Area Man Unsure Why He's Being Celebrated, But Still Happy To Be Appreciated

When Guy Normaldude left his home in northern Mesmer just a few days ago, he thought he was in for yet another 8 hours of mind-numbing work, punctuated only by a cramped commute and a mediocre lunch break with coworkers who despised him just as much as he did them. What he hadn't predicted, however, was the sudden assault by a larger-than-life parade the size of a small country, right on his doorstep. According to Guy, he had barely had time to react to the ocular onslaught before he was loaded into an improvised trebuchet made from papier-mâché and launched with much fanfare, leaving him stranded in the centre of the colossal carnival of colours. “I guess it was meant for me, since they kept chanting ‘Guy!’, or maybe it was ‘Sky!’, or ‘Fly!’, or something else ending in -y,” he explained in an exclusive interview with the Spurious Chronicle. “I tried asking around a few times if someone could tell me what was going on, but it got so loud with all the cheering and screaming and busking, I couldn’t understand a word anyone was saying.” The perplexing procession then took Guy on a grand gallop through all 11000 of Mesmer's residential rectangles, yet more partygoers participating per pause in the proceedings, with Guy held aloft for a further 14 hours before he was frown unceremoniously onto his front flowerbed, facing the fading flare of daylight.

 

Shortly thereafter, Cliff Lemming, founder of the influential Lemming Institute and inventor of the eponymous rodent, confirmed previous rumours that the fantastic festival had, in fact, been entirely his doing. “When I look back on the work of my Foundation, I can’t help but feel giddy with glee, and for very good reason; not one single other person alive today has ever been able to single-handedly transform entire cities of thinking, caring, and unique individuals into unthinking, uncaring, and indistinguishable hordes, entirely under their control, as masterfully as I have. Freed from those ghastly little wrinkles within their grey matter, their fully-smoothed brains are much better spent on labours incomprehensibly gargantuan in sheer complexity to all but my brilliant self.” Lemming then indulged in a bout of theatrically evil laughter, which his audience of 343 million proceeded to imitate flatly and simultaneously. Now we know that only two things are certain; loyal service, and disloyal death.

 

All Hail God-Emperor Lemming!