Young Writers Society

That thing could speak!? So much for returning a curve ball, apparently it had an arsenal of pitch types to select from.

That sound, that metal on metal!

I could only speculate the total amount of scars this day would leave in remembrance of itself. I vowed to passionately forbid myself from all things that could even insinuate volunteer in the future, provided the injuries weren't so cavernous they would never get the chance to scar.

We were all aghast. Who the hell wanted to battle, much less converse with it? Everyone was looking to each other for a solution. Thus it blasted another screech before we adjusted to such a precedent.

“Your friend,” it started as if friend was some foreign concept, “is in particular peril.” It... attempted to laugh. This produced a noise similar to a couple dozen pigs being massacred. “I have not taken the pleasure to expunge him. As of yet. All the same, it brings me much convulsions of gratification to end life--in the most harrowing method I know how.”

Dudley was alive! I was sure all were as relieved as I to hear the news. Doubtless he was alive in the most meager sense of the word. So perhaps we were yet daunted, perceiving that his life was on the line for a second time. I had suspected, when it bonked him into a tree, that the adversary might well be rational. It was a blunt move; the bird had not lost grip; it had hurled him against that tree, a pattern contrary to normal animals. Earth-abiding creatures abolish their lunch with as little mess as possible. This bastard was into gore: an unnatural stance in the Animal Kingdom. And that meant it might have underlying motives.

“Hey-y,” Vinny tried to find the nerve. “We ain’t got no beef with you. Why bother us?”

The delight of the position it had us in, divided only by the relatively thin ceiling, was palpable. “Beef? But your kind is like that of beef.”

Malibu emerged as the adult in the room, “Tasty, I’m sure. Now why the hell are you sitting on my property?”

There was a hesitance, almost as if it was blinking in astonishment. Whether contemplating or simply amused I wasn’t sure. Likely, its objectives had never been called into question.

“Vile Pestilence!” it squawked. “Are you not my playthings? Mend your manners, before I rectify them for you.”

“Watch it. This toy bites back.” Pheonix challenged. She hadn’t looked confident when she said it though.

“Charming.” it gloated. “A challenge.” The strumming of claws rained down. “Here’s the game.”

Damn it, we need to slow this party down. Be brave...

“What if, say, we don’t want to play?” I spliced in as I motioned for Gutterson to come over to me. To my dismay I noticed he might as well be on the far shore of the high seas. Precious time. But the wise man had his thinking cap set to critical and began to ford furniture.

“I advise you to partake. Lest you’d rather listen, destitute, while I gradually dash your compatriot to ribbons and demolish this crate straightaway to bathe in your blood. You believe this pitiful housing to serve as a sufficient hide about? Nothing, that any of you are mindful enough to draw upon, can subdue my power. Adversely, I am quite content to be civil about this. Think of it as a token of my charity.”

The building suffered under the force that taxed it. It was beyond frightening to think the roof might cave in at any second. On the other hand, to peacefully rest suffocated under an avalanche of awesomeness might call for a Thanksgiving session when pitted against the idea of dropping dead at the beak of butt ugly.

Gutterson was surprisingly agile for a person his age. He landed nimbly beside me, mute as a spider on the wall.

“Touch a hair on his head,” Vinny flew in the beast’s unseen face, “and I’ll strip that reeking hide of yours.” He may have taken heed not to say such things if he could observe it eyeballing him.

Vinny had been right next to me the whole time, and I tugged his sleeve in my direction as Malibu leaned in. My touch startled him, but Vinny conserved his calm. Now the three of us were a couple of strides away from the others, and hunched in tight of our own accord.

“Oops. Bygone request, I’m afraid.” The villain crooned. “He has undergone some…. discomfort.”

Dallas was now inspired to spew forth as well. “That you’ll regret, Featherhead.”

Vin wanted to forge a comeback, but like a good soldier, he relinquished his Cold War of words with the whale-sized liquidator. Sometimes it’s best to shut your mouth.

Keeping my voice as low as possible I said, “We’ve gotta get to the guns. Vinny: the game has already begun, although I filibustered it from laying out the details just yet. Prolong the talkathon while we're gone, you’re on Delay duty. Detect the do’s and don'ts, learn how to bend them.” I gave a wolfish grin, “Bend that thing’s mind a little, whatever. I expect the protocol when we get back.”

Somewhere in the distance I faintly heard the bantering of the unhuddled entities. Dallas, Mr. Chieftan, was telling the monstrosity how he trusted it as much as he would trust a cop to hunker down on duty during Worldwide Doughnut Day--if there was such a day.

“I’m no salesman.” Vinny whispered back. “I can only do my best.”

“That’s all I can ask for.” I saluted. “Get going.”

I was left with my old chum Malibu. “Hope the bird won’t miss us.” I kidded. “Maybe they can chaperone it to the nearest bird bath.”

We broke camp and streaked to the edge of the arena. Teeny stairs gave the lavish arena its oval shape. We leapfrogged the two steps, galloping towards a ramp beside the bar. On the side of the bar that did not lead to an isolated water closet, the ramp ascended to unite with a balcony situated directly above the bar. There was an ongoing feud as to its bona fide name. Gut called it the Wooden Leg; I called it Peggy--right now neither of us gave a butterball cow.

We mounted the slope and pivoted to the right, where our feet traded shag carpet for thick lumber, and whizzed by a collage of antlers that made up the balcony's railing. There was a terrace akin to this, on the opposite side of the quarters that was larger, dull blue, non-wooden, and had no railing to enclose the open edge of its rectangular perimeter. That one was a plain wing for secluded lounging, “rising above," or what I had a tendency to use it for, ambushes.

But Peggy was exclusive, if not confidential access. Gut once said he’d block the entrance of the ramp with caution tape if it wouldn’t spark curiosity from unwanted pests, like bugs to a light bulb. He had informed me of its existence, but that was only as good as knowing that Area 51 is in Nevada--you never get to visit.

But now I was about to become a commemorative-patch-wielding member of in-the-know, all thanks to this catawampus day. After all this time that he had supplied mystery with infinite room and board somewhere at the heart of the shack, all the time amidst the cover up that he never felt remorse for the martyrdom of my imagination (seeing as it postulated a jillion theories as to the weapons’ majesty so that it was overwhelmed), I was going to get to peer into the belly of the beast!

Finally, an event to rejoice over. The revelation.

We zoomed through a dim, open space, which a view from downstairs would obscure the depth of, that lead back to some dreary curtains. Gutterson instinctively swept them out of the way to unveil a silver box with small beeping lights. A pole bored through its center and if it wasn't for that I'd have thought the box was lying in an everyday spot on the floor. He produced a round, gooey substance, rolled it around on the fingers of his left hand, stooped over, and began punching a code into a keypad I hadn't noticed on the side of the box. I peered over his shoulder that I might dedicate the sequence to memory. A closer look revealed there weren’t numbers on the buttons, but symbols.

Gnarly padlock.

When he squashed the last button, the lights flashed faster, faster, louder, louder, and a series of interwoven clicks came from inside, cracks slowly transpiring ever wider along all the cube's surfaces. An icy glow scattered from between the cracks like the sun’s rays through a glacier.

Gnarlier padlock.

“Now you know,” he warned as we watched it break apart and lift to expose the hole it had concealed.