Joey Cloudy online

Isaiah Jones vs the Sea: The Lonely Fiancée of the Emperor Jones* pt 1

May 6th 2022, United States/San Diego, California

Campus University of San Diego

‘Wrapped Around Your Finger’

“The devil and the deep blue sea behind me

They vanish in the air, you’ll never find me

I will turn your face to alabaster

When you’ll find your servant is your master”

-Sting

Penelope Stockard Bedowitz, in full racing leathers and biker boots that matched her bike, parked the deep coral and nautical azure 2022 KTM RC 390 crotch rocket in front of the steps next to the reflecting pool in the shade of a row of palm trees near the campus’s labs. The six-foot-tall blonde California native removed her helmet in order to take a few casual puffs on a mango/pineapple scented E-stick while leaning against the bike, waiting for Aeon to get out of her chemistry classes’ weekly labs.

She had been secretly teaching Aeon to ride against her parents’ wishes. As much as Penny respected Aeon’s parents, she was in love with Aeon and would deny her nothing. While removing her leather jacket and adjusting her lavender Hello Kitty tank top, she noticed two rather burly, dark-suited African gentlemen and three conservatively dressed women as they exited a limousine with plates of the Ghanaian embassy.

Isaiah Jones’s speech yesterday was all any of the news anchors were talking about. After listening to it, every black person on earth walked down the street as if they were nine feet tall with a purple mohawk. The network talking heads were already comparing the speech to the Gettysburg Address and I Have a Dream, with Dr. Cornel West on the Ari Melber show predicting it would win Isaiah Jones the Nobel Prize in literature even before he got the one he was on track for for his work in mathematics. Every YouTuber was playing and analyzing the speech and trying to explain to their mostly white audiences what was going on and why.

The western economists were in a tizzy because the newly formed unified nation had immediately nationalized all of the continent’s mineral and mining as well as oil. All of the new nation’s resources were now under the control of the world’s first and only General Intelligence AI, built by Isaiah, code-named MOTHER. The sentient software now ran the new continental nations’ economy with a new single African currency and focused on infrastructure rather than exporting the continent’s resources to enrich the Western colonialist powers.

The introverted sailing prodigy had shocked and surprised everyone when he revealed the formation of the new nation, the African United Alliance, yesterday. In one fell swoop, he managed to provoke the ire of the European bankers’ guild, i.e. the IMF, the World Bank, every western corporate power, and for reasons unknown, his holiness the Pope of Rome. He did kick out all of the pedophile priests the Catholic church routinely sent to Africa, Asia, and South America after they were caught molesting white children in Europe and the US.

Every social media influencer and imbecilic hack with a modem was online talking about it, regardless of race. Black Twitter was blowing up with it immediately after he delivered the world-changing oratory yesterday. Everyone was playing the speech online, following it with the Pan African Nationalist red, black, and green flag behind him.

The online communities of the diaspora intuitively joined with their African counterparts to play the South African national anthem at the end of the speech. Others played the African American / old negro national anthem ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’ while the Africans were all playing ” ‘Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika’ at the end of the video. “Social media influencers all over the web were posting their ‘reaction videos’ as they listened to the speech he gave 24 hours ago in a football stadium in Acura Bay, Ghana. The arena was filled to capacity with over 40k people according to the AP (Associated Press) reporters, and several million more had come to the city in the preceding weeks, anticipating the young sailor’s arrival. The two men and one of the women were obviously part of the security detail for the man and woman who exited the rear of the limo just as Aeon entered the area in front of the science buildings.

“Ms. Zavala, Ms. Aeon Zavala!” The woman said with an almost British-sounding Ghanaian accent. “We need to speak with you for a moment. We have an urgent message from your fiancée, the Emperor Jones.” Aeon, her usual afro puffs and cat eye glasses, wearing a catholic girls’ school uniform with knee-high Doc Martins, stopped next to Penny, listening as the ambassador and her entourage approached.

“He was very specific in his instructions, insisting that you would understand. We were instructed to play this song first: The Police/Sting ‘Wrapped Around Your Finger’ began to play. Aeon gasped, hearing the opening chord as the ambassador handed her the Tiffany Blue box along with a white envelope. It was a letter from Isaiah printed out on the Ghanaian consulate’s stationery.

“As you may have heard by now, I have recently come into a bit of money. This position in the new government doesn’t pay very much, but the benefits package is obscene. I do not know when I will be able to get back to the States, given the current circumstances. Since I couldn’t give you the ring in person, Mister Boateng, my PA (lah de dah), suggested I have the consulate deliver it to you for me. I’m not sure if it will “choke a horse” as per your request, but it is the biggest Tiffany diamond I could find online, and there was only one left. It is a 6.39-carat Round Diamond in Platinum Engagement Ring.

“HOE LEE Shit!” Penny exclaimed when Aeon opened the box. Other students and passersby had stopped to watch as well as record with their phone cameras the spectacle on their way to and from class, all gasped as well.

“It’s the size of fucking golf ball!” Penny exclaimed.

“The Emperor Jones sends his apologies; he could not contact you in person, he is in a dead zone for the conference with the other heads of state concerning the new government.”

“Penelope Stockard Bedowitz, esquire, I presume?” The ambassador said, now addressing Penny. “Yeah, that would be me?” “The Emperor Jones has requested that we put you on retainer. You are to act as his attorney, advisor, and counsel for his corporate holdings.” Penny and Aeon both looked at each other, somewhat confused and then at the ambassador.

“Ambassador, I’m sorry, but Izzy just has a ceremonial political position; he has no corporate holdings.”

“Incorrect, the late Beaumont Ulysses Johansson, the nautical engineer and master shipwright who designed his sloop the SS Exodus, left all of his shares of MYC / Monarch Yachts Corporation to Mister Jones.”

The two security agents, one man and one woman dressed exactly alike, like all agents dress black suits, Ray-Bans, black tie, black rubber soled dress shoes, eyed the gathering crowd cautiously. “An AUA / African United Alliance security detail will be here for you, until things settle down.”

“Why do I need security?” Aeon asked.

“Well, as you already know, since you are the admin for his websites that you yourself built and put up to help fund his trip, that he has been getting a lot of hate mail and like all blacks in the public sphere, more than his fair share of death threats from mostly your countries fetid alphabet soup of white nationalist organizations.”

“Yeah, Aeon retorted, unfazed. It’s just the usual suspects, a bunch of dumb pencil dick white bois sitting in their parents houses in thier bedrooms desperate for attention. Third rate edge lumps between bouts of masturbating to BBC cuck vids and tranny porn. I block Bennies incel morons they never do anything but talk and try to derail the conversation to some puerile alt right talking point nonsense. As long as you do not engage with them and remove their post immediately as well as block them, they can’t win. The moment you engage them in any way, they win because that is all that they ever really wanted was for you to acknowledge them. Aeon looked at the ambassador with a Cheshire cat’s smile. I never feed the trolls.”

“These are not children Ms. Zavala these are clandestine imbedded domestic terrorist going back to the late 1980s in this current iteration of white nationalism “Ghost Skins”, right wing idealogues, neo-nazi, republican fascist of america, they are armed, organized, and have corrupted every aspect of your government’s security, military, and police, this nations justice and law enforcement institutions are completely compromised. We will keep our eye on you from now on. We have the list from Anonymous sources of those in your law enforcement who are active members of domestic terrorist right-wing organizations, but that doesn’t matter. Over 50 percent of your police are closeted Nazis and white supremacist of some sort.

The entire world knows this. We all watched them on Jan 6th taking selfies and high-fiving the insurrectionists, then doing nothing once the attack started. The missing secret service tapes of the president’s Secret Service files magically being erased accidentally, impossible, before the trials. No one called the SWAT, the National Guard or the military. You put up more resistance when a black college football celebration gets out of hand than when your capital is being overrun by insurgents.

These are not opinions, madam. These are facts. The whole world was watching, and we have the data from your own government’s internal memos as well as FOIA reports from a multitude of agencies over decades; it’s pretty grim. But also, none of this should be a surprise to anyone. No one imported these fascists; they are homegrown because your government and your so-called liberal allies are cowards; they allowed this to fester and grow into what you have now. But don’t worry; you won’t even know we are here. We are not willing to trust your life to the goodwill of white folk.”

“I hope you know that telling me not to worry after informing me of all of this is not helping at all.” Aeon retorted.

“Relax, Ambassador Bombay cooed reassuringly. Go about your day as usual; we will see each other again soon, Ms. Zavala and Ms. Bedowitz. Good day.”

“You are engaged, Girl?!” Penny shouted as they screamed and hugged, jumping up and down, now joined by several of Aeon’s classmates and friends that were standing nearby, looking on.

“You also have a safety deposit box available at the embassy, Ambassador Bombay said, eyeing the engagement ring on her finger, should you need it.”

…“I didn’t want you to hear that I was married with ten African wives and freak out. It’s all political theatre to unite the continent as a single nation. I’ll go over all of the boring details of the politics behind it when we talk. I love you.

PS

Tell Penny I said, “Na Na Na Na Na Nah! when you show her your ring.”

Aeon smiled as she folded the letter and returned it to the envelope. She put the Tiffany’s box and the letter in her backpack with her school books and laptop. Penny and Aeon put on their helmets and sped away with Aeon on the back of the bike, pumping her fist in the air. Her friends and random students cheer and wave goodbye. Ambassador Bombay returned to her limo with the other agents not assigned to Aeon immediately kicking off her heels.

“Do you think she knows that ring is worth nearly a million dollars?”

It is the exact ring she told him she wanted when they got married on her 27th birthday. So yes, I’m fairly certain she knows exactly how much she’s worth. The ambassador said with a grudging respect for the young American girl. The driver headed for the hotel they would be in town for the next few days.

After a moment’s silence, Calvin Ohene Mense, the ambassador’s PA/personal assistant, spoke up again. “I was expecting her to have a complete meltdown over the polygamy. Most Western women are not intelligent enough to comprehend our ways. The average black woman in America would have ended the engagement the moment they heard 10 wives. Only their skin is black, they think just like these feminist white women for the most part.” The round, flat-faced man sighed, adjusting the lapels of his blazer.

“It is quite remarkable, she reacted as if she comes from a polyamorous society.”

“They grew up together, you know,” the ambassador Bombay replied, “and they were homeschooled together by their university professor parents. When he said that she was smarter than he was, I believed him. Her intelligence is emotional and social; his is mathematical and logical; hers is verbal. Aeon is the one who has been monitoring his websites since he became the star of that viral internet video in January, after those two Cuban girls in Key West posted the video. This girl watched as he made his way island hopping across the Caribbean, new lovers on every island, before crossing the Atlantic to his final destination in Africa.

Aeon Gabriella Zavala created his GoFundMe as well as monitors his websites; she HTML and Linux coded them herself. She understands he does what he does in Africa out of duty to his people, our people, but Aeon, he will marry her for love. She is secure, as she should be. She would have made an excellent queen. And since you are new to the United States, I will let you in on a little secret: Aeon is also in a sexual relationship with Penelope the tall blonde white woman who picked her up on the motorcycle.”

“Is the emperor Jones aware of this?” The young Ghanaian dignitary with his typical African male double standard inquired indignantly.

“Of course he knows, Ambassador Bombay chuckled, he introduced them; Penelope was his best friend from Uni, as well as his informal au pair. Ever since he was on the cover of People Magazine’s 30 under 30 a decade ago, when he became the youngest person to be awarded the Fields Medal, his mother and grandmother, as well as their circle of friends, have worked tirelessly to shield him from the media. He hides it well, but did you know that he is on the spectrum, a high-functioning autistic math prodigy? Those rarified few who comprehend his field of study are certain he is on the path to the Nobel before he is 30. Ambassador Bombay exhaled a sigh of exasperation. According to the neurologist, his mind functions more like a machine than a human being.”

“I had no idea he was a retard. Calvin Ohene Mense replied excitedly. This makes yesterday’s speech even more amazing!” The PA exclaimed. Ambassador Bombay slowly shook her head in disbelief. As she wondered how this foolish man had been sent to work with her by the AUAs senior intelligence officer Virgil Boateng himself.

“It appears that you have neglected to read the dossiers you were sent when you were chosen for this assignment by Mister Boateng formerly of NIB now director of the Department of the Interior, Isaiah’s personal assistant if you will; so, allow me to enlighten you, the emperor makes love to both men and woman. And I know what that gold stripe on the suffragette’s sash stands for as well as any black feminist.”

The young PA, Calvin Ohene Mense, decided silence would be best, considering he already had his foot lodged firmly in his mouth.

Ambassador Felicity Ayorkor Bombay continued. “The title she will be referred to as, she grinned, is her Royal Highness the Empress Zavala, until they are wed on her 27th birthday in 10 years he says in the message he sent to the consulate. Then you may address her as the Empress Jones.”

Ambassador Bombay sat leaning back into the limo’s thick leather cushions, the air conditioner blowing cold air over her neck and cleavage cooling her from the California heat. She pressed the tip of her index finger on the triangular play button on the flat black screen of her iPhone, cueing the music app to play, plugged in her earbuds and listened to the song’s lyrics once more as the limousine melded into the San Diego afternoon traffic.

Felicity minored in literature at Oxford University, and as she listened, she was beginning to suspect the boy was more sophisticated emotionally than they gave him credit for, as she listened carefully, decoding the lyrics. A song of immense intellectual depth, literary lyrics inconceivable from this generation’s functionally illiterate popstars written 2 decades before he was even born, she smiled; sometimes you have to love the internet, sometimes.

‘Wrapped Around Your Finger’

“You consider me a young apprentice

Caught between the Scylla and Charybdis

Hypnotized by you if I should linger

Staring at the ring around your finger

I have only come here seeking knowledge

Things they would not teach me of in college

I can see the destiny you sold

Turn into a shining band of gold”

-Sting

Chapter Epilogue:

One hour later… Lake Nyanza/Lake Victoria Africa aboard the SS Nea Ope Se Obedi Hene anchored at the intersection of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania coordinates longitude and latitude 0°59’41.8″S 33°55’45.0″E, 2 am an armed dingy motor to the catamaran one uniformed Ghanaian soldier disembarks and makes his way up to the flybridge where Mister Virgil Boateng sits on a cushioned bench reading over a stack of dossiers, he has for his young charge to peruse the next day. They have a meeting with the warlords after he finishes his business here and his honeymoon is over.

The only pressing issue at the moment is the PM of India is upset that they were not on the list of nations to receive the flash drive with the new AI known as MOTHER while the Chinese as usual were attempting to flex their muscles now in an attempt to negotiate for a better deal at the upcoming summit in Dubia. The Cuban mobster friend of Isaiah’s, this spectre a Senior Dead Eye Polly, sent word that his people were in position in Cancun with eyes on Isaiah and Aeon’s parents as well as the Western agents tailing them. The team at the Long Beach, California marina reported all clear on Hector’s boat. The situation was under control.

Their US consulate attaché’s message read simply, “She loved the ring, all is well.” Isaiah’s PA agent, Virgil Boateng, dismissed the courier as he lit another cigar and popped the cork on another bottle of champagne, saving the Remy Martin Louis XIII Black Pearl 1.75L for when Isaiah joined him later. It was a small victory, but reason enough to celebrate Mister Boateng’s thought as he popped the cork on another bottle of Dom Perignon 1990. The young Emperor Jones had been worried about the royal wedding upsetting his American fiancée. The letter and ring had done the trick; she understood exactly what was going on and why, or at least as much as she needed to know. He filled a crystal Champagne glass and toasted the waxing crescent moon over the black waters of Lake Nyanza.

[Note 2.]

“Nkosi sikelel’ Afrika

Maluphakanyisw’ uphondo lwayo

Yizwa imithandazo yethu

Nkosi sikelela thina lusapho lwayo

Morena boloka setjhaba sa heso

O fedise dintwa le matshwenyeho

O se boloke o se boloke setjhaba sa heso

Setjhaba sa South Africa, South Africa

Uit die blou van onse hemel

Uit die diepte van ons see

Oor ons ewige gebergtes

Waar die kranse antwoord gee

Sounds the call to come together

And united we shall stand

Let us live and strive for freedom

In South Africa our land”

[Note 4] the ring $900,000 Tiffany & Co Solitaire 6.39ct D VS2 Round Diamond Platinum Engagement Ring

[Note 4] the ring $900,000 Tiffany & Co Solitaire 6.39ct D VS2 Round Diamond Platinum Engagement Ring

About the author

JD Cloudy’s poetry has disappeared in the literary journals; Fatfizz, Mad Swirl, Texas Beat Anthology, Danse Macabre, Du Jour, and Death List Five. He has won no literary awards, entered no slam competitions, and never completed college. He lives to write in Dallas, Tx.