Cape Calamity Prosperity Saga - Episode Two: The Strapping Family

[simtarts]

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"Hello my darling!" Zhanna trilled at Mustang as she scrubbed down the stove top. "If you are wondering why Mommy is in her undies, it ez because I do not want to get ze grease on my dress!"

Mustang just slurped up some cereal with his fingers and grinned, happily unaware.

Finally, it seemed that the household was happy again. After the stress of Russ's job loss, the fines from the police and fire departments, and other assorted events, things had started to calm down.



Russ was doing well at the Lab. He never would have pictured himself as a man of Science, but his past life as a submarine scavenger had prepared him well for working with instruments and technology.



Lottie was invigorated by the return of Spring weather and was spending every waking moment out-of-doors, chasing down butterflies.



Even Lottie's non-waking moments were sometimes spent out-of-doors. Zhanna didn't have the heart to disturb her only daughter's sleep, even if the beach furniture didn't look very comfortable.



With the rest of her family doing well, Zhanna tried not to think too much about that day at the Bayside Hotel. Long ago she had determined that her past would neither haunt nor define her. That two people from her past had been visiting Cape Calamity that day was merely coincidence. Yes, that was it - coincidence.

But the stress of wondering if maybe it wasn't a coincidence sometimes got to her.



But everyone else was so content. She wouldn't dream of making them worry.



Only Ace showed signs that something was amiss. He had begun to wring his hands together nervously, sometimes even deviously, and he muttered obscure words under his breath when he thought no one was listening. Zhanna wanted to sit him down for a long heart to heart, but it was difficult to find the time. Ace had a new after school job as a locker room attendant, and when he wasn't working he was doing homework or hanging out with his best friends, Dino and Ferris.

When Ace was actually home and available, Zhanna was usually sleeping. She was so tired these days...



And soon enough she knew why.

How had she missed the signs? She'd been through this three times before!



Russ was just as thrilled as she knew he would be. He had been talking about making their family into a "half-dozen" for almost a year now.



To her relief, the children responded well to the news, too. Ace was especially enthusiastic, and it made Zhanna feel reassured to see him excited about something other than money for once.

Clearly, he was doing better than she had thought.

***


"Guess what?" Dino said, and before Ace even had a chance to answer, he continued on, as was his habit. "I heard there's some Condition X freaks hanging out at the Bowling Alley lately, with really bad strains of Alienism, too. What do you think of that? Freaks getting their nasty germs all over the bowling balls."

"Bowling balls are probably covered with all sorts of germs anyway," Ace said, shrugging.

"But not FREAK germs," Dino emphasized. "We ought to meet up there tomorrow after school, make sure they know that the Bowling Alley is ours."

"Okay," Ace said agreeably, but mostly because he wanted to see if he could beat his high score on Shark Attack!



Ace assumed that the conversation was over, but as usual, Dino kept beating that horse.

"Who they hell do they think they are? Some of them are going on the news and claiming that they don't have Condition X at all. They're trying to claim that they're real aliens who came to the planet on a rocket or something. Can you believe it?"

Dino shook his head with heavy disgust, making it clear that he didn't expect any answer, especially not one that disagreed with him.



The Bowling Alley was pretty empty when they got there, which pleased Dino greatly, as if folks with Condition X had already gotten the memo that the Bowling Alley was his. They spent an hour or so trying to top their scores on Shark Attack! while Ferris whined that they were hogging the games. The glare from the juice bar girl suggested that she felt the same way.

"Fine, let's just go outside," Dino announced. "I need a smoke." As usual, Ace and Ferris followed without question.



Ace didn't know why he laughed at the same things Dino laughed at. Dino's sense of humor wasn't particularly good and Ace knew it, but he wasn't sure how to show it.

Like giving Cale Umbria the nickname "Gayle." It wasn't really funny, and it was really kind of lame; predictable, even. Cale Umbria liked to figure skate and looked kind of girly, true, but Ace didn't understand why Dino would care. Didn't Dino like girls?



When Cale fell on the ice, Dino laughed even harder. Ace chuckled too, but it felt forced. Would Dino still laugh if Cale had been really hurt? Would he have called for help, or would he have kept laughing? And if he did keep laughing, would Ace have to be the one to get help?

Ace found these kinds of questions paralyzing, so he pushed them away, into a far corner of his mind.



Besides, disagreeing with Dino always resulting in some kind of humiliating head-lock or noogie. Ace hated noogies. It took him a long time to get his mohawk perfect every morning, and nothing ruined it faster than a noogie from Dino.



Ace had to give Cale credit, too. Even with Dino, Ferris and himself laughing it up on the sidelines, he just continued to practice his figure eights and his double-axles, smiling all the while.



Ferris was usually pretty mellow, but he must have been on a mission to impress Dino when he walked up to Cale with a joy buzzer in hand. A joy buzzer of all things. Hadn't joy buzzers been extinct since the 60s?



Cale must have thought they were extinct; otherwise, he surely wouldn't have been so foolish as to grab on to Ferris' hand.



Dino ate up the scene with relish, but Ace found it difficult to watch.



Cale surprised him, though. Rather than whimpering and running off with his tale between his legs, he drew back and poked Ferris hard in the chest.

"Do that again and I'll tell everyone at school that you're a panty-sniffer."

"What?" Ferris blurted out, astounded. "No I'm not!"

"Oh yes you are. Don't you know that the girls tell me everything?" Cale gave him a mild smile and did an about-face, then walked away.



A mortified Ferris tried to cover his face to hide the fact that he was nearly sobbing.

"God, what a wuss. I can't believe GAYle made him cry!" Dino hissed.

Ace didn't even know what to say to that. He sort of wanted to defend Ferris, but then again, Ferris shouldn't have messed with Cale. As he contemplated how to respond, that old feeling of paralysis made its return.

So he said nothing and hoped it was for the best.



The last time Ace had made a major decision, it hadn't gone so well.

Ace had been the one who called the cops when Lottie "disappeared." He knew she was perfectly well and hiding in her toy box, but it seemed like the perfect opportunity for some publicity. His father's submarine scavenging company would get some new business, at the very least. If the family was lucky, maybe they would get television offers. The money would come rolling in, surely!



Ace hadn't known that the Calvary would arrive on their doorstep, sires wailing and lights blaring.



He'd felt awful, seeing his Mom get chewed out like that. And then the whole family had lost money and possessions when they couldn't pay the fines that the city issued them for filing a false missing person's report.

And it had all been Ace's fault. He wished he could bring himself to confess, but he just couldn't do it. He would make it up to his parents in other ways, instead. He got an after school job and studied until his grades were the best they'd ever been. Someday, he would make them proud!



A few nights later, Ace was returning home from work when he heard a scramble of frantic footsteps behind him. It sounded like someone was running for their life.

It was Cale Umbria.



"Hey GAYle," Ace drawled, a little embarrassed to find himself adopting Dino's tough-guy posturing. "Where's the fire? At your boyfriend's house?"



Cale ignored the insult an tried to catch his breath.

"Please, you've got to hide me!" he said. "I was walking home from North Beach and some strange man started following me... his eyes glowed!"



"What do you mean, his eyes glowed?" Ace was unimpressed. "Maybe he just has Condition X or something."



"He just seemed dangerous," Cale insisted.

Just then, a movement at the end of the block caught Ace's attention.

"Go up the stairs and get in my house," Ace said firmly to Cale.

Cautiously at first, and then with more resolve, Ace took long strides toward the intruder.



"Hey you, this is private property!" he said. "Get lost or I'll call the cops."



"Ah, yes, ze cops," the man said, waving his arms in mock-fear. "They will put me in, how you say? Ze jail? I would like to see if your feeble bars of steel could hold one such as I."

Ace felt his blood run colder by a few degrees. The man had an accent that was similar to his Mother's, though this man's was much, much thicker and stronger.

Perhaps owing to the large fangs that filled his mouth.



"The blood rose," the man said, practically gulping as his reddish eyes dilated. "I smell it all over you."

"What? I don't smell like roses," Ace protested.

The man bent over and shuddered, as if on the verge of a fit, and drew his arms tightly around himself.



With a noise like something being snapped in two, the man disappeared and in his place was a bat, which flapped away so quickly that Ace couldn't be sure he even saw it. All that was left of the man was a cloud of red, coppery-smelling smoke.



Ace was stunned by what he'd just encountered. He walked back to the house with his heart nearly pounding clean out of his chest, yet his body moved slowly, as if he were stuck wading through a bad dream.

Only the sight of Cale on the couch, watching television as if nothing were wrong, brought him thudding back to reality.

"You're watching television?" he sputtered. It seemed highly inappropriate, somehow.

"Whenever I got scared at night I used to turn on the TV. It made everything feel normal and safe again," Cale explained. "Did you ever do that?"

"No," said Ace flatly.

"What happened to the man?"

"He's gone."

"Oh, in that case," Cale stood up gingerly, "I suppose I ought to thank you." He took a step towards Ace, his arms outstretched as if in a hug.

"Wha?" Ace lurched backwards.



Too late.

Cale had him in a surprisingly tight head-lock, and was delivering a noogie that rivaled the infamous ones Dino gave.



"What the hell?" Ace burst out. He wasn't sure this night could get any weirder. "What's your problem?"



"Oh, sorry," Cale said, looking sheepish but not really sorry. "You and your friends are always doing that, so I figured it was how you, you know, communicate."

"Well, we don't!" Ace reached up to feel his 'hawk and found that it seemed uninjured. He'd used a lot of egg-whites that morning.

"I guess I'll just go, then. Thanks for letting me watch your TV." Cale gave a casual wave and headed for the front door.



Ace watched him descend the steps, a knot of confusion in his stomach.

The man with the red eyes who turned into a bat had been weird, but Cale Umbria might be even weirder.



No one was at the Bowling Alley again.

Ace had never intended to try figure skating, but he didn't have any money for Shark Attack!, and the skate rentals were free.

What he had learned in point-five seconds time was that figure skating was a whole lot harder than it looked.



It wasn't so bad, though. Kind of peaceful.

Ace glanced up as a drop of rain hit his cheek. Spring was warming up more every day, and then there would be no more figure skating.

He would skate now, then, while he still could.



Ace didn't know how long he'd been skating, oblivious, while Dino watching him quietly from the sidelines. When he did notice him, though, Ace hurried off the rink, unlacing his skates while he wracked his head for some kind of excuse.



"Sorry I didn't throw you a bouquet of flowers, Johnny Queer - I mean Weir - but you didn't quite stick the landing on that triple-sow-cow-moo spin."



"Yeah, well, I just was reading about how much money some of those professional skaters get, especially with advertisers. It's not too bad a gig, Dino."

"Any gig where a dude wears tights is bad," Dino said with finality. He seemed willing enough to drop the subject, though, and gestured for Ace to follow him into the Bowling Alley.



"Check it out," Dino hissed, his revulsion evident in his tone. "GAYle's here again and this time he's got some new blue boyfriend. Look at them, they're practically holding hands!"

"I think they're just playing Red Hands," said Ace, who sometimes played the same game with his sister.

"Who cares? It's still dudes touching hands."



With that, Dino strutted over to Cale and his friend, and Ace winced as he grabbed the blue guy and started to noogie him to hell and back.

"How do you like that, freak!" Dino shouted triumphantly.



"Cale, why did you bring him here?" Ace asked over the sounds of Dino's laughter. "You know how Dino can't stand people with the Alienism strain of Condition X."

"Jung doesn't have Condition X. He's my cousin.

"Really?" Ace said suspiciously. Cale wasn't even remotely blue. He was more alabaster.

"Yeah, his Mom and my Dad were siblings."

"Were?"

Cale paused. "My dad's dead."

Ace paused, too.



Before Ace could think of what to say, Cale brushed him aside and pounced on Dino. It was the first time anyone had thought to retaliate on Dino with his own noogie methods, and Ace couldn't help but be a little impressed. Still, he thought Cale was asking for trouble.



He pulled the boy aside, speaking under his breath. "That was stupid. Dino will be out to harass you now more than ever."

"Speaking of harassment," Cale said softly, looking towards the door.

Ace followed his gaze and saw what he saw: the man with red eyes.



With a burst of uncharacteristic confidence, Ace approached the man.

"First you stalk Cale to my house and then you stalk him to the Bowling Alley? That's pretty desperate, even for a guy in head-to-toe leather."



The man laughed vigorously, showing fang.

"I was not stalking your little friend," he said. "I was stalking you."



Ace felt all his confidence wash away, until he was left with a foolish, uneasy smile on his face.

"Why?" He finally asked, the words dry in his mouth.

The man looked into his eyes intently. "You should be asking that of your Mother," he said, and his tone was strangely regretful.



Ace didn't stick around to ask the man what he meant. He just ran.



Ace had always thought of his mother as perfect. She was so pretty and fun-loving, and she seemed to know a little something about everything. She was especially skilled in home remedies, and Ace and Lottie were rarely ever sick thanks to her skills. The bottles she made for Mustang even seemed to glow with a strange magic sometimes. She said it was a special recipe from her homeland, and that it helped little ones to grow big and strong.



Its effect seemed very nearly miraculous, even.



You should be asking that of your Mother.

Ace watched his mom play her instrument. It was an odd, harp-like thing that she played beautifully. Funny, he hadn't known his mother was so musically inclined.

Now he wondered what else he didn't know about her.

"Hey, Mom. Where'd you get that thing?"



"It is the instrument of my homeland!" she said, smiling widely. "I keep it in storage after I get engaged to Daddy, but lately I want to play it. It makes ze baby happy."

"Oh." Ace looked at her thoughtfully. "Where is your homeland, again?"

"Oh Ace, pfft," she said dismissively. "You know that it is far away across the sea."

"But what's it called."

She shrugged. "Nothing of significance. Why do you ask, my darling?"

"I met a man who sounded like he came from the same country from you."

At this, his mother went pale. And she was already pretty pale to begin with.



"A man with long, black hair, and skin of white stone?" she asked, and Ace had never heard her sound quite so stern.

Now Ace was confused. "No, he had brown hair. Kind of long, I guess. And yes, definitely pale."

"You stay away from this man," she said. She sounded almost...cold.

But it was impossible, surely.

Ace's Mother was never cold, and had never been cold before.

***

That's the end of the last chapter two. I hope you enjoyed it! I'll start "filming" the chapter three stories soon, I hope, and the Boxcar family will be next.

Comments

[niloublue.livejournal.com]

I just finished reading all the episodes of Cape Calamity and I think I am in love with it and its characters! They are so funny and interesting!
I wonder what that pale man wants from Ace and I am really curious to know more about Zhanna's past and about the country she came from.
And Cale is great, I laughed a lot when he gave Ace a noogie because he was trying to communicate! :D

[simtarts.livejournal.com]

This particular group of teens are NOOGIE MANIACS. They just wouldn't stop doing it so I had no choice but to make it a part of the story-line!

I'm glad you read and enjoyed :)

[spyroeldragon.livejournal.com]

*Is just tuning in*
*is off to read more*
8D

[simtarts.livejournal.com]

Welcome, welcome!

[fireflys-locket.livejournal.com]

I think this is the first time I've gotten into a Prosperity Challenge. I'm enjoying it very much so far. ^_^

[simtarts.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you like it! :)

[simtopi]

I read this the other day, only getting to commenting now!

Oooh just wondering what Zhanna is hiding and if it's going to get her family into too much trouble. Ace is adorable... Cale too! I'm having some Blades of Glory flashbacks here, but it's just because of the ice skating thing. ;) Cale is great though.

Looking forward to episode 3.

[simtarts.livejournal.com]

I am also only getting around to commenting to your comment. :D I originally envisioned Ace as kind of a jerk, but that didn't work out for various reasons (he's got too many nice points, mainly), so I gave him jerky friends instead. And I too was tempted to bring in some Blades of Glory jokes, but I restrained myself. ;)

[boredbythehour.livejournal.com]

I just stumbled upon this earlier today and i'm glad i did! All the stories are very interesting/mysterious! Hope you don't mind if I add, and follow along!