>> Gremlins In The Attic

Zipper's eyes meet mine, and a mad surge of emotion rips through me. Dozens of thoughts vying to escape me in in a mad explosion of garbled words. They were talking about me behind my back. They were conspiring. 'Picking Quarrels', as The School would put it.

And that's a good way to end up in very, very, very literal hot water.

If you're lucky.

But even as my hands slam down on the tiled surface of the kitchen's bar, I snap my teeth shut on the urge to expel all my nerves at Zipper in a crazed rush. He don't deserve it. It's not his fault. And he clearly doesn't want to be here. So, instead, as he recoils and raises his guard.... I force myself to breathe out. Then to twist something onto my face that could, in the dim light, be called a smile. “Picked the short straw, huh?”

The boy's, eyebrows flicker with strands of metallic silver as they rise. “Well.... Kinda." He admits. "Kami...."

"Yelled at ya, and stormed out?"

"Heh. Basically, yeah." He rubs at his neck, and shrugs. "She said.... well, like, that someone had to talk to you, like. And that it wasn't gonna be her. Y'know? And that she 'sucks at all this cheery chatty bollocks' and….. uh.... yeah.....”

I blink. "She.... actually said.... she sucks??"

His eyes flick up and away. "Well.... I mean.... she sounded pretty pissed at me when she said it. Like it was my fault, or whatever." His lip twitches. "She, uh, sorta kinda also said she'd 'hoist me on my own intestines' if I told you.... though..... Uh...."

"Huh. Wonder why." I snort. "Maybe I should ask....."

"Yeaaaah- Uh.... Maybe not, mate..... Like-"

"Coward." I snort, slumping a little. "Look. Zip-"

"Mate..... Like, about....."

I flash a hand. "Look, I know you got a 'mission' to 'fix' me here. But Kami ain't the boss. I am." Deep breath. "And I know shouldn't have bloody run off. It was stupid. It was crazy. I'm sorry. And I won't do it again. Alright? So lets.... put a pin in the 'pep talk'. Okay?"

Zip's gloom sparks into cheerful relief. "Right, mate! But, like.... can you sorta tell Kami I did?"

"Sure." I snort. "I'll tell her ya scooped me up a whole buncha pre-cooked bollocks about, uh, friendship and teamwork and crap?"

"Heh. Sounds about right, mate!" He smirks, flicking me a double peace sign. "But y'know, like, for reals.... if you ever wanna tell me what happened.....?" He stutters into silence as my claws grind in the gaps between the tiles.

Our eyes meet. His lit with concern. And mine.....

I rip them away.

Words boiling in my throat, like poison - clawing at my tongue. Eager to spill from me. But..... if I told them what I saw......

The crew would either damn me as insane, and dethrone me as leader.... or worse.....

...they would believe me.

Either one could rip us apart. Either one could plunge us back into our past. Into the mad, twisted, brutalistic paranoia of The School.... where truth is a lie, and lies are everything.

And Opposite Day is a lethal reality.

That's why the traitor terrifies us so much. Not just because it might be real, but because it might be imagined. Because The School's insanity infected us, right down to our bones. And the dark terror of it pumps through our veins like blood.

Twisting our nightmares.

If I start spitting mad stories of visions and missing time, they're gonna lose their Goddamned minds.

They'll panic. Not just because I'm 'losing it', but because that place fed on us for so long we became a part of it. And it of us. A shadow on our hearts, ready and eager to come creeping out of the dark. To infect our sanctuary, and our world, like some kind of cancer in the stuff of reality. Endlessly spreading.

So. Best guess is they'll leap on the most solid explanation available:

That 'Spook is nuts and unreliable.'

That everything I saw is a wild, vivid, 'PTSD flashback'.

And that I'm fixated on a 'glitching, stuttering, old camera' that probably jerks and jumps all day long.

And that's why I just.... can't tell them. Zip would be terrified, even if he didn't believe me. They all would be. And each and every bloody one of them will fight the idea that The School Has Found Us, almost to the point of death itself.

Because The Monster In The Kitchen cannot be allowed to touch us again.

So they'll rationalise it. They'll say it's impossible. That the monsters are trapped and tucked away, literally a thousand miles from us. Locked away in their own private reality, like nightmares and dreams split from the waking world. And they'll chant that phrase that has kept us going ever since we got out:

'The School has no idea where we are.'

Which is, even now, evolving into 'They've stopped looking for us.'

And other lies.

Even the sudden reappearance of Moon can't shake that kind of thinking. They're already starting to explain that away, too:

A fake. A local scam. An elaborate trick that can't really hurt us.

And Wayman Company will be next, no matter how much sense that doesn't make.

Because this ain't about truth.

It's about survival.

And sanity.

And protecting our minds from what happened Before.

Because if they're HERE....

....actually, physically, verifiably, HERE..... then maybe....

....just maybe.....

....The School's twisted, psycho, ever-changing, reality is the Real one.....

Zip frowns at me, quiely. Waiting. Waiting. Until he can't take it anymore. "But, like, seriously mate..... Do you wanna talk-?"

"God, I'm bloody hungry." I growl. Leaping fully onto the counter, and pretending to snuffle the air in the kitchen. “Damnit. Any food left?”

"Maybe, mate. But....."

"Hey, let's just sort breakfast. Alright?" I yawn, hugely. "Anythin' left in the cupbards? I know we had a stash up in there someplace....."

"I guess mate. Dunno if it survived this long, though."

"Ah come on. We-"

"MATE!" Zip yelps and ducks as a certain 'war-paint'-streaked dork lets out massive battle-cry behind us. My eyes snapping around as he leaps, madly, off the top of a sofa. Bringing a 'beanbag-chair battle-axe' swinging down to cleave a terrified Tufty in half. There's an instant of realised horror on cat-boy's face, and then the century-old fabric engulfs his head - rupturing in an explosive tsunami of squashy little beads. Billions of the damn things, blasting in every direction. Roaring over the lip of the counter like the blast-wave of a nuke.

I yelp, and roll to escape it. Landing in the kitchen, on all fours, in a single fluid motion. Mounds of white, white, 'snow' whispering down around us. Clinging the walls, the ceiling, cupboards, and tiles. To my tail, my arms, my ears, my skin. And everything else in sight. Zipper, his hair covered in tiny baubles, stares at me and snorts loudly. Fighting to keep it in, until it's just too much. "Oh, man, like....! You....! You look like a little kid's Christmas card, mate! Your face! Like, it's all over-"

"Murder." I breathe, in the voice of death. "Murder."

"Uh, mate-"

"MURDER!"

"Yeha, huh. Maybe you get.... get, like cleaned off and I'll go deal with-"

"Murrrrder...." I agree as he makes a bolt for it. Leaving me to slap and flail at myself to knock the stuff off even as it keeps on coming. Scratching, furiously, with a foot. Shaking and flapping until off what I can. Though the dang stuff is all up in my mouth, my nose, and everything. It's just too much.

And so, resigning myself to my new life as a partial snow-monster, I set about finding breakfast. Prowling my way around the horrid old fridge (now mummified with duct tape, and plastered with dire warnings) as I sneak up on the lower cupboards. Bracing myself for a good ole poke-about.

And I do mean brace. Because y’know what happens when you leave a bunch of open food in a kitchen for five times longer than I’ve been alive?

Nothing wholly holy, wholesome, or sanitary. That’s what.

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"Hey. You, like, really think there's anything in there?" Zip yells through from the wreck-room, dangling a smaller yeti in one hand.

"We'll see." I growl, horribly. Cracking one of their doors to peer inside - from wherein, mounds of dark mould and gunk stare back at me. With big eyes. And grin. I shut that one, sloooowly, and seal it with tape and wire. Then I try the next one over, which merely smells like people died in it. A condition that, unfortunately, that makes it an ideal candidate for our ever-mobile ‘secret snack stash’.

After all - what's better than a nasty stink to fend off those sneaky lil GMO noses?

I mean, besides a landmine.

"Any good, mate?" Zip yells as Badger wiggles free, cackling with mad energy.

“Not yet. But, daaamn.... it's bloody grim in here....” I wince, tossing out a suspiciously sloshy old thermos. "Wait. I think I see..... Wow. Is that.... an ancient sandwich!?” I hold up the sealed pack, admiring the livid black and green spots. “Mmmm. Tasty.” I grin. “Y’know, some forms of mould ain’t poisonous…..”

"Oh, gross mate! You first!” Zip yelps. Ducking back into the kitchen as a very snowy Demon storms past in pursuit of a giggling idiot. With a terrified Tufty clinging to his horns, no less.

"Heh." I flip him a fangy grin. “Y’think it got left here by the ‘previous owners’, or am I lookin’ at what’s left of the previous owners?”

“Yuck. Either way, mate…. Oh, yahh! Gross!" We both yelp as the sealed package starts to squirm in my fingers.

“Yeah, nope. Nope! No thanks!" I agree, diving for the biohazard crate on the counter to stuff the horrendous thing inside. Fending off escaping condiments, and ramming em back in their pit.

“Damn,, like…. wow…. You ever gonna empty that?” He breathes as I lean hard on the rattling lid.

“Hm? Empty? Incinerate? One of the two.” I grumble, furiously duct-taping things down. "Right. That oughta hold it.... for now.... But damn am I hungry, here.... I'm hollowing out. Full famine mode....." I drop back on all fours. Tail whisking as I sniff the air. "Rrr. That won't work." I dive back into the cupboards - prying open door after disturbingly sticky door. Hurling out random items, all over the place. A can of ‘SUPER Spray-on Corn Plasters!’. An old phone. A rattling jar of dusty old cred-chips.....

All refugees from a bygone age, when ‘digital’ money blasted through the air all over The City. And.....

I rip open one of the upper cupboards and - with absolutely no warning - something small, scaly, and viciously spiky slams directly into my face. Latching on with its viciously sharp little claws. A ruby tail swinging as I scream, twist, and fall. Which would've been way less of an issue, if I hadn't been stood on the counter at that exact moment.

There's a bang. A hideous wail (me). And I topple onto my face - holding part of a cupboard.

This, at least, knocks off the tiny monster - who bounces off five other cabinets squealing “Spookieeeessss!!!! SssssssSSSPOOKIEssss!!” at ear-shattering volume. Bounding off Zipper, the ruined furniture, and me as I try to get up. “Spoookies!! Yous camesss backssss! Youss camesss backsss!!!”

"Rrghghggh....." I groan, fending off some playful swipes. "And then there were bloody three of em."

"Spoookies!!!" The tiny red blur chips again, bounding in circles that send her leaping over her own too-long tail. “Ssspoookiess Spoookieesss Spoookiess!”

"Yes." I moan, tossing the ruined door to one side. "What's bloody left o' me, anyways."

"Uh, mate? You okay?" Zip winces, leaning over the crimson monster in the hope of helping me up - but I fend him off.

"Fine. Fine. I had way too much face, anyway." I growl, rubbing at what's left of it. "God damn. Who let her out of containment."

"Dunno, mate. Want me to, like..... go get....? Y'know....? Mr Shooty-Sleep-Sleep?" He mimes pulling a trigger, with a wink. Gremlin's lil head tilting in confusion.

I flick him a look. "Nah, we're runnin' out. But I'm kinda partial to Dr Netty-Pew-Pew." I add, as the small scaly wotsit bounds up - onto the ceiling - and sticks there. Perring down at us with big, curious, eyes. "Plus, last time, ya hit Badger on accident."

"Ah. Yeah, mate." He says, as nearby sounds of destruction intensify. "Like, total accident."

"Could always try the 'diplomatic' approach?" I add, as the red blur scampers in happy little sticky-pawed circles around the ceiling. Batting at the lightbulb and snapping at the tuft on her whipcord tail.

"Good idea mate, but, uh - I think we're out of napalm."

"Pity." I mutter. "Right. Nothin' for it then." I take a breath. "OI! Scaly! Get ya ass down here!"

"SpppOOOkiesss!! Spookiesss!!! Come play-play!!!" She trills, bouncing down onto the cabinet top. Flickering long and adorable ears, as she pulls into a long - feline - stretch in her adorable 'little monster' pyjamas. Ruby scales of dark and bloody red glimmering on squishable lil kitty cheeks, topped by hair like dried blood. With hugely round, dark, eyes that scream 'adorable lil demon-tyke' from half a mile away.

Which is about the minimum safe distance, as a matter of fact.

The scaly thing curls a mischievous little yawn, full of mischievous little fangs, and purrs at me happily. Inviting me closer, as she scratches a long pointy ear with an oversized hind-paw…. and fires herself directly at my face. I duck, and she squeals happily - already in full play mode.

I.e., claws out and ready to mince.

“You can’t bloody fool me twice, titch.....! Hey, where’s the PJs from? Did Demon print ya those?” I add.

"DeeemonsSSSssesss?"

"Y'know? Blond hair? Horns?"

“Ooooh!! Yessss Yes-essss!!" She nods, very hissy and pleased with herself. "Yellow thingsss superssss nicess!!!! Brushesss meesss hairs!!! And tellsss meesss storiesssss!!!"

"Wow, that's-"

"Andss sssupersss tastiesss!!!!" She smacks her lips. "Andss screamssss bigss-BIGSss whenss meess bitess his-”

“Ahahah. Yeah. I bet he does.” I laugh, very nervously, as Zip extracts the 'Gremlin petting stick' and rubs the top of her head. Which results in some horrible cracking noises, and a much shorter stick. "Good grief. He's taking his bloody life in his hands doing that....." My eyes narrow. “So, hey. Gremie.... you seen our snacks round here?”

"Ssssnacksssesss?" She hisses, head tilted adorably. "Oooh! Yellow thingssss?"

"Ahah. No. Not him."

Her head tilts the other way. "Blue thingsssss?" She licks cute lil scaly kitty lips at Zipper.

"I mean the actual snacks! Not us! The ones you're allowed to eat!"

"But meeess allowdssss chompsss!!!" She tantrum-flops.

"I mean the bags of food! The bags! In the box! In the cupboard!"

“Oooh, yesssesss!!! Themsss tastiesss toooss!!!” Gremlin perks happily - very pleased with herself.

“Ah Crap..... Not again..... The whole box!?"

"Yumsss yumsss!!!"

"You scaly lil bin!" I facepaw. "Guess there’s nothing bloody for it….” Zip trades me a wink. “I guess we gotta eat HER!”

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!” Gremlin squeals happily. Diving over the edge of the counter before ironic, toothy, vengeance can be meted out. She hops up on a wall, looks back - and I take a big dramatic step, sending her scampering into the fray with Badger. Which.... uh....

.....quickly devolves.

“Heh. Well, that's her sorted..... But what’re we gonna eat?” I sigh as Zip has a last, dubious, shufti in another cupboard. Finding only a few scraps of wrapper and a terrified, half-chewed, tentacle abomination that clings to his hand for safety.

"Ah dunno mate." He grunts, flicking it off into a new hazmat box. "I mean, like - (No, let go! Let go!) - I know you really hate the idea. But, like, we could bodge off downstairs and crack open…..” He winces, seeing my expression. “….those shops?”

"Yeee. I dunno. Y'really wanna scarf down a freaky truckload of food that's ten times older than us?" I shudder. "I mean, come on, this ain’t the internet. We got standards in here. We ain' gonna lick a buncha petrified Crystal Stardust Bars just ‘cause I can.” I have a snicker. “Though it’d be pretty funny to see if Grem’s stomach can handle that crap.”

Zip snorts, slapping the table. “Mate. Like, she ate the food box! I’m pretty sure, like, shitty old food ain’t gonna stop her. Y’know?”

“Weirdest 'Girl Power' slogan I've ever heard.” Kami snarks, leaning her too-many hands on the sideboard. "We doing this or what? Only I just caught Gremlin eating our bloody underwear again."

I slap my poor, abused, face. "Dirty or clean?"

She cringes, horribly. "Do you REALLY want the answer to that?"

"No. No, I do not." I groan as my belly rumbles furiously. "RRRRRrrrrh. I wonder what roast Gremlin tastes like."

"Probably the sofa." Kami snorts. "She eats enough of it."

“Heh. Yeah. But, seriously, like..... what we gonna do for, like, food and stuff?” Zip says, groping about in some cupboard I already checked. “I mean, like.... if there ain't anything here then that only leaves-”

“NO! Not the army rations! Not again!” I panic.

“….but, mate - it’s, like, the only thing left. Y’know?" He drops his arms in frustration. "Like.... there's no snacks left, and-”

Kami smirks. “The sofa?”

I consider it seriously. "If it's that or canned cheeseburger...."

"Look. We've got nothing." Kami states, almost happy about the idea. "And we're ducking training. So lets just-"

"Woah. No. No chance." I growl. "It's food or death, over here."

"But mate, like, we don't got any food!"

"There's.... one other option." I breathe. "And it ain't whoever Gremlin is eating."

"Sounds like Demon, mate."

"Noted." I growl, over the screams. "But this is gettin' desperate. I got a whole hungry crew to feed here, and we got nothin' but scraps and air. It's time to get drastic. It's time..... to go get some food."

"Mate, you aren't thinking what I-"

"Oh yes." I grin. "Kami. Get me my 'shopping crowbar'. We're gonna go get.... 'takeout'....."

image [https://images2.imgbox.com/9b/42/diMQluRC_o.png]

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