Terrible Company Ch. 09

The Narrator rubbed mercilessly at his eyes and shook his head. "It's too early for this," he groaned. "Hamish, why did you bring half the city to my door?"

"Oh, there's only the three hundred out there."

"Hamish—"

"Four hundred tops."

"Hamish!"

"What?"

"Why are they here?"

"Oh! They followed me."

The Narrator blearily peered up, through his fingers, and waited.

"Oh!! Fuck! I almost forgot why I came over! It almost seems trite now."

"Hamish!"

"I woke up in bed with Ebba..." He held up his hands, drawing the tension as he paused. "...and another woman."

"How much did that cost?" The Narrator grumbled.

"See, that's just it! I don't think I paid her at all, and she was really... you know..." He cupped his hands in front of his chest, a good eight inches out from his ribs. "...eager!"

"I'm very happy for you," The Narrator groaned. "Did the parade cost you anything, or were they free too?"

"Oh no!" Hamish said quickly. "Those are my fans!"

"Your... your fans?"

"The Harrislots, remember?" He shook his head. "I just heard that out loud for the first time. Like, really heard it. Doesn't work." Then he shook his head again. "Either way, I expected this to happen sooner, but now I'm just glad we're finally here."

The Narrator walked, hunched, over to the window and peeked through the blinds. A sea of bodies filled the alleyways, packed shoulder-to-shoulder, as far as he could make out. "This is for you?"

"Oh yeah! They were gathered outside my door this morning."

"Why... how...I'm, I'm—"

"They found out about my new book, and the word spread pretty quick!"

"Your new b—" The Narrator's eyes widened. "You didn't... We... Where is it?"

"Where's what?"

"Your book!"

Hamish beamed, standing very straight, and pulled a small yellow book from inside of his jacket. "I personalized the signature on this one for you."

"You didn't..." The Narrator took the book in his hands and gasped. His voice trembled. "The Double Slit Experiment, by Hamish R. R. R. Harris."

"Lesbian Alchemists. Clever, right?"

"Hamish R. R. R. Harris?!"

"Yeah, I saw that. Weird typo."

"That's not a typo! We did this! Last night, but..." The Narrator fell back on his bed, nearly hyperventilating. "I can scarcely recall anything after sunset."

"We did that?" Hamish asked, pointing at the book cover. "On purpose?"

"There's power in the R's," he groaned. "Ohhh, this is bad. This is very bad. It's too many R's!"

Hamish took back the book and turned it around in his hands. "You know, I had this weird dream that we broke into my publishers last night—"

"It wasn't a dream," The Narrator moaned. "By the Gods, what have we done?"

"We broke into my publishers to change my initials?"

"Yes!" The Narrator grabbed the lapels of his jacket, and hauled him in until the two were nose-to-nose. "There are secret forces at work in the world. Powerful forces."

"Everyone knows about The Cabal."

"I'm talking about magic, you incompetent buffoon! You have tapped into something so far beyond your ken, you cannot even conceive of it."

"I thought you'd be happy for me," Hamish said, looking affronted. "I mean, this is what I've been working toward all my life.

"No," The Narrator moaned, shaking his head. "No it isn't. Oh, how could I have been so stupid?"

"I don't understand what you're so worried about. I mean, some things are finally breaking my way, and you're... you're upset?"

"Not just 'some things', Hamish; 'everything'. 'Everything' is breaking your way, right?"

Hamish frowned pensively.

"This is a lot of power to have in one person's hands, my friend. Too much. The R's are not a child's toy to be wielded recklessly."

Suddenly there was a knock at the door, and the damaged wood swung open with a slow creak. "Mister 'arris," Gort said, as he peeked in.

"Yes?"

"Just got a no' 'ere. You've been invi'ed to dine with the Baroness tonigh'."

"What fun!" He turned back to The Narrator and clasped him tightly by the shoulders. "Don't worry. I'll be very careful." The Narrator nodded, still very hungover and very confused, as his friend bounced out the door. The noise outside picked up for a few minutes, but then, very quickly, went back to silence.

***

"It works on paper," the first flunky said, "but not when you say it out loud. It's just weird." Hamish had already stopped trying to learn their names. There were too many, with more flocking by the minute. "Sounds like you're saying Hairy Slots."

"You're saying it wrong, and you're doing it on purpose!" shrieked a second flunky.

"Well, what if we go retro," the first one offered, "and don't shorten it? Leave it as two words... like... the KISS Army."

"Well at that point, we go with a different word than Harlot."

"I like the alliteration," Hamish casually added. "It sounds beautiful."

"Of course, sir," the flunkies said, almost on top of one another. They quickly descended into a tiff about replacement words that also started with H while attempting to outdo one another for Hamish's approval. He frowned, trying to drown them out while he planned out his next big plot. He wanted to tackle something that had never been done before. He briefly considered trying to write a musical as a book, and dismissed the idea as completely stupid.

The Verdul Gate, sitting between the Verdul and Jirot sections of the city, was predictably packed. Merchants travelling back and forth always complained, to anyone who would listen, about the amount of time lost, but that was the price they paid to live in the hills. To live in the shadow of, and breathe the same air as, royalty. Hamish had never tried before, nor had reason, to visit the beautiful Jirot district. He felt a wonderful kind of thrill as he stepped closer and closer.

The gate itself was imposing, stopping traffic at three different points for a variety of reasons. At that late hour, the shadow it cast stretched nearly a hundred and fifty yards. There was a tangible feeling inside him, a kind of rising tension he had written about many times but never felt himself, as he stood on the literal and metaphorical precipice of his dreams. On the other side of that wall lived the social elite. The means to the influence he had always sought. The influence he deserved. He bid his followers to wait and pressed on alone.

Many in the line said something as he passed alongside them. Some called to him as he walked, shouting his name and praising his work. Calls for guards to intercede went unheeded as he passed through the first and second checkpoints unhindered. As if expected. The captain at the third checkpoint held him up momentarily, owing to a necessary physical check for weapons, before sending him on with a sincere apology.

The air smelled better. The grass was greener. It was everything Hamish knew it would be. He stood there, on the sidewalk of a broad boulevard, and took a moment. He had made it. He had finally made it.

Just as he was about to start walking again, conscious of the fact that he was likely to be late, someone grabbed his hand. A redhead, slightly taller than himself, dragged him toward an alleyway. A full-figured woman. Hamish wondered, in the back of his head, if this was how it would be from now on. If this was his life. Racing from engagement to engagement, with brief, passionate encounters everywhere he went? Women throwing themselves at him? The redhead turned to him, and he gasped.

"Everyone pays their dues," she whispered harshly, just before the knife slipped into his side.

***

"Uuuuuugh!" Ayen whined, as he leaned to one side and stared ahead. "We've been in this line for, like, forever!"

"Oh, come on Lass. 's'no' so bad."

"Feels like it's been at least 8 months."

Val squinted at the waning sun and frowned. "It's been... 14 minutes."

"No," Katsa said insistently. "There's no way you can calculate time by the passage of the Sun across the sky. That's absurd."

"There's a clock," she replied flatly, pointing at the slender silhouette of a tower just ahead of them. The clock face was almost lost in the shadow.

Katsa threw up her hands in frustration, and turned. And then turned some more. And then turned some more. "Where did Ivy go?!"

"Right here!" Ivy said, panting lightly as she rejoined them in line. "I'm right here!"

"Where did you go?"

"After that line jumper. He tried to get around paying the dues at the gate."

"Ah think it's a toll, lass."

"They're synonymous," Ivy said, matter-of-factly.

Ayen, Val, Mathilda, and Katsa all turned, collectively, toward the gate. "He tried?" Ayen said.

"Yep!"

"Did he get through?" Val asked

"Yep!"

" 'ow?"

"No clue," Ivy answered, smiling brightly.

"Did you get through too?"

"Yep!"

"How?!"

"I flashed my breasts!"

Katsa squeezed her eyes shut, and pinched her nose. Val frowned at Katsa, from behind her back, and shook her head. Ayen merely hung his head.

Mathilda scoffed. "Wha' d'ye care if some tart prances through?"

"It's against the rules," Ivy said, tilting her head slightly.

"Well ye, but—"

"It's against the rules." More seriously. Very seriously.

Mathilda blinked. "Ne'er took ye fer a stickler fer..." And then she really thought about it. "Oh."

"If we didn't have rules," she said, resuming her normal, chipper tone, "it would be chaos. And so we have rules. The Maestro was very clear about that."

"There!" shouted a man, as he pointed at Terrible Company. "Stop them!" A cadre of guards, fifteen strong, ran toward them with weapons drawn.

"They found me," Ayen and Katsa said simultaneously, before turning to stare at each other.

"It was me," Ivy said, waving emphatically. "I did it!"

"Wha' did ye do?!"

"I helped!" Ivy said brightly.

"We have to go," Ayen whispered harshly. "We have to go!"

Val shook her head, and looked back over her shoulder. "Not good."

Armed guards converged on them from two sides. Val broke two noses and an arm, and Mathilda broke seven ribs spread out over three guards. Ayen proved to be almost impossible to keep bound, and Katsa shrieked at the top of her lungs every step of the way. Ivy was the only one who allowed herself to be bound without incident, but confusion set in for her when they treated her like a suspect and not a fellow law enforcement officer.

//Follow-up Note: Votes and comments are dearly appreciated. The next couple chapters will be found in other categories (Non-Human, Humor), but Terrible Company will be back! If you found the storytelling to be interesting, I would encourage you to check out the rest!

This is a completed series. There are fifteen total chapters with a satisfying conclusions (I think) to the individual plot threads for each character. You don't have to worry about getting to the end and finding out I gave up or lost interest because it's totally done! Isn't that awesome of me to finish something I started?//