Murdoc was on the phone yet again. They had the band, they had the new name "Gorillaz", they had the music. Now they needed a venue for their first concert, so he'd made a list of every pub in a fifty-mile radius. Then he'd had to go through the list again and scratched off the ones he hadn't been banned from. This left him with very few options, but he wasn't bothered; they only needed one. This call seemed to be going well so far.
"Great! Uh, one thing, is it okay to bring a minor in? She won't be drinking anything.
Good ... What? No, she's not my daughter!
No, she's not one of theirs either, she just lives with us ...
Dunno exactly, but we think she's about eight. Is that important?
She's our guitarist, we have to bring her!
She can play, we needed a guitarist, we don't know where she came from and she couldn't tell us. So we thought we'd better keep her around ...
Listen, you, our Noodle's the best. Okay? She plays like Jimi Hendrix and she's bloody adorable to boot. The audiences are gonna love her. I reckon I could market cuddly toy versions of her ...
I don't know, I placed an advert and she came in a FedEx crate ...
She didn't tell us, she can't speak English. I think she's from Japan or somewhere, but I don't know the specifics ...
What? No, she's not a mail-order bride!
Excuse me, my drummer is laughin' at me, I have to go slap him.
Okay, yeah, I know it sounds weird, but it's not like we asked for the kid! I'll tell you what I told Russel, all I advertised for was a guitarist! And don't laugh! She might be a kid, but she's the best damn guitarist I've ever heard, and if you don't like it you can-!"
Murdoc put down the phone and sulkily said "They hung up."
Russel choked back his sniggers. "Maybe you should tell 'em she is yours."
"Why can't I tell them she's yours or denthead's?"
"Because nobody's gonna buy that either of us was a father at the age of twelve."
"Are you sayin' I'm old?"
Russel ignored the bassist's rage. "Fine, tell 'em she's your niece. Or a cousin, or a sister, or somethin'. Or say she's adopted, it's not like you're gonna have to produce the paperwork. 'I found her in a box' only works with puppies."
"They're hardly goin' to believe she's adopted either, are they? Like you said, three single blokes with not-so-great reputations-"
"Speak for yourself," interrupted Russel. Murdoc ignored him.
"-livin' in a haunted house aren't really prime candidates for looking after kids, even by the standards of a system which handed Two Dents over to me."
2D looked up from his keyboard. "Well, we can't do anyfink about the haunted house thing but you could always wear a dress-"
This was a bad move on 2D's part. Murdoc was frustrated with his trouble finding a venue, annoyed by Russel, and generally on edge. 2D's pitiful attempt at a joke pushed him over. Before he really realised what he was doing, Murdoc's fist had connected with 2D's eye. The singer was caught off-balance and collapsed backwards with a yelp. Russel jumped to his feet and rushed to 2D's side to help him up.
"I'm okay!" 2D squeaked. "I landed on me 'ead, no damage to anythin' important!" He sat up, giggling despite the fact that his eye was swelling up as he spoke. Russel glared at Murdoc, who ignored him; he was too busy looking at 2D. Something about the way the kid's hair flopped over his bruised eye was pitifully endearing. Murdoc noticed an odd warm feeling in his stomach, and the knuckles of the hand which had hit 2D felt strangely tingly. Huh, what could that be? ... oh shit, it couldn't be.
This time, he had no excuse. He wasn't drunk. He wasn't in shock. He wasn't just looking at 2D as a warm body which wasn't going to fight back. No, it was something about 2D specifically that was the problem.
He tore his eyes away and headed for the door, walking very carefully, as if his mental turmoil was leaving him equally physically unbalanced.
"Hey, where're you goin'?" 2D asked.
"I, uh, have to, uh ... do ... something," Murdoc said, inarticulately. "'Scuse me a minute."
He closed the studio door behind him, then ran to his room, shut himself in, and blocked the door.
The other bandmates looked at each other.
"What's he doin'?" asked 2D, blinking stupidly.
"Beats me. I'd say he wanted to hide 'cause he felt bad, but this is Murdoc we're talkin' about ..."
Murdoc lay on his bed and stared at the ceiling through the clouds of cigarette smoke, pondering his predicament. Okay, I can't deny it any longer; I'm attracted to a bloke. Girly-looking bloke, but still a bloke, and I know that for a fact after a year of changing his clothes. I s'pose I can live with that, on the condition that nobody ever finds out. What's bothering me is that I'm attracted to a bloke who has done nothing but irritate me since we met, walks like a Muppet, talks like an asthmatic ten-year-old even though his singing sounds fine, can't tie his own shoelaces at the age of twenty, and tattooed "KFC" on his arm even though he's a vegetarian. Okay, so I don't exactly look for brains in women either, but surely there has to be some kind of cutoff point. Huh. So did I suppress these tendencies because my brother and the lads would have killed me if I hadn't, or because I subconsciously realised that I apparently have the worst taste ever? I mean, there's a couple of billion men in the world, and out of all of those I pick him? Sheesh. Stupidity must be catching.
In all seriousness, the former reason was probably a pretty good one. When you have a brother who breaks your nose in two places for using his record player without permission, you learn to be damn careful not to express any ideas or behaviour that would give him another excuse to dole out beatings. Apparently Murdoc had put up the homophobe front so well for so long he'd started to believe it himself.
Sure, Murdoc didn't like faggots, but then he couldn't say he liked anyone else much either. He'd always believed in equal-opportunity misanthropy, regardless of gender, age, race, or whatever else; it saved a lot of trouble. Genuine hate was better saved for individual people.
Okay. So I know what's what. Now what do I do about it? he wondered.
Best option was probably to do nothing. If this got out, his career in music would be ... well, "ruined" was probably too strong a word, it might even increase publicity and therefore sales, but he'd forever be known as "that gay guy". Even if, technically, that wasn't true – he indulged in a brief fantasy involving Kate Bush just to be sure. Yep, at least fifty percent of his heterosexuality seemed safe, but the public probably wouldn't be bright enough to pay attention to that.
And if his brother found out ... well, Satan forbid his brother find out. Okay, so he was miles away now, but if Hannibal heard the Niccals line really had spawned a fence-sitter he would do everything in his power to find some way to make Murdoc suffer for it.
He considered whether it would be possible to let 2D know. The kid idolised him, despite all the horrible things Murdoc had put him through, and would probably stay quiet about it if told to. Yeah, tempting ... Then again, what if he said no?
Murdoc chewed on his cig and started to mentally list possible outcomes: Best case scenario, either he says yes and I get an easy guilt-free fuck and possibly a more-easily-manipulated Two Dents, or he says no but keeps his mouth shut. Or he could completely misinterpret it as actually meaning something, and I get stuck with him either stalking me or leaving the band with a broken heart. Or he could announce it to all and sundry, either because he's disgusted or frightened or just too stupid to get that I want it kept quiet, which would mean I'd have to murder him, which I have to admit I'd rather avoid if at all possible. So the odds suggest I'd be down one keyboardist, and the chances of gettin' a second new band member shipped in from Japan are just a tad lower than I'd like to bet on. And pretty much every one of those outcomes is likely to end with that fat nosey bastard Russel finding out and coming down on me like a ton of bricks. So yeah, better not say anything. Can I keep something like this secret? Well, I've managed to keep it secret from myself for thirty-two years, so that shouldn't be a problem. He chuckled humourlessly.
But what if I get another opportunity like when he was in the coma and ... well. Never really figured I'd do something like that, but up till that point I always assumed it was less because of any kind of moral objection than because it was too damn risky to be worth the bother. But no, I had the chance, nobody would ever know if I had fucked the dullard, even him, and I chickened out. Can't believe I actually disturbed myself. So, if I got the chance again, and I knew he wouldn't know, would I do it?
Murdoc pondered for a long time, and finally said to himself, "Nah, he's safe."
He was pretty sure of that. After all, he'd considered it and stopped himself once. He was a thoroughly horrible person and he was happy with that fact, but some things even he had to admit he wasn't comfortable with. He wasn't sure whether he should be ashamed of that, but whatever. Despite public misconceptions, Satanism was really about doing what you wanted to do, not doing evil for the hell of it (he tried to ignore the horrible pun), so it was okay.
He looked down at the floor and tapped his inverted cross. "Sorry, boss, but ... that's just not my style. I'll go set fire to a few things to make up for it, 'kay?"
Not exactly feeling happy, but at least a little more at ease with himself, he got up and stretched. "Okay, that's enough existential angst. Time to get back to what's actually important here."
(Author's Notes: Awwww. Even Evil Has Standards. Speaking of which, many thanks to whoever put this fic on the Fanfic Recommendations page on TVTropes! Yay! You like me! Considering putting a page for this up on Troper Works – thoughts?
Murdoc has canonically declared that he likes Kate Bush. Can't remember where, though.
I've now seen the "On Melancholy Hill" video. Awesome. Also seen the "Superfast Jellyfish" video. Am I the only person who finds that one insanely creepy for reasons I can't really explain? Something about the jellyfishes' expressions, I think.
Just one more chapter to go!)