Chapter 138: 4.34

I had a few faces in the past that were outgoing even though I myself wasn’t. I was quite introverted actually if my self-assessment was accurate. I wasn’t like those people whose answer to “What do you want to do in life?” was “Everything”, or those who just up and went backpacking in Asia or something on a whim. Erind Hartwell was just a simple girl with a simple life.

Okay, I was an Adumbrae now, so not that simple. The point was I rarely tried new and adventurous activities.

Never in all my years on this dirtball of a planet, and some unspecified amounts of time in other dimensions whenever SpookyErind was around, did my simple, cute, and pretty self—the adjectives were starting to pile up—ever expect to loot a convenience store in the middle of a raging riot…

Yet, here I am.

“Lil’ Homie, this your first gig, or what?” A burly man swung open the door of the fridge behind me and shoved the beer cans on its shelves down to a shopping cart. He was fully covered in dark-colored clothes and wore a balaclava mask as I did. “Doncha worry, Cracked Humpty’s gotcha. I take care of Trevino’s crew while the BID got him. Just grab anything you want.”

Cracked Humpty? Not sure if I heard that correctly. Cool street name.

To my right was an ice cream freezer cabinet. I liked ice cream, even though I had to wait each time to eat it because of Rule #10. However, I wasn’t sure if it would lower my looter creds if I got, or stole, rather a couple of pints. I eyed it then turned to Cracked Humpty. He nodded encouragingly at me. I pushed aside the cover of the freezer and scooped a few tubs in one dive.

A topless guy who wrapped his head with his shirt handed me a shopping basket. I placed my loot inside and bowed as thanks. They seemed nice.

After leaving Myra’s car behind because the street was blocked, I went with the stream of people going to the police station with no plan and no clue of what was happening. I had a feeling that the car was going to get trashed. Sorry, Myra. I was going to help them anyway, so I was certain she wouldn’t mind it.

I fitted right in with the protesters—rioters—with my get-up, other than that I didn’t have any PCM paraphernalia with me. I saw a long pole with a PCM banner attached to it propped up beside the entrance of a convenience store, so I went to get it. At the same time, a group of people rushed into the store to loot it, sweeping me along with them. I was positive they weren’t with the PCM; they didn’t have any of the distinguishing yellow color or the fist symbol, and they weren’t keen on joining the march but instead focused on stealing.

“You okay with just that, Lil’ Homie?” asked Cracked Humpty.

I nodded. I refrained from speaking to not give away I was a girl. They thought I was a teenage boy, apparently mistaking me as part of “Trevino’s crew”, whoever that was.

“Finish up, boys!” called out Shirtless Guy, who wasn’t really shirtless because he used his shirt as a mask. “We movin' next door!”

“Keep up! Keep up!” Cracked Humpty grabbed my basket with ice cream, put it on his cart, and guided me out. Shirtless Guy and about half a dozen others followed us carrying their goodies. “Stick with me, Lil’ Homie. Don’t get left behind. You don’t want no PCM to get a hold of your ass.”

“Got that right, Humpty,” said Shirtless Guy. “We’re just hawks, cleanin' up their trail.”

“Hawks?” Some guy behind piped up. “They don’t eat no scraps. We vultures, man.”

“I saw a hawk eating a fuckin’ roadkill ‘coon once.”

“Get your eyes checked, man. Ain’t no hawks eat roadkill.”

“I watched Animal Channel when I was little, hawks are also scavengers.” There were grunts of agreement, and that settled the issue. Apparently, we were hawks.

I was in a bit of a quandary here.

Two actually.

The first was I didn’t put up a face that I was with their gang; they just assumed I was. However, I went along with it on a bit of an impulse, so that was on me. The concept of ratification in law applied here; I approved of their act and adopted it as my own. I was stuck with this face and couldn’t break it as per Rule #7. 

The second question was whether Rule #7 was even going to apply in this case. Did I really have a face to speak of? I was wearing a literal mask. My identity was this actual mask. Did this count?

For now, I assumed it did because it was the prudent thing to do.

Just like with the US legal system, if there was a shaky part of a law, the law enforcer, the cops, for example, should ensure it was followed to a tee. It was up to the courts later on, if a legal challenge was raised, to interpret an exception, if so warranted, which would then become part of the case law. In my case, I was the Rule maker, the Rule enforcer, and also the interpreter of the Rules. But I didn’t have the time right now to sit down and deliberate on how this should work.

I guess I’m going to go looting with them for a bit.

And one of them also watched the Animal Channel as a kid, so I was chill with them.

We broke into a shoe store a couple of doors down the sidewalk. “Do your shopping, Lil’ Homie.” Cracked Humpty gave me back my basket. The rest of the group rushed down the aisles to get the products they wanted. “We first here, we first dibs.”

Despite my pressing mission of helping Myra, Johann, and Ramello, I also went to pick out a few pairs of shoes. Not that I was going to bring this with me back to Deen’s house, but this was such a rare opportunity that I had to immerse myself…was my fake reason. I personally just found this very amusing.

A realization came to me.

You know what’s funny? I asked myself.

Whenever I transformed, I thought in answer, I had a literal mask becoming a literal face, and body too. So, this balaclava mask should be considered a full face as well. And another funny thing was that I was also trying to make different faces for my transformed faces like I was trying to make my Pino face have a heroic face…aaaah! My head is spinning with layers and layers of faces to keep track of.

I had a suspicion that there was an ironic twisty shit in all of this. Adumbrae powers were connected to the person in some ways, and I was sure SpookyErind set something up with me that was hilarious to her. She was probably laughing right now that I was carrying a shopping basket with tubs of ice cream and boxes of shoes in the middle of a riot. Oh well, if she was entertained, she was on my side, so it was all good.

Time to get serious. I circled back to the front of the store to observe the PCM outside.

Were all the megaphones used by the PCM leaders capable of mind-controlling their members? I couldn’t say for certain. But I was super positive it didn’t work on all of them. It wasn’t that noticeable unless one really paid attention to each individual, but there was only a small fraction of the dozens and dozens of them who immediately reacted, almost mechanically, whenever someone gave an order using the megaphone. The majority just followed instructions like normal people, going along with the group.

I surmised that yesterday, the main PCM horde went to protest at the memorial for the Adumbrae attack casualties, while those connected to the megaphone thingy stayed behind around the hospital for a different purpose. Now, they were mixed together. And…I don’t know what to make of it.

When our looting party would go to the next location, I was going to separate from them.

And then what?

Going to the police station was the simplest option, but not the easiest. Or it might be the easiest considering other alternatives. But I didn’t immediately head there because I had a hunch something bigger was afoot, and it might be a good idea to get a megaphone. Strolling up to a PCM leader and just grabbing it was too rash, so I was observing, gathering more information. Hooray, I’m being careful. And I now had ice cream and shoes.

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“Me knows we got to loot shit because of 'em,” said Shirtless Guy, noticing that I was looking out the display windows at the PCM fucks on the—oh wait, there was no more window because we broke the glass getting inside. “And I like them new kicks,” he continued, raising his feet to show the stolen sneakers he wore, “but I’m getting really bad vibes from them PCM dudes.”

“You got that right,” Cracked Humpty said, rolling his cart piled high with shoeboxes up to us. “Showing up out of nowhere a few months ago and gathering a group. Preaching and all that. Me? Not going to join that fishy shit.”

“Yeah, they actin’ mighty suspicious. Be all mysterious with what they doin’. Reminds me of them Adumbrae cults.”

“Was telling Lil’ Homie here to be careful of the PCM.” He peered down at my basket. “Whatcha got there, bro? That lady heels? Watcha going to do with that?”

I picked up the box of pumps I got, stared at it, and then shrugged at them. I didn’t pick this for myself; this wasn’t my size or my style. I just wasn’t good at this looting thing.

“Givin’ that as present for your mum?”

“That’s a good Lil’ Homie right there,” said Cracked Humpty, patting my back. I resisted the urge to tear his arm off; I didn’t like being touched, but we were part of the same gang. “Let’s get a move—”

“Aargh!”

The three of us looked at each other, all equally surprised by the anguished scream. It came from further inside the store.

“Yow, Pinky! What’s goin’ on back—” A display cabinet toppled on us.

Cracked Humpty pushed me out of the way. He and Shirtless Guy dropped to the floor. They were lucky the shopping cart stopped the cabinet from falling further and hitting them. They scrambled towards me as the screaming continued.

“Fuck was that?” Cracked Humpty spun around. “Pinky! What happened to your arm?”

This Pinky guy held a bloody stump, his arm lost up to his elbow. He yelled for help as he tried to get away from someone dressed in PCM clothes. This mysterious newcomer had blood down his front, and the missing arm was entangled with tentacles that came out of his mouth. Hey, this looks familiar. Déjà vu?

“The hell is that thing?!” Cracked Humpty shielded me with his body.

“Motherfucking Adumbrae!” Shirtless Guy reacted quickly and whipped out a gun tucked in his waistband. Gunfire reverberated inside the small store. “Take that!”

The tentacle zombie staggered as Shirtless Guy emptied his gun. But the zombie didn’t fall. It wasn’t an Adumbrae that had extreme regenerative capabilities, contrary to their assumption, but it was still pretty hard to kill. It flung the arm it was chomping on at us. We ducked. Then it jumped at the first guy it was trying to eat, wrapping his head with tentacles and trying to rip it off his body. Fearing for their lives, the other gang members had no choice but to abandon their fellow, choosing to go past the tentacle zombie while it was occupied eating, and ran out of the store.

Cracked Humpty pulled back Shirtless Guy who still wanted to try and save their friend. He led the both of us out to the broken windows but stopped when he saw what was happening outside. “The hell is going on? This the fucking end of the world?”

A couple of minutes ago, there were just normal humans rioting outside. Now, several tentacle monsters were killing and eating them. I didn’t even notice the monster attack. It was so sudden and unexpected. Some of the tentacle creatures were already transforming into more hideous abominations as they ate more and more people.

It was my condominium all over again. But this time, it might be much, much worse because we were out in the open; these monsters could spread all over the city. I couldn’t understand what the 2Ms were thinking by releasing their parasites here. What would they gain from this? Were they just pissed at the BID destroying their business that they intended to cause as much death and destruction as revenge?

And that wasn’t even the most insane thing about all of this. The PCM leaders ordered their members to fight back! They had weapons so they had moderate success against the weaker monsters, but many of them were slaughtered by the big ones. I seriously couldn’t understand what the fuck was going on! And I was watching this while holding my shopping basket with ice cream and shoes.

Yeah, SpookyErind is definitely laughing her head off with this scene.

“Baron! Guido!” Cracked Humpty called out to his friends who were grabbed by a car-sized crab that scuttled past the shoe store.

“Fuckin’ shit. Where do we go?”

“To the back!” someone called out. The guy who saw a hawk eat a roadkill raccoon waved for us to follow him.

Compared to the pandemonium outside, there was only one zombie here, and it was still busy devouring our friend. Shirtless Guy pointed his gun at the tentacle zombie even though he was out of ammo. It noticed us. Me specifically. It charged at me, its tentacles flailing. Cracked Humpty charged it with his shopping cart. The tentacles, which had grown to the size of Humpty’s arms, coiled around the cart and threw it aside. I took out a tub of ice cream—it was frozen rock solid—and threw it. I hit it squarely on its chest. It stumbled back for several feet and was covered with collapsed display cabinets.

“Nice going, Lil’ Homie!”

The way to the backroom of the store was blocked by one of its employees. He was trying to drive us away with a mop. Shirtless Guy threatened him with his empty gun, and all of us entered the backroom which, judging by the tons of shoeboxes here, was also its storage space. Cracked Humpty grunted as he pushed a heavy cabinet to block the door, and then stood in front of it. He took off his mask, revealing that he had a bald eggy head with a huge scar running across his scalp, hence the nickname, and wiped his sweaty temples.

Two frightened store employees, Cracked Humpty, Shirtless Guy, two other gang members, and me, whatever I was supposed to be. The seven of us kept deathly quiet under a single dim lightbulb that illuminated the cramped storage room. We listened to the screams, gunfire, and monstrous roars muffled by the fairly thick door. The female employee could no longer hold back and started hysterically sobbing. First getting robbed, then getting attacked by monsters, a rough day for her.

So…am I just going to stay here?

Bang!

The female employee and Hawk-Raccon Guy screamed in unison.

The door creaked, the cabinet in front of it shifted, a few boxes on its shelves fell on Cracked Humpty. He stayed put on his post, roaring to keep up his bravado as the banging continued. All the other people rushed to the far end of the storage room. Once again, the tide of the crowd swept me. I was pressed against the stacks of shoeboxes right up the back wall. I could barely see what was happening in front.

“Go away, motherfucker!” Cracked Humpty yelled. “Ain’t no Adumbrae getting in here!”

Tentacles burst through the door, smashing the back of the cabinet, and grabbed his body. Shirtless Guy tried to help him, but he was already pulled out of the room.

I sighed.

Side mission: Save the homies.

And while Lil’ Homie Erind couldn’t do anything that would violate Rule #7, a different face may have something to say about this. I held up my hand and peeled off the band-aid covering the crystals on my palm. Golden liquid flowed upwards.

 

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