“Got a new one,” the boy stated as he ascended up the steep slope of Jenna Drive on his red ten-speed.
It didn’t matter how the boy felt on any given day. Either in sickness or in good health, the steep climb uphill was always a struggle. In a city as conspicuously flat as Ames, Iowa, Tyson was lucky enough to live near surely the only real hill in town. And this often insurmountable mountain was the only obstacle the young boy needed to overcome on his way to and from Abby Mitchell Elementary.
It wasn’t like this was Tyson’s only option to get him to school on time. The boy’s stepmother was more than happy with Tyson catching a ride with her and Sasha on the way into town. But the raccoon’s desire for independence had begun to assert itself. It would take some effort to surmount the slope on a daily basis, but Tyson would eventually render the task an effortless endeavor. Well, that was the goal anyway.
“Oh? So what’s your theory this time?” the stoat teased as he casually strolled beside the boy near the gutter. Tyson may have been exerting all his strength to clip along at a steady pace uphill, but even then, Trace was still able to match his speed as if no effort was needed. “I’m not sure what you expect me to say, but sure, I’ll humor you.”
“Alien ghost,” the young boy stated jokingly as he gulped down draughts of fresh air, his body rising off the seat with each push.
“’Alien ghost’? Huh. Was not expecting that one. So what? Just as the name suggests: the spirit of some alien guy who died?”
“That’s pretty much it. So what do you think? You think it makes sense?”
“Dude, I’m not sure what to think,” said the ermine with a genial, sideways glance. “But it’s better than some of your other theories. At least this one’s more entertaining than the last few. ‘Cuz I sure as hell ain’t your imaginary friend, Tyson. Let’s get that straight.”
Tyson didn’t have a response, so he stayed quiet for the time being as he concentrated on the steep climb. It would only be a matter of time before the two approached the summit, but it was patently apparent that the boy—try as he might—lacked the muscle mass needed to peddle his way there.
From the corner of his eye, the stoat could see Tyson struggle to surmount Ames’ lonely mountain, and physical strain wasn’t the only pain Trace read on the boy’s tired face. There was far more activity erupting underneath plain sight than the end result of ordinary exercise. The stoat could never quite put his finger on it, but he rarely needed to be told outright that Tyson was upset or in some foul mood. You’d be wary to shelve him like a closed book, but it wasn’t always an easy task to read deep enough to know the boy’s true disposition. Trace knew that better than anyone even if the reason why would likely elude him indefinitely.
‘It’s weird to think Tyson’ll be nine years-old in a couple days,’ Trace thought. ‘It doesn’t feel like a whole year has passed. Time flies, I guess.’
The stoat tilted his head back, shoved both hands into each trench coat pocket, and stared reflectively past the bare tree branches and into the wide open spread of calm blue sky that laid beyond their reach. It would be only a matter of days before the bitterness of winter would give way to the lush and inevitable resurrection of springtime. The limbs overhead had begun to sprout green shoots, and the ever-enduring wind had since lost its bite. For the past couple days, the temperatures held steady around forty, and the resuming wildlife had begun to fill the treetops with psalms of resurgence. The dampness of mid-March had filled the air with petrichor’s perfumed pull and the clean scent of ozone after a refreshing rainfall.
They were signs that signaled a fresh start for all of life, but new beginnings were not in plain sight for everything under the sun. Even if Tyson didn’t say it out loud, Trace knew that the boy was unable to let the relentless march of tides wash away yesterday’s detritus with time. Tyson clung onto that wretched piece wreckage for dear life as if his sanity depended on it. And, in fact, that may not have been far from the truth. In the end, given what he’d lost, the stoat couldn’t fault Tyson for clinging to the debris left behind that terrible day last March.
‘It should be an exciting time for him, but he’s barely talked about it,’ Trace mused. It was then that an idea sprung to mind as his thoughts lingered on unfinished business. There was only one reason he’d be so hesitant. Monsters weren’t on his mind today. They rarely were. What occupied the boy’s thoughts more often than anything else—even if he didn’t openly admit it—was what was left behind before the violence shook the earth with fury and flames.
‘I wonder if it’s got anything to do with the girl.’
“You still don’t think you could be like my guardian angel or whatever? I don’t think that one’s all that weird,” the boy said, trying to inject more levity even as he began to run out of breath. “You lost your memory, right? So who’s to say you didn’t just forget that you’re an angel? Why can’t it be that simple?”
“I don’t know, dude. It just doesn’t feel right,” the stoat responded, a solemn burden now weighing down his thoughts with sudden severity. “It’d feel like a lie if I said that much. I wish I knew what to tell you, but I’ve really got no idea. I still don’t remember anything, Tyson. Where I came from. Who I am. The only thing I do know for sure is my name. And who’s to say that ‘Trace’ is even my real name? Point being, I don’t want to call myself anything unless I’m entirely sure.”
“I just don’t want you to be like just a ghost, y’know? That’d be really lame,” he promptly answered with affected liveliness. Trace didn’t have to look at the boy to know that he was about ready to buckle. It was only a matter of time before the raccoon’s legs gave out from under him. “And I’ve never heard of a ghost that could do all the stuff you do. You for real about that stuff? You can just wake up—I know you don’t really sleep but still—and look like a whole new person? A new outfit and the like? I think it’s funny. You barely look like the same guy I met back then. Yeah, you got the same coat—same Chucks—but that’s about it. How come you can’t just—“
“You talk too much,” he said, interrupting Tyson mid-sentence. “You know that? Life would be so much better if you kept your mouth shut more often.”
“You’re such a douchebag, Trace. Why you gotta pick on me so damn much? What I ever do to you?” Tyson asked, laughing and exerting actual, honest enthusiasm for the moment.
“’Cuz it’s fun. That’s why. I love pickin’ on ya, kid. You got a funny face.”
“And what’s so funny about my face?”
“Everything,” he jeered. “Where would I even begin? You’ve seen yourself plenty of times in the mirror. Make an educated guess, numbnuts. Why would I think you look funny?”
Suddenly, everything fell silent. The bike’s tires ground to a halt, and the cheerfulness had all but abruptly fled the scene with the wind. It didn’t stand a single chance. The stoat came to understand that much as he saw Tyson hunch over the bike’s frame with abject dismay. Tyson may’ve hidden his facial features underneath the hood of his red sweatshirt, but his body language was easily a dead giveaway. The young boy was in considerable pain.
“Dude, why are you stopping?” Trace asked with a small laugh, hoping in vain to disarm the issue with humor. “You’re almost at the top. You got like twenty feet left.”
“I’m sorry,” the boy said, firmly clutching the handlebars. His youthful voice was straining to stay composed under the mounting pressure. It was much akin to a shrill, warbling sound about to splinter a fine wine glass. It was only a matter of time before the right frequency was found, and everything would fall apart. “I just can’t. I can’t do it.”
The stoat could hear it in his voice. Tyson was drowning. He’d let go of the wreckage, and his body was slipping under the waves. If Trace didn’t act now, the boy would be swept out to sea by the vindictive currents of misery. So Trace did the first thing that came to mind. He embraced the young boy before he’d sink to the bottom like so many forsaken shipwrecks.
“Some days I wish she really did die back there. She’d be dead and I could get on with life, and everything would eventually get better. But, more than anything, I hate myself for thinking that. Even for a second. I hate myself when it gets that bad, but I’m not sure what else to do. Isaak. Naomi. They don’t remember her at all, and I don’t know why. I feel like I’m going crazy thinking about a girl everyone says isn’t—wasn’t—real.”
The ermine had wanted to say his peace, but deep down Trace knew that the best course of action demanded that he’d remain silent. Right now, the stoat simply had to be the lifeline Tyson sorely needed to stay afloat.
“I miss her all the time, Trace. All the time. And I don’t know what to do about it. I even see her in my dreams. She won’t go away no matter what I do. Everyone else just acts like she was never even alive. But Trace, I know she’s out there. And I left her to die,” Tyson finished, the glass shattering at long last. It was then that his speech became almost unintelligible. “And I’m so sorry I let it happen.”
The ermine felt the boy begin to sob uncontrollably into his chest and instinctively pulled him closer.
“What are you talking about? You didn’t leave her to die. Tyson, you were beaten the hell up when I found you. What were you supposed to do?”
“I don’t care,” the boy asserted, preventing the torrents from overwhelming his senses by fighting back the deluge. “It was my fault. And now it’s my job to fix everything.”
“Fix everything? Kid, don’t put that kind of responsibility on your—”
“We need to go back,” he insisted, breaking free of Trace enfolded arms. The boy’s eyes were red, but the tears had since evaporated. In its place was tenacity and the strength of will. “We can’t just leave her there.”
*chick*
But Tyson was no longer the shaken child who now sat upon the seat. In fact, the boy in his place didn’t look anything like the young raccoon. The only aspect they shared in common was a singular voice. The boy who stared back was but an apparition from a bygone era haunting Trace in the present tense. He, too, was an ermine much like Trace, but his attire was strikingly antiquated. The boy donned a brown newsy cap, gray sweater vest, a long-sleeve white cotton shirt, black tailored trousers and mahogany wingtips.
But the one thing that truly made the most impact was his tender, trusting face. The gentle gray eyes that received Trace’s scrutiny seemed to gaze back from a long lost lifetime modestly restored in a fleeting moment. He was a living memory made manifest and encapsulated in the heart of a shuddering child. And all the stoat could do in response was stare mouth agape as tears streamed down his face in untended waterfalls. Even then—even with this dramatic and inexplicably raw reaction—what frightened the ermine the most was that this boy was still nobody but a stranger.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, impersonating the raccoon’s voice with absolute accuracy. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
*chack*
***
"What’s wrong?” the young man muttered, eyes closed and body slumping to one side.
“Mr. Bishop?”
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Mr. Bishop, are you with us?” a pleasant voice asked from behind the veil of haze.
Tyson’s eyes had yet to adjust, and everything in sight was all part of a single indistinct blur randomly coming into and out of focus. From what Tyson could tell, he felt as if he was bound in place and unable to move his arms and legs. Not that any real effort to move them would have mattered much. All his appendages were numbed to any discernible sensation, but that didn’t mean that there was no connection whatsoever.
He felt the presence of pressure restraining his wrists and ankles to the chair in which he sat, and it burned to the touch. But more than that, the young man felt an inexplicable impression that an integral aspect of his very soul had been taken from him. Either that or it had been mistakenly carved out of his body like a cancerous sore. A thief in the night had stolen a vital organ, and he’d surely die if it wasn’t returned.
“I was wondering when you’d regain consciousness,” the serene voice chimed, continuing the conversation. Tyson tried to train his focus on the man, but his eyes couldn’t rest on any steady images. This soft-spoken sentry was simply a darkened blur standing in contrast with a blinding background of bright white light. “After a while I began to doubt that you—or more specifically somebody with your physiological makeup—would react to the same set of stimuli as all the others. But, in the end, you didn’t surprise. Just as expected, a couple days was all you really needed to fully recuperate.”
“Recuperate? From what?” Tyson asked sleepily, slurring his words in the process. “Where am I?”
“Patience, Mr. Bishop. All will be revealed in due time. But first, there’s one issue that can’t be overlooked,” the spectral figure said calmly as he pulled an item from his pocket, or at least that’s what the young man came to assume. “Is it true that I’m speaking with a Mr. Tyson Bishop? Is that your name?”
“Yeah, that’s my name. Who are you?”
Suddenly, a sharp, clanking sound rang out in front of Tyson’s face. It was soon followed by the scraping of metal and a loud snap. Every separate sound was but a single step in a deliberate, hypnotic progression. Right after the final step’s conclusion, Tyson saw a small flame erupt to life before him. The young man sat motionless with wide-eyed, enraptured enthusiasm as the fire held firm from within a lighter’s gunmetal gray throne. In that moment, Tyson sat transfixed and unable to give his mind over to anything else. What mattered most was the flame’s resolute resilience clarifying the scene around him. The longer he stared, the more that was revealed about this space in his peripheral vision.
The room he and the man occupied was composed of incandescent glass walls of milky white that shone with a lifelike radiance. The white space was filled with computer monitors meticulously arranged along the walls with old, thick tomes standing out between each of them. Yellowed parchments hung from the white walls in glass cases near a plethora of firearms and bladed weaponry kept securely locked behind glass cabinets. Tyson then heard an electric chime sound off and slide open a door behind the stranger. It appeared that they had both been received by a visitor’s presence. Tyson made an effort to distinguish its features from the room in which it stood, but for the time being, this new shadow merged with the many multitudes that rose and fell in swift succession.
“This should help you see a little better. I’m sure you’ve got plenty on your mind right now,” he said, traces of distrust inflecting his once pleasant and personable tone with menace. “But there are a few issues that must be resolved before I can tell you what wish to know.”
And with one swift motion, the lighter’s casing engulfed the fire with one quick flick of the wrist. The coarse clanking sound of metal striking metal had broken the spell the flame had cast over his mind. The young man could see that his assumption was proven accurate. He glanced up to see that the man had indeed held out his hand to incite the raccoon’s interest. In fact, the stranger still kept the black zippo extended as he stared intently into Tyson’s eyes with ardent, analytical absorption.
The young man was disarmed by that electric blue luminosity searching his soul for motivation. Even though the stranger could not have been more than three feet away, the look in his eyes gave the impression that this man’s body and soul, if one was still inside, were disconnected. His lively blue eyes, for all their lurid luster and supposed cheerfulness, were somber and detached from the world at large. They were both standing on separate shorelines that each stood miles apart. His incandescent, empathetic eyes beckoned Tyson across the water’s reach like an unmanned lighthouse. Even then, it was all subterfuge. Even though the man’s body sat composedly for all to see, he simply wasn’t all there.
“’Tyson L. Bishop’ is the name on the driver’s license I found in your wallet. And you look enough like the man featured in the photograph, but appearances can be deceiving. As much as I’d like to take your word for it, I know from past experience that such faith would be unwisely placed.”
Tyson could only think of one word as he observed the strange man who sat before him: grim. Everything about him, aside from his fur and hair, was stern and black. Everything about his wardrobe from his black pea jacket and black dress pants to his black boots and gloves was altogether melancholy and unyieldingly strict. He was a rabbit around forty with fur the color of cream. The polished sheen of his bronze hair was cut in a short, unremarkable style that belied its splendor. And his facial features were every bit as sharp and rigid as his choice in clothing.
“I’m going to ask you again, and I want you to be honest with me. Am I speaking with a Mr. Tyson Bishop?”
“What’s this about? Why do you keep asking me that?”
“You probably don’t remember me, Tyson, but I’ve known about you and the circumstance concerning your current state for quite some time,” said the rabbit, slowly filing his zippo in a coat pocket. His peculiar blue eyes never once breaking their stubborn focus on Tyson.
“In fact, I’m surprised that I’d even run into you again after all these years. Let alone with either of us in this precarious position. But in this instance, it would’ve been reckless to let well enough alone. I’ve taken a keen interest in you in recent months after it became apparent that you played host to a powerful entity. We had to take action to ensure that no harm came either to you anyone else. We're doing this to help you.”
“Help me? I feel like a prisoner here,” Tyson retorted with mounting irritation. “You haven’t even told me your name. And what’re you going on about with this crap? I’m no threat.”
This response elicited a real reaction from the man in black. His eyes squinted and his once unmoving, mechanical smirk honed each edge into razor-sharp points. Relief washed over Tyson’s body as the man’s interest drew itself to a manila folder he kept in his lap. He opened it and began to thumb over page after page inside. He was glad that the man’s eyes no longer rested their sharp scrutiny on him. It was like a surgeon’s scalpel cutting into his vulnerable body with no anesthesia.
“While you slept, I swung by the Des Moines office to see if they had any documentation that would substantiate my suspicions. And I came across a few inconsistencies in the official record. Your name and few others—maybe five or six—were listed on a particular register taken six years ago. Around July.”
“Why would I be on some random list? What's it for?”
“Good question,” the rabbit said with subtle acerbity. He cocked his head and lifted his eyes off the contents within the file folder. That discreetly, disquieting expression still lingering on his face like an unsheathed sword.
“To be honest, I was surprised I stumbled across it. It was by accident no less. The other names on the list were suspiciously redacted, but your name—oddly enough—was left unedited. I’m not sure what this could mean. For whatever reason, Blutmond took an interest in you, Tyson. And that is what troubles me the most. You don’t want to be on their radar. And if you are, then you have good reason to be afraid. But then again, you’d know by now if their plans called for your detainment. In other words, you’d be in a cell by now if that’s what they wanted most. I want to know why they even bothered with you in the first place. I’d like to know why they assumed you were worth studying.”
“Yeah, I’d like to know what the hell’s going on, too,” the young man shot back derisively.
“Tell me, how long have you known ‘Trace’?”
“Trace?” Tyson asked, caught off-guard with this surprise question. In all this time, nobody had ever asked Tyson about Trace directly. In just over a decade, the idea never once dawned on him to think of a cover story. The reason behind such inaction was that there was no need to bother with such needless, bothersome work for a phantom’s sake.
“You muttered his name in your sleep every so often. Can you tell me a little more about this man? Is he a family friend?”
“Yeah, he’s been part of our family for like ten years,” he said, tripping over his tongue in an effort to force the words out his mouth fast enough to please his interrogator. “He’s from back east. Chicago.”
For all any of them knew, that much wasn’t fabricated. The South Side’s attitude was often inflecting the stoat’s speech with a sort of coarse self-confidence. If he had to come from anywhere, in lieu of an actual answer, Tyson and Trace came to the conclusion that the Windy City was likely the one place Trace must have called home in life.
“And was he the one who gave you this?” the rabbit demanded, retrieving Tyson’s bracelet from the same coat pocket he placed his zippo. The upsetting smile he once wore was now gone. The mask had fallen away, and its place stood the appearance of a man who’d do just short of anything to discover the truth. The sheer ferocity in his bright blue eyes was simply frightening.
“I don’t know how you came into the possession of such an artifact, but rarely does anything this valuable fall out of the sky into someone’s lap. Be honest with me, Tyson, where did you get this?”
It was then that the other man who stood behind the rabbit much like a constant shadow took a step out of the darkness and into the revealing light of transparency. Even then, it was hard to make out each individual detail. He appeared to be a marten in his mid-twenties. He wore a dark flak jacket that seemed to be made from a protective, nonflammable material like Kevlar. And his black cargo pants hugged both legs until they cuffed around a pair of jet black Timberland boots. He was a man of tall standing with an athletic physique.
Even though he went at length to disguise his facial features underneath an enormous hood, some elements were not made undetectable by such suppression. The hood made an undersized cavern that veiled anything too enlightening from view, but even then, Tyson could perceive the white and light brown textures of his facial fur. The young man strained in his seat to catch sight of the visitor’s eyes, yet they were still inaccessible in shadow.
“You’re stalling.”
“What? No, I’m just—“
“And I’ve had enough.”
‘Just tell him what he wants to hear. By then it’ll soon be over.’
The raccoon’s mind adjusted itself straight away to the invading voice’s demand. It was a familiar petition. He’d heard the same timbre of sureness and security for little more than a decade now. On instinct, he looked up and stared into the eyes of the hooded marten. This time around, unlike merely a moment ago, Tyson beheld his golden brown eyes the same way he’d regard a parent or guardian. They were full of slight distress and uneasiness, but they retained a substance that the rabbit sorely lacked. They were eyes filled to the brim with unblemished, indisputable kindness.
But stranger than this recognizable sympathy was the simple fact that all the while he spoke, his lips never moved.
“Tyson, do you have any idea,” the rabbit murmured in quiet tones, almost apprehensive in his approach, “what’s living inside you?”
Tyson’s eyes stayed on the hooded marten before they fell back down to meet the rabbit.
“Who are you people?” he breathed, eyes wide with both primal fear and fascination.
But before the young man could properly react, the rabbit had lunged into another coat pocket and splashed Tyson’s face with what must’ve been sulfuric acid. At least that’s what it felt like for the young man as he tipped backward off his chair, clutching and clenching as he thrashed in pain on the shiny, smooth white tile floor. The rabbit rose off his seat, strode around the upturned chair and knelt beside Tyson while he pulled one last object from the same pocket.
“You’re fine, Tyson. You’re fine,” said the rabbit with unsettling cordiality. “It was just water. Ordinary, everyday tap water. ”
The scalding pain had subsided for the moment, and its enduring aftershock was being rapidly transmuted into rage. At once, the fury was forced upward and primed ready for eruption. But before Tyson could let loose an attack on the man in black, the raccoon was welcomed by a horrific portrait: his own reflection. The ire he’d stoked at a hysterical pace fell away the minute his mind processed the image in the pocket mirror. The bared teeth and fierce eyes were both eerily identifiable. They were like stunning scenes from an oft-recalled memory. His raised fist lost all its determined firmness and resolution once the connection was made conclusively. He’d only seen these eyes once before, but their impact stuck with him all these years, nonetheless. These were the same foreboding eyes Tyson once saw back in the forest more than a decade ago.
They were eyes of red and orange.
“Are you sure you’re not a threat?”
***
*BOOM!*
The stoat heard the sound before he felt the cold encase him in ice like a burial shroud. A hammer had been taken to the sky, and its mantle had been devastated by the blunt force of the impact. Trace’s heart screamed in his chest as his eyes thrust open from the shockwaves. The crashing calamity overhead drove the rooks from the barren branches and into the deadened winter scenescape. The world was quiet in the wake of such unimaginable violence. The cawing crow and its murder had flown away and left but the rumbling sounds of an idle engine to the fill the empty space with life.
“Tyson?” the ermine quietly called out. But the car’s stuttering reluctance was the only response. So Trace tried again, but this time he chose to shout, “Tyson?!”
But there was still no answer to be heard in the wind’s wispy, incomprehensible voice.
The ermine utilized every ounce of strength to stir his body off the cold ground, but his flesh couldn’t resist the flooding pain piercing his torso underneath the right breast. Reaching his limit, the stoat collapsed face first into the wintry debris with a soft crunch. Coughing up a brief burst of blood, Trace resigned his resolution to the barren soil.
His vision was then immersed in the chilly stasis of snow striking his face and back with cold, compassionless indifference. The world was but a blank slate of shuddering white walls. The fallen flakes would soon stifle the stoat’s breath in burial. In short order, he’d dissolve into the drab background. And Trace’s white fur would most surely hide his body until the spring thaw revealed the shadow of his former self.
“Just what were you thinking, Trace?” a voice asked from above. The ermine recoiled at the sound and tried to shift position to catch sight of the source. But the effort proved itself to be too tiring. The full exertion of his will could only cause his arms and legs to shiver impotently in the freezing snow. “Huh? Why didn’t you take charge when you had the chance?
In the end, it was all for naught. Before the stoat could lift his body off the ground, the stranger strode over and shrunk down on the tips of his toes to face the ermine with a tilted head. It was the same ferret who stood warily in the copse of trees back in Fraser. The very same creature who was once persistently stalking them deep within the forest was now scrutinizing the stoat’s face for any signs of distress.
In contrast to the incensed countenance he showed back in town, the expression he wore with such self-satisfaction now was one of innocuous innocence. Even then—even with his ostensibly warm impression—his features were absolutely inscrutable. His sweet smile was both honestly felt and yet came across as correspondingly artificial. Whatever his intentions, the peculiar ferret with the bow tie and suspenders was hiding in plain sight. And that’s what frightened the ermine the most.
They never left the forest.
“It’s you,” he said, wheezing from the pain and struggling to overcome the numbness everywhere else.
“Oh my fair icarus, how far you’ve fallen,” said the ferret affectionately as he pulled the ermine to his feet and draped one of Trace’s arms over his shoulder. The stoat stared at the joyful ferret in disbelief as he stood undeterred and unaffected by the cold.
“What did you just call me?” the ermine inquired, mildly irritated.
“You had ample time to get away, but you let that boy fall to pieces anyway,” the stranger said warmly, all but ignoring the question. “I just don’t know what’s become of you, Trace. Trust me when I say that you’re not the man you used to—”
*EHRRRAAAAAAGHHH!*
But the stranger was unable to finish. Just like before, the world was rocked by sounds of tremendous violence. But this time around, the noise overhead was purely primal in nature. A great beast had taken flight unseen into the white abyss, and it was screaming its sadistic intentions to all who stood in range. Yet the sky above was little more than a brilliantly bright white board illuminating the sleeping wastelands of an icy world. There were no warnings or ill omens that sailed across the vacant sea. The ferret smiled and stared into the nihility of this eerily, empty space. The stranger seemed unfazed by the monster’s call to arms. In fact, he appeared to be almost absorbed by the implications of the beast’s inevitable approach. The look in his face was not fear. It was anticipation.
“This is it, isn’t it? This is where it began all those years ago,” he said with a hush, his eyes scanning the horizons. “How exciting!”
*ker-chack*
At once, Trace was drawn to the façade of a quaint farm house. It was a two-story scenic beauty with ebony black shudders and pearl white siding. The red chimney’s stack breathed the warmth of rejuvenating life into the frigid sky with fresh soot. And the idling car was revealed to be none other than a pristine, pale blue ’32 Ford Victoria. If the immaculate tire tracks were any indication, then this arrival’s entrance was only recently made. But none of them were what drew Trace’s interest to the delightfully outmoded estate. It was the sound of a screen door clattering shut that captured it. There was no way it could have been anything else. It was unmistakable.
“Someone’s inside,” the ermine declared in a sickly, weakened voice.
*EHRRRAAAAAAGHHH!*
Once more, the unseen creature screamed its rallying cry over the frozen plains like a trumpet’s resounding shout amassing an army in the unobservable distance. Wherever it had flown off to, it was circling back around to accost the ermine and ferret with reinforcements.
“Need not mind the drums of war, friend of mine,” the ferret said with unexpected zeal and battle lust of a conquering crusader. “Blood may soon be shed within the hour. We must be prepared come what may. Let’s go!”
With much laughter and great haste, the stranger led the battered stoat up the driveway while Trace clutched at his torso. Blood had begun to leach through his shirt and over his hand in trickles.
“Wait, wait,” the ermine implored, both feet dragging along the icy pavement. “We can’t go there. Someone’s inside. Someone’s. It could be—it could be—“
But it soon became apparent that the ferret had no interest in listening no matter what was said. And Trace was losing all desire to assert his thoughts now that they’d fallen on deaf ears.
“Please,” he feebly begged as they scuttled up the driveway, his lungs giving out and his vision fading. “We can’t go inside. Someone’s inside. Someone’s—“
Suddenly, without warning, the white world gave way to the still black solace of the void. When Trace awoke, his eyes were captivated by an entrancing, bright blue light that consumed everything nearby in an enticing, ethereal glow. As the ermine took the time adjust to the new settings, he discovered that he’d been stripped, bandaged and left to heal in one of the house’s many bedrooms. Trace tried to push back the covers, but his weakened body made such a task too taxing to bear in stride. The stoat was pinned to the firm mattress and unable to affect the affair to suit his need.
“Hello there, Trace,” said the voice of a young woman with quiet, controlled resentment.
The disguise was barely, if at all, persuasive. Once she stowed the light away in a closed fist, Trace was able to fathom the extent of her discontent. She may not have signaled it with her word choice or intonation, but Trace would have been long dead if her scowl could wound.
She was a lynx who had to be around nineteen to twenty years-old. Her shoulder-length, tawny brown hair cascaded from her head like the unruly currents of a mighty stream splashing every which way once they collided with the boulders at the bottom. The bangs appeared poised to submerge both auburn eyes as well, but their progress was obstructed before they washed down her face and overtook her buttermilk brown facial fur. From what the stoat could see, the young woman wore a red and yellow flannel shirt, a plain white undershirt, a scarf the color of smoke and black leggings. It didn’t take much more than a casual glance to conclude that this lynx stood out among the antiques crowding this charming little room with quaint charisma. And the dissimilar apposition of her presence in this place was, by far, the most alarming aspect of this waking vision.
“Who are—“
And that was all Trace could manage before his breath was choked in his throat by an intangible hand pressing its full weight down upon his windpipe. But in all that time, the lynx hadn’t made a move. She stood still with her left hand clutching at the bright blue light’s source. The other remained at her side as, once more, she voiced her concerns.
“We need to talk.”
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