Genesis *UHF* Chapters 1-2
By Mufasa
When Khalid got the snooty call from the restaurant manager – a man named Laurence Chamberlain – he was tempted to turn down the gig outright. Arrive at no later than 7:45 P.M. dressed in formal wear AND presentable. Come in through the back door. Those were the instructions. When Khalid asked what ‘presentable’ meant, his answer was ‘properly groomed.’ MAN, he hated being talked down to.
“So YOU’RE the new busboy, huh?”
Khalid blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Good way to make a first impression, by arriving half an hour late. You better hope Laurence doesn’t see you or he’ll send you walking,” the cook threw the towel at his face. “You’ll also have to cover for Marcus tonight, because he got a bout of food poisoning. So, go ahead and clear off tables seventeen through twenty-five and then get started on washing the dishes. With this being a Friday night, you can expect to be…”
Khalid clenched his teeth. “Shut the hell up. I’m not your fucking bus boy. Where the hell is Laurence?”
“You aren’t going to last long here with the chip on your shoulder, kid, especially with the owner coming by with his girl tonight. He doesn’t have much tolerance for…”
“Asshole,” Khalid said, moving around him. Yes… a GREAT way to make a first impression… but treating him like he was the fucking busboy. So, the busboys come here dressed in tuxedos, do they? He threw the towel across the white countertop as he made his way through the kitchen.
As he expected, the place was jumping with activity. Cooks were running back and forth preparing their dishes and setting orders aside for the waiters. Over near the entry to the dining room, a man in a tuxedo with a bright red tie and vest was going over instructions with the waiters. That was Laurence. There was no doubt in Khalid’s mind, not only because of the distinctive voice, but the way he talked to others. He was about what Khalid expected: short, snively, and a temperament that would take little time to go red.
“Excuse me, Sir,” he said, turning his attention away from the waiters. “Delivery men are not allowed in the dining…”
“Do I LOOK like a delivery man?” Khalid snapped. “Because maybe I could go someplace else.”
Laurence jerked in place, clearly embarrassed. Good… He should be. “Mr. Hunter, my apologies. I didn’t expect a pianist so…” Khalid was getting closer to leaving. If he wasn’t getting paid four hundred for this gig, he would have been out the door. ”…early.”
Black. Khalid knew better. Whatever. “I assume that the piano is in the main room?”
“In the center,” Laurence said. He led Khalid into the dining room. “Tonight, it is extremely important that you choose soothing material. The restaurant owner is dining with his significant other tonight.”
“What… You telling me that if he doesn’t get laid, he blames you?”
“No, Mr. Hunter… He becomes a grouchy, confrontational, and irrational jackass.”
Khalid blinked. That guy was talking about him! “HEY! I heard that, you motherf…”
“It is fortunate that his girlfriend asked for you specifically. A performance like this is a rare opportunity. I suggest you don’t mess up, because it isn’t likely a man with your… background will have another chance in a fine establishment such as this.”
“Well, when you put it like that…” Khalid said as Laurence walked away. “That is exactly what I intend to do.”
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It was about 9:00 when the owner of the restaurant strode through the front door to the sounds of Debussy and Ravel coming from the Steinway piano. Out of the corner of his eye, Khalid could barely see the two of them. As tempting as it was to turn and look, he was in the middle of an Arabesque. He wanted to last just long enough to make a scene. It looked like to him that this couple was making a scene by themselves, considering the way the staff was falling all over him.
The owner’s girlfriend was a dish and a half herself. When the blonde walked past the piano, Khalid’s fingers almost slipped right there. The neckline on her blue Sandubal original could compete with Jennifer Lopez and win hands down. It took nearly all of Khalid’s willpower not to turn away from the piano and stare. As it was, his rubato was getting a little bit too fast. Taking control of himself and his tempo, he still ogled her out he corner of his eye. That woman had nice legs – a dancer’s legs. According to Laurence, Rhoda loved to dance, so he should adjust his program accordingly in about half an hour. I wonder what her last name is…
Her boyfriend was likely some hotshot on Wall Street, the heir to a corporate conglomerate that swallowed yet another small business today. Khalid could just imagine this guy - probably some rich, spoiled, frat boy – jetting off to Milan to be with his super model girlfriend. They’d probably go skiing in the Alps. (Mountains in the Northeast are, after all, SOOO tiny.) With that sparkling diamond necklace she was sporting, Khalid knew this guy had some serious money.
Once the owner passed in front of the piano to join his girlfriend, Khalid’s assumptions went out the window. Yet again, his fingers nearly slipped. With a name like “Pharaoh’s Oasis”, he should have known better. Apparently, there WAS a Black man who got his mule and forty acres – and bought out everyone else’s after he was done. He wasn’t at all what Khalid was expecting. Instead of the spoiled White pretty-boy constantly whining to his daddy for more money, the owner was a young black professional. All right… No doubt the same type of Black executives that would thumb their noses up at Khalid for so much of his adult life. Either way, it didn’t matter. That didn’t change Khalid’s game plan at all.
True, he might not get paid for tonight and he will probably be down on the rent again, but at least this was going to be fun setting a few people in their places.
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“So,” Gabriel Strong whispered in her ear. “Who are you tonight? Ivana or Gotta?”
“Neither, Gabe. I’m Rhoda tonight. Ivana has the red wig and Gotta has the black wig.”
“Rhoda? I like the Fokker sisters better…”
“Well, instead you just have to settle for Ms. Horse tonight.”
“Rhoda… H…” Gabe blinked and smiled. He definitely had to appreciate his girl’s choice of pseudonyms. He understood why she never liked to use her real name or appearance in public. In her line of work, doing so can be extremely dangerous, especially when being seen around town on the arm of the owner of the most successful technological corporation in America. He wished she had better choice in music, though. She had requested this guy personally, though Gabe could not see what was so special about him that caught her eye. It was either the size or the hair, he decided, because the talent just wasn’t cutting it. “You are a naughty girl.”
“And you are just catching onto that?” she asked, leaning back in her chair. “I would have thought the dress would have been the first clue.”
“It should have been. The pianist you asked for nearly lost it just when you passed him.”
“Only nearly? I must be slipping,” she said. She waited for the waiter to pour the champagne before she continued. “Last year, he WOULD have lost it. Maybe I shouldn’t have taped the dress to my chest.”
“You aren’t slipping. The guy’s just reserved,” Gabe smirked. “Any particular reason you wanted me to see him play so badly?”
“You can’t see them because of the tux, but he has a set of tattoos I think you might be interested in.”
“Where and how do YOU know about them?!”
“Not there, Gabe. Get your mind out of the gutter.”
“You put it there.”
“Yes, and I’ll put it back there in a moment. These are on his arms, going nearly down to the elbow. Mom took a picture of them and I ran them through the database. At least some of the symbols come out as Pharaohan.”
Gabe looked over at Khalid and shook his head no. “No J… Rhoda. He’s not Pharaohan.”
“Exactly, but he seems to know the language… enough to get tattooed, that is. Other than that, he really is a good pianist,” she said. “At least he was last week.”
“He looks pissed to me. Good. Laurence told me he was rude on the phone.”
“Laurence is an asshole, Gabe. Not everyone is going to put up with his shit. I told him off myself the first time I called here. I guess I didn’t sound rich enough to talk to him.”
“Maybe, but…” Gabe blinked. On the other side of the room, Laurence was talking into a cell phone. His hearing focused in, screening out everything else in the room. Laurence just told someone that ‘he’ was here. “That’s his loss, isn’t it?”
“There’s one more thing. Khalid’s electrical signature…”
“What about it?”
“He has two of them. The second one is a harmonic of the first.”
“And why does that interest me?”
“I know you, Gabriel Strong. You won’t admit it, but your brain is already churning. You’re interested and you want to see what those are all about.”
“Nope. Not interested at all.”
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By now, Khalid’s program had shifted from Impressionistic music to slow jazz ballads, so all the rich snobs can press their bodies together and sway back and forth. Then, after they were done, they would all go home, have meaningless sex, and then go on living like there wasn’t a care in the world. Those guys had it all. They didn’t know anything about real human concerns, such as paying rent or utility bills. No, real life for these people was about whatever company they were planning on taking over next.
Fuck it. They’ve had their dream-like blissful dance time. Once “My Funny Valentine” was over, Khalid decided to treat them to the first of Bartok’s Rumanian Dances. HA! Good luck dancing to that one if they could figure out the time signatures. Once he finished it, he could already hear Laurence behind him trying to catch his attention.
“I think it is perhaps time for a break before your next set, Mr. Hunter. If you don’t mind, I would like to talk…”
“Yes, I do mind,” Khalid sneered. “And I’m just getting warmed up.” Time for a little “Confirmation.” He bet Charlie Parker was laughing in his grave right now… Just before he was about to start, he felt a faint glowing in his eyes and something… telling him he should move!
As he pushed away from the table, the arrow went through his shoulder joint and came out the other side. A roaring sound came from his mouth while he stumbled forward, this time an arrow going through his thigh. The restaurant broke into chaos with frightened patrons running toward the doors.
“Stay very still, Mufasa,” Gene said from the kitchen doorway. “This is going to hurt like a bitch.” He let another arrow fly. This one, however, was caught by Gabe. “Hello, Daemon… Don’t mind me. I’m just completing a contract.”
End Chapter One
Chapter Two
Khalid stumbled off the stage and onto the floor, wailing as loud as he could. The arrow in his leg snagged on the microphone cord and brought a speaker tumbling down on him. One arm and one leg each were down. With his free hand, he broke the shaft off the arrow in his shoulder and bit down on it. Then, he broke off the shaft going into his thigh. He started crawling toward the door, doing his best to keep the ongoing fight in the corner of his eye.
“Hotwire, get him out of here,” Daemon said, with his extradimensional sword flashing to his hand. He deflected another arrow bearing down on Khalid. “I’ll take care of Gene.”
“Not likely.” The arrow in the bow flashed white, casting sparks off. “You won’t get close enough.”
“Try me.” It flew off. Before it reached Daemon, it split into five and shot into different directions. He deflected one off his extradimensional sword, then realized that the others were converging on him.
“Better keep moving, Daemon,” Gene said, pushing the bow on his back. “Those are homing arrows that are locked onto your life force. No matter how much you deflect them or blast them, they are going to keep moving until they hit their target.” Gene watched Daemon zipping from place to place in the room, bouncing the arrows off his sword before they could strike him. “Now, where did Mufasa go…”
Hotwire looked up from Khalid, who was going into shock, and dashed her head around trying to get a fix on things. There… the microphone cable still on Khalid’s leg. She grabbed it and sliced it across the blade of the arrow sticking out of Khalid’s shoulder. “Back off,” she said to Gene. “You aren’t killing him today.”
“Lady, you can’t stop me, much less with a microphone cord,” Gene said drawing out his tonfa. “Now step aside so I can take care of Lion-O here.”
“He doesn’t need your kind of help.” Gene started to advance when the lights exploded, showering the room with glass. Once the initial explosion cleared away, he could see the field of electrons that surrounded the woman. Her hair – which had been impeccably pinned – started rising from the current going through her.
“Careful there,” Gene smirked. “Or else you might burn your dress away.”
“Guess that means you get a free show before you fry. Don’t worry… They’re real. Khalid,” she said.
“Wha…?” Khalid said, barely lucid enough to make anything out. He was trying to pull his shirt off. Hot… he felt hot…
“Quit fucking around and get the hell out.” What was left of the microphone cord wrapped around Khalid and jerked him into the air. Bits and pieces of tile fell to the ground behind Hotwire as Khalid disappeared through the ceiling.
“Psychokinetic?” Gene asked.
“No…” Hotwire answered. A flash of her eyes and the microphone stand pulled off the stage and flew to her hand. “Electropath with some nifty Pharaohan jewelry!” Once she caught it, she spun it around in her hands without taking her eyes off of Gene and held it out.
“THIS one’s going to be fun,” Gene said. He swung down one tonfa, but Hotwire spun to the side and tapped him in the back of the leg. She moved again toward the back of Gene’s head, only for Gene to block her and slam her in the stomach. Gene threw himself into her and knocked her to the floor. Before he could reach for her neck, a wave of electricity picked him off and hurled him into one of the nearby marble columns.
“Now now now, Gene,” she said as she jumped to her feet. She kicked off her stiletto heels and braced the microphone stand. “We just met. It’s too early for the two of us to be rolling around on the floor.”
“I always did love it when they play hard to get,” he said. A flash of his eyes and a field of mystical flame spread over him. “We can play some more, if you want. I like it rough.”
“Oh I don’t know, Gene,” Hotwire said. She rushed him herself, jabbing the microphone stand at his face. He moved at the last moment so the stand struck the marble column. She spun around, slapping it across his nose. “It doesn’t say much for you when my staff is longer than yours.”
“It isn’t how LONG it is that matters.” He slapped the stand out of her hands with on tonfa and hit her in the chin with the other one. “It’s how you use it.” He followed it up with a kick to the midsection and another punch to the face. That didn’t stop Hotwire from punching him – in someplace very painful.
“THAT has got to be the most overused phrase I’ve ever heard,” she said. She headbutted him in the chin and knocked him away with another wave of electricity. A flash of her eyes and metal objects and electric appliances around the room started lifting into the air. “A bastard like you should be able to do better than that.” A flip of her fingers and they all started launching themselves at Gene.
“Do you REALLY think you can stop me with these?” he spat. He started flying over toward her, reinforcing his mystic flame. His progress was slow because of the sheer number of objects thrown and rethrown at him, but he was closing the distance. “I have been at this business much longer than you have. People have tried a lot of things, but this… THIS takes the cake.”
“You are so stupid,” she said, not moving. At her command, the wires ripped out of the walls and tried to wrap around Gene, but they slid off his field. “I already beat you before you stepped in the door. You just didn’t realize it yet. I don’t need my powers, this room, the microphone stand, or even my significant martial arts training to defeat the likes of YOU.”
“Confident, are you?” he said. The miniature maelstrom dropped suddenly, freeing Gene’s path, but still Hotwire stood her ground. Gene continued moving toward her, keeping his eye open for whatever ace she had up her sleeve. “Then tell me, since you have me pegged. What do you need to take me?”
“All I need are THESE!” Hotwire pulled open the sides of her dress. Gene, who was taken off guard by Hotwire’s “aces”, stopped and stared gawk-eyed.
“HEY YOU!!!!” Daemon called out. He rushed in to stand between Gene and Hotwire. “Those are MINE!” Gene was about to attack Daemon, when he suddenly tensed up. Blood started bubbling out of his mouth as he fell over. “And THOSE are yours,” Daemon said, referring to the five enchanted arrows buried in Gene’s back.
“How…?”
“They homed in on me… and you just happened to get in their way,” he kicked Gene in the jaw and started to bring the sword down on Gene’s head when the man faded away. “Fucking bastard had an escape route.”
Hotwire readjusted her dress. “Took you long enough to figure that out.”
“Calculating five projectiles moving that fast in different directions and getting them in line… It’s not something I recommend… and that’s the last time you’re wearing that dress out, ‘Rhoda.’”
“Only because you plan on ripping it off of me later,” she said. “I ran out of charge doing the maelstrom. Khalid should be up on the roof.”
“Are you sure? I don’t hear anyone up there.”
“Give me a loan,” she said, grabbing him by the arm. The two of them flew through the hole in the ceiling and dropped onto the top of the roof. Daemon was right. There was nothing on the roof but a discarded microphone cord, two arrows, a tux coat, and a lot of blood. “He shouldn’t have been able to do this. He was already in shock when I sent him up here.”
“There are no other scents up here. He left by himself.”
“We have to find him.”
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“Sir… excuse me… Sir… You’re hurt… can I help you?”
With a growl, Khalid threw the well-meaning man into the dumpster across the street and kept stumbling on. He had memorized the scent on the arrows. For some reason he couldn’t name, he was positive that he knew where the man who shot the arrows was. He couldn’t remember much of what was happening or even why he was in this strange place. What he DID know was that someone tried to kill him.
A fatal mistake…
End Chapter Two
Mufasa
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The White King's Bishop
Officially Annoyed by Marvel Girl
No, I'm not jumping to the Grey Court
King of Insane Kemetic Lions
Doesn't like the way Gene's eyeing his hair
*ROAR!!!!*