By Sarah Hodges
In an attempt to force legislators to expand the area that zoning laws allow for street performance, a group of extremist mimes committed mass suicide bombings last Tuesday that left the nation paralyzed with fear. Mimes were scattered throughout the city with explosives strapped under their shirts. They gathered large crowds with old favorites such as “downward facing dog” and “bucking bronco” before detonating the bombs.
“I thought it was just the horizontal stripes on his shirt making him look bulky, but it turned out to be a bomb,” commented victim Julie Evans. “You’d think that that box he was stuck in would have contained the explosion, but I guess it wasn’t made of very strong stuff.” In a nod to Darwin’s theory on “survival of the fittest”, Ms. Evans died from massive burns shortly after we talked to her.
In the days following the attack, we have yet to hear from the mainstream mime population concerning this extremist violence. Conservative congressmen are readying jumbo jets to deport the performers back to the streets of Europe, while the liberals are taking a different stand.
“We believe that the mime population may be afraid to speak out at this time. Violence has been directed towards anyone attempting to perform on the streets,” says democrat Ryan Anderson.
In fact, violent retaliation has also been mistakenly directed toward uninvolved groups. The Society of Pale, Mute Frenchmen has seen many of its members driven into hiding for fear of their lives.
“Manee of hour membhers have had to restock zheir sheltairs from zee freedom fries incident of oh trois,” Treasurer Jacque Laroque declared in a written statement. “Plus zee sun zis time of year rezults in a lot of bhurns for zis populacion.”
So why is it that the mutes are willing to speak out and the mimes are not? We spoke with their lawyer, who alerted us to a Catch-22 of sorts.
“Mimes have a contractual obligation not to speak while on duty. After their shift ends, however, they return to their mediocre lives as awkward human beings. Thus, it is impossible for a mime to speak.”
In order to test this, BoUNCe’s resident private investigator kidnapped and tortured a mime. Unfortunately, just as he was about to crack, a shadowy, beret-sporting sniper shot our mime in the throat, permanently muting him and rendering him useless to us. Mimes: 1, BoUNCe: 0.