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Prelude to a Predator Part I

Moonlight flowed over shiny black fur like rain pouring down as the mother bear and her cub stalked the forest for the first time in seven months.  They’d emerged from their river-side cave after a long winter’s nap only a day earlier.  The younger of the two was not yet even a year old and had never felt this level of hunger.  It was a hollow, penetrating feeling that dictated everything—how much you should move, how far you could travel, how long you would sleep before the hunger woke you up again. 

The older one looked down to her cub beside her with motherly pride—and worry.  She recognized his sluggishness, he was weak, and it killed her to see him this desperate for food.  Berry season was still months off—so was trout season, and it was still too cold for any humans to be out with their cloth shelters and frozen foods stored in those flimsy plastic boxes that were so easy for bears to break open.  If they were going to eat tonight, they were going to have to hunt.  But she was weak herself, she wouldn’t be able to chase her prey very far or fast and she’d have to choose it wisely.  She’d also have to choose something slow, which diminished her options greatly.  They couldn’t risk eating anything sick—not this early in the waking season.  The meat of something older would be tougher for her cub to chew and admittedly she didn’t look forward to the taste of eight year old rabbit gristle—but it would have to do until her strength returned to her.

She heard a rustling in the undergrowth, it could’ve been a gust of cool spring wind but she couldn’t take that chance and she lifted a paw in front of her cub’s path to stop him—on some reluctant level hoping it was that rabbit she’d been thinking about.  But then something else tickled one of her senses—a smell.  It was wet and bloody like fresh kill.  The noise she’d heard could have been the animal who’d made the kill but the old bear couldn’t smell any other creature nearby.

The woods were silent—unusual for this time of year when animals were waking up and combing the woods for new mates.  Something was wrong but the rumbling in her stomach convinced her to take the chance.  Cautiously the mother poked her snout through the wall of snow-crusted bushes, then the rest of her head.  And laying there in the snow, the blood still warm, was a deer carcass.  Normally bears preferred not to scavenge—unless you count pillaging campsites as scavenging—but who doesn’t like Little Debbies? 

But desperate times call for desperate measures.  So, knowing she should have checked the area more thoroughly, she coaxed her young out from the bushes with a soft wuffle and they approached the deer together. 

No sooner did they press their tongues to the cold, exposed flesh than a medieval-like stock made from metal exploded up from the bloated guts of the deer and snapped into place around the mother-bear’s neck.  She roared at her cub to run which he did, but only too late—a net of steel sprang up from beneath the snow, encasing and suspending him in mid-air.  The net spun around as the mother bear raged and thrashed about in the stock, desperate to get out, desperate to get her cub to safety.  But it was no use—whoever laid the trap had been expecting something larger to spring it—the stock was made of some kind of reinforced metal.

And then came a human voice—ragged and terrifying, like hollow trees rubbing against each other in the winds of fall.  The voice was followed by the silhouette of a scrawny male human who smelled of blood and gun powder.  “Two of you!”  He hissed, playfully nudging the cub’s net just enough to get it swinging again.  “Well that’s just perfect.”  He concluded as he squatted down beside the mother bear and stroked the fur in between her massive shoulders.  He glared provokingly back into her cub’s terrified eyes.  “Now I have an audience.”

 

“I count twenty-plus superficial cuts.”  I say to my wife over my radio as I inspect the bear corpse.  It’s such a shame, she was a magnificent animal—a good 600 pounds.  And cut down only hours after coming out of hibernation.

“And according to the scanners they’re all at slightly different levels of decomposition and bacterial infection.” 

“Which means he took his time.”  I relay, using my fingers to probe a patch of worn fur in back of her head.  “She’s got ligature marks around her neck where a device would have held her—just like the others…”

“So you think it’s the same guy?”

“There’s no doubt in my mind.”  I say sternly, my fist involuntarily clenching.

“How can you be sure?”  She asks.

“This is his fifteenth victim, Fauna—that means I’ve combed over fifteen different crime scenes in a month.  Believe me—I know this is the same guy.”  There was silence for a moment and then the fact I’d been trying to ignore—the fear I’d been trying to suppress came careening back to the forefront of my mind and I had to say something.  “He’s taunting me, Fauna.  He’s moved her from the actual kill site to this area—one he knows is in sight of a hive cam—again, just like the others.”

At first she didn’t say anything, then her voice came back a bit snarkier than before—like the time I’d left her debit card at the pharmacy.  “And how long have you suspected this?”

“I thought it was weird right from the start but I thought—or was hoping it was mere coincidence.  But this hive cam is the only one in the area—it would’ve taken a lot of effort for him to move her to the top of this hill.  It’s no coincidence.”  I say, shaking my head.  “And I fear he’s escalating.  When he first showed up on our radar his victims were primarily smaller wildlife, since then he’s gone from rabbits to foxes to deer and now bears…”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, I know all life is important.  But is it wrong that I’m glad he’s only killed animals—I don’t know if I could take helping you on this case if his victims were human.”

I take a moment to consider the implications of what I’m about to say.  There’s no easy way to say it so I just talk, “that’s just it Hon, I don’t know how long it’s going to stay that way.”

“What do you mean?”  She gasps.”

“Animal cruelty is usually a good indicator of serial crime and he’s obviously moving his way up the food chain as his confidence grows with each unsolved case.  The restraints say he’s organized and the torture points to sadism.  It’s not long before he makes the jump over the species barrier.”  I say as I expand my search to the rest of the area, searching for any other clues at all that might be hidden amongst the underbrush.

Fauna remains silent, praying that what I’m suggesting isn’t true.  “Are you sure?”  She questions, hoping I’ll reverse my position, “I mean I know it looks like torture but a bear is a very different animal compared to his other victims—thicker, more muscle…maybe the killer isn’t a sadist, maybe he just didn’t know where to stab?”

I say nothing in reply.

I can’t.

I’m completely and utterly speechless.  Her theory is sound and I would’ve considered it had I not just uncovered evidence that confirms my own.

Completely and undeniably.

“Badger what’s wrong?”  She asks for what has to be the third time. 

“We’ve got a problem, he’s devolving—straying from his usual script.”

“Why, did you find something?”

I nod my head, “a net.”  I quiver as I lift the steel mesh stained with bear blood from the foliage.  A twinge of disgust courses through me as I accept the words I’m about to say next.  “…and eye lids.”  I finally spit out just as my scanners finish their approximation and feed me age of the bear who’d left them.

“The victim had a cub, Fauna.  And her killer made her child watch while he tortured his mother.”

“Dear God.”  Is all she can get out before she mutes her microphone to gag.

“Contact the police, Hon.  I think it’s safe to say that a future serial killer is on the prowl.”     

      

To Be Continued…

In the Land of Ice & Blood Part II

I crank on the steering mechanism, the tail end of the Crayfish flicks and the craft rounds the bulky underside of an iceberg.  I re-watch the latest Club recording once more and find what I’m looking for.  I flip on my radio again and hail my wife back in Wisconsin. 

“What?”  She asks in that tone that means she’s trying to curl her hair for work, which is a different tone than the one she has for straightening her hair...  I know what you’re thinking: we spend way too much time together.  We even both work at the same place—the D.N.R. office.  Currently I’m sick…or at least that’s what she told Lawson Hunter, our boss, to explain my absence.

“You mean you’re going to work while I’m at home sick?”  I joke. 

“Well one of us has to earn a paycheck, and since you’re off on a Canadian Cruise...”  She returns, not at all amused.  “Now what do you need?  I still have to get Brock to the sitter’s.

She’s not going to like me adding another task to her morning routine but she can yell at me once the Minister is safely away from his under-siege home and I’m back to my home—a little less safe.  “I noticed something before when you sent me that recording, I checked it again to make sure I really saw what I saw.”

“And?”

“And I’m not going crazy.  I’ve isolated the image and took a screenshot of the frame—it should be in your e-mail by now.”

“Ok?”  She said with a muffled voice, which by this time in her morning routine could only mean she had a wad of hair in her mouth while she used her iron on the rest.  “What’d you find?”

“A mistake.”  I reply.  “The Club’s, not mine.  When the leader fired his weapon, the muzzle flash illuminated his face.  It was only for a second but I got a clear image of it and from the sounds of things it’s the only one anyone has of him.  I need you to scan the mug shot into D.A.D. and see if he can find us a name to go along with it.  If we can I.D. him we’re bound to find something in his profile we can use as leverage.”

“So now on top of everything else you expect me try to figure out how to turn that unfinished, oversized microwave in the basement you call a computer on? “

I shrug, I’m thousands of miles away—she can’t hurt me.  “That’s the short, long and narrow of it.”

She grumbles madly, “alright, but you owe me.  I mean you haven’t even installed a power switch on the blooming thing yet, one of these days I’m gonna get zapped!”

“Shocking.”  I chuckle back at her.  “You’ll figure it out.”  Then I switch off the comm. link and turn my attention back to the frigid ocean just in time to dodge beneath an enormous grey whale but I’m too close and the Crayfish gets caught in the currant the massive creature leaves in his wake.  The craft spirals into an underwater tailspin as I fight to keep it from bashing into the belly of the whale as I pass underneath the behemoth.  In these cold, green-tinted waters he is king but he poses no threat to me—some animals don’t need to push their weight around to prove dominance.  For some their majestic size and grace is proof enough.

I skim past the tail and peer out my rear viewport just as the whale is swallowed up by the murk as though traveling through a portal to another realm and I am once again alone.  The ocean in front of me is clear of any other traffic so I increase my speed, set the auto pilot to follow the coordinates and pray that my wife finds the information I need before I arrive.

 

Five minutes later the base of the seaside cliff that the Minister’s fortress sits on comes into view.  I steer the Crayfish directly beneath, allow just the tip of the exit hatch to clear the water and ice and set the anchor.  The entrance hatch pops open and I’m just about to get up from my chair when my wife hails me over our comm. link.  “So’d you get zapped, Mamma?”

“Yes.”  She replies with a sour tone that reminds me of her reaction to when my mother asked her what in God’s name she put in the lasagna.  “And I expect you to stop off and get me some aloe when you eventually decide to come along home.  “Damn thing singed me.”

I smile.  “For you I’ll even spring for the big bottle.  So you get anything other than burned?  I love our time together but a man’s life is hanging in the balance here.”

“Of course.”  She says, “The man in the video is Victor Reed.  He’s a lifelong sealer but he’s not the head of the group as we originally thought.  He’s a lower middle-class man from Cape Breton Island, average yearly income is under $50,000…”

“Anything we can use?”  I ask impatiently, checking the time. 

“Now I expect chocolates to go along with my aloe.”  She snips back.  “I was just telling you his situation so you could maybe go into this thing understanding your enemy and any possible motives he might have for getting involved in all this in the first place.  If you can sympathize with him maybe you can resolve the situation without anyone getting hurt.”

Of course she’s right—the yin to my yang.  “I slump my shoulders, “yes ma’am.”  I concede in a sheepish tone I’ve not used since the last time my third grade teacher caught me eating paste during class.

…yes, that’s right—THIRD GRADE.  So sue me.  But the next few words are no joke.  And they smack me back to the realities of human frailty, even my own, all too quickly as my wife speaks the words, “looks like Victor’s wife has some form of cancer…she’s dying.”

There’s nothing I can say.  I was hoping for leverage that would make him think about the future but not that…I’ll almost feel guilty for using that, but it’s all I’ve got.  “Thanks, hun.  I’ll make contact when I’m done.  Okay?”

“Okay—and…”

“Yeah?”  I ask, about to turn away and get to work.

“Do be careful.”

A short, timid smile etches across my face, “I will.”  I tell her then I lift off the steel grating of the sub and shoot up through the open hatch.

I follow the curve of the cliff higher and higher.  It begins to snow and the wind picks up, yellow sunlight reflects off the frozen precipitation and I’m blinded by the glimmering white out.  But finally I reach the edge of the cliff.  I misjudge my trajectory and I have to correct myself by reaching out with my hands and flipping off the roof of the edge a second before impact.  Then I get my first glimpse of Harb’s fortress.

It’s a massive compound.  The house itself sits on five acres.  Huge windows open to luxurious balconies that look out over the frozen bay.  Elaborate white stone pillars pop against the red brick of the mansion and I find myself officially feeling just a tad jealous.  But I’ll be jealous of a dead man unless I find him in the next two minutes…the only problem in that there must be at least fifty rooms in this house and twice as many windows.  I know Harb is being held in a room with a window—I saw it on the recording…but which one?  There’s no way to tell and it’s going to take a lot longer than two minutes to check all of them. 

Then a gust of wind knocks me around, tossing me about, flipping me end over end in the air.  Then the turbulence subsides, I look down to check myself over and find a glowing red dot on my chest.

I’ve flown right into the path of a sniper’s laser sight.  I duck out of the way and use the zoom lenses in my cowl to follow the laser beam to its intended target: a window covered with red velvet drapes on the fourth floor.  Now I don’t know the layout of the mansion and like I said, I haven’t a clue as to which room the terrorists are holding Harb in…but the one a sniper has his sights set on is a good enough place to start for me. 

I rise higher into the sky and when I figure I’m high enough, I dive bomb the window.  I gain speed as I dart down towards the glass.  I shield my face with my forearms, brace for impact and crash through the glass.  I roll on the plush, purple carpet, the drapes blow in the breeze in back of me as the three thugs scramble around the room trying to figure out what just happened.  Victor hides behind Harb who’s strapped to a rickety wooden chair, he’s got his bat pressed firmly against the minister’s throat.  One of his henchmen brings his bat down at me like an axe, I let it hit the ground then I roll over the top of it.  He lets go and the handle slaps down on the top of his foot.  He jumps around holding it like a cartoon character while the other guy takes a swing at me head.  I jump back and he takes another shot at my gut, I kick the bat but he manages to hangs on.  Then he takes the weapon in both hands, close to his side and brings it back, then he pushes it towards my stomach like a battering ram.  I turn and catch the bat, lift up on the end of it and strike him in the forehead.  He staggers backwards and bumps into his jumping buddy.  In a flash I rip one of the drapes off the rod and wrap them up tighter than Minister Harb, then I clunk their heads together like the Three Stooges.  They thump to the floor, unconscious and I turn towards Mr. Reed.

“It’s over Victor.  Now put the bat down—you don’t want to do this!”

He reacts to my knowing his name but only for a moment. Then he pushes desperately, trying to bide his time.  “How would you know?  You don’t know anything about me!”

“That’s not true…I know your name…and I know where you live—though I’m not going to prove it with an address—not in front of the Minister.”  Harb glares at me and I wave my hand at him as though to let him know that it’s all part of the plan but I don’t think that makes him feel any better.  Now here comes the hard part—the part I don’t want to do…“I also know that your wife is dying and that you’ll soon be a single parent.”  He pauses for a moment then lowers the bat.  I struck a nerve with that one so I keep on him.  “And I know that the only reason you’re doing this is because you’re worried you won’t have enough money to support your little girl without the income from the seal hunt.”

“You don’t understand!”  He shouts at me, lowering his weapon even more.  His arm is shaking now that I have him thinking about his family.  “Not really anyway.  My father was a sealer—my grandfather…it’s all I know how to do!  It’s my livelihood!”

I look to the Minister, his eyes are filled with tears and fear and I can’t help but wonder if the intensity of this whole thing, along with all his other responsibilities, will be the cause of some sort of heart condition for him.  I take a chance with a hesitant step forward.  “I do understand, Victor.  I come from a place where old habits are dying hard—where the fight for animal rights is slowly winning.  As laws are passed and animals become more and more protected, people are being charged with things that weren’t illegal even a month ago.  I’ve seen the effect it’s had on my friends and neighbors as they struggle to adapt.  But it’s worth it Victor.  It’s worth it because nobody’s livelihood should cost another their life.  “I pause for a moment to let that sink in then, “I’m sure your daughter would agree.  You really don’t want to do this.  Your daughter is about to lose one parent—don’t make her lose both.  Neither you nor your wife have anyone who can take care of your daughter if you’re both out of the picture which means she’ll become a ward of the state.  Now for someone who hates their own government as much as you claim to, you’re sure trusting them with a lot.  Or have you even thought about that?”

He shakes his head and his shoulders slouch.  “I guess I hadn’t.” 

I’ve beaten him.

“Drop the bat and I can get you out of here.  The police have followed your demands and have kept their distance.  You can make it to your escape boat and be miles away before they even get close.  You haven’t killed anyone yet—sure they’ll look for you, but eventually the heat will be off…you can still walk away from this, but only if you stop now.”

The bat is about to fall from his hand, “why are you doing this?”  He asks me, painfully—like he’s about to sob.  I think he got so desperate that all he saw was the reward—not what he’d have to do to get it.  I don’t think he realized how far deep he was in until he realized he didn’t want to go any further.  By then it was too late.

“I’m doing this because I’d rather see a father be there for his daughter when she needs him the most than behind bars or dead on the floor of this very room.”

He flexes his muscles, ready to bring the bat up again, taking what I said as a threat.  “And were you gonna be the one to kill me if I refused?”

“No.”  I tell him.  The sniper is…he was just setting up on the glacier a mile off when I arrived.  I’ve been blocking you from his laser sight since I got here.  But I’m not with them—and if you don’t end this soon it’s entirely probably he’ll take the both of us out before your time table is up.”

Victor peeks over my shoulder, just enough to clear my mane, he can’t see anyone but the sniper sees him and fires a round that whizzes past my shoulder, barely missing us both.  “You’ve left me little choice.”  He says as his club clatters loudly to the floor.

Beneath my mask I smile, just a little.  “You always have a choice.”  I reply, slowly taking out a fox star filled with a gaseous chemical that once mixed with air will produce a dense fog.  “Today you just made the right one.” 

Then the fox star cracks against the wood flooring.

The room fills with a cloud of fog.

And the mastermind behind the club, who turned out to be just another pawn, and I escape.

 

By the time I return to Wisconsin the summit has already adjourned.

And the seal hunt remains. 

Apparently while The Club was threatening to kill Minister Harb they were also bribing other members of the summit and they voted to keep the slaughter going for the very people threatening to kill one of their own.

It’s not the ending I’d hoped for but at least I saved that one seal and the Minister…and a father.  And fortunately today was the last day of the season and the seals are now safe until next year.  Still, for all my efforts, for Harb’s brush with death, for things to have ended this way because someone was bought is disgusting.  But this was always a possibility—a vote this loaded is always prone to corruption. 

But now I have a whole year to figure out which sleazy government fat cat accepted the money—a whole year to expose them for the underhanded, amoral, pathetic excuse for humanity who would allow something as sick and twisted as the seal slaughter to continue.

I have a year to root out the degenerate who would accept a few dollars in exchange for the lives of thousands.

And when I do… 

 

 

The End        

 

 

 

   

 

In The Land of Ice & Blood Part I

I hope everyone will forgive the hiatus in new stories, it’s not for lack of inspiration, I have many stories to tell.  A few months back I made the decision to finally attend my first writing conference and since that decision I have been working non-stop on getting my book ready for critiques and submissions at the conference and I felt guilty every moment I wasn’t working on it.  It has taken up a lot of time but I’m happy to say that I’m now a little more prepared for the conference, so it’s been worth it.  Now I can finally return to bringing you the weekly adventures of Wisconsin’s first super hero! 

This week our hero must travel outside his usual jurisdiction to stop the most brutal and large scale assault against mother Earth he’s seen yet.  So without further ado, I’m pleased to give to you: In the Land of Ice & Blood Part I…

 

Red.

The water outside the hull of the Crayfish, my submarine, is stained with it.  I arrived in Canadian waters only moments ago after a long night of using the CrayFish’s lasers to burrow new underground waterways to the country from Wisconsin, USA.  But I’m still too late, it would appear.  The carcass of a dead seal sinks past my porthole and it becomes clear.

Canada’s annual seal slaughter has already begun. 

But I’m not here to save a few seals—no that would prove quite useless in the grand scheme of things. 

I’m here to stop the hunt for good.  Sixteen hours ago the home of Canadian Parliamentarian Harb Orseel, Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, was invaded by a rogue faction of seal hunters who call themselves “the Club,”  it’s a play on words but I’m not amused.  Their demands are simple, all they want is for the government to permanently stay out of their business and allow them to continue the annual seal hunt unimpeded for the foreseeable future.  The only problem with that, aside from the fact that Canada doesn’t negotiate with terrorists, is that the seal trade isn’t what it used to be.  Seal byproducts are not the multi-billion, worldwide business they once were.  Humans have found alternatives for seal products—for the most part, the black market is the only fence for them and even those are dwindling as countries who use seal byproducts for superstitious practices join the 21^st century. 

The majority of Canadian citizens don’t even support the slaughter anymore and the failing industry needs government funding to keep it going.  In short, the practice of the seal hunt is nothing but a barbaric practice with no real economic value and those who participate in it are nothing but a bunch of Neolithic barbarians who need to kill, bludgeon, stab…or club something to feel stronger.  Minister Harb was going to put a stop to the seal hunt at the Fisheries and Oceans summit but the Club had other plans and have threatened to kill him if the summit votes to stop the seal hunt.

It’s a bold move, even by extremist group standards, and it’s a situation my expired passport couldn’t keep me from sticking my nose in. 

I’m getting readings from the sheet of ice above me, warm bodies standing over fading heat signatures.  I haven’t met any of the locals yet and I’m itchy to break the ice.  The Crayfish rises from the dark depths and I fire the burrowing laser at the chunk of ice above me, but I don’t cut all the way through—smashing through the ice will make for a much more dramatic entrance.

A group of three hunters has a seal pinned against a mound of ice.  They raise their clubs, ready to bring it down on the frightened and helpless sea mammal.  The craft closes in on ten feet and I brace myself for impact.

CRACK!  The sub slams into the ice.  ERRRREACK!  Ice scrapes against the orange hull as it emerges from the freezing ocean.  The hunters fall to the ice as my craft breaches the surface and the seal escapes with his life back into the ocean.  You should see the looks on the three hunter’s faces as they slowly turn to look at the craft from the snow, unsure of what just happened.  The entrance hatch flips open on the top of the sub and the hunters flinch. 

Then I make my move.  I shoot up and out of the green cockpit, flying right in front of the sun, momentarily blinding the gaping goons who are trying to keep track of me.  “Two for flinching!”  I shout as I fling two fox at each of them, knocking their weapons out of their hands.  I hit the snow and kick the closest one in the face, knocking him out cold.  The other two get up from the ice, one charges me and I leap over the top of him, I come down on his back and slam him into the snow.  I try to kick him but he rolls out of the way.  I bring my foot down in an axe kick two more times but he keeps dodging me and then I feel it, the other hunter has found the club he lost earlier when the Crayfish burst through the ice beneath him and he strikes me with it right in between my shoulder blades.  I stagger forward as the one with the club helps his friend up, once up he recovers his spear and takes an offensive stance with it. 

This isn’t what I expected but at least they’re posing a challenge…and they’ve already told me everything I need to know to defeat them.  The one who hit me with the club is a scrawny guy and likes the sneak attacks—he won’t know what to do with head on offensive.  The other one I’ve already fought with is a top-heavy, imbalanced guy who went down easily.

And he will again.  A loose chunk of ice sits at my feet, I channel my inner soccer player and kick the chunk at his legs, I make contact and his legs fall out from underneath him again.  He cracks his head against the ice and I dash forward toward the coward.  The guy reacts just the way I thought he would—he freezes.  Apparently he was only brave while chasing down slow, defenseless animals.  I jump and catch him in the face with my knee.  He lands on the snow and doesn’t get up.  I snap back to the top heavy thug who is trying to lift himself from the snow and make sure he’ll be staying down for a while longer. 

The wind blows against me and if it weren’t for the heat absorbing material of my suit, or the thermal mask covering my mouth, warming every breath I take in, I would’ve keeled over long ago from my asthma.  I stand back up and for the first time I can appreciate the wilderness—or at least I would if it weren’t so tainted with overkill.  The sun reflects off the snow and ice but I can see the carnage clearly.  I’ve heard stories about what happens here on the ice and I’ve seen pictures of seals cowering in the cold shadow of the human with club poised to bring it down and crush their skulls but there are just some things you have to see in person before your heart truly breaks. 

And it’s times like these when I hate being lumped into this greedy, violent bunch called humanity.

Before me I see hundreds of pools of blood staining the snow in gory recollections of the violence I’m too late to stop.  Seal pups, too young and too small to bring in any real cash, are left dead and scattered across the tundra, killed just for sport—killed just for having the unfortunate predisposition of being a part of a species with an unfortunate predisposition.  Their usually warm bodies are frozen and still, and their normally silver skin is a sickly pale shade of grey—the life having been drained from them. 

They’ll never grow up. 

They’ll never again swim in the waters that hugged them since birth with the parents they saw slaughtered before their eyes right before their own lights were extinguished forever.  But then I wonder if in some sick, twisted way, if this death isn’t somehow better than living the rest of their lives, which for a seal is a good thirty years, with the images of their parents’ murder swimming around their heads.

The annual seal slaughter is the most gruesome and horrible form of prejudice—no different than racism and I thank God that the arctic temperatures have frozen the scent of the blood and innards that have been spilled across the ice but still find it difficult to keep last night’s dinner where it’s at.  It’s like a train wreck and I can’t look away.  I wince at the evidence of the needless pain spilled over the frozen tundra—the violence that was handed out to the hundreds of innocent creatures, social creatures—creatures with families, who have been killed for no more than thirty-two dollars a pop. 

The life of a father, son, daughter or mother for thirty-two dollars? 

I have to get Minister Harb out of the Club’s clutches. 

I have to get him to that summit.

But first I have to get to his home.  Suddenly I hear the voices of a larger hunting party—too large for me to take on by myself, heading my way and I decide it’s time to pay the Minister that visit.  So I turn from the blood-smeared ice and jump back inside the Crayfish.  The hatch seals above me just as the new hunting party rounds a massive snow drift and discover their fellow killers laid out unconscious on the ice. 

As if by design, my comm. link switches on, “the Club just released another video.”  My wife tells me.  “You’re running out of time.”  Then she flips a switch and a replay of their broadcast cuts in.  Senator Harb is on his knees before three men in big, plushy dark blue coats with grey fur-trimmed hoods whose shadows Shroud their faces in darkness.  The biggest man holds a gun to Harb’s temple, turns to the camera and, as though he’s speaking directly to me, says, “you have twenty minutes to comply with our demands.  After that, this gun…”  He says, firing off a round at the ceiling before dropping the pistol to floor while another of his comrades hands out bloodstained clubs to each of them, “…will be the least of the good Minister’s concerns…”

The screen goes black and I’m about to ask my wife if she was able to get the coordinates for the Minister’s house but before the first syllable of my request even leaves my lips she’s got it displayed across the screen.  I shake my head with an approving little half smile—God I love that woman…

The Crayfish sinks back into the frigid water and I set a course for Minister Harb’s compound.

 

 

…To Be Concluded…

 

 

             

 

 

Spirits Unbroken: Part II

…I shiver in the shadow of the truck, close my eyes and wait for it to come.  My only regret is that I don’t get to see my wife’s face or hear my son’s voice call for me one last time.  But then something very close by sounds like my son and, come to think of it—the truck should’ve crushed me by now.  So slowly I open one eye.

Then the other.

And I realize the semi-trailer has stopped in mid-air.

It’s just hangs there.

Without a sound.

I shake my head to clear it but my senses have come back to me now—and still I can hear my son against the frantic whinnies from the horses still inside the transport compartment.

And then the trailer slowly moves back and descends, revealing the cable suspending it from the underside of the Sky Fox.  The craft sets the trailer down gently, the top hatch opens and my wife emerges with our smiling son in her arms.  “What took you so long?”  I ask her with a relieved grin.  “Couldn’t find the right thing to wear?”

“Careful.”  She warns, bending down to strap our son back into his seat.  “Or I won’t risk dinner to save your butt next time.”

I wipe the sweat from my brow, or more accurately, rub it into the fabric of my cowl, “who says there’s gonna be a next time?”  I mumble to myself.  Then I rise from the dirt, walk over to the trailer and swipe at the lock securing the door with my claws.  The lock THUDS to the dirt and I peer inside.  “You good?”  I hear my wife ask as I inspect the horses who, to my surprise, appear to all be alright, despite the few cuts I noticed earlier.  A heavy sigh escapes me as I can’t help but think about how much worse this all could’ve turned out. 

And then I see him—the one who I spoke to earlier—Royale With Speed.  He’s bigger than I thought and more beautiful than I could have imagined.  The sun glistens off his perfect coat and his black eyes gaze into mine, filling me with a calmness I never feel when wearing this damn costume.  I move forward, past the others who all sense that I’m the end to their suffering.  I reach out and place my hand on Royale’s muscular neck.  Somehow he manages not to cringe at the touch of a human, after all he’s been through I couldn’t have blamed him if he had.  He moves his head up and down, moving the air around to get as much of my scent in as he can.  He still can’t decide if he can trust me.  His huge nostrils sink in and out with each strong breath.  His tail whips from side to side, swatting at flies.  Then he neighs softly and pushes his long face against my chest—it’s a gesture easily read without my invention.  Most of the time, if you care enough to just try, it’s not really difficult to understand animals—but most humans don’t see it that way.  No matter what our race, creed or religion, most of us are too hung up on appearances—if something doesn’t look like us, we can’t imagine them being like us—sharing thoughts or emotions.  It’s a god complex that has allowed us to accomplish many things as a species: our rank on the food chain, for example.  But it’s also given us the belief that we’re the only ones that matter and that we aren’t responsible for what happens to the rest of the world in our wake because it’s all here for our use anyway—so damn the consequences.

A full minute has passed since the horse nuzzled me and I still can’t take him eyes off him, somewhere in the distance, my wife asks me again if I need any further assistance.  I smile and breathe for the first time in almost a minute and I finally respond with a nod of my head, “yeah, I think we’re good.” 

“Alright then, I’d better get going before our quiches burn.”

“Hold on.”  I shout, my voice echoing inside the metal compartment.  I tilt my head at a button on the far end of the unit, a well-placed Fox Star depresses it and the locks keeping the horses in their stalls release.  I tell them to follow my wife home.  They all accept and the Sky Fox leads them through the woods towards the green pastures they’ve worked all their lives to find.

All but one.  But somehow I’m not surprised that he’s decided to stay.

Royale With Speed’s head thrusts violently up and down and he snorts angrily.  A sudden smile spreads across my face as I stroke the animal’s back, understanding his unmistakable body language, “well old boy, what do ya say?  You up for one last run?”  The slow, determined echo of his hooves against the metal floor of what, only moments ago, had been a horse hearse, is his only response as the exquisite equine brushes past me and exits the trailer.  “Well then.”  I say to myself, wondering if talking to myself is going to become some odd habit.  “Giddyup.”

 

Hooves cut tracks in the dirt as we dash through the undergrowth.  Leaves and random foliage leave green streaks across Royale’s pure white coat as he tears through dense thickets of saplings without slowing.  The landscape flashes and bounces by like I’m on a tilt-a whirl.  I barely feel the breath of the beast carrying me, this is nothing to him.  Running was what he used to live for.  And in that moment it becomes clear to me that Royale With Speed’s day had not passed as his former owners had believed.  Despite his age, his strides are long and smooth, I barely feel the jarring ride, even as we trample over uneven ground littered with rocks and sticks.

His grandfather would’ve been proud.

I feel a jolt and realize Royale With Speed has sped up.  I look ahead and see the tractor, despite its strong lead, it has stopped in a clearing—the drivers probably wondering how they’re going to explain what happened to their boss.  So Royale and I decide to do them a favor and make it so they won’t be able to form complete sentences for a while. 

The horse lowers his head towards the ground.

I hang on tight as we near the tree line.

And we erupt through the ferns like a volcano of muscle and revenge.  The thug pulling out his hair outside the rig sees us and tries to get back inside but the driver already spotted us and the engine rumbles to life.  The truck starts pulling away down the logging trail and the guy outside clings to the door handle for dear life.  Royale barrels ahead, intent on not letting the two escape.  The driver shifts his gears but he’s not fast enough and Royale gets right up alongside the rig, rears up and then kicks the clinging goon into the side of the truck, breaking a few of his ribs and leaving a nice impression of him in the door.  I push off the horse’s muscular back and take his place on the door.  I look back and a cloud of dust conceals what Royale is doing to the fallen man.  Serves him right.  I think to myself before bashing out the window with my elbow.  The driver picks up his gun to cock it and I grab ahold of the roof of the cab and pull myself in just as he pumps the action.  “You know it’s really not safe to shoot and drive.”  I tell him as I grab the muzzle and push it back into his face, breaking his nose.  Then I toss the gun out the window as the driver tries to figure out what to do with the blood oozing from his face. 

The truck comes to an anticlimactic stop in a knoll of ferns just a little off the beaten path of the old logging trail—the fight having drained from the driver like—well—blood from his nose, I suppose.  I pat the thug on the shoulder then we leave the truck.  We make it back to the spot where we left his partner and Royale.  The other thug is laying bruised and broken and covered with blood and dirt. 

But he’s alive.

I tell Royale I thought he’d killed him, that I wouldn’t have blamed him if he had.  <Of course you wouldn’t have,> he knickers.  <You’re human.  We so called “animals” don’t feel the same need for revenge as humans do.>  All I can think about the whole way back to the house is how lucky we are that that’s true.  Because if animals did feel the need for revenge—and if they ever tried to exact that revenge—mankind has much to answer for and we would surely loose that fight.

We supposedly have intelligence but animals have strength.

And as a scientist who survived public school—I can tell you which one usually wins on the playground.

 

In my driveway back at the house, Royale rejoins his herd who have already taken to my property.  All twenty of them pace around in the driveway, it’s a wonderful sight that I’ll never forget.  Their coats shine and their manes bounce, their spirits are lifted and I can’t believe how good they already look after only forty-five minutes of being out in the open air with a little bit of fresh grass in their bellies.  My wife steps outside the house, the aromas of the dinner she’s made me follow her and I can’t wait to sit down to a nice, warm meal.  The horses all look at her and she stares back, smiling. 

And at that moment I remember—she’s always been fond of horses.

“So what are we going to do with all of them?” 

And then the horses are looking at me, their long mane hair blowing in the warm breeze.  “They can stay here with us—if they want to.”  I say, not thinking about anything other than that meal.  My wife puts her hands on her hips and gives me a stern look.  Royale trots up along beside me and wuffles something softly into my ear, I nod in understanding then rephrase my last remark.  “…I mean of course—if it’s alright with you, my dear.”  Then my wife smiles satisfied, and with one sharp nod of her head, goes back inside to set the table.  The horses disperse, heading out into the trees in search for more grass.  Royale heads off with them, probably to find a nice, soft spot to lay down and rest.

He’s had a long day…they all…we all have.  And it frightens me to think about how close these beautiful creatures came to never seeing another sun rise.  But that thought is tossed away like a fly buzzing too close to the tail section of a horse.

Their story couldn’t have ended any better…

Their freedom returned.

Their bellies full

And their spirits unbroken.

Spirits Unbroken: Part I

The wind whips at my mane as I cling to the tree 300 feet above the forest floor—making the final adjustments to the first Hive-Cam; a surveillance camera subtly disguised as a bee hive.  Eventually the forests of Vilas will be covered in them—transferring footage from all around the area to my lab so I can keep an eye on my territory. 

But for now it’s just this one.  I straighten up and lean back just a little to get a wider view of my creation and I have to admit—it looks pretty authentic.  Like a real honest-to-God hive.  Heck, Winnie the Pooh wouldn’t be able to tell the difference and the compact solar panels disguised as leaves above the actual camera unit will keep it powered and hidden.

Sometimes I even amaze myself with my ingenuity.

Then the sound of a very loud, very close horn blaring through the otherwise peaceful woods muffles the tooting of my own.  BUUUUR, BUUUUR!  I glance over my shoulder and through the dense foliage catch a glimpse of a camouflaged double-decker semi tearing over an old logging trail.  “And I was hoping to just hang out all afternoon…”  I say to no one in particular as I let myself fall backwards off the tree and plummet towards the forest floor.  Young trees rise up from the ground, threatening to impale me and I shift my weight to avoid them—but I still wind up with oak leaves in my mane.  The ground rushes up and four feet before impact I spread my arms and let the wind catch the flaps of my suit and I shoot through the undergrowth in a fast, straight trajectory towards the semi.

And then my cowl starts beeping which means someone’s trying to get a hold of me, and there’s only one person I know of who has this kind of bad timing.  But I have a few moments to spare before the real fun begins so I answer the call with a tap against the ear on my cowl.  “Oh hey honey, what’s up?”  I ask my wife as pump my arms to clear a moss-covered boulder.

I can hear pots and pans clanging in the background.  “Just getting dinner ready.  Do you want peas or corn?”

I grimace at the thought of those pasty little green balls, “I think you know the answer to that.”  I say.  “

“Alright, well that’s all I needed to know, dinner will be ready at five o’clock.”

Here comes the part where she tells me I’m sleeping on the couch, “…actually, do you think we could push it to about five thirty?”

There’s a long pause, then “…why?”

I lay it on thick, we haven’t been married long so these types of shenanigans haven’t grown stale just quite yet, “no reason—I just want to see you, that’s all…and I think I may need back up.”

“Dear…”  She says in that annoyed tone she gets when she asks me to take out the garbage for the third time.  “…I can’t just put dinner on warm and go flitting off into the woods.  What am I supposed to do with Brock?”

“Bring him with!”  I reply cheerfully, inching closer to the semi.  “Our son needs to get a feel for the Sky Fox, anyway.”

There’s a certain kind of silence you tend to pick up on when your wife disapproves.  And then I hear the beginnings of her reply, “Brock will join you in this suicidal crusade of your over my dead bod…” 

Then I swoop up right alongside the truck, “oops—gotta go, hun!  See you soon!”  I tap the button and disconnect her.  I hope I won’t need her but somehow a semi rampaging through hidden back roads doesn’t exactly scream “legal”.

I reach the passenger side window and tap on the glass as the truck rumbles over a rough patch in the old logging road that’s riddled with large rocks and pot holes.  The passenger’s face turns a ghostly shade of white and his eyes flare—not exactly the reaction of a law-abiding citizen.  “So whatcha haulin?”  I shout to them, loud enough so they can hear me over the roar of the engine.

The gruff voice is muffled by the glass and the wind between us but the reply is clear, “dead meat…”  It’s also punctuated with the sound of a shotgun cocking. 

Suddenly the passenger ducks as the driver takes aim with the scattergun and fires.

A hailstorm of pellets and shattered glass sprays against my suit and suddenly I’m loosing altitude as I fall back towards the trailer.  I grab a hold of the camouflaged netting that covers the trailer and slam against its side as the truck speeds up, the path becoming so narrow that I have to suck in and press myself as close as I can to the trailer or get clipped by a tree.  I feel a draft and look underneath my arms and see what the problem is—the pellets from the shotgun have shredded the air-catching flaps of my suit.  I won’t be flying anywhere for awhile.

Then an unexpected sound jolts me out of my head.  It’s familiar—like a seal blowing its nose on a bumpy road.  I flip over and find small rectangular slats line the trailer beneath the netting and I peer hard into one of them and gasp at my discovery.

Inside the double-decker compartment are horses. 

Frightened horses.

Exhausted horses.

Neglected horses.

Some of them are have white tape or ribbon around their ankles like racing horses, while others just look like they’ve been worked hard and are noticeably malnourished with their ribs and spine showing and suddenly I realize what this semi is—I’ve heard of it before.  I just had always hoped I’ve never find that it was happening in my territory—but I should’ve been watching for it.

The beautiful animals inside glisten with sweat, many of them have suffered injuries to their legs from being jostled around and their tongues all hang slack and dry outside their mouths—they’re obviously dehydrated.  And with a flip of the Jargon and a few simple neighs I’m brought into the tragedy of their lives from the beginning.

They were race horses once upon a time, the majority of them.  Royale With Speed, a pure white thoroughbred, is actually the grandson of Secretariat and had recently lost six races in a row—that’s when his owner decided to sell him to the meat plant in Quebec—so is the case with many of the others who are crammed, cramped and chained into the transport.  The others are old farm animals who instead of being rewarded with a lush, green pasture for their years of back-breaking service to Old McDonald, were sold to a foreign market where they’ll end up as a hamburger.

I make Royale With Speed a promise that that won’t happen—not if I can stop the smugglers driving the rig.  I turn back around and get slapped in the face with a birch branch.  I try sucking in again but it’s not enough and the bark of a looming jack pine shaves off a patch of my suit and rips open a chunk of flesh.  I creep along the web of netting like a spider until I reach the hitch in between the bobtail and trailer, the two sections surround me like a canyon.   The sound is intense like I’m inside a rock tumbler and the vibration nearly knocks me to my butt.  I’m just about to make my way around to the driver when the passenger smashes out the rear window of the cab with the butt of his scattergun and fires at me through the hole.  I disarm him with a well-placed fox star and his gun clatters through the connections, the truck barely lurches as the weapon flattens beneath the tires.  I dodged the blast but the coupling attaching the trailer to the tractor is obliterated.  And suddenly the sound of metal rubbing against metal fills my ears as the trailer separates from the cab.  Oh crap.  I curse to myself as I realize what’s about to happen—the dirty drivers will get away while I’ll be thrown underneath the out of control trailer while the horses inside crash against each other and the aluminum walls of their pens.

In short: I’ve just killed every horse inside that transport.

I hit the dirt hard and skid into a tree, my head hits the coarse bark and my vision spins as my warm afternoon is swallowed up by the cold shadow of the haywire trailer barreling down on my helpless body.
        
                                                   To Be Continued...