On episode No. 79 "Musings of a Cigarette Man" Pivotal Publications notifies CSM (aka Bloodworth) that his story "Take a Chance: A Jack Colquitt Adventure" dealing with alien assassinations was to serialized beginning in the November 12, 1996, in Roman A'Clef Magazine.

Unfortunately, when the Smoking Man reads a copy of the magazine that he purchased from a street vendor, he realizes that his original story ending has been altered ("This isn't the ending that I wrote. It's all wrong"). Disappointed, he sits down and delivers an unhappy little monologue before returning to his life in covert ops.

"Life is like a box of chocolates. A cheap, thoughtless, perfunctory gift that nobody ever asks for. Unreturnable, because all you get back is another box of chocolates. So you're stuck with this undefinable whipped mint crap that you mindlessly wolf down when there's nothing else left to eat. Sure, once in a while there's a peanut butter cup or an English toffee but they're gone too fast and taste is fleeting. So you end up with nothing but broken bits of hardened jelly and teeth-shattering nuts. If you're desperate enough to eat those, all you got left is an empty box filled with useless brown paper wrappers." -- CSM sitting next to a homeless man eating chocolates from a box he found in the trash.

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Snipets of Story Text

"Jack Colquitt, sat alone in his apartment at Christmas. He believed in sacrifice...Yet, some nights, he longed for a second chance..." [CSM's own life mirrored in the words of his spy story]

"I can kill you whenever I please... but not today." [A direct quote from the novel "Take A Chance: A Jack Colquitt Adventure" by Raul Bloodworth - CSM later spoke these words as he looked through the sights of a sniper rifle at Frohike, one of the "Lone Gunmen" who had read the Jack Colquitt story and theorized that Jack Colquitt was, in fact, Cancer Man in a fictionalized form.]

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Rejection letter from Montgomery & Glick - Note: some text from the letter is missing]

Mr. Raul Bloodworth
555 Brookabank Ave.
Apt. 24
Washington, D.C. 20091

Dear Mr. Bloodworth,

I have recently had the unhappy
and reading your manuscript: TAKE A CHAN ADVENTURE.

My advice? Burn it! It stunk like
floor. That, Mr. Bloodworth, is ca
do well not to litter your next man
of them.

In addition, I felt the plot of TAKE A CHANCE to be preposterous, the characters unbelievable, the ending lame and the writing, frankly, crap. Needless to say, Montgomery & Glick Publishing declines
your manuscript.

Please, DO NOT send this piece of trash to another publishing house.

Very Sincerely,

Albert Godwinkle

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Acceptance letter from Pivotal Publishing.

Mr. Raul Bloodworth
555 Brookabank Ave. Apt. 24
Washington, D.C. 20091

Dear Mr. Bloodworth,

Thank you, thank you, thank you for TAKE A CHANCE: A JACK COLQUITT ADV

Wow! I loved it. It's perfect for adventure angle. Such characters death! You are definitely on the adventure.

Please call me as soon as you reached at (212) 555-0127.

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CSM phone conversation with Publisher

WOMAN:	Pivotal Publishing.
CSM:	Um, uh, Walden Roth, please.
WOMAN:	One moment.
ROTH:	Walden Roth.
CSM:	Oh, Mister Roth, hello. Um, this is Raul Bloodworth, uh, author of "Second Chance: A Jack Colquitt Adventure."
ROTH:	Yes, of course, Mister Bloodworth. What an active imagination you have... alien assassinations!
CSM:	Is it too much? Uh, I mean, is my imagination too active?
ROTH:	No, no, I love it. Now, as I've expressed in the letter, I wish to serialize your novel in my publication "Roman a Clef." Many outstanding authors received their first printing in our publication.
CSM:	That's great. Um, I had an idea about the artwork. Uh, um, I thought it could have a sort of Tom Clancy-ish kind of look, and, and that...
ROTH:	Great, great, that's, that's why we work with young writers, but I'll be honest, however. You'll have to relinquish some control.
CSM:	Of course. Of course. (CSM doesn't sound happy about that.)
ROTH:	After all, it is our publication and I can assure you we'll handle it with the utmost respect.
CSM:	No, no, no. I, I, I, I, I, I'm sure you will. I'm just excited.
ROTH:	Understandable. Uh, do you have an agent or attorney?
CSM:	No.
ROTH:	That's fine. It's a minimum agreement of twenty-five hundred dollars, and you'll save yourself ten percent.
CSM:	Well, that's fine, that's fine. Any, anything. When do you plan to publish the story.
ROTH:	"Roman a Clef." It'll be on newsstands the morning of November twelfth.

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