[FONT="]Yes, it's Monday. Yes, it's time for the next chapter. No, I did not write this.
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Chapter 7 : No Chance of Redemption, Ever.[/FONT]
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Chapter 7 : No Chance of Redemption, Ever.[/FONT]
Inky repaired her lipstick while her latest meal stumbled erratically toward the door and crumpled in a heap at Bernie’s feet. She climbed off her barstool with odd thoughts of dessert flitting in her head, just to have those thoughts dispelled when her boot splashed in something. [/FONT] She looked down and wrinkled her nose.
“EEEwwww, is Mel back already?”
The answer was immediate. She heard a flushing sound then Cray bounced out of the men’s room, splashing all the way to the bar.
“Nope. Toilet’s clogged again,” he beamed, pouring himself whiskey with a similar name.
“You idiot, look at the floor. Why don’t you do something?”
“Is my butt hanging out my pants? Is my name ‘Joe’?”
Inky shook her head.
“Then I believe I’ll have another beer.”
“You’re drinking whiskey, battery brain.”
“I was drinking beer yesterday, dear.” Cray grinned, his smile lit up the Cabaret like a bolt of greased lightening. He grabbed both bottles and waded off to a booth. A current, attracted by his electric personality, followed him.
“What seems to be the problem, Inky, my dear?” She turned in time to see Ed shift from well-dressed ferret to well dressed man. He adjusted his tie, dusted stray fur from his dinner jacket, and shuffled a deck of cards.
“You’re standing ankle deep in it, fur ball.”
“Call me that again, fang face.”
“Why you ratty excuse for a cheap coat.”
“Don’t call me names, you cheap excuse for a ratty…”
“Will you two GROW UP?” Tsuki snatched the deck of cards from Shadow Ferret, cut the deck with deft perfection then flicked the cards in their faces.
“Fifty-two pick up, divided between two oldsters, should make it easy to handle.” She grinned and adjusted her waders.
“What’s with the wardrobe, Tsuki?” Inky asked, ignoring the cards fluttering around her.
“Yes. It is...oddly appropriate,” Shadow Ferret added.
“Yeah, well when ever Lady Jay is gone, it gets deep in here, and I don’t mean intellectually.” Looking at the floor she wrinkled her nose. “Someone‘s taken it to a new level, this time, though.”
“Smells like Paris,” Ben said, pulling his head out of a bucket of tequila, “I remember it so well. Nineteen hundred and seventeen, the flu was raging across Europe... “
“Toilet’s backed up in the men’s room,” Cray shouted.
“...the bodies were piling up and there was no one to bury them and...”
“My HEAD STASH!!!” Tsuki said bolting for the Retrieving tools from behind the bar she splashed down the hallway, kicked the door open and went to work. Twenty minuets later, the sewage drained away and Tsuki began swearing. Several unsavory looking sailors left the bar, ears covered and blushing.
“Lightweights,” Tsuki muttered. She slammed a reeking filthy bundle down in front of Cray. Effluvium splashed across the table and into Cray’s drink.
“This is … NOT my HEAD STASH!!!”
“. . .the scent of ammonia and chlorine gas did nothing to cover the stench of. . .”
“Ewwwww” Cindy said, “I am not cleaning that up!”
“It … it is … moving!” Inky exclaimed, all thoughts of dessert vanishing as a revolting miasma of odors wafted from the bundle on the table.
The odors fought a brief yet furious battle, declared an armistice, then began a combined assault on Cindy’s senses.
“Smells like ….POOT!” Cindy exclaimed. She threw down her towel and stalked out the back door.
“POOT!?” Sister OFG entered as Cindy left. She pulled out a vintage AK47 and poked the bundle as Ed covered her with a gleaming Glock.
“There’s only one thing that smells like ‘POOT’ and that is. . .”
“Ben Panced!” Bernie rumbled.
“AHA!” Ed said, dumping Cray’s filth filled drink on the disgusting pile.
“Hey!” Cray said.
“MUMPLFPGH!!” the bundle said.
“That’s not Ben!” Tsuki exclaimed.
“. . .despite the surgery, there wasn’t a bite of Brain Salad to be had on the Rue de. . .” Ben said.
“Not you, BMW!” Inky said.
“Looks like. . . an. . . aardvark!” Tsuki exclaimed, emptying Cray’s beer over the bundle.
“Hey, Stop that!!!” Cray said.
“That’s not an aardvark, “ Shadow Ferret observed, “That stinking pile is Rolling Thunder.”
“MUMPLFPGHMUMJSYRGGHLEPH!!!!” Rolling Thunder said as he squirmed on the table trying to untie himself.
“Way to spread it around, dude,” Cray said as more of the mess dripped into his lap.
“MURGHKPHILFPHEGHMERUMJJJJH!!!!”
“Someone take the gag out of his mouth, I can’t understand what he’s saying.” Ed said morphing into a ferret to keep his clothes clean.
“I’m not touching him.” Inky put her hands on her hips with her usual adamant look.
“Don’t look at me.” Cray dabbed at himself with a napkin that was soggier than the table and RT combined.
Sister OFG sighed, “In the name of Saint Barbara…….” She said and leveled her gun at RT. His eyes grew wide and he shook his head ‘NO!”
“ BRRRRRRRRRAAAAPPPPPPPPPP!! “ said the AK47, happy, as always, to do its thing. Both gag and duct tape fell away leaving Rolling Thunder free on the table.
“AAAAAAAARRRRUGGGHHHHH!!!!” RT exclaimed. “You could have killed me!”
“But I didn’t,” Sister OFG said.
“But, I might,” Tsuki said. “Where’s my freaking head stash?”
“How long have you been in the toilet?” Inky asked.
“. . . it was nineteen hundred and eighteen before the last of the bodies. . .”
“It’s been clogged since Saturday,” Cray offered.
“Wait. If Rolling Thunder has been in the toilet since Saturday, then Jaycinth and Haggis are walking into a nefarious plot that was rudely hatched!” Shadow Ferret/Ed said.
“Give the Ferret a star!” Inky said. “For the record, it is called a ‘trap’.”
“So what are you going to do about it?” Cray asked, snatching a bottle of rum from a nearby table.
“Get your motor running. . .”Ed said. He tossed the keys to the New Jaguar XF to BMW, who stood, snatched the keys out of the air, and grinned an unpleasant grin.
“Head out on the highway. . .” Sister OFG added, picking up her guns and munitions case.
“Looking for adventure. . .” Sister Susie said dragging in her favorite grenade launchers.
“Um…where is the ‘Safeway’?” Maestrowork asked. The Cabaret was suddenly silent and everyone turned to stare.
“Sorry, I’ll be leaving now.” Maestrowork guzzled a liter of Dom Perignon and left.
“That guy’s weird. He worries me.” Tsuki said.
###
“With a purposeful grimace and a terrible frown he cooks those diseased chicken lungs down, with Armadillos…” Mel sang. The glass in the cabinets above the stove, tired of being battered by the discordant harmonies, shattered into a million little pieces and fell into the pot.
“Ah bet Oprah would like this!” Mel exclaimed. A rat, near death from ingesting the cyanide on the floor stumbled across the pile of cayennes Mel had laid on the stove.
“OOOOhhhh …exotic seasoning!” Mel exclaimed. He grabbed the rat, bit off the head and spit it into the pot. He looked at the still twitching body, spit on it, rubbed it in his crotch and tossed it in the pot, too.
“Ho Ho, they say he’s got to go…” Mel stopped singing and a thoughtful expression came across his face as a yellowish-brown stain spread across the back of his pants. A moment later the kitchen smelled worse than an outhouse in the middle of a tire-fire, and Mel was singing and dancing again. He took his act to the other counter where an industrial sized food processor sat full of squashed and fermenting armadillos. Mel added the cayenne’s, tossed in the barrel of habaneros he’d been given, then, as an afterthought, tossed in a bounty hunter who had wandered in unaware.
“Wait I just needed a paper towellllllllllllllllllllll!!!!”
“Go Go armadillos,” Mel sang and turned on the blender. As the mixture foamed and spewed around the kitchen, Mel began to play air concertina.
“Oh Oh! What is Tokyo? Go go ARMADILLOS!!!. . .”
Mscelina slammed the kitchen door closed and pulled the gas mask from her face.
“It is all proceeding according to plan. The Sauerkraut Packers began checking in this morning. The final shipment of armadillos will arrive by nightfall and the buffet will be served after. . . What are you doing Ben?”
“I’m building my new Flaming Banana Pit Credit Card. Help me put a picture of. . .”
“Ben!” Soccer Mom trotted in, her face a mask of distemper.. She reached in her briefcase and removed a dozen bags of lacy lingerie and a subpoena before she withdrew a sheaf of papers.
“DISCOVERY!”
“Not, now, Soccer Mom. That’s just a third rate card company. Now, nothing is going to interfere with my Flaming. . .”
“It’s a legal term, ‘Panced. And as legal things go, you’ve got a lot of trouble. You’ve got Three Managing Partners at $1,750.00 an hour trouble!”
Celina paled. “Set and Isis help us, no…not that…I thought…I thought he was just…just a legend.”
Ben Panced straightened up and looked at his cohorts.
“What are you two so upset about. Everything is going as planned.”
“No, Panced, it is not!” Soccer Mom glared, looking around for a jury to pepper with closing arguments.
“You’ve got a problem. It is a big one and it is not going to go away.”
“Out of LOL captions again?”
“Very funny, Rainbow Poot. Roger Carlson is in town.”
“So?”
“Our plans are ruined! He can eat a raw habenero and smile! I’ve heard he can eat a peck of pickled peppers and ask for seconds!” Celina wailed.
Ben looked through the kitchen window. Mel was naked now, his clothes and several more rats had made their way into the cooking pot and he was picking scabs off his thighs. Ben smiled and pooted softly.
“There, there now ladies. This is a small set back and easily handled.”
“How you gonna handle it, then?” Celina asked.
“Simple. Jalapenos. A lot of them… jalapenos….and a few dozen tubes of ‘Icy Hot’! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!”
Soccer Mom and Mscelina stared in dis-belief, then joined in:
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!! They howled.
###
Meanwhile, somewhere in Texas:
“Laura?”
“Yes George.”
“I don’t understand this.”
“What don’t you understand, dear.”
“What’s a ‘poot’?”
“You know that sound Condi makes when you have opinions?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s a ‘poot’ dear.”
“Oh.”
Will Mel put on some clothes?
Will Soccer Mom and McCelina continue to stare in disbelief?
I know I will.
How about you?
Tune in next week when we hear Jaycinth say, "Crap!"
