It took Bob, and the girls, a few minutes to regain their footing.
Bob was looking confused by what’d happened, and I tried to get everyone back on the bike while he was still unsteady, but we weren’t quick enough. He stood up and pulled a spoon from his pocket, and a fork from his belt.
Ann and Kaz, who’d been moving towards me, stopped. They turned back to face Bob, and began circling him.
He started making threatening thrusts with his cutlery while trying to keep an eye on Pony, and what the girls were doing, at the same time. I ran in and took the girls by the arm, pulling them back to stand with me to protect Pony. Also, if we got the chance, we were close enough to the bike for a getaway.
Bob continued his threats. He’d picked up one of his despatulator’s that had fallen out of his quiver, and lunged at us a few times. He wanted to separate us from Pony, but we stood our ground. I don’t know how long this went on for, but we didn’t get an opportunity to leave. The way it was going, I knew the only chance we’d get to outwit Bob, would be to wait until he became too exhausted to thrust anymore.
Pony had climbed off the trailer, and was standing behind me. I only knew she was there because I felt her slime run down one of my arms.
‘Ya fools for protectin’ tha monster, she’ll eat ya,’ Bob yelled. ‘Don’t think she won’t. Best let me finish her off now an’ we can all go ‘ome.’
He stopped talking when he caught sight of her behind me. She was trying to hide, but when you’re six foot five, trying to hide behind a five-foot-four anything, it’s simply not going to work.
He raised his arms and pointed his cutlery at Pony, well it was actually at me, but I’m not one to quibble, and nearly took my eye out with his spoon.
‘I bin looking for you lass,’ he said. ‘Ya shoulda been decapitated with ya man, but you’re a slippery bit ain’t ya? Bin hidin’ out wit’ ya man ay? Knew I shoulda gone back ta tha home. I thought ya would’ve made ya way to tha cemetery by now. Bin lookin’ there all week. No worries, I can sort that out for ya right now. Jest step out here ghoul an’ ya can be with ya man again. I’ll even make a matchin’ pair of gloves outta ya hide.’
‘Get out ‘ere ghoul,’ Bob called threateningly.
It sounded as if he’d reached the end of his tether, and things were only going to get worse if he didn’t leave us alone. Kaz must’ve had enough. She stepped forward breaking the line and, in her own way, tried to warn Bob.
‘I’ve about had enough of you old man,’ she said. ‘This is our friend, and we’ll do what we have to, to keep her safe. So move aside, or I’ll move ya.’
As I said, in her own way.
I was impressed, I didn’t know Kaz had it in her. I knew she was angry, but that was the first time anyone other than me had taken charge. It was enough to rally the troops. We stepped forward to join her in a threatening line, with our ghoul standing behind us. What happened next, I can say with surety I never even saw coming, and don’t ever want to see again.
Ann walked to Kaz, took her by the arm and pushed her back to stand with me. Then she began waving a despatulator around.
‘Where the fuck did she get that?’ I asked Kaz, with an unusual panic rising in my voice.
‘She picked it up when we knocked him over,’ Kaz said.
‘Oh,’ is all I could say.
Ann was thrusting at Bob, and they’d started circling each other, with Bob using his fork and spoon to deflect Ann’s thrusts.
‘Piss off old man,’ Ann growled in her best Al Pacino, playing Tony Montana in Scarface (One of Ya-Ya’s favourite movies and Ann was the apple of her eye), voice. ‘I’ll cut ya, you best believe I will. I’ve put up with a lot this last week. I’ve been chained up, dipped in piss and other bodily fluids, and that ghoul there is wearing my new blazer, so don’t you go testing me old man.’
Bob, like the rest of us, looked taken aback.
I have to admit I was surprised, shocked too, but definitely surprised. Ann had come a long way from crying in the dark to… well… this. I always thought Deb would be the one who’d do something like this. Well not completely like this cause this shit was messed up, but like it. I guess it really is the quiet ones you have to watch out for!
Bob moved away from Ann.
‘You watch who you’re stickin’ that thing at girlie,’ he said. ‘Thin’s can go bad in a hurry. Give me back me despatulator an’ I’ll leave ya be.’
Bob extended his hand, but she thrust the despatulator and sliced his hand open.
We all gasped in horror as Bob’s blood began to spill over his old knobbly brown boots. He wrenched his hand back, pulled a filthy white hanky from his pocket and wrapped it around the slice. It was wet with his blood within seconds.
Sneering, he backed away, then turned and ran towards the other side of the park, calling over his shoulder.
‘She’ll eat ya. She’ll eat ya an’ you’ll deserve everythin’ ya got coming to ya.’
I was watching Bob run through the park. He was only about five foot tall, but he ran like a well-honed athlete. I was feeling a little sorry for him, not that I’d tell the girls that after he told us he’d killed Horse. I was also impressed he kept a nice steady pace. He must’ve been doing it for some time.
Bob was almost halfway across the park when I caught Ann out the corner of my eye. She took a few steps forward while holding the despatulator behind her right, shoulder ready to throw it.
‘Here’s ya damn despatulator,’ she yelled and threw it to him.
I don’t know what she intended to do, but it flew through the air and caught up to Bob just as he passed a dog pissing on an old water fountain.
That’s when it happened.
Kaz and I gasped as the spatula flipped on its side, and flew through the air as if something was propelling it. Then we watched as it cut Bob’s head from his shoulders. His body continued to run for another few steps, his head had already come to a stop near the fountain.
With mouths agape, we stood looking at Bob’s lifeless, headless body. It was minutes before anyone could speak.
‘What the fuck?’ I said turning to Ann. ‘What did you do?’
I was in shock, wide-eyed shock as I took in the scene. I wanted it to stop, wanted to stop looking, but for some reason, I couldn’t.
‘Did that just happen?’ I asked no-one in particular.
‘I didn’t mean to… to kill him,’ Ann was saying. ‘I… I was just playing a role from one of my old movies to scare him off. I was only throwing the despatulator to him, but it was like something else took control of it… You saw it didn’t you?’
‘Uh ha,’ is all I could say.
‘Guess his despatulator really does work,’ Kaz said, who’d been standing next to me looking just as stunned.
Pony’s lips started to smack together, and when I looked at her, they’d begun to grow. Her tongue flicked across them and, before we knew what was happening, she was over at the now headless Bob. I heard a cracking sound and looked up just in time to see Pony dislocating her jaws. Her mouth kept getting wider and wider until it was Bob size. I was unable to do anything except watch.
Horrified by what had happened… what was happening, I think I threw up a little in my mouth when Pony wrapped her lips around Bob’s torso. I watched her pull him into her mouth, inch by inch, I had no idea how that was possible. She wasn’t even using her hands to tuck him in there.
When her mouth reached his hips, my eyes nearly fell out of my head when I saw another set of teeth pop out of her mouth, latch onto Bob’s belt to pull him in. Bob’s body slowly disappeared into Pony. Spoons, forks, quiver, and arrows were clinking together as they fell from his body, creating a small bloody pile at her feet.
Thinking it was all over when Bob’s boots fell from her lips, and hit the ground, as the last of him disappeared into her mouth, something more happened. Once Pony had Bob inside her, she began to grow taller right in front of our eyes. She grew to an unimaginable si
ze. That’s when things got truly horrifying.
I could see the outline of Bob as he moved down into her digestive tract, and heard the sickening crunch and crack of his bones ring out across the park. When the last bone cracked, Pony pulled in her amazing stomach muscles, and crushed Bob’s body until he couldn’t be seen anymore.
As if my fuck me quota hadn’t been filled for this millennium, Kaz and I dry retched as Pony coughed up the last of Bob’s clothes.
Ann threw up.
It was like watching Animal Planet when the boa constrictor eats and digests a wild boar that wandered to close to the water, only faster, bigger, and much, much more disturbing.
The terrifying sights and sounds of Bob’s body being crushed will live with me forever.
There was another gasp from the girls, and I looked up in time to see Pony had moved to his head.
‘Fuck me.’
Those words were uttered in complete absence of my vocal cords, and yet they are still the words that echo through my mind as I relive that moment.
We watched Pony pick up Bob’s head and put it into her mouth, as someone at a dinner party would pick up a cocktail onion off a tray of pre-dinner appetisers. I wasn’t sure how much more I could take.
Bending in half, Pony pressed her lips to the ground, and ran over Bob’s blood and fluids like a vacuum cleaner. Now and then her tongue flicked out from the side of her mouth to gather the bits she’d missed. She was fast, efficient, and I wasn’t quite sure if it was her first time. She was very good at it if it was.
After she finished Bob, she let out the burp to end all burps.
Let me tell you this, when a ghoul burps, close your mouth, bring in your nostrils, and shut your eyes cause that shits gonna get into everything.
After her beastly Bob belch, Pony came back to the bike with a huge smile on her face. Standing in front of us, she had a full body shake like a wet dog after a good swim. The girls and I stood frozen to the spot. Our mouths were agape, and we had Bob dripping off us in the form of ghoul slime. Pony sat on the grass in front of us and smiled.
I was the first to speak.
‘Right,’ I said, bringing my sleeve up to my mouth in an attempt to wipe the away slime. ‘Let’s lie Pony on the trailer and get out of here.’
Yeah, it wasn’t going to be that simple. Pony may have cleaned up the grass, but there was plenty of Bob still on her blouse. Ann was pissed Pony had Bob all over her new blazer, and refused to allow her back on the trailer until someone, me, picked Bob off.
I so wanted to remind Ann whose fault it was that Pony was wearing Bob, but I saw she was trying to shift not just the blame, but the entire incident on to Pony and myself.
‘Well, Okay,’ I said, taking another wipe with my filthy sleeve across my mouth to try to have it absorb the slime. ‘I’ll just get Bob off your blazer, Ann…’
I stopped and waited for a few seconds.
‘I’ll do that shall I?’ I asked, waiting for her to say she’d do it.
Nothing. Bitch just stood there looking at me with a blank stare. Maybe it was shock? I don’t know. All I knew at the time was I wanted to get away from where I was. That’s why I set about picking bits of Bob from the blazer and fed them to Pony. I was feeling pretty pissed off, and Kaz did nothing but laugh.
Pulling the last of Bob off the blazer, Ann climbed on the back seat, and looked like she was checking if she’d broken a nail.
Poor dear.
I kept an eye on her, well the corner of one, as I lay Pony on the trailer.
‘Let’s get Pony to the hospital,’ I said. ‘We’ve still got some way to go, and it’s through town.’
‘At least we don’t have Bob to worry about now,’ I thought, looking respectfully at the stranger on the rear seat.
After her initial shock, Ann didn’t seem fazed at all.
Normally I’d be concerned, but I’ve wallowed in what I’d prefer to think of as piss, smuggled a ghoul out of a funeral home, watched that ghoul wearing a Cantoré Blazer, eat a man, and now we’re on a bicycle ride that will change our lives forever. What could go wrong that hasn’t already!
’We’ve got some riding to do,’ I called, and felt the bike pull backwards as Kaz climbed on board.
Pony seemed calm, happy and full. I’d covered her in jackets, and Ann and Kaz were getting along better than I’d seen them in a long time. We were making good time, quiet, but good. I was still freaked over the whole Bob situation but had focused on getting to the hospital.
Edging closer to the centre of town, we moved further away from the park, what had happened to Bob, and that’s all that mattered. I pulled the bike in behind an old trucker’s garage and eatery on Highway-4, Bens Meats for Eats. I thought it best to take that route with a glowing ghoul on… well… our trailer. I thought we’d be pretty safe there, because the place was always packed with weirdos. We certainly fit that category.
As we pulled up, I got off the bike and drew up a sand map to begin planning our route.
‘We need to map out a way to get from the eatery here,’ I said pointing to the map, ‘to make it to the hos… pit… tal…’
‘What the hell girls, what are you doing?’ I asked after noticing they seemed to be following the smell of deep-fried whatever the hell that was.
‘It’s alright for you Jo,’ Ann said, ‘but I haven’t eaten in almost a week.’
Ann was right. She must’ve been starving, but Kaz’s response sent a chill down my spine.
‘After watching Pony eat,’ Kaz said, ‘my stomach hasn’t stopped growling.’
‘Now you see how that’s just plain creepy Kaz?’ I asked. ‘My stomach’s’ been telling me it doesn’t need feeding possibly ever again after watching Pony snack.’
‘Alright,’ I said. ‘Even though I don’t know how either of you could eat anything after… Bob.’
I turned and saw Ann had begun to pick up her pace as she headed towards the diner.
‘What did you even have to throw up?’ I asked too quietly for her to hear.
‘Don’t be long,’ I called out after them. ‘Pony and I’ll wait here, and work out a route to the hossy… hospital.’
‘Horsey.’
‘Yes Pony, hospital.’
Ben's Meat for Eats
Pony and I’d been at the back of the eatery for a while when we suddenly heard Kaz’s piercing scream. Looking up, I saw her running down the side of the eatery, where Pony and I were sitting on the ground drawing maps in the sand. Trying to ignore the screams, because I couldn’t handle another Pony snack pack courtesy of Ann, I went back to scratching a twig into the sand and began drawing spirals.
No, there’s nothing more to it than that.
‘Jo, Jo, you’ve got to help Ann,’ Kaz yelled.
I looked up again and saw her running, almost as well as Bob had when he ran across the park to escape Ann, down the side of the eatery.
‘Yeah! Look where that got Bob,’ said brain.
Kaz caught her arm twice on the rough edges of the rocks protruding from the wall. It didn’t slow her down though. She almost ran into two extremely large gas bottles connected to the wall. That’s when the now familiar churning began to grow in my stomach.
It was an odd looking diner. On one side they’d built up a large gravel packed wall, and it looked quite attractive coming from town. On the side Kaz was running down, it still had an old dirty white rock wall that looked like it’d fall in a decent breeze.
It’s like, if you’re leaving town they want you to stop in, but if you’re coming to town, you may as well keep going.
We’d seen some freaky shit already, so I knew whatever was spooking Kaz must’ve been bad. My slow reaction to her panicked call, was likely due to me not wanting to face another gruesome event. There was just no room left for it in my head.
‘What do you reckons going on now?’ I asked Pony, who looked at me blankly.
‘What’s happening,’ I asked, looking up from the groun
d with a fake smile on my face. ‘Killed someone has she?’
‘No, not killed, but oh it’s bad,’ Kaz said catching her breath. ‘We were sitting on the stools at the counter instead of a booth because Ann said, “We’re as tough as these guys”. Anyway, our orders were placed in front of us when Ann thanked Beth, the sheila behind the counter.’
Kaz leaned against the handlebars of the bike trying to catch her breath.
‘Apparently, she knows her, which is good,’ she said turning to Pony, ‘seeing as neither of us had any money.’
‘Ann lifted her glass of lemonade into the air,’ she continued lifting her hand in impersonation. ‘Then said, “Here’s to me and Pony cause without us we might not be here at all”, and we both said, “here, here”. I didn’t care. I was just glad for a drink.’
‘That’s when Deb appeared out of nowhere. There she was, just standing beside us,’ Kaz said. ‘Anyway Ann was so happy to see her, she began to insist on having a beer with her meal. I think they come here a lot because Beth knew them by name. Anyway, Ann started to yell and slam her cup on the counter top, “Give me beer, give me beer, give me beer”.’
Kaz was tapping her clenched fist on her leg as she spoke. We were getting the whole show.
‘Go on,’ I said, taking hold of her hand to stop her from hurting herself. She’d started to get a rhythm up. I wasn’t sure what was coming, but was concerned sharp cutlery might’ve been involved.
‘What happened then?’ I dared to ask, with a sinking feeling growing in my chest the longer the story went on.
‘A big hairy bloke stood up, gave her a weird look and said, “Be cool bitch”! Ann must have thought he’d called her a ghoul bitch,’ Kaz almost screeched, ‘because then she started mouthing off, “We’ve got one, we’ve got one an she’ll eat ya”. The poor bloke was trying to move away, but Ann wouldn’t stop, and kind of growled at him. She’s a little scary… Anyway, when he found a booth, he looked back and said, “You’re bein’ a fool”. That was it, Ann picked up her fork and started yelling, “I’ll fork ya, I’ll fork ya, I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again”.’
Josephine Marlin and The Alternatives_Book One_A Friend in Need_Feilds of Elysian 1 Page 8