Holy beached whale riding a flaming skateboard down Mount Kilimanjaro! After 2 years, I hath risen once more! Just as Nostradamus predicted. And with me a bring the eventual completion of this silliness, because I don't like unfinished business. It's what makes vengeful spirits, you know. But anyway, here it goes – Chapter 7 of Spike Man and British Boy!
From the perspective of, say, someone who just moved in to the neighbourhood, Tea Gardner was the epitome of pure goodness. She was cute, helpful, kind, although a bit irritating with the whole "I'm your bestest friend everest! And friendship can help us to accomplish anything!" thing.
But, like most of us, Tea had a dark side. She called this "evil, imitation Tea" (as Joey so fluently put it) Anzu.
People who knew her well, such as Yugi, Tristan, Joey and Spencer McShazbot (her next-door neighbour), knew that when Anzu came out, you better get the fuck out of the way. When Anzu was 'in control', she would go down to the local pub, down about 10 shots of vodka (earning $50 in the process), then go about her nightly chores, which mostly involved knocking over a minimum of 5 garbage bins, starting a pub brawl, and setting Joey's house on fire.
There were 4 (known) reasons that Tea would switch to Anzu.
1. Her favourite TV show is cancelled (which, surprisingly, happens at least once a fortnight, which just goes to show that she watches very bad TV shows).
2. She is woken up before 8:00am (exactly), or 11:00am weekends.
3. The pizza boy gives her the wrong pizza/gives her the wrong change/asks for a pair of her underpants.
4. Someone interrupts her "me time".
By the time Ryou and Yugi got to Tea's apartment, it was 2:37pm.
Yugi glanced at his watch. "Oh," he managed to whisper. "Fuck."
Ryou whirled around, expecting a police car or helicopter to close in on them at any minute. "What? Where are they? Should I take my sleepy pill now?"
"No, no, no police. Worse. It's 2:37."
A look of realisation slowly spread over Ryou's face, followed by a look of sheer terror. "Yugi, we have to come back another time. I mean… it's 2:37, for crying out loud! If we go in there… we could… we could DIE!"
"I know, Ryou, but it's a risk we're going to have to take. We can't just 'go back' – the police will be combing the city for us, and we pretty much have no other place to stay. Hell, I'm surprised they aren't here by now, though Tea's place isn't that likely a location for us to be."
Ryou gulped reluctantly. "Alright, but at the first sign of any danger, I'll get Cho up and you fly us the hell out of here."
Yugi nodded. "Alright, sounds like a- wait, Cho? Who or what the hell is that?"
Ryou looked embarrassed. "It's… it's my name for… for the little blob thing..." He quickly looked down, seemingly fascinated with the tip of his shoelace.
Yugi rolled his eyes, but what could he say – he was expecting that sort of thing from Ryou. "Yeah, sure, Cho. Whatever," he breathed, then, mustering every inch of confidence he had, knocked on Tea's door.
Nothing.
Ryou exhaled. "Maybe she isn-"
Suddenly, a huge wave of pain rushed over Ryou. He clutched his head in agony, and almost fell over. Images formed in his mind – which was quite odd; it had never happened before during a migraine – then slowly grouped themselves together to form animations. He knew he had never seen them before, but he felt as if they were familiar in some way… as if he had seem them already.
The first one struck him very odd: two stick figures with spiffy hair (undoubtedly him and Yugi) were sprawled on the floor before a screaming girl holding a bucket of icecream and the largest spoon he had ever seen. It wouldn't take a genius to figure that one out – but when had that happened? And why stick figures?
The second one made even less sense: he saw a… dancing? Yes, it was a dancing cup of coffee, marked by a flashing neon sign above it that declared, "I AM A MOCHA LATTE, DRINK ME". It was suddenly picked up by a gloved hand and raised to a blurred face that felt strangely familiar. Another neon sign appeared, this time above the stranger, shouting to all that could see: "HELLO THERE, RYOU! JUST FILL OUT THESE PAPERS HERE… IT'S ALL CONNECTED, RYOU. EVERYONE, EVERYTHING." Suddenly, the lights exploded, and the third movie slowly faded into vision.
Dark. Ryou didn't like this dark. It wasn't natural. It wasn't… it wasn't right.
Then, a light. Small, flickering, in the distance. It was… a torch, he was sure of that, but the person holding it was unclear.
Then, BOOM. Slightly muffled. A trail of white flew straight through the air… towards him. A… what was it?
The trail began to illuminate the room – he could smell something burning. What? Where was this… his kitchen?
The trail grew closer, and it dawned on Ryou…
… a bullet?
There wasn't time, it was coming closer, the turkey has to be just right! Wait… he didn't say that? What are you on about, Ryou?! Stop being so-
The bullet hit.
Blink.
What the? Ryou thought. What the hell was that? And what is that horrible noise? And slowly he began to remember – the cops, the crossword, Tea's apartment –
Oh dear Lord.
Tea's apartment.
Everything came into focus – he was lying on the floor, Yugi was standing over him, and thankfully the door behind him was closed. "Ryou? What the hell was that?" Yugi was saying. Ryou looked up at him questioningly, and Yugi elaborated. "Well, we were just-" Yugi was temporarily cut off by the strange loud noise rising in volume, then dying out after a few seconds. "-door to open. You started to say something, and then you just stopped. When I looked around, you were lying on the ground, perfectly still, mouthing something… I picked a few words up but it didn't make much sense; just snippets, like 'I am a something' and 'just something these something'. Then you kind of just… stopped. Hell, I think you stopped breathing for a minute! Care to explain what happened?"
Ryou opened his mouth, but what was interrupted by the strange and loud noise again. What the hell was that? It seemed to be coming closer… now it's unlocking the door- wait, what? Oh God-
"YUGI! LOOK OUT!" Ryou cried. Yugi reacted immediately, throwing himself sideways just in time to avoid: a) the door slamming open violently, and b) a flurry of ninja death stars embedding themselves into the wall behind where Yugi's head had been. "Motherf-"
"Are you aware of what time it is…?" said a deep voice from the shadows beyond the door. The pain in Ryou's head felt like it was at its peak.
Yugi, now sprawled out on the flaw like Ryou, opened his mouth, but no words came out.
"EXACTLY!" boomed the voice. A light flickered on somewhere inside, and suddenly Tea's face was illuminated – but it wasn't Tea anymore. Her normally large and innocent eyes were now narrow and seemed to be… glowing red. The voice continued. "And what time does The Adventures Of Mister McStick start?!"
Ryou barely managed to whisper, "2:30". He felt as if simply Anzu's presence was crushing his lungs.
"And WHAT TIME," Anzu continued, more and more malice edging into her voice, "WHAT TIME DOES ME-TIME START?!?!?"
Ryou gasped for air. He heard a high-pitched moan beside him, which was met by a glare so venomous it made Yugi start hacking and coughing.
"WHAT TIME, DAMNIT?!"
Ryou gave in. "T… two… twenty-nine…" Then something slotted into place in his mind. "Wait… what show… were you watching?"
Anzu was clearly taken aback by the fact that anyone had dared to say anything to her other than the time, "Here are your drinks, Queen Anzu", "Ow, what was hell was that for?" or "JESUS CHRIST, IT'S A MONSTER!" This had never, ever happened before. "The… The Adventures of Mister McStick… why?"
It made sense. Ryou continued, more confidently. "And what flavour is your icecream?"
Anzu was genuinely shocked. "How… how do you know I'm eating icecream?"
Ryou picked himself off of the floor, looked her straight in her eyes, and calmly said, "And correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't your spoon absolutely freaking huge?"
Anzu blinked, then suddenly her eyes grew larger and less red. "Ryou? What are you doing here? Oh… did you… yeah, you woke her up, didn't you? Sorry about tha- Yugi? What the hell are you doing on the floor?" Her reply was nothing less then another high-pitched moan, followed by a whisper of, "Can I breathe now?"
Tea turned off the TV and sat down. "So you need a place to stay, huh? Mind if I ask why?"
Ryou looked over at Yugi, who was now rapidly shovelling spoonfuls of nothing into his mouth and crying out, "Oxygen, I missed you so much!" Maybe it's time to make an executive decision, thought Ryou. "Sorry, Tea. I'd love to tell you, but it's a bit…" He looked over at Yugi again. "…well, weird more than anything else, but also private."
Tea sighed. "Alright, fine, I won't go anywhere near this private thing of yours. Oh, and by the way… what was Anzu saying? Because, if she said anything mean, I want you to know that I didn't mean it, and I'm sorry, and-
"Tea, it's OK! She didn't say anything mean… she didn't get a chance to. I kinda interrupted her by… well, she was eating icecream, and…" It was starting to make sense to Ryou now – that first little mind movie he had seen. There was him and Yugi, on the ground; Tea, with her huge spoon and her icecream; and the Adventures of Mister McStick, which explained the stick figures. So that must mean…
"Holy crap!" he yelled out, making Yugi choke on his spoon. He leapt up, grabbed Yugi and dragged him into the bathroom.
"Yugi!" he hissed into the flustered teen's ear. "I think I may be psychic!"
Yugi spat out his mouthful of air (also known as exhaling). "Ryou, that's ridiculous. I mean, the blob was one thing, but now this…"
"No, no, you have to believe me! When I passed out or something before Anzu came-"he and Yugi simultaneously shuddered, "-I saw these… strange sort of… movies, really. Now don't look at me like that, I'm serious. Anyway, in the first one, we were stick figures, we were lying on the ground, and Anzu was eating icecream with a ridiculously large spoon. It all makes sense when you put it together with my conversation with her! I think I can predict the future!"
Yugi was looking at him very oddly. "OK then… so you can predict Anzu yelling at us. Hell, I saw that coming too. I'm not sure about the stick figures, but most women eat icecream in their me-time."
Ryou saw the truth in Yugi's words. "Well, I guess… but then there were the other ones! There was the dancing coffee-" Now Yugi was looking at him as if he were a psychopath. Which, Ryou thought, I could very well be. "And then there were those words I was mouthing. He was telling me to fill out the papers… and it was all connected… and then that last one…" Then something dawned on him.
If the first 'movie' had proved to be true…
What if the last one was?
That's all for now, but stay tuned for an actual plot! Now with added twists!
Read and, if you're up to it, review. It would be nice if you did – it makes me look good!