Page 88 of Haunt the Mall
After my shift, I marched down to the theater, half-expecting carnage. Instead, I found the place swept up and sectioned off, but fully operational. The chipped, bent railings on the staircase added a seasonal ambiance. Broken connective cables hung like black licorice instead of sparking snakes. All in all, the cineplex crew must’ve worked quickly. The spider carcass had been dragged to a far wall. Poor girl was lopsided now. Still impressive.
A lady in a black baseball cap with oversized, blue-tinted glasses knelt in front of the widow with a toolbox. Her hair poked out the back of her hat in a loose bun. Victor glowered beside her in the shadows, his arms crossed and his jaw clenched.
A woman in a power chair held up her scanner to stop me from walking right to him. “Ticket?”
“Oh, I’m just here to talk to Victor," I said.
She sucked in a sharp breath and eyed my outfit. “Right. My mistake. Go ahead.”
“Thanks.” Did she recognize me, or did I fit the profile of one of Victor’s cinema sluts? Either way, at least I didn’t have to pay. One of the many benefits of sleeping with management.
I wiped the sweat off my palms as I walked over.
“This didn’t have to happen, and especially not like this,” he ranted to the woman in the baseball cap.
The baseball cap babe poked the widow’s insides. “It’s fine. She’ll be fine.”
“She is not fine,” he hissed.
“Look, I’m sorry it didn’t work out, but it’s not my fault—”
“It’s not your fault.” He glared at the broken rafters.
“It isn’t,” she said tersely.
“Well, far be it from me to question your calculations. It’s not like you put us in danger or anything.”
She gripped her tools tighter. “Victor…”
“You programmed the widow to be a battle bot, and now, it’s practicing bodily injury. I’m so lucky I can rely on your diagnoses,” he seethed. “You’re a genius. You can fix anything—not that we need it. You’re fine. She’s fine. I suppose you’d say I’m fine, too. Well, I’m not. And I won’t be just to ease your conscience.”
His voice dripped with acid and pain. Raw resentment brewed behind his beautiful face. But we did get hit, and this lady clearly had something to do with the animatronic. So, maybe he needed a little venom. A little vulnerability. By the looks of things, he wasn’t in the right state to talk to me.
I pivoted away, but Victor’s Kat-senses must have tingled, because his hawk eyes snapped in my direction.
He uncrossed his arms and stood straighter. “Kat. You’re back.”
I faked a smile. “Yeah, but if you’re busy—”
“It’s fine.” He pushed a hand through his hair and glanced away. His eyes were rimmed with red.
A tremor barreled through my chest with the urge to comfort him. But he’d been more forthright about his feelings with this girl in the baseball cap. I curled my fist around my cross. “How’s the widow? I see you got an emergency vet.”
The girl tugged her hat firmly down. “I’m her creator. I’m the engineer, mechanic, and tech for this arachnid.”
Victor rolled his eyes and vaguely gestured. “Kat, this is—”
“Zero,” she clipped.
After years of working in an anti-establishment brand, weird names didn’t faze me. The palpable tension between them via glares and furrowed brows did. Clearly, these two had history beyond the widow’s maintenance.
I feigned a smile. “Hi, Zero. I’m Kat.” The wife, I almost added. “Please do your best with the widow,” I said. “She’s a fan fave. I would’ve brought her a get-well bouquet, but she’d probably prefer bugs. Maybe she was hungry, and that’s why she—"
“She’s not a sentient being,” Zero said, slipping her screwdriver under black fur. “She’s not capable of feeling hungry.”
I blinked. “Right. I was just joking because I know when I get hangry, I leap onto unsuspecting people, thrash around, then roll down stairs, and curl up in a ball afterwards.”
Victor chuckled under his breath and hung his head.