Mexican Standoff

by Heavens to Bikini Kill (who is shamelessly "jocking" Reservoir Dogs)

Three

"Uranus, you've got no fucking clue what you're talking about."

"Shut your trap, Neptune! What do you know about it?"

"I know that everything about your 'Ichi the Killer' analysis is just fucking wrong."

That blatantly American Denny's soon became our headquarters. The largest booth in the place was located in the back, and it took us three days and an extra glare from Mr. Jupiter to establish it as ours. We even had a seating standard: me, then Uranus, then Jupiter , then Venus, and then Kaiba, who I only referred to as Mars when I absolutely had to talk to him. (Other than that, I pretty much forgot that he existed.)

My days were spent working at the record shop (where Joe would frequently wink and nod at me, trying to establish to the other employees that we had something secret that they'd never know about), talking to Joe about the operation breifly, and then riding my motorbike out to that Denny's for "orientation," in which Joe found it necessary to have us get to know each other better.

"Knowing each other better" consisted of Jupiter smoking and smirking at my fear of him and his one eye, Venus smiling and being his naturally polite self, Kaiba ignoring everybody and everybody ignoring him, and Uranus and myself arguing about pop culture.

Which brought us to this particular point in time.

"No, no, no, Uranus. You are wrong. You were born wrong. You have lived wrong. You will always be wrong."

"Yeah, whatever. All I know is, you people glorify violence way too much. Gore is the hipster icon in films now."

"Shut up, Uranus! Gore is not some hip new fashion! Blood in art can be beautiful. Look at Kill Bill, for example."

"That is the worst example ever. Kill Bill was Tarantino's announcement to the rest of the world that even at forty years old, he is still a hipster."

"Oh great, are you gonna link to your 'why Tarantino sucks' analysis? You do realize that that one was wrong too, right?"

Conversations like this are not rare.

But out of nowhere came a "heh" from one of the men at the booth.

Mr. Uranus fumed at the mere concept of someone mocking his ranting. He turned to the man next to him. "You got a problem, Mr. Jupiter?"

Mr. Jupiter relished the rest of his cigarette, and mockingly peered at Mr. Uranus through his one white eye. (I still say it's a contact lens, but I've never brought it up with him.) His messy hair moved with him almost threateningly. "No. I don't."

Mr. Uranus sniffed haughtily. "Then that chuckle you let out was pretty unneccessary, wasn't it." A statement, and not a question.

None of us thought it was that big of a deal. Mr. Jupiter did. Without warning or a second thought, a short sword flew out of somewhere in Jupiter's coat and in a split second, we all saw that blade stuck directly next to Uranus's throat. Only half an inch away from death.

Nobody dared to breathe as Jupiter let out another "heh." He peered at his own short sword, and then at Uranus's quivering neck. Uranus himself was entirely pale. Jupiter smirked. "You're right. It was unneccessary."

Fade out, fade in.

"Auuuuuuugh!!"

"Oh.. oh my fucking god!"

"Eeeeegh! Oh, oh, oh, aaaaaaaaaah!"

"Wait, wait, wait! Calm the fuck down!"

"Calm the fuck down?! Calm the fuck down?! That cop just got a bullet in my stomach!"

"Look, Kaiba, I realize that you've been shot, and I admit that I don't know what it feels like, and that I really wouldn't want to either, but you can't freak the fuck out on me, 'cuz then I'll start to freak the fuck out on you, and if we both freak the fuck out, then you won't get out of this alive."

Kaiba, who was in the back seat of the Cadillac I borrowed from Uranus, the same Cadillac that was now barrelling down a quiet suburban road in Domino, took a moment to look up from his ugly bullet wound. "I thought you weren't supposed to call me by my real name."

I rolled my eyes as I flipped off an angry honking motorist. "You have fucking lead in your belly and the only thing you care about is the fact that I'm breaking one of Joe's rules."

"Yeah, whatever, but I'm not getting Joe all up in my ass just 'cuz you broke his rule."

I heard a small sniffle. "Kaiba, you're gonna be all right, okay? I swear to every single fucking god, you're gonna be all right."

And because I lost most of my judgement in my well-hidden panic, I reached back and grabbed a hold of Kaiba's hand. He squeezed it so hard I could barely feel my fingers, but that was all right.

Everything just had to be all right, or we were all gonna be dead.