Hunger
I want it so bad I can taste it
It drives me mad to see it wasted
When I need it so bad that it's burnin' me
--Spectre General
Holy Grail
A Hollywood Vampires Tale
By
Matt R.. Jones, Esq.
*
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“Shaddup kid, you have absolutely no idea what the hell you’re talking about, so you better just back off right here and right now before I have to make you look like a complete baboon . . . and a lobotomized one at that!” a tremendously annoyed Stacey growled at the equally-irritated short, chunky 12-year-old boy with the blond Kurt Cobain haircut. The pair dueled with their eyes, glaring at each other from where they stood several feet apart, next to the wall racks containing the collected and special edition Batman books, the kid’s friend, a lanky, dark-haired specimen, looking on nervously, wondering what was going to come of this. “I’ve been reading Batman comics for longer than you, and your mother most likely, have been alive, and speaking as an expert on the subject, I can tell you that on no uncertain terms, Batman can kick the ass of anybody that gets in his way!” Stacey snapped, leaning closer to the kid, who he had a good three inches on, trying to menace him with his imposing presence . . . unfortunately for Stacey, the kid was built rather stockily and had the edge on him in sheer mass, so the kid didn’t back down.
“Yeah, and that’s exactly why you don’t know what you’re talking about,” the kid snapped back, pushing some of his hair out of his eyes, “Maybe once upon a time Batman could kick everybody’s ass, when all of the superheroes were nothing but geeks running around in their pajamas, but times have changed and the superheroes have gotten a lot better than they used to be! Batman’s just a rich weirdo who wears his underwear on the outside of his clothes and uses all kinds of gadgets to get the job done, because he doesn’t even have any super powers! He’s just a regular guy!” scoffed the kid, shaking his head at the wiry man with long black hair, unable to believe the stupidity of some adults.
“That’s exactly why he’s better than everybody else!” Stacey screeched, flailing his arms in the air, drawing the attention of the several other customers within the large, happily cluttered interior of the Three Amigos comic shop. “Batman was born a regular guy, and yet he can still take on anyone and everyone, because he spent years building himself up to be the best at everything in the world . . . he’s a total self-made man! He got his abilities because he earned them, and wasn’t born with them or had them given to him like that pussy Spawn did!” Stacey informed the kid, jabbing his finger in the direction of the Spawn comic books the kid was holding in his hands. “Without his powers, Spawn’s just another generic military guy that Batman would take out without a second thought! And you know why, because he’s just that damned good! Hell, he already done did it when they got into a fight!”
The kid’s face twisted up in an angry scowl, and then he jabbed his own finger at Stacey, getting even angrier at the slim adult. “The hell he did! The only reason Spawn didn’t beat him into bits and pieces was because Batman used his wimpy nerve gas on him and that screwed him up! If Batman was so tough he wouldn’t have needed nerve gas against Spawn!”
Stacey rolled his eyes, unable to believe the gall of the kid. “And before he brought the nerve gas into it, he fought Spawn to a friggin’ standstill! A standstill! If Spawn’s so big and bad, why couldn’t he beat up a so-called regular human, huh? Batman just used the nerve gas because he was sick and tired of screwing around with a meta-human loser like Spawn, who not only had his powers given to him, but was so much of a dork he spent all his time hanging in alleys with smelly bums!”
The kid was getting so mad at Stacey his eyes were so narrow that they were mere slits, and he snarled, “At least Spawn didn’t always keep a young boy running around in briefs as his sidekick! Why’s Batman so interested in kids in tights, anyway?!” Several of the other patrons of the store were now watching the exchange with interest, having their own thoughts on the subject, and wondering just how far and how ugly this debate could get. Even the young redheaded woman with the blonde streaks in her hair had stopped reading and was following the argument from where she sat on the floor in the manga section with a stack of comics next to her. After all, how often did one see a long-haired, tattooed man in a wifebeater and leather pants get into a heated argument with a slightly rotund kid in a Spawn shirt in the middle of a comic shop in plain view of everyone?
Meanwhile, in the back of the shop, in the stockroom, Dorian could hear the rising voices and began to try to get the conversation with the local Japanese toy supplier over with as soon as he could, in case things began to get incendiary out on the floor. He probably should have just hung up, but the man on the other end was able to turn up some of the rarest and most interesting items Dorian had ever seen, and was a very friendly sort besides, so the vampire, who was the owner of the comic shop, didn’t want to alienate the fellow in any way. Besides, Yamaguchi’s boy was stopping by later on tonight with a special box of old Robotech toys for a very good customer of theirs, who was stopping by the shop at five that morning to pick up the toys before heading on a trip to Europe for three weeks (the toys were a gift for his sister’s youngest son) so Dorian needed to get all of the details worked out first, as that was an important deal. Yet again Dorian regretted bringing Stacey with him to work that night, not quite sure how he’d gotten reeled in by the other vampire’s promises of helping out and behaving himself when he should’ve realized by now that Stacey never behaved himself. But the slim vampire had somehow managed to turn up a few hard-to-find books that one of the Three Amigos’ customers had been looking for, and instead of trying to sell them or trade them for something he wanted, Stacey had actually given them to Dorian to sell to the lady, without asking for anything in return, so when he’d asked to come in tonight while Dorian filled in for one of the regular workers, who had called in sick, Dorian hadn’t said no . . . though he’d wished he had several times during the course of the hour and a half they’d been there.
Dorian tried to move to the door of the stockroom to peer out onto the floor, and then cursed under his breath when he found that the phone cord couldn’t reach the door, not with the shelves of books and boxed collectibles in the way, and he nervously fidgeted as Stacey’s voice rose into the high-pitched screech that he was extremely familiar with, the one that said that Stacey was getting ready to go off in a big way.
“Ohhhhhh, don’t you go there! Don’t you even!” Stacey shrieked at the kid, hopping up and down a couple of times in his rage. “Just because your favorite hero is a goddamn pussy is no reason to try to drag down a noble guy like Batman just because you can’t think of anything else to throw against him! And for your information, the new Robin wears pants, you idiot! You’re just pissed because Spawn couldn’t beat him in a fight!”
“And the reason for that was because Frank Miller was writing the story, and he’s pro-Batman!” the kid shot back. “He’s the jackass that thought that Batman could actually beat Superman in The Dark Knight Returns, too, when it was obvious it was bullshit!”
Stacey had reached that curious point of anger and annoyance that sometimes caused one of his eyes to nearly shut, while the other one bugged out, so he looked something like a crazed Popeye when he retorted with, “Miller’s not the first guy that thought Batman could wail on Superman in a fight, and he sure as hell won’t be the last, because everybody knows Batman could do it! And not only that, but your beloved McFarlane drew that comic where Batman put the screws to Spawn, so he knew that his boy couldn’t best ‘ol Bats! He was probably just happy that Miller decided to be nice and not humiliate Spawn totally, because he knew damned well that if Batman and Spawn got into it and Batman let totally loose, Spawn would be doing the job!”
Now the kid stopped short and looked at Stacey with irritated curiosity. “What the hell’s that mean?”
“What does what mean?”
“Doing the job. What are you talking about?”
“It’s pro wrestling terminology, you uneducated prick, and when a guy does the job, he’s getting beaten by the other guy,” Stacey informed the kid, whose countenance softened a bit, and he nodded knowingly.
“I see,” the kid said, sounding rather condescending, “Now I know why you’ve been pushing this so much . . . if you know wrestling that well, you’re obviously illiterate and don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Now both of Stacey’s eyes bugged out, and his hands came up in front of him as though he meant to strangle the smart-ass kid. “What?! You better take that back, kid!”
“Make me!” the kid growled, and then set his comics down on a box of other comics and gave Stacey a shove that moved the surprised vampire back a few steps. Stacey snarled and returned the shove, moving the kid back an equal distance. Now the kid barreled forward and pushed Stacey again, while his friend backed up, wishing he was somewhere else. The patrons of the store were now looking around at each other, wondering whether they should break this up or simply let the two children settle things their own way, and the redheaded woman was laughing her head off at the exchange, clapping her hands in glee.
“Make you? Hell, son, I’m gonna make yer momma regret she ever let your Spawn-lovin’ ass out at this time of the night! It’s almost 10:30, shouldn’t you be at home cuddled up with your teddy-weddy?” Stacey sneered as he gave the kid another shove, and then thumbed his nose at him.
“Actually, at this time, I’m usually over at your house, cuddled up with your mom!” the kid informed Stacey as he pushed the vampire, who sputtered in anger for several seconds before shoving the kid back.
“That’s rich, kid, real rich! My mom’s been dead for ages now, so if you wanna snuggle up next to a corpse, you go right ahead, and I’ll be busy videotaping your mom with me and my girlfriend!” Stacey bellowed, and then cackled at the disgusted look the kid got on his face at that comment.
“You motherfucker!” roared the kid, and he charged Stacey, hitting him with a tackle that spoke of at least some experience with football.
The vampire crowed “You’re damn right: yours!” as he tussled around with the kid, trying to get the little nipper off of him without actually hurting him or knocking over one of the comic racks or toys and collectibles on display. The redhead, who was dressed in blue vinyl shorts and a snug glittery tanktop emblazoned with the Union Jack, threw back her head in laughter and tipped over onto her back, kicking her platform shoe-clad feet in hilarity. The other spectators were also chortling and snickering, still not sure if they should continue to enjoy the scene or stop it before things got totally out of hand . . . as if they were in control in the first place.
Fortunately, Dorian’s phone call with Mr. Yamaguchi had come to an end just as the kid had rushed Stacey, and he galloped through the stockroom doorway and appeared at what he considered to be the place of the utmost authority in the place: behind the main counter with the glass display case full of Transformers and other Japanese stuff underneath it. He grabbed the air-horn kept under the counter by Glenn, Scotty, and Petey (the three guys who took care of the business itself) and let fly with it, making everybody in the store jump, especially Stacey, who had very sharp ears, and the redheaded gal, who let out a yip of surprise at the sudden loud noise and sat bolt upright on the floor. The wrestling around immediately came to a stop, and the two combatants turned towards Dorian, extremely guilty looks on their faces. Dorian pointed his finger at the kid. “Jerry, you know better than that. No fighting in here, for any reason, and if I catch you screwing around like this again, you can shop at Mark’s from now on,” he said, bringing all of his natural charisma (of which he had a ton) to bear, making it clear he wasn’t kidding around, being very firm, but at the same time not coming off as hostile. Hostile owners, even justifiably hostile owners, were bad for business.
Jerry, the blond kid, pointed at Stacey and protested, “But he started it! I was talking to Ben about Spawn and made a comment about Batman, and then this guy got into it and—“
Dorian shook his head, making his long blond hair sway back and forth. “I don’t care. If you want to fight, you know the rules: take it out to the parking lot and don’t let the cops see you, because if they do, I don’t know anything about it. And furthermore, for crying out loud, don’t antagonize him,” said the vampire, indicating Stacey, who was still glowering at Jerry, “Because arguing with him is like trying to arm wrestle a gorilla: you’re not going to get anywhere and you’re likely going to walk away from it wishing you hadn’t started it in the first place.” Jerry grumbled something in agreement, then picked up his comics again, shooting a malevolent look at Stacey, who returned it in spades.
“And as for you,” Dorian said, aiming his finger at Stacey, who held up his hands and looked around innocently as though he didn’t know what the other vampire was talking about, “If you don’t stop picking fights with 12-year-olds over whether or not Batman can beat up their favorite characters, I’m going to smash your friend here.” Dorian reached behind the counter, set the air-horn down, and grabbed the rare Godzilla fire extinguisher, which actually looked like a foot-tall exact replica of the giant lizard and could spray CO2 out of its mouth when one pushed one of the spines on his back. Dorian held Godzilla up over the solid part of the counter next to the glass section, and got into position to bounce the beleaguered lizard off the counter as hard as he could, which would likely be enough to mortally maim the scaly fire extinguisher.
Stacey’s eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t.”
Dorian gave Stacey his most winning grin. “Try me. This is the only place in town where you can get one of these things imported from Japan . . .”
Stacey’s eyes narrowed further. “You wouldn’t. That thing’s special.”
“Oh yes I would, and if you don’t quit starting fights with the clientele, your little buddy will be taking the fall for you,” Dorian said, waggling Godzilla in the air above his head while Stacey watched the imperiled lizard almost forlornly.
After several long moments, the slim vampire finally relented and said, “All right, all right, if you wanna be a tyrant about it and get an innocent involved, I guess I’ll have to leave the little peckerheads alone . . . even when they’re ignorant pricks.” He gave Jerry one last menacing look and the walked away from the kid and his friend, then came up to the counter to get Godzilla from Dorian, but the blond vampire held him away from Stacey, who grabbed furiously at the air, trying to retrieve his diminutive friend. “Gimme!”
“No can do, he’s staying with me until after our shift’s over, because I don’t trust you,” Dorian said, putting his hand on Stacey’s chest and giving him a push back.
The black-haired vampire looked shocked. “What?! What have I ever done to make you not trust me?”
“You called up the cops and told them I was running a pre-teen prostitution ring out of my house last month, and that’s just the most recent incident!” Dorian hissed, low enough that the customers couldn’t hear, as he didn’t really want that allegation going any farther than it had to, even if it was completely false.
“Aww, geez, gimme a break!” Stacey protested, still grabbing for Godzilla. “I was just kidding around, and the authorities weren’t smart enough to figure it out! How was I supposed to know they were going to harass you for two weeks over a crank call? Usually nobody takes me seriously, so is it my fault that someone finally did?”
Dorian was tempted to clonk Stacey on head with Godzilla. “Just last week you said I had it coming because I borrowed your bike!”
“Well, you did, and I’d do it again if I thought I was justified! Don’t screw with me, bucko!” Stacey barked, and then cringed at his own words, realizing that he’d damned himself yet again. “D’oh!”
“Exactly,” Dorian replied smugly, still holding Godzilla well out of reach. “Now, get over to the new book racks and start stocking them . . .there’s a good three or so boxes over there that need to be emptied.”
Stacey scowled. “Man, if I’d thought that you were actually gonna make me work when I offered to help, I wouldn’t have done it . . . I thought we were gonna sit around and watch cartoons and play with toys!”
Dorian rolled his eyes. “That’s what you usually do during the day anyway, so what are you complaining about?”
“Yeah, but I never got to do it in a real comic store before,” grumbled the slim vampire, still watching Godzilla closely, making sure the other vampire wasn’t going to hurt it. “I thought I was gonna have a new experience.”
Dorian was unimpressed. “You want some cheese with that whine? Now get going,” he said, and then held Godzilla up in front of him with a fist aimed directly at the lizard’s snout. “I mean it, dude.”
Stacey looked a little stricken at the rough treatment Godzilla was getting, but finally relented, and wandered off to the racks for all of the new books on the other side of the store, muttering some truly terrible obscenities as he went. Dorian watched him go, and was pleased to see that after a few backwards glances to see if he was being observed, Stacey got to work and began to very quickly and efficiently stock the racks.
Dorian nodded in approval, set Godzilla down on the counter next to him, then went about taking care of business, ringing up Jerry’s comics, advising the kid never to argue with Stacey about Batman again, as Stacey’s love for Batman could be considered nearly fanatical. Jerry agreed with that as he and Ben left, and Dorian shook his head. If only you knew the full truth of it, he thought, remembering the countless occasions that Stacey had dressed up as Batman and viciously ran down criminals in a manner extremely reminiscent of the Dark Knight himself, though with perhaps a great deal more glee thrown in.
Once the argument was over and Stacey had been put to work (Brandi and Steele had been totally right about him: when he didn’t particularly wish to do something, threats were the absolute best route to go with), the store settled back down into its usual peaceful nightly routine, and Dorian wandered about, helping customers, chatting with them about the myriad items the store boasted, and did a little of everything, making sure everything was displayed as neatly as possible. Other than the somewhat cluttered manner of the store, he was quite pleased with the way Glenn, Scotty, and Petey had been running the store since he’d set it up and brought them in as its management a couple of months ago, after their own store (Android’s Dungeon) had been harassed and run out of business by their competitor, the owner of Mark’s Comics, who was incidentally named Mark, the fat bastard.
When Dorian had learned that Mark had gotten hold of the deed of the building where the three guys had set up shop in and had then caused them several weeks of trouble with building codes, fines, “mysterious” power outages, and other such nonsense before finally declaring that he wanted to rent the building out to somebody else (after he’d damned near drained the trio dry), Dorian had decided to finally act on his longstanding desire to have his own comic shop. He bought all of the three’s remaining stock from them so that they could pay off their debts to Mark, and then got hold of a new building for them, which was rent-free (Dorian had many connections in the big city of Los Angeles), helping them get their whole operation up and running again. They’d been flabbergasted at Dorian’s acts of philanthropy, as with his usual leather and denim-clad look he didn’t seem like the type that would have a lot of money to throw around, and also because he did so much for them simply because they’d set aside items for him and had even kept the store open later on nights that new comics that Dorian was interested in arrived . . . as far as they knew, he had a skin disease that prevented him from going out in the daylight, and had very nicely accommodated him without having been asked.
Dorian appreciated acts of kindness like that, and it hadn’t seemed like a big thing at all to help them out in a time of need . . . they’d helped him out as best as their means could provide, so he’d returned the favor with the best that his own means could give them. He’d had two conditions when he’d started up the store, and they were that the trio had the store running 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so that all of the odd fanboys and collectors, like himself, could simply come in and get their goods whenever they felt like it or had the chance, and that he got first dibs on the really cool stuff that he liked the best. The arrangements went off without a hitch, and Three Amigos Comics got off to a good start and continued to do a very brisk business, as with all of Dorian’s connections and tremendous funds (he was one of the many vampires that took care to always have large sums of money scattered in banks all over the world, as it never hurt to have a lot of cash on hand if you needed it), he was able to ensure that the store had the biggest and best selection of any place in Los Angeles, and the 24-hour thing only helped further move the operation along. While most of the time he was content to be the semi-mysterious owner of the store who came in a couple of times a week to check on things and pick up anything he might be interested in, Dorian would occasionally work at the store as well. Sometimes he’d do it to fill in for someone that was sick, and other times just for the hell of it, since he enjoyed being amongst others who shared his interests that didn’t involve fast cars, fast music, and fast women.
Dorian settled in behind the counter, Godzilla at his side, arranging the Transformers on display around a bit, and made sure they were dust-free and polished up to look as good as possible, occasionally giving in to the temptation to transform them and try them out. As he fiddled, he could begin to understand why Stacey was so fond of these things, as they offered a great many possibilities as toys as well as display pieces, and he got them arranged in a very nice battle scene that not only showed them off, but did it in a very dynamic way that he was extremely pleased with. He stepped back and admired his handiwork, glad that he’d come in to work tonight, as there were times that it was simply nice to fall into a pleasant little lull like this instead of always going out ranging around all over town. As much as he loved ripping it up on stage with the other members of the Hollywood Vampires, the hard rock band that he played bass and occasionally sang in, or tearing up and down the strip in his highly-customized and extremely beautiful ’65 Mustang (not a scratch on her!) or chasing around the prettiest and most seductive women in town, both vampire and mortal alike, he enjoyed spending a quiet evening goofing around the shop now and again.
It was almost as though the shop came around at the right time for him, as in the last several years there had been nights that he hadn’t felt like doing the usual things, but he hadn’t known what else it was that he’d wanted to, giving him a rather nebulous and drifting feeling that he hadn’t particularly liked. It was akin to when a person wanted to listen to music or eat, but found that the usual suspects just didn’t do it for them just then, and they sat around trying to figure out what the hell it was they wanted for a while before finally giving up and going with whatever seemed to best fit the bill, even though it didn’t totally satisfy them. That was what had been happening to Dorian, and shortly after he’d bought the shop, Petey had called up Dorian and asked if it would be all right for him to come in and run the store for a few hours while he got some sleep. The three hadn’t totally filled out their staff yet, so they’d been taking turns running the shop at different times of the day, and after working a long, busy day, Petey had gotten a call from Glenn and Scotty, who’d gotten stuck in New Mexico early on that day while heading back from a convention, after the motor of Scotty’s formerly trusty Escort had frozen up. Petey didn’t have anybody to cover the graveyard shift that night, and after already working a full day, the young half-Samoan wasn’t sure if he could manage to work through the night until the next worker came in at 4 am, so in desperation, he’d called Dorian, who, to Petey’s delight, had been more than happy to come in. Petey had originally asked if Dorian could just watch over things for three or so hours while he caught a quick nap so that he could make it until the morning, but Dorian had sent him home and told him to get a good night’s sleep, and that he was good until the next guy came in. As happy as Petey was about it, Dorian found that he was even happier, as he’d been in one of his odd moods that night and had decided to stick around his big house in Venice Beach rooting through his massive concert bootleg collection, organizing it further, and when Petey had called him in, he’d found that it was exactly what the doctor had ordered. The rest of the night had slipped by so quickly and pleasantly that Dorian had barely noticed the time passing, and when the next worker came in at 4, Dorian was certain that the fellow had shown up early. So now, Dorian usually filled in for the graveyard shift workers when they couldn’t make it in, and sometimes he’d just appear and either help out whoever was working or otherwise relieve them for the evening with full pay . . . needless to say, that as a boss, Dorian was never compared to a diaper.
After Dorian had finished with the Transformers, he felt a tap on his shoulder, and turned to see that Stacey was crouching down behind the counter with him, and when Dorian began to ask him what he wanted, the black-haired vampire shushed him and then pointed over in the direction of the anime and manga section, which was obscured from sight by the counter. “Can you hear it?” Stacey whispered, looking somewhat conspiratory.
“Hear what?” Dorian whispered back, humoring the slim vampire, hoping that this wasn’t going to end in rabid screeching.
“Her.”
“Her who?”
“The red-haired chick over by the Japanese stuff,” Stacey said, peering over the counter and then dropping back down after a quick glance. “Can you hear her?”
Dorian replied, “Yeah, I can hear her just fine.”
Stacey looked at Dorian askance for a second, and when Dorian shrugged, the slim vampire held out his hands as though he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “And?”
Dorian shrugged again.
“But she’s talking to herself, and not talking to herself like I do; I mean she’s having a full conversation with somebody that I can’t see or hear! I listened to her for a full five minutes while I stocking, and she’s reading parts of the comics out loud to somebody named Lucille, and then discussing them! I think she’s talking to someone else named Fred, too . . .” Stacey said. Dorian gave him one more shrug, and Stacey shook his head. “And this doesn’t strike you as odd in any way, shape, or form? And what does she think this is, a lending library? If she wants to read stuff for free, tell her to go do it somewhere else! She’s got a whole stack of comics next to her that she’s been working through!”
“Well, for starters, she always buys everything she reads, and the guys have told me that she likes to read here in the store because she enjoys the ambience, and they don’t mind, since she’s an attractive girl and attractive girls tend to draw guys into comic stores, especially when said girl is obviously interested in comics. In case you haven’t noticed, she’s had several different guys hovering around her tonight, making small-talk with her, trying to pick her up, and even though they’ve struck out, they’ve all bought stuff from that section, so apparently she’s having some effect on sales. And not only that, but she’s cute and I, for one, really like her voice,” said the blond vampire, who very much enjoyed listening to the gal’s husky, British-accented voice. “And secondly, after putting up with you for right around forty years now, there’s very little that strikes me as odd these days, and when something does strike me as odd, for some strange reason, it usually involves you.”
“But I’ve never talked to invisible people!” Stacey hissed, annoyed that Dorian was taking this so lightly.
Dorian snorted. “What about Mr. Frock?” he asked, referring to the horrible, bile-green sock puppet Stacey had carted around with him for an entire week back in the mid-80’s, performing most of his interaction with other people through the ugly sock with the googly eyes.
“Mr. Frock wasn’t invisible,” Stacey growled, “He was right there, plain as day, so everybody could see who I was talking to, and Mr. Frock would interact with other people, too, so it was clear he wasn’t an imaginary friend.”
“Mr. Frock also sucked,” Dorian replied dryly making the other vampire sputter. “I don’t know how many near-fights you got yourself, and the rest of us, into because you started talking shit through that stupid sock and then pretended you had no control over him. Now don’t worry about the redhead . . . as long as she doesn’t try to rob us, kill us, or wreck the place, and she pays for her books, she’s welcome to have conversations with whoever she wants, even if we can’t see them.”
Stacey shook his head. “Dude, you are so soft when it comes to women, I swear . . . she’s probably a ticking timebomb just waiting for someone to go off on, and even though it’s clear she’s cracked, you’re not gonna do a damned thing until she tries to cut our heads off, are you?”
“Nope,” said Dorian firmly, fully comfortable with the fact that he was a very soft touch when it came to women, especially comely ones. He’d always thought of himself as more of a lover than a fighter, and despite his sometimes lecherous ways, he was actually rather gentlemanly and chivalrous towards the female species much of the time.
Stacey sighed. “You’re gonna get yourself killed one of these days by a supposedly harmless chick that’s gonna put a meat cleaver into your brainpan.”
“I already almost did get killed that way, and it hasn’t changed my habits any, so I guess I’ll take my chances,” Dorian replied, remembering his run-in with a murderous woman who had turned out to be a great deal more bloodthirsty than himself, “And if she tries to take us out, I’ll make sure to throw you to her first . . . gotta use the buddy system when trouble arises, and besides, I know how you’ve got a thing for redheads.”
“Not lunatic redheads that are out to do me bodily harm if I cross them the wrong way,” Stacey replied, watching the woman closely as she giggled and talked to herself while she read.
“Hmm, and what about Janice?” Dorian asked slyly, referring to an ex-girlfriend of Stacey’s that he wouldn’t break up with because he was afraid she’d try to kill him if he did.
The black-haired vampire shuddered at the reference. “Stifle yourself. Don’t even remind me of her . . . that was just a freak of nature anyway,” he said, sticking out his tongue in disgust.
The blond vampire decided to let the obvious opportunity for another rib pass, as it was just too easy. “Then you can forget all about her while you’re minding the counter for me, because I’ve got to take some quick inventory in the back,” Dorian said, rising to his feet and stretching.
Stacey didn’t look totally pleased at the thought, and still had his eyes on the young redhead, looking at her as though he expected her to grow a second head, a third arm, and then charge him waving a hacksaw while spewing forth obscenities in Yiddish. Of course, considering the fact that Stacey’s mind didn’t totally exist on the same plane of reality as everybody else’s, that could very well have been the case. “What if she tries to cut me up and drink my blood out of a Yogi Bear sippy-cup? She seems like the type that would do that . . .”
“No great loss,” Dorian said as he headed back to stockroom, making sure to take Godzilla with him, just in case. “Just don’t get the Transformers bloody if she starts hacking you up, okay?”
Stacey’s middle finger did all the talking that was required, and he sulkily settled into the stool behind the main counter, crossed his arms over his chest and did his best to be surreptitious while he kept his eyes on the redhead. “This is a stone drag, man . . .”
Dorian chuckled as he sauntered back into the stockroom, settled down on the floor with a clipboard he’d grabbed from one of the shelves, and began to root through the several boxes of back issues that were several years old, wanting to take stock of what the store did and didn’t have, in case somebody came asking. Stacey apparently didn’t mind sitting behind the counter too much, as it didn’t take him long to find the store’s stereo and start fiddling around with it, making Dorian wince several times as he monkeyed around with the volume level while trying to figure out what to listen to, before finally deciding to pacify himself with one of the Cult’s older albums. The music made it into the stockroom quite clearly and Dorian found that it made the time pass even faster, and before he even knew it, he was already through the first box of back issues, which he’d even organized by title and publication date.
As he started on the second box, he heard Stacey ringing up a couple of customers, and listened very carefully, his ears sharp enough to be able to pretty well follow what the other vampire was doing on the cash register, and he was pleased to discover that Stacey had actually paid attention to him when he’d given him instructions on how to run it earlier that evening . . . the eccentric vampire was actually quite the capable and clever individual whenever he felt like it, except that most of the time it satisfied him more to behave somewhere along the lines of a precocious chimpanzee with a pronounced rambunctious streak. Shortly afterwards, Stacey made him jump by appearing in the doorway and bellowing, “Hey! I’ve got a guy here selling some old comics, what do I do? They’re mostly Batman ones, too, all mint it looks like!”
Dorian shot Stacey a dark look, as he’d nearly hit himself on the head with the clipboard when he’d jolted and didn’t like the way that Stacey was grinning at him after seeing that. “There’s a big binder on one of the shelves underneath the cash register, that has ‘price guide’ written on the cover . . . get that, find the books in there, and then make him offers on them based upon what the guide says and what kind of condition the books are in. And if you’ve got anything that you’re doubtful about, ask me . . . nicely.”
“Jahwol, mein Fuhrer!” barked Stacey, giving Dorian a Nazi salute as he tried to click the heels of his combat boots and then disappeared again, leaving the blond vampire to the peace of the stockroom. He could faintly hear Stacey muttering to himself as he went through the price guide and looked over the comics, and Dorian forced himself to stay in the stockroom and let Stacey take care of the job . . . the guy was nearly two thousand years old, so if he couldn’t judge the condition of old comic books when he had a rather explicit price guide in front of him, then there was something wrong with him.
Dorian fell back into a lull of inventorying and organizing the comics in the second box as Stacey haggled prices back and forth with the guy, and then finally the cash register’s drawer sprang open and the vampire counted out the cash for the guy, which sounded like a fair amount from what Dorian could tell. After that had been done, he heard the man ask Stacey about another book he had, and Stacey made a sound of complete and utter disgust, followed by, “Get that piece of crap outta here! I don’t condone that sorta shit! If you think I’m gonna buy that off you, you’re as cracked as that . . . never mind, can’t say that right now, or I might get beheaded. But I’m not crazy, so I ain’t buying it! You can take it to that Mark guy for all I care, he’s probably sick enough to buy it . . .” After exchanging a few more words, Stacey bid the man a nice night, and the bell hanging from the door clanged as the man went out.
Dorian’s curiosity was heavily piqued by Stacey’s reaction to the mysterious book the man had tried to sell him, especially the comment about “not condoning that shit,” because as far as Dorian knew, there were very few things that Stacey didn’t condone. It might have been something pornographic in nature, but it had to have been something really terrible for Stacey to get pissy about it, as he was something of a porno enthusiast, and he was pretty jaded to the more extreme forms of the subject . . . it couldn’t have been kiddie porn, because the guy would have been quite dead as soon as Stacey had seen it; the slim vampire’s reactions to that sort of thing were even more extreme than most other vampires in Los Angeles (who universally frowned on the subject matter), to the point of being utterly, hatefully vicious. Dorian wondered if it was something imported, as that stuff could get really insane at times, and now he hurried up to finish the second box so he could hop back out front and find out what it was.
He decided that he couldn’t wait, so he hopped up from the floor, headed for the door, and when he came back up behind the main counter, Stacey was sitting on the stool again, reading through the stack of comics the man had sold him, which looked to be almost all old Batman issues, from what Dorian could see. “Looks like you got a pretty good haul with that . . . and you went by the guide?” he asked Stacey, who looked offended at the question.
“Of course I did! I even gave him fair price quotes, just because I knew you’d get uppity if I took advantage of him, since he was selling those books to get some new custom parts for his Fiesta, of all things . . . you can be such a Pollyanna sometimes, I swear,” Stacey said, setting the issue he was reading down on the counter and giving Dorian a meaningful look.
“Bite me,” Dorian said, and drew back his fist and swung at Stacey, stopping when his knuckles were less than an inch from the other vampire’s nose, making Stacey jump a little in the stool. Then Dorian slugged him in the shoulder twice. “Two for flinching,” he snickered as Stacey rubbed his wounded shoulder and scowled at him. “So what was it that you didn’t want to buy? I heard you bitching about something he tried to sell you . . . was it somebody else trying to pass off some of the really nasty foreign porno or something?”
Stacey shook his head. “Naw, he was trying to sell me a copy of that lousy Vengeance of Bane one-shot, and thought he was going to wring some extra bucks out of me because it was one of those stupid editions with the fancy shiny covers. I told him to shove off and that kinda shit doesn’t fly with me . . . I hate those covers, nothing but a stupid marketing ploy, anyway.” He picked up the book he’d set down on the counter and started to read again, while Dorian stared at him in shock and horror, trying to form words to express his feelings at the other vampire’s ignorance.
Though Dorian couldn’t speak at the moment, Stacey noticed that he’d started to tremble a bit, and then looked up at him curiously. “What? It’s not like you don’t have it already . . . hell, when I read the awful thing, it was your copy! Besides, that’s the origin of that jackass who broke Batman’s back in the cheapest way imaginable . . . if he was a real man he woulda went up against him mano y mano when Batman was at his best instead of letting all the other bad guys run him down first! I ain’t gonna support that kinda shit . . . Bane’s the pussy to end all pussies, if you ask me, and if I still had to wipe my ass, I wouldn’t even use his origin book for that. Now Azrael, now there’s a baaaaaad mofo right there, hell, he’s so cool that—”
Finally, Dorian regained control over his voice and the first thing he managed to get out was, “You idiot!” cutting the other vampire off completely. Stacey leaned back in his seat and gave Dorian a somewhat concerned look . . . not concern for Dorian, mind you, but concern for himself.
“What?” he asked innocently.
“I’ve . . . been . . . looking . . . for . . . that . . . forever!” Dorian stammered, his eyes bugging out monstrously as he tried to shoot lasers from them and burn a hole through Stacey, but to no avail.
“You’ve already got it, though!” Stacey protested, setting the comic back down and getting into a posture more suitable for running away, just in case he needed to. “I should know, when I read it, it was your copy!”
“I don’t have the special edition, there’s only fifty of those in existence!” screeched Dorian, nearly apoplectic by now. The redhead sitting on the floor with her stack of Japanese comics had ceased her odd conversation and was now watching the exchange between the two with unconcealed interest . . . fortunately, she was the only one in the store besides them.
“Oh come on, don’t tell me that you’re being bought in by that stupid marketing ploy with those idiotic special covers with the foil and shimmering shit on them, are you?” asked Stacey, looking at Dorian as though he’d been scandalized. “That stuff’s D-U-M, dumb!”
“Any more dumb than collecting every single version and variation of Black Sabbath’s first album, whether it be vinyl, tape, or CD?!” hollered Dorian, referring to Stacey’s obsession with the legendary heavy metal band’s first album. He slammed the clipboard down on the counter, making both Stacey and the redhead jump, and then he hissed, “I oughtta kill you right this minute!”
“But that’s different, a lot different! That’s Black Sabbath we’re talking about!”
“This is a Batman comic! The guy you dress up like every several months! That’s the last comic I need to have a complete collection of everything connected to the Knightfall storyline, EVERYTHING! That’s my holy grail, you asshole!” Dorian yelled, his eyes starting to glow reddish, which was extremely common among vampires whenever their emotions started to really run wild. “I’ve been looking for it for five years now! I’ve been to conventions as far away as Jersey, Canada, and Florida searching for it! And now it just walks into my store and you chase it away?!” Now Stacey was leaning farther back in the stool than any mortal ever could, his vampiric balance the only thing keeping him from toppling onto the glass display counter.
“So what’s the big deal? He’ll probably take it over to Mark’s Comics and sell it there, I bet that fat bastard’ll buy it in a heartbeat, and rip the guy off in the process, and then you can just get it from Mark . . . it’s not like you can’t pay for it, and even if you don’t wanna do that, you can just steal it!” Stacey said, trying to soothe Dorian’s raging nerves.
Dorian growled, as Stacey simply didn’t understand the situation. “And what if the guy doesn’t take it to Mark’s, what if he thinks it’s worthless after you talked it down, and he takes it home, never to be heard from again? Yeah, I could wait until another one crosses my path, I’ve got the time, but dammit all to hell, Stacey, it’s the principle of the thing! I told you if anything was questionable, you were supposed to ask! What if that had been a super-special Harley-Davidson part that I just sent away, possibly forever?”
Stacey shrugged as though the answer were elementary. “Well, I’d kick your ass all over the place for being so . . . uh oh.” Understanding dawned in Stacey’s mind, and he began to realize just how deep of a hole he’d dug himself, as Dorian took his comic collecting as seriously as Stacey did his motorcycle hobby. At the evil gleam in Dorian’s eyes, Stacey’s own eyes got huge. “Now hold on, hold on here a second!” Before Dorian could attempt any bodily harm on him, the slim vampire lunged forward and slithered around Dorian, putting his own natural agility and swiftness to excellent use, and Dorian just barely missed grabbing him by the neck and shaking him silly. “The more time you spend trying to massacre me, the more likely it is that guy’s gonna get away!”
When the blond vampire responded by making another lunge for Stacey, the black-haired vampire did a neat commando-style roll into the stockroom, knowing that if there was a time to make a rescue, it was now . . . no telling what Dorian would do to poor hapless Godzilla after this! Stacey snatched up the lizard fire extinguisher from the floor next to the back issue boxes as fast as he could, then charged forward to run out the way he came, and stopped short, as Dorian was standing in the doorway and looking positively murderous. “Outta my way!” When Dorian started to move forward, a dangerous gleam in his eyes, Stacey formulated a quick plan, one that would hopefully help him survive.
He held Godzilla up in front of him and said, rapidly moving his mouth so that it was out of sync with his words (looking like a badly dubbed movie), “Hory cow! It is Gojira! RUN!” in the absolute worst impersonation of a Japanese accent Dorian had heard in a long time. As soon as Stacey started to speak, he jammed down on Godzilla’s special spine, causing icy CO2 to spray out of the lizard’s mouth and jet all over Dorian’s chest and face, momentarily blinding him. Stacey threw back his head and let fly with a pretty good imitation of Godzilla’s trademark roar, and then rushed forward, pushing the temporarily sightless and heavily cursing vampire out of the way and running out into the comic shop, where he leaped over the glass display case like a gazelle and hightailed it for the door, making “Whoo whoo whoo!” sounds like Curly of the Three Stooges as he went.
Dorian blinked the frozen spray out of his eyes after a few seconds, and he was in hot pursuit of Stacey as the fleeing vampire sprang over the display case, leaping over it several seconds after Stacey did. Unfortunately for Dorian’s killing instincts, Stacey was an expert at running away from trouble, and he managed to get out the door, on his motorcycle, and was pulling out of the parking lot, heading for the safety of the river of L.A. traffic just as Dorian made it outside. Triumphantly holding Godzilla above his head, Stacey revved up his customized beast of a motorcycle, affectionately named “Jocko,” and tore off into the stream of cars going past the shop, pulling out in front of a minivan, and disappearing from sight, though his Godzilla impression could be faintly heard above the sounds of the vehicles. And to make matters even worse, a blue Fiesta had just pulled out of the parking lot ahead of Stacey, which was likely the guy with the book Dorian wanted . . . he’d just missed him!
