Description: Chapter Hang I am not, nor will I ever be, a morning person, mused Admiral Fontoon, subliminally noting that it was perhaps the only thing of which he felt truly certain. He winced and made a sucking sound through his clenched teeth as he gingerly touched the bump that had risen on his head. He was hanging upside down, swaying gently now after swinging wildly for some time. His arms hung limply in mute surrender. One leg extended to the side and bent like a branch that did not know where to grow, drifting half-heartedly, searching to no avail for a plausible position in which to await death or redemption. The one straight and rigid limb was his other leg, which had a tightened noose around the ankle. From there the rope looped through a pulley attached to the ceiling, and routed thence to a spinning spool at the foot of his bed, anchored firmly to the floor with steel bolts. It was the furious spinning of the spool that had yanked the rope so suddenly, resulting in the tightening of the ankle noose and the unceremonious hoisting of Admiral Fontoon. The entire apparatus had been triggered electronically by Fontoon's alarm clock; more specifically, it had been triggered by the seventh sounding of the snooze alarm, a result, in turn, of Fontoon's obstinacy, and of his lethargy. Son of a bitch, thought Fontoon, dangling. He was supposed to have gotten out of bed before all this. That was the whole idea: A clock to inspire fear, ergo motion. Fontoon spoke several profanities aloud to his uncaring apartment, and punched the air viciously, which caused him to spin. He felt the lurch of nausea and struggled to control it. He did not think he could bear either the sound or the sight of his vomit hurtling out of his mouth and splashing onto various of his possessions some nine feet below, and he especially did not relish the thought of cleaning it all up. Agh, or the taste of it, he thought, which only made it harder to control. Admiral Fontoon looked around the room while the spinning gradually subsided, trying to get a fix on something for as long as he could, to combat the dizziness. Directly below him was an imitation Oriental rug that had caused bitterness at how quickly it had begun to look dingy. Must everything be cheap? Must everything be tawdry?

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