Cineverse - Bride Of The Slime Monster Part 21

"Oh, yeah, sure!" the other voice finally called back. "The surfboard! Got it right here. Roger's surfboard!"

Two men in baggy swimsuits ran through the crowd, carrying something that was long, flat, and red. Neither one of them looked like they saw much of the sun, either.

The fellow in front was compactly built and moved with quick, nervous energy; the fellow behind him, who was bald and a bit on the flabby side, had to struggle to keep up.

"Here it is, Doctor Dread!" the compact fellow announced as they approached. "The dev-I mean, the surfboard!"

"Doctor Dread?" Roger repeated with a frown. There was something about that name, something that didn't belong on a world of sand and surf.

"Don't listen to those guys," the snakeskinned surfer replied with a nervous smile.

"You can call me Dreaddy."

"Dreaddy," Roger repeated with a smile. Yes, that name sounded much better.

"And these are my friends," Dreaddy went on, "the Prof and Mengy. They're the guys who"-he hesitated for some reason-"worked on your board."

"Mengy?" the flabby fellow complained.

"Ixnay!" Dreaddy said out of the corner of his mouth. "Ou'reyay an urfersay!"

"Oh, yeah!" The flabby fellow laughed and waved halfheartedly. "Mengy!"

"Roger?" a lyrically feminine voice whispered in his ear. "Could I talk with you?"

"Okay, babe," Roger said as he turned to the young woman."I don't have much time.

I've got a wave to catch.''

She smiled at him as he turned-the kind of smile that would melt the heart of even the most hardened surfer. Her spangled evening dress sparkled in the midday sun.

Didn't he know this girl from somewhere? A name floated past the sound of waves and the memory of surf guitar-Delores. That was it. Roger was glad to see her again.

Even though she wasn't wearing a bikini, Delores wouldn't look out of place anywhere.

"I understand," she rea.s.sured him. She pushed her long blond hair out of her eyes, hair that shone in the wind and sun. "But I must talk to you."

"But, girly!'' Dreaddy insisted."Roger's got to get ready for his surfing challenge!"

"Yeah, Roger," Mengy added. "You haven't even taken a look at your new board."

"Yes," the Prof continued as he and Mengy lifted the surfboard between them. "We've added some very interesting modifications."

They had, too. It was the strangest board Roger had ever seen, especially with the red tubes along the side, and the lump of plastic over the rear fin.

"Hey, babe!" another voice interrupted. "Why'd you split the scene?"

"Oh, no," Delores whispered. In a much louder voice, she shouted at the newcomer: "Would you kindly get out of my life?"

"Oho!" the tall, tanned, and slightly awkward newcomer replied. "Spirited-that's the way Fast Felix likes 'em!""Roger," Delores continued, "could we go somewhere else to talk?"

"Well, gee, babe, if I didn't have this surfing duel-"

"But that's right, Roger-Dodger!" Dreaddy insisted. "You do have this surfing duel, and this special board, which you'd better try out right now!"

"Hey, cutie!" Fast Felix interrupted. "Who is this new guy? How can you turn your back on the greatest lover on the beach?"

"Who's the greatest lover on the beach?" another woman's voice loudly demanded.

"Outta my way!"

Surfers screamed and scattered as another newcomer trod heavily through the sand.

The oily smile fell from Felix's face as he turned to look at the woman, who now stood all alone.

"My name is Bertha," she growled gutturally, "and if I want you, you're mine."

Felix started to shake. He opened his mouth, but no sound issued forth. Roger had to admit that Bertha cut an imposing figure. Maybe it was that six feet six inches of height. Maybe it was the pink bikini on that thick, muscle-laden body. It made her look as s.e.xy as a Sherman tank. Perhaps, Roger considered, pink was not her color.

"Who's that?" Roger asked.

"Oh," Dreaddy said lightly, "just another one of my beach buddies." He cleared his throat delicately. "Bertha, dearest? Perhaps now is not the best time-"

She shook her head and pointed at Felix. "So you're the best lover? Prove it!"

"Prove it?" Utter fear allowed Felix to find his voice again. "Oh, wow. Well, you know-I talk a lot. Maybe I'm not the best-"

"No one backs down from Big Bertha!" she announced as she grabbed Felix with both of her ham-sized hands and lifted him from his feet. "Let's see what you're made of."

He squirmed, but only for an instant. There was a loud crunch, like the smas.h.i.+ng of cartilage and bone. Fast Felix went limp.

"Typical shoddy merchandise." Beach Bunny Bertha tossed the remains over her shoulder.

"Anybody else?" she asked.

All the other surfers started walking casually toward some other beach.

"But about this surfboard," Dreaddy continued as if nothing had happened."It's really customized!" Mengy joined in as he pointed to the flame decals.

"It was providentially coincidental," the Prof explained, "that we could get parts from this old car and rocket s.h.i.+p that were sitting around on the beach."

"Yeah!" Mengy agreed. "It's amazing what you can scavenge from a rocket s.h.i.+p."

"But, Roger-" Delores began.

"Hey, you've got to get going!" Brian exclaimed.

"Yeah!" Frankie added. "The Cowabunga-munga waits for no man!"

"So take the board," Dreaddy insisted.

Mengy and the Prof held the six-foot-long surfboard out to him. Why did Roger feel such trepidation as he touched the polished red wood?

"Good," Dreaddy purred as Roger accepted the board. "I promise you you'll have no"-there came that hesitation again-"regrets."

"With this board, you can't lose," the Prof explained.

"Let's just say you'll go over in a big way," Mengy cheerfully added. "Ah hahahaha!"

"Yes, I think you'll find the results quite-" Dreaddy paused yet again. Roger wondered if maybe the surfer had a problem speaking in public.

"-explosive," he finished at last.

The three pasty surfers smiled at each other as if they shared a private joke.

Delores shook his shoulder. "Roger! Can't you see-"

"Listen!" Brian and Frankie shouted together.

Everyone stopped talking. Some of the surfers who had fled at Big Bertha's recent a.s.sault started to drift back. The birds had stopped singing, the ocean breezes had ceased abruptly-even the waves seemed somehow muted-but it wasn't silent. There was a sound so low that Roger almost felt it more than heard it, a deep rumble that seemed to fill the whole line of the western horizon, rising from an ocean that still appeared deceptively calm.

Brian and Frankie whispered together: "The Cowabunga-munga!"

"Lrsssgrrssmm!" called a muscular fellow in black leather swimming trunks. He carried a jet-black surfboard.

A dog barked nearby."The Mumbler says its time for your duel!" a small man in a double-breasted suit explained.

"But, Roger-" Delores tugged on his arm with a desperate insistence.

"Get away from him, you hussy!" another, very deep woman's voice demanded.

Roger turned around and almost dropped the board. Big Bertha was bearing down on him.

"Roger's going out to face the biggest wave that ever was," Bertha a.s.serted. "A wave he may never come back from. I think he's going to need a good luck kiss. And I'm just the kisser to give it!"

Delores turned a very funny shade of red. She leaned over and gave Roger a quick kiss on the nose. "I may not be able to convince you of your folly," she whispered, "but I can save you from this."

She turned to Bertha and shouted: "I warn you-I've been to Hero School!"

Balancing his board with his right hand, Roger touched his nose with his left.

Shouts of "girl fight!" came from the growing crowd of surfers.

His nose tingled where her lips had brushed it.

Delores took three graceful steps across the sand.

He would remember that tingle anywhere.

Bertha stomped forward, murder in her eyes, muscles rippling between the two strips of pink.

That woman was not simply any Delores. She was his Delores! As he was her Roger!

It was like something out of Sleeping Beauty-her kiss had brought him back to his senses!

"This is getting serious!" Brian yelled.

"Bertha, this is," Dreaddy chimed in, hardly hesitating at all, "-counterproductive."

Wait a moment. That wasn't Dreaddy. It was Doctor Dread, looking particularly anemic in his snakeskin swim-wear. And, among the crowd of surfers, Roger could see Zabana-who actually fit in quite well-and Officer O'Clanrahan, and Louie, and Dwight the Wonder Dog, all of whom were rather easier to spot. That meant they were all back together again. It also meant that there was no way he was going to go out and get himself killed facing some humongous wave. He had no idea how to surf!

Roger let go of the board. It fell to the sand with a dull thud.

"But Roger!" Frankie pleaded. "The Cowabunga-munga won't wait!""I want what I want," Bertha announced, "and no one will stand in my way."

"Fllmshrrssmm!" the Mad Mumbler demanded.

"Erthabay!" Dread demanded. "Ou'reyay inay ouble-tray!"

"I don't care," she snarled back, pounding her grapefruit-sized fist into her other large and muscular hand. "My love"-pound-"will not"-pound-"be denied."

Dwight the Wonder Dog barked something.

"At lasht!" Doc called from somewhere around the surfers' feet. "A showdown!"

"There's only one way to handle this," Frankie announced.

"That's your cue, Bix!" Brian added. And the surfing song began all over again.

Frankie sang it: "Roger's gonna grab that big wave, He might be heading for a water grave!

That's why our Roger's just a surfing fool; That's why we think he's pretty cool!"

"Hey!" everybody yelled as usual. But the song wasn't going to work this time. Roger was all too aware of the ever-increasing rumble that came from the sea. He had places to go, people to see, meetings with the Plotmaster to describe.

But Brian was already into the next verse: "If he's not careful, in that wave he'll crash, And tons of water will upon him smash.

What happens next is not pristine; And that's why Roger is pretty keen."

"Hey!" everybody joined in. Roger smiled a bit at the insistent beat. Actually, when he thought of it again, that ever-growing rumble didn't interfere with the song at all. It worked more like accompaniment, like a ba.s.s guitar and a tom-tom drum on a really good stereo system.

"Everybody let's jump and shout, And hope that Roger does not wipe out, For that to him would be sure doomsday, And that's why Roger is so okay."

Roger sighed. They had been playing this song for so long, he sort of thought of it as an old friend. It would be a shame for a surfboard, especially a board as state-of-the- art as his, to go unused.

"Roger!" Delores yelled as he squatted down to lift his surfboard from the sand.Dreaddy, Mengy, and the Prof smiled at him as they danced. Delores waved frantically from where she danced behind them.

Roger took a step toward the ocean, then stopped. His left hand wanted to jerk away from the surfboard, as if the red painted wood were lethal to the touch. His right hand punched the sun-drenched air before him, impatient to get out there and face that wave if it was the last thing he did. Why was this so perplexing? Surfers weren't supposed to think!