Back in the makeshift “catacombs” at 1308 North Main, Ayzook was trying to figure out what to do next. He and Ralphie had brought that bizarre rabbit creature back here to interrogate him about the missing money. But so far things were not going as planned.
Ralph had flown back with the rabbit under his wing, and the trip had been a bit rocky; the rabbit had not fared too well. The angel had dropped him once and had to swoop down and catch him. He had then pissed himself, for one thing, and Ayzook wasn’t even sure how a rabbit could do this. He was figuring since this was not an ordinary rabbit maybe he should not expect him to follow the general guidelines of rabbit behavior or even physiology. But it was unnerving; this whole experience seemed to be unhinging the mind of the filthy little pornography peddling furball. And Ayzook needed some information – if the rabbit went belly-up then Ayzook would not be far behind. He knew the Druid Council would be on him any day; it could be sooner than he expected even. He had to get the rest of that money – he needed the entire fifteen grand. He felt like time was running out on him and he was not in control of the situation.
When Ayzook had arrived at the smashed Plymouth parked by the college, he had basically found one hell of a mess. On the car’s roof stood Ralphie – he had smoked so much ganja that he could barely speak and it was difficult for Ayzook to even find out who was who. Ralph had not bothered to drag the rabbit out of the wreckage; the bunny was still pinned inside and was hollering about the mayor and gopher holes and pounding his foot incessantly against the dashboard. Meanwhile a few feet away the stupid corpse who was his companion had somehow twisted off one of his feet – he was lying on the ground flopping around while apparently gouging out his eyeballs with his own fingers. Ayzook did not know if this was an accident or part of some kind of undead ritual. He tried to talk to the corpse but it was useless. Ayzook concluded in a very short period of time that this dead thing was beyond communicating – he knew nothing, he had no idea of past or present behavior by himself or anybody else. When Ayzook had Ralph carry the rabbit back to the church, he had just left the babbling, floundering corpse on the ground by the car. His last words to the thing were, “You go to Hell.” The zombie had replied with something about doghouses and Jughead bringing Betty Cooper around to fix up the Volare’ so they could drive it back to Riverdale.
Now in the catacombs Ayzook stood by the tiny crypt in the wall where his old pal Dobie the turtle was interred. He was thinking that maybe the last time anything around him had truly made him happy was back in the 1970s when he had his beloved pet at his side. He didn’t even want to think about the cruelty of Madame Fate and the sad demise of his hard-shelled friend.
In the next room the rabbit was babbling away. Ralphie was sitting on the floor next to Porno and she was eating a taco and washing it down with bourbon. Her wings smelled of bunny piss. She really wasn’t even paying any attention to the rabbit anymore. There didn’t seem to be a point. Porno was talking about movie producers and film printing and distribution rights and biker gangs and who knew what else. The druid had found Porno’s “business records” in the glovebox with the remaining money but there were no actual names for anybody, nothing he could use to figure out where the other four grand had gone. It was just some ridiculous code and so far the rabbit had not provided the information to decipher it.
At first Ayzook thought the bunny was putting on an act to stall or try and throw his captors off course – but by now Ayzook was pretty sure the rabbit had more or less lost his marbles, and couldn’t tell them anything useful even if he wanted to. All Ralph was doing was baby-sitting this gibbering idiot, and Ayzook knew that pretty soon she would just decide to take the rest of the ass-kicker pot and go smoke it on the roof of the courthouse or down by the train depot, leaving him alone with this babbling fool.
“Here’s how it started. Whiskey Moe lost the bet to me over the fighting dogs, okay?” Porno was saying. “You should ask him about the way things work on the street corners downtown. He knows more about nothing than any other totally ignorant dumb person you might ever accidentally find,” he said. Ayzook had the idea at this point that the rabbit was genuinely trying to be helpful, out of fear if nothing else.
Ralph the Angel took another snort out of his bottle and looked over at the rabbit. “Dude, what’s with the foot? Why all the kicking and shit?” Porno was hammering away on the floor with his big flat foot; it was echoing through the underground rooms and Ayzook was getting a migraine.
“Walt Disney fucked me over big time!” Porno said. “I tried to make a deal with him and the Trix Rabbit but it all backfired and suddenly that Disney rabbit from the Bambi movie was all up in my grill and next thing you know I can’t eat no colorful breakfast cereal no more and my foot is stomping like a Chuck Berry song was ripping through my ears! It was the classic double cross if you want to know the truth.” This actually made more sense than anything else Porno had said in the past fifteen minutes.
Porno turned to Ralph with a desperate look in his eye. “Cracky!” he said. “What did you guys do with Cracky?”
“The corpse? We left him in the dirt by the car. He was totally out of it, man.”
“Gol’ darn it! That dad-blamed zombie can’t be trusted to take care of hisself!”
Ralph had a very amused and puzzled look on her face. “Why are you talking like that all of a sudden? Are you channelling Snuffy Smith now or something?”
Just then there was a strange whooshing sound from up above. Both Ayzook and Ralph heard it. Before they could even react, they both sensed that there was another presence in the underground cavern. A mystical one, and a powerful one.
Ayzook turned and took two steps out into the entryway where the door from up above opened onto the chamber. What he saw did not make him very happy.
By the doorway stood a very unusual being – dressed as a nun but obviously an undead being, with blackened skin and long white dreadlocks of all things. This large creature exuded a sense of power. Ayzook looked again and then he saw the eyes, glowing through the darkness. And the fangs. Dripping fangs.
“Oh, shit!” he exclaimed. “Ralphie! Get out here! Quick – need backup! Ralphie?”
“Boots,” said Sister K.T. as she examined Ayzook. And she smiled. This was the thing that she had sensed on the miserable corpse of that former loser boyfriend that she had encountered by the theater. This was the blood she had smelled on him. Mystical blood. Druid blood. And there was nothing rarer, or more forbidden . . . or sweeter.
Ayzook was trying to back away. He was thinking about all those glyphs he didn’t remember and how useful it would be if he knew any of them about now. “Ralph,” he said. “This is serious.” He still did not hear his friend coming to his assistance.
“Sugartown,” said the Unblessed Vampire Sister of the Jamaican Catholic Apocalypse. She tilted her head to one side and her dreads flipped about behind her habit. Ayzook was watching her but then suddenly she just wasn’t there. He didn’t have time to even assess this perception however; she was just as suddenly at his side and had him by the head. Sister K.T. twisted the druid’s head impossibly to the side and exposed his throat.
And then she sunk her glorious fangs deep into his mystical flesh. He was gurgling something about “berserkers” but the tearing of his esophagus brought that to a quick halt. There was a sickly ripping sound and his throat was torn wide open. Blood flew through the air and splashed everywhere, on the floor, on the ceiling, along the walls – and all over the doorway to the little crypt of Dobie the Most Unfortunate Druid’s Friend and Pet Turtle of Butte of Montana.
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