfilling, but right now you’re just glad to have a job. Good thing you listened to your Dad. “Whatever happens with the economy, people will always blow their noses. Booms and busts come and go; snot is eternal.” Before you go inside, you shake the blue and pink dust from your clothes, not quite ready to turn off your MP3 player, especially now that it’s playing an appropriate quitting-time anthem: “Workin’ like a dog for the bossman (whoa-oh) Workin’ for the company (whoa-oh yeah)” – preach it, Steven.

It all comes through loud and clear on your Wicked Little Earbuds. For a workin’ stiff like you, it’s important to get decent sound for an indecent price, thanks to your new best buds. And with three different sizes of cushions, you’re always ready to rock despite that bizarre condition you suffer from where your ears are always shrinking and expanding. Not even Unstable Ear Disorder can stay you from your appointed jams.

But you won’t be lovin’ it up in any elevators anytime soon. Not until you get to the bottom of the mysterious package on your doorstep. For some reason, it’s addressed to your good friend Dr. Brant Brentlinger, international nuclear scientist, c/o you. You haven’t seen Brant in months – the last you heard, he was on a uranium-hunting expedition in the South Pacific, chasing rumors of the legendary Glowing Silver Mountain of Nura Lor. Why would he have something shipped to you? The package is no help – other than the address, it’s marked with nothing more than an exclamation point.

You’re just about to open it when there’s a pounding at your door. Through the peephole, you see something that turns your loins to ice, and for non-temperature-related reasons. Two… people? Things? Monsters? Their faces are a mess of tentacles, antennae, tusks, and compound eyes. And they’re wearing matching suits – not cool men-in-black suits, but powder blue tuxedos. You appreciate the effort they made to look nice, but you really don’t want to deal with this right after work.

Do you (A) answer the door or (B) sneak out back?

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