“What is he tweeting? What is he tweeting?” the hat asked the jizzal void of the tunnel system under Washington, DC.

The hair grumbled noncommittally over the whine of the electric scooter he was driving. The lights were out in the current section of Kennedy fuck tunnels they were investigating and he was barely creeping along.

“Why isn’t there a signal?” the hat wailed.

“Maybe you should have stayed behind,” the hair offered.

“Donald insisted I come with you,” the hat said morosely.

“Well, you’ve certainly been a huge help,” the hat said.

“Yuge help. Yuge,” the hat said absently. “Is there a USB port on this scooter thing? My battery is dying.”

“I don’t see one,” the hair said, not taking a look.

“Did you take a look for one?”

“Of course I did.”

The hat snorted in disgust.

“I’m sure Donald is fine. Some tweets about Mueller. No collusion, blah blah blah,” the hair said.

“I’m worried that he might be trolling on the McDonald’s feed again,” the hat said. “Remember that flame war he got in over the McLean?”

“He’s probably just obsessively checking the McRib Locator site.”

A low guttural moan echoed through the tunnel and the hair let the scooter glide to a halt.

“What was that?” the hat asked.

“How should I know?” the hair asked. “Fucking creepy as fuck though.”

“I did it come from ahead of us or behind?” The hat turned on the flashlight on his cellphone. The light barely penetrated a few feet in front of them before being swallowed by the dark. The hat turned it off with a snort of disgust.

“Shh,” the hair shushed.

“What? What is it?” the hat asked.

“Be quiet. I think I hear something.”

They both strained to listen. Water dripping. Far-off churning of machinery. The stale exhale of one of the grimy air vents set into the ceiling. The hair was about to speak when he heard the soft shuffle of feet.

“Did you hear that?” the hat asked.

“Yes, of course, I heard that,” the hair replied in an urgent whisper.

“Ruh-roh, Raggy,” the hat whispered. The hair reached back with a tendril and slapped at him.

“I’m going to keep going,” the hair whispered back and started the scooter forward.

“Wanafud?” a voice behind them asked and they both yelped in terror.

“Go!” the hat said. “Go go go go go go go go go go go!”

The hair twisted the throttle as far as it would go and the scooter sped up a little.

“Wanafud?” asked the voice again.

“It’s coming, it’s coming,” the hat screamed. “Open her up.”

“That’s what she…” the hat began before scooter ran into a low wall that had been built across the tunnel.

The hat and the hair shot over the barrier and landed, tumbling, on the other side.

“Are you alright?” the hair asked when they stopped.

“Ugh,” the hat replied.

“Wanafud?” they heard again, close enough for them to tell it was back behind them, beyond the scooter.

“It will be here any minute!” the hair squealed.

“Wanafud?” asked a voice ahead of them and they both groaned.

“We’re surrounded!” the hair exclaimed.

As the shuffling steps grew louder, the hat checked his phone again for a signal. The screen came on briefly through a thick webbing of cracks. “No signal, of course.”

“Donald will come looking for us when we don’t come back,” the hair said.

The hat’s laughter was high and piercing in the tunnel. After he stopped, from before them and behind them, “Wanafud?” was said in near unison.

“Whatever happens, I just want to say,” the hat said calmly to the hair. “Fuck Donald, fuck Gerald Ford’s Probably Non-Existent Gold and, and most of all, fuck you.”

 

Check back next week for Part Three: The Hat and The Hair vs. The S.T.U.D.s