2058.01 Long Beach Corrosion

[shoeless.db]

The new surgical assistant wasn't going to last long, likely wouldn't make it to lunch. That's what Foghorn Jackson thought, anyway. Foghorn had only been with the Mad Popes organization for five weeks and was already the senior assistant for the team's mysterious doctor running the Department of Innovative Cycloptic Kinetics beneath the concourse level at the Basilica at Muskrat Slough.

The surgeon, whose name Foghorn never learned, had went through sixteen other aspiring assistants. Six were let go within the first hour of their first day for voicing concerns about the surgical room sharing space with the stadium's concessions storage. Another four stormed out during the first procedure they assisted on because of personal principles or ethics concerns. The non-disclosure agreement each of them signed the morning of their hiring kept them from bringing any of their angsts to the state medical board, that or the exit interview with the green-eyed surgeon and the organization's assistant general manager. Foghorn had no idea what questions they were asking the departing hires, but every one of them left with hollow expressions and never said a word or looked at anyone as they were escorted from the ballpark, regardless how fired up they might have been entering the exit interview.

Foghorn couldn't have cared less about any of them, anyway. The job was the best thing that had happened to him for years, and the expectations were simple: don't ask questions, don't make suggestions, and clean up every last speck of blood, fecal matter, or bodily fluid before the next ballplayer was gurneyed into the room.

"His name is pronounced fuckin' Goes-In-You, you believe that shit?" The new, soon to be old, assistant said, his crisp blue surgical mask tucked under his chin despite Foghorn repeatedly pointing to his own pulled-up mask. "Like Goes in You. This bastard should be slapping asses in porn rather than slapping singles for this shit organization, am I right?"

Foghorn, of course, didn't respond. The green-eyed surgeon had a way of always knowing what was said in this room. Foghorn had searched for a recording device every time he cleaned the room but had so far come away without finding anything.

"Can't believe we signed this discarded piece of Surfer trash." The assistant lifted Geauxinue's arm into the air, let it go, and laughed as it slammed hard onto the surgical table. "Everyone knows the air down there has a way of corroding away the human body until it's nothing but a fuckin' shell of what it once ..."

The door swung open, and the green-eyed surgeon walked in. Foghorn looked forward to how this new assistant would react to his quick firing.

Instead of immediately taking him for his exit interview, though, the surgeon said sternly, "Tell me more about this air down in Long Beach."

"The air? Well shit, doc. The air is just a way of saying that Long Beach is where players go to die, so to fuckin' speak. Look what happened to our boy Carlos Flores. Dude found second life here until that idiot shoeless," the assistant made the sign of the cross, "passed him off to @Lane down in Long Beach who quickly destroyed the poor fucker."

"Corrosion. You said something of corrosion."

"Well yeah, doc. Players fuckin' age like shit down there -- fallin' apart like a @RonCo team in the playoffs [author's note: obligatory reference]. Me and my boys are sure there's something in the air or gotta be in those rusty pipes beneath that old cattle barn they call a stadium. Kind of an urban legend kind of thing to never wash your hands when you have to watch a game there. A guy's hands don't feel right for a week. I swear my buddy Kenny washed his hands down there because he wasn't fuckin' thinking, and, anyway, his girl spent a week down in the hospital getting her fancy parts fixed up because Kenny got a little handsy and finger..."

The green-eyed surgeon raised a hand and the new assistant stopped. She turned to Foghorn and pointed at Geauxinue on the table, "Monitor this man and prep him for tomorrow morning. 6:00 am. We'll do the surgery then."

She turned back to the new assistant. "You, with me."

[Lane]

Oh i love it. This is gonna inspire me to write.

[7teen]

"His name is pronounced fuckin' Goes-In-You, you believe that shit?" The new, soon to be old, assistant said, his crisp blue surgical mask tucked under his chin despite Foghorn repeatedly pointing to his own pulled-up mask. "Like Goes in You. This bastard should be slapping asses in porn rather than slapping singles for this shit organization, am I right?"

You have Portland's interest.