Hello readers. Well, it's been quite a while since I last uploaded something here. The main reason for that was because we got a new computer, and I had to figure out how it worked. Still not quite sure in terms of it's workings, but hey, think of this as a trial run.
The Bar Man"The usual, love?"
The 'love' in question didn't even react, except for a slight drunken "Mhhrr". The aged former librarian sighed, plunking a beer bottle down in front of the dark skinned rebel. What was her name again? Oh, that was right. Aretha.
He knew many of the rebels here. They would come in shifts, groups of one or two, to collect texts from his library. Some came more than others. Like that blonde girl. She came often, always in the company of her boyfriend. Her boyfriend wasn't here, he noticed. She looked a little odd without him.
Oz stared into the murky depths of her glass, her vision swimming before her. She had been having dreams of late. They weren't unpleasant ones, but still, they troubled her. There was always someone present in her dreams, a man whose face she couldn't quite make out, and yet still she felt something nagging in the back of her mind, some form of recognition. She would often try and see his face, but whenever she was about to see him clearly, she either woke up or her dreams changed into mere alcohol induced quagmire.
A man with shoulder length hair and an odd sort of jacket fell into the chair opposite her. "Hey."
Oz didn't even look up. "Hey."
"I'm Jack."
This time Oz raised her head to look the man, her eyes half closed. "Oz. How long have you been here?"
The man's face cracked into something resembling a smile. "Forever," he slurred. "You?"
Oz sighed. "I've been here forever too."
They remained in silence for a while, each not really paying much attention to the other. At the next table a latex clad woman was idly puffing away at a cigarette, her eyes staring off into the distance. A smaller, younger woman was leaning against her shoulder, fast asleep. Spilt liquor had stained the bright red pants she wore, but even if that had happened while she was awake, she probably wouldn't have noticed. Her name was Madonna, Oz suddenly realised. How did she know that?
A slight nudge in the hand brought Oz's attention back to the man sitting opposite her. "You going to finish that?" he belched, indicating the glass of vodka in Oz's hand.
Oz pushed the glass across the table with a sigh; her nose curling at the alcohol fumes radiating from the man. Oz sniffed. She probably smelt the same way, what with all the cheap grog she was consuming.
Jack took a swig from the glass, burped demonstratively, then fell forward onto the table. Oz jumped slightly, then relaxed when she heard the sounds of loud snores. He just fell asleep, that was all.
Oz leaned on her bruised hand, wondering idly where the bruise came from. She had indentation marks around her wrists as well, as if she had been handcuffed at one point. She shook her head. For the first time, it bothered her that she couldn't remember anything. She had never thought about it before… the vodka usually took care of that.
Oz traced the cracked pattern of the counter with her finger, humming a tune under her breath. She didn't know how she knew that is was a tune, or how to even hum it, but for some reason it seemed to relax her more than the drink did, so she kept it up. Her voice steadily became stronger, until a wrinkled hand slammed down on her shoulder.
"What you singing there, girl?"
Oz jumped, convinced that she must have been doing something terribly wrong. "N-nothing!" she stammered, her hands shaking. Quickly her left hand snaked out and grabbed a beer bottle from the bar man's tray. That was the only way she could redeem herself now.
Pop watched with a sigh as the little blonde sculled down the cheap beer. It always went like this. One of them would show a brief moment of soberness, then the drink would slide down their throats and they would be lost again. He had a theory that some of the Bohemians had never been truly mind wiped. Some spark of individuality had remained alive, but they did their best to douse the flame by drinking themselves into submission. Self-destruction, it was. They were killing themselves.
Pop nodded grimly as the blonde's eyes slid out of focus and her mouth twisted into a dreamy half-smile. She had flown to the moon. It would be a while before she was back. Pop chucked her under the chin. "Cheer up, sweetheart," he murmured.
He raised his eyes as he spied a white-haired man in a grey suit staring moodily at the tabletop. "Well, I'll be damned," Pop muttered. "So he decided to join us."
He made a point of walking in front of the grey suited man's table, but all the man did was ask him for a whisky. Another one bites the dust.
Too right.
"Coming right up, Commander," Pop said briskly, going back behind his bar. Yes, he definitely had the most sense in this place.
That's why he was the bar man.