The ball is kicked out of bounds, in the soldiers’ direction, and the boys all seem to catch sight of them at once. They charge toward the soldiers, who jump to their feet, dropping their smokes. The camera follows, bouncily, as the boys press forward, ascending the hill, surrounding the soldiers while shouting out multiple words and phrases in a foreign tongue rife with velar fricatives. [Demon!] and [Demons!] the subtitles read.
One of the soldiers, unsmiling, shows the children his palms, makes placating gestures. The other presses a button on his shoulder radio, says, “Clybourn here. Over?”
The response is inaudible.
“Who you with?” shouts the unsmiling soldier at the camera.
“AP,” says the cameraman.
[“Demon!”] [“Demons!”]
“We’re all swarmed up in B-7,” says Clybourn. “Requesting a cuddlefucker Aye-sap. Over?”
The response is inaudible.
“Copy,” says Clybourn, and nods once, affirmatively.
“You fellas love the United States?” he says to the boys.
“He am love United States!” one of the older boys says.
“Who?” says the other soldier, pointing to another boy. “Him? This guy? He loves the United States?”
[Demon!] [Demons!] shout the boys.
The older boy points at himself with a thumb. “He am love United States!” he says.
“Who’s ‘he,’ though?” says the soldier, and, pointing at a third boy, and then a fourth, says, “Him? Him?”
The older boy appears confused, pats his own chest.
“Take it easy,” Clybourn tells the other soldier.
“He am love United States? Loving United States? He loving USA,” the older boy mumbles, pointing to himself with both of his thumbs.
The rumble of an engine. A Humvee pulls up at the bottom of the hill. The boys, shouting [Demons!], rush down to the Humvee. The camera follows.
A soldier in a cape steps out of the Humvee. Standing contrapposto, he parts the cape dramatically, revealing his bulgy, ribbed cuddlefarmer uniform.
The children clap and cheer and continue to shout.
[Line up now!] the cuddlefarmer specialist orders them.
The children line up.
The specialist unsnaps a forearm compartment. A trio of infant cures climb out. He cups his hand beside one, the cure climbs in, and he turns his hand over onto the palm of the first boy in line, who is missing three fingers. The specialist extracts from a pocket in his cape a foil packet adorned with the Graham&Swords/US flag logo. He waves the packet in the air and tells the group of boys, [This packet here contains some instructions and a thimble and a special spandex EmergeCuff plus two weeks of good, clean demon food. Some of these demons I’ll be handing out are a day or two older than some of the others, and, depending on its age, your demon might or might not think it’s my demon. If it thinks it’s my demon, it’ll die, but that’s okay. Before it dies, it’ll make a stone, and from that stone, if you follow the instructions included in this packet, you can make a new demon, and that demon will be yours. Now. There’s fourteen demonfood pellets in this packet. You feed your demon one pellet a day, and you give it some water in the thimble when you do it. We will drop more demonfood from the sky soon. If you run out before we drop the food from the sky, you can feed the demon crumbs of any food you’re eating. Its shit’ll smell bad, and it’ll come out in weird shapes, but the demon won’t die for at least a few days. Read the instructions about everything else. The instructions are important. The instructions explain how to make more demons. So many demons you’ll never run out of them. If you can’t read, find someone who can, and have that person read the instructions to you. That’s how you’ll get as many demons as you want. Okay.] The soldier tries to hand the packet to the boy at the front of the line, but the boy, staring fixedly at the Curio in his palm, doesn’t see. “Hey,” the soldier says. “Hey now. Hey. Shit. Already? Hey!” he says, and backhands the boy’s shoulder.
The boy, jarred, looks up at the soldier, fear in his eyes, steps back, gets shoved forward, cups the cure to his chest, looks left, looks right, and jams the cure in his mouth. He chews a couple times, swallows, puts his hand out.
[No,] the soldier tells him. [No more demons for you. That’s why I told you to read the instructions.] The second boy in line shoves the first one aside. The first limps off, crying.
To the other boys, the soldier says, [Don’t stare at your demons til you’ve read the instructions! I won’t give you another one!]
The new boy at the front of the line has his hand out. The soldier fills it with a cure and a foil packet. The boy steps out of line. A third one comes forward with his hand out.
CUT.
Nine minutes later. The seven-fingered boy who went into overload is holding his face at the bottom of the hill. All the other boys are gathered on the slope behind him, in groups of four and five. One member of each group is reading the instructions aloud to the others.
The cuddlefarmer specialist approaches the lone boy.
[I’m going to give you a stone that makes another demon. It’ll take a few days. You read the instructions before the stone makes the demon. You understand?]
The boy removes his hands from his face. [But why can’t I just have another demon? Everyone else has a demon.]
[You had a demon. You ate the demon. You’re lucky you’re getting a stone, don’t you think?]
[Yes.]
[You’re lucky?]
[I am lucky.]
[Remember that.]
[Yes.]
The soldier opens a foil packet and removes the spandex EmergeCuff from it, hands the cuff to the boy. [Put that around your wrist,] he says. While the boy complies, the soldier unsnaps a compartment on his thigh, removes from the compartment a Curio marble. [Give me your wrist,] he tells the boy. The boy complies. The soldier inserts the marble in the cuff. He hands the boy the foil packet. [Read the instructions,] he tells the boy. [Now.]
The Afterbirth of Rock ’n’ Roll
From 20/20
May 12, 2000. P.A.L. Productions/ABC Studios, USA
[86 seconds]
A 20/20 news anchor speaking into the camera: “And tonight, we have something special to scroll for you beside our closing credits, so special in fact, we’re gonna make a weekly habit of it! You know ’em, you love ’em, you’ve been calling up the studio demanding we show more of them…Well here they are! The P.A.L. Brothers! And don’t forget to tune in next Friday for the exclusive Barbara Walters interview with Fondajane Henry. For now: enjoy!”