Chapter one: Deal with the purple coiffured devil.
Ut sipped his cocoa and laid back in his over stuffed armchair.
'Explain this to me again. You want me to convert this kid to a
vampire.' He poked the crimson marshmallow floating on the top of the steaming
drink. It bobbed. Ut was pleased.
'Those are the terms being negotiated, yes.' Said the purple haired man
opposite him. He was hovering (Ut wanted to know how he managed that) near to
the fire, which was roaring and spitting in the fireplace.
'You want me to kidnap her, drain her, then convert her to the dark
side, eh?' Ut snuggled down further into the chair.
'Do you have any difficulty with this idea?' The man turned to face Ut.
He was smiling. Ut was too.
'Well, no. Not really. The drinking of blood I have no qualms with. The
termination of life, replacing it with the existence of the undead is fine by
me. Kidnapping, so long as it's done discreetly, is my bag, baby.' He slurped
his cocoa and beamed at the stranger, who beamed back.
'So what's bothering you, then?' The man asked. He stirred the fire
with his staff, rearranging the coals to form a picture of the Mona Lisa
picking her nose. Ut squinted.
'That's amazing. Can you do Picasso?'
'I can do Warhol.' The coals formed into the likeness of a Campbell's
tinned soup.
'Anyone with a well stocked larder can do Warhol.' Ut pointed out. 'But
really, my only worry is this girl I've got to prey upon. Lina Inverse. For
Shabby's sake, do you know she turns bandits into charcoal briquettes on a
daily basis?' Ut shivered and hurriedly downed some more cocoa.
'So you're scared, eh?' The strange man was now doodling with the logs.
Flames leapt.
'No way! I'm just saying, for this sort of dangerous employment, I'm
going to need some…incentive.' Ut pointed to one of his pockets. The man
sighed.
'How much?'
'A year's supply of vanilla beans!' Ut chirped happily.
'An odd request. Very well. For the kidnapping, draining and converting
of Lina Inverse to vampirism, I, Xelloss Metallium, will give Ut Sarandapalus
three bags of gold and a years supply of vanilla beans.' He reached out his
hand. Ut shook it vigorously.
'Done! It's a deal! Like some marshmallows? They're blood flavored, you
know.' Ut was chewing on his rapidly. 'V're shticky, th'ou.'
'Just this once.' Said Xelloss. Ut handed him the packet. Xelloss took
about half the contents and pushed them all in his mouth, like he was stuffing
a cushion. He smiled idiotically.
'So tell me, how did you become a vampire?' Xelloss knew full well, but
we wanted to hear Ut's side of the story. Ut settled into the chair a bit more
lower.
'Well. I got what I thought was a hickey from a girl wearing a chain
mail bikini in a seedy disco. Rather discomforting. When I remarked after she'd
finished her tour of my jugular, she was hurting me, she offered me a thick red
drink in a glass. I thought nothing about finishing the contents in one go.
Turned out she was blind drunk, or just blind, and she thought I'd kinda look
cute as a vampire. The hickey was the telltale two red dots, and she'd managed
to suck me dry in less then a minute. Amazing lady. I wish I'd got her phone
number.
Anyway. The drink she immediately offered after this hickey with bite –
ha ha- was her own blood. She filled up a glass prior to the disco and had been
carrying it around with her. Shabby knows how she managed do the bolero and not
spill the contents. She was just waiting for a cute guy to entice into her
coffin. Well. She sampled a bit too much of the screwdriver that night,
methinks, because she picked me.
So, she drank my blood, I drank hers. Under the impression it was a
Bloody Mary, but there you go. I was now a vampire. That was the sort of
initiation ritual, you see, prior to becoming a vampire. I didn't know at the
time, of course. Well, I'm older and wiser now. I no longer accept drinks from
strange ladies in chain mail bikinis.'
Xelloss nodded us Ut drained the last of his cocoa.
'A cautionary tale on the vices of drink.' He proclaimed. 'Or at least,
accepting hickeys from strangers. Well, Ut, it was fascinating, but I must bid
you adieu.'
'I'll call you when I have Lina in my power.' Ut promised. Xelloss
disappeared. Ut got up and gave the fire a hearty shake with his poker.
'Lina Inverse. Lina Inverse. How the hell am I going to overpower Lina
Inverse? Hmmm…' he tapped his chin thoughtfully and tried to dislodge a
stubborn marshmallow from one of his wisdom teeth.
Chapter two: Vague plot development ahoy! Things happen!
Characterisation!
If there were anyone to observe Ut at that moment, they would have been
surprised, by judging his appearance, to learn that he was a vampire. He didn't
follow the rules of being a vampire, after all. The rules go as follows:
1.Be tall, pale and cultivate
a lean, hungry look. (Ut was short; red cheeked, and had the look of slight
consumption.)
2.Wear evening dress, a cape
with a high collar, or anything that takes a paragraph to describe in loving
detail. (Ut was making do with a fluffy yellow dressing gown and blue bunny
pyjamas.)
3.Be sexy. (Ut's likeness had
been compared to Winston Churchill.)
4.Have a hypnotic gaze. (Ut
could just pull off a peeved squint.)
5.Be feared across the land,
yet deep inside, lonely and misunderstood. (Ut worked in a late night Pizza
takeaway. The customers knew him as: 'That vampire guy who always shouts a
round of beer after work.')
6.And finally: BE MYSTERIOUS!
(Ut could do Slightly Suspicious on a good day. Working in a Pizza delivery
service tended to dull one's image of harbouring dark secrets.)
But Ut didn't mind. He could be a vampire and still hold down a normal,
human job, after all. True, he avoided going near the garlic supreme pizzas,
(True, people avoided eating them. Even having one slice could give one's
breath the power to peel paintwork.) True, he could only work a late night
shirt, and true, people tended to give him dark looks and make the sign of the
Lord of Nightmares whenever he walked by, but Ut countered this by remembering
their faces and secretly spitting on their pizzas.
So when Lina Inverse and Gourry Gabriev flounced into Ut's work
('Bloody Pizzas') the night after the fateful deal (Signed by a handshake and a
handful of bloody marshmallows), Ut thanked the powers that be and grinned
encouragingly at them as they umed and ahed over the culinary treats available.
'Do you just do pizzas?' Asked Lina. She was just as short as they said
she was. She nearly came to Ut's eye level. Ut leaned over the counter to get a
good look at her. Miniscule, dressed in a loud magenta outfit, with eyes like
two drops of tomato sauce. (Working in a pizza delivery joint had warped Ut's
perception of beauty. He tended to compare things to his favourite foods. His
dream girl would have legs like long leeks, hair like fettuccini and a wit as
piquant as camembert.)
'Oh no. We done Shepard's pie, only it's not Shepard season right now.
We do Kate and Sidney pie, and Donna kebabs.' Ut flicked his tea towel at the
drinks menu.
'More bloody Mary's then you can poke a towel at. And bloody Sams, and
John, and Amy's, of course.' He did his best to be ingrating. Put them at ease,
and then pounce.
'Eat here or take away?' Ut asked.
'Eat here.' Said Lina.
'So, what's the order?' Ut fingered a blunt pencil, ready for the
worst. He'd heard about her gastronomic adventures.
'Well, I want three family sized seafood pizzas, nine medium meat
lovers pizzas, a couple of large Hawaiian pizzas, and about a dozen family
sized triple deluxe cheese. How long with they be?' Said Lina. Ut put his hands
about a half a metre apart.
'Depends. Oh. You mean time. About ten minutes.' Ut was writing the
order down on some parch-it notes.
'Each?' Quizzed Lina.
'All. I pride myself on my speedy yet skilled food preparation.' And
this is helped terrifically by my heightened vampiric speed, Ut did not say.
Lina grinned and dragged Gourry by his hair over to a table.
'Then get on with it! I'm starving!' On cue, her stomach rumbled
ominously. Ut jumped, but Lina and Gourry ignored it. Ut hurried into the
kitchen.
Thank Shabby they were the only customers this time of night. Odd,
that. The clock chimed nine. Where were his usual mob? Oh, that's right, it was
a special movie screening night. Events like this would bring the entire
village out in throngs. Normal life, or the semblance of it, would be
temporarily on hold while the villagers traded gossip and threw popcorn at the
screen. The movies, if Ut remembered, was a deluxe three-movie bumper
screening. It would finish at about three in the morning. Nobody would be
around to come to Lina's rescue if she found herself in strife. Perfect.
Ut rubbed his hands together gleefully and started to grate the
Parmesan. His hands blurred. Wonderful. He would have the night, this lonely
night, to do wicked things, and nobody would ever find out. He hummed. Nobody
out. No witnesses. No pesky observers. Ut was free to entice Lina to the joys
of blood sucking. Life, or at least what passed for Ut's life, was good.
Chapter three: The content of this chapter is rated U for Unlikely plot
movements
While Ut schemed and chopped tomatoes, Lina and Gourry listened to the
movie soundtrack booming out across the village.
'Of course there's hope, John' throbbed a passionate voice. 'There's
always hope.'
Lina winced.
'I hate soppy movies. Why can't they ever screen something with gore
and depravity?' Gourry shrugged. His mind was engrossed with the salt and
peppershakers he was emptying on the table. Lina didn't notice.
'I mean, romance is all very well, but you've got to have movies to
reflect reality.'
'I think your reality is different from most people's.' Said Xelloss.
Lina jumped. Xelloss was floating above her, hanging from one of the blades of
the ceiling fan, which swooped a lazy circuit. Watching him glide round and
round was making Lina feel queasy.
'Xelloss, what the hell are you
doing here?' Lina demanded, not looking at him. Xelloss noted this mentally.
'Wheee! This is fun! Do you want a go, Lina? I'll catch you if you
fall!' Lina focused on Gourry making dot paintings with the pepper and salt.
'You didn't answer my question.' Lina pointed out. She looked at her
watch. Three minutes down, seven to go. Her stomach complained again.
'How terribly remiss of me.' Mused Xelloss. He dropped off the fan and
into Lina's lap. For a single, terrible moment there was perfect silence.
'AIIIEEEAAARGH!' Lina shrieked. 'GET OFF ME, YOU LECHER!'
'But it's so warm here!' Complained Xelloss. He tried to snuggle
downwards, but Lina picked him up by the scruff of his neck and turfed him onto
the floor. Gourry had stopped his erstwhile artwork to watch with interest. Ut
emerged out of the kitchen, clad in an apron that read: 'Join the army. Go to
exotic places. Meet interesting people. Then KILL THEM!'
Ut's jaw dropped when he saw Xelloss on the floor, moaning about Lina's
social skills. Xelloss saw Ut, and then disappeared. Ut quickly went back into
the kitchen. End of act one.
'One of these days…' Muttered Lina darkly. 'Xelloss is going to be so
dead…' While she groused, a small part of Gourry's brain wondered why that
Ut person had had small, pointy teeth, which he'd inadvertently flashed when
his jaw had dropped. The rest of Gourry's brain told the smaller part not to
get big ideas. Gourry promptly forgot about the teeth, and returned to his salt
and pepper. Oddly enough, if he squinted, and if he'd has some knowledge of pop
art, the small mound he'd created looked eerily like a Campbell's soup tin.
Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Xelloss re-appeared from a vantage point on
top of the dishwasher. Ut sweated and chopped the olives.
'Xelloss, what the hell are you doing here?' Ut demanded, repeating
Lina's question from a few paragraphs ago.
'I came back to say I love you!' the soundtrack howled. Ut
winced. He hoped not.
'I wanted to check on my favourite vampire.' Xelloss piped sweetly. He
squirted some dishwashing detergent on the wall. The splatters, suspiciously
enough, looked, if one closed one's eye and stood upside down, like a
Campbell's soup tin. Xelloss saw this and was pleased. His eternal smile
notched itself up.
'Yeah, right. You don't trust me, do you?' Ut sniffed, his pride
slightly scratched.
'Well, let's just say, Lina Inverse packs a mean punch and I don't want
my favourite vampire to catch it.'
'Your concern is touching. No, wait, it's non-existent. You think I
won't be able to handle this on my own. I've got it all planned. I'll drug both
their pizza's, which'll put them both to sleep. I'll slit this Gourry fellow's
throat. Then I'll drain Lina dry. She'll become a vampire. I'll have put a few
drops of my blood on Lina's pizza before hand, you see, so once she's asleep,
she's mine! A vampire!' Ut walked over to the stove to check on the bases.
'What do you think? And stop fooling around with the detergent.'
Xelloss pouted but put the bottle back.
'Nice idea, but it needs the Xelloss touch.'
Ut sighed.
'Well, I suppose it's not like I have any choice.'
'Cower before me, mortals!' Cried the soundtrack. Xelloss nodded
in agreement.
Chapter four: The cook, the thief, her bodyguard and the mazuko
Five minutes later, Lina cheered when Ut bought the steaming pizzas out.
He plonked them down on the table, in front of Lina and Gourry. Both tucked in.
Ut watched nervously, fingering his apron strings.
'Good?' He asked. Both paused to nod enthusiastically then hoed into
the piping hot offerings. Ut took refuge behind the counter, ready for the
worst.
It was about four minutes into the meal, most of it deposited from the
table into the two stomachs, when Gourry made a strange face.
'There's something fishy going on…' Mused the soundtrack. All
ignored it.
'Lina, this tastes funny.' Gourry noted. Lina ignored his and shoveled
in the pizza he had momentarily stopped devouring. Gourry looked as if he was
about to say something, but then slowly slid under the table. After a few
moments, snores could be heard. Lina paused in her eating, got up, and faced
Ut.
'Okay buddy, what's in this pizza?' She snarled, walking slowly towards
him. Ut tried to grin placatingly at her. It didn't work.
'Nothing but the finest ingredients!' He protested. Lina's eyes glazed
over, and for a moment, she looked like she was going to topple sideways. She
righted herself, and stood firm.
'Top of the world, ma!' Cried the soundtrack. Ut moaned in
horror.
'Are you trying to poison us?' Lina took another two steps towards Ut.
He gripped the counter. He was going to weather this one out.
'No! No! Eurch!' This last part was due to his throat being constricted
by the grip of Lina's fingers. Ouch, went his brain, this hurts. Jeepers, she's
fast and strong. Why hasn't the sleep inducer's worked? Oh hellhellhellhell…
'Looks like this is the end.' Observed the soundtrack, perhaps
prophetically. Ut wriggled in the iron jaw of Lina's fingers. They tightened.
He stopped.
'This is all a misunders- eurch!' Ut chocked. His mouth opened, gaping
for air. Lina frowned at it. He wondered why, then realised his canines were
peeping coyly out. Oh, hell. Where was Xelloss when you needed him? Laughing
his head off, probably, the evil bugger.
'Aha! I could have sworn it was you!' Crowed the soundtrack.
'A vampire!' Lina exclaimed. 'You were going to poison us and suck our
blood, weren't you? Well-'
'Prepare to die!' The soundtrack roared.
'Prepare to fry!' Lina roared. 'Fireball!'
The sound of Bloody Pizza being decimated momentarily drowned out the
soundtrack. The villagers shrugged and continued to throw popcorn at the
screen.
Minutes passed.
Amongst the rubble of Bloody Pizza, something stirred. It was Gourry.
He had been woken up by the table collapsing on him. He shouldered some debris
away, and shuffled around the smoking ruins.
'Lina! Where are you?' He shouted.
'Scooby Doo! Where are you?' The soundtrack wailed.
'What sort of a movie is this?' he demanded to the ruins. He
found a strand of red hair and tugged at it. A sooty Lina followed it.
'For Shabby's sake, Gourry, let go of my hair!' Lina yelled. Gourry
obliged.
'Lina! I thought you might be dead!' Gourry exclaimed. The fact that
he'd previously been sitting in a fully intact pizza take away meant nothing to
him. Buildings, when Lina was around, tended to get dramatically re-arranged.
He was used to it by now.
'Well, looks like my work here is done!' The soundtrack
proclaimed.
'That soundtrack is starting to get on my nerves.' Lina muttered.
There was a muttered curse as Ut crawled out from under his former
counter.
'Curses, foiled.' The soundtrack rasped.
'Hell, foiled.' Ut coughed. He saw Lina and Gourry. They saw him.
Uh oh…
Chapter five: Interrogation with the vampire
'I can explain! I wasn't going to kill you! Well, I was going to kill
him - that's not important! I wasn't going to kill you; I was going to convert
you to a vampire! Please don't fireball me again, I have a weak heart! It's
been staked too many times!' He got himself in a defensive posture.
'So, you were going to send us both to sleep.' Began Lina.
'Well…yes.' Ut agreed.
'And after you had drugged us, you were going to kill Gourry in his
sleep.' Lina continued.
'Well…yes.' Ut agreed grudgingly.
'And while I was asleep, you were going to turn me into a vampire
without my permission!' Lina concluded triumphantly.
'Well…yes.' Ut agreed. He trembled. 'But it wasn't my fault! Xelloss
made me do it! He paid me three bags of gold and a year's supply of vanilla
beans!' At the moment, Ut was spilling the beans.
'Vanilla beans? Coffee beans I can understand. But vanilla beans?' Lina
asked quizzically.
'With vanilla beans you can make vanilla ice-cream!' Ut explained.
'And that's it? Vanilla ice cream? You'd turn me into one of the legion
of the undead just for vanilla ice cream?' Lina sounded scandalized.
'Please, you don't understand. There's a movie theater just down the
road, where most of the villagers go on their Saturday nights.'
'Don't go there Gilligan! There's a giant man eating tarantula in
that cave!' The soundtrack obediently boomed.
'Yeah, so I heard.' Lina groused. Her fingers made ominous twitching
motions. 'Get on with it.'
'Do you know how much gold I could make if I sold them vanilla ice
cream dipped in chocolate sauce? Do you know what sort of things moviegoers
eat? People's gullibility level significantly rises when they go into a movie
theater! They'll eat anything! Salty popcorn! Watery Coke! Drippy vanilla ice
cream dipped in horrid chocolate! At greatly inflated prices!' Ut sighed to
think of the lucrative offers. So did Lina. Then Xelloss appeared.
'Boo.' Hooted the soundtrack.
'Boo.' Announced Xelloss, 'To you.'
'Xelloss! You were scheming to turn me into a vampire, you bastard!'
Lina shouted. 'And have this guy dispose of Gourry.' She added as an
afterthought. 'By the way, what's your name?'
'Ut. Ut Sarandapalus.' They shook hands. Ut wiped his nervously on his
blackened apron.
'Why are you blaming me? He's the one who was actually going to do the
dreadful deed.' Xelloss argued.
'Yeah, but you were paying him. And he makes great pizzas.'
'Made.' Ut stared sadly at the debris of his shop.
'Don't worry. Xelloss will build you a new one.'
Xelloss blinked.
'Or else…' Ut chose that moment to stumble over to Lina and hiss
something in her ear. She grinned.
'Or else…' She paused significantly.
'Or else…?' parroted Gourry.
'Or else…?' Repeated Xelloss, like a straggling Greek chorus.
'Or else…(drum roll) I'll-'
'Well bugger me with a bottle opener!' Shrieked the soundtrack
at this inopportune moment.
'Or else…(Da da dum) I'll-' At this point Lina leapt up and did the
world's first mid air tackle. It would have made any footy player proud. She
bought Xelloss to the ground in one bruising move that deserved to be repeated
at lest three times in slow-mo. And then she snatched his staff from him.
'Or else I'll use your staff as a golf club!' She bought the staff down
savagely on a piece of dirtied brick. She flawlessly putted it several smooth
metres in the air. Xelloss winced.
'Alright! I'll rebuild your bloody shop!' He snapped his gloved fingers
and Lina, Gourry and Ut found themselves in Ut's previously ex shop. It had
been completely re built, re furbished, and re newed. Except, naturally, in
blistering purple. Lina handed Xellos's staff back to him. He made cooing
noises to it and polished the red bauble with his cloak.
'Did the meanie weenie Lina hurt baby? You can tell Daddy.' He cajoled.
Chapter six: The shortarse chapter
Ut yowled in horror. Sure, Xelloss had magically re-built and
re-decorated his shop, but at a price…
'My bloody shop! It looks like Prince's bedroom!'
It did. The coffee machine was a psychedelic lavender, aubergine chairs
dotted the magenta tiled floor, the walls were done in stripes of plum and
grape, the table were indigo Formica, the cash register was a muted burgundy,
and Ut's apron was now coloured a deep solferino. (You can tell I raided the
thesaurus, can't you?)
Ut staggered around in hopeless circles, gibbering incoherently.
Ironically, the soundtrack was squealing cream. Gourry sang
along tunelessly. Even more ironically, when the moon shone through the
amethyst tinted windows, the moonbeams seemed to form the hazy silhouette of a
Campbell's soup tin. Spooky.
Lina had found the pizza remains was gobbled them up. Xelloss had
finished playing with his staff (You'll
probably find that phrase in a yaoi fic is you look hard enough) and was
watching the heliotrope (It's a word. I swear.) fan spin its raison residues
around the lilac room.
Ut finished wandering.
'Are you going to pay me?' He asked Xelloss.
'For this monumental cock up?'
'Yeah.'
'Oh, all right.' Xelloss tossed him a large calico bag. Ut opened it up
greedily.
'Vanilla beans! Oooh goody! Thanks, Xelloss, you're occasionally a
really nice guy.'
'When it suits me. Lina, I really am sorry I ever thought of plotting
to turn you to the dark side and kill Gourry in the process. My sincere
apologies.'
'Mrmph.' Asked Lina with her mouth full.
'I bet he's plotting something again. Stuff him. I'm eating pizza.' And
so she did, for the rest of this story.
'That's all, folks.' The soundtrack mourned.
'Yeah.' Said Gourry, profoundly. 'That just about wraps it up.'
And it did. The end.