AN: To my adoring fans, no. I will not marry any of you. But thanks for unintentionally giving me these ideas. You will all be paying for my future therapy. And, Cheese, thanks for giving me the idea of the 'suspenseful' page breaks/scene changes.
And I find it to be awesome that I came up as sarcasm.
Hey, how many references can I keep making to books/movies/TV? Can you guys find them all?
Title: Just Another Day in the Neighbourhood
Word Count: 2K-ish
Written By: Zadi
Summary: Come to Casper Town. It's a lovely place built over hell, criss-crossed ley lines, and the meaning of life. The inhabitants are just as charming: A sweet old lady that knows how to destroy everything we care for, a mad scientist that may or may not be responsible for the dwindling pet population, an assassin that is…er…something, a PI that seems to be stuck in the noire-times, and pets that can communicate on a human-like level.
We bring smiles, a carnival, and murder.
Care to stay?
Chapter Two: Bring Out the Body Bags
OH, AND ZADI, YOU CAN'T FORGET THE WEIRD DISAPPEARANCES OF ANY TOURISTS/TRAVELLERS WHO STOP BY, AND THE WHISPERED TALES OF THE INFESTATION OF THE UNDEAD.
AND WHY DO WE HAVE SO MANY DEATHS THAT CAN'T BE EXPLAINED BY NATURAL MEANS, ANYWAY?
—Cendi
"Bloody hell," said a girl in an American accent.
She toed the corpse with the tip of her trainer, half-expecting it to stand up and do the salsa. She then wondered if a dead guy could dance properly without the usual functions of the living. Maybe it could also sing and do her laundry.
The lake that had spewed out the corpse gurgled.
That was not a good sign.
The girl, Sydney, looked at the water with her colour-changing eyes. Any second now there will be another dead body to add to the list. Sighing, she hooked her arms around the corpse's and dragged it to the wheelbarrow. Dropping it on top, she skipped a little as she wheeled it away.
(La, la, la. What a happy day this was. La, la, la.)
Ten minutes later the twelfth dead guy rose up to the surface of the lake.
He felt lonely that Sydney had forgotten about him.
Eh, she'll pick him up the next day
Back at the house TLWitL, the little old lady was knitting again. With her feet stuffed in oversized slippers, and resting comfortably in a rocking chair, she whistled a merry tune as the gold-silver needles moved into creating a masterpiece. The yarn was very strange looking. Like the house, it had an odd warped quality. The colours were colours, but no one was sure which ones they were. Maybe mauve. Mauve's the colour of the narrator's soul.
To be blunt, the lady wasn't knitting just any blanket. If the reader paid attention to the first chapter, then he/she/it would have known what the old lady was doing. She was—
A drastic scene change later.
Zadi doubled over to catch her breath. That crazy old guy just had to live on a giant mountain that had no proper driveways of any kind. Walking up was a nightmare, but what she was really dreading was walking down. She could have sworn that she saw skeletons on her way up.
She lifted her head to look at the door. The doorknob looked strange. Almost like a frog. And it was all painted, no doubt as a sign of eccentricity. She knocked the door and waited.
Five minutes later she knocked again.
Ten minutes later she stood there, tapping her foot impatiently.
What's taking him so long? Zadi thought.
The door finally opened, but only just. A nose stuck out, but it was the only visible appearance of a person. His voice was lathered in an Irish accent. "Who goes there?"
"Someone that needs advice." Zadi said, crossing her arms.
"Come Thursday of next year. I'm booked." The door slammed in her face, the green doorknob grinning at her in a mocking fashion.
"Oh. Come on! I walked all the way up here!"
His voice came muffled. "Too bad, Mr Big Shot. I already know everything, now leave!"
That was a pointless scene, the narrator decided. Probably more weak comic relief and a way to direct the reader's attention away from the lake that barfs dead people. She's not at all trying to do the same for the old lady.
Pft. What old lady? I don't see an old lady knitting?
Do you see an old lady knitting?
In Casper Town, there is this adorable pub known as The Forum. It could be as empty as a ghost town, or filled to the brim with people wanting their orders.
Oh, can someone please get me some crisps?
Whoops! Silly narrator, now isn't the time to eat. It's time to narrate and other such stuff. Like contemplating your place in the universe. That's very important and not at all important to this whatsoever.
Just for the record, I'm five steps above squirrel.
The Forum wasn't densely packed, but it had a nice crowd. The Professor was there lecturing a group of tourists. With a thesaurus in his hand, he spoke in great lengths about the importance of grammar and spelling. He also spoke about the fifth element, cheese, but that doesn't matter yet.
"That is why, simpletons, the letter 'u' is used for—"
"Excuse me," a tourist interrupted. "Why would I need to add the 'u'? We're in America. We don't need to use the 'u'."
Things got very confusing. And the narrator changed the setting to American English.
Proof: Color. Favorite. Pants. Fries. Period
Don't laugh, I would like to see you try being at the end of a sentence.
The tourist barely dodged the book as it flew over his head and hit someone else. The guy that got hit stumbled, and fell to the ground. His soul got erased by the book, thus substantiating the rumors, and he was now obviously dead. Or dead-ish.
Poor bastard.
"We are not in America!" The Professor exclaimed loudly. "We are in—"
Actually, no one knows exactly where Casper Town is.
Maybe Yugoslavia.
Yugoslavia is nice at this time of year, even though it no longer exists.
Back to the PI. She was sitting at the bar, exhausted from her encounter form the batty fruitcake. She took her hat off and put it on the counter, and then rubbed her eyes. "I can't believe it," she said to no one is particular. "I need a question answered, and he wants to terrorize the tourists."
The barman wiped a glass clean with a somewhat dirty rag. He raised an eyebrow. "He's always mad. Must be the leprechaun thing."
"What leprechaun thing?"
"Exactly. Want your usual?"
Zadi nodded, a root beer float and a plate full of french fries appeared in front of her. This town was surely something. "Hey," she asked him, holding a half-eaten fry in the air. "You know everyone, right?"
The barman propped his elbow on the counter and rested his chin on his opened hand. "Shocking, is it not?" he said in a dry voice.
Zadi resisted the urge to chuck a fry at his head. "What can you tell me about the occupants of these three houses?" With her free hand she spread the photos on the counter.
The barman picked one up and laughed. "What doesn't this town know about them."
"Like?"
"For starters, they're related to everyone. You've seen their family trees yet?"
She thought back to their marriage records and birth certificates. She shuddered, her brain and eyes, poor them. "Can't say I want to. Everything is so confusing and intertwined."
The barman was about to enter when a short girl walked up to him. "Into," she said a heavenly voice. Zadi choked on her gulp of root beer. "There's another body for you."
Into the barman threw his hands up in the air, grinning. "Excellent!" He threw his apron off and left the bar with a happy skip in his steps.
Zadi blinked several times. "Why is he happy about a dead person?" she asked slowly.
The girl spoke in her honeyed voice that reminded the PI of angels singing. "Why, he's the coroner, of course."
Zadi looked down at her depleted food. She was starting to feel sick. "Please tell me that he washes his hands."
Back at the WaGotP house, the other mad person known as Cendi cackled.
"It's alive!"
Nothing happened.
"I said—It's alive!"
Still. Nothing happened.
Cendi scowled, and stuffed her hands in her pockets. She stomped over to her computer, coughed, and typed in something. Stepping back, she repeated, "IT'S ALIVE!"
An eerie line of music filled the air, and lightning struck a nearby black cat. Bats flew in the underground laboratory, and a frightening piece of foreshadowing struck the narrator.
Bats. Why does it always have to be bats?
Zadi stumbled out of the bar-pub-thingy. Gods, she was exhausted. What a day this was: a stake-out, a crumbly professor, and a guy that touches dead people handling her food. She looked fondly at the trash can. As long as she refuses to think of fries, then she may not use it.
Putting her hat back on, a convenient wind gushed past her, making her trench coat flap behind her in a dramatic fashion. Of course, it was empathetic weather at work, but what Zadi doesn't know won't hurt her. The narrator chuckled at the thought of the next scene.
All of a sudden—with theme music—a girl appeared out of nowhere. The narrator cursed herself, but decided to add some comedy.
The girl looked down at her hands and her arms, confused. "Wait a tic, why am I not an old lady?"
Zadi rubbed her eyes. Hell's bells, this had to be the barman's fault. Maybe she accidentally ate an eyeball or something. "You know," she said, "I have the oddest feeling that there is an old-lady-limit rule." She blinked. "How do I know that?"
The strange girl shook her fist in the air, scowling. "I will smite you!"
The narrator only grinned, and waved her hand a little. "Good to see you, too."
"Er," Zadi wasn't sure how to phrase this exactly. "Who are you?"
The other girl claimed down and dusted off her shirt. "I am Cheese, of course." She said in an all-knowing voice. "Bow down before me."
"Excuse me?"
"Eh?" Cheese tilted her head to one side. "Didn't you summon me from The Great Beyond?"
"No."
"Oh, are you sure?"
"Positive."
Musa woke up from her nap, and she felt very refreshed. Her cat, known as Soapy, jumped into her lap. Musa smiled and petted her kitty.
"I thought I felt a slight disturbance, but it's probably nothing." She said out loud to an invisible audience.
The cat purred in agreement.
Nemo, somehow without the narrator knowing, snuck into the next scene change. The scene dissolved into her office. It was large, there was a cheery fire in the fireplace, and she was sitting in her large leather chair. The assassin stroked the scales of beloved pet Ro.
"Hang on," she said to the iguana. "Is this when I do my evil laugh?"
Ro rolled its eyes. "Duh," it said, emphatically.
"Well, you should have told me that beforehand."
"I am not your mother, you can do things on your own."
"But I keep forgetting."
Then it was as if a camera was being backed away, the scene started to go black, when all of a sudden...
"Mwa, ha, ha!"
The narrator struck her head on the keyboard several times more. With homework needing to be done, she glared at the word processor. "Work, damn you. Brain why you not work?"