Several years ago a film crew from the television news program PrimeLine was given unprecedented access to the staff of Monster Hunter International, a secretive company headquartered in Cazador, Alabama. Chief PrimeLine reporter, Leslie Bing, after learning of the existence of monsters was committed to educating the public about their dangers. Mr. Bing’s original plan was to broadcast the interviews as a series of public service announcements before Halloween. However, the tapes were later seized by an unnamed federal agency and the staff of PrimeLine was admonished to never speak of monsters publically. The only thing that remains from these conversations are the transcripts of the original un-edited PSA footage, presented here for the first time.
Reception Area, MHI headquarters building
PL: I’m with Earl Harbinger, Director of Operations for MHI, a company that purportedly tracks down and destroys supernatural threats. So, Mr. Harbinger, this is your chance to tell the world about monsters. What does the public need to know to stay safe?
HARBINGER: You know they’re never gonna let you show this, right? Cold day in hell before that happens.
PL: Thank you for your concern, Mr. Harbinger, but here at PrimeLine, we’re dedicated to getting the truth.
HARBINGER: Uh huh… Good luck with that. Agent REDACTED will probably feed you into a wood chipper. If I were to say, on camera, that monsters were real, I’d get shut down by the REDACTED so fast your head would spin.
PL: Well, hypothetically… For our Halloween special, if monsters were real, what would you tell everyone?
HARBINGER: Hmmm… hypothetically? Buy guns. Lots of guns.
#
CUT TO: A different office.
PL: Julie Shackleford, MHI Contracts Manager, has agreed to speak with PrimeLine about a very serious threat. Ms. Shackleford?
SHACKLEFORD: The biggest danger to America’s youth is that whole emo-tween romantic vampire fiction crap that’s caught on. Movies, books, TV, its everywhere.
PL: Excuse me?
SHACKLEFORD: You know, Anne Rice started it, with her brooding, sensitive vampires. Come on, pre-crazy Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt in one movie? That’s some man candy. Then you got Twilight, oh barf, where sparkly vampires don’t want to eat you, they just want to be loved and all that EXPLETIVE DELETED. It sends the wrong message to young women. What kind of hundred year old hangs out a high school to pick up dates? Weirdo pedophiles. That’s who. Real vampires love those books. It makes picking up victims much easier.
PL: Really?
SHACKLEFORD: Absolutely. Speaks directly to camera. Listen, girls. I know you like that whole ‘bad-boy-but-I-can-change-him’ thing, but real life vampires aren’t sensitive, they aren’t sparkly, and they don’t want to be your boyfriend. They want to eat you. Sucking your blood is not a euphemism, they literally want to suck your blood… out of your body. You kind of need that to, oh, not die. With vampires, when somebody says don’t forget to wear protection, we’re talking about body armor. The rates of vampire attacks have risen dramatically over the last few years against gullible teenagers because you’re just making this easier for them. Looks back at reporter. Hypothetically.
PL: Of course.
SHACKLEFORD: Looks back to camera. Vampires love you about as much as you love a Big Mac, honey. Deal with it.
#
Cut to: A very cluttered office
PL: Owen Zastava Pitt is the Finance Manager for Monster Hunter International. I’ve got to say, you don’t really look like an accountant.
OZP: Sorry, just got off the range. I like to shoot at least two hundred rounds before lunch every day.
PL: Am I reading this right? Studies piece of paper. Why do they call you the God Slayer?
OZP: Sighs. Kill one god, people get all worked up. Go figure. Drops a giant pile of guns on desk. Hypothetically, of course.
PL: So Mr. Harbinger has already talked to you?
OZP: Sent a company-wide e-mail, but yeah, I’ve been thinking about it, and I’ve got a public service announcement for you. Picks stack of papers off of desk. This is valuable stuff and often overlooked by most people. Let’s say that you were to kill a monster, which could never actually happen, mind you, but say that you did kill an imaginary monster… How do you get paid?
PL: I have no idea.
OZP: This, holds up paper, is a Treasury Form P-3506. You need to submit one of these within sixty days of killing a monster. As you can see, you need to put in your PUFF table numbers, which you can get by cross referencing column J from page 56 of table P. I built a spreadsheet for this, but you can use the cross reference from ES-1920-B paragraph fourteen–
EDITORS NOTE: Several minutes of explanation have been deleted here. It was believed that the accounting details would put most PrimeLine viewers to sleep.
OZP: –then, and this is important, you still need to report this on your taxes. The 1040X is where you report PUFF income. Oh, man, the IRS will fine the EXPLETIVE DELETED out of you if you don’t fill out your schedule X every quarter!
PL: coughs politely. Thank you for your time, Mr. Pitt.
#
Cut to: outside of a workshop
Three individuals wearing baggy black outfits, masks, and tinted goggles have stopped the PrimeLine cameraman and are poking at him curiously. With sticks.
PL: Excuse me. Who are you?
?1: Stares. You… I seen on magic box.
?2: The Prime Lines?
PL: Why yes, that’s me on the… magic box.
?3: We be on magic box now?
PL: Maybe.
?2: We for news! Curious. You know the Bills Oh-Reillys?
PL: No. I’m afraid he’s on a different network.
?2: Sadness. Likes the Oh-Reillys.
?3: grunts. Possible laugh? Pinheads. He he he.
?1: Suspicious. You know the Keiths the Olbers Mans?
PL: No.
?1: Good. Skippy would eat the heart… of Keiths the Olbers Mans.
?2: Foul beast, the Olbers Mans. #2 turns his head and spits on the ground.
The three mysterious individuals lose interest and wander off.
#
Cut to: Inside a very packed workshop.
PL: I’m here with Milo Anderson. MHI’s…. what is your title exactly, Mr. Anderson?
MILO: It’s just Milo. I don’t really have a title, though I’m thinking about putting Renaissance Man on my business cards. Earl said you guys were coming and that I wasn’t supposed to talk too much. I think he said be helpful, but non-committal.
PL: Well, if you’ve seen our program, then you know that we pride ourselves on hard-hitting, fact-filled, journalism—
MILO: Nope. Haven’t seen it. I get all my news from Coast to Coast AM. I’ve got a public service helpy thing for you, though. Pulls sheet off of workbench dramatically. Ta dah!
PL: What’s all this?
MILO: Now, you might be thinking this is just a bunch of household cleaning products and some lawn-care items that you could pick up at any Wal-Mart, but oh no, what you’ve got here are the ingredients to take care of even the nastiest monster problems. I want to do my PSA on how to build improvised home explosives!
PL: I don’t think we can air that.
MILO: Aw, come on! One bag of REDACTED mixed with REDACTED of a pound of REDACTED and I can do this. Milo picks up a sack, lights it on fire, and chucks it out the open doorway. You guys may want to cover your ears.
HORRENDOUS EXPLOSION
MILO: Waits for dust to settle. Coughs. Seriously. I think I should have my own show on the Discovery Channel. Each episode I could demonstrate all sorts of cool stuff. Now that would make for some good TV. How to build bombs and flame throwers for science! Could you pitch that for me?
PL: Thank you for your time, Mr. Anderson.
#
CUT TO: Reception Area, MHI headquarters building
PL: Thank you for having us, Mr. Harbinger. It’s been an interesting experience.
HARBINGER: Glad to be of assistance, Mr. Bing. They’re never gonna let you show this, though. When you run into Agent REDACTED and he threatens you and takes your files, don’t resist too hard, it just gets him in a punching mood.
PL: Do you have any closing statements for our viewers in order to prepare them for Halloween?
HARBINGER: Kids, don’t eat too much candy all at once. You’ll get sick. For the grownups, don’t get too stupid at any parties. Everybody looks better in costume and you’ve probably been drinking too much. That can lead to some poor judgment.
PL: That’s it? That’s your advice?
HARBINGER: shrugs. From everybody at MHI, have a happy Halloween.
AAAwsome!!!! Larry. That needs to go in a book.
Unless Agent Redacted gets to you.
That is hilarious! Gotta love Skippy & family.
“Pinheads. He he he”
Outstanding Larry!
Brilliant. I would love to see the footage of Franks retrieving the camera. Just brilliant.
I’m still trying to stop laughing, but it’s just to funny!!! I can’t say which part I like best because it’s all freaking awesome! Thanks for a really great Halloween present 😉
Nicely done, Larry! Just one more reason a big-screen MHI has to be a Halloween release… this would be a kickass trailer.
I would pay hard cash to watch Skippy vs. Olbermann.
Not much to watch, unless the mental image of Olbermann being killed by a orc…wait yeah I’d pay for that too.
I’d give a months beer money to see that!!
Beautiful. I am in the Ohio airport after World Fantasy, and this made me laugh so loudly is startled the newspaper-reading guy next to me.
Also I finally found a copy of MHV…at the con! So guess what I’m going to be doing for the next 2-4 hours of flights? 😀
Awesome! 😀
You know if they ever make MHI into a movie, this would be great to watch during the ending credits.
Hey Larry, my dad sent a check to that guy for the charity redshirt auction thing and he hasn’t gotten a confirmation or anything so I just wanted to see if you got the info or not?
Nick, I got an e-mail from your dad. They are supposed to be sending me an update to the charity redshirt list soon.
You won’t make MHA though. I had to get that finalized last week. You want Grimnoir 2 or Monster Hunter Legion?
Thanks, he just wanted to make sure everything was in order 🙂 Tomorrow is my birthday. If at all possible I’d prefer Monster Hunter Legion. Thanks again.
“On today’s episode of ‘Monster Blasters’…
“The Newbies test if silver nitrate tipped ammo is really effective…”
“We show you how to make napalm”…
“And Milo tests out the Abomination Mod. 4”
I’d watch it. Heck, if anyone knows Adam & Jamie…
I get the feeling that Jamie, along with all of the other thing’s he’s done in life, has hunted monsters.
That is one of the reason Mythbusters is ending, Jamie has been contracted to Dugway to help with some of the stuff left over. Dugway couldn’t get Milo to take a contract so they asked Jamie to take it instead.
Good one Larry- Have a ‘happy’ one 🙂
Julie’s part was great. The whole romantic Vampire and werewolf thing just means the dark side has learned to fiddle with their image and publicity.
That’s why we love Hamilton too – one friend described a few books as just porn and violence. I asked what was wrong with that? She didn’t hit me.
Thanks for the Halloween candy, Larry.
Made of win! I loved Skippy’s part!
Don’t know how MHI could makes such an error but
“HARBINGER: Hmmm… hypothetically? Buy guns. Lots of guns.”
Guns don’t kill monsters, silver bullets kill monsters …
Re: the werewolf who started our hero on his monster-slaying path took 12 rounds of 357 and kept coming …
Better issue a correction, quick. (LOL)
Awesome
Good stuff Larry.
Milo could have his own discovery channel show if he wasn’t so busy making stuff that goes bang for MHI.
Ah, but he could combine the efforts…
“today boys and girls, we will be making a magnum ghoul sporker with the new phosphorus burn package”
Now *that* would get ratings! 😎
Happily, I finished my B.S. program yesterday (Friday) and can finally return to recreational reading!
So I hit up the local Borders and got MH-Vendetta, and ordered the other from Amazon. Monster Hunter Nation — here I come!
Hmmm, I think it is time to get working on that MH fanfic.
Forget the movie, when does the MHI IRPG come out? That should be up there with WOW in no time. Lessee, pick a team (or make your own and pick team members), go hunting with Z, get to work with Milo. Hmmm … (im)possibilities are endless.
YES! MHI addon to the “Zombies!!!” game-system, MHI RPG, maybe an MHI Collectible Miniatures Game… Larry, the Merch possibilities are limited only by your imagination!
I’m thinking GURPS: MHI
Maybe a sourcebook for All Flesh Must be Eaten?
” Kill one god, people get all worked up. Go figure.” – classic
Man… this would make a great short film! 😀
That was wonderful! Thanks for making me crack up laughing in between bestowing candy upon the happy hordes arriving at the door!
I’m so tempted to look up those forms on the IRS website… you know, hypothetically. 🙂
I looked them up… it says ACCESS FORBIDDEN. CONTACT YOUR LOCAL HOMELAND SECURITY OFFICE NOW UNDER PENALTY OF LAW.
Gonna be an interesting couple of days for my supervisor. I used his computer.
I can’t get any work done I’m still chuckling.
Does Skippy’s tribe have a patch of their own?
I am ROFLMAO. I swear one of the pre-school moms had a mini-skirt on smaller than a handkerchief on last night, and it was chilly here – not that I minded, it was just too dark to truly appreciate it going house to house with the kids.
Armed to the teeth, in true MHI spirit.
That is the nice thing about where I live, no one asks if those are real weapons or not …
Here in West Virginia, it is assumed the weapons ARE real – I know guys who open carry as part of their costume! What is the point of carrying a weapon if it ISN’T real?
Milo sooooo needs his own program on Discovery channel. he could invite those two weenies from “Mythbusters” over and show them how to make really large craters in the ground with common household chemicals…
*dies laughing*
*sigh*
Why am I just reading this? Anyway, I was nearly crying while reading Milo’s interview. I could almost see it.
“HORRENDOUS EXPLOSION”
HA!
tweaker
You know, you could cause a lot of confusion, if you legally changed your surname to Redacted, then got a job with the FBI…you literally could be Special Agent Redacted then.
Please get book three out sooner rather then ASAP…. I finished MHI:V and I am going through withdrawal!!! I need my MHI!!!
BTW- Great series, characters, and story. Keep up the great work. You have a devoted reader in MHI and looking forward to Dead Six. 🙂
You’re welcome, Larry. 🙂
Loving everything you write. Keep up the amazing work!!
Hahaha…Coast to Coast am….
brilliant, start the next MHI novel that way!
Too funny… and definitely ‘follows’ the script…
ROFL @ “public service helpy thing”!
That’s totally Milo, alright!
I’d also watch the shit out of that show.
Thanks, Larry Correia, you made my day with this!
This is great!
Think you could get Oliver Wyman to do a dramatic reading?
LOL LOL LOL loved, super funny.
leave it to prime line to redact milo’s helpful hints…
This never gets old… Especially Milo’s bit.