Side Story #1 - Colt - Page 23

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He had a dream.

He was in an ocean. Floating. Trying to swim. To somewhere. Anywhere. Searching for land. But there was nothing on the horizon. And he was barely moving, besides. He felt so sluggish. Like he could sink at any moment.

There was a school of fish ahead of him. For some reason, he wanted to catch them. He didn't know why, but it was the most important thing in the world to him. But they were always just out of reach. They were swimming too fast. Starting to pull away, even. And there were sharks in the water. More and more, all the time. Soon, everywhere he looked, he saw one. Circling. Not striking. Just circling. Biding their time? What were they waiting for?

Any moment could be the end. But it just kept going. Swimming. Chasing. No land in sight. Only sharks.

Colt jolted awake. An unnamed sense of urgency possessed him in that moment. Why had he been sleeping in the middle of the day? Where were the kids? Were they safe? Was he an utter fool of a father?

And what the hell was that noise?

Scratching. On wood.

He saw Thomas and Stephanie there on the floor, trying to stack blocks. They were looking at him with apparent curiousity, probably wondering why he'd been flailing about just now.

They were fine.

He breathed. Unsteadily, but he breathed.

He rubbed his forehead. He hadn't had a nightmare in years. Most nights, he didn't even dream.

Agh. What time was it?

And that damn scratching. Where was it coming from?

He stood and looked around the cabin. The noise was at the front door. Was it an animal? A fucking possum or some shit? Whatever it was, he was about to roast it and have it for lunch.

When he opened the door, however, he discovered that it was, in fact, not a possum, but a dog. And a familiar one. A Dantean Shepherd named Brick.

Janet Beaumont's dog. The one that had been mysteriously absent from that house last night.

And something was off. Brick was hunched forward, and his normally pointy ears were slicked back. And that whimpering. Oh dear goddess, that whimpering.

Colt knelt down. "What the hell are you doing here, boy? And what's the matter with you?" He tried to pat Brick's neck, but the dog snapped at him. "Hey!"

Brick growled and slinked back a few steps, apparently favoring one of his hind legs.

Colt stepped out of the cabin and closed the door behind him. "Hey," he said, a bit more softly this time. "You came to me, asshole. Let me get a look at you."

Brick stopped but watched him closely.

Colt approached slowly and crouched down to inspect the beast more closely. He started with that back leg.

The fur there was damp. And dark where it shouldn't be. Oh, shit, was that blood? It was crusty. Dried. Colt broke off a small chunk and sniffed it.

No, not blood. Just mud.

That was a relief.

He felt up and down the leg, searching for either a bruise or a point of obvious pain for Brick. He found both on the upper thigh, and Brick turned and snapped at him again, this time almost nicking him in the face.

"Hey! Stop!"

The dog thrashed away from him, kicking up dirt as he failed to maintain his balance. Brick fumbled back onto all fours and growled at him again.

Colt sat down and sighed. "Do you want my fuckin' help or not?"

Brick stopped growling and just stared at him.

"C'mon. I'm not gonna hurt you." He bobbed his head. "Intentionally."

Brick's ears turned like radar dishes, and he looked around.

Colt listened, but he couldn't hear anything, and after a moment, Brick went back to staring at him. "How the hell did you even find me, huh? I know Orden's a small town 'n all, but damn."

Brick exhaled a heavy breath and lay down on his belly, face still pointed straight toward Colt.

"Is that it?" said Colt. "You're just gonna lie there?"

Shockingly, the dog did not respond.

Colt stood up and tried to get closer again. "C'mere. I'll take you to the vet. We'll get you looked at properly."

Brick got back up and shuffled away from him.

Colt stopped and vented an angry breath. "Don't be a dick." And as soon as he took another step, Brick backed farther away. Colt was about ready to give up. "You're impossible, y'know that?"

Brick just snorted at him.

Colt could see the twins watching from the cabin window. The hell? Had they climbed up on the table there? The little monkeys.

He tried to think. He decided to back up toward the cabin, nearer to the door. And he waited.

It took a minute, but Brick scuttled closer.

Hmm.

Colt opened the door and went inside. He left it open and moved the twins over to their playpen. Then he waited again.

He found a book to occupy himself, some little paperback about a rabbit named Invenio who builds things and gets caught up in various misadventures as a result. It didn't have pictures, but he liked reading it to the kids on occasion. He wasn't really reading it at the moment, though. He was mainly paying attention to that open doorway.

After half an hour, he was starting to wonder if he should give up and go back outside, but then Brick came limping into the cabin. He looked around, sniffed the air, eyed the kids in their playpen, and finally Colt. Then he hobbled over to the corner of the room and lay down again, bundling up with his tail wrapped around his head.

Colt set his book down. He would've liked to give Brick some food and maybe score some points with the mutt, but he didn't have much in the cabin. With no electricity, he didn't usually bother to store any food here other than nuts and occasionally some edible plants or berries. He remembered wanting to research how to make his own jerky, but with this whole murder investigation, it had completely slipped his mind until now. He wasn't even sure if jerky was safe for dogs to eat, though. Theoretically, it should be fine, right? He supposed he'd have to research that now, too.

Not that he intended for Brick to stay here that long, of course. He couldn't take care of this fucking guy indefinitely.

In fact, what the hell was Colt even doing? He should just shove Brick into his car and take the big furry bastard back to Janet. She was probably wondering where he was, anyway.

Except...

Janet was probably a bit busy with police again, wasn't she? She'd just been the victim of a home invasion and nearly died. Colt didn't exactly want to push his luck and go see her again so soon, especially if it meant that there would be more cops hanging around.

Ugh.

He supposed he could just take Brick to the vet. Was there even one in Orden? If not, he could go to Lagoroc.

But the questions that would come up during such a visit... could he answer them? Brick wasn't his dog.

Then again, any vet worth their salt probably wouldn't care that much if he said he just found Brick on the side of the road or some shit. Those people were animal lovers, right?

Getting the bastard into the car would be a giant pain in the ass, though. Would it even be necessary? Brick seemed like he was in pain but not seriously wounded.

Bah.

"How'd you get injured, anyway?" asked Colt.

Brick wasn't even looking at him, anymore. Maybe a good thing, though. He wasn't quite as wary of Colt's presence as before.

Colt had a lot of questions for the animal. Why hadn't he been at the house last night? And how did he end up way out here? He hadn't actually tracked Colt's scent, had he? No way. Brick must've been out here for some other reason, then maybe picked up his scent and followed it to the cabin.

And was it a coincidence that Brick had been injured around the same time that Janet had been attacked?

Hmm.

As usual, he needed more information.

'Hey, Boh,' Colt called, 'you back from ferrying souls yet?'

'Yeah, I am.'

'Last night. Did you forget to tell me about a dog that ran away from the house after the thugs invaded it?'

'What? No, of course not. Why do you ask?'

'Because Janet Beaumont's dog is at my cabin, right now. And he's injured, too.'

'Whoa, whoa, whoa. Say that again.'

'Dog. Cabin. Injured.'

'Wow. How the hell did he end up at your cabin?'

'That's what I'd like to know.'

'Well, those two thugs definitely weren't the ones who injured him. I watched the whole thing go down. There was no dog. I would've told you.'

'Good to know, but I've still got about a thousand unanswered questions here. Got any new clues for me? Especially ones about a dog named Brick?'

'Uh...'

'What are you even doing right now, anyway?'

'I'm haunting Janet. She's still a suspect, right?'

'Yeah. What's she up to?'

'Well, I was actually gonna tell you about that after you'd gotten a bit more rest. But I see you're already awake, so I guess I'll just tell you now. Ah... the thing is, she... never called the police.'

Colt sat up straighter in his chair. 'What?'

'The three of them seem a little... uncertain about that decision. They've been going back and forth on it, arguing a bit, but it's midday now and... still no cops.'

He wasn't sure what to say.

'Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that is what detectives call "suspicious as fuck," no?

'Yeah.'

Shit.

Colt really hoped he hadn't just killed two men for the sake of a fucking murderer. Sure, he'd worked out that she was hiding something, but he hadn't really thought that she was the killer. At worst, he figured she'd done something that, once uncovered, would lead him to the real culprit.

But now... if she was trying to keep quiet about a damn home invasion, then... she was suddenly looking like, at minimum, an accessory to the murder.

It still seemed unlikely to him that she could've killed Rex herself. Maybe that was just gender bias, but statistically, women killed far less often than men. And when they did, it was typically a crime of passion, not the kind of calculated setup that he'd found at the crime scene.

Though, to be fair, most murders were crimes of passion.

He needed to maintain a healthy suspicion. He knew perfectly well how cold-hearted and psychotic some women could be.

'Colt? Still with me?'

'Has Janet mentioned her missing dog at all?'

'Nope.'

'So she's not worried about him, then...'

'Seems that way.'

'Either she's a terrible owner, or she handed him over to someone else's care last night and thinks he's fine with them.'

'Or,' said Boh, 'he was never her dog in the first place, and she was just pretending he was all along.'

Colt paused to consider that notion. 'Well, technically, she wasn't pretending. She told me herself that he didn't actually belong to her. Supposedly, he's "just visiting" her. Presumably, her uncle is his true owner.'

'Wait a minute. That dog belongs to the dead sheriff?'

'Ah... I'm not actually sure about that. For some reason, when we met in the park, Janet lied to me about being related to Rex. Or she lied to the police when you overheard her talking to them. And even besides all that, she could always have more than one uncle. She said Brick belonged to an uncle who lived in the capital.'

'Well, now I have no idea what to believe.'

'I think it's a good idea for you to keep following her. Try and discern the truth in all this bullshit.'

'Yeah, alright.'

<<Page 22 || [Part One] [Part Two] [Part Three]

These Side Story pages are released each week on Sunday at 6 pm EST.
However, they are released four weeks earlier over on Patreon, along with many extra pages of the main story.
Thanks for reading, everyone.