Chapter Seventeen
Devi drives the car down the road, her white knuckles gripping the steering wheel angrily. Tenna stares at the passenger side window, watching the scenery zoom by. Squee sits lonely in the backseat, staring down at Shmee.
“It’s better this way,” Shmee says reassuringly, “Johnny was a danger to you all. Even he knew it.”
Squee doesn’t respond. Just sighs and looks out the window.
“We don’t need him,” Devi barks suddenly. “He even said so himself. We can beat the Nightmare by ourselves.”
“Do you really think so,” Tenna says, not quite asking but not quite stating either. Devi blinks, her grip on the steering wheel lessening slightly. But she quickly regains her composure and remains angry.
“Squee, Pepito’s house is this way, right?” she asks.
“What?” Squee questions quietly. “Oh, uh, yeah. I think so.”
Tenna turns around to look at him. He looks tired. Not tired like he needs sleep. Just tired of everything. And the more she looks at him, the more she realizes that that’s not all.
He’s also sad and lonely.
Tenna clenches her fists and turns away. She wants to touch him, to comfort him. But she doesn’t feel she has a right to, since it won’t help at all.
Devi suddenly slams her foot on the brakes, causing Squee and Tenna to lurch forward suddenly.
“What the hell, Devi?” Tenna groans as she rubs her neck.
“I’m sorry,” Devi squeaks, “someone suddenly ran across the road. They should fucking watch where they’re going.”
Squee looks out his window and notices something moving around in the shadows of a nearby building.
“Oh, no,” Shmee mutters.
“Devi. Drive,” Squee orders.
“What?” she questions.
“Drive. Go now!” he demands, harsher this time.
Devi starts driving down the road, but stops abruptly when something clatters on the roof of the car. Almost like something jumped on it.
“Shit,” Tenna whispers plainly. Squee whimpers as people start surrounding them. Devi growls low, like an animal, kneading the steering wheel.
The zombies close in on them, planting their scarred, bleeding hands on the vehicle.
“Everyone hold on,” Devi demands lightly. She slams her foot on gas. The tires squeak as the car takes off, smashing through the zombies and flying down the street. Squee looks behind him through the rear window and watches as the zombie on the roof tumbles to the ground.
“I guess the Nightmare decided to take the initiative first,” Tenna comments.
“What do we do now?” Squee asks.
“We’ll stick with our first plan and ask Satan if he knows where the Nightmare is,” Devi replies, “we just have to get there quickly.”
She enters an intersection, not noticing the car adjacent to her running the stop sign. Squee sees it at the very last second.
It smashes into them, erupting the airbags. They skid across the road from the force of the other car’s acceleration and only stop when they brake.
Squee’s head is spinning, his vision speckled by stars. He barely notices Krik and Dillon jump out of their car and walk over to the passenger side. Krik opens the backseat door and starts to reach for Squee.
Tenna slams her foot into Krik’s skull. She jumps out of the car and smashes her elbow into Dillon’s neck.
Devi scrambles over the console and out of the car, then grabs Squee’s arm and pulls him out.
“Squee, are you okay?” she asks, gently patting his cheeks. Squee blinks a couple of times and looks at her. The side of her head is bleeding and her clothes are speckled with blood. Squee is in a bit worse shape, covered in bruises, cuts, and gashes, having taken the most of the crash. Tenna is the least hurt, only sustaining a couple bruises.
“Yeah, I-I think so,” he replies.
“We gotta move,” Tenna demands as she draws a handgun from under her shirt.
Devi nods and squeezes Squee’s hand as they run down the road, away from the healing Krik and Dillon.
“Where are we gonna go?” Squee asks.
“We need to get our injuries looked at,” Devi replies.
“Let’s go to Charlie’s,” Tenna order.
“Is it safe?” Squee asks.
“Don’t worry, we’re not that far away,” Devi says.
They take a sharp right into an alley but come to a quick stop. Standing in front of them, blocking their way, is an entire army of zombies. Bleeding, drooling, gibbering, scarred-up zombies.
They quickly back up and try to run the other way, but are immediately blocked off by Krik and Dillon. They smirk ugly grins and step closer to them.
“What now?” Squee asks.
Tenna lifts her gun with speed that does not fit an average city girl and blasts a bullet into Krik and Dillon’s heads.
“Run!” she barks as their bodies hit the ground. The trio quickly make a break for it, but the zombies behind them are much faster. A couple slam into Devi, causing her to lose her footing and slam through the door of a nearby building. She looks up and, to her relief, sees that nobody noticed. She quickly scrambles deeper into the building and towards safety.
Tenna and Squee aren’t as lucky, however. They barely reach the main road before the zombies are on them, tearing at their already damaged skin. Tenna fights back with surprising speed and strength, kicking in their skulls or chest cavities, shooting them in their heads or knees with amazing expertise, and doing her very best to protect Squee. But there’s just too many. They’ll never survive at this rate.
Something smashes through the thick of the zombies, diverting everyone’s attention. It’s a small, grey car. The driver loses control from all the bodies under his wheels and spins around the road until coming to a perfect, parallel stop at the curb.
Johnny steps out of the car, a knife in each hand.
The remaining zombies roar at him, immediately recognizing their killer. They charge them but Johnny is unfazed. He lifts his knives and slices through the zombies, fluidly, almost rhythmically, until they’re all dead once again.
Squee and Tenna stare at him, bewildered, as he walks over, slipping his knives into his jacket. He looks at them and cocks his head.
“Fuck, you guys look like shit,” he comments.
Tenna’s face lights up like fireworks as she starts jumping around, punching the air. “You came! You actually came back! God, I’m so happy I could kiss you!”
“Please don’t,” Johnny grunts.
Tenna continues jumping around happily. Johnny looks at Squee who stares up at him with his big, brown eyes.
His face suddenly splits into a huge smile. “Thanks for coming back,” he says.
Johnny flinches and quickly looks away. “Uh, yeah, well… it suddenly became apparent to me that you guys would never survive without me. So I thought I should, you know, help.”
He looks around. “So where’s Devi?”
Tenna suddenly freezes, mid-cheer, and looks around. “She-she’s not here? Shit! Do you think the zombies got her?”
Johnny looks over into the alley but sees no blood or any other evidence that she was stolen. “I don’t think so.”
“What about Dillon and Krik?” Squee asks.
“They’re here too?” Johnny asks.
“They were,” he replies, “they were right there.” He points at the place where he saw them last, after Tenna shot them, but they’re not there anymore.
Johnny looks around and sniffs the air, but he senses no other presences.
“Maybe Devi got away,” Tenna suggests, “if she did she probably went to Charlie’s. We should go too.”
“Right,” Johnny nods, “everyone get in the car.”
They step over the many bodies littering the road and climb into the car. They drive in relative silence, except for the light groaning of Tenna and Squee as the pain of their injuries start setting in.
“So, what really made you come back?” Tenna asks.
Johnny sighs. “Just a really good bitch slapping from my Nailbunny. It really woke me up.”
“What’s ‘Nailbunny’?”
He blinks. “I… don’t know.”
They arrive at the apartment building a few minutes later and begin their trek up to Charlie’s room.
“I can’t believe this place doesn’t have an elevator,” Johnny mutters.
“Trust me, the people here need the exercise,” Tenna comments.
They reach Charlie’s room and knock on the door. He answers as he wipes his hands with a white cloth.
“Jeez, Tenna,” he exclaims, “what the hell happ- no, wait. I don’t want to know.”
“Can you fix us up?” she asks.
“Yes, come on in,” he replies and holds the door open.
“Is Devi here?” Squee asks.
“She was but she left not that long ago.”
“Why?” Johnny asks.
“I don’t know. She said something about them being gone and took off,” Charlie explains.
“Them being gone?” Tenna questions.
“We’ll figure it out later,” Johnny declares, “Charlie, fix Squee first.”
“Of course,” he nods and leads the boy into the operation room. He doesn’t do too much, just cleans the wounds and bandages him up. He even gives him a lollypop when he’s done.
“Aw, man. I want a lollypop,” Johnny mutters as Squee walks over and sits with him on the couch.
“Tenna, come on,” Charlie orders. Tenna enters the operation room, leaving the boys alone.
The room is filled with a comfortable silence, except for the slight slurping of Squee licking his candy. He glances at Johnny, and notices a growing wet spot on his left sleeve. It doesn’t take him long to realize what’s going on.
“Johnny, you’re bleeding!” he exclaims.
“Hm? Oh, look at that,” Johnny mutters as he rolls up his sleeve, revealing fresh, bleeding cuts. “They must’ve opened up when I was fighting those zombies. Ah, well.”
Squee stares at him as he rolls his sleeve back down and sits back like it’s not a big deal. Finally he asks, “you did that yourself, didn’t you?”
Johnny doesn’t reply. Just glances at him before looking away uncomfortably.
“Johnny? Why do you… hurt yourself?” Squee asks.
Johnny sighs. “Well… a long time ago it was for curiosity. You know, I would wonder if something hurt really as bad as it looked and then I would try it out on myself. Nothing major, just cuts, gashes, burns. But it never hurt as much as my victims made it look.”
“It was never for punishment. At least, that’s what I thought,” he rambles, “but at some point it stopped being for curiosity’s sake. At some point I started doing it just for the sake of feeling something.”
He runs his fingers through his hair and sighs. “I… hate emotions. I hate feelings. I hate urges. I just hate them. So I wanted to get rid of them. But once you do, then what are you? Nothing. Just an empty shell. The more I started ridding myself of feelings, the more I realized this. And I discovered that the only way to keep myself from being empty was by stimulating something that no one can ever lose.”
“Pain. Pain is real. It’s powerful. It’s immortal. It doesn’t matter how strong somebody is, how thick-skinned or immune. Everyone can feel pain, at any time.”
He rolls down his sleeve and runs his fingers along his fresh cuts. “But for some reason I didn’t feel it. I didn’t feel anything. No pain. Nothingness.”
Johnny sighs again and rests his arms behind his head, not bothering to roll down his sleeve.
Squee is quiet for a few minutes. Then he asks, “why do you hate emotions?”
“They lead to vulnerability,” Johnny replies plainly, “whether you’re by yourself or with someone, all types of emotion somehow lead to vulnerability. And being vulnerable to someone is something I never want to do.”
Squee fiddles with Shmee’s arms for a few seconds, working up the courage to continue. “Is it really emotions you’re afraid of? Or is it actually people?”
“What?” Johnny questions.
“I-I mean… just…” Squee stammers, “I-I-I was just thinking… you can’t really be vulnerable to someone without being with someone. Right? S-so maybe you’re just afraid of being near people.”
Johnny stares at him, curiously and somewhat judgementally. “How would you understand that?
Squee smiles sadly. “I think I would understand that, not wanting to be close to people. My parents hated being close to me, literally and figuratively. And my peers always made fun of me in any way they possibly could. So, yes, I understand better than most people how terrible this world can be.”
“But I also understand how nice this world can be too,” he adds, “there are lots of mean people but there are also some nice people too, mixed into the bunch. Kind of like… mixed nuts. There’s the gross kind and the tasty kind. And sometimes you gotta dig through the gross kind to find the tasty ones.”
“I-I think if you took the time to dig through the gross nuts instead of immediately deciding that every nut is gross, you’d eventually find a nut that you actually like the taste of,” Squee concludes.
Johnny blinks, his criticisms slowly changing to surprise and… admiration. “How do you know so much?” he asks, “are you really just a kid?”
Squee smiles, “some kids understand a lot more than adults.”
“Yeah,” Johnny sighs, “I guess that is true.”
He sits back and stares at the ceiling. “A nut I might actually like the taste of,” he muses.
He glances at Squee then quickly looks away.
