Jazz, Monster Collector in: Down with the Clowns (Season 1, Episode 15) Read online

my mind hadn’t yet grasped the importance of. “What did you say?” I asked, my mouth struggling to keep up with the rampart of disjointed thoughts rampaging through my brain.

  “Enough of this; shut up, the both of you!” the boss Clown shouted.

  “Jazz, what is it?” DJ asked, her expression had switched from nervous to concerned.

  “No,” I said. Still in something of a haze, I shoved mother goose into DJ’s hands, pushed past the big leader and grabbed for the mouthy goblin. “You say that again!” I shouted.

  The goblin hissed and clubbed for my hand, but the boss Clown roared and shoved me away. I tucked into a roll, straightened the boss’s thick arm, locking his sensitive elbow, and flipped him backward over me. He slammed onto the street and described his experience with a cry of pain.

  I rolled to my feet and charged the little goblin. He should have run, but he lunged, swinging at my head. I pivoted sideways, took his wrist, and, with a quick upward strike, broke his elbow. He cried out a grating, high-pitched scream and dropped the club. I pivoted behind him, drew my dagger, and brought the blade to his neck making sure to draw a little of his black blood.

  Boss Clown shambled onto his feet. “That does it! I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you. You’re going down, human,” he said and drew a knobby club from a back mounted sheath.

  That’s when DJ, good old trusty DJ, shoved the business end of mother goose against the goblin’s crotch.

  “Move and I’ll geld you, monster,” DJ said. She still sounded like a little girl, even when trying her best to sound dangerous.

  Still I nodded my approval. That was a Jazz-worthy witty threat.

  I could feel the other Clowns creeping up on my back. “Stand them down or she’ll make good her threat and I’ll decapitate the lot of you.”

  Boss Clown lowered the club and his shoulders slumped. “Fine, have it your way. No one liked Miblot anyway.”

  “Hey!” my goblin captive shouted. The dope sounded insulted despite his terrible pain and hopeless predicament.

  “Alright, Miblot, answer the question,” I said, satisfactorily in control of the situation.

  “What was it again?” he asked in between little squeaks of pain, black tears ran through the greasepaint on his face.

  I gave his broken arm a little twist, even though the moron had probably legitimately forgotten. He let loose another one of those high-pitched screeches.

  “Why did you tell me to eat pickles?” I asked again.

  When he finished whimpering, he said, “Because you’d insulted me.”

  “So why pickles? Where did you hear about them?”

  “Umm,” he said stalling. “I can’t remember.”

  Now he was lying. I pressed the knife in a little deeper and, despite the terrible reek of him, brought my mouth very near his pointed green ear. “What is a pickle?”

  “Well that’s an easy one,” he said as if he were going to win a prize or something. “Pickles is a kind of cloudy liquid that tastes like laundry soap mixed with salt water and old chair cushions and gives terrible diarrhea.”

  My heart was racing. I couldn’t believe what he was saying but I didn’t have a moment to convince myself. I shoved the little creep away, drew my macdaddy revolver, and jammed the barrel in his ear hole. “You get me those pickles, get them right now.”

  He closed his eye on the side of the plugged ear and raised the shoulder. “Hey, hey, hey, wait, I ain’t gotz no pickles! I hate them, they’re disgusting,” he said as he cradled his broken arm in his other.

  I shot him in the foot.

  He screeched, hopping around like a dancing clam.

  I drew the gun’s hammer back.

  “Alright, alright, I’ll get them,” he squealed though a screech of pain. He hobbled over to an overturned car, leaving a trail of slimy black blood, and pulled out a big glass jar, my jar. My eyes opened wide and my heart raced. It was just too unbelievable and my feet wouldn’t respond, so I just stood there with my mouth hanging open like an idiot.

  “Jazz,” DJ called and ran over to Miblot. “That’s your soulution, that’s it! Quick, quick, you gotta spit the stone in, hurry.” She was jumping up and down with excitement.

  “Yeah,” I said and started toward it.

  Then, holding the old glass jar precariously in one hand, Miblot raised it over his disgusting head. “One more step and I’ll smash it.”

  I stopped walking and DJ froze mid jump.

  “So…” Despite his many injuries, the little twerp smiled. “How much will you give me for it?”

  The jar was pulled from his hand and Boss Clown, who’d come up behind Miblot, hammered him on top of his goblin head with a heavy fist. Miblot dropped unconscious and bleeding to the street.

  “Here, take it so we can get back to business,” Boss Clown said.

  DJ grabbed the jar in her two little hands, set it gently onto the ground, and unscrewed the lid. “Come on, Jazz, hurry,” she called waving me over enthusiastically.

  I made it in two long steps, shoved my face in the jar, and waited. But nothing happened. Normally the stone would come right up. So I tried to will it up, and still nothing happened.

  “What are you doing? Spit it out,” DJ pleaded.

  There was too much happening too fast and my brain wasn’t keeping up. I’d just spent the last twenty-three and three-quarter hours convinced I was on the verge of dying. Now, at the bitterest of ends, I was kneeling in front of the jar I’d thought destroyed in the explosion and now the stone didn’t want to come up…or did I not want to continue the fight?

  “I’m trying,” I snapped angrier than I should have. “Nothing’s happening.”

  “Well try harder, Gods damn it!” DJ shouted, which struck me. Not the shout, I’d heard her shout tons of times. But I’d never heard her curse before, especially not at me.

  I stuck my face back in the jar, stuck out my tongue, and thought the most disgusting thought I could think; which frankly, isn’t something I’d share with anyone.

  “Oh, I know!” DJ shouted with an excited clap. “Jam your finger down your throat.”

  I shook my head. “Doesn’t work on me, I’ve tried.”

  DJ’s perfect petite features wrinkled up into a frustrated knot. “It must have something to do with the forest elf’s spell.” Maybe if we break the spell you’ll spit the stone up.”

  I glanced around at the blank and thoughtless stares of the bvorcs and goblins surrounding us. “No magic users around here, I’m afraid.”

  “Hey,” DJ said as her face smoothed over again. “Swallow your magic eraser; maybe that will cancel the elf’s spell.”

  I huffed and glanced at my countdown timer, three minutes left. “I’m not a chalkboard, DJ. Besides, it doesn’t have that kind of power.”

  “Oh for Maleckk’s sake, you humans take the bread I swear,” Boss Clown exclaimed, removed his worn leather boot, and shoved the foot hole in my face.

  Needless to say I threw up.

  The stone, and a little more, dropped into the jar. At first tiny bubbles formed all around the stone, rose in the jar and gargled on the surface. Then the soulution churned and whirred as it emitted what sounded like cries of pain and whales of torment; all perfectly normal. But then the jar shook and shimmied. The soulution frothed as the jar walked a little hobbling line in the street, this was not normal. The Clowns gasped and opened the circle around us. Then the cries from the jar turned into what sounded like terrible screams of agony and the circle opened further.

  “What have you brought upon us, Monster Collector?” Boss Clown asked in a voice full of trepidation. “What manner of monstrosity is this?”

  “Relax,” I said in my most commanding tone, “It’s just an inert cleaning solution. DJ, give me the lid.”

  DJ just stood there with her mouth hanging open staring at the jar, which was rattling hard against the blacktop.

  “DJ!” I shouted.

  Her eyes snappe
d into focus and she passed me the tin lid.

  I wrestled the jar between my feet and, with a little fumbling, got the lid screwed down tight. Then I grabbed DJ’s hand and dragged her back into the circle of Clowns.

  “There’s nothing inert about that stuff. Someones’ are in there,” the boss Clown said, adding a growl and showing me his fangs.

  “It’s just a noise, like wind or scrubbing bubbles. It will settle down,” I said although I wasn’t sure that I believed any of it.

  “Well I am worried about it. If this is some kind of trap—”

  “Look, Clown,” I said interrupting. “First off, if I wanted you dead I would have killed you long ago. Secondly, don’t threaten me, that won’t work out so well for you. If you don’t believe me just ask Miblot over there.” I pointed at the unconscious goblin as I fought through an intense wave of vertigo and exhaustion. Then I was sinking in an ink black sea, the water kept getting deeper and colder and I couldn’t breathe.

  The next thing I knew strong hands pulled me up and DJ was shouting, “Jazz, wake up!”

  I shook my head to jar it clear. As my eyes came into focus I saw DJ’s arms held by two goblins. Another Clown held her KFC pistol and my shotgun. A bvorc, a big bvorc, probably one of Boss Clown’s lieutenants, had my arms pressed tight to my sides from behind. It looked like him and the other lieutenant had had some DNA manipulation done as they were both at least six and a half feet tall—normally bvorks don’t stand much taller than my five foot five in stature

  I shook my head again, failing to dispel the ringing in my ears. The boss Clown came into view and