Teddy was complaining about Georgina’s cat, the way she dressed, how prone to violence she was… how, in school, she had been so quiet, but then would shoot somebody down with a devastatingly harsh word or two.
That last part was true. I remembered some pretty good insults she’d deal out on the regular. But pretty much I felt for her. She’d been miserable. You could tell. And sometimes there were bruises.
And even though Wood didn’t seem to like me much–taking explosives and pissy looks under consideration–I was happy that he seemed to have somebody.
Sure, it would have been nice if his somebody hadn’t tried to kill us. But Wood had never been interested in anybody back in school. And at least Georgina was… interesting.
Definitely interesting.
I had a thought. I felt a little smile spread over my face.
“Wood blew me up with a booby trap bomb,” I said. Teddy turned his head my way. “And Georgina lobbed a grenade at us.”
Teddy scowled. “So?”
I gave my head a slow shake, my smile getting wider.
“Nothing, really. It's just… maybe they were made for each other.”
Teddy didn’t say anything for a few seconds, and then smacked me in the back of the head. Which caused him to groan in pain.
“This gnome is near indestructible,” I taunted. “Remember?”
His hurt hand was bunched up in a fist, and he looked pained. I hoped he hadn’t broken his hand.
“That's not funny, Mort,” he said.
I heard Ellie chuckling from behind us.
“I don't know,” I continued. “I'm thinking it kind of was.”
Teddy turned away from me and started to walk faster. “Maybe… I see why my brother blew you up.”
What?
Ellie laughed loudly behind us.
Teddy and I both turned to look at her. She was cracking up.
“Come on!” She bellowed. “They're both being idiots.”
I scowled at her, and then I looked over at Teddy and saw that he was scowling at her too.
He noticed me looking at him, and we both turn back around to the way we were walking.
We were not being idiots.
Well… maybe we were.
We were passing the west side of Market Street, the block that had the old JCPenney building, the Mars Bank building, what was left of the municipal building (two out of four walls), and a line of smaller buildings that housed everything from Worchester’s Deli, and a long-abandoned magazine shop.
We heard something clatter down the alley that bisected West and East Market Street. Actually, there were two allies, one running from spring Street which we were on, to Bank Street, where the municipal building, JCPenney and the bank were. The other, longer alley, stretched the length of the block and ran behind all the buildings.
I looked down the alley, didn't see anything, but then looked over to Ellie and Teddy. They both have their weapons out, Teddy his bow and arrow, and Ellie her menacing Negan bat.
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I guess we’d already made up our minds, so I pulled my frying pan out of my inventory, and we all started to walk towards the alley.
Here and there, scattered at the sides of the alley, were some pretty odd items. On the right hand side of the alley, leaned up against the wall, were a line of Hummel figurines, and creepily enough, three of the five statues didn't have heads. And they weren't just cracked off. The tops of those Hummel statues’ necks were all burned black. A few more steps and on the left hand side of the alley I saw colorful dishes stacked up in rows against the wall. I think they were called Fiesta Ware, and were manufactured about an hour away at a pottery somewhere in West Virginia. Some of the dishes were shattered, and those dishes were burnt black as well.
About twenty feet or so in I saw the burned remains of a very large rat. It was literally standing up on its back legs, in the middle of the alley.
Okay… this whole thing was starting to get really weird.
Just as I was about to whisper to my friends that maybe we should turn around and get out of the alley, a strangely familiar sound came from behind us. The revving, thoaty roar of a 1956 Chevy truck.
And no, I'm not some kind of automotive savant. If you remember, I couldn't even figure out how big the hole would be for my mom's SUV when we buried it.
No, the sound was familiar because we had been harassed most of our childhoods by a senior citizen lunatic who drove just such an ancient automobile.
Ellie turned towards me, her eyes wide, and whispered, “Mr. Ripper?”
We all turned to the mouth of the alley, where we had just entered. A hulking red truck lurched into view. It stopped, it's windows tinted black.
“Shit…” Teddy hissed.
It was Mr. Ripper’s truck. He’d named it Maggie back in the '60s when he bought it used. He’d kept the engine and everything under the hood in spectacularly good condition. He even made sure that the tires were brand new each year. But he had always left the red paint oxidized.
He said he liked it better that way. He didn't like things shiny.
The man had harassed many a teenager over the decades, making him an infamous bully. And he had used that damn truck in all of his many near hit and runs.
The only thing that saved us the last couple years was that they had taken Old Mr. Ripper’s driver's license away.
But, I guess now that we were at the end of the world, the old man had decided to start driving his truck again.
Lucky us.
The three of us all seemed to have the same idea all at once. We all started to back away from that end of the alley. Mr. Ripper's truck did a perfect two-point turn, and then shot straight into the alley, and toward us.
“Run!” Teddy called out. And, indeed, we ran our asses off. It was moments like this I wished I’d had much longer legs. I was lagging behind my two friends. So maybe that was why I noticed light flickering from the alleyway crossing from the right of us.
My first thought was that I was that it was the glowing cube, the sleep eater. But then I heard the hair raising cluck of a chicken.
Oh God…
I double timed it, pushing my short little legs as fast as I could go. Luckily, Teddy heard the clucking as well, and threw his arm out in front of Ellie, slowing her down.
I threw myself in front of them just as I heard the monster chicken bellow, Bu-bu-BUCK-AK!
A strobe of light flashed in the darkness right before a torrent of electricity ripped out of the adjacent alley. That lightning crashed right into me, full force, knocking me backwards, and about ten feet down the alley in the opposite direction.
Luckily, Ellie and Teddy had gotten out of the way, rushing forward on past the alley, away from the electro-chicken, and from Mr. Ripper's truck.
I shook my head, looking up at the overcast sky, and then pulling myself up to look down the alley.
I saw two glowing white eyes staring back at me, unblinking.
I shook my head again, and then I heard the roar of Mr. Ripper’s truck. It lurched in front of me, blocking out the two glowing eyes of the chicken.
And that's when the chicken exploded into view, vaulting up on over the red truck, it's feathers fluffed up, it's eyes glowing with electricity, and its beak open in a savage snarl.
Bu-bu-BUCK-AK! The chicken roared, and then lightning spat out of its beak again.
I hadn't made it to my feet yet, so I just fell backwards, laying back down on my back, just as the lightning bolt screamed over top of me. I could feel that electricity bite at me as it went past.
Good God, that chicken's lightning really hurt. Even when it didn't hit me.
I rolled towards the wall to my left, and pulled myself up.
The chicken was moving towards me, taking one slow step at a time, it's ludicrous head bobbing up and down as it sighted me.
I saw that Mr. Ripper's truck had left, probably chasing after Teddy and Ellie.
God, I hoped they were okay.
But right then I had a lightning blasting chicken to get away from. And no sooner had I thought that than the damn thing flew at me, landing on top of me, smashing me into the wall. I tumbled to the ground, and tried to scurry away, backwards, crab walking on my hands and feet.
God damn Clyde the chicken wasn't having it, though. He jumped on top of me, flattening me to the ground–how much did this damn chicken weigh?—and immediately started bashing at me with its beak.