Chapter 17

The Deception

 Kent heard a snap of a finger and awoke from a trance. Standing in the parking lot, across from the hotel were two police officers pointing guns at his face and Kate standing before him lowering her hand. In the place of the Kate the reporter was Kate the officer and next to the burned down hotel were EMT’s pushing steaming burnt bodies into the back of an awaiting ambulance. It was Shandy and Mike, fried like chicken in a pan. In a daze, Kent tried to make sense of what he was seeing before him and it didn’t take long to realize his hands were cuffed behind him and he was being escorted to the back of an awaiting police car. His head pushed down, he was shoved into the back of the car and the door was slammed shut. Kate stood outside the car watching the officers lock Kent in the back and started chatting with one of them. As his confusion wore off, it became clear that Kate was no reporter, or witch and that she had used some sort of hypnotic to put him in a trance and convince him to leave the hotel room without incident.

image

Groggy from coming out of the trance, Kent felt his body push back against the seat as the police car took off out of the parking lot and onto the street with lights and sirens now blazing. “What the Hell is going on?” Kent asked in a fog.

“You’ll find out at the station,” the officer driving stated.

The car quickly sped down the street, made several turns and pulled into the Sally Port of the law enforcement center where the garage doors were lowered trapping everyone inside. Kent was allowed to exit the vehicle and with two police officers as escorts, was led to the booking room and uncuffed. He was stood up against a wall with height markers and told to look at the camera, a picture was taken and he was told to turn to the side and another picture was taken. His cuffs were removed and his fingerprints electronically scanned and fed into a computer. Now more clear headed, he realized he was in deep shit and began to panic. The officer in charge took him by the back of the arm and led him to an interview room where he was shown a chair and asked to sit down. Two detectives entered the room and the door was shut.

“Mr. Koperski,” the shorter, fatter detective said aloud. “We would like to ask you some questions about the death of your wife Shandy, and a Mike Reed who were found dead in the bathroom of the hotel you’ve been held up in for the last day.

“Go ahead, ask away,” Kent said staring at the camera in the upper corner of the room.

“Before I do, I want you to know you have the right to an attorney.”

“I am an attorney,” Kent said with a smile. “Actually, I was a sitting judge for three years at one point, lost the election and had to go back into private practice.”

“Would you like to have an attorney present now?” the officer asked.

“No, that’s fine,” Kent said looking down at the table. “I think I got this.”

The taller, thinner detective who was standing in the corner started off by asking, “How long did you suspect your wife was cheating on you?”

Kent leaned back in his chair and shook his head in disgust. “I knew something was wrong for about the last six months, never suspected she was cheating on me. I just knew we weren’t getting along like we used too. You know, the late nights and hidden texts, all the normal stuff.”

“So why did you decide to tail her?”

“I wasn’t planning on tailing her at all, I bought a portable GPS and hid it in her bag and watched the whole thing unfold on my computer at home. It wasn’t until I saw the marker on the hotel that I decided to go see for myself.”

“How long were you planning on killing her?” the sitting detective asked.

“You did bring some pretty mean tools with you, a flame thrower, a grenade and a 40mm Glock pistol.

This had to be premeditated.”

Kent bit his lip and nodded his head in agreement. “I can see how you would think that, but I had all those things in my garage for years. I didn’t go out an buy that stuff to get back at her, I brought it along for self protection.”

“Against what army?” the taller detective asked.

“Listen guys, it’s a simple story. I thought something was up, I used a tracker and showed up to see what was going on. I have the right to protect myself as a citizen of this country and brought along protection. I have rights.”

“Yes you do,” Mr. Koperski, but you don’t have the right to take the lives of two innocent people.”

“I’m confused,” Kent said slowly. “What makes you think I had anything to do with their deaths?”

“You have no memory of what occurred over the last day since you took them hostage?”

Kent rolled his fingers on the table top over and over trying to think back to the last day and it was all a blur. He remembered coming into the hotel room and finding Shandy and Mike about to do the doggy style fuck job, but then it all gets hazy.

“I can’t recall what happened,” Kent said trying to think. “Sometimes my medications do that to me, I have spells of amnesia.”

The two detectives leaned their heads together and whispered something back and forth out of earshot of Kent sitting across the table. After a brief discussion, the taller standing detective left the room leaving Kent alone with the shorter fatter one. The fat detective leaned in close to Kent and said, “My name is detective Barnett and I have to inform you that I think you’re full of shit. We have video surveillance of you in the bathroom, beating those two to death with the hair dryer from the hotel bathroom.”

Kent smiled and smirked at detective Barnett and replied, “I know it’s not against the law for law enforcement to lie to a suspect to invoke a confession. I may be a bit foggy on the details, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t beat anyone to death with a hair dryer. That sounds ridiculous. If I brought a flame thrower, why the Hell would I do that?” Kent said with a Patrickle.

The detective leaned back in his chair and realized Kent was no fool when it came to interrogation. The door opened and the other detective handed Barnett a manila envelope. He pulled the flap back and hung the opening upside down allowing photographs to spill out on the table top. There, in full color, were photo shopped pictures of Shandy and Mike from the crime scene covered in bruises and cuts from multiple contusions and abrasions. Not a sign of burnt flesh in any of the pictures.

“See, no bar b que,” Barnett stated. “They were beat to death with a hair dryer.”

“Can you link me to the hair dryer?” Kent asked like a jackass.

“You’re fingerprints were all over it,” Barnett replied. “And your clothes had their blood all over it as well.”

“This is bullshit,” Kent stated. “No one brings a flame thrower and ends up using a hair dryer, if you had a case, you’d arrest me on that charge. As it is right now, it’s all circumstantial. For all you know, the maid did it while I was asleep and you can’t prove otherwise.”

Barnett, frustrated but professional stated, “We have you at the scene and it was your wife and her lover. We have enough to book you on second degree murder at the least.

I don’t like the whole, “amnesia” bit, sounds like something from a bad Perry Mason episode, but I’ll put it in my report. For now, you are under the arrest for the murder of Shandy Koperski and Mike Reed, do you understand this?”

Kent raised his hands for the handcuffs to be replaced and stood to be escorted out of the interrogation room into the holding cell down the hall. In an hour, he was dressed in county jail orange and sitting in a room with three other men were housed, all dressed alike in orange. Across the hall in the jailors lounge, a live television feed from the courtroom upstairs was visible through the bars of the holding cell. There was no sound.

“That’s right,” Kent said aloud to his two cell mates. “It’s Thursday night, prime time executions on the local cable channel. I used to DVR this all the time until they started blurring out the good parts.”

“Good parts?” one of the incarcerated men asked.

“The FCC made them cover up the action due to complaints about violence on television. Now you can only get it on pay per view and I’m not paying thirty bucks every Thursday night to watch a pedofile get his nuts chopped off live and in color.”

“I’m a pedofile,” the inmate stated. “You want to see my nuts get chopped off for free?”

Kent leaned back from the bars and tried to judge this mans facial expression to see if he was serious or not. Sometimes kidding can reduce the stress in a situation. Kent thought he’d make a joke back. “You have tickets?” he asked with a smile.

“You think I’m kidding?” the inmate said with a firm straight glare. “I’m in this holding cell until they take me upstairs at seven and start the fucking show.”

Now realizing this man was dead serious, Kent stepped away and sat down on the bench no longer looking at the television screen across the hall. “Sorry man, didn’t mean to piss you off,” Kent said in fear. “Why would they mix us in the same holding cell? You’ve had your day in court and I’m waiting for mine, you’d think they’d have a cell for each.”

“Cheap ass mother fuckers,” the inmate said. “Won’t spring for an extra cell for guys like me who like to fuck kids,” he said with a laugh. “God I love a good ripe ten year old asshole,” the inmate said brushing his hand on his crotch repeatedly.

***

Six forty five on the button and the door to the cell opened with a clank. Two jailors approached the holding cell and signaled for the three inmates to exit the cell and walk down the hallway. At the end, they waited on an elevator and got inside, a few minutes later, they were upstairs and the doors opened to a large television studio set of a courtroom complete with jury box, bailiff and a very pissed off looking judge behind the bench. The three inmates were led off to an area sectioned off for them where they could have their cuffs secured with an iron bar that kept them in place.

They all had a good view of the stage and watched as the stage manager counted down the production and the proceedings went live on pay per view.

“Bailiff, call your first case,” the judge said in his shining robe and well lit hair.

“The court calls for the sentencing of Ted Warren, convicted of five counts of sex with a minor, and two counts of sex with a vulnerable adult.”

The inmate to the left of Kent had his cuffs disconnected from the iron bar and was escorted to the plaintiffs table where his attorney stood waiting for him. Kent sat quietly in the back watching the proceedings, tapping his foot on the soft floor nervously, wondering what the Hell was going on.

“Has the jury a recommendation to the court a suitable punishment?” the judge asked.

The lead jury person stood and said aloud, “Yes your honor, we have.”

“What is your recommended sentence for this convicted pedophile.”

“The jury recommends the bowl, your honor.”

“The bowl?” Kent asked himself. “In all the years in the law business and as a judge, he had never heard of the bowl, he knew of the slide, and the pole, but the bowl was new to him.”

The judge took a moment to look important in front of the camera and act like he was making a decision. He rubbed his chin and looked around at the people in the gallery and said, “I concur, the bowl it is, execution to take place after the commercial break.”

Ninety seconds later the set was split in two equal parts, rolled back on large rails that were hidden under the seats. In the center of the room was a large, forty feet wide cupped shaped indent into the floor that looked like something from a skate park. It was polished white, reflecting the studio lights from above and at the bottom was an industrial sized set of interlocking metal grinding teeth that spun in unison. The audience was now behind a plexiglass safety wall, like that of any hockey arena and able to watch what was about to occur in the bowl.

The bumper music from the show played on speakers and the crowd yelled in excitement as the announcer talked about the upcoming execution on a large screen television mounted on the far wall in easy view of the cameras. On the screen, a short video showing the horrific crimes committed by the pedophile was shown along with pictures of the victims and interviews with police and family members.

After a few minutes, the music stopped and a live announcer who was sitting close to the bowl began a play by play. A door opened on the rim of the bowl exposing the man to be executed, dressed only in white shorts with a solid wall behind him. The wall began to slowly creep forward forcing the man to step out onto a twelve inch ledge that rounded the entire bowl giving him his only place to stand. The crowd hushed as the wall behind the man became flush with the rest of the wall and he stood there with only this small ledge to keep him from falling into the bowl, and into the rotating cutting teeth below.

This was new to most of the audience and the announcer had to explain over the speakers how the execution worked. It was obvious that the man would end up in the teeth of the grinder eventually, but how nobody knew. Then, from small openings in the walls at the top of the bowl, just below the plexiglass, a slick clear oil started to flow down onto the ledge and down into the bottom of the bowl. The convicted man stood motionless, on the ledge, trying to control his breathing, not allowing any of the oil to get under his feet. It seemed as long as he stood still, he could avoid the grinding teeth below and stave off his eventual death.

For minutes the camera showed a close up of his face and a close up of his feet on the big screen and the audience watched screaming banging on the plexiglass trying to unnerve the convict and cause him to loose his balance. He stood like a rock, staring forward at the crowd behind the plexiglass ignoring the sounds and the action. He then closed his eyes and tried to tune out the crowd but felt a bit wobbly and opened his eyes again to regain his balance. It was a scheduled thirty minute execution, and the producers were starting to get nervous that their new killing machine wasn’t giving the crowd what they wanted.

Then chanting started and the crowd began to beat on the plexiglass in unison shaking the bowl below. The crowd had somehow decided to take the lack of action into their own hands and fulfil their blood lust themselves. The bowl rattled and shook with every bang from above and the convict began to tip from one side to the other causing him to raise his arms to help keep his balance. The act of raising his arms was enough to move his center of gravity and his feet shot out from underneath him on the slick oil and he slid down the side of the bowl into the fast moving grinding teeth. He tried in vain to push himself away from the metal grinding teeth, but the more he struggled, the more the teeth dug into his flesh and in twenty seconds, all the remained at the bottom of the bowl was blood stained oil and bits of bones and flesh. He was ground up and dead.

Kent watched the whole event on the big screen because he was too far away to see the action live. The reaction of the crowd and the sight of the horrific death made him numb and he sat in his chair in a daze thinking this was going to be his fate as well.

Then the announcer commented that they were out of time for this show and to tune in next week on pay per view for the next execution. Kent now knew that his turn was coming up and that he had only caught the sentencing and execution phase of the man before him. He had no idea how the court proceedings would go and if he would be allowed a lawyer or not. Would this be like a real courtroom trial, or one of those set up ones for day time television? This was all new to him since his practice had nothing to do with violent crime, he came from a background of contract law and torts.

Before Kent could be too happy, one of the security guards said, “The executions are always live, but the trial is taped and edited for time, so don’t think you’re going anywhere, it’s your turn next.”

“I don’t even have an attorney yet!” Kent yelled.

“You will have one provided for you,” the guard said smiling down at Kent.

“What about witnesses? And evidence? And...”

“It’s all good,” the guard stated. “This isn’t no People’s Court, they take this very seriously.”

“I’ve been locked up for less than four hours and I’m already going to trial?” Kent asked in disbelief. “There’s no way I’m getting a fair deal out of this.”

Kent watched the studio crew push the set back together and cover the bowl with the seats from the gallery hiding the blood and gore below. It was amazing how quickly the crew could get the set back to the way it was before the execution and make it look like a real courtroom.

The guard shifted back and forth on his heels and looked at how nervous Kent was getting. “You’re chances are pretty good actually, they can’t give the audience what they want every week or they would get tired of it and quit watching. I think this was the first execution we had this year so far. Now that the home viewers have seen a child molester ground up on live television, they will be glued to their sets every Thursday for the next two months waiting for the next. The producers don’t like the viewers getting to desensitized, it’s not good for revenue.”

Chapter 18

Roadside Bar

 Thirty minutes into the pitch black tunnel and a light is finally visible in the distance from the outside world. Not a bright light, but a light non the less and quickly it gets larger and larger as the van approaches what is no longer the end of the magic box, but now is the magic tunnel. At the end of the tunnel the van slows down and stops before it exits and everyone looks out the front windshield at the dark grey skies and pouring rain outside.

When they left a half hour ago, it was around noon, and now it looked like it was almost 9 pm going on sundown. The tunnel ended in what looked like a department store parking lot filled with water puddles and shopping carts, but very few people. Slowly Julie pushed on the gas and drove the van out of the tunnel and into the rainstorm switching on her wiper blades and looking out for shopping carts.

“Where the heck are we?” Ury asked from the passengers seat. “This looks like Texas.”

“Texas?” Rita asked. “When were you ever in Texas? This looks like parking lot to me.”

“Yeah, a parking lot in Texas,” Ury replied. “Look at the cowboy over there.” pointing at a bar at the end of the strip mall parking lot. “It says, “Roadside bar,” right on the sign and there’s a picture of a cowboy on the sign wearing a pink scarf.”

The van slowly crept along in the rain and the passengers looked around for any signs of life but only saw the lights on at the Roadside bar and headed in that direction. Inside through the windows, they could see people moving around and knew if they wanted to get help this was the only place close by they were going to get any.

“What does the g.p.s. say” Gary asked from the back.

“It says unable to connect to satellites at this time,” Ury replied.

“Must be the shitty weather.”

“Pull into that bar and lets ask for directions home,” Gary said having to go to the bathroom.

Julie pulled up to the one handicapped spot they had at the front door and put the van in park. She looked back at Gary and looked at him for directions.

“Who wants to volunteer to go in there?” Gary asked.

“I think we should all go or none of us go,” Eleonora Kabloutchko stated.

“We don’t know any of these people and have freaking idea where we are.”

“Fine,” Gary said. “Get me out of the van,” he said and Julie pressed the button to open the hatch and lower the chair to the ground behind the van. With a beeping sound, the door opened and the cold wind blew inside the van creating a chill everyone could feel.

“Fuck I hope this goes fast,” he said and the rest of the crew opened their doors and exited the van.

Julie, hiding her head from the stinging rain, ran to the back of the van, unbuckled Gary and pushed his wheelchair around the van and up the entrance ramp out of the rain.

The wind was still blowing in cold gusts and it was hard to block the drops from sliding sideways under the overhang. “Open the fucking door!” Gary yelled and Eleonora Kabloutchko opened the door allowing Julie to push Gary inside. Ury and Rita followed behind and Eleonora Kabloutchko slipped inside letting the door slam behind her.

Inside the bar it was hot and loud with dance music playing over the speakers and men dancing on the dance floor in skimpy revealing clothing. In the back there was a sign that said “Grill” and on the left was a long bar with men sitting on stools talking to each other.

“What kind of place is this?” Gary asked holding back his urine.

“The kind of place that has bathrooms,” Eleonora Kabloutchko said pointing to the right. “See if you can get him through the crowd,” Eleonora Kabloutchko said to Julie who still had her hand on the grips of the wheelchair. Julie pushed with most of her remaining strength and the crowd begrudgingly parted allowing the huge diabetic vampire to make his way to the bathroom. As he rolled along, Gary noticed men kissing and grinding into each other against the walls and feeling each other up.

“The handicapped bathroom is in the back,” one of the men said leaning over to whisper in Gary’s ear. With a lick, the man stood back up and continued to grope his boyfriends ass.

“Now would be a good time to have a catheter,” Gary yelled. Go back the other way, we have to get to the rear,” Gary yelled to Julie not realizing he had just said “rear.”

Pushing the wheelchair by the row of bar stools was actually easier than trying to get around on the other side because there was a little lip and railing that kept people on the dance floor and off the bar. It seemed like a quick trip until Gary motioned for Julie to stop when he spied something out of the corner of his eye. It was a nude male stripper up on a corner stage shaking his hairy ass at a group of men who were holding out dollar bills for tips. The dancer would squat down and let the men shove the dollars between his ass cheeks and then would stand and drop them next to his stripper pole.

The pole attached to the floor. Not the pole projecting from between his legs.

“I’m going to be sick,” Gary said and motioned for Julie to move on towards the handicapped bathroom. It was then that Eleonora Kabloutchko stopped in her tracks seeing someone who looked familiar. Way too familiar.

“Paul?” she asked over the loud music.

A man turned around from the bar who looked exactly like her ex fiancee Paul only he had no shirt and a pink hanky tied around his neck. “Eleonora Kabloutchko?” he asked surprised and reached out and gave her a hug. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “I haven’t seen you in over a year.”

Eleonora Kabloutchko, embarrassed and still in shock shrugged her shoulders and said, “It’s a long story, we came here on accident really.”

Paul slipped off the barstool and put his hand around Eleonora Kabloutchko’s back and announced to the group at the bar that his ex was here. The men peered at her and looked her up and down examining everything she was wearing and the make up she was wearing. In disgusted jealousy, the men turned back and faced the mirror behind the bar and made sure they were far better looking than she was. “We need to catch up and talk, are you going to be here long?” Paul asked.

“We’re taking someone to the bathroom, but we could stay for something to eat. I see there’s a grill back there.”

Paul escorted Eleonora Kabloutchko to the back and found her, Ury and Rita a place to sit down in the grill area. Gary and Julie were in the bathroom getting Gary up onto the toilet and Eleonora Kabloutchko read the menu on the wall. Besides each item was a picture of a naked man holding a sign that said, “Foot long hotdogs only one dollar”

“Who’s buying?” Paul asked in a very feminine manner.

“Gary is, he’s loaded,” Eleonora Kabloutchko replied. “Is he single?” Paul asked.

Eleonora Kabloutchko leaned back against the wall and took a hard look at what she thought was her ex boyfriend. “Since when did you turn gay?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” Paul asked. “I’ve always been gay, you knew that.”

Eleonora Kabloutchko opened her eyes wide and laughed. “You do realize we’ve had sex?” she asked.

“Yes, what about it?”

“Did you happen to remember I’m a woman?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked.

Paul looked at Eleonora Kabloutchko like she was kidding and motioned his hand waving off her comment. “Yeah, like you are a woman,” he said and shook his head.

“I’m lost here Paul,” Eleonora Kabloutchko said slowly. “I am a tad bit offended as well. Two years together and you thought I was a man? We showered together, we had sex, you put your thing in my thing.”

Paul reached over and pulled Eleonora Kabloutchko’s shirt out exposing her cleavage and let the shirt snap back in place. “Oh, fucking God,” he said. “I’m going to throw up.”

“Do you want to see the bottom half as well?” she asked in disgust.

“No thank you,” Paul said scooting back in his chair. “You must have had me high on date rape drugs missy, I would never travel down that stank hole if you know what I mean.”

Eleonora Kabloutchko, pissed but calm, looked at Paul and asked, “What about your mother?”

“What about her?”

“Did she ever show you the DVD she made after she got me drunk and had sex with me?”

“Yes, it was so hot. Back then you had a cock and could fuck like a horse. Not sure what you did with it, but after I saw that, I wanted you so bad.”

“I never had a cock!” Eleonora Kabloutchko yelled over the music.

“Something is wrong here and we need to leave. Where is Gary?”

Ury slipped off her seat and scampered to the men's room, there was no ladies room, and peeked inside at the empty wheelchair next to the bathroom stall.

Standing by the wall was Julie who was patiently waiting for her husband. “How long?” Ury asked.

“Give me twenty fucking minutes,” Gary yelled back from behind the stall.

“That coon was under cooked and it gave me the runs.”

“Eleonora Kabloutchko wants to leave,” Ury yelled back.

“Tell her to fucking wait a minute,” Gary yelled back. “Order some mini taco’s or something and maybe some cheese sticks. I love those cheese sticks.” Ury waddled back to the table where Paul was now missing and sat next to Eleonora Kabloutchko.

“Where did your boy toy go?” she asked snickering.

“He went back to the bar to make out with his boyfriend from what I can see,” Eleonora Kabloutchko said looking over her shoulder at the bar. “What did I ever see in him?” she asked.

“That’s not him,” Ury stated. “This is some fucked up alternate universe where your perfectly straight ex boyfriend is now making out with men in a all nude gay juice bar.”

Eleonora Kabloutchko thought to herself for a second. “That has to be it, you’re right. I can’t be that stupid. Paul hated pink, unless it was my pink and he loved that.”

***

Thirty minutes later, Gary was finished with the toilet and the rest of the crew had eaten all the mini taco’s they could stand along with an assortment of tasty beverages. As a group, they decided to try to find help somewhere else and leave the Roadside bar behind them as a bad memory. Once again, Julie pushed Gary in his wheelchair through the crowd of half naked dancing men towards the front door where they were abruptly stopped by a large muscled man with a thick mustache and a whip. He was the bouncer.

“Where do you think you’re going?” the bouncer asked tapping his whip on his hairy thigh.

“We decided we had enough fun for the night,” Gary stated looking up at the man with the dark eyes and metal studded neck collar.

The bouncer pointed his whip at a sign by the door and watched to see if anyone would look at it. When the group stood there like deer caught in the headlights, he spoke up and read the sign aloud, “No admittance until 1pm.”

“Excuse me,” Eleonora Kabloutchko spoke up in an accusatory manner. “We are not coming in, we are leaving,” she said with a smug grin.

“You got it backwards honey,” the bouncer said in a thick British accent.

“There is no admittance to the outside from here,” and he laughed at her like he had just beat her in a game of gay strip poker.

The group looked around and saw men looking at them like they were from a zoo whispering to each other and pointing fingers. “Is this some sort of joke?” Gary asked.

The music changed and the crowd erupted in cheers from behind the group and Gary struggled to turn his head and see what was going on behind him. In his low seated position, all he could see was the bare backs of men who were watching something going on the dance floor. He wanted to get out more now then ever and became very anxious hoping the bouncer would have a change of heart and let them leave. Then he felt his chair being pulled backwards and watched the crowd part as he was pulled from the front of the bar onto the dance floor by one of the dancers.

Gary, now sitting in his wheelchair in the center of the dance floor, surrounded on all sides by men watching him sit there, swallowed hard and panicked. He felt the unshaven face of the man behind him nuzzle his neck and reach around and stroke his chest. The dancer behind Gary continued to dance out of Gary’s view and do a strip tease for the crowd whipping them into a frenzy to the loud dance music and bright lights. Gary sat in terror like a penguin at a petting zoo.

Then in an instant, the dancer came around to the front of Gary and to Gary’s horror was only wearing a dog collar and a pair of wrist cuffs. In a gyrating dance move, the naked man approached Gary and started a close up lap dance grinding his privates into Gary’s face and pretending to give him a blow job for the crowd. Gary looked up at the dancer in disgust and yelled for him to get away, but to no avail, the dancer kept getting close making Gary very uncomfortable.

Then the dancer, showing off for the crowd, turned and faced away from Gary in front of his wheel chair and bent over showing Gary his fuzzy butt crack. The crowd yelled and the dancer reached back and pulled his butt cheeks apart and started bouncing in rhythm to the music. In total disgust, Gary raised his one good leg and placed his foot on the dancers ass and shoved him off the dance floor into a table knocking drinks all over the floor. The crowd gasped in shock as the dancer stood up crying like a baby covered with mixed drinks. Then the music stopped.

From the elevated D.J. booth, a tall man in cowboy chaps and dark mirror sunglasses walked down the steps across the crowd and onto the dance floor facing Gary. Other than the a pair of cowboy boots, a g-string and a set of guns on his belt, the man was naked. Gary looked up and saw the face of the game warden. The same man that drove him to the edge of town and dumped him off the bridge into the river.

“Who do we have here?” the game warden asked.

Gary sat in silence looking up at his reflection in the mirrored glasses and shook his head in disbelief. “Milk man,” Gary said flat.

“Milk man?” the game warden asked rubbing his badge that was attached to his gun belt. “Do you know who I am?” the game warden asked.

“A gay cowboy?” Gary asked.

“I’m the law around here mister. And from what I have seen, you have been disturbing the peace.”

“That guy was sticking his hairy ass in my face, I think my peace was being disturbed,” Gary replied defiantly.

“Nobody twisted your arm and made you come in here,” The game warden said with his hands on his hips.

“Yeah I know, but nobody’s fucking letting me leave either!” Gary snapped back.

“That’s city code, can’t do a damn thing about it. Once you come in here, you can’t leave till 1pm.”

“What kind of fucked up law is that?” Gary snapped back. “I have rights you know, keeping me here is false imprisonment and I have a constitutional right to go anywhere I fucking please!”

“Do you?” the game warden asked with an evil grin. “Then head right out,” he stated pointing to the door which was blocked by a large group of sweaty men lining the dance floor.

Gary looked back at the game warden and quickly realized that the law meant nothing in this bar and that he and his group were trapped until they decided to let them go.

“Tag him!” the game warden said getting the bar tenders attention with a whip of his finger. The bar tender reached down behind the bar and handed a hand tool to one of the waiters who walked onto the dance floor and stood next to Gary. Gary looked up at the man with the tool and shook his head telling the waiter he wasn’t welcome. In a flash, the waiter grabbed Gary by the nose, pushed his head in the opposite direction and clipped an ear tag on Gary’s ear the size of a playing card. It was bright orange and had the number forty two printed on it in black ink.

Gary screamed in pain and blood dripped onto his shoulder after the tag was clipped to his ear. He reached up and grabbed the tag and tried to give it a tug but the staples in his ear held tight and firm. The tag was long enough that it hung down and brushed against Gary’s shoulder every time he turned his head and this became immediately annoying to him. “I’m not some fucking cow!” he shouted pulling the tag around so he could see the number printed on the face.

“Tag the rest of the group,” the game warden said and turned to walk back to the D.J. booth where he continued playing dance music for the crowd. The waiter, with the assistance of the men lining the dance floor, tagged Ury, Rita, Julie and then Eleonora Kabloutchko in the same fashion and gathered them in a circle in the center of the dance floor. Over the loud speakers, the game warden, wearing headphones and grinding to his own beat said, “Kick them out!”

Eleonora Kabloutchko looked at Ury and said, “I thought we couldn’t leave till 1pm?” Then one of the bouncers grabbed Eleonora Kabloutchko and pulled her towards the front door and said, “You’re a pig now girly, we don’t allow pigs in our club.” With that said, the group was forced out the front door back into the cold breeze with a slam of the door behind them.

They stood under the awning and looked at each other with their ear tags hanging down and tried to tug them free only to cause pain and bleeding. “Let’s get back in the van,” Gary said. “I have a pair of pliers in the glove box.”

Julie pushed Gary back down the ramp and the group rushed back to the van to avoid the intermittent drops of rain that came with the cold breeze that whipped around them. In a few minutes, everyone was safely aboard the van and Julie set the heat to high after starting the engine. Julie looked back to Gary silent as to ask him where to go now.

“Just drive,” Gary said leaning back in his wheelchair tired and pissed.

“Hand me the pliers,” he stated and Ury dug them out of the glove box and handed them back.

The van pulled out of the parking lot and headed back onto the main street where it was eerily quiet and dark. For a small city, there weren’t many lights on although it was still light enough to see the storm clouds looming above and the occasional crack of thunder. “Take a left,” Gary said and managed to bend the staples enough to feed the prong back out of his ear and remove the tag.

The van turned left and Julie drove down the street out of the business district into a residential area filled with old broken down houses and unkept lawns.

House after house was a mini junk yard filled with old couches, cars and bags of crap strewn all over the porches. Still, no lights from any of them, it was like a ghost town complete with tumble weeds that blew across the lawns like in an old west movie.

Nine blocks down the street, the asphalt turned into gravel and the houses were now further apart but none the cleaner. The area they were driving across now became more hilly than before as they seemed to be heading out of town into the country. “Turn around,” Gary yelled from the back, I don’t want to get us anymore lost than we already are.”

“Lost?” Rita asked sardonically. “Do you have any idea where we were? Let alone where we’re going?”

“I want to stick to town,” Gary replied. “At least we can get food and gas if we need it.

Who the Hell knows where this road leads?”

Julie spun the van in a circle at the intersection and headed back towards town.

“We need to go back through the tunnel and get back to where we were,” Eleonora Kabloutchko said.

“I don’t like this place.”

“And drive back to the poachers?” Gary asked. “I’ll take my chances here, if they worst they can do is stick a fucking tag in my ear, it’s a step up from a bullet in my back.”

“You are not the only one in this situation,” Rita stated trying not to be a total bitch. “Ury and I came along for the ride, we had no intention of being stranded in some other screwed up dimension. We have a nice home and we’d like to get back to it eventually.”

Gary stewed for a moment watching the country view turn back into city as the van headed back to town. “Fine, go back to where we left the bar, and take that street back to the mall parking lot where the tunnel is.” Just then Gary noticed something out his window and yelled, “Stop!”

Julie slammed on the breaks and skidded on the loose gravel sending all the passengers in the van lurching forward. “Pull in over there, next to that house.”

Julie pushed on the gas and turned the van to the left and pulled up along the curb next to piece of shit run down house with a mysterious figure sitting on the porch smoking a cigar. Next to the figure was a power chair with a sign that read, “For sale.”

“This may be my lucky day after all,” Gary said. “Get me the fuck out of this van, I’ve got a purchase to make.”

Again, Julie wrestled with the buttons and ramps and got Gary back on the ground and pushed his huge frame across the gravel up onto the sidewalk in front of the house. The rest of the group sat in the van watching keeping out of the wind and sprinkles. “Mind if we come over” Gary yelled from the sidewalk along the edge of the street.

The figure waved them over and Julie pushed Gary up to the porch as close to the house as she could get. The porch had a wheelchair ramp but it was far too steep for Julie to push

Gary up, it was built for a power chair that could easily drive up the ramp and into the house under it’s own power.

“How much for the power chair?” Gary asked getting right to the point.

“Two thousand five hundred,” the dark figure stated from under the brim of her wide hat.

Gary, stunned, shook his head in disbelief at what he had heard. “Excuse me?” he asked. “That model isn’t that much brand new, let alone used.”

The figure sat silent and sucked a drag of it’s cigar.

“Did you hear me?” Gary asked.

“I heard you,” the figure stated flat.

“What if I make you an offer?” Gary asked.

The figure continued to be silent and blow smoke out from under her hat.

“Eight hundred,” Gary stated, not asked.

The figure shuffled in her seat a little and sat quiet.

“Nine hundred,” Gary stated upping the offer.

Once again the figure sat motionless holding a lit cigar in her right hand.

“Does it come with the power chord?” Gary asked.

“Yes,” the figure replied. “But the warranty is expired and non transferable.”

“So you admit it’s not a new chair?” Gary asked.

“It belonged to my husband, he had it for six months before he died. The chair is practically brand new.”

“What did you pay for it?” Gary asked.

“None of your fucking business.” The figure replied.

“I’ll go as far as one thousand dollars and that’s it,” Gary stated firmly. “A used model like that would be eight hundred anywhere else.”

“The nearest power chair store is in Grant, good luck trying to get there.”

“You’ve heard of Grant?” Gary asked. “I thought this was some sort of fucked up second dimension where everything was backwards.”

“Not completely,” The figure replied. “We do commerce with your dimension all the time, funny you would say that, how did you get here in the first place?”

Gary, now shivering in the chilly breeze replied, “We found this magic box at the bottom of a river and it turned out to be a worm hole of some sort to this place.”

“Magic box?” the figure replied laughing. “There was a good reason why that was at the bottom of the river I’m sure. Somebody put it there for a reason, probably so nobody would ever find a way over hear again.”

“About the chair,” Gary stated getting back on topic.

“I paid twelve hundred for the chair but it’s worth more than that because it’s too dangerous to make the trip to Grant to get another one. If you can find a chair at a better price, go buy it, I can wait.” the figure stated.

Gary fished out his wallet and dug through his cash. “Is my money any good over here?” he asked.

“Sure, I can spend it on your side the next time I go over,” the figure replied.

“Go over?” Gary asked. “Is there another way back?”

“Several,” the figure replied. “But that information will cost you as well.”

Gary looked back at the group sitting in the van and then back at the figure on the porch. He came to get a chair, and fuck it, he was going to get a chair.

“How much for the chair and the information?”

“How much do you have?” the figure replied.

Frustrated, Gary recounted his cash and stated, “I’ll give you three thousand, that’s it!”

The figure sat silent pondering the offer taking another drag off her cigar. “Do you have any men on that van?” she asked.

“I’m the only man here. Why? Do you need your toilet fixed?”

“No, I shit in the woods, but thanks for offering. My deal is this, two thousand five hundred for the chair, and you in my bed for an hour for the information.”

Julie stomped her feet and shook the wheelchair getting Gary’s attention.

“I don’t think my wife here likes your offer,” Gary said with a smile.

“She is one selfish bitch.”

“My offer stands,” the figure stated.

“You heard her honey,” Gary said looking back up at Julie standing behind him. “We can’t get home unless I service this lady.”

Julie pointed at the ramp and raised her hands as if stating there was no way he was getting onto the porch even with her help.

“She has a point,” Gary said. “There’s no fucking way I’m getting up that steep ramp in this wheelchair. You’ll have to let me get in the power chair down here so I can get in the house.”

“No chair until I get what I want.”

“We seem to be at an impasse,” Gary stated frustrated. “Is there any other way to get in your house?”

“You have one good leg, hop up the steps.”

“Hop? Are you nuts? Four hundred and thirty pounds does not hop!” Gary snapped back.

“Get some help and take a run at the ramp. If you get enough speed, you can make it,” the figure said.

Frustrated and pissed, Gary turned as far back in his wheelchair as he could and motioned for the group in the van to come over. The doors opened and the passengers got out and walked over to Gary and Julie who were standing on the sidewalk in front of the porch. “What do you want?” Ury asked shivering.

“You all need to get behind me and push me up this ramp,” Gary said. “But back me up first, you’ll need some momentum.”

Julie pulled Gary back about fifteen feet and lined his wheelchair with the ramp on the front porch. Eleonora Kabloutchko took and handle and put one hand on Gary’s back, Julie took the other handle and put her hand on Gary’s back as well. Ury and Rita stood back and watched because they had short legs and waddled and wouldn’t be able to help anyway.

“On three,” Gary said. “One, two, three...” and the women pushed as hard on the wheelchair as they could getting Gary up to enough speed to get his front two wheels on the ramp and tip the whole chair backwards spilling Gary onto the ground smacking his head on the concrete. Like a beached whale, Gary lie on the ground, still in sitting position in the wheelchair moaning in pain. “I think I broke something,” Gary said softly.

“I feel real dizzy.”

“Do you want me to call an ambulance?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked looking down at Gary, face flushed red with blood rushing to his head. “Might not be a bad idea,” Gary replied wheezing.

“We don’t have an ambulance here, just the mortuary to pick up dead bodies,” the figure stated from the porch.

“Then how do you get people to the hospital?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked.

“There is no hospital here, not for years.”

“Where do the injured go? Who delivers the babies?”

“Used to go to the doctor, but not anymore.”

“Why not?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked.

“See that power chair? Used to belong to my husband, the doc.”

“We have to get Gary some medical attention, there must be someone you can call!”

“First place I’d call would be a tow truck, he’s going to be a bitch to get off the ground.”

“What if he punctured a lung? Or broke his spleen?” Eleonora Kabloutchko pleaded.

“Give him and hour and call the mortuary, we do have a mortuary,” the figure replied.

“Do you have law enforcement?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked pissed.

“No.”

Eleonora Kabloutchko stepped off the sidewalk, past the ramp and stepped up onto the porch next to the power chair and pressed the power button. The lights flashed on and she had a plan. “Where is the power chord? Never mind, I see it,” she said and unplugged the chair from the orange extension chord that fished out the front door and lay across the porch.

“What are you doing?” the figure asked.

“I’m taking the chair, and giving you three thousand from his wallet. If you don’t like it, call the cops, oh, I forgot, you don’t have cops here.”

The dark figure set down her cigar, reached around her chair, pulled out a twelve gauge shotgun and pointed it at Eleonora Kabloutchko who was trying to mess with the joystick on the power chair. “Get the fuck off my porch,” the figure stated calmly.

“He’s no good to you now!” Eleonora Kabloutchko shouted pointing down at Gary on the ground. “Do you expect him to fuck you with a broken back?”

The figure sat quiet and pondered what Eleonora Kabloutchko had just said and set the shotgun down leaning it against the house. “Give me the money,” she said.

Julie grabbed Gary’s wallet and tossed it over to Eleonora Kabloutchko who then dug out three thousand dollars and handed it to the dark figure sitting on the porch.

“That includes the information to get us back home.”

“Fine. Go all the way back into town, go right at the gas station and then another right a block later and pull into the self serve car wash. There is one bay that is never used and has a construction barrier on both sides. That bay is a doorway back to your world.”

“A carwash?” Eleonora Kabloutchko asked. “I was expecting something more dark and sinister.”

“Nope, hidden in plain sight. I use it every time I need to go shopping on your side. We can’t get anything good here anymore since our grocery store closed down.

I don’t like getting all my food from the gas station snack isle.”

 To be continued...