© THE SERUM OF DOCTOR BURCHARDAn Exercise in

© THE SERUM OF DOCTOR BURCHARD
An Exercise in Prefixes and Suffixes: PART TWO

            The Mafioso laughed again.  "Prepare yourself for the biggest headache you're ever going to experience," he sneered.  "I'm gonna blow your brains out."

            "That's fine," Dr. Burchard said, quite calmly.  "By the way, I spoke to your mother yesterday."

            "I've got no momma.  I'm mommaless," the Mafioso replied with half-formed conviction. 

            "You're also loveless," Dr. Burchard replied.  "She was crying about her little Louie who turned to a life of crime and left her for a life of unfulfilling employment." 

            "Why would she speak to you?"

            "I'm a psychologist, remember?" Dr. Burchard said.  "The serum that I developed helps doctors determine the underlying causes of mental sickness."

            "Mental sickness!  My mother isn't crazy!"

            "No, I was able to determine that.  She just misses her son.  You're the one who'd be completely senseless if you fired that gun.  You would disappoint her immensely and more than disappoint me!"

            "I'll make you disappear!"

            "I can make you accept your past, Louis," the doctor said, moving towards the mobster's gun.  "You may have psychosocial stress."

            "Baloney!"

            "Do you remember the bologna sandwiches your mother always made you?  She told me about them.  Bologna, lettuce, and pickle sandwiches, to be precise."

            The gun wobbled in Louis Aptolungei's hand. 

            "Accept your past, Louis," Dr. Burchard said.  "Resistance is pointless.  No arguments, now."

            A tear dropped from Louis' eye and rolled down his scarred right cheek. 

            With one swift movement, the doctor snatched the gun from his aggressor's hand.  One more patient on the rolls.    

Comments

[Paul]

Bologna (pronounced buh-LON-yuh) is the Italian city; bologna (or bologna sausage) is the large sausage named for the city and pronounced buh-LON-ee, buh-LON-yuh, or buh-LON-uh. Baloney and boloney are Americanized variant spellings of the name of the sausage and widely used in the relatively long-standing slang noun and retort meaning ?nonsense, foolishness.?