Sorry for that huge delay in me posting the next chapter. I have this horribly tendency to get sidetracked, and I got a bit too involved in writing my RE/Conker's Bad Fur Day crossover to put work into this… That and trying to fix my dumb computer. The memory is almost trashed from a virus one of the files I created at the library picked up. Now I've got to try cleaning everything out, and repair the damage, which has been going very slow. It hasn't stopped me from typing much of anything ('cause I can open my documents in safe mode without it freezing or crashing), but it did destroy my audio files, and a couple programs. Now I've got to try writing to this local computer show for advice, 'cause every attempt I make to solve the problem all results in one of two things: either my mouse begins working again, or my audio suddenly comes on. So if you read anything I write, I may update even slower. I have at least five fics to update regularly (including this), and a possible sixth that I got a request to continue after not updating it in months.

Anyway, onto the story. I've wasted enough of your time rambling.

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Chapter Eight

In the Middle School Cafeteria

Annette was beginning to get slightly worried. After the first lunch period, they had somehow nearly run out of food, and the principal had instructed her to make something else. Unfortunately, the only thing she found in the fridges was a lot of Awesomely Cultivated's patented Sloppy Joe Meat Mixture. Not knowing exactly what else to do, and being on her own now since her husband had to go "teach" some more, she stared at the numerous Ziplock bags of the disgusting mixture sitting on the cold shelves.

"What am I supposed to do?" she asked herself, and all of a sudden, a spiked hand jerkily grabbed about fifteen bags at once. She peered slowly over at the Iron Maiden, who just wheezed.

"Should I even ask?"

It walked back over to the hotpans, shredding the plastic bags with a spine growing out of its arm, dumping the mix into the pans with an eerie KZZZSSSHHH sound. One pan gurgled at the monster, who just stuck a serving spoon into it and shut it up.

"Where'd this thing learn to cook?" Annette murmured to no one in particular, and the Iron Maiden looked over at her. "I didn't mean that in a bad way."

It just twitched uncontrollably in response, looking expectantly out into the cafeteria again, watching for the first sign of the next wave of students.

She just shrugged, and walked over to the pans of meat and sauce, looking at them in disgust. And yet… It was almost like she couldn't look away.

The students had started to pile in, but Annette didn't notice. She was a little too busy staring at the bubbling meat.

"Uh… Is she okay?" a female student asked.

"Hhhhhheeeeeeehhhhhhhh," replied Iron Maiden.

Meanwhile, Over the Loudspeaker…

"Hello, this is Maria and today I am here on behalf of the debate club to give you a preview of the upcoming debate, which we hope you will all buy tickets to so the school can cover the new football field with Astroturf. Anyway… Here to argue with me is a very special guest. Please welcome Ozwell Spencer!"

Someone clears their throat gruffly, and there's a fluttering of papers. "Err, why am I here?"

"To debate, duh… Okay. Mr. Spencer, your company had no form of ethics at all, as well as causing the deaths, amongst other things, of many, many people. Therefor, you suck."

"As President of Umbrella, it is my duty to inform you that I was made for the people by the people. So in order for me to suck, you would have to suck too."

Back in the Cafeteria…

Annette was still staring at the bubbling meat, even though many students had started to stop and gawk at her. And some others were dancing around clapping their hands in her face. Didn't matter, she was still very interested in that meat.

There was something so… red… about it… And so… meaty…And so… sloppy…

"Eat me."

"What??" Annette snapped out of her trance, looking around, but not seeing anyone near her, except the Iron Maiden who waved and attempted something of a smile.

"Repulsive," she muttered, rolling her eyes.

"Eat me," someone repeated, and she looked down to see… nothing but meat.

"Uh, okay. I think I need to go to sleep for a while."

"No, I am actually talking."

"Who is talking?"

"Me."

Annette was getting seriously creeped out. "Who?"

"Me."

Her gaze came to rest on the meat.

"You?"

"Yes, me! Jeez, how stupid are you? If meat was to talk to anyone else, they would have figured it out by now!"

"I resent that," she said, grabbing a cleaver off of the counter behind her and throwing into the pan.

"Damn, that hurt! Now I won't tell you what's in the school's tacos!"

"I don't care."

"Then… Um… I won't tell you what happened in the end of Napoleon Dynamite!"

"Napoleon what??"

"Fine. Be that way."

"Where are you going with this moronic - "

"I don't know. I just wanted someone to talk to."

"Meat that wants someone to talk to?"

"Of course. I have feelings, don't I?"

"Well, actually you're just a pile of smashed tomatoes, blood and muscle. I know that living organisms have feelings, but when they get ground up and packaged, I'm pretty sure they're no longer sentient. So you're probably just a figment of my imagination."

"No, I'm just as real as the Lunch Lady Song."

"What?"

"Hoagies and grinders, hoagies and grinders. Navy beans, navy beans, navy beans… Sloppy Joe, sloppy, sloppy Joe," the pan of meat sang, while Annette gave it a very disturbed look.

She stood there staring at it intently until it fell silent. "I didn't say stop."

"Sloppy Joe, sloppy, sloppy Joe," the meat continued singing, "Sloppy Joe, sloppy, sloppy – AAAHHH!"

The Iron Maiden stuck a ladle into the meat, piling a large amount of it onto a bun and giving it to a waiting student as the pan of beef and tomato fell permanently silent.

"That was very strange," Annette said to the spiked monster.

Roaming the Halls

Steve had gotten bored sitting in the Janitors' lounge/office/huge-closet-type-thing-where-they-hang-out. He'd been going through old defaced textbooks that had been abandoned in a pile near the door, and found himself vaguely entertained by an old American History book that someone had labeled various illustrations in… And doodled on another that now showed a man leaning out the window and vomiting on Paul Revere. Taking a couple other books in hand, he decided to take a walk to numb his boredom as much as humanly possible.

He flipped through the pages of an abandoned French workbook, finding cartoons on nearly every page that the owner had drawn out of tedium, most of which involved Lord of the Rings and characters being in The Omen. Getting really into reading one, he inadvertently stopped paying attention to where he was going.

After what felt like a few minutes, he suddenly collided with a desk, falling over it and landing on his face. "… That hurt…"

To his surprise, he was greeted by an all too familiar voice. And it didn't sound happy.

"What do you think you're doing?" Alexia said unpleasantly, observing the redhead that had just walked in and tripped over a desk, with a glare while the class just stared.

"Uh… Leaving?" Steve replied, quickly getting to his feet and straightening out the desk.

"No, I don't think so." She started to come at him.

"Yeah, I am," he said matter-of-factly, hoisting up the desk and throwing at her. Of course, it missed, but he had a back up plan. "Catch!" He tossed the American History book, but Alexia caught it.

"American History? You're going to have to try harder than that," she said just in time to get nailed in the face with the Algebra book.

"Bye!" Steve said running out of the room… And right into Carlos.

"Watch where you're going!" Carlos said irritably, after they had collided with the floor.

"Sorry, I was in a hurry."

"That's kind of obvious," he said sitting up, "Hey, have you seen part of a conspiracy list anywhere?"

Steve gave him a funny look. "No. Why?"

"It's a long story," he responded tiredly. "Anyway, why were you in such a hurry?"

"Her," Steve answered, jumping to his feet and putting a couple yards of distance between himself and the door, where a flaming Alexia stood, her arms crossed huffily.

"I'm feeling generous," she said, eyeing them disagreeably. "So you may both have ten seconds to run."

"Why am I suddenly involved in this?" Carlos asked indignantly, but not receiving an answer. "So, shat do we do, Steve?"

"Run, duh!" Steve made a move to take off, but Carlos grabbed his shoulder.

"She'd just find us. We should try to defeat her. She's, like, completely evil right?"

"Yeah, I suppose. Where are you going with this?"

"'Light will spell her doom and death' – how about that?"

"I don't think Darkness Falls is the answer to our problems… Wait, I've got it!"

"'Brightest flame engulfed her whole, setting free her wicked soul'?"

"No, fire extinguishers," Steve whispered, "There's a whole pile of them right down there." He indicated the hall to their right, which led towards the office.

"Why is there a pile of fire extinguishers in the middle of a hallway?"

"That's beside the point. Let's go down there, now!"

Carlos and Steve bolted for the pile fire extinguishers, just as Alexia started after them.

"Oh crap!" Steve managed right before he skidded right into the pile of extinguishers, almost like he was diving into a pile of leaves.

Carlos was still about halfway down the hall, breathing heavily. "I knew I should have gone back to the gym after Christmas!"

Steve picked up an extinguisher, looking at it oddly. "How do you work one of these things?"

"The directions are on the label!" Carlos called, still a couple of yards away, running slower than a snail in the desert.

"Like I have time to read the directions during a fire," Steve muttered, trying to comprehend what they said.

"What's wrong?" Carlos panted, finally reaching Steve.

"What do they mean by 'pull the pin'?"

"That thing."

"This thing?"

"No, not that thing!"

Alexia reached them just in time for Steve to accidentally cause the extinguishers contents to decompress all at once, spraying her with a mixture of chemicals. "I'm melting!"

She hit the floor, looking like a charred crash-test dummy.

"I guess that works, too," Steve said, dropping the extinguisher.

"Maybe we should call the nurse," Carlos offered.

"First, let's get the hell out of here," Steve said, and they both took back off down the hall.

"Don't run so fast!" Carlos called after him, resuming his panting.

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Yeah, this chapter wasn't very long, but it's been a while since I updated this, and I forgot where I wanted to go with it since then. But I had fun writing it, either way.

I decided to continue with Annette for a while because of that whole Adam Sandler's 'Lunch Lady Land' theme I had going. That will always be one of my favorite SNL skits. I don't know when I'll be going back to her again, but I'm going to try to make it good.

The bit with Spencer was inspired by a fic I wrote a long time ago, that involved Bill Clinton going to a random country and becoming president. Needless to say, it was a weird fic.

And, last but not least, the whole thing with Alexia was something I started thinking about a while ago. I was wondering what would happen if someone tried to extinguish her, and I decided to experiment in this story to see how it might go. I think Alexia is pretty cool, but it's still funny to see her get whacked in the face with a book.

Well, that's the end of that chapter. Leave me a review and let me know what you think! Hopefully, I'll update this sooner next time.