Part 3 of 6
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Tonight, Ruby begins to receive disturbing signals from her current roommates.
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060 - Ruby Departed: Utopia, Part 3 of 6
[ Music ] Welcome to FlashPulp Episode 60. Tonight, we present Ruby Departed, Utopia, Part 3 of 6. This week's episodes are brought to you by FlashPulp on iTunes. Hey, did you know Henry the Fond's Winkler was a producer on MacGyver? Search the iTunes store for FlashPulp or find the link at skinner.epn. [ Music ] ♪ One day it blew me, my hours are stumbled ♪ ♪ Here is the shadows I live with are stumbled ♪ [ Music ] ♪ FlashPulp has an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age. Three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings. Tonight, Ruby begins to receive disturbing signals from her current roommates. Ruby Departed, Utopia, Part 3 of 6, written by J.R.D. Skinner, Art and Narration Biopoponax, and Audio-produced by Jessica Ma. [ Music ] July 7th, 1143. I woke up feeling guilty, which is probably why I said yes when Leatherhead asked me to go along on a cruise. I was feeling bad about how sweet life was going compared to the groaning buggers I'd left outside, and a bit like I needed to be pulling my own weight, despite the fact that this is all at the expense of the Canadian taxpayers. Up the ramp and through the double doors we went, before I'd even fully come awake. Andy kept up a constant stream of Prattle as he drove, but I could only make out about half of it over the engine, and I spent most of the trip nodding and pretending I had some clue what he was saying. A lot of the streets were blocked along the way, but I guess no one cares about all the hedges and picket fences we crushed. I couldn't have counted the number of people Leatherhead ran down if I'd tried, and frankly, I'm not interested in taking on that guy's bad karma. It was only once we'd pulled into a parking lot, seaved the undead, with slayer rocketing from the speakers, that I began to wonder where Linda was. We'd arrived at a Walmart, and Andy told me to stay put. Before I could respond, he was out his little hatch, goggles on his head, a rifle in one hand, a sledgehammer in the other. He made his own entrance into the welcome area, and I saw him flip down the goggles before he disappeared into the dark beyond. The place has probably been locked up since the earliest reports. If he'd found a more subtle entrance, he wouldn't have had to worry about something coming up behind him. But as it was, all I could do was sit and watch a slow trickle of stumblers follow him through the shattered glass. The first ten minutes felt like taking a trip to the mall with Dad. He often promised to "be right back," and then get lost in the outdoor equipment department of zellers, all while I was stuck roaming the car's radio stations. It was that memory that actually made me realize I didn't know how to operate the go buggy, so I took some time to eye up the controls. I wasn't sure, but I was starting to think I might be able to manage the steering wheel if I had to, when gunfire started. I'd just made it into the rear before Leatherhead came running out of the place, laughing. "Having fun yet?" he asked, after he jumped through his hatch. There are a lot of words I'd use to describe our current situation. Fun is not one of them. I was kind of mad that he dragged me along just to watch him bumble around. I survived weeks amongst the dead without creaky McBeef skin, but his attitude is like a sixteen-year-old's. He's right, and the universe can bloody well conform to his reality. I tried to return his level of merriment. "Ha, you're just lucky I didn't lock the door and drive away," I said. He stopped laughing. I was attentive to his technique as he drove us back. "One forty." Just had lunch with the gang. Linda didn't seem very talkative, and Andy wouldn't shut up. He joked five or six times about repopulating the world, and wasn't he a lucky man to have such a good start on hand. I used to have a boss who thought he could turn insulting emails into jokes by attaching a smiley face to the end. Andy kind of does the same thing by sounding like he's about to bust out laughing as he delivers a line. The worst part was that he was eating something he called "bacon sushi," whatever. It was meat, and it was raw, and I've seen enough of that lately. Actually, I may have become a post-apocalyptic vegetarian. I was going to have a PB&J, but they didn't have any bread, and the last of the pitas had just gone bad. I opted for some more cereal, but they're low on milk, too, so I ate some Cheerios and sipped it some bottled water. I took it out of the eating area, and back in here, though, Andy's open mouth chewing was reminding me too much of the shamplers. For thirty. Just got in from running in the gym and found a note in my room. Don't think Linda, whoever Linda was Linda in here, located where I hid this book, though. It said, "Get out, now, while you can, you don't know what you're messing with." FlashPulp is presented by HTTP colon slash slash Skinner dot FM. The audio and text formats of FlashPulp are released under the Canadian Creative Commons attribution non-commercial 2.5 license. Thank you. (chimes)