“…and, and then the mom has to turn to a life of crime to support her FOURTEEN CHILDREN adopted from a MONASTERY in the HIMALAYAS! Can you believe that? Then she gets away with it until EIGHTY FOUR years old! And then, this is the best part, she doesn’t even make it to trial, she dies of PNEMONIA in the POLICE VAN!” Number 3 laughed with a ker-whack when he was a bird, a grating and deafening sound.
“Do you have to talk about that stuff? You know it makes me feel bad.”
“Aww, does the little baby not like hearing about how people are going to die and not being able to help? That’s TOO FUCKING BAD, get over it. If anything, you killed them, you could’ve just handled it yourself.”
“How is it my fault that you killed them?!”
“If you let a bear out in front of a baby, is that your fault or the bear’s?”
Jojo interrupted, “We’re not doing this, this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Please just shut up until I deal with my grandma and then move very far away from me.”
Number 3 pouted, which was honestly difficult to do as a bird, but it seemed he had a lot of training. Hermes seemed grateful, which is nice, because I felt like I was being a little mean, but I really don’t like the freaks that Hermes is attached to.
“The rest of the idiots I was stuck with were blabbering on about nothing, but I was convinced that we needed to go check the body and make sure it was really dead.” Sam was on the other side of Hermes now, in between him and Jojo, leaning in, blocking her sight of Hermes.
“I’m pretty sure he’s dead, I mean, I saw him stand up and then just kind of crumple to the floor. Seems like dead dude behavior to me.”
Sam turned to Jojo, an indiscernible mask of shadow and hair, before turning back to Hermes, whispering something.
“You can’t seriously be thinking about believing a fake detective over a real human person.”
A slight pause, Sam stopped talking, and then Hermes leaned back, looking at Jojo with a guilty expression.
“Oh my god, don’t speak to me.”
“Jojo-”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
“But he has a good point-”
“What does it matter?! Why can’t you just ignore it and not try and kill that guy more dead than he already is!? Are you a psychopath that needs to go double tap him after you gave him a heart attack or whatever with your horrible evil murder stand?”
“But what if he tries to come kill us again! What are we gonna do then?”
“Kill him again! It wasn’t really that hard the first time! Just throw a rock at him or something and he’ll do a triple backflip and crack his head on a passing orphanage and kill them all!”
“Do you want that? It’ll be easier for everyone if we can just take care of him while he’s weak and unconscious!”
“Are you listening to yourself?! Let’s go kill the guy that is unconscious because there’s a chance he might come get us later!?”
“And what would you want to do? Just ignore him and wait for him to come and ambush us again? Look over our shoulders for the rest of our lives because you can’t do what needs to be done!”
Jojo looked at Hermes as he began looking more and more nervous. “I’m sorry, I- I just...” He trailed off.
Jojo sighed, and then began walking back towards her hospital room. “You can go figure out whatever you want, but I have more important people to worry about.”
Jojo stepped away, leaving Hermes standing alone in the hall.
Damn, what room number was I in? I think it was on the first floor, but I got no clue where. I gotta start paying more attention. Alright, alright, I’m just gonna go in this room and hope.
She stepped inside, seeing a school of silver fish swim right by her head, about the size of her index finger. As she looked farther around the room, she saw more, a massive catfish at least 9 feet long stretching out the window towards the grass, coral growing fast along the ceiling, a giant mola mola investigating another, flat fish, about 4ish inches.
“Can you see this?” A voice from a bed called, a small boy, like 10 or 12 or smth, idk. Sitting in his lap was an aquarium, bigger than him by a long shot, sitting on top of the handlebars of the bed. “I just kinda woke up with my aquarium and there was a bunch of my fish swimming around. I really like Pearl over there, he thinks he’s one of those big old fish from Hawaii, isn’t that cute?”
“Yeah, sure is. Um, any of the other ones got names?”
“The Pictus Catfish is called Napolean, the schooling fish over there are Harlequin Rasboras, it’s Huey, Dewey, Louis, Inky, Blinky, Pinky, Clyde, Balin and Dwalin, Fili and Kili, Dori, Nori and Ori, Oin and Gloin, and Bifur and Bofur. The coral is just Carol, my mom named that one, the one that Pearl is looking at over there is Yumeiro, and if you look really carefully, you can see my little brother in the chair over there.”
A metal figure sat slumped up against a wall, the same bucket of bolts from on the bus, goddamn freak.
“Oh, jeez, didn’t notice him. He okay?”
“I think so, they do that sometimes where they’ll just sit in the sun and not speak for a while. I only woke up like 20 minutes ago, so I figure I’ll let them sit for a while before I check on them.”
“Oh, okay, cool. So, uh, is it like a physical deformity, or are they one of those dudes that needs the machine to keep them breathing?” Oh my god, this might be unsalvageable. Should I pivot to cardboard manufacturing? I can’t pull the pregnant card this early.
“I can hear you you know.” The voice came out modulated and harsh, a barely identifiable tone, as if it had gone through a voice changer 3 or 4 times before being scraped through the grinder where a mouth should be set.
“Oh, uh, my bad. I just uh-”
“You wanted to know what was up with the metal body. It’s no big deal, some people ask the question with more tact than others, some wait for us to become close, but everyone wants to find out eventually. It’s the obvious question.” They paused, the echo of their words bouncing inside the tin man cosplay, a crude facsimile of a human form.
“So… is there an answer you feel… comfortable with?”
“Oh, glad you consider my feelings now that you know I can hear you. Of course, let me just divulge the full details of my condition so that you may properly feel bad for me.”
“Alright man, don’t have to be a dick about it. You can just say no.”
“No, please, why don’t I give you my medical details. Would you like my birth certificate too? How about my social security card.” They were attempting to gesture now, a movement that revealed how stiff and jerky the body they inhabited was. With every lift of an arm, wires were revealed, almost flesh colored, traveling from a clawed hand to a torso about 2 feet long, completely rectangular.
“Listen, I’m sorry, I just wanted to make conversation, I picked a bad topic. Completely my fault.”
“No one said it wasn’t. Why are you in our hospital room you pervert.”
“Whoa, who said anything about pervert. I resent that statement you, you clanker.”
“Really? What are you, a Geonosian veteran?”
“Be quiet, you guys are scaring Huey, Dewey, Louis, Inky, Blinky, Pinky, Clyde, Balin and Dwalin, Fili and Kili, Dori, Nori-”
“Alright, I get the picture. Sorry about this whole thing, um…”
“It’s Huey, Dewey, Louis-”
“She meant our names Freddy.”
“Oh. I’m Freddy, and that’s Kenny. I don’t like to have grudges hanging in the shadows, so everyone say the problem you have with everyone else and then they can apologize for it. Kenny, I think you were very mean to this nice lady, and you still haven’t told us your name.”
“Oh, my name is Jojo.” Freddy rolled his hand, signaling for her to continue. “And I’m sorry I didn’t introduce myself sooner?”
“Good, and Kenny you too.”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“I’m sorry for being rude to you Jojo. Freddy, I think you are trying to make friends with this girl too quickly. And I still think she should leave, because you need to recover from getting shot.”
“I’m sorry for trying to make friends and I also apologize for trying to protect my fish with my own body.” They were speaking without a hint of sarcasm or irony, like this was something they did all the time.
“I’m sorry for being in your room still, I can leave if it helps.”
“You still haven’t done your grudges.”
“Oh, uh, I wish that Kenny had let me sit on the bus with him, and I think that one of you should try and help me find my room.”
“Don’t get up Kenny, I got this.” Freddy was already letting down the side rails on his bed and moving to stand with his, holy shit, 200 gallon tank?! I knew it was big, but that’s fucking ridiculous! The label actually said 205, but who’s counting.
“Freddy, you got shot, I can handle it.”
“I don’t even know where the bullet went in, It’s no big deal.”
“Should you be carrying that right after you had to get stiches?”
“Please Jojo, if I couldn’t carry this tank through any injury I could possibly endure, I wouldn’t have been on that bus, I would’ve still been doing my conditioning training.” He stood, holding the tank with one hand and grabbing a harness from a stand next to him. The tank sat on his back with 2 metal pieces holding it on the front, and straps reaching around to connect back to the top.
Jojo spoke as they left the room to check the halls, “Do you do this every day?”
“Well, sometimes I don’t go anywhere. Then I can put them with the rest of my fish.”
“You have more?”
“Trust me, unless you are just as autistic as him, you don’t want to hear this.”
“Usually, people stop me after the 3rd tank of this size I go through. Sometimes I make it to my amphibians, and once I even started to get to the reptiles, but then they woke up.”
“Well, I don’t think we’ll have too much time unfortunately, because I think I remember this room.”
As they entered, a handsome man with a slicked back head of hair dived in front of Jojo, sliding on his knees to land with a rose held up. “My lady, the suns of a thousand stars pale in comparison to your beauty. I have seen men go to war over one but 7/8s as beautiful as you. I see now why songs are written, in an effort to approach your wonderous visage. Please, do me the honor of allowing me to bed you.”
“… … … … Are you hitting on me?”
“You are blinded by what society has told you you look like. Please, no need to be brave, I know that people must have told you you resemble a dog, elephant, perhaps a star-nosed mole, but I can see past it, to the beauty lying, deep, deep underneath the hard exterior.”
I think I’m being hit on. It’s fine, I prepared for this. I need my handy dandy 5 category list to see if I’m willing to pursue it. First, are they attractive? 5 stars there, can’t deny facts. Second, do they like me? 4.5, anyone can say pretty words, but they were decently pretty. Third, are they a passably good person? 2.5, but it has a chance to go up or down. Fourth, can I date people right now? 3, I’ll be stuck in this town for a while, but I can’t bring them back to my place, I think they’ll call CPS on my grandma for the loose needles. Finally, do I wanna? Ehhh, idk, we’ll call it a 3 for now. Coming in for a final score of 3.6, it’s decent, but I’d like to see more for a real commitment.
He'd been talking for a while now, and he kept moving the rose closer with every pause to breathe, launching into another monologue every time. I gotta turn him down gently and respectfully, make sure he knows it’s nothing he did wrong.
“I’m not gonna fuck you.” Could’ve been better.
The man paused mid-sentence, stuttering as he came to the realization that this was the second woman to ever turn him down. Just then from the back of the room, 2 raucous sets of laughter made themselves known, the makeup girl from the bus, and the guy that didn’t stop screaming.
“Sh-shut up! Shut up you-” A speech bubble of expletives flew from his face, before meeting a sword that deflected it into the wall. “You, you uh, that’s cheating you-” Another speech bubble, and another deflection to the ceiling.
“What? Slut? Whore? You’re getting uncreative Roger.” Even louder laughing now, like a hyena standing on a ledge above a bleeding gazelle, coarse and-
“Whoa whoa, there’s no need for that kind of language, I’m a chill guy.” He had stopped, a small two legged rabbit with a conspicuous zipper placed onto his back.
…I don’t know guys, I’ll try and keep his interaction to a minimum, but there’s only so much I can do at the end of the day. At least everyone else will think he’s crazy so they might not let him tag along.
“Oh, big man when there’s nothing I can do to get back at you. Besides, I’m not gonna let this opportunity pass me by.” He leaped up from his bed, real degenerate like, stepping right over to Jojo, ending with a kneel at her feet.
“Jocelyn Cujoh, I can tell that there is much that you will be able to accomplish in the days to come. That is why I humbly request, when the time comes, allow me to accompany you on your journey.”
“Oh, uh, I’m not going to fuck you either.”
“Ha! A quick wit as well! Believe me, that is not my intention in the slightest. I simply wish to be a minor ally at best. I will even accept a cameo at the ending if I must. All I wish is a chance to see your journey come to fruition.”
After he was done begging on his hands and knees to be someone’s friend, he stepped back to his bed in the only shadowy corner of the room, resuming his screaming. Jojo scratched her head, wondering what was up with the freak that decided he wanted to cosplay a mental patient every 20 minutes. Y’know what, if I do end up going on a hero’s journey or what have you, I’ll bring him along. Goddamnit.
“He’s a bit of a character, but don’t worry too much about it. My name is Carmen Tatiana, and I managed to pull the name Wes from him. The dude cowering at your feet is Roger, just Roger, says he doesn’t need a last name. I’m hoping your name is Jocelyn Cujoh?”
“Uh, yeah. You can just call me Jojo if you don’t mind.”
“What are you gonna do if I do mind?”
“Uh, what do you mean?”
“Well, maybe I like the name Jocelyn. I feel like it suits you well.”
“I mean, go for it I guess.”
“Maybe I should come up with my own pet name though. I always feel like that makes people feel …closer.”
“Uh, well I guess let me know if you come up with one.” Jojo said, leaning back and missing the wall.
“I feel like something animal themed might be nice. Maybe something like honey bear? Perhaps a worm themed something? I like the idea of a unique kind of thing, got any special connection with any Annelids?”
“Uhhh, I think that it’s an underrated… species?”
“Oh yeah? You think that the class that contains earthworms is an underrated species?”
“Oh, I thought you said… um…”
“No please, name a species of worm.”
“…Inch.”
Silence filled the room for a long moment, even that disgusting freak in the back of the room stopped his cacophony for a brief moment before resuming, seeming to strangle the room with his horrible cries.
“So, Jocie and company, what brings you to our humble room?”
“Oh right, I’m Franky and that’s Kenny. You guys don’t have any long-standing grudges, do you?”
“I don’t think I know any of you guys. Have you been going to the school over in Yale?”
“We were at Bagley before the roof collapsed, and then we were supposed to go for our first day today.”
“I just moved here from Atlantic City. And from Arkansas before that, and from Florida before that.”
“Wow Jocie, real world traveler on our hands. Is that why you came over here, just to visit and marvel at the spectacle?” Carmen hit a couple joke flexes, but there wasn’t much there to flex with.
“Oh, you wanna go there?” Jojo pulled an arm out of her jacket, thick paracord muscles moving just under the skin, a testament to the genetic lottery. TPAB was also on her shoulder, holding up 2 tiny front legs in a facsimile of a flex.
“Aww, your little guy is so cute! I kinda wish I had something like that, a sword isn’t really much of a partner if we’re talking about posing.” She held the sword at her shoulder and tried to balance it while she was flexing.
Jojo chuckled, “Oh yeah, I was just trying to find my room again, I kind of ran out on my grandma.”
“Aw, your grandma? That’s sweet, I like a family woman.” An awkward laugh from Jojo as Roger grumbled from his bed. “We should go head on over there. Roger, Wes, you want to come along?”
“Sure, I need to regroup with my groupies anyway.” Wes thankfully continued screaming, saving us from him messing things up. Now another 2 strong, the group began searching around for Jojo’s grandma, going through another 6 rooms, thankfully devoid of small talk, before coming back to room 191, where Nana Mildred sat, tapping a foot next to an unconscious man, who if his right eyelid were lifted, would have a socket devoid of eye.
“Heyy Nana, sorry about running off, I uh, just wanted to explore the hospital with some of my new friends. These were other people that were shot while on the same bus as me. We were all going around looking for people we knew. Sorry for… um… running off.”
“Why don’t you let your new friends go and then you can explain to me what exactly happened.”
Everyone but Jojo wiggled on their feet for a couple seconds, then slowly started filing out, Carmen whispering in Jojo’s ear, “Good luck, you’re probably gonna need it.”
The door shut, Nana Mildred leaned forward, resting on her knees as she sighed. “Why don’t you explain to me exactly what happened, and make sure to include the parts about the floating fish and the caterpillar on your shoulder.”
Jojo stiffened, then sat down on the bed near Nana Mildred and reluctantly explained what had happened since she awoke about an hour ago. Nana Mildred was silent throughout, except when Jojo tried to avoid mentioning the stand Eye, or The King, a sharp smack hitting her knee, just hard enough to hurt.
“And then, I wandered around and found your room.”
Nana Mildred leaned forward, cupping her face in her hands, as tears began falling through her hands, soft sobs wracking her body, choking out a sentence, “I’m so sorry, I wanted to try and keep you and your mother safe, keep you away from all this, I tried to change your name, tried to protect you from your stupid father, I’m so sorry…”
“Nana? What are you talking about, isn’t Mom sick? Quarantined back in Florida? What does she have to do with this?”
“I told her not to marry that bastard, I knew he was trouble, as sure as I am that he got my grandfather killed, should’ve never let him anywhere near her…”
“Nana, slow down, I don’t know what you’re saying.” Jojo held her Nana’s shoulder, as her grandmother grabbed it back, her face covered in tears.
“Please Jojo, promise me you’ll give up on this stupid bullet thing, I can’t lose another member of my family to some stupid plot by whatever vampire is trying to conquer the world.”
Jojo leaned back a little, “Nana, I don’t-”
Nana Mildred gripped her arm harder and pulled her back in, “PROMISE ME JOJO! PROMISE ME RIGHT NOW THAT YOU WILL NOT TRY TO INVESTIGATE THIS BULLSHIT AND DIE!”
“Alright, alright, I promise I won’t investigate this. Just tell me-”
“No! No, I’m going to deal with this all on my own! Just… sigh, just stay here, and I’ll come back for you eventually, okay? Hand me the bullet too, I don’t need anyone trying to kill you again.”
Jojo reluctantly handed the golden bullet to her, and Nana Mildred stood up and moved to the door. “I’m sorry for yelling, I just… I need you to trust me.”
“Y-yeah, alright. Are you sure you won’t answer any question I have?”
“Maybe once this is all sorted out, but for now just hang out here, I should be back soon.”
She opened the door, slowly walking into the hall and out of sight. Jojo sat, thinking about what she could be talking about. It reminded her of what her father had said, right before she had to leave for her grandmothers because of her mom being sick…
A knock sounded on the door, knocking Jojo out of her thoughts as a doctor opened the door. “Hello, just wanted to check in on you, the bandages working out?” He stepped in a little farther, noticing the man laying on the floor with cuts on his face. “Oh my god, is he okay? What happened?”
“Oh, I, I don’t know, I just came back from getting my jacket and he was laying on the floor, I was about to call somebody.” Fuck fuck fuck, I’m so cooked.
“Geez louize, this isn’t good. Do you know how long he’s been unconscious for?”
“Uh, no, not really. I just got back.”
He leaned in close and pulled out a stethoscope as he began examining the unconscious man.