Episode 057

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            “Oxygen is so important during those prepubescent years, don’t you think?”

                        Dr. Gregory House, House, M.D.

 

 

            Everett held a blue collared shirt over the red one he wore, studying himself in the mirror.  He scrutinized the color’s effect on his light ebony skin.  He considered it for a moment, uncertain.

            In the reflection, Roland leapt back, his hands up defensively.  “Come on, old man,” he said with a huge grin.  In a flash of motion, Edgar stepped nimbly into the reflection, sweeping his arm around the younger knight’s.  Sliding it up along Roland’s back, he snapped his knee up at Roland as he pushed his head down.  Roland blocked the knee and slammed his palm into Edgar’s chest, knocking him a step back.

            Everett lowered the shirt and held up a silk blue shirt with a lighter tint for comparison.

            Roland threw a quick boxing jab at Edgar, but the older knight parried it away, snapping at Roland’s face with his parrying hand.  Roland blocked the strike and punched at Edgar’s side, forcing him to skip back from the assault.

            “Okay, guys,” Everett warned, mostly to the mirror as he went back to the first shirt.  He glanced towards the counter where the under-paid attendant wasn’t paying attention to the only three costumers in the store.

            Roland snapped a quick set of shin kicks at Edgar, but Edgar kicked Roland’s leg on the last kick.  Stepping on Roland’s foot, Edgar pulled Roland’s defending hand forward.  At the same time, he elbowed him in the stomach, then snapped his fist straight up into Roland’s throat.

            The blow landed solidly against the side of Roland’s neck and he coughed silently, his eyes going wide.  “Oh crap, Roland, I’m sorry,” Edgar said, grabbing his shoulders, steadying him.  Everett dropped the shirts and turned, shocked.  “Can you breathe?” Edgar asked.  Roland coughed, unable to speak, his face growing red.

            “What’d you do?” Everett asked.  He pulled Roland towards him.  “Roland, say something.”  Roland held up his middle finger, frantically trying to breathe.  Everett looked at Roland’s throat, feeling it.  “Where’s Ledger?” he demanded.

            “He and Morgan aren’t here yet,” Edgar answered.  “I’ll call 911,” he said, reaching into his pocket.  “Miss!” he yelled to the woman behind the counter.  The woman reached to her iPod and turned it up.

            Everett glanced at the girl, then faced the storefront.  SYDNEY!” he yelled at the top of his lungs.

            Within a heartbeat, out from the women’s clothing store across the mall hallway came sprinting Sydney in her underwear, clutching her red shirt to her bare chest.  She vaulted over the benches in the middle of the hall in a single bound and rushed into the men’s store.  “I punched him in the neck,” Edgar reported as she arrived, “but his throat isn’t collapsed.”

            Sydney awkwardly pinned the shirt to her chest with her elbows and checked Roland’s throat as his lips drew blue.  She pressed her index finger deep into the side of Roland’s neck and also pressed her thumb into the base of his jaw.  “Hold up your foot,” she ordered.  Roland struggled to keep balanced, having to rely on Everett’s help.  Sydney yanked Roland’s hiking boot and sock off and stabbed her thumb into his sole.

            As soon as she did, Roland coughed violently and fell into Everett’s arms, breathing frantically.  Edgar sighed with relief.  “Thanks, Sydney,” he said.

            She adjusted her shirt ungraciously and glared at him.  “Don’t mention it,” she muttered, heading out.

            Edgar watched her go and shook his head with a laugh.  “Roland, I’m sorry,” he said sincerely.

            “Don’t worry, buddy,” Roland waved off, holding his throat.  “We were horsing around.  It happens.”  He started to put his shoe back on.

            “You guys are just lucky that Sydney’s been studying Dim Mak at Ledger’s kung fu school,” Everett said; already back to appraising the shirts.  “That pressure point stuff is no joke.”

            “Yeah,” Edgar said, smoothing back his salt-and-pepper hair.  He breathed out and smirked at Roland.  “You sure you’re okay?”

            “Yeah, don’t sweat it,” he said before picking up one of Everett’s selected shirts.  He held it against himself, considering it.  “I’m still not clear on how changing our wardrobe is going to help matters.  I mean, it’s not like we’re Power Rangers and changing clothes means we get new mechs or anything.”  He looked hopefully at Everett.  “Are we?”

            “Ledger, Armand, and I have been blasting the change all over Knightsnet,” Everett answered, turning around to see Roland’s chosen shirt.  “That looks good on you.”

            “Nehru-cuts usually do,” Roland observed, checking around to find the rack the shirt had come from.

            “Anyway, people are starting to look into the whole ‘European Knights’ thing,” Everett went on, checking through his selection.  “We’ve gotten a lot of responses and stuff.  We’re just hoping that switching over and aligning ourselves with the European knights will distract from Alan Vick, and maybe the loss of support will take some of the fight out of him.”

            “Blue and Silver’s been the official colors for, like, forever, right?” Roland asked, picking out a few shirts himself.  He held up a sleeve to his head, checking the color against his dark blonde hair.

            “Once knighthood stopped being a class and became a strictly moral imperative,” Edgar answered, also looking through a few racks, “the colors blue and silver were adopted.  They’re worn, from what I understand, by all knights except for US knights, a few Canadian knights, and, oddly enough, Australian knights.”

            “They have knights in Australia?” Roland asked, surprised.

            “I know,” Edgar sympathized.  “That’s what I said.”

            “Why’d we go to black and red in the first place?” Roland asked, coming over to the rack Everett was looking through.

            “It was after the attempt on the FBI building in the 1950s,” Everett started.

            “No, I know that,” Roland said, standing half a head taller than Everett.  “The Knights tried to take the FBI building, in order to prove that they were a viable military.  It ended in a bloodbath.”

            “Yeah,” Edgar said.  “After that, the US knights adopted black and red.”

            “Yeah, that’s what I mean.  Why black and red?” Roland asked.

            “Cherokees,” Edgar answered, turning to him.  “The knights adopted the Cherokee war paint, which was black and red, as our official colors.  I think it was a political move at the time.”

            “So we’ve been wearing red and black, basically, because we were pissed about losing a fight?” Roland asked.  Everett thought about it and nodded.  Edgar nodded as well.  “Hmm,” he said.  “I think I feel a little bit better about this then,” Roland said, holding up a blue shirt.  His eyes trailed off as he thought.  “I think.”

 
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