by Matt Rogers
Chapter 24
Selfishness is an odd little emotion because of its effect according to its implementation. It can be the downfall for many if employed in ways viewed as negative to society, such as robbing another at gunpoint, or it can be a windfall to others who use it to advance an idea which is beneficial, such as air conditioning. Selfishness is what gets many people out of bed in the morning to gain something, be it money, a new car or the accumulation of power. It doesn’t matter the reward, it’s the selfish act of the individual which drives them to receive the reward which has led to so many discoveries of both profound and destructive proportions.
“George?”
“Yes, Johnny?”
“Aren’t you running low on gas?”
“Yes.”
“Then why didn’t you stop at the gas station we just passed?”
“Did you see the price he was selling it for?”
“Yes.”’
“Well, it’s ten-cents lower in town.”
“But we’re driving away from town.”
“So? Not every gas-station owner outside of town is a price-gouger.”
Of course, he was wrong and we kept right on driving past all the other outside-of-town gas-station price-gougers because he just couldn’t let himself get taken for the extra two dollars it would cost him to pump his twenty gallons of gas. Why do we take umbrage at some things we view overpriced and not others?
UMBRAGE? YOU’RE GOING TO USE THE WORD ‘UMBRAGE’?
Yep, take perfume for example. In what universe does a few smashed up rose petals cost more than a microwave oven?
ANDROMEDA.
Seriously, the microwave oven now costs less than a bottle of scent from Europe. What are they putting on their flowers over there?
EXTRA SUNSHINE.
I know this because I was trying to wine and dine a young lady a few years back and had neither the food nor the cooking equipment with which to do so; the wine I had in abundance just in case. So I went down to one of those super-super-markets, you know, the ones larger than the very factories used to produce the goods they sold. Inside I found a microwave oven and on the way to the counter I saw a bottle of perfume. Now I, being a wise and cosmopolitan kind of guy…
REALLY? WISE AND COSMOPOLITAN?
Yes, wise and cosmopolitan. I thought it might lend a little credibility to my mystique if I showed off both my culinary skills with the strange little food-zapper and my unique skills as a mystery shopper. I lumbered up to the register with my microwave and bottle of perfume, the cashier scanned them and I about had a seizure. The perfume was three times the price of the microwave. An amazing invention which somehow cooks meat without fire was three times cheaper than some leaves off a plant grown in manure.
“I’m not helping at all.”
“Yes you are, Johnny.”
“No I’m not, Phillip, you and George are doing all the work.”’
“Well, what do you want to do?”
“I was thinking maybe I could steer.”
“Vivian’s already doing that,” said George.
“Then maybe I could make some sandwiches?”
“Trudy’s doing that” said Phillip.
“Well… then…”
“Just keep pushing, Johnny, I’m sure there’s another gas station somewhere over this hill.”
Small towns are what make up the bulk of the Great State of Texas and it’s those little oases of tranquility which have given them their reputation as a kind and good-naturedly folk, not the big cities. In big cities one can be as rude and ignorant to the plight of others as they wish because the odds of crossing the other person’s path before they’ve had the chance to forget what a selfish jerk you were is infinitely small. Not so in small towns. In small towns you run into the entire population about once a week so being rude is not the best idea because most small town folk I’ve met grew up in those towns, so they already know everyone, and if you are rude to one then word gets around you might be rude to all, thus they aren’t rude; and unlike big cities they have firearms and the willingness to use them.
“Hey, folks. You need a lift?” the farmer in the truck asked.
“Nah, we’re okay” said George.
“Thanks, but we’ve got it handled” said Phillip.
“Heck yeah, I need a lift!” said I.
I rode alone because George wouldn’t leave the pickup, so neither would Phillip, which made the Vampires self-conscious and Steve, who we had wrapped up in blankets in the back, was not an option; so it was just me and farmer-man with a gas can. The ride to the nearest gas station was twenty miles and since we were in a farmer’s pickup truck it took us forty minutes. I think I might like to live in a small town someday because it seems people from those towns have a good handle on what’s important in life; namely, nothing big-city folk believe is important. They don’t put much stock in the car you drive or the clothes you wear as long as both are relatively clean and up to the task at hand. In my farmer-taxi-driver’s case he was wearing overalls and driving a truck painted various shades of prime which gave him a country-boy vibe except he looked sixty, listened to opera and farmed emus. Yep, he raised those overgrown birds from Australia. Turns out sometime in the last decade a cult emerged in the health conscious communities and emus were considered downright good eating because their meat was fat-free or something.
REALLY?
Yeah, apparently tasty too.
GOOD TO KNOW.
So anyway, my farmer-guy decided to branch out and invest in those flightless giant chickens and said he made a pretty good living at it too. They sold for over ten times what it took to raise them, laid eggs for your breakfast and had another quality which made them exceptional game stock.
WHAT WAS THAT?
The inability to recognize a baseball bat as their means of destruction. He said he’d walk right out into the pasture when it was time to thin the herd, take a good stance, spit on his palms to get a better grip and just swing away. Turns out emus have a head about the same size as a softball with a long skinny neck supporting it so killing them was like playing avian T-ball.
AWESOME!
Yeah.
“You need a ride back?” he asked and I didn’t really have a good answer. I mean, obviously I needed a ride back but when he asked me I thought to myself maybe it was the way of the country-folk; you know, sort of one-way rides and all. Maybe in small towns they were so polite to each other he thought I would invariably catch a ride back by someone going the other way. I stood there in my indecision, not sure which way I was going to answer his question when…
“Johnny!”
… big-eyed, long-necked, green-skinned, molecular-hologrammed, Alien Detective Nat Hallowed hollered my name.
“Nat! What are you doing here?”
“I’m going to the Judgment, of course” he replied.
“How did you..?”
“Are you going to be okay, sonny?” the Babe Ruth of Emu-ball said.
“Huh? Oh, sure. Thank you very much for the lift, sir. Can I pay you for your trouble?”
“Oh, it was no trouble; I was heading this way anyway. I’m going to sell some of my pickled-emus-feet in Austin.”
“Oh, well, good luck with that.”
“You have a good day” he said while driving off and to this day I wonder if I might’ve just missed out on the best business partner Phill-Aussie-fries could’ve ever found.
“Nat!”
“Yes, Johnny?”
“Oh! Oh yeah, we’ve already done the whole greeting thing. So, um…?”
“You want to know how I knew you’d be here?”
“You knew?”
“Yes.”
“How? Oh, the chemical monitoring thing, right? Look, Nat, I’m sure your intentions are all well and good but I’m not sure I like the idea…”
“Not by chemical monitoring, Johnny.”
“No?”
“No. I knew you’d be here because t
his is the main freeway between Dallas and Austin and George is incapable of spending money he might otherwise save so he wouldn’t fill up in town because he might find a better deal on the road, which is impossible because of the price-gougers, so he would need to stop somewhere around halfway and this, Johnny, is halfway so…”
“He ran out of gas, Nat.”
“… or that too. Hey, you want to get a burger before we go and pick them up?”
“You think we have time?”
“Sure, why not?”
“Well, because they’re pushing a two-ton truck and probably a little anxious to get to the Judging.”
“They can’t start the proceedings without them and the exercise might get their minds off their worries for a while so, in reality, we’d probably be doing them a favor.”
I love Aliens from Heaven who lie to themselves to justify burger-eating!
“Hello, gentlemen, what can I get for you?”
“Ooh! Do you have any emu burgers?” I asked.
“No, we don’t have any emu burgers.”
I was disappointed I couldn’t partake in the gastro-intestinal delight which is the emu. If you haven’t seen an emu; think ostridge, only smaller. It’s nothing more than a long-legged, skinny-necked turkey-burger just waiting for you to walk up and deliver it to your esophagus with one well-placed swing of a Louisville Slugger. I’m telling you, the thing was born to be eaten. Heck, if it weren’t for the feathers you could just grab its neck and legs and go to town like you’re eating corn-on-the-cob. You know what else looks tasty? Penguins. Think about it. They’re already shaped like a drumstick and you know they couldn’t outrun you. Heck, you probably wouldn’t need anything more than a nine-iron to…
“Johnny?”
“Yes, Nat?
“Are you going to order?”
“Huh? Oh no! Did I say that out loud?”
“Yes, Johnny, and I think you’re scaring the poor waitress.”
“I’m sorry, Ma’am, I’ll have two jumbo-burger combinations, please.”
“Okay, will that be one check or two?”
“Huh?”
“Will that be one check or…? Oh! I’m sorry. What can I get for you officer?”
We sat there eating our two-pounds of cow-flesh and tater-fries with the gusto deserving of men on a mission to save Werewolves and Vampires from other Werewolves and Vampires.
“Johnny?”
“Yes, Nat?”
“Did you bring Bob and Steve with you?”
“We brought Steve, Bob’s in the closet.”
“Why is Bob in the closet?”
“Because his heads on backwards.”
“Oh, okay, well, at least you brought one of them.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re kind of integral to our little adventure here.”
“Really? How?”
“Johnny, what do you know so far?”
“About what?”
“About what is going to happen at the Judgment.”
“Oh… um… absolutely nothing, Nat.”
“Okay, our friends out there are going to be fighting for their lives.”
“Hold on, I thought they said if they lost they would just be demoted?”
“Well, that’s partially true, but after they got demoted they would most assuredly be killed.”
“What? Why?”
“They’re too powerful a family. Any family above them would plot their destruction on a daily basis because it’d be the only rational thing to do.”
“Why?”
“Because this has been foreordained since the instant Stephanie proposed her plan to Vivian and Trudy.”
“What has been foreordained?”
“The LeTorque would rule.”
“Okay, I’ve been meaning to ask; why are they called the LeTorque?”
“It’s Stephanie’s name and she’s the Matriarch.”
“Okay, so then, um, I’m confused.”
“Yes, I can see. All right, when Stephanie proposed Peter, George and Phillip set aside their rights to declare themselves Alpha she set in motion a chain of events which could only lead her family to the position of Clan Elder.”
“Why?”
“Because all three Wolves are Alphas, Johnny.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Unusual? It’s unheard of. Never has there been a family with two, let alone three, Alphas. They weren’t designed that way. So when the three of them agreed to set aside their rights to Alpha they got the attention of every higher family in the Clan.”
“Huh?”
“The other families in the Clan have been working to thwart the LeTorque since they formed their union.”
“Then how did they move up the ladder?”
“By being better at what they do than any other family. The other members of their tribe may plot and connive against them but when it comes to placing families in the hierarchy, well, it’s impossible to overlook their success and vote against them unless you’re willing to accept the consequences.”
“What are the consequences?”
“Being viewed as ignorant and according your family the place on the ladder where the ignorant reside.”
“At the bottom?”
“Under the bottom. Any family seen as placing their own interest above the tribe is viewed as a traitor.”
“What happens to them?”
“What usually happens to traitors?”
“Oh.”
“Uh-huh. So the LeTorque have been maneuvering for eons up their tribe’s ladder and are now one rung away from realizing what’s been foreordained from their inception.”
“Clan Elders?”
“Yep, but not only Clan Elders. Like I said before, since they’re such a powerful family and Peter was able to set up their prison and oil-well business in such a way it overlapped all three occupations of the necessary things in life the LeTorque can make a claim of complete clan supremacy.”
“How? I thought the families only voted for members of their same tribe?”
“Yes that’s true; at least it has been till now.”
“What’s changed?”
“Remember when I said the other families in the clan have been working to thwart the LeTorque from the beginning?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, I meant that literally. Every family in all three tribes of Third Clan have been working against the LeTorque since they formed their union and they were still able to pull off their little overlapization plan.”
“Really? You’re still going to use that word?”
“Heck yeah, it’s a good word. So anyway, if and when the LeTorque finally decide to put themselves up for consideration as sole Clan Elders the other families would almost be honor bound to vote for them. I mean, if they’ve been working against them for so long and they were still able to hatch their little scheme how could they, in all honesty, not give them the title?”
“But Peter’s dead?”
“Yes, Peter’s dead, Stephanie’s in pregnant hibernation and another family has taken their occupation.”
“The Ramos family.”
“Yes, I know.”
“What? Then why didn’t you tell us?”
“I’m forbidden to interfere. Oh, I may help out with things they could readily find out on their own but I may not actually side with one family over another.”
“Why not?”
“Because we bred them. We bred them to be superior and with it comes a little competition. If we were to choose sides then we’d be altering the very thing we’re trying to discover.”
“What are you trying to discover?”
“What’s superior to the Superiors?”
“That’s kind of cruel, Nat.”
“Why, Johnny?”
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe the fact you’re using them as guinea pigs in your little world-cultivating thing?”
“We gave them life.”
“Only to wat
ch them kill themselves.”
“Well, it wasn’t my idea.”
“Whose was it?”
“My father’s; Art.”
“Your father’s name is Art?”
“Yes.”
“Your father Art, who lives in Heaven?”
“Yes.”
“And your last name is Hallowed?”
“Yes, Johnny, I know, it sometimes gets a little mixed up when…”
“Your father Art, who is in Heaven, and Hallowed be his last name?”
“Look, I think we’re getting a little off track here; what say with stick with helping the LeTorque?”
“Okay, but I bet your Dad gets a little kick out of Sunday mass, doesn’t he?”
“He’s unbearable, Johnny, he struts around all day like some prized rooster or something.”
“Sorry about that.”
“Yeah, thanks,.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Hey, I think it’s about time we give our friends a break, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess we should go and pick them up.”
“Pick who up, Sweetie?” I heard and turned around to see the stunning blonde Vampire walk up to our burger-eating man-booth.
“Vivian?”
“Yes, Sweetie?”
“How did you…? There’s no way…”
“There’s no way what?”
“There’s no way Phillip and George could’ve pushed that truck twenty miles in an hour and a half?”
“Really? I’m standing right here. Hi, Nat.”
“Hello, Vivian, you look gorgeous as usual” the detective said as he rose to give her a hug.
“Nat!” Phillip yelled as he joined us.
“Hello, Phillip” the detective said with a smile.
“How are you doing?”
“Well, I can’t complain, I’ve got a job I love and a truck…”
“Hold up!”
“Yes, Johnny?” Phillip asked.
“How the heck did you push a truck twenty miles in an hour and a half?”
“We didn’t” he said while Vivian sat down with a seductive grin on her face.
“Then how’d you get here?”
“A tow truck.”
“A tow truck?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You called a tow truck?”
“Nope, he was in the area.”
“A tow truck was in the area?’
“Uh-huh” he said with a goofy smile.
“Why was there a tow truck in the area, Phillip?”
“Probably because of the pile-up, Johnny.”
“What pile-up?”
“The thirty car pile-up.”
“Okay, stop messing with me. What happened?”
“Well, Trudy yelled she’d finished fixing our sandwiches so George and I sat down to eat when some cars ran into each other.”
“How’d the cars run into each other, Phillip?”
“Well, I don’t know for sure because we were sitting facing away from the road but I would guess it was due to a little rubber-necking.”
“Rubber-necking?”
“Yeah, you see, the way we figure it happened was when Vivian got out to stretch her legs someone, and remember we’re not pointing fingers here, but someone must’ve taken his eyes off the road for a bit and, well, here we are.”
“Someone? How does one person taking their eye off the road lead to a thirty car pile-up?”
“Okay, it might’ve been more than one person. All I know is I heard one car screech its tires and then ‘Bang!’ so I assume it was the first car to get into the wreck.”
“Okay.”
“Well, that’s where it got a little weird because there weren’t any more screeches, just a whole lot of banging.”
“Huh?”
“They were ramming themselves into each other, Johnny! It was like some weird bowling match or something where one car would be sitting on the road and here’d come another just racing along and ‘Bang!’ he would plow into the car which had just plowed into another.”
“Oh my God! Was anyone hurt?”
“No, we were far enough off the road to…”
“Not you, Phillip! The people in the cars.”’
“Oh, I’m pretty sure they were hurt. You can’t go ramming your car into another one and not expect to get hurt, can you?”
“But then how…? Why…? Why would a tow truck take you instead…?”
“Because of Trudy.”
“Trudy?”
“Yup. When Vivian finally realized what was causing all those cars to hit each other she joined us on the other side of the truck. Now, after about fifteen minutes or so a whole bunch of ambulances showed up to cart those awful drivers away and with them came a couple of tow trucks. Well, to make a long story short, Trudy asked if the tow-truck guy would tow our truck here, he said ‘Yes!’, so here we are.”
“He just said ‘Yes’?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You didn’t threaten him?”
“Nope.”
“Why would he tow a truck not in the wreck?”
“Have you looked a Trudy lately, Johnny?” said Nat.
“Oh, I guess that kind of makes sense.”
