Nap Lapkin’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve (Part 5 of 6)

“Come now Mister FBI or CIA or whomever you are” said Seacrest, clearly enjoying himself, “Look around. Do you really think the world misses any of these guys?”

A smile crept across the face of Dick Clark. “At first I considered feeding exclusively on the homeless. Transients. Bums. But eventually people would come looking for them. What I needed were people that absolutely nobody would care about.”

Ryan, his long incisors glistening in the bright torchlight (did I forget to mention the torches? I feel like I did), started to walk up and down the long line of cells. He stopped in front of one of them.

“Tell me, who in the world would give a shit about Lou Bega and his Mambo No. 5? When someone contacted his agent, one of our thralls of course, about him appearing in a commercial we just sent out another one of our thralls, a fat black one, and nobody knew the difference” beamed Seacrest.

“You do know what a thrall is don’t you agent-man?” inquired Dick.

“Do I look like I read Twilight motherfucker?” spat Lapkin.

“And thank goodness for rap. We have so many one-hit wonders coming in these days … quite frankly I’m getting a bit sick of dark meat” confessed Seacrest.

Nap tried slipping out of the nylon zip ties that held his wrists but they were pulled tight.

Ryan was making his way back towards Nap, trying his best to make eye contact. “Don’t fight it” he said “it will make it easier for you” he hissed menacingly.

“Any last requests before we drink your blood?” inquired Dick Clark. “Perhaps a song from one of our esteemed guests?”

“A little Dishwalla? Some Semisonic?” asked Ryan with mock sincerity.

Nap kept his eyes down. Every time he would make even the slightest eye contact with Seacrest things would get fuzzy.

“Do you happen to have Looking Glass down here?” he asked. “I could use a little Brandy.”

“Good call but we ate them a decade ago” answered Dick. “Now I’m afraid you’re out of time.” With that he produced a long knife and took a step towards Nap.

The blade was inches from his throat when an even larger blade was thrust through the chest of Dick Clark. It disappeared from where it came only to return seconds later in a sweeping arc that took off the head of one very surprised vampire.

“Good to see you again Nap!”

“Chance Goodrod?!” was all Nap could splutter out (For those of you who didn’t read Nap’s recent space adventure Great Ball of Fire, Chance Goodrod is the moniker Nap gave actor Jeff Goldblum).

“I was in town for the New Year’s Rockin’ Eve thing and saw them taking you down in the elevator. I thought I’d follow and see if I could be of any assistance.”

“That was your first and last mistake” screeched an enraged Ryan Seacrest and he hurled himself towards Chance. Although Nap’s hands were bound he was able to unleash a flying side kick into the ribs of Seacrest that sent him stumbling back into one of the holding pens. He took a moment to smile and dust himself off and that proved to be a mistake. Suddenly countless arms reached through the bars to grab his arms and legs.

Eyes ablaze he let loose a roar as he tried to pull away. That was all the time Nap needed. Pulling out the stake that was somehow inexorably replaced in his jacket he advanced on Seacrest.

“I’ll be honest Ryan, you’re a total douche bag. Even if you weren’t a vampire I was hoping I’d get to do this” and with that he drove the steak into the dark creature’s chest. With a final guttural cry Ryan Seacrest died. Again.

Slowly the arms holding him up relaxed their grip and he tumbled to the cement. As Chance came over to cut through Nap’s bindings they got their first good look at the owners of those arms.

Gotye. Daniel Powter. The guy from Primitive Radio Gods. Natalie Imbruglia. And in the back, much older than the rest, Peter Schilling.

“Are you Nap Lapkin?” he asked.

“Yes I am. And you’re Peter Schilling right? Major Tom himself” replied Nap.

Let me stop it here and point out that I previously said that there were ‘countless’ arms holding Ryan Seacrest against the holding pen (a description of the pen that proved quite ironic) when in fact there were ten arms holding him there. Ten is not exactly countless. My apologies, I got caught up in the moment.

“Yes. I am Peter Schilling” said … well, you get who said it. I hope so anyway. I have pretty high standards for my readership.  I just thought I’d get us back to the Peter Schilling dialogue after my clumsy apology.

“I had the weirdest dream that David Bowie was singing Major Tom and you were somehow there” he continued. ‘He’ being Peter Schilling. Just to be clear.

“It wasn’t a dream” Nap began to explain. “It was me sharing consciousness with a comet headed to destroy the Earth. You must have been included somehow. Long story and available on the website.”