Izzy looks at the black mass that is now Dr. Blob. Her stomach rumbles. She had been in the process of getting dressed to go to the pool. With a stop to get breakfast on the way. Izzy turns to Josh. “Got any more of those hot dogs? This is going to take a while.” Izzy hops up on the edge of the counter; she shifts her hips, getting comfortable.
She looks up at Doctor Blob. “Hope you’re doing ok.” The mound is unresponsive and now sunset black.
She shifts her bikini top; the shape is flattering but not comfortable. The counter is cold on the back of her thighs; she regrets not putting on pants.
Josh moves to the hotdog machine and puts on a dozen dogs; they turn slowly. His eyes drift to Izzy’s cleavage. “Yes, but they will need time to cook.”
She leans back on the counter, her head hanging off the back, stretching her spine. “Well, crap, what else do you have to eat around here?”
Josh is distracted; the way Izzy has stretched is showing off her pubic mound. The way her hair dangles and the way her face looks upside down He is flooded with images of her sucking on a hotdog while she touches herself. “Uh, I have microwave things,” he says, trying to pull his mind out of the gutter.
“Can you make me something?” Izzy asks.
Josh grabs a frozen breakfast pizza and tosses it in the microwave. Izzy watches with a bored expression. She sits up and looks down the rows of shelves to see the blue transparent doctor is browsing the comics section.
The doorkeeper watches silently. He notices Josh checking out Izzy. “Oh no,” he mumbles, “more ick?”
Josh looks over at the door. “You ok, Keeper?” He asks as he slices up the pizza. He slides it onto paper plates and hands it out. Izzy gets her on her belly; the doctor gets his put on a shelf, and for the door, he puts it on the ground in front of it.
They sit, they pace, and they read comics, but mostly they wait. Over the course of 2 hours, Dr. Blob becomes more inky, the silver powder falling out of him and forming a ring of dust on the floor. “How long do you think this will take?” the doctor asks, flipping through a copy of The Trouble with Sissy’s for the second time.
“No idea it took all night with me,” Izzy says, looking concerned, “but his color didn’t turn black like that.” She finishes her second hot dog and sits on the floor back against the display case.
“I could perform an examination,” the doctor says thoughtfully. He is immersed in the pictures of men dressed as women being used by dominant women. “You’re overdue.”
“Hard pass,” Izzy says and slumps back, pulling her phone out and scrolling. She looks up to see Dr. Blob is missing. She sits forward and sees he has fallen into a puddle in the kiddy pool. His color is now the same as midnight.
She walks over and looks inside the pool. “Dr. Blob, are you ok?”
The doctor rushes over and looks into the pool. Inside the doctor can see The Finder is curled up into a fetal position; he can’t tell if the vampire is alive or not. The doctor reaches out to touch his patient when Izzy’s hand reaches out and pulls it back.
“You have no idea what is happening; let it happen. Dr. Blob is an expert at this,” Izzy says.
“And exactly what are your medical qualifications?” the doctor asks, waving the dirty magazine in Izzy’s face.
“I… just have a feeling,” Izzy says and leans back in her spot against the checkout counter. Eventually she checks her phone.
“That doesn’t make you an expert,” the doctor says, his form distorting with anger. ‘First they make me get up early, then they make me sit here while this country bumpkin performs medical miracles,’ the doctor thinks as he turns away and goes and checks out the ice cream section just to get as far away as he can from the others.
“Izzy,” a faint voice wibbles, making Izzy jump.
Izzy looks up and looks around. She moves close to the slime. When she is close enough, she looks down into the kiddy pool to find the surface covered with something wiggling softly. “What did you say?” she says to the mass.
“Izzy,” it shutters.
“Are you ok?” she asks the puddle. She feels like something has gone wrong; the hair on the back of her neck is standing up, and there is a pain in her stomach.
“Izzy, I am hungry.” The slime starts to pull itself into a mound; it forms a mouth with sharp teeth.
“Do you want more slushy? A hotdog?” Josh moves close and offers.
“Izzy, I want blood. I NEED IT.” The mouth opens wide, and the sharp teeth take on a whitish hue.
Izzy takes a step back; she watches as the thing she calls her friend forms a pair of vestigial wings, and then from the side, it sprouts a dozen legs with sharp points. It lifts itself out of the kiddy pool and lurches toward her.
Izzy turns and runs toward the back of the store.
“Izzy, don’t run away!” Evil Dr. Blob yells out as it rushes after her, slamming into the refilled rack of Twinkies, sending them across the ground where its sharp feet pierce and smash them.
Izzy, with a will not seen in horror movies, runs fast and toward the sex shop. She turns back foolishly also, like you see in horror movies. The monstrosity is gaining on her. She grabs the first thing she can reach and throws it at him. A box of tampons hits the monster and falls to the ground harmlessly.
The infected blob laughs. “That was worthless. Now come feed me!” It surges forward.
Izzy runs along the back wall of the store looking for something to protect herself with. The rack of magazines is useless. She starts grabbing random things and tossing them, but nothing has an effect.
“You can’t run forever, Izzy. Come be my cake and ice cream!” He roars and throws himself at her.
Izzy makes the turn and runs toward the front of the store. She hears the sound of Evil Blob slamming into the ice cream cooler, breaking the glass and crumpling the metal.
“Eat the ice cream,” Izzy shouts at the monstrosity.
“That won’t work, Izzy; I need blood.” The blobby vibrates as its pseudo-people masher gnashes together.
Izzy slides and bounces against the front glass of the store as she makes the third turn headed toward the counter. Josh Gas is standing there confused. “Josh, help me,” she screams as Dr. Blob slams into the front window, breaking the glass and flopping outside into the sunlight.
His surface starts to bubble, and he screams. He smashes the next window and shoves his way back inside the building. “That wasn’t very nice, IZZY.”
Josh has a moment of clarity and rushes over to the slushy machine and yanks it off the table, tearing the cord out of the wall. He grunts and rushes back toward the counter.
Dr. Blob makes a long tentacle and sweeps the middle of the store clear, throwing it into the cooler section. “You won’t get away this time.” The infected Dr. Blob stops and laughs hysterically. Once he is done laughing, he lunges forward, reaching out with an uncountable amount of pseudopods, wrapping around Izzy’s legs, and dragging her into its mass.
Izzy screams and thrashes to get away. “Help Josh!”
Josh spins around and hurls the 100 lb slushy machine at the infected blob, splattering it all over his surface.
“Izzy, I am so hungry,” he whines one more time as his body turns into a ball of spikes. “Bleh bleh bleh!” The blob wibbles, and a dark purple smoke starts to rise from the surface. “I’m melting,” he shouts as he slowly spreads out into a giant puddle 10 feet across the surface, cracking with little fires.
Izzy, almost in tears, looks at Josh. “How could you!” She cries out.
Josh looks at Izzy, confused. “How could I save your life?”
The doctor looks up. “Can I examine the patient now?”
Izzy throws her flip-flop across the room and beams him in the head. “Where were you?”
The doctor holds up the last of a hotdog “eating.”
Izzy watches as the thin layer of slime begins to turn green in color. The lump in the middle that is the Finder begins to slowly move. A hand reaching out.
The black ichor vs. the green ichor battle is raging inside Dr. Blob. Inside his mind he keeps finding small ways to defeat this mythological menace using clever wordplay and the power of cake, but in reality he is just simply tearing apart the disease at the molecular level.
The slime slowly moves to the kiddy pool and slithers its way inside, the last of the blackness being burned off as a thin blue fire on its surface.
Dr. Blob wibbles, “I need a nap,” and becomes a puddle of light green water.
The finder stirs. The gelatin flowed off of him. He opens his eyes and takes in a deep breath.
“Fucking hell, that sucked,” the Finder mumbles.
The doctor moves to the patient, taking hold of his exposed body and lifting him out of the pool, setting him on the cold, twinky-mush-covered floor.
“No pain,” the finder says while lying on his back laughing. “You did it, Dr. Blob.” He turns to the kiddy pool, but the blob doesn’t respond. He sits up and looks at the liquid in the pool slowly forming a ball.
The doctor begins examining his patient, checking everything: heart rate, respiration, and temperature. His hand searching for orifices to check.
Izzy walks over to the pool and reaches in and grabs the small ball of slime. She picks it up and pulls it to her chest; it stays together, and she realizes her mistake. “He is sticky,” she says, making an ick face.
The finder attempts to stand up and makes it to his feet only to fall on the floor. He yelps, “So human,” he whispers, and sits on the ground. “I can’t stay like this.”
The doctor chases him around trying to shove parts of himself inside the finder.
The finder pushes the clear blue doctor away. “Enough,” he says commandingly, and begins dressing himself.
“So it’s over,” Josh Gas says, looking at the devastation that is his store.
“From me it is the door that has powerful enemies who won’t stop.” He staggers to his feet again, holding onto the only rack left standing, the shelf filled with bread. “Where is Trish? I need my gift back.” He looks around, seeing if she is hiding somewhere.
“Are you sure you want it back?” Josh says, standing behind the counter. “I saw what the curse looks like when it infected the gelatin over there.”
“Yes, I do.” He staggers to the checkout. “I need food. Feed me.”
Josh, with the same expert skill he always uses, makes 4 hot dogs and sets them in front of the finder. “That will be 12.50, sorry, habit.”
The now painfully human finder devours them, the first human food he had eaten in half a millennium. “This is awful,” he bemoans but is soon on his third one. “The door has my word I will not find it again.” He stands up and walks out the door into the bright midday sun, feeling its loving embrace.
