“What could possibly be the good news if we haven’t anything to eat?” came a soft, motherly voice from the crowd.

“There is no good news.” Rude looked around, confused. “I thought that was just a saying. Ya know, when ya have bad news, you just say ‘I’ve got good news and bad news.’”

“Typically, you use it when you have both a piece of good news and bad news,” Mr. Cuddles explained.

“No, it’s like, just a phrase you say. Like, if I were to say ‘I’m heading down,’ I don’t mean I’m literally moving downwards. It’s just a way of saying you’re going somewhere.” Rude Cancutter was confident in that.

“What the fuck are you talking about?!” shouted the motherly voice.

“No one has ever done that!” shouted another voice from the crowd. “Down is a direction with a stated value. You can’t just use it to mean moving in any form!”

“Listen, people, let’s not turn this into another dog eating a baby nightmare like the one from a few years ago!” Mr. Cuddles tried to be the voice of reason. He didn’t want to see another rift wedged into the already strained community. The last time that happened, they had lost the trust of the hero, Tommy Tony. It lead to the infamous landscaping incident and the horrible massacre Tommy’s llama companion committed afterwards. Especially what he had done to those freckled children.

“None of it really matters if we’re gonna starve to death! We’ll need some form of a miracle if we plan on surviving the winter. Above all else, I am not in the mood to trick all the elderly out of the city again. The last time we did that, it took forever for them to get the hint and move on. Literally and figuratively. It was really awkward.” Rude Cancutter threw his hands into his jacket pockets.

Before anyone could offer up a resolution, Ronny burst loudly into the room. Ronny was someone who probably slipped on his way out of the womb and never quite got his footing afterwards. He tripped over someone’s feet and began to stumble.

Instead of reaching out for something, he held his arms to his chest, then crashed to the ground like a plank of wood. No one made any attempt to help him up or see if he was okay. They had grown so tired of his constant accidents that many wished one of them would just kill him already.

“I uhhh. Uhn. I. There’s…” Ronny pulled himself back to his feet and was cupping his nose. Blood began pouring out like someone trying to attach a garden hose while the water was already running.

“Jesus, Ronny, again? Stop trying to talk through your bloody nose!” Rude Cancutter was one of the people who wished the man would just die.

“I’ve heard you have to tilt your head back,” came a voice from the crowd.

“You can’t do that!” another voiced countered. “Then you’re just swallowing blood. That can’t be good for you,”

Another voice proposed, “You’ve gotta put ice on it so the swelling goes down!”

“You don’t bleed ‘cause you’re swelling, you idiot!" shouted a faint, female voice. "What you need to do is drink some apple cider vinegar, then use some lavender oil!”

“Why is it that every time something is wrong with someone, you instantly go to apple cider vinegar?” Mr. Cuddles asked the woman.

“I just so happen to believe in holistic and homeopathic healing,” the faint female voice answered. “If he didn’t have so many toxins in his body to begin with, he might have stopped bleeding by now.”

Rude casually strolled through the crowd, which parted like a bad haircut. He made his way to the faint-voiced woman and grabbed her forcefully by the shoulders. He shook her. He shook her long and hard. She was so shaken that she succumbed to motion sickness.

“No! That is not okay! Bad! Bad person! Out! Outside!” Rude Cancutter spoke to the woman like she was a dog with something naughty in its mouth. She looked to the crowd for assistance, but was answered with fingers pointing towards the city gates.

 She began to cry. “You… you can’t do this! I’ll starve or get murdered out there!”

A bottle of apple cider vinegar sailed through the air and struck her in the head.

“Just use a bottle of that and you’ll be fine, lady!” a malicious voice called out.

“Yeah, and there aren’t any toxins out there!” came another cry. “It’s all natural, so you should be safe!”

Tears in her eyes, the woman grabbed up the apple cider and began her march towards the city gates. Not a single soul would make eye contact and not a single word was spoken as she dragged her feet to the open gate. Her steps beyond the gate were filled to the brim with fear and her breaths came ragged as the gate slammed shut. She was not missed.