Oh, and I own squat, whatsoever. Even these early chapters are not mine. Disney owns the characters, Scoutcraft Piratess owns the story concept, I'm just posting and playing with them. The early chapters will just be tweaked for some minor mistakes from the original (for some reason, the apostrophes and quotations got doubled in the copy she sent me).
Check out Secret Identity Book II: ALL HAIL ZOD, by FAH3, as it reaches its climactic finish.
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The Ronless Factor – Chapter 11
"Die, undead scum!" Felix screamed as the flamethrower opened a healthy dose of fire upon the approaching zombie. Then he happily watched as the thing crumbled into gore and bones——which could be amazingly crumbly——shrieking as only a dying zombie could shriek. That's what made the game so darn satisfying. And the screaming as one killed the zombies. His mom would never understand that part. It was a good thing she wasn't yet back from the lab, or she'd be dealing out the "why do you have to scream at the inanimate videogame?" speech again.
Unfortunately, another zombie chose that moment to literally pop out of the woodwork.
Felix screamed again and attempted to spray more flames at the zombie. No such luck, he was out. His mom didn't understand about screaming when one was endangered, either. Or the necessity of keeping the flamethrower properly fueled.
The katana in Zombie Mayhem 2 never ran out of fuel. Or… cutting ability. So Ron had been right about that much.
He bit his lip. Was it ever going to get any easier? It felt so strange to be playing videogames——without Ron and the possibility that if Ron wasn't there, he could always call him up and invite him over. Was it right? But sometimes it felt like a tribute. Ron, at least, understood about the screaming.
Well, there were other weapons. And basic physical videogame character force. A couple taps of the A and Z buttons, and the zombie was shrieking in death agony.
"Die, Brikk," he muttered.
The controller fell from his hands. He hadn't spoken that loud but… ugh, he could hear the words sinking right back into him. He had not just said…
Another zombie was headed his way. He grabbed the controller back just in time. The zombie was not Brikk Flagg. It was not.
Why was he even thinking about that? When he could think about other things that he equally did not want to think about?
"Just get back into the game, Felix," he muttered. "You two have barely even talked, and what Brikk does is none of your business."
That had to be the worse form of improper mourning——thinking about friends of your friend a week after his death.
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Bonnie had an interesting house, to say the least. Or an interesting garden, whatever standards he felt like going by. Flamingos. Cheesy pink flamingos were always worth a laugh. Ron had laughed at them before, on the few rare occasions he had actually gone by Bonnie's house. Well, with the mom she had. But other than that, it was a nice house. He waited on the lawn, studying the place against the setting sun. Not exactly the kind of house anyone would haunt. He felt almost guilty breaking his promise.
But he really needed her help. It wasn't too much, was it, to waltz through the walls of her house? There was something sick about that. Mean. You broke into criminal lairs, not houses of people from school.
Though somehow that was no longer an applying rule. Hopefully she wouldn't be too mad. Hopefully. Hopefully she wouldn't faint again. He could see it now, Bonnie thinking she had done her deed with ghosts, never expecting to hear from him again.
He was going to see that, in a few minutes. And it was a very good thing she had no way of killing him again. But she definitely would be mad, what with him wandering in after he had promised to go away…
Well, Kim hadn't even tried to listen to her. No matter what Bonnie said, Bonnie had to follow through and tell Kim the truth.
He stepped through the bricks. Almost a scratchy feeling, different from glass. He found himself in a kitchen, one of those cutesy ones that looked like an innocent country kitchen gone multi-million dollar redo. Like any little peasants had this kind of technology. There was Bonnie's mom, singing Beatles'' songs off-key as she fixed a pot of spaghetti.
She didn't have any crazy ghost-hearing abilities, did she?
Ron waved his hand. "Hi."
No response. Good. "So, um, where's your daughter?"
Nope. The woman couldn't hear, or apparently see, a thing. Of course, she was distracted by ruined classics and spaghetti. He decided not to press his luck.
"Hah!" a voice called from the next room. "No wonder you bombed that history test today! Do you not know a thing about the French Revolution?"
"I'm in American History A.P., Lonnie,"" came the reply. Bonnie. "We don't exactly find a reason to cover France."
Ron slid from the kitchen into a hallway. Dark, but the light from an open door spilled out. That's where Bonnie was.
The room was a den, complete with home movie screen, pool table, and three deer heads mounted on the wall. A card table was set up in the middle, surface covered by a board game. Bonnie was there, feet up on the table as she leaned dangerously back in her chair. Two older girls were with her, laughing. Her sisters, he assumed.
The girl called Lonnie wiggled a card before Bonnie's face. "And you only study your classes?"
Bonnie rolled her eyes, apparently unphased. "You don't."
"That's because I model for Sears catalogs. But Connie bothers to. Which is why Connie is winning. And…" Lonnie glanced down at the board. "And I'm in second. Wow. So Connie didn't get all the brains!"
She struck fists with the other sister who had to be Connie and laughed harder.
"A Sears catalog," Bonnie muttered. "Wow. Call VH1."
Lonnie glared. "Better than you're going to get."
"Ignore her," Connie said. "It's your turn, anyway."
"Yay for me." Lonnie scooped up the dice and threw them on the table. "Let's see…"
Bonnie was now staring at one of the deer heads. She was going to be so mad.
She wouldn't fall, Ron hoped. Flipping backwards in the chair, feet sending the game board flying across the room… He laughed. Suddenly he hoped she did.
She didn't. She leaned forward, her legs dropping from the table, her expression utterly ill.
Connie paused halfway through selecting a trivia card. "Bonnie? You aren't going to faint? You really need to learn to be a good loser."
"Hi, Bonnie," Ron said. Maybe she'd scream. Ooh, that would be priceless.
She kicked the chair back as she stood up. "I need to go to the bathroom."
"What are you, five?" Lonnie asked.
Connie couldn't contain herself; she fell forward in hysterical laughter.
"Morons," Bonnie muttered, leaving the room.
He followed her. "Wow, your sisters are worse than you."
Bonnie flipped her head around, eyes once again searching for him. "What are you doing here?" she whispered. "How dare you come here."
"You didn't warn Kim," he replied.
She turned her head again. She really seemed to want to face him. "Hey, I did just as you asked. It's not my fault she didn't listen, and frankly I don't need to be haunted right now. I spent a horrible day because of you, hoping that everything was from hitting my head when the pyramid fell, and—"
"You heard me before the pyramid fell."
"Do you have any idea what this is like?"
"Is she talking to herself?" Lonnie asked inside the den.
Bonnie's hands clenched, her face going red with a fight against air as she attempted not to speak. Then she turned and marched down the hall.
"You're not really going to the bathroom, are you?" Ron asked. That would be rather awkward. That would be way too much.
"What if I did? Are you going to follow me in, you pervert? I thought you were a decent enough guy to not even come to my house like some psycho stalker…" She took a deep breath. "Stoppable, I really want you to leave now."
"But you need to talk to Kim!"
"And I need to have a normal life!" she snapped. "Kim hates me even more now because of you, and the whole school probably thinks I'm an insensitive jerk, and maybe you should just go die all over again."
Ron paused. That had been a little harsh. "Yeah, Bonnie, that's sensitivity."
She threw open another door and marched inside. The bathroom. The door was immediately slammed. "I already said I was sorry you died."
"You're not acting like it!"
She threw open the door again and stepped out. "Fine. So I won't go in there. At least you didn't follow me in. I think."
Had she always been this impossible? Ron tried to think. Yes, she had. "Bonnie, the guy that is trying to kill Kim… his name is Cory, and he was one of the people that attacked her at the museum today."
"Like I care. Kim is oh so wonderful and perfectly capable of taking care of herself."
"And there's a ghost trying to kill her!"
He might as well have declared the sky was falling. "And isn't that your jurisdiction?"
She was probably right. "Uh… but she needs to know!"
"Whatever. Stoppable, she won't believe me, so just leave. Have a nice afterlife." She marched back to the den.
"Bonnie, please!" he begged, following her.
She stopped before the door, attempted one more time to see him, then shook her head and stepped into the room. "My turn yet?"
"Like it matters," Connie said. "But yes."
Bonnie slid back into her chair, rolled the nice, and moved her game piece. "Arts and Literature."
"Ah, stuff for the uncivilized!" Connie said happily, pulling out a card. "Who wrote the early twenty-century novel Rebecca?"
Bonnie leaned back, trying to think.
"Let me guess," Lonnie said. "You aren't studying that particular century of literature, are you?"
"I'll be nice and give you a hint," Connie said. "It wasn't Stephen King."
Lonnie actually looked surprised by that.
Connie and Lonnie were worse than Bonnie, Ron thought. He crept around to Connie's side. There was a perfect view of the card. Which conveniently told the answer.
Would that be too nice to Bonnie?
Well, he always did like to root for the underdog. "Daphne du Maurier," he said.
"What?" Bonnie straightened.
"You want the question repeated?" Connie asked.
"Daphne du Maurier," he said again. "At least I think that's how it's repeated."
For a moment Bonnie did nothing, then, with a shrug, she said "Daphne du Maurier."
"Wrong," Connie sang. "It's actually Daph—" She stared at the card, smile gone. "Oh. I guess… I guess you're a savant for one question."
"That means I get to go again," Bonnie said, yanking the dice from Lonnie's hand. Another roll. "Ah, nature. Again."
"I'll give her another easy one," Connie muttered. "Bonnie, you do realize we're just being nice to you. Okay…" Ron watched as she selected a card. "Name the third largest constellation in the sky."
"Big Dipper," Ron read aloud. "Or, to sound smarter, Ursa Major."
Bonnie repeated it perfectly.
"She's cheating," Lonnie muttered.
She had no idea.
Connie smiled dangerously, a very fake upward twist of her lips. She was not pleased. "Okay, technically you only get that one extra turn, but since you're so far behind… we'll test you again." She pulled another card. "What is the name of the Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton's ship that he used during the Antarctic expedition of 1914?"
The girl really should have been covering the answers. "The Endurance."
Connie and Lonnie both looked fit to kill.
Boo-ya, Ron thought.
Bonnie's sisters only put up with another five right answers. "You are such a brat," Lonnie said, flipping the box of cards at Bonnie.
Bonnie didn't seem to care. She only smiled back. "I guess I got some of the brains, too. Models don't get brains."
Connie actually resorted to sticking her tongue out as she stormed from the room.
"You forfeit!" Bonnie called after her. "That means I win!"
"We're not forfeiting!" Lonnie shouted back.
"They are lousy losers," Ron said, attempting to pick up one of the cards. Focus… it just wasn't working.
"Eh, they're like that all the time," Bonnie replied coolly, swiping cards away from her lap. "You get used to it."
"Hard to think they're worse than you."
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that. You have no right sneaking in here and insulting me and my sisters." She flicked away more cards as her face broke into a huge smile. "Wow! That felt good! I know it was cheating, but did you see how mad it made them?"
It had been entertaining. "See how nice I was to come cheat for you?"
"Yeah, Stoppable, stop congratulating yourself. I wouldn't trust you to be that smart, so I know you were reading the cards. Good for you." She jumped to her feet with a thrilled scream. "That was awesome! Thank-you!"
When had Bonnie thanked him for anything? "Uh… you're welcome?"
The smile vanished. "But I know what you want me to do in return, so don't even think about asking. You might as well leave right now."
"But…" The card actually hovered on his fingers for a moment before sliding through. "But I just cheated for you!"
"I didn't ask you to."
"But Bonnie… just… one more time? Just make her listen? Is that so hard? I mean, she already hates you…"
She seemed to consider this. "I'll think about it. Now get out of my house, Stoppable."
Ron paused, thinking. "No."
She held up the cards.
"What are you going to do, Bonnie? Throw them at me?"
"Stoppable, I'm not getting involved."
"I helped you cheat. You owe me."
"I said I'll think about it," she snarled. "Now just…"
"You can't make me leave." That was the truth. That was the precious truth.
Growling, she pulled out her cell phone.
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Reposter's Notes – You gotta love the Ron/Bon interaction, it's just so much fun!