Forum Overview :: Cabaret Voltron :: Barbecued Armani (A working title)

[quote name="mrs. johnson"]I would appreciate any comments, especially ones about the ending or suggestions for a better one. I A Babylonian sunset is currently taking place at Barcelona International Airport and Marco the baggage handler is preparing for another American plane. There are a lot more tourists coming to Spain recently. Marco didn’t know why and didn’t particularly care. He lived nowhere near the common tourist destinations, so they were nothing but a part of the job for him. He glanced over at the other men working the shift. There was Ricardo, a gruff womanizer, Manuel, a quiet overweight man, and Jose. A self important pompous jackass, thinks Marco. None of them really got along with each other, so they spend their time quietly smoking imported American cigarettes bought at the duty free shops. A silent eastern breeze had come in when the sun descended beneath the Airport Sheraton Hotel. The airplane door opens and the passengers begin to pile out. Tourists, most of them, Marco thinks, looking goofy with their cameras around their necks. Jose lets out a guffaw as he always does at the sight of Americans. The laugh peters out, however, when two men in suits come out of the airplane. One is wearing a black suit with blue pinstripes and the other wears a solid colored black suit. Both have wildly colored ties and slicked back hair. Their shoulders are broad and their movements are smooth, like those of a lithe prairie wind. The twilight conceals their faces, but Marco doesn’t really want to see any faces he might have to identify later. As he always said, the less you know the better. For fifteen years he had worked here, with no thought or hope for a promotion. His pay was enough to keep him alive and drunk most of the time, and that was fine with him. Who was it that said that only something that can get drunk has a soul? II To Raoul, the Mediterranean Sea resembles a dying sky; fallen to the ground, and thrashing with its blood carelessly flowing out by the liter. He isn’t aware of this because he has eliminated all thought about five years ago. He’s middle aged and owns a restaurant that sells seafood, almost exclusively. It was 10 am and too early for customers. Raoul sat on the porch with his feet propped up. As a child he noticed that while his peers required time to compose words for speech, he did not. He composed sentences while he spoke them with no effort. With years of practice he had learned how to eliminate thought for activities, and also removed all thought, by accident. He felt vague happiness and vague sadness once in a while, but mostly he sat on the porch since he had enough employees to run the restaurant for him. The sight of the sea calmed him, and the sounds of it removed any boredom. A car pulled up the restaurant and two men grim looking men walked out. Raoul didn’t think about their appearance at all, but he did notice and file away somewhere that they wore suits, one pinstripe and one black with oddly colored ties. Both had dark Italian faces and Pinstripe had slightly reddened cheeks. They walked past Raoul into the restaurant and ordered swordfish. Outside, Raoul’s mind struggled, without his knowledge, to retain some sense of awareness. The cry of a passing seagull emptied his mind completely and he smiled the smile of a priest dying for his god. III Somewhere deep within Barcelona, a group of pigeons are being fed by an aging couple. Both of them will die within a year, but neither knows. They are no longer sure if they are in love, but are satisfied enough with what they have. The pigeons quickly fly away as a taxi passes by. The driver is Hamil, an atheist Arab. His music is playing loudly and he’s singing along. He is trying to figure out what two Italian looking, English speaking men wearing suits on a day as hot as this want in the worst part of town. Must have some business with the mob, thinks Hamil. He turns down the music and turns around. In thick accented English, he questions, “Are you enjoying the comforts of Spain?” The one in the pinstripe replies, “Sure. Just keep driving, and don’t talk to us.” He then turns to his partner and says something in a hushed tone. Hamil can’t quite hear what they say and turns up the music. Assholes, he thinks. He turns the music up even more, noticing the discomfort of the passengers, and smiles. Upon arrival, the men direct him to wait until they return, and tell him that he shall be paid upon returning them to their hotel. Hamil nods. The suits walk into a run down looking building which Hamil knows to be the home of Hassan, a man who deals in art and old books, stolen mostly. After about twenty minutes both the men come out and one is cradling a book in his hands. They get into the cab and signal for Hamil to leave. As he turns the corner he sees a fire envelop the bookshop in his rearview mirror. After going a few more blocks, he stops the car. He turns around and yells over the music, “I’ll expect a little extra so I don’t go to the police and tell them what two suit wearing gentlemen started the fire.” Hamil smiles. The men briefly confer in whispers. One of them removes a revolver from his jacket and shoots Hamil between the eyes. Both exit the vehicle, walk a block and hail another taxi. IV Rafel orders another whisky and throws down his cards. “Flush!” He yells. The other men at the table look with disgust at his hand and inhale the stale smells of cigarettes and marijuana. The five men come here nightly to fatten each other’s wallets with a game of poker. If a lifetime total was to be calculated, Rafel would come out on top. He always brings the deck of cards, and he fails to shuffle on the first deal. He arranges the deck at home to give him a close but inconspicuous first win, betting big, and then plays conservatively for the rest of the night. He smokes bitter Italian cigars, and slaps his wife about once a week when she makes a dinner he doesn’t like. It isn’t a hard slap, but they both know that their marriage is very close to ending. His wife would have divorced him by now, if her priest didn’t keep insisting that it wouldn’t be a Christian thing to do. Rafel never really believed in religion. As a boy, while the pastor preached on Sundays, he thought of how much he enjoyed the sight of nude women. As he deals the next hand he glanced at the opening door. In come two men wearing suits. Rafel can’t really make out their faces behind the smoke, but their skin is dark, like his own. He forgets them almost immediately. One of the men at the table, Abad, excuses himself and goes to the washroom. Rafel’s gaze follows him and he notices that the two men enter the bathroom almost directly after Abad. Curious, he puts the cards down and gets up with the excuse of getting a drink. After ordering a shot of rum and gulping it down greedily, he casually walks over the bathroom and walks in. He gets a glimpse of one of the men pocketing a package as Abad is counting a reasonably thick wad of bills. “Hey Abad!” Says Rafel. “That’s quite a lot of money. Come back to the table and I’ll win it from you.” Abad looks up nervously, and says “I’ll be right there. What are you doing here?” Rafel makes an innocent face that he uses when his wife asks if he had been cheating on her. “Can’t a man relieve himself? It’s a free country! Just like America! Say, aren’t you two boys from America?” He directs his gaze to the two men. On of them smiles lightly and fidgets with something inside his jacket. The other nudges him and they both quickly walk out of the bathroom, knocking over Rafel in the process. He mutters a few curses and is about to chase them down and start a fight, when he sees a frightened look on Abad’s face. “Who were those assholes, anyway?” Rafel’s face betrays his anger. “Just a couple of guys who wanted to buy my grandfather’s old knife for a lot more than it is worth.” Abad exits the bathroom without looking at Rafel. He follows Abad out and notices the two men in suits sitting in a distant booth, sipping identical colorless drinks. His anger is ignited once more. He walks up to their table and stands over it until they notice him. “What do you want?” Asks the man in the pinstripe suit. “How about I punch you in the face and then we will see what I want?” Rafel swaggers threateningly. One of the men kicks Rafel in the shin under the table, and he collapses. Both step on his chest as they leave, leisurely walking out of the bar. V Estevon always loved animals. Ever since he was a small child, he had wanted to become a veterinarian, but he did not do well enough on the tests, and could not get into the right college, so he settled for a pet shop. After learning that the town of Zaragoza had no establishment like that, he moved there and opened up his store. Business wasn’t too bad, and was picking up, so he was happy enough. He met a girl a couple of weeks ago and they were getting along fine. With a little luck, thinks Estevon, he could get married and buy a house, have a couple of kids. Something about that bothered him quite a bit, but since he couldn’t quite identify what it was, he tried to ignore it. Today, a couple of men wearing strangely wildly colored ties walk into his shop as soon as he opens up. One of them asks for the largest snake that Estevon has, but after he shows them the snake, they say that they will need two. What does anybody need with two male snakes, Estevon wonders. “Will you be needing two separate cages or some food for the snakes?” Estevon wants to make sure the gentlemen know what they are getting into it. Owning snakes is no joke. This species often killed one another, Estevon remembers. The man inhales enough air for a Gregorian chant before speaking. “Uh, yeah, give us two cages. Skip on the food, we won’t be needing it. Are these poisonous by the way?” “Yes sir, very poisonous.” The suits smile, “Good.” After paying, they leave without another word. I wonder what Americans need to buy poisonous snakes for in a foreign country, Estevon wonders out loud. A few of the dogs yelp in response. VI At the outskirts of Zaragoza, Xavon runs a transportation service. Not that many tourists make it out this far, so he is pretty surprised when two suit wearing Americans show up on his doorstep and ask very specifically to be taken to some ruins that he hadn’t visited in twenty five years. What makes the situation even stranger, thinkst Xavon, was that they wish the trip to be only one way and each carries a covered cage. Xavon knows better than to ask questions, so he overcharges the Americans and they get into the jeep. The drive takes a good three hours, and during the trip, the Americans confide in low tones and, once in a while, laugh with heavy tones. Xavon does what he always does on these lengthy trips: fantasize about his wife. He had been married for nine years and not once did he fail to find his wife arousing. Her complexion remains smooth and spotless, her thighs are still creamy and her face has stayed completely wrinkleless. He is looking forward to this evening with great anticipation. Upon arrival, the Americans instruct him to leave immediately and walk into the ruins. The clouds above roll pregnant with rain through a still, hazy sky. Xavon did as he was told without a word, and tries to forget the Americans almost immediately. He keeps his thoughts on his wife and does not notice as lightning dots the landscape behind him, miles away. VII Pablo is a young boy who lives with his family in a small village a few miles away from some ruins the town pretended didn’t exist. He had gone on an excursion with his friend Tadeo, but had lost sight of him. Pablo is coming upon the ruins as he had a thousand times before and is walking amongst them, when he hears voices. He instantly drops to the ground and waits. Into the clearing in front of him walk two men, wearing suits and speaking a foreign tongue that he does not understand. They remove the coverings from their cages, and one of them unsheathes out an old looking knife. The other carefully unwraps a book and stands, waiting. The first man, wearing the pinstripe suit, carefully extracts one of the snakes from its cage and cuts off its head. He then holds the bleeding stump over his mouth and allows the blood to pour down his throat. He repeats the process for the second man and both soon have bloody streaks on their previously spotless suits. They both turn to the South and the man with the book begins reading in a loud voice. The sky opens up and rain begins to pour out in large globs, almost as if in protest. Both men ignore it. Pablo is more curious than afraid, and continues to lie upon the ground, almost hypnotized. As the man’s voice rises, lighting lights up the sky. The man who is chanting slowly removes a gun from his jacket and discreetly shoots his partner before he notices. He laughs harshly as he continues to read and the winds pick up. The man chants with even more intensity but nothing else happens. After a few more minutes, the rain dies down, and the book is obviously too soggy to read. The main in the suit looks around, and seeing nothing out of the ordinary yells in anger. His eyes settle on the corpse and his screams change into wails. He collapses onto his knees and begins to pound on the chest of his former partner. Either the rain is running down his face or he is crying, Pablo cannot tell. With a shrug, he gets up and runs away. He is cold and hungry. Hopefully, he thinks as the shrieks continue behind him, mama made something good. the mrs.[/quote]