The Stopped Clock - Criss Cross!
Feb. 6th, 2011 05:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hwrnmnbsolI was in The Stopped Clock for Trivia Night. That’s always a humiliating experience, since the cross-section of history I’ve encountered is a very small slice of the sheer volume of history out there. I counted nine questions concerning obscure matters of the Dark Ages and none of the modern era, which I think is unfair but what the hell. I did have some good beers I’ve never tried, including a microbrew that Edgar swears will one day be copied by the Trappists.
There were a couple of guys in the corner having a conversation, and because I was sitting near them, I couldn’t help but hear what they were talking about. Or at least that’s the excuse everybody in The Stopped Clock has taught me to use; if that bar were a nation, eavesdropping would be its national sport. Actually, now that I think about it, The Stopped Clock probably meets most of the qualifications for sovereign nationhood, although its chief means of defense is not being there when you want to invade it, which is kind of cheating.
So I was completely accidentally overhearing what these two guys were saying, and that was this:
“We have so much in common,” hissed the one with the curly black hair and the neat mustache. “Hatred of tyranny. A desire to serve our people.” He leaned forward dramatically. “The courage to do what must needs be done.”
“You know nothing about me,” the older guy with the toga and the Justin Bieber hair countered. “All you think you know about me comes from a play written more than sixteen centuries after I died. You’re comparing yourself with a fictional character, Booth.”
The younger man straightened his stage military uniform. “I know enough about your real life, Brutus. I know, for instance, that we both must commit a murder. I say: let’s trade murders. Criss Cross!”
“Guys,” I cut in, coming over with my beer, “I couldn’t help but overhear what you were talking about, and I have to say: this sounds like the opening act of Bad Idea Theater.”
The two conspirators seemed a little ruffled at me barging in like that, but Booth composed himself quickly. “And what’s so wrong about the idea? It’s foolproof! We each go back in time. I use my thespian powers to impersonate Brutus and commit his murder of Julius Caesar. Meanwhile, he dyes his hair, learns a bit of English, and goes back to shoot President Lincoln. We each will return to this temporally neutral location afterwards to compare notes and savor the results. If caught before we can jaunt forwards…”
“Horizontally,” I corrected, having learned a thing or two in the times I had been drinking there.
“If caught before we can jaunt,” continued Booth, glaring at me, “we will both be trivially found to be the wrong person, and hence will not be executed. It is a perfectly foolproof plan to commit two assassinations that will rock each of our respective worlds.” He leaned back triumphantly and drank deeply from his Tom Collins. Brutus, meanwhile, looked down into his Bloody Mary and shook his head slightly.
“I take it you’re not convinced,” I said to Brutus.
“It seems like an unnecessary elaboration,” the Roman admitted. “If we’re so interested in escaping, why don’t we just go back and do our own murder, and then jaunt here?”
“Where's the artistry?!” Booth demanded. “Where’s the flair for the dramatic that will capture the imaginations of the people? This isn’t just a murder we’re doing, senator! Our mutual aims are not simply to kill a tyrant, but also to destabilize a government! We cannot succeed unless we secure the admiration of our nations for our bold actions!”
“But the people will never know of your little detail,” Brutus countered. “If your plan is executed properly, nobody will ever know that we are not who we are supposed to be!”
“Then we shall drop hints to make them wonder,” Booth suggested, arching one eyebrow. “When you shoot Lincoln in his private box, you shall leap to the stage below…”
“Is that a high leap? I’m not a young man anymore,” Brutus inserted. Booth gritted his teeth.
“YOU SHALL LEAP TO THE STAGE BELOW,” he repeated, “and shout ‘Sic Semper Tyrannis!’”
Brutus almost choked on his drink. “Nobody talks like that, you know.”
Booth was undaunted. “And for my part, when I stab Caesar in the Senate, I shall shout ‘The South Shall Rise Again!’”
“Now wait a minute,” I inserted, but Brutus was way ahead of me.
“They’re before your murder on the timeline,” he argued. “What do you think they’ll understand you to mean, that they can expect another uprising from Carthage?”
“Dammit, man!” shouted Booth, pounding on the table and nearly spilling all the drinks. “I won’t be saying it for the benefit of your Senate, I’ll be saying it for the history books!”
“I thought we were supposed to be inspiring both our nations,” said Brutus, folding his arms. “My nation mostly doesn’t read.”
Booth sighed. “All right, I plainly haven’t convinced you. Can I bribe you to do the right thing? Do my murder for me. I’ll do your murder for you. We’ll meet back here, and I’ll get you all the drinks you can swallow for a solid week.”
“No time interval references,” warned Edgar, pointing to the sign above the bar that read NO TIME INTERVAL REFERENCES - NO EXCEPTIONS. Brutus and Booth ignored him.
“Oh, all right, if it’s so important to you,” grumped Brutus. “Here, we’ll swap garb and weapons in the bathroom, do our thing, and meet back here for some serious drinking.” He eyed Booth’s cocktail. “And you can show me what this ‘Tom Collins’ is all about. It looks refreshing.”
“It is, I assure you!” said Booth, rising and slapping Brutus on the back. They retired to the restrooms. Edgar shook his head and wiped off the counter.
Retro Retro slipped into Brutus’s chair. He was wearing a fishing cap with smiley-face and biohazard buttons on it, and a teeshirt that read I'M WITH STUPID and had a nice 3D laser illusion of an arrow pointing out at the reader. “Oo, he didn’t eat the celery,” he said greedily, taking over the drink remnants.
“That’s disgusting,” I said.
Retro Retro crunched the celery happily. “Hey, know what’s really disgusting?”
I finished my beer before Retro Retro could. “No, what?”
The veteran chrononaut grinned. “When they step through that door,” he confided, “they’re not going back to do each others’ murders.”
I blinked. “Why not?”
“Because I already did them.” Retro Retro swirled around the remnants of Booth’s Tom Collins, sucked it down and crunched the ice.
“You?” I asked. “You shot Lincoln and stabbed Julius Caesar?”
“No,” he corrected, “I shot Lincoln and shot Julius Caesar. Hey, it was a big feeding frenzy, nobody knew the difference. Plus, I already had the gun on me.”
I gaped. “Why?” I asked.
“Shit,” said Retro Retro modestly, “those two were assholes. I’d kill ‘em even if they didn’t need killing, continuity-wise.” He looked hopefully at my beer; I shook my head. “Both of ‘em were playing chess games with the lives of their nation’s soldiers. I hate that kind of jackass, really I do.”
I asked Edgar to bring us two more beers; Retro Retro pounced on his greedily. “Okay, if that’s the case,” I hazarded, “then where are Booth and Brutus really going?”
“To where they’re supposed to go, only five minutes later,” Retro Retro explained. “The shift is subtle, but it’ll jack up their chronometric telemetry. They’ll never find the door back here.” He drained his beer. “Booth will be hunted down at a farm in Virginia. Brutus will commit suicide on a hillside in Macedonia. Just as it should be.”
I shook my head, disgusted. “Retro Retro,” I said, “you are a sick motherfucker.”
He grinned. “Twice a day!” he said loudly.
“TWICE A DAY!” roared the crowd.
As I went to join the toast, I realized Retro Retro had boosted my beer.
There were a couple of guys in the corner having a conversation, and because I was sitting near them, I couldn’t help but hear what they were talking about. Or at least that’s the excuse everybody in The Stopped Clock has taught me to use; if that bar were a nation, eavesdropping would be its national sport. Actually, now that I think about it, The Stopped Clock probably meets most of the qualifications for sovereign nationhood, although its chief means of defense is not being there when you want to invade it, which is kind of cheating.
So I was completely accidentally overhearing what these two guys were saying, and that was this:
“We have so much in common,” hissed the one with the curly black hair and the neat mustache. “Hatred of tyranny. A desire to serve our people.” He leaned forward dramatically. “The courage to do what must needs be done.”
“You know nothing about me,” the older guy with the toga and the Justin Bieber hair countered. “All you think you know about me comes from a play written more than sixteen centuries after I died. You’re comparing yourself with a fictional character, Booth.”
The younger man straightened his stage military uniform. “I know enough about your real life, Brutus. I know, for instance, that we both must commit a murder. I say: let’s trade murders. Criss Cross!”
“Guys,” I cut in, coming over with my beer, “I couldn’t help but overhear what you were talking about, and I have to say: this sounds like the opening act of Bad Idea Theater.”
The two conspirators seemed a little ruffled at me barging in like that, but Booth composed himself quickly. “And what’s so wrong about the idea? It’s foolproof! We each go back in time. I use my thespian powers to impersonate Brutus and commit his murder of Julius Caesar. Meanwhile, he dyes his hair, learns a bit of English, and goes back to shoot President Lincoln. We each will return to this temporally neutral location afterwards to compare notes and savor the results. If caught before we can jaunt forwards…”
“Horizontally,” I corrected, having learned a thing or two in the times I had been drinking there.
“If caught before we can jaunt,” continued Booth, glaring at me, “we will both be trivially found to be the wrong person, and hence will not be executed. It is a perfectly foolproof plan to commit two assassinations that will rock each of our respective worlds.” He leaned back triumphantly and drank deeply from his Tom Collins. Brutus, meanwhile, looked down into his Bloody Mary and shook his head slightly.
“I take it you’re not convinced,” I said to Brutus.
“It seems like an unnecessary elaboration,” the Roman admitted. “If we’re so interested in escaping, why don’t we just go back and do our own murder, and then jaunt here?”
“Where's the artistry?!” Booth demanded. “Where’s the flair for the dramatic that will capture the imaginations of the people? This isn’t just a murder we’re doing, senator! Our mutual aims are not simply to kill a tyrant, but also to destabilize a government! We cannot succeed unless we secure the admiration of our nations for our bold actions!”
“But the people will never know of your little detail,” Brutus countered. “If your plan is executed properly, nobody will ever know that we are not who we are supposed to be!”
“Then we shall drop hints to make them wonder,” Booth suggested, arching one eyebrow. “When you shoot Lincoln in his private box, you shall leap to the stage below…”
“Is that a high leap? I’m not a young man anymore,” Brutus inserted. Booth gritted his teeth.
“YOU SHALL LEAP TO THE STAGE BELOW,” he repeated, “and shout ‘Sic Semper Tyrannis!’”
Brutus almost choked on his drink. “Nobody talks like that, you know.”
Booth was undaunted. “And for my part, when I stab Caesar in the Senate, I shall shout ‘The South Shall Rise Again!’”
“Now wait a minute,” I inserted, but Brutus was way ahead of me.
“They’re before your murder on the timeline,” he argued. “What do you think they’ll understand you to mean, that they can expect another uprising from Carthage?”
“Dammit, man!” shouted Booth, pounding on the table and nearly spilling all the drinks. “I won’t be saying it for the benefit of your Senate, I’ll be saying it for the history books!”
“I thought we were supposed to be inspiring both our nations,” said Brutus, folding his arms. “My nation mostly doesn’t read.”
Booth sighed. “All right, I plainly haven’t convinced you. Can I bribe you to do the right thing? Do my murder for me. I’ll do your murder for you. We’ll meet back here, and I’ll get you all the drinks you can swallow for a solid week.”
“No time interval references,” warned Edgar, pointing to the sign above the bar that read NO TIME INTERVAL REFERENCES - NO EXCEPTIONS. Brutus and Booth ignored him.
“Oh, all right, if it’s so important to you,” grumped Brutus. “Here, we’ll swap garb and weapons in the bathroom, do our thing, and meet back here for some serious drinking.” He eyed Booth’s cocktail. “And you can show me what this ‘Tom Collins’ is all about. It looks refreshing.”
“It is, I assure you!” said Booth, rising and slapping Brutus on the back. They retired to the restrooms. Edgar shook his head and wiped off the counter.
Retro Retro slipped into Brutus’s chair. He was wearing a fishing cap with smiley-face and biohazard buttons on it, and a teeshirt that read I'M WITH STUPID and had a nice 3D laser illusion of an arrow pointing out at the reader. “Oo, he didn’t eat the celery,” he said greedily, taking over the drink remnants.
“That’s disgusting,” I said.
Retro Retro crunched the celery happily. “Hey, know what’s really disgusting?”
I finished my beer before Retro Retro could. “No, what?”
The veteran chrononaut grinned. “When they step through that door,” he confided, “they’re not going back to do each others’ murders.”
I blinked. “Why not?”
“Because I already did them.” Retro Retro swirled around the remnants of Booth’s Tom Collins, sucked it down and crunched the ice.
“You?” I asked. “You shot Lincoln and stabbed Julius Caesar?”
“No,” he corrected, “I shot Lincoln and shot Julius Caesar. Hey, it was a big feeding frenzy, nobody knew the difference. Plus, I already had the gun on me.”
I gaped. “Why?” I asked.
“Shit,” said Retro Retro modestly, “those two were assholes. I’d kill ‘em even if they didn’t need killing, continuity-wise.” He looked hopefully at my beer; I shook my head. “Both of ‘em were playing chess games with the lives of their nation’s soldiers. I hate that kind of jackass, really I do.”
I asked Edgar to bring us two more beers; Retro Retro pounced on his greedily. “Okay, if that’s the case,” I hazarded, “then where are Booth and Brutus really going?”
“To where they’re supposed to go, only five minutes later,” Retro Retro explained. “The shift is subtle, but it’ll jack up their chronometric telemetry. They’ll never find the door back here.” He drained his beer. “Booth will be hunted down at a farm in Virginia. Brutus will commit suicide on a hillside in Macedonia. Just as it should be.”
I shook my head, disgusted. “Retro Retro,” I said, “you are a sick motherfucker.”
He grinned. “Twice a day!” he said loudly.
“TWICE A DAY!” roared the crowd.
As I went to join the toast, I realized Retro Retro had boosted my beer.
