Such As It Is

in

"Nothing more to do here?" The severe woman in the crisp, black business suit looked unsmilingly on her partner.

"Nothing." Her partner, a bearded man of sizable girth looked around the small living room with a look that approached wistful as near as it dared. His suit was red and of a much more generous cut, but otherwise in the same style as hers. "Everything's in place. Such as it is."

"Excellent." The woman tapped something on a tablet. "On to the next."

"But..."

"We have a schedule to keep, Nick. No time for a nightcap." The man's gusty sigh soughed through his beard. He made a tired gesture toward their egress with a winter-gloved hand. She ducked in ahead of him and he, pausing a moment, took one last look at the scene: a plastic tree by the fireplace, beneath it a slim binder detailing available rewards for virtue points earned through the year.

"Tick tock, Nick." He closed his eyes and remembered a happier time. "Tick tock." He stepped beside her at the mantle and laid a finger on his nose. As they whisked up the chimney, he wished for a time before the hostile takeover of Christmas.

An Innocent Fiction

in

It was a tiny story, an innocent fiction. He wrote it for his friend Cindy and, in whimsical fondness, named the character after her. Cindy, as described in no more than two hundred words, was fond of ancient art, her home, and a little bit of arson. Just a funny, little story.

He began receiving old, dusty postcards in the mail, bearing no return address and "What do you know?" spelled with magazine cutouts. Texts came from unknown numbers asking, "How do you know?" He sometimes thought he was being followed.

Running into Cindy in the local bookstore, he asked if she remember that story he'd given her. She furrowed her brow, stared into the recesses of memory, and said, "Oh, yeah. What was it about, again?" Something about the statement felt deceptive, and he excused himself awkwardly.

He woke at three a.m. with Cindy standing over him, gun pointing at his hairline, and he had to mutter "What?" three times before her words made sense. "How did you know?" she said.

"I didn't! I don't! I just wrote a story! I made it all up!"

"Oh." She lowered the gun. "Can we maybe keep this just between us?"

Dog Noir 2

in

It was a day where everything's too still, so still it puts an itch between your shoulder blades, one you can't reach to chew. I was working out of The Couch, my favorite hangout. The bosses didn't want me there, but I'm not always a good dog.

I was worrying the old Squeaky Frog Case, and I felt on the verge of cracking it when she walked in. Sleek, subtle, and insidious, we'd tussled before. It had never ended well. Usually, she stayed on her turf and I stuck to mine, but The Couch was neutral territory.

I could almost hear the schemes percolating in her mind like the water in a powered-pump water bowl. But she wasn't looking to fight. She had a puzzle for me. She disappeared around the corner and I heard a sound a high wheeze that could only be a break on the Rubber Bone Mystery. I followed at a run.

I found the bone, but not her. Suspicious, I returned to The Couch to find her in my spot. There was no use arguing. When that cat's claws come out, no one walks away happy. It wasn't fair, but hey. It's a dog's life.

Dog Noir

in

The air's unseasonal chill tickled my nose as I sat in The Yard. It smelled like trouble. That's why I wasn't surprised when she walked in. Her legs went all the way up, to a butt too high to sniff. I could tell by the way she approached that she had a job for me.

She wanted me to come with her. Normally I'm too suspicious, but there was something familiar in the way she stood. So I followed, and once we turned the corner I knew exactly what she wanted.

It was an old song, so old I could sing along if I hadn't been salivating at the mystery I knew was coming. She'd lost something. A ball, no doubt. These dames and their balls. And she wanted me to go get it.

Nothing's free. If she wanted me to do her dirty work for her, she had to do something for me first. She had to throw it. The moment she did, I knew why she seemed so familiar. She was my partner, my frequent companion... she'd just changed her hair.

Mystery solved, I prepared to do what I do best. It was time to earn the biscuits.

Forty Years in Service

in

Suwo snapped to attention as the officer entered the the interview room, all concrete and bolted steel and wide, shadowed one-way mirror. Her uniform marked her as a major, but conspicuously lacked her name. She nodded and said, "Take your seat."

"Yes, Sir." Despite the major's easy manner, Suwo maintained her posture.

Sitting, the major slapped a thick file on the metal table and flipped through it. "Trained, conditioned in '43. Saw action in '44, '45 and '47. Reconditioning  in '49, back in the field in '51. Since then, stationed for rapid deployment in Libya, the Ukraine, Guatemala, and Phoenix. In the service... almost forty years." She paused for reaction, but Suwo had none.

"And now you get to retire. Normal." The major set a large, metal syringe on the table, filled with a metallic liquid. "This will deactivate your enhancements."

Suwo picked up the needle, looked at it. "The lab coats always told us these enhancements were permanent."

The major shrugged. "Science, am I right?"

Suwo dropped it; it shattered. "Oops." The major's easy manner vanished. She straightened, her hand conspicuously under the table.

"You know we have to decommission you, soldier."

"I know you're going to try. Sir."