Delinquency

by Daemon McRae

Level Ten: Cafeteria Meltdown

Level Ten: Cafeteria Meltdown

Nothing is quite so worrisome as paranoia. At its most basic, it is simply another type of fear. However, it’s the subtle complexities of a paranoid mind that wreak the most havoc. The fundamental problem with paranoia in comparison to a simple phobia is that there is no one source of danger. No single threat. As an example, an arachnophobe is wary specifically of spiders, so they look for signs of their presence: webbing, nests, and that prickly feeling on your skin that feels like tiny legs. Paranoia takes simple fear and supplants it into every aspect of life. Every shadow is a hiding place. Every slightly ajar door is a trap, and every noise is not what it sounds like.

It gets even worse when something is, in fact, out to get you.

“Can it be Tuesday yet?” Devil groaned, leaning into the back of the cafeteria booth as if he was trying to merge with it and escape into another, more comfortable reality of fake leather seats. Which was likely his motivation.

Treble fiddled with a lighter under the table, an old nervous habit that had become somewhat practical given recent events. He felt the comforting rattle of the can of hair spray in his hoodie pocket, which did little to naught to ease his tension. “No fucking joke. I keep hearing students and teachers all day talk about the ‘weird people’ in town. This morning I had to barbeque some flesh mannequin just walking to school. Mother fucker didn’t even attack me, it was just, standing there. Under a lamppost. Like a cheap horror movie monster. Let me tell you, that shit is much scarier in real life.”

Rubble had buried his head in his hands. “At least you got to take one down. You remember I’m like, right on this curved line of horrible shit, right? I keep thinking I see them everywhere. Can’t we pull the plug on this thing early? Find the asshat doing the ritual and just… do something about him?”

Spooks shook his head, eliciting a heavy groan from Rubble. “Nope. The ritual isn’t the cause of all these monsters. It’s just an attempt to scoop up some power and make a mad dash for the exit before everything hits the fan. Like grabbing as much money as you can before the last lifeboat leaves. This thing’s been in the works for a while. That’s the problem with fighting Beasts; their sense of time is so radically different from ours I don’t think they even understand linearity as a concept. Either these are all random accidents leading to one really big cosmic meltdown, or this thing’s been reaching across the veil for decades knocking over the right dominoes.”

“How do we even know someone’s gonna go for the gold on this anyway? I mean, sure, someone could have figured it out, but who’s stupid enough to try and hijack a Beast?” Treble asked pointedly.

Rubble leaned his head on one hand while the other dug through his backpack. “Yeah, I did some digging on that, cause Spooks had the same question. If it’s any consolation, they’re the type to announce their bullshit schemes on the internet,” he muttered, pulling out a crumpled bunch of papers and dropping them on the table.

Dusty gave the cover page a once over. “Wanted: Seeking subordinates for cosmic ritual magic to assimilate the power of a Being Beyond Time and Space to ride out the end of the wrold.”

“I think you mean world,” Spooks pointed out.

“Nope,” Dusty deadpanned, shaking his head. “Wrold. What kind of magical psychopath doesn’t use spellcheck on a recruitment page? He he… spellcheck.”

The rest of the boys groaned. “Oh my god Dusty. It’s not even Monday,” Rubble protested.

“I think you mean Punday,” Dusty corrected in an annoying, nasally voice.

“You remember I still have my lighter and hairspray, right?” Treble growled.

“Yeah, but you wouldn’t use those in the cafete-”

His argument was met with a loud crash and a lot of screaming. The boys looked up as the remains of one of the cafeteria windows cascaded to the floor, no doubt caused by the large, nondescript arm now occupying the space where the glass used to be. It gripped the window sill, paying no mind to the shards now embedding itself in it’s palm, and lurched forward, carrying with it the rest of one of the flesh golems.

Unlike its predecessor, this golem was a perfect imitation of human form, barring one major detail: the lack of any defining features. It had no face, hair, fingernails, and besides the cuts on the arm and hand on it’s right side, no blemishes. Fortunately for those present with a sense of decency, it also had no defining sexual characteristics. It was like a blank template for printing a human.

A well-toned, fast human, as it charged straight for the boy’s position. “Oh come ON!” Treble shouted, diving headfirst under a neighboring table. Dusty and Rubble jumped up to meet the interloper, as Spooks just ran for the other side of the room. Unarmed, he posed little threat.

Dust Devil and Rubble Maker, however, did. Gleefully and with much abandon. Their shoulders met the golem’s as they crashed together, and their faces registered a second of surprise as it managed to push them a few inches backwards.

It didn’t get farther than that, however, as Rubble twisted around it’s side, wrapping one arm around a leg and the other around it’s neck, dead-lifting the creature while Dusty stepped aside. Very aside.

“Table for one!” Rubble shouted, a declaration that was met with much eye-rolling from those not currently running away and screaming. The scrapper launched himself backwards, putting all of his weight into the creature’s back as it’s back met the not-quite-sturdy enough cafeteria table, which broke under the unwelcome weight, sending both crashing to the ground. Rubble recovered first, getting to his feet with a groan, though not completely upright. Which was unfortunate, as a meaty arm swung out from the crash site and knocked him off his feet, as he was propelled back a good meter or two.

“I don’t think you’re getting a tip,” Dusty quipped, picking up one of the broken slats of wood from the now-ruined table. Swinging to break it over the creature’s head, it instead split in two on contact with the golem’s other fist. The skater jumped back, turned around, and ran for the exit. “Be right back!” He called as his friends stared at him incredulously.

Treble crawled out from under his table to help Rubble to his feet. As they stood up, he fumbled with the lighter and spray can, putting up his makeshift flamethrower in time to give the freshly-recovered monster a face full of burning aerosol.

Which, while effective in slowing it down, did little to actually stop the creature. It still surged forth, stopping only as a very large book met the back of its head. It turned slowly to face a now-shaking Bones, who seemed to be both rather disappointed in the effectiveness of his attack, and apologetic for having disturbed the monster’s fight can he please leave now thank you very much.

Had the golem possessed a face, Spooks was certain it would be wearing an expression of incredulity, as it turned slowly and rapidly raised an arm to swipe him aside. An action that was interrupted by another surge of fire against its back. It convulsed briefly, as if in pain, and returned its attention to the main threat: the snarky kid with the hair spray. As it turned around, Rubble took a great big swing at its head, making a solid connection. Unfortunately, with no bones to break, and no pain receptors, it was little more effective than his daily use of a punching bag.

The golem’s punch, however, was far more effective. Even as Rubble raised his arms in a boxer’s defensive stance, the mighty blow rattles his forearms and knocked him off his feat again. It stepped forward, only to be met with yet another burst of fire. This one smaller than the others, however, as it soon became apparent that the spray can was now empty. “Oh for FUCK’S sake!” Treble barked, dropping the can, pocketing the lighter, and backpedaling in a rather impressively athletic interpretation of a moonwalk.

The golem seemed to pause for a second, as if deciding who the more imminent target was: the boy who had run out of ammo, or the one getting back to his feet for round three. He lunged at Rubble, only to be interrupted by a third option, as the cafeteria doors burst open, and Dust Devil skated in, carrying Pinkie Pie on his back. He came to a halt in front of Treble, as Pinkie Pie bounced off his back and glared daggers at the golem.

“Seriously? Pinkie Pie? SERIOUSLY?!” Treble protested, ducking behind a booth for cover.

Rubble raised an eyebrow at the bubbly girl, the newest entrant into the fray. “Tell me you have something,” he pleaded.

Pinkie Pie rummaged through a pocket, eyes on the golem. “Ooooohhhhh, yeaaahhhhh,” she said smugly, pulling out her weapon of choice.

Dusty took one look at it and ducked behind the same booth Treble was occupying. Rubble’s eyes widened as he took a few steps back. “Is that…?”

“Five-inch jawbreaker, baby!” Pinkie yelled, as the solid mass of hard candy glowed a dangerous pink. The golem surged forward, having chosen a new threat. It hadn’t made it more than one step before Pinkie reeled back like a pitcher at the mound, and launched the makeshift hand grenade with impressive force.

“HIT THE DECK!” Rubble barked, diving under a long table and covering his ears with his hands. Pinkie Pie simply stood in place as the hard candy met the golem’s face.

The explosion was deafening. Glass shattered out of the windows, yet another table was destroyed, and chunks of now-dead golem rained about the room like atrocious hail.

After the debris settled, Treble poked his head out. “Pinkie?”

“Yeah-huh?” she asked cheerfully, turning on her heel and breaking her victory pose.

“The next time you do that, please save it for more than one golem in a wide open space,” he groaned, picking pieces of… stuff out of his hair. “Oh god, I need a thousand showers now.”

Pinkie was also all-over monster bits, but seemed almost entirely unfazed. Save for the fact that her hair now pointed entirely in one direction. She shook herself off, and almost impossible, she was clean again, her large pink poofy mane returning to its original, only mildly gravity-defying position. “Okie-dokie-loki!”

Spooks stood up from his hiding place in the far corner. “Is it gone?”

Rubble also resurfaced. “Infinitely so. Now, we just have to worry about-”

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?!” came the rather impressively loud voice of Vice-Principal Luna.

“That,” Rubble finished, jabbing a thumb at the door their VP had just burst through.

------------------

“Ok, so we know they’re not explosion-proof,” Spooks groaned, push broom in hand as he gathered up the last of the debris into the dustpan Pinkie was holding.

“Well, duh!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Like, nothing is explosion proof!”

“Ghosts,” Rubble corrected.

“Wraiths,” added Treble.

“Beasts.”

“Reapers.”

“You, apparently.”

Pinkie’s smug smile was now accompanied by a slight eye twitch. “Right! Almost nothing is explosion-proof!”

Treble slumped back into the ruined upholstery of their usual booth as he watched Pinkie dump the last of the debris into the trashcan. “Well, she’s definitely coming with us for the big endgame fight. Hell, I’ll even buy her ammunition. As least I won’t get funny looks for walking around with twenty lbs of jawbreakers.”

Pinkie flopped into the seat next to him. “Well, I don’t know what my schedule is, but if you’re buying the candy, I’m totes in!”

“That’s ok,” Dusty grunted, lifting the new tabletop onto the stand, to replace the one Rubble had suplexed. The later picked up a toolbox and crawled under the table to fasten it into place. “We don’t even know when this fight thingy is supposed to happen,” Dusty groaned.

Spooks raised a hand, fishing out a book from his backpack. “Actually, we do. I’ve been telling you guys this whole time that all these signs and shit are pointing to a specific universal alignment-”

“At which point we all tune you out in favor of words that don’t make our retinas fall out,” Rubble grunted, as he fought with a particularly stubborn nut.

“Well, if you hadn’t, you would know that the most likely time and place is eleven P.M. Friday evening,” Spooks protested, once again incensed at his friend’s lack of interest in the important details.

“Isn’t that-OW!” Rubble exclaimed, sitting up too quickly and beaning himself against the table.

Pinkie took over. “But that’s like, the end of the Fall Formal! Ohhh… Sunset’s gonna be maaaad.”

“What else is new?” Treble groaned. “That girl is MAD about EVERYTHING.”

“Not really,” Pinkie corrected. “Just mostly around you. Not sure why she gets all angry-pants with you, though.”

Spooks rolled his eyes. “Yes. It’s a total mystery.”

Dusty snickered as he handed Rubble both new tools and an icepack. “Well, at least this is the worst of it today. I mean, yeah, spending the rest of our afternoon cleaning out the cafeteria blows, but it’s not like we weren’t gonna get saddled with that anyways. Nice of Luna not to, you know, press charges.”

“I think the two-hundred something students screaming about a faceless monster crashing through the window had something to do with that,” Spooks pointed out.

“Why did it even come after you guys, anyway?” Pinkie wondered aloud. She rocked back and forth in her seat as the boys finished up their work.

Spooks had an answer for that. “Probably because someone told it too. I think whoever is gonna try for this power-grab ritual knows we’re on to them. And since these things are basically blank slates with no direction, they would be much easier to hijack than, well, most anything else. These things were made to be controlled, mind you. And until this big bad pops up, they don’t exactly have a prime direction. Probably the same person who cobbled together that spare parts monstrosity that came for Dusty last week.”

“Is there any good news here?” Rubble groaned, joining Pinkie and Treble on the couch as he held the icepack to his head.

“Well,” Spooks said, in a voice that basically meant yes and no in a way nobody approved of. “Once the Beasts starts asserting its presence I doubt the caster will be able to control it at all, so there will be less of them trying to kill us while they focus on their gathering point. Should make it easier to ambush them.”

This explanation was met with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. “Yeah,” Spooks said in a hollow voice. “I don’t like our chances, either.”

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

“What else is new?” Treble groaned. “That girl is MAD about EVERYTHING.”

No, Treble, that's a different story.

In any case, I suppose trying to hijack the golems and get them to destory one another wouldn't end well. Not least because by the time there was enough of them to have an impact, the Beast would likely be able to assert control over them.

Still, with some luck and candy, this might just turn out Avengers-esque:

"I have an army"
"We have a Pie."

[Daemon McRae]

8442585
Hey, someone got the reference!

[RainCrasher]

hahaha. When in doubt, get the Pie.

[Jarimor]

reactiongifs.com/r/agtmbomg.gif
my responses in sequence to this chapter.

[Magnus Orion]

“What else is new?” Treble groaned. “That girl is MAD about EVERYTHING.”

Sneaky.

[Alondro]

8442585 Alondro hijacks all the golems and gets them to attack each other! ... At the place they needed to be to summon the... oh... ok, so I didn't think that one through.