Lunch

New card, new chapter, this one was tough.

 Chapter Three

 Lunch

        He swallowed the booze and pulled air through his teeth, savouring the icy waves of fire as he swirled the remaining liquid in the bottle. Only three fingers left.  He finished brushing off two pills and popped them in his mouth, crushing them between his teeth. Judging by the sunlight steaming through the gaps in the blinds it was close to noon.  Lunch.  He gathered his laptop and gave a few crumbs from the stale loaf of bread on the counter to those goddamn fish on his way out.  Gotta find some sunglasses.  He shielded his eyes from the glaring sun, surprised at how little things had changed, even though everything was different now.  Crime and corporations Heh hadn't dissolved with the government.  Commerce?  Commerce was human nature, and voids were filled quickly, if not adequately.  He was certain radio and television broadcasts would fill the airwaves as soon as the brownouts and blackouts were under control.  He was on his was to The Method, a holdover from before that had evolved into a sort of catch-all provisions monger.  He wasn't sure which corporation or syndicate was backing The Method, and he didn't much care.  He ordered the usual, lunch and supplies for later, while he sat in the corner and fired up his laptop.  He began trolling through the newslists catching up on the situation around the world.  Pretty much the same everywhere, a few holdouts in the Middle East, but they were barely out of the stone age to begin with.  The situation was worldwide, a handful of documents exposed, scores of explosions and the rise of private and corporate security forces enforcing their own brand of civilization on the masses.  As he began trawling the wires looking for work his mind began to drift in the ether.

     "I'm coming with you" she stated matter of factly.  "I'm bored and you might need me" He thought back to her performance in the alley a few days before and sighed.  Not that it matters what I think.  "Fine, but it could take all night, these guys aren't exactly known for their punctuality.  Bring something to keep yourself occupied."  He gathered his gear, laptop, credstick and the thumbdrive containing the information he was about to trade.  He had stumbled across it while looking for, well, exactly that type of information.  Loose information floating through the wires, information that would be worth something to the right parties. 

    He perched atop the empty crates in the alley, idly flipping through the newswire, one eye watching as she pawed through her seemingly bottomless pack.  Coils of cables, connectors, a pile of gadgets in various states of disrepair or modification, it was difficult to tell which was which.  The little piles inexplicably grew larger while the pack seemed to remain full.  Curiosity finally got the better of him and he set his miniterminal off to the side,"What are you looking for?"  "Lunch," she said without looking up, "here it is"  She pulled a wet looking waxy wad of paper from the depths of her pack.  What could that possibly be? She rummaged some more pulling out various coloured bottles and baggies.  After a few minutes of watching her assemble the various bottles and bags from her never-ending pouch curiosity got the better of him.  He tried to lean over and get a peek at her concoction, but she noticed his interest and shuffled around, squatting between him and her prize.  One hand shot out and rummaged through the bag without looking, returning with a small zipstove.  She yanked the zip-strip out of the small round device and with a hiss and puff of acrid smoke a steady blue flame appeared.  She freed a wad of foil from her pocket and spread it across the grate of the zipstove.  A few pokes and prods and a little shuffling later she stood up, spinning with a flourish and with a mocking half bow extended her hands. "Hotdogs?" as he arched a brow.  "What do you think I have the entirety of The Method in my bag?  "Take it or I'll eat both I...". She was interrupted as light flooded the alley from behind them.  

    He shielded his eyes and squinted at the end of the alley, the sound of car doors slamming from the opposite end caught him off guard.  Two men in suits and sunglasses approached while four more waited at the mouth of the alley.  "You have something we want." a soft voice filled his head.  The lights behind them got brighter.

 Something is wrong


Very wrong

Pharmacopoeia

 Once again, I have no idea what the card is or where the story will go until I flip it.

Chapter Two

Pharmacopoeia

     He jolted awake, the feeling of a hundred thousand volts of electricity coursing through his nervous system.  It was like that sometimes, when the pills wore off.  He reached for the booze as his arm convulsed knocking his pills onto the greasy, stained carpet. He was hands and knees on the carpet picking up pills and brushing them off when he realized he wasn't sure of the carpet's original colour. No decorator in their right mind would willingly choose this putrid shade of greasy, grayish-brown.  He was fairly certain the small ochre spots were a recent addition as well.  He swished the booze around in his mouth and thought back to the first time he had staggered across the threshold, trying to remember the colour of the carpet.  

     "I'll take the fish".  What is she going to do with those goddamn fish? he thought to himself.  She looked thin, maybe she planned on eating them.  He discarded that thought as he watched her carefully heft the bowl and head towards the door.  It looked heavy, made of good thick glass with no blemishes he could see.  Maybe she's dumping the fish and hocking the bowl for credits, maybe she... "If you aren't going to open the door", an exasperated voice said, "get out of the way."  He snapped back to the present, his train of thought disrupted.  "This thing isn't as light as it looks" she said, as he backed out the door holding it for her to sidle through.  He lit a cigarette and popped a couple pills as he watched her waddle away, careful not to slosh too much water out.  He checked his watch and headed in the opposite direction, eager to meet his landlord and get the keys.  His last apartment had burned down and he was eager for a couch he could call his own.  He was halfway down the block when a shriek pierced the night air.  "NOOOO WAAAAIIIT!" shrilly echoing down the empty streets.  He was nearly to the mouth of the alley by Ernie's before he realized he had ran towards the shriek.  Why, what are you going to do?  You aren't brave, you aren't a fighter. Numbers, codes, crypto that's your thing.  Indoorsy and non-confrontational.   He didn't, couldn't stop.  Rounding the corner he saw a blur of neon, heard the sibilation of springsteel cutting through the air.  The unmistakable crunch of bone turning to powder and the whimpering groans of men that would most likely walk with a limp for the rest of their potentially short lives. Seconds later she stood bent over catching her breath, the springsteel baton hanging from a lanyard at her wrist, unconscious and barely conscious bodies writhing in a circle and in the center of it all those goddamn fish.

   Don't do it, don't ask.  She is obviously trouble. DON'T. DO. IT.  "So, um, do you need like a place to crash or something?" Goddamnit you idiot.  "I just got this place, haven't been there yet, but it's furnished"  She nodded and muttered "thanks" as she hefted the fish back up.  "We should probably get moving before somebody you can't take down shows up"  She smirked as he continued.  "If you could do whatever it is you just did, why did you scream?"  "I needed time to set down the fish."  It began raining as they neared his new building, the landlord was standing under the shabby awning, sweating in the cool night air and scratching furiously.  Another junkie landlord, shouldn't have any issues as long as the credits come in on time.  They made their way up the sagging stairs, him swaying slightly from the handful of pills, her taking wide steps carrying those goddamn fish, and found the door. It swung open on protesting hinges.  Light from the hallway illuminated a swath of carpet inside.

Yes, the ochre spots were definitely new.

   

"Those Goddamn Fish"4

In keeping with the spirit of the game I have not looked the ten cards drawn.  This will play out in the ordered they were pulled.

Chapter One

Those Goddamn Fish

    Most days he could almost forget what had happened.  The din of explosions and screams, the acrid scent of burning metal and flesh, the tang of ozone from fried electronics.  All of it buried under a layer of pills, booze and ash.  There wasn't much left on television any more, just a smattering of pirate broadcasts that came and went about as often as the electricity.  The radio had been looping warnings and government broadcasts for weeks. Most of the time he sat on the broken couch staring at the static's endless flickering, occasionally interrupted by bandanna faced radicals and cartoons from last century.  He didn't know who was broadcasting the toons, but he liked them.  Even without sound they offered an escape.

    Eventually, as it always did, his gaze shifted to the kitchen.  The one sickly bulb hanging above the splintered table.  The table was empty, save for one heavy glass bowl, the home of those goddamn fish.  He wasn't sure if they had names, he only ever referred to them as "those goddamn fish".  It was nearly two months ago when he first saw those goddamn fish, blubbing stupidly in that heavy glass bowl.  They were a prize at Ernie's Electrocade, the run down arcade he spent most of his free time at.  Ernie's let you smoke inside and if you were on good terms Ernie might let you have some booze, or a job.  A job was the reason he was there that night, he had just finished a delivery for Ernie and was waiting for the credits to hit his stick when she walked in.  Thin and dirty from the streets with short hair dyed a myriad of neon hues.  She didn't say a word as she began playing Skeeball on the machine at the end of the bar where he was perched.  She had the look of someone living on the skids, alternating between alleyways and capsule hotels as credits allowed.  Her eyes didn't have the haunted look of the hunted or abused and he was fairly certain he could see the handle of a springsteel baton poking out from under her jacket.  He kept his eyes on those goddamn fish while casting sidelong glances at the newcomer.  If that was a springsteel baton there was no sense in angering the owner, in the right (or wrong) hands those batons could break bones as easily as glass.

   Ernie appeared behind the bar and gave the newcomer an appraising glance.  "Here's your credstick" Ernie rasped as the stick slid across the bar.  He finished his drink and was almost to the door when a cacophony of bells and whistles stopped him in his tracks.  The newcomer had hit it big at Skeeball and tickets were vomiting from the tarnished slot.  She gathered up her winnings and dropped them on the bar.  It was then he heard her speak for the first time, "I'll take the fish".

Machinations of Shindiggery

The check cleared and another barrage of nouns and verbs is coming your way.  Possibly adjectives as well, but probably not adverbs, adverbs fucking suck.  Fucking might be an adverb in that sentence.

This explosion of literary bromide is totally new, never before seen on the interwebs.  Shindig Machine.  I didn't underline the white space there so the slower readers could figure out there are two links.  Anyways, enough bullshittery.

Some of you may recall Shindig Machine from last year's GenCon round up, and the more I think about it the more it grows on me.

The plan is to shuffle the deck and draw ten cards.  Each card will be a chapter in this tale of shindiggery.  Will it suck?  You very well might think it does, but I don't think you understand art, also get fucked.

Chapter one coming soon.