The Mall Goes On

[seymoure]

Chapter 9
“Popcorn, Red Licorice & Goodbye”
     The morning and then the lunch rushes were without any distinguishing characteristics.
     Nothing turned into any distasteful animals or exploded or anything out of the way like that.
     That did little to settle TD’s mind.
     Once you had seen the things he had seen, you don’t feel a great deal of relief because a Rueben sandwich didn’t become a crocodile and eat the person that was supposed to eat it.
     It just lets you sit on the razor’s edge a little longer.
     He had his assistant Duane take over the bar about 2 in the afternoon and after a quick check up of the restaurant side of the business, he chose to take a walk.
     The Mall wasn’t empty, but it wasn’t doing the kind of business that would signal a recovery either.
     At this point he wasn’t sure if that was good or bad.
     At least it gave him some time to think.
     At this point he wasn’t sure if that was good or bad.
     He looked up and found himself in front of The Popcorn Shoppe.
     Topzepopoulous was bitching in Greek to no one in particular. TD had heard it before, but it was somehow comforting.
     “Are you going to be here at the end of the month?” Mikle asked him, long before he was aware that the Popcorn merchant even knew he was in the area.
     “Huh?” TD stammered.
     “The bank is planning to move out of the mall, and so is the movie theatre,” Topzepopoulous said, “And I wondered if you were still going to be here.”
     “I’m here for the long run,” TD smiled, and hoped that would be mirrored in his old buddy’s face. It wasn’t
     “I can’t keep enough product,” He said sadly, “I’m okay on the weekends, but during the week there just aren’t enough people to make stocking up worth the time and the waste.”
     Jackson understood. His stock was more constant, if it didn’t move today it wouldn’t go stale. Popcorn and red licorice were not like that.
     “This should have been the perfect place, “ his friend went on, “They did the market research, the location is right. We had the right mix of shops…”
     “Except, no one needs 12 different shoe stores,” TD offered.
     “What about Star Jones?” The Greek smiled back.
     “Maybe 10, but even she wouldn’t need 12 shoe stores in one mall.”
     “Us neither!”
     The two men smiled. It was good. They had needed some lightness. The economic discussions always turned dire.
     “Well, I gotta get back,” TD said.
     “Here,” Mikle said, offering a handful of fresh red licorice, “For that beautiful daughter of yours. I know it is her favorite.”
     TD took it and said, “How much?”
     “I’ll come by for a free drink later.”
     “First one is on the house, the second one is on me.”
     “The third one will be an Alka-Seltzer.”
     They smiled at each other, and then went back on their way.
     It was the last time TD would see his friend alive.

Chapter 10
“Larry, Mo & Curly”

     TD continued his walk around the Mall.
     If he smoked, this would have been the time to do it. But he didn’t so he kept his hands in his pockets and walked.
     He was coming up to the Mall graveyard. That’s what they called the shell of the old “B.J. Tuppence” department store.      Tuppences had, around the turn of the last century been a catalog store that sold about everything. Then in the 80’s it had dropped almost everything but clothes from its brick and mortar stores, and that was when they saw the chain begin to implode.
     The move into this mall was seen as a hopeful sign that they were back and going to pull out of the nosedive that bad choices had put them in.
     No such luck. For two months now the empty storefront was the biggest blemish on the face of the merchants who believed in the possibility of this place.
     He got ready to make his ritual bow to Larry, Mo and Curly. They were mannequins who were left in the window when the chain slunk off into the night. You would think they could have used them somewhere, but maybe they were just forgotten.
     Larry was one of those fashion guys with solid plaster hair and an unjustifiably jaunting air. Mo was a lady who had looked almost fetching when she still had a wig and clothes. Curly was the joke, as he had no hair left (and a chip off his nose that, it seemed, appeared from no where).
     As TD turned the corner to look at Tuppences he saw something he never expected. Larry, Mo & Curly were fully dressed! They were dressed as Clowns.
     He wondered if Mall Management had gotten into the store and tried to liven things up.
     Then the laughter began.
     The clowns were laughing. Not in a happy, “see, we’re not really closed and ain’t that grand” way, but in a “you don’t want to come into this Funhouse at the Carnival” kind of way.
     He caught movement out of the corner of his eye.
     There were the naked children again.
     Actually, not children as he had first perceived them, but naked thin, pale and very small people.
     They didn’t have the kind of “baby fat” physique, but ganglier more emaciated small adult forms.
     They were leading children out of the mall.
     The laughing got louder, and then the glass erupted.
     The clowns were moving, and coming at him.
     They were alive, and they were not friendly.
     Before he could get his hands out of his pockets they had knocked him to the floor.
     The red circles of their mouths were full of sharp pointy teeth.
     TD struggled to get his hands free, and when he did he flipped Mo off him. When the clown/mannequin hit the wall it exploded, became a cloud of black dust and reformed into something else.
     While he stood and kicked Larry to the wall (he wasn’t any heavier than his original plaster form, so he wasn’t much of a weight) he saw that Mo was now some sort of demonic Mylar balloon animal.
     TD used Curly to pop Mo.
     Larry rolled towards TD in his new form. TD gazed incredulously at the salivating, growling big wheel that bore down on him.
     Once again Curly was his weapon of choice. The pair flew off into the distance, as Mo’s new form approached.
     Now the clown was the giant Rat-Bat-Spider thing that TD remembered from the film “The Angry Red Planet.” He had seen the movie as a child, and while most of it was nothing, the creature did unsettle him.
     He ran.
     The ratty jaws ran with drool and the spider legs skittered across the carpet after him.
     The two other clowns had taken the same form, they joined their former comrade and chased the former football star.
     It was at this moment TD decided to resign from the Merchant’s Association.

Chapter 11
“When You Are Invited To Hell, Do You Bring The Wine?”

     The cell phone in his pocket buzzed.
     If this was someone trying to sell him something he was gong to kill them.
     “TD?” The shaky voice of Molly was on the other end.
     “Baby,” Jackson answered, hoping he sounded stronger than he felt, “What’s going on?”
     He looked and knew he had outdistanced the monsters, but he didn’t know for how long.
     “We just got attacked!” Molly shouted.
     “Who was it?” He said, with anger now tingeing his alarm.
     “Not who,” she said, “It was a flock of Pink Flamingos from the lawn and garden outlet!”
     “Damn, “ he spit, “This sounds like some kind of nightmare. Are you guys alright?”
     “Yes,” she assured him, “Barry Shipbern had a gun and got most of them. Shannon even dropped a heavy cast iron pot on one.”
     “Shipbern from the bank?”
     “Uh-huh.”
     “Listen to me. Have Barry take you and Shannon and anybody else you have there into the vault of the bank. It’s outfitted with fresh air, in case anyone got locked in by mistake.”
     “How did you know…”
     “He was showing it to me the other day. When there’s no business you’ve got to talk about something.”
     “Guess so,” came the unsure reply.
     “There is also food in case the place was being robbed and the employees were locked in there for a while.”
     “Where are you?”
     “I’m okay, but there is something really screwy going on in this mall and I’m going to try to get the police. You guys stay safe till I can get there, okay.”
     As he spoke a ravenous snuggly stuffed bear was edging towards him.
     “Okay, but you don’t try to be a hero!”
     “You know me,” he laughed.
     “That’s what I’m talking about,” she said with little humor.
     “Get safe!” he said, and then slammed the bear all the way across the open space to smash against the far wall.
     “Okay.”
     “And, baby,” he said. “I love you.”
     “Love you too,” she told him, “Talk to you soon.”
     She hung up and he now saw four of those rat-bat-spider things on the far side of the hall.
     “I guess snuggly took the hint” he thought to himself.
     He looked up and realized he had taken refuge in the doorway of the closed Wine Chalet.
     The place had closed, but was scheduled to have a going out of business sale next week.
     Wine Chalet was the classy moniker they had put on the door of what was, in reality, and upscale liquor store.
     And what did every liquor store have behind the counter?
     Unlike the windows that fronted on the parking lot, these windows were without bars.
     He grabbed the trashcan from the corner and smashed in the window.
     Jumping inside, he rushed to the cash register and there he found the shotgun he had anticipated.
     It was lucky that he found it so quickly, since the monsters were right through the window just after him.
     With a roar the gun blew the face off the first one, and it wafted away.
     He leveled the barrel at the second, but somehow he missed it.
     Lucky again, he hit a wall full of alcohol. The bottled burst into flame and coated the creatures before it, who scrambled, screaming out into the hallway.
     TD picked up the extinguisher and put out the fire before it spread.
     A cursory check found one box for shells under the counter. The bad news was that there were only three more shells in the box.
     He put the shells in his pocket and walked out onto the mall.
     Two of the monsters were flaming piles of yuck.
The third was only singed, and was moving in his direction.
     It moved so fast he didn’t have time to load the gun, so he used it as a bat.
     He hit one of the front legs of the beast and it snapped like kindling. With a second swing he broke the other front leg and the thing fell forward onto the ground, its other legs not strong enough to support its large trunk.
     With the butt of the rifle he smashed its head.
     The thing disintegrated and the mist swirled off.
     Now, before anything else comes for him, he ran to the doors.
     When he hit the door he got another new, unpleasant surprise. It were as though he had hit an electrical fence.
     With an explosive “zat” of sound and light, he was hurled back.
     He looked around to see if anyone was doing it to him, or if it was the door itself.
     Again, he sprang at the door.
     Once again he was zapped three feet backward.
     He wasn’t going anywhere.
     Dazed, sitting on the floor, he tried to gather his senses.
     His first sense was sound.
     He began to hear them.
     Different sizes, different directions, but similar sounds he heard.
     Growling.
     None of it was human.
     None of it was happy.
     Almost all of it sounded hungry.
     He slipped two shells into the shotgun.
     Time to kill some evil teddy bears!