by Justin Sloan
“Tonight, Mia.”
“Fine!” Mia bit her lower lip and ran after Brutas and Ari. She couldn’t believe someone had said that about teddy bears, but for now she had to make sure Tiffany and Rick were safe.
By the time they reached the school, the sky was completely dark. In front of the school more jack-o-lanterns lined a little graveyard of cardboard crosses, and a scarecrow had been erected near the main entrance.
Mia looked at the fake graves and shuddered. "What do the kids see in this holiday?"
"Trust me," Ari said. "It grows on you."
Pop-music with witch laughter and screams grew louder as the group approached, and within they saw more monsters, fairies, and super-heroes running around.
"Are we sure about this?" Brutas asked nervously. "I mean... a ghost?"
Mia held her brothers paw and looked up into his gentle eyes. "Little brother, it's either us who confronts the ghost, or the children.”
Brutas’s doughy expression turned serious and he led the way toward the open doors.
"Wait," Ari said, pulling Brutas to the side window. "It's still a good idea to not be seen."
"Ah, right." Brutas nodded as if it had been his idea, and in through a window they went.
Within the school was more chaotic than Mia could have imagined. Large paper-spiders and bats hung from the ceiling, and the walls were lined with cut-outs of ghosts. She smelled popcorn and a sweet scent, maybe caramel. Children ran everywhere, laughing and playing, while a teacher here and there tried to get them to play games like bobbing for apples and whatnot. At the sight of a table with questionable looking food and signs that said "brains," "eyeballs," and "guts," Mia felt she was going to be sick.
Ari must have noticed, because he said, "It's just spaghetti, peeled grapes and... Maybe more spaghetti?"
"I hope you're right."
A scream sounded to their right. A real scream, not some Halloween soundtrack.
"Come on," Ari and Mia said simultaneously as the darted down the hallway, Brutas lumbering close behind.
They pulled to a stop at the edge of an auditorium, where several children had gathered, Rick among them.
"My sister's in there all alone," Rick was saying, his cowboy hat scrunched in his fist and his fake mustache hanging as half of it clung to his lip. "We have to go after her!"
A girl in a ballerina outfit looked visibly distressed, her hair sticking out in weird angles as if she'd been pulling it. "You've got to be kidding me. I saw a real-live ghost!"
A chubby boy dressed as an ice-cream cone nodded. "It was floating, no strings, I mean it. This place is haunted!"
"You can go in there alone," the girl said. "But if you do... good luck." She and the other children took off running in the other direction, leaving Rick to stare down the dark hallway opposite him.
"Darnit," he said to himself. "If she had any friends, she wouldn't be off by herself. And now this?!" He stared a moment longer, and then took off into the darkness. The teddy bears followed at his heels, doing their best to stick to the shadows.
Rick pulled to a stop suddenly and turned back. "Hello?"
Mia and the others dived out of the way, and lucky for them their soft fur made no noise on the slick floor.
Rick's eyes searched behind him, but he must not have thought to look down to the level of the teddy bears. "Stay away from me, ghosts!" he said with a shudder before continuing on and taking a right at the hallway ahead.
“That was close,” Mia said.
She was about to relax, when Rick ran back into their line of sight and to the left, followed by several other children. They were screaming and shouting for each other to hurry, and then, to the teddy bears’ horror, a ghost appeared. It floated six feet off the ground, its white, flowing form rippling in the air as if a wind were blowing around it. Two hollow eyes turned to take in the teddy bears, and then it came right for them!
“Run!” Brutas said, and he dove into a nearby classroom.
Mia and Ari followed. They all cut across the classroom and found a closet to duck into. Mia peeked out and saw the ghost hovering in the room. It turned, searching, and then left.
With a sigh, Mia turned back to her friends and shook her head. “We have to get to Tiffany.”
They agreed and, within moments, Mia found herself leading them down the hallway, tiptoeing in case the ghost was nearby.
Something clattered behind them and Mia felt Ari bump into her as he turned in fright, but it was just Brutas.
“Sorry,” Brutas said. Then, realizing he’d forgotten to whisper, he whispered, “Sorry again.”
“He’s your brother,” Ari said.
Mia glared at both of them. She turned to move forward, but stopped when she saw the room where Tiffany stood on a desk, holding a mop like a weapon with the mop bucket on her head like a helmet. Mia would have laughed, if she wasn’t so frightened. A noise echoed off the walls, like a distant, shrill scrape of fingernails on a chalkboard. Mia searched and then froze in terror as she spotted the ghost moving toward Tiffany.
"We have to stop the ghost," Ari said.
He held out his paws and light streamed toward him, gathering around his fists like blue flames. With a heavy feeling in her gut, Mia did the same. There were so many kids around here, she couldn't understand how no one would see teddy bears fighting with light emanating from their paws. But it was be discovered and save Tiffany or an unthinkable alternative.
"You guys get Tiffany," Brutas said. "I'll handle the ghost."
"What?" Mia turned to her brother in surprise. He rarely spoke, and when he did it was never something so strategic.
"Go," he said in his deep voice.
Ari nodded and they were off. As Mia rounded the corner, she turned to see Brutas leaping through the air, light streaming from his paws like an explosion, and what sounded like a yelp from the direction of the ghost.
"Tiffany!" Mia shouted. "Get down!"
Tiffany turned to them, wide eyed, and lowered her mop-weapon. "I knew it! I knew it wasn't a dream, that you were real, that—"
"Yes, yes," Ari said. "And right now we have to save you."
The excitement to see the bears melted to terror. "From what?"
Just then the doors came crashing open from the back of the room and Brutas rolled in with the ghost, the two grappling. The light from Brutas's paws didn't seem to be doing anything! With a crash they tumbled through a pile of books and a set of scales, and then even worse--they knocked over a box of glass beakers that shattered across the floor. The other kids were bound to hear this.
"Stop, stop!" Tiffany was shouting.
Mia prepared to jump into the chaos and help her brother, when Tiffany was in her way and pulling Brutas and the ghost apart.
Wait a minute, ghosts weren't supposed to be able to be pulled, right? Mia ran forward to see what was going on, and to her surprise watched as what she thought was the ghost turned out to be their friend Harpner, the flying monster, wearing a sheet. As the sheet came off, they saw his familiar wings and goblin looking face. He must have been flapping under the sheet to stay afloat, making it look like wind was flowing through the sheet.
"It was you?" Ari asked. "What were you thinking?!"
"He just wanted to play with me," Tiffany said in defense, turning to look at the teddy bears. "Which is more than I can say for the rest of you."
"Excuse me?" Ari replied. "We always play with you, we—"
"No, not really," she said. "You always pretend to be toys that can't talk and walk and stuff. Me and Harpner, we were playing ghosts, then I was the knight and he was storming the castle, and then—"
"Okay, okay," Mia said, hands up. "So you weren't in any danger? We risked everything... for nothing?"
Tiffany blushed. "I appreciate the effort."
"Great," Mia replied.
"And hey, now we all know the secret’s not a secret, and Harpner's here, so we can all play together!"
The bears shared a look, then turn
ed to Harpner. Tiffany looked about to protest when shouts came from the hallway.
"Quick!" Tiffany said as she motioned to the teddy bears and Harpner to hide.
"What'll you do?" Ari asked.
Reaching for the mop and the sheet Harpner had been wearing, she nodded for them to get to a hiding spot.
The chatter of students came down the hallway and a moment later a group of them burst through the doors. They stopped in amazement. Mia couldn't quite see what they were staring at from her position under the desk, so she inched closer, then nearly squealed. There was another ghost!
But then she heard a laugh, and one of the kids turned on the lights. Sure enough, the laugh had come from Tiffany. She was holding the mop by the stick, the top part covered with the sheet so that it looked like a ghost.
"It was your sister the whole time!" one of the kids said, then slapped the shoulder of a kid next to him, who Mia had to reposition to see was Rick.
"No way," Rick said, a slow smile spreading across his face.
"Your sister's awesome."
Rick gave Tiffany a high five as she laughed, and then the two older kids walked off, leaving Tiffany with a girl and a boy her own age. The girl had braided pig-tails, the boy with long, blonde surfer hair.
"Hey," the girl said. She held her left arm nervously and glanced around. "You got us pretty good."
"Yeah?" Tiffany asked. "I was just having some fun."
The boy smiled wide. "It was amazing."
The girl looked to the boy and shrugged, and he nodded.
"Want to come play with us?" she asked.
Tiffany glanced around, likely looking for the bears and Harpner. Mia heard a quiet "go," from Ari to her left, and for a moment thought that maybe the kids had heard it too, but only Tiffany reacted.
"Sure," Tiffany said, beaming. "Why not?"
The boy and the girl skipped off, Tiffany following close behind, but she paused at the doorway and looked back.
"I know you’re real and alive, so no hiding it from me anymore, got it?" Tiffany waited. And waited. "If you don't say you got it, I'm staying right here and refusing to make any friends."
"Got it!" all three bears hissed at once.
With a smug smile, Tiffany let the doors close behind her on her way out to join her new friends.
After a moment, Mia came out of her hiding spot to find the others.
"So you'll be joining us?" she asked Harpner.
"At least on Halloweens," he said. "Gosh, it's good to see you all."
"Could have been on better circumstances," Ari replied.
They shared a moment, thinking about how absurd the night had been, and then all started laughing.
"Halloween's awesome," Brutas said, and Mia had to agree.
TEDDY BEARS AND THE CHRISTMAS PIRATES
Book 3 of the Teddy Defenders Trilogy
Justin Sloan
www.JustinSloanAuthor.com
To my amazing wife and children, who I hope love crazy action stories as much as I do.
Teddy Bears and the Christmas Pirates
Book 3 of the Teddy Defenders trilogy
by Justin Sloan
Copyright © 2015 Justin Sloan.
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. No bears or monsters were harmed in the making of this novel. Please consider leaving a review, and tell your friends about Teddy Bears and the Christmas Pirates.
Thank you for supporting my work.
Chapter 1: Christmas Eve
The scent of cinnamon and cloves lingered as Ari opened his eyes. He turned, hoping to see Tiffany nearby, but instead he found himself, once again, on the chair in the corner. He craned his neck to peek at the bed. Mia and Brutas were lying in bed with Tiffany, as they deserved. But he still wanted to belong to a child, not be the old teddy bear tossed aside.
He sighed and leaped from the chair, heading for the door with his head hanging low.
“Where you going?” Mia asked as she jumped down beside him.
“Just taking a walk.”
“For a bear on Christmas Eve, you sure don’t seem jolly.”
He didn’t know how to tell her. It wasn’t like his feelings were even warranted, after all. He knew Tiffany’s older brother still loved him, even if he had let Tiffany have Ari. After a certain age, kids needed to grow out of having teddy bears. He got that. And now Tiffany had two other bears as well, Mia and Brutas. Brother and sister. Why would she care if each one got equal attention?
“You’re worried about the presents,” Mia said with a tilt of her head. “That’s it, right?”
He opened his mouth to speak, but she kept going
“I get it,” she said. “I was worried last year, but nothing happened, right? And think about it—Tiffany’s mom knows we’re all her little girl needs, right? So why buy more bears?”
“Actually, that wasn’t on my mind at all.”
“Oh?”
“Hey, bears….” a deep voice called from behind. They’d forgotten about Brutas. He looked down from the bed and cleared his throat. “Come on.”
“Big guy,” Ari said as he pulled over a doll for Brutas to land on. “You gotta stop worrying about heights. You’re a teddy bear… made of fluff.”
“Yeah, I know.” He jumped down and bounced off the doll to land beside Mia. “But ever since jumping out of the Monsterlands, I don’t know…. It just gives me the willies.”
“But we landed safe.” Mia shook her head, flustered at her brother. “Here, with Tiffany.”
“I know, I know.” He looked sheepish, but then perked up. “Are we gonna eat the leftover cookies and milk?”
Ari smiled, remembering that bonus tidbit. The teddy defenders—teddy bears throughout children’s houses everywhere—would always eat the leftover cookies and drink the milk that Santa couldn’t finish. Naturally, if he ate them all, he’d be way too fat to fit down chimneys.
“I claim the peanut butter ones,” Mia said, and they rushed into the living room.
The cookies were every bit as delicious as Ari had remembered from the previous year. As they finished the last crumb, Ari leaned back against a stack of presents and sighed, his sorrow forgotten. He glanced at Mia, considering telling her why he’d felt down, but saw she was looking past him with horror.
“What?” Ari asked.
“I knew it….”
Ari frowned and followed her line of sight to where the stockings hung from the mantle. Sure enough, one of them was moving.
“Maybe it’s a mouse?” Brutas suggested.
“I’m not a mouse!” a high-pitched voice said from the stocking. “I’m here to defend the children!”
Mia held her forehead with her paw. “I knew it, I knew it!”
“You were just saying it wouldn’t happen,” Ari said. “You said their mom—”
“It doesn’t matter what I said!” Mia turned on him, paws out for effect. “We’re getting replaced!”
“Are you serious?” Ari stood, motioning for the stocking. “You think whatever bear’s in there will replace you two? Tiffany loves you above anything, above all other bears!”
Mia looked at him, stroking the pink fur of her right arm as she glanced about. She took a step closer and lowered her voice.
“Tiffany loves you, too,” she said.
He’d said too much.
“Hey, uh, bears?” the voice said from the stocking, just as a cute, sky-blue teddy bear head popped up from the top. “Mind helping me down from here?”
“Yeah, of course,” Ari said, happy to get away from Mia’s pitying gaze.
He had just taken a step from the presents when an explosion of green light sent him flying backwards. He landed against the tree with a thwonk.
Ari blinked, trying to clear the blur from his eyes. His head was spinning, and as his vision cleared he saw large shapes moving from the chimney, scaling the fireplace to the top of the mantle. He couldn’t quite make them out, but he thought he sa
w a glimmer of a hook on one, a large captain’s hat on another, and heard the clunking of a wooden leg from another.
Pirates.
Then he heard shouting from the little sky-blue bear.
“Help! Help me!”
Ari leaped up, then froze for moment at the scene before him. Mia and Brutas were struggling to fight off two of the pirates, but Ari could tell by the flying fur they weren’t just pirates….
They were pirate bears!
The pirates grabbed the bear, tied him up, and carried him off between two of them. They leapt to the floor and leered at Ari before turning back to the fireplace and, with a puff of green smoke, they vanished.
Another pirate ran past and escaped in the same way, but Ari turned just in time to stick out his leg and trip the last of them.
Mia pounced on the downed pirate, and a moment later Brutas was sitting on him. The others were gone, but at least they had this one.
“What just happened?” Brutas asked.
“That’s for him to tell us,” Ari said.
Striding forward, Ari pulled the pirate bear up by his black vest to a seated position. The bear was a grizzly, almost twice as tall as Ari, and wore a red and blue bandana around its head, a gold earring, and a sword strapped to his side. Ari kicked the sword aside so Mia could grab it.
“Where’d you take him?” Ari asked. “The new bear?”
The grizzly smiled, then laughed. “As if you’d care.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re free now!” the grizzly said. “We did you a favor. I heard this pink bear whining about being replaced. Well, guess what? The grizzly pirates just took care of that for you. You’re welcome.”
“He has a point,” Brutas said.
“What?” Ari turned to Brutas to see if he was joking. It didn’t appear so. “No. No bear, child, or anyone should be taken against their will!”
Brutas looked to Mia for confirmation, and she just shook her head at him. He shrugged, sheepish.
“Sorry.”
Ari turned back to the grizzly pirate. “Tell us more.”