Chapter 66: Escape from Deadly Town!
"Run! Scream! Die screaming, you parasitic bastards!"
On the barbecue lawn, a group of wealthy body-snatchers were still arguing heatedly over ownership rights to Brian's body when everyone suddenly heard a sharp, distorted female voice that sounded barely human.
Everyone turned toward the source of the sound and found Lois—who should have been sedated and prepped for surgery by the Armitages—walking out of the house wielding two decorative machetes, an unnaturally wide smile stretched across her blood-spattered face.
"What the hell is going on?" one man muttered, confused. "Is this some kind of roleplay thing after the procedure? Like a celebration?"
The crowd looked bewildered. Some wondered if this was part of Dean's post-surgery entertainment—perhaps the new host getting to act out fantasies.
However, people who'd undergone the body-snatching surgery in the past had never shown such dramatic personality changes immediately after. The transition was supposed to be seamless. Could the technology have improved that much?
Just as everyone stood there wondering, Brian—who was tied upside down to a metal pole like a hunting trophy—roared desperately, "Lois! Help me! These sick freaks want to eat me!"
Brian still didn't understand the true purpose of these cultists. He genuinely thought they were perverted gourmands who wanted to find out what intelligent dog meat tasted like.
But Lois was in no mood whatsoever to concern herself with this freeloading mutt's confused theories. She looked at the still-bewildered crowd, that disturbing clown-like smile stretching even wider across her lips, and charged directly toward them with both machetes raised.
Near the edge of the gathering, three elderly women—wealthy widows from Connecticut—had been quietly discussing which client had preemptively claimed Lois's body, so much so that Dean hadn't even bothered with the usual auction process.
Originally, these three had assumed their main competitors were standing right beside them. They hadn't expected the truth to be so much worse.
Just as the three women turned to continue their speculation, Lois's machete slashed diagonally downward in a brutal arc, directly sending two of the elderly women flying backward like rag dolls.
The decorative machetes weren't even properly sharpened, but fortunately, Lois's strength at this moment was absolutely inhuman, and she was dealing with three frail, elderly women.
The mere kinetic force of her downward swing was more than their brittle bones could withstand. She sent two people flying with one slash, then—without even breaking stride—casually lifted the machete in her left hand in a rising uppercut motion and launched the third woman into the air.
In the span of three seconds, the three individuals who'd coveted Lois's body were trampled and discarded like roadside trash.
The other cultists watched Lois brutally dispatch three people in an instant, and only then did they truly believe this wasn't a joke or some special theatrical event planned by the Armitages.
This was their operation going catastrophically wrong. The Armitages had completely fucked up.
"Jesus Christ—run! Get the hell out of here! That woman's not normal!" one man screamed.
Seeing that things had gone completely sideways, the elderly clients immediately abandoned Brian and hobbled away with their canes and walkers as fast as their deteriorating bodies could manage, not looking back even once.
Lois didn't bother chasing them down. These decrepit old folks, who struggled to move faster than three miles per hour, wouldn't be able to leave this town even if they ran for six hours straight.
Besides, compared to these elderly clients who hadn't yet stolen their new bodies, those who'd already undergone the procedure and now possessed youthful, athletic physiques—those were Lois's primary targets.
Lois charged toward the cluster of younger cultists—the hosts who'd already had their minds replaced—swinging her weapons in wide, brutal arcs. She casually harvested anyone foolish enough to stand in her way while excitedly shouting in a voice that didn't quite sound like her own, "Inferior beings! Worthless meat-puppets! All of you will die under my blades!"
In the Griffin family's temporary residence next door, Chris—who'd been awakened by Stewie shaking him urgently—looked at the scene of absolute carnage unfolding outside in complete bewilderment.
He felt like his mom had somehow wandered onto the wrong movie set. Were those really the words an American suburban housewife would shout while committing mass murder?
"What the hell did you do?" Chris demanded, looking down at Stewie accusingly. "Why did Mom turn into... that?"
Chris, realizing that events had spiraled far beyond his expectations, stared directly at his little brother. He was now absolutely convinced that Lois's transformation was definitely Stewie's doing.
After all, Stewie's expression when he'd left the barbecue earlier hadn't looked like someone planning to do nothing.
And especially now, with his excited, almost envious expression—he looked like he wanted to replace Lois entirely, to become the one wielding machetes and mowing down cultists like wheat.
However, upon hearing Chris's accusatory question, Stewie turned back with genuine confusion on his face. "What? Isn't this your plan? To let that psychic bitch awaken Lois's dark side, and then turn this vacation into a hunting competition for the Griffin family? Death games and all that?"
Looking at Stewie's apparently sincere expression of confusion, Chris was equally bewildered.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Chris said incredulously. "Do I have the ability to orchestrate something like this? You don't actually think my death-accident powers let me manipulate causality on this scale, do you?"
Seeing that Chris was genuinely just as confused as he was, Stewie immediately realized there'd been a massive misunderstanding between them.
"Shit!" Stewie exclaimed. "When I heard you talking earlier about Mom's dark side, I thought you had some way to make her go a bit crazier as entertainment! So this situation isn't something you caused?"
"Of course not!" Chris explained defensively. "I just knew Mom had violent tendencies buried deep and wanted to see if that psychiatrist's hypnosis could help Mom release some pressure—you know, like a psychological steam valve—to prevent her from eventually going postal all on her own."
Chris explained his previous reasoning, then looked at Lois, who was going absolutely berserk outside, and said with exasperation, "But clearly this situation has exceeded my fucking expectations by a considerable margin."
"Well, now it seems like they're the ones running for their lives," Stewie observed with dark amusement. "By the way, aren't you going to join in? I seem to remember on the drive here, there were at least several hundred houses in this town. Plenty of targets."
Stewie heard Chris's unspoken question, then peered outside at Lois—now covered head-to-toe in blood, her machetes broken, hunting people bare-handed by literally ripping them apart—and he visibly shuddered.
"You know what? Forget it," Stewie said nervously. "Let's leave those poor bastards to Lois. That crazy woman clearly hasn't gotten it out of her system yet, and I'd rather not become collateral damage."
"Hahahaha! Don't run! Don't you want my body anymore?! Come back here, you cowards!" Lois laughed maniacally, having finished clearing everyone from the immediate lawn area. She'd flipped onto a golf cart someone had abandoned and was now chasing the fleeing cultists down the residential streets.
Chris, witnessing this scene, thought for a moment and said to Stewie, "Do you have connections to suppress this incident? I'm seeing that some of these people have serious money and status. This could blow up into a major investigation."
Stewie raised his eyebrows and looked sideways at Chris. "Wouldn't it be easier to just let the authorities lock this crazy woman up for two months in a psych ward to calm down? The way she is now, I'm legitimately afraid she'll finish her killing spree and decide to come after us next for being witnesses."
Chris understood that Stewie's words meant he definitely had the ability and connections to suppress the matter, but simply didn't want to bother with the paperwork and complications.
After all, not to mention that Lois was still technically within the realm of human capabilities—even if she somehow transformed into a fucking Tyrannosaurus Rex, she couldn't actually do anything to harm Chris and Stewie with their respective abilities.
Regarding Stewie's suggestion, Chris simply said flatly, "If you want to eat the food Peter makes for the next two months while Mom's institutionalized, I don't care either way."
At those words, Stewie's face fell with genuine horror. "...Point taken. I will personally contact the CIA director about the situation here. He owes me several favors. He'll handle the cleanup and cover story."
"Okay, you handle it then," Chris nodded, not intending to ask for further details about Stewie's apparent CIA connections.
He was currently dealing with a different headache: figuring out how to get Lois to calm down and return to her normal personality.
However, Chris had absolutely no ideas about how to accomplish this, so he could only take things one step at a time and hope she'd eventually exhaust herself.
Just as Chris was about to head downstairs to rescue Brian from his humiliating position, he suddenly heard movement and muffled shouting from the Armitage house next door—and it sounded distinctly like Peter's voice.
Chris wasn't at all surprised that Peter was still alive. The man had cartoon-level durability and survival instincts.
What Chris was more curious about was how Lois had apparently left someone alive in that house. Hadn't she killed the Armitages?
What the hell was going on over there?
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