Dirk and the Bubbas

Dirk looks up at the clear autumn sky as he's dragged through the leaves, thankful that they're dry and even more thankful to be facing upward. The Bubba brothers had spotted him across the street from the gas station buying a pop science magazine and with but a glance between them decided it was Dirk's turn, and so now they each hold onto an ankle as they saunter along bantering about nothing in particular.

Totaling about 580 pounds of mostly meat between them, they had grown up in various foster homes till they were found useful at Esco's service/junk lot on the edge of town.  From a shortened form of their last name that no one seemed or cared to know they were used to being called the Bubba Twins. Those old enough to remember Hee Haw might picture Junior Samples with a buzcut and in stereo.  All they had was each other, no one else mattered, except when they needed amusement.

For his part, Dirk was a senior in high school, the very same one his captors had left behind as soon as they turned legal, as far as the state was concerned, and thanks to robust builds landed jobs throwing truck parts and old girders around. No one knew where they lived per se, they just showed up every day.  But Dirk's ACT scores and advanced pursuits had gotten attention from MIT among others.  Somehow it didn't take him long to realize that this ordeal would be over soon enough, and then life would go on.

When they finally get to some old shack in a small clearing hey sit Dirk in a chair among not a small stash of just about everything one can scrounge in a backwoods county.  Bubba Alpha, we'll call him, instructed Bubba Beta, git that thar rope while ahh proceed to arrange for tha enter-tainment.  Bubba the lesser then kneels next to Dirk and starts to tie him to the chair, but Dirk doesn't resist.

Daddy Bubba eventually rigs up some kind of car battery to an old portable CD player and turns to Dirk and grins as the bass line to Madonna's Like a Virgin starts up.

Hey boy, think you gonna git laid 'fore you turn therty-fahve, he starts in with a tobacco-stained grin as his counterpart starts to chuckle.  Well that thar purdy sawwng is on ree-peat so u gots lots a tahme ta thank about thar ahh reckon, yeap. So the Bubba-squared proceeds to head out the door, each with a rickety pellet gun, and secure it with a padlock.

The thing is, Dirk had lots a tahme while being tied up to spot what he needed sitting in plain view around the shed.  That, and, it seems his congenial hosts had neglected to check his pockets for, let's say, a swiss army knife.

It was getting toward dusk when the twins had enough of pinging small furry animals and headed back to see how their prize had fared, although, the expected Material Girl Marathon was not to be heard.  Well, this situation calls for words.

Y'all don't reckon tha bat-try done run out?

The other one just stares at the door with a quizzical look.

Bubba Prime digs out his key and undoes the lock, looks at his brother in the eerie silence, and gently pulls the door handle.

Dirk is along a secluded lane just over a mile away when the explosion startles birds in the brush overhead.

The local sheriff rules it accidental, and then life goes on.