New SERGE entry...
Parts One through Three of Serge's interesting times can be found in this entry:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/benchilada/50530.html
Moon Turk runs a pretty standard ramen shop. You part the long strips of paper hanging in the doorway and find what is essentially a wide wood-paneled hallway with a bar along one side. Stools line the bar, which has two levels, one at just the right height for you to rest your arms on, the other about a foot higher.
Behind the bar, Moon Turk has pots of water on the edge of boiling, neatly cut fresh noodles, and fresh vegetables laying all over the place. There’s a television in the corner in the corner above the door that is never turned off, in spite of the fact that it only picks up the Lithuanian equivalent of Inside Edition. Moon Turk, of course, does not speak Lithuanian.
As soon as Serge grabbed his stool, Moon Turk brought over three small, warm bottles of sake and set them on the upper level of the bar, along with a small ceramic cup.
“Mike has been drinking lots of beer,” he smiled, “but for you I bring out the good stuff.”
“I heard that, you towel-headed squirrel-fondler,” Mike shouts, reaching across the counter and grabbing Moon Turk’s own 500 ml. bottle of beer.
“Towel head?” shouts the Turk, “I’m a mother fucking Presbyterian, you sack of horse nuts!”
“Shut up and get me ramen, tofurky and scallion,” Mike barked, before killing the bottle of Kirin.
“Turk, can I get the roast pork special?”
“I got no roast pork special, Serge,”
“Can you make one up?”
Moon Turk shifted the bandana on his forehead and grinned, shuffling off to grab an enormous hunk of meat that Serge prayed to God was pork. He began to use a ridiculously oversized cleaver to shave pieces off.
“Mike, why the hell am I here? I love hanging out with you, and eating at Moon Turk’s is like a fucking blowjob…”
“Yeah, with too much teeth,” Mike muttered a bit too loud. The Turk threw a pork bone at him but he ducked and it bounced harmlessly off the wall
“Vegetarians have faster reflexes than crazy people,” Mike smiled.
“And Moon Turks can fuck for hours without coming,” came the response.
Serge found himself getting very annoyed very quickly. He usually enjoyed the dynamic between these two, but tonight it was…almost angering. He felt uncomfortable, his neck was itching, and the walls seemed to be closing in on him.
Serge rubbed his eyes under thumb and forefinger, then grabbed one of the three tokkuri in front of him and drank every drop of the rice wine without pausing for a breath.
“Mike. I’m tired. I’m uncomfortable. I’m not hungry,” he said, catching a mean glance from the Turk, “Hey, man, you know I’ve practically got an extra stomach for your food, man, I just wanna go home.”
“Serge, relax, have more sake, just…”
“Fuck you, what the hell am I doing here? I’m feeling really nervous here,” Serge cried, lifting his right hand, “look at this bastard shake! I feel like I’m at prom, or I’ve just drunk a pot of coffee laced with junkie piss. The only reason my left hand is steady is because clockwork parts are rarely effected by tense situations. I’m not happy, I’m beginning to think you drugged me, and I’ve just gathered enough moans to keep the Emperor happy for months. What the fuck is…”
“Serge, shut up. You’re talking like this and feeling like this because I asked the Turk to hook up a Jitterator behind the counter.” He nodded at the Turk, who sheepishly pulled a dishtowel off of a small machine that looked like a cross between a transistor radio and a pineapple. Serge quickly made to stand up, only to find his legs were quaking too hard to support his weight. He dropped the second tokkuri to the ground, still half full.
“We set it high enough that no customers would want to come in,” Moon Turk mumbled, “and I put some natural sedatives in your sake, so you could handle it after a few minutes.”
“Are you fucks are going to kill me? Is that was this is? Who put you up to this? Was it those dickless bastards at the Church of the Sexless God? No, damn, it was the Maxedon’s son, wasn’t it? Just because I put his dad in prison for the rest of his life, all three hundred years of it, he wants to see me dead. Shit, I just…”
Mike’s slap was hard enough to cut open the inside of Serge’s teeth, and echoed between the close walls of the shop.
“Serge. We need you to calm down and quiet down, okay?”
“He’s right, Serge. Drink more sake, it’ll help.”
“Fuck you. If you guys are going to do me in, I’m going out sober.”
The Turk slammed his cleaver into the slab of meat so hard that the handle nearly split, and began screaming.
“Serge, you shut your fucking mouth and listen to us, Goddamnit! We bring you here because we need help only you can give, and we don’t want any other people in here to listen, and if you keep interrupting we’ll never finish before this goddamned machine,” he flicked a finger towards the Jitterator, “runs out of fucking juice, so drink your drink and let Mike talk!”
Serge slumped against the counter and lowered his eyes. “Fine, I’ll listen. But this better be good, you manipulating sons of…”
“Sometime in the next three weeks,” Mike said plainly, “the Church of the Sexless God and the United Mendicant Index are going to have a street war. A preplanned street war. While the cops and vigilantes suppress it, The Monsters of Propulsion are going to kill the Emperor, fuck his corpse until all the divinity leaks out, and manipulate a coup in the Artist’s Guild that will leave it unable to support itself. They’ll seize control of the entire fucking country, and I think you know how doomed we’ll be if that happens. That’s why we needed you here tonight, alone and still hopped up on the endorphins from the ceremony.”
“You’re making this shit up,” Serge said weakly, trying and failing to stand yet again.
“I bug every seat in my restaurant, my friend,” the Turk offered, making his way in front of his only two customers, “and the Mendicants have been coming in here for two months, talking about this. The only reason they think I can’t understand them is because of the Lithuanian television and the fact that I only speak in Esperanto when they come in. This is bad, my friend, and we need you to do things that only you can do.
Serge looked at Mike, whose eyes were tearing up, then at Moon Turk, who was nervously tearing some bok choi into tiny pieces with his fidgeting fingers.
“You,” he said, pointing his quaking right index finger at the Turk, “shouldn’t have drugged me. You,” he pointed at Mike, “shouldn’t have slapped me, and YOU,” he said to nobody in particular, “picked the wrong time to get ramen.” With his good arm, he quickly whipped out his Gutpunch and fired it at a homeless man who was trying to back out the front door unnoticed. The beggar’s shoulder caved in as the force spun him hard in the doorway and smashed his head on the inside of the frame. He slid to the floor, twitching.
“Mike, get his fucking Mendicant ID. Turk, finish my fucking soup. Me, have another fucking drink.”
benjamin sTone
4:58 pm, Urbana, IL
Current Music: "Asia," - Kenji Kawai, PATLABOR 2 soundtrack
Last Book I Read a Page of: THE GIFT OF THE MAGI AND OTHER STORIES by O.Henry
Last Movie: NIGHT OF THE BEAST (Japan, Seijun Suzuki, 196?)
Next MOVIE: HAPPY TOGETHER (HK, Wong Kar Wai, 199?)
http://www.livejournal.com/users/benchilada/50530.html
Moon Turk runs a pretty standard ramen shop. You part the long strips of paper hanging in the doorway and find what is essentially a wide wood-paneled hallway with a bar along one side. Stools line the bar, which has two levels, one at just the right height for you to rest your arms on, the other about a foot higher.
Behind the bar, Moon Turk has pots of water on the edge of boiling, neatly cut fresh noodles, and fresh vegetables laying all over the place. There’s a television in the corner in the corner above the door that is never turned off, in spite of the fact that it only picks up the Lithuanian equivalent of Inside Edition. Moon Turk, of course, does not speak Lithuanian.
As soon as Serge grabbed his stool, Moon Turk brought over three small, warm bottles of sake and set them on the upper level of the bar, along with a small ceramic cup.
“Mike has been drinking lots of beer,” he smiled, “but for you I bring out the good stuff.”
“I heard that, you towel-headed squirrel-fondler,” Mike shouts, reaching across the counter and grabbing Moon Turk’s own 500 ml. bottle of beer.
“Towel head?” shouts the Turk, “I’m a mother fucking Presbyterian, you sack of horse nuts!”
“Shut up and get me ramen, tofurky and scallion,” Mike barked, before killing the bottle of Kirin.
“Turk, can I get the roast pork special?”
“I got no roast pork special, Serge,”
“Can you make one up?”
Moon Turk shifted the bandana on his forehead and grinned, shuffling off to grab an enormous hunk of meat that Serge prayed to God was pork. He began to use a ridiculously oversized cleaver to shave pieces off.
“Mike, why the hell am I here? I love hanging out with you, and eating at Moon Turk’s is like a fucking blowjob…”
“Yeah, with too much teeth,” Mike muttered a bit too loud. The Turk threw a pork bone at him but he ducked and it bounced harmlessly off the wall
“Vegetarians have faster reflexes than crazy people,” Mike smiled.
“And Moon Turks can fuck for hours without coming,” came the response.
Serge found himself getting very annoyed very quickly. He usually enjoyed the dynamic between these two, but tonight it was…almost angering. He felt uncomfortable, his neck was itching, and the walls seemed to be closing in on him.
Serge rubbed his eyes under thumb and forefinger, then grabbed one of the three tokkuri in front of him and drank every drop of the rice wine without pausing for a breath.
“Mike. I’m tired. I’m uncomfortable. I’m not hungry,” he said, catching a mean glance from the Turk, “Hey, man, you know I’ve practically got an extra stomach for your food, man, I just wanna go home.”
“Serge, relax, have more sake, just…”
“Fuck you, what the hell am I doing here? I’m feeling really nervous here,” Serge cried, lifting his right hand, “look at this bastard shake! I feel like I’m at prom, or I’ve just drunk a pot of coffee laced with junkie piss. The only reason my left hand is steady is because clockwork parts are rarely effected by tense situations. I’m not happy, I’m beginning to think you drugged me, and I’ve just gathered enough moans to keep the Emperor happy for months. What the fuck is…”
“Serge, shut up. You’re talking like this and feeling like this because I asked the Turk to hook up a Jitterator behind the counter.” He nodded at the Turk, who sheepishly pulled a dishtowel off of a small machine that looked like a cross between a transistor radio and a pineapple. Serge quickly made to stand up, only to find his legs were quaking too hard to support his weight. He dropped the second tokkuri to the ground, still half full.
“We set it high enough that no customers would want to come in,” Moon Turk mumbled, “and I put some natural sedatives in your sake, so you could handle it after a few minutes.”
“Are you fucks are going to kill me? Is that was this is? Who put you up to this? Was it those dickless bastards at the Church of the Sexless God? No, damn, it was the Maxedon’s son, wasn’t it? Just because I put his dad in prison for the rest of his life, all three hundred years of it, he wants to see me dead. Shit, I just…”
Mike’s slap was hard enough to cut open the inside of Serge’s teeth, and echoed between the close walls of the shop.
“Serge. We need you to calm down and quiet down, okay?”
“He’s right, Serge. Drink more sake, it’ll help.”
“Fuck you. If you guys are going to do me in, I’m going out sober.”
The Turk slammed his cleaver into the slab of meat so hard that the handle nearly split, and began screaming.
“Serge, you shut your fucking mouth and listen to us, Goddamnit! We bring you here because we need help only you can give, and we don’t want any other people in here to listen, and if you keep interrupting we’ll never finish before this goddamned machine,” he flicked a finger towards the Jitterator, “runs out of fucking juice, so drink your drink and let Mike talk!”
Serge slumped against the counter and lowered his eyes. “Fine, I’ll listen. But this better be good, you manipulating sons of…”
“Sometime in the next three weeks,” Mike said plainly, “the Church of the Sexless God and the United Mendicant Index are going to have a street war. A preplanned street war. While the cops and vigilantes suppress it, The Monsters of Propulsion are going to kill the Emperor, fuck his corpse until all the divinity leaks out, and manipulate a coup in the Artist’s Guild that will leave it unable to support itself. They’ll seize control of the entire fucking country, and I think you know how doomed we’ll be if that happens. That’s why we needed you here tonight, alone and still hopped up on the endorphins from the ceremony.”
“You’re making this shit up,” Serge said weakly, trying and failing to stand yet again.
“I bug every seat in my restaurant, my friend,” the Turk offered, making his way in front of his only two customers, “and the Mendicants have been coming in here for two months, talking about this. The only reason they think I can’t understand them is because of the Lithuanian television and the fact that I only speak in Esperanto when they come in. This is bad, my friend, and we need you to do things that only you can do.
Serge looked at Mike, whose eyes were tearing up, then at Moon Turk, who was nervously tearing some bok choi into tiny pieces with his fidgeting fingers.
“You,” he said, pointing his quaking right index finger at the Turk, “shouldn’t have drugged me. You,” he pointed at Mike, “shouldn’t have slapped me, and YOU,” he said to nobody in particular, “picked the wrong time to get ramen.” With his good arm, he quickly whipped out his Gutpunch and fired it at a homeless man who was trying to back out the front door unnoticed. The beggar’s shoulder caved in as the force spun him hard in the doorway and smashed his head on the inside of the frame. He slid to the floor, twitching.
“Mike, get his fucking Mendicant ID. Turk, finish my fucking soup. Me, have another fucking drink.”
benjamin sTone
4:58 pm, Urbana, IL
Current Music: "Asia," - Kenji Kawai, PATLABOR 2 soundtrack
Last Book I Read a Page of: THE GIFT OF THE MAGI AND OTHER STORIES by O.Henry
Last Movie: NIGHT OF THE BEAST (Japan, Seijun Suzuki, 196?)
Next MOVIE: HAPPY TOGETHER (HK, Wong Kar Wai, 199?)