Sarges (サージェス Sājesu) is the commander of the Lemur unit in charge of negotiating with Senator Manfred Beriam while other Lemures hijack the Flying Pussyfoot overnight between Dec 30 – 31, 1931. Sarges' mission fails due to the actions of several unanticipated riverside factions, including a group of delinquent youths, an outlaw trio, a pair of twins, and one enormous circus bear.
Appearance
Sarges wears the military-influenced uniform worn by the Lemures. He has light-colored hair and defined cheekbones.
Personality
Sarges has no qualms about 'eliminating' those who obstruct his goals, including children, with his own hands. He harbors a disdain for the government much as Goose does.
Sarges has a habit of clicking his tongue.
Chronology
1931 Winter: The Time of the Oasis
In 1931, Huey Laforet is arrested on suspicion of plotting terrorism against the American government and held in New York, where he is to be interrogated by Victor Talbot and the Department of Justice in December. By December 29, Lemures' leader Goose Perkins has devised a scheme in the name of securing Huey's freedom that works along the following lines:
Goose and a detachment of thirty Lemures are to hijack the Flying Pussyfoot en route from Chicago's Union Station to Pennsylvania Station and hold hostage its passengers, including Senator Manfred Beriam's wife and daughter; Goose has additionally instructed the hijackers to kill fellow Lemur Chané Laforet, Huey's daughter, during the operation. Sarges is assigned command of the Lemur detachment responsible for negotiating with Beriam and relaying the results of those negotiations to Goose: five men will act as designated negotiators, while the rest of the detachment will remain with Sarges at a forest camp as patrollers and security. Via a path that lies by a cluster of bungalows designated Point K, the five negotiators will return from Beriam to camp one at a time to give Sarges progress reports. Once negotiations reach a resolution, Sarges' team must be ready to release a flare when the train crosses a bridge.
Come the evening of December 30, Sarges' Lemur squad have parked a military truck and several private cars—the license plates of which are all forged—and raised a tent in the forest near the railroad upon which the Flying Pussyfoot shall travel. Sarges leads several Lemures into the woods to scout the area and, two hours before the operation begins proper, spies a large group of delinquents consulting a map; the delinquents leave in their boat-laden trucks, and Sarges and his men return to their campsite.
At about eight hours before the appointed crossing time, a Lemur informs Sarges that the negotiators have spotted the same delinquents in the bungalows, which means the delinquents could serve as witnesses to the negotiators' movements. Since the negotiators are too far away to be contactable via wireless, Sarges sends two Lemures to monitor the youths with the understanding that they should only neutralize the youths if they prove a threat, ideally via minimal use of firearms. Once alone, he smiles and invites the absent Beriam to demonstrate his character.
Time passes until it is December 31 and significantly past the time when the first negotiator is scheduled to return; moreover, the two men sent to monitor the delinquents are similarly nowhere to be found. Sarges orders two men to guard the camp while he and the rest set out for Point K via the woods. En route, a gunshot rings from the direction of the bungalows—one that Sarges can tell via sound alone could not have come from the firearm model used by the Lemures. He quickens his stride, nettled by the unpleasant possibilities that his men are dead and that the "government's dogs" are involved.
At the rumble of approaching engines, Sarges and the Lemures duck further into the wood and watch three trucks drive past them toward the river. If these are the delinquents' trucks, which the men assume they are, then the two Lemures failed in their mission to neutralize them. As the last, uniquely worn truck passes by, the men catch sight of one of the Lemures scouts propped up, motionless, in its bed. Sarges restrains his companions until the truck is out of sight, then ushers them to retreat so that they may plan a mode of attack.
By the time Sarges and his five or six men advance on the trucks, all the youths are playing by their boats in the river save one: a boy—Carzelio Runorata—who has alighted from one of the truck beds and is running in the youths' direction. Sarges seizes him and puts a hand to his mouth followed by a knife to his throat once a Lemur fires his gun to draw the deliquents' attention.
Sarges demands that the delinquents identify themselves. One of the few girls, Melody, claims they wanted to explore the area downstream and asks him to release Cazze, promising that they will not interfere with the "soldiers' drill" and that they did not harm the two Lemurs who are unconscious in the worn truck. Its owners, she said, found the men prostrate in the bungalows and decided to bring them to the river for fresh air. Believing that the Lemures' advantage is as ironclad as his grip upon Cazze's neck, Sarges responds to her lie by threatening to shave Cazze's nose off and to the delinquents' protests by threatening to shoot them all dead.
Nevertheless, the delinquents fall silent in lieu of answering his subsequent question about how they incapacitated the two grown men. Before Sarges can order his men to cull the children's numbers by half, one of the boys answers with his eyes trained on something by the trucks: "Uh, if you wanna know what happened to your guys... Um... I think...it was probably that."
The Lemures look back and are faced with the awesome sight of an enormous grizzly bear rearing back on its hind legs, taller than the trucks at its full height. A scream for the Lemures to open fire lodges in Sarges' throat—and ice freezes Sarges' heart at the sound of another engine. Sarges turns to discover a man—Gabriel—has knocked out two of the Lemures; seconds later, the man's twin—Juliano—bursts out of the forest atop a motorcycle.
Gabriel slams Sarges onto the ground and steals his knife. While Sarges senses are scrambled, the rest of the Lemures are neutralized: some have dropped their guns, another man suffers a knife to his arm, and two men are sent flying by Cookie. Juliano dismounts to acknowledge Cazze, his and Gabriel's master, and afterward ask Sarges what he thought he would accomplish by making enemies out of the Runorata Family. Sarges makes the mistake of concluding that Bartolo Runorata is one of Senator Beriam's "loyal hounds," offending the twins so thoroughly that they mutually agree to render Sarges' permanently mute.
In the next moment, the two Lemures who had been unconscious in the worn truck bed cock their old-model submachine guns and order Gabriel and Juliano to freeze. Those among the Lemures who are still mobile ease themselves to their feet and begin retrieving their guns. Sarges meanwhile shoots the twins a leer, his old confidence already returning—but not as fast as the smoke grenade that Lana hurls into the fray's midst. This is the flare that is absolutely critical to the Lemures' operations—that which is, was, supposed to signal that Beriam agreed to free Huey.
Smoke swiftly obscures the riverside, providing the twins and the bear cover for trouncing the Lemures once more. Sarges barely manages to escape the commotion with a gash to his head and hurries for one of the youths' boats. With his mission a failure, an all-consuming desire for revenge drowns out whatever survival instincts might have otherwise compelled him to flee the scene—especially once he hears the Flying Pussyfoot approaching the bridge under a lightening sky.
Sarges aims his submachine gun at the delinquents and other boats gathered a little ways downstream, yet hesitates upon realizing everyone, including the bear, are staring at the train—no, at Chané leaping from it and the bridge. Although Sarges recalls Goose's orders, he is a second too late to shoot Chané; she plunges toward the river unharmed, as does a heavy wooden crate that smashes into a concomitantly harmed Sarges.
The police later arrive to arrest the Lemures, all of whom have miraculously survived. Sarges is among the majority that are transported directly to a police-run hospital; his injuries are so severe that his full recovery is projected to take anywhere from several months to several years.
Trivia
- Sarges' name was commonly spelled as Serges prior to Yen Press' translation of Volume 20.
References
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