CHAPTER 4

Meanwhile, realizing he'd been following the same storyline for almost two chapters now, the author abruptly shifted focus, to a dark and shadowy underground room, many miles west from where Professor Landover and his colleagues were pondering the mysterious significance of the Manlison diary.

Why, a shadowy figure wondered, why must we reside in such a dark and shadowy room underground that smells not so slightly of mold and wet rot? Wouldn’t a well-ventilated skyscraper be more suited to our purposes?

“Perhaps,” his henchmen responded, sidestepping the figure’s pet attack koala as he entered the room, “It represents dually our dark and malicious nature, as well as serving as a metaphor for the portions of our operations that are yet obscured from the reader.”

“Interesting,” the shadowy figure said, “but how did you know what I was thinking?”

“Oh, you didn’t think it.” said the henchmen. “You simply said it in a fashion the author felt would be represented by italics.”

The figure pondered this statement. “That defies many principles of commonly accepted literary logic.”

“A good point. This whole chapter is starting to seem a bit superfluous,” the henchmen said.

“I guess it does remind the reader that there’s an antagonist in this whole situation.”

“True. Also, it does introduce the attack koala, which will undoubtedly play a part of greater significance later in the narrative.”

The shadowy figure and his henchmen sat in silence for a moment.

The attack koala simply smiled.