The Only Beanie - Book 4 (Riverdale Season 4/5)

Killing Mr. Honey - Part 5

"I'm ordering Chinese. You want Lo Mein?" Charles asked as Betty and Aminity stared at the tape playing on the tv.

"Yep. And some fried wontons please," Betty called.

"Chicken or veggie."

"There!" Aminity pointed, hopping up and rewinding the tape.

"Oh, hell no," she let out as they caught the figure. "Charles." He walked back down and leant down to see Honey on the screen. "I think we got him.
"Oh, no, Betty," Aminity smiled. "We did get him."

***

"Agent Smith, Miss Cooper, Mr. Jones, Miss Jones, may I help you?" Honey asked as they walked into his office.

"Yes, you can tell us whether or not this is you in the screengrab from the video you received," Betty said, placing the printed out picture onto his desk.

"Is it you holding the camera in that photo?" Jughead asked.

"I mean, it's only two frames, but it's enough to nail your ass."

"Emergency fire lights," Aminity shrugged. "They're a problem."

"If you're suggesting that I'm sending videotapes around town-"

"No, not all the tapes," Jughead stopped him. "Just this one."

"You're a copycat, Mr. Honey."

"But not a very good one," Aminity said after Betty.

"Using the voyeur's MO to ramp up your personal feud against me and my friends?"

"Feud?" he asked her. "I... I've been trying to protect you."

"The only person we need protection from is you, Mr. Honey. You're deranged."

"I was trying to help you," he said as she stood. "To prepare you for a life outside of Riverdale."

"You can justify your actions all you want, but we already sent copies of the videos to the school board, aka, our parents. So between them and the FBI," she glanced back at Charles who waved, "I hope you have a good lawyer."

"I'm pretty sure that's checkmate, Mr. Honey."

"Don't mess with us in our own town," Jughead crossed his arms.

***

"What causes a principal to hate his students so much?" Jughead asked as they walked down the halls. "Was he bullied in high school? Is his entire career based on revenge?"

"Well maybe he should have had sessions with Mrs. Burble along with the rest of us."

"Can we not do that again" Aminity sighed.

"Oh, just wait until you have your required senior meeting with her," Betty said as Jughead smirked at his sister. "At least now you can finish your story without any real life interruptions," she grabbed her boyfriend's arm. "How close are you to being done?"

"Oh, close. Reggie just died."

"Wait, what?" Aminity asked.

"Reggie? Why did Reggie have to die?"

///

They all watched the locker being decorated in memory of Reggie, Cheryl starting to cry and running off. The rest of them slowly followed, finding her in the music room.

"It's not right," she cried. "Reggie didn't deserve that."

"Of course he didn't deserve it, Cheryl," Jughead told her. "You need to get ahold of yourself. You understand me?"
"Look, Reggie was one of my best friends," Aminity spoke up, "and it's sad, even tragic, what happened to him, but he was out of control. When Mr. Honey died, he couldn't handle himself and-"

"Died?" she cut her off. "Are you serious?"

"Aminity's right, Cheryl," Betty went next. "Reggie was spiraling. He was drinking. Tell her, Arch."

"Yeah. If I hadn't been in the locker room that time, I don't know what he would've said."
"Fine, but did we have to cut his breaks?" Veronica asked. "I mean, we murdered our friend."

"What are you talking about, V?" Betty asked, grabbing Veronica's arm and gripping it tightly. "We didn't cut Reggie's breaks." She loosened her grip. "His death was an accident." She chuckled. "The truth is, he was never taking care of that car the way he should've. Eventually it just caught up with him."

"We can't change what happened," Jughead said. "The only thing we can do is live our lives."

"Wow. Are you hearing yourselves? It's like you actually believe this crap."

"I've gotta side with Veronica on this one," Sweet Pea said, stepping beside her. "What we did was wrong."
"Really, Sweet Pea?" Archie asked. "Ronnie, two people are dead right now. Dead. And right now the world thinks Reggie died from a car accident. A horrible car accident. So this ends right now if we all just stick together."
"We can all make it out of this," Aminity agreed, taking Sweet Pea's hand. "Can you do this for me?" Sweet Pea and Veronica looked at each other and he pulled his hand away from Aminity's.

"I'm sorry, Princess."

"I know Betty and Jughead had a dark streak," Veronica said, looking at Archie, "but when did you become such a monster, Archiekins?"

"Come on," Jughead scoffed. "Don't kid yourself, Veronica. In this town, we're all monsters. We've always been monsters. And that includes you too. The question is, are we going to be monsters in college, or in jail?" Sweet Pea stormed out of the room, Aminity following.

"Pea, stop. Sweet Pea," she grabbed his arm.

"Aminity, how can you not see how wrong this all is?" he demanded in a low voice.

"How is this any worse from what you've done as a Serpent? You're already a monster, don't blame me for bringing you into this."
"You're right," he nodded. "I was the monster before you were. But now you're worse than I am." He started to walk away before she stopped him again.

"We've already killed one of our friends. You think we'll hesitate to kill another?" she asked, cocking her head to the side. He stared at her before pulling away and turning down the hall.

One more chapter for season 4! Since the ending of this season was weird due to Covid, I did decide to put the first part of season 5 in this book, so it's not gonna be the last chapter here.