Welcome to the
four-ring circus that is V’s first attempt at JTHM fanfiction. Be on the
lookout for a narrative told out of sequence, yet more movie rip-offs,
Squee-centric plot, and an obsession with a certain director. Be afraid. Be
very, very afraid.
Here’s Hoping For the Worst!
Prologue:
Up A Creek Without A Paddle
“Is he dead?” asked the vampire again.
“How the fuck should I know?” Jimmy snapped
over the blaring music as he scrounged around the motel room. There was a click
and a sharp stink of cheap cigarettes.
The vampire said nothing. It walked up to
the tub, daintily stepping around the broken glass and rumpled shower curtain.
Todd barely held back a cringe when its icy
fingers grazed his neck. Each noise, each smell, each little scrape of sensation
hurt like hell but at least he was still alive enough to feel. Not that it
amounted to much since he was still sprawled out on his back in the scummy
bathtub with another monster leaning over him. Todd had a funny feeling that
he’d be better off just letting them both think he hadn’t regain consciousness.
But no amount of survival instinct could stop the reflexive gagging when the
vampire licked a gooey clot of blood off his mouth.
“Well, well,” purred the vampire with a
cheerful slurp. “I’ve got good news and bad news…”
Jimmy thumped into the bathroom, sounding
disgustingly hopeful. “Good news?”
“I just saved a bunch of money on car
insurance by switching to GEICO.” There was brittle crack when Jimmy backhanded
the vampire. “Fuck!” it hissed, hopping to its feet. “I was just kidding,
asshole!”
“Ha ha. Very funny bitch.”
“The good news is the boy’s alive…barely.”
“Lucky him.” laughed Jimmy.
“The bad news,” continued the vampire
stiffly. “This boy’s a virgin.”
Dumb silence hung in the air. Todd could
feel Jimmy staring at him.
“You’re not fucking serious.”
The vampire made a nasty little growl.
“Um…actually, I am.”
“But the way this kid’s been acting, I
thought Johnny was…”
“They weren’t.” It sounded smug. “One of
the very few ‘commendable’ things about the Beast was that he had restraint in
such matters.”
“He was too squeamish…” Jimmy leaned
closer, chuckling.
“You can’t touch him.”
Jimmy moved closer. “The fuck I can.”
“I don’t think you understand me…” the vampire
snarled, pulling Jimmy away. “This boy is a VIRGIN.” It emphasis the word with
a sneer. “What that means is that not only is he…‘untouched’ by man or woman…or
tentacle monster… He’s also an INNOCENT.”
“Right…”
The vampire sighed. “An Innocent is a mortal
whose soul is still pure. In theory, if this boy were to die now, his soul
would be clean and he’d go straight UP!” Noticing the dumb look it was getting,
the vampire elaborated, “The boy’s got the spiritual equivalent of a ‘Get out
of Jail FREE’ card, you dig?”
“Nope.” Jimmy barked. “Now fuck off.”
“Okay, maybe I was being too subtle.” The
vampire slammed Jimmy against the wall. “You can’t fuck him because we need a
sacrifice for the ritual. A VIRGIN sacrifice.”
“Aren’t you supposed to use girls for that
shit?”
It began ranting angrily. “You men are all
the same! Always victimizing the woman! Just because she doesn’t have the PENIS
means that it’s OKAY to hand over the girl to be raped, mutilated, and
otherwise violated by any old Demon or Elder God or Vampire Lord you happen
upon! Even though gender is truly inconsequential so long as the sacrifice has
an uncorrupted soul and their virtue intact! Do you have any idea how rare it
is to find a mortal nowadays who’s both a true Innocent and a Virgin? In fact,
given who this boy’s neighbors were, I’m fucking amazed that he’s
remained so pure for this long!” The vampire paused, then added sweetly, “Oh,
quit looking at me like that. There’re plenty of other mortals about for you to
have…fun with in the meantime. Why not try the strip club up the road?”
“Hmm…strippers…” Jimmy thought a moment.
“Sounds good to me!” He darted out of the bathroom, and then shouted back.
“Hey! You wanna coming along?”
“No. I’ll stay here…just in case. But you
have fun! Bye-bye now!” The vampire waited till the door slammed before adding,
“You sick motherfucking…” It muttered a litany of Spanish curses before turning
its attention to Todd. “You can quit playing dead, boy. He’s gone.”
Opening his less swollen eye, Todd glanced
up at the vampire as it grinned from its perch on the leaky sink.
“You poor, poor little thing. Looks like
you put up quite a fight…and for what? Only to die a most horrible and
prolonged death at the hands of a worthless undead rapist piece of shit like
Jimmy?” A faint little frown crossed its lips. “You know, despite the fact that
I’m pride myself on being the most cold-bloodedly evil of the Master’s minions,
I can’t help but feel sorry for you. So do you know what I’m going to do?” The
vampire reached into its jacket and pulled out an obscenely large pistol, which
it sat within Todd’s reach. “I’m giving you the chance to escape. True, suicide
is a mortal sin and offing yourself does doom you to being a civil servant for
the rest of eternity, but it sure as hell beats being tentacle raped and have
your immortal soul consumed in a freakishly nasty pagan ritual only to be
reawaken as the demonic thrall of some fucking hag-bitch punta vampire…”
It stopped short. “But it’s really your choice, so I’ll just give you a minute
alone to make up your mind…” The vampire jumped down from its perch and left
the bathroom, shutting the door behind it.
“I thought she was never going to leave…”
snapped Mr. F as he crawled out of Todd’s pocket. “Well, what are you waiting
for dumbass? Take the gun and go blow Jimmy’s fucking head off!”
“An exercise in futility, my sorry excuse
for sibling,” D-boy mumbled from within the toilet. “You should take the
vampire lady’s advice. Suicide is relatively painless…well, maybe not if you
choose to commit seppuku.”
“Fuck you! Are you going to listen to that
bullshit? Who’s your buddy, man? Remember, I was the guy that told you to kick
Jimmy’s ass.”
D-boy laughed, climbing onto the toilet
seat. “Oh yes. I’m sure you remember how well that ended…” The little doughboy
jumped over to the rim of the bathtub and sat on the gun. “There are easier
ways to kill yourself, you know? Like this nice, large caliber gun we have
here. Doesn’t it look so friendly right now? Such an easy way out… All you need
to do is pick it up, put the barrel all cozy in you mouth like this…” D-boy
demonstrated. “Then…”
Suddenly, Mr. F grabbed the ring dangling
from D-boy’s head and slammed him against the tub. “Don’t listen to this tubby
bastard! What you need to do is…”
“Where’s Shmee?” Todd asked groggily.
“Forget the stupid bear! You don’t need his
Ragged Ann punk ass anymore! You’ve got me now, Todd. It’s just you and your
good buddy Mr. F, two badass mutha’fuckas out to kick
some major undead ass! Just like…Uh…like…” Mr. F paused, clawing his hat in
deep thought. “Shit! Who’s that big chin guy from all those Evil Dead flicks…”
“Bruce Campbell?” a voice intoned from
nowhere.
“Yeah! Oh fuck…”
Todd jerked upright. “Shmee? Where are
you?”
“Right where you left me, safe and sound in
your backpack.”
“But if you’re there, then how are you
talking to me?” Todd rasped, voice tightening with paranoia. “You never did
this before. At least, I don’t remember you doing stuff like this
before…”
Seizing the moment, Mr. F screamed,
“Because it isn’t Shmee at all! IT’S A TRICK! KILL IT! KILL IT NOW!”
“Be quiet.” At that, Mr. F’s mouth sealed
shut, leaving the doughboy flailing and gesturing obscenely.
D-boy smiled. “Thank you, master.”
“Okay,” squeaked Todd. “You definitely
couldn’t do that before.”
“It’s only me, Squee,” whispered Shmee with
a chuckle. “Your oldest, most faithful friend Shmee. But the Doughboys have a
point, Squee… You need to get out of this terrible place.”
“How? There’s a vampire sitting in the other
room. It’ll kill me if I try to escape.”
Shmee laughed. “Then kill her first.”
Todd picked the gun up and stared at it
skeptically. “You want me to shoot her?”
“No.” Shmee snarled. “You can’t kill a
vampire with regular bullets. Traditionally, the weapon of choice is a wooden
stake.”
“Well that’s fucking great!” Todd snapped
in a deeper voice. “And just where am I gonna find one? Break the fucking
toilet plunger in half?” Struck by inspiration, he realized that it could WORK!
Stashing the gun in his waistband, Todd grabbed the foul smelling plunger and,
with a quick snap across his knee, transformed it into a pointy implement of
anti-vampire weaponry. Stake firmly in hand, Todd moved toward the door.
“Um… Squee? Aren’t you forgetting
something?”
“Right, the Doughboys…” Going back over to
the tub, Todd swept up D-boy and the very pissed off Mr. F. He stuffed them
both into his pocket then stalked out of the bathroom.
“What the hell?” the vampire gasped,
pulling Shmee out of the backpack it was rifling through. “A teddy bear? What
kind of fucked up kid keeps carrying around their damn baby toys?”
The vampire got an answer when Todd rammed
the splintered plunger through its heart. He watched impassively as it writhed
and howled, its accursed body shriveling into a mummified husk. Then he yanked
his bear out of its clenched dead hand. “Let’s go home, Shmee.”
“Wait!” Crawling out from the pocket, the
Doughboys looked pleadingly up at him. “Isn’t there something you ought to do
first?”
“Yeah!” barked Mr. F, now free to speak
again. “Like, ya’ know, slaughtering a certain zombie bastard?”
D-boy glared at his twin. “What is with
you? All the time, it’s ‘kill that guy’ or ‘smash his fucking head in’ or ‘hey,
let’s disembowel that dumbass over there’! Your damn hard-on for killing is
what started all this shit in first place! If you hadn’t encouraged Nny to
shoot up that Taco Hell in the first place—”
“Johnny?” Todd croaked. “How do you guys
know Johnny?”
“Forget about it, Squee.” Mr. F chirped,
then sneered at D-boy, “And you can’t have a hard-on when you don’t have a
dick, shithead! Now, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, you
oughta listen to your good pal F and go get yourself some sweet, sweet revenge
on Jimmy with a few bullets to his fucking head.”
“I think I’d rather just go back to my
family…”
“But you can’t do that, Squee.” Shmee’s
voice was soft yet dank with evil. “Jimmy killed both your parents…”
Todd laughed bitterly. “Real big loss
there…”
“And he killed Johnny.”
That stopped Todd dead in his tracks.
“He…He might’ve survived.”
“Don’t be stupid!” snarled Mr. F. “Even a
blind man could’ve seen the gaping hole in his head!”
“Yes, yes…” D-boy hummed. “Johnny certainly
was very, very much dead when you put him in that shallow grave. His body now
lies rotting in ground, his cold flesh dissolving in the bellies of the worms
as they eat the putrid decay that once was Johnny away into sweet nothing.”
Mr. F glared at the other Doughboy. “Are
you trying to make me barf?”
“Shut up.” Todd growled, shaking all over.
“Squee…” gasped Shmee. “Calm down, Squee.
You’re…you’re going to rip me apart...”
“Huh? Sorry.” Relaxing his grip on the
bear, Todd sat down on the motel bed. He slumped forward in despair. “What am I
going to do, Shmee? I hardly even know where we are let alone how to get out of
here. Even if I find a way back home, I don’t think I could make it all the way
to
“But he’s not.” Shmee’s voice was flat.
“You became too dependent upon him, making yourself weak and vulnerable. Johnny
abandoned you in your hour of need. So too has the lying spawn of Satan,
Pepito. They were never your friends. True friends would never have let these
things happen to you. I’m the only one you can put you faith in, Squee. I’m the
only real friend you ever had…”
“Hey!” Mr. F barked. “What about us,
asshole?”
“Must I silence you permanently?”
growled Shmee. With Mr. F properly cowed, the bear continued. “Of course you have
the Doughboys too, but it was I that gave them as a gift to you. Did
Johnny ever really help you, Squee? Did he make sure you were taken care of?”
“He…he didn’t kill my dad.”
“Your father hated you, Squee. Would
someone who cared for you let such a hateful man live on to make you
miserable?” The bear laughed. “And did you know it was Johnny who brought Jimmy
to your neighborhood. Johnny gave that terrible, terrible creature a reason to
find his house. Johnny was the one who killed him! He made the monster! This is
all Johnny’s fault!”
“And now Johnny’s dead…” Todd groaned,
clutching Shmee close. “I want Johnny back!”
“He’s never coming back, Squee. You have to
fight alone.”
Todd sobbed hysterically. “I can’t! I can’t
fight the monsters!”
“But you can, Squee. You’ve already
slain a vampire.” Shmee seemed to grin. “All you need are the proper tools…”
“Tools?” asked Todd, wiping his nose on his
sleeve. He looked down and saw Jimmy’s suitcase lying open on the floor, the
blades shining in the dim lamplight.
“Take them.”
Slowly, Todd stretched out his hand…
“Yes…”
…reaching for a large knife only draw back
in horror at the face looking back at him from its pocked and grimy surface.
“They’re unclean…” he whispered darkly. “By
even touching them, I’ll become a monster too.”
“Don’t be stupid, Squee! See? Nothing more
than steel…” Shmee was almost pleading now. “A knife doesn’t make you into a
monster! Knives are mere tools! A tool cannot decide how it is used. They’re only
things!”
“What about you? And the Doughboys? You’re
only things too, aren’t you?” Todd shook the bear violently. “AREN’T YOU?”
The silence was crushing.
“Shmee?”
No reply.
Todd picked up his backpack and shoved
Shmee inside then stuffed now lifeless Doughboys back into his pocket. He
glanced down at the spilled blades on the floor. Nudging them flat with his
foot, Todd couldn’t stop looking at the horrific resemblance reflected by all
those sharp-mirrored surfaces. There was the same dead eyes which stared
hopelessly, the same blue-black hair—messy, exactly like it was when Todd was
little—and, underneath the bruises and cuts, that same waxy pallor…
“This can’t happen…” he mumbled, lifting
the knife for a closer look. Todd closed his eyes and began to laugh. “This
can’t fucking happen.”