Kittens with MechWarriors!

Author’s note: What happened to Between a Grizzly and Her Cub? I didn’t quit that miniseries. However, I took a break from it. It will return next week.

I invite you, if you don’t know what I mean by any of this, to scroll backwards through this blog and read that miniseries from the beginning.

A miniseries centered around murder, Russian hookers, and crooked cops didn’t strike me as holiday friendly. I present, this week, a shift from the serious stuff to something easy and lighthearted.

I shall, next Thursday, post a short, Thanksgiving themed story.

Today, I offer the following, Kittens with MechWarriors. What else? Enjoy.

—And yes, “MechWarrior” is trademarked, but screw it. I didn’t charge anyone anything to read this thing.

His parents had named him Doctor Destruction, so he knew from an early age that he would become either a super villain bent on world domination or a foot doctor.

Medical school proved expensive and exhausting, and halfway through his second year, Doctor D, bored by the school's lack of explosions and booby-traps, quit to start his path to evil.

He felt certain that he could easily conquer the world with a strong enough army. He wouldn’t need many soldiers. He often won chess games with fewer than five pieces at the start of the match.

He posted an ad on Craigslist, asked for henchmen (henchpersons, in today’s politically correct society) with at least two years experience. Only two people responded.

The first person to respond wanted a medical plan that would cover his clubfoot. The second person (a former college roommate who called at three in the morning) wanted to cry about how much “I love you, man. I'm so, so sorry about that Jell-o incident back in '96.”

Doctor D, disgusted, decided to find another source of soldiers for his evil army. He eventually noticed an ad for such an army in his Fingerhut catalogue. He placed his order and waited several days for his army to arrive.

He heard, one morning soon thereafter, a knock on his front door. He opened the door to greet the UPS worker on the other side. Doctor D’s hands shook with excitement while he signed for his package, which he afterwards dragged inside his home.

The brown box seemed too small to contain an army of professional killers, but dynamite often arrived in small packages. He gleefully tore open the box and discovered—

A box full of adorable kittens.

He blinked several times and afterwards called Fingerhut to demand an explanation. The operator patiently explained that Doctor D entered the wrong code when he ordered his soldiers, and thus he accidentally ordered a box of kittens.

Doctor D despaired . . . until the solution to his problems surfaced in his mind. He set to work in his garage and, within a week, created a fleet of kitten-operated MechWarriors.

Armed with these giant, steel, two-legged vehicles, the kittens could stomp through the White House walls and take hostage the president of the United States.

Brilliant! He celebrated his certain success with maniacal laughter, as fit his style.

He sealed a kitten into each of the seven MechWarriors, taught them how to operate the metal beasts, opened his garage door, played some dramatic music off his iPod (Fleetwood Mac), and led his army to—

He stopped short, realized that his kittens didn’t follow him. They instead chased balls of yarn across the garage.

Doctor D slapped his forehead.

He, over the next few weeks, trained his kittens in the art of war. He upgraded their Mechs with missile launchers and laser-guided chainsaw spitters (which he purchased with Kool-aid points and heartfelt IOUs).

The kittens, despite their intense training, despite all of Doctor D’s direction, continued to play with yarn, chase mice, and perform little to no world-conquering.

Doctor D drove the kittens to the movie theater, where he forced them watch one action movie after another.

The kittens took no interest in Bruce Willis's snappy one-liners. They instead stomped across the theater to chase the red dots of their laser-guided chainsaw spitters.

Doctor D, disappointed, dropped the kittens off at home before he went to the farmer’s market to purchase some produce.

Kyle worked at the farmer’s market, and he always listened to Doctor D’s describe the ways in which he would rule the world once his rise to power arrived.

D would, after he took over, start a national healthcare system, pull American troops out of the Middle East, and (here’s the truly evil part) encourage kids to eat healthier and exercise.

Kyle interrupted Doctor D’s maniacal laughter to ask, “Do you know a way I can grow watermelons with apple seeds?”

D blinked. “I don’t see how you could.”

Kyle cast a sad gaze across his produce stand within the farmer’s market. “It’s just that . . . I would like to have watermelons, but I can’t seem to grow any.”

D rubbed his chin. “Have you planted your apple seeds in a watermelon patch?”

Kyle nodded. “That didn’t work. I still grew apples.”

“Have you tried painting the apples to look like watermelons?”

Kyle shrugged the way a tire deflates. “That didn’t work, either.”

D paced. “I hate to say it, but I think you have apples, and no matter what you do with them, they’ll remain apples.” He halted, slapped his forehead. “And kittens will remain kittens. I’m such an idiot.”

“Are we still discussing my problems?” Kyle asked, quite concerned that they weren't.

D completed his purchases and raced home to the kittens that arrived in his life, not the soldiers that hadn't.

You can catch my novels, such as Daughters of Darkwana, on Kindle.

I publish my blogs as follows:

Short stories on Mondays and Thursdays at martinwolt.blogspot.com

A look at entertainment industries via feminist and queer theory, as well as other political filters on Tuesdays at Entertainmentmicroscope.blogspot.com

An inside look at my novel series, its creation, and the e-publishing process on Wednesdays at Darkwana.blogspot.com

Tips to improve your fiction writing at FictionFormula.blogspot.com

Movie reviews on Sundays at moviesmartinwolt.blogspot.com

Between a Grizzly and Her Cub: Part 5

Chad steered his Prius towards his home. A sleek, black sports car sat on his driveway, left him no room for his own vehicle. Detective Redwood leaned backwards against the sports car. He wore a suit, tie, and black sunglasses.

Chad’s cellphone rang in his pocket. He answered while he parked his car along the road.

“It’s Ernie,” his called said. “I found the security footage you wanted. Still haven’t identified Valdus Qasim. Won’t get the chance until tomorrow.”

Chad shut off his engine. “Thanks. I’ll head towards your place in half and hour.” He disconnected, selected an app on his phone, and slid it into the pocket of his windbreaker.

He took his time, wanted to force the smug detective to wait. Chad checked his mailbox, discovered a bill and an eviction notice. White envelope. Not pink. Nothing to panic about yet.

He strolled up his driveway. “Officer Redwood.”

“Detective Redwood,” the cop said. “I fear you got it wrong on purpose this time.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Let’s discuss it inside.”

“No.”

Redwood digested that. “Pardon?”

“We can talk out here.”

“I'd rather not.”

“Then go home.” Chad pushed past him and headed towards his front door.

“You possess an attitude, Mister Heel,” Redwood said. “You’re arrogant.”

Chad spun around in a three thousand-horsepower huff. “You don’t possess honesty. You’re a shitty cop.” He marched towards Redwood. “You know damn well someone murdered my brother, but you won’t do anything about it.”

Redwood removed his sunglasses, exposed the ugly scar that disfigured his face and the smoky orb that served as his right eye. “Don’t act too smart for your own good.”

“That a threat?” Chad stood nose-to-nose with the other man.

Redwood spoke slowly and steadily. “I had a puppy when I was a kid. He used to bite the wire that connected my mother's lamp to an electric outlet. He wouldn’t let it go. He chewed and chewed, until lightning flashed through his jaws, cooked his brains.”

“Too subtle,” Chad said, stone-faced.

“When you left the autopsy room, you wore the expression of a puppy that wanted to chew on something. I took the time from my busy schedule to come here and warn you to. Let. It. Go.”

Chad went for broke. “You’re protecting someone. Who killed my brother? I deserve the truth.”

“The truth?” Redwood snorted, slipped on his sunglasses. “The truth is that curious, stubborn puppies get buried in the backyard.” He got in his car, started his engine.

Chad unlocked his front door, entered, and shut it. He removed his cellphone from his pocket, switched off the phone's voice recorder app. He hadn’t captured a confession from Redwood, but he had a threat.

He called Internal Affairs, made an appointment for tomorrow afternoon to speak with someone named Agent Teller.

Chad knows how not to get himself adopted. If a family won’t take his brother, David, then Chad ensures that they will not take him. When potential foster parents interview him, Chad picks his nose, says wildly inappropriate remarks, farts if necessary.

He hangs onto the hope that his father will surface. He clings to that hope the way a child holds the string of a balloon.

Balloons and hope run out of air, shrivel . . . deflate.

Ernie sat in front of his desk in his basement. Chad sat on the other plastic chair.

On Ernie’s computer screen, security footage from an ATM played. David stood onscreen. His eyes darted with a curious mixture of guilt, optimistic anticipation, and shot nerves.

“He withdraws five hundred dollars and then another sixty,” Ernie said. “Three times, each on a Thursday.”

Chad watched his dead brother onscreen. “Where?”

“Lehigh Acres. Middle of nowhere.”

“Must be something near there.”

Ernie’s fingers danced across a keyboard. Google Maps materialized on a second computer screen. “We have a bar, a liquor store, a motel that looks like a great place to stock up on meth, and a rusty trailer park.”

A lump clogged Chad’s throat. His eyes drifted towards the first monitor, towards his brother’s sweaty, guilty expression. “Can you give me an address for the hotel?”

“I can do better than that.” Tap. Tap. Tap. Ernie’s fingers assaulted his keyboard. “I can give you directions.”

Detective Redwood sat in his den inside the house he shared with two dogs. Ice clinked in his glass. He flopped into a heavy, green recliner, heaved a sigh, and made a phone call.

The receiver rang in his ear four times before a gruff, Russian voice answered. “Do you have Mister Heel under control?”

Redwood sipped his Scotch. “Negative. We'll have to persuade him to mind his own business.”

To be continued . . .

Between a Grizzly and Her Cub: Part Four

Chad and Melissa sat in the latter’s living room. Matthew would arrive home from school in the next thirty minutes, so they worked quickly.

Last month’s banking statement rested, spread across the coffee table. Chad circled all the suspicious ATM withdraws. Melissa could explain none of them. Each came in pairs, every Thursday for the last three weeks.

Each time, a withdraw for five hundred dollars preceded another for sixty.

Chad considered that most ATMs allowed withdraws only in multiples of twenty. Most wouldn’t allow a single withdraw beyond five hundred dollars. Had David meant to withdraw five hundred-fifty at a time?

Had David even made those withdraws?

Chad sighed, sat back on the sofa, and rubbed his eyes. “Anything else?”

Melissa hesitated before she walked out of the room. Chad heard her open and close a draw. She returned, a check in her hand. Someone had ripped the check in half. Someone had also taped it back together.

She handed it to him. “I found this ripped in half in the bathroom trashcan. Someone, David, I imagine, had nearly buried it beneath a few fistfuls of clean paper.” She seated herself beside him.

Chad read the check. “Five grand to someone named Valdus Qasim. Ring any bells?”

She shook her head. “I’ve never heard the name in my life.”

The front door opened. Ten-year-old Matthew entered the house, a Spiderman backpack over his shoulder. He stopped short. “Uncle Chad?”

“Hey, sport.” Chad glanced sidelong at Melissa, whose eyes slid shut.

She’s going to tell her son that his father’s dead, Chad realized. He stood to leave, to grant Melissa and her son some privacy. He held up the check and bank statement. “Mind if I keep these?”

Melissa made a dismissive gesture of halfhearted consent.

Concern deepen behind Matthew’s eyes. Chad wondered if Melissa had already discussed her cancer with him. Would the kid deal with both punches at once? The death of his father and doom of his mother?

Chad wondered what sort of face he wore when he learned his mother would die of liver cancer, back when he stood about Matthew’s age.

Chad kneels besides his mother’s bed, tries to ignore the stench of her bedpan.

Her eyes creep open, gaze through him. “If I still had your father’s financial support, I could've afforded treatment.” Her eyes close for the last time. “If only you hadn’t chased him away.”

Chad spends the entire funeral with his mother’s words in the pit of his stomach.

Ernie adjusted his three hundred-pounds across the plastic chair in front of his computer desk, which he kept, for whatever inexplicable reason, in his basement.

He stared through his glasses at David’s bank statement.

“Can you do it?” Chad asked. He sat in another plastic chair across from Ernie. He had driven straight here after he left Melissa’s home.

Ernie shrugged. “Not legally, but I can do it.” He set the statement next to his computer. “I can run the numbers, identify from which ATMs your brother made those withdraws.”

“How long?” Chad asked.

Another shrug. “This time tomorrow? The statement provides the times and dates of those withdraws, which will help me locate and copy the ATM footage.”

“How much?”

“We’re even after this. All those favors I owe you? Poof. Gone.” Ernie grinned. “Fair enough?”

Chad stood. “More than fair. Thank you.” He turned to leave, stopped. “One other thing? Could you research the name on that torn check?”

Ernie glanced at the check in question, which sat on his desk next to the statement. “Valdus Qasim? Why don’t you just Google it?”

“I was going to,” Chad said, “but . . . I figured you might know a better way to identify this guy.”

“I’ll give it a shot,” Ernie said. “No promises.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow, then.” Chad headed for the stairs that would lead him out of Ernie’s basement.

The stairs creaked beneath him. He entered Ernie’s living room, headed for the front door, and patted Ernie’s chocolate-black lab along the way. The dog produced a grateful whine. His tail thumped against the hardwood floor.

Chad’s cellphone rang. He answered.

“Mister Heel.” Redwood’s voice pounded from the phone’s speaker. “We need to talk.”

Chad froze. He heard the lab whine behind him, as if the dog sensed Chad’s discomfort.

“Should I meet you at the police station, Officer Redwood?”

“Detective Redwood, and no. Meet me at your house. I’m there now.”

Redwood disconnected, and Chad felt his stomach fill with hyperactive snakes.

To be continued . . .

Between a Grizzly and Her Cub: Part Three

Chad steered his Prius towards his brother’s house. He watched families in their front yards. He recalled his eleventh birthday, when he, his brother, and their mother still lived in Detroit, far from Fort Myers, Florida.

He makes a snowman in his front yard while he watches the rusty station wagon turn onto his street. Its one headlight winks at him through the confetti curtains of snow.

The station wagon turns onto Chad’s driveway, and Chad freezes when he spots the driver.

“Dad!” Months passed since he last saw his father.

Dad kills his engine and steps out of his car. “Is you mother home?”

Chad shakes his head. “She’s picking David up from school.”

Dad seems pleased by this. “It’s somebody’s birthday today, isn’t it? I can’t seem to remember whose, though. Any clue?”

Chad bubbles with laughter. Mom had promised him that Dad would forget, wouldn’t show up.

“Did Grandma and Grandpa send you anything?”

Chad nods. Mom’s parents sent him a card with a twenty-dollar bill. He proudly exhibits the money.

Dad’s eyes linger a bit too long on the bill, but Chad won’t realize that until tomorrow morning.

“Great, sport. Just great. I have a big surprise for you, birthday boy. I’m taking you to a football game. The Lions are playing.”

Chad’s eyes grow huge. He holds little interest in sports, but he would happily spend a day at the DMV if his father would accompany him.

Dad places his hands on his knees and leans towards his son. “Great! Let’s go—uh no! I just realized something.”

Chad’s smile deflates. “What’s wrong, Dad?”

“I need to fill the car with gas.” He pats down his long coat, frowns. “I left my wallet at my apartment.” He rips off his hat, scratches his head. “We can’t go without fuel.”

Chad’s stomach drops.

Then, he realizes he can save the day. “Dad! I have money.” He against displays the twenty-dollar bill.

Dad’s eyes ignite. “Of course!” His hand rustles his son’s hair. “Why didn’t I think of that? You wait here. I’ll fuel the car and return for you.”

Chad waves goodbye to his father, who climbs into the station wagon, twenty-dollar bill in hand, and drives away.

Chad watches the station wagon get smaller and smaller, until he never sees it again.

Chad pulled into his brother’s driveway. David’s wife stepped through her screen door. Their eyes locked. Chad killed his engine, took a deep breath, and stepped out of his Prius.

He approached her. David’s wife, Melissa, looked pale, undernourished. Chad wondered how advanced her cancer had become. He couldn't help but recall how his mother looked while her cancer devoured her all those years ago.

Melissa’s lower lip quivered. She threw herself forward. Chad caught and hugged her while she sobbed against his chest, dampened it with tears. He squeezed her, felt her shoulders convulse.

“Why?” she screamed. “Why would David do this?”

Chad had no answers. Not yet.

He wanted to tell her that he didn’t believe it, that David would never commit suicide, but her stress levels wouldn't improve if he suggested that someone broke into her house and murdered her husband.

“Where’s Matthew?” Chad asked.

Melissa hiccupped. “He’s at a friend’s house. I haven’t even told him, yet.”

Chad’s eyelids slid shut, too heavy to hold. He couldn’t imagine how this news would affect David’s ten-year-old son.

Melissa’s head shook back and forth, burrowed into his shoulder. “I don’t care what the Fort Myers PD says. Someone murdered David. I know it.”

Chad bit his lip. “Do you have . . . any evidence?”

She released him, stepped back, and wiped her eyes. “David’s checking account. There’s something wrong with his statement this month. The police won’t listen to me, but . . .”

Chad squeezed her shoulder. “Show me.”

To be continued . . .