I've been wanting to take a break from this story for a week or two… But for some reason, I can't pull myself away from it. Maybe 'cause I actually know what I want to write for once…Oh well, at least it's getting worked on, right?
Sigh…Writing is the only thing that's really making me feel cheerful lately since I've been in significantly low spirits. Normally, music cheers me up, and that hasn't done much to improve my mood – Elton John might have been onto something when he said 'sad songs say so much', but right now, sad songs make me turn the TV volume up and try to ignore them. I didn't even feel this bad when my grandmother died… But then again, she was extremely hard to get along with, anyhow…
Well, it's time for Act three of the play – it may go on for a while longer, not sure at the moment, because I don't know where it was going in the first place, and I just took on a new co-writer for "Resident Pancake Head", after getting a request from a fan to help. I have some ideas for further acts, it's just a question of figuring out what to do with them.
Ah, and if you're interested in watching that video I talked about in the last chapter, I'm still trying to post it - YouTube is being stupid for some reason.
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Chapter Twenty-One
ACT III
On the Stage
Alice was in the midst of being wrapped up in the roller-skating guys' shared beard when she suddenly realized exactly how easy it actually would be to just to unravel herself.
She spun around, sending the roller-skating guys right into the backup singers, and right off the stage. Being the last one on stage, she took it upon herself to bore everyone in the audience to death some more.
"There once was a zombie named Zeke; he got stabbed by a spear made of teak. He fell off a bridge located on Allegheny Ridge, and… simply… just died…"
Then she exited the stage. Just to come right back out.
"I forgot! I must find that convoy, and tell them to head north, where there is no disease! … Even though they did try to kill me…"
Then she re-exited.
In the Audience
"Mama loves mambo, papa loves mambo…" Ashley was singing for no apparent reason, when Forest ambled over and seated himself next to her.
"Fif… teeeeesss?" he asked.
"Excuse me?! I am not fifty!"
"Nnnnoooo…. From… fifteeeeeessss…"
"What?"
"Ssssoooong."
"Oh, you mean the song is from the '50s? Yeah, I guess it is."
Then Mr. X tapped her on the shoulder from behind. She turned around in her seat, coming face to face with the acetylene torch.
"AHH!"
She ran away screaming, not realizing her hair was now on fire.
On the Stage
The "convoy" had come onto the stage, and sat down, pretending to go about cooking cans of food. Player Claire and Player Carlos began discussing how they tried to kill Alice.
"I think we need a new plan," said Player Carlos.
"Yeah. I really want to kill that bitch," answered Player Claire.
Suddenly, the "convoy" piped up in unison. "Claire Redfield took an axe, gave that freak of nature Alice forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she went back and did another forty-one."
"Wait… Why are you comparing me to Lizzie Bordon?"
In the Audience
"Lizzie Bordon? The axe murderess?" Claire shouted at the top of her lungs in an offended tone. "… Awesome!"
Rebecca just shook her head. Claire was certainly beginning to act crazy.
On the Stage
They continued. "London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down. London Bridge is falling down, my fair lady. Take a key and lock her up, lock her up, lock her up. Take a key and lock her up, my fair lady."
"Hold on, hold on," she said, turning to the audience, and looking around weird. "What's with the Straitjacket reference?"
"What's with the references to old movies in general?" Player Carlos asked.
Someone back stage said something, and they nodded.
"So, what should we do next?"
Before Player Claire could respond, Alice came onto the stage. "Fellow survivors! We need to go north!"
"North to Alaska! Goin' North, the rush is on!" the "convoy" sang before going back to what they were doing like nothing happened.
"Um… Do they always do that?"
"For some reason, yes," Player Claire said. "Anyway, why should we trust you?"
"I have absolutely no idea. But I trust myself, so that should be good enough, right?"
Everyone exchanged weird looks.
Unexpectedly, some girl walked onto the stage, coming up to Alice and punching her in the face. Alice glared at her, and then retaliated by ripping her arm off.
"Oh, my arm," she said apathetically.
In the Audience
"Is it just me, or does the acting in this play really, really suck?" Jill asked, turning to look at the person who had been sitting next to her… And finding him hanging from a noose attached to the ceiling. "I'll take that as a yes."
On the Stage
The now one-armed girl just stood there for a moment, staring at the spot where the limb had been attached and watching fake blood spurt from it. Then she started fist-fighting Alice for her arm.
Everyone on stage watched with some kind of emotion – but no one's sure which one.
The girl managed to retrieve her arm from Alice, and then went over to Player Claire and cracked her in the face with the severed appendage, before running off, blood going everywhere.
In the Audience
"Why did that chick just hit me in the face with a detached arm?" Claire asked, feeling something on her skin. "Is it raining in here?"
"Uh, Claire… That's blood," Rebecca replied.
"Blood?"
"Turn around," someone said, and she did.
The girl from the stage whacked her in the face with the arm, spraying fake blood all over everyone in the vicinity in the process, before running off again.
"I'm going to get you, bitch!" Claire screamed after her.
On the Stage
"I got it!" Player Claire announced, "I'll kill Alice with an axe!"
Everybody stared at her.
"Ooh, I guess I said that a little too loudly…"
Alice was standing right next to her, giving her a dirty look.
Player Claire gave her a dirty look right back.
This went on for a long, long time.
"Stage janitor, coming through!" a guy in a white jumpsuit said, pushing a gigantic broom ahead of himself, and chasing everybody off the stage.
The lights dimmed, and the sound of rain and wind was heard. Player Wesker entered.
"Here I am in Tokyo. Don't ask why, I don't know either. This is where my branch of the company is for some reason… Wasn't the sequel for this was supposed to be in Spain? How the hell did it become Japan?"
Somebody off stage throws a shoe, and he moves on.
"Uh, yeah. Well, since the world is populated by monsters, I live underground. Right beneath a sewer. Where there are a lot of big rats."
In the Audience
"Get to the point!" Birkin shouted, "Your monologues are horrible!"
Then someone else in the audience called back at him.
"Shut the hell up! You're ruining the mystique!"
"Mystique? That is complete and utter garbage!"
"Who asked you?"
"I have the freedom of speech! I can say whatever I want, whenever I want!"
"Go to hell! I want to hear my backstory!"
"Wait… Albert?"
"William, is that you?"
"Indeed, it is."
"Oh… Okay then, carry on."
"No, don't carry on!" a guy behind Birkin shouted, hitting him in the head with a book.
"I'll be quiet now."
"You're just going to sit there and take that?" Annette asked incredulously, "Get up and fight like a man!"
"I'll pass."
"Fine, then I'll do it!" she said, diving over the seat and attacking the guy.
On the Stage
"And even though I'm in Tokyo, for some reason I make appearances in a lot of places I shouldn't physically be in, in this play…"
Suddenly a rat the size of a small dog gets thrown at him.
He picks it up, and throws it back.
"Go to hell, Mulcahy! You're the moron directing the play!"
In the Audience
"Isn't Mulcahy the name of the guy who directed a movie based on a series of games that had almost nothing in common with them?" Jill asked.
The hanged guy didn't answer, seeing as he's dead.
"Is that a yes?"
Elsewhere in the Audience
"This is the perfect trap," Claire said, standing back and admiring the trap made from a cardboard box, a stick and a piece of string. "And I've got the perfect bait."
She placed a severed arm under the box.
"Uh… Claire, I doubt that will work," Rebecca said.
"Oh come on. It's the 'Headless Horseman Theory'."
"What's that?"
"He was missing his head, and he went around taking other people's until he found his own. The same should work for arms."
"Okay, whatever you say. Where did you get that arm??"
"I dunno. I just chopped it off someone and came back here."
Rebecca inched away from her.
"What? Was it something I said?"
On the Stage
Player Wesker had regained his composure, and was attempting to remember his lines.
"Um… Where was I?"
Then the one-armed girl ran by, spraying him with blood.
"Blood, hooray!" he said, twirling around.
Then Slater came walking out. "Hey, uh - "
He hadn't realized he was walking on a slick, blood-covered floor and slipped, falling down, plowing into Player Wesker, and causing both of them to slide right off stage.
They came back on foot, slipping in the blood again, this time landing in a heap. They didn't bother getting up to finish the scene.
"Hey, I think Dr. Isaacs is planning some retarded scheme that will never work."
"Oh? What's that?" Player Wesker asked.
"He wants to build an escalator to the moon."
Then the stage janitor came back, using his giant broom to sweep them right off the stage, still in a pile.
INTERMISSION.
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This play gets stranger every chapter… The fact that Mulcahy (the director of "Extinction") is the director of the play, sort of explains a lot. Just a weird idea I had.
The "Straitjacket" reference (which actually includes the Lizzie Bordon thing) was inspired by… Well, watching that movie when I was working on this. Of all the old, old horror movies I've seen (that one's from 1964), that was an excellent psychological thriller. Worth watching, definitely. You know, maybe I'll do a "Night of the Living Dead" reference somewhere… That is a classic zombie movie…
That last scene with the blood had me picturing a blood Slip&Slide for some reason… How disgusting… And an escalator to the moon… That is pretty messed up…
I still don't know where this play is going – but when it finally ends, I can guarantee it will probably be really screwed up, and possibly scary.
Yup, that's it for this chapter… Seems like I say that a lot recently… So, see you next time, and leave me a review and let me know what you think!