Beat To A Pulp has "They Come From Above"

Some people have no vision at all. Not only can they not see the forest for the trees, they possess the tunnel vision of a mole on the darkside of the moon. I am fortunate that David Cranmer is not such a person. He saw a piece of microfiction that two other editors had rejected and he decided that it could be more, and that it could have a greater audience.

With plenty of encouragement from David, Elaine Ash, and Katherine Tomlinson, that piece of microfiction is now a fuller, richer story that is now up at Beat To A Pulp.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you "They Come From Above," at Beat To A Pulp.

Paulie Decibels types softly...

It is not a question of "if," as it is a just a question of "when" the British crime fiction wave will wash over our shores.

Over at the other side of the pond, they bring a fresh perspective to noir and quite frankly, it tends to have a little more depth than most (though, not all) of American crime fiction. It is my belief that among those writers to change things up over here, will be Paul D. Brazill. He shifts from the abyss, to humor, to poetry, and all with amazing ease.

I will give you an opportunity to see for yourselves, by giving you two links to some of his horror writing:

His story "This Old House" is up again at A Twist Of Noir, and let's just say Bob Villa wouldn't last a minute in that abode.

And part of Erin Cole's Thirteen Days of Horror, comes "The Friend Catcher."


Enjoy.

Replay:"Reversal"

Now, how obscure is this story? To my knowledge, only six people have read it and only one has ever commented on it. Yet it I believe that it deserves a second airing and hopefully it will find an audience this time.

Let me do a better job of selling it, by giving you the opening paragraph-

Whether it's in books, movies or the news, everyone wants to talk about the heist gone wrong. Yet, nobody wants to talk about the robbery gone right and the crooks that got away. Least of all, nobody in this car or we might jinx it. And when I say it went right, I mean we were out of the bank three and a half minutes early. That counts as at least five less patrol units to deal with.

So if the heist has gone right, what could go wrong? Well, superstition certainly doesn't help. So here we go with a little "Reversal."

Best Of: "A Cool Breeze Licked The Back Of Her Neck"

This will be the last "Best Of" until some time during the summer. It's a quick read about a girl's valiant last stand. Here is "A Cool Breeze Licked The Back Of Her Neck" and as with all of my stories, don't try this at home.

Blood Will Spill

Please, I need you to know that no matter what, I love you very much.


Accusations will fly like a hundred courtrooms all merged together.

Things will be said that cannot be taken back. Blood will spill.

All is fair in love and war, but all bets are off when there’s too much liquor at a family reunion.

Oh no, Uncle Chaz has gotten into the Jose Cuervo again, may God have mercy on us all!

"Number"

She is my numerological exception.

Like a number, she is irrational and few can understand her, much less explain her without a chalkboard.

And like mathematics, you could lock me in a room with all the tutors in the world and I'll never understand her, because I have dyscalculia.

Or look at us this way-

XX + XY= Confusion.

"Art Move-oh"

Laura and Jacques take in the painting before them, and each has a decidedly different reaction, judging by their expressions.

“Isn’t Raymundo amazing?” chirps Laura. “He is just teeming with potential and I’ve invested a small fortune into him.”

Jacques moves around, but there doesn’t seem to any angle on Earth that will improve upon this work. The palette suggests a color-blind Hieronymus Bosch. The splatter-style of the brushwork makes Jackson Pollock look like a steady-handed Impressionist pointillist in comparison.

Jacques chews on the end of his sunglasses, the way so many do when they are trying to convey deep contemplation.

“He is on the verge of changing the very perception of art as we know it,” Laura chimes with her arms raised as if she is being moved by the Holy Spirit. “He is on the vanguard, he is an iconoclast and eventually, they will create a whole new movement around him.”

Jacques nods brusquely and says, “Yes, absolutely, and I believe it will be called the ‘bowel.’”

They Come From Above

Their swift, massive ships control everything in the above.

They are hideous, malevolent creatures, incapable of sentiment. They lure us out and we’re abducted without warning or mercy. If we are released, it’s not out of compassion, but due to some strange criteria that they choose not reveal to us.

Their probe hypnotizes me and, as if by magic, they seize me painfully onto their ship.

They grasp me with their horrid appendages and I cannot breathe in their brutal atmosphere. I writhe and gasp under the sinister glares of their giant misshapen heads.

“Damn, throw him back Clem, he’s got to be the smallest big mouth bass I’ve ever seen.”

My Old Haunts

Oh, yeah, I love dancing. I've been dancing since I don’t know when, it seems like forever. I go to the clubs and some cats, they just leave. They know about my abilities and they split. I keep up on all the latest dances, though my clothes are falling a little behind the times, and I wish there was more I could do about that.

I like to hit my favorite old haunts and check things out. Women are a lot wilder than I remember, sometimes for the good and sometimes they bring out the prude in me. I love the hip-hugger and low rider jeans. The tight shirts, the thongs, all that, is all good.

I can’t appreciate, however, the piercings and the tattoos just right above their butts...I can’t handle that. Then the clubs? Everywhere I go, it seems like they’re playing music from another planet. I can hardly keep up and most of it doesn’t sound like anything I was listening to, just yesterday.

The ladies love me, though. I don’t come there to hit on them or to drink: it’s strictly dancing with me. They don’t have to listen to a bunch of lines or nonsense. We get down on the dance floor and it’s cool.

And when we dance? I can’t even describe it, but I’ll try anyway. It’s kin-etic, it’s elec-tric, it’s as close to sex as we can get. Sometimes it gets a little freaky, but we keep our clothes on...for the most part. And when I touch them? The ladies shiver...they always shiver. I got that effect on them.

So I always wind it up at the Beat Box, because all that has changed over the years with clubbing, a few people still know of me there. It’s almost closing time and I’m still going strong, the ladies dig that.

Like this one tonight? She’s been going on about how she like my “retro” threads, whatever that means. I don’t know, it’s like sometimes we’re talking another language altogether, but whatever keeps the party going, you know?

She feels good during the slow dances, almost too good, you dig? But when the music picks up? She complains that she was working hard today and she wants to rest. That ain’t cool. So I know that there’s just one more dance to go before last call and she just turns her back on me. Not cool, I’m not dancing with that chick again.

“I’ll have a Seven and Seven.”

“I’m sorry, Lady. The last call is in two minutes and quite frankly, I think you’ve had a few too many already.”

“I’ve had only one drink all night.”

“Right, whatever. I still can’t serve you alcohol.”

“Well, let me have some mineral water and give the dancing fool whatever he wants.”

“Who?”

“The guy.”

“Who? What guy?”

“The guy I’ve been dancing with for the past thirty minutes.”

“Lady, you’ve been dancing with yourself all night long.”

“No, I was with a guy. He had retro clothes and old school hair. He looked like one of those disco guys.”

“Oh...Pierre, I think we’ve got another one.”

“Are you sure? Who?”

“This lady, right here.”

“What do you mean, “we got another one?”

“Did you dance with a guy in a blue polyester outfit and platform shoes? Did he have big, permed hair out to there?”

“Yes.”

“That was-“

When things get odd, it's my cue to split.

I wait outside and she keeps me waiting thirty minutes...I guess, I’m not sure, because I don’t have a watch. Pierre is walking with her and I don’t know why. It’s not like I’m scared of him or that I have any problem just walking right up to her and touching her on the shoulder, right in front of...

“Ohhhh, shit!”

C’mon Pierre, be a man this time.

This is ridiculous.

Look at them running away, you’d thought that they had seen a ghost.

Pussies.

Well, like I said. Oh, yeah, I love dancing. And I lovvve to hit my favorite old haunts.

The Writing Is On The Wall

“The writing is on the wall, Tim and it’s ugly. I mean the kind of stuff that young eyes shouldn’t see.”

“What are you going on about, Jim?”

“I’m talking about the writing on the wall, it doesn’t look good. We’re a thing of the past.”

“Who says, Tim?”

Me and James Angelo are hired muscle.

“We make sure that people stay informed of their options. We teach people the finer points of paying their loans or protection money on time, as well as the occasional confiscation of personal property to mitigate those debts.”

What does all that mean? I don’t know. It’s what Jim tells people we do and I almost understand most of it. School and fancy terms for plain things, have never been my strong suit. It was always cracking helmets on the football field and cracking heads off of it.

I would’ve become a mover, but my cousin who used to do the job, had a freak accident where he wrenched his back out, something fierce. He couldn’t see the little cat that ran in front of him while he was carrying his end of couch and the rest is just wrong. Not to mention the lady, who owned the cat and couch, had the nerve to sue him for the vet bills and the cat’s cast.

This has messed with my head...tremendously. I’m always looking down now and no cat, dog, squirrel, bird, or any other pint sized freak of nature, is going to get me.

Tonight as me and Jim sit in a “gentleman’s club” parking lot, Jim’s whining sounds a whole lot like my complaining grand aunt. She always had her hair up in a bun and she wore a black dress. Picturing Jim as my grand aunt (God knows he has the moustache for it) is the only way I can deal all this nonsense.

We are waiting for a guy named “Barry,” who was named after his father’s favorite college coach. They won the National Championship back in the day and as recently as in 2000. The problem is, Barry bets stupid. He always bets on that team...though to be fair, barring a trick play in which the other team pulled a win out in the last minute, Barry would be an extremely rich man right now and I wouldn’t be listening to the “stylistic bitchings” of Jim.

Tim is back on this, “what are we gonna do for a living? I can’t get a real job, my record is too long and no honest employer is going to trust me to even go get sandwiches and coffee with the things I’ve done.”

“I tell you what, Jim; the Board of Prisons could hire you to see if a murderer is truly insane. Having you talk to them in a locked room for half an hour? If they weren’t insane before, they’d be insane after.”

“What did you say?!”

“Hold that temper for something else, here comes our chump now.”

Barry pulls up in a Corvette that is barely two years old, impressive, no? No, it isn’t impressive at all, it’s his sister’s. The guy paying us for this job says to grab anything that Barry drives and we have tried like hell, to keep up with this Corvette.

Barry is a little too eager to see the strippers, because we are almost on him before he sees us. He puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles. Here comes one of the bouncers, lumbering up like a big clumsy attack dog. As I drop him with a small crowbar, I feel bad for the guy because I think we used to play next to each other in junior varsity football. Oh well, business, is business.

Jim holds Barry while I go through his pockets. I find the car keys and then I see why that when Barry calls, the bouncer comes. The bouncer must get great kickbacks from the dancers, because Barry has a roll of one dollar bills that would choke a Great Dane. I work Barry’s face over a little, not too much because if you rough him up too bad, the other gamblers aren’t going to want to borrow money.

One of the other bouncers went back inside to get help, so we decide that Barry has gotten the point and we take off.

“I’m driving the Corvette!”

“Says who? I did all the dirty work,” I say as I walk over to Barry’s sister’s car. “And I have the keys.”

It handles nicely as I try to chirp the tires, but there are electronics that keep me from burning rubber the way I used to. I miss good old-fashioned American muscle and with all of these computer chips, I can’t work on cars anymore. My cell phone rings and I answer it without checking the number...big mistake. Jim’s at it again.

“It said in the New York Times, of all places, that the crime families are going into drugs, or going legit.”

“Hey, as long as there are degenerates like Barry, we'll always work.”

“I don’t know, Tim. We are dinosaurs and the writing is on the wall.”

I let out a sigh; I'm tired of his whining. "What the hell, I could never read for shit, anyway,” as I hang up my phone and I turn it off.

"Reversal"

Whether it's in books, movies or the news, everyone wants to talk about the heist gone wrong. Yet, nobody wants to talk about the robbery gone right and the crooks that got away. Least of all, nobody in this car or we might jinx it. And when I say it went right, I mean we were out of the bank three and a half minutes early. That counts as at least five less patrol units to deal with.

The Phoenix Police and Arizona Highway Patrol had predictably concentrated the majority of their resources on the west, east and southern parts of town. They've figured that anyone hightailing it out of town would head for all points Mexican.

That's sound logic since we had taken enough money to live in Ensenada for years. By now it also might have come to their attention that we had pinched a fortune in jewels as well. Besides, don't all criminals believe Mexico to not only be haven, but a combination of Outlaw Heaven and Hell?

If we wanted to chance driving right under their very noses, we could do just that. We had changed cars and disguises twice and we've already passed three police cars without incident. So if everything has gone to plan, why tempt fate and talk about it? If the jinx is hovering around us like a score of mosquitoes around a porch, don't let it in.

Croyle, Babbo and I are going north to Utah, where Babbo has a plane fly that we're going to fly down to Ensenada.

The traffic on the Seventeen and the half hour of silence are getting to me, so I chime in my best Julio Iglesias, "Ensenada, where the food and ladies are hotta."

"Shut it!" barks Croyle.

"What, what's wrong with a little singing, Croyle?"

"Sing about anything you want, but not about that. Don't talk about our trip and don't...talk about our destination." Croyle rubs the cross that is dangling on his sweat-soaked shirt, then he rubs something else in his pants pocket that he keeps for good luck...no, not that.

He believes that part of the power of whatever it is that he carries, is that no one can look at it and break its bad luck. My guess is that it is a rock, though knowing Croyle, it's John Dillinger's gallstone. His twisted version of good luck, is to study the bad luck of others and I know that it has carried over to collecting objects of criminals with bad luck.

When we were in the holding cell at the Maricopa County Courthouse for a simple mugging, we met a guy in there that was about to be sentenced to life for a post office heist on Christmas Eve that had gone altogether wrong. Croyle asked him how much he wanted for the cross around his neck and the loser said a TV. The whole post office thing was so he could get his family a flat screen TV.

Croyle told him that if he gave him the cross, he would get a 42" plasma for the loser's family. The guy hesitated all of a millisecond and gave his address to Croyle as he handed the cross over. Croyle and I got that day on time served and probation. The very first thing he did was take the money we worked so hard to get to go get that family the damn TV.

"What the hell, Croyle? That guy can't touch you on the outside and he probably expects you to go back on your word! We worked too hard to get that cash!"

"I don't care about him or the money. The jinx has already touched this cross and it won't be coming back. Whoever wears this will be invisible to the jinx and its bad mojo."

So neither Babbo or me has so much even dared to sigh or fart since Flagstaff. We've just left the edge of the Navajo Reservation and we're on the Alternate Eighty-nine, north of the Grand Canyon. Now even I'm starting to believe in Croyle's convoluted superstition, though I won't say anything about it either way, so as not to tempt the jinx.

That cross has come in handy, in that we've met Babbo. I doubt that there is a scientist that was ever born that could calculate the chances of meeting someone who has both a disgruntled bank manager cousin and a plane. I'd tell you to "go figure," but the odds dictate that you can't.

What a shame that we had to pick this econobox for its low profile, because its handling is wasted on the long, luxurious curves of Alt. 89. As we come out a sweeping right-hander, a woman in a long white coat waves us down, though we're going too fast to stop. I look over to Croyle and he nods for me to turn the car around and see what this is about.

She is entirely too pale to be a native of these southwest states and her hair is as red as the sun just before it sets. She's wearing a white lab coat that is soiled and ripped. I look past her and I see why: she has a white van with two flats, one of them which she has managed to replace.

I look back from the van, straight into those green eyes...this is going to get complicated. I don't have time for love...or for lust.

"I'm sorry, could you give me a ride to Page, or to at least a gas station on the Reservation?" she says with equal mixture of helplessness and sultry.

I'd give her a ride to Argentina and Babbo with his tongue almost lolling out, seems to agree. It's Croyle's call, though and he decrees "we are running a little behind schedule and unfortunately we can't turn back. We can drop you off in Fredonia or any gas station between here and there."

She looks at the van and she looks at us. She seems a little spooked, though I'd love to be candid and tell her that she has nothing to be afraid of, because I'm all business at this point. As is, this detour is closing the barely left open window that is our escape.

"Hold on," she says with all the sultry and helplessness gone. She gets her purse out of the van, then she writes something on a piece of paper and puts it under the left windshield wiper. Babbo scoots over and she gets in the right passenger seat. We all nod to each (except for the leering Babbo) and we're off.

You'd think that another person would add something to the conversation...uh, no. Every bump in the road and every pebble that we run over, you can hear loud and clear. I look at her every so often, via the rear view mirror. Croyle's eyes are focused on the road and down the road into our future. I don't want to know about Babbo and neither does our new passenger, as she's definitely averting her eyes away from him.

Babbo who hasn't said a word since the day before yesterday, decides the break the ice.

"What's your name?"

She's distracted and I can imagine why, out in the middle of nowhere with three men who she's guessing are armed, and lo and behold, she's right. It takes a few moments for her to realize that he's talking to her.

"Jill."

"Jill, huh. I'm Ba-"

Croyle tersely interrupts "he's Bob, that's Rob and I'm Huell."

An already skittish Jill blurts "nice to meet you."

Great going Babbo, why not really try and impress her by telling her you just got through robbing a bank? But he just won't let up as his little head has taken over his all of his reasoning.

"You're wearing a lab coat, are you some kind of scientist?"

"No. Actually, I'm on my way to a conference."

I turn the radio up real loud in an effort to end this conversation before it steers back to the heist, so I don't hear what she says next. Whatever it is, Babbo has turned pale and Croyle is now redder than a lobster.

"-the car" Croyle seethes.

"What?" I ask as I turn the radio down.

"Stop, the, fucking, car!"

I stomp on the pedal and nearly lock the brakes up.

"Pull it over to the shoulder!"

I shrug and does as he says, having no idea why Mount Croyle is about to erupt, and Babbo looks like he's going to vomit. Jill's trying to figure what did she say that was so offensive and so am I.

"Get out!"

I don't know who Croyle's talking to and neither does anyone else.

"I said, get out!" he repeats. Jill reaches for her door and "not you! Him!"

I get out and Croyle shoots out of the car like one of the bullets did out of his gun, some six hours ago. He gets in the driver's side and moves the seat forward. I am just standing on the highway, trying to make sense of this and wondering how far this is going unravel.

Are we going to kill her? Has Croyle lost it completely and is he going to plug us right after that? He points to the passenger seat and I get in. Croyle puts the car in reverse and I'm waiting for him to whip it into a J-Turn or a one-eighty. It's not going to happen.

Babbo has finally lost it, he rolls down his window and vomits. With her arms and hands pushed outward and her body firmly lodged in the right passenger corner, Jill looks like a startled spider. Me? I'm contemplating putting one in Croyle as soon as the car stops...if he doesn't drive us over a cliff, first.

He has us going backwards at thirty miles an hour and this econbox has a hard enough time going forwards at that speed. Apparently the whining of the transmission and engine isn't enough of a clue for Croyle, so the car drops another hint with the smoke that is now seeping in.

"Um Cr...I mean, 'Huell,' the car isn't made for this" I offer up, as I visualize my first shot going into his chest.

I don't know if he heard me and I say it again, as I picture the second shot going right between his eyes. The glare that he gives me before he yanks the emergency break and sends us spinning, let's me know that I've gotten my point across.

We skid to a stop right in front of Jill's van, much to the detriment of us and the RV that just misses us. Croyle shoots out of the car again and whirls over to right rear passenger door. He yanks it open and Jill responds by sliding towards the nauseous Babbo. Croyle bows and does an odd flourish like some odd combination of a psycho, a modern dancer, and a chauffeur. Jill cautiously sidles around him, then sprints for her van.

Suddenly it's all so clear. I guess, we were so busy looking at her, that none of us three saw the small "Maricopa County Coroner" painted on the side of the van.

The car howls once more, as Croyle floors it and pushes it past its meager limits. I flashback on something I saw on her jacket.

"Hey, Croyle-"

"Shut up, you'll bring the jinx back."

I chuckle and say "no, you don't understand, do you know what her last name is?"

"What did I just say-"

"Her last name is 'Nix."

"So?"

Babbo laughs, he gets it.

"What? What little private joke do you two have going on that's going to bring us more bad luck?"

"Croyle, think about it. Jill...Nix. Jill...Nix."

He shrugs and Babbo's quiet chuckles are annoying him even more.

"Jill...Nix. Take away a few letters and what do you get?"

It takes Croyle another few seconds, then the annoyed look is melted by a smile.

"Jinx."

"A Cool Breeze Licked The Back Of Her Neck"

A cool breeze licked the back of her neck. Or at least that is what it would seem like to the rest of us. To her, it was the hot, fetid and fiery breath of a monster. Where to run? Where to hide? No manner of weaponry at her disposal even fazed the "Beast."

None raised a hand to help her, they even watched in bemusement or amusement at her tribulations. Everything as far as she could see was ruined or on the verge of. Her whole world was near asunder from this indomitable juggernaut. The sun was departing like her spirit and the Beast's essence grew even stronger with the coming of darkness.

A plate fell in the kitchen, the Beast knew no fear, so it knew no reason to hide its presence. Yet it circled her, toyed with her, revealing just brief glimpses and flashes of itself to increase her fear. She knew that all of her life was building up to this, her final stand and that there could be a certain nobility in death.

The beast dipped its head, extended its claws. A shiver went through her as a growl rumbled from the very bowels of the Beast and the monster surged forward with the strength of a dozen tidal waves. She tensed and stood fast at the charging Beast, determined to live her last moments with valor.

"Honey, no! Don't you dare squirt the cat with your Super Soaker! You put that thing away and get ready for bed!"



Note: JJ's starter sentence was, “a cool breeze licked the back of her neck...” The story was based on two posts, from two different blogs that I had read just a few days before.

"It Was Either A Pill Or A Piece Of Candy"

It was a pill or a piece of candy. I get lethargic from time to time, to which my cousin invariably says, "did someone mix Prozac up with your M & M's?" Only this time, I really did feel off and I wondered if someone accidentally, or intentionally dropped something into the candy batter at the Mars candy factory.

It wasn't a lighter than air feeling nor was it a sensation of being heavy. More like I could just slowly melt away or dissolve into the leather couch that I had just made the first of twenty-five payments on, and straight down. Down through the apartment that it takes two jobs to pay for and through the decrepit building that the landlord is too cheap to repair, even though he more than has the means.

Even further past the neighborhood that is no better than the sewer below it and even further still, until I would reach the Earth's core. Where the heat would consume whatever was left of me and the hell below would reflect my personal hell above.

I felt myself rush upward, twice as fast as the speed of light as she came out of the bathroom.

"Well?" was what I wanted to say, but the only parts of my body or sensations that I could control were my eyes and my ears, though both seemed like they could fail me at any moment.

"It's a minus," she spat out. In my mind I shrugged, but the expression on her face told me that I did nothing of the kind. Her irritation was all too evident as she gathered up her coat and purse.

"A plus would mean that I was pregnant," she managed before she slammed the door and left my life.

I realized that for better or for worse, the only thing "off" was me.


Note: JJ's starter sentence that Friday was, "it was either a pill or a piece of candy…"