Oh, shit.
Evil saw all of this in his peripherals, and he would have applauded if it wasn’t for the dog and the deadlines and the girl he still had to impress.
With all this action around the playground, no one was really watching the big screen anymore. So when the movie finally went black altogether, there were no howls of complaint, no car horns honking. Instead, the remaining people that hadn’t headed for the bottleneck at the exit started their engines and turned their headlights onto the action near the monkey bars. The spectators were torn between this sudden double-feature of a cop riding a man like a horse through a wave of bouncing rubber balls, and a kid on a dirt bike tearing ass through the chains of the swing set with a growling German Shepherd hanging off his handlebars.
Most watched the kid and the dog. He had the better soundtrack.
“…watching Let’s Make a Deal too many times to count… fuck this tape, I know how it turns out… all that’s left of my posse are bloody shirt labels… don’t dump spaceship parts, you’ll scratch the pool table…”
But Evil’s bike was beginning to sputter in defeat as the dog bit hard enough to throttle his rubber grip back down. Evil was considering bailing out at the sand box.
But then he saw the ramp again. And now it was lined up perfect.
And above it all was Bully.
Evil saw her standing tall, taller than she’d ever been, up high on that weird concrete bunker with the fluttering eye of the film projector dancing between her feet. Her hands were at her sides, and he knew, even with the insanity going on around him, that for the first time, she was only watching him.
Evil grabbed the dog’s snout and cranked it forward on the throttle. The dog yelped, and teeth peeled back the rubber on the handgrip, exhaust shrieking like pertussis and billowing like a swamped outboard, and stones fishtailed high into the sky behind him. He was amazed how disciplined the K-9 officer was. It still hung on tight. In fact, now it was chewing the rubber, sawing off chunks into its jaws, and Evil figured he had only a couple seconds before it ate his whole damn bike.
Officer Bigby, who had been laying low and letting the dogs do all the work, suddenly recognized Evil and realized he was about to lose his quarry. So he headed him off on the other end of the slide, then got lucky with the dog distracting him and snagged Evil by the face, a thumb finding his nostril and a pinky finding his ear. Bigby started to lift him up off his seat, and the bike’s back tire swerved in protest, losing its grip on the road. Bigby threw an elbow to smash the stereo and stop the boy’s song, but he elbowed the dog instead. It chewed faster.
“…on Commodore 64’s watchin’ cells get devoured… back in the kennel, dog splits open like a flower… stick a needle in your blood and your blood’s gonna scream… stick a needle in your blood and your blood’s gonna scream… someone in this crib ain’t what he seems…”
Watching the dog, Evil could see what teeth and a little dedication could do, especially teeth as clean and strong as Evil’s after his new regime of mouthwash five to seven times a day (he still never left his house with it swishing in his mouth, however. That would be like running out the door twirling a loaded gun). Evil waited until Bigby’s forearm started sliding down for the chokehold, and he aimed for the tattoo, but missed by about a foot, chomping down tight to answer the eternal question:
How hard is it to bite through bone?
It turned out it was the easiest thing in the world really. That night, Evil discovered the only reason people thought bones were strong was because we were afraid to bite our own fingers hard enough to snap them off. Evil found out bones weren’t shit. Shit was much harder to bite through. He sang along with Billy, even though it was muffled around his meal.
“…someone creepin’ ‘round and trashed the bulldozer… keep your enemies close but your aliens closer… the only bitch in the movie likes cheatin’ at chess… that puddle on the floor? ‘It ain’t Fuchs,’ I guess…”
He bit through three of the cop’s fingers, the three good ones a cop needed. And as his teeth sunk in, and his mouth overflowed with copper, he imagined Bigby, years from now, struggling not just to hold his gun, but to even make a pretend gun with his hand. Bigby bellowed, and his forearm slipped and he rolled off the side, hot metal cracking him upside the eyebrow. Suddenly free, Evil got control of the bike, and the back tire finally bit the ground, and Evil headed for his ramp, chewing all the way. Tasted like chicken shit. Chicken shit with a badge.
He weaved through a couple more cars, heading for the tow truck near the exit. The congested line reminded him of summer construction on the highway, when every vehicle was idling and miserable, and he’d zip along them in the ditch while they glared. Sometimes he tried to imagine which driver was the angriest. He knew that somewhere in that line of a hundred steaming cars was one person gripping their steering wheel harder than anybody else.
But today that was every car. And now they were getting out, a mass of humanity pressing in, blocking his path. A sweaty crowd of screaming spectators, thick as mayflies used to be on the highways. They grabbed at his head, his arms, his new favorite dog who he swore was singing, too…
“…Palmer smokin’ blunts big as a brick… that shit on the poster ain’t in the flick… ain’t gonna rest till we burn down the whole station, Quaker Oats shrugs, “That ain’t dog. That’s imitation…”
A little boy tried to climb onto his seat, and Evil caught the child’s face in his hands and yelled.
“Run, kid! Tell everybody! The Police Training Manual? To Protect and Serve Man?! It’s a cookbook! It’s a cookbook!” Then he laughed so hard he choked on it.
No, it was just more hands in his mouth. But way too many eat, and his bike was stopped cold in the dust as they swarmed him, still a good thirty feet from the finish line.
On the other end of the playground, Bucky Balls, still stuck tight to Larry’s back and trying for the ol’ L.A. choke hold, too, stopped fighting for a second to watch the action over Larry’s shoulder. He saw an old man in a wheelchair, skinny arms pistoning his way into the fray, and Bucky’s eyes went wide when he noticed the spiders all over his face. The wheelchair bumped into Larry’s ass, and Bucky tried to ask him a question.
“Wait a minute, sir,” he started. “Aren’t you…”
Then most of Bucky’s head exploded into chowder from the ears on back, christened by Officer Dwayne B. Bigby (last name pronounced “big bye”). His first lethal bullet. First any bullet.
Another bullet flipped a child’s swing over and up like a duck at a shooting gallery. Then another bullet flipped a child. Bigby had all the medals to prove his marksmanship in case anyone ever asked, but while shooting at Evil’s disappearing dirt bike, he’d just discovered what happens when you try to operate a gun with your two smallest remaining fingers.
It affected some stuff.
More gunfire erupted, and at first Larry thought it was more cops. But the bullets were coming from the cars, and the arms coming from the cars were tattooed. Homemade bullshit mostly, illegible, except for one, a rash splatter of black ink surrounding a sketch of a broken arm in a sling, advertising something called a ‘podcast,’ which was very strange, not just because it sounded like some sort of horticulturist’s splint and neither of the bearer’s thumbs were remotely green, but also because when the body was exhumed decades later for reasons unrelated to this incident, an investigator would become convinced this tattoo referenced a form of entertainment derived from technology that wasn’t widely available until 20 years after the man’s death.
Out of time or not, these men behind driver’s-side doors were here now, protecting their families, sliding along hoods like pros from half a decade of Dukes of Hazzard reruns, gunfire popping off in all directions, even a compound bow or two.
Larry was suddenly convinced that the new John Carpenter remake of The Thing was much more popular than the bad reviews suggested because, in their panic, people seemed to be targeting every goddamn d
og in the place. These emotions were infectious, ongoing, and very easy to maintain in the midst of so many bouncing rubber balls.
But Larry decided Bigby must have been a big E.T. fan instead, because he was keeping his shit together a little better. In fact, like a lazy bolt of lightning, Bigby seemed to be moving more steadily, almost as if he was seeing everything unfolding in slow-motion, finally, after years of abuse from fellow officers, recognizing the intricate and idiotic workings of the two young terrorists’ plan to simply make all branches of law enforcement look foolish. It wasn’t that complicated. There was no bomb. There was never a bomb.
That was it! Bigby thought. I’m a real detective!
Then he heard his name, pronounced wrong as usual, coming from curly hair of a child near his boots, and he commandeered the boy’s headphones. In his cauliflower ears, Bigby heard the helium voice of his original suspect describe his every movement… in a very judgmental tone:
“Officer Bigbee watched the entire incident with binoculars from his nearby squad car, and when the call came over the radio, he sped home, empty-handed. But at his residence, Angela Strongarm waited, and when Dwayne Bigbee returned without the money, she assumed Bigbee had double-crossed her and simply hid the cash along the route home as he feigned distress over his missing K-9 unit, ‘Gretel.’ Officer Dwight C. Bigby was questioned as a possible accomplice to Bigbee, due to their dogs’ resemblance, but both were subsequently released. Angela jumped into the squad car and headed toward the bank, driving erratically, occasionally stopping to search weeds along the median. Witnesses notified authorities, and as Angela Strongarm searched for the money and Officer Bigbee ran down the highway, presumably after his car, Mr. Bells’ life continued to tick away. Or so he thought. Using the nine-page letter as a guide, Bigby tried searching for clues. After the bank, his first stop was a nearby McDonald’s drive-thru, where he thought the first item in the scavenger hunt would be the prize in the second of three Happy Meals he would purchase. But in an attempt to save time, he only bought two such meals, which he consumed. It is then that we believe Officer Bigbee began constructing his own device out of guilt…”
I didn’t do that…
Horrified, Bigby began to understand that just because one bomb was a fake, it didn’t mean the others were, too.
He held the headphones tight against his head and ran to the nearest car. He smashed the drive-in speaker through the driver’s side window, then reached in to press the heel of his hand against the horn. He needed everyone’s attention, even civilians. He could explain it all to everyone right now, if they’d just stop fighting. He honked and honked to calm himself. A horn still felt like home to Bigbeep, and he even tried tap, tap, tapping out a message in Morse Code, a message from his childhood which, as always, explained every goddamn thing that was happening if people would just bother to listen.
Sadly, everyone was already honking their horns even harder than his, either stuck in the exit line or angry at Bully’s gigantic, happy-dancing legs now blocking the projector beam of the movie. Even though the movie was over, everyone hated shadows on a screen. Bigby turned up his headphones as he honked faster.
“…at 3:00 p.m., Mr. Bells was spotted at a particularly long traffic light, trying to remove a key from the back of a toy robot and periodically holding a cheeseburger up to the sun. When they removed him from the car at gunpoint, they saw the device on his neck and were reminded of the hoax the week prior. He wielded a plastic sword…”
Then a little girl in lime-green pajamas slipped from her parents’ grip so she could chase one of the rubber balls. She caught up with a red one, and she put it in her mouth.
And she choked. For a second, this changed everything.
The screaming subsided a bit, civilians putting down some weapons. Spectator’s hands untangled from Evil’s face, his arms, the scruff of his new dog’s neck, and they let his dirt bike’s back wheel touch the ground again, pick up speed, aiming for the elusive ramp as the crowd ran to help the little girl instead.
The dog was still locked tight on the accelerator, but now it was helping.
“I am the last gladiator,” Evil mumbled.
Evil was riding so fast he swore he broke the sound barrier. But it was just the cassette getting caught on the tape heads for a moment. He smiled, remembering his dreams of the rib cage and the red rubber ball, finally understanding what it meant. He turned his dog’s head harder on the throttle, but stroked its fur lovingly at the same time. The dog snapped like a gator to get better grip, and its tooth caught a meaty chunk of his thumb. Evil didn’t even blink. Sirens screamed in the distance, and Evil kept petting away and singing along.
“…hot wire test not really scientific… head be turning into something really horrific… one gun in the camp and Childs wants to keep her… Jesus Christ, dude, can you cut my thumb any deeper… stick a needle in your blood and your blood’s gonna scream…”
And he made it.
Evil wrenched his arms and the dog up and back, lifting the front tire to cover the gap between the ground and the tow truck’s ramp, a stuntman’s age-old confidence technique that convinced his body into believing it had more to do with the launch than it really did.
“Did you see the weather channel on that TV back there?”
“Back where?”
“At the gas station,” Jack says. “There was a big-ass red spot coming at us, but the TV feed froze.”
“Not a cloud in the sky.”
“How do you know it was Doppler radar or whatever? Maybe that red spot was something else.”
“Don’t start,” Rick says.
“Just take it easy on the corners when the storm comes. We’re still missing some tread on these tires.”
“We’re fine.”
“Fifty bucks says you roll this thing.”
“How are you doing back there?” Rick yells to the old man on the gurney.
“I’m fine,” the old man says, annoyed.
“We know you’re fine,” Jack says. “You’re always fine. That gurney is for people who aren’t fine, not for a free taxi service so you can go to the gas station and get cigarettes.”
“Come on, Jack…” Rick says, in good spirits for no reason, like the early years, when his partner was doing everything right.
“Come on nothing.”
Jack reaches to turn off the siren, but Rick stops him.
“You know when it’s time for a paramedic to quit?” Rick asks.
“When?”
“When they start losing… patients!”
“Zing!”
“Get it?”
“Oh, I get it. I don’t need the word spelled different to get it.”
“Good.”
“The siren will get us there faster,” Rick says, reaching for it again, holding onto the memory of them doing their jobs like men.
“It’s bullshit,” Jack says. “Ten dog attacks today alone, and we’re carting around this fool.”
“Don’t worry,” the old man says. “I’m sure there will be plenty more. And just because you drive this meat wagon around in circles all night don’t give you the right.”
“What?”
“You shouldn’t talk to us like that.”
“Like what?” Jack asks.
“Like you’re down here with the rest of us.”
“What’s that supposed to mean, you miserable old fuck?”
“That’s enough, Jack.”
“There’s a reason the Russians put a dog in space while we used a monkey,” the old man says after a couple blocks.
“And why’s that?” Jack asks.
“I didn’t say I knew what the reason was, but you can be damn sure it was a good one.”
Jack remains unconvinced.
“So, what’s up with all these dogs anyway?” Rick asks, really asking just this once, to see what happens. He watches the old man walk into the emergency room, turn around and walk out again, then light up a smoke, not even trying
to fool anybody.
“We’re gonna find out tonight. Once and for all,” Jack says, putting the CB back in its holster. “Hit it.”
“Don’t you want to go in and get your hand checked before we finish up tonight?”
“Barely scratched me! That old bastard wasted his last tooth on my ass. An old man’s fingernails are a lot more dangerous than his rotten mouth. Hold on, did you say check my head or my hand?”
“Well, you shouldn’t have shoved him,” Rick says, not answering Jack’s question. Then he turns on their siren and stabs the gas.
“If this was a movie and I ignored a bite like this, I’d be so fucked,” Jack laughs.
Rick shakes his head and, for the first time in weeks, watches his partner with something like sympathy. It feels like their last day on Earth.
“We’ve got what, twenty bites in as many hours? I think people are confusing dogs with something else.”
“Like what.” Rick is long past caring about the answer. So Jack doesn’t answer. He’s blowing on a stethoscope and checking his own chest instead. Jack taps his chest over and over, then starts laughing.
“You’re the first dyslexic paramedic with a Dog Complex,” Rick sighs, throwing stones on swerve through traffic. He checks the sky for rain and sees nothing, so he takes the corners harder.
“Hey, you know how they say dogs start to resemble their owners, or people start to resemble their dogs?” Jack asks him. “You’ve heard of doggelgängers, right? Maybe that’s what’s happening.”
“You make no sense.”
The girl on the gurney starts convulsing, but Jack does nothing to help her. Rick turns around, livid.
The Last Projector Page 39
