The Misses Foo & Cockerill

The Chaos Cap

Miss Foo just smiled when Eli punched her in the gut. She had hardly even felt it. Eli's fist had simply sunk into her rolls of fat like into a giant pillow. When Eli had taken off running with Miss Cockerill chasing him, Miss Foo hadn't moved. She simply hummed tunelessly to herself. Slowly, methodically, she licked the donut crumbs from her fingers, used the table to push herself up, and waddled down to the basement.

There she surveyed her morning's work. "Beautiful," she said and wiped a tear from her eye. "Simply perfect."

She pulled on a few wires, tightened a few bolts, tested the edge of the scythe, and then settled in to wait.

Eli struggled against the vines; the pod full of man-melting venom was just feet from him. If only the botany book hadn't been stained! If only any other part other than how to escape had been stained! If only the Misses hadn't chosen that day to throw fish around the library!

A lid opened on top of the pod.

If only his parents had never left. If only, if only, if only...the time for if onlys was over.

Eli reached back and drove the pipe cleaner into the belly of the pod.

The entire vine shuddered. The vines unraveled from Eli's body and he fell to the stairs with a thunk. He ripped the pipe cleaner from the pod and drove it in again. Thick, amber liquid seeped from the holes in the pod. Eli watched in horror as it ate through the stair, burning through wood, metal, and vine alike. A wailing pierced the air and Eli wasn't sure if it came from the vine or from Miss Cockerill, but he didn't care. Within moments the venom had eaten through two, three stairs and Eli peered through the hole as it continued earthward.

Then he saw something even more terrible. Miss Cockerill thrust her head into the hole, first peering downward, following the path of the venom, then turning and looking up and Eli.

There was a strange look on her face. It was twisted and contorted.

"Weevil!" she shouted.

Eli did not wait to hear more. He ripped the rest of the vines from him and tore up the stairs.

The plant now shrank away, as if it sensed destruction upon him.

Eli was three steps from the landing. He could see the sky at the top of the staircase where the vine burst out of the house and onto the roof. A breeze of fresh air tickled his nostrils, washing away the horrid stench of rotten meat.

He was two steps from the landing when the board beneath him split open.

Miss Foo had been wrong: the leak in the roof did not keep the boards from shriveling. In fact it did the exact opposite; it had rotted them. Eli went tumbling through the rotted stair and into the gaping hole left by the Stranglervine venom.

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Miss Cockerill watched through the same hole as the stair broke beneath Eli. She watched him tumble through the hole, scream past one flight of stairs, and whistle past her face. And he kept falling, right through the first floor and into the darkness below.

Miss Cockerill gasped. "The basement!"

She turned and ran, skidding down the hallway in her high heels. In her excitement she got lost, turning right at the Hall of Trophies when she should have turned left. She ran clear to the kitchen before she realized her mistake and turned around.

"Weevil!" she cried, finally reaching the door to the basement stair and ripping it open. "Weevil!" she yelled again. She looked into the murkiness and strained her ears. She thought she heard a moan. Then, as though from far off, there was a whapping like leather hitting meat. It grew in volume and was joined by a slicing sound and then a whirring sound.