Sometimes You Wanna Go Where Everybody Knows Your Name (16 Patrons Remain)

Seymour's

A bar on the outskirts of Reality. A real dive. The kind of place that violent men romanticize. Here, the drinks flow, the lights are neon, the music plays when patrons make their entrances, and the patrons themselves? Well, they usually fight.

There were thirty two patrons here moments ago, but half of them departed. Different circumstances led to their removal, but nonetheless, it's an hour closer to closing time, and only half of them remain.

In a shadowy corner sits the Desperate Man and the Politician. The Desperate man hides his dark eyes behind a pair of bright sunglasses. He pleads with the Politician, whose snake smile betrays his venomous intent. The Desperate Man has turned to foreign interests to save something terribly important. The Politician has what the Desperate Man wants. He toys with him before announcing that he'd like to buy everyone a drink and reminding them all to vote.

Nearby sits the Old Bear and his pet weasel. The Old Bear, larger than life, thinks of his dead mother and his surrogate daughter while the weasel schemes grandiose designs. Across from him is the Restaurateur. He does not know why the Bear stares at him and licks his lips – he hopes it's because the Bear has heard about his delicious hamburgers.

The Lizard planks on the head of the Sophomore, torturing itself. The Sophomore, feeling silly and utterly unphased, plays games with steel chairs and other pieces of sentient furniture. When together like this, they are the most formidable duo in the bar. Everyone is thankful that the fights at Seymour's are one on one.

Leaning against the Jukebox is the Rhinestone Cowboy. He has a timebomb strapped to his chest that counts down to an unknown hour. His self-destruct sequence is activated. He drowns himself in liquor and drugs. Everyone watches. No one helps. To his left is the Tentacle. It grabs onto anything it can while the octopus pulls it further into itself.

The Mime sits at the bar. His conman associate does the talking while he mimics the legend he used to be. Nearby sits the Phenom, his natural athletic ability matched only by his mustache. These two have fought recently, under different circumstances, but things seem far from settled. No one would be surprised if they killed each other. No one would be upset either.

The Guru sits in lotus pose in the center of the floor, pretentious as he is dangerous. The A-Lister sits at the end of the bar, irritated with how life has turned out. Recently, he was mauled by the Old Bear – but he survived, and he made sure the Old Bear saw him walk in.

Far below everyone, in the basement, is the Golden Rookie. He is a walking contradiction, both new and very, very old. Both cool, and very, very uncool. He imprisons himself down there. Calls it the Gallows. He had hopes that one of his friends would be the ones to drag him out of Seymour's, but they all left without him. He considers that a slight.

In a low-lit corner by themselves, at a table with two V's carved into it, sits the Serious Man and the Comic Relief. The Serious Man has a dragon on his back that he carries like a weight. There was a time when he could barely withstand the antics of the Comic Relief, but had come to love him deeply. The loyalty between them is rare, special. Their bond, as permanent as a tattoo.

And yet, the Serious Man still does not appreciate those with a lack of professionalism, a lack of respect. Those types, he believes, have no business fighting in the same bar as him. So perhaps one could understand why his eyes pierce right through the final patron.

The Shid Gremlin.

He is, one might say, most unlike the others.

Dipshitted beyond measure, as calloused and disgusting as an old man's foot. A Wild Thing not even Sendak could draw with a Michael Jordan jersey and a penchant for mixing inhalants and cheap booze. He has trained with a nihilist goat spirit. He has been both a loser and a dragon. He is now considered a champion.

Though his crown is silver.

The Serious Man watches the Shid Gremlin raise hell by himself, start arguments few even understand the premise of, and rail against the injustice of existing in a world he does not control. The Serious Man, a champion himself with a golden crown, finds the Shid Gremlin mostly as anyone would find him, an unserious cretin one should stay far away from. But he also sees him as something more, and less, than that.

He sees the Shid Gremlin as an insult.

An outlaw mudshow in a world of tradition and technique.

The Shid Gremlin's very existence offends the Serious Man's sensibilities.

And the Shid Gremlin knows it.

Flaunts it.

That's the thing about Shid Gremlins. They like to crawl under the skin. They'll live there, if you let them, burrowing beneath the flesh. They'll bind to the bone and drink the marrow out. They'll poison the blood and the mind. This is their modus operandi.

Normally, they have to work at getting under the skin to that degree. They have to start blood feuds that get really personal and ugly, or perform a mind control operation. But the Shid Gremlin knows that he has none of that work with the Serious Man. He knows that the mere idea of a Shid Gremlin has buried itself under the Serious Man's skin already, far deeper than the ink of the dragon on his back.

So when the Shid Gremlin finally feels a hankering for violence, all he has to do is waltz right over to that table in the corner with the two V's scrawled into its veneer, and pound his fist on it.

The Serious Man stands to his feet, fists balled and teeth clenched.

This isn't simply Champion versus Champion, Gold versus Silver.

It's Ideal versus Ideal.

Talent versus Endurance.

Reason versus Absurdity.

Reality versus Unreality.

“I heard that pictures don't change, just the people inside of them do.” - NF, ‘Lost in the Moment’ The Boiler Room

It was early morning when Fred Dick removed his sleep apnea mask and gave the Lasagna Boys an important chore.

“Look here,” he said. “I printed y'all a picture off the internet machine of my opponent: Kurrykurryama. I want y'all to stare at his fuggin’ picture for however long it takes.”

“However long what takes?” Toddrick asked.

“However long it takes for you to figure out how tha fug I'ma beat this muhfugger,” Fred replied. “Do you have any idea the kinda run he's on? It's like he's Forrest Gump. Just running across the face of this fucking company until he tires out! Well – we gotta put a dayum stop to it.”

“Okay,” Miguel said. “Why though?”

Fred replied thusly, “Because we want that muhfuggin Universal Title. That there's the Big Belt. It's actually more important than your lives. Like, I'd actually murder the shid out of boffa ya fo' dat belt. See, my Intense Title, ‘tis truly nice as hell, and I do love it, but, well, you ‘member how Bradley Pitts was with Jennifuh Anniston? But he left her for someone more sexier? See, dis belt here, dats muh Jennifuh.”

Fred got close to Miguel's face, close enough to stick his tongue out and lick Miguel's nose if he wanted.

“But I'm lookin’ for my Angelina, nawmsayin? I know you do,” Fred purred. “I know you do.”

Then, he locked Toddrick and Miguel in two, separate dog kennels.

“Go on, go to bed neow,” Fred had said. “And don't stop starin’ at that picture until it speaks to you from beyond the ether. You gotta focus on it with your eyes and your feeble minds until you break free from Reality. That's a hard thang to do, neow. You want my advice? Okay. Personally, I find that when one seeks to escape Reality and find sacred knowledge from beyond our mortal plane, it helps to do a lotta drugs. Therefore, I've left you both a couple cans of spray paint each. Enjoy. But don't overdose! Fuggin’ – I just now thought about that! God damn it! No fuggin' overdosin’. ZERO fuggin' overdosin’. I done spent too much time warshin’ yer brains for y'all to end my MK Ultra experiment so early. Actually, tell ya what, go ahead and fuggin’ overdose if that's what you wanna do, sorry ace fuggin’, ungrateful ace sumsa benches. I don't give a shid. Actually, yes I do. If yew two muhfuggas even THANK about pullin’ off an overdose on me, I swear to GAWD I'll kill yo’ parents in an incredibly complicated revenge plot. Only, guess what? You don't have any parents. Because I'm yo' mothafuggin’ parents. Daddy ‘Sagna, somebody called me that recently. Reckon y'all can too. Also, if y’all did have parents, I already kilt ‘em. But y'all never did have no got damn parents, cuz I'm yo’ parents. Understand?”

Then, Fred left them to go get his eyebrows microbladed.

Thus, that is where the Lasanga Boys currently find themselves. In padded doggie kennels, barely big enough to fit inside of, with printed-out 8x11 photos of this mysterious “Kurrykurryama” in their hands and cans of spray paint by their sides.

Toddrick examines the photo carefully, and says, “Hey, Miguel, what kinda asshole takes a picture with his back turned to the camera so he can show off his tattoo?”

Miguel replies, “Well, he's proud of it.”

Toddrick looks at it deeply. Focuses on it.

Focuses more on it, even harder and deeper than he focused on it already, which wasn't that hard or deep, but you know, these things take time. They escalate.

He stares at the Dragon.

“Welp, the ether ain’t saying a damn thing to me,” Toddrick says as he shakes up a can of paint.

Miguel, however, is already ahead of Toddrick. With red paint on the tip of his nose, he gazes into the dragon's eyes.

Is that its lips beginning to form a smile?

Or was it about to smile the whole time?

Seymour's

As the Serious Man and the Shid Gremlin face off, neither entity is afraid to share personal confessions with one another.

“If the likes of you were to get the best of me,” the Serious Man says, “It would undermine my entire identity.”

“Funny,” the Shid Gremlin replies. “The likes of you's done undermined my identity my entire muhfuggin' life.”

They encircle each other. The silver crown, the golden crown, two opposing sets of ideals, they swirl around each other in the fog of war and drink.

One might ask, besides their ideals, besides their identities, why would two crowned champions fight each other? Why not just exist separately, allowing each to maintain their own realms as they see fit?

Because, a new realm was in play.

The Universe itself.

All the silver.

All the gold.

And this…

This is why the patrons fight at Seymour's.

It's the only bar in town that makes such new openings possible for the likes of lesser champions, though champions they may be. It's the only bar in town that gives everyone inside an equal opportunity to take the Crown of the Universe off its Mantle.

Above the bar on proud display, the Mantle sits. It watches and looms over the patrons as though they were inside a labyrinth of its own design.

As if any minute now, it would release the minotaur.

After all, the Mantle desires more than anything to keep its crown.

Because in the end, the Crown of the Universe just means more.

Look amongst the patrons in Seymour's. The sixteen who remain are all united by the desire for this Crown. This is why they gather. This is why they fight.

And they all expect to win.

For the Serious Man, for the Shid Gremlin, this is the only opportunity they have to pursue the Crown of the Universe while remaining champions of their own realms.

And so, it is little wonder that once the first hands are thrown by the Serious Man and the Shid Gremlin towards one another, they are thrown with the entire weight of the Universe behind them.

“Two things are infinite: The Universe, and human stupidity – and I'm not sure about the Universe.” -Albert Einstein The Boiler Room

Hours upon hours had passed.

Days, perhaps.

Well, not days.

Actually, maybe not that many hours.

Have you ever been MK Ultra'd? If so, you'd know that time becomes something very hard to keep up with. Couple that with being high as fuck on spray paint, and yeah, you could say that time basically just becomes whatever you want it to.

Toddrick and Miguel, high as hell, eyes glued to their photos of this mysterious “Kurrykurryama” fellow.

They had no real idea who he was.

They had never watched wrestling. At least, not until the 4th of July. Even then, they hardly understood what was happening.

But as they focused they began sort of…

Capture little details, compile them together in their incredibly broken minds. Together, they honed in on a few specific traits.

1. The confidence in his face. It wasn't unproven, unjustified. That's arrogance. This was not arrogance in his expression. Arrogance is when a toddler thinks they are the fastest kid alive. It's naivety. It's inexperience. The mysterious Kurrykurryama had none of that in his expression.
2. His eyes, specifically, lacked the kind of whimsical evil that Daddy ‘Sagna had in his own. They were not evil. They didn't even know what whimsy was. His eyes meant business.
3. The dragon on his back. It covered the entirety. No one gets a back tattoo that big unless it says something very important about them.

“Well,” Fred said as he stepped back into the Boiler Room. “Did you hear anything? From beyond the ether?”

“Yeah,” Toddrick said.

“What?” Replied Fred.

“You're fucked.”

“Damniiiiiiiit,” Fred said, with a series of petulant stomps on the Boiler Room floor. “I was afraid you would hear that from beyond the ether.”

Fred threw his milkshake against the wall and himself to the Boiler Room floor. He began sobbing.

Miguel sighed. He didn't know if it was the spray paint he nearly overdosed on or the fact that Fred turned his brain into a gumbo for Fred's will to feast on, but either way, Miguel was feeling empathy for the first time in his entire life. He hated it.

“Do you really want to beat him, Daddy ‘Sagna?” Miguel asked.

“More than anything!” Fred sobbed.

“Then you need to listen to me.”

Fred sat up, wiped the tears away from his eyes.

Toddrick took a hit of spray paint to the dome.

“This uh… ‘Kurrykurryama’ guy. You say he's the Five Star Champion. You say he's on a legendary run. But you know what? He hasn't ran into the likes of you.”

Fred nodded, sniffled. “This is good. This is good – oh, and bonus points for the wordplay.”

Miguel nodded in kind. “I'm looking at this picture and I'm seeing a man who is the exact opposite of you. He is physically fit. He is gifted. His tattoo actually looks good.”

“C'mawn man,” Fred interjects.

“Just hear me out,” Miguel continues. “He's got this quiet confidence about him. He doesn't need to tell the world that he's the best in the ring, his work will prove that. In fact, he's all about work. You remember the other day, when you hooked a car battery to Toddrick's nuts, and like, we were training for future torture scenarios, but also, it was legit like, really funny the way Toddrick screamed when we electrocuted his balls? So we did it extra? You had the happiest look in your eyes that I've ever seen. You looked like Santa Claus in a fucking Coke commercial.”

“And?” Fred asked, patience running thin.

“This Kurrykurryama guy has never looked like Santa Claus in a Coke commercial in his life. He doesn't know what mirth is. He doesn't know the joy, the pure, unadulterated joy of making Toddrick scream while we send electricity straight to his tater tots. But you do.”

Miguel tried to stand, mimicking the rising action of the point he's making, but forgot he was in a kennel. He quickly sits back down.

“Do you know what happens when a thesis and an antithesis meet?”

“Buddy,” Fred said, “I don't even know what an antiffufus even is.”

“It's a counterpoint,” Miguel said. “Say the point, the thesis, is ‘Take your work seriously, take your body seriously, and don't make a mockery of this sport.’”

“And that's Kurry?” Fred asked, making sure he's following. “The theefus? That's Kurry right thur?”

“It is,” Miguel confirmed. “And the antithesis would be, ‘Nyaaahhhh, fuck all that.’”

“And that's me? I'm the antififfifuss?” Fred asked, starting to catch the vibe.

Miguel sighed. “Yes, that's you. And when a thesis and an antithesis meet in the battleground of ideas, neither win out.”

“Huh?” Fred asked, anger flushing to his face. “When a theefus and an antiffififius meet, neither one win? Then what tha FUG ARE YOU EVEN TALGIN’ BOUT MIGUEL!?"

“Daddy ‘Sagna, neither wins out, it's true,” Miguel continued. “Instead, they synthesize into a new idea altogether.”

“Mmkay, mmkayyyyy,” Fred said, smacking his lips. Then he asked, “But what does that mean for me?”

“It means that if you find a way to synthesize what makes him good and what makes you good, then you'll have already surpassed him. Don't you see, Daddy ‘Sagna?”

Fred looked excitedly over at Toddrick. Toddrick had passed out, slipped beyond the ether himself.

Fred forgave him.

“Tell me, Miguel, tell me.”

“My liege,” Miguel said. “If you want to beat Kurrykurryama… you'll have to… actually… train.”

Fred, initially, was devastated. He had made it so far on pure want-to and a natural ability to get back up after getting his shid kicked in, that to start trying to do better now would feel like a step backwards somehow.

But then, what was the old saying? “Two steps forward, one step back?” If he were to take one step back, that would mean he then takes two steps forward, making him, somewhere, you know, further than he was before the step back. Some number of steps.

Bottom line? He was fucked if he didn't. Everyone knew that. Even Fred.

“Miguel,” Fred said.

“Yes, Daddy ‘Sagna?”

“Don't tell Toddrick,” Fred said. “But you're my favorite Lasagna Boy.”

“Thanks, my liege. It means a lot.”

“Would you like a treat?” Fred asked.

“Oh boy, would I,” Miguel replied.

Fred walked over to a box of dog biscuits. He slipped one between the kennel cage walls. Miguel ate it off the kennel floor.

Fred turned the lights out.

“I'll be back tomorrow.”

“My liege,” Miguel said. “Wait.”

“Yes?” Fred replied.

“What if I have to piss? Or, shit?”

A pregnant pause in the dark Boiler Room.

Finally, Fred replied, “Then piss. Shid.”

“On myself?”

Another pregnant pause.

“I'ma go now, Miguel.”

“Okay.”

Fred hauled ass from the Boiler Room door and began making his way through the belly of the United Center in Chicago, Illinois. He needed cell service desperately.

He was not much of a runner. He was even less of a sprinter. Waddling would have to do.

After about 45 minutes, he finally made it through the United Center's undercarriage to the outside employee parking. He reached in his pocket. Pulled out his phone. Dialed a number. Held it to his ear.

“Bobanner… hey… hey, can you hear – naw, naw, my service fuggin SUGS dawg. Ohp, ok, I hear you now. Hey, I need a favor.”

Fred took a deep breath. Then, he asked a career-altering question.

“Will you teach me how to do a suplex?”

Seymour's – Closing Time.

The final bell had rung.

It was time to go home.

Most of the patrons had left. Sixteen had dwindled to eight. Eight had halved into four. And four quickly became two.

But, at closing time, there was only one remaining.

No one expected the Shid Gremlin to be the last one in Seymour's.

And yet, there he was.

Looking up at the Mantle, who refused to let go of the Crown of the Universe.

“You will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands,” the Mantle said to the Shid Gremlin.

“December's just around the corner,” the Shid Gremlin replied. “By then, everything will be cold and dead.”

“Synthesis is like telling somebody how you really feel after carrying it around for months: the weight that pours like sand off your shoulders with getting clarity.” - Mark Brand