Fernando's Second Quest

The crew headed swiftly forth, leaving the lands of Saladolsa and its Dominion of Movies far behind them. They passed through Zail-Kanzin, which is about the limits of Fernando's usual travels in a southerly direction, and continued onwards to Bobsdaughter, the municipality which Macombo and Natasia called home.

Fernando had never met these two individuals, but Ronaldo staked his life and reputation on the qualities of their characters and so Fernando was predisposed to treat them as members of his posse. Macombo, it turns out, filled a vital hole in the party's composition, for he is quite the extroverted man and would serve well as the party's face during interactions with strange peoples in strange lands. Natasia, meanwhile, gravitated immediately to Fernando's style and tone of speech, for she possessed a similar outlook on life and sense of humor.

The newly met comrades' equipment was stowed in the Tahoe's trunk, next to the large cooler well-stocked with ginger ale and other sodeys, and Ronaldo guided the vehicle back onto the highway. The journey had now officially-officially begun.

Time passed swiftly. The group made a quick pit stop at a gas station at the border to stock up on Gas Station Hot Chocolate and breakfasts. While the sausage and egg biscuits which had been procured were quite acceptable fare, the ones containing Canadian bacon were foul bastardizations of a meal that no one in the vehicle could choke down, for the shitty and waxy cheese overpowered the sandwich. To Fernando, who finds most varieties of cheese—especially mass-produced and oily ones—reprehensible, it was like trying to eat a spoonful of earwax.

During the drive, Macombo extroverted himself into the group by sharing many tales of debauchery and sorrow at his workplace over the previous weeks, stories in which characters such as Dragon Lady, Chicken Wing, Entitlement Mike, and Guinness Guy figured heavily. It is not Fernando's place to share these with the world; Macombo deserves this honor and privilege, for they are tales on par with the finest of Chronicles.

And, speaking of Chronicles, Ronaldo mentioned their existence, and Natasia begged Fernando to provide dramatic readings therefrom. Our hero, whose ego knows no bounds, did precisely this for over two hours, sharing some of the choicest anecdotes he could recall. By the end of his filibuster, Fernando's voice was shot, but they found themselves at the outskirts of Milwaukee, where they stopped at another gas station to stretch the limbs and relieve the bladders.

Now, however, began the twisting navigation of on- and off-ramps and their associate tollbooths which snaked out from the Chicagoite nexus. Gertrude, who had until this point remained silent, spoke up as the group approached the first of the tolls: “Bear left on I-94.”

Ronaldo, dear naïve and trusting Ronaldo, did as Gertrude bade, for Goo-Gol's words of wisdom in no way countermanded her.

This resulted in the van being shunted into the express toll lane, where vehicles with toll stickers may pass through without slowing, rather than turning over coinage to yellow-vested attendants in tiny cubicles. As was written in the books of the heavens, traffic fused into a solid brick around the Tahoe as though it were a foreign body besieged by lymphocytes, rendering it unable to cross the lanes into the coin-tolls on the right, and they whizzed through without paying the required $2.80.

That fucking bitch.

Fortunately, the State of Illinois is not a complete cocknibble, in that it allows a grace period of seven days from the date of infraction to square away unpaid tolls by paying through a website. This thing would be done promptly upon the group's return home, for at the moment they lacked an appropriate top-of-lap computer on which to complete such tasks.

Gertrude was placed into the Box of Shameful Solitude and all the group's attention and love was showered upon Goo-Gol's directions, which did not steer them wrong with regard to tolls, though it did encourage them to take a wrong turn in their quest to reach their place of lodging. Gertrude was reactivated with resignation, and she recalculated the path they must forge. Perhaps to make up for her earlier misdeeds, she did not lead them astray, nor bone them on any more tolls.

Their hotel lay quite near Chicago O'Hare International Airport, in quite the industrial district. Natasia noted that the premiere landmarks in the vicinity were gigantic twin piles of shattered concrete and gravel, respectively, and these mounds were used to orient the party during their later explorations.

They arrived at the hotel just before eleven in the morning. Unfortunately, they could not check into their rooms for another two hours, so time needed to be killed. Ronaldo suggested fanning out from this new base of operations and to acquaint themselves with the vicinity, so this was done. Unfortunately, little was immediately accessible to the party, especially since they journeyed on foot, not wanting to waste gas wrangling with midday Chicago traffic. The sidewalks, in defiance of everything Fernando thought he knew about the world, were in worse shape than those in Saladolsa, and in some places they were absent entirely, so the party had to trudge along narrow trails tramped into the grasses parallel to the four-lane road, sidestepping a wide assortment of litter up to and including orange traffic cones.

They stopped at a nearby Subway, the only easily accessible eatery that was not also a porn shop, for lunch, and they overheard a conversation between the cashier jockey and either a coworker or a manager about money which had gone missing from the till. It sounded to Fernando like it was amateur hour at the Thieves' Guild. Business matters and chastisement therefrom should not be discussed before a group of five strangers. It reeks of callous disregard for simple courtesy among individuals in the same trade.

Were Fernando Master of that particular Sandwich Lair, and had he come upon one of his minions acting in such a manner to another wage slave, he would have shitcanned the unprofessional bastard on the spot.

After the group had left the awkward Subway behind them, they walked around the block. Blocks in Chicago seem much larger than blocks in Saladolsa, or Inuitland. They made a circumlocution around a single-building business park which sprawled over about a square kilometer of land. Fernando walked next to Natasia during this, for the young lady was the only one to keep up with the Keeper's quick pace, and they discussed names, and why Fernando gives others pseudonyms. While they walked, an olive-skinned man in a car appeared around one corner. He slowed up as he passed the group, then rolled down the window, pointed two fingers at the party, and mimed a gunshot.

Random encounters. What in actual fuck.

The group returned to the hotel and still had much time to kill, over an hour. Fortunately, a picnic table outside the front gates to this castle was unoccupied, so Fernando broke out his set of Cthulhu Dice and inaugurated Macombo and Natasia in its eldritch workings. Natasia proved quite the talented and fortuitous thrower of jinkies, and she won by far the greatest number of bouts out of the many that were played as they waited.

Finally, the hour of one in the afternoon dawned. Ronaldo and Macombo could secure their respective rooms! And they did, and it was glorious to behold, for the bedchamber Ronaldo has leased contained a full-size refrigerator in which sodeys could be stashed and kept cool! As an added bonus, the remote was right there on the nightstand, so Fernando did not have to experience nihilism given physical form as he did on his last journey.

To make things even better, the hotel provided free shuttle services to and from the convention center. No wrangling with overpasses and traffic lights and law enforcement, not for this saucy crew of adventurers! But, the convention was not to begin for another two hours, and no one had any desire to stand in lines for that duration, so a quick round of Munchkin was begun. Macombo acquitted himself quite admirably to it, but the game proved not entirely to Natasia's liking, as she politely declined participation in subsequent bouts.

'S alright, Natasia. I still think you're cool.

When the hour struck three, the group gathered what belongings they felt they would need and struck out for the convention center. Here they met for the first time a splendid, competent, genial Hispanic gentleman whom the party named Cool Driver Jim, and he was their link to sanity and safety over those next three chaotic days. They also encountered a group of fellow convention-goers who hailed from the faraway state of Ohio. Fernando struck up conversations with them, though he misremembers their names and he is certain they misremember his.

The shuttle proved overencumbered, as Cool Driver Jim had to drop off a pair of young adults at the airport before bringing a mob of seven sweaty, smelly nerds (and Natasia) to the convention, so Ronaldo was a good guy and hunkered himself into the space behind the back seat, keeping low to avoid the prying eyes of Cop Dudes who might otherwise detain the shuttle. Once the O'Hare dropoff was completed, Ronaldo was able to return to the lands of men from his self-imposed exile, and all was well.

Then, they arrived at the convention center, clambered out of Cool Driver Jim's pimping ride, and had their notions of “standing in line” changed forever on that day.