Part 87
Not long before.
Without breaking stride, all three of us burst through the swinging door into the kitchen, where a trio of olive-skinned, mustachioed men stand around a stainless steel table, obliviously chopping various food-items to strains of Poison’s “Nothin’ But a Good Time,” from a radio on the shelf above the sink. As Bret Michaels raises a toast to all of us who are breaking our backs every day, the three smiling cooks look up, and lose their smiles.
“Hi,” Mephis says sharply, waving his hand.
One of the cooks nods slowly, unsure.
“We were uh...,” Nepotism says, running his tongue over his lips and making a little ‘tsk’ sound. “They said this was a short cut to the dining room.” He pats his stomach.
Just as unsure, one of the cooks points to the door behind him.
“Thanks,” Mephis says, leading our train to the exit.
We get through as Bret screeches, “CC, pick up that guitar and uh... talk to me!”
Most of the people in attendance are seated around the twelve-foot oak table. Some are eating. Others check out the paintings that have been arranged about the room. A few are talking about the fireworks, fingers nervously working over the Zodiac symbols engraved on the table’s surface. One or two are rubbing their feet back and forth on the cranberry-colored rugs, but the events all the way on the other side of the mansion has not gotten anyone excited yet. The presence of three tuxedoed, mildly famous young sneezers associating with the kitchen help, that’s a different story altogether.
I spot our goal, an oak rail partitioning off the staircase from the rest of the dining room, with a plastic sign screwed over it reading ‘CONCERT HALL.’ Extra chairs line the walls around the table for those that wish only to spectate the meal. A SpectraCom Security agent in a tuxedo slouches there. His job is to protect, not attack. The only honorable thing is to die here with them, so he waits for the horrifying menace. Until it does, he will conserve energy, and stare at the cleavage of the up-and-coming young actress that recently slept her way into a love scene with one of Nepotism’s older brothers. Our entry isn’t even enough to break the guard out of his stupor.
The up-and-coming young actress is standing though, eyes on us, mouth agape in shock. “Is that paint?” she gasps at the unfathomable assault on our defenseless clothing. “They’re painting us?” Her eyes and mouth are wide. “Oh my God!” she screams, throwing her hand over her forehead and falling back in her seat, jiggling her boobs famously beneath her sobs. “They’re painting us!”
Memorably and in slow motion with the most agonizing shrill explosion, the floor-to-ceiling windows all disintegrate at once and cave in on themselves like fine piles of ice and snow.
This, of course, gets everyone screaming.
Dashing about too.
Then the paint balls are spraying the room. A smoke bomb hisses to life, belching a magenta plume as white and thick as a milkshake. BAK! A bottle rocket kamikazes into the corner of the room. Even the guard is up looking around, thinking something might be wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment