"But..." Harlan looked at the offending object. "But I'm holding it."
"No, dude, what you're holding is not NASTiES. It can't be NASTiES. You know why? Because Funelli died before that movie was finished, and all of the footage was lost in the fire."
"Fire? What fire?"
"You don't know about the fire? He doesn't know about the fire," Dave added to his imaginary audience. "Nicolo Funelli died in a studio fire shooting B-roll green screen footage for NASTiES. I mean this was some sick shit he was filming. Legend has it, he wanted this to be his version of Hellraiser. He'd really upped the full-frontal nudity and the gore, with just buckets of blood, but word is..." Dave stopped suddenly at the sound of creaking upstairs. "I'm hungry. Are you hungry?"
Harlan wasn't, but to be amiable he made a head gesture between a nod and a shake, and followed Dave up the stairs. At the top, a small landing led to three doors, each painted black, the peepholes, doorknobs and apartment numbers still rimmed with the previous sloppy red paintjob. Dave opened the door to their right, and disappeared inside.
The bachelor apartment reeked of weed. Dave had paused near the end of Dario Argento's Suspiria (some called Funelli a lesser Argento, but Harlan had always had a soft spot for the former, at least until very recently), and the blood-streaked woman hanging from a skylight stared at them from Dave's widescreen television. Every bit of floor space was covered in videotapes, dirty magazines, and dirty clothes, aside from a path of stained carpet leading from the door to the futon, futon to kitchenette, futon to bathroom. Harlan longed for the clean comfort of Vicky's small basement apartment. He kept his shoes on despite Dave's request to take them off at the door.
Dave walked the trail marked by '80s centerfolds and frayed tighty whities to the kitchenette, and opened a cupboard. He came back with a box of Fruit Loops and dug a hand inside, munching a handful of the sweet colorful cereal before offering the box to Harlan, who shook his head.
"Suit yourself." Dave flopped down on the futon, reclining against the arm with one foot up on the mattress, like a burnout's boudoir photograph. Considering all the skin mags on the floor, evidence of potential solo hand play on the futon, Harlan elected to gently kick some tapes out of the way and sit on a stool at the kitchen counter.
"You can sit over here, I won't bite," Dave said, his black goatee sprinkled with bright rainbow crumbs.
"Yeah, but I'm afraid your mattress might."
Dave snorted laughter. "Fair enough. Now where was I?"
"The, uh, the fire at Funelli's studio."
"Right. So..." He shoved another handful of cereal into his mouth, speaking as he chewed. "Legend has it, Funelli hired a bunch of non-union actors to shoot the cabal cutaways. If you listen to the tabloids, it was Satanists, but the word on the street is Funelli was into some really dark shit even Satanists wouldn't touch. I'm talking sex magick--that's magick with a ck, not with a c, and the extra k is for extra krazy. I'm talking ritualistic sacrifice. I'm talking summoning the Dark Lord Cthulhu type shit. I mean this stuff would make the Cenobites look like Jehovah's Witnesses."
In the brief silence, Harlan eyed the cassette case. "So you're saying... he was shooting some kind of ritual with these cult people when the studio burned down?"
"And Bingo was his name-o!" Dave grinned, his teeth stained purple-gray from artificial colors, BHT and God knew what else.
"Shit," Harlan said.
"Add to that the fact that the police never identified his body among the remains they found, and you've got yourself one helluva mysterious grand exit, Urban Legend-stylee."
Harlan considered it. Something in the story didn't follow, but he couldn't put his finger on it. The cabalists, the fire, the missing body. All of it was insane, but something felt wrong. "No, wait a second," he said, piecing it together. "I saw his funeral in those old documentaries. All of his ex-wives were there, crying and throwing themselves on the casket."
Dave shrugged. "They just buried his cowboy hat and boots."
"Jesus..."
Dave nodded. "And he's kidnapped your girlfriend."
Harlan nodded morosely.
"How?"
"I don't know. Vicky said she fell asleep in front of the TV and woke up in this studio... I saw her on the tape, tied up in front of a green screen, and Funelli was there with her. He told me I've got until--" He looked at his cell phone. The digital face read 9:04. "Shit! Less than three hours. He made a special point of reminding me he's not afraid to kill off main characters, and Vicky's a main character--"
"Shit, dude..." Dave sat up. "What does that make me? The Asian sidekick?" He got up from the futon and began pacing, trudging carelessly over cassette cases and magazines. "This is ridiculous, man. Just trying to smoke a bowl, watch a movie and chill, and some white dude I barely even know, by the way, comes knocking on my door and gets me caught up in a curse. I knew I shouldn't have answered the door but you're a good customer, and the customer's always right. The customer's always an asshole is more like it--"
Harlan stepped in front of Dave and grabbed him roughly by the shoulders. Dave snapped out of it, his gaze much more lucid than before. "Sorry, man," he said.
"No, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have got you caught up in all this but I'm in a lot of trouble here and you're the only person I know who knows more about bad movies than me. Also Vicky's mom is Chinese, so I don't think the 'Asian sidekick' thing really matters all that much."
"Oh, really? Where's she from?"
"Dave!"
"Sorry. Sorry."
"It's okay. Now what are we gonna do?"
"Well, okay," Dave said, gathering his thoughts. "I was thinking, Funelli's co-writer lives here in town. If anyone would know what to do in a Funelli movie, it'd be him."
"Jack Emmerson lives here?"
"I thought you were a Funelli fanboy, bro! They shot a lot of their movies here. If anyone would know how to help you, it's--" Dave paused, turning his head toward the TV in a slow motion move straight out of a demon possession film. "Wait a minute. You said Funelli zapped your half-Asian girlfriend into the television or something, right?"
"Dude, can you--?"
"What?"
"Well, what the fuck does her being half-Asian have to do with anything?"
Dave opened his mouth to reply, and seemed to think better of it. His mouth remained open, staring over Harlan's shoulder at the TV. Harlan turned to see the hanged woman break apart into digital blocks, warping and streaking across the screen, repeating the cascading motion of blocky smearing color like a digital waterfall until Funelli's face replaced her in close-up.
"I heeeeear you!" he said, speaking into a flopping, bloody severed ear with ragged flaps of torn flesh. Throwing the ear over his shoulder, he stepped back into a medium shot. Funelli's absence in the frame revealed Vicky tied up and unconscious on a dentist's chair. To Harlan's relief, both of her ears appeared intact. Behind them, Funelli had superimposed a room filled with scientific equipment looted from the set of some '60s sci-fi series on the green screen. Harlan recognized it as the setting for a key scene in The Quasar Conspiracy, where the sadistic Lead Scientist used a laser to burn the protagonist's eyeball until it split open, oozing bubbling white goo.
The scientist stepped into shot behind Funelli with the laser in one oily gray mitt. The white coat had split in places, and a dentist's face mask barely concealed the bulbous alien features and slobbering, jagged-toothed sucker mouth of Funelli's Space Rager.
"You'd better not be trying to mess with me, Harlan. You have three hours. And then, I let my creations have some real fun." He flashed a smile. "Goodbye."
The screen went black.
Harlan hoped he could get to Vicky in time. He wished he'd been better to her. He wished he'd never found the box. Tears of helplessness welled in his eyes.
Dave grabbed him by his rain-dampened jacket. "Snap out of it, dude!" He dragged Harlan out of the apartment, locking the door behind them.
"We have to be ca
reful," Dave whispered hoarsely. "Anywhere there's a TV, he can hear us. Probably even zap us from a cable connection, like that movie--" He peered around his feet, looking along the baseboards for outlets. "Okay, looks like we're safe. Here's the plan. We go to Emmerson's place, get him to help us figure out how to beat--"
CLAP!
Harlan and Dave turned to each other, both startled by the sound.
CLAP! CLAP-CLAP!
"What is that?" Harlan asked. The sound made him think of cartoon clams.
CLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAP!
"It's coming from the store!" Dave bounded down the stairs. "Dammit, not again!"
"Not again what?" Harlan said, hurrying behind him.
An alarm sounded through the wall.
"I just got robbed last week, man!" Dave shouted over his shoulder, pulling his keys out of his PJs as he pushed through the front door. By the time Harlan got outside, Dave had already unlocked the door and stepped into So Hip. The alarm blared out into the street, cutting through the silence like a sawblade.
Dave cried out in anguish, swallowed by the blare of the alarm. Red light flashed over the darkened interior, throwing long shadows on the walls. Harlan thought it was all a bit much. The alarm likely did a good enough job deterring criminals on its own.
Dave snatched a baseball bat from behind the counter. Harlan barely heard him swearing at the top of his lungs for the intruder to come out, motherfucker. The door bumped Harlan in the ass, and he uttered a frightened little yelp, the alarm and lights making him nervous as the door swung shut behind him.
Dave crept toward the shelves, the bat slung against his shoulder. Harlan considered following, and when he'd finally made up his mind to go after his friend, a giant black limb grabbed Dave by the shoulders and picked him off his feet.
Dave's Ugg-booted feet dangled as the monstrous creature lumbered out from the shadows. Harlan saw it in red flashes: a heavy 21" television, one of the old wall monitors that would normally be playing some trashy film when the store was open, rested on the thick, clattering body of a massive humanoid beast made of plastic cassettes, wound together with shiny black sinews of magnetic videotape. The bat fell useless from Dave's hands. On the screen, Funelli's grinning face, bathed in ominous green light, stared directly into the video store owner's soul.
Harlan ducked behind the counter, breathing heavily as the alarm continued to wail. He had to help Dave, but Jack Emmerson's address was paramount. Dave could have been dead already, and Harlan wouldn't have heard his bones crack over the alarm. The little computer on the counter came to life as he reached up to grab the keyboard, bumping the mouse. Praying Funelli's Monster wouldn't notice the light from the monitor--praying the monitor itself had no connection to the same connection keeping Funelli alive--Harlan typed EMERSON into the search bar.
No hits.
Items on the counter and in the drawers behind him jittered as the Tape Monster shook the floor.
He tried again with two Ss, fingers shaking uncontrollably, then again with two Ms. With a sigh of relief, Harlan read the address that came up. He repeated it aloud several times before creeping up over the top of the counter.
Funelli's Monster held Dave up like a ragdoll to its flickering face, Funelli's teeth gnashing on the screen. Harlan made a decision to distract him, but he worried about Vicky. She was a pawn in all of this, a bargaining chip Funelli could use for Harlan to help him escape from his digital prison. He had to hope Funelli wouldn't harm her until midnight. He had to trust no matter how crazy being stuck in his own private Hell had made him, the director would stick to the logic of his script.
Harlan picked up the computer screen, hesitated briefly, then launched it as hard as he could. It snapped back on its cable and smashed against the front of the counter.
"Hey, Max Headroom!" Harlan shouted as he leaped out from behind the counter, waving this hands. "C-c-c-come and g-g-g-get me, asshole!"
The Funelli Monster's TV head twisted in his direction, Funelli's immortal rage visible on the screen.
Fear propelled Harlan toward the door. He came to an abrupt, painful halt against the frame, his conscious mind registering too late the door had opened inward. Funelli's Monster dropped Dave crumpled and unconscious to the floor, and lumbered forward like a massive practical-effect Transformer, its limbs clattering and shimmering in red flashes of black magnetic tape, rattling movies on the shelves.
Harlan fumbled with the door, his back still against it, trying to tear it open without moving closer to the creature's VHS claws. Finally, he managed to edge over far enough to get out of its way, but by then the Monster was mere feet from him. Funelli's lips twisted into a sinister grin. Harlan yanked futilely on the handle. The director snarled, mere moments from his prey, reaching out with giant black plastic fingers when the cable at the back of his TV head pulled taut, jerking it back.
Funelli uttered a startled, strangled choke before the television tore off its body, smashing on the floor tiles. His face flickered with a buzz of static before the smoldering screen winked out, and the Monster's structure broke apart in a loose twisted heap of videotapes.
Harlan laughed aloud, short of breath. "Dave?" he called over the din. "You okay?"
Dave groaned in reply, rolling over onto a heap of scattered cassettes. "Dude... that thing literally killed my buzz."
The television fell off the wall so quickly Harlan was only able to shout a choked "Dude!" before it came crashing down over Dave's shocked face. The screen shattered and the tube exploded. Still plugged in to the wall, electricity jolted Dave's body in a morbid dance to the smell of burning circuitry and cooking flesh.
Police sirens neared, louder than the alarm. Too late to help his friend, Harlan rushed out the door and ran. He knew the writer's address, and it wasn't very far. He just hoped he could reach him in time to end this.
3 – The Writer
JACK EMMERSON LIVED in a crumbling townhouse in the gentrifying warehouse district. Harlan ran the eight blocks from So Hip Video, taking breathers while streetlights changed from red to green, wishing he'd quit smoking years ago and taken up jogging. Midnight loomed like the crescent moon that had parted the clouds above the city streets, flickering in puddles and storefront windows.
Harlan thumbed the doorbell, then knocked without waiting for a response. Jack Emmerson came to the door in a plush gray robe, and blinked out at Harlan. Bald head shimmering under the front light, he scratched his salt-and-pepper beard with the backs of his fingernails and grunted, "Somebody better have died."
Harlan didn't waste time with small talk. He simply showed the man the tape.
"Dammit," Jack Emmerson grumbled, his whole body seeming to sag. "I guess it's worse. Someone came back from the dead." He narrowed his eyes, his crinkling face giving lie to the expression black don't crack--though to be fair, the man was in his 70s. "Well, you might as well come in, I won't be able to sleep tonight anyway. Not knowing he's out there."
Jack's townhouse was neat and clean, a tastefully furnished condo if it was still the 1980s, everything smooth, shiny blacks and whites. A brown wood stereo system with a record player stood alongside retro-futuristic shelves lined with colorful record jackets in the sunken living room. Harlan noticed with surprised relief the writer had no TV.
Jack pushed on the wall near the spiral staircase. A hidden door clicked open to reveal an astonishing array of booze. "Drink?" he asked.
"No thanks, I don't drink."
Jack arched an eyebrow as he poured himself a brandy. "You might want to start."
He stepped down into the sunken area, sat on the arm of a leather sofa, and directed Harlan to the chair. Harlan sat.
"I'm guessing time is of the essence. Nick always was a fan of the ticking clock. Too much for my taste, but what do I know, I just wrote the shit."
"Midnight," Harlan nodded.
"And he'll, what? Kill your boyfriend?"
"Girlfriend," Harlan said with a slight frown.
"Just a collector."
"A collector." Jack sipped his liquor thoughtfully. "And where did you find this... invaluable collector's item?"
"I was on my way home in the rain. Vicky and me got in a fight."
"Vicky and I."
Harlan gave him a flustered look.
"Sorry. Continue, please."
"We got in a big fight," Harlan said, choking up at the thought of never seeing her again. "I'm pretty sure we're broken up, but anyway... I was hurrying past the old factory in the rain when I saw this box of videotapes--"
Jack held up a hand. "Wait, wait. What factory?"
"The burned-up--" Realization struck him. In all his years passing by the burned-out shell on the way home from Vicky's apartment, he'd never put the two together. Now everything made sense. Somehow, Funelli had made it so the tapes had been out in the rain when Harlan walked past, leaving them as bait for someone who loved old video nasties enough to bring them home, to dry them out and put the tape--the only tape that mattered--into his or her VCR. "On Lexington and Rebar," he finished. "That's Funelli's studio, isn't it? The one that burned down?"
"You catch on quick. So you found the tape, and what? You put it in the tape player."
"Right."
"And when you did, it started to spark. All this blue lightning went just about everywhere, is that right?"
"Right..." Confused, Harlan asked, "How do you know all this, Mr. Emmerson?"
"Jack. And like I said--" He gestured with his fingers, wriggling them on an invisible typewriter, "--I wrote the shit."
"You..." Harlan shook his head in confusion.
Jack cocked his head at an angle, displaying annoyance. "Wrote. The shit. So I guess now we're at the Old Master scene. You've come to me to ask for my help, and that's when Funelli's Tapenstein monster shows up to kill me, and you escape by the skin of your lily-white nuts."
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