Chapter Twenty-Three
It took 6 and a half pitchers of Guinness Malt Beer and several filled-to-the-rim high-ball glasses of Jim Beam whiskey to mellow Beppo enough to finally allow Joe Young to get the animal into the cute tuxedo that the ape wore to the shows. Joe was a little concerned about the amount of alcohol, but he was far happier to just get the show done for the night, get the weekend's shows done, and leave Smallville; ever since the interview, with the high school's paper, no less, Beppo was acting bizarre. Joe hoped that getting the animal on schedule, back on the stage, would help calm him and the primate. Beppo, usually resplendent in the miniature Armani suit, tailored just right, was now more muscular, and the suit didn't fit properly.
"I have no idea what's up, Beps," Joe said, realizing for the first time the anatomical changes in his friend. "I hope you don't rip the suit." Beppo nodded and swayed drunkenly while Joe placed the satin top hat atop the ape's balding dome. Setting down the matching dapper cane, Joe tugged on the tuxedo's lapels, stepped back, and saw that the red bow tie under Beppo's chin was crooked. "Here," Joe said, "let's straighten this out."
From an open window, an outdoorsy scent sneaked in, a scent of barns and hay, mixed with some type of spice, a scent that Beppo sniffed in the air. He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply when Joe began to adjust the collar. The air particles rushed into Beppo's nose and triggered his memory, causing him to remember someone who had that particular scent: someone tall that walked away with a blonde, a girl that Beppo felt was his prize. The primate breathed out, his eyelids opened slowly. While Beppo's eyes were dull, the irises had a bright lime green glow to them. The scent brought up the memory of The Tall One, and Beppo knew if The Tall One was close, so was The Blonde. The more he thought of The Tall One and The Blonde, the brighter his eyes glowed. And stronger his hated burned, and more fierce his need to want his prize.
"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON GOW AHHHHHHHHHH!" Beppo screamed. He slammed his chest with his fists; the sound was like iron slamming against steel.
"OH NO!" Joe yelled; primal blast sent him scrambling back. He was first worried that Beppo was in a mood. Then he saw the verdant glow emitting from Beppo's eyes. "OH (Expletive Censored)!"
There was a time, not so long ago, like the Wednesday of that week, when Beppo and Joe were the best of friends; Joe took Beppo out in every town they visited: to museums, movie theaters, operas, plays, theme parks, fine restaurants, aquariums, and even zoos. Because of that, Beppo felt a love toward the man, a special bond. They were drinking buddies, for goodness' sake, spending many a dark hour AM in a local bar, pub, juke joint, drinking free beers (thanks to Beppo's popularity) and getting hugs from boozed up women. The love Beppo felt for Joe completely dissipated when the animal reached for his cane. The long slender ebony cane still had a weight to it because of the polished onyx. It had an odd silver bat-wing grip; it was a gift from a young teenaged millionaire in Gotham who watched a performance and told the media present that Beppo was "the sensational character find of 2000!"
Joe watched ...the thing; thats all that Joe could think of his drinking partner now, the thing before him with the glowing green eyes, the thing that gripped the cane and whacked the silver head into its thickly calloused palm. Beppo was no longer the cute monkey wearing a cute tuxedo. No, Beppo now was a sick parody, a chilling, hulking menace: the top hat was crooked, the bowtie askew, and after Beppo hit the lamp in the room and darkening it, his glowing eyes lit his grin, no longer a grin that made kids in hospital wards smile; it was a homicidal maniac's grin. An evil grin lit by meteor-lite.
Human instinct has a 'fight or flight' mechanism, and the mechanism whispered to Joe run this time. Joe ran into his bedroom and reached under his pillow. All the thing's recent abhorrent behavior flooded into Joe's mind, and he knew by the way Beppo held the cane, he had to act. He felt for and pulled out what he kept just in case, just for what he never thought could ever happen until the circus and carnival arrived in Smallville. This was a just-in-case moment. Joe pulled out a tranquilizer-handgun, specifically designed to fire up to 11 hypodermic darts by means of compressed CO2 cartridges.
Unfortunately, just when Joe slid his index finger through the trigger-guard and curled against the trigger itself, a silver wing hacked into his shoulder, into the thick deltoid muscle, severing ligaments to his bicep, making his arm drop, making thick crimson blood splatter onto white sheets. Joe screamed once. Just once because Beppo ripped out the wing, swung the cane, and lodged the wing into his former friend's temple. A twist of his wrist made the wing carve deeper into Joe's brain. The wicked smile on Beppo's lips disappeared, and the monster watched Joe slump and fall to the carpet. The monster dug out the wing and blood spewed in an arc onto the killer's pants.
Beppo didn't care about that blood; he was fascinated at the dark thick crimson of that poured from the gaping hole. at the unblinking eyes, at the stillness of the body. He envisioned The Tall One's face, bloodied and mutilated, The Tall One's body unmoving, and The Blonde hugging him. Beppo looked down at the body, looked at his...at his...his meteor-laced mind was clouded only with two thoughts: claim The Blonde One and kill The Tall One; nothing mattered to him. Not even good friends.
The scent spurred Beppo on. His feet left bloody prints in The Dead Nice Man's room. The monster pushed on the windowpane and the glass popped off and shattered on the ground. The sound of the glass breaking into thousands of shards was overwhelmed by the laughs and talk of the carnival-goers. Beppo hopped, swung his body through the open window, and pulled himself to the motor-home's roof. He figured that he could track down the scent easier if he didn't get mobbed by the guests at the carnival. But he grabbed his head; the sights, the sounds, and the smells bombarding him, flooding his senses, disorienting him. Beppo staggered to his knees and curled up. Suddenly the scent was powerful, strong and ever so close. The monster shot his head up, and looked toward the ferris wheel.
Despite the pain of his senses being assaulted, Beppo followed the scent of The Tall One, scrambled between both the circus entertainers' and the carnival workers' trailers, dodged people, and lurked in the darkness. Every breath he took brought his bloody, dirty feet closer to his prey and stopped just a few rides from the ferris wheel. Then he squinted at a tall figure standing with a short-haired blonde girl under the bright rainbow colors of bulbs. The monster rubbed his sensitive eyes; the glare was almost too much, really. The meteorite somehow augmented Beppo to the Nth degree, but his fragmented mind tried hard to keep pace with his body's new enhancements. Colors and smells and sounds swirled, like the broken pieces of his mind. Two things were keeping him together: Kill The Tall One, Claim The Blonde.
In the darkness, the monster's hand clutched a rock. Beppo lobbed the rock and pelted the drink that the boy had in his hand. The girl with him shrieked when the drink spilled on her. The boy looked around, looked to see if jocks were trying to ruin their night, again. Beppo shook his head, the pain intense but grabbed another rocks, threw them and purposely hit the ground at the boy's boots. The Tall One looked over where Beppo was standing.
Beppo nodded his head wildly watching The Tall One walk toward him. The monster rolled a rock and crept backward, doing it again, making sure The Tall One kept following his lures, kept walking into his trap. It was easier on Beppo's eyes to stare at the dark ground rather than the anything the light shone upon, so he grinned when he saw a left-over piece of metal piping laying on the dirt. He wished he had his cane, but the pipe would do: he crushed the end of the pipe with his cherished, new found strength and created a point at the tip. The Tall One walked into the darkness, away from the bright lights and big fun, away from his date. He was not afraid of the dark at all; he never was. He should have been.
The muscles in his legs, the powerfully thick quadriceps and the hamstrings, and the fat horseshoe shaped calves, propelled Beppo into the air. He flipped, and landed softly on his footpads, landed behind The Tall One. The young boy's eyes went wide when he felt Beppo's leathery calloused palm cover his mouth. The Tall One gripped the tuxedo sleeve, and started to pull. Then, the grip of his left hand went limp a second after the monster stabbed the point of the pipe into the toned inraspinatus and subscapularis muscles that covered the shoulder blade, the rhomboids under it, piercing through the bone, cracking it, breaking the fourth posterior rib and sent the tip into the rapidly beating heart. Beppo nodded crazily, feeling the boy's hot breath rush against his palm. The monster thrust the tip in further and heard the infernal beat of The Tall One's heart sporadically thump. The pipe churned in the calloused hand, the boy twitched and spasmed, and Beppo waited to hear...silence; The Tall One's heart stopped. With the front of the tuxedo's jacket and what was once a crisp white shirt soaked with blood of two men, Beppo shoved down the limp lifeless body. It was easy to kill The Tall One, like it was easy to defeat him at chess. The monster plucked out the pipe, and wiped of the bone fragments and muscle remnants from the pipe's shaft.
"The boogyman is in there, not stupid jocks..."
Beppo stood up straight and listened. The voice of the short haired blonde was more softer than what entranced him.
"Jake!...C'mon! I wanna ride the ferris wheel..."
Jake was not The Dead Tall One's name...it was Clark. The monster kicked the boy over onto his back, and and his anger flamed: the lifeless body at his feet wasn't The Tall One but it had the enemy's height, build and scent. And the name that belonged to the body wasn't Clark Kent, but to Jacob Whiteflag, a nephew of Joseph Willowbrook, Chief of the local Kawatchee tribe.
Beppo turned at The Blonde, the wrong blonde, Libby Prince, took too many steps into the dark. The pipe's metal caught a flicker of light when the hardness penetrated soft flesh. There was a muffled cry. And Libby never stepped out of the dark, and Beppo scurried away in the dark, hunting for the real Tall One, the real Blonde.
"Why isn't that considered child-endangerment?" Chloe asked Clark, and pointed at the poster of The Flying Graysons. Beneath the picture of John and Mary, the married acrobatic couple, were a series of stop-motion images of their son, Richard, a five-year old boy, swinging from one trapeze to another, doing a tumble in between the handholds.
"I don't think so," Clark said. "I mean, along with being daredevils, the Graysons are known for their safety measures."
"Yeah," Chloe nodded. "It's silly to think that something bad could happen to him."
They walked along to the ferris wheel, too entranced with each other, not noticing the added graphic that the Graysons had started to perform without a net. When they arrived at the ferris wheel, the squeezed each other's hands: their destination was tall, brightly lit, and had an unusual aquatic motif. Unlike the year before's theme of outer space and being called "Starro", this year the wheel was called "Poseidon's Tridents." The spokes of the wheel were covered with a teal and moss colored trident fork, the three prongs along the side of the cabin seats.
"I thought Poseidon had a beard and was old," Chloe said stepping into line. Wearing a orange tunic and green pants and boots, a carny in his twenties portrayed 'Poseidon' and greeted the riders. He was clean shaved, short of hair, and blonde. Chloe thought he was too slack-jawed to be the 'King of the Sea'.
"Well, he should be," Clark laughed.
"Maybe a hook for a hand, or something," she giggled. She turned and saw him look her up and down. He never did that, or she never caught him do that; she gulped.
"Have I told you how beautiful you look tonight?" Clark said, enraptured.
"Yeah," Chloe smiled. Then she snarked with a wiggle of her head, "but frequent reminders are always appreciated."
"You look INCREDIBLY beautiful," Clark whispered softly, breathing out when he said 'beautiful'.
"Oh." Chloe blushed red. "That kinda talk will get you anything..."
"Let's get you onto the ferris wheel first," Clark smiled.
"Ok," Chloe said with a knowing smile that suddenly turned into a frown when she saw the foam cup flip and the contents spill on the pants of girl ahead of them in line for the ferris wheel.
"I know that feeling," Chloe said sadly. Clark hugged her and they watched a teen that was with the girl walk into the shadows. The line moved up; the riders exchanged spots with passengers getting off the ride and Chloe thought it was odd that the boy didn't come back. She was going to mention it to Clark when she saw the girl saunter off to the darkened area. Immediately she thought of the 'Lana Rules' and and wondered if the girl was enforcing one of them
"That Victoria looked really beautiful..." Chloe said while the ride attendant ushered them to an empty cabin on the ferris wheel.
"Really?" Clark wondered truthfully when the ride's engines restarted and the cabin moved forward, allowing on the next group of passengers. "I guess I got wrapped up in thinking of you to notice."
"Oh...wow," Chloe said softly and snuggled into Clark. He wrapped around his arm on her shoulder. They sat silently, waiting for the ride to actually start, waiting to kiss. They both knew it and they pressed their sides into each other. They were alone, they were in love, and while the music chimed, they waited for just the right time. Their cabin rotated around, and finally rotated to the top. Clouds in the sky parted and Chloe and Clark's cabin was basked with the full moon-light.
"It's just so beautiful," Chloe whispered while they looked at the moon.
"You look more beautiful," Clark whispered, who like Aristotle, understood that the light coming from the moon was reflected light. He turned and saw Chloe's features in that reflective glow: her ringlets, her triangularly-placed moles, her green eyes, her lush lips. Yes, he loved her.
"Oh wow," She said again, her mental thesaurus stuck on 'Clark-related words and phrases'.
"Wow," Clark whispered. Chloe shifted in her seat and leaned her chest in first, pinning him against the seat and her body. She licked and bit her bottom lip and nodded. Everything was right. So right. Too right...
Instead of enjoying a blood-boiling kiss, Chloe and Clark suffered through several blood-curdling screams. "What the heck is going on NOW?" Chloe asked, her mouth inches away from her target. But Chloe pulled away, her investigator's instincts overriding her teen desires. Clark sat up and they, like others on the ride, leaned out the cabin to see what caused the screams. They watched carnival-goers, once happy and carefree, running to and away from where Chloe saw the two teens that were ahead of them in line went to earlier.
"Whatever it is," Clark said after he used his vision powers and spotted the dead kids. "Its serious."
"We seriously need to get off," Chloe said, and shook the guardrail. The latch was securely locked. The cabin got close to the bottom. "If it's serious, you need to...to...to help somehow," she said, cryptically. "And we're reporters...its our job to cover events. Even when the timing sucks."
"Business before pleasure?" Clark wondered.
"It pains me to say it, but yes," Chloe sighed. "And this better be the last time tonight!" she screamed and shook her fist to the night sky.
Clark noted her fist was aimed at the constellation Aquarius, and thought the Water Bearer was dousing them with many a frustration. When the cabin reached the bottom, Clark easily popped the latch with a gentle push on the guardrail. Chloe jumped off first, and thought to ask Clark how he did that later. Clark himself hopped off, lifted Chloe at her hips and swung her bottom away from the still moving cabin and spokes. Chloe decided that wasn't really a 'save' per se; she was used to him saving her butt .
"Hey!" The ride attendant screamed. "You can't do that!"
"We're with the newspaper..." Chloe screamed back, holding Clark's hand whiel they ran to the mob gathering by the dead bodies, "we can!"
"Stupid reporters," The ride attendant whispered and went back to his mindnumbing job.