It’s me again, and this minimum wage over glorified greeter is still kicking! And getting kicked. Hard.
Ever since that carwash deep clean, my skin has had a sickly green tint to it, and I always feel cold. It’s especially stressful to me after my experience with hyperthermia, but that’s a me problem. I guess.
Anyways, the rest of that week went mostly alright. I refused to use the carwash until I saw others run through it a few times, even then I still had mixed feelings. To this day, I have mixed feelings.
I came in on Tuesday morning, half an hour early as always. I pulled some cars out of the garages from the overnight storage, then started to write up an overnight drop off. I stepped foot outside, then immediately wished I hadn’t.
Sitting across two parking spots, a gladiatorial style chariot sat, in its two wooden wheeled glory.
“What in the-“ I muttered under my breath, approaching the peculiar historical mount. As absurd as the situation was, I marked the dings on the sheet, treating the chariot like a car. Believe it or not, the condition of the chariot might surprise you.
It was barely holding together. One of the wheels was missing most of its spokes, evident by the jagged protrusions along the interior of the wheel. The axle was warped, the hitches had frayed leather straps unfit to pull the chariot, and the chariot itself was worn and weathered. It looked like a museum exhibit.
I didn’t touch it, instead I turned around, and headed back inside. “Tom? What’s up with the chariot outside?” I asked, seeing the white haired, retired man standing by the valet table.
“What about it?” Tom asked, sincere and almost sinisterly.
“What do I do about it? It’ll fall apart if I touch it,” I kept my tone in check, trying to quell my impatience so early in the morning.
“Get the VIN and mileage. Don’t forget the license plate.” Not willing to put up with this, I turned around and went back out to the chariot.
As someone who appreciates malicious compliance, I did as I was told. I knew the cameras on site would support my story, if something happened to the chariot, I’d be backed up.
Now folks, I am incredibly disappointed to tell you this, but it was all there. The license plate, VIN, even the damn mileage. I can’t remember the numbers exactly, though I wouldn’t share that online even if I did. What I do remember, though, was that the plate stated it came from Cairos. Why is an Egyptian chariot sitting in the front parking lot?
I hopped onto the chariot, searching for the mileage, immediately regretting my choices. Right where my hand met the wood, a large piece splintered off, impaling my hand. Instinctively, I fell backwards, and onto the ground, nursing my hand.
My shock was quickly interrupted by two rumbling neighs. Here we go, I sighed internally, sucking up the energy I needed to ignore the pain in my hand. When I looked at the chariot, I had to make a double take. Instead of a worn out hunk of wood, there stood a brilliant blue, intricately carved and painted chariot fit for a king.
God dammit. Not only had the chariot become a pristine example of ancient technology, but two very unfortunate looking horse camel hybrids now stood side by side, hitched to the chariot. They took turns whining and neighing, the fur on their humps stood on end as though static electrified.
I approached the oddity, holding my injured hand in the other, to see a dashboard. You’ve got to be shitting me. Seriously?
I managed to get the mileage, though I did find it interesting that its speed only offered increments of miles per hour. Most cars in the US have mph around the outer ring, in larger numbers, with kph along an inner circle. Notably, this speedometer lacked the kph notation. The dashboard also lacked the engine temperature reading, though that wasn’t as surprising, considering there was no engine.
I retreated inside, now that I had the information I needed, eager to avoid prolonged contact with this strange situation. I handed Tom the sheet, only for him to stop me.
“Keys?” Tom pressed.
“There are no keys. It’s a chariot?” I countered, unsure of myself.
“What’s in your hand then?” Tom retorted.
Are you blind?! Dear lord what’s wrong with him! I screamed internally for a moment, before showing my palm to Tom. He did not react how I had expected.
“Was that so hard?” Tom chortled, plucking the splinter from my hand in a single fluid motion. I jumped back from Tom, expecting my hand to erupt in a fresh wave of piercing pain. Instead, I was met with the insidious, self satisfied smirk spread across Tom’s face.
This is funny to him? Jesus these people are insane. I shrugged, then hit the opener, already fed up with the morning.
Two or three hours later, a woman came through. Walter, another porter, checked her in, since I was busy with another customer. I mention this because of something that caught my eye. Across the back of her neck, Hebrew was tattooed. Not just Hebrew, but the sort of Hebrew you’d find in a traditional Torah. While I may be somewhat Jewish, I cannot translate it.
I wanted to ask her what it meant, but work comes first. I stuck to my job, filling out forms and handing them in, parking cars when they had been processed. Somewhere along the line, the lady disappeared.
I was a tad disappointed, but it was okay. I was at work, afterall.
Two hours later, I saw the same woman out of the corner of my eye, checking out and paying. I decide to approach her, and ask her about the tattoo.
“Excuse me, may I ask what the Hebrew on your neck means?”
“Planet,” she said simply, “are you Jewish or something?”
“Sorta, I can read basic Hebrew, but like languages in general” I answered.
We had a little chat, and I went back to work. That was until I heard thunder. Earsplitting, earth shattering thunder. My hands shot to cover my ears, as I surveyed the outside for the cause of the commotion.
What on earth is she doing! I screamed in my head, watching the flames spew out from various exhaust pipes across her colossal monster truck. It looked like jet engines firing off in the front lot.
No one else seemed bothered by the rockets outside, in fact the only thing most people were thrown off by was me. Standing there, flabbergasted, I was at a loss.
“Quit your gawking kid. We’ve got customers waiting.” Tom called over the ear rupturing ruckus.
It took some major effort, but I finally managed to break my gaze and return to work.
Ten minutes later, one of the mechanics, Ziv, asked me to pull the car out of his bay. What he failed to mention was that the so-called car was in fact, the chariot from earlier.
Before I could refuse, I felt the same piercing pain as Ziv stabbed the ‘key’ through my hand. Again.
“Why?!” I cried in pain, slapping away Ziv’s hand as he reached for my shoulder, accidentally stabbing his hand in the process. The splinter transferred to his hand, immediately relieving me from the agony.
I took no pleasure watching him convulse slightly, seemingly unaccustomed to this sort of pain. Ziv crumpled on the floor, a heap of subdued groans of pain. I caught the occasional glare as he looked from his hand, to the chariot, to me, then back again.
Then everything went black. I woke up an hour later, my head and hip both throbbing like nothing I’d ever known.
“Eyy sleeping beauty’s back,” Ziv chuckled. “Took a nasty kick to the hip, then ya dropped like a sack of crap. Knocked ya clean out when your face met the ground.” Ziv snorted, then continued, saying “don’t stab me again.”
“Ye-you did it first!” I objected, pushing myself to sit upright.
“Irrelevant. Your job is to handle the driving. All we do is fix them up,” Ziv countered, slapping a hand on my shoulder all chummy like.
My stomach lurched at the physical contact, but I did my best to hide the grimace by turning to look around. I was laid in the corner by the tire machines. No ambulance, how long was I out? “How long was I down?”
“Eh two, three hours, maybe?” Ziv cocked his head, thinking. “You missed the uniform people, by the way.”
Great, I rolled my eyes. I had been left to run the same pair of pants through the wash each and every night, after work, since I didn’t want to go and ruin all of my pants. Guess that’s another week of nightly laundry, I sighed in defeat, getting to my feet on quaking legs.
“Eyy you can walk! Surprising, normally a kick from a Dromedary takes two or three days to heal-“ Ziv slapped a hand over his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut. Had he just said something he wasn’t supposed to?
I was in no shape to press further, though I was glad to have gleaned anything from this experience. I decided to take what I could get, as I headed back to the porter area.
I had many questions, and by all rights should not be walking, nor should I have been alive at that point, but I was. Spoiler, I still very much am alive. Those Dromedaries kick hard though, let me tell you. Bent my knee backwards earlier today. That chariot seems to come in every two months, from what I’ve gathered. And I am always pinned with handling it. Please send help, till next time, -Jamie from the dealership.