Episode 3: Drunk in Paradise

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"Ilyana," Soren said. "You better have my stuff. And a lot of it. Because if you don't I'm going to get medieval on your ass."

"I—I do have the things you asked for."

"Fine. I'll get that raw meat for you tomorrow. I'm as beat as a filly in a Daein stable." Soren gasped. "Oh my goddess, I'm so tired I'm spitting out clichés. Maybe I should medicate myself. Oh NURSE. Hand over dat Vulnerary, it's prescription time!"

"Um, Doctor Soren?" Ilyana said as Soren snatched the bag from her hands. "Where did Ike and, um, Nurse Anna go?"

"Twenty large says they're going to get biblical."

"What?"

Soren shook his head. "You'll get it when you're older. For now, you're the de-facto nurse. I don't like it, but ehhh, I'll deal with it. Hey, maybe in a few years you can 'service' me as well as Nurse Anna can. Because there ain't no one like a red-headed slut when it comes to good 'service', ain't it great?"

"Um…I guess."

Soren spun around. "Luckily for you, I have a position available on my staff." Soren winked suggestively.

"I thought Nurse Anna was on your staff."

"No, right about now she's on Ike's staff getting quite a big bonus. And I have the feeling she's going to be working overtime if Ike doesn't leave early."

"But…Ike's not a doctor."

Soren facepalmed. "Look, just scram. I'm going to get loaded on pree-skription Vulnerary and hit the hay. I'm just glad I don't have any more clients."

The door busted open.

"HEY GUYS!"

Ilyana shrieked, and Shinon staggered into the doctor's office, a giant feather in one hand and a flask of something in the other.

"Speaking of loaded…" Soren said, rolling his eyes.

"Sho, howsh life treating ya, you overshized fruitcake?" Shinon took a swig of drink and tickled Ilyana with his feather. She ran away.

"Hey doctor, I got thompthin to tell ya. YOU SUCK! Ha ha ha ha ha…"

Soren rolled his eyes. He spun around in his chair and threw down some Vulnerary.

"I'm gonna have to find another dead guy to write out a prescription of Vulnerary for," he said.

"LISHEN TO ME!" Shinon yelled, drinking. "I got—gotta problem."

"Wow, I would never have guessed that. Any more fascinating tidbits of information you want to share with me?"

"Hey! Hey hey hey! Heyeyeyeyeyeyeyey mister don't start being a smart ass with me!"

Soren rolled his eyes again. Shinon was standing on the other side of the desk, really really drunk (as if that were not already obvious.)

"Okay. Why don't you tell me exactly what hurts, and I'll tell you how you can go screw yourself," Soren said.

Shinon paused for a moment. For a few seconds there was blissful silence, and the insects of the night chirped merrily. Why the cicadas cry, we may never know, but one explanation is Shinon.

"Well, heresh my prob—prob—pobem," Shinon said. He took a drink. "Me an—an a guy friend of mine, we was goin' to—now, now I mean it, we weres going to beat on some woodland animalsh together."

"Oh, is that what they're calling it nowadays?" Soren said, quaffing Vulnerary.

"An', an' then we were going to shoot our arrows in a couple stumps."

"Oh, is that what they're calling it nowadays?"

"An', an' then we were goin' to whomp some yahoos with sticks."

"Okay, I know for a fact that's not what they're calling it nowadays…"

"An', an' then we were goin' to buy a hotel room an—"

"All right, that's enough of that," Soren said, groaning. "So what you're saying is, you really don't have anything wrong with you, you just came to boast about how you and some other dude were about to have a 'long discussion of geopolitical affairs in layman's terms'."

"Uhhh….whu-huh?"

Soren facepalmed. "That's exactly what I thought. Okay, I have the perfect cure for what you have. Come over here, Shinon."

Shinon stumbled around to the other side of the desk and stood in front of Soren. He tried to tickle the doctor, but Soren's stare was cold enough to freeze fire.

"Time to give you a check-up. Get over here. Stick out your tongue."

Shinon was going to protest, but belched instead.

"If you stick out your tongue, I'll give you candy," Soren said.

Shinon, being too drunk to remember his name, stuck out his tongue because he liked candy.

Soren grinned evilly. He grabbed a pair of tongs and grabbed Shinon's tongue. Shinon, of course, protested, but these were magical tongs, able to turn tongues truthful with a single tug.

"Now tell me, Shinon. What is the real reason you came to my humble abode tonight? Tell me the truth, or I'll hit you. And you can't sue because you deserve it. What is the real reason you came to my humble abode tonight?"

"Ah…" Shinon said, gagging. "Ah caat teeh ya any-hin ca you gah my tahhg!"

"What's that, Shinon? Did you say Rolf fell down the old well?"

"No damma, ah shed you gadda leggo ma tuggg!"

"What's that, Shinon? You say you want fish? Okay, I'll get you a barrel of fish as long as you balance a ball on your no—"

"OH, FUHYOU MAHATHATIN PITHA FUHFIN SIT, I ODDA FUTHIN RIP AH YAH TAAG ATHEE HA YA LAAI ED!"

"Oh, I get it. You need to be medicated. I'll write you a 'script for Spritzerin, the wonder drug. Like penicillin…except, you know, for drunk psycho nutjobs instead of…whores." Soren took out a blue pen (the pen is blue! The pen is blue! The damn pen is bluuueee!) and wrote something on a small slip of paper.

"AHTHA PETHTIN THA POGGIE FOM YOW."

"Okay, now I just have no clue what the flying flink you're saying. Sober up and call me in the morning. Unless you can 'service' me like Nurse Anna can—and I know that's why you're here, you falling-down drunk fruits basket—you might as well stop wasting my time. Here, take this and give it to the Farmer Cyst's Guild and they'll give you the stuff." Soren thrust the prescription into Shinon's hand.

"MAH TUGG!"

"Oh, right, sorry. Are your motor skills so bad that you can't take off the tongs yourself?"

Shinon put his hand to his face and accidentally poked himself in the eye. "AAAAAOH!"

Soren rolled his eyes and removed the tongs.

"Ah! Hey, thanksh little feller that's actually half deshent of you. Yknow I got ta thinkin' and I just wanted to say that…I RULE!" Shinon took a big swig of drink and dropped his prescription.

"All right, that's it. Let me ask you something," Soren said, folding his hands in the way that evil geniuses do (and then say "mwa ha ha ha"). "Mwa ha ha ha," Soren said, grinning in a way that was both evil AND stylish. "No, seriously, man, you think you're hot shit, don't youse?"

"Well, shit yeah I do."

"So tell me exactly how hot shit you are."

Shinon stood up and puffed out his chest while he took a ferocious drink. "Are you shittin' me? I'm the besht—aweshomest archer on this widdle bittle tiny winy planet we call Earf."

"Earf?"

"Yeah, we…we liff on a planet called Earf an'…an' the people all make big buildings of steel that go waaaaaaay up into the sky an' an' they have this machine that can take two sheep, right, right, they take two sheep, right, and no wait I mean ONE sheep, yeah one sheep, and they make it into two. Like, like, like, like a doll…or something. That goes baaaaaaaaaaaaaaa moo. Ohh mah tug—I mea, tongue, oh it hurts."

Soren crinkled his brow. "Uh huh. Right. 'Earf.' Yeah, okay, right, I'll buy that. What exactly is that stuff you're drinking?"

"NO! You can't have it. It's mine. You want it but you can never evereverevereverevereverevereverEVER have it, 'cause it'sh mine mine mine. Hahahahaha! You…you just an ass-backwardsh guy who sheecretly likes to take it up the—"

Before Shinon could finish, Soren stood up, leapt five feet into the air, and dropkicked Shinon halfway across the room.

"Ha HA, beeyotch!" Soren proclaimed triumphantly. "Oh, you were all shootin' off some straight shit until you got KICKED IN YO CHEST! That's right, ho. That's right. Uh! Uh! This is my house! That's right, this is MY HOUSE, you pink-haired whippersnapper!" Soren started doing triumphant pelvic thrusts and went into an impromptu chicken dance that soon became a freestyle breakdance session set to the tune of "Flaming Disco Mania"…for some odd reason.

Meanwhile, Shinon was groaning and licking up some of his booze that had spilled all over the ground, aww poor baby.

Soren stood up and cleared his throat while simultaneously wiping the dirt off his robes, drinking an apple martini, and "servicing" some elf chicks that had mysteriously appeared under his desk (Doctor Soren can do things like that, and no one minds because he's that good of a doctor.)

"Anyway, NOW you have something treatable," said the doctor. "A serious chest injury. And a hangover tomorrow. I'll give you a prescription for some sleeping pills and suggest you sleep. FOREVER. And if that doesn't work, do the world a favor and go make yourself taller."

"No, I don't wanna," Shinon said stubbornly, still lapping up booze while groaning in pain. He looked like a fish with pink hair.

"Oh NURSE!" Soren yelled.

Ilyana sleepily walked into the room.

"Hungry…"

"I told you, I'd get you the money—er, meat, tomorrow," Soren snapped. "Anyway, I need you. There's an 'uninvited guest' hanging around who is in desperate need of getting the hell out of here."

"Who?"

Soren facepalmed. "You, if you don't shut up."

"Oh."

"Ilyana, do you have your head in the clouds?"

Ilyana blinked. "Do I what?"

"Can I touch your boobs?"

"My what?"

Soren rolled his eyes. "Okay, look, just get this stupid drunken archer guy out of my office, will ya? I need to get back to my porn."

"Your what?"

Soren beat Ilyana with a paper fan quite viciously. She yelped and decided to do what the doctor ordered. She picked up Shinon and quickly walked out of the room, muttering something about lamb and fruit and roast chicken and pie and boobs.

"Now how can a sweet little girl like her carry a big frackin' lump of shat like that?" Soren pondered as he spun around in his chair. He needed more Vulnerary. "How did that girl get so freaking freakishly strong? I might have expected something like that out of a crappy comic book, where the superheroine gets her powers from nuclear waste or radiation or someth—"

Soren sat up straight. Finally he had a revelation. He knew exactly what ailment Ilyana was suffering from, exactly how to treat it, and why what they had been doing before to try to help her had not worked. Then he promptly forgot the revelation and decided to go to sleep.