What do a sexy Elvis, sticky tape on 'Punk safety pins' and a Unicorn onesie have in common? Bone Valley - The Last Dragon

Chapter 7 Bone Valley

The Vampire and the Werewolf

Finally, Zorro Lobo managed to get his hair slicked into the right style; his reflection smiled appreciatively back. “Rock’n’roll” was said with devotion as Zorro took in his magnificence.

His brand new, straight-out-of-the-box blue suede shoes screamed cool, as did his black pinstriped pants; the black short-sleeved shirt with an up-turned collar just finished everything off nicely, and after a week of practice, he’d gotten the lip curl down pat as well.

An attitude of rebel cool screamed out from his full-length mirror.

“Yeah, baby, all you ladies ain’t gonna be able to resist this Hunka, Hunka man!” Zorro’s hips swung left and right.

“Yes, they will.” Was sighed quietly from the occupier of an old wicker chair, who sat happily in the shadowed corner.

“Yeah, they ‘ll be watching my hips and scream’n, ‘Oh Zorro, you’re so cool; take us home with you!’ ”

In the unlit corner, another sigh was given. It was quickly accompanied by a rattle from a copy of the Epoch News before it became too much for the reader not to comment. “No, they won't.”

“Run your hands all over my body Zorry; you’re so sexy!”

That was the last intolerable comment before the reader allowed his frustration to boil out with a harsh comment. “You’ll have to go outside to hunt these ladies down, and both you and I know that’s still an issue you need to face.”

Zorro stopped wiggling his hips and adjusting his collar. “Yeah, but this time it’s going to be different.” The highly coiffed young man turned to his observer, “Just you wait and see; I’ll just a hunka, hunka my way out of the front door, wave goodbye to you whilst you flap off to work and then it’ll be party hardy time for my ladies and me.”

The newspaper was straightened and folded neatly along the seam. “That’s what you said last time when you went all punk and did Jonny Mouldy.”

Zorro refused to make eye contact with Sangre De Ventosa, who had not, as he resentfully lay down the neat newspaper on his lap, yet finished recounting his agoraphobic friend's past personas.

“Remember how with the punk costume, you didn’t want to get yourself pierced, so you just stuck on the safety pins with some sticky tape? Remember you stepped outside, looked at everyone in the café, then, and this is my favourite part, you then freaked out, took off all your clothes and stood there with just the safety pins sticky-taped to your nipples. Everyone was quite surprised when you started screaming ‘Goddess Save the Queen’ whoever that is. Then you bellowed out at the top of your lungs that you couldn’t breathe! But please don’t forget how the tour bus with a group of elderly nuns from the ‘Village Near the River’ pulled up at the café. Remember how they took pictures of you? Because if you don’t remember, I have copies, and I’m happy to take them off my wall and show you.”

The newspaper was thrust back up in front of Bone Valley's only Vampire, signalling the end of this conversation.

Zorro’s shoulders slumped, “Why do you always have to spoil it when I’m just about to bloom? To come into my own!” He walked over to the seated vampire, who was trying to read a recipe for baked carrots with garlic and honey. “You know what your problem is, don’t you?” Zorro flicked the newspaper with an overly hairy hand.

Sangre looked up with big, sad brown eyes, “I have a friend who’s a werewolf and an agoraphobe. I work for the worst person who has ever existed. I hate the sight of blood, which causes me no end of issues. And the man I love is a huge pillock!” Then, because this was true and tried territory, the vampire again folded the newspaper and sighed, “But please, Zorry, feel free to prove me wrong. Bounce up and out of our flat. Dance on the street. Embrace your wild side. Go out into the sunset and embrace with all your might. Break free of your invisible chains. Tango away into the night with lovers galore.”

With a grin of defiance, Zorro turned and flicked on the record player. If he was going to do this, it was going to be done to an awesome soundtrack.

As the original Blue Suede shoed one began crooning the knickers off his audience, Zorro poked Sangre in the chest, smiled and said, “Watch me, baby, watch and learn!” Then the agoraphobic werewolf, whose physic resembled an amiable brick wall, swaggered left and right until he stood before the front door of his flat and smiled to Sangre, “Thank you very much!”

Like the rest of the Bone Valley’s residents, ‘flat’ was a very fancy word for a half-dug-out hole in the ground. On the ‘Night We Don’t Talk About’, Zorro’s actual apartment, which had been five stories high, was sadly burned down in an unfortunate hiccupping incident. Worst of all …he’d been in the apartment at the time and was now suffering the after-effects, which had surfaced as a deep-seated fear of being exposed to another… hiccupping incident.

Consequently, this meant he hadn’t left his… ‘new apartment’ in six months. Zorro relied solely on his best friend to keep him ‘in the loop’ as it were. And as Sangre was a soft touch, he did his best.

It was Mother Harper's idea to provide costume catalogues to the terrified werewolf. Her thinking was if he couldn't go outside as himself, then surely, he could go outside as someone else. On the surface, it made quite a lot of sense, but when faced with the blow torch of reality, the psychological experiment burned the same way Zorro's apartment did, in a great big ball of blue flame straight down to ash.

Mind you, the cafe that operated next door to Zorro and Sangre’s flat was benefiting quite exponentially. Sangre didn't know who had printed up the flyers advertising Zorro’s many attempts at exiting the flat, but word had spread very quickly in the cafe brigade. To the point now where a number of people considered themselves to be quite the expert in predicting just how long the werewolf would last outside before he had a major meltdown.

A small betting ring had blossomed, and a small fortune had been lost by those not aware of Zorro’s past history. But it had then been quickly put down by the local establishment. The coppers new Lieutenant looked down on that sort of thing. Admittedly, she was trying her best to keep the law in order, but when you had Mother Heggerty running the show, the only law in order was witches, and just lately, being a police officer didn't guarantee the longest of lives.

Zorro’s doors were flung open as the young dark-haired werewolf with the long- bushy sideburns stepped out onto the sidewalk. His canines caught the glint from the setting sun as he turned to look at the café crowd. A small group of grey-habited nuns smiled, waved and held their cameras at the ready. The solid young werewolf blinked at the expectant crowd, who all held their collective breaths in anticipation. Suddenly, a twitching began from Zoro's left eyebrow, which travelled over to his right before rapid blinking took over. Smiles grew upon the faces of many of the cafe's long-term inhabitants. They knew exactly what the eyebrow wiggle indicated; the nuns readied their cameras.

Zoro howled, ripped all his clothes off, threw them to the ground, and then screamed at the stunned onlookers. “I ain't nothing but a hound dog!”

The poor café brigade watched with cups and glasses half raised as Zorro, in all his naked glory, swung his arm around and around in a circle like a mini windmill, then contorted himself into a tippy-toed, one arm up and pointed to the sky, the other to the ground action before crooning. “Hunka Hunka, man has left the building!”

Then, unfortunately, Zorro ran back inside, slamming his front door shut. After a minute or two, after he commando crawled under his bed, his best friend heard the whimpering six-foot-nine werewolf whisper a Hunka, Hunka quote quietly to himself. "The Lord can give, and the Lord can take away. I might be herding sheep next year."

“See, I told you, pay up, losers!” Was heard above the café crowd and nun’s cheers, who, by the way, were now discussing the merits of this latest performance.

For those regulars who had seen this all before and who now were sharing their very informed and learned opinions with the newer patrons. Most believed that Zorro Lobo, the first Werewolf in Bone Valley, had definitely provided a much more enjoyable performance when he attempted to leave his flat dressed as a ballet dancer. The white tutu and feathered headdress had been a bit tight, and that may have hampered his full performance of Swan Lake, fully presented in under four minutes, but nonetheless, the ending was rather radical. Whether or not the poor poodle who happened to be walking by at that very time would ever recover was anyone's guess.

Sangre quietly looked at his friend's quivering blue suede shoes and gave his own Hunka Hunka man quote as his only reply, “Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't going away.”

A high-pitched “Toot Toot, Mails here!” made all the café eyes turn from Zorro and Sangre’s front door as Pat, one of the local drone delivery men, turned up with a package tied to the end of his stick.

“Allo, Allo, you’se in there, Mr Zorro, I’s got a package for you. It’s the unicorn costume you ordered last week. I found it on top of the church with the brass roof off Beggars Lane. Pat stood proudly in his pelican-badged helmet and big brown overcoat, waiting for the door to open.

Through the doorway, a genteel voice replied, “I’m dreadfully sorry, but Zorro is unable to answer the door. He’s under his bed right now, and there's absolutely nothing I can do to make him come to the door and sign for a new costume. Absolutely nothing. I've even tried it with the cat nip and peanut butter biscuits, which are his absolute favourite. So, may I suggest you send the package back to the company who manufactured it? Good day.”

“Allo, Allo, is that you’se, Mr. Sangre?

The door opened a little crack. “Yes, it is.”

With a cheery grin plastered on each and every word, the postman piped up, “Is me Pat! I’m tha one who delivered you those chicken livers the ova day. Remember, you’se made me eat some pat-tay even though I said I don't eat no foreign tucker ‘cause I’d frow up if I did. But you insisted ‘cause you said if I didn’t, you’d suck the misses dry! So, I tried it, and I loved it. And then you tolds me you made the pat-tay outta the chicken livers, and then I threw up. Yeah… tha was me!”

A deep, soul-breaking sigh escaped from between the door and its frame. “Yes, hello, Pat. I hope you’ve recovered.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry. But did you hear a dragon just landed in the poor quarter?”

“Yes, I did; that’s why I’m here, making sure he’s okay and not at work.”

“Well, apparently, it went into tha’ weird kid’s hole, you know the one who burnt his bits with homemade soap, and it didn’t come out! So, goodness only knows what tha kids dun to it!”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, but then the weird kid, an a witch who had tha’ silly plonka knight slung ova the dungman’s horse, came out near the docks, and then they went to Muva Harpa’s place.

The door was swung widely inwards as Sangre grabbed Pat by the collar and lifted him with ease to eye height.

“Tell me everything you know about the knight, and I’ll make you and your wife the most romantic dinner you’ve ever had.”

“What fish’nchips?”

“What… Oh, my good goddess…” Sangre took a deep breath, “I am a five-star Mishilantyre chef I can make…” The vampire watched at the postman's eyes glazed over… “No, that’s fine; yes, yes, I can make you the best dame fish and chips you’ve ever had. Just tell me if the knight is still alive.”

“Ooooo, that sounds like a deal. He’s still alive, but apparently, he’s dreadfully burnt.”

“Zorro, get out from under your bed, put on your unicorn ‘cause we're going to the hospital. It’s a matter of life and death! My love life and your death if you don’t do as I’ve just told you.”

“Will there be pickled onions on tha fish?”