Almost icy cold rain splattered on the rooftops of the downtown buildings. The pink car pulled around the curb and stopped because of heavy traffic.
"Oh, c'mon already!" the driver, Amy, said. "Why are so many people downtown on a day like this?"
Chernobyl stared out at a huge plate glass window emblazoned with the Moose Lodge 2314 symbol. Then he noticed an old friend, Thomas, who was a member of the Moose Lodge, waving at him. Since the traffic was so thick, the car wouldn't move for a while, so Thomas rushed over to the car.
"Hi, Chobe!" he greeted cheerfully. "What's up?"
"Oh, the Grand Pooh-Bah's missing, there's a new shampoo, Michael Jackson wants some dead guy--"
"Tokky's gone?" Thomas said, looking worried.
Choby nodded.
Thomas looked somewhat uncomfortable. He suddenly began to say, "Hey, Choby, I know what--"
"Finally!" Amy cheered. "Let's get goin'!"
"Gotta go, Tom," Choby said. "Bye!"
Thomas stared blankly after them, his chance to tell all gone. The Moose Lodge Pooh-Bah called him in. With a deep sigh and a halfhearted hum, he disappeared inside.
Later the next day, Damien was driving down a paved sideroad in his red Lamborghini with Kat.
"Boy, what a nice day for driving," Damien said with a laugh.
"Yeah, but the roads are awfully wet," Katrina put in.
Damien nodded. "It sure was a bad downpo--" He gasped and braked suddenly. An ambulance pulled off another road and squealed to one side, then sped off, it's [sic] sirens on fullblast [sic].
"That's the Shriners' ambulance," Damien said. "I wonder what's wrong?"
The ambulance careened around the road, it's [sic] tires squealing and screeching. It shifted from one side to the other.
"They're not going towards town," Damien noticed. "Something is definitely wrong." He sped up behind the ambulance and honked, then tried to pass. But the noisy vehicle blocked him off. He tried again, several times, unsuccessfully.
"They don't want us to pass," he cried, squealing to the right.
"What's the trouble?" Chernobyl's voice, from a strange contrivance near the controls, asked. [Note--in my early stories Damien had some sort of radio, like CB, in his car that allowed him to communicate with other drivers. This was before the popular advent of cellphones, and back then I just did not know what this thing was called. Damien installs this device in his and in Father Damien's car in Chapter 12 of the Lucifer rewrite; take note of how the dates correspond. Tokky's latest diary entry was on July 1, 1990; the rewrite of Lucifer takes place in July of the previous year.]
"Choby?" Damien exclaimed. "But--but aren't you in the ambulance?"
"Ambulance! What ambulance?"
"The one ahead of us!" Kat shrieked, grabbing the communicator and holding it up so the siren could be heard. "The one that nearly put us in need of one!"
"But I'm not driving it!"
A gunshot ran out. Kat screamed.
"What was that?" Choby asked.
"A gun! Someone's got a gun!" Kat screeched hysterically.
"Chobe, you've gotta get us out of this goosechase," Damien shouted over squealing tires and roaring engines. "Before I ring [sic] your neck!"
"But--"
Another voice cut in. "Testing, testing, testing! Hello, hello!"
"Who is this?" Damien asked.
"Is Chobe there?"
"I'm right here!"
"Chobe, it's me! Thomas!"
"Tom! What're you doing on?"
"I'm in the ambulance."
"In?!"
"Chobe, I tried to tell you before, but you wouldn't listen. It's Tokky! The--"
A crackle of static cut Thomas off. Damien tried to drive and find out the problem at once.
"Dami, where'd Thomas go?" Choby asked, startled.
"I don't know, Chobe, I'm tryin' to figure it out--"
"He said something about Tokky!"
Damien glanced briefly at Katrina, who was staring ahead with terrified eyes at the wailing ambulance. "Kat, calm down. Choby, I don't know! I can't tell!"
The car hit water and went sliding. Damien slammed on the brakes again to avoid an accident. [Note--tsk! He should know better!] He watched the old ambulance speed off into the distance. And, before it was completely out of sight, a final, crackling message, in a broken, desolate voice, emitted from the communicator.
"It's Tokky...he's going to die..."
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