So Night Follows Day Pt. 08

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Troy walks into danger. Susan does the same.
3.2k words
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Part 8 of the 30 part series

Updated 06/08/2023
Created 09/06/2017
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"Grampa pissed his pants again,
he don't give a damn.
Brother Billy has both guns drawn,
he ain't been right since Viet-Nam.
'Sweet Home Alabama,'
play that dead band's song.
Turn those speakers up full-blast,
play it all night long."
-Warren Zevon "Play It All Night Long"

A potted plant came sailing down the hallway, smashing on the floor of the Greens' living room. Troy Equals slipped the shoes he'd started to remove back on and hurried down the hall, toward the shouting. If the foliage was suffering, it meant that most of the rest of the breakables in the room had already been eliminated.

The Ultimados were trying to drown out their fight with the sound system they'd hooked up outside, so that any complaints from neighbors would be about that, rather than the sounds of the inside of the house being destroyed. Mander had set up the playlist earlier in the afternoon, and whatever had gone on down the hall had been done to the tune of The Beatles' Penny Lane. That song had since ended, and Troy was now surveying the damage to the opening guitar of The Who's 5:15.

"She's a MOTHERFUCKING CIVILIAN, HELENA!" Julie shouted from the dining room. "What is she going to do to the FUCKING TRIADS? YOGA them to death?"

Helen must have found something that wasn't broken already, because something shattered with each pause in her reply.

"She's a FUCKING... GROWN... WOMAN! And since you want to bring ranks and such into this, Army Brat First Class, she's also a fucking citizen of San Finzione! One who came to La Contessa in a crisis and said, 'I know something I can do to help.' How was I supposed to ignore her?"

Troy surveyed the room from the end of the darkened hallway before entering. The overhead hallway light had been hit by something hurled down the hall before his arrival. Troy looked back toward the living room, now noticing how much of the debris in the living room had been dining room furniture, and figured it was likely one of the chairs that were in pieces that he'd passed.

Before now, the Greens' dining room reminded Troy of those mock-up 1950s suburban communities in the desert from old A-Bomb test footage; populated by dummies dressed as happy suburbanites. Kid dummies, being handed invisible ice cream by a dummy ice cream man, businessdummies waving goodbye to their housedummies; frozen in the middle of their sunny suburban day, and oblivious to the countdown booming from loudspeakers.

The image he got now was from the aftermath of those videos. Debris strewn all about, missing only men in gas masks and business suits walking around with crackling Geiger counters, and thinking they were protected while horrible, other effects that science wouldn't learn about for decades began slowly taking place inside their bodies.

In the middle of the wreckage stood Julie Equals and Contessa Helena de San Finzione, both holding fragments of plates as if deciding whether to throw them or use the sharp edges to cut a bitch. Neither had seen him in the hallway yet, and Troy was still watching.

Helen wasn't a petite woman, only a few inches shorter than Julie, with a build a shade more athletic than Julie's curvier one, though her breasts were still large enough to have been the source of Troy's Tit Man-hood; and it was only during their fights like this, when they were shouting in each other's faces and Julie took the effort to try to loom over her, that he really took notice of the two women who'd played the biggest roles in his life's differences. He listened, waiting for a sufficiently-long lull to step in, rather than interrupt and get two dish-pieces hurled at him. Julie continued.

"Susan ALWAYS wants to help! She's a helpful person! But the woman has PROBLEMS, Helena! Some of the ones you have, too, but more! She has..." Julie caught herself. "It's nothing to worry about most of the time, but Susan has some very real issues. There's no telling what could happen to her in a shootout or a brawl, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be anything good! And what if she gets hurt? They'll take her to..." Julie stopped and took a deep breath and ended it. "It's like with me and Troy and Deathwater Pits, all right? There's places Susan can't go."

"That's why I sent her with two people with proven track records in saving Maria and my lives! Yes, Mander looks like the giant dude Indiana Jones always has to fight; if I didn't know him, do you think I'd have brought him into your home? Susan was great at the crime scene, she'll be able to handle it."

"This isn't the same as taking her to a crime scene, surrounded by fifty cops and Ramirez, you sent her on a FUCKING Ultimados OP! And I REMEMBER the quality of guys you used to bring home, Helena!"

"Yeah, your taste in men has always sucked really bad, Helen." Troy said from the doorway, stepping in with what he hoped was a disarming smile.

The two women stopped and turned to Troy. They simultaneously dropped the sharp dish fragments they'd been holding, causing them to break into tinier pieces. Julie stomped toward him.

"Troy, do you know what she did?"

"Capitan Ortega told me. And Mander and Velasquez went with her?"

Helen nodded and stomped up to join them.

"Yes. She wanted to help. I told her she could help us all by staying safe here. But, like someone told me earlier, I'm not going to keep you guys under house arrest all week."

"Then what?" Julie turned to her again. "She asked you what it was like to get stabbed and nearly die and you recommended she try it?"

Helen's response to that was to sucker punch the first girl she ever loved in the stomach.

"Felt about like that, bitch!" Helen shouted as Julie doubled over onto her knees. Julie looked up and saw that Helen's crotch was unguarded, and was about to nail her with a fist right in the cunt when Troy grabbed it and dropped to his knees to look Julie in the eye.

"I just got you back, Mistress." Troy said softly, putting his hand on the back of her neck and gently guiding both their heads together until they touched. Helen could still hear him; he'd been making no effort for her not to hear. "And I won't have the strength to do it again without some of that barbecue that I've been smelling since I was a block from home and a nap."

He took hold of her hands and kissed her forehead.

"I don't know what's going to happen to anyone; but I see Helen's point: It's Susan. She was going to try to help in some way. Helen gets that, too. Remember what Susan said before we went to the room? She doesn't want to be the princess locked in the tower. Just like Princess Mesmera wouldn't tolerate it. That's a third of the reason I didn't suggest that you go away with her."

While they spoke, Helen found where her cigarettes had gotten to in the struggle. She fished one out of the crumpled pack, found it was broken, pulled out another, and put it in her mouth. She looked about for her lighter for a moment, couldn't find it, and went into the kitchen.

"But what's she going to do, Master?" Julie whispered back, calming down. Helen fiddled with something out of sight in the kitchen. The stove clicked on a moment later. "We've taught her how to Do What We Do, and she's been doing great, but she's never had to COUNT on it, Troy." Helen returned from the kitchen with a lit cigarette. Julie gestured with her right shoulder, because Troy's back was to Helen. Julie seemed to be almost deflating as she looked into her best friend's eyes. "Like she did... that one time it didn't work..."

Helen stopped at that. Her other hand crept up to the scar on her neck while Julie continued.

"You've both gotten me thinking about other ways What We Do doesn't work. Here's one that she forgot from our time in Europe: They've got to understand us. If we ran into someone who didn't know English, French, or Greek, Helena had to do the talking. I could only get across what I could infer from similar languages. Triads are Chinese, aren't they? What if the guys they send don't know English? She..." Julie gestured to Helen again. "Could just tell them to drop their guns in Cantonese or Mandarin... She'll take one look at them and know the right fucking regional dialect to use! That's probably WHY her thing is languages: So Helena can command anyone and everyone!"

Helen finally spoke.

"Velasquez and Mander speak a language everyone understands. I know you'd like to believe otherwise, Troy, but all too often, it's the only one people will listen to."

Troy turned to her with a look that told Helen that she wasn't helping.

"I said I saw your point, Helen; I didn't say you were right. The woman has administrative skills, and it looks like you had a little office setup here before it all got smashed. You could have just asked her to be your secretary while all this is going on."

"She's not Moneypenny, Troilus." Helen replied, taking a couple of careful steps closer. "She was pretty perceptive before learning The Thing, she'd have seen that for what it was right away; an effort to give her something to keep her busy and safely out of the way. She would have told me to fuck off, I would have deserved it, and then she would have gone home mad and started thinking of ways she could contribute substantively. I tried telling her that you'd never go for it, too. That would factor into her thinking, and she would have concluded that she's a big girl and she'll just have to find a way to help without our fucking permission. Then we're in the 'daughter sneaks out and goes to an older kids' boy/girl party with no parents' episode of some wacky sitcom."'

Troy saw that the continuing to engage Helen now would just prolong things, and turned to finish defusing Julie before coming back to her.

"Susan's going to be all right, Sunflower. I don't know how to fix all of this at the moment, which is why I need you here, with me. The other two-thirds of the reason I didn't suggest you go somewhere safe with her were becaue I knew you wouldn't; and I had hoped you wouldn't. Because I can deal with absolutely anything if My Julie is by my side. I know nothing bad can happen to either us when we're together."

"Susan doesn't have either of us right now." Julie whispered back.

"No, she doesn't. And if we try to go after her, we'll just make things worse. Helen sent Velazquez with her, that woman can take care of any Triads by herself. She's also with Mander, whom we don't know all that well, however, Helen wouldn't have brought him unless he was OK and good at what he does. I'm more worried right now that Susan's going to come home and find that the OTHER two women I love most in the world have killed each other over her."

His words calmed Helen down as well, and she righted what was left of a chair and sat down.

"Dammit, Troilus, stop being right all the time."

Troy's phone buzzed. He checked the message.

"There's something outside. Can you two not kill each other long enough for me to go get it?"

Helen nodded and took a drag. Julie nodded as well. Troy stood and left the room. Once they were alone again, Helen spoke.

"I told her that she wasn't expendable. How I'd never forgive myself, and neither would you two. But that's not even the VERY worst possible outcome I can think of, Julie. Even worse than that thought, or the thought of you and Troy getting killed, is the thought of ONLY you OR Troy getting killed! Because I know that neither of you would be able to live for one minute in a world without the other."

"I think of that sometimes. I worry more about what Troy would do without me than what I'd do without him. That's why if anything ever happens to me, they both have triggers to remember how I would want him and Susan to be together and honor my memory by loving each other just as much, if not more, than we do."

"Nobody could love anyone more than you two." Helen thought a second. "That reminds me, I looked up that Bechdel Test thing, and you were totally right. To possibly just now make up a word, we suck at Bechdeling."

The two of them were laughing by the time Troy returned with a giant bag of random chocolate.

* * *

Susan Bailey drove into Seattle. Or, more accurately, crawled inch-by-frustrating-motherfucking-inch up I-5 and onto the Pike Street Exit.

"You have two major streets," Primo Tenente Marisol Velasquez of La Squadra de Ultimados asked her from the passenger seat. "Called Pike and Pine, running parallel through the middle of the city? People are not confused by this?"

"Oh, often. I have a theory about that." Susan replied. I think that Seattle's original city planner was told that he was fired on a Monday, but to finish out the week. So, he hit the bar at lunch, got all liquored up, then came back to work and said, 'I'll lay out your fucking city for you!'"

At the bottom of the off-ramp, Susan saw why getting into the city had involved more drivers whose sole purpose for living was to be slow in front of her than usual. Police were directing traffic around the protest zone, trying to keep the crowds contained. Although no violence had yet occurred, she noticed that the riot cops at the barricade already had gas masks on.

"I was just a kid when WTO happened." She told Velasquez and Mander; who was sitting in the middle of the back seat, between them. "I remember someone describing the riot squad moving in as 'a wall of Darth Vaders.'" She looked at Mander in the rear-view mirror. "That wasn't another cover for one of these auctions, was it?"

"Don't think so." Mander replied. "I'm not connected like Her Countessness. Only way a geezer like me gets in'd be as someone like 'erself's Plus One, so I ain't on the list. But not all of 'em are the Auctioneers, though. Sometimes, these fancy, do-nothin' conferences 're exactly what they say on the tin."

"I don't think I've ever heard anyone but Captain Jack Harkness use that expression." Susan replied with a smile. "Hey, just a thought, that reporter did have a decent question: Why is STRANGERS being held in Seattle, and America wasn't even invited?"

Mander and Velasquez both suddenly started laughing at that.

"Ya think..." Mander explained between laughs. "ANYONE in the world... wants 'at turd you spray-painted orange... stuck a Tribble pelt on top... an' call it Dipshit-In-Chief... 'avin' ONE MORE doomsday weapon?"

"Si," Velasquez remarked. "We are all disappointed at whichever number above zero of nuclear weapons that you have already entrusted Rey Joffrey El Naranja with."

Past the police barricade, scattered protesters who couldn't make it into the mob scene outside the Convention Center were standing on corners and shouting about which aspect of STRANGERS would doom or save the human race.

"This ain't a protest." Mander said, looking out the side window at some of them. "Ya've got too many wankers an' not enough molotovs."

"Welcome to Seattle." Susan explained as she took the turn toward the hotel, and traffic returned to Seattle's usual standards of obstruction. "Protests here aren't about changing anything, they're about feeling like you matter. Show up and wave a sign, and you get to tell yourself you accomplished something and look down on all the 'sheeple' who weren't there to 'make a difference.'"

Mander and Velasquez both winced at the word.

"Sheeple?" Mander asked. "This's a word people use now? I live on an island. Hearin' that makes me want to go 'ome."

"Not the socially-functional, no. It means 'people who don't believe the same whack-a-doodle bullshit that you do.' Generally used by..." Susan thought.

"Well, probably everyone at the protests. Basically, any time you hear any talking about one of the subjects STRANGERS is supposed to be about, or their favorite conspiracy theory, they use it to describe 'the unbelievers.'"

"And this is supposed to win people over to their point-of-view?" Velasquez asked.

"The kind of people who use it don't want to win anyone over." Susan replied. "It's more about imagining that you're superior to everyone else; because you know 'what's really going on,' and they're all just unwitting tools of their pet conspiracy. The ones who aren't suckers are out to sell something to the ones that are."

"Well, that part's always the same wherever ya go."

"Si. Americans are idiotas."

"Oh, you haven't seen anything yet." Susan said as they turned the last corner toward the hotel where the Ultimados were keeping Rita. "Wait until you see how many are proud of that fact."

Four blocks away from the hotel, traffic started crawling, and Susan got to try out some of the Greek curses she'd picked up around the house. When they eventually reached the head of the line, they saw why. Another blockade with more protesters was surrounding the Hotel de San Finzione in downtown Seattle where Rita and her Ultimado detail were holed up in the La Contessa suite, the hotel's penthouse. Like the La Contessa suites on Air Finzione, everything was designed and secured to Helen's specifications and centered on the theme "fit for La Contessa herself."

"Blockading the delegates' hotels, too." Susan said. "That's what they did for WTO."

Susan lucked into an empty parking space and pulled in.

"Block away." Mander said.

"We'll be exposed, but we can blend into the crowd once we've got her." Velasquez contributed.

"You're not blending in anywhere, Marisol." Susan said, looking her up and down and trying to hide Suzy-Ho's interest. "The Playboy Mansion, maybe, but nowhere else."

"Aren't I?" She asked, pointing to a portion of the crowd from whose signs, they could infer, were in support of the Sexual Equality portion of the STRANGERS acronym, flanked by a group against Racial Harmony, and one condemning Sexual Equality on the other. Most of the crowd were women, some were topless, some had foregone clothes altogether; many covered with body paint, but not all.

Susan looked over and smiled. She tried to think if there was something she could do to help them on the way out. Sue suggested something, and she made certain to remember it for later as she undid her seat belt. Mander checked his gun in the back, then tucked it under his shirt.

"Well, in that case, people." Susan said, removing her shirt and bra and stuffing them into her purse before opening the door. "Let's go make a difference."

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