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Tucked behind the back alleys of the grey, dusty main street of the capital city of planet Mercury, there sits a bar called “The Seven Deadly Sins”. The presence of the establishment is indicated by a set of pulsating lights configured into the shape of two humongous arrows. These indicators swoop downwards so that both their nozzles are directed towards the rickety metal staircase that leads to the entrance. The Friday night on which our story begins was a particularly busy one.
Sat at the bar was an obviously intoxicated Octo-Man. Octo-Man had come into the bar already drunk, and it had only taken a tiny bit of light coercion accompanied by an extra tenner to persuade the apprentice bartender (Johnny) to keep the martinis flowing. Needless to say, Johnny’s boss had not been very happy about the incident and Johnny was currently being told off in the kitchen. The door was left open so that an ominous, piercing light flitted through the opening, creating two distinct and strange halos around the frames of boss and employee.
“How could ya be so stupid! I told ya to watch out for the ones that seem sad coming in. Those’re damn near always the ones that don’t know when to stop!” yelled the Boss, who was more commonly and adoringly known as Fat Sal.
All the while, Octo-Man was unaware of the fuss he was causing. He stared wearily at the five empty cups of half melted ice splayed out in his wake. The one closest to his farthest reaching tentacle teetered dangerously on the edge of the counter. Thoughts floated through the cloud of drunkenness that enshrouded his squishy cerebral cortex. It was in some of these thoughts that Octo-Man imagined how the glass would look as it smashed ceremoniously onto the floor, splintering into hundreds – or maybe thousands – of unequal pieces. A grudging smile played on his slimy lips as he remembered that he had once heard that on some planets the breaking of glass is believed to bear good fortune.
With a few controlled absorptions of his suction cups, Octo-Man sought the attention of the waiter. Johnny and Octo-Man locked eyes. This implicit exchange did not go unnoticed by Fat Sal, whose nostrils flared as he burst into a second symphony of cacophonous complaining.
There was a lifeform of the Hippocampus-Seahorse persuasion seated next to Octo-Man. Friday was his night off and his only night in the week away from the kids, and he was understandably growing quite tired of the irrelevant commotion. Seahorse Sean swiveled his head towards the wall and pointed his open brain at the sign urging bar-goers to remain at a safe level of intoxication. The text was written in the General Tongue, yet Octo-Man stared at it blindly, for the heavy stupor was bearing down his eyelids. At that moment the words of warning etched onto the wall seemed to him to merely be random scribblings with no beginning and no end.
Octo-Man was not in a state to understand language or much else for that matter. He had reached the critical point that came before argumentative drunkenness. There was no question that it would be a good idea to not become argumentatively drunk as this had in the past led him into some seriously dangerous altercations. In fact, the reason he was so far from his home on Neptune was because he had been banned from all bars on his own planet.
The ladies from Venus sat at the booth furthest from the door, haughtily overlooking the rest of the bar. Just as on every other Friday night preceding the one currently being described, the Venusians had reserved an entire booth for themselves. It was a rounded booth with soft leather chairs on each side and a white futuristically configured table was planted smack-bang in the middle. The ladies on each side of the booth were at eye level with one another – most of their evening was spent making unwitting and unnecessarily romantic eye contact with one another. The totality of their booth was safeguarded by a plastic sparkling shield. The function of the shield was to protect these ladies from lonely interplanetary stags. Through this heavy screen the women within viewed the distorted figures of those outside. What they saw were the murky men and women crawling like crusty arachnids over the mahogany surfaces of the pub.
“How disgusting,” thought the women in unison.
Through the rose-tinted material, the rest of the lifeforms in the bar could see them whispering and giggling. To the ugly laypeople, the beauty of the women from Venus gathered into a sort of unmanageable force that accumulated within the shield and shot outwards as a piercing ray of unbearable elegance. In his mind Octo-Man compared the brilliance of these ladies to the shine of the celestial pearls sold by street vendors on the beach-bordering promenades on Crupo, his hometown on Neptune.
As Octo-Man gawked at these women, the liquor began pulling him under, lower and lower still, down to the place of no return. He swayed forwards a little as if testing the direction but collapsed finally onto the floor behind him. At the sight of the Octo-Man’s body contorted uncomfortably on the floor, the gaggle of elegant gals imploded into uncontrollable laughter. The sound of their cackles was muffled by the booth, but the faint ghost of their echoes travelled all the way to Octo-Man’s ears. Following the unexpected ebullition, it took more than a moment for the Venusian to wipe the tears from their wondrous bug-eyes and to realign their overly nourished hair back into position.
The Elf-people from Jupiter were also out that night. Being of a superior social stratum, they floated far up above the grimy floor of the bar, observing the madness while remaining at a safe distance from it. They sipped at the edges at their martinis, nibbling at the salty olives that had been delicately placed at the rim of each of their translucent pitchers.
“Could’ve made these a tad drier,” remarked the Section Commander of the Elves. As he uttered these words, he simultaneously adjusted his crown to sit more comfortably on his oddly egg-shaped head.
It was a quarter past midnight when the robot and the alien arrived. They rambled loudly down the metallic stairs leading to the bar and tread unapologetically in. After entering, they turned their pretty heads from side to side to get a look at the sorts of lifeforms in the bar that evening.
In a jiffy the had clock ticked. It was time.
Two distinct sets of boots, one platformed and the other shrill and sharp, marched across the bar. Vitality diffused out from their feet. The ambience of apprehension was now so thick that one could have cut through it with a knife. They were unreal, celestial. Much more alluring than should have been allowed of such female lifeforms.
“One number seven and another number four please,” requested the automated babe breathily, flicking at her fiberglass locks with her metallic fingertips. The nails covering the silver finger were painted a deep red.
Still in the daze bred from his belittling, Johnny scrambled among the liquor bottles to complete the request.
Judging only based on the attire of the robot and alien, it was clear that they had dressed for the purpose of an impending dance competition. The competition was organized for the sake of tradition, but these two were the only ones who attended. Therefore, the ‘competition’ is perhaps better described as a ‘performance’. Sal gave both the alien and the robot a nod of the head as they tread into the bar, signaling to the rest of the customers – particularly to those here for the first time – that these two seemingly outstanding lifeforms were welcomed and accepted here.
The spectacle was about to begin. A wave of excitement rippled from bar goer to bar goer.
Fat Sal stood by the Jukebox, awaiting his orders.
“Disco tonight boys,” said the alien, swiveling her hips in a way that caused the colorful fabric of her jumpsuit to become even tighter over her hip bones.
Fat Sal nodded slowly in response.
“You can tell from the way I use my voice I’m a woman’s man, no time to talk….”
The dancing began.
The robot and the alien boogied back and forth, shimming somewhat rhythmically to the sound of the falsetto. The rest of the lifeforms in the establishment could tell that the alien and the robot were only good dancers by virtue of believing themselves to be so. Neither of them had any formal training nor any real skill. Without their winning attitude, they would have been quite average, if not slightly below average. As any obscure and indie specialists, the robot and the alien made up for their lack in talent by adopting very distinctive styles. While the alien loved flinging her arms up high and shaking her hips, the robot was more into a sort of bouncing movement that made her appear to be wedging a nail into the floor beneath her.
When the song finished, both robot and the alien were out of breath. There was even a thin shield of sweat slathered onto the skin of the extraterrestrial. As the robot was mechanical, there was of course no such layer of sweat overlaid onto her sweet, silvery skin.
The dancing caught Octo-Man’s attention. He was the only one that applauded. After having demonstrated his support of the dames with a few solid claps of his tentacles, Octo-Man passed out once again, hitting his head against the sticky floor. On the far side of the bar, the madams from Venus were absolutely appalled. Their disgust and displeasure could be seen plainly due to the fact that their tiny delicate mouths twisted into shocked “O” shapes. Far up above floor level, the Elf-people were silent and scornful.
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WAST WRTNG 