milliways_bar | Tuco

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Tuco - First EP

OOM: Once Upon a Time in New Mexico...

The door to the bar swings open, closely followed by a dusty boot-clad foot. From behind it strides a sweaty, filthy, red-faced man with a smug look on his face. He takes three loud, deliberate steps forward before his smile disappears.

"What kind of saloon puts a gunsmith's sign up front?"

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"Not 'can'," X says, matter-of-factly.

"Will."

Negotiations happen to other people.

"Okay, I will!"

Tuco looks very sheepish indeed. He just got beat by an unarmed woman who barely weighs half as much. Well, unarmed except for those...what the hell are those things?

Somehow falling off a broken noose into an open grave isn't the strangest or most embarrassing thing that's happened to him today.

"Good."

X flicks a quick look at John, as if to make sure he is on board with the non-aggression plan as well, then hops up onto a table and back into the rafters.

Where she goes after that?

Who can say.

But chances are good that she's still watching.

Just in case.

John nods by way of agreement, then, after X leaps up into the rafters, saunters over, his hands on his hips.

"Now, ordinarily I suppose this'd be the point where I'd bluster about, enraged at how you pulled a piece on me, how you threatened to - 'blow my brains out'."

He squats down next to Tuco.

"But here's the thing. Frankly, I think it'd be pointless. You ain't the first dumb fucker to pull a piece on me, and-" he says this with a chuckle "-I doubt you'll be the last. Me gettin' all pissy about it wouldn't change a damn thing, least of all your - unkindly disposition.

"Now, you've been told the rules. You've been shown how they're enforced. You pull that cute little pistol on me again, and I won't need to end you. Miss X there will."

He holds a hand out to Tuco, willing to help him up. "Now. You willin' to try again, mister?"

Tuco slaps John's hand away and stands up under his own power.

"Smile all you like now, gringo," he says. "Here you've got your police and your...whatever that girl is to protect you."

John smirks and stands up with him. "They ain't mine, mister. She ain't, neither. I'm just a farmer, is all."

He crosses his arms. "Now, seein' as how we ain't exactly on the best of terms, I don't think you're likely to care overmuch, but...my name's John Marston."

It's a step toward (somewhat) orderly conversation.

Well, it's an attempt.

"Well, you are right," he says. "I don't care."

At the moment, Tuco's eyes are looking at everything in the bar except John. Eventually, they fixate on the back door.

"That's the door out back," John says. "Leads to a porch, a lake, a forest, all manner of crazy things.

"Though I suppose a fella like you'd be more interested in the shooting range."

"What I'm interested in is a way out," Tuco says.

He's already bolted off for the door before he's finished saying it. He flings the back door open. And blinks. That...isn't New Mexico.

"¿Que carajo...?"

Edited 2012-11-26 05:23 (UTC)

John shakes his head, following after him - this fella just does not learn.

"Like I said, that's the way out back. Wherever you came in from? This ain't it, mister."

Tuco hasn't really been listening. He's entirely too dumbstruck. Which tends to be when he starts babbling.

"But...how could they put all this in Socorro? It doesn't make no sense! I must be dreaming or..."

Or maybe he didn't make it through the desert after all.

"Or you ain't in Socorro no more, friend."

John shakes his head, his hands on his hips.

"I told you this was the end of the universe."

Again, Tuco only half-hears him.

"...Am I dead?"

John sighs. As much as he imagines it would solve a lot of problems in Tuco's world...

"You're no more dead than I am, mister."

Beat.

"And no, I ain't dead. So you're alive, you damn fool."

"Then where the hell am I!?"

Tuco is confused and more than a bit terrified. This is about as close as a man like him gets to crying.

John throws his hands up in the air. "I told you, mister! In a bar at the end of the universe!"

Did he not hear him the first two times?

"Which end of the universe!? What does that mean? And how in the hell did I get there FROM GODDAMNED NEW MEXICO!?"

Edited 2012-11-26 07:03 (UTC)

"The end of the universe! The literal end! And it means we're on a goddamned asteroid, and you got here through a fucking door!"

John's shouting too, now, whether he likes it or not.

"But why!? Things like that don't happen!"

"Yes, they do!"

John takes a deep breath. Collects himself.

"Look," he says. "The Landlord wanted you here for a reason. The door for that saloon you were goin' into turned into a portal here. I don't know how it works. Frankly, nobody does, and I'm not sure they ever will. You understand, mister?"

Tuco exhales deeply through flared nostrils. He rubs his forehead with his palm, clearly still frustrated and confused.

"Fine. So you don't know, I don't know. But that doesn't mean I've got to like it. I've got important business in New Mexico and this...whatever the hell this place is...is costing me a lot of money keeping me here!"

Edited 2012-11-26 07:30 (UTC)

"No it ain't."

John lets one hand fall by his side. "Soon as you came here, time on your side of the door stopped. Don't matter how long you stay, you'll go back the same moment you left."

Tuco stares at John for a long moment. It's the kind of stare that could cut through solid rock. And then he cracks. He begins laughing hysterically.

"Of course!" he roars. "Why not? I'll bet it has rivers made of whiskey, too! It makes as much sense as anything else!"

Edited 2012-11-27 01:57 (UTC)

John sighs. Somethin' just ain't right about this man, but when you're at the end of the universe, you've got no ground to question anybody's mental state. "Wouldn't surprise me, mister. Would not surprise me."

Beat.

"There're rooms available for rent upstairs, if you're so inclined. Bar has keys.

"And no, she don't dispense ammunition."

Tuco sighs. "I'll bet it even has drinks, too. If they're going to keep me locked in here for who-in-God's-name-knows how long, I will be needing a lot of whiskey."

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bornuntotrouble - 2012-11-27 05:28 (UTC) - Expand

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el_feo - 2012-11-27 05:39 (UTC) - Expand

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