THE MAN WHO KILLED HIS BROTHER, Ch 18

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Dragonlily
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THE MAN WHO KILLED HIS BROTHER, Ch 18

Post by Dragonlily »

Now that Ted has killed Last, Brew has no avenues left. Mitty’s life is in immanent danger. He has to go to el Señor, drug lord of the city.
...I’d say offhand the easiest way to commit suicide in Puerta del Sol is to go ask el Señor questions about his business. Some of the cops who tried it haven’t been found yet.
Brew is so scared that he needs the drive through the night to help him pull himself together.
Night was something I understood. At night people did things for reasons that made sense to me.
I really wish SRD could have used his original title for this book -- the one dividing the city between day and night.

SRD’s description of el Señor clarifies the relationship of all drug dealers with their marks. Referring to the people who attend el Señor’s night club, who might think a pusher is their benefactor, Brew says:
...They have too much money and not enough sense to know that the man who feeds them their kicks has nothing but contempt for them.
Whoa! Here’s a great one!
After wading a few yards along a carpet as deep and rich as lava...
Did you have any doubts that SRD would call el Señor's world hell? :evil:

And then comes the fateful meeting of Brew with el Señor’s bodyguard Muy Estobal.
...He was built like an armored car. His arms were so heavy they made his sleeves look like sausage casings, and he couldn’t have buttoned his jacket across that chest with a steam winch.
Come on, SRD, are you trying to tell us Muy Estobal couldn’t pay for a jacket that fits? No, I think he’s trying to tell us Muy Estobal has threat popping out all over him. But Brew beats him up! Yes, he does! When Muy Estobal throws a gut punch just to put fear into Brew, Brew fakes being hurt worse than he is. Then he knocks Muy Estobal over a desk and tromps on his neck. Ha! Very satisfying.

(For lack of Kasten at the moment, I thought we could use a little of Kasten’s tone. :wink: )

Here is the clientele of el Señor’s casino:
...I still had time to spot at least one man and two women who didn’t have the vaguest idea that they were tossing away every cent they had. They were so stoned that you could’ve hit them over the head with a brick and they wouldn’t have known the difference.

The really screwy thing about it all was that if you’d taken a poll in the room, most of those suckers would’ve told you they were more alive right then than under any other circumstances.
Anybody want to invite SRD to go gambling? I thought not. :wink:

Here is El Señor:
From his manicured fingertips to the ends of his vandyke beard and mustache, he was the perfect dapper grandee. He couldn’t have been more than five six. That desk should’ve made him look like a dwarf, but it didn’t.
El Señor is severe about Brew having removed the ammunition from Muy Estobal’s gun. He also doesn’t like private detectives. But when Brew speaks el Señor’s name, which Manolo had told him as a kind of secret password, he listens.

Brew excuses his bad manners by an appeal to el Señor’s sense of family, his protectiveness toward his daughters. Brew tells him about his niece Alathea, and the threat to other young girls through drugs, the urgency of finding one more girl before she is killed.

We think el Señor has been reached. We think he will help. But then he demands the one price Brew wouldn’t pay. So they force the stuff on him. After all his heroism and denial and stubbornness, Brew is finally drunk again.
Then I went blind with tears while the stuff burned its way into my guts.
:cry:
Last edited by Dragonlily on Sun Jul 11, 2004 2:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: THE MAN WHO KILLED HIS BROTHER, Ch 18

Post by kastenessen »

Joy wrote:Whoa! Here’s a great one!
After wading a few yards along a carpet as deep and rich as lava...
Did you have any doubts that SRD would call el Señor's world hell? :evil:
LOL! Fantastic quote!... and I too just loves it when Brew beats and wins over Muy Estobal, it's soo satisfying...and your description of it is very funny :) ...Do I really write like that? :) ...anyway, the chapter ends in sorrow. Brew is filled up with alcohol. It shows that not even when it really matters is he prepared to back down one bit. But it's a strange moment. At the point when he could have succeded in gaining information the price was too high. He didn't want to sell his soul to the devil as I see it and as you pointed out with your fantastic quote Joy...


kastenessen, yes I'm back again...
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Post by Dragonlily »

I wrote:But Brew beats him up! Yes, he does! When Muy Estobal throws a gut punch just to put fear into Brew, Brew fakes being hurt worse than he is. Then he knocks Muy Estobal over a desk and tromps on his neck. Ha! Very satisfying.
kastenessen wrote:...Do I really write like that? :) ...
:lol: Sometimes. In tone, not in punctuation. :lol: :twisted: The words came to me, so I decided to use them. I did some playing around when I wrote up this chapter. :)
kastenessen wrote:At the point when he could have succeded in gaining information the price was too high. He didn't want to sell his soul to the devil as I see it
Brew knew he was Mitty's last chance at rescue, so he had to remain conscious. But to look at it another way, should he save Mitty from addiction by taking on addiction himself? It's a moral puzzle, and suggests Brew has come to value himself a bit during the past few days.
"The universe is made of stories, not atoms." -- Roger Penrose
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