Adversity. Stan tried to reassure himself that he wasn’t the first or last director to ever face it. He was well aware that calamities of all sorts had plagued film productions ever since Thomas Edison invented motion pictures near the close of the nineteenth century. But as he recalled from his History of the Cinema course his sophomore year at Eisenhower, perhaps no movie was more troubled than Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam War masterpiece from the late seventies, Apocalypse Now. The litany of tribulations were well documented and of legendary proportion: on location in a Philippines jungle, a typhoon destroyed the first set and delayed filming for two months; a heart attack felled lead actor Martin Sheen; the budget spiraled out of control as the shoot ballooned to two hundred and thirty-eight grueling days; script pages were torn up; scenes and dialogue improvised on the spot. Chaos reigned, yet despite the unprecedented turmoil, Coppola endured and finished his film, considered one of the greatest of all time.
Now Stan faced an apocalypse of sorts of his very own. Not the biblical end of the world kind, he thought, but one that required the same pluck Coppola displayed to weather the multitude of misfortunes that made Stan’s own pale in comparison, with one exception: Coppola didn’t have to deal with any vengeful zombies.
Stan arose and stepped to the sink in the self-conscious way someone arriving late for a funeral service might slink into a church. He cupped his hands beneath the faucet and allowed them to fill with water before he leaned over and plunged his face into the cool liquid. He pulled back, inhaled, and released a steady flow of air through his mouth before soaking himself again. Beads of water cascaded down his cheeks and off his chin as he turned to take in the sobering view of his colleagues sapped and battered by the pandemonium they had encountered.
“All right, here’s the deal,” Stan announced, as he patted himself dry with his jacket sleeve.
Dana kicked at one of the table chairs, flipped it over, and sent it crashing into the wall. “No deals! No deals no way!”
Stan strode toward his sister. “Just hear me out,” he urged, as he maneuvered himself so that he was in each cast and crew member’s line of sight. “One more scene. Five minutes. That’s all I’m asking. Then we’re outta here.”
While Bryce, Keisha and Irv contemplated the proposition, Dana scoffed at her brother’s heartfelt pitch. “It’s always ‘one more of this, one more of that,’ and it never is!”
She was right—and Stan couldn’t deny it. After all, he knew Dana had a lifetime of proof to back it up. Stan had broken plenty of promises to his sister, but justified it in his own mind as a kind of rite of passage she had to undergo as the last-born child in the family. He figured it was a time-honored ritual: By virtue of her status at the bottom of the sibling chain, Dana was subject to the dictates of her older brothers, which were more often than not whatever served his and Chuckie’s best interests. The reckless disregard for truth and allegiance in matters involving their sister was carried out in the customary Darwinian pecking order of the strong taking advantage of the weak. Promises made to her and not kept were a common occurrence and quickly forgotten, sometimes within minutes of swearing to uphold them. Except for one time. The single instance of betrayal that Stan still remembered and regretted. Perhaps because it was the most recent and bothered him from the day it happened. Just a few months previous, he failed to show up to support Dana’s long-awaited dream, one she’d spent years preparing for: American Idol auditions in East Rutherford. It wasn’t because he didn’t make an effort to get there, because he did. However, seeing the thousands of aspiring contestants snaked around the arena and calculating the hours it would take before Dana would get into the building and perform, sent him U-turning out of the parking lot in his mother’s Volvo. Instead of meeting up with her as he assured her, he phoned her cell instead, claiming that the car was making strange noises, and he didn’t want to break down en route. He’d held himself responsible ever since for his sister’s flop in front of the judges and surmised that it was because of his absence that she botched the Britney Spears hit, “(You Drive Me) Crazy,” a song she never failed to perform to perfection during rehearsals at home. Dana was depressed for weeks afterward and even trashed her beloved karaoke machine. Stan’s profuse apologies were rebuffed while his sense of guilt deepened. If there was ever a reason she was so upset with him, this was it. And if there was ever a chance to make amends, this was it also.
“Well, this time I mean it,” Stan stated, not a crumb of insincerity in his voice. “You with me?”
“Why should I be?” Dana answered, her posture in full-blown sulk mode.
Stan’s demeanor hardened. “Because I need you around to remind me that I’m your pig-headed, smart-aleck, thinks-he-knows-it-all brother, that’s why.”
Dana stared at him as though he’d just spoken a foreign language and she needed a moment to translate. “You forgot ‘total jerk.’”
“That, too,” Stan admitted. “But just for five more minutes.”
“Then what?” Dana asked, her suspicions aroused.
“Then I’ll just be a jerk.”
Dana shook her head and sighed. “You’re impossible.”
“Love you, too, sis,” Stan quipped.
“Aw, ain’t that sweet?” Munyon chirped from the sofa, where he reclined with his ever-present jug resting atop his belly.
Stan ignored Munyon’s wisecrack and extended his hand to Bryce, still parked on the floor. “Howie?”
Bryce eyeballed Stan as though deciding whether to accept an offer from a pyromaniac to help him put out a fire. “Just one scene?”
“One and done,” Stan replied.
Bryce made it a point to dawdle longer than necessary before he accepted Stan’s help getting him to his feet.
“Okay, here’s how it’s going down,” he explained to Bryce. “You and Zoe have just fought off the Evil Forces, but time is running short until they attack again. Got it?”
“What’s not to get?” Bryce responded with a shrug, as though Stan just informed him the preferred way to put on a pair of pants is one leg at a time.
Stan offered Keisha his hand as a proper gentleman in seventeenth-century France might invite a lady to join him in the salon to dance a minuet. “Zoe?”
Keisha reached out, wrapped her fingers delicately around Stan’s, and stood without the tiniest hint of reluctance.
Stan continued to outline the scene. “You and Howie realize that the only way of surviving is to give up the treasure, but the temptation becomes too great—”
“And we open the box,” Keisha concluded.
Stan smiled and exchanged a gung ho high-five-style slap of the palms with her before he hurried on to Munyon, still in repose, slouched across the couch cushions like it was just another lazy Sunday afternoon. “Mr. Munyon, we’ll need Bad D to break off the lock.”
Munyon popped off the sofa like it was a trampoline. “Now hold on there.
I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. Might make the dead angry.”
“You mean more than they are now?” Stan asked.
Irv scurried to retrieve the ax and handed it off to Stan who passed it on to Keisha.
Munyon appeared agitated as he confronted Stan. “I’m sayin’ they might not take too kindly to your snoopin’.”
“I’ll take my chances,” Stan said.
Munyon scowled and jabbed Stan in his shoulder with his forefinger. “Now listen up—”
Stan poked him back—twice. “No, YOU listen up, Munyon. We’ve got a film to finish, and I’d very much appreciate it if you just shut your trap and let us do our job!”
His blunt outburst left Munyon dumbfounded, the cast and crew of Letter 13 stunned and Stan dreading what would transpire next. He didn’t have to wait very long.
“Why you mis’rable little shit. I oughta smack you silly!” Munyon snarled as he cocked his arm and made a hostile move toward Stan.
Before he could deliver a blow, however, Irv, Keisha, Dana, and Bryce jumped in front
of Stan and halted Munyon’s advance. It was like the Lilliputians road-blocking the giant Gulliver.
“Hmph. Is this the part where I’m s’posed to get all worried?” he asked, more intrigued by the show of resistance than concerned.
Keisha held the ax up in front of Munyon’s nose and stroked the handle like she was petting her pit bull before unleashing it. “Yep.”
The standoff lasted but a few seconds as Munyon surveyed the situation and sized up his opposition. When he backed away, there were palpable signs of relief on the faces of the Letter 13 team.
“Suit yourselves,” Munyon grumbled as he shuffled off back to the sofa.
“We will, thank-you,” Stan said. “Okay, places everybody!”
Bryce and Keisha proceeded to the chest and positioned themselves on the floor next to it. Stan readied his camera as Irv adjusted his audio gear, and Dana backed up against a far window in order to include everyone in her shot.
“Speed,” Irv announced.
Stan crouched down and framed Bryce and Keisha in his viewfinder. “And…action!” he called out.
Keisha clenched Bryce’s hand, her voiced filled with trepidation. “We haven’t much time left, Howie.”
Bryce nodded, his mood sullen. “It’s true, Zoe. The Evil Forces will be coming soon.”
“We should get ready,” she suggested.
Bryce hesitated and his head drooped.
“What’s wrong?” Keisha asked.
He gnawed at his lips before allowing his anxious eyes to gradually float up to meet Keisha’s. “I was just hoping…” he said, trailing off and leaving his thought incomplete. “Nah, you may think I’m foolish.”
Keisha grasped both of Bryce’s hands in hers. “No, I won’t, promise. Please, tell me, Howie.”
“Well, it’s possible we may not make it out of here…well…you know—” Keisha’s jaws tightened and she shook her head that she understood—no need to utter the word “alive.” “Which is why there is still one thing we must do,” Bryce stated.
Keisha caressed his cheek, her touch tender, her gaze smoldering with desire. “You mean…you and I should…”
Bryce’s lunged across the chest and groped at her hair in the clumsy way new lovers do. “Yes, Zoe,” he panted. “No more waiting. We’re going to—”
“Dear god, at last!” she swooned.
“Open the chest!” he proclaimed as he spread-eagled his arms.
Keisha leaned forward and hugged Bryce like her fiancé just pulled an
engagement ring box out of his pocket. “Oh, Howie, you read my mind!”
“I know it sounds crazy,” Bryce admitted, “but if we depart without knowing what we left behind—”
“It will haunt us forever!” she declared.
Bryce hoisted the ax and displayed it in his hands as if it was a pair of scissors and Keisha was the designated dignitary at a ribbon cutting ceremony. “Will you do the honors, Zoe?”
Keisha accepted. “Your wish is my command, my liege!”
They stood, and Keisha secured her grip around the ax handle. With a mighty windup and heave, she smashed the blade down onto the lock. WHAP! Nothing—it remained intact and defiant. WHAP! Keisha again walloped it, but again she was foiled by the stubborn padlock. WHAP! A third blow finally cleaved it off its timeworn mooring, and they watched as the chunk of gashed metal skidded across the floor.
“Just one peek, and we’ll walk away from this cursed treasure forever!” Bryce exclaimed, as he held out his pinky finger. “For luck?”
Keisha wrapped one of her own pinkies around his. “For luck.”
They knelt, and Bryce grabbed hold of the top of the box as Munyon hunched over behind them for a better view and Stan edged nearer for a close-up angle. Bryce’s hands trembled as he flipped open the side latches and began to raise the lid, an inch at first…then two…then—
CRASH!
The window behind Dana shattered to smithereens, glass splintering in every direction. Before she could react, an arm punched inside, seized her around the waist and began to drag her out through the gaping hole. It was cloaked in a similar pinstriped suit jacket as before, except the cloth was gray instead of blue. The hand, however, was of the same sickly pallor and grimy with soil stains.
Dana writhed and struggled to break free, but couldn’t dislodge herself from the vise-like grip of the intruder. “NOOOOO!” she shrieked as her camera tumbled to the floor.
Stan, Bryce, and Keisha rushed forward, latched onto her legs and engaged the infiltrator in a desperate tug-of-war.
“Keisha, the ax, get the ax!” Stan shouted.
Keisha released her hold and dashed to the chest, but her frantic search for Bad D came up empty. “I can’t find it!” she yelled.
“Forget it! We need your help!” Stan replied as Keisha sprinted back and grabbed Dana by the foot.
“STAAAAN!” Dana screamed.
“We got you, Dana!” Stan assured her.
She was slipping further and further into the darkness outside when they heard Irv roar behind them. “AAAAAAA!!!!”
Irv plowed through the room with his boom pole positioned at his side as if it were a lance and he a medieval knight atop a steed, engaged in a joust. He jabbed the butt end of the carbon fiber rod through the window. Again. And again.
POW! POW! POW!
With each blow, a pained grunt followed and the arm slackened more. One final thrust by Irv freed Dana and ended the manic tussle as the night raider unhooked his tentacle and disappeared.
Stan led his shell-shocked sister to a chair where she crumpled, and fought to regain her breath. “Are you all right?” Stan asked as he stroked her back.
Dana nodded, despite the several scratches and abrasions on her wrists and neck from the flying shards of glass.
Munyon observed the post-invasion scene like it was nothing more than the aftermath of some lighthearted horseplay that got a smidge too rowdy. “Told ya!” he chirped.
“Okay, so now why don’t you tell us, what did you do with the ax?” Keisha demanded.
“Me? Nothin’,” Munyon professed with the earnestness of a choir boy.
“So where’s it at? I left it right there.” Keisha gestured toward the area next to the box.
Munyon shrugged. “How am I s’posed to know? You had it last.”
“Here it is,” Irv noted, as he bent down and retrieved the ax from beneath the sofa.
Keisha glanced over at Munyon. “How did it get there?”
“Beats me,” Munyon said. “Must’ve got kicked under there durin’ all the confusion.”
“Yeah, right. Sure it did,” Keisha grumbled.
“Never mind that,” Stan urged as he helped his traumatized sister to her feet. “It doesn’t matter now. It’s a wrap. Let’s grab our stuff and go.”
Munyon beamed like a man whose mother-in-law just announced she would be departing after a month-long visit. “Now you’re talkin’ sense, big cheese!”
“What’s the best way out of here?” Stan queried.
“Well, you can start with the door!” Munyon remarked, but to his disappointment, the wisecrack fizzled like a firecracker in a hurricane. “Well, okay then, if that’s the way y’all feel. Just head around to the back of the cabin. There’s a trail. Take you right back on to a county road, no more than a mile down.”
Munyon’s response riled Keisha. “What? Why didn’t you tell us this before?”
As Munyon strutted toward Keisha like a gigolo in a singles bar, she whisked herself away in the opposite direction. “Don’t recall you askin’, honey bunch.”
Dana picked up her camera, and it was apparent from just a cursory inspection of the crack in the lens and dents in the body that the damage was extensive. “Sorry, Stan. I think it’s busted.”
Stan smiled. “Doesn’t matter. What’s important is you’re not.”
Munyon rubbed his hands together like an antsy dinner party host hinting to his guests that they had overstay
ed their welcome and it was time to say good-night. “Well, surely was fun havin’ you all stop by. Next visit, call ahead so I can spruce the place up a bit.”
“Wait,” Bryce interjected. “Before we leave, isn’t anybody curious what’s inside the chest?”
“Wouldn’t do that, whiner,” Munyon warned. “You’ll piss the buggers off real bad. Best you just vamoose.”
Bryce marched straight past Munyon to the broken window. “Well, I don’t care anymore. Screw ’em!” He jammed his head through the opening and emptied his lungs. “Hear me out there? SCREW YOU, DEAD DORKS!”
“Bryce, no, forget it,” Stan pleaded, as Bryce withdrew and sashayed through the room. “That chest has caused us enough problems.”
Bryce reached out to tweak Stan’s chin as he glided past like a grand diva cavorting with a fan lined up along the red carpet. “Oh chill, Stan. You’re so uptight.”
As Bryce approached the box, Munyon snagged him by his tie and jerked him backward with such force it was like he’d just lassoed a rodeo calf.
“Best listen to your director, whiner.”
Bryce squirmed and tried to wrestle himself away from Munyon’s grasp. “Take your paws off me you, you—”
“What?” Munyon snarled.
Bryce winced as a spritz of Munyon’s spittle drizzled across his face. “Uh…can you give me a sec?”
The sound of heavy footsteps clumping across the porch ended the tussle. Munyon smiled and pinched Bryce on his cheek. “Time’s up, boy.”
CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK.
“Uh-oh,” Keisha murmured as she and her colleagues stood paralyzed and listened.
The flimsy walls started to shudder from the force of the multiple fists that began to pound against it.
THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.
A petrified Bryce glanced down at his crotch, checked to make sure nobody else noticed the discoloration, and covered the area with his hands in as discreet a manner as possible.
But it was the low, muffled, bloodcurdling growls and wails that came next that brought the goose bumps popping through the surface of the skin up and down their arms.
GRRRRH! GRAAAAGH! GRRRRH!
“I were you?” Munyon suggested. “Might wanna seriously think ’bout haulin’ ass out that door and never comin’ back.”
“He’s right, Stan,” Dana said, visibly shivering from the frightful noises so close by. “We should make a run for it. It’s our best chance.”
Stan grabbed his camera and slung his backpack over his shoulder as his sister and Irv gathered their own. “Let’s do this,” Stan commanded.
Stan took the point as the Letter 13 team formed a wedge and positioned themselves a few yards in front of the door. They packed themselves together as if for a rugby scrum, their bodies taut, coiled with anticipation. Munyon waited with his hand resting on the doorknob.
“Okey dokey, boys and girls, buckle up your diapers. On the count of three you go and keep on goin’,” he instructed. “Ready? One. Two. THREE!”
Munyon flung open the door. “Arriver-derci!”
The crew charged forward like a regiment of soldiers springing out of a trench during WWI. “AAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!”
Chapter 21