As the Tuning Peg Turns

[rugerpc]

Having enjoyed scraps from a breakfast burrito, a mouse farted.

Paul looked up from the sketch he was making and canted his head a bit. He punched the intercom button on his phone and keyed in the extension 4556.

"Nutzhall."

"Shawn, there is a mouse under the number 2 neck machine, the one that by the sound of it is working on the heel of a maple blank. Birdseye. Kill it."

"Right away, Paul," replied Shawn. As he made his way to the wood shop, Shawn wondered again how Paul's hearing could be so phenomenal.

After Paul hung up, he placed a conference call. Somewhere in studios Carroll County Maryland and just outside of Detroit, the phones of Doc Bill Ruger and Ell Schefman began to ring simultaneously...

 

[rugerpc]

This is a collaborative story. You are invited to enjoy the story or even add to it. Feel free to add characters and plot twists. Please be careful not to completely derail or end another member's developing story line. Let people have most of the control over characters that they introduce. As a general rule - don't kill off characters you have not introduced, unless of course it is a minor bad guy someone put in your way. The main bad guy(s) will require a team effort to kill. If you have a doubt or suggestion, PM the author handling the character in question at the moment. Make sure you have read the whole story before jumping in. Refer back to posts as an author may have edited his storyline a bit in an important way. Have fun. I'll update the cast of characters as we go along in post #2

Cast in order of appearance:
Paul Reed Smith - Yes, THAT Paul
Shawn Nutzall - doing what, exactly?
Doc Bill Ruger - small studio owner and beginning guitarist
Ell Schefman - aging studio owner
Vaughn Sizzler - tattooed guitar savant
Sergio - Rapper Extraordinaire
Bogdan X. Crapisteanu XIV - Romanian Mazil
Constance Lee Crapisteanu - shapely niece
Alan Tick - Mostly harmless guitarist
The Fat/Thin Lady
Duke Fookin Diamond (DFD) - Bang Stallion PRS Dealer
Jessup Fookin Baker (JFB) - PRS enabler
Amanda Bynes - skank
Lindsey Lohan - skank
Kendall Jenner - skank
Don and Zena - Felder Musical Instruments Company (FMIC) senior agents of Field Research and Development Agency of Technology (FRAT).


.

 

[vchizzle]

On a conference call, Paul summons the advice and expert knowledge of the highly regarded Ell Schef and Doc Ruger. It's decided a massive joint effort will be the only way to solve a problem of this magnitude.

 

[rugerpc]

Meanwhile in Wisconson, Vaughn Sizzler was getting a tingling sense. Despite currently getting new ink (a 12th fret Cooper's Hawk killing a Morning Dove on his tushie), he sensed something else. The last time he felt that particular tingling, something was wrong in Stevensville.

Elsewhere, Sergio was busy boxing up a dozen cats for Vaughn when his cell phone rang...

 

[László]

Ell answered his phone. The voice on the other end of the line said, "Hi Ell, this is Paul Smith."

"You're calling because you're finally going to come out with the Ell Schefman Sig model, right?"

"No."

Ell immediately broke down, sobbing into the phone. "B-b-b-but I've been playing your guitars since 1991 on all those ads, and now your amps, too. And the ads get played all over the world. >sniff<"

"Ell, no one on planet Earth cares about ad music, except guys doing ad music. Plus, you suck as a guitar player. I'm calling about something else. Something...bigger."

"You need a new keyboard player for your band."

"Um...no. We have a keyboard player."

"You're giving me a free guitar or amp because I have the most posts on the Forum, then."

"No."

"Throw me a bone here, Paul."

"Well, Ell, that's exactly what I'm going to throw you. Now listen..." And Paul R. Smith began to talk...

 

[rugerpc]

Bill had heard that exchange between Ell and Paul more times that he could count. But he also knew no one had Ell's experience when it came to overseas black guitar ops. Paul knew it too, that's why despite the whining, he always called Ell.

While Paul outlined what he needed from Ell, Bill only half listened to the conference call. He knew Paul would get to him soon enough. During the respite, a Bill took the opportunity to slam the ban hammer on another spammer.

"Sweet!"

"What?" Said Paul and Ell simultaneously.

"Sorry, just got another spammer Bastid."

Paul went back to giving instructions to Ell.

 

[László]

In Ploiesti, Romania, a very old man busied himself cleaning up a room in his estate's main house that hadn't been used in a very long time. In the center of the room, a large bell-shaped object was covered with a dust laden tarpaulin. In a corner was a table holding a large rack of what appeared to be mid 20th century electronic measuring equipment and scientific instruments.

There was a faded inscription painted on the wall of the room. In the light one could make out the phrase, Meine Ehre heißt Treue.

"Bones!" muttered the old man. "Soon the world will see what these bones can do."

The man was Bogdan X. Crapisteanu XIV. He was a Mazil, a title of Romanian nobility. It means "Of Boyar Bones." The Boyars were second only to the princes of Romania. A Mazil owned land, and until late in the 19th Century, also owned people - serfs.
Until the end of World War II, when she switched sides like Italy, Romania was a German ally, and Ploesti was the center of oil production for the Axis powers.

"Meine Ehre heißt Treue" was the motto of the SS.

 

[rugerpc]

Doc Bill Ruger was about to open the door to leave when there was a soft, but somehow sensuous knock. He opened the door to stare at the most wonderfully shaped perfect and perky ... eyes he had ever seen. And that camisole wasn't filled with chopped liver either.

"Doctor Ruger?"

Bill opened his mouth, but all that came out was a meek, "Ga..."

The girl smiled at him and said, "My uncle sent me. My name is Constance Lee Crapisteanu. I have a message and a couple of things I want to show you."

"Please do come in. Would you like a Ţuică ?"

 

[alantig]

The two things Constance whipped out were not the two things Doc Ruger had hoped for.

Instead, they were pictures. Pictures of an elderly man, clad only in underwear, clutching a guitar as if his life - and honor - depended on it.

Had Constance said the two things were pictures and described what the pictures showed, Doc would likely have just shown her the door, because Doc was not only familiar with the incident depicted, he knew photographic evidence existed.

What had him trembling was that he hadn't known there were pictures from different angles.

 

[rugerpc]

Bill knew a few things about photos. It was why Constance was sent to him in the first place. He had just finished a series on nudes with guitars and although all of his models had been women, he knew what the composition on the photos Constance held meant.

"We're going to need some study shots for comparison, do you mind posing?"

Constance had never modeled before, but leafing through the coffee table book on Doc Ruger's desk made her want to experiment.

"I'm not wearing any underwear," she offered.

"None of my models ever do. Besides it's the angles we need to duplicate and study."

While Constance disrobed behind the screen, Doc put in a call to Alan Tick. Alan knew a few things about photos too. Well, he knew how to save the photos of others and repurpose them as his forum avatar of 2 other members in their underwear proved. And somewhere he had squirreled away a photo of Doc Bill holding a guitar in what looked like his underwear.

Bill figured Alan was either well versed in photography or he just has a thing for underwear. Bill was hoping for the former and dreading the latter.

As Alan's phone began to ring, Constance stepped from behind the screen.

"Ga..." Exclaimed Doc Bill for the second time today...

 

[László]

Of course it would be all about the world supply of 96 million modulus carbon fiber, thought Ell. He knew that most carbon fiber is made of ordinary PAN (polyacrylanitrile) fiber, but this is then heated and processed until nothing is left but the carbon. Most of this material has what is usually considered a very high modulus of 33 - 50 million pounds per square inch. And carbon fiber makers can call this stuff "high modulus" because it's pretty good. But the great stuff, the real-deal, high modulus stuff can handle many more million pounds per square inch.

And it's the 96 million pound high modulus stuff that PRS wants to use on certain new guitars.

The long strands of PAN fibers are heated, but the idea is not to let them burn, but to expel all of the non-carbon atoms by causing them to vibrate violently. The technology is pretty amazing, but it also causes a fine dust to circulate in the air. It's believed that this dust isn't particularly harmful.

Ell realized quickly that the processes involved in making carbon fiber required heavy computer involvement, and that this could be one of several Achilles Heels that could possibly interfere with production if an outsider could hack the process. It could also be ruined by mechanical means, if vibrations could be altered or prevented somehow. And there were few safeguards to prevent unhinged lunatics from interfering with the processes involved, even remotely.

Ell's long-standing interest in the history of WWII on the Eastern front made the name Crapisteanu familiar, though he couldn't quite place it. Of course, he did recognize the name as Wallachian, thus Romanian, and the title rang a bell.

Romanian is an interesting language. Ell knew from his college studies that the area we call Romania the Romans called Dacia. Conquered by Trajan as part of the largest expansion of the Roman Empire in its history, it was the place that Roman soldiers were settled as a reward for life service upon retirement with land grants. Romania meant "Roman citizenry." The country still speaks a form of Latin that is closer to the Latin spoken in classical times than even Italian. Trajan's column in Rome was erected to memorialize this conquest. It is a country with an ancient and proud lineage, but its ruling class was often under the heel of Turkish or Russian masters, and had a "chip on the shoulder" world view as a result at times.

But Ell had heard the persistent rumors that had circulated for 70 years that it also had possession of one of Germany's greatest wunderwaffen secrets of World War II, an object that could supposedly defy gravity and whose energy could create force fields, an object of almost science fiction power: Die Glocke.

And Ell's contact in Romania had mentioned something interesting in connection with Crapisteanu. His nickname was Clopotul Bogdan. In English, Bogdan, "The Bell." In German, Bogdan, "Die Glocke."

It was time to get to Romania and do some research.

 

[sergiodeblanc]

(Sweeping helicopter shot) A DeLorean limousine crashes into a an older (festively painted double-decker) bus on a tropical one-lane mountain road.
[end scene]

 

[rugerpc]

Alan didn't answered his phone, so Doc Ruger left the simple message, "underwear photos. Call me." And hung up.

Constance was already holding a guitar in much he same pose as depicted in the photos she brought with her. Even she had to admit her curves complimented the instrument way better than the shape of the old man. But oddly enough, there wasn't very much difference in breast size between the two, thought the old man's were decidedly less perky.

When time allowed, both knew that there would a much longer photo session.

Bill fussed with the photo flood lights, positioning them to get the highlights and shadows correct. He never used flash as you cannot easily predict or control either.

Satisfied, Bill punched the transformer up to 3400 degrees Kelvin and began snapping photos. With the original photos as reference, he tweaked Constantine's pose. There was something about the shadow her breasts and torso made across the headstock that seemed off.

Looking back at he originals, it looked like the fuzzy lack of detail you see in a dark shadow next to a bright area. But something wasn't right.

It hit Doc Ruger like a ton of bricks.

The guitar in the original photos had no truss rod cover...

 

[László]

As Ell crossed the Atlantic on the flight that was stopping at Heathrow and continuing on to Berlin, he realized wistfully that he was simply too old to enjoy taking photographs of scantily clad women like his friend Bill.

Because to Ell, scantily clad women meant immediate scantily clad sex.

Unfortunately, in Ell's case, unpaid volunteers for scantily clad sex were by this point in life limited to genus "old women" and species "grandma." He opened his iPad and began reading more history.

"Time," he thought, "wounds all heels."

 

[rugerpc]

As Constantine slipped her cami and shorts back on, Bill was busy at the computer. He had scanned in the two photos supplied by Constance and had downloaded the new images from his Canon.

He isolated the headstock in one old photo and one new and made a side-by-side photo. A little bit of man boob showed in one and a little bit of niece boob in the other.

He then sent the new composition photo to Ell Schefman's iPad without subject or comment. Ell would know what he should focus on.

Bill then sent cropped pics of the old man's face and his underwear to Alan Tick. He hoped Alan would know what to focus on.

As Bill pondered his next move, Constantine appeared with the bottle of țuică. Like most țuicăs, Doc Bill's was a home brew. He was not Romanian, but he still used plums fermented about 8 weeks. He liked the traditional guest beverage that was as strong as 60% alcohol and double distiller over a wood fire in a copper still. One of the interesting effects of țuică was that it made you hungry.

Downing a shot each, Bill and Constance swallowed, gasped and simultaneously said, "I'm starved!"

 

[László]

Ell looked at the photos Bill sent, then idly checked the PRS Forum to see if anyone had responded to his latest rant on music production, hardware and software.

No one had.

Ell realized that the figure on a piece of wood elicited more comment and debate than the stuff he thought was worth dissecting in a post, though he couldn't figure out why. But the world had passed him by. Women? Uninterested. Friends? Would rather talk about something else - anything else. He had become merely a garrulous old coot, going on and on about things no one cared about any more. A bore. Invisible.

He asked the flight attendant for a bag of peanuts, but was refused. "We've already given out the peanuts," she said. "Why don't you take a nice nap, you look like you could use one."

"I'll use the head first, please excuse me," said Ell.

"Oh?" she said. "We figured you were already wearing Depends. Well good for you then, you still have control of your bodily functions - that's so cute! You call us if you have any trouble, OK? Do you need any help to get down the aisle?"

"Only if one of your attractive flight attendants wants to join the mile high club," Ell replied.

"Oh, listen to that! The mile high club! Isn't that sweet. You're a very naughty old boy, aren't you. My grandmother would have liked you, but she passed away last year."

Ell could only shake his head. "It's over," he thought. "There sure isn't much fun left." He left his seat and made his way down the aisle of the plane, but then realized that he'd forgotten why he got up from his seat. "I wonder why I'm not sitting down?" thought Ell. "And I wonder where that smell is coming from?"

 

[vchizzle]

As Ell turned around, he spotted the flight attendant passing by with a cart of dinners being served to the first class passengers. Ell asked what was being served. The flight attendant replied, "Oh, it's a very nice filet mignon served with fresh steamed broccoli and wonderful hollandaise sauce." Ell got that pleading look in eyes. The flight attendant frowned and said, "I'm very sorry, sir. These meals are for 1st class only. There's no way I could possibly..." Irritated and hungry, he began to see red. His hands began shaking, sweat on his brow. Ell quickly cut her off an yelled at the top of his lungs, " WELL JUST GIVE ME MY GO% DA#% PEANUTS THEN!"

 

[László]

Ell pretty much knew he wasn't going to enjoy the lockup at Heathrow as they led him off the airplane in handcuffs after landing.

There had been quite the disturbance after he demanded another serving of peanuts so loudly. A few passengers shouted him down. And several other passengers started screaming for their own peanuts. Within a few moments a shouting match erupted on the plane between the pro-more-peanut passengers and the anti-more-peanut passengers.

A scene erupted that was quite like the one in Network where people were shouting out their windows, "We're mad as hell and we aren't going to take it any more!" And after what seemed like only a few moments, a fight broke out among the passengers.

By this time Ell had stopped shouting for peanuts and just wanted to sit down, but it was impossible to escape the melee. He wound up tripping over someone's carry-on bag, falling onto the floor of the aisle, and a very heavyset woman was pushed on top of him. Several more people were pushed onto her, causing everyone great discomfort, except the heavyset woman, who seemed to be oblivious to the fact that her ample boob package was nearly suffocating Ell, who was struggling for breath and gasping for air under the load. Who knows, maybe she enjoyed having a man try to shout "help" into her gigantic brassiere.

It seemed to Ell that it took nearly the rest of the flight for the secret security force on the plane to untangle the bodies, and of course, Ell was the last to be lifted to his feet, dazed, with two broken ribs, and a bloody nose.

As he was led to his temporary cell at Heathrow, he caught a glimpse of the heavyset woman, who had also been arrested. She waved and winked.

"Will this nightmare never end?" thought Ell.

 

[vchizzle]

It was only as Ell was being led to his cell that he noticed a damp, warm discomfort below his waistline. The broken ribs and bloody nose didn't hurt half as much as his ego at this point. Maybe it was the excitement, or maybe piles of people who had fallen on top of him. Or maybe his large, busty new admirer pressing on his bladder. It didn't really matter at this point, he thought to himself. It was a helluva day, that was for certain. The only positive he could pull out of the entire ordeal? Well, he remember why he was standing in the aisle in the first place before the melee broke out....he was heading to the restroom.

 

[rugerpc]

While Ell was being deloused in the Heathrow lockup, Doc Bill and Constance were sitting down to a sushi dinner.

Warm tea was the beverage of choice, though Bill would have liked to have had a Sapporo or a Kirin, but this place was bring your own beer. It was just as well, after two shots of țuică back at the studio and the vivid memory of his guest starkers, he felt heady enough.

First up was a sashimi salad. Doc Bill and the restaurant owner had collaborated on several unique sushi dishes that the owner had been pleased to put on the menu for everyone. The sashimi salad was the first. Traditional sushi fish like tuna, salmon, snapper, yellowtail and others were cut into bite sized pieces then a secret sauce made from soy sauce, eel sauce and conch sauce with scallions and other ingredients was stirred into the mix. At the end, bite sized bits of avocado were added and the mixture was served on a bed of julienned Japanese turnips. Delicious.

After that, they moved on to another of Doc’s custom dishes, the avocado bowl. Bill had wanted to call it the avocado boat, but 'boat' was lost in translation when he suggested the name to the restaurant owner. An avocado is pitted, peeled and quartered. Spicy tuna or spicy salmon is placed in a generous heap where the pit was and the entire slice is dipped in tempura batter and quickly cooked. Removed from the oil, the slices are arranged in a star pattern on a plate and drizzled with eel sauce and conch sauce. Served hot, the avocado simply melts in the mouth while the spicy fish and tempura crisps offer low resistance chewing. Another hit.

Doc’s third concoction was a mix of two of his favorite dishes in one. You start with a basic California roll, but add in sliced ginger. Then you top the roll with baked scallops. The interplay between the warm rice, cold crab and avocado, warm scallops and crunchy cucumber is like a party in your mouth. The savory scallops compliment the spicy/sweet ginger and are in counterpart to the buttery avocado. The ginger scallop roll, like the other two dishes, was well received by the restaurant’s patrons.

Candice was enjoying the new and unique dishes as well. Bill could tell just by watching her eat. The smile, the way she leaned back to chew with her eyes closed, the headlights growing in her cami…

The two went on to other rolls and nigiri, but somewhere between the salmon and the octopus, Doc Bill’s cell rang. He thumbed the phone and listened.

“Constance,” he said, “I hate to interrupt this, but I have to make a quick call.”

Bill punched in a number. In just a little over 4 minutes he successfully transferred funds from the secret PRS Emergency Fund to London and posted Ell Schefman’s bail.