Tentacle Death Trip Page 9

  Drac’s car.

  She jumped out of the driver’s side, guns blazing and screaming like a goddamn banshee. Her blonde hair was flapping angrily in the wind. Gabby wasn’t aiming her guns but she came pretty close to hitting Drac.

  “You got balls, bitch,” Drac said, retracting the tentacles but finding they were stuck in the wreckage of Gabby’s car. He’d have to handle her the old-fashioned way. No big deal. He had no qualms about fighting a woman face to face. Besides, he didn’t really consider that bitch wasn’t much of a woman at all. She was just a typical delusional head case of the post-apocalyptic world.

  III.

  Who the hell did that glass-skulled freak think he was?

  Gabby had been talking to her friend on the phone when that piece of shit sent his tentacles under her car. “I’ll have to call you back,” she said, putting the phone down and holding on as her car spun around.

  When she realized her car was totaled, she stormed out of the car and started shooting like a crazed gunslinger. She didn’t have the patience to stand there and aim at the motherfucker. It was just: blam-blam-blam.

  Gabby thought about the dozens of people she killed in the last ten years and each one had been more satisfying than the last but snuffing out this freak would be the best kill ever.

  IV.

  Drac got out of the car and stood with his gun at his side, looking at the crazed woman in front of him. He wondered if he made any impression on her whatsoever with his glass skull full of gasoline, spiked shoulder pads, and inhumanly bulging muscles. Image was important in the wasteland. First impressions were what either struck fear into someone’s mind or made them think of you as an easy target.

  As he was about to unleash his firepower, he saw his car’s tentacles pull out of Gabby’s car. It took only a few seconds for them to find their target.

  One tentacle wrapped around Gabby’s upper body and lifted her off the ground while another found its way in between her legs. A third entered her mouth. Her eyes bulged and so did her stomach. The bitchy look was still on her face and Drac figured it was probably something she couldn’t get rid off even in death.

  Drac could never get used to that sound. It was something between the crinkling of paper and the slapping sounds of sex. Though they were his tentacles and were under his control, this time they didn’t seem to be following his directions. Drac would have never sent one of the tendrils in between her legs though there he was staring at one of them inching its way up there slowly for maximum pain. Finally it pulled out and showered the ground with Gabby’s insides. Her remains landed in toxic moss.

  Drac got back in the car and revved his engine. He thought it sounded like that dead bitch’s screams.

  V.

  “Where are we going?” Paulo asked.

  “Gonna see a friend of mine,” Samson said. “He might be able to take care of you.” Though he thought about killing Lord Bing Bong, he knew it would smart to visit his friend Cobra Canfield first and drop the kid off. The guy had been living in the Zone of Dead Roads for as long as Samson could remember and he was the only one he trusted. Also, he had a constant supply of weaponry.

  “Who?” the boy said.

  “Just a friend.”

  “I don’t want to stay with him. I want to stay with you.”

  “It’s not under discussion, kid. I can’t take you along.”

  The car veered off to the right in a cloud of dust. Two miles later they were navigating around boulders painted deep red.

  “We’re almost there,” Samson said, looking carefully at the boulders until he saw the one he was looking for. There was a tiny flash of blue light. He pulled the car around the back of that boulder and turned the car off. “Here we are.”

  Samson got out of the car and motioned to Paulo to follow but saw the boy was reluctant to get out in the middle of nowhere. It was understandable so Samson put his arm around the boy’s shoulder and told him it was going to be okay.

  A small door opened out of the boulder revealing a tall black man with a Fu-Manchu mustache wearing a purple t-shirt with the word WRENCH scrawled in black across the front. The man said, “Well holy shit, if it isn’t the man himself. Jesus Christ, good to see you, Samson.”

  “Cobra.” The two men hugged briefly and then Cobra extended his hand for Paulo to shake.

  “How you doing, little man?”

  “Good, sir.”

  Cobra laughed. “No need to call me sir. Makes me feel old.” He looked at Samson. “Saw you guys coming from a mile away. Was gonna take a shot at you just for fun, you know, keep you on your toes.”

  “Then I would’ve had to kick your ass.”

  “Or at least you’d try,” Cobra said, laughing. “Is this a friendly visit or you need something? And who’s this little man?”

  “This is Paulo. Found him during the race….”

  Cobra interrupted. “Race? Jesus Christ, Samson, you doing that shit?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. I don’t need you to talk me out of it.”

  “Well, I won’t. I assume it’s too late anyway.”

  “I came by to see if you could do me a favor.”

  “Sure thing.”

  “It’s kind of a big one.”

  Cobra cocked his eyebrow. “Spill it, Samson.”

  “I need you to take care of the kid.”

  Cobra rolled his eyes. “Come on, man. You seriously gonna ask me for a favor like that? This ain’t no place for a kid.” He looked at Paulo. “It’s not anything against you, little man. Just take a look around and you see what I’m saying.”

  Samson said, “Look, you have connections and I’m sure you can find someone to take care of him, some nice family or something. Just watch him until the end of the race and if I….survive, I’ll come back and get him. Okay?”

  “Shit, man,” Cobra said. He put his hands on his hips and shook his head. “Jesus Christ. Okay, fine.”

  “Thanks. Now for my second favor. You have any weapons? Specifically blow gun refills.”

  Cobra shook his head. “You’re pushing you luck, brother.” He laughed and motioned for them to follow him. “Let’s go inside and talk.” He led them through the door in the boulder, up a staircase to a small loft. There was a table set up with an old teapot and various dried meats, some brown and others dark green. Cobra motioned around the room. “This here’s one of the rocks I go to when I just want to, you know, relax.”

  “We can’t stay long.”

  “If you want your stuff….sit down.”

  The three of them had a seat while Cobra poured them some hot meat-water. Then he opened up a cabinet in the wall and took out crates of weapons. “I’m low on new weapons. Haven’t had my guy come by in quite a while. I do have your blow gun darts and some bullets, though.”

  Samson took the supplies and said, “What do you know about the race?”

  “Shit, man, what do you know about the race? I know you’ve raced before but that was for, what, food and gasoline? Canadian dollars? What the hell is Silver offering the winner?”

  “A job. Food, gasoline, supplies.”

  “A job? Working for him? Christ, Samson, you gotta be smarter than that.”

  “What the hell else do I have better to do?”

  “There’s something else, isn’t there?”

  Samson shook his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “And what about the kid? How’d he get wrapped up in this?”

  “Saved his life during the race so I took him along.”

  Cobra sighed. “And now you’re on your way to win this race?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, good luck to you even if you are a stupid son of a bitch.”

  Samson chuckled. “Hey, another thing. Silver wants the racers to kill a guy named Lord Bing Bong. You know him?”

  Cobra said, “Shit, man, you serious?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “That dude is bat-shit crazy, man. Dangerous, too
. Silver probably figures most of you ain’t gonna survive trying to bring Bing Bong down.”

  “Well, I didn’t say I was going to try for it. The time I spent here already means I’m going to be behind. I figured those other assholes will be preoccupied with that. Might give me a better chance.”

  “You think you’re the only racer to have that idea? I’d get going if I were you,” Cobra said. “And speaking of which…I’m glad as hell I ain’t you. No offense.”

  Samson grunted. “Yeah.”

  Cobra turned to Paulo. “Looks like you’re staying with Uncle Cobra. Can’t say I have much in the way of toys but I have a dirt bike I’m almost done fixing. You might like to take a ride on that when it’s done. How about it?”

  Paulo said, “What’s a dirt bike?”

  The men laughed. They shook hands and went outside.

  “I owe you,” Samson said.

  “You get out of that shit alive and we meet again, you can pay me back in good conversation or a game of chess.”

  “I’m sure I’ll find time to kick your ass.”

  Cobra laughed.

  Samson went into the backseat of the car and pulled out the crabs he had gotten from Lee. “You have any use for these?”

  Cobra smiled. “Sure do.”

  “You might be able to trade these to someone. You can’t eat them, though. They’re not safe.”

  “Sure as hell I can. I have an iron stomach.” Cobra took a small one out and started to eat it raw. “Haven’t had this shit in a long while. Reminds me of home.”

  “Enjoy,” Samson said. He turned to Paulo. “You be good for Cobra, okay?”

  The boy stared at him. “Don’t go.”

  “You can’t come with me, kid.”

  “Don’t go.”

  Samson patted the boy on the shoulder and got into his car. He revved the engine, sending dust up into the air. He pulled away while looking in his rearview. Cobra was still eating one of the crabs.

  VI.

  Paulo watched Samson drive away and then heard Cobra cough. There was a gurgling sound and a crunch.

  Cobra’s abdomen exploded, and out of it came a crab claw covered in stomach acid and bile. Another claw tore through his rectum. A third thing, not quite a crab claw but definitely made of crab parts, made its way up Cobra’s throat and out his mouth, plucking his teeth out. His body was carried away by his new, gory appendages, moving into the desert.

  Paulo screamed, jumping and waving his hands so Samson would see. He saw the car in the distance, skidding and spinning 180 degrees, speeding back in his direction.

  The boy ran forward and away from the crab-thing.

  Samson’s car reached him within seconds, skidding around with the passenger side door already open. “Get in, kid!”

  Paulo ran to the car and jumped inside.

  “What the hell was that?” Samson said.

  The boy shook his head. “I don’t know. He was eating the crab and then they just came out of him.”

  Samson couldn’t believe it. One minute he’s talking to his friend and the next the man’s dead.

  “You didn’t eat any of the crab, did you?”

  “No.”

  “Good,” Samson said, putting the petal to the floor. “I guess you’re coming with me.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  I.

  Three Years Ago

  Drac was anointed with fish and motor oil by Simon Revair, pastor and head mechanic of the Church of the Starry Engines.

  They had taken Drac, the last son of the Dunwich clan and “souped” him up like they would any machine, any car. It was experimental to say the least; they had tried it on dozens of young men with occult inclinations but always with disastrous results. All of the test subjects were either deceased or roaming the wasteland as biomechanical deformities from the pits of automotive hell.

  Drac endured the surgery, the incantations, and the blasphemous repairs. He forced himself into a half-sleep state as his veins were pumped with sigil-laden gasoline and mixed with accursed blood of some shunned ancestor. Dreams came quietly, easily, and in the form of winged slabs of neon meat. Their tendrils wrapped around his dream-body and forced him to acknowledge their supreme role in an ancient but advanced patriarchy. He acquiesced to the mysterious mechanolater’s repairs.

  When it was all done, Drac was dropped back into the cellar of his father’s house. He didn’t remember much, only the sight and sound of leather-like wings. The cellar was just as his father had left it: full of obscure militaria and esoteric texts wrapped in crumbling desert cloth. A wooden donkey sat in one corner, dusty and staring at Drac with those eyes that implored him to burn the house to the ground and let it fall into ash.

  That night Drac dreamt he was a child. He was at the seashore with his father, walking along the beach and on the boardwalk almost simultaneously. Spatially there was no difference between the two places. To the right of him was the ocean and to the left there were impossible games where one could try to win prizes from simple machines and archaic automatons. There was also a mirrored labyrinth and a spook house and a place that was something in between the two. It was called a scratch house and Drac instinctively knew it was horrifying.

  His father was in full military attire with his arm around Drac, protecting him from harm in the form of the violent ocean spray and splintery boardwalk. Then without actually falling, Drac hurt his knee on the ground below him. It was an instantaneous wound, bubbling and bloody.

  “Daddy, I got a boo-boo.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, son,” his father said, stooping down to eye-level. He gently lifted Drac’s leg and kissed the wound. “All better.”

  “Thanks, daddy.”

  Drac woke up with the eyes of the wooden donkey staring at him, begging to be set on fire.

  II.

  Drac had met Lord Bing Bong once and that one meeting left him intrigued at the weirdo historian of occult tomes.

  The man was leader of the Zoners, the group of people insane enough to live in the Zone of Dead Roads, an area ravaged by radioactive winds, marauding killers, fecal floods, and the long-headed freaks known as the Yuggs.

  As far as anyone could tell, the Yuggs were just another result of radiation but some said they existed before the war and that they only made themselves known after the collapse of normal society. The Yuggs were short and yellow with long skulls that stretched their skin to the breaking point. Their facial features were mostly human but their arms were slightly longer than normal and their legs slightly shorter. Traveling mostly in groups, they survived by stealing things while chanting in an unintelligible language.

  Lord Bing Bong didn’t approve of the Yuggs or their noisy thefts. He instructed all of the Zoners to slaughter the freaks on sight. Over the course of just one year, hundreds of Yuggs were captured, tortured, dismembered, and killed. Their body parts were used to cook up a strong hallucinogenic. Lord Bing Bong had told Drac he had gotten the recipe for it from a large tablet of black plastic he had found emblazoned with bizarre hieroglyphs. After nearly a year of translation, one recipe was unearthed and it involved using the skin and organs of those ugly Yuggs.

  Drac didn’t have anything against Lord Bing Bong. He was a crazy motherfucker, there was no denying that, but he had shown Drac some respect though it was probably due to Bing Bong’s having received a rare tome from him. It had been Drac’s father’s book, something he had no use for: the 1856 edition of Ian Griffith’s Examination of the Great Space and the Deconstructing of Some Inner Societies. It was heavy reading, even for Drac.

  So with that in mind, Drac decided he could use the history he had with Bing Bong to get close to him.

  “Guess I’m off to see the Lord,” he said, stepping on the gas and keeping his eyes on the tall, disfigured buildings on the horizon. Those buildings marked the boundaries of the Zone of Dead Roads. It was an urban, labyrinthine hell. The Zoners repaved the streets after the war, making sure to keep them smooth enough to al
low unsuspecting drifters to drive on through the zone in order to be shot, stabbed, raped, impaled, or set on fire.

  When the Zoners were paving the roads, in their minds they were setting down an offering to important visitors from another world, a world only opened to them after the ingesting of the Yugg hallucinogen.

  As he entered the Zone, Drac saw an intimidating group of sentries standing in front of every building on the block. They held guns and were naked except for spiked elbow pads and ball gags. Drac saw their eyes turn yellow as they stared at him.

  He slowed down and waved his hand out the window, moving his fingers the way Lord Bing Bong had instructed him. It was a bizarre gesture, one that revealed Drac to be a person of occult knowledge and therefore safe until Bing Bong said differently. Drac was, after all, the son of Willum Dunwich, sergeant in the United States Marine Corps and expert in all things metaphysically obscure and magickal.

  The sentries nodded slowly, their eyes turning to black.

  Drac drove past them and noticed things were different since the last time he had been there. Though the Zone had always looked like an urban cesspool, it had gotten worse. The buildings were still run down but now they were covered in black sludge and railroad spikes. Rusted chains and animal skins hung from the lampposts. There were groups of Zoners on the corner of every block, gesturing conspiratorially as Drac drove past.

  The Zoners were made up of people from all age and racial groups. The one common characteristic they shared was an unwavering dedication to removing themselves from the past. They refused to acknowledge the nuclear war but instead used the Yugg hallucinogen to expand their inner worlds.

  Drugs weren’t the only things the Zoners were obsessed with. When Drac had first ventured into the Zone of Dead Roads, he had noticed that every building had a television on at all times and there was only one movie playing at all times. Each and every day, every Zoner would sit through multiple viewings of Under Siege 2: Dark Territory.

  He didn’t understand Lord Bing Bong and his Zoners but luckily it didn’t really matter. He had been able to trade with them and that was all. But now he had to decide how he was going to kill the man.