“Did he just call me tootse?” Doc grunted.
“And ‘Hottie McHotterson’, and ‘Hottie Biscotti’,” Rooster replied.
“So,” Double OT mumbled, with a mouth full of grub as he looked down on us from his impromptu perch, “Now that we’ve established that I’m unfortunately not having another hallucinatory episode and you’re not here to kill me — What the hell do y’all jokers want? Autographs? Signed NecroLord paraphernalia? Take a few NecroSelfies? Maybe trade some cat pics? Cat pics are epic.”
“Look, Owen,” I grumbled, having had about enough of this bullshit, “We need you to take us back to 1975 and track down some jackass named Ronkowski. It’s very—”
“NecroLord,” he mumbled, mid-bite.
“What?”
“You heard me, dickholio. My name — Is NecroLord. Dig?”
“Did he just call me ‘dickholio’?” I grunted, looking at Rooster.
“Yes. Yes, he did.”
Glaring at the time hippie, I barked, “Alright, you frigg’n jack—”
“Be nice,” Erin grumbled. “We need his help, remember?”
“Right. Nice. I can be nice.”
“You were saying something, dickholio?” Double OT quipped, as he tossed a couple pieces of tofu at me.
As a dark grin curled across my face, I replied, “You know what, Owen, I think we got off on the wrong foot. Let’s start over, shall we?”
Willing the cloak into being, it manifested in a spectral flash and billowed about my shoulders like a goddamned raging animal. And since I felt the compelling need to break some shit, I called for the gauntlets and clenched my fists as the unbreakable ashen hell stone instantly covered my hands and forearms.
“Allow me to introduce myself,” I grumbled, boldly stomping toward the towering eight foot amplifier he was still using as a seat. “I’m Dean. And this is me being nice.”
I then proceeded to pummel the big ass speaker like it was a frigg’n punching bag.
After all, you only get one chance to make a first impression.
Chapter 25
“Damn, hoss,” Coop chuckled, gazing at the comical vision of Double OT sprawled out on the floor amongst smoking bits and pieces of his broke-ass amplifier with Thai food remnants splattered across his face. “I do believe you kicked that speaker’s ass.”
Making no attempt to get up as he gazed at me through widened, blood shot eyes, Owen simply muttered, “Does this mean you’re not here for NecroSelfies?”
“Maybe later,” I replied, willing the cloak and gauntlets into retreat as I helped him to his wobbly feet. “First we need to talk business.”
“Business!” He yelled, instantly perking up as he ripped off his food stained dress shirt to reveal a yellow tee shirt boldly emblazoned with the catchphrase ‘I Did It All for the Wookie.’
“Yes, business.”
“Wait, what kind of business does a flipping Deacon want with me? This ain’t about that toodling tata thingamadoodle back in Singapore is it? Cause that was not me, good sir. That was that deviant doucheball NecroLaird.”
“Isn’t that you?”
“LOL! I’m NecroLord. But that was NecroLaird. My third cousin, twice removed. Total stalker. Drives around in a creeper van and everything. Flipping drummer to boot. Actually, I’m not even sure we’re related. Although he does share my affinity for epic cat pics. Hmmmmm. Curious.”
“Okay, whatever. I don’t care what happened in Singapore.”
“Hashtag — Phew! Cause it was totally me! Just so you know.”
“I don’t frigg’n care.”
“Sphincter says what?”
“What?”
“Ha! Dude, loved it! Made me snortle.”
“That’s it,” I grunted, turning to the crew, “I want to punch him. Somebody else talk. Is there any bourbon left?”
Slinking toward Erin like Pepé Le Pew, Owen said, “Bonjour mon amie. I do not believe you’ve had the dubious pleasure of making my acquaintance. Allow myself to introduce myself. I’m—”
“I know who you are,” Doc grumbled, “I’m Erin.”
“Erin, Erin, bo-berin. Banana-fana fo-ferin. Fee-fy-mo-merin. Erin!”
“And now I want to punch him.”
“Look, Owen,” Rooster interjected, “We seriously need your help. It’s important. We need you to focus—”
Grabbing a guitar and breaking into song as he flipped his hair like Paul McCartney, Double OT yelled, “Help! Johnny Rooster needs my … Help! Not just any Rooster … Help! You know he needs some—”
“Owen!”
“Sorry, John Boy, no can domundo, brah. I got a show tonight. But, if y’all high rollers want to come back next month — or never — official office hours are between 3:00 and 3:15 every third Saturday not to include long weekends or shomer Shabbos. NecroLord don’t roll on Shabbos. Dig? Mazeltov!”
Turning to Coop, I muttered, “What the frig’s wrong with this guy?”
“How much time you got, hoss?”
“Is he always like this?”
“Pretty much. Although, I will admit he’s in rare form tonight. By the look of things, I think he may’ve actually drunk the MidKnight Jayde out of whiskey. Which ain’t no small feat.”
“Fuck it,” Rooster grumbled, winking at us as he dug around in the pockets of his bomber jacket, “We don’t have time for this shit. Time for Plan B.”
Producing a pair of handcuffs etched with Enochian script, he then proceeded to slap one on his own wrist and the other on Double OT’s.
“What the flipping frak, bro?” Owen protested to no avail as Rooster then whipped out a peculiar glass vile and doused the inebriated time phantom with a fluorescent yellow liquid.
As Owen instantly froze in place and his face went blank, I said, “Holy shit, did you hit him with the Rooster mace?”
“The Nepheralyzer? Hell no.”
“Then what the hell is that crap?”
“That, my friend, is a concentrated dose of my special Rooster Sobrie-a-Tea.”
“Tea?”
“Not just any tea. It’s a pretty slick recipe I came up with; all on my own of course, through years and years of analyzing the molecular composition of—”
“Please stop,” I grumbled, seriously not in the mood. “What does it frigg’n do?”
Clearly disappointed he was robbed of yet another bloviation opportunity, he mumbled, “Adding a mere drop of it to a glass of water will render the drunkest of the drunk stone cold sober in a matter of minutes.”
“And what happens if you empty the whole frigg’n bottle on somebody?”
Looking at his pocket watch, Rooster replied, “No clue. But, I think we’re about to find out. You guys might want to back up a few steps.”
And, as if on cue, Double OT snapped back to life looking like he just slammed a million shots of espresso laced with rocket fuel.
With his eyes literally popping out of his head and his body shaking like he was having an epileptic fit, the poor bastard then let out a blood curdling scream that rang out at full volume for a solid five seconds before degrading to a half-hearted gurgle with the occasional burp thrown in for good measure.
Instantly appearing perfectly lucid with a noticeable green hue to his skin, he calmly asked, “Why am I handcuffed to Johnny Rooster?”
“You were tore up from the floor up, cuz,” Coop replied. “Rooster got you all sober like.”
“Hmmmmm. And how did he do that exactly?”
“With some Rooster tea, I reckon.”
“Great ballsac of fire! He tea bagged me into sobriety! How drunk was I? Did anybody take pictures? Was it a brodak moment?”
“Wait, what?” Rooster scoffed. “Nobody freaking tea bagged anybody.”
Skeptically, Owen asked, “You sure?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
“Are there pics?”
“What? No!”
“Balderdash! I knew it! How can you be sure if nobody took pictures?”
/>
“Can we get him drunk again?” I grumbled. “I think I like him better that way.”
“I second that!” Double OT agreed. “And can someone please uncuff me from this tea bagging ginger ass monkey?”
Completely ignoring the tea bagging ginger ass monkey comment, Rooster said, “Sorry, Owen. First we talk. Then I uncuff you. And, just so you know, these are hex cuffs that negate the abilities of anyone they bind.”
“Yeah? So what?”
“So, you won’t be able to time phase yourself out of here.”
“Hmmmmmm, and you can’t turn yourself all big, red, and fugly bugly either, ey?”
“No. No, I can’t.”
“Good to know. So, whatcha wanna talk about, doucheypants?”
“We need your help,” I chimed in.
“Yep. Got that part, Deacon Dolittle. What kind of help? You need some e-dating advice, brah? I can hook you up just like I did for Cooper Trooper.”
“Ah, that never happened, y’all,” Coop blurted out.
“Awkward,” I grumbled, trying to erase the mental image of Coop’s profile pic on an internet dating site.
Focusing on Double OT, I said, “We need help getting back to 1975.”
“Hell yeah! The seventies are my fave. Ha! Lemme guess — You wanna take the little hottie tottie with the naughty karate body over there to a vintage Stones concert? You sly dog! Old school Stone’s concerts are better than taking a bath in jello. Feeling me?”
“I don’t even know where to go with that, Owen.”
“You ever take a bath in jello, big man? It’s life altering. Highly recommend it. Orange flavor is the best. Trust me. Word!”
Feeling like my head was about to implode from Double OT’s unrelenting stream of anti logic, I took a deep breath and tried like hell to eradicate the last thirty seconds from my memory banks.
“Look, it’s very, very, very frigg’n important that we find a time phantom named Rick Ronkowski. He’s supposedly hiding out on October 21st, 1975.”
“Ronk? Shit yeah. I know Ronk.”
“Wait, what?” Rooster scoffed. “You do?”
“Yepperoonies. Everybody knows Ronk.”
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“Time? Ha! I don’t do time, mandingo. Time does me. Wait, that came out wrong. Or did it?”
Jumping into the conversation, Erin asked, “Where was he, Owen? Where did you see Ronkowski last?”
“Bend over and I’ll show ya, tootse. Boom!”
As her face curled into an exceptionally evil grin, Doc then pulled one of her H&Ks from its holster, chambered a round, and jabbed the muzzle squarely in Double OT’s crotch.
“Sausage!” He squealed in a piercing falsetto.
“What?”
“Last time I saw Ronk he was pushing his sausage cart around a city. And there was a game going on. It was a tournament or something.”
“What kind of tournament?”
“Tennis!”
“Was it in 1975?”
“Hell, I dunno. Maybe?”
“Can you take us to him?”
“Can we continue this conversation without your gat jabbed all up in me groinage? Super pretty please with orange jello on top?”
Holstering her man-sized pistol, Doc said, “Do us both a favor and hold the jello.”
“So you’ll help us?” Rooster chimed in.
“Depends on one minor condition,” Double OT replied, with a wolfish grin.
“Which is?”
“Somebody coming clean about what the hell you’re really doing here?”
And then, Owen Octavius Trask did another thing that I think I’ll remember for the rest of my unnatural afterlife.
Before any of us had the first clue as to what the hell was happening, he simply flickered out of existence only to instantly reappear behind Rooster with a frigg’n samurai sword held to his throat tight enough to draw a fine layer of blood.
With a big shit eating grin on his face, he then casually slid off the hex cuff, which up until recently was supposedly suppressing his abilities, and slapped it on Rooster’s other hand.
“So,” he said, with the cold demeanor of a seasoned assassin, “Cooper Rayfield strolls, uninvited, into NecroLord’s Lair with Johnny O’Dargan, Dean Robinson, and Erin Kelly in tow. Not often I get a personal visit from Heaven’s most flipping wanted. That’s right, kids. I know who you are. Question I can’t wrap my head around is, what the hell are you up to?”
“Wait a frigg’n minute,” I muttered, taking a step in his direction, “You knew who we were the whole time?”
“Roger dodger, monkey man.”
“And how’d you get out of the cuff?”
“Please,” he scoffed, “Child’s play.”
“So that whole thing about you being piss drunk was a ploy?”
“Ha! No! I was totally lit. Seriously — I was like smashed out of my mind. For reals.”
“Right,” I muttered, really hoping this was all part of Rooster’s plan of letting everything go to shit. “So, what now?”
“Simple, whistlebritches. You tell me what this is about and maybe I won’t give Roosterballs an extra close shave.”
“What happened to you being all zenful and shit?”
“Being zen don’t equate to being a dumbass, dumbass.”
“At least I’m not the dumbass that thinks that blade’s going to do anything to Rooster besides really piss him off.”
“Ha! Wrong! — Thanks to the fact that Johnny’s wearing his own kinky hex cuffs, his fugly alter ego can’t come out and play. For the moment, he ain’t nothing more than a stringy human. And trust me, monkey man, that means this here katana will snuff the Rooster faster than Oprah loses weight. Ain’t that right, John Boy?”
As Rooster mumbled something indecipherable mainly because he had a frigg’n sword pressed to his adam’s apple, Owen proudly pontificated, “It’s almost like I meticulously manipulated this whole series of events to amazingly culminate in this diabolical, suspense filled conclusion. Overly dramatic sound effect anyone? Bum bum bummm.”
“Son of a bitch,” I grumbled. “You planned all this?”
“Bingo! Guess the shoe’s on the other foot now, ey? And by shoe, I mean cuff. Just so there’s no confusion with my choice of metaphors. Feel me?”
“Wow,” Doc muttered, “That’s actually really impressive.”
“Right? That metaphor was killa. Nailed it!”
“I don’t think she was talking about the metaphor, cuz,” Coop interjected.
“Of course she wasn’t! What was she talking about, Cooper Trooper?”
“Probably the fact that you backwoods snookered us.”
“Oh, that! Epic, right?”
Trying my very best to ignore the fact that we’d been thoroughly outwitted by a sloshed, time hopping rock star with an affinity for cat tee shirts and Underoos, I muttered, “So, you want the truth about what we’re doing here.”
“Are you about to tell me that I can’t handle the truth in a totally epic Jack Nicholson voice?”
“No.”
“Total buzzkill. But, tell me anyway.”
“Alright, here’s the short story — One of the archangels is a traitor working with Azazel and his oversized cronies. Together, they’re holding man-kind ransom to force the seraphic court into opening the gates of Tartarus and free the fallen Watchers so they can launch some kind of angel mutiny. As such, we’ve got less than two hours to expose the traitor, and put a stop to all the bullshit before the anakim army systematically lays waste to the Earth.”
“Egads, man! That’s an ambitious plot arc. Are you yankin’ my wang?”
“No. And for the record — that’s frigg’n disturbing on many levels.”
“Holy shit! This is intense. I’m on the edge of my seat here, monkey man. What’s next? Sex, danger, inter-dimensional espionage, British accents, Germans with eye patches, creepy hairless cats? Pirates? Evil clown guys? More
sex? More cats?”
“There’s none of that.”
“Alright, I dig it. I’m disappointed, but I still dig it. So, what does finding Ronk have to do with all this?”
“We’ve got good reason to believe he’s in possession of the key to exposing the traitor and ensuring the gates of Tartarus stay sealed. All we have to do is find him.”
“And what exactly is this most fabled key?”
“It’s, ah, the Ark of the Covenant.”
“Great galloping gonads! For reals?”
“For reals.”
“Well, spank my fanny and call me horsepucky.”
“Ah, no?”
“Ha! So, tell me, how do you know Ronk has the God box?”
“Rooster’s mom told us,” Erin chimed in.
“And how does Johnny’s mom know Ronk?”
“She was screwing him.”
“I knew it! There is sex involved! Bum bum bummmm. Hold the phone. Johnny’s mom? You talking about Lilith?”
“Yes.”
Talking directly into Rooster’s ear, Owen said, “So, I might’ve heard, through the grapevine, that she and your pops kind broke things off a while back. Is she like dating anyone nowadays or—”
“Dude!” Rooster scoffed as the sword pressed into his throat. “Awkward?”
“Ha! Sorry, Johnny! Your mom has it all kinds of going on though, brah. Just saying.”
“What’s it gonna be, Owen?” I grumbled. “Will you help us or not?”
“So, lemme get this straight — You want me to abandon my comfylicious lifestyle of music and mamacitas to join your crew of militant outlaws so we can embark on an epicalarious Indiana Jones misadventure to save the world from certain demise by defeating a maniacally rogue archangel who’s hell bent on popping the top on Tartarus, and unleashing the fallen flipping Watchers to kick off halomania, hence causing the zombie apocalypse but with giants instead of zombies. Did I get that about right?”
Wrath of the Fallen: The Guild of Deacons, Book 2 Page 23
