Archive of Our Own

“I appreciate this, Amira.” Brian and Amira walk into the Monstropolis City Dump, wearing leather smocks and protective gloves. Amira has opted for a big heavy duty mask and a pair of goggles but Brian has not. Given that he is a zombie his nose stopped working a while back and he’s pretty sure if he lets anything here get to his eyes he deserves to lose them.

Not like Vicky doesn’t have a jar of them at her place.

“So you said,” Amira grunts, “we ain’t started work yet, so we’ll see if you sound the same after a couple hours.” She rolls her shoulders and the pair look at the mountain of utterly ruined and tortured vehicles cluttering the yard. “I swear to god if Damien doesn’t stop having his cronies drag these Mad Max afterbirth cars out of hell. I am going to send him straight to hell. Like via murder.”

“Yeah there are a lot of these.” Brian grunts looking at the cars, all sharp edges and vicious fenders. “It's shocking that these idiots don’t know how to refuel a gas-tank right?”

“It’s something to do with the 8th circle being kind of…Gentrified I think.” Amira waves her hand. “Dahlia was screaming about it among all the other screaming. Demon knights so used to getting their gas pumped for them they don’t even get out of the cars to do it themselves.”

“Now it might be all the Vera self help books I’ve read.” Brian mutters and Amira’s mouth isn’t visible but it hangs open. “She is very good at making money, Amira, don't judge. I also don’t sleep.” He coughs. “Do these run on earth gas cause we could make a mint flipping these.”

“No last I heard Hell GAS.” Amira makes quotes. “Is some kind of blood they draw out of giant Guzzoline beasts.”

“You know that would explain why they kept murdering those mascots and draining their blood into gas tanks.” Brian nods slowly and Amira hisses. “Yeah that was messed up. I saw them try and cram a dude dressed like a giant doughnut into a giant juicer.” Brian stares dead ahead, his eyes glassy. “I can still hear him screaming about coupons.”

“Cool!” Amira claps her hands, her hair shoots up in a bright burst. “We are getting paid big bucks to reduce these cars to scrap.”

“How did you hear about this?”

“I have a guy.” Amira tells Brian as she heads over to a large green locker, she kicks it open and inside are a pair of sledgehammers. “He tells me about jobs that let you go buck wild for a few hours.”

“Is this your shady fight club guy?”

“I can’t talk about that.”

“So yeah.” Brian holds up one finger and raises and lowers it a few times.

“I bet you haven’t read that book.” Amira’s smirk can be heard through the mask and Brian nods his agreement.

“Nah.” He punches at the air, once, twice and lets his arms fall to his sides. “Not enough Edward Norton in the book. I also think Palahniuk’s prose drags in places.” He and Amira advance on the cars. “Don’t get me wrong it’s a signature style and I can’t begrudge him the success it’s earned but you know…Sometimes I don’t need the same slogan chanted at me thrice a chapter.”

“The man who reads how to get rich quick books finds Fight Club’s text to be…Tasteless.” Amira levers her hammer up and Brian just snorts at her, shaking his head. “I’m just saying there’s a palpable irony.”

“That’s a big word for you.”

“Bite me, zombie.”

“I only bite the tasty beasts.” Brian lets his teeth clack together and he feels one crack. “Damn it.” He spits out shards of tooth. “ I knew that one was gonna go sooner or later.” He shakes his head. “Back tooth at least.”

“Yikes.”

“Yeah. Cash needed for replacements and my…Secret project.” He taps his nose. “Thanks for letting me tag along.”

“Hey no I got…Legitimately just the thing for that, but we gotta put a dent in this first.” She slams her hammer down on the hood of one of the hell cars and the rusted steel crumbles inward, exposing engines that were a twisted fusion of gristle and steel. Fan Belts covered in hellish runes and pistons topped with the eyeless skulls of lesser demons, throats full of fire until they were imprisoned in the grim eight cylinder. The sacrifice of blood would bring them to life and they would rage and fight and roar the great machines forward.

“You know, I forget…Hell just makes shit that looks like an album cover.” Brian looks down at the engine block. “Do I just?” He holds up his big green hands, covered in scars and stitches. Amira bows her head and Brian reaches into the barbed wire mess of steel and tears out the unbeating heart of the mechanical monstrosity. It dies not with a roar but a wheeze.

“Now you pull out all the pistons and we toss them in the sanctified boxes over there,” Amira gestures to the big golden boxes to one side. “You can go near those right?”

“Reanimated by cruel-disease, nothing holy or unholy in here.” Brian taps his chest twice and the dull hollow sound that rings out from the motion says it all. “So, crush, rip, remove, sanctify.” Brian nods and repeats it to himself.

“That’s right.” Amira nods as the zombie repeats his little chant. It sometimes takes a minute for him to keep level. “I’ll crack on, busting these bad boys open. You start pulling as you go. Once we run out of cars here I’ll help you with the pistons.”

“Okay. Okay.” Brian nods again. “You do that I gotta…Rip, remove, sanctify.” He mutters and points at Amira. “You crush!”

“That’s right. I do that part.”

He nods a few more times as Amira starts to work. There’s dozens of these stupid cars and the city keeps finding more and more of them. Hard to believe that despite all the numbers and crazy tech Hell is just…bad at adapting for invasions. It might explain why they can so easily be thwarted by teens who ask too many questions and priests who go to the gym.

Amira cracks the hammer down on another spiked bonnet and there’s a hiss of steam that erupts from within. She takes a step back and mutters something. She hears the sound of steel being ripped apart and turns to watch Brian ripping the skull topped pistons out of the engine block. He does it with an ease that borders on contemptuous. Steel bends, the skull’s crack under his hands and his arms are ropey with thick strings of muscle.

It’s a little unsettling, not any more unsettling than watching a bunch of the demon genteel chopping up fast food mascots to try and make their screaming hell-machines work. Still Brian breaks stuff like nobody's business, just bends steel. Pushes through solid stone and could probably fall off a building and while he might not STAND up depending on how he lands he’ll keep moving.

Brian is a machine.

“You think it’s weird how all the skulls look the same?” Brian stands up. “Like is it a type of demon they use…Do they grow them to be engine parts?” Brian clacks two skull heads together a few times. “I feel concerned by this.” He throws the skull pistons into the marked barrels, a plume of black smoke rises up from the barrels and intertwined among the smoke are the grinning faces of the freed hellions. Mocking, dagger tooth smiles swell and bloom outward as they soar upward. Free now.

“I dunno, I think they taught us about hell in History class once but I was trying to whittle my student ID into a shiv.” Amira cracks her hammer down on another bonnet. “I try not to worry about it until it’s in my face or we’re dealing with Damien’s special brand of courtly shit.”

“Lotta rules in hell.”

“Lotta rules in life.”

Brian nods his head to one side. True. He goes about popping free the last of the engine pistons and tosses them away. “What do we do with the engine block?”

Amira turns around and stares, blinking slowly as she leans on her hammer. “I wasn’t told to do anything with them besides leave them lying around.” She spins the hammer on the ground. “Why you got another get rich quick scheme?”

“No I just…I dunno.” Brian shakes his head and picks up the engine block with one hand. Amira can see the muscles on his back straining against his shirt, taut, tight, gotta be going through-

“Brian!” Amira calls out as a faint red stain appears on his back and he drops the engine-block. He hisses, not at all in pain but he just knows when he reaches back and feels the damp. “You-”

“Fine.” He sounds tired. “That was stupid of me. Stuff like this needs both arms or I’m gonna rip stuff apart.” He grunts and rolls his shoulder, the stain blossoms outward and spreads down his white shirt. “I’m fine,” he flexes his arm a few times, “still works. All the digits can…” He touches each finger to the middle of his palm. “Yeah, we’re good.”

“Then we’re good.” Amira nods, she can hear him grind his teeth from here. He’s annoyed at himself. He’s been a zombie for a while now and he still keeps breaking his body, little rips and big rips alike. “You want to pick up the pace?!” She asks him with a loud deliberate sigh. “You know we got a bunch of these to do!”

“Oh yeah, shit.” Brian turns around quickly and making sure to use both hands he rips the engine block free of the next car. Then the one next to that one. Then the next one. “Get a few going at once, the pistons are easy to get out.”

“Yeah well, you keep pulling and I’ll keep cracking.” Amira makes a show of taking a big step to the side and smashing open another car. “Don’t wanna be here all night, I still got that surprise to show you.”

“Well you know,” Brian tells Amira but he doesn’t bother to finish as he starts his little chant of ‘rip, remove, sanctify’ to himself. His brain takes a moment to catch up to his actions. They get a good thing going, the hammer comes down and there’s a hiss of demonic fog. A nice steady pace, Amira is pretty sure they could both go faster. She could, totally, go much faster. Brian has his pace to keep.

A lot of people think Brian is lazy…and he is. But he also is lazy where necessary. The human body sans it’s protective mechanisms and faculties tend to break. He’s not got all his own engines firing but the car keeps running. Brian died once before but he stood back up, not all of him came back from the experience.

His body is fragile despite everything he’s capable of. Go too fast and you rip something, jerk too quickly and shear a bone…Sometimes you just got to take it slow. Rushing doesn’t promise you first place, taking your time means you get to finish.

It’s an hour later and Amira can’t help but see it now. “Wow the engine heads are all the same.”

“Right?” Brian holds two up. “Even the same messed up teeth!”

“That’s…” Amira rests her chin on the top of her fist. “Maybe it’s like a logo in hell?”

“Hell is messed up. Imagine a little demon farm full of little pissed off fight demons, like cock-fighter demons. All reared to get decapitated and used to power hell cars.” He stares dead ahead. “I swear this is the type of shit that would keep me up at nights.”

“Maybe it’ll keep me up, thanks stiff.”

“No problem, scorch.” Brian stuffs his hands in his pockets, the flesh all over his hands is poxed and sliced apart. Ribbons of green putrid flesh lay open to the world. The faint white gleam of bone and his clotted dark veins stand out. He doesn’t even really notice or react to it, not in the slightest. Amira just keeps walking ahead of him.

“It’s around here somewhere, I left that,” she points to a large body pillow of some kind of…Cube with tits? It was a shape that was blushing and was either covered in tits or tumors. Brian stares at it utterly transfixed for a second.

“What the fuck is that?”

“I think it’s an anime thing.”

“...I’m gonna take a picture.”

“For personal use?”

“No, I wanna know what that is.”

“FOR personal use?”

“No, shut up, it's haunting me.” He gets out his phone and takes a photo. “Who do you think knows what it is? Oz or Zoe?” He looks at Amira and she looks up. “If it’s an anime thing it’s gotta be Zoe.”

“Gotta be Zoe.” Amira agrees as Brian sends out a text asking for all the information possible on this awful little shape. “Okay so you used the most nightmarish thing possible to mark this thing you say is gonna be rad.”

“I did!” Amira leads him to a towering pile of junk. Lots of steel scrap, springs and busted up machines. CRT displays that held no more life. “I think a chunk of this is from that robot-uprising back in the Spring.”

“Oh yeah. That would explain the…Retro-Deadlies.” Brian looks at an old home computer, the floppy disc drive mounted to one-side of the hard white bakelite body. Only the word “Floppy” has been scratched out and “SHURIKEN BUKKAKE” has been written in place of it.

He can only shake his head at the display, eyes going up and then down the pile of failed mechanoid warriors. He hears Amira whistle and he turns quickly, hears something pop in his leg.

“...Fuck.” He mutters to himself as he takes a moment, grips his shin and slides his hands up and down. Making sure nothing is broken inside or torn or out of place. He doesn’t need his leg filling up with spoiled blood again. He recalls the raw horror of taking a dodgeball from Scott to the thigh once.

It wasn’t so much a spray of blood as it was a wet, flaccid slap. Then the laughter.

Thankfully it just seemed his kneecap had come…A little loose. He pushes and there’s a hideous sound, scraping and he tests the limb. Much better. “Coming!”

He makes it around the pile of scrap to find Amira, one hand on her hip and the other hand splayed towards her find. Brian’s eyes go wide and he chuckles at it.

“Holy crap.”

“Right!?” Amira nods her head a dozen times, her eyes glowing almost as brightly as the roiling inferno on her head. There was a pinball machine, a little grimy but it looked glorious. Big shiny dials and polished steel, coated in rust and mess. But it was a beauty. “I found it when I was hunting around the other day for more stuff to take a hammer to.”

“You take a hammer to stuff here often?”

“You wanna probe about my nights or enjoy this treasure?”

“Treasure it is.” Brian walks up to the machine and through the glass he can see his own worm eaten mug, peeled skin around his lips and a little exposed skull on display. He runs a hand over the backboard of the machine and the words “AQUA-VENTURE” are written in faded, faux seaweed soaked letters.

“Sunken treasure.” He mumbles and crouches down to peer into the guts of the machine. A haruspex of flippers and fancy plastics tells him the internals of this thing are still in decent working order. It’s just a little ugly on the outside. His lips twitch up at the corners.

He taps, gingerly, one of the flipper buttons and the machine coughs before the flipper jerks upwards. “Oh, Amira.” He tells her with a smirk. “You sure you don’t want this thing?”

“Brian what am I gonna do with a mouldy old pinball machine?”

“Fix it. Clean it. Make it look like it’s never had a rough day of service?” He offers as he looks at himself in the reflection. Amira shrugs her shoulders.

“That sounds like a lot of time and I need my eight hours a night.” Amira looks at him, pulling down her mask to show him her grin. “I figure this might help with your lil project. You know, she adopts a pose with one arm out and the other resting on..Nothing.

“It wouldn’t hurt.” Brian admits. “A little delicate work would be very useful.” He smiles at her, his eyes alive. “Thank you, Amira. This is gonna be so helpful.”

“Yeah well once you get it fixed up expect my fine ass to get the high score on it.” She points at him. “I want a free shot.”

“Sure, anytime you want.” Brian looks up. “You think I can just,” he mimes pulling, “get it outta there?” He and Amira stare at the pile. “Yeah, totally.” He mumbles as he slides under the machine and rests the weight on one of his shoulders. “Already gonna see Vicky for a repair job so…” He bares his teeth and something grinds. “On three….One, two….”

The entire pile of trash shakes and crumbles in on itself as the two bolt away from the oncoming avalanche of 80’s era murder robotics. One last desperate attempt to take a human life aided by gravity the machines hurtle toward the pair, both of them hissing and swearing as they leap to safety.

“Fucking piece of shit ass trash!” Amira flips the garbage off and sweeps a hand through her hair, shooting a gout of fire into the pile. Much of it exploded into melted slag and the fire began to spread across the busted up trash bots. “You can’t kill me! I’m gonna go home tonight and do alive people things, you scrap heap rejects!”

Brian just pants and is pretty sure something came loose in all that excitement. A bone, twisted, a nerve pinched, a gland swollen to bursting. But goodness, sometimes it feels good to get the sludge in his veins flowing and the tired muscle of his heart to hammer.

“You feel better?” Brian asks Amira as she gets onto the fifth stanza about living forever and how fucked up these guys are for trying to mess with her. She stops and rubs at her arm, nodding as she steps off the molten plastic skull of a death dealing retro-TV.

“Much.” Amira tells him. There’s a loud buzz and Brian squats to fish his phone from his pocket, he answers.

“BRIAN!” The voice calls, Zoe. “Brian! You have no idea what a treasure you have found! That’s the ultra-rare Shining Trapezohedron-CHAN BODY PILLOW! Given away at Nyarlothocon back in the fifth Yuga-Cycle of reality!” She sounds giddy, he can hear a dozen mouths champing and chomping at each other as she goes on.

“Oh huh.” Brian looks at the pillow fluttering on a now burning pile of robots. “Is it…valuable?”

“Brian for the love of god.” Amira looks at him.

“I mean to the right buyer it’s easily worth a couple hundred bucks, even covered in trash juice. If anything that might enhance it, convince someone it’s elder god jizzum and well you might be talking tens of thousands of bucks.”

“Brian for the love of god!” Amira’s tone changes and the two look at the fluttering presence of Trapezohedron-Chan in the distance.

“I gotta call you back.”

“If you wanna sell that call me! I can pay you in fanfics and risque lewds!” Zoe screams down the line as he hangs up. He looks at Amira and she nods back at him.

They have a mountain of burning plastic, possibly functional vintage-death machines and now fire to contend with. The pair couldn’t be happier as they bolt for the pile of junk. Leaping over scrap and heat as they scramble up the pile. The smell of cooking flesh, burning hair and the howl of frustration as the whole scrap mountain continues to rupture and break under them both.

----

“...I mean,” Amira holds up the pillow, “maybe the little singes add character.”

“Totally.” Brian nods, his palms all but scorched away into a flat tangle of gristle and meat. “That’s the reason people get those pillows, the character right?” He grins at Amira and she snorts, shaking her head.

“Corny.”

“You laughed.”

“Corny.” She repeats. The two walk into the city at night, there’s not many cars around and the devils prowl around in their little gangs. “So you really gonna do this thing?”

“I said I would.” Brian tells Amira. “Doesn’t need to be more than that, does there?”

“Isn’t there?” Amira grins and Brian looks at her out of the corner of his eyes, expression flat and unreadable. “Okay, fine, keep your secrets big guy.”

“There’s no secret. Miranda asked me if I wanted to go and I said sure.” He holds up his hand. “It’s in two weeks and it’s just a formal function.” He makes a quiet sound in his throat. “To be honest I think she maybe just wants a big guy to stand between her and open windows.”

“Oh come on.” Amira shoves him and Brian isn’t the one who moves. “Not funny.”

“Didn’t laugh.”

“Good cause it wasn’t funny.”

“AS you were.”

“I’m sure Miri isn’t all tactically minded in her choices for this.” Amira takes a slow breath. “Still it’s a lot of effort.”

“I had that night free.” Brian goes on. “I’ve got most nights free. Besides I feel like getting asked to a formal dance by a princess is one of those,” he tilts his head back, “what do you call thems?”

“Once in a lifetime events?”

“No.” He pauses. “Offers you can’t refuse.” He tells her with a smug grin, Amira snorts and wheezes.

“Oh my god they’re royalty not the mafia.”

“IS there a difference?” Brian asks. “Besides the mafia having nicer hats?” He grins at Amira who can only nod in return. “Right?”

“I feel like the mafia probably way less obvious too.” Amira points out. “But no yeah, I am all about you and me doing this. Get you some scratch to get a nice set of duds.” She flashes him a big smirk.

“Helps with articulation too.” He holds up his hand to the light, a shine hits his face as he takes in the mess of his palms. “I am gonna probably wanna wear those gloves next time.”

“Oh yeah.” Amira nods. “Heading to Vicky’s for a new pair?”

“She’s got the cure for what ails me…” He clenches his hand to a fist. “Then I gotta talk to Oz about some practical help.”

“...” Amira stares and then freezes. Brian stops too. “Are you and Oz gonna-”

---

“So Brian!” Oz claps his hands. “What is your practical experience with dancing?”

“I mostly recreate video-game reload animations and bend my knees.” He holds out his hands and very slowly bends and twists. A wave passing from the left side of his body, jerky quick motions having his limbs move up and down. “When I try to dance carefully people think I am popping and locking.”

“When actually-”

“I am not trying not to punch them and or break my own arms.” Brian nods. Oz tilts his head a little bit. “So when it comes to fancy dancing I know what it looks like. But not…How to do it if I am honest.”

“Hey that’s fine,” Oz puts his hands on his hips, “it’s not super tricky but the issue is probably gonna be memorizing all the steps.”

“Absolutely it is. Which is why I wanted to start this early with you.” Brian peels off his jacket and tosses it onto the sofa. They had to do this privately at his place. Brian wasn’t embarrassed to be seen learning to dance but he also didn’t want to have to pay for anything if he had an accident.

“Sure thing,” Oz pulls his rucksack from his back, a little phobia hands him out a book which he takes and hands to Brian, “I also brought you this. It’s an old merpeople dance book. So even if I’m not here, if you wanna make flash cards or really read this you can.”

“Oh that’s amazing, dude.” Brian all but sighs the words. “This will be so useful.” As he flicks through the book Oz gets out another couple of things from his bag. Little cutouts of feet. “Wh…What are those?”

“Step guides.” Oz shakes them. “Where to put your feet!” He waves them around. “Green for you,” he holds up yellow ones, “yellow for me! Also I guess Miri, Miri will step where I do.” He looks up to the side. “That’s right, me and Miri are close height wise this is probably fine.”

“Wow Oz you got everything but the tights and heels.” Brian laughs and Oz laughs a second later.

“Yup everything but the tights and heels,” he agrees looking at the Phobia in the bag, holding a pair of bright red pumps. He shakes his head slowly at the little creature and it places the shoes down. One day, not today.

“Okay so…How many dances do you think I gotta learn?”

“Probably….” He leans his head to one side. “About ten.” When he says that Brian stares at him, hard. “If it helps most of them ALL start the same, so if you get the basics down it’s really easy.”

“Oh that’s a lot to remember.” Brian mumbles into his hand.

“No no!” Oz tells him quickly. “All of them start with two holds.” Oz walks up to Brian, dumping the foot guides on the ground. He stands in front of Brian and he places a hand on his shoulder. Then with his other arm he lifts up Brian’s right arm and interlaces his fingers with his. “Now you put your hand on my waist.”

Brian takes a moment.

“It’s fine Brian nobody can see us- you don’t have to worry about people thinking stuff, dude.”

“No I just wanna do it…Slowly so I don’t punch a hole in you.” Brian tells him and Oz’s grip on his shoulder grows tighter, a set of phobias sprout up on his knuckles. “That’s…You know.”

“I know I’m a friend who knows how to dance and can grow back…If you break me.”

“I don’t wanna break you.”

“You and me BOTH.” Oz laughs nervously. “So sure. First lessons will be nice and slow but we’re gonna be speeding up bit by bit.” Oz nods and feels Brian’s hand rest gently on his waist. “Just like that, don’t hold or squeeze. That hand is to guide.”

“Okay.” Brian tells him. Oz wiggles the hand he is holding with Brian. “Remember Miri is a little shorter than you and maybe me. I will find out her height and fix this,” Oz tells him, “I think I’m meeting her for a thing in a day or so.”

“A thing?”

“...She wants me to try on a dress for something.” Oz states flatly.

“Oh.”

“It’s not a weird thing or like a sexy thing like you guys are-”

“Oz, it’s fine. If you get asked by our friends to do something you can do it.” He can feel the little guy squeeze his shoulder and tremble just a little. “They’re your friends and mine too. You don’t wig out if Polly and I hang out right?”

“Not…Out loud.” Oz leans his head. “I don’t think you guys would do anything but I’m always a little.” He rolls his eyes. “She did want me to ask if you’ve seen her ‘dope hip flask with the human face on it’ around?”

“No.” Brian tells Oz quickly. “I have not seen it.” Which was not totally true, it screamed at Brian one morning and out of fright he punched it out the window, hadn’t seen it since then. Now he knew who it belonged to. “She lose it over here?”

“She said she thought she either gave it to you or to some other giant zombie dude.” Oz shrugs. “I mean lotta big undead dudes.”

“WE do tend to get big, yeah.” Brian is pretty sure he’s gonna have to get Polly a new flask. “How is stuff with you and Polly?” He asks and Oz makes a low, delighted little noise. He looks down at his feet.

“It’s…Really good.” He sounds happy. “It’s still a lot of talking but it’s,” he shrugs his shoulders, “she makes me feel good.” Oz tells Brian with a look, the taller undead gives his buddy and proud wink.

“Good for you dude.” Brain leans down, slowly. “Has she umm….Taken a trip on the Tower of Terror?”

“BRIAN!” Oz wheezes leaping back from him, Phobia’s shoot out of Oz like an explosion all of them flailing and wailing to try and calm down Oz. Brian just chuckles, his face remains rigid but the little chuckles come out anyway.

“I’m just busting your balls, clearly she’s doing the sam-”

“Brian come on!” Oz whines.and flops his hands at him. “That’s not appropriate dude talk.”

“Dude that is the most dude talk.” Brian tells him. “You don’t gotta say but you know, YOU KNOW,” he points at Oz, “Amira is gonna come at you like a rocket and she will want details. She will want the most ludicrous details possible.”

Oz swallows. “I have been doing my best to avoid Amira for that reason.” He grumbles and chuckles. “She is going to want all the details and while, I am quite sure, Polly will tell her. She wants ME to do it.”

“Amira wants you to be able to talk about this stuff.” Brian tells him. “She doesn’t mean badly she just…You know.” He shrugs. “So you said..there’s…” He blinks, brows furrow, this is getting embarrassing. “Two! TWO start positions!” When he shouts there’s a little sound like a pop.

“...It’s okay.” Oz says. “Don’t freak out.”

“I broke your fingers didn’t I?” Brian clenches his eyes shut and Oz can only look at the fact Brian’s hand is closed over his, ooze runs between his fingers and what were once HIS fingers are now on the carpet, wriggling.

“It’s fine. Just a thing to remember.” Oz tells him, he can feel the inside of Brian’s mind. It doesn’t run at quite the same speed as a lot of others but Oz is fluent in the language of fear. Brian’s got the shakes now, he’s afraid…Oz has to be happy that it’s not that he thinks he’s going to run. Brian is worried about doing that to Miri.

Brian has no doubt Oz is okay, probably shaken up. The little lights turn on in his mind and Oz takes a breath. “Yer okay dude.” Oz tells him, squeezing his shoulder. “Easy mistake, that’s why we’re doing this.”

“You’re not hurt?”

“It stung a lil but I got over it.” Oz was in horrible pain, that hurt a lot. SO MUCH honestly but at the same time…He’s gonna be fine. Brian doesn’t need to know that, he’s doing his best for Miri and so Oz can do his best for his friend. “So the other pose is…a little fancier.”

“Fancier?”

“Oh yeah.” Oz turns around, pulling his mauled limb free of Brian’s grip. “The lady stands with her back to you like this.” Oz looks over his shoulder at Brian. “One hand is down here,” he holds a hand at his waist and places Brian’s still damp hand there. “You put an arm around her back you can rest it on the waist or on the back, it’s fine either way.”

“Okay.” Brian nods. Then his other hand comes up to rest on Brian’s shoulder. “Shoulder again?”

“Lotta shoulder for the ladies, yeah.” Oz chuckles. “I think Miri can reach your shoulders right?”

“Yeah.” Brian nods. “I’m pretty sure she can.” He stares. “You make sure of her height yeah?”

“Oh totally.” Oz gives him a thumbs up. He only has a thumb on that hand so it’s easy. “This one is usually for slightly faster dances.”

“Oh that’s dangerous.” Brian mumbles. “Faster how?”

“Like the music is more up tempo.”

“Shit.” Brian mutters. “Like a lot faster?”

“Not a lot faster. But faster.”

“...Shit.”

“Hey we got time and you got that book,” Oz reminds him, “if you want we can go over the dances and which goes with which pose or we can try some motions?” Oz gives him a choice, choices are important.

“Can we…Maybe work on the slower ones first and move up to the fast ones? I feel like if I get down…The slow stuff, then the fast stuff will come easier.” Brian looks at Oz and he just gives him a nod. “Thanks, Oz.”

“Hey no. It’s been forever since I got to bust out my dance shoes.” He wiggles a pair of black and white spats. “I used to be really good at dancing, it used to be super forbidden. Fear knew how to tango.”

“No fucking way.”

“OH WAY.” Oz nods. “Dance used to belong to the devil and that meant everybody was scared of it. Thanks to that for the longest damn time I was the hottest thing on two feet.”

“For real?”

“Yeah!” Oz slaps Brian’s chest.”The essence of fear gets some perks. I could really cut a rug.”

“Oh dude don’t say shit like that,” Brian looks at him, “cause you know I’m gonna put you on the spot and ask to see that and you’re gonna freak out.”

“Nope.” Oz slides away. “Cause you’re gonna get two weeks of Oz dance studies. So you’re gonna see that I am the best dancer you know. Until I get done with you, then you’ll be the best dancer you know.”

Brian just holds out his hands and grins at Oz, teeth clenching in his jaw. “Let’s see if I can get this down before we celebrate teach.”

Oz walks back over to Brian and they adopt the first position. “So…Five slow dances and five fast dances?” Brian asks. “Is there a-”

“I colour coded them in the book.” Oz tells him. “We got this.”

“How do you do this and still have grades like mine?” He looks down at Oz. “You know…Decent but not…great.”

“I test bad.” Oz says in a quiet voice and Brian…Yeah that checks out.

The two wobble back and forth for a bit, debate the names of the dances being intentionally punny or if in fact they are supposed to be this way. Goldfish Gallop, Dashing Sturgeon, Grand Old Duke Of The Sea.

They settle on trying not to worry about it. They already had a lot of stuff on their plate and while both smirked or did the best they could do to simulate a smirk. The pair of them were screaming on the inside. Brian was sure learning two dances might kill him and Oz was fairly certain teaching someone to dance was going to be miserable.

But this was Oz, Brain thought. His scared lil buddy who wanted to put that aside to help him do something for a friend. For a friend Oz would scream his head off but he’d still walk through hell barefoot.

This was Brian, Oz thought. He’s always had your back and listened to you roll around in the muck of your mind. Least you can do it teach him the two-step, he wants to do better and god you can get behind that can’t you Oz?

“Goldfish gallop first?”

“Yeah. Let’s get to it.”

----

Vicky exhales. “What did you do shoving them in a meat grinder?” She leans back from the tattered remains of Brian’s hands. “I am serious, if you shoved them in a meat grinder I need you to tell me.”

“No, Vic. I was helping Amira destroy cars. I gotta earn cash for the tux.”

“You can’t just wear your prom tux to the fish ballet?” Vicky scratches at her head. “No I suppose not, you’d wanna get something semi-aquatic and with the right family crest on it.” She points at Brian. “You’re thinking ahead!”

“Course I am.” Brian just felt like his prom tuxedo was a little done, he didn’t find it on a dead guy after all. “It’s not everyday a princess invites you to dance in an undersea waltz.”

“It is not.” Vicky tells him, leaning back in her chair. “Which is why I find you here,” she pulls a black strap that keeps Brian stuck to the steel table. “In need of some fine tuning yes?”

“Yeah.” Brian nods. “I umm…Closer to the time I’d like to not be falling apart.” He looks down at his hands. “I’d like my hands to be good if we can make that happen, if she’s gotta hold them to dance. I don’t want them to be gross.”

Vicky smiles, it’s a soft thing that makes her cheeks puff out. “Oh of course!” She nods to Brian. “We can make sure we have some extra reinforced hands, wrists and I’ll make sure to get the skin fresh. That way there’s no time for rot to set in.” She picks up a clipboard and begins to take notes. “The hands are very important, thankfully you don’t sweat so that’s half the awkward dancing teen issues solved.”

“Ha,” Brian chuckles. “I didn’t think of that! Oh wow that is great.”

“Oh sweaty hands at school dances,” she retches, “what a chore those were. None of that for you my fine statuesque stunner.” Vicky taps her fingers against her lips. “We’d want nice hands wouldn’t we? Miri has such delicate little fingers.” She wiggles her own fingers.

“She does have little hands.”

“She’s little all over, Brian.” Vicky goes on and she pushes her swivel chair around the table. “Do we want lighter bones? Maybe you want a full nerve stripping and replacement? We could make you practically fresh again.” Her smile isn’t soft now it’s all teeth and gums. “I’ve always wondered if we could strip back one of us to a near living state, it’s so difficult to find willing participants don’t you know?”

“I’m just here to be made fresher, not new out of the box.”

“Oh Brian neither of us are ever going to be new again. Our warranty was voided a long time ago.” She sighs to herself. “For one reason or another this is our unlife and we’d best work on maintaining it.”

“Yup.” Brian mutters. “Hands and making sure all my bones are reinforced. That’s my list, doctor Vicky.”

“Oh please. It’s Professor Schmidt.” Vicky stands up and looks down at Brian. “I take it we want that closer to the day so tonight is just a…Tune up?” She asks and Brian nods. “So whats our damage, Mr. Yu?”

“I popped a tooth, at least one.” He rolls his shoulder. “I tore open a big patch of my back. Lots of stuff to the hands and my arms are….In a not great state.”

“Ahh it’s the usual upper body maladies is it?” Vicky takes a little breath and nods. “Not that I’d ever make a suggestion to you that I felt would be unwarranted. I know you’re not always up for unnecessary modifications,” she holds up a magazine and taps a page. There’s what looks like some kind of fat bag. “This is a new thing for sub-zero necromancers.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a super active gland that generates heat. The idea is to position it in slices across various active musculary groups to prevent zombie freezing. We don’t have to worry about that too much for you,” she lowers the magazine, “you keep active and that’s fantastic. This is mostly for forgetful little zombie botherers.”

“But?”

“My butt is not the topic of discussion,” she snickers at her own joke before waving at Brian as if he needs to calm down. “Sorry. It’s a heat muscle. I thought if you wanted…We could get some for your…” She pauses. “Where will Miri be squeezing besides your hands?”

“Umm Oz has been showing me the dances, lots of shoulder touching. Hands and shoulders and wrists.” Brian twitches under the leather straps and Vicky nods along. “It’s pretty hard work.”

“I bet it is!” Vicky tells him, leaning over to rest a hand against Brian’s bare chest. She runs a hand over his flesh slowly. “No tears and it feels solid, having issues breathing?”

“No none.”

“Even when practicing?”

“We aren’t doing the really fast dances yet.” Brian tells her. “Should I look out for that?”

“I want you to tell me any level of discomfort you feel, Brian.” Vicky goes on. “Dancing is a full body activity.” She reminds him. “Every bit of you will be and is engaged when dancing. Brain, lungs, muscles all of it.” She waves a hand. “I want to know if anything bothers you, I will not have you experience an iota of discomfort where possible.”

“Thanks Vic.” Brian looks up at his friend and she just nods down at him. “I’ll keep an eye on it. So far there’s nothing in the slow dances but. We’re learning them first and then we’ll add music.”

“Oh that’s smart,” Vicky nods, “how is your cognitive processing?”

“Still need a lot of reminders.” Brian mutters. “Reading is easier.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Just got easier. Comics are still the easiest but I can do the other books pretty well.” He flexes his fingers. “I prefer book books, I keep busting the e-readers.”

“They are fragile screens on those.” Vicky mutters through her fingers. “I’m so used to tossing books around that I’d just,” she throws a clipboard and there’s a clutter.

“Yeah I bet.” He can’t sit up to see it but that sounds like a busted clipboard. “I know it’s probably asking a lot of you, Vic. I’m sure you got stuff you’d rather be working on.”

“I mean I’m pursuing something right now but this is a good diversion, one can’t become too invested in a singular study.” She walks over to Brian. “Besides, I always got time for my favourite walking stiff.” She says this in a voice that makes him glad he can’t blush. Vicky, oh Vicky. There’s something in the way she smiles at him that tickles some long dormant console in the back of his head. Sparks wires that ought not spark. He’s dead the fact he still gets horny is an endless mystery and a bottomless misery.

There’s a lot of monsters out there, plenty would be fine with dating a deadman. Brian was sure he could find love but he’s not sure he could keep up with it. He’s slow, not by choice or design but by nature. He’s falling apart and he can’t keep himself together with a needle, some thread and a tonne of staples.

He’s not sure if the monster is allowed to feel love for the scientist, but he carries a little torch for her. It’s not gone out yet. Maybe it’s a little fucked up, it’s probably fucked up. But when she puts all her attention on him, all her time, he can’t help but feel…Well something very shaky inside him. He’s not got a word for it but it feels good, he’s not sure what a lot of things feel like when your brains half dog food.

“So!” Vicky claps her hands.” Let’s get rid of the dead skin and get you new stuff. Would you rather we take your gloves off or do you just want new hands?” She steeples her fingers. “I’d honestly say the state you got these into you want new hands.”

“You got a new bonesaw, don’t you?”

“How did you know?” Vicky gasps. Brain nods his head backwards.

“I saw the box before you strapped me down.” He does his best to sigh. “You better make my new hands very special, professor.”

“Oh Brian,” Vicky wanders to one side and kicks open a floor freezer. She pulls out a nice big set of hands, they’d wrung throats for someone who upset Vera. Now he wouldn’t be wringing anything anymore. They were about Brian’s size. She’d just have to shave off some layers on the back of the hand. Can’t have people thinking Brian is a member of the criminal consortium.

“I have the very best manhandlers for you. I just need to make sure they’re the best possible fit.” She tells him as she sets the hands down on a table. “I’m going to need a hand to compare.”

She bounces back to his side with a big fat saw, the teeth glint in the light of her little laboratory. It used to be a shed, he helped her build it over the Summer one year. Not it wasn’t very big but a standing table, a hole in the ground into which a large chest freezer sat and a few extension cords had turned the place into a lovely little lab. The best thing about monsters for patients? Most don’t need to be kept alive, most find death a distant and mind numbingly impossible result.

Brian for example, Vicky had notes and notes on what he had survived. Brian of their little gang was easily the most terrestrially durable. Oz was…Well that summed it up. Oz Was. Vicky was fairly certain you couldn’t actually kill or harm Oz in any way that would actually matter, but he was afraid of pain and that would have to suffice. Brain though he didn’t feel pain, he didn’t fear agony and really his transformation was something of a wonder.

In quiet moments Vicky might consider the joys of an unlimited budget to peel apart little samples, to dig deep into the rot and wet of the zombie and find out what delightful chemicals brewed such a creature. The scientist in her was tickled, delighted really at the idea of what could forge someone like her friend Brian. But it was because he was her friend Brian she would never do that to him.

She’d never peel apart each and every molecule, she’d never break down what she had and she’d never pickle the samples to observe. Because he was her friend and she so dearly loved her friends.

Her friends deserved the best.

Which- when you got right down to it is exactly what Professor Vicky Schmidt was.

“Doesn’t hurt, does it?” Vicky asks once she reaches the vein. Brian looks up at her. “What?”

“I didn’t notice you started.” Brian mutters.

“Oooh these..Might have been in more dire need of replacement than you thought.” She looks at him and her arm moves backwards and forwards, the faint grind of bone rumbling out. “Nothing?”

“...No.” Brian blinks a few times. “I was touching demon engine parts the other day. Think that has anything to do with it?”

“No, I just think that maybe these hands might have succumbed to the necrotic process a little quick with all the precise motions you’re putting them through.” Vicky makes a quiet sound. “Which might mean…You’re nervous.”

“Nervous?” Brian doesn’t laugh but he makes a rattling sound in his chest. “I don’t get nervous.”

“Oh but you do.” Vicky reminds him and they both hear a loud snap. “Oh wow that's just,” she holds up Brian’s hand, “broken off didn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Brian mutters. “I’m not nervous, Vic.”

“You might be but it might not be how you remember it.” She leans. “Your emotions take a little longer to reach you, nerves might take even longer. You always said you weren’t a nervous sort of guy.”

“I haven’t been and I’m not.” Brian goes on and Vicky makes a noise. “What?”

“I’m just giving you a theory, Brian. You’re a complicated form of undead animate. You are paradoxical and at times that makes working out the exact details hard.” She holds up a new hand, running a scalpel over the back of the palm. A square patch of skin falls away just out of view. “For example a hard science undead shouldn’t.” She slams the arm stump against his softly weeping wound. The fingers twitch before the first stitch is even in place. “Be able to do that.”

“Oooh, oooooh!” Brian blinks a dozen times in a second. “Oh these fingers are itchy!” He mutters and Vicky looks down. “They got hairy knuckles?”

“Very.” Vicky tells him. “Do you want them shaved?”

“Please.”

Vicky makes a little sound and begins to work with some thread. “Your body accepts near universal donors Brian. I could graft anything to you and it would take. It would also rot very quickly but it would take instantly. You think slowly but you have a full emotional range. Pain is…Not a thing you feel, allegedly.”

“I don’t.” Brian tells her as she stabs his wrist about twelve times, he doesn’t stir. “Not a bit of pain.”

“Rather awkward.” Vicky goes on. “I feel like certain emotional cues might be the same. Nerves might not feel or work the same. Perhaps a loss of sensation is part of that. Or…” She throws up her hands and with her hands goes one of his. It hits the floor with a thud.

“...Was that?”

“OIther hand is off!” Vicky tells him with delight. “We’ll get you all ready to go soon and then we’ll get to work on your back. I received a nice shipment of flesh. That said…Some of it’s quite tender.”

“Tender?”

“Had to argue with the previous owner.” She rolls her shoulders. “Real tooth and claw customer that one.”

“...Are you buying the people Vera feeds to tigers again?”

“Brian. No.” She opens the freezer. “Vera feeds them to something much larger and angrier than tigers. She also gives them to me now because she’s so thoroughly charmed by me and my winning smile.”

Vicky chuckles to herself. Vera probably wasn’t interested in her, well she thinks not. Hard to imagine people that fiscally motivated not having an ulterior motive. Vera likes to know what all the pieces on the board are doing at all times. A back alley doctor might hear things you wouldn’t at the top of the world. Might be able to tell you who comes in with funny shaped wounds or who you dig specific calibres of ammunition out of.

Of course a back alley doctor would not ever divulge such secrets. Clients and their privacy are important in this day and age. However Vera has a lot of money and tools and looks like an absolute spunk in suspenders. So…Concessions could be made.

Brian is flipped, prodded, twisted, turned and carved over the course of about three hours. By the time it’s done large patches of him are entirely different shades and colours. Huge chunks of him do not blend well and around stitches his body weeps grey clotted fluids. He taps his fingers to his palm and then rubs his hands together. It’s warm, at least, warm as he understands it.

Nimble fingers.

He rolls his shoulders and his back feels tight. Very tight. He stretches slowly and it all comes back to him. Vicky throws him his shirt and he pulls it over his head. Adding more stains to the litany of splotches across his chest.

“I’ll look into some fancier fingers but remember,” she points at him with her pen, “I want you to tell me if you feel anything weird. But also if you feel nothing now. That’s a pretty big thing to keep an eye on.”

“I tend to feel a lot of nothing, Vic.” He tells her and she scoffs.

“One of these days you’ll stop with action man lines and give me a working medical statement. Something about your phalanges or your twisted up nerves.” Vicky rolls her eyes and grumbles something. “Just keep me abreast of the situation, Brian. Can’t have Yu getting two left feet.”

“I think that’d be more on YOU than me.” He tells her with something approaching a grin.

“Note to self.Remove patient Yu’s sense of humour, to help his date with Miri.”

“It’s not a date.” Brian says over his shoulder. “She just wants someone to dance with. I’m pretty sure she wants someone to duck behind when the ballista fire starts up.” Brian chuckles.

“Oh alright. It’s not a date.” Vicky leans on her arm. “So in two weeks time, you’ve got dance lessons, car destruction and major surgery before going dancing with a fish princess. Do you have time for yourself there, Mr. Yu?”

“Plenty of hours in the day, Vic. You just gotta know where to squeeze.” He slings his jacket on. “You know. I actually even have a date tonight.”

“You do!?” Vicky almost falls out of her chair, standing to her feet. “Wh-with who?”

Brian taps his nose.

“I gave you that nose, Yu! Tell me! YOU CAN'T HIDE GOSSIP FROM THE CREW!”

---

Q-tips a legion of them, three buckets of soapy water, a dozen screwdrivers and a dozen little plastic bags. Brian places a marker on each bag and takes a quiet breath. Ahead of him sits the rusted piece of scrap from the junkyard. It’s dead, long dead. The mechanisms work a little bit but everything needs some TLC.

Brian doesn’t do tender. He works the lock on the side of the machine open with a screw driver and a little bit of enthusiasm. The glass pops up and the last breath trapped between neon organs wheezes out. He knocks the lock out and places it in one of the bags. He writes “LOCK- REPLACE” on a sticker and slaps it on the bag.

Within the machine there’s flippers, dull lights,cracked bakelite and more. Brian clasps his giant hands and picks up a q-tip. He starts to excavate years of dust and grime and neglect. He works the ends over faded character’s faces, between the point dials and he does so unerringly and unblinking. He stares into the open body ahead of him and he can’t help but smile at as the colours come back.

What noises do you make? What lovely lights do you have? It wouldn’t be done quickly, it wouldn’t be a one night project but nothing ever is. Brian Yu is familiar with the rigours of being brought back to life. Brian Yu is the foremost firsthand expert in coming back from the dead that he knows.

He’d died once. It was boring so he stood back up.

Some people need a helping hand finding their feet. They need patience and a few lucky breaks. Most importantly though a helping hand or two. Brian swipes at his forehead, the play board now cleaner but not spotless.

“Okay,” he takes a breath. “Let’s have a look at your guts. I promise to be gentle, I ain’t that type of zombie.” He unhooks the latches that hold the board down and as slowly as he can lifts the board free. Below there’s a nest of tangled wires, half moulded connectors and what appears to be…Yes that’s a wasp nest.

“....Please don’t be full of living wasps.” Brian begs. Thankfully there are no wasps and no zombie wasps, which are real and worse than you can possibly imagine. Still he needs something to do to keep him from worrying about his not date with Miri- his dance lessons with Oz and his side gig with Amira.

A little necromancy would be delightful.