THE BEAST WOKE ALONE in the room with three chairs. He sat up and took a moment to get his bearings. His head hurt and what looked like a wooden rocking chair lay in pieces all around him.
She hit me with a chair , he thought to himself, rubbing the back of his head, which was still rather tender.
He stood and his legs began to wobble. Everything around him was blurred and distorted, as if he viewed the world through lenses made from the bottoms of glass soda bottles. So he sat back down. And then, because it seemed like the right thing to do, he passed out … again.
While unconscious he spent some more time with the colorful singing badgers who made him promises of chocolates, comfy sheets, large quantities of mayonnaise, and a long life of happiness, joy, and unending pain. This last one he felt to be most unsettling.
The Beast regained consciousness once again and thought it might be best this time to take things a little slow. He crawled over to the large recliner and pulled himself into it, marveling at the way it truly conformed to his body and cradled his spine. He’d have to get one for his place once this was all over.
He sat in silence for a time. Listening to the sounds of the house around him. Trying to clear his mind and settle on his next course of action.
His dream with the field of yellow roses had been both revealing and somewhat disturbing. Did the yellow field represent Goldilocks? Did the bear represent the family that owned this house? They were bears, after all. But he wasn’t sure. He didn’t buy in to all that dream interpretation claptrap. There is an entire field of study out there that believes dreams can teach you things about yourself that you’ve never known before. That dreams are the way your subconscious self-communicates to you and tells you what it is you truly want out of life, and people use this information to make life changing decisions.
The Beast didn’t buy it. As far as he was concerned, dreams were just a way for your subconscious self to get rid of all the visual and oral stimuli you were subjected to each day from television, radio, the internet; pretty much everywhere. Dreams were nothing more than your brain taking an informational dump each night and ejecting all the worthless crap it had been filled with each day.
Yet, he did have to admit to himself that he may still have feelings for Goldilocks. Despite her betrayal and the anger he felt, he still cared for her. Granted, he just tried to kill her, but these things happen in even the healthiest of relationships.
The Beast pulled his gun, a Smith & Wesson Model M&P R8. It was black with a synthetic grip. It held eight .357 Magnum rounds and had a five inch barrel. He loved the gun. Well, love might be too strong of a word, but he sure felt good holding it in his hand. He swung out the cylinder and pulled out each cartridge, then reloaded. The act gave him comfort.
Just then he heard a scream from somewhere in the house. A woman’s scream. Goldilocks.
The Beast leaped to his feet, fighting off a wave of dizziness and nausea, not giving even a second thought to the idea that he might have a concussion. He holstered his pistol and ran from the room, making for the direction in which the scream had come.
It took him a few moments to find Goldilocks. The house was huge, but he found her all the same. She was at the top of a staircase at the front of the house. He noticed three potential problems the instant Goldilocks came into view.
Potential Problem Number One: A rather large bear stood between Goldilocks and himself.
Potential Problem Number Two: Another rather large bear was with the first rather large bear, and they both stood between Goldilocks and himself.
Potential Problem Number Three: A smaller bear, but large all the same, stood just behind the two rather large bears that stood between Goldilocks and himself.
Luckily the three bears hadn’t yet noticed him. Goldilocks hadn’t noticed him yet either. She just sat there on the floor above him. She looked miserable. She looked sad. She looked reflective and regretful.
She looked beautiful.
The smaller of the three bears suddenly advanced on Goldilocks. The Beast drew his gun, but the bear, instead of mauling her, gave her a hug. The Beast was confused. Then Goldilocks began to cry, and with that he had had enough. He was not about to sit idly by while Goldilocks received the comfort and care that he deserved. He was the one who was betrayed. He was the one who suffered. He was the one who had died a little inside. At the same time, he didn’t like that bear touching her, even if it was innocent. He suddenly felt protective. He wanted to be the one to comfort her. To protect her. To touch her, hold her, be with her. He needed her.
He still loved her. And frankly, that just plain pissed him off.
With his gun in one hand, he drew his sword and just as he was about to call out something powerful and dramatic like “Get away from her,” Goldilocks began to shout.
“No! Not Goldilocks! Never again!” and with that, she turned, ran up the staircase, and disappeared deeper into the house.
“Well crap,” the big bear said. “I guess that means we gotta chase her.”
The three bears set off up the staircase after Goldilocks, none of them noticing that a man with a pistol and a sword stood behind them. The Beast stepped forward to take chase when his head began to spin and the world around him went all squishy.
A scarlet badger came bounding down the steps and stopped at the feet of the Beast, looking up at him with an expression that on a human could only be described as shifty, but on a badger … well, still looked rather shifty.
“Hey, fella,” the badger said. “You need any socks?”
“What?”
“Socks, guy? You need any socks?”
He noticed that the badger wore a long overcoat. The badger opened it up and revealed row upon row of pristine white socks hanging on the inner lining.
The Beast wobbled slightly and vertigo took hold of him and he fell onto his back. As he slid back into unconsciousness, as he mentally calculated the possibility of purchasing a comfortable pair of woolly socks, he heard Goldilocks crying out in absolute terror from somewhere above. So he fought. He clawed and he spit. He cursed and he bit. He fought free from whatever tried to pull him into oblivion. He fought, and he won. The scarlet badger was no more.
The Beast sat up and shook the cobwebs from his head. His gun lay to one side, his sword to the other. He picked up his gun and sword and stood. He wasn’t sure where in the house Goldilocks and the three bears had gone, but he could hear people running above, moving deeper into the interior of the house, so he launched himself up the steps. He paused at the top, listening. All he heard was nothing.
Then the nothing was replaced with something.
The something was the sound of gunfire from outside on the front lawn. Gunfire and people screaming. The sound lasted for almost two minutes before it resolved into the thud of boot heels falling on concrete as someone walked up the sidewalk outside toward the front door. The sound was accompanied by a feeling of great evil. A feeling so intense that he wanted to vomit. Such evil that the Beast, who had known fear before, discovered what true terror felt like.
So he turned and ran. Hoping against hope that he would find Goldilocks. Find her and tell her that he still loved her. Tell her before they all died.
CHAPTER TWENTY
ALBERT GORDON, GRIMMELTON FIREFIGHTER and all around smarmy guy, was not in a good mood.
Al had one motivation in life, an extreme dedication to meeting girls. He devoted great swaths of time, money, and energy to the task. Entire days were planned months in advance toward this one venture. Al had even signed up to be a volunteer firefighter for the sole purpose of getting girls to take an interest in him. The only problem with the whole firefighting gig was that Al ha
d a paralyzing fear of fire. Luckily, one of the more interesting facts about Grimmelton, Kansas was that there hadn’t been a fire in town since 1983. “Fire free since ’83,” most Gimmeltonions were known to say when they set about to brag on their home town. So Al felt pretty safe making the leap into firefighting when there were no actual fires to fight.
See, Al knew, or at least he had a fairly good idea, that the ladies just love a man in uniform, so while Al didn’t have to actually go out and fight any fires, he often got the opportunity to respond to a plethora of emergency situations. When eight year old Timmy Brosco fell into that well last month, Al was there with the team that pulled the boy out. When the Cleaver boy climbed into that giant coffee cup on the billboard above the downtown market six months ago, Al was on the scene. When that same idiot Cleaver kid got his head stuck between the bars of a wrought iron fence two days later, Al was there to grease the kid’s ears. So no, Al didn’t have to put out any fires, but he did get to suit up and look like a hero as often as possible, and of course, get the ladies.
There weren’t many occasions in which the firefighter gig worked against Al. Usually it only came back to bite him on his butt when he had to be pulled away from working his magic on a babe just so he could stand around in his firefighter’s gear and do nothing. Most especially when there weren’t any girls around to impress.
Today happened to be one of those occasions.
Al had been out at the Chicken Coup on Route 9, playing pool, drinking beer, and of course, doing what he did best … hitting on chicks. There weren’t too many women at the bar this time of the day, being early afternoon and all, but that meant that there weren’t too many fellas around to compete with either.
But it wasn’t just any random girl Al had been trying to score with this morning. Al spent most of his afternoons at the Chicken Coup lately for one reason only. The new waitress. Rose.
Al didn’t know much about Rose. Only that she used to be married to someone powerful and important. He knew that she left him, but wasn’t sure why. He honestly didn’t care. He also knew that Rose wasn’t her first name. It was her last name, and her maiden one at that. He had no idea what her first name was. She only went by Rose. He didn’t know much about the woman, but that was okay by him. He felt that he already knew all he really needed to know about Rose. He knew that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He knew that she seemed to enjoy the attention that he gave her. And he knew that he couldn’t stop thinking about her. That was really all he needed.
Al had been on the verge of convincing Rose that going out to dinner with him sometime would be one of the all-time great ideas in the history of great ideas when his phone rang. He looked down at the display window and saw that it was Chief Rudolph, which meant that he was being called into duty. He apologized, kissed Rose’s hand, and left with a heavy heart.
Which was how he found himself sitting on his rear, in the grass, in full gear, in the heat, out in front of Griswold House, doing nothing at all, and with no girls around to impress.
Al Gordon was not in a good mood.
Twenty minutes ago the fire alarm at Griswold House had sounded. All able bodied volunteer firefighters were dispatched with a speed that would have made the Flash look like an old man standing on his lawn screaming at passing cars to slow the heck down. But by the time they had arrived, the fire alarm had quieted. There were no signs of fire, and no one had answered neither the phone, nor the front door, which was locked. The staff were all out on the front lawn, but the Griswold family were nowhere to be found. So, Chief Rudolph, ever the one to avoid displeasing the wealthy, chose to just sit and wait. The household staff were no help. No one among them would take any initiative. They deferred to the family, or when they weren’t around, to the head of security, Jack Horner. And of course, Jack was annoyingly absent as well.
When the Griswold family finally showed, Al was relieved. At last he’d be able to leave. Maybe Rose was still at the Chicken Coup.
But it was not to be.
As soon as the Griswold family arrived, the security guy, Jack came out of the house. To Al, the man looked injured. He went straight for the Griswolds. The big bear, Al thought his name was Burt, or Bud … maybe Burt, called for a medic and the EMTs that were on the scene grabbed their bags and went to work. All the while Mr. Griswold and the security guy talked. Jack must have said something to Burt, Bud, or whatever his name was, to get him riled up because suddenly the bear stood, said something to his wife, and all three of the bears started for the house.
Al noticed Chief Rudolph running to intercept the Griswolds, and Al decided to join them.
“Excuse me,” the Chief called as he ran. “Excuse me, Burt?” That was the bear’s name. Burt.
The big bear, Burt, turned and stopped. His wife and kid waited with him as the Chief and Al caught up.
The Chief asked, “What would you like us to do, Burt?”
“Do about what?” Burt looked distracted, like he had somewhere else he’d rather be.
“About the fire alarm,” Al said. “The alarm went off. We got a fire to fight here or what?” Al prayed silently that they did not, in fact, have a fire to fight here.
“It was a false alarm,” Burt said. “There is no fire.”
“Good, so we can go.” Al thought the day might be looking up.
“No,” Burt said. “I’d like you to stay.”
“But, Burt, without a fire, what do you want us to do?” The Chief asked.
“There may be a thief on the premises. There’s no telling what she might do. I’d appreciate it if you all just stood ready. Just in case.” And with that, the Griswold’s entered the house.
“Can you believe that?” Al said. “Who does that guy think he is? We ain’t his own private team of first responders. We got better things to do than just sit and wait. I mean, come on!”
“Now, Al,” the Chief said. “Burt’s a good man – I mean, bear. He’s done a lot for this community.”
“And he’s given a lot of money to the fire department,” Al finished the thought for him.
“Well, yes, that’s true. But we’re going to stay. If Burt and his family need our help, then I’m going make sure that we’re here for them.” The Chief walked away to inform the rest of the crew, which left Al with nothing to do but wait.
Al took a moment to scan the household staff. They had all broken off into little groups that were spread out all over the front lawn. He was, as some call it, ‘scoping for chicks’. Al figured, if he was going to be stuck here in the heat with his uniform and gear on, he might as well take advantage of it. Al found just what he was looking for a few moments later. The housemaids.
Al approached the small knot of housemaids who were all standing about and talking in excited voices on the same subject everyone else seemed to be talking about. The non-fire and the possible thief in the Griswold’s home.
“Who is she?” one of the more attractive housemaids asked to the group.
“Does it matter,” another replied. “Someone needs to go in there and get her.”
“But, what if she’s dangerous. I heard she beat up Jack!” the first one squealed in fright.
“Never fear, ladies. The Grimmelton Fire Department is on the scene,” Al said, striking his best Superman pose.
Al noticed one of the housemaids roll her eyes … he didn’t find her all that attractive. He was about to respond to the eye roll when something exploded from down the road. The ground shook slightly beneath them and a bulbous cloud of oily smoke rose up on the horizon. It looked to Al like it might be coming from the Brick House Gas and Groceries. Maybe one of their wells blew. Al couldn’t be sure.
Regardless, every firefighte
r, police officer, and EMT on site froze for a moment or two before springing into action.
“Ladies,” Al said, tipping his helmet in salute and giving the housemaids his very best smile before jogging off to join his crew.
But before Al could climb aboard his assigned fire truck, he noticed a figure walking up the road, walking out of the wall of smoke that billowed toward Al and the others. The figure was dressed in black. Black boots, hat, pants, coat, and string tie over a shirt of white. The man looked like he stepped out of an old western. Gunsmoke, Rawhide, or even Bonanza. He looked like the sort of character that frequented a saloon and always had a fan of cards in one hand and a shot glass in the other. He even wore a pair of old revolvers.
No one moved as the man drew closer. Al and the rest just sat in, or hung on, to their vehicles, letting the engines run.
As the man in black drew nearer, one of the police officers climbed out of his cruiser and stepped over to the man, barring his way. They were too far from Al, so he couldn’t hear what they were saying, but the conversation didn’t last long. The officer made a gesture to get the man to stop. The man pulled one of his revolvers, and without slowing, shot the officer down, stepped over the body, and continued moving toward the house.
Al couldn’t believe what he’d just seen. His mouth had gone dry and his bladder threatened to let go. Al was no stranger to violence, but he was only use to the kind created by Hollywood. Al had never before born witness to the callus, almost casual way in which the man in black took the life of another. It was like a child stepping on a beetle. The act clearly meant nothing to this dark stranger.
The man in black drew closer. All that stood between him and the house were pretty much every emergency vehicle and worker in town, minus the few police officers that responded to a call for back up down at the Brick House – which was where this man had come from. Al looked at the smoke on the horizon, the smoke that appeared to hang directly over the location of the Brick House. What had happened down there?
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