Misc.

urinetown 2

his memory of barrel had become the smell of crash mat foam, a dull pain in his right hand, and the ripple of laughter bubbling out of a young man watching over him twenty feet up. 

and yet, lockstock never forgot a face. 

it was december, cold. it was lockstock's turn to drop off payroll forms at the ugc. the officers were on rotation, and every week someone else brought in the forms. lucky, he supposed. it was either this or throwing some poor bastard to their death. whatever. same building. 

he ran into barrel standing guard in front of the elevator. 

barrel stood at attention, staring ahead. he seemed distant from himself, or at least, more distant than the last time lockstock had interacted with the man. 

"finance, please." lockstock told him. barrel nodded.

"do you have id?"

"yes." lockstock said, sighing and pulling out his badge. security was tight, but then again, wasn't it always? 

with barrel satisfied, he summoned the elevator for lockstock. silence settled in while the soft whir of the elevator hummed quietly in the background.

"don't i know you?" barrel asked, giving lockstock a double take. lockstock gave him a polite smile, and a single nod of the head.

"we trained together. twenty bucks." he reminded the guard. barrel's face lit up with recognition. 

"oh yeah! lockstock, right?" 

"nice to run into you again, mister barrel." 

they shook hands and the doors chimed open. 

"good luck in finance." barrel told him, tipping his hat. it felt silly, and it make laughter bubble up from lockstock's stomach. 

"thanks." 

the elevator doors began to close. barrel began to ask a question.

"see you aroun-"

"what?" lockstock asked, turning to face the guard, only to find that the doors had closed and he was being whisked upwards, leaving barrel beneath him.

the young man was not there when lockstock left the building half an hour later. 

-

it was only one year later when lockstock and barrel's lives intersected once more. 

of all the people lockstock expected to train, barrel was maybe one of the last ones. 

there was a chronic shortage of police officers in the town. too much crime, never enough justice. never enough regulation. never enough conformity. so, whenever someone was brought into the workforce, there was no waiting for group training. you were told what to do and then you did it. 

it was absurdly late at night when lockstock walked into the small office he'd been told to go into to train this new guy who'd shown up halfway through lunch. apparently it had taken so long to actually get someone to go train him because he couldn't stop crying- he couldn't stop being upset. so the chief had left him there to rot. like a prisoner in a jail cell. by the time the new guy was calm enough to listen, everyone had gone home. so they assigned lockstock and told him to get it over and done with as soon as he was finished with his rounds.

overtime, lockstock kept telling himself. he was being paid overtime. that was just enough to keep him going. 

he came into the small office with an envelope full of paper work and stopped short when he realized it was barrel. barrel was the new officer. barrel- ugc guard barrel- was the new officer. ugc guard who'd been moved down- demoted- huh? previously-ugc-guard-now-demoted-officer barrel was the one who'd been so upset all day it had taken close to ten hours to find the time to train him. and now lockstock was staring at him with a frown etched onto his face, and barrel looked like he was about to start crying again.