Continued from Part I.

“Listen,” Gerry began, “there are two ways to insult someone.  Intentionally, and unintentionally.  Here, I’ll show you.  Insult me.”

I raised my eyebrows at the bald fellow, but he seemed serious enough.  “Uh… you’re old and bald,” I offered.  I wasn’t sure exactly how harsh I should go.

Gerry didn’t seem phased by this terrible, incredibly offensive attack, however; he merely nodded, as if accepting that I was right.  “Yep, sure am,” he confirmed, still nodding.  “Now, if you had said something that was actually hurtful, like telling me that I had a tiny dick and I deserved to go die in a fire, well, I would have been a bit hot and bothered.  But insults like that?  Easily shrugged off, and most of the time they really don’t stick with a fellow.  They’re temporary.”

I’m confused.  I took another swig of my drink to cover up the blank look on my face, but Gerry still spotted it.  “Those, you see, are just intentional insults,” he went on.  “And although they make us feel better when we yell them at someone else, they don’t mesh with what we believe about ourselves.”

My face must still have showed my confusion.  “Like this,” Gerry continued.  “You’re an imbecile.  You are.  Now, how’s that make you feel?”

I shrugged.  “Honestly, it doesn’t really bother me,” I said.

“Exactly!” he replied.  “Because in your head, you know that you aren’t an imbecile.  Your internal image of yourself is that you’re a pretty smart guy.  So when I call you something that doesn’t match your internal view, your brain rejects it, brushes it off.”

This actually made some sense.  “Isn’t there some psychological theory about that?” I asked.  I could vaguely remember reading about something like this, what seemed to be a million years ago in college.

Gerry shrugged.  “Probably.  But this means that, if you really want to hurt someone with an insult, you have to take an entirely different approach.”

“Do you have to get something that they actually believe, inside their heads?” I guessed.  “Strike at their inner weakness?”

“If you do, sure, that’ll land a knockout punch,” Gerry acceded.  He paused to raise a finger to our bartender, who nodded and busied himself pouring a beer from one of the taps.  “But good luck spotting someone’s weakness like that – especially on a stranger, like Ned over there.”  He nodded across the bar at the gray-haired man, who cackled as he lifted his glass in a mock toast.  “No, there’a much easier method, one that won’t rely on guesswork.”

I was leaning forward a bit in my seat, and I had finished the rest of my drink without noticing – Gerry could tell that I was interested, hanging on his words.  He grinned, obviously enjoying being the center of attention.  “You gotta insult them unintentionally,” he imparted, as if sharing a great secret.

I sat back a little.  “You’ve got me confused again,” I confessed.

Gerry waved one hand in the air in a vague and meaningless gesture.  “Let’s go back to that internal picture of yourself,” he said.  “Now, you don’t believe that you’re an idiot, but nobody, on the inside, is really, truly, confident in themselves.  Like you.  What’s something that you’re good at?”

At first, I thought of mentioning my job, but that idea was quickly squashed – if I was truly good at it, I wouldn’t have been kicked to the curb.  “I can play a pretty decent bass guitar,” I offered, my head filled briefly with visions of my garage band from college.

“Sure, that works.  Now, imagine that you were at a party, you picked up a bass guitar, you played a couple songs.  You’re enjoying yourself, and then one of the other party guests walks up and comments that your playing sounds great!  Before you can thank him, however, he guesses that you must have been playing for three or four months.  Now, how are you feeling?”

I closed my eyes for a minute as I envisioned this scenario.  A clink next to me signaled the arrival of Gerry’s beer.  “And one for this gentleman, too,” he commented.

To be continued…

Rubbing my forehead with the back of one hand, I hauled open the heavy wooden door and stepped into the bar.  I had always enjoyed the throwback atmosphere of the bar, just down the street from where I worked.  Had used to work, I mentally reminded myself.  Had to get used to using the right script.

After my eyes had adjusted to the internal gloom of the bar, I sidled up to the counter, finding a spot equally between the few grizzled old men that seemed to be permanent fixtures around the counter.  I didn’t make eye contact with any of them, but a gray-haired fellow on my left still began grunting as he slid closer to me.  “Bit early for yeh to be drinking, doncha think?” he wheezed out through the bent bars of his remaining teeth.

The old-timer was right; I usually didn’t show my face in the bar for another few hours, when work let out and happy hour began.  Today, of course, I didn’t have to wait that long.  Another advantage of being unemployed, I suppose.

I ignored the man, instead raising a finger to catch the bartender’s attention.  “Whiskey, double,” I requested, when the man sauntered over.  He nodded without speaking a word, turning and ambling off, taking his sweet time to prepare my beverage.

Fortunately, as there were no other placed orders to compete with mine, my drink arrived in front of me in short order.  I traded the bartender my credit card for the drink and took a long pull.  I was still on edge, however, overwhelmed by the stress of the day, and some of the fiery liquid went down the wrong tube.  I choked, coughing as I slammed the glass back down on the bar.

The gray-haired man, now sitting next to me, let out another wheezing bray.  “Di’nt your dad ever teach yeh houw to drink?” he got out between laughs.  “First rule is that you’re sposed to swallow!”

I glared at this annoying boil of a man.  “Screw you,” I told him, taking another pull of my drink.  This time, it went down properly.

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught the man on my other side, this fellow nearly completely bald, also scooting closer to me across the bolted-down bar stools.  “What?” I snapped, turning to him.  My anger was fully raging by this point, helped along by the heat rising from my belly.  “You got something to say as well?”

Instead of sneering at me, however, this fellow merely put on a slightly self-satisfied looking grin.  “Actually, I was going to correct you,” he said, and I was forced to slightly alter my opinion of him.  Despite his wrinkles, this man still had all of his teeth, and was currently giving me a million-watt smile.  His voice was also slightly clipped, giving him a barely perceptible cultured accent.  “You’re doing it wrong.”

“Doing what wrong?”

“Insulting,” the bald man replied.  He had by now reached the stool next to mine, and he offered his hand to me.  “Gerry,” he said.

“Arthur,” I replied, taking the proffered hand.  Gerry gave it a single brisk pump, and then released – the kind of handshake I had grown accustomed to at my old job in finance.  “You’re saying that I’m insulting him wrong?  Is there a right way?”

Gerry kept up his smile.  “Perhaps not a right way or a wrong way,” he said, “but there is definitely a better way and a worse way.  And you, my new friend, are using the worse way, I’m afraid.”

On my other side, I saw the gray-haired man roll his eyes and begin shuffling back to his original spot, where he had abandoned his drink, but I was interested.  Gerry sounded as though he was slipping into a lecture, as if speaking in front of a class.  I might be a class of one, but I gave him my full attention.

To be continued!

No, this isn’t connected to any other story yet.  Just a bit of post-apocalyptic character building.

As I gazed around the interior of the ruined building, uneasily noticing how the other members of Terry’s crew seemed to occupy their spare time by using pointy objects to pick at their teeth or nails, or sharpen their blades, something nagged at the back of my mind.  Something about Terry’s description of his allies.

“Wait a minute,” I said, turning towards Terry.  He was still standing beside me, obviously enjoying my discomfort, thrust into this world with which I was totally unfamiliar.  “You said that you had four other people in your crew, right?”

“I did,” he agreed, grinning at me.  His hands hung free, but I knew that, if I made the slightest aggressive move, he would have the pistol at his waist free in a heartbeat.  Although I doubt he’d waste a bullet on me.  Not when a knife would work just as well, and be much cheaper.

I glanced around the dusty, shadowed interior.  “I only count three,” I said, my eyes roaming over each of them in turn.  Jhang was using a dagger to clean his nails, perched contentedly atop an overturned shelving unit.  Kali was using a whetstone to hone her many daggers; a small pile sat on the ground beside her, waiting to be sharpened before she would tuck them back up her sleeves.  And Wade, whom I had yet to hear utter a sentence more than three words long, was sitting cross-legged atop a small stool, his eyes closed in meditation and his long, straight-edged blade lying across his lap.

“We’re a tight-knit crew, sure, but there’s always more to be done around this place,” Terry commented, spreading his hands wide to take in the disarray.  “So sometimes, while most of us are out on missions, like retrieving you, I’ll send one or two of us off to get some real work done.”  His eyes flicked away from my face, over my shoulder.  “Ah, and here he is now!”

I turned, and was stunned as I took in the newcomer.  I couldn’t believe he had managed to get this close to me before I noticed him.

Approaching at a slow tread was the largest man that I had ever seen.  He stood well over seven feet in height, and had shoulders as wide as axe handles.  Each hand, hanging open loosely at his side, must have been as big as a dinner plate.  He was walking with his back slightly hunched, but I was still amazed that he was able to fit through a door frame.

“Our last member!” Terry declared loudly as the giant joined our rough, ragged circle.  “Meet Smasher.  Oh, it’s an obvious name, to be sure, but it just suits him so well!”

The giant gave a slight grumble, a low-pitched rumbling noise deep in his throat.  Terry crossed in front of me, reaching up to pat the massive man’s arm in a curiously dismissive manner.  “Smasher doesn’t do much talking,” Terry went on.  “Not really his thing.  But he’s our go-to for the heavy lifting, and he certainly pulls his load!”

I looked back up at Smasher.  Now that I looked closer, I could see that his wide face was curiously childlike.  He had a protruding brow which, coupled with his wide, flattened nose, made him appear slightly as though he had walked face-first into a wall.  His eyes, nestled deep into his face, looked calm, unworried.  That made one of us, I thought darkly to myself.

“Wonderful,” I said, directing my voice towards Terry as I surreptitiously took a step or two away from the group.  “So now you’ve brought me here, under the threat of violence-“

“Implied violence, mate!” Terry interrupted.

Behind us, Kali laughed, a sharp, harsh sound.  “As if there’s any real difference,” she spat out.  “No room for sneaky lies or fancy words in this world any more.”

Terry made a tutting sound, clicking his tongue at her.  “Oh, subtlety is alive and well!” he insisted.  “But yes, Ambassador, we have brought you here for a reason.  Oh, that is very certain.”

“And what reason is that, pray tell?”

The leader of this villainous gang swung his hand wide, arcing around to indicate the dark recesses of the large building that held us, pointing off down the dim corridors.  “We may be some of the best out here in this God-forsaken wasteland, but look at our digs!” he exclaimed.  “This place isn’t much more than a hovel.  No power, no light – basically every system that could break has done so.”

I nodded.  “Sure, but I don’t see what this has to do with me.”

Terry’s finger, previously taking in the decay, now swung around to point straight at my chest.  I noted uneasily out of the corner of my eye that Kali had stopped sharpening her blades, and that her and Jhang’s eyes were locked on mine.  “You, my dear boy,” Terry said, “are going to fix it.”