by Eirik Gumeny
***
“Why do they still have lives to make difficult?” rumbled Walt Sidney, his voice like a vacuum sucking up pennies. “I told you to kill them.”
“I know, Mr. Sidney, and I am,” said Loki. “But it’s more fun this way.”
“I didn’t tell you to have fun. Fun has no place within the walls of the Walt Sidney Company.”
“But we’re an entertainment company, sir,” slurred a very confused junior executive through his slobbery mandibles.
“Quiet, Alex,” barked the head in the jar. He returned his glare to the skinny Norseman. “Quit screwing around, Loki.”
“They’re going to die eventually, Mr. Sidney,” explained the trickster god. “And not one of them has shown even the slightest inkling that they’re going to release the information publicly. In fact, they seem to think it was Satan behind everyth–”
“Get it done. Now.”
“Yes, Mr. Sidney,” replied Loki, sinking back into his chair. Then, nodding to the swamp monster, he added, “Although, Alex does make a good point, sir. For the head of a children’s entertainment company you are, with all due respect, sir, kind of a humorless dick.”
“I am well aware,” replied Walt Sidney matter-of-factly. “Now, moving on to inventory issues: Who the hell is using all the copy paper? Who’s using any copy paper? We live in the future, damn it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Reach Out and Stab Someone
“‘Get it done. Now,’” mumbled Loki Laufeyjarson, lowering his voice and mimicking his boss. The trickster god riffled through a box of old, pre-internet personnel files. “Fine. You want dead people, Mr. Sidney? I’ll give you dead people. Sucking all the joy out of everything. You’re lucky I want your job, old man. And that you pay well. And that you offer a 401K and a pension plan. And that the mini-fridge in my office is always stocked. And then there’s the masseuse, and the foosball table in the break room ...” Loki paused. “You really do know how to run a company, Walt.”
The scrawny Norseman found what he was looking for. He pulled a yellowed piece of paper from a manila folder, then entered the phone number on the paper into his cell.
“Hey, it’s Loki,” he said. “I need a favor.
“Yeah. A murder favor.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Viva Las Vegas
Amber Romero-Patel, having gambled away every last cent of the money her wife had just inherited from their dog, walked contentedly down the Las Vegas Strip and back toward their hotel. Carissa, the wife in question, was several steps behind her, decidedly less content and grumbling to herself.
“This is exactly the reason Cleo left the money to me,” Carissa finally said. “She knew you’d do something stupid and lose it all. In less than an hour!”
“Yeah, well, you said it was stupid to let her invest our money in the first place,” replied Amber, “so who’s laughing now?”
“You. You are. You’re laughing about squandering the windfall that could’ve gotten us a new stove and a better car and a less shitty backyard and who knows what else. That’s the problem.”
“I don’t see how it’s a problem.”
“Losing three million dollars on a half dozen spins of roulette isn’t a problem?”
“To be fair to me, I was up at one point.”
“Yes. You actually doubled your money and then lost it all again.”
“Look, we didn’t have three million dollars last week and now we still don’t. We’re exactly where we were. I don’t see why you’re getting your panties all in a bunch.”
“At least I’m wearing panties.”
“Oh, now you’re going to get on me about that?”
“There are elevated glass walkways everywhere!”
“I’m wearing jeans!”
As the women walked past the perpetually burning fire fountain of the Super Miragio, Amber was suddenly and viciously attacked by a chupacabra. The tiny, spiky-backed, lizard-like canine came tearing around the corner on all fours, before jumping and latching itself onto her face and shoulders.
“Luke fucking Skywalker!” she screamed, spinning around with the creature on her face.
“I don’t see how this is a problem ...” said Carissa.
“It’s really starting to hurt, babe.”
“Oh, OK.”
Quickly, Carissa grabbed the chupacabra by the neck with both hands and began pulling. Amber got her hands between the miniscule monster and her shoulder and pushed.
“Get it off! Get it off!”
“What do you think I’m trying to do?!”
The two women wrestled with the creature for several minutes, circling around on the sidewalk, all elbows and shouting, before giving up.
“Man,” said Carissa, catching her breath, her hands on her knees, “that thing is really on there.”
“I think it’s got a claw in my bones,” explained Amber, futilely punching the lizard-dog in the side.
“OK, hang on,” replied her wife, looking around. “You’re not going to like this.”
“Like what?”
Carissa threw an arm around Amber’s waist and pulled her toward the fire fountain. Grabbing her roughly by her hair, Carissa managed to duck the chupacabra – and Amber’s face – squarely into one of the jets of flame. The creature screeched and let go, toppling into the decorative pyre, while Amber quickly snapped her head back and out of harm’s way.
“What the shit was that?” she asked, stray hairs still burning away against the purple sky beyond her.
“A chupacabra, I think,” said Carissa.
“No, I meant the roasting my face.”
“You’re welcome.”
“You could have killed me!”
“Oh, please. I would have severely disfigured you at worst. Besides, it worked, didn’t it?”
“That’s not the point.”
“You didn’t have any better ideas.”
“I certainly couldn’t have had any worse ones.”
Carissa didn’t respond. Instead, she took a few steps backwards.
“Fine, duck the issue, just like you always do,” said the other woman.
“No ...” Carissa pointed behind her wife. Amber turned.
“Oh, fuck,” she said.
CHAPTER THIRTY
For Every Action ...
Abyzou, an erstwhile demon with a predilection for baby murder, stood on the side of the road, watching as the intimidating, black luxury tank rumbled toward her, the caterpillar treads churning up dirt as the car barreled forward at a, quite frankly, ludicrous speed.
“OK, Abby,” she said to herself, “you can do this. Ready ... ready ...”
The dreadlocked former demon pulled back on the massive slingshot mounted into the ground, let go, and fired a jagged rock the size of an overweight kindergartener at the tank just as it passed her. The projectile bounced off the rubber-reinforced titanium body and ricocheted straight back into her face. Abyzou tumbled backward, staring dazedly at the turquoise sky overhead and watching a handful of her own bloody teeth rain down onto her face.
“If I wasn’t so high right now,” she said, blinking her eyes repeatedly, “I guarantee this would hurt.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Office Space
Chester A. Arthur XVII sat on his couch in a fresh pair of boxers, leaning over his coffee table. A laptop, two tablets, three cell phones, and a mess of papers were spread out before him. As he scoured and searched, scrolling through spreadsheets and flipping through printouts, trying to pin down Satan’s current location, he jotted down notes on a pad of paper resting next to him on the couch.
Queen Victoria XXX entered the living room in a bathrobe and put a cup of coffee down in front of her boyfriend.
“I’m going to go for a run,” she said.
“Don’t you want to help me with this?”
“I brought you coffee.”
“And I appreciate that,” he replied. “But there’s a lot of data points and dubi
ous sightings to go through. You don’t feel like lending a hand?”
“No, not even a little.” The cloned monarch continued on her way, through the living room and into the back hallway.
Chester A. Arthur XVII shrugged, then looked at his handwritten notes and reached for one of his phones. As he did, the phone immediately rang.
“Hello?” he said.
“I need help.”
“How bad?”
“I’m calling you, aren’t I?”
“Good point. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“Bring Vicky.”
Chester A. Arthur XVII ended the call.
“Hey, babe?” he called. “Where did we put the jetpacks?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost ... but, Yeah, Usually They Are
Satan, a surprisingly well-mended Persephone, and Steve Careers, lugging several bags of guns and computer equipment, trudged through the radioactive wastelands that were once Pennsylvania – now the Sovereign Nation of Atomic Mutants – in search of another café, or, really, any other place that had free or easily stolen Wi-Fi and a high tolerance for dudes with horns growing out of their heads.
“Why are we walking again?” asked Persephone.
“Because we can’t stay in one place too long,” explained Satan. “By now they’re bound to be looking for us.”
“Yeah, but can’t you just teleport us where we need to be?”
“I can teleport myself, sure,” he explained, “but probably not anybody else. My powers are all pretty self-serving, even when they’re at one hundred percent.”
“They’re not at a hundred percent?” asked the deceased tech mogul, rushing up from the rear to be part of the conversation. “But ... the horns ...”
“They’re usually a lot bigger.”
“I don’t know,” teased Persephone. “I don’t remember anything being that big.”
“Shut up,” replied Satan. “Besides, it’s not like you’re at full strength either.”
The goddess in the bloodstained greatcoat shrugged. “Something’s better than nothing, right?”
“Kind of weird that you guys only got part of your powers back, though, isn’t it?” asked Steve Careers. “You’d think it would be an all or nothing situation.”
“Eat me, mortal.”
“Look, I know I don’t know a lot about religion and all, but –”
“No, you don’t, Steve,” bristled the former Prince of Darkness, “so shut your hole.”
“OK,” he meekly replied, before falling a few steps behind the fallen gods again. “Sorry.”
The trio marched onward.
“So, continuing our conversation,” began Persephone, shooting Steve Careers a dirty look, “I get that we have to move, and I get that teleporting is out of the question, but why are we on foot?”
“Because,” replied Satan, “today is apparently some kind of mutant holiday and none of the buses and trains are running.”
“OK, right,” said the former Greek goddess slowly, “but I don’t think you get what I’m saying. Why are we relying on public transportation at all? Not exactly the quickest way to make a getaway.”
“Well, Seph,” began the devil, suddenly remarkably condescendingly, “Sidney took away my car, so unless you have –”
“Why don’t we steal another one?”
“Oh. Yeah. We should probably do that.”
“Cinnamon toast crap, Lucy. You are not on your game lately.”
“I’m a little focused on the revenging, OK?”
“Yeah?” she replied, grabbing her wounded shoulders. “How’s that going for you?”
“Hey, how radioactive are these radioactive wastelands?” asked Steve Careers, stumbling up from the rear once again. “I’m not feeling so hot.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Fly the Friendly Skies
Chester A. Arthur XVII and Queen Victoria XXX roared through the air, her silk assault dress fluttering in the radioactive wake glowing dimly behind them.
“This is so fucking awesome!” screamed the queen.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
... There Is an Equal and Opposite Reaction
Aka Manah, the former Zoroastrian demon of ill will, cautiously leaned out from behind the desiccated shrub and threw a pair of traffic spikes in front of the approaching luxury tank. The vehicle, sensing an obstacle in the road, automatically unfolded the grille into a cowcatcher and scooped up the tire shredders as it raced past, flinging them harmlessly to the side of the road.
Well, mostly harmlessly.
One of the spiked rubber strips stabbed itself into the protective guards built into the front of the old man’s pants, before wrapping painfully around the back of his thigh.
“Benedict H. Cumberbatch,” he grunted, hobbling backward and ripping the caltrops free from his leg. He held the three foot strip of spikes in front of him, exhaling deeply.
“That wasn’t so b–”
The erstwhile demon tripped on a large branch and fell to the ground, the small of his back landing squarely on the other set of traffic spikes. Aka Manah spent the next hour screaming and swearing and trying to remove the steel points from his spine.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Scientist’s World
Once upon a time, during the events leading up to the twenty-fifth-and-a-half end of the world, Chester A. Arthur XVII died spectacularly, his insides ending up all over his outsides after trying to catch a grenade with his stomach. Thankfully, the cloned president had been smuggling rare breeds of scrap metal to Dr. Lee Arahami, a reclusive roboticist living in a volcano in the scientist sanctuary of Las Máquinas, in what used to be New Mexico. Dr. Arahami saved the life of Chester A. Arthur XVII by cybernetically rebuilding him – better, stronger, and with a cannon in his chest.
***
During the geomagnetic solar storm that blanketed the globe in darkness and ended the world for the twenty-sixth time, the cyborg Chester A. Arthur XVII shorted out and effectively died. A few times. He was carted back to Dr. Arahami for repairs, but, this time, opted to go under the knife with the roboticist’s neighbor, Dr. Joselin Gonzalez, a renegade biologist.
Dr. Gonzalez removed the electronic components from the president, replacing them with a grab-bag of all-natural body parts she happened to have on hand. The clone, despite looking like several half-finished jigsaw puzzles jammed together, had not died since.
***
Bio-Evocative Technologist X1211MR, or Bex for short, was nearly six feet of steel, circuitry, and curves, with the smartest brains her engineers could find – including those of Stephens Hawking and Colbert – uploaded into her cybercortex. Under the employ of William H. Taft XLII, mayor-king of Las Vegas, when the lights went out, she was tasked with going to Montana to fix the continental electrical grid. She did so, with the assistance of her companion, Tanner, a transgender gorilla, and Dr. Lee Arahami.
They were heroes.
Hooray.
Dr. Arahami and Bex, compelled by necessity, raced back to Las Máquinas to personally mend the fractured relations between humans and robots. By boning.
Eventually, the android and the roboticist put their genitals and sex-ports away and fell into an easy rhythm, living and sciencing and being the best thems that they could be. They would often have Dr. Gonzalez over for dinner.
Tanner, for her part, after being unceremoniously left behind at the electrical grid, began working for the newly-formed Continental Electric Company, a private corporation of recently graduated electrical engineers that had, when no one was looking, quietly taken over the grid and the need of running it. The pay was great, the breaks were plentiful, and her new bosses knew all the best video games. Tanner was thrilled.
And so it was that the doctor, the other doctor, the robot, and the gorilla all lived happily ever after.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The Empire Strikes Back,
&nb
sp; or, More Accurately, the First Thirty Minutes of A New Hope
Catrina Dalisay sped the custom-built luxury tank along the battered interstate until the smoking volcanoes of Las Máquinas began to rise into view.
“Aren’t all the volcanoes out here dormant?” asked Mark Hughes, leaning forward from the backseat.
“Yes,” replied Catrina, slowing the car and staring at the hundreds of dark plumes twisting into the sky.
“Dormant means asleep, right?” asked Thor – his skin no longer resembling pepperoni, and fully clothed in his standard denim, flannel, and silk thong uniform.
“Yes,” replied Mark.
“Then that can’t be good.”
***
The tank pulled up in front of the volcano lair of Dr. Joselin Gonzalez. They knew it was hers because her lifeless corpse was strung up by vines across the enormous doorway. Smoke poured out from within her lair. Scattered beneath her body were the stomped and smashed bodies of her mutant plants and marsupial/flower hybrids.
“This definitely can’t be good,” said Thor.
***
The tank pulled up in front of the volcano lair of Dr. Lee Arahami just in time to see his torso stop crawling forward and collapse face-first into the dust. Behind him, Bex was piled in a dozen mangled pieces. Also, Dr. Arahami’s legs were back there. And a lot of his blood.
“Yep,” said Thor. “We’re fucked.”
“Oh my god,” said Catrina, killing the engine and jumping from the car. “Lee!” She ran to the dead roboticist’s side. “Lee!”
Mark Hughes limped after her. “This is pretty messed up,” he said, looking down at the doctor.
“Lee,” said the Filipina woman, stifling a good cry. She lifted his hand, then dropped it limply to the ground.