"MR SNIPPY! I HAVE MOIST-GOOD NEWS!"

Captain burst through the doors with such intensity that the door hinges erupted right out of the wall. As the dust from the fallen doors settled, I noticed that around Captain's neck dangled something that looked like a golden Oscar statue on a plastic chain. As Captain moved around excitedly it swung back and forth in a most dangerous manner.

"WE HAVE BEEN INVITED TO A RED CARPET PREVIEW OF CAPTANIC! YOUR ROLE AS CABIN BOY WAS SATISFACTORY, BUT UNINSPIRING. NEVERTHELESS, MY BRIBE OF 50 JARS OF JAM DELIVERED STRAIGHT TO THE JUDGES' MOUTHS WORKED AND WE'RE IN!"

"Eh? What?" I stammered, as Captain pulled me out of my hidey-hole and led me across a road to an old cinema complex.

On the crumbling semi-circular wall of the cinema, I noticed a large battered poster of Titanic, which had the original actor's heads covered up with white paste. In their place were drawn the heads of Captain, Pilot and myself with various crayons and markers.

On the poster, I noted the following: CAPTANIC - THE KINEMATIC KALEIDOSCOPE OF PASSION

STARRING: PILOT AS THAT DASHING FELLOW THAT NEEDS A HAIRCUT, CAPTAIN AS JULIA ROBERTS, SNIPPY AS MISERABLE CABIN BOY.

On the sign above the entrance was spelled out "CAPtanic - 6D - 11:75 13:94 27:11" I found it slightly cute that none of these viewing times were possible, and mentioned such to Captain.

Captain dismissed this with a dramatic wave and said, "GREENWICH TIME HAS BEEN DECLARED OBSOLETE AND INEFFECTUAL. WE ARE NOW ON CAPTANIA TIME, YOU SILLY WILLY."

Inside the building I discovered a clock with a face that had one hundred digits. Captain must have taken an old clock and modified it for this purpose. It had six hands, which, for some reason, moved at seemingly random intervals.

Most interestingly of all, two of the hands were stoically pursuing an anti-clockwise path around the face, which must have taken some serious clockwork-modding skills to accomplish!

Captain strolled directly to the ticket desk and demanded

"THREE GOLDEN VIP TICKETS FOR ELEVENTY-SEVENTEY-FIVEY PREFORMANCE".

The skeleton cashier didn't argue, but Captain must have imagined that he did, and so the poor skeleton lost his jaw to the sound of

"DAMN KIDS! NO RESPECT FOR VIPS THESE DAYS! DON'T THEY KNOW WHO I AM?"

"Clearly not," I voiced, amused by Captain's shenanigans and bellowed demands to: "SEE THE MANAGER OF ZIS VILE ESTABLISHMENT!"

For a short while, Captain stood resolute, tapping the floor with heavy army boot in an arms-crossed sulk. After no more than twelve seconds, Captain burst into life again and charged straight through the barrier, destroying the ticket desk and its resident skeleton in an explosive cloud of dust, bones and time-worn wooden planks. From out of the dust cloud, a triumphant figure of Captain emerged with three golden pieces of foil and handed one to me.

On it, I read, "CAPTANIC - THEATRE SEVENTEEN AND A HALF - 11:75."

"Heh," I muttered, amazed by Captain's dedication to the art of showmanship.

"NOW, DON'T LOOSE YOUR GOLDEN PASS OR YOU MIGHT FIND YOURSELF TRAPPED OUTSIDE THE THEATRE! SECURITY IS ADAMANT ABOUT SUCH THINGS THESE DAYS DUE TO PINEAPPLE TERRORISTS."

Captain rumbled.

Shoving the golden foil ticket into my pocket, I followed Captain deeper inside the cinema. Thankfully there weren't any mutated creatures inside, and it was relatively bright thanks to numerous shattered sky-lights and half of the ceiling being on the floor in a heap of rubble.

Dead black mushrooms crunched under our feet as we approached the "SNACKS" counter. Here Captain ordered me to "OBTAIN DELICIOUS BEVERAGES" and pranced off, after shoving a slightly burned purple something into my hand. It was a piece of paper that had "100 CAPTAINIA CREDITS" written on it.

For a second, I admired the fine handiwork on the made-up currency. A comical sketch of Captain's head was in the middle, with rays of sunshine emanating from the cap. Underneath it, I read "IN CAPTAIN WE TRUST".

I stuffed the 100 CAP-CREDITS into the skeleton cashier's drawer and pondered for a bit whether it would be wise to obtain change, and whether Captain would shout at me for hours that I could not count to fifty-four and that "CALCULATING AND HANDLING THE CORRECT TIP IS ZEE TRUE GENTLEMEN'S BURDEN!"

Would Captain harass me for not tipping the dead or slap me for not bringing back change? If I brought back some old coins would I have to hear endless complaints of "THE EXCHANGE RATE JUST ISN'T WHAT IT USED TO BE"?

I gave up on guessing and tried to unlock an old, rusty refrigerator. The fridge door didn't budge for a while but finally crashed open, spilling soda cans all over my head. By looking at the labels, I figured the soda must have expired at least 2 decades ago.

Oh well. That's just the age we live in: no more production, only consumption.

The popcorn cart had some sort of withered, black roots growing out of it, webbed and spiky.

I looked at it in disgust, contemplating how radioactive it was and whether it would be wise to try to dig some black popcorn nuggets out of it to throw at Captain's head (in case demands for popcorn should arise). Annoyingly enough, I wasn't able to find a single straw around the place. I suspected that there was a straw-eating monster somewhere around.

. . .

Completing the "SNACKS AND BEVERAGES" mission,

I joined Captain in theater number seventeen and a half.

"Isn't Pilot coming too?" I inquired.

"NO. PILOT IS ON A MISSION OF GRAVY IMPORTANCE! HE AND I ARE GOING TO THE 27:11 LATE NIGHT SHOW, AND THAT HOUR IS WAY PAST YOUR BED-TIME. BUT IT IS NO MATTER, FOR I MAKE TIME FOR ALL MY JUICY MINIONS," Captain declared.

I nodded, agreeing that, yes, it would probably be past my bed-time (unlike Captain, I actually slept 9 solid hours at night) a bit happy that I wouldn't have to deal with Pilot's childishness that day.

Captain pulled out a straw from somewhere, sipping from zeer mug. I asked if zee would be so kind as to share, which was shot down with a weird story about why Captain would not share straws due to the horrid devourer of eyes and wielder of straws that lives in a unicorn-painted van.

"BEHOLD," boomed Captain dramatically, waving at the dark screen, "THE MOST GLORIOUS PERFORMANCE OF TWENTY SECOND CENTURY!" I settled in my seat, almost excited, hoping that Captain had been able to activate some sort of still-functioning projector, but no, the screen remained pitch black. I complained about the lack of picture, wondering if there had been some kind of mistake, but was shot down with, "WHAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE CHEERS AND APPLE-SAUCES!

...BROKEN PROJECTOR? OH POOR, UNSIGHTLY SNIPPY! HOW COULD YOU FORGET YOUR 6D GLASSES AT HOME! DON'T YOU KNOW THAT ALL MOVIES NOWADAYS PLAY IN 6 DIMENSIONS? SUCH A PITY!

NO MATTER! I'LL NARRATE FOR YOU WHAT IS HAPPENING ON SCREEN!"

And so Captain went into narration mode, describing all the pre-movie advertisements, and after ten minutes, the "WILDLY EXCITING, MIND-BOGGLING, AND GRIPPING TALE OF CAPTANIC, A MOST TRUE TALE OF ROMANCE IN THE WORLD OF YESTERDAY."

. . .

As Captain rambled on and on, my mind wandered off to what Pilot was up to now...