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thatboomerkid · 4 years ago

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PORTALS

We open weird portals to the Underworld and pull the Damned out for cash [part 1]

Hellcrashers Fiction by Nonbinary Bones

I broke open the factory door with a crowbar and entered a decrepit manufacturing plant. The soot-covered facility went bankrupt years ago and still leaked chemical waste into the “Mighty Missisip’” several decades later.

For a brief moment, the only noises were the icy wind racing over the waterfront and the soft ticking sound of the van’s engine behind me. The side panel of the van slid open.

“Sweet baby Jesus, it’s colder than a witches’ tit in a brass bra out here!” Felix exclaimed.

I nodded my agreement as a mechanized lift lowered my co-worker’s wheelchair to the ground.

Jackie hopped from the passenger seat, her military boots crunching on the wooden timbers of the boardwalk.

Sections of the greasy promenade had rotted away, revealing the polluted harbor below. The rancid waters stank of dead fish and petroleum. A huge rickety crane loomed overhead, its base squatting in the water, rusting its way towards oblivion.

Jackie opened the back of the van, rooted around, then pulled a bulletproof vest on over her tank top. She held another vest out in her grimy hand. I took it with a grateful nod.

Vasquez put The Club on the steering wheel, a sunshield on the dash, and began inspecting his gear. He may have been an OCD prick, but he knew how to plan a job.

New Kid hovered nearby, hands in his pockets.

“Hey Bitchnugget, try doing something useful for a change!” Felix jibed.

We grabbed our camping gear and entered the factory. Light filtered in through broken windows from sodium streetlamps outside. The center of the room was illuminated, but darkness clung to the corners. Conveyor belts and walkways filled the cavernous space like a real-life version of Chutes and Ladders. The air reeked of grease and metal. Rusted machinery spoke of long years of disuse.

Felix accidentally rolled right through a pile of animal droppings and cried out in disgust at getting shit in the tire treads. His shouts echoed in the gloom.

I dropped a duffel to the floor and opened it up, revealing a cache of weapons. We divvied up the contents so each of us had gas masks and guns.

“Alright everyone, huddle up.” I said. Everyone gathered in a semi-circle. “Vasquez, give us the rundown.”

“Today is a standard snatch-and-grab. Our target is named Aurora Laura.” He held up a centerfold spread ripped from an adult magazine. The lewd pose didn’t leave much to the imagination. “Real name Laura Brown. Originally from Omaha.” He squinted at the glossy pages. “Measures 34B, Waist 25, Hips 26. Likes puppies and men who aren’t afraid to show their vulnerable side.”

The New Kid blushed, Jackie snorted, and Felix grinned.

“We have reliable intel that the client’s Dearly Departed is being held in a Domain known as Hotel California. Basically, it’s worse than the worst ‘No-Tell Motel’ you’ve ever imagined; word on the street says each Dweller gets their own room, so we’re searching door to door.” He sighed.

The rest of us groaned out loud. “The floor-plan tends to change on its own, so watch out for that. This isn’t Scooby-Doo: we do not split up under any circumstances.”

“If you see something valuable on the way out, grab it. And I’m talking something portable. Smaller than a breadbox. We don’t want another incident like last time.”

Vasquez looked pointedly at Felix before continuing.

“Garrett, you’ll pop the Cherry for us.”

I nodded in response.

“We go in, acquire the target, and get the fuck out of Dodge. Any questions?” Vasquez looked at each of us with an upraised eyebrow.

New Kid raised his hand like a schoolboy.

“Why am I not surprised?” Felix asked the ceiling.

“What’s a Cherry?”

“It’s a door, Kid. A gateway Down Below Where The Bad Men Go.”

“Oh, right.” he said, blushing.

“Okay then, let’s get to it.” I said.

Past wasp’s nests and sticky linoleum floors I found a door with an ��Employees Only” sign on it. The door-frame sagged, dislocated from rotted walls heavy with mildew. The door had warped over time so even though it was unlocked I almost couldn’t get it to budge. The factory door bore battle scars and boot prints from a hard fight with someone who lacked a crowbar. Someone like me. Busting open the door revealed a tiny office containing a desk, chairs, and an empty safe. Nothing worthwhile. I closed the door again.

From my backpack I took a jar of a milky yellow fluid and a barbecue basting brush. When I unscrewed the lid, a nasty rotting smell wafted out. My nose wrinkled in distaste as I began painting the door hinges in slime.

“What the Hell is that?” inquired the New Kid over my shoulder.

“Kid, Crashers never say the H-Word. Never. Not even Topside if we can avoid it. I told you this before we started.” I said.

“Aw, come on! That’s some superstitious bullshit!”

“I mean it.” I glared at him. “Watch your fucking mouth or you’ll jinx the whole Crash. Do not say the H-Word.”

“Sorry. What the heck is that?”

“Ever hear of ‘bukkake’?” I replied.

“No?”

“Then don’t worry about it.”

“Okay, but why are you doing that?”

“This particular Cherry won’t pop until the hinges have been lubed with actual body secretions. And before you ask: no, spit won’t cut it. Just be grateful the gateway doesn’t need it fresh.”

“Are they all like that?”

“No, some of them only open at midnight or you have to make a cat cry in pain. It depends on the Cherry.”

“Can I ask you a question?” the Kid asked, shuffling his feet uncertainly.

“Another one? Sure, Kid. Ask away.” I replied patiently.

“What makes a Cherry open where it does? I mean, if they can open anywhere how come a gateway doesn’t open up in the middle of Times Square? Or in a daycare?”

I paused for a long moment, considering.

“Rust and despair. Plants need water and sunshine. Mushrooms need shade and shit. Cherries need rust and despair. Simple as that.”

When I finished painting the hinges the door creaked open on its own, this time revealing a rickety wooden staircase down into darkness. Felix cracked a couple chemical glow sticks and shook them. They began glowing with a golden-green light and he tossed them through the doorway.

I grabbed the handles behind Felix’s wheelchair and edged it closer to the Cherry.

“Hey careful with the merchandise, peasant!”

“I ain’t afraid to kick a cripple downstairs.”

Felix stood up on the other side of the portal.

“What the fuck? You’re just faking?” Kid asked in an angry, disbelieving tone with eyes wide as dinner plates.

“No, Cuntpuddle.” Felix said, rolling his eyes. “My legs don’t work Topside, but they work just fine in the Nether.”

“Topside?”

“That’s just a slang term for the world we live in. Topside is the place that the Damned covet beyond all else and the rest of us take pretty much entirely for granted. Don’t know what you got ‘till it’s gone, as they say. It’s the world you see out your window, where we get born, fuck around, and die. It is what it is and for the most part it’s a pretty okay place to be. For the most part.”

“But how can he walk on the other side of the gate?”

“I don’t know Kid, but as soon as you figure it out let me know.” I said.

We turned on our lights and the five of us moved slowly downwards, footsteps echoing in the gloom.

The staircase was built out of salvaged boards, no two of which were the same; different lengths, different colors. There were fourteen steps exactly, but the topmost step was smaller than all the others and bright red. A last minute addition to avoid Unlucky 13 perhaps.

My nerves were on edge as we descended. Every little creaking step telegraphed our movements to anything lurking nearby.

At the bottom of the stairs we found a diseased and barren wasteland. The ground was black and filthy like the Athabasca oil sands of Canada. My throat and lungs ached. Noxious smoke filled the air and made breathing a chore.

I saw a hundred burning fires lighting up the distant mountains. That made me real tense. I’d watched “The Hills Have Eyes” once and the things down here would have put cannibal mutant rapists to shame.

Glancing backwards, I saw the staircase slowly disappearing like it’d never existed.

----------

In front of us, our destination was uncomfortably close. Squatting less than two hundred yards away was a dilapidated motel modeled after every circa-1940s cheaper-than-shit roadside inn on “the wrong side of the tracks” but worse. The walls had been marred by fire. A flickering red neon sign stuttered “VACANCY” into the night. On the porch was a screen door creaking back and forth on its hinges as if begging for relief. Acid rain tinkled weakly against the corrugated tin roof.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Hotel California.” I said.

Inside, we found rusted pipes leaking raw sewage and rotting the stucco. Fungal blooms spread over paper-thin plywood with the texture of rotten leaves splintering at the softest touch. Nearly every window was boarded up over the remnants of razor-sharp glass.

We searched room to room, seeing some of the sickest things you’ve never imagined. Things that can’t be unseen. It took us almost three days to find our target. I think the New Kid must have puked twenty times during that stretch.

Sleep was damn-near impossible for a variety of reasons. The moth-eaten sheets were stained yellow, constantly and consistently damp with every body fluid imaginable.

Thanks to the AC units mounted in the walls, most of the rooms were freezing cold and when I say freezing cold I mean actual people covered in actual ice. Never thought I’d see someone with their own urine frozen in an icicle hanging from their crotch.

Some of the rooms were blazing hot, literally cooking the inhabitants alive.

“Mmm! Smells like down-home cooking!” Felix quipped as he caught a whiff of scorched human flesh.

The ice machine down the hall never actually worked until you were attempting to sleep at which point it spontaneously turned on. It wouldn’t do a damn thing when you wanted it to but it would happily and loudly make the sound of a thousand blenders grinding away at a fistful of pebbles as soon as you laid down.

The first night we were camping in one of the motel rooms when the old TV in the corner suddenly turned itself on, self-tuned those old rabbit ear antennas covered in foil, and scared the ever-loving crap out of us by blasting some repugnant program at maximum volume.

The New Kid unplugged the television from the wall, but it stayed on anyway, causing him to start pounding on it angrily.

“Kid, quit making such a damn racket.” Vasquez said.

“Okay, fine.” the New Kid huffed, throwing himself down on the bed. “So here’s a question.”

“Jerkstain, your entire life is one big fucking question.” Felix quipped.

“Where do those shows come from? Is it something the Hotel made to screw with us?”

“Actually, that is a good question.” I said, busily stripping, cleaning, and reassembling my rifle. “I’m fairly certain those shows are piped in from CRT.”

“CRT?”

“It’s another Domain in the Big Bad. Except instead of a motel imagine a sewer filled with television sets and bad wiring. All the TV channels are fucked-up versions of the worst shows ever made.”

“Yeah Dickcheese, if you survive this job maybe someday you’ll get to go there!” Felix said, holding out a flask.

The Kid ignored the jibe but accepted the flask and took a swig of whiskey.

“For example?”

“Okay, you’ve seen the show ‘Survivor?’ Now imagine it’s more like the Hunger Games except the contestants hunt and eat each other to survive.”

“Jesus…”

“Trust me Kid; you really don’t want to watch anything on that boob tube. Here’s a question for you, Kid. How’d you get into this line of work?”

“Well… I dropped out of high school and started getting into trouble, hanging out with a bad crowd. One night my gang broke into a moving van and the cops spotted us. So I ran and made it into the basement of an abandoned meat packing plant. Found a door leading to a hallway made of baby teeth. The cops following me got eaten by a monster made out of tumors and barbed wire. Bought me time to get back Topside. After that, it was only a matter of time before I found more Crashers. What about you guys?”

“Back in the day I was a long-haul trucker until I went into the wrong goddamn gas station. My partner never really came out again. I found that I’d lost the use of my legs when I dragged myself out of the Pit. I figure if I keep Crashing I’ll find a way to make them work permanently.”

“How about you?”

“Me? I’m in it for the money. Cold, hard cash. This ain’t no charity; I got bills to pay. When I do a job, I expect to get paid.” I said.

“Amen to that, brother.” Jackie said, tilting a bottle in my direction with a nod. “The bigger the paycheck the better.”

“How about you Vasquez? How’d you get into this line of work?”

“I’ve been doing this my whole life, man.” Vasquez replied.

“Say what now?”

“When I was a kid, I was a refugee. My dad brought me to the U.S. from Cuba on a raft made out of old plastic barrels he lashed together. I think I was about nine, maybe ten years old at the time.”

“You’re a Cuban?”

“Cuban-American to you, gringo. I’m a Hialeah boy, born and raised. Before ‘95, if a Cubano set foot on American soil they got the chance to apply for residency status a year later. Lucky for us, we made it ashore before we got picked up on Miami Beach. Dry-Feet, they called us.”

“Dad got a job working graveyard shift at a gas station and I started going to school. I always walked down there by myself to bring Dad a soda and we’d sit and chat for a while. One night I’m going down there right before bedtime and there’s all these police out front with that yellow crime scene tape strung up across the door. The cops say that the robbers put lit matches all over him before they killed him.” He takes a long swig from the bottle.

“So Mom couldn’t afford the rent without Dad, and after that we were sleeping rough. Couch-surfing, church pews, shelters, and sidewalks.”

“My God…” Kid said.

“God? God can’t help us, man. See, Satan led his army to storm the Gates of Heaven and drove God and the angels out. The demons smashed his palace of blue-moon marble into dust and Satan sits on the Throne of Heaven. That’s why our world is so fucked up.”

“So Dad’s spirit came to me. He was bloody and there were these tiny flames burning all over his body. He told me that demons found doors to our world. That’s why the gates keep opening, man.”

“Dad told me that he was joining God’s secret army of angels to take back Heaven. He told me that I needed to learn to fight. To stay strong and smart, so I could count on myself, no one else. To fight back against evil. So I went looking for the gates. You look hard enough and long enough, eventually you find something. And I did.”

“Man… is it worth it?” the Kid asked.

“That’s not the right question.” I said.

“Huh?”

“The real question is do you censor yourself or not?”

“What do you mean?”

“Option A: you say the things you ought to, and shut your mouth on what you actually think. You wear the clothes you’re told to wear, go where they say to go when you’re told to go there, do the things they tell you to do. In return, you get the job, the girl, the two-point-five kids, a white picket fence, and a dog. You get to eat three square meals a day, get laid occasionally, and probably enough money to get you everything you need, some of what you want, and a bed to sleep in with a roof over your head. You’re a slave but you’re comfortable.”

“Option B: you get nothing. You get fuck-all and you’ll like it because you’re free. Go where you want when you want and do what you want to do when you want to do it. Comfort means fuck-all because you’ll probably get arrested, get your head kicked in, or both.”

“So my point is do whatever you want to do because I really don’t give a shit, Kid.”

We sat there silently for the rest of the night. There was really nothing more to say.

It was the second night when the New Kid decided that he actually did want to watch something on TV. Scrambled Porn Sally was pole dancing and the fuzzy static bar was right where you didn’t want it to be.

We found the Kid staring and slack-jawed, his nose touching the flickering television screen. His eyes were watering and blood trickled from one nostril.

I shook him out of it and he mumbled a quiet “thank you.” Every so often I’d catch him stealing glances at the television when he thought I wasn’t looking.

If you were still so exhausted that none of that kept you awake, the phone rang and room service cheerfully provided a complimentary wake-up call just as you were nodding off.

Then there were the cock-roaches. Behind one door we found one of the Lost covered in chittering insects. Carnivorous, angry little bastards about three inches long and sporting chitinous dicks.

The moment it was dark the cock-roaches came scuttling out to bite a hole in your skin, pump their nasty bug-dongs in the bleeding orifice, and lay eggs in your flesh. After a few minutes, the cock-roaches deposited a load of eggs and goop into the poor bastard which then burst open and made a new swarm.

Hiding in every nook and cranny, they skittered into hiding beneath the bed and in the closet when illuminated by a flashlight mounted on the barrel of an AR-15.

The New Kid squashed a couple roaches beneath his boot and the rubber sole began to sizzle. “Damn it! That burns like battery acid!” he shouted.

“Then don’t do that.” I calmly said.

On Day Three we found a Damned that swore up and down he’d seen our target. We’d bribed him with a little baggie of black tar heroin that offered a brief respite from his torment, so we felt confident the intel was solid.

We were moving through the darkened hotel hallways, guns at the ready. The Kid was on point with Vasquez watching his back. Felix and Jackie were in the middle while I was behind the squad.

“This scary-ass motel reminds me of that movie ‘Identity’ with John Cusack. You ever see that shit?”

“Is that the one where Cusack delivers a bag to a creepy motel out in the middle of nowhere?”

“Nah, man. That’s ‘The Bagman’ but it did have a creepy motel.” he said.

“Okay, so is Identity the one where Cusack has to stay in a haunted hotel room?” Jackie asked.

“No goddammit, that’s ‘1408.’ Identity is the one where there’s like a dozen people stranded at this motel in the middle of nowhere and they start getting killed one by one.”

“Okay, first of all: why does John Cusack stay in so many scary motels?”

“Typecasting?”

“And secondly, why are we talking about this while we’re standing in the scariest motel ever?”

“Third question.” I interrupted. “Do you two ever shut up?”

We entered Room 303 and finding it completely thrashed, lingered in the doorway. Mattress slashed, threadbare blankets ripped, and every stick of furniture broken. The stench in the room was overpowering. The source was easy to spot; a cadaver lay rotting amid scattered toys on the floor.

“Rock and roll.” Felix said glibly.

We slowly searched the room.

“Dude check this out!” Felix excitedly waved his latest find: a teddy bear stitched together with human skin, complete with male genitals and real eyeballs too. Just looking at it gave me the creeps.

Giggling, Felix waved the bear inches from the Kid’s face. “Come here and let me give you a big old kiss!”

“Ugh, it’s blinking at me.” Jackie said.

“You’re coming home with me little buddy!” He stuffed the doll into his backpack.

We heard a scraping sound inside a large armoire in the corner with the doors shut. Everyone went silent immediately. Vasquez pointed his gun at it.

“Come on out of there slowly, and you won’t get shot.”

There was no noise or movement of any kind in response. Felix sighed before moving very slowly towards the armoire. He pulled the door open quickly, surprising the woman crouched inside. She was covered head-to-toe with bleeding holes from the cock-roaches.

“Climb out of there slowly, with your hands up.” Vasquez said. The woman seemed to comply with Vasquez’s order, her palms open and weaponless.

The Kid hesitated for just an instant when she sprang at him. The woman grabbed his hand, pointing the gun away from herself and he fired out of reflex, the blast ringing in our ears. He tripped over the corpse on the floor, falling backwards. His head hit the floorboards, dazing him momentarily.

She straddled him, clawing his face and howling like a banshee until Jackie stepped forward and bashed the other woman upside the head with the butt of her rifle. The woman collapsed to the floor, clutching her bleeding skull.

“Oh God, don’t kill me, don’t kill me!” she sobbed as she cowered and covered her head with both arms.

“Quiet!”

The woman shut her mouth instantly, but her body visibly trembled and her eyes welled up. Occasionally, tears ran down her face, leaving twin trails on her filthy cheeks.

“Damn guys, isn’t that a little harsh? I mean, look at her. She’s scared and she’s hurt!” said the New Kid.

“Look Kid, I explained this before but let me make it perfectly clear. She isn’t a person deserving of respect and dignity. She’s a very bad person who did very bad things and ended up in a very bad place.” I said.

“Yeah, but-“

“Everyone, and I mean everyone, in the Down Below deserves to be here. No one wakes up down here for being an atheist, or being gay, or for smoking weed when you were sixteen.” I continued.

“Every single person in the Bad Place committed at least one genuine act of pure, unmitigated evil.” I counted off a list on each finger. “Rape, murder, torture. Shoot, I’ve even been on a job to collect a Wall Street banker who stole people’s retirement accounts then blew it on hookers and cocaine.”

“The point is that they did something that caused pain and suffering to others and whatever they did was enough to earn a ticket Way Down to Hadestown.” I pointed to the woman crouched and shaking on the floor. “That includes Little Miss Sunshine here.”

“You try anything like that again, and I’ll shoot your hands off. You run, I shoot your feet. Am I making myself clear?” Jackie said to our target.

“Yes.”

“Is your name Laura?”

“Yes… how…?”

Felix gripped the woman roughly by her chin and held her face up. Vasquez pulled out the centerfold and looked back and forth from one to the other.

“That’s a positive ID on the primary target.” Vasquez said.

“Great, can we get the Hell out of here now?” said the New Kid.

“Goddammit Fucktard, we told you not to say the H-Word!” Felix yelled angrily. He grabbed the Kid by the straps of his flak jacket and shoved him back against the wall.

The New Kid stammered out an apology, but we all knew the damage had already been done. By all rights, we could have abandoned him right then and there. We could have left him to die, but for the time being, we still needed another pair of hands to finish the job.

“We need to get out. Now. We have definitely overstayed our welcome. Bag her up.” I said.

Felix and Jackie grabbed the target by the arms, holding them together and Vasquez locked handcuffs to her wrists. The Kid shoved a black bag over the target’s head despite her protests.

Prize in hand, we made our way out of the motel room just as fast as we could.

----------

At long last we made it to a stretch of blacktop. Abandoned vehicles filled the road and we cautiously threaded our way around them. Each vehicle was rusted or gutted, and most of them had corpses for passengers. The Damned turned their rotting heads to watch us pass, reaching weakly out to grab us.

Dead weeds stuck up wherever they could find purchase in the cracks. We found that the road had been melted, cooled, and reformed. Several Damned had been submerged in the asphalt, arms outstretched as if surfacing from beneath a pool of black oil. Their cries were muffled but still audible. There were impressions left behind in the asphalt after it had released its prizes to the scavengers who came later.

“Hey, do you hear that?” Jackie asked.

“Hear what?” said the New Kid.

“Sounds like something scraping on metal. Listen. It’s coming from over there.”

Obscured by the tinted windows of a camper shell, something moved in the back of a rusted pickup sitting up on cinder blocks. The New Kid crept slowly up to the back of the truck and dropped the tailgate.

A sleek, obsidian hound with a human head launched itself out of the back of the truck. Its fur was black and glistening, with a body built for speed like a greyhound but with the face of a man. It opened its disjointed jaw and roared like a mountain lion, revealing rows of serrated shark teeth.

Like a heat-seeking missile, it hurtled itself at the Kid with every intention of clamping its jaws around his throat. He brought his arm up to block the hound’s attack and the beast locked its fang-filled maw around his limb.

The creature snarled, shaking the Kid like a rag doll, intent on tearing his arm off in a gout of blood. Claws tore his clothing, and the Kid screamed in pain as triangular teeth began to puncture holes in the flesh of his arm.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a short length of wood. He scrambled for it in the dust with his left hand while the dog savaged his right arm. The New Kid finally managed to wrap his hand around the sturdy board and brought it down on the canine’s square-shaped head in a sweeping arc. There was a loud crack as the board connected, but he could’ve been smacking it with a flyswatter for all the good it did. He struck the sharkdog in its human-shaped face with the board over and over again. The New Kid tried shoving the end into the monster’s mouth to pry it open, but the beast refused to release his bleeding arm.

The moment I saw an opening I shoved my old Ka-Bar knife right into the side of its head. The beast shuddered and died, collapsing in a heap on top of the Kid. He wiped blood and gore off his face and looked up with bleary eyes.

“Told you not to use the H-Word.” I said.

We stopped beside a rusting Quonset hut for a quick break. Jackie dug around in her backpack for a pack of smokes and her lighter. Felix went to take a leak on the other side of the building.

I took a swig from my canteen. The water in the canteen had a sharp taste of iodine from the purification pills I’d dropped in: not unexpected from reclaimed water, but always tough to stomach.

Vasquez sat the package down beside the Quonset and removed her hood long enough for me to give Laura a drink of water. She gulped it down gratefully before we replaced the hood on her head.

I mentally inventoried the remaining water. We all had plastic bottles in our packs plus had the canteen on my hip. I’d read somewhere that the best place to store water was inside ourselves. While I understood that intellectually, I couldn’t help but be daunted at the prospect of making our way across the desert without any water tucked away for later.

Rations were running low too.

We were still many miles away from an exit Topside, and the Bad Place was always full of surprises.

“Hey Garrett. Got a minute?” Vasquez beckoned me over to the side of the building. “You know what I just realized?” he asked.

“That simultaneous revelations aren’t a thing?”

Vasquez leaned in to whisper in my ear. “We are now standing in the Tollway.”

“Route 666?” I asked.

He nodded. “I didn’t recognize it before because there’s no tollbooth and no signs. But one of us is going to pay the toll. You know who I mean.”

I looked over at the New Kid. He was nursing a knot on the back of his head and his face was still all scratched up from Laura’s fingernails. The New Kid removed the sopping bandage wrapped around his arm. The wound where the sharkdog had bit him was black with infected tissue.

Together, we coldly calculated his chances of survival and came up short.

The New Kid was taking a leak on the side of a rusted Quonset hut while Vasquez and I decided his fate.

Rumbling engine noises heralded the arrival of a flat-black sedan on the horizon. A vehicle of generic make and model, the police cruiser had clearly driven through “You-Know-Where” and come out on the other side.

Jackie and Felix grabbed our target and the five of us hustled behind the Quonset, hiding as quick as we could and praying we weren’t seen. The New Kid wasn’t so lucky. The dumb fuck stood there with his dick in his hands and didn’t notice the police cruiser until it was too late.

The battle-scarred vehicle came to a stop, engine idling. The dented drivers’ side door opened and a bipedal male wearing a khaki uniform emerged from the dark interior of the cab. At first glance he may even have passed for human except that every inch of skin was horribly burnt and mutilated. Steel-toed boots crunched on the gravel as he approached.

The Trooper peered at the Kid through his mirrored aviator sunglasses. One hand rested on the nightstick tucked into his belt.

Unsure what to expect, I kept my hand near my pistol just in case.

“You live around here, boy?”

“No sir. Just passing through and found the place like this.”

“I find out you’re lying to me, we’re going to have a problem, boy.”

“Understood.” Every now and then, I caught a glimpse of scarred flesh beneath his shirt.

“Alright then. Just so long as we have an understanding between us.” The Trooper looked around at the horizon almost as if he’d forgotten he was in the middle of a conversation. His gaze settled back on the Kid. “What’s your name, son?”

“My name?”

“Don’t play dumb now.”

Without warning the Trooper pulled a baton from his belt and smashed the Kid with a merciless blow. He doubled over in pain, clutching his belly.

The Trooper loomed over the Kid, lightly smacking the baton in the palm of his palm.

“Looks like you in a heap of trouble here, boy.” the Trooper said with a pronounced Southern accent. He pronounced “here” like “he-ah.”

“You look healthy, don’t have the shakes. No sir, I can tell just from lookin’ at you. You a young man, your back is strong, and you got all your parts in working order, yes sir. You got your whole life in front of you. Seems to me you’ll make a fine slave.”

“You’re gonna dig for us with your bare hands, until your skin is gone, and you dig until your finger bones are worn down to lil’ nubbins. Yessuh, and I’m gonna beat you so bad you’re gonna thank me for the privilege of diggin’.”

The Trooper raised the baton to smash the Kid over the head.

Shots rang out as I unloaded my Glock 9mm into the Trooper’s head, blasting him over and over again. Bullets shattered his aviator shades and tore holes in his khaki uniform before the Trooper fell to the ground. We ran up and Jackie fired her shotgun point-blank into the Trooper’s face before checking on the Kid.

“That seems like overkill, Jackie.” I said with a smirk.

“Overkill is nothing but a word.”

“That stick looks like lacquered hickory but felt like rebar covered in nettles.” The Kid hissed.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here. If one Trooper found us, more are on the way.” I said.

The crew hurried into the Cruiser while the target went into the trunk like a piece of luggage.

“Buckle up.”

“I don’t want to.” the New Kid pouted.

That nasally whine was the last straw. Ice water flowed through my veins. It must have showed on my face because when he saw my expression he recoiled.

“I don’t give a fuck what you want. I ain’t your brother, I ain’t your dad. Lately I ain’t even a nice person. If you don’t do what I say when I say I will knock you the fuck out and make it happen. Now buckle the fuck up.”

He buckled up.

I shifted the police cruiser into drive and stomped on the gas. Nothing happened. “No.” I stomped on it again, shouting louder each time. “No, no, no! I do not believe this horseshit!”

“Is it a Ford?” Felix joked.

Aggravated, my forehead hit the steering wheel. The Troopers were bearing down on us fast. I stomped down on the gas out of frustration and the Cruiser lurched forward. Surprised, I looked up and the vehicle died again, whiplashing our necks. “What the-?”

I closed my eyes, gripped the wheel, and stepped on the gas. The Cruiser moved forward slowly.

“Guys, you’re not going to like this.”

An hour later and my heart was still hammering in my chest and I was white-knuckling the wheel. Vasquez sat right beside me, giving me directions as I drove pedal-to-the-metal with my eyes shut tight.

Bullets pinged off our vehicle and I ducked out of reflex. I could barely hear the gunshots over the roaring engines and police sirens.

“Can’t this piece of shit go any faster?!” Jackie screamed inches from my ear. Jackie turned in her seat, firing a few potshots at the other cruiser.

Felix rooted around in the Army surplus duffel bag and pulled a homemade pipe bomb from the bottom. He lit the fuse with a cheap gas station lighter, let it cook for a moment, then lobbed it out the window at our pursuers.

His throw fell short, and the pipe bomb landed in the middle of the road.

Whether it was Luck or Fate or God deciding to finally give us a break, the second cop car drove over top of the pipe bomb, straddling it with all four tires before it went off.

The police cruiser lifted off the ground, bursting into flame and sending two Troopers screaming into oblivion.

“Keep driving, let’s get as many miles away from here as we can before this thing runs out of gas.” Vasquez instructed.

The sun was setting, and already a cold wind was sweeping down from the hills. Within an hour the temperature would drop by fifty degrees. Sleeping in the exposed cab of the police cruiser would prove to be a very uncomfortable option that night.

And the next night.

And the next.

Four of us left the New Kid hogtied and blubbering in the middle of the road. None of us said a word about it, but we all knew our offering was accepted because we found an exit Topside within an hour.

To this day, I don’t know what dragged him screaming into the desert. But the toll had to be paid.

----------

We delivered the package to a seedy film studio on the outskirts of Las Vegas, Nevada. On the soundstage was a set built out of plywood and made to look like a teen girl’s bedroom: painted pink and full of stuffed dolls. Stage lights hung from metal bars where the room’s ceiling should be, and several cameras were aimed at the bed from different angles.

We were escorted by a couple of hired goons. Low-rent thugs with chrome-played Glocks tucked in the waistband of their jeans.

Vasquez led the way past the stage lights and cameras. Jackie and I flanked the package, while Felix rolled behind with a sawed-off shotgun cradled in his lap.

“You know what the worst job here would be?” Felix asked.

“What?” I sighed.

“Janitor. Can you imagine cleaning this place every night? ‘Excuse me sir, can you lift your feet? I’m trying to mop here’.”

“Jesus, Felix.” I laughed. I couldn’t help it.

“Every night you have to clean it! You can’t imagine the smell!”

“Sure I can.” Jackie retorted. “Like a warm turtle tank probably.”

Felix chortled loudly.

Our customer was a loathsome weasel named Bob Gunkel. He was fat, slowly sliding his way to four hundred pounds. He came out of his office wearing a Hawaiian shirt with huge sweat stains under his pits. He wiped cheese puff dust off his hands, leaving long orange fingerprints on his khakis. The very sight of him made my skin crawl.

“Well? Did you bring her back to me?”

Vasquez pulled the black bag off the package’s head.

“You did it! I have to admit, I had my doubts when I heard you could bring her back but you actually did it!” Gunkel caressed her with his meaty fingers and the expression on his face looked like he was already creaming his pants. She flinched away, but we’d kept the ankle chains and handcuffs on for a reason.

“Laura, sweet Laura, I know I got carried away the last time we were together, but I promise you this time is going to be different!”

Vasquez gripped my arm before I even realized my fist was clenched.

“Sir, not to interrupt, but if you’ll just pay us our fee we’ll be on our way and leave you two alone together.”

“Of course!” He snapped his fingers and one of the goons retrieved a couple of greasy fast food sacks, handing them to Vasquez.

Vasquez checked the paper bags and the wads of cash inside. Jackie and I watched the goon squad to see if their hands moved towards their pistols.

“Are we good?” Gunkel asked.

Everyone held their breath for a moment.

“Yeah, we’re good.” Vasquez said. “Let’s move out, team.”

“You lovebirds have a real nice time now, y’hear!” Felix called on the way out.

Later that night we were sitting in a strip club called Sin Bragas working our way through our second bottle of Don Julio Blanco.

On the asphalt, neon-drenched streets of Topside, we're nothings and nobodies. Between the fast food and taxes, the bad gas station coffee and the past-due child support payments, we’re just pieces of soiled human garbage. In a world of drugs, traffic, radio, politics, smoke and mirrors, we’re little more than dirty, disposable pawns.

Yet amongst the freak show outlaws and leather-clad outcasts, the occult cabals and deranged sickos, the demon summoners, the adrenaline junkies, and conspiracy nuts who make up the heart of the Hades-diving fringe, we’re death-defying, bigger-than-life rock stars.

Every form of fame has its own form of groupies. There are women who sent marriage proposals to Ted Bundy when he was on Death Row, for God’s sake.

Most of us had a scantily-clad woman hanging on an arm or crawling in our lap. Jackie was busy showing off her new tattoo, flexing biceps as big as my head. Her upper arm shined with fresh ink depicting a sexy Devil Girl straddling a black spade with the number “13” in racecar red.

“Well, I gotta go drop the kids off at the pool. Felix said.

Vasquez rolled his eyes and jerked a thumb towards the hallway behind him. Felix rolled his wheelchair to the men’s room. I followed.

When I stepped into the men’s room Felix was pounding on the handicap stall door. “As if my life wasn’t hard enough!” Felix shouted.

I was standing at the urinal when one of the local yokels came in. I recognized him as the hillbilly at the bar telling racist jokes to the stone-faced bartender.

Now, every man knows that there are unspoken rules of men’s room etiquette. When you’re first and there are multiple urinals on the wall, you’re supposed to take the spot furthest from the door. When you come in second, you take the spot furthest from the first guy. What you don’t do, what you never, ever, ever do is stand at the urinal directly adjacent to the first man. That’s a surefire path to an ass-kicking in my book. Of course, this mullet-wearing motherfucker decided to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with me.

“You guys are Hellcrashers, aren’t you?” he asked.

I didn’t respond.

“Dude, you guys just go down to Hell, kick Satan in the balls, and rescue the souls of big-tittied single moms. Man, that’s fucking awesome. “What’s it like being a Hellcrasher, bro?”

“Ever hear the one about the guy who wouldn’t shut the fuck up with his dick in his hand?” I curtly replied without looking at him.

“Um, no?”

I reached up and grabbed the hair on the back of his head then slammed him face-first into the tile. His nose broke and he crumpled like a wet paper sack, hitting his chin on the urinal on the way down to the floor. I hosed him down with the contents of my bladder for good measure.

“That’s what it’s like.”

I was washing my hands when I heard Felix shouting.

“Hey! Can somebody toss me some toilet paper? I’m all out of shit tickets over here!”

I left the club without a word.

#hellcrashers #fiction #Not pathfinder

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furnituresmarket · 4 years ago

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#Wood Products #Wood #wooden flooring

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siribear · 4 years ago

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dear claire,

she stares at the handwriting she’s become familiar with, with a particular scrutiny. his letter is much too soon. normally, they’d come after a few weeks. maybe a month, if his regiment was on the move. but she just sent off own letter the other day. no way he’s gotten it so soon. and yet.

i know this letter is early. no kidding. but i couldn’t wait for yours to arrive. you’ll have to forgive me for putting this in writing.

claire brushes a stray strand of hair behind her ear and forces herself to sit still in her chair. her roommate is already squirming in her own seat, waiting for her reaction.

if i know you, you’re waiting for me to get to the point. but first, tell rachel i said hello. she does, and her roommate’s smile only grows wider. so, whatever this is, she’s in on it. i’m coming home soon. within the month. but that’s not why i’m writing. claire only realizes she’s biting her nails when she begins to taste nail polish. claire, i want to start a family. with you. i know this is sudden. but i wanted to give you some time to consider. i’ll - and here the handwriting shifts. still his, but rougher. - understand if you say no.

i can’t wait to see you. i love you.

nathaniel ward.

she reads it. and reads it again. and once more, before she shoots up from her seat, letter still in her hand, eyes boring into the paper.

‘so?’ rachel asks, sing-song.

‘rachel, find my stationary, please,’ claire responds, eyes not leaving the letter. rachel bolts from her chair and runs into their room. she returns carrying a piece of paper and pen.

claire sits, turns back to their kitchen table. a family.

dear nate, she writes.

start thinking up names.

i love you.

claire (soon-to-be) ward.

‘that vault up there has quite the interesting history,’ deacon says, after they’ve had their breakfast in her kitchen.

whisper blinks at him from across the kitchen table. ‘and what’s that?’

he leans forward, elbows on the table like her mother hated. ‘never been opened. everyone knows about the other vaults in the commonwealth, but 111?’ he clicks his tongue. ‘nothing.’

she frowns. ‘you want to go vault diving?’

‘i would, but it’s locked up. no one’s ever been able to get in, either.’

she shrugs. ‘as long as monsters don’t come out of it, it doesn’t matter to me. wonder what’s down there, though.’ she avoids his gaze, looking down at her pipboy, pretending to double-triple check their next destination.

deacon chuckles. ‘yeah, i wonder.’

preston approaches them before they leave, giving deacon a casual nod. ‘if i could talk to the general for a moment, uh, dingo?’ whisper nods, and deacon strolls over to dogmeat to play fetch, pretending he’s not going to be listening to their conversation anyway.

‘is everything okay, preston?’ she asks with a hand on her hip. she knows she’s been gone longer than she’s been here, leaving preston in charge of sanctuary and the budding minutemen. but he’s built them up well. even a few of the newer faces are dressed uniformly, carrying their own laser muskets.

he tears his gaze away from dogmeat bowling into deacon. ‘more than fine, general. in fact, with the other settlements you’ve established, we’re having trouble communicating with them all. it’s a good problem to have,’ he assures her. ‘the only way we can get further word out right now is from carla; she’s the only caravan that’s come this far up north. otherwise, i’ve sent out one of our newer scouts, but it’s not ideal.’

‘so we need a way to communicate more easily. like - another radio station? broadcast updates on each settlement so we know if anyone needs help or extra supplies.’ she looks up at him and his bright eyes. ‘you have a plan.’

‘i do.’ he practically vibrates with an excitement she never saw in him, weeks ago. at least, not before she agreed to help him. he’s a far cry from when they first met. ‘the minutemen used to have another headquarters, far out east. before the war, it was called fort independence. but we knew it as the castle.’

she has a vague image in her head of fort independence. too much information crammed into her head in college now useless and discarded. that, and she and nate hardly traveled far from boston’s city limits. ‘used to. what happened to it?’

he grimaces. ‘they say a monster from the sea breached the walls. all anyone knows is, most of the minutemen leadership died.’ he drops his gaze, voice going thoughtful. ‘i think that’s where all of our problems began.’

‘a... sea monster?’

‘uh, yes. but i think if we retake the castle and reestablish radio freedom, we stand a better chance of keeping our allies, and the greater commonwealth, safe.’

she blinks. ‘a sea monster,’ she repeats. ‘okay. that sounds reasonable - ’

he steps closer. ‘should i have a group meet us outside the castle?’

‘ - but i think we’ll have to table it, for now.’ she watches his enthusiasm fade. ‘preston, it’s a great idea, don’t get me wrong. but if there is some... giant sea monster, it doesn’t do the minutemen any good if both of us die taking back the place. train up a few more people. i’m going to clear out sunshine tidings co-op, make a few more... stops.’ she chances a gaze at deacon, sitting on the side of the road rubbing dogmeat’s belly. ‘and we’ll come back to this, okay?’

he salutes her. ‘yes, ma’am.’

whisper frowns. ‘hey.’ she gently lowers his hand from the salute. ‘i’m sorry i haven’t been around. but you and the others are doing a wonderful job here. we’ll take the castle, i just have a few loose ends to tie up before i throw myself at a sea monster.’

preston squeezes her hand. ‘yes, ma’am,’ he says again, softer.

she withdraws, slowly. ‘i should go get de-dingo. he gets restless.’ she turns to see deacon tying what looks like a third bandanna around dogmeat’s neck, to complement the small pair of welder’s goggles upon his head. preston keeps his eyes on her. ‘i’ll try to be back soon.’

he steps away. ‘stay safe, general.’

‘what do you know about the castle?’ whisper asks deacon along the way to the co-op.

‘a lot of your people - minutemen,’ he clarifies, ‘died there. it’s a mirelurk nesting ground now.’

she hums. ‘those would be the sea monsters preston mentioned, then.’ she rubs at her eyes. ‘great.’

they cross a bridge over to the co-op, weaving around abandoned cars. he helps her over a barricade as the first set of buildings looms over the hill. a short gravel path leads them up a hill into the co-op proper. wind blows heavily through the co-op, kicking up dirt from the expansive planting grounds that surround a large barn.

the puttering sound of an approaching mister handy prompts them to draw their weapons. the robot stops in front of them, seems to look them over, then, in a rough voice, says, ‘groovy,’ long, drawn-out, and airy, and floats away.

whisper lowers her gun. ‘deacon, what just happened?’

‘you take me to the best places, partner,’ he says, grinning.

in the barn, she accesses the logs on a dusty computer. ‘oh wow,’ she whispers. then laughs. ‘this was a hippie commune, pre-war. they... stole and reprogrammed a mister handy. they, uh, named him professor goodfeels. i guess that’s where the graffiti comes from.’ she waves a hand toward the wall and the painted free the robots on a piece of plywood. she turns to deacon. ‘origins of the railroad?’

she imagines he rolls his eyes at her. ‘funny. this place is... mostly quiet. wonder why no one’s picked this place back up since.’

‘you’re the intel guy.’ she pulls herself away from the terminal. ‘shall we see why?’

they see why. beginning at the first house, they explore counter-clockwise around the co-op, clearing out the feral ghouls sleeping in the buildings. in a far building, up another hill, they find the first body that isn’t a skeleton. someone else apparently had the same idea as the minutemen, but didn’t survive the ferals. the mess hall completes their circle in addition to housing another group of ferals, easily sniped through the broken windows. radio beacon up, whisper returns to the terminal.

‘what to do with the professor?’ there’s a few options listed on the terminal: return for repairs, guard protocols, and... just be.

‘i say leave him. if anything, he’s good for a laugh.’ on cue, professor goodfeels floats by with a slurred whoa man.

whisper sighs. ‘people are going to think we’re crazy.’

‘maybe that’s my plan. discredit the minutemen with beatnik mister handys.’

deacon suggests they head back to hq to see if there’s anything else that needs doing. now that the railroad has another heavy, it’s only fair they take on another job so glory can have a day off. besides, she can check in at goodneighbor along the way, see if hancock has found anything on kellogg. they head west across the commonwealth, traveling north of boston and weaving south of lexington. deacon draws her into the shadows near the corvega factory, and they pass by without incident.

that is, until the sound of gunfire brings them to the outskirts of the town. curious, whisper grabs deacon by the wrist and pulls him against the side of a building. ‘sure you want to do this?’ he asks over her shoulder. ‘looks like gunners got someone pinned down there.’

she peeks around the corner. ‘close to bunker hill, aren’t they? maybe it’s a caravan in danger.’

‘not the gunner MO, partner. behind that car.’ he points, and she sees it, a head poking out behind a rusted bumper.

whisper squints. ‘hang on. that’s - that’s maccready.’

‘the merc that hangs around goodneighbor? what’d he do to the gunners?’

‘doesn’t matter.’ she crouches, edges around the building to get closer to the gunners. a bullet whizzes past her, flying off down the road. too close. ‘deacon.’

she feels, doesn’t see, deacon’s rifle lower next to her. ‘one on the right is mine.’

whisper aims deliverer at the left gunner. near the hip, just below the plating of his combat armor. the gunners don’t notice them, too busy aiming at maccready. she counts down from three. in sync, they fire. deacon’s gunner goes down in a shower of red, head missing. hers shouts, drops his gun, and grabs at the hole in his hip. the third gunner only has a chance to look at his comrade before deacon finishes him off. her gunner falls to his knees. she finishes him off with one more quick shot.

‘you good?’ she nods, rising. he puts a hand on her shoulder, stilling her. ‘don’t be so quick to rise above cover, there. never know if there are more. or a sniper.’

she remains in her crouch, at that, his hand still on her shoulder. one moment passes. another. then, ‘boss? did i hit you?’ maccready yells, his voice growing closer. deacon releases her then, using the same hand to help her up.

‘i’m okay, maccready.’ she gestures at the dead gunners behind him. ‘this have anything to do with those two at the third rail?’

‘winlock and barnes? yeah, guess someone saw me picking around the commonwealth.’ he sighs. ‘gunners don’t like it when their people leave and start taking jobs away from them.’

‘huh,’ she says. ‘so they’re going to hound you until... what? they bring you back in?’

maccready laughs, bitter. ‘i doubt that. they’ll kill me and be done with it. i hoped to buy them out before that. get them off my back.’

‘good luck with that,’ deacon pipes up.

‘what can i do?’ she asks him.

his eyes widen in surprise. ‘what?’

‘i’m offering to help you, maccready. you already have most of my caps, though. what else can we do?’

‘i know where they’re stationed,’ he says quickly, as if she’s going to take it back. he looks between her and deacon. ‘mass pike interchange. there’s a lift up to the interchange, that’s where they’re stationed.’

‘what kind of resistance are we looking at, maccready?’ deacon eyes him.

maccready winces. ‘a dozen or more gunners, plus defensive turrets. barnes usually wears a suit of power armor.’ he pauses. ‘and an assaultron.’

‘jesus,’ deacon curses under his breath. ‘you really want to do this?’

whisper shrugs. ‘he’s in danger unless we do. i’m sorry, i know you said - ’

‘glory hates days off anyway,’ he finishes. ‘any plans?’

‘we’re three snipers,’ she says. ‘and maccready knows the layout. we hit them before they can hit us.’

#siri drabbles #oc: alice ward #series: we will all go together when we go #hey maccready is back

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plyneer · 2 months ago

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mrswoodcraft · 1 year ago

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Exquisite Plywood: MRS Woodcraft - Leading Manufacturers in Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, and UP

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mcrmadness · 5 years ago

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Funny how seagulls always remind me of summer so much. They arrived back to Finland a few weeks ago and every time I sit at my computer at night while having my window open and hear them scream, it reminds me of summer and somehow I’m super excited for the summer. I don’t even have any plans but I’m just so excited because this is going to be the first summer in years that I can finally spend at home, and the whole summer and not just a few weeks of it (even tho the Finnish summer usually lasts only about 2-4 months, depending on what kind of weather decides to stop over Finland that year). It’s currently still spring in Finland, the trees don’t even have their leaves so it will take a few weeks before the actual summer weather comes here (if it comes anyway).

So many summers I’ve slept on my couch because it’s too warm to sleep in my bed (except for last year, it was pretty cold so that I could sleep in my bed the whole summer) and just the sounds that come from outside at night are so relaxing. My personal favourite is the birds, not necessarily seagulls as they’re sometimes so damn loud, but the smaller birds. They always become quiet for couple of hours at night and then they start singing around 3-4am again, that is just one of the best sounds of summer for me. I’m usually up at that time, too.

The summer in Finland is so short anyway but it’s kinda special because it never gets dark. Tourists who come to Finland often find it difficult to sleep because it looks like it’s daytime 24/7. Sometimes it annoys me too, but I kinda love those few weeks when you can’t know if the time is 6pm or 1am because it’s pretty much as bright at both times. And I love that smell of summer nights. It always just feels like it goes by so fast that it makes me sad already in July when I notice the nights getting darker. It’s also weird because I’m a nightowl, I do have a fear of darkness but I still get annoyed every spring when it starts getting brighter every morning because the nights feel so much shorter and I feel like I don’t have enough time for myself because it means the world is starting to wake up soon. The length of darkness during winter nights is what I love too, but I don’t like how dark also they days are, and how little daylight we get (in my area during the darkest months it’s about 5-6h/day, it’s shorter to further up north you go and at certain point sun doesn’t rise at all; and during summer it’s the opposite - the sun does not set at all in Lapland, there’s literally this phenomenon called a midnight sun).

So the thought of upcoming summer is making me happy now. Mainly because the summer is not here yet so I don’t need to feel sad for it going by already. I know it happens super fast when it finally is summer but right now I just feel like I’m enjoying this and I’ll probably remember to enjoy the summer too.

Like I said, for so many years I haven’t been able to spend the whole summer just at home doing nothing, because I’ve been studying and working. And normally I had summer holidays for about 2-3 weeks but the last time I had an actual summer holiday was in... 2016, I think. In 2017 I had 3 weeks off from work, but those were not the best because on the first week I had to go to a dentist and take so much antibiotics for that, that it upset my whole system and I was sick for a week because of my stomach; on the second week I was to school then and of course I caught a flu from there and the last holiday week I spent sick. And then I went back to work and I was still mildly sick but not so much that I couldn’t have continued working. And in 2018 I didn’t have summer holiday because I knew that my work and school were going to end in the Autumn and we had lot of stuff to do at work so I felt like I can do this because I’ll be getting lots of free time after October. So I worked through the whole summer. And then I spent the whole winter just recovering from 5 years of studying and working and trying to focus on my mental health more from that on. Last year then I thought I was going to finally have summer for myself only but nope, I was persuaded by a couple of people to go to work for them (or it was through employer agency so no actual paid job) and I agreed, and that’s where I was spending the summer, then. And I quit in August because of stress and so many other things that were way too overwhelming to me and well, it was already August and the summer started to go to end already. I hope this summer will be bit better than this and I can enjoy the sounds of summer nights while watching TV while it’s bright as day outside. My personal favourite from the sounds btw is the sounds coming from the plywood factory nearby - which btw sometimes also has this smell of warm wood which is also one of my favorite smells and I could take that smell as an air refreshner just anytime :D (I don’t use them actually because they smell terrible, but if there was one with warm wood, I’d be sold immediately.)

Seagulls also remind me of this ice cream kiosk in my town. I visited that probably only twice last year because of how cold it was and I freeze easily already and I don’t like eating ice cream (or anything too cold) unless it’s actually a warm weather. Btw, do seagulls live everywhere or only near places with water? I don’t know because my town is literally in the middle of one of the Finland’s biggest lakes so we always have all kinds of (fresh) water birds here and I just one day started wondering that are these birds actually found from cities without bigger lakes, too...

#mcrmadness' random stuff #finland

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boogiewrites · 6 years ago

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Reports & Repertoire 11

Characters: Eddie Brock x Venom x Candace Miller (OFC)

Word Count: 6000

Summary: Candy’s ego leads her to make a bad decision. This leads Venom having to reveal himself to save her. How will she react to finding out her new romance has been a threesome she had no clue about?

Warnings/Tags: Language. Violence. Fighting. Venom being the best wingman ever. Venom saving the day. Candy coming to terms with Eddie being the weirdest groupon ever. Candy is the coolest and most reasonable cucumber.

Click on my icon then go to Mobile Masterlist in my bio for my other works and chapters. (Had to do this since Tumblr killed links, sorry.)

Candy and Eddie had fallen in a nice flow of come and go with each other. They had been right, being able to reach out and simply ask for the other was working well. He'd slept over at her place, she'd slept over at his, meeting up for meals and even a late night quickie in her office once was holding up pretty well for them so far. They were busy, but they were happy.

Venom kept nagging Eddie, threatening to show himself so he would tell her about him. Venom was growing very impatient and Eddie took to spending more time in public with Candy instead of nights in to avoid this happening as long as he could. He kept Venom fed in the meantime as best he could, and that was the most helpful thing he could've done for himself. This didn't stop the insults from coming though.

"Coward." Venom would whisper into his ear as he left Candy's place.

"Shut up." Eddie would groan.

"Chicken. Weakling. Pussy. Wimp. Baby." he'd nag.

"I get it you got a fuckin' thesaurus." Eddie sighs. He knew he was right but he was so happy, and Candy was happy and he didn't want to lose it. He didn't know if he could lose it again. But as he does, Venom pushes him to be better. He wasn't just Eddie anymore, he was Venom and together they could be so much more than they had been apart. And that fear of being alone was useless now.

"If you'd told her before you got together this wouldn't be an issue. You're acting like a jerk again. A liar. A dumb ass. It wasn't a big secret and now it is something you are keeping from her. Now you are breaking her trust. And it will be all your fault if she leaves us. Again. You're doing this to yourself, Eddie. You cannot learn your lesson can you?" Venom hisses and judges.

"I'll tell her when it's a good time to tell her. She's in the middle of a big story right now, I don't wanna throw her off her game."

"You are a cur. You should not lie to her like this."

"Oh you've got the fancy words out now." he rolls his eyes.

"Distraction. Excuses." Venom spits out.

"Are you just jealous? You want to be able to be with her too? That it?"

"No. I'm disappointed in you." he rumbles out and he knows Eddie feels it within himself too. ------

Both Eddie and Steph both were loving Candy's new place. It was better than what either of them had. Eddie was paying off back logged bills still and Steph still at her same job weren't in a position to move up so soon. Candy was happy to share with both of them, they house sat when she wasn't there and helped keep her company in the quiet neighborhood when the other wasn't around. It had even worked out by accident that Eddie and Steph had been staying over at the same time on a few occasions, which no one seemed to mind as they soon found their missing of Candy and potential for eye-rolling level jokes were strongly shared between them.

Candace had been deep in an investigation for a fighting ring. WIth her new platform she was ready to get back to her first social injustice she focused on, the homeless, and give a platform for awareness to it. She had assisstants and PA's that helped her go to and from places, recording and scouting and general snooping of suspected areas of interest. It wasn't unusual for local gangs to run drugs through the homeless areas of the Mission, this had been going on for a long time. Street corners with members rubbing elbows with tech start ups on the same street made for an interesting mix. This apparently had led to another case of exploiting the homeless. With promises of money or drugs, they would be lured into old warehouses or abandoned lots, where members would watch them fight for whatever was up for grabs. It was a dangerous job, but the cops were only interested in drug money, they didn't care about the people. Candy did. She caught wind from one of her informants at the shelter about a meetup spot that had been used more than once. So she sees an opportunity. With the sun still up she figures it's safer. Armed with a phone set to send out 911 texts and call emergency services with the tap of a button and a gun she'd recently trained and licensed in a holster under her shirt, she felt ready to take on another big bad.

She didn't want to endanger any of her employees or coworkers, she would've felt entirely guilty and responsible, so she calls up Eddie to see if he's up for some good old fashion detective work.It's a Sunday and that usually meant a travel day, prep day or meeting a deadline for Eddie. She tells him she has a lead, that she doesn't want to wait for it to get cold and is gonna check it out and asks if he's interested. He doesn't think much of her vagueness, she usually was when it came to work since they dealt with sensitive information. So as he's trying to complete an article draft to send it before midnight, he grumbles and tells her he can't, that he needs to finish up but he'll call her later. Without being offended, Candy tells him she'll just text him after she's finished, that she'd be near his neck of the woods anyway. He agrees with a soft smile and a heavy sigh, wishing he could go out and get his hands dirty with her instead of being stuck inside working with an increasingly hungry symbiote.

So Candy makes the decision to go alone. She gives Steph all her information as to where she'd be going and she is not happy about it. She lectures her and tells her she's being reckless, that if one of her people tried to do this she'd give them hell. But she doesn't listen, Candy is tenacious and when she feels those she cares about are at stake, and her inflated ego from her recent successes, she leaves anyway.

She circles the old warehouse, surrounded by desolate and decaying buildings with for lease signs on them. Broken windows and overgrown parking lots, the only thing she sees besides her were stray dogs and birds, she walks confidently, hand on her phone in her pocket and starts to close in on the specific building. She finds an old busted service door, a large piece of plywood over it that had recently been moved, the dust and debris around it was ddisturbed and the door behind it was ajar. She moves it just enough to get through. The metal door is heavy and scrapes the ground, uneven on its warped hinges as she makes her way into the tall, hollow beige painted brick building. Windows with lots of tiny panes, many broken with no particular rhyme or reason let in more light into the space. She sees rooms that used to be offices, for she's guessing was a factory of some sort. Over turned filing cabinets and paper garbage line the cement block walls with their single, wide windows to see through. The wire lined glass made it hold together for the most part, but it'd been smashed many times over. She guessed by the metal trashcan that lay on its side a few feet away. The usual graffiti, some gang-related, some teens drawing dicks and writing 'hail satin' unironically cover the inside walls. The ground is damp in spots, leaves, and puddles, papers, condoms and drug paraphernalia are littered about. She watches for syringes and plastic baggies, stips of rubber and spoons, remnants of busted glass pipes crunch under her feet. She moves to the center of the room, a large circle spray painted very roughly lays in the middle. She walks it, taking pictures with her phone, noting the blood splatters within it, the abandoned bloodied clothes and the signs of struggle among the lines of upright and strewn crates and boxes that surround the circle. There was definitely something going on here. But she didn't have enough evidence to really do anything about it. As she takes pictures, her phone buzzes. It'd been a few hours now since she'd called Eddie that afternoon, she answers quietly as she sees it's him.

"Hey." she whispers.

"Hey. Why are you whispering?" he whispers back.

"I'm at the spot I was talking about."

"That still doesn't answer my question." he snarks.

"I can't see outside so I don't want anyone to know I'm in here." she says obviously, walking back towards the door.

"You trespassing?" his voice inflects.

"Well duh." she says with a roll of her eyes

"Candy are you there by yourself?" he asks more seriously.

"Yeah, no one else could come-"

"Get out of there now." he says sternly.

"I'm leaving, I just wanted pictures. I needed some sort of evidence." she retorts.

"Candy I swear to god, you get out of there now and go home or I'm gonna come get you myself."

He doesn't hear her respond.

"Candy?" he asks more panicked.

He hears a rustling sound.

"Someone's outside." he hears her whisper much lower. She'd ran into one of the abandoned offices, barricaded herself in an old coat closet where the smell was bad enough to make her gag.

"You in trouble? I'll call someone. You okay?"

"I don't know who it is. I gotta go. They can't know I'm here." she says curtly and hangs up.

"Don't you fuckin' hang up on me!" he shouts and is met with the beep of a disconnected line. "GODDAMMIT!" he shouts, eyes shifting quickly over his apartment.

"Where is she?" Venom asks.

"I don't...I don't remember...did she say?" his voice fast and high pitched.

"No. Who would know?" he asks, trying to hide how nervous Eddie was making him.

"Stephanie. Steph would know." he says in an almost slurred risen voice as he punches her contact information.

"Steph? Where the fuck is Candy?"

"Her dumbass went to an abandoned warehouse for some fight club thing." she says with an annoyed sigh.

"AND YOU LET HER?!" he shouts.

"NO. I did not LET her. I told her not to but you try making her listen. You fuckin' journalists and your ambition." she rolls her eyes.

"Text me the address right now. Right when I hang up, you got it?" he orders.

"Why?"

"Just fuckin' do it. I'm going to go get her, she's not safe." He didn't want Steph to panic and he knew he had the tools to take care of trouble himself, he just had to get there in time.

"Okay, shit..yeah okay." she mumbles, hanging up and sending it.

Eddie's phone dings as he leaves his apartment through the window, venom carrying him with extended himbs down the fire escape to his bike. "You remember this okay? You know where this is?" he asks aloud to his partner.

"Yes. Go fast. I will make sure we do not wreck." he says sternly, just as worried about her as Eddie was.

Eddie zips through the streets, and thankfully she isn't too far away. He pulls up, seeing escalades and crotch rockets outside the building in question. He knew this was bad.

"You get me up on the roof?" he asks, and before he can receive an answer Venom envelopes his body and bounds onto the roof to find a place to get a good look.

"Eddie." he growls, looking through a hole in the ceiling, seeing Candy pushed in front of a grouping of men.

"Oh shit." Eddie squeaks. "We gotta get her."

"We have permission to eat these men?"

"Yes, yes, whatever we gotta do. They're bad guys, they're' gonna hurt her." he rushes out. Venom is about to crawl his way discreetly back down the building, but one of the men lay his hands on Candy and shouts in her face, backhanding her and pushing her to the ground. It lights a fire inside him that he only knew from fearing for Eddie. She was theirs and no one got to hurt her. His large fists raised, black obsidian boulders bashing through the weakened place in the roof. One time. Two times and it breaks through, sending debris and a grand distraction down to the floor where he lands on all fours, creating a blockade with Candy behind him.

As if she wasn't terrified enough, her gun already drawn as she's rolled onto the ground, her eyes almost bug out of her head, kicking herself back as she sat on her butt, creating space between her and the monster. A loud shrill screech, an eardrum reverberating roar comes from the inky body of the beast, as it moves faster than she can almost comprehend in her shock, knocking men into walls so hard the cement cracks. It grabs them and bites their heads off, eating some whole as they shoot at it and it goes unphased. She moves quickly, trying to find a place to hide from it and the gunshots. She stays low, not wanted to chance catching a stray bullet and hides behind a pile of crates, covering her head and trying to control her breathing.

The chaos stops. The screams cease and an eerie quiet comes across the large open space. Her eyes haven't blinked since the creature appeared, her breathing shaky and uneven as her hands shook.

"Candy?" she hears the low, bass filled voice ask.

She gulps and makes a helpless sound.

"We will not hurt you." it says.

She hears the feet padding towards her slowly. She takes a deep breath, a loud gulp and with balled fists she wills herself to turn to face the source of the reassurance. She's shaking, but she's trying not to. WIth her jaw tight she lowers her brow, trying to appear more in control, slowly standing and turning, finding herself face to face with a giant quivering mass of black, white veins pulse and squirm across the broad expanse of its humanoid form. It stands nearly seven feet tall, built like an action figure with large and bulky limbs, it's hairless head with large slanted, opalescent eyes focus and blink as it looks at her. A mouth opens to speak, revealing a mouthful of teeth she'd only ever dreamed of being in the mouth of some megalodon dinosaur shark from her childhood nightmares.

With the reveal of it's most certainly lethal jaws, she whimpers and stumbles backward into a crate, not falling but the look of terror clear on her face. Venom slumps his posture, retreating it's forward-leaning stance as Eddie is telling him he's scaring her.

"Candy." he states again.

"Wh-wha what...? You?" she squeaks out. "What are you? You know my name?" she says with more confidence, leaning forward slightly, eyes not leaving it's as she tries to wrap her head around what she's seeing. She must've gotten hit in the head and this is all a hallucination. Some strange thing that happens when you're in a coma or something of that nature. But it felt real. It sounded real.

"Yes we do." he says simply, more quietly.

"We? Are there...oh shit are there other ones...oh god." she rushes out looking to the door and the windows quickly, backing against a wall and her chest starting to rise and fall quickly again.

"Yes. But none like us. They are not here. They cannot hurt you." he says, it's fingers that point into claws, rest at its sides.

"Are you gonna hurt me?" she rasps out and the sound hurts Eddie deep in his chest.

"No. Never. Eddie would never allow it." he says with a slow shake of his head.

"EDDIE?!" she says loudly, her chin hutting back into her neck in surprise at the mention of his name. "Whatthefuck? Eddie? How the fuck do you know Eddie?" she says quickly, her mouth open and her eyes worried.

"We...are Eddie. We are Venom." he says, it's massive paws moving to its chest.

"Lemme see her, you're scaring the shit out of her, man, change back." Eddie says from inside the symbiote's protection. He slowly soaks back into Eddie's skin, shrinking back down into the familiar form she knew and loved.

She stands with her mouth agape, her face contorting through several emotions, mainly different expressions of shock and confusion. "Eddie?" she whispers, eyes darting around the room again, checking to see if this was some glitch in the matrix she was experiencing because she was having a hard time comprehending that this could be real.

"Yeah. Uh...hiya Candy." he says with a reluctant wince, holding his hands up as if he were surrendering.

She blinks fast and stutters, mouth opening and closing like a fish as she can't find words to express herself.

"I guess there's somethin' I should tell ya." he says rubbing the back of his beck and grinning nervously.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" she shouts, not angry, feet stomping and fists clenched, her eyes looking him over, head shaking back and forth.

"I can explain." he says with a frown.

"YOU FUCKING BETTER! WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK EDDIE?!" she screeches, moving closer, head guiding the way as she confronts him.

Venom's head with it's vein like attachments to Eddie's body forms and slithers up near his head and she makes a nervous noise and backs away again. "We uh..." Eddie swallows and smacks his lips. "I." he says putting his hands to his chest.

"We." Venom says, looking to Eddie.

"Yeah uh...both of us. We're this thing. Together."

"Uh huh?" she says with a mixed look of confusion and uncertainty.

"I am a symbiote. An alien from another planet. I was brought here. Eddie and I have bonded. I need him to live on your planet. We help each other. We are one in the same now. Together, we are Venom." he explains slowly and calmly as Eddie is swimming over his head in guilt at how terrified he'd made her.

"Venom?" she asks flatly, addressing the alien head, trying to take in its words and make sense of them.

"Yeah, that's his name." Eddie chimes in.

"Our name."

"Our name yeah. When we're together ya know. Like you saw." he gestures to nothing in particular.

"Uh," she says before taking a deep breath, raising her hands up and lowering them to steady herself. "So..." she begins. "An alien life form... this... gooey guy here." she says looking to the head and gesturing with her hand.

"Symbiote." he clarifies.

"This..." she shakes her head in disbelief again."This symbiote." she clarifies. "You're bonded? Like... physically right. LIke symbiotic?"

"Yeah, he needs me to live. I'm his host." Eddie says with a hesitant face.

She stares at them without saying anything for a moment, blinking with her mouth open, eyes shifting between the both of them. "This." she shakes her head quickly and raises her hands. "This is a lot." she says in an offended tone. She turns and takes a few steps, mumbling to herself. "You think you find a nice guy and he's been abducted by a fucking alien." she groans, hand running through her hair as she exhales loudly.

"Not abducted. Chosen. By me. We are extremely compatible. We work as one now." Venom elaborates.

She puts her hands on her hips and looks around the room that's starting to grow dark. "Okay?" she says shrugging. What else was she supposed to say to all this?

"She said we were nice." Venom says with a happier tone. Misreading the context of her statement.

"Not exactly what she meant, man." he mumbles back. "Uh..." Eddie steps towards her and clears his throat. "It's gettin' dark we need to get goin' before more of those guys show up." he says, hesitantly reaching out to touch Candy's shoulder. He wanted to touch her, to know she was okay, but he'd lost that privilege, for now, he sees as she jumps out of her skin at the feeling, stepping away from him and putting her hands up between them.

She takes a shaky breath, eyes fluttering as she looks at the ground, ashamed of her reaction, but she was still entirely rocked by all this. There were too many questions to even form coherent thoughts. "Yeah. We should." she says softly.

"I got my bike. We could go back to my place? Or yours...whatever you want. I don't wanna make you anymore uncomfortable than I have. I'm sorry about this...you finding out this way. Can you...can you ride with me back?"

"With him?" she asks, pointing to Venom.

"Yeah he...he's been around a while now." he admits, wincing again.

"He has?" she says, eyes growing wide again.

"Yeah, there's...a lot to tell you Candy. And I wanna answer everything. I want you to know everything, okay? Can we get you safe? Can you ride home with me?" he asks reaching out for her.

She nods and lowers her gaze. "Yeah let's...let's go back to my place. I'd feel...better there." she says awkwardly avoiding Venom's staring.

"Quit starin' man, you're making her nervous. Go away for a little bit, we gotta get her home." he says, moving forward with a polite nod to her as he opens the door. Venom dissipates into Eddie and he reaches out for her hand to help her out of the narrow door.

She hesitates and it breaks his heart. She looks at his hand for a moment, and he leaves it still, eyes wide and sad as he watches the fear of him move across her face. She looks up at him, one smooth sweep of her eyes to his before moving back to his hand and finally taking it. -------

They enter her house, she's quieter than he's ever known her to be before. He quickly texts Steph he's got her at home and she's fine so they don't get interrupted. He fills a pack with ice and brings it to her. She looks at him confused.

"For your face." he says sweetly.

"Oh. Right." she shakes her head for a moment. "That." she says, moving to put it against her cheek.

He sits next to her on the love seat, where they'd been so close so many times before. But he keeps his distance this time. She went and changed out of her dirty clothes, already whooshing away in the washer beforehand. They share an awkward silence, the shifting of the bag of ice the only noise.

"You wanna ask me questions?" he finally breaks the silence.

"Yeah I'm just...I'm still shocked. I think. I'm wondering if any of this is happening at all." she admits, not looking at him.

"I would like to assure you that it is. Most are confused by a new concept such as this. But you are very smart. Ask us questions, we will answer. Then we can lose this awkwardness." Venom states matter of factly.

"Man, why ya gotta bring it up like that it makes it worse."

"It is clear she is uncomfortable. We do not want her to be. This is the solution."

Candy watches their bickering and it humanizes the amorphous goo for her.

"But when there's tension you don't just say there's tension. We can both feel it we know." his face was clear with agitation.

"But this solves the problem."

"It's a matter of tact, man. You gotta know how to handle people and their emotions." he says annoyed.

"You barely have control over yours Eddie. You are in no place to be telling a lifeform with 600 million years of knowledge how to problem solve." he sass's back.

They both hear a tiny huff of a laugh from Candy who is watching them with a much softer face. They turn their heads at the same time and watch her and her subtle smile appear.

"So you have your own, like, personality and stuff, huh?" she says, making eye contact with Venom. This was good, Eddie thought. This was progress.

"Yes. I am a culmination of all I have learned from all my hosts and all their interactions and knowledge they hold."

"So Eddie isn't your first."

"No. There have been many others." he keeps his voice soft.

"Why did you come to earth?"

"We were taken by a man you know as Carlton Drake. I escaped. The others that came with me...died."

"Carlton Drake?" she asks, looking at Eddie.

"Yeah. Venom here was a part of the big takedown of the Life Foundation."

"Oh?" she says surprised.

"I found Eddie when he broke in. We bonded, living with him made me see things from a different perspective. Together we saved the planet. We stopped my team leader from returning home to bring others to Earth."

She blinks and looks back over to Eddie. "Save earth? When you broke in?" she asks, tilting her head with an accusatory tone.

"Yeah... I uh..." he shrugs, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Tell her Eddie. No secrets. You said no secrets when she found out about us."

"I would appreciate no secrets. No secrets is going to be the only way I don't break up with you for this." she states rather coldly. And he suspected he deserved it.

"Remember when I said I was sick?" he begins with a weary voice.

"I fucking knew you weren't sick." she says with narrowed eyes and pursed lips.

"Yeah. I'm sorry I lied. But, it was I'm sick or I have a symbiote who needs to eat people to survive now."

"He didn't want to lose you." Venom interjects.

"Oh, c'mon man." Eddie mumbles and looks away.

Candy's resolves falters, with Venom's admission.

"A scientist came to me, tellin' me I was right about what I was accusin' Drake of... the stuff that got me blacklisted. I wasn't gonna do anything about it, but people were dyin' Candy. They were takin' homeless people and testing on them and they were dyin' and it wasn't fair. He was insane, he really was." he says and sighs. "I wanted to prove myself. To you and to everyone else. I could redeem my name, get my life back if I could get in there and get proof."

"He wanted to be better... for you." Venom once again interjects with what really should be said but what Eddie was too afraid to admit. Once again Candy's heart softens.

"I.." he slumps and meets her eyes with his ashamed ones. "I did." he nods and looks away. "I wasn't gonna get any better livin' how I was. And you deserved better... and you knew that and I didn't see any other way to be worth your time unless I was somebody again."

"When I told you I thought you should get your shit together...breaking into the Life Foundation isn't what I meant." she says with a sigh.

"I know I just. I had to. I couldn't keep livin' in the shadow of it." he shakes his head.

"This is the part where I come in." Venom gives what he thinks is a smile and she sheepishly returns it.

"Yeah, I broke in with the doctors help and then it all happened real fast... Venom bonded to me, we escaped, I tried to go to Anne to have her tell somebody about what I saw. I had pictures, proof."

"You went to Anne?" she asks with a much less enthusiastic voice.

"She was a big lawyer, she had connections no one else did. What I did to Drake got her fired too cause we were togehter and I got the information from her so she was a victim in all this too 'cause 'a me." it all comes spilling out and it's an odd pleasurable pain to feel, coming clean.

She looks to Venom to see if he's lying, as he seems to be the one telling her the full truth. "This is true. She was the only one that coule help us. Eddie hurt her, she deserved the redemption as well." he states simply.

"Her new boyfriends a surgeon, and I was acting all kinds of crazy. All that was true that I told you, about the..." he pauses, "parasite..." he whispers " but it was because of him." he nods to Venom. " I didn't know what was happening to me and I wasn't in control and we were fighting for control and Dan, that's his name, Dan, he took me and tried to get me better. But when I got back home Drake's men came after me. There was a big chase-"

She interrupts his story. "Holy shit that bike chase was you." she says with wide concerned eyes.

"Oh yeah it was fuckin' nuts Candy, I tell ya. I almost died. I broke my legs and my arms and it was crazy." he rushes out.

"Broke your legs and arms? What?" she asks with a tilt of her head.

"I healed him." Venom states and she blinked fast at him.

"Healed him?" she inquires.

"Yes. I can control Eddie's bodily functions if I wish. I can heal him when he is hurt."

"Oh. Wow." she says, impressed. "That's...that's really helpful." she says looking to Eddie.

"Yeah, it's a perk."

"So if you got hurt... like someone hurt you, he could heal it?" she asks Eddie.

"Yes. We almost died. Taking down my team leader to keep Earth safe."

They both see the sadness in her eyes and the mutual feeling of relief to see it still there and also the fact that she was feeling it made them shift anxiously.

"You almost died?" she whispers, reaching out to touch his knee and she doesn't even think about it.

"Yeah I got speared through the chest...actually." he laughs nervously.

"You fucking what?" she says with a wrinkle of her nose. "But you can't even tell you..no scars or anything." she says looking to his chest.

"I healed him. I keep him running if I am fed."

"That's another thing..." Eddie begins. "He needs this chemical, phenylethylamine to function. And it's found in things like chocolate and what not but it's best if it's in the form of...well..." he winces.

"Brains. Human brains." Venom says what's hard to Eddie to discuss.

"That why you...ate those guys back there?"

"Yes. And because they hurt you. We would not allow anyone who hurt you and get away with it." Venom elaborates and the corner of her mouth turns up into a smile.

She shifts her eyes over to Eddie. "It's true." he says with those puppy eyes she's weak to.

"So you got your job back because the truth about the Life Foundation came out, and I'm guessing those first breaking photos were ones you took, right?"

"Right."

"And you didn't take credit for it?"

"I wanted to be finished with it. I don't want anything to do with that place again." he says with a slow shake of his head.

"But...aren't they gonna want him back?" she points to Venom.

"All of those who knew are dead."

"Oh." she says with wide eyes. "All of them?"

"Yes. We did not kill them though. For the record." he adds.

Candy lets out a little chuckle, an alien using human turns of phrase struck her as funny at the moment. "Well, that's good. I guess. For us." she shrugs and lets out a noisy sigh.

"Us?" Eddie can't help but blurt out.

"Well yeah. I mean...So, me, you, Anne and...?"

"Dan."

"Dr. Dan know about Venom, and they aren't gonna tell anyone since they haven't yet so that ties up the loose ends."

Venom lets out a low laugh. "I like her. She is so logical." he smiles.

"Thanks." she nods. "So are you."

"Except when he's hungry. He's an asshole when he's hungry." Eddie clarifies.

"So...you've been with Eddie for months then."

"Yes."

"Which means..." she sighs and knits her brow. "You've been with him when we've..." she tilts her head.

"Yes." Venom clarifies.

"Uh huh. That's a little weird. I would've liked a heads up before you unknowingly roped me into a threesome ya know." she says with an only half joking pout.

"Yeah. I...I'm sorry about that too. But...I didn't want to tell you because this is..." he makes an unsure face.

"Fucking insane?" she clarifies with a grin.

"Exactly."

"He did not tell you because he did not want you to leave us. He won't' say it. I will for the sake of keeping him happy. We really like you Candy. I have wanted to interact with you for a long time."

"Well he's lucky I'm an idiot who has a soft spot for other idiots apparently," she says with a smirk to Eddie who accepts the criticism gladly. "I get why you didn't tell me but...you should have." she states obviously.

"Yeah. I'm sorry. I didn't exactly know how to bring up this whole situation."

"Yeah." she sighs.

"I told him to tell you sooner." Venom interjects.

"Seems like I owe you a thank you...Venom." she says. "I don't know if I should like, shake your hand or something?" she chuckles. "You saved my life back there...do you even have hands? What's this sharing a body situation like?" she asks in a much more casual way.

"Complicated." Eddie says.

A oozy tendril emerges from the stringy body that flows behind Venom's formed head. "We can shake hands. I would like to touch you." he says a tentacle forming solid and splitting into a hand shape.

"Don't be weird, man." Eddie says, swatting the reaching limb away.

"No, it's okay. I mean..." she shrugs. "I would be lying if I said I wasn't curious." she admits.

"She is honest Eddie. I like her." Venom almost coos.

"Thanks." she says, holding out her hand.

Venom reaches out slowly, closing the space between them. The feel reminded her of a snake, you expect one thing out of it, cold and clammy, but it's warm and soft instead. It's solid but it had give under her fingers as she gripped it, moving her hand up and down and watching as the blackness moved around her hand. It changes from a shake, pushing between her fingers, wrapping it's formless hand around her like it was interlacing its fingers with hers, it felt affectionate and soft, encasing her fingertips and lapping around her wrist. It didn't hurt, it wasn't unpleasant but it was strange. "You are so soft, Candy." Venom says, little tentacles stroking the back of her hand lovingly.

"So are you." she says with a shifting brow of interest. "You're a lot warmer than I expected."

"You are smoother than I expected." he retorts and she smiles.

"So you just lay in wait in Eddie'ds body while we..." she quirks a brow.

"Yes. I feel what he feels, in every way. Every sensation, every thought, every feeling."

"It's annoying." Eddie says with a frown.

"I don't know..." she shrugs, pulling her hand back and Venom heeds her wishes. "That seems sort've...nice." she shrugs, her voice inflecting upward.

"See. She gets it Eddie. I told you she would."

"Yeah but she doesn't have to live with you all the time. Just wait." he says rolling his eyes as Venom moves to nuzzle his face against Eddie's. Candy lets out the first laugh since the shock of learning about him, and it melts them both to hear it, to know there was hope for normalcy again for them. As strange as normal had become for them.

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garnetindia · 4 months ago

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veryrealimagination · 3 years ago

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Whumptober Day 4

Day No: 4

Prompt: “Do you trust me?” | Taken Hostage | Pushed

Fandom/OC: Superman & Lois (2021)

Medium: Fic

Trigger Warnings:

SFW/NSFW

Additional Tags: Smallville (2001) Enemy Appearance, Some of original Multiverse still exists after Crisis,

He doesn’t know how he fell into this Smallville. He only knows that it’s not his Smallville. Lana Lang isn’t married to Lex Luthor. Never had been. He never even lived in the town. Neither, none of the Luthors did. (Another Luthor sister, although this one wasn’t Tess Mercer. She actually carried the name Luthor.) He didn’t know anyone named Kyle Cushing. The Talon doesn’t exist. The name Chloe Sullivan gets him a lot of strange looks. There’s never been a Chloe Sullivan here? She was Lois Lane’s cousin. That name got attention, as the woman now lives in Martha’s old house with her twins and her husband, Clark.

Clark Kent.

He exists here, whatever universe he apparently ended up. There was a Clark Kent here. And there was a Superman. He remembered those powers. He remembered feeling great, powerful and stronger than everyone else around him. The fear of his parents, but the satisfaction of being better, finally. He could get them back. This Smallville still had Kryptonite. He saw it wandering through the woods trying to find evidence of people. There was already a good sized crystal in his pockets. Another surge of electricity with a Clark Kent that didn’t know what it could do with him holding the other side.

But, would that work? This Clark was older, married to Pulitzer Prize winner Lois Lane. She would figure out what happened after a minute of listening to the story. Her father was DOD, the military had recently been here. Would he be able to get away with the switch?

It was hard finding a hiding spot, but the man managed it. The trees were further away than he liked, but the stuff he stole off of someone that didn’t lock their house. God, people were really idiots in small towns. He remembered people doing that as well back in Smallville. His Smallville. The Kents were always like that, although they had a superpowered kid to protect them.

The first one out was some teen. Did Clark have a kid? The kid had some of his traits. Tall, easy-going. He had lighter colored hair and he knew Kent and Lane were dark brunettes. Maybe she cheated. It was a dark thought, but one that brought a chuckle. He doubted Lois Lane, cousin of Chloe Sullivan, would ever cheat. Chloe Sullivan-Queen was a bitter thought that popped in. Chloe had been a natural blonde. Maybe it was from her side. It was the second one that really looked like Clark, although he didn’t look to really act like him. He had two?

It was a shame that he couldn’t hear like Clark at the moment. And the people that he stole the binoculars, the money, and a few other things from didn’t have a listening device. Instead, he could only watch as the two threw a football around. He was an only child, and no one stayed friends with him after they experienced his parents a couple of times. The easy way they treated each other, laughter as one fumbled a bit, fake fighting, grew and gnawed as his already depleted state of mind. Clark Kent had to have it all. A loving set of parents, some of the hottest girls hanging off of him. Friends that would die to keep his secret and protect his life.

Why couldn’t he have that? He got stuck with the father that berated him for not being good enough. A mother that didn’t fight for him. People that shoved him around when he tried to help. Okay, he was really only helping Holly because she was cute, but even just getting a smile from a cute girl was something that he never really got. When he got powers, it was the best for a short while. People wanted to be near him. To know him. If he got those powers back, he could have that again.

His eyes had glazed over with the trip into his inner consciousness, but it came back when he saw the boys had switched games. The truck that had to be older than he was, and that was saying something because he was just as old as Clark, his Clark was. The lighter haired one was egging on his brother.

The man gasped as he saw mini Clark lift the truck from the side and hold it for a good sixty seconds before placing it down. “He inherited them,” he muttered, before realizing he had talked aloud near two possible superhearing people. Seeing that the boys hadn’t noticed him, he watched for their father to come out instead.

Lois came out instead.

It was horrifically weird seeing this woman. There was a freak in the asylum that managed to woo over a Luthor guard and would find out everything from the outside. She managed to get pictures in. That’s when he first saw Chloe’s cousin. It seared in his mind, along with Chloe, Pete, Martha, and other superheroes that helped the man out. People that Clark got to have. She wasn’t a clone of that one, but she was similar enough. As if someone played with pictures and applied filters to her face to get a new one. Creepy.

She must have been chastising the boys, both looking sheepish. It wasn’t too terrible though, because she just shook her head and started laughing. He could hear scant amounts of it. It must be nice to have that. The three of them went into the house after that, and he took the opportunity to escape before their version of Clark showed up.

Jonathan had gone out for a quick run around town. It was more to keep himself in shape than to train for anything. He wasn’t sure if he was going to do football again in the fall. He wanted to, it was his favorite sport to really play. Jordan wanted to as well, even though his first season was bumpy. The coach liked them well enough, the guys were still okay with them even after leaving roughly. A few seniors were obviously leaving and that would give them some places that they could fill.

There was, however, always the family stuff. Jordan still spontaneously spouted powers that sometimes took him out of school for a few days. His strength control was better, much to Jordan’s comfort. Jonathan was wary of his own possibility that he might develop something. Jordan’s happened because he was in danger. He hasn’t developed any yet. But it was always a yet.

His running took him around the three stages of school, elementary, middle, then the high, before he decided to start going through the old industrial park as well. The broken cement reminded him of some of the parking lots, roads, and running trails that he ran around Metropolis. He had to be more cautious, and he considered it a bit of field training as well. Some of the schools they used to go to had lumpy fields that the schools probably tried fixing and couldn’t manage like bigger schools could.

He didn’t wear earbuds now, so the scrapping of metal stopped him in his tracks. The industrial park was mostly abandoned, as companies started leaving when the economy turned bad. There were two that still had operations there. A Queen plant, and a Luthor. He was near neither of those.

Curious, he moved over, seeing a broken door barely covered by plywood. He thought about calling Jordan, knowing he would be by in a couple of seconds. He should call Jordan, or better yet, walk away. Mom’s voice was in his head insisting that. Instead, he pulled it back and headed inside. Looking around, he saw a sign for Mercer & Company. He hadn’t heard of them. Maybe he would have to ask his Dad after this. The floor of the building had deep holes. Above those were old cauldrons for smelting metals. Most of them were barricaded, but a few of the metal poles had rusted and given out. “Maybe I just heard one of those breaking,” he muttered, to himself. “Creepy old factory. Bad idea, Jonathan.”

“I don’t know, I thought it was a pretty good one,” someone said, startling him. Before he turned around, someone had an arm around his neck. He struggled, hoping that a cliched appearance of super strength came out so he could toss whatever creep decided to lure him into an abandoned factory. Jordan was going to hold this over him. Going into an abandoned area to investigate some sound. Mom was going to ground him when this came out. “You know, I am so glad you haven’t gotten your father’s powers.”

That shocked him to stop struggling, which made it easier for this strange guy to drag him over old metal stairs. “Powers? I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he tried, a strained smile settling on his face to try and pass for easy-going, “My Dad’s just a farm guy. Mom’s got the real superpowers. She can manage me and my brother at the same time. We’re kinda a handful.”

The guy actually chuckled a bit as Jonathan started struggling again as they got higher. “Oh, yeah, Clark’s a real farmer. Good old Jonathan Kent taught him. Your grandfather, right?” he said, “Everyone always wondered how the old man got things done so fast. As it turns out, having a superpowered kid dropped into your lap helps.”

Again, shocked. How did this guy know so much about his family? They were steadily getting to a catwalk that went over the entire floor. Bits were broken, and it squeaked, but held as he was let go for a moment. However, the guy brought out a gun, and pointed it at him. He held up his hands automatically. That’s what he was supposed to do. His Mom usually did that until she brought out a taser, or the ELT to get Dad to respond. He had the ELT. In his pocket. In his jeans. At home. He forgot his ELT. Did he have his phone? Yes, he did, it was on his bicep in the holder. “Okay, so, how did you meet my Dad?” he asked, half interested, half terrified.

“I didn’t,” he said, “Keep moving forward.”

Jonathan was now confused. He knew about Dad, knew about his powers. Knew about his grandparents adopting him. Maybe knew about the alien part? He had to stop thinking as the catwalk threatened to give out from underneath him. He kept going after hitting a safe area. “For someone that’s never met my Dad, you sure know a lot about him.” He scanned ahead of him and saw a pair of suspiciously white zip cuffs ahead of him.

“I said I never met your Dad. I know my Clark Kent, though. And his family.” That actually made a lot of sense. The guy’s from a different universe? Jonathan turned around when he got to the zip cuffs. The guy actually smirked. “Sit down, put those around your ankles.” Nervous, he tried to gently sit down and got his feet through the loops. “Now tighten them.” Jonathan stared at the guy before he carefully closed the loops to where he could barely move around.

“Alternate universe? Cool,” he said, his voice only slightly cracking. His parents were always careful, and they weren’t really in any danger from their stories. It was only after coming back to Smallville with Jordan’s powers and Edge’s plans that they really started seeing some of the danger that their parents faced for years. A little crack in his voice was better than breaking down screaming for help. Why did he do that? His Dad could just fly in, grab this guy, then fly off again. He watched the guy pull out another zip cuff.

“Hands in front of you,” the man directed. Jonathan watched him zip his hands with one hand, keeping the gun pointed at his head.

“So, what, uh, what’s different about our universe?” he asked.

The guy glanced at him for a minute. “Anyone in your family named Chloe Sullivan?”

He had never heard of that name. “Nope.”

The guy nodded, getting confirming the answer. “In mine, she’s a cousin of your mother. Grew up in Smallville and went to school with Clark. They were best friends.”

Third shock of the day. Besides the hostage situation, which he felt he was handling very well. Very, very well. “Mom never mentions any cousins. She barely mentions our Aunt.” And his Dad doesn’t mention his cousin. They rarely talked to ‘Uncle’ Jimmy anymore. Their Dad really needed more people to talk with. So did they.

Maybe he wasn’t doing so well with the handling part with his mind and mouth running faster than making Eliza angry a year ago.

The guy put the gun away. Didn’t need it at the moment. “So, how should I contact your brother?” he asked, staring down at him.

Jonathan looked at him, the pit of his stomach developing ice blocks. “What do you want with Jordan?”

The guy shrugged. “His powers.”

That sounded crazy. “What?!” The man had a twitch in his hand, and he hoped that the gun wasn’t going to come back out. He didn’t want to get shot today. He also didn’t want to fall down any of those holes in the ground, but he had a bad feeling about those things.

“I can take his powers,” he stated. “Got everything here for it. Your brother gets to be human, and I get to be better.”

“There’s gotta be a catch,” he said.

“It hurts a bit. The best things do.” The guy was smiling. “How do I call your brother? Has his hearing picked up?” He noticed the band on his arm and held him in place to remove his phone. “Damn. Didn’t have this when I was a kid.”

“That’s been out for a year.”

“Yeah, the ‘smartphone’ stuff started happening after I was locked up in an asylum. Wasn’t even old enough to drive yet,” he mused. “I missed a lot.”

“You were institutionalized?” Good, Jonathan. Nice language that won’t hopefully piss the guy with a gun off.

He laughed. “Yeah. ‘Institutionalized.’” He knelt down to directly stare at him. “All meteor freaks were. Develop powers, then get shipped off to a hospital that kept you contained so you don’t harm other people. Experimented on to see if your powers were good for weaponizing. They couldn’t weaponize me, but they couldn’t let me out thanks to my many issues. Then, there’s the fact I know that Superman is Clark Kent.” He stood back up, holding off on so much that he could tell this kid.

“Hey!” Jonathan would never admit it was a squeak that came out when the man dragged him up. It didn’t completely pass his attention that they were set up near one of the deep holes. The furnace that sat above it was half-gone. The catwalk had a suspicious part of its railing right over that hole, and he was being forced to stand right in front of it. His toes were just over the catwalk. “You know, I think I should sit back down. I’m getting a bit of vertigo and kinda wobbly on my legs right now.”

“Don’t move too much and you’ll be fine,” he jokingly warned. Jonathan glared at him.

Staring down at the darkness below was a terrible idea. Too bad it was sort of enchanting in a black way. Fall over and disappear. So, he switched his head up. The sun was higher, lighting up the interior of the factory. He could see more rust on the metals, broken equipment and forgotten tools lying about. The hole beneath him, however, grew more shadowed, the darkness getting darker as the sun couldn’t get over the lip of the edge to get through. He was staring down at the hole again. It terrified him now, thinking about not knowing what he was going to land on if he was pushed over. He could hear himself getting worse.

Any anxiety that was about to boil over was shoved down when his phone started going off. The guy started messing with the phone until he managed to answer. “Hey Jon, Mom and Dad want to know when you’re going to be back,” Jordan said.

“Jordan, get Dad!”

“Jon, what’s going on?”

“Jonathan, named after your farmer grandfather. How adorable,” the guy said, “But, I’m the one on the phone, and not you.” A hand grabbed the collar of his shirt and held him out over the hole. He screamed, his knees locking to keep his legs straight so he wouldn’t collapse.

“Jon!”

“Still here!” he yelled. That hole was looking blacker than a power outage in a Metropolis subway. He didn’t want to fall in today.

“He’s fine, maybe.” His arm moved, dragging Jonathan’s body around to increase his fear.

“Oh my god! Please stop doing that.”

“What the hell are you doing to my brother?!”

“Oh, nothing much. Just holding him over a concrete hole about 50 feet above the ground.But, hey. You can get him back, almost mint condition. You just gotta meet us in Mercer and Company’s old factory. Don’t tell your parents where you’re going, though. We don’t want SuperDad to show up and have me drop Jonathan.” He ended the call after that and pulled back his arm. “You’re doing well, kid. Keep that up.”

Concentrating on his breathing, he vaguely noticed that the man was grabbing a severed power cord. The guy touched the exposed wiring and jolted when he felt it. He also smiled. “How are you taking Jordan’s powers?” he asked, his self control gathering a bit.

“It’s my freak power,” he said, pulling out a two inch solid piece of Kryptonite. “I was holding this and lightning hit Clark and I when he was trying to pull me back up the bridge. That’s how I got his powers. The times after that, we switched with electricity. It’s all I need now.”

Jordan had come in after hearing that. He wasn’t sure what the plan was, but they were trying to figure that out. First things first, he had to get the man’s attention. He entered the factory and looked up to see Jonathan on the catwalk. “Jon!”

He grinned. “Jordan!” He squawked when the guy grabbed him again.

“Up the stairs. I’ll hand him back.” Jon’s attempt at warning him were cut off when the hand tightened around his upper arm. “Start moving, kid.”

Jordan scanned for where the stairs were and moved up quickly. He just had to get Jon away from the guy. Dad actually had a whole plan for this type of stuff. He said that he and Aunt Kara had run through it a few times when someone had grabbed Mom for the same reason. To stop Superman from interfering in something. The stairs only looked weak as he moved up them quickly. It was the catwalk that he felt unsafe. The thing had more rust on it than he first saw. He moved slower to avoid breaking anything. He needed to be closer to Jon before the plan would kick in.

“That’s perfect, Jordan,” the guy said, releasing Jon’s arm. “All you have to do is give me a little handshake and you can walk out of here with your brother.” Jordan looked down at his hand and saw the tale tell sign of green Kryptonite along with a live wire nestled next to it.

“He wants your powers, Jordan. Don’t do it,” he said, wincing at the increase in pressure from the man’s hold.

“If you don’t do this, I will push your brother over and let you listen to his body breaking on the floor down there before getting those powers out of you anyways,” he threatened. Jordan looked over to Jon. Trust me? He nodded. The man seemed to know what was happening,

and pushed Jonathan over the edge.

The scream he let out was innate, terrified as he twisted in open air with his body trying to figure out what to do next. Jordan jumped after him, the guy just missing him by two inches. His focus was just on getting to Jon. Five seconds too long, he was holding onto his brother, righting himself before he switched. The air around them slowed down, until he finally was able to stop and hover. “Jordan?” his brother asked, still slightly breathless.

Staring up, he was waiting for the signal to come back. “Yeah?”

“Are you holding me bridal style?” he asked. Jon felt him nod. “Great, because I already had an embarrassing moment entering into an old factory to investigate a sound. Now I’m being held like Mom by my brother. Great.”

He snickered, “Would you rather it be Dad?”

It took a couple of seconds for him to think about that. “Only if it’s not my fault.” After a minute, he felt the two of them slowly fly up out of the hole. The first thing he searched for was his Dad, who wasn’t wearing his suit. Steel was there in his suit. The man was on his knees, apparently handcuffed. “You know, he was a little scarier like five minutes ago.”

“I can imagine,” Clark said, coming over when Jordan landed just outside of the hole. He carefully broke the zip cuffs until the pieces landed on the floor. “So, are you good, or do you want to be carried home like your Mom?”

Jonathan took the opportunity to swing an arm around Jordan’s shoulders, completely ignoring the fact that Dad heard that. “You know, I could go for being carried home by my dear, wonderful,” he said, before Jordan forcibly dropped him onto the ground. “Rude twin brother.” He got a little help standing back up.

His Dad had his phone. “Where’s your ELT?”

“In my jeans. At home,” he admitted.

He sighed, pulling his child close to wrap an arm around his shoulders, “Jonathan.” Jordan started snickering again. He lightly bopped the other on the shoulder. “Let’s get going before the Military shows up.”

#whumptober2021 #no.4 #do you trust me #taken hostage #pushed #superman and lois #fic #it's eric summers #other Smallville meteor affected are around #because that would actually make since with the combining of the earths #167 Clark and Lois and some of theirs would end up on 1 #i also thought of evil Shawn Ashmore #because #also #no powered Jon #my writing

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