Dr. Bennett takes this opportunity to kick her two suitcases out of the way, grab one end of the stretcher, and and begin dragging it as rapidly as possible towards her van and away from the monstrosity in the suit.
Ingar, whose body's shape and posture bears increasing resemblance to some unholy cross between a silverback gorilla and an allosaurus, cocks his head at Leo's call (keeping one eye on Ben), and hums in his most inhuman bass, his voice somewhat louder than Leo's but nothing like the Bar & Girl primal scream:
"HEY LLLLEO, MMMMY FRIENNNND. I AMMMM GLLLLAD YOU ARE HHHHERE. ANNNOTHER DELLLICIOUS... UHMMM, PRECIOUS CHILLLD IS HHHURT. BENNN HAS TAKENNN THIS AS ANNN OPPORTUNITY TO VIE FOR DOMMMMINNNANNNCE IN ACCORDANNNCE WITH HIS PRIMATE PHENOTYPE, HAZARDING THE CHILLLLD'S PRECARIOUS HEALLLTH IN THE PROCESS. WE ARE ALLLLL RATHER UP'SET WITH H'MMMM. HE SEEMS TO ENNNNJOY THIS... MY OWN EMOTIONAL INVOLVEMENT IS QUITE FRANNNNKLY SOMEWHAT DISCONNNCERTING TO A CARD-CARRYING PACIFIST SUCH AS MMMMMYSELLLLF --"
At this point in Ingar's soliloquy Chris bursts out the door of the bowling alley andbegins striding purposefully towards Ben, seemingly oblivious to the rest of theindividuals in the parking lot.
"--GRANGAFLANGHANTHARGHARMMM...."
The sound if chilling, frightening. It sets off million-year-old alarm bells in the back of every human mind.
Leo gasps and stops dead in his tracks as soon as Ingar's now bizarrely warped shape (well, much more warped than before, anyway) turns to face him. The Voice sends unpleasant vibrations into every one of his bones, and perhaps in a more quiet moment later on Leo will be able to marvel at the fact that even his kneecaps and heelbones can act as resonators. Unfortunately, The Voice also carries with it the absolute certitude that there will be no such quiet moment and no 'later'; it promises not only terrifying and immediate death, but also the destruction of any stray immortal souls that might be in the vicinity, ergo, no quiet moment to reflect even waiting in line at Heaven's Gate. Or Hell's, unless this is it.
Leo, however, is well-inured to the bizarre, the grotesque, the outré, and he's by experience a skeptic, having a thorough knowledge of how most supernatural wonders are crafted by entrepreneurial types. His reaction to Ingar's altered demeanor is therefore sane, rational, and logical.
He dives behind a garbage can and huddles into as small a ball as his considerable contortionist abilities will allow, hyperventilating and shaking. He's making a sound not unlike that of a vacuum cleaner stuck under a piece of furniture: "HHHhhhhhHHH -- HHHhhhhhheeeHHHHhhh --"
The sound sends chills down Woofard's spine, and he has a sudden urge to howl mournfully as Leo dives behind the nearest dumpster. "Shit!" yelps the Akita. He makes no connection between Ingar and this... monstrosity. He only knows it's big, horrible, and makes a horrifying racket. He turns tail and takes off back the way they came, calling out over his shoulder, "Run Leo, run!"
Ingar stares confoundedly at the spot vacated by the collapsing clown. While his friendly greetings have not always had the best effect on people, this is somewhat unprecedented. Could something be stuck in his teeth?
Ingar's Culture is making a rather futile attempt at getting his Nature's attention by beating it about the head of shoulders with a rolled-up copy of Irvin D. Yalom's "When Nietzsche Wept".
Dr. Bennett begins moving even faster in the direction of the van. From the stretcher, the girl begins making a weird, hardly human keening sound of despair and hopelessness.
Ingar's more civilized part is trying to point out to the rest of his mind that this primal rage thing, while doubtlessly enjoyable, may endanger interpersonal relations. Really. The rest fails to listen. It knows that BEN is to blame.
"Fuck this," growls Goodness, and moves over to help Dr. Bennet with the stretcher, muttering obscenities under his breath the entire time.
"YES." says Ingar with a psychotic finality to his voice. Unless Ben is too occupied with being hard-assed, he will notice something large and sinuous begining to stretch and unfurl in Ingar's general crotch area (all his body areas are pretty general by now), squirming in the vastness of his trousers. This might be an omen boding ill for the general texture of Ben's ass.
At this point Ben turns his back to Ingar, still unwilling to give him the satisfaction of a single glance. He begins to walk out of the parking lot slowly if a bit unsteadily, weaving his way drunkenly towards Bilge street. His efforts at a dignified escape are thwarted, however, when he catches his foot on the lip of the sidewalk, stumbles, and falls to one knee. He tries to rise determinedly but his legs go all wobbly like a punch drunk boxer whose mind is screaming to fight on but whose body refuses to comply. Lurching to the left he collides with a streetlight. Wrapping one arm around the post he hugs it tightly still doggedly refusing to go down.
"Engar!" Goodness barks, looking over his shoulder. "Yair frightenin' people! An' that includes me!" He ventures a glance at Dr. Bennet. "He's Norweigian," he offers by way of explaination.
Ingar freezes. He casts a glance at Goodness. Something pinkish green which might conceivably be a large, discoloured tongue, but on the balance of the evidence probably is not, is lolling halfway out Ingar's mouth: "H'H? 'UT 'OU 'OL' 'E 'O 'UCK 'HE A'?!" he hum-growls around the whatever which twitches and curls as he speaks.
Ingar waves one forelimb in Ben's direction for emphasis. Despite having taken time off from conventional vertebrate anatomy, he manages to look somewhat like a schoolboy trying to point out that the other boy started it all, and really has things coming to him.
Try as he might, Goodness finds himself unable to ignore the screaming, the sudden rending in his soul. He lowers himself to his knees, placing the backboard down as gently as possible, and puts his hands tightly over his ears. Ingar's voice, his very aura has become more than even he can bear. Like a sadist passing by a particularly gruesome auto accident, he finds his head turning in the direction of the big man, watching the ebb and flow of essence beneath the surface of the warping suit. His brain makes a half-hearted attempt at reconciling the visual input it is receiving, but to no avail. He dimly becomes aware of the drool beginning to run from the corner of his mouth, and of the gibberish he is spouting, but his eyes refuse to tear themselves away. The human world seems so far away now, and somewhere in the dim recesses of his mind, the part that remains true no matter what he may attempt, he can hear his breathren muttering glibly, "We told you so. We told y! ou this is what happens when you let THEM into the world. Order, concession, ONENESS, these are the things you are a part of. THIS, this is as much your doing as anyone. This is what WE will hod you responsable for, once we find you. And we are LOOKING. This place and their 'law enforcement,' they are looking for you as well, thanks to this... this abomination. Who will find you first, you who presumes to take a new name, a new face, who would PRESUME to take a new life? WE WILL. We will find you, and punish you, and welcome you back unto us."
Goodness curls himself into a ball and begins pounding his forehead against the pavement, trying to drive the sights and sounds him, to exorcise the things which he can no longer comprehend.
Ingar, having determined from Goodness's last statement that no orifice violation was actually intended, spends a few moments in a staredown with his own crotch, his back arched. The sinuous presence down retreats, with some hesitation, back into anonymity.
He looks back up at Ben's retreating back, puzzled. Having shut up, Ingar listens to the wails, gibberings and sighs of the terror-struck. He is of two minds. His better nature implores him to act like a responsible human adult, his greater nature tells him that MEAT IS MURDER - MURDER IS DELICIOUS. His better nature holds the field.
Ingar walks carnosaur-like, on distended bowling shoes, over to Goodness.
He eyes the balled-up viand - uhm, better make that "friend", and wonders
at the tenacious way he keeps beating his noggin against the pavement.
Ingar leans slightly forward, and breathes "GHHHOOOTNESSSS". Taking
the renewed fevour at headbeating to mean that this was not the best approach,
he tries to moderate his voice: "GHOO-". "Shit" thinks his
better nature, while his greater nature tries unsuccessfully to convince
it that a "merciful lunch" is in order.
Watching the stumbling thug, Chris wonders: "Is this a fighting style? Is he wounded? Is heintoxicated? When did he have time to get drunk? Does he suffer from that gut fungus that certainJap males are known to have?" He shakes his head to clear that sudden blizzard of thought. "Hey Fucky! You violated my hospitality and hurt a little girl! "
Ingar grabs at his crotch at the mention of the F-word, looking towards the two men at the lamppost.
Chris decides against a quick kill, intending to draw this out and teach a lesson. He comes up behind the Muscle and aims one bowling shoed foot at Ben's genitals.
Ingar has a brief vision of Chris getting ready to kick into the muzzle of a shredding machine. And just when he was getting his drooling under control... About to bellow out a warning, he changes his mind at the last minute and slaps his other hand over his mouth. Having thus gotten some sort of hold of himself, he runs (relatively) lithely, though not elegantly, towards the two men who are still standing.
As Ben whips around Chris aims a bowling shoe at the big man's crotch, slipping through Ben's befuddled defenses and landing on target - though Ben retains enough of his street fighting prowess even now to prevent the blow from landing full force on target. A jolt runs through Chris's leg as the blow connects - Crutcher is apparently wearing not only a thick jacket made of some kind of ballistic cloth, but also seems to be wearing an armored cup that absorbs much of the force of the blow. The big man merely winces slightly.
Chris has little time to contemplate this, however, as the large leg breaker leaps at him, clawing for his eyes. Chris finds himself fending off blow after blow, only by the narrowest margin keeping the clawing fingers away from his face.
As he claws and tears at his opponent, Ben notices, much to his horror, that the Ingar-Thing is approaching!
Chris snarls, "Bloody Fucking Christ!" as he sidesteps and whips his knife hand around to bring the pommel down on the back of the enforcer's head. The distraction caused by the nearby presence of the Ingar-thing, plus Ben throwing up an arm and taking the force of the blow on his arm, are all that prevent the blow from striking home.
Ingar's training tells him that Goodness, Leo, and the small victim are now pretty much over the brink and more or less insane with terror. If they are lucky then selective traumatic amnesia will allow them to avoid most of their future mental unpleasantness - otherwise it is likely that years of therapy will be necessary, presuming they do not rip their eyes out or hang themselves. Chris is slipping badly, but Ben seems to have actually pulled himself together for the moment. Dr. Bennett is also holding her own. Ingar is also hungry enough to eat a horse - not QUITE literally - and getting hungrier by the moment. The rational portion of his brain (which is getting smaller and smaller) suggests that if he is going to do anything whatsoever that does not involve eating Goodness and Leo, he had better do it soon.
Ingar shrinking superego is flailing madly for some sort of hold on the reins of the Das Es juggernaut. It is also trying to nurse a cowardly hope that Ben will kill the entire Ingar-matrix, freeing him of responsibility for what he has done, but every time the thought arises, the realization slams in that death is not the end, and that getting ground under the heels of Ben will be but a gentle prelude to the tender ministrations of the Father.
Still, Das Es is making an excellent argument that everything is Ben's fault, if Ben is not stopped, the consequences to Chris will be dire, though perhaps Ingar will be able to eat the tenderized remains, and there is HUNGER to be considered, at any rate.
Ingar humgrowls "WHYNOTWEALLGOTOTHEHAMBURGERBARANDTALKTHINGSOVERVIOLENCEISANABOMINATION!" as the violent abomination attempts to jump onto and overbear Ben, coming at him with hands, hindlimbs and a myriad of tentacles and pseudopods squirming from his mouth, abdomen, loins and legs like a school of well-coordinated lampreys. A cloud of noxious vapour wafts out as the slimy protuberances are freed from his clothes. Sartorial concerns be damned. "Other things too! That problem! Big problem! Big, big problem! Friends lose sanity! Them damned! If Ben kill me! I to meet FATHER!" squeals the increasingly bullied superego with gradually failing syntax at the rest of the mind-complex. "Don't worry. I won't kill him. He won't kill us. Would I lie to me?" comes the sardonic response, drawled langourously at incredible speed from the pits within Ingar's superior and multidimensional mind.
And there is that very special "going sparal" look to Ingar's face, or rather, to the area surrounding the primary feeding-orifice. It squirms to display all basic emotions (as delinated by Ekman), simultaneously: anger, happiness, fear, sadness, surprise and disgust. Additionally, there are lamprey-like things on their way out his mouth, dripping of foul gastric juices.
The nauseating pseudopods lock onto Ben with a wet, slurping sound, wrapping around his arms and upper body. But the wily street fighter in Ben is no stranger to grappling attacks, even in this horrifying and unconventional form. Before the Ingar-thing can get a firm grip, he slips out of his thick jacket, leaving the creature clutching no more than cloth as he moves in on Chris.
Grabbing the skinny punk by one arm, Ben uses his momentum to spin Chris 180 degrees and then slams into his back with one shoulder. Chris tumbles forward and into the Ingar-thing, the combined trauma of the blow to his back and the acidic slime from the tentacles causing him serious injury.
Dr. Bennett has, by now, gotten the small child to the back of the van. She slides open the back hatch and begins struggling to get the kid and the backboard inside. The small child continues to howl and now begins to thrash about to the limit imposed by the restraining straps.
Chris rolls out of ingarthing@evilfreak.com's grasp and comes to one
knee, knife up, ready to ward off what ever comes at him next while planning
his next move. Stupidly, or dazed perhaps, Chris mumbles "I thought
Norway was a Christian country, there is a cross on their flag, yes?"
And he tried to put himself between Chris and Ben, presenting Chris with his still -relatively- sane back, and Ben with the amorphous hell of his ventral surface. And he said unto Ben, violating the atmosphere auditively as a matter of course, "UNLESS YOU STOP HARASSING MY FRIENDS AND START ACTING IN A CALM AND RESPONSIBLE MANNER, I WILL EAT YOUR FACE AND ENJOY IT! THAT WILL BE THE APPETIZER! ARE WE COMMUNICATING?!"
Goodness, for his part, rolls over onto his side, blood streaming down his face from numerous abrasions on his forehead. Some tiny part of his brain seems to have refrained from wanting itself forcibly removed from its holder. Instead, in a moment of heroism, his stomach decides to sacrifice itself in his brain's stead, having reached an accord with his duodenum, and the Scotsman began vomiting copiously onto the pavement. A song pounds in his head; a nightmare tune, one that would have served a calliope as imagined by De Sade, or perhaps Beelzebub. It crawls through the crevices of Goodness' soul as he shuts his eyes and continuesd to vacate the contents of his digestive system. It is the worst thing ever, and it goes like this: "And now, the end is near, and so I face the final curtain..." Yes. It is indeed... "My Way."
Goodness tries very hard indeed to die before the song finishes.
"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" says Ben to Ingar in disbelief. "Your the one harassing your friends," he says, pointing and accusatory finger at Ingar. "And it's your friends who are harassing me." He jerks his thumb towards Chris. "I was just trying to get the hell out of here when this idiot came at me. So don't give me this harassing your friends crap. This is all about you. It's obvious you've got something to prove. Maybe you thought I wasn't showing you enough respect. Well, if that's the case, your plan failed. I have a hell of a lot less respect for you now. And you!" barks Ben, turning on Chris. "Apparently you've got something to prove as well. Don't give me that bullshit about protecting the girl. If you were really concerned about the welfare of that child, you would have stuck that knife in Big 'n Ugly's back. He's hurt that girl, physically and emotionally, far worse than I did."
Ingar stares mutely and multi-eyedly as uncomfortable truths impact on such organs as are currently registering auditory input. Chris did initiate the aggressive encounter and Ingar's atavism has caused damage several magnitudes greater than Ben's initial callousness. The statements regarding respect, however, sends part of his mind off sniggering inanely: Such hypocrisy! Approximating Ingar's own! And such arrogance! Like a pig rearing up on its hindlimbs and squealing "I'm disrespecting you!" One damned big, strong pig, muses a cautious mind-aspect. It is unanimously told to shut up. As is the sniggering portion - laugher is a bad, antropomorphic habit. The Great Tentacled Hunter notes that the superego is weeping quietly. Make him shut up, it begs. Ah. At long last, the ape-mimicking sissy is talking sense! The cautious mind-aspect communicates once more: "He could have Cimmerian genes! Are you aware of what a certain Cimmerian phenotype did to our kind during the Hyborian age? The combined physical power, brutishness and dumb foolhardiness more than suggest convergent kinship! Statistically..."
As Ben and Chris and Ingar square off, Dr. Bennet finishes loading the small child into the back of the van and slams the door. She whips around, and gives the brim of her cap a savage yank upon hearing the latest exchange.
"WILL ALL OF YOU JUST STOP IT!" she yells.1
There is a moment of profound silence - even Woofard (a block and a half away and moving fast) comes skidding to a stop.
"You!" she says to the Ingar-Thing, "Whatever you're doing, stop doing it - you're scaring the hell out of that little girl, and your friend here," she indicates Goodness, "is about to crack his skull open!"
Upon hearing the Voice of Reason, Ingar's superego becomes supercharged, and he changes his plans so quickly one can almost hear the astral brakes whining. He looks guiltily back at Dr. Bennet, his countless mouth-tentacles drooping, including those protruding from his mouth, looking like so many pieces of overcooked aspargus. "-ohf'ly sohf'ly-" he mutters in a quite human baritone.
Dr. Bennett turns on Chris. "Put that damned knife away. Hasn't there been enough damage done already tonight?"
Ingar meanwhile blushes darkly and begins to cover up his distended front with Ben's coat, after pulling it from a body opening which was in the process of ingesting it. His tentacles shrink and retreat.
"And you," she says to Ben, "Don't even TRY to take the moral high road. What you did was truly vile, and if I thought I had the least chance of success I'd kick the shit out of you myself! Whatever the hell that thing is --" she indicates Ingar-Thing.
"Actually, I prefer the term 'phylogenetically different', if you don't mind. I find 'Thing' to be somewhat demeaning," offers Ingar mildly from his moral ditch. He has returned more or less to the Frankenstein-like stance his friends have come to know and love. Or at least prefer to the 'semi-amorphous bouncing about waving tentacles and oozing acid all over the place' alternative.
"-- if it wants to eat you then it sure isn't going to break my heart, and I honestly doubt that there is a single soul on the planet who will shed any tears over the loss. As long as it lugs you off to somewhere where it isn't terrorizing everyone else I'll even toss in complimentary condiments!"
Ingar's ear perk up, and his guiltridden face is briefly lit by a hungry smile.
The doctor puts her hands on her hips and surveys the group in the parking lot like a conquering general. "Now are you going to help this little girl, or are you going to stand here in the parking lot acting like idiots?"
"At last," mutters Goodness, hawking a vomitous loogie to one side. "Th' voice o' reason..."
Chris, totally confused, says to Ben. "Um, what did you mean by that, how did Ingar do more damage than you?"
Ben gives Chris an incredulous look. "What? Are you fucking blind? OK, let's compare the damage done. I merely dropped the foot end of a back brace three feet to the ground. That's it. As a result of Ingar's actions the girl was dragged madly across the parking lot, thrown into a van, and then went into a seizure. And those are just the physical repercussions. He has also undoubtedly opened fresh wounds on her already fragile psyche. He had to have known the reaction we'd have to that aura of fear he unleashed. He not only sacrificed the well being of that girl but also the well being of his supposed friends all just to make a point. I may not be on the high ground here but at least I'm not standing in the moral equivalent of a ditch."
"Okay-okay-okay! I should not have tried to kick your balls through the top of your skull, but watching you drop that kid set me off. Can this be an end to the hostilities between everyone? In fact we could find who did this to her and be hostile to them, eh?" Chris gets up, puts one foot under Goodness, and tries to flip him over.
"Many thanks," mutters Goodness. He stares up at the night sky dazedly. What a day. He struggles up to his feet, daring to cast a glance at Ingar's back, as if his eyes were daring his brain. "Y'know," he offers, "Tis one thing t' know yer companion is na human; tis quite another t' actually see it. I wonder if he kin aim tha' mind attack o' his. Nah, I doon't. I do know I need a tic-tac oor somethin'. Anybody got a breath mint? Spare toothbrush? Scope? Belt sander?"
Turning to face Ingar, Chris says, "I'll put the knife away only if Ingar gives us a full explanation of what in the Holy Hymen of Mary he is."
Ingar answers, "I am not the Son of Mary, I can tell you that.
But going into my precise nature and ancestry would take a -long- time.
For now it will have to suffice to say, I am your friend, Chris, and I
was trying to keep Ben from tearing you to nice succulent pieces - Sorry
about the 'succulent' bits. I mean 'bit'." Ingar wisely leaves
off trying to cover up his Freudian slip further.
"I will eagerly tax my abilities to the very limit in an attempt to rectify the grave injury I have done to all the people present," says Ingar mournfully. "But I am sorry to say, Doctor, I will have to wobble over to the burger bar over there and try to negotiate the use of their washroom, first, otherwise my help might prove somewhat counter-productive. So if you will kindly excuse me..." says Ingar and wobbles off at considerable speed, wearing Ben's coat like a bib.
Chris puts his knife back, making sure to wipe any stray Ingarooze(tm) off the blade. He looks at his clothes and just sighs. "First my shoes, now my pants and my shirt... Say, Doc, after we deal with the girl can I get some salve for these acid burns? Thanks."
"Hold on a minute there buddy," says Ben as he steps in front of Ingar. "I'll be taking my jacket back now, if you don't mind."
There is a collective twitch in Ingar's infinite limbs as Ben closes in. Ingar slows down and veers aside. "If you insist, sir," he replies and tosses the disintegrating, acid-soaked garment in Ben's general direction. He then surges onwards while pulling his jacket shut over his chest as best he can, and pondering whether Al-Amarja has any 'insane exposure' laws. "Mhuurp. Kan henda burde eg faa meg nokre latex-klede," he says to himself. He lumbers off in the direction of Kanga Burger, leaving Ben holding his quickly decaying jacket remnant.
Dr. Bennett looks at Chris and says, "You should probably take the shirt off. I'll see what I can do about the burns after I take care of..." she inclines her head towards the back of the van, then heads in the direction of her medical bags, which are still sitting where she put them down.
Chris puts one finger through a hole in his shirt and tugs. The
garment rends instantly, falling
in acid burnt strips to the ground.
In addition to the acid burns on his chest are numerous scars. For those able to tell such things there are some obvious bullet wounds, many knife wounds and what might be a chainsaw mark on his left side. There are also three zipper type surgical scars: one over his sternum, one on his lower back and one on his right clavicle.
Dr. Bennett moves over to her bags, gets out a syringe, and fills it with some sort of drug. While she is in the process of doing this, Ingar totters off across the street and into the Kanga Burger.
Once the syringe is refilled, she walks over to the back of the van and opens it up. Low wails and moans indicate that the small child is still inside and still conscious. Dr. Bennett reaches in, makes an expert jabbing motion, and administers the hypodermic without problem, then gently closes the back of the van again, cutting off the sounds from within. She heads back over to the bags, looking at Goodness on the way.
"Are you OK to walk inside?" she asks. "There's someplace to sit down in there and the lighting is better, so I can put a compression bandage on your forehead." Turning to Chris, she continues "I can treat those burns in there too." She looks in Ben's direction and opens her mouth with the obvious intention of saying something scathing, but thinks better of it at the last moment. Instead, one corner of her mouth quirks up slightly.
"Nice jacket," is her only comment.
She finishes walking back to where her bags are sitting, drops the syringe into a small "sharps" container in one of them, reaches into her pocket, and pulls out her keychain. There is a metallic "click" sound from the van as the doors lock, and she puts the keys away and picks up her bags.
"Gentlemen?" she says, nodding in the direction of the bowling alley. She stands and takes a step in that direction, when a particularly loud moan from Leo across the street causes her to hesitate. She looks across the street, then at Chris, Buttery, and Ben in quick succession. Finally she turns to Sam, who is still standing near the entrance to the bowling alley.
"Hey," she says, "I think one of your friends is hurt over there. Could you go check on him while I get these two bandaged up?" She smiles reassuringly at Sam.
In Chris' brain the debate over Ingar continues, it is a closed door session so only one loud voice can be heard the rest are low and muffled:
"All right what happened out there and what are we going to do about it?"
"Grummmblerummebtleflummer"
"What! What do mean you mean 'what'!? What the fuck is Ingar and what do about him?"
"mummmblerummblemummble"
"Skin Condition! He dosen't have a skin condition! The only skin condition that fellow has is a taste for other peoples skin...... Homer Simpson and donuts, Ingar Forn and human flesh. Get it?"
"We must face this now our we will never be right again, lets be strong about this!"
"Nummvmletummleswiummrmoffer"
"Just this once!"
"blimmblimmnimmmurrmemr"
"Lets discuss it with Goodness then."
"Sazzztmummlerummlebumle"
"Okay!"
Chris turns to Goodness a sincere and eager but haunted look on his face. "Goodness, I need to know something, it's serious..." In the next instant his face changes, his eyes flicker and dim. "...Would that movie by Tim Burton, 'Edward Scissor Hands' been as much of a success had it been 'Edward Ice Cream Scooper Hands'?"
"muummmbuzzzzmemeblebummmelr"
"You dirty bastards you betrayed me! I'll I'll...." shouts the lone voice.
Chris, his shoulders sagging, wanders off to his foldout bed in the office.
Meanwhile, Harvey figures he has done enough damage for the moment, he is standing and trying to think what to say to Marda. Eventually he gives up and sits down with a soda trying to work out where he went wrong.
* * *
Woofard stopped running when someone back there yelled. He looks back. That horrible monster is still there. He is getting ready to keep going when he notices the monster is shrinking before his eyes. Slowly it becomes... sort of like that weird dude from the bowling alley. What the Hell? Not for the first time, and probably not for the last time, he wishes he was back home and his life was back the way it was. Hey, that sounded like Leo. Cautiously Woofard makes his way back to where they had been standing, keeping an eye on that monster thing all the way.
He looks at Leo. "Hey, dude, are you ok? I... think, the monster has gone away.... sorta."
As he peeks around the piles of trash behind which Leo is hiding, Woofard finds the circus artist folded into as small a wad as he can possibly make, sort of a foetal ball except more crumpled. His spidery arms are clutching the newly repaired Teddy, tetanized with fright. Slowly, upon hearing Woofard's voice, he peels the fingers of one hand off his face, turning a wild eye towards the talking dog.
"Good dog," he says. "Good dog..." His voice hoarse as the sound of a rusty old pulley.
"Uh, hey there Leo," says Woofard uncertainly, "are you ok?" He distractedly looks towards the parking lot of horror. "Um, I think it... he... it... um, whatever... has gone, or turned into the Swede or... honestly I have NO idea what's going on. But no one is being eaten... any more... I think."
"Nnnn...nnnoo," agrees Leo, "nnnot ea-ea-eating." He's holding on to Teddy like the passenger of a falling 747 holding on to the only parachute on board.
He looks intently at Woofard, and some measure of sense seems to gradually return to him. He looks around furtively, then slowly unfolds from his knot. "Ungh..." he groans as he forces his tetanized muscles to decontract one by one.
Very carefully, he stands up, looking at the Akita like he expects some sort of reassurance from the comparatively normal companionship of a talking dog. "Let's..." His voice breaks but he tries again. "Let's go," he manages. "In. Away."
"In? Isn't that....? Nevermind." Reluctantly Woofard
follows the tall man back to the bowling alley. Cautiously looking
around, and sniffing he re-enters the bowling alley. He doesn't want
to get eaten up by some big slimey monster.
Leo furtively follows Woofard into the bowling alley, looking very nervous. Leo looks completely shell-shocked; in his arms, he's nervously clutching a very battered but whole Teddy.
There is an awkward moment when Marda spots the ursine veteran. Suffering as he is from post-Ingar trauma syndrome, he barely notices her screech of delight which must be the Rumanian equivalent of "Gimme, gimme, GIMME!" His senses have been assaulted too many times for simple things like air-raid sirens and screaming six-year olds to register as more than small discomforts. He stares at her uncomprehending, still clutching the re-stuffed bear.
Finally, he gets the clue and connects the elements of the puzzle. With a visible effort, he unlocks his death grip on the bear and hands Teddy over to Marda. "Here," he mutters dazedly, "all better..."
To Marda, however, the moment is not awkward. It is nothing less than glorious. For the past thirty minutes, she had been trying (and failing) to reconcile herself to a life without Teddy, when suddenly he appears out of nowhere, once again raised from the dead by her savior/messiah/clown. She immediately jumps from the bench, grabs Teddy, holds him to her so tightly that you would think he would collapse to his neutrons and become a pulsar, and proclaims "Thankyouthankyouthank youthankyouthankyou." (Not a bad performance considering the drugs still flowing through her.) More to the point for the other denizens of the bowling alley is the sudden drop in volume level, allowing for a certain modicum of sleep.
Realizing that he has a genuine menagerie on his hands, one that is already bedding down for the night to boot, Chris heads down into the basement to see what he can find by way of supplies, following a dim recollection of a rusty sign down there marked "AACD" with a large radiation trefoil on it. Poking around reveals a large storeroom containing:
* a dozen serviceable canvas and wood cots, along with
4 times that many rotted and/or broken ones
* A good several dozen wool blankets with red crosses
and something written on them in Italian.
* 1,000 cans of what appear to be rations, also Italian,
dated 1942.
* The remains of a large, oak guncase, now thoroughly
demolished
* A box containing 6 blobs of rust which, upon extremely
close inspection, turn out to be small animal traps
* 40 bottles of Phillips Milk of Magnesia, dated 1954
* 4 50 lb sacks of flour, now reduced to sludge
* 10,000 waterproof matches, still in their original boxes,
wrapped in plastic, and dated 1966
* One gallon of iodine
* 1,000 aspirin, which expired in 1972.
* Approximately an acre of tinfoil, in rotting & moldy
cardboard containers
With this new treasure, Chris is able to set up a cot for everyone in the lounge area of the bowling alley and distribute blankets for all. He even scrounges enough canvas from the broken ones to make a comfy, though admittedly somewhat musty dog bed for Woofard.
The akita looks at the pile of canvas skeptically. He ventures a sniff and wrinkles his nose. He looks to Chris, "Say there, Sporty, make sure I get one of those blankets too, 'kay?"
Chris just smiles and walks away, his left hand a twitching blur.
Woofard looks at the departing host. He steps on to the pile of canvas, and starts turning around...suddenly realizing that he's doing the dog-turning-around-before-laying-down-thing, he stops and drops onto the bed. He lays there with his head down, watching people moving around for a few moments, but eventually the day catches up with him, and he drifts off to sleep.
Leo drifts around a bit, submits to Dr. Bennett's ministrations (hmmm, sedative...), receives cot and blanket from Chris, and drags everything in the furthest, quiestest corner he can find, which happens to be the currently unused kitchen. He turns on all the lights, sets up the cot behind the big central counter/chopping block (though the ominous symbol is apparently lost on him), and proceeds to wrap himself in the musty Red Cross blanket and curl up under the cot. Fortunately for him, he is fast asleep by the time Ingar returns from his visit to Kanga Burger.
Finally, twenty or so minutes later, a rather sated and contented looking Ingar comes wobbling in (at which point Chris decides that it is a good time to lock the doors.)
Dr. Bennett, meanwhile, takes the time to examine the abused waif a bit more thoroughly, then gives some painkillers, some antiiflammatories, some more sedative, and some oral antibiotics to Harvey with instructions to keep the girl sedated through the night, and to administer the oral meds in the morning.
After that she cleans Chris's burns out, puts some ointment on them, gives him a shot of antibiotic, and some painkillers, and dresses the wounds. Finally, she issues a mild oral sedative to just about everyone with the exception of a) Ingar, and b) Ben. She promises to check back tomorrow, then departs.
With that the bowling alley begins to quiet as the Burger refugees begin to bed down for the night.
Goodness picks up a cot and sets it up in the middle of lane three (as they haven't all been swept and oiled, he doesn't see this as a problem of etiquette). He lays his body down, taking an inventory of his physical stores, and trying to decide which part of him hurts the worst. Thankfully he doesn't get far before the doctor's combination of analgesic and mild sedative take hold of him. Just before sleep claims him, he calls out, "G'night, John-Boy," and with that falls fast asleep, dreaming of nothing at all.
Ingar finds a cot as far away from everybody else as possible. By way of apology, he says to no-one in particular "I am very sorry about everything" (meaning this more literally than anyone can begin to imagine), his voice soft, yet carrying to the far reaches of the hall, echoing and susurrating. Then he rolls down on his cot, like a collapsing piece of abstract art. The cot crumbles underneath him, like a collapsing piece of cheap furniture. And then they are both still.
Harvey looks around, hoping to see something a little more comfortable.
Not seeing it, he wanders over to near where Ingar seems to be sleeping.
In stressful times, Harvey has noticed, there is always something soothing
about Ingar. He sets up a cot nearby. Bedding down, he reflects
on his day. He has seen death, disappearing heads, his best raincoat
was torn to strips and he met a talking dog. "I've got to get out
less" he muses to himself. Finally, his mind slows and he starts
to drift off. "Must drop by the hotel in the morning" he thinks,
"pick up some new clothes, and maybe a toothbrush. I wonder where
I can buy a gun in this town, or mace spray..." thinking idly of weaponry
he drifts off to sleep.
To Be Continued...