Who: Yondu When: Halloween, during Halloween plot Where: Yondu’s house What: His car decides to be undead Rating/Warning: Low. For once. Status: Closed.
Yondu had been enjoying Halloween for the first time...ever, possibly. At least, since he was a kid, anyway. Folks had noticed real quick the setup of dressed up skeletons around a fake campfire and the bright blue skinned alien with the giant red fin on his head chilling out right along with them. Yondu knew better than to have a real fire in the tinderbox known as California, but the fabric fan blown flames did look somewhat real. He had alternated between immediately greeting some visitors and staying stone still, only to startle them with a “BOO!” before cackling and nearly falling out of his lawn chair at their reactions.
Most had remarked as to how realistic his ‘costume’ was and some had asked how he managed to cover himself in so much blue paint that didn’t seem to rub off. “I just know somebody that knows somebody that has that Hollywood makeup stuff.” he’d lie while preening. Once in a while, especially if there were tweens in the group, he’d activate his Yaka arrow and marvel them with tricks, leaving them nearly forgetting to ask for any candy.
He’d made sure not to drink too much during the evening, slowly consuming the beer bottles that worked as both decoration and actual refreshment. He could get a little belligerent when drunk, and didn’t want to end up making a scene that ended up with the cops being called.
At the moment, he was in the middle of a sip when out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw movement. Not that there was any lack of it: with all the kids and their parents/older siblings walking up and down the sidewalks. Rather, he could swear he’d just seen his car move. He stared at it a minute, slowly tearing away his gaze and shaking his head. Maybe he did need to slow down on the booze.
But then there was a “mommy look!” and a kid pointing and Yondu saw that indeed his big, red, pickup truck was started to roll slowly forwards all on its own, despite the parking brake he knew he’d engaged. And the fact the street was level. It was also making a low, weird sound that was in between an engine growl and metal grinding.
“The hell?” he shot up from his chair, alarmed. He ran past a mother and her son who was in a Hulk costume who had just been heading down his pathway. Fumbling for his keys, he ran around to the driver’s side, trying to unlock it as it slowly crawled along the road. Yondu cussed as he fumbled to get the key into the door, then succeeding he swung it open, jumping into the seat.
The brake had disengaged somehow. He slammed a foot down on the brake and re-engaged it, the car stopped. Yondu sighed in relief and decided he’d have to get it looked at in the morning.
He started to get out of the car when he felt a slight jolt and - with a terrible squeal - pushed on, despite the brakes. “The hell is wrong with you, girl?!” He yelled at his car, door still open. He tried turning it on, tried the brakes again, but the car wouldn’t even start. Looking through the windshield he saw less than thirty feet away various groups of kids trying to cross the street. Panic started to grip him. “You stop this nonsense right now, Willehemena!” he hissed. “There’re kids in the damn street!”
The car only rumbled on, occasionally groaning in a melancholy, mechanical way.
Yondu tried turning the steering wheel, but the truck only inched over a little before fighting him and returning to its original course. He jumped out of the vehicle and ran ahead of it. “Don’t make me do this.” he growled. He looked from his car to the kids and bellowed at them “WATCH OUT. THIS CAR AIN’T GOT NOT BRAKES! GET OUTTA THE WAY!” There were a few startled yells but everyone seemed to hear him and stayed out of the street. It was hard to ignore a big blue guy with a gravelly Southern accent, it turned out.
Yondu followed Willehemena as she ambled along, worried about what would happen when the pickup truck would reach the intersection. He was starting to wonder if this had anything to do with the other shenanigans that people on the Network had been talking about - coffee makers going awry, elevators stopped and making sounds and the like. Guess vehicles weren’t exempt.
He could see out of the corner of his eye that now there were curious people with cell phones recording the weirdly sentient car and its blue master slowly making its way through the neighborhood. Great. Like he needed to show up on the news again.
“Looks like I got two choices.” he mumbled to himself. “Let you keep rollin’ and see what you do when you get to the corner, or blow your tires out an’ hope you stop.” He really didn’t relish the idea of busting his own tires, that was a lot of money to have to replace them. Willehemena for her part, groaned to a stop as if contemplating. Yondu held his breath. The steering wheel turned slowly as if there were a ghost driver, and the car started making the world's slowest U-turn. Yondu rolled his eyes, despite being grateful his truck was turning back for home - at least he hoped that's what this was.
More and more folks were pausing to take video and photos. The hours of slowly imbibing booze was starting to kick in, as Yondu felt his hackles raise in irritation the longer this dragged on. Walking for several minutes at funeral procession pace, he finally lost it when some stupid teenager decided to take a selfie with Yondu and his truck in frame. “All right show's over!” He barked. “Ain't nobody seen a grown ass man walk his zombie car before?” He watched with satisfaction as people recoiled and went about their business. When Willehemena finally pulled up to where she'd been parked before he waited to see if she'd stop.
She didn't.
Yondu groaned. “Dammit. Just like a woman. Doin’ her own thing outta spite.” He let out a curt whistle, trilled a few notes and suddenly POP! POP! POP! POP! the tires were blown out. Arrow caught mid flight by hand he pocketed it, watching the tires deflating quickly. The truck ground to a halt and sat still.
Yondu stared, not moving an inch for a long moment. Then, like a stalking cat eyeing prey, he cautiously walked around his car. He poked the hood with a finger. A headlight. Opened and slammed a door shut. Kicked the rear bumper.
“Oh thank the damn stars,” he breathed, every muscle finally relaxing. “I need another beer after this nonsense.” And he went back to his skeleton crew and flopped down into his chair, cracking open a fresh bottle. He tilted the bottle in the direction of one of the skeletons, the one named Boney Raitt. “You said it, sister. Never fails. Every damn Halloween.”