Feardevil novel by Lillian Owl
Will Dockery
creations, including the title character, Feardevil.
http://www.lulu.com/product/file-download/feardevil-the-rebirth-of-a-hero/29943?productTrackingContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/1"...Based on comic book characters originated by Will Dockery, this pulpfiction noir novel explores the seamy supernatural side of the fictionalShadowville town in West Georgia, USA. Ancient Shamanism, heroes withsuper-human abilities, vampires, poison potions, strangely passionatecriminals, and ordinary policemen in extraordinary circumstances, and evenmore surprises, are all blended together in this darkly original novel.There is even time for romance, both sacred and profane, in these pages.Co-authored by the immensely creative Blackwolf, this novel is a must-readfor pulp lovers." -Lillian Owl--Red Lipped Stranger by Will Dockery & The Shadowville All-Stars:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBhcN1WK144
Will Dockery
Feardevil novel today, in the Usenet archives. Good writing by my
friends Lillian Owl & Blackwolf, with plot & characters by me:
http://www.youpoetry.info/feardevil-a-return-chapter-five
Feardevil: A Return [Chapter Five]
by Lillian Owl, Will Dockery, Blackwolf
Chapter Five
John Smith was definitely not a happy camper. Last night’s event were
bad enough, but encountering a seemingly paranoid doctor no one could
identify as on staff, a cop suddenly shooting his partner then trying
to nail him, all before sunrise, was more than his current fees were
covering. And to top it all off, still waiting on his bed tray
was a
cold breakfast!
"Yecch," he muttered. "Nothing’s worse than cold oatmeal, cold toast,
and cold coffee. I’d rather drink blood and eat dirty laundry."
And now that hick cop was back. With his partner in tow this time,
plus some other uniforms. John sincerely wished he had stayed home,
or at least been better paid.
"Oh, for Pete’s sake, Smith! If that even is your name! Exactly how
you could put a grown man’s lights out with a plastic bedpan, I can’t
figure, anymore than I can grasp that one of my officers, a man with
ten years on the force and a clean record, could suddenly decide to
start shooting his closest friend. Not to mention this mysterious
doctor who you say warned you about what was going to happen, that
surprisingly no one else here knows!"
Schmedly raised his hands toward the ceiling in exasperation, then
suddenly doubled over and clutched his stomach. His partner looked at
him with genuine concern.
"Easy, Petey. Think about your retirement. You wanna live to retire
don’t you?"
Schmedly got a far away look in his eyes for a moment, then
straightened his back and scowled. He shook his head, which
started
to pound worse than before. "Steve," he said quietly to his
partner, "get me some coffee, some decaf this time, and, uh, make
sure no one’s trying to kill anyone over the scrambled eggs, eh?"
"Good idea me bucko, want anything else, a donut maybe?" Schmedly
nodded, and as his partner left he looked Smith coldly in the
eyes. "I have a bad feeling about you Smith, and rest assured, I will
know if you’re for real or not. I got half a mind to book you anyways
and forget which basement we locked you in!"
Smith snorted. "For what? Refusal to catch a second bullet? Get real,
Tedley, I am a victim here, not the perp. "
Schmedly gave it up, for now. He turned to look out the now-locked
window.
"Looks like its going to be a nice day, despite everything. " He
paused, then looked back at Smith. "You’re not such a bad guy, tell
me how the hell did you manage to deck a man with a five ounce piece
of plastic?"
"More like fifteen ounces, and if you aim just right, you can get the
hard bottom to swerve up and hit the nose. Especially that guy. Man,
what a schnozz."
Which of course was ridiculous, as the officer in question had the
smallest nose Schmedly had ever seen on a man.
A nurse poked her head in through the door. "Excuse me, is there a
lieutenant Edward T. Schmedly here?"
"Unfortunately that’d be me. Why?"
"There is a captain Menendez was on the phone for you, says its
urgent that you call him back immediately. He also asks, ’Where
the
hell is your cell phone?’ Uh, that’s
a direct quote, Lieutenant."
"’Edward T.’ How did you get ‘Petey’ outta that?" Smith asked with a
smile.
Schmedly looked at him with a harsh look "Never you mind wise-ass.
Okay, Nurse, where’s the phone?"
Elsewhere Devil Buddha was fixing himself some tea, had even cleaned
his own cup and everything. He could hear the muffled cries of a
young man in another room. He mused to himself that probably wands
was dripping some hot wax on him or otherwise toying with him. He
chuckled, then spotted a video. He picked it up and read the
title: "BUBBA DIVAS #9"
"Really?" he said out loud, a smile spreading across his soft, pudgy
face. "I wasn’t aware they were up that high. Well, this should amuse
me for the next four hours…’hot southern belles, many doing it on
camera for the first time.’ No plot, just sex, sex, sex… good, I
hate it when a plot gets in the way of a story. Hey special
appearance by… well my, my!" He shifted his gaze toward the door of
another room. "Wonder when she did this? How the once great have
fallen. Well, let’s find the TV and check it out."
He reached for a loaf of bread on the table, then
reconsidered. "Think I’ll just wander over to that diner down the
street in a little while. I can be reasonably sure they’re not going
to poison me." Looking around the shabby little house, he said, "Not
that these guys needed my girl Cups for that. They should thank us
for liberating them from their miserable, roach-infested existence."
Owlyn looked around, wondering what her chances of getting onto the
riverbank and out of the wilderness alive and uninjured were. That,
and how long it takes one superhero guy to pee. "Everything coming
out okay?" she asked, half-mockingly.
"Not for years,"Hill grumbled."Not for years." Then to himself he
muttered "and don’t tell me I can change that. Sip your stupid potion
and be healed, yeah, right." He finally zipped up his pants after
polluting a dark corner of The Bat’s already dank lair. He wondered
if his urine was good for the glowing lichen, or if he had just
killed a small patch of it. "I guess the Bat will get back to me on
that one," he muttered, wiping his hands on his thighs. He felt the
long dagger in its sheath, tucked into his waistband. "Damn, I forgot
it was there… I almost dropped it when I unzipped." He adjusted it
for comfort in the small of his back, and wearily turned back toward
Owlyn and the mouth of the cave.
With her back to the first strands of a cold dawn, she seemed to
radiate a pale arc of clouds. The wind was blowing her hair around,
and it made him want to bury his fingers in it once more. He hated
his own frustrated desire; it almost made him hate her, for being
desirable. It made him want to be warm and satisfied again; but maybe
he didn’t deserve it anymore.
Dawn rose softly, turning Owlyn’s hair golden around the edges,
reminding him of the last woman who’d made him feel warm and
satisfied. With a renewed pang in his chest, he sadly mused that
that woman now went by the name "Queen of Cups." That thought seemed
to freeze his heart, still his limbs.
"Is it my fault, Owlyn?"
"What, that you can’t pee?"
"No, no… that she’s a Kaos Queen now… a poisoner, instead of a
healer."
Owlyn shook her head. "Why would it be your fault?"
"Maybe I failed her in some way. I seem to fail everyone I’ve ever
loved."
Owlyn took a deep, cleansing breath and advised Bart to do the
same. "We have to go, now. We’ve already been here too long." She
looked down at the Chattahoochee River, a sheer drop from the mouth
of the cave. Suddenly, she smiled to herself, as the surface of the
water was only about six feet away.
"C’mon," she urged him, "even if we can’t scamper across the river
bank, we won’t hurt ourselves by trying. Let’s go."
But Bart had already lost himself to the throes of self pity. Between
not having eaten much the day before, the harrowing and constant
adrenaline rushes of the night, the sorry state of his once perfect
health, and the regrets he bore from his lost loves, he felt that he
just didn’t have the physical strength to take one more step.
"Maybe the world doesn’t need me anymore. Maybe I don’t deserve to go
on. Maybe I should just let The Bat bite me, and I can spend the next
thousand years drinking rats and playing chess in the dark… with
glowing rocks…." His voice trailed off. He stared off into the
sunrise, which brought him none of its former joy.
He didn’t even notice that Owlyn had stepped up beside him and was
tugging on his hand. He didn’t hear her urging him on anymore. Just
on the verge of winning his peace and freedom, he had simply slipped
into deep, emotional shock.
Owlyn managed to tug him forward, desperately trying to snap him out
of it. She got him to the edge of the cave mouth, but he just kept
staring straight ahead.
As the sun finally came up over the horizon and began to shine
through the dense canopy of trees around the Chattahoochee, Owlyn
dropped his hand, stepped back a few paces, then spun her body around
in a tremendous roundhouse kick, square in the fleshy part of his
buttocks.
Instead of being stunned further into oblivion by the impact of
Owlyn’s boot, he startled back into full consciousness of sudden
free-
fall. He opened his mouth to yell just as his face hit the cold,
murky water.
H bobbed back up to the surface, catching sight of Owlyn clambering
down the cliff like a nimble black spider.
The Chattahoochee is not very deep at this bend in the river, and
Bart easily made his way to the shallows and the river weeds. The
numbness of his emotions was quickly replaced by the numbing cold of
the water and the wind.
I’m wet, cold, and running for my life. Can things possibly get any
worse? he asked himself.
"Bart!" screamed Owlyn from the shrubbery at the shore. "Behind you!"
Bart twisted his torso just in time to see a large fish with a long,
sword-like snout speeding toward his backside. Now it was heading for
his stomach. There wasn’t time to move out of the way. He brought his
booted foot up to his waist and lashed out at the fish with his foot.
The fish deftly avoided the kick and veered away, only to turn around
and charge him again.
"What’s a shark doing in the Chattahoochee?" Owlyn screamed.
"Not a shark! It’s a garfish!" Bart delivered a glancing blow to the
fish’s snout, causing the gar to leap out of the water in a flash of
frustration. It flipped over and tried to catch Bart’s arm in a
deadly, barbed sweep, but Bart punched the fish in the side with his
fist, stunning it momentarily. He took that moment’s advantage to
grab the fish with both hands just behind its gills, yanking its head
completely out of the water.
The fish flailed mightily in his arms, looking for all the world like
a strange parody of the legend of Excalibur and the Lady of the Lake.
The Lady was on the shore, however, safe and dry, while "Arthur" was
waist deep in murky water...
(To Be Continued)
This is a cool, obscure novel based on many of my childhood comic
strip creations, including the title character, Feardevil.
"...Based on comic book characters originated by Will Dockery, this
pulpfiction noir novel explores the seamy supernatural side of the
fictionalShadowville town in West Georgia, USA. Ancient Shamanism,
heroes withsuper-human abilities, vampires, poison potions, strangely
passionatecriminals, and ordinary policemen in extraordinary
circumstances, and evenmore surprises, are all blended together in
this darkly original novel.There is even time for romance, both sacred
and profane, in these pages.Co-authored by the immensely creative
Blackwolf, this novel is a must-readfor pulp lovers." -Lillian Owl
--
"Wobble", "She Came From Overseas" & "Crawford Road Crawl" by Will
Dockery & Friends:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XyRCh0kj5w
will.d...@gmail.com
> creations, including the title character, Feardevil.
>
> http://www.lulu.com/product/file-download/feardevil-the-rebirth-of-a-hero/29943?productTrackingContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/1
"...Based on comic book characters originated by Will Dockery, this pulpfiction noir novel explores the seamy supernatural side of the fictionalShadowville town in West Georgia, USA. Ancient Shamanism, heroes withsuper-human abilities, vampires, poison potions, strangely passionatecriminals, and ordinary policemen in extraordinary circumstances, and evenmore surprises, are all blended together in this darkly original novel.There is even time for romance, both sacred and profane, in these pages.Co-authored by the immensely creative Blackwolf, this novel is a must-readfor pulp lovers." -Lillian Owl
--
Music & poetry from Will Dockery & The Shadowville All-Stars:
http://www.reverbnation.com/willdockery