From: crimson@csi.compuserve.com (Mark "Crimson" Friedman)
Subject: Deuce Trance [part 01/03]
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 1993 04:28:21 GMT
///// [ CUE FILE: dutran01.txt ] /////
Heh. Long time, eh?
This is old stuff, really, from like a year or so ago. This
particular version is a rehash/edit of the last part of my "Trance
Entrance" line that crossed over to Jim Gaynor's "Deuces and One-Eyed
Jacks" before it sorta...disappeared. We had other things to do,
okay? Anyway, I needed Freddy for another project I'm starting with
Phyllis, so I'm aborting the hung story with this three-parter...
The first part contains, arguably, one of the best fight scenes to
ever hit the Chatsubo. Well, IMHO, of course: I think it's because it
lasted so bloody long, due to the fact that neither party was armed,
and that someone actually gets hurt, feels pain, but does not die.
It's real and it's Jim's: I love it! 7'>
The second part is one of my "soap-opera" dialogues that the Aussies
always seemed to dig more than others (don't ask me why, eh?). You
don't *need* to read it, but you should. Oh, and it also has my
version of who Dorcas is: though she's really Jim's, my characterization
of her might actually be canon... [shrug: she's hardly been written, but
I always thought she was a breath of fresh air in a stinky Chat...]
The third part hadn't actually been previously posted like the other
two (they're just recaps), even though it was written a year ago.
This is where the "switchover" itself happens...
Oh well, I guess the only other setup needed is this: Blackjack (along
with his musician AIs, Danny and Floyd) was pretty much the house
musico before he took off, and Freddy is currently auditioning on a
busy night to take his place, whilst teaching the AIs a bit about how
to play like a person. I'll be happy to explain the rest of the
missing pieces (there's a *ton* of text that went before this) by
email. Drop me a line.
We now resume the story, already in progress...
- Mark "Crimson" Friedman (10/5/93)
Plug: 21st Century Schizoid Man WILL continue. Yeah, I said this
back in February, but I still mean it.
Plug: So will The Rubber Chicken Agenda. Or Dan'll kill me. 7'>
///// [ CUE TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 01/03] ] /////
"Floyd, can you send out continuous controller info to effects
units?"
"Certainly: it's just MIDI data, after all."
"Bitchin'!" Freddy grinned an dug through his gig bag for a
spacial effect processor. He patched it up to the synth rig, "Okay,
here's what we're gonna do, eh? Play this drum part..." He thought
up the line, a jerky electronic beat emphasizing the 3 and 4, and
Floyd took in the MIDI data and started playing the beat. "Okay now,"
Freddy punched in a long regen, all depth flange patch, "Every other
measure, change the delay time like this," he tweaked a knob on the
unit so the general ring of the flange went up or down a minor third.
"Ahhh!" the AI replied, "tuned flanging! I see: the wave
interference of the original and delayed waves create a new pseudo
standing wave which has consistent, pitched overtones that can be
altered predictably in real time. Thusly, an inherently untuned
instrument may acquire new tonal possibilities..."
"Yeah, and it sounds kool to boot!" He turned to Danny,
"Okay, clean sound, chorus, high cast EQ, 300 millisecond delay.
Slide into the notes like this..." He played the part on his bass and
Danny followed suit on a guitar. "That's it, eh? And delayed
distortion on the B parts." The AI copped the lick again. "Kool!
Let's do it, eh?"
He turned to the mike, "Say hey, folks, just teaching the kids
here some new riffs. Here's some more nonsensical lyrics for ya..."
He cued Floyd for a four measure intro highlighting the trick flanging
and then he and Danny came in together.
"If I had three days
With which to bury you
I'd take the first with donuts
Not unlike the "moo"
Firey lemons
Ate key-lime pie
Figuring out
With the blink of the eye
The railway of Belgium
Skids out of the rain
What a wondrous village
Near the blockade
Screaming, screaming
Under the bay (or may)
To say, lest we forget
Finding three say...
With my three days..."
The bass part was a twangy slippy-slidey slap attack that
lazily meandered around a mixalydian mode. Freddy basically laid back
and grooved with it and cued Danny for a solo. The AI gladly took up
a silly little fuzztone-wah patch and picked out a truly humorous
rendition of "The Fishing Hole", as was used on "The Andy Grifith"
show in the previous century.
Freddy laughed out loud at how much the AIs were able to pick
up in the span of a couple of hours. True, they probably wouldn't
invent tricks like "musical quoting" on their own, but they were eager
to incorporate anything that he taught them. He chuckled to think
he'd have them "trading fours" by the end of the night!
They were musical sponges, and Super-Absorbent ones at that.
He spun into a fingerstyle 5/8 part, using tritone intervals
and semitone offsets for a little cognitive dissonance. Danny noticed
his alteration and, not to be outdone by a mere "human", began to play
a slow 7 cycle himself, whilst Floyd still chugged away in four, solid
as ever and keeping the dancers happy.
Suddenly, Danny and Floyd's playing came to an abrubt halt.
While launching into a solo to cover the silence, he spun around to
face them, mouthing, "what's wrong?" Floyd pointed a drumstick back
towards the dance floor.
"Wha' th' FUCK do you think you're doing?"
Freddy spun around again to face the voice. A squalid,
unkempt, and slightly smelly man had approached the stage and and was
now snarling ferally at him. His impromptu solo halted via a Duke
Ellington ending, punctuated with an open-fret quartal chord that
continued to ring.
He crouched down on the stage so that he was at approximately
eye-level with the man. "I was *trying* to entertain the kiddies here
and maybe get a job before I was so *rudely* interrupted..." He
turned around to the images of the AIs. "Who does this guy think he
is, anyway?"
Danny muttered, "Freddy, this is Blackjack. Blackjack, this
is Freddy Marx, aka Klone Crimson". He nodded apologetically and
shrugged. Floyd bit his lower lip in apprehension.
Freddy shook his head at the irony. He faced the rumpled
fellow and chuckled, "Blackjack, huh? I shoulda worked that one out
when the stench of brandy drifted this way..." He wafted his hand in
front of him...
...and suddenly the dirty floor of the Chatsubo rushed up to
hit him squarely in the face. Terribly unkind of it, Freddy thought
as the hands that had yanked him from the stage pulled him upright
again.
He opened his eyes again to see Blackjack taking a step back,
as if to put a bit of distance between them. Blackjack's next
movement was a blur and Freddy only just managed to dodge the
roundhouse kick, 'Jack's booted foot coming within millimeters of his
face.
"Hey, take a pill," Freddy protested, raising both hands in
front of him. He spotted his bass on the floor, all scraped and
mangled from the fall. "Cryminee: my axe! What a complete
bastard... it was only a joke, eh?"
"Fuck off," Blackjack growled. The punch that followed, a
swinging haymaker, made up in speed what it lacked in grace and
style. Freddy managed to avoid the main force of it, taking the hit
on his right side.
"Well hey, if that's the way you want it." Freddy threw a
right jab, trying to score on the now close-in Blackjack.
Hands moving in a blur, Blackjack grabbed Freddy's right wrist
and pulled. "Yeah, that's how I want it," Blackjack said as he
turned, jerking Freddy forward into his bent elbow.
Blackjack's elbow struck Freddy just beneath his rib cage,
driving the air from his lungs with a "whuff". As Freddy doubled
over, Blackjack yanked his elbow up, cracking Freddy in the jaw.
Stunned, Freddy fell to the floor.
"Where's the smart-ass now?!?!" Blackjack shouted as Freddy
pulled himself to his hands and knees. Freddy shook his head, drops
of blood falling from his mouth to splatter on the dirty floor.
"Get up, dammit!" Blackjack shouted, "GET THE FUCK UP!" He
started to take a step forward, only to be held back by a pink plastic
arm.
"No," Ratz said, "now you will stop this."
Blackjack paused to look at Ratz, anger flaring on his dirty
features. The musician's aggression drained, though, as he saw the
sadly serious expression on Ratz' face, and the wide-bore shotgun that
the bartender carried in his meat hand.
Ratz nodded. Dorcas, the waitress, moved up to help Freddy to
his feet. Together, the two of them staggered off to Chatsubo's back
room, Freddy leaning heavily on Dorcas' shoulder.
"You." Ratz' words fell heavily into the silence that had
come over the bar. "The artiste was right. Go clean yourself. Look
in the mirror and see the thing this is turning you into."
With that, Ratz turned and started to walk back towards the
bar. Blackjack moved to the stage and retrieved a duffle bag from
behind one of the amps and, eyes downcast, went back to the restrooms
as the hum of biz slowly returned to fill the empty quiet.
Danny and Floyd remained on the stage, silent.
///// [ END TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 01/03] ] /////
Frederick (Freddy) "Klone Crimson" Marx is Copyright by Mark Friedman
1991-1992, all rights reserved. Please get permission before using
him in your own storyline.
Blackjack, Dorcas, Danny, and Floyd are Copyright 1990-1992 by Jim
Gaynor. Used with permission.
Fight choreography by Jim Gaynor. Neat, huh?
"Three Days" lyrics by Mike Friedman, music by Mark Friedman, and
Copyright 1992 by Barbed Wire Armadillo.
Comments and criticism openly accepted at crimson@ihz.compuserve.com,
forwarded as appropriate.
///// [ END FILE: dutran01.txt ] /////
--
.. Mark "Klone Crimson" Friedman is crimson@ihz.compuserve.com ................
"There is nothing former "Beat poets, "Bite me, "My jacket! I killed
about King Crimson." not children." it's fun!" Kennedy in this jacket!"
- Robert Fripp, 5/11/90 - t-shirt - MST3K - Ron Post
From organpipe.uug.arizona.edu!CS.Arizona.EDU!noao!asuvax!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!ihz.compuserve.com!crimson Wed Oct 6 21:17:02 MST 1993
Article: 1800 of alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
Path: organpipe.uug.arizona.edu!CS.Arizona.EDU!noao!asuvax!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!ihz.compuserve.com!crimson
From: crimson@csi.compuserve.com (Mark "Crimson" Friedman)
Subject: Deuce Trance [part 02/03]
Message-ID: <CEICqz.HEy@csi.compuserve.com>
Reply-To: crimson@ihz.compuserve.com
Organization: NAIVE - New And Improved Virtual Environment
Date: Thu, 7 Oct 1993 03:37:43 GMT
Lines: 152
///// [ CUE FILE: dutran02.txt ] /////
Like I said before, this is the "c-punk soap-opera" part where you get
all the dirty low-down on what's happened. Dish it out, eh? 7'>
One more part of this intro follows: then the *real* fun begins...
- Mark "Crimson" Friedman (10/6/93)
///// [ CUE TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 02/03] ] /////
"He's really not like that." Dorcas gently dabbed a damp
cloth over the abrasions on Freddy's forehead.
"Yeah, right." He spit an unsettling volume of blood into the
trashcan beside his chair. "He sure is good at it for a first timer,
then."
Dorcas frowned, "He's been under a lot of stress lately. He's
looking for someone..."
"Yeah, yeah, ain't we all. Then again, most of us don't go
beating the crap out of other people because of it. I should sue his
ass, eh?" He picked up his battle-damaged bass. "I don't care that
much for my dental work, but the fucker's gotta pay for what he did to
my axe." He tried to tune it, but three of the heads were bent out of
shape. "Looks like I'll be playing Stick for a while..." He dropped
his head as if saying a prayer for a departed loved one.
She lifted the instrument out of his limp hands and set it
aside. "Interesting graphics...", she ran her hand along the surface
as she examined the holo-pics on it. The body of the bass depicted
the head of a hooded Humanis or Klan member (she wasn't sure which).
Around his neck was a noose of thick rope. This rope trailed upwards
and continued along the neck of the instrument, so that it appeared
that the musician was gripping the noose when he played it.
"Heh," he spit blood again and chuckled, "I have this thing
for racists. Killed me parents, ya see..." He grinned wryly.
Dorcas gasped softly, "Oh, I'm sorry..."
"Oh, no, it's okay. Happened a long time ago. They were
race-rights activists. Dangerous hobby these days..."
She nodded, understanding completely, "It certainly is." She
wrung out the cloth and applied some antiseptic to it. "This is going
to sting a bit..."
He clinched his teeth. "Owie." He looked her in the eye when
she had finished. "So, what *is* the scoop on this Blackjack
character, eh?"
"Well," she pulled up a chair in front of his and sat down,
crossing her legs, "he used to be the house musician in the Chatsubo.
After he started working here, he eventually developed this 'thing',"
she winked, "for this cat-girl named Nekoko, who was waiting tables.
Actually, I'm the one who replaced her after she disappeared..."
Freddy raised his eyebrows, "Disappeared?"
"Yeah," she looked over her shoulder to check if the coast was
clear, "supposedly she was carted off by ARES right from under
everybody's noses here. I don't know exactly how it happened, since
that was before my time."
"ARES?" He cringed, "I've had the 'pleasure' of dealing with
them before. What did they want her for?"
Dorcas shrugged, "I'm not sure. Some say she's an alien and
they wanted to interrogate her. Some say she's a creature of magic
and that ARES wanted to tap the power. There's even the notion that
she might've been genetically engineered by ARES and that she went
rogue."
"Hmmmm...and your best guess?"
She sighed, "I don't know. I get all my information from
Lonny's girls, and they're not exactly a good source. The regular
customers are damned tight-lipped about it, and even Ratz won't fill
me in on the situation." She nodded, "Now *that's* secretive..."
"I suppose so." He looked up into the space near the ceiling.
"Maybe I can understand where Blackjack's coming from, then." He
looked back at her and shook his head. "Not long ago, my, errr, *ex*
girlfriend was kidnapped and I went to great lengths to get her back."
A vision of the look on Howler's face as he died flashed across his
senses and was gone. "Guess I did some things I wouldn't normally do
during that time."
"I'm sure it's the same way with Blackjack. Rumour has it he
can kill with his *voice*, so I guess he took it easy on you..."
"Sheesh!", he shook his head and imitated Blackjack, "'Get the
fuck up!'" He laughed ironically. "Yeah, maybe so. 'Where's the
smart-ass now?' He definitely got that one right. Maybe I *did* ask
for it?"
Dorcas shugged. "Maybe so. I think you should talk with him
about it."
He frowned. "Maybe so. Maybe so..." He looked down at his
t-shirt. It showed a map of Indonesia and displayed the title "Java
is more than coffee", with a red circle marking the appropriate
island. Unfortunately, there were now several more red markings on
it, the blood drops from his mouth soaking and spreading through the
fabric. "Great. Guess I'll have to get a change of clothes first.
Hopefully Blackjack will too, though, eh?" He grinned at Dorcas.
"Hopefully!" she laughed, "even the Chatsubo has standards..."
He stood and set his hands on her shoulders. "Thanks. Thanks
a lot. I've always relied on the kindness of strangers, so to speak.
If you ever need a favour from me, just say the word..." He touched
her cheek with his hand, making her blush. He chuckled, "Where's my
manners? I don't even know your name!" Freddy stared deeply into her
dark features as if to try to find the answer like the guesstimators
at circuses and county fairs did.
She smiled at him. "It's 'Dorcas'. It's a pleasure to meet
you, Mr. Marx..." They shook hands jokingly and Freddy pulled her to
her feet.
He shook his head. "And none of this 'mister', stuff. It's
just 'Freddy'." He exhaled, gathering his wits about him. "Well,
Dorcas, I suppose it's time to meet Blackjack, my peer by profession,
for the first time. I think we might have a little discussion on the
financing of instrument repair..." He winked, "Take care of my baby
for me..."
She nodded, picking up the instrument as he left the back
room...
///// [ END TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 02/03] ] /////
Frederick (Freddy) "Klone Crimson" Marx is Copyright by Mark Friedman
1991-1993, all rights reserved. Please get permission before using
him in your own storyline.
Blackjack, Dorcas, Danny, and Floyd are Copyright 1990-1992 by Jim
Gaynor. Used with permission.
Heya, send comments and crits to: crimson@ihz.compuserve.com
...forwarded as appropriate.
///// [ END FILE: dutran02.txt ] /////
--
.. Mark "Klone Crimson" Friedman is crimson@ihz.compuserve.com ................
"There is nothing former "Beat poets, "Bite me, "My jacket! I killed
about King Crimson." not children." it's fun!" Kennedy in this jacket!"
- Robert Fripp, 5/11/90 - t-shirt - MST3K - Ron Post
From organpipe.uug.arizona.edu!uunet!ihz.compuserve.com!crimson Mon Oct 11 15:50:26 MST 1993
Article: 1827 of alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo
Path: organpipe.uug.arizona.edu!uunet!ihz.compuserve.com!crimson
From: crimson@csi.compuserve.com (Mark "Crimson" Friedman)
Subject: Deuce Trance [part 03/03]
Message-ID: <CEr6sH.4q7@csi.compuserve.com>
Reply-To: crimson@ihz.compuserve.com
Organization: NAIVE - New And Improved Virtual Environment
Date: Mon, 11 Oct 1993 22:07:28 GMT
Lines: 248
///// [ CUE FILE: dutran03.txt ] /////
Damn. This reads like a soap, too. Heh: cope.
Anyway, this is the last of the intro. The new fun starts really
really soon after, ya hear?
- Mark Friedman (10/11/93)
[durn, gotta format these things differently: s'gettin' old. fast.]
///// [ CUE TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 03/03] ] /////
Freddy rubbed at the polished steel of the bathroom mirror,
trying to wipe away enough of the grime to get a decent reflection.
"Cryminee - wonder how many years bad luck you'd get for breaking this
old thing," he mumbled, "Maybe I could get a karma discount..."
A final wipe, and he had a surface that gave a decent
reflection. He leaned in over the sink to get a close look at the
damage done. Bruises were purpling nicely along his left cheek and
eye socket, and a scab had formed on his chin from the laceration
received when Blackjack had elbowed him.
"So much for the GQ shoot," he said with a sardonic grin. The
image in the mirror smiled back. So did the face reflected from the
shadowed corner of the restroom.
"Shit!" He whirled about to see Blackjack leaning against the
wall in the corner of the restroom, dark brown duster blending into
the shadowed grey. "So like, what? Can't wait to jump me in a dark
alley, eh?" He dropped into a defensive stance and shuffled backwards
to get some space between them.
"Hey, ease back." Blackjack held his hands in front of him,
palms outward. "Just chill, ok?" He waited for Freddy's posture to
ease a bit before moving away from the wall. "I just wanted to talk,
something a bit more sane after all that bullshit out there," he
explained. Freddy folded his arms over his chest, still not looking
very at ease with his position...
Blackjack continued, "Look, lemme buy you a drink, ok? You
finish your biz here, and find me out there. I'll spot you a drink,
and we can talk." He moved towards the door of the restoom and opened
it, letting in the noise of the bar outside. "I'll even keep my hands
above the table," he said over his shoulder, as he walked out.
Freddy let out a sigh of relief. "'Hands above the table...'
All the better to *strangle* me with, I guess..." He moved to the
back of the restroom and found a window to the alley...
Pulling himself into it, he could see two shadowy figures
talking in hushed tones. The sudden flash of metal from one of them
convinced him that perhaps this *wasn't* his best escape route.
"Damn," he jumped down again, "Oh well, my gear's still in the bar
anyway..."
He walked over to a sink and turned on the faucet in hopes of
splashing some cold water on his face. However, the brownish liquid
that escaped the tap changed his mind. "Water, water everywhere..."
He turned the "water" off (wondering if that was indeed the word for
it), took a deep breath, and pushed the door open with his foot...
----====<<<<(((( ))))>>>>====----
The Chatsubo was crowded, despite being late in the eve...or
perhaps despite being so early in the morning. Lots of folks, so many
it was hard to move without bumping into someone. Fortunately, it's
not always a bad bump...
Freddy came out of the men's room to notice that Danny and
Floyd were playing again: it was a ska-funk fusion with a knack for
syncopation that the AIs probably wouldn't have allowed themselves
before the night's "lesson". He smiled to himself, musing that mere
machines were more open to new music than the average bar-fly was.
He waded through the crowd towards the music. Before he could
reach the stage to retrieve his instrument, he ran across Blackjack,
sitting at a table near the stage, a bottle of Dos Equis in one hand,
fiddling with the bass with the other. Blackjack looked up to see
him: "Hey. Have a seat. Whatcha drinking?" He motioned towards
empty seat at the table, keeping both hands visible, with a slightly
amused expression on his unshaven face.
Freddy sat at the offered place, keeping the chair pulled out
from the table. "Errr, usually I'd say Three Mile Island iced tea,
but that Ratz guy doesn't do 'em right..."
Blackjack shrugged, "Haven't heard of that one, but I'm not up
on mixed drinks. Spent most of my time drinking beer or rum." He
motioned to the bass on table. "Seems I really hosed yer bass. The
tuning heads are a mess."
"Yeah, I was meaning to talk to you about that..." He smiled
wryly, "Seems you've put a dent in my normal set list, eh?"
"Yeah...well..." Blackjack looked quite uncomfortable.
"Damn. Look, I'm sorry. I just...didn't expect that. I expected to
come back to...something predictable." He pushed bass across table
towards Freddy.
"Predictable?" Uneasy laughter: "Believe me, if I lasted a
week without getting the shit kicked out of me, I'd be surprised." He
took the bass and re-examined it while speaking. "I have this bad
habit of opening my mouth before thinking..." Attempting to tune it
up, he only managed to break a string. He put the bass down,
frustrated with it all. "Cryminee...you know a good luthier in the
neighborhood?"
Blackjack was chuckling at the "if I lasted a week" comment.
"I used to know a guy that could do just about anything with any kind
of instrument. Rewired my board for me before I had to head south. I
figger he could fix that without much problem. I could intro you.
Mebbe even help pay. I'm about busted, but Ratz owes me a bit..."
Dorcas approached, having worked her way throught the crowd
towards the table. "You need another beer, BJ?" Freddy waved a
"howdy."
Blackjack nodded, "Yeah. And what do you instead of that tea,
uhm, Freddy?" Dorcas smiled at Freddy and looked at the two with a
small bit of concern. But not too much. Doesn't pay to get involved:
she had learned that lesson quickly.
Freddy laughed, "How 'bout some morphine?" He shook his head,
"Really, I could do with a screwdriver, eh?"
"No problem. I'll be back in a minute." She left for the
bar, dodging a grope here and there...
Freddy sighed, picking up where they had left off. "Well, the
cred's really no problem for me. However, it's the principle of the
matter: I'm glad you offered. I'll pay, but I'll need your local
contact..."
"So, no hard feelings? I mean, you were one hell of smart ass
back there..." He grinned.
Freddy stood and extended his hand, shrugging off any grudge.
"Freddy Marx: professional Smart Ass..."
Blackjack took his hand and shook firmly. "Blackjack: amateur
Loose Cannon..." They sat back down. "Look, I can try to look
Thompson up. No promises, but I'll give it a shot."
"That'd be kool. 'Course I have my Chapman Stick with me too,
so I can use that in the meantime."
"Hell, if anything, he'd just like to take a look at that
bass. Damn interesting design."
Freddy squinted, "Heh. 'Interesting'?" It was a subtle,
'feeling out' tone.
Blackjack continued, hardly noticing, "Can't say that I've
seen a humanis strung out like that before. Seen a few strung out
*other* ways..." He grinned widely. "They don't like Humanis in
Atzlan..."
The door to the Chatubo banged open; and showed that the sky
outside the bar was beginning to light. A slender girl with black,
flat-topped hair in ripped, blood red leathers staggered in, dripping
sea water.
Anyone with a nose could tell it was sea water, and the
more... pickled of the bar's inhabitants dropped like flies when the
smell hit them. The Sound was not the most perfumed of waterways, and
it looked as if she'd taken a dunking.
At her entrance, Blackjack straightened abruptly, and got up
as she headed towards them. "Sara..." he said softly.
She raised an eyebrow at Freddy. Blackjack glanced the
direction of her gaze, "He's O.K. Did you find her?"
Sara nodded, "Sargasso Shipping, out by the waterfront.
Sniffed her out inna shipping 'tainer; but she broke and ran before I
could get to her, security on her tail. She went South." The girl
tipped her head sidewise a bit, and suddenly Freddy realized that the
some of the liquid dripping from her leathers was blood as well as sea
water. "Caught the sight of the hair and the ears as she skipped.
The address is," and Sara rattled off both the street address and the
IP address.
"Thanks." said Blackjack and suddenly reached out and hugged
her. She cried out softly; but the tall, unshaven man was oblivious
and she didn't stop him when he walked out the door.
Dorcas came back to the table with Blackjack's beer. "Where
did he go?"
Sara said faintly, "To find his true love, I think." And then
the slender girl sat, rather heavily, down in Blackjack's chair.
There was a squelching sound, and Dorcas' eyes grew round when she
looked down at the floor and the pools and splashes of blood around
the girl. "I'll take and pay for his beer." The credstick flashed
metallic and Dorcas' eyes grew even wider at the white of platinum.
She ran off with it.
Freddy found himself looking into a very odd pair of eyes.
They were mismatched, one the blue of a empty data module, the other
the yellow of a police barrier. They blinked and the girl said
softly, "Hello. My name is Saraquael. You killed my father, prepare
to die."
As the last line sank in, Freddy sighed slowly through his
clenched teeth: Dirk? Howler? That other go-ganger scum? All were
too young to have a daughter of this "Saraquael's" age. His hands,
which were originally just resting on the table, had taken it upon
themselves to start a polymetric rhythm, one hand tapping out 5 and
the other 8...
The teeth remained clenched, even while he spoke, "Oh yeah, I
guess you're right," his right cheek and eyelid broke into a
convincing nervous tic he'd learned while in the asylum and used in
order to keep orderlies away, "but, my therapist says I'm doing *much*
better, now..." Hopefully she'd be just as freaked as he was with her
and just leave him alone...
Saraquael laughed softly, shook her head, leaned forward to
touch his tic, which stopped abruptly. She sat back and took a long
draught of her beer. "Just kiddin'. You kin call me Sara." She
sighed and sat back, closed her eyes and sang softly, "Excuse me, one
moment/ I remind you/That tomorrow/It will be all or it will/be
nothing," to the synchopated beat. She smiled a bit and no more blood
joined that already on the floor. She took another swig on her beer
and asked, politely, "What shall I call you?"
///// [ END TEXT: Deuce Trance [part 03/03] ] /////
Frederick (Freddy) "Klone Crimson" Marx is Copyright by Mark Friedman
1991-1993, all rights reserved.
Blackjack, Dorcas, Danny, and Floyd are Copyright 1990-1992 by Jim
Gaynor. Used with permission.
Saraquael is Copyright 199x-1993 by Phyllis Rostykus. Used with
permission.
Heya, send comments and crits to: crimson@ihz.compuserve.com
...forwarded as appropriate.
///// [ END FILE: dutran03.txt ] /////
--
.. Mark "Klone Crimson" Friedman is crimson@ihz.compuserve.com ................
"There is nothing former "Beat poets, "Bite me, "My jacket! I killed
about King Crimson." not children." it's fun!" Kennedy in this jacket!"
- Robert Fripp, 5/11/90 - t-shirt - MST3K - Ron Post
Back to the index for this section
Back to the Tea Bowl