Chapter 4
Finale
The car chase between Lifty, Pop and Lumpy, was intensifying. Lifty kept looking at the rear view mirror for any sign that he might have ditched the sheriff, but the siren and the beacon and the bloodstained vehicle refuse to leave the tail of Pop's car.
Lumpy, for his part, kept his eye and the car on Lifty. He was concerned for his friend Giggles, and he was determined that he would get that cellphone no matter what. He was so focused on Lifty that he hit and killed several pedestrians along the way.
"Faster! Faster!" Pop shouted. "He's getting away! And don't drive so recklessly. Just because they come back to life doesn't mean you could be careless with lives!"
"I'm going as fast as I can!" Lumpy replied. "And you're the one to talk, Mr. Model Father!"
"Don't drag my son into this!" Pop growled. "And you're too slow! I'm going to lose my car if you don't hurry up!"
"Oh shut up! There are more important things to worry about than your stupid car!"
"Yeah! Like Disco Bear's walkman and cell phone!" Pop bitterly replied.
"Oh will you please shut up!" Lumpy shouted. "I can't concentrate! You're seriously interfering with police work! The most important thing is Giggles' life, get it! Not your car, not that idiot's walkman, and not thief's cell phone!"
Pop was surprised. "How is Giggles involved in these?"
By now, they were at the outskirts of town. Both cars were already drenched in mud as Lifty took a 'short cut' which turned out to be a dirt path through fields of grain in an area that recently rained.
"Shifty is holding Giggles hostage in her house," Lumpy explained. "Lifty will call Shifty if Petunia rats on their scheme. So we need to get that cell phone. But as far as he's concerned, we're after him because he stole Disco Bear's walkman and your car."
Pop immediately grasp the significance of what they're doing. Its not about theft, it's about saving lives. "Get a move on! We need to save Giggles! And my car!"
They emerged from the dirt path unto a highway besides a cliff overlooking the sea, where the chase continued. The highway during this part of day is busy, with unfortunate consequences.
"Look out you moron!" Pop shouted. "We're going to get hit by that truck!"
Lumpy screamed. "I know! I know!"
Luckily, the police beacon caused the truck to swerve to avoid the car. The resulting action saved Pop and Lumpy, but it caused a ten vehicle pile-up behind them, and seconds later, an explosion ended the lives of scores of motorists.
Lifty laughed when he heard the explosion behind him, figuring that he had shaken off his pursuers. Taking a look at the rear view mirror, he was peeved that that Lumpy was still chasing him. He looked at the gas meter and it was running low. "Just my luck to steal a car low on gas!" he cursed as he stepped on the gas to try and evade the sheriff.
Shifty ran as if his life depended on it—which it did. He was so terrified that he could see Flippy on every corner and on every house he passed by. After running for about ten minutes, stumbling many times in the process, he looked around for any sign of the psychotic bear. When he was satisfied that Flippy was gone, he gave a sigh of relief and went to a nearby apple tree to rest. He laughed at his good fortune of being alive.
He put his hand on his pocket, where he felt Petunia's car keys. He immediately cursed himself for not taking the car. He had already stacked a lot of items in her car. Fleeing with it would at least make the heist partially successful. He wondered—everything was so perfect! What could have gone wrong? The blue skunk obviously squealed. And that brother of his did not stop her! He should have hung Giggles! No, he won't do that—he's won't kill anyone deliberately.
Shifty heard his cell phone ring. "Yes. Lifty, where the hell have you been? You're being chased by that moose? No. That blue skunk must have squealed to that green bear. Yes, the same one who carved me with a Christmas cookie. Why did you let her rat us out? Oh, it's that anteater's fault, eh? You got the money! All of them? Good! Why are you being chased? You imbecile! You just have to rob that idiot, didn't you? Don't let them catch you. I repeat, don't let them catch you! That loot that you've got there is the only thing we've been able to successfully rob. I've been chased out of the house by Flippy, you nincompoop! Oh I'm the idiot now Lifty, eh? At least I'm not being chased by a dumb moose right now! Fine! Don't loose that money! As soon as you've ditched them, meet me at our hideout."
In spite of their altercation, Shifty was pleased. The mission was a success after all. As long as his brother could escape the sheriff, and he had no doubt that Lifty could do so, they'll end this mission rich, or if not, then reasonably well-off. He began laughing out loud. "Ha, we've won! We're rich!" he shouted.
Lifty would surely crow to Shifty. After all, Lifty succeeded whereas he failed. Still, it doesn't matter. He sat on a rock besides the tree. He took Petunia's car keys and looked at it again. The keys were shiny and he could see his reflection. Then he froze. Through the shiny reflection, he could see Evil Flippy grinning evilly and standing on the branch above. "How did you get up there without me seeing you?" shouted a terrified Shifty.
"You forget, I'm a soldier," Evil Flippy stated as he jumped from the tree. Shifty panicked and tried to flee, but the bear grabbed his tail, and used it to slam the raccoon's back against his knee.
Experiencing excruciating pain, Shifty screamed when his back broke upon Flippy's knee. It only made Evil Flippy laugh. "Oh look, I forgot my knife," he said. "I think I'll just use this then!" Flippy pried open Shifty's closed left fist and took Petunia's car key. "It's so shiny, isn't it?" he said as he admired it. He took hold of the paralyzed Shifty using his left hand, and clutched the key on his right. "Look at those jagged teeth on the key. Looks like a knife, doesn't it? Do you think that it could pierce skin and flesh and bone? Let's find out."
With a swift, powerful movement, he stabbed Shifty on the abdomen with the key. Shifty screamed again, but Flippy stepped on his neck and broke his throat to silence him. "I don't want crybabies," Evil said as he thrust the key upwards to his chest, tearing a huge gash on Shifty's torso and spraying blood on the bear. Shifty was still alive, but he was on his death throes. The veteran then plunged his paws inside the raccoon. When he withdrew it, he ripped out the Shifty's small intestines out of his body. He fashioned a noose out of the organ, tied it around the thief's neck, swung the other end to tree branch, pulled it until Shifty hung from the tree by his own intestines. Flippy only laughed as he saw Shifty's stomach and liver fall out of the torso gash. The bear was now red from being covered in blood. After a minute, Shifty was mercifully dead.
Pocketing the car key, Evil Flippy scanned the area for the next victim. Fortunately for the inhabitants of Happy Tree Town who were still alive, he slammed his fist against the trunk of the apple tree. An apple fell from the tree and hit Flippy on the head. He immediately flipped back to his normal self.
He gasped when he saw the dead Shifty and the fact that he was covered in blood. "Flaky! Giggles! Cuddles!" he remembered. "I hope they're still alive."
With that, he ran fast towards their house.
Sniffles was in his laboratory conducting one of his experiments. He wanted to help Giggles, but did not want to leave Petunia alone. He simply hoped that everything would turn out all right.
He was mixing chemicals when he heard the sweet voice of the blue skunk. "Hey!"
"Petunia! You're done already?" Sniffles said without taking his eyes from his chemicals.
"Yes. Really, you're house is not as dirty as some of the other ones I cleaned!" Petunia claimed.
"You're amazing! I mean I always knew you're a super cleaning lady, but I'd thought it'd take longer than an hour to clean that mess!" he laughed as he transferred the chemicals to a test tube to heat it with a burner.
"Yes. I am a neat freak you know!" Petunia stated. "And I do this for a living. What are you doing?"
"Oh I'm testing whether the nitrate compound of the chemical will break the ionic bonds—oh sorry, sometimes I forget that my words can get over the head of others!" Sniffles laughed. "Just watch. I'm developing an antidote to Kryptonut for Splendid. If I'm successful, Splendid would no longer have a weakness to that gem."
Petunia just chuckled as she watched. Sniffles poured the blue chemical in the test tube into a beaker with green liquid. The green liquid in the beaker remained green.
"Great Newton's Apple!" Sniffles cursed. "It didn't turn to red! Well, so much for that hypothesis." Sniffles cleaned the chemicals and wrote a few items in his notebook.
"Oh I'm sure you can find the answer," Petunia offered. "Well, you want me to help you clean up?"
"Thanks!" Sniffles replied. "Well, Splendid would just have to wait."
"Sniffles, I think I'll throw a party for those of us who went through the events of this day, and I'll invite everyone who saved us or at least helped. So that means I'll invite you," Petunia started.
"And Lumpy," Sniffles opined.
"Pop should come too," Petunia added.
"And you can't invite Pop without inviting Cub too," Sniffles said.
"And we shouldn't forget poor Handy."
"How about Disco Bear," asked Sniffles.
"Oh not that pervert! No!" Petunia refused.
"But if he didn't let Lifty pilfer his walkman, then you'd still be with that thief!" Sniffles protested.
"Oh please! He didn't really do anything! And if he did, he's stupid to let Lifty steal from him!" Petunia retorted. "I'm sure Giggles would not want to be near that depraved bear."
"Okay, okay. So it's like Flaky's second party?" Sniffles asked.
"Kinda, but different," Petunia. "Don't worry, I won't let it upstage Flaky's bash for Flippy."
"I knew Shifty would bungle that one," Lifty grumbled as he put his cellphone back to his pocket. "And I shouldn't have let Petunia out of my sight at that bank!" he cursed.
But he had bigger things to worry about. Lifty was now desperate. The gas tank was nearly empty. He looked behind and saw a jerry can filled with gasoline. Looking at the rearview mirror, he saw Pop and Lumpy at his heels. "I can't stop for gas," Lifty ruminated. "Perhaps, I can do something."
He saw the opening of the fuel tank just in front of him past the windshield. Quickly lowering the side window, he reached for it with his left hand (with the right hand on the wheel), opened the fuel tank, opened the jerry can, and tried to put the gas in the tank. Doing so while driving may be suicidal, but what is death in this town? It was hard, as the can was heavy, and his left arm strained to keep the can in his hands. Yet he could feel it getting lighter and lighter as the gas gauge meter went up. Unfortunately, he was so preoccupied with refuelling that he did not notice the curve ahead. He looked forward, and saw too late that he was heading towards the base of a cliff.
There was a sickening crash as the car collided with the base of the rocky cliff. Behind Lifty, Lumpy and Pop immediately stopped their car. Exiting the vehicle they rushed towards the wrecked vehicle.
"My car!" Pop cried as he surveyed the damage.
"Poor soul," Lumpy mourned as he examined the corpse of Lifty. "He never made it."
Lifty's bloody body was smashed against the base of the cliff, his left hand clutching the now empty jerry can, his right hand holding the detached steering wheel of the car. The front of the car was smashed.
Pop examined the body. "Yes. He must have removed his seatbelt to be able to refuel while driving. His body went through the windshield, broke it, and collided with the wall of rock. If that didn't kill him, the glass shards would."
"Well, I better go to the car and make the report," Lumpy stated as he went back to the car. "You coming?"
"I'll just stay here for a while and see what I can salvage," Pop replied.
"Suit yourself," the sheriff answered as he went back to the car to write the report.
Pop sighed. At least the insurance will cover this, he thought. He took a match, lit his pipe, and carelessly threw the lighted match behind him.
Unfortunately, the lighted match landed in the open fuel tank of Pop's car. Having been recently filled by Lifty, it was nearly full of gas.
Lumpy was startled by the explosion of the crashed car. "Pop!" the blue moose shouted as he ducked behind Sniffles' car to avoid the falling debris. One such debris, a shard of metal from the car, hit his car, piercing the vehicle.
Lumpy, after the explosion, tried to see if Pop survived. He did not. He could see the two parts of Pop's burning body that was separated by the explosion. Lumpy took off his hat in respect. "I hope he doesn't blame me when he gets back," he whispered to himself. He took off the shard that pierced Sniffles' car and went inside the vehicle. Hoping that the car would not explode, he turned the key, and was delighted that it ran smoothly. What he didn't know is that the shard that pierced the car also disabled the breaks.
He hummed to himself, congratulating himself on a job well done, and went to Petunia's house to arrest Shifty, not knowing that Shifty, at this point in time, was dead.
Flaky was tired. All of her energies were starting to drain. But she could not let go of Giggles. Giggles herself was still. She knew that any wrong move would result in her death.
"Giggles, I'm not going to let go of you!" Flaky said in her usual timid voice.
Giggles tried to encourage her, but her gag only permitted her to give muffled incomprehensible sounds.
By this time, Flaky's arms were ready to give out. She felt Giggles slipping, but tightened her grip. "Someone! Anybody! Help!" she screamed, hoping someone would come and rescue Giggles.
She was delighted when Flippy, covered with blood, entered the room. Flippy gasped and quickly cut the rope holding it to the wall. With danger averted, Flaky let go of Giggles and the chipmunk tumbled on to the floor—hurt but safe. Flippy, using his knife, cut the ropes binding Giggles and removed the tape on her mouth. Giggles spat what turned out to be two rolls of socks in her mouth. "Cuddles!" was her first reaction as cradled the bleeding rabbit on her arms.
"He needs first aid," Flippy said as he went to the piles of boxes on the corner of the room. "Where is Petunia's?"
"On the top box right there on that pile. I saw Shifty put it there," Giggles stated while pointing to carefully stacked boxes on the corner of the room. Flippy quickly retrieved it and tossed it to pink chipmunk.
Giggles, who works part time as a nurse, quickly removed the pieces of ceramic on Cuddles' head, and wrapped his head in bandages to stem the flow of blood.
"Is he going to be alright?" Flaky asked.
"Yes," Giggles answered. "The blood loss isn't serious. He's just knocked out."
"That's good," Flaky approved. "At least none of us died."
"Except Shifty," Flippy retorted.
"But he doesn't count," Giggles replied. "So we all survived. That's a first. I just hope Petunia is alright."
"G-g-g-g-giggles? Are you okay?" Cuddles struggled as he opened his eyes.
"Yes, I am," Giggles said with tears on her eyes. "And so are you."
"I'm glad everything is okay," the rabbit answered. "I'm sorry for getting into trouble. I thought you'd die so I attacked without thinking. I don't want you to get hurt. I love y…your company so much."
Giggles smiled coyly, indicating that she recognized the Freudian slip. "I love you... I mean I love your company and your tail too!"
Both of them, as well as Flippy and Flaky, who had been watching them, burst into laughter at the awkward moment. "Hey Cuddles, you hear that? She loves your tail! Maybe if you treat her better, she'll love your hair and your ears too!" Flippy teased, laughing at Flaky's shoulders. Flaky laughed too, but in a more timid manner.
"Oh stop it!" Giggles said, but she laughed more, while Cuddles simply blushed.
Yet all of them knew the intimate and unique bond between Cuddles and Giggles. And all of them knew that it was only a matter of time when it would blossom into a full relationship.
"How about you two? Aren't you two dating each other?" Giggles asked.
"Um, no," Flippy replied. "We're just the best of friends."
"And what were you two doing last Friday night? Don't deny it! I saw you!" Cuddles demanded.
"It was a geography lesson," Flippy quickly replied. "I felt that the best way to teach someone about their home town is to give them a personal tour!" he explained with a straight face, giving the impression that he was absolutely serious.
"Yeah! I was curious so I asked Flippy about the town," Flaky, who was now blushing, added.
"At night?" Cuddles asked with eyebrows raised.
"And your lesson limited to each other's home, the movie theatre, the park, and the fancy restaurant?" Giggles joined, now grinning widely.
"It was night because it's our only mutual free time," Flippy answered without a sweat. "As for the places, we had precious few time, and we both agreed to tour those which is of the most interest to us."
"Oh, and repeatedly?" Cuddles asked.
"You can't learn everything of a single visit," Flippy answered.
Flippy was able to answer all questions, but Cuddles and Giggles simply smiled knowingly at the two.
Twenty minutes later, the four were seated on the kitchen table, recently unpacked, drinking coffee and eating a light snack, prepared by Giggles and Flaky.
"The unusual thing about today is not what happened," Giggles opined, "but that nobody died, except Shifty. Usually, at events like this, half the town would already be dead."
"You forgot about Toothy," Cuddles remembered. "He was impaled on his eye by the closet hook," the rabbit explained to Giggles. "What is it with Toothy and his eye? Half his deaths involve his eyes for crying out loud!"
"And I killed Mime, Nutty, and Mole," Flaky reminisced. "I hit them with my car when I was rushing towards you. I hope they won't take it against me."
"I'm sure they'll forgive you and forget about it," Cuddles said.
"Yes. Look at Flippy. No one has a grudge against him or is angry with him. So you'll be okay. Besides, you've caused other deaths before and they forgave you," Giggles added.
Lumpy was smoking a cigar as he drove across town. He did not silence the siren nor did he remove the police beacon so as to clear the road in front of him and enable him to run past red traffic lights. It was unnecessary. There were few if any vehicles on the road, and the traffic signs obliged. Thus, he did not have to slow down or to make way for other vehicles. It was only as he approached Petunia's house that he felt compelled to slow down. He gently exerted pressure on the breaks, but Sniffles' car did not slow down. He then tried to totally stop the car, but the vehicle refused to respond. That is when he realized the breaks were not working.
The car was soon out of control. Lumpy looked for something to crash his car into to stop the vehicle. He saw Petunia' house, and decided to ram the car on the tree opposite her home.
Flippy was first to notice the approaching moose. "It must be Lumpy," Flippy mentioned as he heard the police siren. He went outside to greet the sheriff, followed by Giggles and Flaky. Cuddles, who was not feeling too well, opted to watch Lumpy arrive from a window.
"Oh my God!" Giggles gasped on her yard when she saw Sniffles' car out of control.
"Looks like the breaks aren't working!" Flippy observed as the car seems to be heading their way. "Everybody go inside! He's coming!"
But before they could react, the car swerved and hit the tree opposite the house. "Lumpy!" Flaky and Giggles shouted. Lumpy was slumped against the wheel, still alive. His left arm dangled out the window, with a lighted cigar held on his fingers.
Flippy could see that a pool of gas had formed just below the car, and saw that Lumpy's cigar was dropping out of his hand and into the pool of gas.
"Duck!" Flippy shouted as he jumped towards Flaky to push her to the ground. Flaky fell on her belly to the ground having been pushed from behind. Unfortunately, Flippy was impaled on her quills as he jumped on the porcupine from behind. There was an explosion, and shards of metal and glass flew everywhere. Giggles was near the door so she was able to quickly enter the house and close the door to avoid the flying shards. However, one metal shard entered the window where Cuddles was looking out. It was so fast that he didn't even see it come and hit his neck.
Giggles screamed and cried as she saw Cuddles' head roll from his body towards where she was standing. She heard Flaky screaming from outside. Fearing the worst, she looked out the window, and saw Flippy dead on the quills of Flaky. She promptly fainted.
Thus ended a day which only the three girls—and Sniffles—survived.
Note: I was planning that this would be the last chapter, as the title suggests, but as I typed it, it became so long that I had to split it up into two parts. I already finished the next chapter, and after I proof read it, I'll post it.
Thanks to deadliving, Kitten360, and especially yellowkirby for the kind reviews.
To deadliving, yes I agree with you about Lumpy. He is one of my favourite characters, and I try to make him realistic.
To Kitten360, well, I hope this update is soon enough, so please don't eat me. Anyway, I hope you like this update.
To yellowkirby, thank you for your kind comments. I usually proofread my works before uploading it to document manager, then proofread it again before the actual posting. That way, I can detect many errors which would have gone unnoticed had I posted it after I finished typing.
Thanks again for your review.