Becoming P.T. Lyfantod - 63
A serial fantasy novel
What follows is Part 63 of Becoming P.T. Lyfantod
If you missed Part 1, start there:
Chapter Twenty-One:
Scooby and the Gang
“Scooby!” I called. “Scoob! Scooby Doo, where are you?” I felt ridiculous, yet I couldn’t shake the sense of urgency spurring me through one relic-filled room after another. What was this place? Was any of it real? I trailed my fingers over a polished case filled with Egyptian gold and rough gemstones. The glass rattled. It felt real. If I smashed it and stuffed my pockets, would they still be full when I emerged?
“Scooby Doo?” My voice echoed as I peered inside an enormous copper pot. Empty. It’d been a while now, since I’d heard anything but the rain pounding against the windows. I wondered what the others were doing. If they were actually themselves, or merely dreams. I considered going back. This place was was a maze. Scooby might be anywhere, and I had no clues, other than Stuart’s green ribbon. What did that mean? Was the man in green somehow involved? Or was this place just pulling imagery from my head? If Scooby were real, where would he be?
I slapped myself. The answer was so stupidly obvious. “He’ll be wherever the food is.”
What I needed was a directory. This place was clearly a museum, there was bound to be one about. Once looking, I found one almost immediately. Suspiciously quickly, in fact.
I scanned the map. Did museums serve food? They certainly had space for it… There were dozens of rooms. Multiple floors. I was on level 3, I discovered. There was a coffee lounge on the far side of the Americas Room. They might have sandwiches… But wait. On level 0 there were two—no, three cafes. I’d have t—
“Oh.”
The museum had a pizzeria.
The map said I wasn’t far from the east stairs. I found them quickly, taking four at a leap, my feet pounding the stone till I shot out at the ground floor and skidded to a halt. Which way? The center of the room was occupied by a cylindrical tower. The Round Room, I thought. There was the main entrance, off to my right, and the gift shop in the northeast corner. Which meant the pizzeria was…
That way.
My footfalls rang out in the eerie silence, the rain now muffled and distant despite a good portion of the high ceilings being glass. I circled around the tower, past doors leading off to other wings, closed off with velvet ropes; beneath the black skeleton of some flying dinosaur. And there, in a dark corner, half-hidden behind a shuttered kiosk, I found it. The pizzeria looked like any shopping mall eatery, with a covered seating area enclosed behind a waist-high wall.
I slowed my approach, suddenly unsure. Chairs were stacked upside-down on tables beneath the shadowy dining area canopy. There was no sign of Scooby Doo. A sense of growing unease kept me silent. What if I wasn’t alone? What if the thing waiting for me wasn’t the affable Great Dane from the cartoons?
The door to the kitchen was open, another dark portal in a night with far too many already. I stole toward it, ears pricked. I stopped in the doorway, knowing I’d be framed in silhouette to anyone with eyes accustomed to the dark. A hinge creaked, and cool light pooled on the floor. My heart thumped.
“He-hello?”
An inky shadow slid through the sliver of light. I gulped, reminding myself where I was. Of Stuart’s skirt, and Iain’s ascot. It’s just a test. It isn’t real… I crept forward, mouth dry, past a spacious countertop and a steel vat. A brick oven, still radiating heat. I peeked around a pair of tall metal cabinets. The door to a walk-in refrigerator hung ajar. Nothing moved, and all I heard was the steady hum of the cooling system struggling to compensate for the broken seal. It’s him, I told myself. This is what you’re here for.
I tiptoed out into the open, terribly exposed—
Splat.
I froze. Something soft and wet had hit the floor.
Behind me.
Slowly, I turned. Wishing I was somewhere else. Stiff with fear.
A low form, swathed in darkness. Inscrutable. Indistinct…
On the floor, a single slice of pizza. Face down, oozing red.
A wet black nose slid into the light. Jaws spread, revealing rows of glistening teeth.
I swallowed.
And out flopped a long pink tongue.
Ha ha ha.
“You’re not Scooby Doo…”
But then, no one here is who they’re supposed to be.
“I—I’m P.T.” A pointed ear twitched. “I don’t know if you can understand me, but… I think I was sent to find you. So that we can uh—stop… Tom.” This was absurd. I was talking to a dog. Of course it couldn’t understand me. “Listen. You have to come with me. We need your help for something… I… don’t know how t—”
Thump. Thump. Thump. A slender tail wagged against a cupboard door.
“Does… that mean you’ll come?”
The dog sniffed the fallen slice, and I took an involuntary step backwards. Eyes like black marbles flicked up at me. Radiating… mischief? A sudden, sinuous twist. I yelped. Then, as he darted past me toward the door, and I realized I wasn’t being attacked, I ran after.
By the time I got out of the kitchen, the dog was halfway across the main floor. He—she?—moved like a shadow, gliding across the open space like a serpent on four legs. Nothing like the lumbering gait of Scooby Doo. I struggled to keep up, and by the time I reached the stairs, I was panting.
Up, up, up we went. A swaying chain was my only clue he’d headed for the roof. I clambered over it, arriving just in time to see the security door at the top of the stairs swing shut. Without slowing, I shouldered it open and staggered out into the rain.
I couldn’t have conceived of that rooftop scene in my wildest dreams. My friends were all there, in their strange costumes. A shattered window stretched chasm-like between them and Tom, whose back was to the roof’s edge, whatever he’d stolen cradled in his arms. And behind him, the strangest detail of all: the man in green, descending in the basket of a green hot air balloon.
Tom was speechifying. “—to admit you’ve failed!” He threw back his head and laughed. “Soon, I’ll have Lightfoot eating from the palm of my hand, and by the time he realizes who I really am, it’ll be too late!”
“You won’t get away with this!” shouted Iain.
“Fool! I’ve already gotten away with it! And there’s nothing you meddling kids can do to stop me.”
The balloon was almost near enough to reach. Any second now, Tom would throw himself over the side and float away, and no one was in any position to prevent it. A maniacal gleam shone in the eyes of the man in green. Tom was right. It was already too late.
The hound who wasn’t Scooby Doo turned and fixed me with a look—for she was a she, I realized. And her meaning was as clear as if she’d shouted.
“And just so you understand what it is you’re up against, take a look—!” Tom gestured back at the man in green, near eye-level now. He dug his fingers into the flesh under his chin and peeled it away like a rubber mask. The face beneath was indescribable. A one-eyed embodiment of hate. Fear washed over me like ice water.
“Here!” Tom thrust out his arm. “Take it!”
The hound barked. I gasped.
Go.
I was in motion.
Go.
My feet crunched gravel. My arms pumped. Heavy raindrops pelted my face. I had no plan. I only knew that he must be stopped.
Go!
Inches separated Tom’s hand from the monster in the wicker basket.
I rocked him like a cannonball.
A ragged “No—!” exploded from his chest.
The two of us staggered back, his body absorbing my momentum. I’d come in too hard. Too fast. Tom’s calves stopped at the low rim that ran around the roof, but the rest of him kept going, and together we toppled over the side. We screamed. My friends cried out. An inhuman bellow of frustrated fury followed us as we tumbled down, down, down.
The ground rushed up to meet us. I knew it was the end. Tom scrabbled at my face, tried to twist my body under his. The last thing I saw before I scrunched my eyes shut was his panicked face.
