"Jesusfuuuucggllbrdhghgd -"
"DUDEWHYDIDYOUBITE IT."
Conrad doesn't answer Hanna's non-question, because every time Conrad opens his mouth, black blood is vomited up onto the (original oak) floorboards of the balcony.
Hanna, wild-eyed, is currently perched atop the thrashing basilisk, while Adele/Benghazi/Corey struggles under the corpse of the bartender the lizard had inhibited - it was the spit, in the rag that had wiped the drinking glasses, that had affected the patrons. Toni was slumped in phase near the stairs, having suffered a nasty bite, herself, and Veser was helping to push the heavy bartender's body off Darryl/Eugene/Finley.
The lizard got its jaws around Hanna's ankle, and pulled him off in a rough thrash.
Conrad lunged, and bit again.
"Stopbitingit -" Hanna managed to entreat once he was free of the creature's jaws, scribbling the rest of the runesign across the floor in wide sweeping arcs. Greg/Harrison/Indiana Jones managed to pull an antique railroad spike from the wall and wedged it into the basilisk's mouth, propping its jaws open. The great lizard thrashed and squirmed, so much larger than when it had first emerged, wrinkled and wet, from the back of the barkeep - it only seemed to be growing bigger the angrier it got, eyes peeling open layer by layer of opaque eyelid.
The runes glowed - the lizard put its clawed foot through the floor and broke the read in a splintering crack - Veser's feet were knocked out from under him by the sweep of a thick tail and he went crashing into Keith/Lars/Maybelline on his way over with another railroad spike.
A shotgun blast interrupted the clusterfuck, and the only thing that broke the ensuing silence was the heaving release of another gutful of brackish blood, Conrad bent double over the (original!oak!) balcony rail as the asshole production manager stood from his crouch at the top of the stairs, gun in hand.
Hanna scrambled upright to help Veser from under the limp basilisk tail, the both of them stumbling to Toni, who had phased back to recover.
"Down," asshole manager commanded, and it took all present a delayed moment to register the demand before the balcony under their feet began to groan ominously, the basilisk having grown to roughly the size of an orca before it had met its demise by shotgun blast through its propped-open maw. "Down," the asshole production manager urged again, tugging Toni's arm over his shoulders to hasten the party clear of the gradual cracking and splintering descent the lizard corpse took through the floorboards into the kitchen below.
The stairway they left behind had settled lopsided against the damage, Conrad kneeling on the last stair to dry-heave and gasp.
"Dude, wh-" Veser protested, wide-eyed, as Hanna whipped the stage manager's hunting knife free of his thick belt and marched over to Conrad.
"Ugh," Tony winced, turning her face into the wall against which she had been propped, clutching the manager's duster over herself. All three held unspoken protest as Hanna drove the knife into Conrad's heaving stomach, and Veser contributed his own dinner to the floorboards after watching the pale wriggle of a bloody snake-lizard fall out of Conrad's opened body cavity.
Jericho/Kelly/Liam helpfully dragged Conrad clear of the stairs. Hanna stomped the mini basilisk under his heeled boot with all the fervor of a startled housewife stomping a cockroach, equal parts panicked and vengeful. He straightened once the thing was clearly dead, tugging his vest from its wrinkle with a declarative snap.
Toni moaned soundlessly behind her clenched fist. Conrad lay open-eyed on the top of the bar where he'd been dragged by the dead man and the asshole manager. Conrad did not move, the silk of his costume dark and wet in a blossom down his front and around his middle.
"He'll be paralyzed, like the others," Hanna croaked, wiping his forehead with the back of the hand still holding the knife.
The stage manager, a stocky bearded man in gold wire spectacles, pressed thick fingers to Conrad's neck. "I think you killed him, son," he rasped in a soft Texan accent, robbed of his bluster.
Hanna opened his mouth, but the taverna doors were kicked open and a younger, more fit version of the manager stormed in, expression thunderous. His beard was ginger, not gray, but he sported the same blue eyes behind the same gold wire specs. "Yer fuckin' lackeys wouldn't let me pass til I changed clothes, ya fuckin' loony! I had ta leave my badge an' gun at the gates! The FUCK is even goin' on around here!"
"Badge?" Hanna squeaked.
"He's not dead," Toni quickly interjected, tugging the manager away from Conrad.
"Dead?!" Manager Jr. all but roared.
"I know dead from livin'," the manager protested, snuffling behind his beard in agitation. "Like poor Vergil up there. That's one dead barkeep."
"The barkeep's name was Mike!" Manager Jr. threw his cowboy hat with an angry swat. "And who the hell stabbed the undertaker!"
"Er," Hanna shuffled behind the zombie, knife tucked behind his back. "Mr. BeVonte? I'd like to collect on the case, and get on our way."
The asshole manager loaded another shell into the shotgun's chamber with a perfunctory clack. "Nobody's goin' nowhere until we get doc Rhett on over here ta make a decision. Xachary, fetch yer brother."
"Um," Hanna dropped the knife discreetly behind himself, kicking back at it to try and slide it under a table. "I met your son earlier today. I don't think there's anything he can -"
"If you met Rhett," Mr. BeVonte interrupted gruffly, "then you'd know he ain't my son. Xacharia!"
"I'm gettin'," Xacharia reassured, both hands held up as he strolled to the door, swiping up his hat so he could tip it to Toni on his way out.
"What you need to do," Hanna lectured in an even tone, palms turned up in supplication. "Is find how your bartender originally died. Basilisks don't inhabit the living, they only hatch out of corpses denied a decent funeral. Check, um, check his background. Background check, yeah, employers can do that right?"
But Mr. BeVonte had crossed his arms, gun aimed at the floor, grim and silent as his gaze shifted from the dead man to Conrad to Toni and back.
"Okaaay," Hanna scrubbed the back of his neck. "Just so you know, it's in my employment contract not to be held liable for any injury, death, or loss of property in the course of -"
"And it's in my literature that so long as any fool remains in the park, he or she is my responsibility ta keep safe, ain't it? Have a seat, Mr. Cross, Rhett is a slow waker and a grouchy cuss fer his brother, but he'll show."
Hanna broke out in a cold sweat. "I really really don't think that's necessary, like I said, I met your stepson and I know he can't -"
"You'd be surprised what Rhett can do." Mr. BeVonte strolls behind the bar. Veser drags Conrad to the middle of the tavern, Toni and Hanna darting to help lay him out atop a table, Maurice/Nathaniel/Oto removing the kerosene lamp to make room.
"I kind of, hng, oof - hey, how come he got spurrs - I kind of know exactly what Rhett can do? I just don't have the means to pay him for it."
"You'll owe him a favor," Mr. BeVonte assured cryptically, shrugging. "I ain't about ta let nobody leave my care eviscerated, you hear me?"
Veser huffed, "Gee, thanks." He carefully tucked Conrad's longcoat shut over his wound, fingers light as they pressed Conrad's eyelids shut.
Hanna watched, thoughtful. "He'll be fine," he croaks.
Toni hugs the duster tighter against herself. "He's not fine now, though."
Hanna's voice is wet. "I thought you were gonna get him to eat, tonight."
Toni bristled, "The only thing we could find was some creepy tall guy hanging out at the clinic, and Conrad said he'd had enough of that sort of thing, so...? You can lead a freaking horse to water, dude, but you can't make it not save your life biting a lizard the size of a flipping boat."
The creepy tall guy from the clinic was the one to interrupt the terse silence, shuffling lazily in, ducking to fit comfortably through the historically accurate (read: fuckin tiny) doorframe. He had Xacharia's ginger hair and nothing else, freckled and lean and yellow-eyed as a snake, clean shaven and devoid of expressive emotion.
"What's the ruckus?" Rhett mumbled from around a lipful of chewing tobacco, hands on hips, period outfit rumpled but clean. "I smell gunsmoke." After a pause, "What knocked the ceiling in?"
"Basilisk," Hanna chimed, walking right up to the easy cowboy in the doctoring smock. "Our friend here is just paralyzed, but if we can just get our check and take him home, he can sleep it off!"
Rhett eyeballed Hanna and Mr. BeVonte, chewing, chin jutting out. "Ya heard the policy though, right?"
Both BeVonte and Hanna answered yes.
Rhett took a breath, kicking over to Conrad's table and staring Veser down until he moved out of the way. "Helluva thang," Rhett exclaimed mournfully, sucking air between his teeth and aiming a glob of tobacco butter toward the nearest spitoon. "Dead men what don't get no rest fer theyselves."
Orange eyes flashed from the foot of the table.
Rhett slid a thin finger along Conrad's coatfront. "What's the wound unner this jacket?"
"C-section," Veser deadpanned. "Leave off, Longshanks. We don't buy whatever it is you're selling."
"Down, puppy," Rhett chuckled. "Ain't Satan hisself come ta scratch you a deal. Just me doin' as I'm bid ta do." To Hanna, "Cross, was it? I don't want old bone-digger here ta drive somethin nasty between my ears should he wake a' sudden? If you could go ahead an' hold one a these, er, feminine arms 'a his down, I'd be much obliged."
Xacharia shuffled in to help, mouth set in a grim line as he braced his full weight on an arm that did, by comparison and especially clad in the satin of the coat, look as silver screen starlet's and not just a dweeby computer employee. The length Conrad's fingers had grown was the cause of the illusion, tapered and sharp and elegant.
Rhett carefully peeled the longcoat open, and then not-so carefully plunged his entire hand into Conrad's chest cavity.
"Hey -" Veser protested, held back by a Davy Crockett zombie.
"Shh," Hanna scolded, waving Toni over with the lamp to better see by as Rhett pulled a flat stone out of Conrad.
"Scales," Rhett mumbled, eyes flashing narrow. "He bite the thing, 'r what."
"Yeah," Hanna answered sadly. "I have an office we can bring him to, so -"
"Yer friend a vampire, Mr. Cross?" This, from Xachary beside his half-brother.
Hanna smiled warily. "Please don't hold that against him."
A curl of smoke drifted from the corner of Rhett's mouth, though there was no cigarette to be seen. "Naw, see, just that fucknuts over here don't believe no such thing. Devil's own spawn beside him his whole goddamn life, and he don't believe in ghosts or the undead. Tsch." He elbows Xachary out of the way, bloodied hand gripping Conrad's wrist to keep him pinned. "We got any plastic? Saran wrap, garbage bag, anything?"
There was a murderous silence as the asshole stage manager's face clouded over. "Never in this camp," he gritted between his teeth.
Rhett nods at Paul/Quatre/Roy, who was already schucking his jacket. "Leather'll do. Mr. Cross, is yer friend here a particularly bitey vampire?"
Toni scoffed, "Opposite of that," joining Hanna on his side of the table to help hold down Conrad's arm, just in case.
"Well, good." Rhett draped the tassled jacket over Conrad's gaping midsection, pressing down hard to seal the wound. He hikes a skinny knee easily atop the table to pin the crook of Conrad's elbow, and bends to tilt Conrad's chin up with thumb and forefinger, kissing him full on the mouth. At least, to the horrified silence, it looked like a kiss. Rhett had pinched Conrad's nostrils shut and now drew back to spit brackish blood to the floor, expression terse as he leaned down again to suck more of the Basilisk poison out of Conrad's piping. The jacket on the wound caved a little with each pull, Rhett trading mouth for fingers, face smeared in blood, drawing another scale out from the back of Conrad's throat.
Veser and Toni match for blushing, trading a look equal parts furious and concerned and just plain scandalised, between them. Hanna is somber, though, eyes glued to Rhett as smoke curls up out of every word.
"Should do it," Rhett assures, dropping the scale to the tabletop and wiping his hands on his smock hem.
"Excuse me, uhh," Veser holds both hands up. "Did you just say you were the devil's spawn? Am I the only one who heard that?"
"Patron Saint 'a Gluttony," Rhett saluted dutifully. "Or I will be, once I'm martyred."
"That. Is incredibly creepy!" Veser crows merrily. To Hanna, "Can we leave now?"
Conrad sits up like a stage prop on a spring board, rumpled and squinting. He glares suspiciously at Rhett, then hunches violently forward to spit a small brown wad of tobacco in his palm, holding it shakily out toward the park doctor. "I believe this belongs to you."
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