Breathing space...

PSA Seventeen: Dangerous Weaponz

Begin Tape

"Bang, bang, pow!" May prattled cheerfully before squeezing her finger on the trigger of her homemade wooden slingshot rifle. A chunk of gravel was whipped with sternum snapping force by a rubber band on the rifle and it whizzed toward a fizzy pop bottle sitting atop a fence in the lane. The gravel chunk pierced straight through the bottle, bisected it, and continued to zoom out of sight past the fence.

"You're one wicked gunslinger, huh May?" Marie sincerely complimented as she threw her arm over her sister's shoulders, who lowered her homemade rifle from her eye that had a gleam of untold violence shining within it. Sarah and Jonny, who were standing several feet behind them as an unwanted but barely tolerated audience, began clapping and hooting.

"Sure am, but I wanna be the biggest sure shot in Peach Creek, Marie! Keep lining up those bottles so I can get my practice in!" May replied before sitting her slingshot rifle on a waist-high, folding plastic table in front of her.

It was ten before noon and the two sleazy sisters had set up a shooting gallery in the lane to hone their skills at bringing ranged pain. Across from the plastic table, the bottom of the fence was lined with the remains of dozens of slaughtered bottles that met a bitter end at May's hands.

"Like you need any more practice! I already cleared out a whole dumpster and you ain't missed a single shot yet," Marie replied before resting her right hand on a pop-cap toy pistol inside a holster secured to her belt. In addition to her cork-plug pea shooter, she had on a black hoodie with the image of a giant bullseye on the front.

"If ya wanna turn so bad then stop beatin' around the bush and say so!" May snorted back before snapping the straps on a paint-smeared pair of coveralls she was wearing over her normal attire. She also had on a trucker hat with the words 'Aim Here' printed on it to keep the sun from getting in her eyes and interfering with her career as a pretend sniper.

"I could take my turn, or maybe..." Marie trailed off before looking out of the corner of her eye at Sarah and Jonny, who were tapping their feet while waiting to watch another bottle get unceremoniously euthanized. "It's their turn to take some shots!" she exclaimed malevolently while drawing her popgun and aiming it straight at the pair.

"I didn't sign up for audience participation!" Sarah yelped before grabbing Jonny by his neck to use his retaining wall head as a shield.

"Protect me, Plank, so I can protect Sarah!" Jonny pleaded while holding Plank up so he could take any incoming shots for him.

"You suburban buzzards are too easy!" Marie taunted before snickering, May giving a quick chuckle herself while leaning her back against the table. Taking a moment to ease down, Jonny and Sarah slowly peaked out from around Plank at Marie, who twirled the popgun around her finger before holstering it. "Come on out from behind that wooden voodoo doll and one of you lucky losers can really have a turn."

"Plank isn't a a voodoo whatsit, he's a-" Jonny began to respond before getting trampled by Sarah, who charged over to Marie with a fervent grin.

"You really mean I can plink some bottles down with that cool toy machine gun too?" Sarah asked hopefully.

"Why not? May can't go around hogging all the glory," Marie answered with a shrug.

"Hold on, Marie, I'm the only one that gets to touch Lupo!" May protested while resting her hand on top of the slingshot rifle. "If she wants to blast some bottles then she has to build her own! That's the rules of the range!"

"Don't be such a downer, we can have a blast making fun of her when she's dinging nothing but pockmarks on the fence!" Marie reasoned, Jonny timidly walking over to Sarah's side so they could watch the sisters' spur of the moment debate.

"I'm already havin' a blast while I'm makin' some blasts!" May contested as she flicked the sanded finish on the rifle's butt-stock.

"Spread the blasts around for once! She needs to use your rifle to make that happen!"

"Then give her your cork cannon, cause Lupo's off limits!" May argued, a touch of crimson beginning to rise from her neck as she took a step toward Marie. She ceased her approach when Sarah popped in between them and looked up at her with a deceitfully friendly smile.

"Can I please take a turn? Don't worry about Lupo—if I accidentally hurt him, Jonny will let me know!" Sarah explained before winking over at Jonny.

"Just because she gave her slingshot doohickey a name doesn't mean I can talk to it!" Jonny responded in offense. He suddenly raised an eyebrow and glanced over at the table. "Quiet already, Lupo! I was talkin' to Sarah, not you!"

"See what I mean?" Sarah stated happily before turning back to May. "So now you can gimme that rifle so I can pretend I'm shooting all those stupid alien models Ed keeps leaving under my bed!" she demanded in a sappy voice while clasping her hands and twisting her arms to the side to look as adorable as possible.

May gave an unimpressed frown at the attempted trickery while Marie scratched the side of her head in realization from Sarah's words.

"All that cutesy stuff ain't gonna work on me, prissy missy, not unless you were a cutesy boy," May jeered indignantly to Sarah's disappointment.

"Rats, and here I thought you were supposed to be the dumb Kanker sister..." Sarah pouted before rubbing the tip of her shoe around in the dirt.

"You didn't hear it from me, kid, but Lee's actually the dumb one. May's just what smart folks like us call hard-headed!" Marie joked before coarsely grabbing Sarah by the shoulder and whispering something in her ear.

"Is that really all I have to say to crack off a few shots?" Sarah asked cautiously as Marie stood back up straight and smiled deviously at her.

"It really is," Marie answered plainly, the pint-sized tyke nodding hesitantly before sporting a nervous grin and turning back to a now suspicious May.

"If you let me mow down some bottles, I'll put in a good word for you with my big brother!" Sarah offered reluctantly, trying to fight off the sick pit in her stomach at the greasy smile slowly forming on May's face.

"What kinda good words are we talkin' here?" May questioned while eagerly tapping her fingers on the table, obviously interested in the dark place this was going.

"Oh well I'll tell Ed that you... uh..." Sarah fumbled while wringing her hands together in desperation.

"Plank says you should tell him that May Kanker is really into horror flicks and wants to make a monster movie with him!" Jonny revealed as he stuck the scheming plywood out toward the three girls.

"No one asked for you or Plank's opinion!" Sarah snapped over at the now figuratively wounded boy. "Besides who would want to star in some icky horror movie with-"

"Oh goody, me and big Ed starring in a movie together!" May said in elation while rubbing her finger knuckles together. "But I get top billin' in the commercials, right?"

Sarah gave her an insane expression of delirious disbelief as Marie and Jonny grinned like a couple of smug hucksters.

"Of course you do! Your name is gonna be on billboards in the huge letters with Ed's super tiny name right under it!" Sarah rattled off as May's mind got lost in the fantasy future being constructed in her brain. "So now I get to have a go with that rifle, right?" she asked, snapping May free from her lucid daydream.

"As long as Ed is ready to go over the script with me when I come over tonight," May started with a tellingly mean smirk before grabbing the slingshot rifle and shoving it into Sarah's hands. "Then you can break a baker's dozen of bottles with Lupo for all I care."

"That's a done deal to me, girlfriend! I haven't gotten to play with anything lethal since that first PSA tape we did..." Sarah sighed pleasantly while running her fingers across the fore grip of the slingshot rifle. "But how do I use this thing? I was too distracted watching all those bottles getting busted to see how you did it!" she inquired while aiming the homemade rifle around the lane haphazardly.

"Lemme grab another rock and I'll help ya load Lupo up nice and tight!" May replied, quickly shoving her hand into a front pocket on her coveralls to retrieve more ammo. "Then we'll get to firin' that bad boy off!" she added after retrieving a hunk of gravel with nasty sharp protrusions, Sarah beaming barbarically in response.

"Hey slug-nose, you wanna take some shots too, right?" Marie questioned Jonny before whipping her head around and sticking her face in his.

"I-I dunno if I want to or not... Lupo seems like a gruff guy and besides, Plank might get offended if I get all handsy with another piece of wood," Jonny explained apprehensively as he leaned back away from her. He glanced over at May pulling back the sling band on the rifle in Sarah's hands and placing the stone ammo on top. "This whole assassinating recyclables business is pretty violent too..."

"Total violence is the perfect way to start every day off!" Marie argued without missing a brutal beat. "You shouldn't worry about breaking your haunted board's heart, cause I wouldn't let you lay those gross hands on May's rifle anyway," she went on while stealthily reaching her arm behind Jonny's back.

"Then how am I gonna take some shots without touchin' Lupo?" he asked in utter confusion. "Unless you meant Plank and not me, I think he'd have a lot more fun than I would!"

"I did mean you, and it's real easy—you're part of the shooting gallery now!" she revealed sadistically before stuffing the wide arches of a wire clothes-hanger down the back of Jonny's shirt and hoisting the instantly panicked boy a few inches off the ground by the hook.

"Put me down or Plank's busting your head into chopped liver!" Jonny yelped while wildly swinging Plank at Marie, who tried her best to dodge the slicing lopsided angles of the board.

"What's the big idea? I wanted to shatter bottles, not Jonny's forehead!" Sarah protested rather halfheartedly, May wrapping an arm roughly around Sarah's neck to prevent her from intervening.

"Then go ahead and aim that boomstick over here to save him, twerp!" Marie dared before catching one of Jonny's blows with her free hand and yanking Plank from his grasp.

"Yeah, girlfriend, you don't wanna miss this chance!" May egged on while digging a finger into the center of Sarah's scalp. "It ain't everyday that Marie offers to let you shoot at her! Usually I gotta pull off a sneak attack!"

The slingshot rifle shook in Sarah's hands, but instead of lining up a shot to rescue the flower child POW, she simply gulped and held it low in front of her.

"I knew you didn't have the guts to do it! Guess chickening out runs in the family, right Sarah?" Marie asked mockingly while keeping Plank just out of Jonny's reach, Sarah digging her teeth into her bottom lip as she fought through her fear and frustration. "It'll be fine though, this creep ain't technically your target!" she revealed before marching with Plank and Jonny in tow over toward the fence where the ground was stained with the souls of slain garbage.

"You rotten cranky Kanker, don't even think about firing that thing at Plank!" Jonny hissed as Marie hooked the thrashing boy in suspension from the top of the fence with the coat-hanger and continued to keep Plank away from his embrace.

"Neither of you are what she's really aiming at!" Marie replied as she held Plank in one hand and reached behind her back with the other. "You ever heard that tale about William Tell, weirdo?"

"No but whatever it's about, I bet it would make for a horrible bed time story!" Jonny answered bitingly while struggling to free himself from his wiry steel prison rack designed for freshly steamed shirts.

"It's all about plugging fruit off someone's head without plugging their head off their neck!" Marie explained before pulling out a container of mayonnaise. "Only difference in this situation is that Ed's bratty sister is blasting mayo and your head is even bigger than the old legend says!"

"About time we found a good way to use all that junk our boyfriends pawned off on us!" May interjected while guiding an unwilling Sarah toward the table so she could take aim over it. "And if we're lucky, big Ed's sis will be a sure enough shot to cover his head in mayo instead of yours!"

"I-I don't think I can shoot Lupo anywhere near Jonny, n-no matter how much I normally want to hurt him..." Sarah shivered as she was forced to stand facing her target by May. "Even I have a limit to the pain I'm willing to dish out!"

"Make sure your one big shot counts and he won't feel a dab of pain!" May encouraged caustically.

"I'll take good care of your happy doorstop while you make sure not to squirm too much!" Marie informed Jonny as she placed the mayo container on his head. The nature-loving boy followed her wise advice and quickly ceased his struggling once he realized there was no escaping his role in this horrific play about mortal suffering.

Marie retreated with her hostage to May's side, and the two miscreant siblings hovered eagerly over Sarah as she quivered while lifting the rifle to the side of her head. She lined up a rusty nail that served as the sights over the container resting on Jonny's head and swallowed her fear.

"You aren't gonna really fire that thing at me, are ya Sarah?" Jonny questioned in terror while trying his best to stiffen his body. "Think about what your mom would say if she saw what you were about to do!"

"I'm real sorry, Jonny, but mom probably wouldn't care as long as I wasn't the one who got hurt!" Sarah answered feverishly before wrapping her finger around the trigger and squeezing her eyes shut.

"Ya need to keep at least one of those peepers open or you're gonna miss by a mile!" May pointed out before taking hold of Sarah's arm.

"Yeah who taught you how to shoot, a blind raccoon?" Marie insulted loudly in Sarah's ear, the pressure mounting inside of the armed and dangerous girl.

"Don't do it, buddy, Lupo's a total killer! You don't have a hope in highwaters of winning that fight!" Jonny suddenly pleaded from his precarious perch.

"Who the heck is he talkin' to? And what the heck is he talkin' about?" May inquired in quick succession while tugging at Sarah's arm.

Before either of the cantankerous Kanker girls could react, Plank slipped out of Marie's grasp and the bottom of the board slapped into the end of the slingshot rifle. Sarah gave a wild yelp and pulled the trigger back, the sling band on the rifle snapping forward and launching the gravel far off mark.

Plank landed face up with a thud on the plastic table and seemed to be staring directly up at May and Marie.

"This Plank guy's one slippery baseboard, Marie," May commented in miffed awe as the two sisters locked eyes with their saboteur.

With a ringing crack, the gravel ricocheted off a tin garbage bin and reversed into a crash course for May's skull. Cootie germs sprayed out of May's mouth hole as it bashed the trucker cap free from her head and forced her into a slow-mo somersault. The murderous rock ping-ponged off of a dumpster and slammed into Sarah's elbow, causing her to twirl around in place and strike Marie in the stomach with the bore of the slingshot rifle. As Marie doubled over in agony, Sarah spun out and crashed into the surface of the plastic folding table and it snapped shut, crushing her between the two halves and launching Plank into the air.

"Where's my poor baby Lupo at?" May asked in a dizzy tizzy after landing on her feet. Experiencing too much anguish from the pulsating bruise on her belly to answer, Marie stumbled around and accidentally punted the slingshot rifle at May. It reunited with its owner by slamming into her throat, sending May collapsing to the dirt of the lane.

"My arms are waitin' for ya, buddy!" Jonny shouted upwards as Plank spiraled down through the air toward him. He caught the board in his hands and hugged him tightly while swinging from side to side. "I tried to tell ya what a slayer that Lupo was, just look at how he handled those bullies without breakin' a sweat!"

"I'll wrap my hands around your neck and manhandle you!" Marie threatened while spinning around to shoot a heinous grimace at him.

"Think fast, Plank!" Jonny bleated before holding Plank up in front of his face. The chunk of gravel struck the face of the board and Plank bent backwards slightly before launching it toward Marie. Unable to move fast enough to take cover from the incoming projectile, Marie took the screaming gravel bullet straight to the center of the bullseye on her hoodie and was thrown off her feet, crashing backwards through the fence on the other side of the lane opposite Jonny.

Lowering Plank after a moment, Jonny meekly viewed the carnage before him from his clothes-hanger swing set; the folded up plastic table bounced around on the ground as Sarah tried to pry herself out of it, May was laid out in the middle of the lane with the slingshot rifle resting across her neck, and Marie's legs dangled out of the lane-side of the hole while her body hung limply over the other side at the edge of Ed's backyard.

"We really need to get down before any of those three girls gets the chance to give us lumps to match theirs..." Jonny whispered fearfully to Plank before reaching a hand up to try to unhook himself from the wire hanger.

"Allow me to do the honors and set you free myself, Jonny!" the ever-helpful Edd's voice called out from down the lane.

"Why the hay are ya wearing that junk all over ya, Double D?" Jonny asked as he turned his attention to the astute lecturer, who was currently clanking up the lane toward him with pots and pans strapped all over his body. "Didya just get back from one wild cooking convention?"

"Sadly I'm not much of a cooking expert, but I'm sure Eddy would fit right in at such an event!" Edd quipped before giggling to himself and halting beside Jonny. "The precise reason I've constructed this suit of pain-proof armor is to prevent my own person from being injured by this excessively 'Not Good' weapons training course that May and Marie have set up!" he explained, retrieving the mayonnaise container from Jonny's head and jiggling the hook of the clothes-hanger.

"Doesn't seem like they were doin' much training! Unless I'm such a test dummy that it flew right over my head!" Jonny retorted as Edd bent the hook of the hanger off of the fence post, allowing Jonny to land on his sandals and crush broken shards of bottle into glass dust.

The plastic folding table suddenly exploded open and a black and blue Sarah tumbled out in front of the two boys.

"Don't be hard on yourself, Jonny..." Sarah heaved before sitting up on her rear and rubbing at the bruises covering her body. "Double D is a double dummy for not helping me first when I needed it more than you did!"

"You can save your admonishment for me until after my own for you, Sarah!" Edd stated sternly, watching intently as Sarah stood up and cracked her spine back into proper position. "I understand how amazing devices such as the aptly named 'Lupo' seem from afar, and that it is a tantalizing proposition to be able to play with such weapons yourself!" he went on before pulling out a stainless steel colander and putting it on his head in case the gravel shrapnel came shooting back into the lane with his cranium as its next target. "However, without a deep understanding of how dangerous weaponry can be and proper guidance in their use, it can lead to a horrifying accident!"

"I did have guidance, two times as much as I needed!" Sarah countered sourly.

"Perhaps, but observe the state of both of your guides now!" he argued, pointing over at the devastated carcasses of May and Marie. "And even barring the treacherous mishap that unfolded, it was clear from their methods that neither of your guides gave a stray thought about personal safety! Least of all you or Jonny's!"

"You tell her, Double D! Plank's got one throbbin' headache after taking that rock to his mug!" Jonny whined before yanking the clothes-hanger out from his shirt.

"It was foolhardy for her to go through with firing a weapon she knew little to nothing about, but don't forget that you stood by until it was far too late!" Edd reprimanded as he shifted the conversational spotlight over to Jonny. "I could tell from your own reaction to the prospect of dispatching recyclable products that you partially knew the dangers yourself, yet you allowed Sarah to fall into the clutches of ne'er-do-wells that didn't care whether or not there was a safety risk!"

"You tell him, Double D! My arm is gonna need a cast after taking that blast from Lupo!" Sarah pouted while rubbing her hobbled elbow.

"Now now, I'm not here to make either of you the enemy in all this!" Edd reassured nervously, clearly not comfortable with all the rapid-fire blame shifting occurring before his eyes. "But I am here to make sure that our friends in the audience with a thirst for knowledge understand the 'Not Good' dangers of idle hands around deadly weapons!" he explained, staring past Jonny and Sarah and at you, the reader.

"In that case, I'll suck it up as long as you guys learned the crazy stuff that can happen if you blind fire a slingshot!" Sarah relented as she grinned wearily at you, the reader, and clasped her hands behind her back.

"Plank's migraine is already fading now that he knows our freaky fans will step in to stop their friends from using a person for target practice!" Jonny related while spinning the wire hanger around his wrist to impress you, the reader.

"Both of those are invaluable lessons for any adolescent who's unenlightened to the true precarious nature of weaponry!" Edd stated in delight, giving a thumbs up to both Jonny and Sarah.

Edd opened his mouth to end off the lecture on the highest note possible, but paused when he heard moaning and groaning from nearby. He turned his attention away from you, the reader, and witnessed a ragged Marie pulling herself through the hole in the fence and May shakily standing up and massaging her throat while holding her slingshot rifle in her free hand.

"A-Ah, I see you're both back with us!" Edd exclaimed with fake positivity. "That was certainly a faster recovery than expected..." he grumbled anxiously as he watched Marie and May shuffle in place while checking their injuries.

"Can you guys repeat all of the lesson plan stuff?" May asked as she stopped admiring her battle scars and began scanning around the lane for her hat. "Start from after the part where everything went black and I started dreamin' about sausage links."

"No need for the play by play, May," Marie winced while pressing her arms against her midsection and giving a broken smile over at Edd. "The two runts can run along now that we're done messing with 'em! My boyfriend can fill us in on what we missed while he's rubbing ointment all over us!"

"I-I'm sure Lee can handle treating your wounds! Sh-She is your eldest sister after all, and it's her sworn duty to care for you!" Edd reasoned desperately as he clinked away from Jonny and Sarah's sides, his hands squeezing around the mayonnaise container for comfort.

"Lee ain't here but you are! There's no way we can make it all the way back home like this, Double D!" May replied candidly after catching onto what Marie was fishing for. "Me, Marie, and Lupo can rest in your bed while you get us up to speed!"

"You'd be surprised what you're capable of if you simply focus on mind over matter!" he objected while continuing to back away as the sisters crept toward him. Sarah and Jonny chose to stand aside and whistle innocently, deciding they had enough misery for one tape and were sitting this one out.

"Aren't good guys like you supposed to care for poor girls like us instead of throwing us out to the wolves?" Marie questioned as she and May drew ever closer to the shaking cookware-clad boy. "Well, aren't ya?"

"About that..." Edd mumbled before glancing away for a moment. Instead of answering Marie's loaded question, he tossed the mayonnaise container over to Sarah, who barely caught it while she was in the middle of pretending not to notice the licentious situation. "Consider that condiment a gift from me to you, Sarah! It would only slow me down during the long sprint ahead of me!" he yelled before turning tail and banging his heavy pots and pans down the lane in a frenzied scurry.

"Let's catch the cook before he gets back to his kitchen, Marie!" May shouted, her and Marie running zigzags down the lane after him as they tried to fight through the shooting pain in their bodies.

"Plank says his money's on the Kankers in that game of handicap tag! How about you, Sarah?" Jonny asked while poking Sarah's rib cage with the tetanus-infected wire hanger.

"I guess I'm rooting for Double D!" Sarah replied as she lovingly stared down at the mayonnaise he had gifted her. "He's so thoughtful even if his lessons really bring the pain!"

As the PSA ended and began to fade to black, Ed peeked his head through the hole in the fence to ask what was going on, but when he saw Sarah dipping her elbow inside of the container of expired mayo and Jonny scratching Plank's back with the wire clothes-hanger, he decided not to interrupt all the wholesome fun they were clearly having.

End of PSA Tape Seventeen