Zerns Sickest Comics File <Exclusive Deal>

Found in a crawlspace beneath a defunct “Funny Bone” franchise (Cleveland, 1999). Wrapped in butcher paper. No publisher, no date.

“Zern — this one giggles when you photocopy it. Tried to burn it. Fire came out purple. Keep it in the lead box. — M.” Zerns Sickest Comics File

A single-panel splash, page 5. A clown saws a woman in half on stage. Her torso floats upward, trailing viscera shaped like calliope pipes. The audience is drawn in exact, soulless corporate-art style — smiling, clapping, sipping soda. The clown’s eyes are photographs of real eyes, glued on. Found in a crawlspace beneath a defunct “Funny

Seven pages. Pen and white-out on pulpy newsprint. Art style starts like a forgotten Mad magazine backup strip — big feet, crosshatched shadows, talk bubbles shaped like coffins. By page three, the panels begin to melt . Characters repeat dialogue in loops: “Why is my skin humming?” A recurring mascot — “Laffy the Metabolic Dog” — sheds his fur in one continuous, unbroken strip, revealing a second face underneath that only whispers stock prices from 1987. “Zern — this one giggles when you photocopy it

Here’s a short piece written for the fictional “Zern’s Sickest Comics File” — in the voice of a jaded underground comic archivist. Submitted to Zern’s Sickest Comics File, Tier: Black Label