The Comedian

2,069 words list one

It wasn’t love at first sight, there’s no such thing as that. It was more of a curiosity that overcame me when I met Isadora Merikalos. I was at the amphitheater, in the room where all of the other performers were getting ready. They were mostly actors, dressed flamboyantly with Island accents and well-toned bodies. There were three different troupes of actors, the Farinas, the Theodore’s, and the world famous Brunswolds. Then there were the singers, Marissa Colton, Shelby Gresham, Aaron Viceroy and his rumored lover Frederick Jaunt, as well as an up and coming singer Ed Herrick. They were doing their usual warm ups, humming songs, tuning instruments, throat exercises, getting ready for the big show.

I sat by myself on a crate of unused props, trying to read my parchment of in the dim lighting, ignoring the sound of the crowd cheering for the fight being displayed. I was particularly nervous because it was the biggest show I had been invited to do, and if I performed well, my career would reach new levels. I wasn’t an actor or a singer, when I was sober, I was a standup comedian. There were supposed to be three standup comedians performing at the Prince Hart’s Amphitheater today, but the oldest one, Jonny the Wise as he was called, canceled due to his caravan being attacked by bandits. His allotted time was supposed to be divided between the second comedian, Louis Szekely, and myself. But Louis couldn’t come up with enough jokes to fit his allotted time and ditched me at the last second, leaving me with a thirty minute performance to cover.

I couldn’t cancel like the other two. I was the only Novantae comedian in the region, and Novantaes couldn’t perform gigs whenever they wanted like the rich Islanders or even the Vaspians could. We had the same rights, but the old aristocracy who owned the theaters chose who could perform and who couldn’t, and tended to give the cold shoulder to us if we screwed around. It wasn’t too bad, however, I used my clan tattoos and painted face in my gig, as well as funny encounters with politicians who’d made controversial statements such as “Them Novantae folk is takin’ our jobs!” and the like, as well as speaking in my own tongue if my crowd was present.

Anyways, I was mentally rehearsing when I saw Isadora walk into the room. She held a scroll in her hands, which were tattooed with black ink. Her skin was too pale for her to be an Islander, and her face and neck were tattooed with images of the ocean and turtles. She was a Novantae, the only other one I had seen since entering the Capital Lands. I instantly yearned to know who she was, where she came from, if she came from the same Tribe.

“Alright!” she yelled, her accent was less distinct than mine, she’d been here longer than I had. “My name is Isadora Merikalos, Jeffrey is out sick today. Mr. Hunter wants to change the order of who’s performing. Ed, Marissa, your instruments were late and should be unpacked in half and hour-“

“But I’m due in ten minutes! And by the way the fight seems to be going I’ll go on stage early!” Marissa Colton exclaimed. Ed ran his fingers through his hair.

“Let me finish.” Isadora said, it was something that almost no one would dare say to the woman. I fought back the desire to laugh, but Ed didn’t. It was one of the main reasons he wouldn’t be able to get a gig in the Capital Lands.

“Dakos,” She then said, looking up from her scroll. She spotted me out instantly, and walked closer to me. She was shorter than me, with the slim build and pierced ears of a city dweller. Her eyes were violet, and her short red hair seemed to glow in the dimly lit room.

“How long can you perform?” she asked. She looked me up and down, and my heart beat quickened with a primal yearn to be intimate with this beautiful woman.

“Uhh, I-I can do half an hour.” I stuttered, rolling up my scroll.

“Alright, you’re up after this fight.” She told me. Then, in Novantae, she said “It’s alright if you don’t have enough time with clean jokes. The crowd is filled with young people of Northern descent. They’ll appreciate you telling a few dirty jokes.”

When she spoke Novantae, she had a slight southern accent. Not necessarily Islanders, but a sign that she had lived here for a good deal of her life. Needless to say, what she said made me feel euphoric.

“Ohhhhh thank the Mother! You have no idea how screwed I was!” I exclaimed in Novantae, earning the looks of my fellow performers. I felt so happy, as if fate wanted toarouse some glimmer of hope.

Sure enough, the fight was over with one man out of thirty remaining alive. The blood was covered by sand, and the dead bodies moved underground to the nearby catacombs. The amphitheater’s host, some guy whose name I don’t remember, it might have been something along the lines of Tony, went out into the arena and did his presentation.

“Ladies and Gentlemen of the far reaches of the Dominion, northerners, southerners, swamp people, where ever the hell you came from! We have a special treat for you today! From the northern tribes of the Novantae-“

There was a large cheer from the crowd, and a few chants in Novantae dialects. After a minute the crowd silenced, and the host guy continued talking.

He said something along the lines of “From the northern tribes of the Novantae, he is known across the Mount Alder region and has performed for governors and chieftains across the North, in his first performance for the Southern Moon Amphitheater, I give you, Dakos Ionus!”

He had done something every host should know not to do, he had set up an up and comer such as myself as fantastic, absolutely amazing. Usually we were simply considered edgy at best. This made the audiences expectations of me very high, and if I bombed I would bomb harder. If I did good, they would tell their friends who would expect me to be twice as good. I mentally beat the living crap out of Tony, I believe his last name was Rialto or something of the sort as I walked out into the center of the amphitheater. The place was packed. People from all over the city and other parts of the Dominion had come, many waving flags and beating on drums with remarkable rhythm. Isadora was right, the audience was young and there were a lot of Novantae here to visit.

Tony walked up to me, his Imperial Robe swaying in the wind. He held the front of it up so it wouldn't get covered in sand. He smiled as I walked closer, his teeth like opals, his skin beautifully sun kissed, like most of the rich Islanders in the city. I can't remember what I was wearing, some nice trousers or something. We walked close and shook hands, doing the usual show business smile and head nod. He then pulled me close to his face.

"Good luck Novantae scum! You and your people should know your place and stick to your reservations!" he hissed, and tried to squeeze my hand. I was stronger than him, however, and crushed his hand like a wolf sinking his teeth into a deer's hide.

"I didn't know you were afraid of competition." I whispered back. Not by best comeback, I admit.

I walked out on stage, and several of the Novantae in the audience started playing Rose of The North with their drums, a traditional Novantae song. The other audience members simply tried to hum along, no Islander could sing it properly at the time, Ned Derrin hadn't started his career yet.

At the time, the most common Novantae stereotype was that we ate deer and were hunter gatherers and were all savages who painted their' faces and had tattoos instead of our nether regions. Most of those stereotypes were meant, like all stereotypes, to hurt us. Instead, several Novantae comedians used it to their advantage.

"Wow, there are a lot of Novantae out here today! I wouldn't have taken drugs if I knew I was already gonna see colors!" I started.

It made sense at the time because Novantae were pale, Islanders were tanned, Vaspians were a mix of who knew what, the usual ethnic jokes. It got me a good response, a quick laugh.

"So, yeah. Thanks for coming out and buying tickets to this. That seems such a superficial things to say nowadays, let me say something from the bottom of my heart. Thanks for all your money!"

The crowd laughed more, and I got an applause. I turned around to see Isadora laughing, and I thought I was going to be seeing her later that evening.

"I thought I was going to be late to this, my mule was being an ass along the Trade Road." Simple jokes like that used to get me far in my younger years.

There was another laugh from the audience, and I moved closer to the center of the arena. Directly ahead of me sitting in the front rows were about twenty young Islander men wearing bright blue robes. Back then, before it meant being young and rebellious, it was the color of Islander Pride. Islander Pride was this movement about Islanders being better than everyone else. They wanted the more populous, richer part of the Dominion to forsake the North. A lot of them stated economic reasons for doing this, but most were just racist.

So for twenty minutes I absolutely killed, which is show business terminology for doing really well. I told more jokes, not all ethnic, and people laughed. Yet I couldn't help but feel nervous by the twenty gangly youths in the front row of the left side of the arena. When I was nearing the end of my set, they started getting rowdy, so I politely told them to fuck off.

This got me a quick applause from the Novantae, and the screams of hatred from the Island Pride group. They stood up and one of them threw a wineskin at me.

"Go back North you douche bag!" he yelled. Back then, douche bag was an insult as well as a perfume that women used. Don't ask me the correlation, this was forty years ago. Unfortunately for this racist, a lot of people heard him, and he had said this to a man who had a loud voice and a sense of humor.

"You're right, I am a woman's hygiene product." I shot back, "Because your mom smelled better after I fucked her last night!"

And that is how I jumpstarted my career as a standup comedian. That one simple comeback, that one ingenious verbal counter attack, would forever mold my career. From then on I would be known as an edgy, racist-bashing voice for my people. I would be adored on the reservations, not to mention a lot of beautiful actresses and singers would date me, and eventually hate me.

After the show, I hung out in the storage room, mostly talking to Isadora. I really liked her at the time, but I couldn't flirt with her the way I flirted with Islanders or Vaspians. I had to do the more traditional, get to know you first before we knocked boots thing. I don't really remember much of the conversation, we mostly talked about the North, and we found out that we were both from Reservation 17. This was before she became an actress and became richer than I'll ever be, so I was feeling very confidant. So we talked, and talked, and eventually walked around outside the amphitheater.

"How about we go have a drink?" I asked her

"Oh, I can't. I'm supposed to meet by girlfriend after the show." she told me.

A kick in the groin would have probably hurt more now that I think about it, but at the time I would have preferred it.

"Oh, okay. Well, I'll run into you some time or another." I said, and we went our separate ways.