Characters:
- HANNIBCANARY: Cigar in beak, authoritative, paranoid canary.
- B’AI BARACANARY: Gold chains, aggressive wing-flapping canary.
- CANARY MURDUCK: Goggles on head, unhinged canary.
- KITAI: Nonchalant feline with a bright plastic water blaster.
- TAYLOR SWIFT: Taylor Swift.
(PITCH BLACK STAGE. A dramatic, gravelly voiceover.)
HANNIBCANARY (V.O.):
Ten years ago, a crack unit of yellow songbirds was sent to a pet store lockup for a crime they didn’t commit in the coal mines of West Virginia. These canaries promptly escaped from their maximum-security birdcage to the wilds of the Indiana underground.
Today, still wanted by pet shop owners and stray cats alike, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a municipal infrastructure emergency, if no one else can help, and if you can find them… maybe you can hire: Canary Force. Highly trained songbirds. The C-Team.
(LIGHTS UP, HANNIBCANARY, B’AI BARACANARY, and CANARY MURDUCK enter in a tight tactical flying V formation. They flap their arms rhythmically, and bob their heads erratically with quick, twitchy hops towards a SKYNET computer terminal towards which KITAI idly squirts tiny streams of water. Pfft. Pfft. TAYLOR SWIFT strides back and forth center stage, hitting trademark arena-tour poses.
TAYLOR SWIFT:
(Belt-singing, hitting a massive head-voice run)
♪ ‘Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play… AND THE HATE-RRRS! ♪
(Pauses to speak sharply to her invisible sound technician)
Can I get more of the bird-bath reverb in my in-ear monitors? Also more sub-bass seed-rattle in my in-ear monitors? And turn down the wing-flap bleed on track four. Thanks, sweetie!
HANNIBCANARY:
(Twitching head sharp-left, sharp-right approaching the SKYNET terminal.)
Hold up, canary team. Cease flight vector! Maintain preening posture. We have located the target. I love it when a paranoid delusion comes together. I call it a plan.
B’AI BARACANARY:
(Preening and pacing in tight, jerky bird-steps)
I ain’t gettin’ wet, Hannibcanary! I’m a canary! A yellow, song-singing, seed-cracking canary! We all are. And we all got no waterproof wing oils man! You saturate our canary plumage with municipal water and all our mass-to-lift ratio goes straight to hell! I am not going to be no grounded canary. I didn’t escape maximum security to die as a wet paper towel.
TAYLOR SWIFT:
(Suddenly dropping into a low, intimate acoustic-set stool pose right between them)
♪ …I knew you were trouble when you walked in… ♪
(Looking right past B’AI, pointing dramatically at KITAI)
♪ …So shame on ME NOW! ♪
CANARY MURDUCK:
(Glancing wildly, then tucking invisible wings.)
She’s calling out the cat with a water blaster! She is singing about the blank space. Is she really a canary ally?! Or an acoustic double-agent working for Skynet?
HANNIBCANARY:
Stow the feathers Murduck! Look at the display on that Skynet console. Skynet and AI isn’t just hacking our comms. Skynet and the AI syndicate are rigging elections and paying off local officials to re-zone the local bird bath for their new AI syndicate data center. High-density. Liquid cooling!
B’AI BARACANARY:
(Squawking aloud in outrage)
SKREEE! They takin’ the canary bird bath?! That’s municipal infrastructure! Where is a canary supposed to splash around and sing tunes after a long day of tactical operations?! I pity the fool that tries to take away my bird bath. I pity any fool that tries to add moisture to B’AI Baracanary’s exquisite plumage!
TAYLOR SWIFT:
(Inspirations striking, scribbling furiously on a notepad)
“Lifeless matrix… hyper-scale compute… you left me in the latency…” That bridge is money. Travis. TRAVIS!! Write that down on your football thingy!!!
HANNIBCANARY:
It’s a corporate land grab executed by an autonomous superintelligence. The one we all know as Skynet.
B’AI BARACANARY:
(Flicking head toward Kitai)
Why is that cat staring at us like that?!
HANNIBCANARY:
That cat is just sitting on the valve, tracking our canary flight vectors! An interdimensional instigator! Look at that tail twitch… Baiting us into a full-scale feather panic!
(KITAI lazily turns his head toward them raising the water blaster to CANARY MURDUCK’s flight line, and fires a single, slow arch of water into the air. It lands two feet away with a soft splat.)
TAYLOR SWIFT:
(Gasps, doing a high-concept dramatic fall to the knees right in front of the water splash)
♪ …AND I WAS STANDING IN THE PERFUME RAIN! ♪
CANARY MURDUCK:
(Fluttering arms frantically in a fake aerial stall)
Psychological warfare! That so called cat squirted near my left canary wingtip! Now the pop icon is reinforcing the precipitation zone!
B’AI BARACANARY:
I don’t care if these are enemies, unregistered pests, or an international touring act! They are trying to take away our canary bird bath. Nobody uses B’AI Baracanary or any other small feathered songbird for cheap entertainment! Nobody!
(B’AI BARACANARY puffs out his chest, flutters his arms in aggressive short hops, and charges forward. KITAI doesn’t move. He looks at the water blaster, looks at B’AI and is just bored.)
HANNIBCANARY:
Hold your fire, canaries! That cat is switching tactics!
B’AI BARACANARY:
(Stepping back slowly, smiling nervously)
Hey there, buddy… cool cat… very funny joke with the squirt gun… top-tier canary prank…
(KITAI tilts its head with mild curiosity and gives a tiny, silent meow.)
TAYLOR SWIFT:
(Hitting a massive 12-second belt note, pointing dramatically offstage)
♪ …AND WE ARE NEVER, EVER, EVER… GETTING BACK TOGETHER! ♪
HANNIBCANARY:
She’s giving the signal! Canaries, take to the skies! Fallback to the van! RETREAT!
(The CANARY FORCE scrambles offstage in total panic, flapping arms violently, squawking “CANARY RETREAT!”, and hopping over invisible tires or whatever. TAYLOR SWIFT curtsies gracefully to the empty room. KITAI blinks slowly before one final squirt towards the Skynet monitor. Pfft.)
(BLACKOUT)