Breakfast of Champions...and the Syndicate
You would think that thieves, murderers, and assassins would have better things to do with their mornings than bicker like children over food, movies, and deities. Luckily for us, they don't. Join the Syndicate for another rollicking good installment of foul language, threats of violence, and pantslessness. I don't even care if pantslessness is really a word, either. Many Bothans died to bring you this. Okay, no, that's not true at all. But remycognac, vanillahellsing, and myself did kill many hours on it.
Oh, and extra points to those of you who catch all the references in this one!
Part Seven
Mr. White stretched and popped his back as he walked down the stairs. The music, always with the music.
“Have you seen my pants?” Brown asked, clutching a serving tray over his crotch.
White pointedly ignored Brown and joined the others at the bar. He noticed O-Ren eating delicately with a pair of chopsticks.
“What’s on the menu?” White inquired.
O-Ren sighed with exasperation. “Not one more word about my meal, not one more. And no, you cannot have any.” She pulled her breakfast closer to her in much the same fashion as a ravenous wolf will horde its kill. “Is that clear?” There was something in her tone of voice that suggested she might resort to her weapon to get her point across.
White put his hands up and laughed. “Okay, fine, the seafood’s all yours.”
“I am hungry, though,” Orange said.
Checking his watch, White noticed it was already past noon. “Yeah. Let’s get a taco.”
“I do kind of have a craving for nachos.”
Meanwhile, Brown had wandered back - still lacking pants - and was drifting around O-Ren like a lost puppy. “Come on, I’m starving here! Please can I have some food. Don’t be so mean, you’re hurting my soul.”
“I’ll hurt more than your soul if you don’t watch it,” O-Ren retorted.
“Aw, Renny, please, just feeeeed me!”
“Don’t call me ‘Renny.’” O-Ren was threatening to stab Brown with the chopsticks. “Get your own food.”
Orange laughed. “Hey Brown, did you turn into the plant from Little Shop of Horrors?”
“Dude, Little Shop of Horrors was fucking fantastic!” Brown perked up, forgetting about his hunger as he readied to launch himself into another long movie rant. “Seymour, yeah man. Nothing short of a classic, even if it’s a B-rated classic.”
White turned to Blonde. “You want anything?”
“Nah, I ain’t feeling the taco thing today,” Blonde replied. “I think I’ll get a Big Kahuna burger and some fries instead. Besides, you’d probably spit in my food.”
White laughed. “Yeah, I would.”
O-Ren watched as Orange, White, and Blonde all started in the direction of the door.
“You don’t plan on leaving me here alone, do you?” she inquired, trying to pay no mind to Brown’s jabbering about flesh-eating Venus fly-traps.
Orange grinned impishly. “You’re not alone, O-Ren, you’ve got Brown to keep you company.”
O-Ren narrowed her eyes at Orange. “If I wasn’t hired to protect you, I would kill you.”
He chuckled. “Just kidding, I like living. Hey Brown, we’ll bring you back some burritos, okay?”
“Burritos are awesome,” Brown exclaimed. “Bring them on, I can almost taste them now. Food, glorious food. And don’t you worry about a thing, I’ll take good care of Ishii-chan here.”
The former Tokyo yakuza queen glanced at Brown and then looked back to White. “I don’t get paid enough for this.”
“You two play nice now,” White said, trying his best not to burst out laughing. “We’ll be back in a little bit. Don’t worry, O-Ren, I’m sure you can handle anything that dipshit can throw at you.” He opened the door and stepped out into the alley.
Blonde smirked. “I hope she guts you, Mr. Shit.”
“Again with the Mr. Shit garbage,” Brown snapped. “What the fuck, man? I didn’t say a Goddamned word to you.”
“What the fuck ever. You were the asshole who woke me up prancing around in your fucking underwear.” Blonde then addressed O-Ren: “Seriously though, if you kill him you’ll be doing us a favor. Hell, I’ll help you hide the body.” He winked and exited.
Orange shook his head. “Sorry, O-Ren, you’re on your own for now.” And with that, he followed after White.
O-Ren exhaled slowly and leveled her gaze at Brown. Maybe a little homicide wasn’t such a bad idea.
***
Elle Driver threw the blankets off and sat up in bed. That crazy drunk pain in the ass from last night and the others were making so much Goddamned noise! Unable to pretend to ignore the ruckus, she meandered downstairs.
“Jesus fucking Christ, put some pants on before I go blind!” Elle hissed when she reached the bar. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
Brown did a pirouette and laughed, “Rise and shine, you beautiful blue-eyed Cyclops.”
“Shut up and don’t talk to me.”
“Suit yourself.” He moonwalked away.
“I think the more accurate statement would be what isn’t wrong with him,” O-Ren commented as she finished her breakfast.
Elle raised an eyebrow as she regarded the food.
“Hold your tongue,” O-Ren murmured. “I’ve heard quite enough about my culinary tastes for one day.”
The pair of former DiVAS watched with annoyed bewilderment as Brown danced past them again.
“Are you feeling any better since last night?” O-Ren inquired.
“Maybe,” Elle answered with a fold of her arms. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Brown, meanwhile, had tracked down his pants and was attempting to put them on, dance, and light a cigarette simultaneously…without much success.
“Motherfucker doesn’t know shit,” he grumbled. “It’s just my shtick, man. How I roll, like dice made of ice. I’m stepping out.”
All of his resolve to exit the building dissolved in the harsh sunlight as soon as Brown opened the front door of the Syndicate.
“And I’m back,” he declared.
O-Ren raised an eyebrow. “You left?”
Elle frowned. “And I missed it? Damn.”
“I circled the globe in the blink of an eye,” Brown went on to say, swaying along to the latest song on the rotation: “Beyond the Sea” by Bobby Darin. “I found myself.”
“Nice to see that you found your pants, as well,” O-Ren added.
“Found yourself?” Elle shook her head and laughed. “What is that, like finding Jesus or some shit?”
“Yeah, I found myself.” Brown hopped up on a barstool and spun around. “I found the sun’s a bitch, too. I found Jesus last year, he’s a bowler in LA who likes dressing in monochromatic outfits. I met him once at a tournament game against my cousin Walter. And as for the pants, well, pants are always optional!” His stomach voiced its emptiness. “But the real issue is when the hell is the fucking food going to get here. Pants might be optional but breakfast isn’t.”
***
White paused at the Syndicate’s entrance carrying two bags of food.
“All right then,” he said to Orange, “into the mouth of madness we go.”
“Hey, Brown, we brought you those burritos,” Orange announced. “Hope you like chicken.”
“Babies taste of chicken,” Brown remarked as he snatched the bundle and carried it to a table like a hound that hadn’t eaten in weeks.
“You know what I’ve realized?” Elle said as she casually poached a few nachos. “Half the shit that comes out of your mouth doesn’t even make any sense. Bowling, Jesus, babies, chicken - I mean, really, what the fuck?”
“Okay, you want to hear my views on Jesus?” Brown spoke as he gnawed on the burrito.
“NO,” everyone replied in unison.
“Well here’s what I think,” he continued, entirely ignoring their groans. “Heaven is like a fucking sitcom. It’s all about the trinity, you know? Like a dysfunctional family. You’ve got God, the dad, he’s a decent guy, kind of like an average Joe who just happens to be the creator of all things in existence. There’s Jesus, the son, he’s a little bit of a hippie and he really wants to help everyone out but manages to get himself in trouble instead. Then you’ve got yourself, yeah, that’s right, the grandfather. You know the father from Frasier? That’s him, the Holy Ghost, only he’s way more fucking senile. He runs around with a sheet over his head screaming, ‘Holy Ghooost! Holy Ghooost!’ That’s what Heaven is like, man. I bet you anything.”
Brown stopped to take a breath but it was a wonder that he even needed it.
White sighed heavily. “Will you just shut your fucking mouth and eat your Goddamned burrito?”
Orange chuckled to himself and quipped, “…drat, I would have gotten away with it if it hadn’t of been for those pesky God and Jesus type fellows…”
Orange and Brown exchanged glances and then burst into laughter at the totally random inside joke.
“They certainly are entertaining, aren’t they?” O-Ren commented, opening the bottle of iced green tea she had brought with her food.
Elle sneered. “Yeah, well, ‘entertaining’ isn’t exactly the word that I would use to describe them.”
The Syndicate’s front door swung open again and Blonde came strolling in with his Big Kahuna burger, fries, and - of course - his soda. Whistling, he walked past the others at their tables and sat down one seat away from O-Ren at the bar. Elle pointedly ignored him.
Blonde took a bite out of his burger and regarded Elle, smirking. When she refused to turn in his direction he leaned over to O-Ren and asked, “How’s Girly?”
Elle snorted. Asshole.
“Surly,” O-Ren replied, sipping her green tea. “She’s being rather surly. Although I suspect it may be due to a lack of food.”
“So Girly is being surly, eh?” Blonde laughed. “Why I’m shocked, she’s got such a pleasant disposition, after all.”
Elle shook her head and tapped her fingers on the bar. I’m going to kill him.
He laughed, “Although I’d probably be sore, too, if I had lost all that money last night.”
I’ll torture him before I kill him, nice and slow. I want to hear him scream for mercy. Elle grinned to herself, imagining the damage she could do to that arrogant son of a bitch with a hacksaw and an old dentist’s chair.
Blonde just kept on smirking and slid his fries down the bar to Elle. They came to a stop beside her hand. “Go on and eat, then. You can’t tell me you’re not at least a little hungry.”
O-Ren slid off her stool, carrying the tea with her. “I will catch you all later on in the day, there is business I need to attend to at the moment.”
“Just where do you think you’re going?” Elle asked.
“As I said, there is business that needs attending to,” O-Ren answered over her shoulder, already walking towards the door. “Take care, Elle, I’ll be waiting for you later.”
Elle narrowed her eye as the door closed behind O-Ren. “I can’t believe she just did that, leaving me with these lunatics.”
“Now that’s the pot calling the kettle black,” White commented, cleaning off the table of taco and nacho remains.
“Shut up.” Elle glared at him.
“I think O-Ren has the right idea, though,” Mr. Orange commented, looking to Mr. White. “We’ve got some errands of our own to run: stuff that needs to get done for both the Syndicate and ourselves, you know?”
White nodded. “Yeah, you’re right, Kid. No one else is going to put any effort into getting this place up and running.”
“Catch you later,” Orange said, high-fiving Mr. Brown on his way out.
“Yeah man, thanks for the grub,” Brown replied. “I’m grabbing me a room upstairs while you guys are out. I need to sleep on something other than the floor.”
“Knock yourself out,” White said. “Just stay the hell out of ours.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” was Brown’s response.
As White and Orange exited the Reservoir Syndicate Elle smirked to herself and muttered, “Gee, I wonder what kind of ‘errands’ those two are running.”
“You have got one filthy mind,” Brown remarked. He smiled and leaned in. “I like it.”
“Back the fuck off or you die,” Elle warned.
Brown tried to growl in a sexy manner but somehow failed.
Elle scoffed, “Freak.”
“You know it, baby.” Brown gyrated his hips a little before winking and heading upstairs.
“I swear to fucking God, this place is a madhouse,” Elle exclaimed.
To be continued...
The story thus far:
Part One: Welcome to the Syndicate
Part Two: Hanging with the Syndicate
Part Three: Boozing with the Syndicate
Part Four: Gambling with the Syndicate
Part Five: Cards and Crazy Bitches
Part Six: Hangovers, Dancing, and a Lack of Pants.
Oh, and extra points to those of you who catch all the references in this one!
Part Seven
Mr. White stretched and popped his back as he walked down the stairs. The music, always with the music.
“Have you seen my pants?” Brown asked, clutching a serving tray over his crotch.
White pointedly ignored Brown and joined the others at the bar. He noticed O-Ren eating delicately with a pair of chopsticks.
“What’s on the menu?” White inquired.
O-Ren sighed with exasperation. “Not one more word about my meal, not one more. And no, you cannot have any.” She pulled her breakfast closer to her in much the same fashion as a ravenous wolf will horde its kill. “Is that clear?” There was something in her tone of voice that suggested she might resort to her weapon to get her point across.
White put his hands up and laughed. “Okay, fine, the seafood’s all yours.”
“I am hungry, though,” Orange said.
Checking his watch, White noticed it was already past noon. “Yeah. Let’s get a taco.”
“I do kind of have a craving for nachos.”
Meanwhile, Brown had wandered back - still lacking pants - and was drifting around O-Ren like a lost puppy. “Come on, I’m starving here! Please can I have some food. Don’t be so mean, you’re hurting my soul.”
“I’ll hurt more than your soul if you don’t watch it,” O-Ren retorted.
“Aw, Renny, please, just feeeeed me!”
“Don’t call me ‘Renny.’” O-Ren was threatening to stab Brown with the chopsticks. “Get your own food.”
Orange laughed. “Hey Brown, did you turn into the plant from Little Shop of Horrors?”
“Dude, Little Shop of Horrors was fucking fantastic!” Brown perked up, forgetting about his hunger as he readied to launch himself into another long movie rant. “Seymour, yeah man. Nothing short of a classic, even if it’s a B-rated classic.”
White turned to Blonde. “You want anything?”
“Nah, I ain’t feeling the taco thing today,” Blonde replied. “I think I’ll get a Big Kahuna burger and some fries instead. Besides, you’d probably spit in my food.”
White laughed. “Yeah, I would.”
O-Ren watched as Orange, White, and Blonde all started in the direction of the door.
“You don’t plan on leaving me here alone, do you?” she inquired, trying to pay no mind to Brown’s jabbering about flesh-eating Venus fly-traps.
Orange grinned impishly. “You’re not alone, O-Ren, you’ve got Brown to keep you company.”
O-Ren narrowed her eyes at Orange. “If I wasn’t hired to protect you, I would kill you.”
He chuckled. “Just kidding, I like living. Hey Brown, we’ll bring you back some burritos, okay?”
“Burritos are awesome,” Brown exclaimed. “Bring them on, I can almost taste them now. Food, glorious food. And don’t you worry about a thing, I’ll take good care of Ishii-chan here.”
The former Tokyo yakuza queen glanced at Brown and then looked back to White. “I don’t get paid enough for this.”
“You two play nice now,” White said, trying his best not to burst out laughing. “We’ll be back in a little bit. Don’t worry, O-Ren, I’m sure you can handle anything that dipshit can throw at you.” He opened the door and stepped out into the alley.
Blonde smirked. “I hope she guts you, Mr. Shit.”
“Again with the Mr. Shit garbage,” Brown snapped. “What the fuck, man? I didn’t say a Goddamned word to you.”
“What the fuck ever. You were the asshole who woke me up prancing around in your fucking underwear.” Blonde then addressed O-Ren: “Seriously though, if you kill him you’ll be doing us a favor. Hell, I’ll help you hide the body.” He winked and exited.
Orange shook his head. “Sorry, O-Ren, you’re on your own for now.” And with that, he followed after White.
O-Ren exhaled slowly and leveled her gaze at Brown. Maybe a little homicide wasn’t such a bad idea.
***
Elle Driver threw the blankets off and sat up in bed. That crazy drunk pain in the ass from last night and the others were making so much Goddamned noise! Unable to pretend to ignore the ruckus, she meandered downstairs.
“Jesus fucking Christ, put some pants on before I go blind!” Elle hissed when she reached the bar. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
Brown did a pirouette and laughed, “Rise and shine, you beautiful blue-eyed Cyclops.”
“Shut up and don’t talk to me.”
“Suit yourself.” He moonwalked away.
“I think the more accurate statement would be what isn’t wrong with him,” O-Ren commented as she finished her breakfast.
Elle raised an eyebrow as she regarded the food.
“Hold your tongue,” O-Ren murmured. “I’ve heard quite enough about my culinary tastes for one day.”
The pair of former DiVAS watched with annoyed bewilderment as Brown danced past them again.
“Are you feeling any better since last night?” O-Ren inquired.
“Maybe,” Elle answered with a fold of her arms. “I haven’t decided yet.”
Brown, meanwhile, had tracked down his pants and was attempting to put them on, dance, and light a cigarette simultaneously…without much success.
“Motherfucker doesn’t know shit,” he grumbled. “It’s just my shtick, man. How I roll, like dice made of ice. I’m stepping out.”
All of his resolve to exit the building dissolved in the harsh sunlight as soon as Brown opened the front door of the Syndicate.
“And I’m back,” he declared.
O-Ren raised an eyebrow. “You left?”
Elle frowned. “And I missed it? Damn.”
“I circled the globe in the blink of an eye,” Brown went on to say, swaying along to the latest song on the rotation: “Beyond the Sea” by Bobby Darin. “I found myself.”
“Nice to see that you found your pants, as well,” O-Ren added.
“Found yourself?” Elle shook her head and laughed. “What is that, like finding Jesus or some shit?”
“Yeah, I found myself.” Brown hopped up on a barstool and spun around. “I found the sun’s a bitch, too. I found Jesus last year, he’s a bowler in LA who likes dressing in monochromatic outfits. I met him once at a tournament game against my cousin Walter. And as for the pants, well, pants are always optional!” His stomach voiced its emptiness. “But the real issue is when the hell is the fucking food going to get here. Pants might be optional but breakfast isn’t.”
***
White paused at the Syndicate’s entrance carrying two bags of food.
“All right then,” he said to Orange, “into the mouth of madness we go.”
“Hey, Brown, we brought you those burritos,” Orange announced. “Hope you like chicken.”
“Babies taste of chicken,” Brown remarked as he snatched the bundle and carried it to a table like a hound that hadn’t eaten in weeks.
“You know what I’ve realized?” Elle said as she casually poached a few nachos. “Half the shit that comes out of your mouth doesn’t even make any sense. Bowling, Jesus, babies, chicken - I mean, really, what the fuck?”
“Okay, you want to hear my views on Jesus?” Brown spoke as he gnawed on the burrito.
“NO,” everyone replied in unison.
“Well here’s what I think,” he continued, entirely ignoring their groans. “Heaven is like a fucking sitcom. It’s all about the trinity, you know? Like a dysfunctional family. You’ve got God, the dad, he’s a decent guy, kind of like an average Joe who just happens to be the creator of all things in existence. There’s Jesus, the son, he’s a little bit of a hippie and he really wants to help everyone out but manages to get himself in trouble instead. Then you’ve got yourself, yeah, that’s right, the grandfather. You know the father from Frasier? That’s him, the Holy Ghost, only he’s way more fucking senile. He runs around with a sheet over his head screaming, ‘Holy Ghooost! Holy Ghooost!’ That’s what Heaven is like, man. I bet you anything.”
Brown stopped to take a breath but it was a wonder that he even needed it.
White sighed heavily. “Will you just shut your fucking mouth and eat your Goddamned burrito?”
Orange chuckled to himself and quipped, “…drat, I would have gotten away with it if it hadn’t of been for those pesky God and Jesus type fellows…”
Orange and Brown exchanged glances and then burst into laughter at the totally random inside joke.
“They certainly are entertaining, aren’t they?” O-Ren commented, opening the bottle of iced green tea she had brought with her food.
Elle sneered. “Yeah, well, ‘entertaining’ isn’t exactly the word that I would use to describe them.”
The Syndicate’s front door swung open again and Blonde came strolling in with his Big Kahuna burger, fries, and - of course - his soda. Whistling, he walked past the others at their tables and sat down one seat away from O-Ren at the bar. Elle pointedly ignored him.
Blonde took a bite out of his burger and regarded Elle, smirking. When she refused to turn in his direction he leaned over to O-Ren and asked, “How’s Girly?”
Elle snorted. Asshole.
“Surly,” O-Ren replied, sipping her green tea. “She’s being rather surly. Although I suspect it may be due to a lack of food.”
“So Girly is being surly, eh?” Blonde laughed. “Why I’m shocked, she’s got such a pleasant disposition, after all.”
Elle shook her head and tapped her fingers on the bar. I’m going to kill him.
He laughed, “Although I’d probably be sore, too, if I had lost all that money last night.”
I’ll torture him before I kill him, nice and slow. I want to hear him scream for mercy. Elle grinned to herself, imagining the damage she could do to that arrogant son of a bitch with a hacksaw and an old dentist’s chair.
Blonde just kept on smirking and slid his fries down the bar to Elle. They came to a stop beside her hand. “Go on and eat, then. You can’t tell me you’re not at least a little hungry.”
O-Ren slid off her stool, carrying the tea with her. “I will catch you all later on in the day, there is business I need to attend to at the moment.”
“Just where do you think you’re going?” Elle asked.
“As I said, there is business that needs attending to,” O-Ren answered over her shoulder, already walking towards the door. “Take care, Elle, I’ll be waiting for you later.”
Elle narrowed her eye as the door closed behind O-Ren. “I can’t believe she just did that, leaving me with these lunatics.”
“Now that’s the pot calling the kettle black,” White commented, cleaning off the table of taco and nacho remains.
“Shut up.” Elle glared at him.
“I think O-Ren has the right idea, though,” Mr. Orange commented, looking to Mr. White. “We’ve got some errands of our own to run: stuff that needs to get done for both the Syndicate and ourselves, you know?”
White nodded. “Yeah, you’re right, Kid. No one else is going to put any effort into getting this place up and running.”
“Catch you later,” Orange said, high-fiving Mr. Brown on his way out.
“Yeah man, thanks for the grub,” Brown replied. “I’m grabbing me a room upstairs while you guys are out. I need to sleep on something other than the floor.”
“Knock yourself out,” White said. “Just stay the hell out of ours.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” was Brown’s response.
As White and Orange exited the Reservoir Syndicate Elle smirked to herself and muttered, “Gee, I wonder what kind of ‘errands’ those two are running.”
“You have got one filthy mind,” Brown remarked. He smiled and leaned in. “I like it.”
“Back the fuck off or you die,” Elle warned.
Brown tried to growl in a sexy manner but somehow failed.
Elle scoffed, “Freak.”
“You know it, baby.” Brown gyrated his hips a little before winking and heading upstairs.
“I swear to fucking God, this place is a madhouse,” Elle exclaimed.
To be continued...
The story thus far:
Part One: Welcome to the Syndicate
Part Two: Hanging with the Syndicate
Part Three: Boozing with the Syndicate
Part Four: Gambling with the Syndicate
Part Five: Cards and Crazy Bitches
Part Six: Hangovers, Dancing, and a Lack of Pants.