Puddlejumpers Fic: Tokyo Drift
Aug. 28th, 2006 09:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityofoneHey Hey It's The Puddlejumpers!
Yes, I can't stop writing about them. This story actually moves ahead in the continuity: it takes place after "Four Quarters" and "Bootleg."
Title: Tokyo Drift
A Puddlejumpers Story
Rating: R
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: ~4100 words
Summary: There was a reporter in the limo with them.
A/N: As always, many thanks to my PJ partner-in-crime,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wychwood.
Tokyo Drift
There was a reporter in the limo with them. Sitting across from them, awkward on the plush leather seat. At first he had tried leaning back, sinking into the chair, but his discomfort had been obvious. Then he had tried to perch, balanced on the edge, leaning forward to catch every word. The abrupt turn of the limo down yet another anonymous Tokyo alleyway had almost sent him sprawling onto the vehicle’s floor. Now he was attempting something in between the two postures, a compromise. His calves were braced tightly against the slick leather, his elbows likewise tight and forward. His hands shook where they held the pad and pen, but that may have just been the driver taking another lurching turn. There was a thin sheen of sweat on the reporter’s forehead. He stared at them with wide eyes and licked his lips, getting ready for the next question.
Shep spoke before he had a chance to; the reporter looked relieved. “I really miss my dog.” Shep was wearing his best earnest face, looking rather puppyish himself. “Strange, huh?” He shrugged. “On long tours you do hear people say that they miss their pets, but I never have. And then last night I started really missing my dog. It’s odd.”
The reporter nodded: in agreement, in sympathy. Shep smiled at him, white teeth in the dark.
Rodney took full advantage of the limo’s full slouching capabilities and sank back in his seat, his arms folded. “You don’t have a dog.”
Shep didn’t miss a beat. “I told you it was odd.”
The reporter laughed. Rodney rolled his eyes.
The limo lurched again, but this time it came to a complete stop. Rodney peered cautiously out the window, but Shep was already bouncing out the door, the reporter drawn after him like a toy on a string. They were both almost run over the security car, which proceeded to dislodge personnel like a VW Bug vomiting up an army of clowns. John’s face went momentarily and uncharacteristically slack as he looked at the security the venue had provided for this little late night jaunt. “They just keep sending ‘em in...”
Then Shep’s gaze was snapping up again. He’d clearly noticed, a half-second after Rodney had, the bright, luminescent writing on the back of the security personnel’s shiny black vests. THE PUDDLE-JUMPERS. With a hypen, too. Rodney’s grimace almost matched Shep's.
“For fuck’s sake, take those off!” When this failed to achieve results, Shep cleverly switched tacks. Rodney couldn’t hear what he was saying above the city sounds and the music hammering out of the club, but his gestures spoke clearly enough. After a moment, the head security guy nodded and the vests were removed. Shep slapped him on his now wordless back, all camaraderie.
Rodney was glad that Lorne had chosen to go with Ronon and Teyla tonight; he’d probably be having a tiny heart attack right about now.
They descended the steps into the club. The sign above the door read “One-Eyed Jacks” in both English and, Rodney assumed, Japanese. “Abandon All Hope” might be more appropriate; Rodney thought about nudging the reporter and telling him that—it would make a good quote—but changed his mind. The world was unjustly uninterested in what he had to say.
The reporter trailed after John as Shep made his grand entrance. Rodney started counting off the seconds: sure enough, even before their party was fully settled at a big, semi-private booth in the corner (but still with an excellent sight-line to the gyrating girls) the music switched over from a dance remix of some nineties pop song that Rodney vaguely recognized to a track off of Midnight. “Hey!” said the reporter, seeming torn between watching the scantily-clad girls and staring at Shep. “They’re playing one of your songs!”
Shep rolled his eyes. He was still wearing his sunglasses, but Rodney knew him too well. “I can’t escape me, can I?”
Rodney knew him too well; he was probably the only one who thought John sounded slightly manic when he said things like that.
One of the girls came over. She was an impressively busty brunette—Caucasian, like most of the girls working the club. She had beautiful skin, or so Rodney could judge by the ample amount on display, with a light dusting of freckles trailing down toward... He swallowed, and looked up to see Shep smirking at him. The reporter was still...distracted.
The girl had eyes only for Shep, however. She slid around the odd kidney-bean of a table and plopped down in his lap without so much as a by-your-leave. Her breasts bounced. “Hi!” she announced. The white fabric of her dress pulled invitingly up her thighs.
Shep’s eyes (Rodney imagined) stayed firmly on her face. His grin looked a little tight, but it too stayed in place. “What’s your name?” he asked. “What brings you to Tokyo?”
The girl slid a little closer; if she kept it up, she and Shep would be pretty much having sex where they sat, whether he liked it or not. “I want you,” she said, fingers slipping beneath the high, protective collar of Shep’s leather jacket. “I always get what I want.”
Shep didn’t say anything. He leaned forward, miraculously avoiding mashing his chest into the girl’s breasts. His teeth hovered next to her ear. The pose gave Rodney a very strong impression that Shep was about to go for her neck.
He said something.
The girl bolted backward like a shot. Her full lips slanted down into an angry, upset pout. Jerkily, she tore herself off of Shep’s lap and out of the booth, and quickly disappeared into the crowd. The reporter was the only one who looked sad to see her go.
“I guess you must be used to that by now,” the reporter said. He sounded envious.
Even Shep’s shrug managed to look winning. “Actually, I’m still surprised. I never see it coming...”
Rodney snorted. Both Shep and the reporter shot him a look, one flat and the other curious. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m contemplating the horrifying prospect of finding the bathroom in this place.”
Neither of them said anything. After a moment, Rodney awkwardly slid out of his seat. Refraining from shooting a glance at John over his shoulder, Rodney turned his concentration to trying to remember how to say “Where is the toilet?” in Japanese.
He made one of the security guys do it. He was pointed toward a long corridor with walls that dripped ominously and lots of frustrating twists and turns. Rodney began to wonder if he was going to stumble into a Yakuza den. Or maybe he'd find a minotaur, he thought, and turning a corner, ran smack into the brunette.
She wasn’t crying, but her eyes looked puffy and red. “You!” she said.
“Uh,” said Rodney. A second later, something splattered wetly against his cheek, stinging the corner of his eye.
“You spat on me!” Rodney cried. “This is just—Shep rejects someone and I get spat on. Of course. Of course!”
The girl was still standing there, fixing him with a brazen stare. “Get out of my way!” Rodney demanded. She didn’t move. “I—I have a highly trained escort of security personnel waiting just...um....” The corridor ran ‘round corner after corner, taking a slight detour through Narnia for all he knew. “They’re around!”
The girl pushed her giant breasts of death into Rodney’s personal space. He could see the headlines now: Puddlejumpers Guitarist Found Dead in Tokyo Strip Club, Smothered to Death by Enraged Mammaries. Or not. They’d probably lead with a story about Shep’s non-existent dog instead.
The girl tapped him sharply on the chest. “Tell your friend! Tell your friend that I loved him. And tonight he broke my heart!”
She pushed past him, her shoulder smacking roughly into his. Rodney paused for a moment, then quickly followed after her, his quest for the toilet forgotten. Without a guide, he doubted he’d ever make it out of here.
He lost her around some bend, but by then the sounds from the club proper had become more pronounced and he was able to follow the music (Shep’s voice, singing, A man will beg, a man will crawl...) back into the brightly lit room. The security guards were huddled in a little cluster, most of them staring at the platforms of writhing girls like men bewitched. Rodney thought he saw the brunette talking to one of them and quickly reeled off, back in the direction of their table.
He almost walked right past it, because Shep wasn’t there to guide him, to mark his place. There was just the reporter, tapping his notebook on the table’s edge in time to the music.
“Where’s John?” Rodney asked.
The reporter cupped a hand behind his ear. “What?”
“Where’s Shep?”
The reporter’s brow wrinkled, and for a moment, Rodney thought that he was going to have to repeat himself again. But then, “You didn’t see him? He said he had to go to the bathroom, too.”
Rodney flushed, imagining what Shep had probably intended as the climax of a shared bathroom visit. When there was a reporter and a whole fleet of security guys waiting outside—it was so, so like him. And like Rodney to protest, but never actually say no.
“It’s like a fucking labyrinth back there,” Rodney said, reaching up to rub his temple, brushing awkwardly at the rim of his hat. “Wait here,” he told the reporter finally. “I’ll go see if any of these security clowns are actually doing their jobs.”
If they were, they weren't doing them very well. None of them had seen Shep so much as get up from the table. A stoic, manly panic ensued. Rodney, who didn't like standing around watching other people panic when he had his own panicking to do, reeled away from the gaggle of guards and, squaring his shoulders, decided to brave the annals of the club's back corridors again. The music had faded to a dull throb (Look, I gotta go, Shep sang, I'm running out of change...) when Rodney saw a black-clad figure pausing with his body propped up against the wall. "John!" he said, and ran to greet him.
The figure turned. It was not John. It was the reporter, staring at him wide-eyed. "I think I'm lost," he said.
"I told you to wait at the booth!" Rodney said. He did not add, You waited when Shep told you to.
"I'm supposed to follow you guys," said the reporter, stubbornly. Rodney rolled his eyes and sighed.
"Okay, fine. Come on."
He continued down the hall.
"Where are we going?"
"To find Shep!" Rodney said, exasperated. A terrible thought struck him. "And all of this is off the record, understand?"
The reporter frowned. He looked kind of pissed. Why couldn't journalists ever be in awe of him? Rodney wondered. They were always in awe of Shep. They ate out of his goddamn hand.
"What am I supposed to write about, then?" said the reporter, not biting.
Rodney bit his lip. He kept walking, his pace brisk, but the reporter had long legs and no trouble keeping up. He paused to open a promising-looking door; it turned out to be a broom cupboard.
"Look," he said, letting the door slam shut. "You help me out, you keep quiet, and I'll give you an exclusive. All about, um." His mind raced. "My first exposure to music and my dramatic falling out with my piano teacher when I was twelve. Okay?"
The reporter looked less than thrilled. "Oh, come on!" said Rodney. "He told me I lacked soul as a performer, almost made me never want touch an instrument again! I was going to sarcastically thank him when I accepted my first Grammy, but Sam—Sam Carter of The Terrans, by the way—called me petty and guilted me out of it. It's a great story!"
"Shep vanishing is a great story," insisted the reporter.
Rodney made plans to ditch him. They rounded another bend and came to a short flight of stairs—somehow, Rodney was sure, having missed the bathrooms completely. Sure enough, the door opened out onto the street—not the one they had come in on, he thought, although it was kind of hard to tell. The night sky and the neon and the puddles of iridescent, gas-stained rainwater all blurred together like a ruined watercolor. Rodney knew that he should go back and get the security guys, even though they were now officially The Worst Security Guys Ever; he knew that he should call Lorne and enlist his help. But he didn't want any help or outside interference. He wanted to find John and shake him between his own two hands.
He charged off into the dark, the reporter following, yapping at his heels. "How do you know which way he went?"
"I'm following a trail of cigarette ash which, by the odor and coloration, I can recognize as Shep's brand."
"Really?"
Rodney rolled his eyes. "No."
"Oh." They spilled out of the alley and onto a wider, equally unfamiliar road. "Then you have no idea where you're going."
"For— Shut up, will you?" Rodney began waving his arms frantically which, fate being on his side for once, succeeded in attracting a taxicab. He got in and, the brief spate of luck abruptly ending, the reporter piled in, too. The driver turned around and asked him a question in Japanese before, misinterpreting Rodney's blank look, repeating the query in painfully slow English. "Where to?" The slowness was, Rodney suspected, intended for his benefit.
For once it was needed: Rodney was still trying to figure out where Shep would go. Where John would go? He couldn't keep it straight. He was still struggling when the reporter, shockingly, did something useful. "Authentic nightclub?" he asked. "No tourists?"
That did sound like him, like John and Shep both. The cab driver nodded and pulled away from the curb. The reporter sank back, looking satisfied and, perhaps for the first time all evening, comfortable. Rodney said nothing.
The driver released them in front of a nondescript building with no sign, bidding them both goodnight—to the reporter in Japanese, and to Rodney in dummy-speak. I'm a musical genius! Rodney felt like shouting, but he was exhausted and he had a headache. He'd lost John.
This club was up a set of stairs instead of down. They passed through a beaded curtain which tried to steal Rodney's hat and were instantly assaulted by the color white. White walls, white ceiling, white floor. White bar with solid white cocktail glasses. White stools and oddly shaped, lumpy white tables. It was as if somebody had built a club inside a denture.
Another anonymous pop song was playing, but the club's patrons, instead of dancing to it in the usual spastic manner, were instead in neatly formed rows, doing what looked like a complicated, country-western line dance. Rodney boggled for a moment, half expecting to see Shep in the middle of a do-si-do.
The reporter touched his shoulder. "I asked the bouncer," he said—clearly shouting, though his words were still hard to discern. "He said he didn't see him come in."
"Maybe he didn't recognize him," Rodney shouted back.
"What?" The reporter's expression evoked that of the cab driver. "Of course he would recognize him."
"You're an idiot," Rodney said, in his normal tone of voice.
"What?"
He flashed a smile. "Nothing!"
They stumbled back out onto the street, pausing only so that Rodney could sign a bar napkin for the bouncer who, having been alerted by the reporter, now seemed to "recognize" the 'Jumpers' lead guitarist, too. Rodney signed his name and most likely misspelled that of the recipient, but the man seemed happy, and recommended that they try a place called Limón.
"Oh," said Rodney, "great."
The got another cab; Rodney realized that he no longer had even the vaguest idea where they were in relation to the club they had started out at, not to mention their hotel. "Do you know what I wish I had?" he said. "A GPS. Or even better, some sort of handheld tracking device..."
Limón was a wash. Rodney was just happy to escape unpoisoned. Back out on the street, they found themselves standing in front of a giant hotel shaped like a beehive. "Oh, I've heard of this place," the reporter said. "It's a hotel for businessmen who live outside the city. If they need a place to crash for one night, they can rent one of the, the combs." Rodney craned his neck, staring up. Each hexagonal "room" looked no bigger than a person-sized tube, like an MRI machine. Or a place where a giant insect would gestate. It gave him the creeps.
The reporter was also frowning, although probably for a different reason. Indeed: "You don't think..." he said. "Well, maybe, actually, he might have hooked up with someone? Like that brunette maybe?"
"No!" said Rodney, far too vehemently. "I saw her near the bathrooms," he hastily amended. "She had...other plans."
"Well, someone else then." The reporter gave him a knowing look. "I mean, it's Shep. The guy dated Chaya. I doubt he has trouble getting laid."
He likes my cock up his ass. Rodney didn't say it. He didn't even come close to saying it. But it was there, lingering at the back of his mind, turning his laugh and his what-can-you-do? shrug into a lie.
"He's a big boy, I guess he can get home on his own," Rodney said, with a casualness he didn't remotely feel. This was the perfect opportunity: make believe he was giving up, send the reporter scurrying back to his hotel, and keep looking. He had to keep looking. But he said, "Anyway, I'm beat. Where are you staying? Maybe we can share a cab."
The reporter blinked. "I'm staying where you're staying."
Too embarrassed to ask, "And where is that?" Rodney waited for the reporter to supply the name of the hotel.
"Uh, and where is that, by the way?"
The blood drained from Rodney's face. "What?"
"Our hotel." The reporter was flicking through his notebook. "I don't actually seem to have the name."
"How can you not know the name?"
"Well, we didn't really check in, they just sent our stuff from the airport," said the reporter, for whom the penny still had not dropped. "Shep said he wanted to see the city right away and..." The reporter's eyes widened. "Wait, you don't know either?"
Rodney still hated having to admit ignorance in anything; "No," he ground out. Then he waggled his fingers at the reporter. "Give me your cell phone."
The reporter blushed. "I don't have the right kind of SIM card..."
Rodney didn't have his with him at all, but he felt disinclined to mention that. "Well that's just great," he said. He raised his head, looked at Tokyo spiraling out all around him, like the set of Blade Runner, like an alien planet.
"We could go wait at the venue?" the reporter suggested.
It was probably what they were going to have to do, in the end. But Rodney wasn't ready to spend hours waiting outside a deserted amphitheater, not yet. He stuck his arm out again. "Come on," he said, wearily. "I'll buy you a drink."
He let the reporter debate their destination with the cab driver and sank back in his seat, staring out at the city through the darkened glass. There was a certain beauty to it, he thought. A certain rhythm, a certain melody. Maybe if he wrote it down he could capture it, hold it tight.
The cab driver let them off outside a club that looked positively old-fashioned compared to the others they had visited. It was on the ground floor, with some discreet neon in the windows. Stepping inside, they passed a single bouncer and a coatcheck. Music was playing, but not loudly. Rodney tilted his head in surprise, realizing that it was them again. I can't escape me. Then Rodney frowned. The song was old, yes, but he hadn't remembered it sounding that bad.
Beside him, the reporter stilled. "Oh my God."
At the far side of the room was a small stage, barely more than a platform lifted a few inches off the floor, bathed in blue light. On the stage there was a stool, a microphone stand, a catalogue of songs with laminated pages, and a karaoke machine. There was also a man. He had kicked the stool aside and set a drink down on the song catalogue. With his left hand, he was clutching the microphone stand as if he were holding on for dear life; with the right he was gesticulating wildly, punctuating the lyrics with emphatic waves of his hand. His eyes, though shadowed, were wide and open and unprotected.
"Oh, John," Rodney said. "You idiot."
Dimly, he was aware of the reporter looking around, taking in the few bored businessmen and wilted drunks who populated the club, none of whom was paying John the slightest attention. Washed in turquoise, sunglasses gone, he looked almost invisible. Like some sort of backwards blindness: with the lenses off, no one could see him.
Rodney saw: a rigid determination fighting the drunken slouch of his shoulders. Rather than snarling the lyrics, John's delivery was almost upbeat. "One day I'll die / The choice will not be mine / Will it be too late? / You can't fight fate." Across the club, someone guffawed loudly. It probably wasn't directed at John at all, but nevertheless, Rodney saw it reach him like a slap to the face. He was suddenly spread wide, as open a book as Rodney could want, but it was in public and Rodney hated it, he hated it. He needed it to stop.
He walked swiftly forward, turning aside an army of chairs. Stepping into the spotlight, John caught sight of him and faltered, the last word he sang turning into a question. "I was of a feeling it was out of control?" Rodney took the microphone from his surprisingly unprotesting hand and gave him a shoulder to lean on. "Where are your sunglasses?" he whispered, leading John off the stage as his own recorded guitar played on. John shrugged, helplessly. With a sigh, Rodney gave him his hat.
The reporter was waiting for them by the door. His eyebrow, already arched, peaked higher when his gaze slid from John's slumped and now shielded body to Rodney's hairline. "Oh, so that's why you wear—"
"Yes," said Rodney, tightly. "Thank you."
They stumbled back out onto the street.
It was actually brighter outside. John broke away from Rodney's arms and propped himself up against a streetlight while Rodney attempted to hail a cab. With his casual slouch and the downturned brim of Rodney's hat shading his face, he looked remarkably like a midnight cowboy. He blinked blearily around before focusing his attention on the reporter. "Hey, do I know you?" he said. "I think I know you. You remind me of me."
At the start of the evening, Rodney knew, such a pronouncement would have had the reporter blushing and stammering and racing off to get 'Shep' tattooed on his bicep. Now his eyes filled faintly with panic. "Look, a taxi," he said. Generously, and to Rodney's displeasure, he offered John a hand to help him inside.
The door slammed shut and John opened his mouth. For a horrible second, Rodney thought that he was going to say something, reveal something. Then:
"Where are we going?" John asked. "Are we going back to the Four Seasons?"
Both Rodney and the reporter smacked their respective foreheads. The reporter recovered first and leaned forward. "The Four Seasons," he told the driver. "Arigato."
The cab slid off into the night.
The motion of the car was oddly soothing. Perhaps too soothing: John began to lilt with it, tipping over until his head was propped against Rodney's shoulder. The hat poked Rodney in the chin. He peered down: John's eyes were closed; he was safe now. Carefully, Rodney took the hat back and afforded himself a little protection.
From under the brim, he could see that the reporter was looking at them. He had his notebook out, tap-tap-tapping on his thigh. Rodney followed the precise trajectory of his gaze and realized that his own unconscious movements had betrayed them: his hand was holding John's, his thumb gently stroking. For a second he froze, and almost pulled away. But that would seem like an admission of guilt, and what did he have to feel guilty about? The facts were plain, for anyone with eyes to see and report. John was drooling softly on Rodney's shoulder, and Rodney loved him. That was all; it was inescapable.
Rodney locked eyes with the reporter, and fixed him with a defiant stare.
After a moment, the reporter looked away. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a ballpoint pen. "So," he said, speaking softly so as not to wake John. "Why don't you tell me about your piano teacher?"
NOTES:
This story owes a lot to the book U2 at the End of the World, which contains a great sequence about Tokyo. I borrowed several locations, including “One-Eyed Jacks” (transplanted from Twin Peaks, apparently) and the club that’s “like being inside a denture.” Most of Neera’s lines were also direct quotes from insane female fans, and Shep’s joke about his “dog” is Bono’s.
That book was written by Bill Flanagan, the intrepid reporter who followed the band on tour. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about who the reporter in this story is. ;-)
Songs are The Fly (album version this time) and Out of Control.
Yes, I can't stop writing about them. This story actually moves ahead in the continuity: it takes place after "Four Quarters" and "Bootleg."
Title: Tokyo Drift
A Puddlejumpers Story
Rating: R
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: ~4100 words
Summary: There was a reporter in the limo with them.
A/N: As always, many thanks to my PJ partner-in-crime,
wychwood.Tokyo Drift
There was a reporter in the limo with them. Sitting across from them, awkward on the plush leather seat. At first he had tried leaning back, sinking into the chair, but his discomfort had been obvious. Then he had tried to perch, balanced on the edge, leaning forward to catch every word. The abrupt turn of the limo down yet another anonymous Tokyo alleyway had almost sent him sprawling onto the vehicle’s floor. Now he was attempting something in between the two postures, a compromise. His calves were braced tightly against the slick leather, his elbows likewise tight and forward. His hands shook where they held the pad and pen, but that may have just been the driver taking another lurching turn. There was a thin sheen of sweat on the reporter’s forehead. He stared at them with wide eyes and licked his lips, getting ready for the next question.
Shep spoke before he had a chance to; the reporter looked relieved. “I really miss my dog.” Shep was wearing his best earnest face, looking rather puppyish himself. “Strange, huh?” He shrugged. “On long tours you do hear people say that they miss their pets, but I never have. And then last night I started really missing my dog. It’s odd.”
The reporter nodded: in agreement, in sympathy. Shep smiled at him, white teeth in the dark.
Rodney took full advantage of the limo’s full slouching capabilities and sank back in his seat, his arms folded. “You don’t have a dog.”
Shep didn’t miss a beat. “I told you it was odd.”
The reporter laughed. Rodney rolled his eyes.
The limo lurched again, but this time it came to a complete stop. Rodney peered cautiously out the window, but Shep was already bouncing out the door, the reporter drawn after him like a toy on a string. They were both almost run over the security car, which proceeded to dislodge personnel like a VW Bug vomiting up an army of clowns. John’s face went momentarily and uncharacteristically slack as he looked at the security the venue had provided for this little late night jaunt. “They just keep sending ‘em in...”
Then Shep’s gaze was snapping up again. He’d clearly noticed, a half-second after Rodney had, the bright, luminescent writing on the back of the security personnel’s shiny black vests. THE PUDDLE-JUMPERS. With a hypen, too. Rodney’s grimace almost matched Shep's.
“For fuck’s sake, take those off!” When this failed to achieve results, Shep cleverly switched tacks. Rodney couldn’t hear what he was saying above the city sounds and the music hammering out of the club, but his gestures spoke clearly enough. After a moment, the head security guy nodded and the vests were removed. Shep slapped him on his now wordless back, all camaraderie.
Rodney was glad that Lorne had chosen to go with Ronon and Teyla tonight; he’d probably be having a tiny heart attack right about now.
They descended the steps into the club. The sign above the door read “One-Eyed Jacks” in both English and, Rodney assumed, Japanese. “Abandon All Hope” might be more appropriate; Rodney thought about nudging the reporter and telling him that—it would make a good quote—but changed his mind. The world was unjustly uninterested in what he had to say.
The reporter trailed after John as Shep made his grand entrance. Rodney started counting off the seconds: sure enough, even before their party was fully settled at a big, semi-private booth in the corner (but still with an excellent sight-line to the gyrating girls) the music switched over from a dance remix of some nineties pop song that Rodney vaguely recognized to a track off of Midnight. “Hey!” said the reporter, seeming torn between watching the scantily-clad girls and staring at Shep. “They’re playing one of your songs!”
Shep rolled his eyes. He was still wearing his sunglasses, but Rodney knew him too well. “I can’t escape me, can I?”
Rodney knew him too well; he was probably the only one who thought John sounded slightly manic when he said things like that.
One of the girls came over. She was an impressively busty brunette—Caucasian, like most of the girls working the club. She had beautiful skin, or so Rodney could judge by the ample amount on display, with a light dusting of freckles trailing down toward... He swallowed, and looked up to see Shep smirking at him. The reporter was still...distracted.
The girl had eyes only for Shep, however. She slid around the odd kidney-bean of a table and plopped down in his lap without so much as a by-your-leave. Her breasts bounced. “Hi!” she announced. The white fabric of her dress pulled invitingly up her thighs.
Shep’s eyes (Rodney imagined) stayed firmly on her face. His grin looked a little tight, but it too stayed in place. “What’s your name?” he asked. “What brings you to Tokyo?”
The girl slid a little closer; if she kept it up, she and Shep would be pretty much having sex where they sat, whether he liked it or not. “I want you,” she said, fingers slipping beneath the high, protective collar of Shep’s leather jacket. “I always get what I want.”
Shep didn’t say anything. He leaned forward, miraculously avoiding mashing his chest into the girl’s breasts. His teeth hovered next to her ear. The pose gave Rodney a very strong impression that Shep was about to go for her neck.
He said something.
The girl bolted backward like a shot. Her full lips slanted down into an angry, upset pout. Jerkily, she tore herself off of Shep’s lap and out of the booth, and quickly disappeared into the crowd. The reporter was the only one who looked sad to see her go.
“I guess you must be used to that by now,” the reporter said. He sounded envious.
Even Shep’s shrug managed to look winning. “Actually, I’m still surprised. I never see it coming...”
Rodney snorted. Both Shep and the reporter shot him a look, one flat and the other curious. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m contemplating the horrifying prospect of finding the bathroom in this place.”
Neither of them said anything. After a moment, Rodney awkwardly slid out of his seat. Refraining from shooting a glance at John over his shoulder, Rodney turned his concentration to trying to remember how to say “Where is the toilet?” in Japanese.
He made one of the security guys do it. He was pointed toward a long corridor with walls that dripped ominously and lots of frustrating twists and turns. Rodney began to wonder if he was going to stumble into a Yakuza den. Or maybe he'd find a minotaur, he thought, and turning a corner, ran smack into the brunette.
She wasn’t crying, but her eyes looked puffy and red. “You!” she said.
“Uh,” said Rodney. A second later, something splattered wetly against his cheek, stinging the corner of his eye.
“You spat on me!” Rodney cried. “This is just—Shep rejects someone and I get spat on. Of course. Of course!”
The girl was still standing there, fixing him with a brazen stare. “Get out of my way!” Rodney demanded. She didn’t move. “I—I have a highly trained escort of security personnel waiting just...um....” The corridor ran ‘round corner after corner, taking a slight detour through Narnia for all he knew. “They’re around!”
The girl pushed her giant breasts of death into Rodney’s personal space. He could see the headlines now: Puddlejumpers Guitarist Found Dead in Tokyo Strip Club, Smothered to Death by Enraged Mammaries. Or not. They’d probably lead with a story about Shep’s non-existent dog instead.
The girl tapped him sharply on the chest. “Tell your friend! Tell your friend that I loved him. And tonight he broke my heart!”
She pushed past him, her shoulder smacking roughly into his. Rodney paused for a moment, then quickly followed after her, his quest for the toilet forgotten. Without a guide, he doubted he’d ever make it out of here.
He lost her around some bend, but by then the sounds from the club proper had become more pronounced and he was able to follow the music (Shep’s voice, singing, A man will beg, a man will crawl...) back into the brightly lit room. The security guards were huddled in a little cluster, most of them staring at the platforms of writhing girls like men bewitched. Rodney thought he saw the brunette talking to one of them and quickly reeled off, back in the direction of their table.
He almost walked right past it, because Shep wasn’t there to guide him, to mark his place. There was just the reporter, tapping his notebook on the table’s edge in time to the music.
“Where’s John?” Rodney asked.
The reporter cupped a hand behind his ear. “What?”
“Where’s Shep?”
The reporter’s brow wrinkled, and for a moment, Rodney thought that he was going to have to repeat himself again. But then, “You didn’t see him? He said he had to go to the bathroom, too.”
Rodney flushed, imagining what Shep had probably intended as the climax of a shared bathroom visit. When there was a reporter and a whole fleet of security guys waiting outside—it was so, so like him. And like Rodney to protest, but never actually say no.
“It’s like a fucking labyrinth back there,” Rodney said, reaching up to rub his temple, brushing awkwardly at the rim of his hat. “Wait here,” he told the reporter finally. “I’ll go see if any of these security clowns are actually doing their jobs.”
If they were, they weren't doing them very well. None of them had seen Shep so much as get up from the table. A stoic, manly panic ensued. Rodney, who didn't like standing around watching other people panic when he had his own panicking to do, reeled away from the gaggle of guards and, squaring his shoulders, decided to brave the annals of the club's back corridors again. The music had faded to a dull throb (Look, I gotta go, Shep sang, I'm running out of change...) when Rodney saw a black-clad figure pausing with his body propped up against the wall. "John!" he said, and ran to greet him.
The figure turned. It was not John. It was the reporter, staring at him wide-eyed. "I think I'm lost," he said.
"I told you to wait at the booth!" Rodney said. He did not add, You waited when Shep told you to.
"I'm supposed to follow you guys," said the reporter, stubbornly. Rodney rolled his eyes and sighed.
"Okay, fine. Come on."
He continued down the hall.
"Where are we going?"
"To find Shep!" Rodney said, exasperated. A terrible thought struck him. "And all of this is off the record, understand?"
The reporter frowned. He looked kind of pissed. Why couldn't journalists ever be in awe of him? Rodney wondered. They were always in awe of Shep. They ate out of his goddamn hand.
"What am I supposed to write about, then?" said the reporter, not biting.
Rodney bit his lip. He kept walking, his pace brisk, but the reporter had long legs and no trouble keeping up. He paused to open a promising-looking door; it turned out to be a broom cupboard.
"Look," he said, letting the door slam shut. "You help me out, you keep quiet, and I'll give you an exclusive. All about, um." His mind raced. "My first exposure to music and my dramatic falling out with my piano teacher when I was twelve. Okay?"
The reporter looked less than thrilled. "Oh, come on!" said Rodney. "He told me I lacked soul as a performer, almost made me never want touch an instrument again! I was going to sarcastically thank him when I accepted my first Grammy, but Sam—Sam Carter of The Terrans, by the way—called me petty and guilted me out of it. It's a great story!"
"Shep vanishing is a great story," insisted the reporter.
Rodney made plans to ditch him. They rounded another bend and came to a short flight of stairs—somehow, Rodney was sure, having missed the bathrooms completely. Sure enough, the door opened out onto the street—not the one they had come in on, he thought, although it was kind of hard to tell. The night sky and the neon and the puddles of iridescent, gas-stained rainwater all blurred together like a ruined watercolor. Rodney knew that he should go back and get the security guys, even though they were now officially The Worst Security Guys Ever; he knew that he should call Lorne and enlist his help. But he didn't want any help or outside interference. He wanted to find John and shake him between his own two hands.
He charged off into the dark, the reporter following, yapping at his heels. "How do you know which way he went?"
"I'm following a trail of cigarette ash which, by the odor and coloration, I can recognize as Shep's brand."
"Really?"
Rodney rolled his eyes. "No."
"Oh." They spilled out of the alley and onto a wider, equally unfamiliar road. "Then you have no idea where you're going."
"For— Shut up, will you?" Rodney began waving his arms frantically which, fate being on his side for once, succeeded in attracting a taxicab. He got in and, the brief spate of luck abruptly ending, the reporter piled in, too. The driver turned around and asked him a question in Japanese before, misinterpreting Rodney's blank look, repeating the query in painfully slow English. "Where to?" The slowness was, Rodney suspected, intended for his benefit.
For once it was needed: Rodney was still trying to figure out where Shep would go. Where John would go? He couldn't keep it straight. He was still struggling when the reporter, shockingly, did something useful. "Authentic nightclub?" he asked. "No tourists?"
That did sound like him, like John and Shep both. The cab driver nodded and pulled away from the curb. The reporter sank back, looking satisfied and, perhaps for the first time all evening, comfortable. Rodney said nothing.
The driver released them in front of a nondescript building with no sign, bidding them both goodnight—to the reporter in Japanese, and to Rodney in dummy-speak. I'm a musical genius! Rodney felt like shouting, but he was exhausted and he had a headache. He'd lost John.
This club was up a set of stairs instead of down. They passed through a beaded curtain which tried to steal Rodney's hat and were instantly assaulted by the color white. White walls, white ceiling, white floor. White bar with solid white cocktail glasses. White stools and oddly shaped, lumpy white tables. It was as if somebody had built a club inside a denture.
Another anonymous pop song was playing, but the club's patrons, instead of dancing to it in the usual spastic manner, were instead in neatly formed rows, doing what looked like a complicated, country-western line dance. Rodney boggled for a moment, half expecting to see Shep in the middle of a do-si-do.
The reporter touched his shoulder. "I asked the bouncer," he said—clearly shouting, though his words were still hard to discern. "He said he didn't see him come in."
"Maybe he didn't recognize him," Rodney shouted back.
"What?" The reporter's expression evoked that of the cab driver. "Of course he would recognize him."
"You're an idiot," Rodney said, in his normal tone of voice.
"What?"
He flashed a smile. "Nothing!"
They stumbled back out onto the street, pausing only so that Rodney could sign a bar napkin for the bouncer who, having been alerted by the reporter, now seemed to "recognize" the 'Jumpers' lead guitarist, too. Rodney signed his name and most likely misspelled that of the recipient, but the man seemed happy, and recommended that they try a place called Limón.
"Oh," said Rodney, "great."
The got another cab; Rodney realized that he no longer had even the vaguest idea where they were in relation to the club they had started out at, not to mention their hotel. "Do you know what I wish I had?" he said. "A GPS. Or even better, some sort of handheld tracking device..."
Limón was a wash. Rodney was just happy to escape unpoisoned. Back out on the street, they found themselves standing in front of a giant hotel shaped like a beehive. "Oh, I've heard of this place," the reporter said. "It's a hotel for businessmen who live outside the city. If they need a place to crash for one night, they can rent one of the, the combs." Rodney craned his neck, staring up. Each hexagonal "room" looked no bigger than a person-sized tube, like an MRI machine. Or a place where a giant insect would gestate. It gave him the creeps.
The reporter was also frowning, although probably for a different reason. Indeed: "You don't think..." he said. "Well, maybe, actually, he might have hooked up with someone? Like that brunette maybe?"
"No!" said Rodney, far too vehemently. "I saw her near the bathrooms," he hastily amended. "She had...other plans."
"Well, someone else then." The reporter gave him a knowing look. "I mean, it's Shep. The guy dated Chaya. I doubt he has trouble getting laid."
He likes my cock up his ass. Rodney didn't say it. He didn't even come close to saying it. But it was there, lingering at the back of his mind, turning his laugh and his what-can-you-do? shrug into a lie.
"He's a big boy, I guess he can get home on his own," Rodney said, with a casualness he didn't remotely feel. This was the perfect opportunity: make believe he was giving up, send the reporter scurrying back to his hotel, and keep looking. He had to keep looking. But he said, "Anyway, I'm beat. Where are you staying? Maybe we can share a cab."
The reporter blinked. "I'm staying where you're staying."
Too embarrassed to ask, "And where is that?" Rodney waited for the reporter to supply the name of the hotel.
"Uh, and where is that, by the way?"
The blood drained from Rodney's face. "What?"
"Our hotel." The reporter was flicking through his notebook. "I don't actually seem to have the name."
"How can you not know the name?"
"Well, we didn't really check in, they just sent our stuff from the airport," said the reporter, for whom the penny still had not dropped. "Shep said he wanted to see the city right away and..." The reporter's eyes widened. "Wait, you don't know either?"
Rodney still hated having to admit ignorance in anything; "No," he ground out. Then he waggled his fingers at the reporter. "Give me your cell phone."
The reporter blushed. "I don't have the right kind of SIM card..."
Rodney didn't have his with him at all, but he felt disinclined to mention that. "Well that's just great," he said. He raised his head, looked at Tokyo spiraling out all around him, like the set of Blade Runner, like an alien planet.
"We could go wait at the venue?" the reporter suggested.
It was probably what they were going to have to do, in the end. But Rodney wasn't ready to spend hours waiting outside a deserted amphitheater, not yet. He stuck his arm out again. "Come on," he said, wearily. "I'll buy you a drink."
He let the reporter debate their destination with the cab driver and sank back in his seat, staring out at the city through the darkened glass. There was a certain beauty to it, he thought. A certain rhythm, a certain melody. Maybe if he wrote it down he could capture it, hold it tight.
The cab driver let them off outside a club that looked positively old-fashioned compared to the others they had visited. It was on the ground floor, with some discreet neon in the windows. Stepping inside, they passed a single bouncer and a coatcheck. Music was playing, but not loudly. Rodney tilted his head in surprise, realizing that it was them again. I can't escape me. Then Rodney frowned. The song was old, yes, but he hadn't remembered it sounding that bad.
Beside him, the reporter stilled. "Oh my God."
At the far side of the room was a small stage, barely more than a platform lifted a few inches off the floor, bathed in blue light. On the stage there was a stool, a microphone stand, a catalogue of songs with laminated pages, and a karaoke machine. There was also a man. He had kicked the stool aside and set a drink down on the song catalogue. With his left hand, he was clutching the microphone stand as if he were holding on for dear life; with the right he was gesticulating wildly, punctuating the lyrics with emphatic waves of his hand. His eyes, though shadowed, were wide and open and unprotected.
"Oh, John," Rodney said. "You idiot."
Dimly, he was aware of the reporter looking around, taking in the few bored businessmen and wilted drunks who populated the club, none of whom was paying John the slightest attention. Washed in turquoise, sunglasses gone, he looked almost invisible. Like some sort of backwards blindness: with the lenses off, no one could see him.
Rodney saw: a rigid determination fighting the drunken slouch of his shoulders. Rather than snarling the lyrics, John's delivery was almost upbeat. "One day I'll die / The choice will not be mine / Will it be too late? / You can't fight fate." Across the club, someone guffawed loudly. It probably wasn't directed at John at all, but nevertheless, Rodney saw it reach him like a slap to the face. He was suddenly spread wide, as open a book as Rodney could want, but it was in public and Rodney hated it, he hated it. He needed it to stop.
He walked swiftly forward, turning aside an army of chairs. Stepping into the spotlight, John caught sight of him and faltered, the last word he sang turning into a question. "I was of a feeling it was out of control?" Rodney took the microphone from his surprisingly unprotesting hand and gave him a shoulder to lean on. "Where are your sunglasses?" he whispered, leading John off the stage as his own recorded guitar played on. John shrugged, helplessly. With a sigh, Rodney gave him his hat.
The reporter was waiting for them by the door. His eyebrow, already arched, peaked higher when his gaze slid from John's slumped and now shielded body to Rodney's hairline. "Oh, so that's why you wear—"
"Yes," said Rodney, tightly. "Thank you."
They stumbled back out onto the street.
It was actually brighter outside. John broke away from Rodney's arms and propped himself up against a streetlight while Rodney attempted to hail a cab. With his casual slouch and the downturned brim of Rodney's hat shading his face, he looked remarkably like a midnight cowboy. He blinked blearily around before focusing his attention on the reporter. "Hey, do I know you?" he said. "I think I know you. You remind me of me."
At the start of the evening, Rodney knew, such a pronouncement would have had the reporter blushing and stammering and racing off to get 'Shep' tattooed on his bicep. Now his eyes filled faintly with panic. "Look, a taxi," he said. Generously, and to Rodney's displeasure, he offered John a hand to help him inside.
The door slammed shut and John opened his mouth. For a horrible second, Rodney thought that he was going to say something, reveal something. Then:
"Where are we going?" John asked. "Are we going back to the Four Seasons?"
Both Rodney and the reporter smacked their respective foreheads. The reporter recovered first and leaned forward. "The Four Seasons," he told the driver. "Arigato."
The cab slid off into the night.
The motion of the car was oddly soothing. Perhaps too soothing: John began to lilt with it, tipping over until his head was propped against Rodney's shoulder. The hat poked Rodney in the chin. He peered down: John's eyes were closed; he was safe now. Carefully, Rodney took the hat back and afforded himself a little protection.
From under the brim, he could see that the reporter was looking at them. He had his notebook out, tap-tap-tapping on his thigh. Rodney followed the precise trajectory of his gaze and realized that his own unconscious movements had betrayed them: his hand was holding John's, his thumb gently stroking. For a second he froze, and almost pulled away. But that would seem like an admission of guilt, and what did he have to feel guilty about? The facts were plain, for anyone with eyes to see and report. John was drooling softly on Rodney's shoulder, and Rodney loved him. That was all; it was inescapable.
Rodney locked eyes with the reporter, and fixed him with a defiant stare.
After a moment, the reporter looked away. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a ballpoint pen. "So," he said, speaking softly so as not to wake John. "Why don't you tell me about your piano teacher?"
NOTES:
This story owes a lot to the book U2 at the End of the World, which contains a great sequence about Tokyo. I borrowed several locations, including “One-Eyed Jacks” (transplanted from Twin Peaks, apparently) and the club that’s “like being inside a denture.” Most of Neera’s lines were also direct quotes from insane female fans, and Shep’s joke about his “dog” is Bono’s.
That book was written by Bill Flanagan, the intrepid reporter who followed the band on tour. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about who the reporter in this story is. ;-)
Songs are The Fly (album version this time) and Out of Control.
