Other Fan Fiction / Romance Fan Fiction / Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ The Adventures of Thad Gunter ❯ Land Shark? ( Chapter 7 )

 

 

THE CONTINUING ADVENTURES OF THAD GUNTER!!!

 

-----

 

Chapter 7: Land Shark?

 

-----

 

The heat was hot in the desert. Dr. Isaac Thaddeus “Thad” “Dude” “Mammy” Edgar Howard Sam Gunter III had never given the thought much but, upon startling new evidence, he concurred. The heat was indeed hot in the desert.

 

Thad continued to ruminate. Alas, it was lonely rumination as he didn't even have a nameless horse to keep him company. Despite the proliferation of bugs and rocks and trees and things, they didn't provide any real companionship to our hero.

 

The also quite hot sand burned Thad's exposed left foot. He looked down at the sore foot and remembered the leathery taste of the shoe that once resides there. He flapped his gums, savoring the faint flavor of shoe. It had been two days since he finished it off.

 

How many days had he been in the desert? He wondered. The sun had gone down and come back up, oh, maybe five or six times. But if he had been walking for that long, how come he hadn't bumped into at least something resembling a human being? Was it possible that he could have been going in circles? Thad tried to keep track of that rock over there or that cactus, you know, the funny one, kinda' shaped like William Shatner's gallstone. But the unending heat of the sun slowly eroding at his sanity made such observance difficult.

 

Thad swallowed, feeling every inch of his dry, jiggered throat as absolutely nothing slide down it. Despite his best efforts to stay hydrated, like sucking sweat out of the odor eaters in the bottom of his remaining shoe or a disastrous try at giving his own urine a swig, Thad still felt unhealthily dried out. Oh, all those times he could have been watching “Survivor Man” when he instead opted for reruns of “Nick Arcade.” He could be munching on barbecued scorpions and getting drunk on sweet, sweet cactus milk.

 

The dehydration and starvation would've been bad enough but Thad's incredible headache hadn't ceased. Currently, tiny tack nails were slowly sliding into his brain, or at least that how it felt. Conceivably, tack nails might be drilling themselves through his skull, he wasn't sure. In all likelihood, if that was indeed the case, Thad probably would have tried to eat them by now.

 

Had the hallucinations all ready started? He was fully aware of the adverse effects the combination of starvation, dehydration, and constant, extreme, heat can have on ones sanity. The stability of his mind wasn't something Thad dwelled on much. Not that it didn't worry him but he figured that was topic better left undiscussed. As it stood, Thad didn't feel insane and he hadn't seen anything that day, anyway, that made him question his sanity. So, he concluded, that the hallucinations had indeed not yet started.

 

He fell to his knees, relieved. Oh, what a wondrous day. Oh, sure, being stuck in the middle of an obscure, possibly magically created endless desert was kind of steep but Thad was filled with understanding that his quest was not useless. And, more importantly, he wasn't blithering, completely, batshit fucking crazy. How fantastic. He was sane!

 

His seemingly endless quest to rescue his beloved Helen Maria Rudwalnagirctekahs wasn't fruitless. His recently rediscovered life did indeed have a meaning to it. This realization gave him the strength to go on, to find his way out of this fearful desert, to correctly arm himself, and then to march back up to Renn-Teach head quarters, banish the unearthly James Eaalhi to the eldritch dimension he came forth from, and rescue his beloved Helen from whatever horrid dank porno pit she was held captive in. Yes, it was possible.

 

Suddenly, there was a rumbling beneath his feet. The vibration shook Thad from his intense concentration. Glancing over his shoulder, he became cognitive of a large fissure breaking the desert floor in half. Sand poured down into the earth, disappearing into darkness. The shattering earth crawled towards Thad, as if it was following him. Quickly, he got to his feet, running from the ever approaching mouth.

 

Don't look back, he thought. Because Don Henley said so. You can never look back.

 

Damn you, Don Henley!

 

Thad looked back and then immediately wished he hadn't. Emerging from the crack in the ground was a giant shark. His eyes black, his mouth huge and gapping, rows and rows of razor sharp triangles lined that dark empty glutton. A low roar emerged from the pit and rang in Thad's ears.

 

A realization came to him. He shouted said realization to anyone in earshot.

 

“LAND SHARK!”

 

Thad ran like his ass was on fire. He ran like an Olympic athlete. He ran like an expectant father runs to a hospital. He ran like a motherfucking Land Shark was trying to fucking eat his skinny white ass. He ran. He ran so far away.

But he couldn't get away. From the Land Shark, that is.

 

The creature's hot breath burnt the hairs off of Thad's neck. He knew it was right behind him. What should he do? Considering his actions in a split-second, Thad looked ahead at him, at a rock shaped suspiciously like a dagger a few feet in front of him. He dove for the weapon. A whoosh of air flew through his hair. The ground that he ran on just seconds before was now a crumbled mess of rock and sand being swallowed into the endless gullet of the fearsome Land Shark.

 

Instinct attempted to take over. Thad, quickly as he could come, grabbed the dagger-shaped rock, got to his feet, and leapt onto the Land Shark's body. While flying through the hot desert air, he clenched the stone between his teeth and spread both arms out, ready to grasp a hold of the beast. He slammed onto the monster, sinking his fingers into its sandpaper rough scales. The creature immediately responded to Thad's infraction. The shit was on.

 

The Land Shark started to thrash its head back and forth, attempting to toss Mr. Gunter from its pointed proboscis. Holding on for dear life, our hero very carefully removed the conveniently knife shaped rock from his jaws and into his left hand. Holding on for dear life, he brought the blade like mini-boulder down into the dagger pronged skin, repeatedly. His strife did little, it seemed, other then really piss the monster off, as it immediately began to swing its head around with even more force, crushing the seemingly soft ground beneath it as well as the homes of several innocent prairie dogs.

 

Amazingly, in part due to his almost dehydration-induced near-death grip but mostly do an intense need not to die, Thad stayed aboard the land dwelling man eating fish. However, this will did not prevent his poor, all ready roughed-up body from being even more roughed up.

 

Despite it seeming more and more futile, Thad raised his weapon again, ready to bring the point down on the seemingly unstoppable beast's flesh. He did so continuously, blindly, while the giant land-dwelling sea monster would bash him about in a manner that was not completely dissimilar to a male porn star's testicles, flaying about in during an intense session of buggery. He was all rather bruising.

 

Upon turning an eye to the wound his rock had formed, Thad was shocked, yet again. Instead of flesh and blood, instead of heaving muscles and throbbing vines, beneath the Land Shark's skin was gears and machinery; oil and cogs; bits and pieces. This was of course completely illogical. But when, Thad considered it, the presence of a Land Shark was pretty damn illogical in and of itself. Upon realizing this, the Land Shark ceased its fierce battle against Thad's insurgence, halting in its motions like a wind-up robot with its key pulled.

 

Thad, continually confused by this turn of events, could do nothing but stop and consider everything. Issuing from the shark was the distinct noise of a clock ticking. Pressing his ear up against the Land Shark's skin, the ticking became even more evident. As always, it was only too late when Thad realized that the Land Shark that had been pursuing him was, in actuality, an automated bomb!

 

He could only respond in one way…

 

“Oh, snap!”

 

…before the shark exploded in an enormous fireball, scourging the ground beneath, and tossing Thad helplessly through the desert sky.

 

----

 

The open road provides one with a freedom that can rarely be felt in the rigid constructs of society. The wind in your hair, the musky smells of the environment, the bugs in your teeth, other such road movie clichés. It is a rare, fantastic experience, truly.

 

Freedom was something Rachel Merchawitz was particularly craving at the moment. She looked away briefly from the road to contemplate the dashboard of the red sports car she was piloting. Taped above the radio was an old photograph of her and her husband, Joe Doe, during happier times. It would that be ex-husband? Of course, nothing was official yet. But the proceedings were forthcoming, for sure. After she walked in on Joe deep-throating her ex-stalker DJ Silloc, whatever happiness they supposedly had managed to create over their five months of marriage immediately ended. She was pissed-off, reasonably, some would say. Rachel thought she loved Joe. She really did. Of course love is for high school kids, Rachel realized now. She should have realized. Wasn't she beyond such fancies by now?

 

It was all over, of course. As far behind her as their suburban home was by now. Hundreds of miles back. Rachel stole that asshole's cars and now the only commitment she had was to herself and the road. To fully celebrate her freedom from her husband, she snatch the picture away from the dash and tossed it up into the air, letting it fly away to God no's where.

 

Upon turning her eyes back to the concrete, Rachel hit the breaks. Lying in the middle of the desert road was the mangled, burnt, extra crispy body of a man she briefly recognized. Concerned, Rachel exited her vehicle and decided to investigate further.

 

Beneath the layer of scourged skin, Rachel realized who this poor example of humanity was. The cleft chin, the thick curly dark hair, the perfectly tanned skin, the completely symmetrically shaped bi-and-tri-ceps, the nervous jangling of insecurities just beneath the otherwise fantastic exterior… Though they had only met briefly, she immediately knew who it was. Thad Gunter, the dude that very nearly beat the shit of out her former husband with a jagged board with a rusty nail through it. In retrospect, she should have let him do it. Amazingly, the man appeared to still be alive.

 

Cynical, she might be, but Rachel wasn't heartless. She dragged the charred body into her sport car…

 

----

 

Upon observing his busy work, the Author laughed and laughed and laughed… Until he came to a rather frightening realization. He put his crack pipe down briefly, stroked his neck-beard thoughtfully, and realized that he ended a chapter on an actual cliffhanger. Wasn't that against the rules of “Thad?” As put down in the Great Book of Thad eons ago:

 

“As contrary to real serials, all cliffhangers should be letdowns, falsehoods, and, at the most, mildly frustrating. Never should they actually leave the reader rapt and/or mesmerized. Especially, the reader should definitely not want to read more upon finishing a chapter.”

- The Book of Thad, Cornelius 14:46

 

The Author began to quiver, perhaps from the drugs, perhaps from the horrible truth dawning on him. Plummeting from his shit-stained office chair, he began to seizure uncontrollably on the floor. It wasn't the first time it had happened, of course. And it wouldn't be the last either. But either way, the Author really hoped his mom would get home from her job at the local stripe club to save him.

 

If not, who else would blog about the righteous indignation of it all? His ghost, maybe? Can ghost blog? That one ghost in that movie, “Ghost in the Machine,” it could probably blog, if it got into a computer. Did it? The Author couldn't remember. He remembered it got in a microwave and totally nuked that one dude's face but he didn't specifically recall a computer being possessed. He hadn't seen that one since it was on cable. He'd have to Netflix after he came to from his seizure. Was it out on DVD yet?

 

And what about that word “blog?” Is that a verb and a noun? “This is my blog?” “I will blog about it when I get home?” And what about tenses? Blogged? Blogging? Blogger? Blogs? Bloges? Bloggette? If a blog went off-line and no one was around to read it, would the blogger die?

 

And Netflix, too. Netflixed? Did that x there kinda' mess with everything? To Netflix? Netflixing? Netflixer? And why do certain movies get great DVD releases but equally deserving films just sit there on the VHS self, unformatted? And if he did die and his ghost did manage to get into the computer and access his blog, wouldn't that make for a crazy story? His MyFriend, SexxxyChix1456, sure would love that. “Ghost Blogger.” Now that would make for a great movie! Who would he get to play him, the titular Ghost Blogger? That Gary Buesy guy is pretty cool. Or what about…

 

The Author's thoughts continued much this way until, finally, gratefully, the chapter ended.