Date night

Giant fingers gripped hard around a sweaty bottle. His chest puffed out and exposed the upper part of the body he despised so much. He looked down at the girl. Mariela. She stood several inches below him.

“You are so disturbingly punctual,” said William. His friends called him Billy.

“No entiendo,” she replied, cheeks drawing up, redness blooming on her roundish face. She straightened her dress and nodded, her long pointed nose a sexual dagger.

“Then dance with me.” William took her hand and led her into the middle of a crowd. They swayed. He smiled. She giggled. Both were happy.

Fifteen minutes before, William had been in the bathroom snorting Bolivian cocaine. Mariela had been finishing dinner with her parents. Chilean sea bass.

When the dance was done, William kissed Mariela. And for a moment, she felt completely normal. He had a loveable look about him, large though he was. He hulked over her, the two white ovals in his massive head beaming at her little chest, at her subtle cleavage. He whispered something to her in Spanish, terrible Spanish. Mariela winced and took a step back.

“Que perverso!” she shouted, and ran for the door. William tried to follow but met concrete. The floor looked at him. He looked at the floor.

“What the fuck was that all about?” he asked himself, rhetorically.

William stood up and ruffled his spiky hair. He sidestepped back to the crowd and boogied the night away, while Mariela cried on the vinyl seat of a white taxi with green trim.

Adventures come in strange packages

Hans, whose imagination was fertile, suggested various expedients. "Now please go to your post, shoot as straight as you can, and dont waste cartridges," he commanded, panting and wiping sludge from his stinking brow.

Every system has its drawbacks, he thought, but these are the risks that must be faced. Goddamn it! It's war. He swallowed another handful of "greenies" and bellowed orders panoramically.

A private, small in stature, looked up at Hans from his foxhole. "Sir, you think it will be quite a show out here, today?" His smile broke like a clever child.

Hans nodded and looked at Major Stubbles. "He is a very good wizard, that Baas," said Hans in perfect Swedish. "Just as we planned." The smell of a rout was in the air, and Hans knew what men would be suitable for this kind of bloodbath. Robots, champions and those too intelligent to risk mutiny.

"His friends back home call him Daniel, Colonel," said Stubbles. "They say Baas used to to sleep with lions. At least until the spotted sickness." Hans murmured something garbled in response.

Hans realized that the responsibilities of this battle were heaped upon him. Indeed, there was a hex on the foul battlefield wind. "Go to your post, Stubbles, shoot as straight as you can, and dont waste cartridges. Fuck." This time it was in English.

Hans turned back to Baas. "What do you have in mind, private?"

"A desire for death to the Danish, sir," said the man who once lay with great cats.

"So then you were a literature student?" asked the Colonel.

"No, uhh, sir. But I'd sure be proud to kill for your army," said Baas.

"Good boy," said Hans, and then again in Swedish, "Take a seat and have some time."

Hans went to one knee and looked at his palms. "Certainly I do not intend to return, Lord. No, not to care for such people who have been so ungrateful. Somehow in the confusion, we let this war, we...she slipped from our hands, and we cannot find her. Nothing remains but the fight." His thoughts were awesome.

Hans returned his attention to Baas. "I'll set myself to watch events with the greatest interest. Damn if we don't gottem," he said. Baas stared glossy-eyed and almost irritated. He paused.

When the Colonel thought to speak again, he was cut off by Baas, suddenly forceful. "The responsibilities of this battle ought to be heaped upon me. As your reverend father used to say, if only you wait long enough, the devil always shows himself. And at last, he helps you."

"You knew my father?" asked Hans, dumbstruck.

"No," said Baas, nonchalant.

"Well, then," replied Hans, "I will look for the devil myself. The fucking Danes won't be here yet awhile."

"But they are sacrificing to him," said Baas. "The dirty Danes."

"You listen up, son, and you listen good," fired Hans. "You keep your head down, shoot as straight as you can and don't waste cartridges!" He spun around and trotted to his horse.

Behind him, Baas conjured with his hands.