Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits (57 page)
Read Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits Online
Authors: David Wong
Zoey dropped the mouse on the bed near where Stench Machine was curled up.
“Well, we'll know right away. If he bats it away with his pawâyeah, like that. He hates it. Oh, he likes the bag though. And ⦠now he has his head stuck in it. It's a disaster. Anyway, that was very sweet of you. And it's the thought that counts.”
“I can't even imagine a world where that's true.”
Will glanced at his watch.
Zoey sighed. “Why do you have to pretend like you don't want to be here? You could have called to tell me about the insurance, or not even told me about it at all, because I clearly don't care. Instead you made the trip all the way here. It's okay. You can just say, âI wanted to check in and see how you were doing, Zoey, because I'm a human being and not an android.'”
That created an awkward pause, which Will broke by asking, “So how
are
you doing?”
“I'm agitated because you're acting like sitting down and watching a basketball game with me is a chore on the level of cleaning out a sewer.”
Silence. They watched the game for a bit. McClaren chucked a three-pointer that missed the rim entirely.
Will said, “So what happens now? After you're all healed up, I mean?”
“I think I'm going to go on vacation.”
“And then?”
“I don't know, Will.”
“You're not thinking about staying, are you? After everything that's happened?”
“Didn't you
want
me to stay?”
“Didn't you
not
?”
“I don't know. I've grown to like having my toilet talk to me. You think more supervillains are going to attack?”
“Even if not, I don't think you know what you're getting into. Just living this life. Up to now, you've spent your life trying to keep your little financial raft afloat. Patching holes, bailing out water. But once you get into a nice boat with a motor, and a bunch of passengers, there's this terrifying moment where you look at the ocean around you and say, âOkay, so now where am I actually
going
?' It's a question most people can't answer. They're just ⦠not up to it.”
“Wait, are you doing a reverse psychology thing on me?”
“Maybe I just want you to think I am.”
Zoey tried to puzzle through that, then said, “I'll make you a little bet. If the home team wins the next game, I'll turn over complete control of the company to you and the Suits. I'll leave town and I'll be out of your hair forever.”
“And if they lose?”
“I get to take a black Magic Marker, and draw whatever facial hair I want onto your face, and you're not allowed to wash it off or cover it or anything else for thirty days. You can take control of a billion-dollar empire, but you have to risk looking foolish for a single month. Oh, and at noon on the last day of that month, you have to shove the marker up your butt. Then, with the marker wedged between your butt cheeks, you have to go down to the train station and write âZoey is our queen' on the floor. With your butt.”
Will shook his head and sighed. “You are Arthur Livingston's daughter.”
“Oh, and just for that, you also have to permanently change your name to Fartt Dongman.”
“This game is about over, isn't it?”
“Yep. Then it's the Hawks versus the Celtics. You've got six more hours of basketball to watch, so settle in. This is your life now.”
“All right, hand me a beer.”
“Get it yourself, they're in the minifridge down there. Here's something that I've been thinking about, since I've been bedridden. I don't know if you picked up on it, but Molech really didn't seem all that smart to me.”
“There were subtle clues to that effect, yes.”
“So ⦠I got to thinking about what you said about magic tricks, and how it's all misdirection. Is it possible that Molech
was
the misdirection, for someone else? Somebody ⦠behind the scenes, or whatever?”
Will, not showing any expression whatsoever, said, “Why, that would suggest, I don't know, that there's a bigger game being played here.”
Zoey said, “Well, now I
have
to stay. Oh, look! The cat's playing with his mouse.”
Will sat back with a beer and said, “Well, there you go. Mission accomplished.”
Â
If you want to read more from the guy who wrote thisâmeâcheck out my horror/adventure novel
John Dies at the End
and its sequel,
This Book Is Full of Spiders: Seriously Dude, Don't Touch It
. At least one of those books has been made into a movie, available in whatever format movies are consumed in your era (I have no idea when you're reading this, go stream it into your brain or whatever you people do now).
If you want to keep up with news of upcoming titles and other noteworthy things in my life, assuming the Internet still exists, I can be found at:
or on Facebook at:
www.facebook.com/FuturisticViolence
and
www.facebook.com/JohnDiesattheEnd.TheNovel
Or you can read my humorous nonfiction essays at Cracked.com, where I am the executive editor as of the writing of this Afterword:
http://www.cracked.com/members/David+Wong/
Special thanks to my wife, my friends, and my coworkers at Cracked.com, all of whom were neglected for months at a time while I painstakingly squeezed out the 140,000 words of this tale. I want to thank Mack, for spending a year researching the uncontacted tribes of New Guinea, including a six-month stretch living among them to learn their strange customs. Sorry all of that stuff got cut from the book.
No one in this story is based on a real person, though some parts of Zoey's personality are based on a woman I used to work with who, like the protagonist, also indirectly caused several large buildings to be destroyed.
My next novel will be the third volume in the
John Dies at the End
series, and in fact may already exist, again depending on when you're reading this. After that, maybe I'll return to Zoey and the Suits in Tabula Ra$a. Or maybe we'll all die next week. I do not know the future. I am just a man.
â
David Wong
aka Jason Pargin
January 2015
Â
DAVID WONG
is the pseudonym of Jason Pargin,
New York Times
bestselling author and executive editor of the hugely popular comedy site
Cracked.com
. His first book,
John Dies at the End,
lives forever as a cult classic movie directed by Don Coscarelli, and his second,
This Book Is Full of Spiders,
scares people on a daily basis. You can sign up for email updates
here
.
    
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Contents
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This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin's Press.
FUTURISTIC VIOLENCE AND FANCY SUITS.
Copyright © 2015 by David Wong. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.