The Mercenaries’ Tale – 1.05 The Hole
One of the more infamous haunts was on the edge of Undercit, on the north side. It was one of the few brick buildings left standing in the area, many of the weathered walls having been repaired with corrugated tin, imbuing it a patchwork quality. Back in the days when construction workers and their families had inhabited the town, the building had housed a pumping station which provided clean water to the area’s inhabitants. Now it had been gutted and repurposed to serve a much more sought after liquid: alcohol.
The sign over the door was weathered and had originally displayed ‘Pumping Station No. Two’, but someone had painted over the sign with the words ‘The Watering Hole’. Aptly, the locals referred to it more directly as ‘The Hole’, on account of the fact that it was a complete hole. The more anal retentive members of the Undercit community argued over exactly what kind of an establishment it was. The previous owner had tried to dress it up as a quaint pub in a bid to lure in customers seeking more creature comforts than the simple pleasure of having a beer. In order to achieve the desired effect, they had gone to great lengths to try and smarten the place up. The walls had been painted a soothing cream colour which was now bubbling and cracked in places, most of the spots where the paint had flaked off completely having been hidden behind what the owner thought were interesting paraphernalia and sculptures but were considered by everyone else to be rubbish. The most prominent pieces were the overly elaborate chandelier-esque lighting fixtures crafted from scarps of iron. They dominated the ceiling, several hanging just above the booths which had replaced much of the machinery that had once filled the station, their cushions old and worn, the stuffing escaping from the worst patches and littering the sodden floor. The overhead lighting fixtures were mostly for show; the main source of illumination and biggest attempt at creating an ambiance1 came in the form of ‘mood lighting’ – jam jars stuffed with dribbling candles, the wax marking the surfaces it had escaped onto.
The centrepiece of the Hole was the sizeable well in the middle of it. Originally one of the pumping station’s practical features, it was now a long time out of use. Planks of wood had been nailed across its top to convert it into a makeshift table.
The bar might have been described as ‘rustic’ and ‘pleasantly local’ by optimistic glass-half full types, and by pessimistic glass-half empty types was referred to as ‘the local’, because the penniless and deprived customers currently frequenting the bar certainly had enough to be cynical about. Besides, when your glass is half empty it is always a good idea to find somewhere where you can fill it.
The Hole was currently empty, with exception for the barman and the few others drinking at separate tables. This was because it was a fairly exclusive establishment, the exclusivity revolving around the current owner’s surly misdemeanour and loaded shotgun. Ol’ Jim Malone the one-eyed bearded bartender had came into ownership of the Hole after its previous owner, an overly-enthusiastic chap with a penchant for serving colourful drinks with little umbrellas in them, had met a sudden and unfortunate demise by election; he’d served some of the aforementioned colourful drinks to a gang of hardened biker bandits, and they’d elected to feed him his own leg whole.
Malone hardly ever talked. He wore a tattered shirt, an apron and an eye patch over his bad eye, and spent most of the day carefully and ponderously wiping out the Hole’s interesting assortment of drinking vessels, consisting of cracked glasses and buckled tankards. The rest of the day he spent reinforcing the Hole’s exclusivity by automatically reaching for the loaded shotgun he kept under the bar every time someone he didn’t like the look of walked through the front door, and Malone didn’t like the look of many people. As if spring loaded, the shotgun would come up in his hands in one swift motion and, as the would-be customer back-pedalled out the way they came, the shotgun’s barrel would follow them in a steady arc. Once they were back outside, the shotgun would disappear as quickly as it had materialised and Malone’s hands would be back to the task of wiping the glasses with a greasy cloth.
Old Malone, courtesy of Jazon19.
Malone’s one quirk was his collection of eyepatches, which he displayed by hanging them on a line of hooks set into a wood panel affixed to the wall, next to the bar. They were all black or brown, apart from a blue one with a glittery trim. This one he reserved for happy hour, which didn’t occur too often.
Today there was a rarity in the Hole, in that there was a group of people talking to one another in one of the booths. It wasn’t just the communication that was unusual but the fact there was a group of people together under the Hole’s roof, as the kind of customers Malone encouraged were solitary, disheartened figures with not much fight in them. Occasionally Malone’s one eye would peer up from under its bushy eyebrow and check on the group, but he didn’t seem that worried about them. The fact they had got through the front door in the first place was a good indication that they were welcome.
The group consisted of a man, a woman and a robed person of indeterminable gender. The man, a fairly well-built person with dark hair and a distinctive scar across their face bisecting their nose, was enthusiastically leading the conversation and often burst into loud, rambunctious laughter at short notice. He wore a three-quarter length black leather jacket that had not only seen better days but had smelt, touched and even tasted them, and it now looked as though it spent most of its time pining for the days when its wearer took more care of themselves and their apparel. Torn jeans and a burgundy shirt accompanied the jacket in the nostalgia of a rough life. The most noticeable element to the man’s character, however, was his bionic arm.
The left sleeve of the man’s jacket had been torn away to accompany the metal mound that emerged from his shoulder. Three distinctive components and two joints comprised the majority of the scuffed prosthetic, as well as a surrogate hand which in this case was a three-pronged claw. It clacked and grinded with the man’s body language, as the man had grown so used to it that he hardly recognised it as a false limb anymore. Occasionally the hand would spin right around in a complete circle on its pivot.
The woman, a more reserved red-headed figure, wore brown. A long tan trenchcoat, a pair of boot-cut mud-coloured trousers and worn cow-leather gloves completed her look, along with a wide-brimmed beige gambler2 that she currently wasn’t wearing that sat on the seat next to her. Her long red locks were pinned back to keep her face clear. Compared to the man, who’s mental default was that of ‘genuinely bemused at everything that’s going on around him no matter how trivial’, the woman’s natural expression was one most other people would don upon learning that something has defecated in their beautiful rosebush and, judging by the size and shape of said excrement, that something was another human being. To extend the analogy, the world was the woman’s rosebush, and every time she saw someone new she regarded them like they were dropping their trousers and producing something for her to remember them by. It is a very dour viewpoint to have of life when you decide that people = shit, but something in the woman’s life had obviously provoked her into accepting such a perspective on her fellow man.
Finally, there was the robed person. They wore a long, flowing light blue robe and sash decorated with gold trim. A slim figure, trying to determine their gender was confounded by the gold mask clung to the upper part of their face, an intricate beaked design with rounded black glass over the eye holes. They were the quietest of the trio, rarely contributing anything audible to the conversation.
Malone secretly liked them. They were mercenaries, and this was their local. They always paid for their drinks, they never caused any hassle and they often scared off Undercit residents less desirable than themselves. He smiled as the man heartily broke into laughter again, this time accompanied by the woman, who was chuckling. She rarely laughed, and it was nice to see her in a light mood for a change. This thought was broken by the sound of footsteps at the entrance of the Hole. Malone tensed and turned his good eye to the approaching gentleman who strolled in and walked up to the bar.
“Good day ser,” the man said, placing his large hands on the bar. “Ahm leckin’ fer Doug McCracken, Blaise O’Donnell and that magical fecker who hangs arend with ‘em.”
Post by Sean Patrick Payne | October 14, 2013 at 11:00 am | The Mercenaries' Tale | No comment
Tags: Blaise, Doug McCracken, Gratin, Old Malone, the Hole, the Mercs, Undercit