Returning to No Applause, Only More of the Same

The bike shop Poirot was placed on the outskirts of the city, near the small villages that naturally formed in the city’s vicinity. Kreig wasn’t sure how they got there so quickly, but according to Erica, time moves fast when you’re having fun.

The shop itself, although small, clearly prided itself on the skill of its owner. It wasn’t actually clear whether it was a bike mechanic or a bike shop foremost. It seemed to be a bit of both, and with so many bikes littering the outside of the quaint shop, it was clear the owner had far more traffic than might be expected for such an out-of-town place.

Had Kreig been alone, he probably wouldn’t be able to enter out of nervousness. The shop really seemed to be of the small, local sort, which would bar him entry if he didn’t have a guide such as Erica.

Kreig sighed and turned towards her. She was gone. Huh?

Head whipping around frantically, Kreig found her standing by the door of the shop, examining a bike standing right beside the door. It felt like an awfully unsafe way to keep a bike, but the shop owner probably knew what he was doing. Probably.

As Kreig approached, Erica smiled and straightened her back. “Since you’ll only be biking between your home and Painstone, I think a casual bike would be best. Unless you wanna get into biking as, like, a sport?”

“No, I’d rather not,” Kreig said dismissively. His entering sports would be terribly unfair to every other sportsman.

She looked him up and down. “Well, okay! With your body type, you’d be much better suited for powerlifting anyhow. Or midget-throwing.”

Kreig felt his eyebrows knit. Midget-throwing?...

Before he could ask her to explain what in the world she was talking about, she’d already snuck inside the shop, causing a little bell over the door to chime pleasantly. Kreig steeled his spirits and followed suit.

The inside of the shop, much like the outside, was somehow both quaint and chaotic. Somehow larger on the inside than the outside, Kreig found himself completely unsurprised by the pile of bikes in a corner, each either rusted past the point of no return or otherwise ruined. Why wouldn’t the owner keep these outside? Or, better yet, at some garbage dump. Though, ignoring those, the actual bikes on display were certainly promising. Not that Kreig knew enough about bikes to make any real judgments about them. But, since Erica seemed happy enough, he couldn’t exactly say they were bad by any means.

The shopkeep did not appear. Even after waiting for a few minutes, the man made no hints at appearing.

Erica seemed to have expected this since she absently went around poking at bikes, each shinier than the last. Kreig would really have liked to leave the bike-shopping to her, but she kept dragging him over to look at the bikes with her. Yes, green was a nice colour. So was blue. No, the marks aren’t too gaudy.

At around the fifteen-minute mark, the man finally appeared from behind a desk. Lo and behold, the man was a woman.

She seemed to be about thirty years of age, face wrinkled enough to suggest a higher age. However, her body and form made it clear she was still rather young. Especially her musculature told of many hours spent toiling. Probably on bikes. Looking at the confounded apparatuses, Kreig couldn’t tell what could possibly be done to fix one, but the shopkeep probably knew that better herself.

Clothing-wise, she wore a dirty apron stained with oil, a pair of gloves, some protective eyewear… She looked much more like a mechanic than a shopkeeper.

“Erica! Did someone steal your bike again?” Her voice was somehow both hard and melodic, deep down in her chest, rumbling and strong. Almost male. Her auburn eyes turned to Kreig. Not a trace of fear in them. Only mischievous curiosity. “And this is?”

“Kreig, he’s my-, well, we’re here to buy a bike. For him. S-, so don’t get any funny ideas!”

“Oh?” A cat-like grin spread across her tanned face. “Really? Well, with how many bikes you’ve lost, I don’t suppose you’ll have any trouble finding a bike for Mr Tall-and-handsome, will you?”

“Hey! Stop having funny ideas, they’re not funny! We’re just-, just two pals, out on the town!”

The shopkeeper shrugged exaggeratedly. “Of course. I bet you even took him to your favourite café before this, didn’t you?”

Erica’s face tightened and she swallowed hard. “Did you follow us?...”

“Indeed I did. On my newly-developed invisible bike. I saw everything!”

Erica gasped, arms flailing up in the air. “Argh, an invisible bike!! I can’t believe this…! Has the government contacted you yet to put atomic bombs on them?! Or was it lizard people who tried to convince you to create this abomination of a two-wheeled vehicle…?”

The shopkeeper stared at her. Hard. “-Yes.”

Erica almost fainted.

Meanwhile, Kreig was wondering how in the world an invisible bike might work. Did it also make the rider invisible, or did it just look like the rider was floating above the air? Furthermore, why would lizard people want such a strange vehicle?

“Alright, enough about that. I’m sorry to say I won’t be able to sell you any invisible bikes, but I can definitely get you something to take you where you need to go,” the shopkeeper said, striding over the floor and over to the bikes. “So? You a professional ox-tosser or something?”

“No, I simply want an easy way of commuting.”

She nodded sharply. “Right. With your weight, being a professional biker would probably be pretty bad. Muscle or not, if you’re too heavy you’ll just hold yourself back. So, a simple, normal bike, then?”

“If possible,” Kreig affirmed.

She frowned. “‘Fraid I can’t give you that. You look, what? Two hundred, three hundred pounds? Most bikes would buckle under that, mister. But, lucky for you, I do have this new ultra-thick bike I made for shits and giggles. I have no idea if it’ll actually be able to hold you, it really depends on how much of you is muscle and what’s fat, but if it doesn’t hold, you’ll at least make for a nice experiment.” She placed her fists on her hips. “Well, what say you? Ready to take Pigsty out for a run?”

Blinking, Kreig tried to decipher what she just told him. There’s a bike called Pigsty, and she wants him to ride it for science.

Normally, if Kreig felt this confused about something, he’d decline out of pure apprehension. However, after hearing this woman talk about the bike for so long, how could he possibly refuse?

“Of course.”

“I-, I’m coming along!” Erica said, appearing out of nowhere. She didn’t seem as dazed as she was before, though some parts of that state of mind still lingered. “I need to see it. Pigsty. And-, and also the invisible bike. It is imperative that I see the truth, even if it may hurt!”

The shop owner stared at Erica for a few seconds before grinning and giving a thumbs-up. “Sure thing.”

As promised, the shop owner led them further into the back of the shop, where a number of strange and unfinished bikes stood here and there like a massive maze of bikes. Pigsty, the bike, was hanging on a blue bike stand, and as she alluded to, the bike was truly thick. Kreig wasn’t confident in comparing it to anything, but if he just looked at the difference between Pigsty and a normal bike standing beside it, it seemed to be about twice as thick.

This in itself seemed like a modern marvel, but it also appeared to be outfitted with other things and gadgets as well, such as a pair of massive springs beneath the saddle and extended handlebars.

Erica would surely be very interested in it if she wasn’t currently occupied with looking for the invisible bike.

The shopkeep seemed entertained by this, which Kreig didn’t quite understand since she had promised the existence of an invisible bike. As a matter of fact, Kreig might also be looking for it if he wasn’t occupied with Pigsty.

Using strength Kreig hadn’t expected from her, the shopkeeper lifted Pigsty off the rack and placed it on the ground. Then, with Kreig and Erica following, she led it outside.

“Alright, here he is. Have a go, buddy.”

She handed him the handlebars. With Kreig only holding onto the handle, the bike buckled over. Realizing this probably wasn’t what it was supposed to do, Kreig lifted it up by the saddle. There. Now it was standing properly.

Both Erica and the shopkeeper were staring at him. “Yeah. Just hop on.”

...Hop on.

According to what Kreig had seen, when biking, you’d usually sit on the saddle and have your hands on the handlebars. Yeah. Right. Now to actually do it.

Thankfully, the saddle was quite low for his height, so Kreig could sit on it while still keeping his feet on the ground. Although Kreig knew that this wasn’t the usual state for biking, he liked to keep his feet on the ground. It felt good. It kept him connected to his God. Though, he still wasn’t sure what the second step was.

Erica pointed at the pedals. Kreig glanced down at them. Oh, yeah. His feet were supposed to go there, right?

He put his feet on the pedals and promptly fell over.

He looked up from where he lay tangled up with Pigsty. Erica and the shopkeeper looked down at him. “Kreig… Have you ever ridden a bike?”

Kreig gulped.