The bell had tolled.
The swan had sung.
And the sign on the front door had been swung from OPEN in blue to CLOSED in red.
Archmage Gilbert, master of the arcane arts and proprietor of Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop was close to death.
Atop his highest chamber, three floors above the customer’s entrance, he summoned his employees by intercom and made manifest his will.
“Apprentices,” he told them all, through jaundiced eyes and haggard beard-breath, “I am at death’s door.”
“Told you to quit smoking,” said Terry.
“Shut the fuck up, Terry. Now I am due to leave this world, but for a wizard of my potency, such things are not inevitable. When I die, leave the left window of my room open and I will return. But I will not leave you to do this out of the goodness of your hearts – or even for the wage I pay you.”
“Below minimum,” said Terry.
“Shut the fuck up, Terry – and besides, I let you keep the tips. Mostly.” Archmage Gilbert coughed phlegmily. “Now, stand you there and let me bequeath your inheritances. George!”
George straightened up.
“As the chief oilaturgist of my diner, you have sweated and steamed over many carcasses animal, vegetable, and mineral alike. To aid you in your further endeavours, I give unto you mine All-Fryer, which can bread and grease up just about anything you can fit in it – and most things will fit in it, if you try.”
George bowed low. “Thank you, archmage Gilbert.”
“Yeah, yeah. Krystal!”
Krystal saluted.
“You have hawked many wares to many morons for many moons as my scammagician, and I respect that level of scheming in an apprentice. To you I give my tricky scanner, whose laser will read any barcode not once not twice but three times, and will never give away what it’s up to through tell-tale beeps. Charge everyone and spare no wallets.”
Krystal grinned. “Will do, archmage Gilbert.”
“Wonderful thanks. Terry!”
“What?” asked Terry.
“You have sold the least out of all three of my apprentices, and indeed the least of any apprentice I’ve ever had. In fact, more than once I’ve caught you actively encouraging customers not to shop here but to go to Pete’s Prawnhooks down the road, and twice that I’ve heard of you’ve insinuated that I chop up people’s stray pets for chum. As thanks for your unstintingly lousy job, I decree that you shall be thrown into the fibbling octobeast’s tank.”
“Hey-”
“Immediately.”
“Bu-”
“Chop chop!”
It took six minutes for her fellow apprentices to get Terry down the stairs, mostly because she wouldn’t stop biting. In the meantime, and with great annoyance, archmage Gilbert, master of the arcane arts and proprietor of Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop, expired.
***
“Got any more band-aids?” asked George.
“Nope, used the last one on my finger,” said Krystal. “Fucking hell that hurt. Now we just need to go upstairs and open that window.”
There was a loud crunching noise.
“Fuck,” they agreed, and then they ran up the staircase two at a time until it ended on a splintered set of steps in the middle of the air.
Above them two great flocks of gulls capered in the sky, a thousand strong all told, angrily fighting over the crumbling remains of the third story of Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop and more specifically archmage Gilbert’s extremely mortal remains. An agreement was reached when the body unspooled down the middle, and away they sped, screaming and shitting as they went.
“I’ll take the north flock,” said Krystal. “That’s his left half. That’s his good half.”
“I’ll the south flock,” said George. “Can’t do much without a right half, even if it’s the bad half.”
And so the two former apprentices and employees of the great archmage Gilbert girded their loins and cleaned their teeth and packed up their toolbelts and set off.
***
Three hours later Terry finally got the flibbering octobeast to let her out of the tank. It had been exceptionally clingy today, and kept hoping she’d give it extra treats.
“No, I didn’t sneak any fries today, fuck OFF,” she told it as she pried the last hopeful tentaclaw from her shirt. “That’s a good boy. Good fuck off. Now where the hell is everyone?”
The lights were off, the fans were silent, and there was a note on the counter explaining everything in a rough sort of way.
“Figures,” said Terry. “Well, serves them right. I’ll just clear out the safe and leave.”
Five minutes later she remembered Krystal had the safe key, broke a window, and crawled out.
***
In the meantime, long had George quested southward, over hill and through dale, up and down and all around, to the farthest tip of the edge of the rim of downtown, where the restaurants lurked all along the waterfront and took the wallets of many a tourist. He hadn’t seen feather nor flitter of a gull the whole way, but he was confident that he was on the right track. Archmage Gilbert had given them some serious indigestion.
At length the tell-tale white spatter ended at the rim of a great steel wall that soared up to nigh the height of the restaurant itself, a bin fit to trash creation, a garbage skip that could hold a dump in itself and have room for more. And from high high up on its rim came the distant aaike aiiike awk awk awk awk awk of seagulls.
“There we are,” he said with satisfied surety, and so spitting swiftly, started to scale the surface. But though George pulled and heaved and clambered until his arms were sorer than a monkey’s buttocks, the peak of the dumpster came no closer.
“Haw!” came from below him. “Looking for something?”
George looked down and then back up and was eye to eye with a great ogre of a restaurateur. His teeth were tombstones and his eyes were deadly burning coals and he never stopped smiling.
“Yes,” said George guarded, putting one hand to his belt. “The remains of my late master, the archmage Gilbert. They have been stolen by a flock of seagulls who reside atop your dumpster.”
“My dumpster, my property,” said the restaurateur unfeelingly. “Code of the cooks.”
“Be that as it may,” said George stubbornly, “I am a cook myself. And I know that if I challenge you to a fry-off, you’ll have no choice but to accept. If I win, I claim my master’s body.”
“Sure!” said the restaurateur brightly. “And if I win, I get to eat you!”
“Wait,” said George.
“Nah,” said the restaurateur. “Starting now, time limit of five, we’ll use my kitchen. GO!”
And they went, George unsheathing the all-fryer as he went. With fury and vinegar and onion tears he roared through the degrees, pouring all his heart and soul and hope into the All-Fryer, which swallowed his every ingredient and begged for more. Though the ogre’s cabinets were damp-sealed shut and his shelves seven feet and more off the ground, they finished at the same time.
“Deep-fried hamburger salad with funnel cake rings,” said George, shaking clean the All-Fryer and sheathing it with a smug expression.
“Why, that’s just what I made,” said the restaurateur, with far too big a smile. “I believe I win the tie, however.”
“What? Why?”
“I also deep-fried my fryer.”
“Fuck!” swore George, but he was already shoulder-deep in the ogre’s mouth and vanishing fast and so he could do naught but flip the cheeky bastard the middle toe as he went down.
***
Krystal walked north and north until she found the place where the boardwalk ended, the long pier. And at the tip of the long pier, on crumbling concrete and purest rust, huddled together for warmth and peevishness, stewed a full flock of gulls.
“There you are,” said Krystal happily. And she walked forwards to them, but the gulls saw her coming and noisily hopped into the water, swearing in bird words at her.
“Hah!” cackled a creaking voice. “You’ll never get close to them that way!”
Krystal looked up and saw that she was being watched by an ancient purveyor of beach glass knick-knacks of glittering eye and craggled sun-crisped ears. “Mind your own business, you old fart,” she said politely. “I’m just retrieving the body of my master, the archmage Gilbert. Those flying rats have taken it.”
“Fat chance you’ll get it back,” sniggered the glass-seller, scratching at their chin until the flakes fell. “But I can do it for you.”
“Hah!”
“BET I can do it for you.”
“Double hah!” said Krystal. “Hah, then hah. Now I’m going to go get it.”
So Krystal moved towards the end of the pier again, where the gulls had resettled, and she moved with all the silent and ingratiating grace of a true salesperson, nothing but a velvet touch and a warm smile and a comforting sunny aura that encouraged you to think that maybe the world wasn’t such a bad place after all and maybe you really were getting the long end of the stick this time, just because someone was such. a. nice. guy.
The seagulls swore a blue streak at her and took off again.
“Shitlizards!” she screamed at them.
“Shitasaurs,” said the glass-seller. “Those are dinosaurs, not lizards. Bet you I can get to them before you can.”
“Not likely,” snorted Krystal.
“Bet you a million dollars.”
“Bullshit.”
“Bet you five bucks.”
“Eat my shorts.”
“Bet you that shiny-looking hand scanner you got on your belt.”
“Sure, why not, see if I care.”
“Cool,” said the glass-seller. Then she tucked her thumbs into her belt, hoisted up her singular pant, and strolled down to the end of the dock.
“Nice day we’re having oh eh what’s going on here nice to see you nice to see you same shit different day eh nice weather oh but I heard it might rain later on can’t complain nobody’s listening hah hah hah you know me right don’t mind me just passing through-”
The gulls were dead asleep by the time the glass-seller stood among them.
“How’s that then?” she called back, but Krystal too had been bored utterly unconscious, and so with a shrug the glass-seller took the tricky scanner from her belt and also her belt and also also her shoes.
***
Terry moved slowly but surely, tracking footprints in fecal material, sniffing the air for bodyspray and fried foods and cheap plastic and strawberry shampoos. She muttered as she walked, dark words from dark languages learned from prawn buckets and worm cases, invertebrate slurs that would make boneless bodies grow limp with horror.
The anger kept her going all the way to the great gleaming surface of the dumpster, and atop it she heard the shrieks and roars of a seagull flock. And beneath it she saw an ogre restaurateur taking a smoke break.
“Hey there,” he said.
“Fuck off,” she told him.
“I like your attitude. Hey, I ate someone that smelled sort of like you but less tentaclawy a while ago.”
“My co-worker,” said Terry.
“Yeah, they lost a bet. Double or nothing?”
“What’d they bet you?”
“Oh, the body of some old guy up there.”
“Sure, I’ll take those prizes-”
“Great!”
“-and for the double I take them back too.”
“Aw shit. Well, rules are rules. I challenge you to a fry-off.”
“Your kitchen?”
“My kitchen.”
“Deal.”
The restaurateur’s mouth was only worse when grinned wide. “Let’s go.”
Terry walked in and swore a blue streak. “Fucking hell, seven-foot shelves? Really?”
“Last guy didn’t complain.”
“Last guy wasn’t five foot three. This isn’t fair!”
“Life isn’t fair,” said the ogre, with the warm glee of someone who had a lot to do with that.
“Aw, c’mon. Please? Just give me a stepstool. Please?”
“Nah.”
“Okay, fine. But I need a fryer at least before we start. That’s part of the setup.”
“Seems reasonable,” said the restaurateur, and he reached up and leaned over and pulled a fryer off the shelf and as he did so Terry kicked his feet out from underneath him and held him face-down in his own oil vat until he stopped squirming.
“Something smells good out there,” said someone from around the ogre’s mid-gut.”
“Get out of there, George,” said Terry. “Krystal in there with you?”
“No? She went north.”
“Great. Great. Just great. Listen, cut your own way out or whatever. Bye. It’s been shit working with you.”
“You too!” said George. And as Terry walked out the door she heard the tell-tale hum of the All-Fryer’s blender attachment starting up.
***
Finding Krystal was easier. Terry just walked north up to the pier and found her sitting on a park bench.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Didn’t we feed you to the fibbling octobeast?”
“Yeah. You got the key to the safe?”
Krystal frowned. “No?”
“Wow, great job. Better take keyholder off your resume.”
“Hey, it wasn’t my fault. That glass-seller took my shoes.”
“So?”
“That’s where I kept them.”
Terry sighed and rolled her eyes and blew a raspberry.
“Fuck off.”
“Make me, shithead. I’m quitting. If I get your stupid shoes back, I keep the key. Deal?”
“Whateverr.”
“Whateverrrrrr.”
The old glass-seller perked up as Terry approached.
“Want some beach glass wares?” she inquired. “Hand-carved myself. This one used to be a beer bottle. This was a lightbulb! And this is a window-pane someone smashed down on Lakeshore Boulevard last week!”
“No thanks fuck off,” said Terry. “I want my ex-coworker’s shoes back.”
“Won ‘em fair and square.”
“Don’t care.”
“I know you are but what am I?”
“Rubber. And you’re glue.”
“Safety!” said the glass-seller.
“Only works in tag.”
“Shoot. Well, I like those shoes. I wanna keep ‘em.”
“Tell you what,” said Terry. “First one to pick up a seagull and bring it back over here without hurting it wins the shoes.”
“Deal!” said the glass-seller. “And I get to keep your shoes too.”
“Whatever. I’m going first.”
So Terry cleared her throat and squared her shoulders and straightened her back and narrowed her eyes and jutted out her chin and clenched her fists and flexed her biceps and braced her legs and took one step and the entire flock of seagulls took off the end of the pier as one, screaming fucking murder at the top of their lungs. It took an hour for them to settle down again, mostly because the glass-seller wouldn’t stop laughing.
“Shut up,” said Terry crossly.
“ahahahahhahHURKahahahahahahHURKahahh. Aha. Hah. Okay, I’m fine now. Watch how it’s done!” cackled the old merchant. And she spat on her hands and began to lurch forwards, half-amble and half-mosey, a stream of nauseating drivel oozing from her and suffocating the air itself with leaden banalisms. Ears sank. Minds fogged. Time died.
“… and that’s the problem with people today,” said the glass-seller, as she cradled the rigid, glassy-eyed body of the seagull back to her stall. “No respect no how for age and experience and wisdom why when I was young I knew better and if I didn’t my mother would thrash me black and bl-”
Her voice died in her mouth. Terry was still standing. Still staring.
“How?” demanded the glass-seller.
“I sold bait to fishermen,” said Terry. “For six summers. Full-time.”
“Oh,” said the glass-seller. And that was when she realized she’d stopped droning, but only a little after the seagull put its beak in her face and wouldn’t stop.
“Bye,” said Terry to Krystal.
And she left, but with the key.
***
At length the two apprentices of the archmage Gilbert made their way home to Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop, worn and tired and dripping gastric juices and gull feces. At their heels circled five-a-hundred birds each.
“I bring the mortal remains of our master,” intoned George, “within the fibres of these birds and their digestive systems, his soul sings strong.”
“I also bring the mortal remains of our master,” said Krystal. “These ones ate him too.”
“Bones and all?”
“Yes.”
“They were VERY hungry.”
“Yep. Now usher them in. Go on!”
They ushered them in, and in, and in. Five hundred wings times two for birds times two great flocks, spiralling up the stories of Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop, filling up the air. The kitchen was a birdcage; the souvenirs were pelted with guano; the fibbling octobeast quivered in its tank.
“Archmage Gilbert!” called George.
“Master of the arcane arts!” yelled Krystal.
“Proprietor of Gil’s Diner, Souvenir Stand, and Bait Shop!” roared George. “Here is your body!”
“Here is your soul!”
“Beyond death you have travelled, beyond you will still!”
“Return now, and let the world see you once more!”
“Arise!”
“Arise!”
ARISE
Every bird alit, every bird flew, and every single seagull spiralled up up up the staircase and out of the broken shell of the building’s third floor and up into the skies with a thunderous blast of flatulent spellery.
“That didn’t work,” said George.
“No. It didn’t.”
“Hey, did you count the gulls?
“No. Did you?”
It took nine tries to get it done, and by the time they did they still hadn’t remembered to check the safe.
***
By then Terry was miles away on the bus and still moving. It’d been easier to get passage than she’d hoped; the way the seagull refused to let go of the glass-seller’s eye had been surprisingly helpful. She’d have to buy it some fries when they got home.
Wherever home was. Ah, they’d figure it out.