Out For Blood 42

Jill went to the office door and getting Greggs’ attention she beckoned for him to come over. ‘Take a look outside,’ she said pointing through the window.
Gregg looked, and there was indeed a short fat man trying to put fuel into a plastic container. And by the way he threw down the fuel pump he wasn’t succeeding.

‘Do you think that could be Sheldon?’ said Jill.
‘No way the guys too short, and besides he’s soaked through; if he was one of them he wouldn’t be out in this.’
‘Don’t you think we should get him inside before they see him then?’

‘If we do we’ll have to tell him what’s going on here.’
‘Well we can’t leave him out there!’
‘Okay we tell him, but not about me.’ Insisted Gregg.

Jill nodded in agreement then Gregg tapped on the window to get his attention.
The short fat man dropped his plastic container and came over to the window and had to shout over the noise of the wind. ‘Morning, I need some gas but the pump seems to be out!’ Then removing his glasses he wiped his face with an already wet handkerchief.

Jill slid open the window slightly. ‘Where are you from Mister?’ she asked.
‘New York, on my way down to Cleveland for a convention, ran outta gas about half a mile outta town.’
‘Go to the shutter,’ said Gregg. ‘I’ll see if we can open it.’

The short fat man put his glasses back on and walked from the window to the roller shutter. There were no chains to pull on but Gregg found three circular buttons, a red one, and two green ones’, one above, and one below the red one, each of the green buttons displayed an arrow, one up one down, the red one displayed the word “Stop”. He pushed the up arrow and the door began to rise squeaking as it went.

When a gap appeared at the bottom of the shutter the driving crosswind blew the rain underneath causing Gregg to move to the side. As it reached about four-feet from the floor he hit the red button and the door stopped moving, the short fat man bent at the waist and shuffled sideways to get underneath it. Gregg hit the other green button and the shutter began to descend.

The newcomer threw his arms down a number of times trying to shake off the excess rain; he was literally soaked through to the skin. ‘What is with this weather?’ he said. ‘Oh sorry, my name is Demby, Nicholas Demby.’ He took a soggy rain soaked business card from his inside pocket and passed it to Gregg.

Nicholas Demby
Pyrotechnics Engineer
Flash Bang Wallop Display Fireworks
Tel: 555 FLASH

Nicholas Demby wiped the outside of his glasses with his forefingers and looked Jill and Gregg up and down, and then smiled. ‘Guess you two are dodging the posse huh?’ he then snorted a laugh. Neither Gregg nor Jill acknowledged the remark, but Gregg did remove his hat. ‘Hum… yes er, Friends call me Nick,’ he said holding out his hand for Gregg to shake.

Nick was no taller than five-feet-two with no definable distance between his head and shoulders, he looked to be about 200 lbs in weight and was in fact a large wet ball with limbs. He wore a black jacket and trousers, black shoes, a white button-down shirt and a maroon coloured tie. Inlaid into the tie was a white triangle with an eye inside it. He had thick lensed black rimmed glasses, short black hair, (not styled with any purpose) and he walked with a very slight limp.

Gregg shook Nicks’ hand but didn’t take off his glove. ‘Hi, I’m Gregg and this is Jill.’
Nick gave a short smile to Jill. ‘So, can you sell me some gas?’ he asked her.
Jill looked at Gregg, and he spoke to Nick first. ‘So, what’s the convention… Nick?’

Nicks’ eyes narrowed as he looked over both his shoulders before answering in a whisper. ‘It’s the Conspiracy III National Science Fiction Convention. This convention is the gathering of gatherings for all fans of science fiction. Guest speakers will include sci-fi writer Eric Flint, he’s my favourite by the way. Comics’ author and artist Dylan Horrocks, cyber punk author Marianne de Pierres and fantasy writer Isobelle Carmody. It’s gonna be the best one ever!’ He exclaimed excitedly.

‘Wow,’ said Gregg. ‘That sounds… really cool!’
‘I knowww, and that’s why I don’t want to miss it. That and the fact that I’m supplying some of the fireworks for the final night in two days time… I kinda need to be there ya know? So how about that gas huh?’

‘Thing is Nick,’ said Jill. ‘This aint our place, we’re just sheltering here.’
Nick looked askance at them both. ‘And there’s no one else around, no one who can get the pumps working?’
‘No, not anyone you wanna meet anyway.’ Replied Jill.
‘Why… they got two heads or something?’ he snorted another laugh.
Gregg and Jill stayed flat-faced.

‘What?’ he said looking from Gregg to Jill then back to Gregg. ‘What?’
‘What if I told you they did have two heads, what then?’ said Gregg.
Nick scoffed and looked at Jill. ‘I’d say you were pulling my pisser on account of what I just told you.’

Gregg folded his arms. ‘Well what if I said the whole town were blood thirsty vampires, what would you say to that?’
‘Look pal, all I want is some gas, there’s no need to take the piss outta me ya know?’

Jill got his attention. ‘Nick, Greggs’ not taking the piss out of you, what he’s saying is the truth. I know… I was taken prisoner by the fuckers, Greggs’ a private investigator and he’s here trying to locate a girl that went missing a week ago. My best friend is in that police station across the road with a fucking cattle-prod sticking out of her chest. Nick…' she said bending and looking him straight in the eye. 'You ran out of gas near the wrong fucking town my friend.’