Channel 27494
Lu Xun pasted the final flyer on a post and wiped his brow. "It's such a hot day today……" he muttered. Zhou Tai walked past him. He was sweating too, but he was wearing a winter coat. So he was sweating way more, the coat was thoroughly drenched. Xun saw him and thought if he was being dehydrated or something. "Hey, you! Can you read my flyer?"
"Um…no. I'm illiterate."
"Anyway, I'll read it to you." Clearly the boy was desperate.
This is what the flyer said: Gargoyle Moulder and Painter for Hire. Also does specialty paint jobs.
Pls. Contact 4159087.
"You're just the person I need….I think," Zhou Tai said, after several repetitions of what was written on the flyer. It was probably due to Tai's short-term memory. "I needed someone to make…..what were those things?"
"Gargoyles."
"Gargles. For my graveyard"
"It's gargoyles."
"Yadda, yadda, blah, blah."
"Should we go now?"
"Um…my mommy told me not to talk to strangers." Zhou Tai announced. It seemed like he forgot what he was doing.
"Okaaaaaayyyyyy….."
Then an ugly guy with a stubble and a pale complexion stepped out from behind the post. "Boss, what do we do with this kid?" Lu Meng hollered, holding up a huge Barbie doll. "She won't give me answers to my questions!" Although Meng hollered, he was talking to no one in particular.
At the sight of Meng, Zhou Tai screamed and tried to hide behind the leaf of paper. Tai whimpered and tried to soothe himself by sucking his thumb and rolling on the sidewalk after letting go of the paper. Meng didn't notice what had happened, so he still kept asking the doll, "Where's your mom? I want to rob her!"
Later at the graveyard…
"Here, and here." Tai pointed to various places on the brick wall.
"All over?" the bewildered Xun asked.
"No." Tai replied, "What gave you that idea?"
"I marked all the places for the statues, and uh…"
"What?" Tai demanded.
"It's all over…"
"So what?"
"That's about 75000000 Yuin." Yuin was the currency, invented by Sima Yi of course. Please don't confuse Yuin with Yuan or Yen.
"Okay."
So Zhou Tai left the boy alone to let him work, and so that he could continue his walk.
Lu Xun started putting the cement in the moulds. The cement was supposed to dry within 5 minutes. And it was a quick dry brand too. Zhou Tai returned shortly after the moulds had all been filled. And that didn't take too long. Approximately after 5 minutes.
"Hey! What are you doing here!" Zhou Tai said. Then he lunged at Xun's throat.
"But you hired-"
POOF!
"-me….."
"Unngghhh……" Tai groaned. In the attempt to strangle Lu Xun, his head made contact with the moist cement.
"Ouch."
Xun put the unconscious Tai on a more cushioned spot (preferably a patch of grass) and got to work. He removed the gargoyles from the molds and painted them. When he was done, there was almost no more space to breathe.
There were different kinds of gargoyles. One had an afro, another had long hair and and a rainbow hairband. Others looked like Elvis, with that super recognizable hairstyle. And there was the occasional pink tutu (like a ballerina). But most of them were orange and red with black eyebrows. Tai woke up soon after.
"Hey. That's nice, putting gargoyles all over my yard. Is it free?" Zhou Tai asked.
"No. 75,000,000 Yuin, to be exact."
"Okay"
Tai look at the wall. He seemed quite confused, as if there was something wrong. "Why is there only one grey one?"
"I ran out of paint so….. oh great" Xun slapped his forehead.
"Why?"
"That one was red. And then I thought 'Why isn't there a grey one'. And then I looked for grey…."
"Spit it out."
"I painted it in watercolour." Then right after, it rained. Of course, the grey was washed off, so that gargoyle became red again.
After being paid, Zhou Tai drove him out, forgetting why he paid him. Of course Xun kept the money, And who knew that graveyard caretakers could be so rich?
His next job was to paint Mayor Liu Bei's house. Of course he painted it like fire. After everybody who helped Xun paint left, including Xun, Sima Yi appeared. He started cackling. And cackling. And cackling. He kept on cackling so hard that he forgot the reason why he was cackling. "Oh yeah!", Sima Yi said, a light bulb appearing over his head. He lit a match and threw towards the house and melted into the darkness that was swallowing the sky.
Riiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnngggggggg!
The fire alarm went off. Xun woke up with a jolt. He was a volunteer fire fighter, but he didn't go with the fire truck. He was more of the guy who would tell the fire truck where to go through radio or stuff like that.
"Wake up!" Lu Xun yelled.
The captain, Gan Ning was an exceptional sleepyhead. When the fire truck finally got to the site of the fire, the building was usually half-burned down already.
Anyway, this was one of those days when Gan Ning had coffee before sleeping, so he didn't have too yell that loudly. Once, he got laryngitis from shouting at Ning.
Going down to check on the truck's equipment, one of his thoughts crossed his mind again.
Why is the fire truck blue?
Well, sure, he visited other places before, but not one fire truck was blue.
Lucky towns, at least they get fire trucks. We get water trucks! There are even pink dolphins on the side. I mean, who would paint a fire truck blue?
His thoughts were interrupted by Gan Ning's forever cheerful voice. "Whatcha doin' eh, Xunie-boy?" he said, ruffling Lu Xun hair.
Oh right. An annoying fire fighter captain.
"Checking the equipment."
"Right. C'mon Tongie! We don't wanna be late right?" Gan Ning yelled, completely changing the topic.
Ling Tong appeared. He was kind of new here, and he never really got the hang of sliding down that pole.
CRASH!
One of the fire engine's spare rims (those are the covers for the wheels) spun around in a circle before coming to rest on Tong's foot. He had fallen off the pole, ricocheted off a shelf and ended up on top of pile fire extinguishers.
"No sleeping on the job, Tong! Get up!" Ning yelled
And look who this is coming from, Lu Xun thought.
Tong stood up and rubbed his back. Before he even got to say 'I think I broke something', Ning pulled him into the truck and drove off. He didn't know Xun got on too.
When they reached the house, it looked like it was in perfectly good shape. It was exactly the same house that Xun painted earlier. But he didn't know that. How would you know if the whole street had the same house all painted like fire but by different people and style? They didn't know it was on fire, even though the owner Zhang He said it was. He was like a crazy person to Gan Ning. So they left. And in the morning, the house wasn't there anymore.
Lu Xun passed by it in the morning, and he believed the story that everyone believed. That the house was abducted by aliens. And Zhou Tai also filed a case on the aliens, demanding his money back.
Sima Yi flicked the off switch. As he was refilling his catsup popcorn bowl, he had already thought of his next victim, who was probably Da Qiao or Zhang He. Or maybe even Huang Gai.
So who was it? That will have to wait for a long time, maybe.
