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Sublime Awakenings	By : Kailean Category: Comics > Squee! Views: 1478 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Squee!, JTHM, or Invader Zim, nor any of the characters from these works. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Sublime Awakenings: Chapter 31

“Johnny, slow down! Do you know how hard it is to speed-walk in heels?” Elize was practically jogging down the sidewalk in an attempt to keep up with the maniac's long and angry strides.

Instead of obliging, Nny only sped up even more, hoping that his “guardian” would trip in her stilettos and impale herself on a broken beer bottle. He kept to the shadows, what little that was still human inside warning him to hide his blood-drenched form from the others, though he had long known that no one would ever notice. Oh, other humans noticed him often enough, usually to ridicule him for his appearance or some other superficial triviality. They noticed his victims as well, after they were dead. But, they never seemed to notice him while he was killing. Not only was killing a good, if momentary, outlet for his rage against those assholes who dared mock him, it was also safe from the rest of society, from those that would so carelessly toss their emotional excrement into his being as if he were a human trash compactor, if only they could see him. If he were a house-wife, the equivalent might be a long, private bubble bath.

“Yeah, a private bath filled with the blood of your family and dinner guests.”

“WHAT?” Nny turned his head sharply in Elize's direction, watching her scantily clad, borrowed form pass under streetlights as they walked. Every time the light hit her, he had to fight to keep looking at her painfully familiar face. “Did you just read my fucking MIND? Is NOTHING sacred anymore?!”

“Nny, babe, once you've crossed over, you're constantly surrounded by the spiritual. Everything is sacred, and at some point everything and nothing kind of run together, ya know? You've met God. You know.”

“Damn it, Elize! You know what I mean! Keep your freaky, demonic powers off my brain-meats! And fucking stop imitating people that I know! I WILL kill you, you know. If those petty fuckers in the club could touch you, before I chopped off their disgusting hands, then I can too!”

“Why Nny, I thought you weren't interested in touch. And this body isn't exactly alive. It is a focused effort on my part to make my spirit more solid. It's not a true incarnation. You can touch, but you still can't kill me. And I'm not a demon.”

“Oh, well, EXCUSE ME, discarnate Satanic minion. Real big difference,
I'm sure.”

“Nope. Wrong again. I'm not a Satanist either.”

“Then...why do you work for the Devil?! HUH?”

“I don't. I do the job that I've been assigned by the administration, whose orders come down through God and Satan. Well, more through the office in Heaven than through God these days, but you get the point. I work in both Heaven and Hell. And, rarely, on Earth.”

“Exactly what is this “administration” that I keep hearing about?”

“Oh, I don't really know for sure. It's all very mysterious. Yahweh or Señor Diablo might know, but if so, they've never told me.”

“So, the afterlife is a hierarchy with information passed down on a need to know basis? That seems like a pretty screwed up way to run a spiritual system.” He looked down to the sidewalk, kicking a can out of his way, and avoiding the face for which he had been suppressing a desire to look upon for years now, though it often played a role in dreams, which he also tried to avoid. “Is part of your job to torture me?”

“Nope, that's just an added bonus. Tell ya what, though. When we get back to your tumble-down shack, I'll let you torture me for a while.”

“You WANT me to torture you?!”

“Sure. Might be fun. That little massacre back at the club was nothing compared to the leather scene in Hell. Plus, I don't experience pain the way a living person does, and I have more control over what I allow myself to feel.” She paused to send him a knowing smile. “I'm great at role-play, and I know that a part of you still wants to create the perfect moment with Devi...before immortalizing it, of course. Which part would you enjoy the most? I would guess-”

Nny came to a full stop before suddenly lunging at the dead woman, pulling out one of his, still bloody, knives mid-leap. His outstretched, left arm came into contact first, pushing her back and against the side of a Hot Dog on a Stick stand, hard. He held her there by the shoulder, raising the knife high into the air with his right hand. “Shut-the-fuck-up!” With that, he brought the blade down hard, into her chest. It sank in deep, even making a screeching sound as it cut into the metal of the stand behind her. He pulled it out forcefully, raising it again. “Stay out of my goddamn head! And never, EVER talk about Devi again!” The knife went in, more quickly this time, before being lifted yet again. “And stop WEARING HER FACE!” He stabbed her again, this time twisting the knife to maximize pain, but she still wasn't dead...or more dead or whatever term one would call the death of a discarnate spirit...exercised? She wasn't even screaming her undead lungs out. “Why can't I kill you?! DAMN! FUCK! And other such obscenities!”

As Johnny threw his useless knife to the ground in a fit of rage, Elize burst out laughing, at the same time losing her semi-physical form and slipping back into her usual appearance. Maintaining the more solid form for as long as she had took a lot of energy, especially with Nny trying to hack away at it. Still, it was so worth it.

When he grunted and tried to give her an angry kick to the shins, his leg went right through her, hitting the hot dog stand and making it rock lightly back and forth.

“HEY! Who's back there!”

They both exchanged bewildered looks as the sound of the side door to the stand opening and slamming shut made its way to them. Heavy footsteps followed, and they both turned their gazes to the corner of the stand, where a chubby Hot Dog on a Stick worker emerged from the shadows.

The man looked around in confusion as his eyes adjusted to the lack of light. He looked right through the now invisible Elize, assessing the damage to his place of employment, before settling his sights on the perpetrator of the ruckus that had disturbed his nap. “Hey! What the hell do you think you're doing, you noodle-thin asshole! I just got hired here, and already there's property damage on my shift!”

“What did you just call me?”

“I said you're a noodle-thin asshole! Your circumference is that of a noodle! Do you hear me? A NOODLE!”

“Noodle?! NOODLE! How DARE you!” Johnny found himself wishing he hadn't abandoned his knife, but surely there was some acceptable instrument of death around here somewhere, probably just inside the hot dog stand. His eyes narrowed as he took cold and calculated steps toward the man. If he couldn't kill Elize, at least he could rid the world of this slime.

As the tall, dark, sinister and SKINNY man stepped into the light of the nearest lamp, the clerk's eyes widened in shocked fear. The noodle-man was covered in what could only be drying blood. Shaking and suddenly conscious of the radio broadcast about a mass killing earlier that evening at a local strip-club, the man backed up the way he had come. “Y-you. It was you. You killed all those people.”

“Yesss.” Continuing his advance, Nny smiled his biggest, widest, most psychotic smile. He could see the man trembling, sweating. He could almost smell the fear. Fear was an instinctual human reaction, designed by nature to help them act quickly to escape danger, but for this man it was already far too late. He knew. By the time they knew, they were already in his web. It was as if the unconscious certainty of their impending death broke through some barrier in the conscious mind, making them see, for a remaining few seconds, with a kind of clarity that the living world, the human world, seemed to blot out. In that one moment, they were no longer merely human. They were no longer limited by their egos. They were immortal. Eternity in a grain of sand. And he would make that moment last forever.

Elize watched with a near blank, hollow expression as Nny stalked his victim, both of them disappearing around the corner of the stand, to the front of it, where an impact and the rocking of the booth made it apparent that the clerk had been forced into it. The rocking intensified as loud screams rose from the white, rectangular structure.

Even though she had spent so much time working in Hell, and despite her claims to the contrary, this sort of senseless cruelty still made her a little sick inside. She sighed dejectedly. Johnny was such a disjointed mess, just like always. She honestly had no idea what the administration, whoever they were, were thinking when they chose him as a waste lock.

She did, however; have some idea why Señor Diablo chose her for this assignment. He must have known that they would drive each other crazy, or in Johnny's case, more crazy. The Devil certainly had a fucked up sense of humor, and maybe, with the way she had been enjoying teasing Johnny, it was contagious. Still, if anyone deserved this kind of treatment, it was him. And, he did owe her for all that time she had to spend doing janitorial work after his little head-explody incident in Heaven. Not to mention the burritos. She shuttered a little at the memories.

When the screaming died down, she made her way to the front of the stand, leaning on the service counter to observe the wreck of a human being on the other side...and the newly dead body of his latest victim as well. “Done yet?”

At the sound of her voice, Johnny popped up from behind the counter, holding a freshly prepared hot dog on a stick. “Yep.”

Just as he was about to hop over the counter and carry on his not-so-merry way home, a sleek, red car pulled up to the curve directly in front of them. It was shortly followed by a new, white Volkswagen Beetle, with a painted image of a hot dog on a stick and red, yellow and blue letters spelling out the name. A graying blond woman in a dress suit exited the automobile, making haste to the booth.

Once there, she addressed the blue-haired man with barely hidden impatience, obviously having better things to do at this time of night. “Hi. I'm Glenda, one of the owners of this city's Hot Dog on a Stick franchise. You're Joe, right?”

Nny stared blankly at the woman before him. He was still very much covered in blood, a fresh layer of red on top of dried brown that reminded him of the wall in one of the upper levels of his basement that he used to paint, but she seemed completely oblivious to this fact, too wrapped up in her own world to notice anything that she didn't already expect from a service worker.

“Right, so as the new manager of this unit, you get the privilege of driving a company car.” She used a thumb to point behind her, indicating the beetle. “So, here ya go.” Holding out a set of keys, she waited a few seconds for the new, creepy employee to take them. When he showed no signs of doing so, she shrugged and placed them on the counter before turning to go. “Well, have a productive night. Gotta make sure we give the Taco Smell a run for the late night business.”

As she walked away, Johnny tilted his head to the side, giving the keys a contemplative look. He had lost his old, run down car about a year ago after an accident involving a large batch of newly ripened laser-weasels, a city-wide black-out and two strange teenagers who managed to run fast enough to escape greasily fates, all the while being too focused on each other to even notice that they were in danger. Biting off a chunk of his hot dog, he shrugged and grabbed the keys nonchalantly before throwing his legs over the counter. Maybe this night wasn't a complete waste after all.

The trunk space was a little tight, but with enough bending and folding or chopping, he was sure he could manage to make it accommodate his needs. But that paint job would have to go, lest he find himself driving through busy streets, shouting loudly from the driver's window, “Witness my Weenie-Mobil! The Weenie compels you!” He didn't even want to contemplate the twisted puns that Reverend Meat would surely play off such a display.

By the time they arrived back at his “tumble down shack”, Nny was once again scathing with anger. As it turned out, painting a car yourself was tougher than it sounded, and he didn't exactly have enough extra money lying around to pay for the outrageous professional job that the automotive department of the local Stall Mart had recommended. In the end, he had decided against using the blood of said workers for the job...the color wouldn't stay anyway. He had bought several bottles of spray-on paint, the shade of his hair...or what was left of it. The home method would take a lot more time and patience than he was accustomed to giving any task besides torture, though. Maybe he could scrap up enough money around the house to pay someone else to do it. He wasn't sure how much he had, but he did have several uncashed checks for Happy Noodle Boy hidden in the floorboard with a gun that he would only use on himself.

In the meantime, the Weenie-mobile was parked in his driveway. Angrily, he threw the door open, making the hinges creek. Elize followed silently behind him. She had been conspicuously quiet during the ride, making him wonder if she had something else up the sleeve of her white dress shirt. He turned sharply, giving her a suspicious and cutting glare, which he held for a full minute without blinking. Finally, he shrugged, turning back around and heading for the first floor bedroom, which he never used for sleeping.

Damned Elize held the homicidal maniac's gaze levelly, rolling her eyes when he turned back around before following him into what was probably the cleanest, and most unused, room in the house. She stopped a few feet past the doorway to watch as the man made his way to the dresser to the left of the bed. On said dresser, in front of a mirror with hundreds of cracks and traces of old blood, there was a tacky old figurine of a Bub's Burger Boy. It stared forward with big, glassy eyes with no irises. “Where the hell did you get that thing?”

“Quiet! Do you hear that?”

“What?”

“Exactly! Nothing! He's gone! Just like the Dough Boys were gone after the last time I flushed.”

“He? Johnny, the figure is right there. Did you sniff some of that paint when I wasn't looking?”

“Yes, but he's not talking!”

“Yes, you did sniff the paint?”

“NO!” He rounded on her, waving his arms in the air in a quick, sporadic motion. “Pay-a-fucking-ttention! Just a few hours ago you were all over my brain and now you suddenly don't know what the hell I'm talking about!? STOP FUCKING WITH ME!”

“I thought you wanted me to stay out of your head, but fine, whatever.” She took a few more steps into the room. “Is it good or bad that he's gone?”

“I'm…unsure.” His eyes narrowed as he scanned the room for anything new, anything out of place, anything that he didn't remember being there. “THERE!” A bony finger flung itself out swiftly in front of him, pointing to the middle of the bed. The bed was made up, as it undoubtedly had been when he moved in, with a traditional floral patterned comforter that had grown ragged over the years. It was covered in a good two inches of dust, but now, lying on top of it, was a light brown, fluffy baby beaver. It was almost small enough to fit into the palm of his hand...as he squeezed the undeserved life out of it.

Elize's eyes followed the direction of his pointed finger, her face clouding in confusion. “You have a pet? A living pet?”

“Of course I don't! At least I didn't! I haven't had a pet since Nail-bunny stopped talking, unless you count Mr. Samsa. But he's really more like a role model. ” He looked back, pointedly, to the beaver. “YOU! What are you doing here?! SPEAK!”

The beaver sat up, exposing its belly and looking at Nny with big shiny eyes. Without moving its mouth, it spoke in an upbeat, high tone. “Why, hello there, Nny. I'm Waffle! I was sent because you need a better role model that an immortal cockroach. I can teach you to be a good person without becoming cold and without emotion like an insect! Isn't that just GREAT?”

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Notes:

-“Eternity in a grain of sand” is a paraphrase of the first bit of “Auguries of Innocence” by William Blake.

- A lot of what happened to Johnny during the first of this chapter was inspired by this:

5f. WILL THERE EVER BE MORE JTHM?

Probably one day. Straight from the monkey's mouth:

"When I do a JTHM run again, I plan for it to be the worst thing human eyes have ever laid eyes on. My thinking is that human beings always have this innate desire to improve upon the past, to build higher and stronger upon the foundation built on experience. I want to do something different. I wish to rebel against the natural, and embrace the perversion of human striving. I want to draw the book with my feet. I want Johnny to be a happy little guy who works at Hot Dog on a stick, and who drives a new Beetle. In order for people to truly feel something new from the books, they will have to be so horribly sickened by them that they want to throw drinks in my face. This will give them something to talk about that far exceeds the usual noise about how the older books were better than the originals. The new books should make people cry for having spent any money on them. There should also be a magical talking baby beaver in the book who gives Johnny good advice on how to be a good person." [9.8.2000 SLG message board -JV. This comes from alt . Spooky . Html
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Sublime Awakenings