by Gary Foshee
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THE REDMADAFA
his face into his eyes. A small butterfly floated by and landed on his nose. Straining to hang on with both hands, he blew upward
trying to dislodge the pesky creature from its perch. The butterfly opened beautiful y patterned wings blocking Rammer’s view—
Rammer looked like he was wearing fancy-looking rocks.
Mogi edged closer to the croaker. His tail whisked around
in the air almost blowing his cover. The croaker lifted its head and spotted his furry tail bobbing with excitement. It also noticed numerous other fuzzy tails blowing in the wind and returned
its head to the water’s surface. Mogi crawled a little further and looked up searching the cliff face. He spotted Rammer on the
ledge directly over the croaker. Rammer shook his head, silently giving the signal.
Adrenalin flushed through Mogi’s body. He sprang from his
hiding place spooking the croaker.
It jumped backwards and froze in place.
It slowly backed up and prepared to make its escape—just
what Rammer had been waiting for.
“Yee Haw!” shouted Rammer, releasing from the cliff ledge.
Rammer landed on the croaker’s slimy back and struggled to
find a grip. Almost falling off, he quickly wrapped his legs around its body and his arms tightly around its neck and hung on.
The croaker jumped trying to buck him off. It twisted to the
right and then to the left, bucking its back legs high into the air.
“You’ve got him Rammer. Hang on! Hang on!” shouted
Mogi, laughing hysterical y, running around trying to stay out of the croaker’s path.
Rammer’s head and tail jostled back and forth, whipping
him around like fuzzy tails in the wind. The croaker crashed
against trees and bushes. It jumped higher and higher, twisting in all directions. Final y, it spun back around and kicked, toppling 71
Dr. Gary Warren Foshee
Rammer over its head, landing him face first in the muddy bot-
tom of the pond.
Mogi waited in shock as bubbles, filled with laughter,
surfaced.
Rammer’s head peaked up through the giant water lilies with
bright red flowers in their middle.
“That was awesome!” he said, spitting out a mouth full of
water.
Mogi laughed and ran over to pull him out of the mud.
“You should have seen his face when you landed on his back. He
thought you were a Magondrea about to eat him.”
Rammer rolled over onto the bank laughing. “That was
great. You know we should build a large ring with holding pins
and saddle them. I bet people would come for miles to watch us
ride them.”
“Yeah, until my Dad found out, then I’d be dead,” responded
Mogi. They looked at each other and busted up laughing again.
“Come on, we’d better start heading home.”
“Hey, do you think your parents will let me spent the night
again?” asked Rammer.
“Sure, if it’s ok with yours.”
“They don’t care what I do. As long as I stay out of trouble, I
can do whatever I want.”
Rammer slanted his eyes at Mogi. “I’ll race you home.”
“Last one home has to ask patches out on a date,” said Mogi.
“Looks like you’ll have a hot date for the weekend, Mogi,”
wisecracked Rammer, as he pushed Mogi into the muddy water
getting a head start.
* * * * * * *
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THE REDMADAFA
Morning dawned over the mountains. Golden rays crept up the
dark dismal canyon shedding light on the wet, lonely-trodden
trail. Chesty rubbed his sleep-deprived eyes and yawned. He had
pressed through the night and continued to follow tracks down
the gorge and into a draw. He followed the draw for several more miles until a thick fog moved in on him. He held out his lantern again trying to find his way through the fog—he knew he was
close.
In the distance, he heard singing:
“No more hurting, no more sob,
pass through me gate and become like God.”
His heart sank.
He dropped the lantern to the ground—it shattered against a
rock, freeing the lightning bugs inside.
“No!” he shouted running through the fog.
“Caboose, don’t say it, don’t say it.” As he rounded the corner
the gate closed.
“No! No! No!”
He ran over to the door and hit it with his fists. Frantic, he
fell to his knees and looked to the sky, “Not my boy, not my boy!”
From atop the gate Lucky gazed with a strange look on his
face. He paced atop the gate observing Chesty from both sides.
“Wel , wel , wel , look who we have here—Pauper,” he said, his
lips making a sharp “popping” sound.
“I didn’t expect to see you here again.”
“Did he pass? Did he pass?”
“Now just hold your horses. Did who pass?”
“Don’t play games with me Lucky. I know your tricks and you
can spare me the riddles and rhymes.”
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Dr. Gary Warren Foshee
“Yes, I suppose I can. Wel , let me see...I guess you must be
looking for...Me boy.” Lucky laughed loudly.
“You better not lay a finger on him, or I’l , I’ll—”
“Now Pauper, what makes you think I would lay a finger—”
“I know who you real y are,” interrupted Chesty. “You are
nothing but—”
“And I know who you are Pauper,” Lucky spewed back.
He climbed down the gate and transformed into a serpent.
He coiled around Chesty and squeezed him tightly, bulging out
his eyes, protruding his tongue from his mouth.
“Yesssss, you know who I am. And don’t forget, I know who
you are Mr. Hypocrite. I ought to kill you right here, right now.”
“You have to let me pass,” gasped Chesty.
Lucky, puzzled, loosened his grip and moved his head back.
“What did you sssssay?”
“You have to let me pass. I have to save my boy,” he responded,
trying to regain his breath.
Lucky released his grip and dropped Chesty back to the
ground. “Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha. You can’t ssssave your boy, fool.”
You escaped me once. You will not escape me again. He won’t be
there for you this time, ‘Elder.’”
“Just let me pass, Lucky.”
Lucky transformed back and motioned his hands toward the
gate, “Be my guest. You know the key, go ahead and open the
door—Caboose just passed. Maybe you can catch him before,
Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha.” Lucky disappeared.
Chil s crawled up and down his spine hearing Lucky say
Caboose’s name. Chesty ran to the gate, bowed low and sang
the song:
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“I am happy, I am free,
I’m in charge of my destiny.
No more hurting, no more sob,
pass through me gate and become like God.”
A crack thundered down the canyon wal s as the door
opened. Chesty ran through the door down the path. He didn’t
see Caboose at the chest so he forded the stream and ran to the
Titan.
Boogies scattered from tree to tree watching him with excite-
ment. The bark rippled around the Titan
tree gossiping as Chesty emerged from the water, his body growing larger on the trail with his approach.
Inside he heard, “Twenty-two, twenty-three.”
“No Caboose! Stop! Stop!” he yelled, banging on the thick
outside trunk. He ran around the tree, grabbing knobs looking
for one his size.
“Twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine.”
He jiggled another one and slid to a stop. The knob formed
around his hand and opened. He slung the door open and bel-
lowed, “Stop!”
His eyes focused on the last coin falling through the air. It hit the side of the stone, rolled along its topside and then fell to the ground. Standing at the stone was a young human girl shaking
with tears in her eyes.
“You scared me,” said the girl.
Chesty didn’t know what to say. He looked around the room
and asked, “Where’s Caboose?”
“Who?”
“My boy, have you seen him?”
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Dr. Gary Warren Foshee
“No sir,” she answered, bending down to grab the last silver
coin lying in the dirt.
“Don’t touch that coin!” shouted Chesty. He ran over and
kicked it into the corner. “It’s a trick,” he said, gasping for air.
“Lucky is not who you think he is.”
She scurried over by the wall and searched in the dirt form-
ing small mounds on the floor. “No, you don’t understand,” she
said, her heart now beating rapidly, confused about what was
happening. “When I put this coin in the hole it will all be mine.
Lucky promised to make me beautiful and give me all the gold
and jewels in the chest.”
“It’s a lie,” grunted Chesty, disappointed she wasn’t Caboose.
The girl, suspicious of Chesty and his intentions shouted
back, “No, you are a liar! You just want it for yourself. I got here first; it’s mine!”
The girl found the coin, scooped it up in her hand and stared
at the stone.
“Please stop and listen to me for a second. You can’t deposit
that coin,” said Chesty. He lowered his body and walked sideways around the stone preparing for her charge.
Her eyes focused on the hole as she matched his footsteps.
Chesty knew she was going to go for it. She bent down, jerked
to the left, jumped right, and then dove for the stone. Chesty
jumped to block her but she slid under his bel y and stood up
over the stone. With her heart pounding, she reached out to
deposit the coin.
Distressed, Chesty froze with his eyes staring at the ground—
“Don’t move.” These tracks; do you see these tracks? These are the tracks of my boy. Chesty followed them around the room. “He
must have come in right before you.”
Although curiosity sent covert messages to her brain to
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listen to him—she thought to herself, he may be right—skepti-
cal y she stood with her hand over the hole hesitant to trust him.
Regardless, he had said enough to hold her attention.
Chesty walked over to a door the size of Caboose. “Look, he
entered through this door. He went over to the closet. He looked at some of the books and then he stood here and read the wal . He then walked and stood there.” Chesty’s finger pointed to tracks
right beside her left leg.
Chesty stood on the other side of the stone. “That is where
he must have deposited the coins. You see? It’s a trick. You can’t deposit that coin.”
“How do I know that your son didn’t get what he was prom-
ised from Lucky? He is probably enjoying something great
right now.”
“Because,” responded Chesty, “there are no tracks leading out
of here. There are tracks coming in and walking around. And,
there are tracks walking up to the stone, but that’s it. All tracks stop here; it’s a trick. As soon as you deposit that coin, a trap door will open sending you to a place of great sadness and death.”
“Why should I believe anything you say? How do you know
what will happen? You just want to deposit the coin and take the treasure all for yourself.”
“There is no treasure. It’s dross. Didn’t you read the sign? It’s not real.” He looked around and waved his hands into the air, “It is…this is…all of this…it’s not real.”
She moved her hand closer to the hole.
“I’ve already deposited 30 coins,” said Chesty, his secret now
revealed.
She looked at him with disbelief in her eyes. All of her hopes
and dreams where one coin away from becoming reality. Her
hand quivered slightly.
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Dr. Gary Warren Foshee
“I already deposited 30 coins,” said Chesty. “That’s how I
know what will happen. It was a long time ago, ok; this is not easy for me. But you have to believe me. I was here. I deposited the
coins. And when I did, wel ...bad things happened. Things I’ve
never told anyone.”
Chesty buried his face in his hands. “And now my boy is lost
and he may already be dead.”
She lowered her hand but stayed by the stone. “But Lucky
said I would be very pretty, like all the other girls.”
Chesty looked over at her and asked, “What’s your name?”
“Brook,” she responded.
“I’m Chesty, Chesty Puller. Brook, putting coins into a stone
in the middle of a hollow tree will not make you or anyone else
pretty. It will not bring you wealth, nor will it make your father come back.”
Brooks’ bel y turned upside down at the mention of her
father. Was this man a seer, she wondered? How could he know
such things? “But Lucky said—”
“Brook, Lucky is a liar. He lied to you, he lied to me, and now
he’s lied to my son. He is the father of lies.”
* * * * * * *
“Caboose is a goose and he smel s like a moose. Caboose is a goose and he smel s like moose.”
“No…No…Stop calling me names.”
“Caboose is a goose…”
“Stop calling me names;”
“Caboose is a goose and he smel s…”
“Stop calling me names!”
“Where am I? What’s going on?” Caboose was dreaming.
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THE REDMADAFA
When the last coin dropped in the hole, it opened a trap door
plunging him down into a cold, dark, muddy tunnel. He had
tumbled for miles sliding down the slimy tube, final y washing
out in a valley of bones. Exiting the tunnel, he hit his head on a rock knocking him unconscious.
Caboose was in the middle of nowhere. Dust covered
the cloudless horizon as dirt funnels chased each other across
the valley floor tossing brown teeth high into the sky—they
drifted back to the ground, bouncing several times before being
launched over and over again. Caboose watched as the last rays of hope were dragged into the catawampus peaks of Mount Viper.
Every day, the sun tried to pass Viper’s steep and jagged peaks to bring hope and rest to those deceived by Slithler; but each day
Slithler laid a trap, and just when it looked like the sun would triumph, he would wake Viper, his beastly fire-of-death, and
Viper would shake the earth, darken the sky, and swallow the sun whole. All that was left was the eerie sound of his ghostly laughter as Viper vomited the suns mangled remnants
back into the sky.
Dark crimson lava, the last remains of the sun, drooled down the sides of Viper’s mouth, over ridges and boulders, moving ever so slowly between a maze of crooked fingers—or at least that’s what those trapped in the valley thought.
Viper’s shadow of death rained destruction over the valley.
Under this shadow of darkness, Slithler’s evil servants dispersed from a labyrinth of caves, tunnels and secret passageways, burrowed deep within Viper. Others stretched for miles across the
open plateau, bringing havoc and death to all trapped in the
valley.
The mountains were a death trap. Deep caves and crevasses
in the canyon wal s were infested with crawlers. They lived in
bottomless caverns with quick access to the valley floor. They are 79
Dr. Gary Warren Foshee
crafty, eight-legged creatures with toxic fangs filled with venom.
Concealed by the shadows, they creep out of their dens and check traps of smel y grass, which are long webs of string that look like grass, but are covered in a sticky mucus that only crawlers can
make. Smel y grass lets off a tang aroma that’s intoxicating and al uring. When some curious unsuspecting creature comes to
savor the succulent blades-of-death, it entangles them making
escape virtual y impossible.
Fire-breathing ragooles (mutant dragons) traverse the skies
at full moon, raining death and destruction from above. They
cover vast domains in a single night and patrol the outermost
boundaries of the valley. Their eyes are toxic blood-shot green
that glow in the dark and they can detect the slightest movements from miles away. Their skin is coarse and dry. It clumps around
the sinews of their necks as they search the ravines and plains.
Their claws are saw-tooth black and curl at the ends, and their
breath is a liquid inferno flame-of-death that turns everything to ash and stubble.
Patrolling the valley canyons and dry creek beds are thunder
beasts, also called “grunters” because of the grunting sounds they make when fighting. Some thunder beasts are so large that when
they walk it sounds like thunder thus the name “Thunder Beast.”
Not all thunder beasts are bad. In fact, most are friendly, but not the Magondreas. Magondreas are fierce beasts that walk on their
two hind legs—they kill anything and everything in their path.
They are unruly giants with a great sense of smel .
Lurking among the shadows are howlers, the most cunning
killers of the valley. They move in packs twenty to thirty-strong, patrolling the flat lands and mountain ridges. They are soul-thirsty cannibals with six-inch carnivores, claws that can scale rocks and trees, and black red-tipped spikes for fur. They ambush 80