December. Alien territory p.3
It was Gar's turn with the aux cord, and he was ignoring the lyrics of his own song to sing his made-up lyrics over it. "Oooh, Terrance got our goat, but we'll never despair! We're the secret team that will fo-oil their plans! Yeah, yeah, fighting with style! It's good to be-eee, on the ass-kicking side!"
When they pulled up at Rose Worth's house, Dick said, "Let's go over the plan again."
"Split up so we're not as obvious," said Raven.
"Keep the walkie-talkie function on and be alert for messages," said Kori cheerfully.
"Anyone talks to us, we pretend to go to East High, 'cause East High's neutral," said Vic.
"Stay sober," finished Gar sullenly.
Dick had to chuckle at his face. "Alright, let's go see how Terrance High does parties."
"Wonder if they're as obsessed and fanatical with the game as our school is," wondered Vic.
As they entered the house, the comparisons between their schools came almost automatically. Seeing the entirety of the food table was store-bought finger food and bagged stuff, Gar laughed. "That's lame. Kitty went all out with the chocolate fountain." The fact he hadn't gotten to enjoy the fountain didn't win over a sudden surge of loyalty to his classmate.
When they saw a guy on a turntable, Raven said, "Okay, they have a DJ. That's a point for them."
Then they walked into the living room. In the center of the room, before the double staircase, stood a twenty-five-foot tall, hay-filled paper-Mache model wearing a triple-sized reproduction of the white and blue Murakami football uniform, arguably bearing the likeness of the new football team captain. It was tall enough to reach the second floor. The Five stopped at it; the Terrance kids partied around it as if it was completely normal.
None of the Five had anything to say about that.
They knew the exact moment Rose Worth came out to stand at the top of the if they hadn't memorized her appearance, they would've known it when the crowd went wild.
She was a half-Cambodian half-White girl with blue eyes and white hair –the official lore was that she'd been born with some streaks of white hair, and at some point she'd dyed all of it white. Everything about her looked sharp—like at any given moment she was concealing several knives in her Five took note of the two girls that flanked her at each side, a redhead and a blonde.
Rose surveyed the crowd with a wicked smirk. "Look alive, losers! Did we show those Murakami fuckers they can't mess with us, or what?"
The crowd roared in response.
Rose produced a Zippo lighter, opened it, and threw it to the ground below, towards the base of the statue.
The model's hay and cloth body caught on fire immediately. The Five did their best to blend in among kids who cheered as their schoolmate was burned in effigy.
"Did we sit back and let those idiots steal our shit?" Rose went on, her voice projecting powerfully. She walked down the stairs, and her entourage of two followed. "Or did we go and steal their shit right back?"
From the back of the house, two boys rolled out a shopping cart carrying Butter the goat. The Five tensed up.
"We're gonna show them who's boss in this rivalry!" cried Rose, and the crowed went up in arms. She raised her arms, as if to absorb the crowd's energy.
"…They're not gonna burn the goat, are they?" Raven asked.
They had all thought it, but only she said it.
Thankfully, that didn't happen.
Rose sent everyone off with a, "Now fuck off and go party!" and the crowd dispersed. Butter was abandoned on its cart in the middle of the floor, from where he didn't dare move. That animal was used to being among loud students—but it seemed even he knew he was in enemy land.
With the crowd dispelled, the Five found a pocket of the room to form a circle and convene.
"Mingle, wait, and watch what they do with that goat," Dick said.
Thus agreed, they split up.
And the 'mingling' part of the plan was the one Kori had a problem with. She watched, disheartened, how her friends split five ways, much like the night before shortly after arriving at Kitty's party. Again they branched out cleanly, like they had preset places to go, and only she hadn't gotten the memo.
First things first, she got herself a drink. She was so distracted by the uptick of nervousness, she forgot they weren't supposed to be drinking until she'd picked a bottle of some sort of liquor, and as she poured it in a cup she felt hot all over, wondering if one of her friends could see her. She decided to nurse this, pretend she'd filled the cup just to hold it and blend in.
Was one supposed to just talk to other people at a party? Everyone else as far as she could see was in a group. That blue-haired girl last night had talked to her unwonted, so she knew that was allowed.
And Kori had had the thought—that this party would come easily to her, because coming so soon after the last party, she should still be warmed up for it, so to speak. And so after a while of wandering and finding every group impregnable, she abandoned the now lukewarm liquor and took to the dance floor, and danced like she'd done just last night.
After an indefinite amount of time, she heard giggles nearby, but she didn't pay attention until they persisted. When she turned, her heart dropped when she saw the three girls laughing were looking at her.
Kori's arms dropped and she stood immobile immediately. Seeing they had her attention, one of the girls looked away, another laughed harder; the third one got close to her ear and said, "Maybe learn to dance, sweetheart." Then the three scurried away as a heap of giggles, leaving Kori hollow and inhibited.
Everything had changed; she'd been shot down from the cloud of easy party happiness she'd been trying to rise to; she'd been informed she wasn't being normal like she thought she was. She wouldn't be dancing again for this party.
Dick was drinking water and pretending it was vodka, just to be able to carry a red cup. He'd wandered in an out of the area where the mascot was, until he saw the two guys who'd pulled the cart before approach it again with purpose.
Dick moved to a vantage point by a table, and ate from a tray of brownies a girl had just left to justify hanging around there. The two guys were carrying Butter's cart upstairs.
At the opposite side of the living room, Gar was at the right spot to see Dick skulk after the goat, disappear upstairs, and then reappear walking backwards, holding his hands up sheepishly at Rose's redheaded girl lackey, who looked to be questioning him. Then Gar lost sight of him.
The next thing he knew, he was getting a text from Dick.
Dick (22:58): I'm in a closet by the bathroom. Come.
Gar found the right door, but looked around and saw none of his friends around. Just to be safe, he took out his phone, disposed to make sure he was in the right place, and as he did he leaned against the door, making a show of casualness. Then the door opened and Vic's arm unceremoniously pulled him inside.
Dick turned on the light-bulb overhead and Gar could see all five of them were inside.
"Did anyone see where upstairs they took Butter?" Dick asked.
They said they hadn't.
"There's two possibilities," posed Vic. "Either he's gonna be in an open room where people are welcome to pet it or something, or they put him away for the night to keep him hidden."
Raven surmised, "So we either find him in an open room, behind a locked door, or next to someone making sure no one gets close to him."
Dick laid down the plan. "Vic, Raven and Gar, you guys go up first and comb through the rooms. We have two goals—locate Butter, and choose a safe room to move him into, in case the room he's in has too many people in it or doesn't have a window."
"Aren't you glad we did the drill swinging you out of a second floor?" Vic asked Gar pointedly.
"I mean, no," said Gar. "Still no."
"What if they catch us going room by room?" Raven asked.
"Make up some excuse," said Dick. "You're looking for the bathroom, you're drunk, etc." His hand moved to the light cord.
"Dick!" Gar stopped him. "And if someone sees us moving Butter and figures out we're Murakami students and tries to stop us?"
Dick shot him a hard look. "You use your training." And he turned out the light.
Vic went up first, belatedly followed by Raven and Gar.
Upstairs had a few people too. Mostly a couple of passed out kids who lay propped against walls and couples looking for a semblance of privacy to make out in. However, they passed a door where one of Rose's lackeys –the muscly boy with cropped blonde hair- was leaning against the door, seeming to be sulking at being there. Conceivably that could be the room they kept Butter in, and Victor texted Dick that discovery along with the guy's description.
At the end of the hallway, they turned the corner to see another long hallway. Vic looked back to Raven and Gar with a 'How big is this house?' look on his face.
The hallway was deserted, making it their best bet for the mission. There were three doors; they each opened one.
"Bathroom," said Raven, closing her door. "Window is tiny."
"Closet with no window," said Gar.
"Bedroom with a window," announced Vic, grinning. "Jackpot."
Still downstairs, Dick got Raven's text, Picked a safe room with a window. Back of the house, middle door. Has a lock.
Dick (23:12): Good. Kori and I will lure the guard away from the door.
"The jock-looking lackey," Dick repeated from Victor's description, "I saw him playing beer pong earlier. Something tells me he'd be swayed from his post if he knew there was another game," he smirked as he posed this at Kori for confirmation.
Kori had been all too happy when Dick's text came and it was mission time again. She hadn't tried to enjoy the party again after what those girls had said. She knew herself too well: she'd be too self-conscious to even pretend to be having a good time; she'd have to go home and nurse her embarrassment first.
And even though not long ago she'd felt like an adequate judge of nothing, right now she let herself get into the old mind space, that perfect teamwork and synchrony with Dick, where she could take his ideas and bounce back her own, back him up and develop something new; she smiled and nodded. "Then let us organize one."
They prepared a table and let interested partygoers take over for them. Then they stood within earshot of the second floor and called imaginary friends over to join them. Dick's hunch had been right; the lackey was coming downstairs soon after.
Dick and Kori wasted no time going upstairs. But as they neared the door, a voice behind them shouted, "You again?"
It wasthe other one of Rose's girl lackeys, the girl with the high blonde ponytail and fuchsia playsuit, coming at Dick hotly.
Instinctually Kori kept walking further down the hallway, past Butter's door, pretending she wasn't with Dick.
"Why are you snooping? What is your deal?" she heard the blonde demand at Dick.
"Uh… well…" went Dick.
Kori feared for their mission and for him, but when she looked at Dick's back he was slightly swaying, and she realized he was pretending to be drunk. She relaxed, seeing he had a plan, and felt a thrill that she could tell, and that he wasn't looking back at her because he knew she'd be able to tell, which she did, because they were connected- "Maybe I wanted to see you again," he said, in a suave tone that shocked Kori. She wasn't expecting that at all.
The girl's vibe changed immediately. She smiled begrudgingly. "That so?"
"What's your name?"
"Angelica."
"Suits you," slurred Dick, and the girl looked gratified. "Why are you hanging out up here?"
Angelica rolled her eyes. "We have to take care of this stupid mascot. Rose thinks the Murakami kids are gonna try to steal it back."
"You can't break away for a minute? To dance a little?"
Dick walked away with Angelica in seconds. As he left, he threw Kori a glance, and Kori moved forward, because right now she only knew one thing for certain: he wanted her to move in and get the goat now.
The door was thankfully unlocked. The room was a closet with no window, and Butter the goat was indeed there, tied to the heaviest looking object in the room, a ladder.
Kori quickly untied him as she dwelled on what had just happened. She couldn't wrap her head about Dick's tone and Dick's attitude—she had never heard him speak like that, so smooth and confident. He had never spoken like that in her vicinity, which was a personal problem to Kori.
In all the moments she thought had been a moment between them –them dancing in the haunted house, them always going off walking together away from the rest of the group, them always pairing up in a natural way, like taking the same cart in the Ferris wheel at the fair- he'd never made a move to go any further, he'd always gotten shy and pulled away. Or so she'd assumed. That smoothness he'd just slipped into baffled her because she didn't know it existed. When had he learned to talk to girls?
She'd thought the noble, friendly, but ultimately shy and awkward boy he was with her was who Dick was—but maybe that was what he was like with some girls. Like girls he didn't like. Maybe there were other girls he did like, with whom he was different. And where had she gotten the idea that he didn't know how to talk to girls? For all Kori knew, he went out regularly. Maybe they all did. She knew Vic had had girlfriends in the past, and Gar was always talking to girls, and Raven spent a lot of time where she wasn't with them. What if they all could boast experience Kori didn't suspect?
She could not get this animal to walk. As much as she pulled, the goat stayed in place.
She tried talking to it. "You must come with me. Please." But he didn't move. Maybe she was too upset. Maybe animals sensed that? Gar would know.
Gar, she thought. She had to get Gar.
She stuck her ear to the door and heard nothing; she dared open the door a crack, and saw only the regular slew of drunk kids, so she slipped out.
She got to the room where Gar, Raven and Vic were, knocked in the code they'd agreed on and was allowed in.
"So?" asked Gar when she was fully inside.
Vic was tying the rope to the bed; Raven was at the window, likely studying the ground below.
"Butter is in the third door on the right," Kori said rushedly. "I cannot get him out. Gar, you must go."
"Where's Dick?" asked Raven.
"Distracting his guard." Kori spoke factually, keeping a hold of herself, because her distress could not ruin the mission. The others must have thought this was her on mission mode.
Gar moved out of the room.
Kori went with him. They peeked around the corner of the hallway, saw no one who looked sober, and Gar went to the door Kori had indicated, slipping in swiftly.
Kori went back to the others. Vic going from the bed to the window, surveying his work. "This is done, I'll go keep lookout for Gar. You guys watch the room."
When he left, Kori saw her chance and approached Raven.
"Raven, may I ask you something?" And then she took a pause, because she didn't know how to articulate her feelings. "What if there was a boy who you had assumed was… shy, and so they did not…" she dropped her tone more, "they did not ask you out, or do anything, because they were shy. And then one day you find they were not so shy, they just… must have other reasons to not ask you out."
Raven stared at her for a while. Kori felt analyzed, exposed, but she persevered for wanting the response so much. But when Raven eventually started, "Kori, Dick is an idiot—"
Kori didn't let her finish. "This is not about Dick!"
Raven raised an eyebrow, skeptic. Kori looked away from her and her no-nonsense all-knowing gaze, and retreated. "I will see if Vic needs help."
When she left the room and turned the corner, seeing the other one of Rose's lackeys was at the Mascot's door –the copper-skinned boy with the utterly detached facial expression- put Kori back in mission mode. Her troubles would have to wait.
Vic, a bit ahead of her, looked up from where he was texting with an equally sober expression. Kori's phone vibrated, and she read Vic's message, GAR DO NOT COME OUT NOW. TERRANCE KIDS AT DOOR.
"These Terrance Terrors must have a tag system," Vic whispered at Kori, "When one leaves, another one takes their place immediately." He eyed his phone, "Dick hasn't been opening messages."
"I will check on him," said Kori, and, getting Vic's nod, went downstairs.
Downstairs, Rose was scolding Angelica, probably for leaving her post. Dick stood by them, eyes fixed in the distance in an odd trance-like way, cradling a family-sized packet of chips he was methodically eating out of. Kori thought he was a little too dedicated to his acting.
He smiled wide when he saw Kori, and went straight to her.
"Is he out?" he asked, in an oddly loud voice.
Kori admired his mettle, to ask about Butter openly because he knew his words were innocuous. But Kori couldn't think how to codify her response, so she whispered, "No, Gar is getting him out. But there is another guard now."
He smiled wide when he saw Kori, and went straight to her.
"Is he out?" he asked, in an oddly loud voice.
Kori admired his mettle, to ask about Butter openly because he knew his words were innocuous. But Kori couldn't think how to codify her response, so she whispered, "No, Gar is getting him out. But there is another guard now."
"Fuck," Dick stated, and, never stopping the traffic of chips into his mouth, he told her, "But you know what, we went about this all wrong! The answer was really simple. We should've just disguised the thing as a kid! Right? We could've walked it out the front door! It was really obvious!"
It was in the course of this animated monologue that Kori realized something was really wrong. She began to look at the people around them, fearing they'd hear him and put two and two together.
"Dick?" she began. "Do you feel… odd?"
Dick suddenly lost his smile, and a chip halted on its way to his mouth. "Kori, I just got it. Butter. The goat. Because they butt. They're all butters, Kori—!"
That was all he got out before Kori covered his mouth with her hand, because it was the best preemptive measure she could think of. It earned her some odd looks, but the mission would be safe.
She texted her friends with one hand.
I think Dick has been drugged. What do I do?
Dick had been momentarily stunned into silence when she'd slapped a hand on his face, but now was trying to talk through her palm. Just as Kori was wondering what else could go wrong, she looked up and made eye contact with a familiar face.
The blue haired girl.
The girl she'd chatted with at a party that was mostly Murakami kids. The one she'd specifically asked if she wasn't from Murakami, implying Kori herself was. That girl was now staring at Kori in too pointed a way to not have connected the same dots Kori was connecting.
The girl's eyes darted, then she offered Kori a wane smile and nod, and disappeared into the crowd. Kori's stomach was doing flips. How was she meant to interpret that? Nice seeing you again, I'm about to blow the whistle on you and get you and your friends exposed and beaten to death by my whole school?
She turned to Dick, removed her hand and tried, "Dick, remember the mission? How we're in enemy territory and have to be quiet?"
Dick stared at her. Kori imagined she saw panic through his sunglasses. "I forgot," he said in a small, childlike voice.
"That is fine, but now we have to be quiet."
"But are you gonna tell the guys about the new plan? We can just give Gar's clothes to Butt-"
And Kori's hand went on his mouth again. She was reduced to looking anxiously towards the stairs, waiting for Vic or Raven to show up.
Upstairs, Vic got Kori's message. "I think Dick has been drugged. What do I do?" he read out-loud, and shared an incredulous look with Raven.
"What does she mean drugged?" asked Raven.
"I'm gonna go down and check it out," said Vic. "It's probably nothing."
But when he got downstairs, Vic had to admit Kori's assessment was correct. Not only did Dick look more relaxed than he'd ever seen him –Kori was encouraging him to eat random snacks every time he tried to open his mouth to talk, and he didn't seem to mind-, he also got confirmation of what had transpired as he neared them, in the form of a pissed-off looking girl demanding "Who the fuck takes all the edibles? I hope you have a bad trip, asshole!"
Kori received him like he was a guardian angel when she saw him.
"Uh…" he started, thinking on his feet. "I'm gonna put him in the car… and just bring the car around now. You go with Gar and Raven."
Kori nodded, and fluttered away too fast –he felt like reminding her to look like she was just partying, but everyone else was too wasted to notice at this point- and Victor slung Dick's arm over his shoulder to carry him out.
What Vic didn't see was that Kori went not upstairs, but into the party instead. She felt it too urgent to go after the blue-haired girl to explain anything.
She found her by a snacks table –she was easy to spot as a rare upright figure in a sea of alcohol-addled kids. To her credit, she hadn't rushed to Rose, she wasn't talking to anyone, but she was on her phone, and that was threat enough to alert Kori. She grabbed the girl by the elbow and took her aside, to the original closet she and her friends had connived in.
Once hurled inside, the girl threw her hands up before her face. "Whoa whoa whoa—I'm not from this school!" she said. "Look, I can appreciate I got in the middle of a weird rivalry, but I swear I just broke into this party, like I did the other party!" And Kori must've looked more unhinged than she thought, because the girl then offered, "Look, I'm gonna go home. Okay? Can I just go home?"
It hit Kori that after a night of communal planning and communication, she was alone for the biggest quandary. The girl looked honest, but if Kori trusted her and was proven wrong… this girl could bring down the whole mission.
And Kori had been wrong enough for one night.
She eyed a pink hula hoop on the corner. Then she looked back at the girl and sighed, "I'm sorry."
Getting a clearly high Dick out of the house earned him and Victor some amused looks and sarcastic cheers. Dick was talking about nothing, but Victor was bracing for the moment he said something compromising.
When Dick said, "Hey, what happened to the-?"
Victor preemptively cut him off, "Everything's under control. The guys are taking care of it."
"The guys are?" Dick replied.
"Yes."
"They'll take care of it?"
"Yeah, don't you worry."
Dick stared at Victor for a moment, then said, "I love them," with truly heartwarming feeling.
"That's nice."
"I love you too."
"You too, man," Victor chuckled.
They made it to the front door. As they crossed from the loud house to the quiet porch, Dick chose to say, "We should've gotten food to get Butter out! 'Course we can't lure a scared goat back to Murakami without a bribe!"
Victor kept walking and heard himself say, "Yeah yeah, butter for the cake, we'll go get it now," hoping none of the kids loitering outside had heard Dick.
"…Hey, what did he say?" Vic heard behind himself regardless.
"I think those are Murakami kids," said another.
"Hey, Rose was right!"
Victor broke into a run, which swept Dick up and made him follow along on his tiptoes. The plan went from getting Dick into the car to getting both of them out of there alive.
He got to his car with Terrance kids hot on his heels. He drove off, fearing someone would get into another car and follow them. He got all the way to a gas station, and then stopped to furiously text.
Vic (23:26): Everything's gone to shit. Dick's high and spewed the plan. Terrance kids know we're there for the mascot.
Dick broke a spell of silence to whisper, "How did I get here?" Which was fair enough.
The kids who'd heard what Dick said and didn't go after him and Vic ran into Rose's house. They found Angelica and Nate guarding the door and told them. The two of them rushed outside, followed by a mounting crowd, looking for the invaders. At the back of the house, they found a hanging rope.
Kori got to Raven before Vic's text did. She let herself into the room, forgetting to knock the code.
Raven looked annoyed to see her. "What is happening?" No one had been answering her in the group chat.
"There has never stopped being a guard on the Mascot's door since he entered," Kori informed her. Then she told Raven about Vic taking Dick to the car.
And then they got Vic's text.
As if to prove Vic's worst prediction, the music stopped—which, in the context of a party, became the most foreboding thing Raven and Kori could imagine.
Only kids' shouting voices could be heard now. Then the mayhem moved up, climbing up the the window, the rope was tugged from the outside. "We have to get out of this room," Raven told Kori.
"But the rope—the mascot-"
"Forget the mission, new priority's to get out of here alive."
Raven wasn't wrong. When she pulled Kori outside, the hallway was chaos. Kids seemed to have been shocked sober, Rose was yelling at Angelica, "Fucking stay where I put you, you useless bitch!" and the blonde looked like she wanted to strangle her, and seconds after Raven and Kori had left the room, the two male lackeys burst in. Through the door they left open, Raven saw them cut the rope with a knife.
Finding a corner of the hallway, Raven pulled out her phone, because it had been vibrating. Over Raven's shoulder, Kori saw it was Gar, finally texting the group back.
Gar (23:29): I'm out, I moved Butter to the bathroom.
Raven and Kori looked at each other in utter confusion.
"What does he mean he's out?" Raven asked. "How did he get out?"
Here's how Gar had gotten out.
He'd made friends with Butter nearly instantly—that was the easy part. But as he'd been about to guide it out, he'd heard movement outside.
When Rose put the other one of his guy lackeys to guard the door in Angelica's place, Gar had been able to tell someone was outside before Vic's text confirmed it. After that he'd heard Angelica come back to the post, and start trash-taking Rose to the guy –whom she called Nate-, to his apparent complete silent indifference. So Gar had stayed put.
Somewhere after Victor made his exit with Dick, and the Terrance kids came to alert Angelica there were Murakami kids outside, and Nate and Angelica went out to investigate without a second thought, Gar had peeked out into the hallway and seen it completely deserted. Not even the passed out kids remained.
He had no idea what was happening. He'd heard commotion, then complete silence. All he knew was that the hallway was empty now.
So he'd tugged Butter's rope and led him out. "Come on, babe. Now or never."
He guided the goat towards the promised room, but before he arrived, the music cut out –Gar's stomach dropped-, and he heard voices coming up the hallway. He threw himself into the closest room, which turned out to be the bathroom with the too-small window, and waited for them to pass.
That was when he'd texted his friends. Now he sent a second text, specifying what door he'd gone through: I'm in the bathroom Rae found. The one with the tiny window.
Raven read that text and looked up from her phone at the mayhem around her.
"Are you telling me that girl's guarding an empty room?" she whispered.
The redhead in the tight cropped jacket was posted before the door looking menacing, having no idea there was no mascot behind her.
"Raven, what do we do now?" asked Kori.
Raven was observing Rose, who was currently yelling at Nate and Angelica. "You shouldn't have cut the fucking rope! You should have stayed hidden and waited for them to climb up!"
Shit, thought Raven, she's smart.
Rose was now speaking to the whole party. "I want people at every door and every window! We'll be ready for those Murakami assholes when they come!"
And Raven understood what was happening all at once. She had been wondering why the Terrance kidswere on defensive, why they weren't looking at people in the party, and why they weren't checking on the goat itself. Now she got it.
"They think we're only now trying to break in," she told Kori. "They're posting people by entrances to keep us out." And only then could she come up with a plan. "You go get Gar and get out of here. I'll clear the hallway for you. Get Butter out through some other window or leave him behind—just make sure you and Gar get out. Either way, leave when it's gone quiet. We'll all meet outside."
Kori nodded and they split, even as Kori noticed the hole in Raven's plan: they had no rope anymore. Leaving Butter behind wasn't a possibility, it was the only option. But she went on regardless.
When she approached the bathroom Gar was in, the hallway was chaos and Rose was yelling Kori easily slipped through the door, because no one paid attention to that room.
"Oh, thank God," Gar said when he saw her. He and Butter wore identical distraught expressions.
Outside, Raven watched Rose order people to different points of the house. She figured Gar going into a bathroom was a stroke of dumb luck: the window there was negligible, and no one would think to guard it.
So she bided her time until Rose left this area. She had worked out that while Rose was smart, her lackeys weren't: they could be herded away. When Rose left the area, Raven made her move.
Gar and Kori heard Raven's voice distinctly say, "They're over here! They're coming through the back door!"
A horde-like crowd stomped downstairs, and then there was quiet. Kori said, "Come."
Gar followed her into the deserted hallway, Butter in tow. Kori grabbed him by the collar to stop him going to the previously agreed room. "The rope was cut," she said, realizing he didn't know.
"Then where are we going?" Gar hissed.
"Any room!" Kori returned. It was all the same now. She picked a door at random.
The random room was a bedroom with four people standing guard around the window. They stared for a moment, at Gar and Kori and the goat in turn, seemingly unable to believe they'd been chosen to face the Murakami intruders.
For a moment. Then the four came charging at them.
Kori and Gar used their training.
Three minutes later, Kori pushed the four kids, all at different levels of struggling and bloody,into a closet, and this was now becoming a habit. She closed the door with considerable effort and placed a chair Gar was handing her between the door and the bed to hold it closed, as Gar went to the window and looked down.
He looked at Kori desperately. "I still don't see what was good about moving the goat here? We still have no rope!"
This room was at the front of the house, and while there was no one on the ground, he didn't see how they would get down.
Kori at that point was more than ready for the night to be over. She crossed the room in three strides and looked down, the around the outside of the window. "There is a pipe."
"Okay, yes, but how…?"
In the time it took Gar to say that, Kori crossed the room again to the goat, expertly kneeled, and lifted him over her shoulders. Then she walked back to the window and swung a leg over the windowsill.
Gar understood she fully intended to go down the pipe with the goat on her back. He thought about it for a second, and realized that if anyone could do this, it was Kori, and anyhow this was their only shot. He had faith in Kori, and she evidently believed she could do this without falling and breaking her neck—in fact, he'd never seen her so scarily determined. He watched her extend her leg to the pipe, then an arm; slowly and methodically, she found her footing on the pipe and stepped on it without a second's indecision; the other leg disappeared from the window sill, then the other arm.
All the while people had been banging on the door. Gar gave himself another moment to be deeply impressed by Kori, then got to work.
He took off his shirt, and held it out of view to answer the door with a "WHAT!" that made the very angry boy at the other side pull back.
The boy bellowed, "Those Murakami kids are here trying to steal back their mascot! What the hell are you doing!?"
The boy made to open the door, and Gar widened his eyes, held the door firmly and said, "Whoa, wait," making a show of looking behind himself, as if he was protecting an imaginary someone's modesty.
"You two put your clothes on and come help!" the boy bellowed, disgruntled, but completely fooled.
Gar let him run away, put his shirt back on, and left the room.
He blended into the belligerent crowd, which saw him safely outside.
Kori, Raven and Gar ran straight into the trees on the front of the house, and from then moved stealthily across the street and walked to the gas station Vic and Dick were at, choosing the darker sides of the sidewalk and constantly looking over their shoulders.
Meanwhile, half of Terrance school was waiting for Murakami attackers on the back of the house, a portion was posted through different rooms of the house, a very small percentage were knocked out in a closet, and the blue-haired girl of dubious allegiance was restrained via contorted hula hoop in another closet, banging on the door with her feet, heard by no one.
If those trees hadn't been there, the night would have ended differently for them. But they were. So it was fine.
Yes, this was indeed a 'let's bare one character's soul' chapter crouching behind a funny unhinged mission. More on Kori's reality-altering breakdown next week, which ends the December arc.
Yes, this was indeed a 'let's bare one character's soul' chapter crouching behind a chaotic mission. More on Kori's breakdown next week, which ends the December arc.
Fun fact: Blue-haired girl was meant to be a random OC at Kitty's party, just an unnamed partygoer for Kori to talk to, until death_march over on AO3 thought it was actual DC character Harper Row / Bluebird. SO NOW she's featured in two chapters and she's gonna have to come back to guest star at some point. So thank them for that Easter egg (and a better scene IMO)!