Zodiac's toy, John Jones [nonfiction book recommendations .txt] 📗

in the cupboard upstairs, go and change into them". Ray smiled.

"Any chance of a cuppa when I come back down?"

 

She had tasked him with picking up shoes, and he had every intention of buying not necessarily expensive, but new ones, so he found himself in a shoe shop, surveying those that would go with the suit. He didn't want to go traipsing around shopping so black pebble-grain shoes would do, and he could barely look at the price, but decided to just pay it and keep Caroline quiet.

He asked a spotty young assistant who looked like he had just come out of sixth-form for his size, and was soon sitting down trying them on. He slid his foot inside, only to receive a sharp sting.

"Ahh what the fuck!" he shouted and watched as a scorpion came out of the shoe.

...and out of the other one.

The other customers and workers all looked in his direction.

"Scorpios," said one. They scuttled across the shop floor. There must have been at least ten or fifteen that emerged from both shoes, causing ruckus in the shop as people shouted and yelled and jumped up on chairs or stamped on them. Some scuttled over Ray who tried to shake them off and succeeded.

"They were in the fucking shoes," he shouted as the worker came back red-faced.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry sir, I don't know how that happened". They had stopped emerging, but were still causing panic by the other customers.

"Sir have the shoes as an apology".

"Fuckin' right I will," he said, picking them up and inpecting them for scorpions. Satisfied there were no more, he left the shop, and limped his way back to the high-rise.

 

Some of the scorpions must have still been on him somehow and dropped into the shoes.

He wasn’t satisfied by that. Maybe he had eggs on him, and they fell into the shoes and then hatched, yet would have to have been fairly big eggs, as each of the scorpions was around 2-3 inches.

It can't have been a coincidence that there were scorpions in the suit, and in the shoes. That means there must be scorpions in other clothes. Maybe there's an infestation.

That could be it, either they're the ones from the suit that stayed on him without him knowing and fell into the shoes, or there's a scorpion infestation, because there was also a load of them in the other supermarket. That's it, it's got to be a plague of them or something. There could be loads in clothes all over the place. Not my problem though, he thought. Others can sort it out.

He was soon entering Shane's flat.

It wasn't long before he was hearing curious noises from outside, a strange clicking and snapping, coming from further down. He stepped out to see Les hunched near the door of Lee's office. It looked like he was trying to get in.

He must have heard Ray stepping out because he looked with wide-eyes at him, caught out, but Ray didn't quite fathom that he was trying to break in, but just looked at him with curiosity. It was Les who spoke first:

"I'm a friend of Lee's. I was just seeing if he was in".

"Not sure. He's in and out a lot". Les felt the need to follow up with some sort of excuse as to why he was there.

"I was er..just going to ask him whether there was a flat available here". He pointed to Ray's old place with the broken-in door.

"Is...this one available?" Ray believed him, but remembered he had not cleaned up Nugget’s blood and viscera and decided to do it there and then once Les had gone.

"No, not at the moment, but it will probably be available soon". Les just nodded, and pursued it no further. He thanked Ray and left.

Outside, he looked at the text he had received earlier from Fred. Him and Lee were out on a debt collection job and Fred had asked him to try and break in so they could make a start on taking the money, although he had no van as yet. He would text when they were on the way back so Les could get out of there and maybe lock up if possible. His friend who did have a van told him he could borrow it in the afternoon and wanted twenty quid. An argument ensued, but Les was still getting the van although he never said why.

He had tasked a friend with acquiring the 'horse tranquiliser' who took no prisoners when it came to taking what he wanted. Les had promised him a hundred pounds and more if what he had in mind came off, which he intended to pay if it was job done, if they cleared Lee's place, but if something happened and they didn't, he wouldn't be speaking to him for a while. He would basically be avoiding him, even though his friend was a violent person, he was rather dim-witted, and promising him things and saying it would come good always usually had the desired effect.

Les didn't know what tranquiliser to get so asked his friend to go and get something that would ‘knock out a horse’. As it turned out, he had found out where a mobile vets was parked up, threatened the vet with 'smashing his fucking face in' if he didn't give him something that would knock out a horse. He had given him a bottle of Etorphine, and the man punched the vet in the stomach anyway, then ran away, giving Les the bottle on his promise of paying up when the job was done.

Two hours later when Lee and Fred came back, Lee paid no attention to the blue van in the car-park, the one with Les hunched up in the drivers seat. Fred told Lee he was just popping to the shop and would be back in five minutes. Les got out of the van.

"There you are," Fred said, "you'd better have it". Les just handed him the bottle.

"Get on with it," he said, "the owner of this van wants it back later".

"What, no we need it longer. We store some of it in your place and some of it in one of those storage places". Les shrugged.

"Whatever, just get on with it," he said, waving him away.

"Think I might just take a hundred percent," Fred muttered, "and give you a smack in the face". He turned and entered the high-rise. Les just sat back in the van and hunkered down.

 

It wasn't too long before Lee suggested coffee, and Fred insisted that he would make it. Lee just shrugged and continued trying and failing to evade a password screen on one of the laptops.

Fred did not know how much Etorphine to administer, so simply poured the whole lot in Lee's cup and was soon putting the coffee on his table.

"Ta," he said, "I'm gonna have to buy a proper computer. I’ll have to see what Gary’s got in his lock-ups, and I'm gonna need his wifi code". Fred slowly sat down, tense, on edge, watching as Lee struggled with the laptop whilst drinking the coffee.

It didn't take long for it to have an effect, and before he slumped backward he seemed to understand what Fred had done. He glared at him and slurred: "What the fu..?" before his eyes rolled back and he fell off the chair. Fred leaped up, went round the desk and punched him hard in the face just to make sure he was out, and grabbed some of the money that was lying around, hurrying out and down to Les, who the second he saw him left the van.

"Get back in and turn it round. Back it up against the door. Lee’s out and I don't know how long for. Let’s just hurry the fuck up". He threw the notes into the open drivers side window and went back inside.

Although Les could drive, he did not have much experience in handling vans, so sometimes stuttered and stalled or would rev the engine too much whilst going nowhere. He managed to manoeuvre it around so it was backed up near the entrance and leapt out to go and help.

Ray stepped out of his flat. "What's going on?" he asked as Fred came out with fistsfuls of money.

"Nothing, shut the fuck up and get back inside". Les appeared and although was usually loathe to get physical, the situation called for him to push Ray back inside the flat and reiterate what Fred had just said.

"Stay in there and keep your fucking mouth shut". Even though Ray could probably overcome Les in a fight, he simply nodded and backed away. He certainly would not be able to overcome Fred.

They're robbing Lee, he guessed, but he was in there wasn't he? They must have done something to him. Ray felt helpless. He thought for a fleeting moment to call the police, but then realised Lee would not thank him for it, so he simply walked across to the living room window and watched as Les and Fred filled the van with money and goods from Lee's ‘office’.

It sounded like they were struggling out in the corridor.

"...why the fuck are tellys always so heavy..?" moaned Les stepping slowly down the stairs. They managed three televisions, putting them beside the van to put in at the end, and gathered the tablets that Gary had amassed and dropped a few as they put them in the back. Also an acoustic guitar. Les was breathing heavily, leaning against the van. Fred was also rather exhausted with his hands on his hips.

"Few more things, then we're gonna need to get the safe". Fred simply nodded, then was startled as something slammed into the side of the van.

"What the fuck?" He turned around and could not help but say it again:

"What...the fuck?" A Ram stood there watching them.

Les came round to see. "Where did that come from?" he asked. They apprehensively looked at each other seeking explanation. It walked towards them and reared up, taller than Fred who was six feet two, and slammed into his chest. He hit the wall beside the main entrance, then it turned and ran at Les who put his hands up as if to stop it but it just tossed him into the air and he fell to the tar-mac, cracking his head. It turned back to Fred.

Ray watched wide-eyed, opening the window so he could lean out. The Ram’s hard keratin curled horns slammed into his chest again, breaking the ribs, then again before he had a chance to slide down the wall, stopping his heart for a few seconds before it began pumping again. When he did slide down, the Ram backed away around a metre, then hurtled itself at his face, smashing his nose and teeth and fracturing his skull, splitting his jawbone.

Les was on his knees, and the Ram hurled at and slammed into him, his ribs splintering. He lay on his back, groaning. The animal stepped across and put its hoof into his mouth pressing down, taking his front four teeth with it, crushing his tongue, his tonsils, choking him. It pressed harder, Les convulsing, trying desperately to remove it from his mouth. The Ram took it out, and he rolled over choking, coughing, blood spilling out onto the tar-mac.

The Ram backed away and stopped, angled its head so it was clearly looking up at Ray, then turned and ran, out of sight beyond a corner.

Ray closed the window, but could hear the moans of Fred and Les. Then he heard another moan, coming from Lee’s place.

"Shit...Lee!" he said, and dashed in to find him holding his head, trying to get up behind the desk.

"Lee are you okay? I’ll need to call an ambulance".

"Ray...fuckin..Fred..cunt...fuckin..spiked me..I'll...be okay...don't you fuckin..dare..call an ambul..." However, in the distance, sirens came closer. One of several passers-by who had observed what had happened had immediately rang them, even before the Ram had turned on Les.

"You called them...you fuc..." but then the effort