Evil International Airport

Gorman Fowley approached the check-in counter with a wry, minor smile.  Too much time had gone by since he’d flown out of Evil International Airport.

The over-rouged, middle-aged brunette at the counter narrowed her eyes, accented with mint green eye shadow.  She gave a quirk of recognition with her mouth.  “Fowley.  Haven’t flown you out in a while.”  Her voice was a croaky instrument, like that of a toad from a sparse woodland.

Fowley plopped his luggage, a large rectangular item in dried-blood red, onto the scale.  “I’ve been missing it, Runa.  Sitting in my apartment thinking of all those destinations.”  Fowley had an unruly head of brown hair that poked out in varied directions and wore a crumpled, thrift store suit in a shade somewhere between light brown and salmon.  His face was leathery, with the over-tanned tone of a man who spent many idle days on corrupt beaches.

“The Lost Isle of the Decapitated Children,” Runa said wistfully.

“The Canyon of Sacrificial Goats.”

“Bloated Crone Mountain,” continued Runa, glancing toward the huge graphic poster on the wall.

“Archfiend Archipelago,” countered Fowley.

Runa put an abrupt end to the dreamy recitation.  “What's your final destination?”  Her fingernails, bathed in dark pomegranate polish, were poised to strike the dusty keyboard.

“Imp Town,” said Fowley triumphantly.

Runa gave a long, satisfied outbreath.  “Imp Town,” she repeated, the syllables conjuring up numerous images of heavily promoted, illicit frolics.  She hammered at the keyboard and, after an outburst of gurgling noises from her terminal, tore a crimson boarding pass from the printer. 

“Board at Portcullis 3¼,” she rasped.  “Have a nasty time.”

Runa sprayed some complimentary fake cobweb thread on Fowley’s baggage and tossed it on the back of the giant salamander.

Fowley bypassed the sleepy shops that lined the terminal corridor, with their overpriced fright masks, marsh potions and torture implements, and made his way to the insecurity line.  He liked to endure the provocations and pokings as quickly as possible so he could relax in the intoxicant lounge in the uncertain hours before his flight.

A hideous, unbathed Mongolian warrior and a mutant lizard-gorilla awaited him, guarding the entrance to the insecurity zone.  With a hostile grunt, the warrior grabbed Fowley’s left hand and nicked his thumb with a rusty dagger.  He collected a few drops of Fowley’s resulting blood in a dried gourd bowl.  Fowley watched with amusement the comforting ritual of the warrior pouring his blood into the instant grey analysis device rigged up to look like a rickety, patched-together contraption from a mad scientist’s lab.  But the gizmo spit out a result quickly enough – a perforated ticket confirming Fowley’s identity and his absence from the roster of clean-living, upstanding citizens on Evil International Airport’s no-defile list.

The lizard-gorilla made a choking, grunting noise and Fowley passed through to the insecurity check.

He got in line under the tattered black canvas hanging from the aluminum ceiling, four obese members of a traveling circus family in front of him.  They were arguing in a throaty East European language and gesturing at one another with stubby, hairy fingers.  The youngest of the group, a thuggish looking boy in a leopard-print tank top, suddenly grabbed one of his apparent relatives by the throat and slammed his head into the metal wall.  The oafish looking circus man slumped to the ground, blood spurting from the back of his head.  A surly uniformed airport officer spoke into his intercom device and called for a gurney.