Other People's Shite: Patsy's Repurposed Designs (Part Two)

After bypassing security measure-men apprehending another faction worker, out past curfew, Ruby Kurtones III had arrived slightly late - and unnerved - taking a wrong turn to the alleyway to meet best friend Patricia ‘Patsy’ Murdock; at their agreed-upon site for a night of hobby.

Sweating in her hazard suit and dragging along her oxygen tank with the busted wheel. Ruby began to find herself both weary and excited for her first night of thievery. As three siren blasts sounded in the distant squadron, signaling the appeasement tower's lighting for the night. Ruby stood increasingly unsure, as Patsy was nowhere to be seen.

“Sty! Where are ya, ya bastard! Patsy, goddammit! Ya said the willy garbage.” Ruby shouted, giving the tin a swift kick. They were in the outer bounds now, which was lawless to the degree of abandonment.

“Oi! There you are! Keep ya voice down!” Patsy whisper-shouts into an average volume, sounding muffled as she appeared from around the corner, giving Ruby a fright.

“What in faction?! Ya, scared me. You’re shoutin’ too. Where’ve ya been?” Ruby wove Patsy off.

“It's called a whispered shout. And I forgot the spot.” Patsy replied nonchalantly, coming up to Ruby in her helmeted work gear.

 “You picked the spot!”

 “Hush, Nevermind. We’re here. It’s gonna be great!” Patsy said, uncommonly bubbly. “Why ya bring clinker?”

 “Ya didn’t specify. I thought ya were providing the supplies. I didn’t know the dress code was professional. Gah! Ya do your hobby in ya work gear; you don’t see the wrong in that? If I wake up in a jail cell again, I swear.”

 “Calm now, Ruby. Not quite sure how ya fell asleep with all dem pumpers, anyways. Can’t drag a corpse.” Patsy replied.

  “I ain't dead!” Ruby shouted.

“Mind as well be, ye grew horns and spoke in me dead mum’s voice.” Shrugged Patsy, as if there was no other logical avenue.

“Ugh. Nevermind. Neither of us is pumped? Are we?”

“I’m only pumped on ya finally tryin’ my favorite hobby with me,” Patsy replies sincerely.

“Aw, fine then. I knew you were the creative type. So, have ya chosen a place, or do ya find your shite haphazardly?” Ruby asked with heavy sarcasm.

“Oi, pleasant natures now, Ruby. And I’ve chosen the perfect place. We’ll be back home and cozy before sixth curfew. Follow me.” Patsy said, grabbing Ruby’s arm to lead.

Ruby’s oxygen tank rattled, and Patsy’s rustling work suit became mildly reflective in the night. They walked for some time as Patsy refused to give Ruby any details or direction.

“This looks quite familiar, actually. Patsy…where are we thievin’ from?” Ruby asked once more, squinting her eyes against the dull yellow night poles: throwing shadows along the winding cracked and narrow neighborhood roads.

“Don’t ruin a good surprise, Rube; we’re almost there. Actually, you should close your eyes for this part.” Patsy replied.

“Ha! I’m blind enough as is.”

“Come on now,” Patsy said eagerly, grabbing and pulling at Ruby’s elbow.

Patsy led Ruby a bit further down the dead-end street – as they crunched and crackled - toward the third to last house on the left. Once they came near, Patsy began to playfully shield Ruby’s eyes; turning her away before approaching the quaint two-story home with a lit panel labeling the property as ‘Kurtones.’

“Ha. What has gotten into you, Pat! Absurd.” Ruby chuckled, shuffling as Patsy limped and danced with her from behind to make a surprise of the location.

“Alright, hold on,” Patsy said, moving to Ruby’s side, as her rubber arms stretched out to present, “Go on now.”

Ruby turned and gasped, “What the -, Patsy! This is my relation’s house! Why in faction would you bring me here?! Ya want me to rob my own hou-… their house. Dammit. I thought we were bondin’ with your hobby Patricia, now you’ve gone and pranked me.”

“What? Nothin’ of the sort Ruby, on our friendship. I jus’ thought it’d be just and sweet. I ain’t tryin’ to prank. I figured we rob the bastards that stole ya position and house, then make a vase to give it back to ‘em during Atonements. That way, everything is proper.” Patsy explained.

“What? …Why? …Oh Patsy, you lush, just absurd you are! Mad and perfect! Alright then, Juniper went and tossed all I had when she took over. Her taste has always been shite. Let's do it! We’ll be doin’ her favor with one of ya beautiful vases, Pat.”

“Aw, now see, I knew you’d appreciate it! Let’s go. I found the best way the other day.”

“So, ya scoped it out, huh? What are we to do if she and her partner are present? I’d sure like to knock her one.”

“I take my hobby seriously. An’ no knockin’, please. They’re supposed to be at the Execute logging now. Strange enough, it ain’t their collective’s cycle.”

“Hm…strange indeed,” Ruby said cryptically, seeming to muse aloud.

“Come on, partner, we’ll slink around the back; the door’s broken.”

Ruby followed behind Patsy across the disparaged lawn to a shed in the back of the house. Patsy paused after creaking the door open, with a slight shove, “Leave ya tank, Rube, they’ve got filtration.”

“…Forgot,” Ruby grumbled, clanking her tank to the side of the house, and entered the darkened space behind Patsy - who turned up the safety lights on her work suit.

Ruby felt fresh anger and excitement begin to boil up within as she shuffled behind Patsy and her strange static glow in the partially stoned tunnel – that attached the shed to the house’s basement. A part of Ruby wished her hateful conniving shifter of a relation Juniper Kurtone-Barbs IV was home, so she could spit in her truly larcenous face.

Juniper had schemed so relentlessly against her family after the head matriarch – Ruby Kurtones I, passing. Since Ruby’s mother – the second - had died giving birth to her daughter, the Executes' position was, by all rights hers. Shortly after the ceremonies, Ruby had even settled into the house and position when Juniper inserted fraudulent requests - pushed along by her affair and current partner. Who at the time was a lowly security measure-man with a mere myth attached to his name. Both their rises were suspect but went ultimately unchecked: the Head Faction turning the deceit to whispers, as it bordered on a coup against the Uppers.

However, Ruby was persistent in her fight. Always requesting trial hearings, demanding to be heard until she became a faction-wide nuisance. The Head Faction attempted to appease her with a moderate degradation before ordering Ruby off to the worker’s collective’s most off-base faction to work as a ‘Sluger’ in the nuclear waste deposits. The silver lining to everything being Ruby’s lone, gang-less, kindly cross-mate: Patsy, who took Ruby under her wing, showing her the ways of Faction Four. From then on, Patsy and Ruby were an inseparable gang of two.

Ruby’s pace quickened as the years of grievances and injustices rushed back. This was her home. Now Ruby thought herself: a rat slinking through the gutters. As she saw her assigned seven by seven block with the minuscule window, too high to look out of. Until Patsy had gifted her with that beautiful vase – made of stolen three-star hospital motel window cords and security cameras - that caught the siren lights in such a way; it animated her darkened concrete walls.

Ruby’s spirits lifted some as she ran into Patsy, who stopped suddenly in the open archway leading into the basement.

“Ey!” Patsy warned, limping forward.

“Whatcha stop for?” Ruby lamented.

“Hold it, Rube…Oh my word.” Patsy gasped, attempting to wave Ruby back before plunging forward into the pitch-black basement.

“What? What is it? Wait now.” Ruby was coming back to herself as the anxiety of what-ifs rose. The Head Faction would probably just off her, if she made more troubles, she couldn’t fathom a more lowly position than her current one, besides death itself.

“My word, are you seeing this, Ruby?” Patsy said in an awestruck whisper; her eyes were more adjusted to the darkness than Ruby, who could barely make out the walls.

“What? I can’t see nothin’. What is it? Ya sound like ya seen a ghost.” Ruby replied, feeling ahead as she stepped through the archway and was hit with the rancid and bleached medley - reminiscent of a slaughterhouse.

“L-let me find a light, I don’t…maybe we should leave now, Rube.”

“What? What are ya on about? Where ya goin’ – Oh.” Ruby went silent, as the basement was slowly illuminated by the unharmonized flicker of ceiling lights.

“What in faction…I think we should leave Ruby. This…” Patsy started.

“What are you on about?” Ruby uttered again, absentmindedly, looking around the space, “Looks like Juniper has a secret hobby of her own…”

“What? Have ya gone mad?” Patsy replied, shocked, “This is a crime. These people are clearly serial murders!” Patsy rose to the apprehensive tones usually reserved by Ruby, who appeared almost pleased in her relation’s murder room.

“I knew she was no good. I knew it.” Ruby went on, walking through the tables splayed with an eclectic collection of blood crusted medical supplies and butchery tools; flicking a hook that hung from the ceiling.

Patsy stood frozen at the light switch as she gazed at Ruby – curiously rustling through the shelving units – lining the walls.

“It looks like they went off in a hurry to get to logging… quite untidy,” Ruby observed.

“As opposed to your own ideal murder cove? I think we should be off now. If we get caught, this could go on us. I’m not too keen on dyin’ for my hobby now, as these nutters would be. I can only imagine.” Patsy went off, pacing now.

“Really now, Patsy. Has your gull gone out with the filtration? This could work quite well for us. I doubt this is on any order. The Upper’s are cleaner in their handling of matters than this. Juniper was always a sloppy bitch.”

“What are you on about Ruby? We are Lowers; Faction Four nothings. They’d just kill us or box us away for the rest of our lives. There are smaller assignments in the box. Trust me on that. Ya won’t ever see out a window again, Rube.” 

“Listen to me, Pat. I’m tellin’ ya this ain’t on course with the Head Faction. Juniper has gotten herself into a real spot. I bet-“

“Did ya hear that?” Patsy interrupted, shuffling to the far corner where she could’ve sworn she heard a whimper. “They’ve got lockers over here.”

“Ya think someone’s in there?” Ruby asked, walking over to Patsy's side as she moved closer to the middle locker in the row of three.

“I swear I heard somethin’…” Patsy answered as she put her ear to the metal door.

“Just open it.” Ruby groaned, pushing Patsy aside to engage the unlocked latch - yanking open the locker door.

“AGHHgah!”

“What the-!”

“Oh my!”

All three screamed, in unison, as the beaten raw body of what appeared to be a young man fell from the locker onto the floor, to Patsy and Ruby’s horror and surprise.

“Ruby! What in faction?! Who is that?!” Patsy hollered.

“Lower your voice, Patricia, I don’t know. Calm down.” Ruby said evenly, cautiously bending down to the ravaged body. “He’s just a lad.”

“Is he still alive?” Patsy asked in a frenzy now, attempting to contain herself.

“I don’t think he is anymore. I think that was the last of him.” Ruby proclaimed, checking for a pulse. “Here, help me. Let’s see if he’s got ID.”

“What?” Patsy stood still, shaking her head.

“Come together now Pat, I need ya thinkin’ right. This ain’t so bad for us. Help me. Now.” Ruby ordered, taking hold of his shoulder and arm, as Patsy went hesitantly to her side to take his legs.

At first slipping in their grasps, Ruby and Patsy grunted and heaved together to flip the lifeless bundle of bloody clothes and tattered skin over to his back. As his label flickered on and began to scroll, Patsy bent over to read it aloud, ”Cromworth HighSeat…the tenth.”

“By faction Patsy…this lad is-was a relation of the Queen.” Ruby avowed.

“What? Oh no, Ruby, this is bad. This has to be bad.” Patsy made the mark of the High Queen across her chest and stepped away from the royal corpse.

“For Juniper that treasonous wench. This…this is why she has succeeded. She’s murdering those who would oppose her. Ha! She’s set her aims too high this time, I tell ya, Pats. Too high! Don’t you understand? I could be put back into position…Patsy?” Ruby finished, looking up to a distracted Patsy, who moved towards the stairs now.

“Why is that off to blinking?” Patsy pointed, looking up to a faint pulsing light in the ceiling corner above the upstairs doorway.

“What’s blinking? Wait…are those footsteps?” Ruby stood, stopping in her tracks toward Patsy - who rushed to Ruby’s side.

Ruby looked savagely up the stairwell to the approaching squeaks that had made it to the door.

“We need to go now! Move Ruby!” Patsy pleaded, the excitement exasperating her age as she wheezed like an asthmatic child and felt the wear on her soul like an ancient soldier.

The door bursts open, and the succession of events that followed would come to irreparably alter the lives of both Ruby Kurtones III and Patricia ‘Patsy’ Murdocks.

---

Patsy stirred as slants of light shined down upon her face, “Who’s open the curtains?” Patsy mumbled, perturbed and immediately confused.

“Eh! Look who’s finally back!” Ruby cheered, clambering to Patsy’s bedside. Pulling up the chair by the broken window blinds to sit at the utterly shocked Patsy’s side.

“What? Why am I connect to all these –“ Patsy gasped and muttered, her eyes moving about the small motel room where she laid hooked up to monitors and fluids.

“Don’t mess with ya medicines. Service calls only come twice a day here. Sorry about the curtains. Karma, eh? Who knew ya’d end up in the fancy hospital motel ya stole all the rods from.” Ruby said with a smile, patting Patsy down to the bed.

“What?!” Patsy shouted, igniting a drawn coughing fit.

“Gentle now. I’ll explain. It’s a long six months for us both.”

Patsy’s eyes bulged as she grabbed for Ruby, sputtering and coughing, “Six! S-six! M-m-months?! What?!”

“Listen. Calm down now, breathe it out, and then I’ll tell ya, okay.”

“What? I remember they tried to gas us…I-I got ya as far as the tunnel…it all happened so fast Ruby…I-“ Patsy began to tear up as the heart monitor spiked.

“Hush now. Calm yourself, Patricia. You did marvelously. I told you it was Juniper’s own undoing, not our own. Dry up those tears.” Ruby cooed.

Patsy closed her eyes and took in some breaths until the beeping subsided to its steady flow, “I can’t stand the suspense, Rube, tell me what’s goin’ on? How’d I end up in the three-star hospital motel? We can’t afford this. You got knocked, not me…have I gone mad?”

Ruby patted Patsy's shoulder gently, a tear springing from her own eye now, “Ah, not in the least, my dearest friend. It was the blessing you deserved. You saved us. And that hobby of yours turned out quite lucrative in more ways than one. It’s true; they gassed us twice. Ya gave me your mask, you silly creature. Apparently, they’d been holed up scheming, and this logging was some type of set up by the High Faction to finally serve Juniper what she deserved.”

“So, what? They got ‘em? I don’t understand. What-”

“Steady, steady. Don’t interrupt. As I said, the collective logging was some set up to take down Juniper. They were on their way when we tripped their wire. The Security measure-men from the high order were just behind. I guess they ain’t as clean as I ventured, for they chose to gas ‘em. It killed ‘em and nearly killed you. They rushed in from the tunnel and basement in suits. I woke up goin’ through the tunnels on some lads' shoulders'. But you didn’t wake up…until, well now.”

“Oh…”

“It turned right, though! I told ‘em you were my partner. I hope you don’t mind; I know you’re against tossing my salads. But it helped, I told ‘em that we’d come to seek the Queen’s justice when Juniper caught us up. The Queen was grateful beyond all doubt. I have risen beyond my former Execute position…or should I say we for my partner receives all benefits of my name.” Ruby paused to gaze into Patsy’s face of pure bewilderment and happiness.

“…Absurd…” Patsy gasped, crying now.

“Hush, silly, I haven’t even told you the best part.” Ruby’s smile widening.

“What can be better?” Patsy choked with laughter.

“Well, as usual, I’m always right,” Ruby started, pausing to reply to Patsy’s eye roll with a loving smack on the shoulder. “A few months back, after the Upper’s threw yet another Charity Benefit in our honor and for your swift recovery, donating all their shite to your cause. I took some of the proceeds and opened up a hobby shop, repurposing the lavish donated items so loving given from the Executes and molting ‘em down. I’ve gotten quite good at vases now. There’s a waitlist for classes and orders.” Ruby finished with a proud air.

“…Brilliant…just brilliant. What’s the shop called?”

“Other People’s Shite: Patsy’s Repurposed Designs.”