The Dragon, the Reaper and the bulldozer

There weren’t always dragons in the valley. But here we are, watching a pair of gray backed dragons down below, making their way through the ceder trees. Ben coming around the truck pulling out his binoculars to watch. “Remember when the only thing game wardens had to worry about was people hunting out of season?” he said.

Smiling a little, “Bright side of this is we finally get decent funding.”

This started just after the new year. First; small things came, spotted by people that are normally less than believable. The unicorns had been the most disappointing. Instead of majestic white horses that had magical horns centered on their heads, what we got was something closer to glorified goats.

Then there was a fair maiden that turned up one night at the Seven Eleven. It was the twins that tried talking to her first. Naming her Mary for whatever reason. Communication with her had been by trial and error, involving mostly hand jesters and google translator. She was picking up English or at least she was picking it faster than we were the out of date German she was speaking. After calling around to see if anyone was missing a patient. Ford and Mustang deposited her at our house without telling me until I got home. Getting her to wear a pair of jeans and underwear had taken some uncomfortable coaching, but the glee on her face at the newfound freedom of movement had been well worth it.

Over all she was adapting really well. The one unexpected bonus for having her stay with us was she could really clean a house. thou we still thought she was crazy.

Then one night we saw for ourselves the red dragon. It had taken days for the fire department to get the blaze under control. Bethany, an eighty-four old woman and three generations of her family, died in that fire. That had been back in February. Thankfully, no one had seen any signs of that dragon since.

After that, every off the wall story a tweaker told us suddenly became plausible. Everyone in the station would have preferred the sudden onslaught of sightings just to be attributed to a bad batch of drugs. Two sheriffs straight up refused to believe there were fairy creatures at all. That was why Ben and I were paired up. If we were on duty or not, it always fell on our desk. What a strange world when I have to take anything Jason says seriously.

Training my concentration again on the valley, looking for any new signs of movement other than the two gray backs. Flexing my hand into a fist out of habit, feeling the current growing along my palm, winding up through my wrist.

“Are you okay?” Ben asking breaking me out of my train of thought.

“Yes, I um, I think I’m getting carpal tunnel, that’s all.” Shaking my hand, freeing it from the sensation, flicking a smile at Ben.

Taking off his cowboy hat, fanning himself with it and squinting up at the early afternoon sun. Already the growing heat was unbearable. It wasn’t even June yet and already it was setting up to be one of the hottest summers on record.

Training his binoculars back on the Grays. They were not what we were out here looking for. Smaller than deer, they lived off rodents and the occasional cat; they didn’t pose a threat. Unfortunately, grays were not the worse thing to come through. The red back had been. This was Texas. To make matters worse, we were in the middle of a historical drought. the last thing we needed was something that breathes fire.

“Spencer.” the truck radio crackling, cutting through my thoughts. Ben picking up the handset.

“Abby there with you? It’s about the twins.”

My stomach knotting at the mention of them. Ben shooting me a look. “Were on our way.” Hanging the handset back. He didn’t even ask why. I don’t think he wanted to know what they had done now, just hoping I could fix it before he had to deal with it.

Ben shooting one last glance back at the pair below. “I’ve started rereading some of the old fairytales. we should be grateful nothing worse has shown up.” he said, climbing into the driver’s side.

“Yeah. lucky.” absently flexing my hand again before climbing into the passenger’s side and cranking the A/C on high. Not that I felt it.

The twins had the misfortune of being born to a woman that didn’t have one bit of humor. That was, at least, until it came time to naming her sons. christening one Ford and the other Mustang after their father took the one thing that he loved and ran off for parts unknown. Their relationship with their mother never improved. On their eighteenth birthday they came home before dawn after a night of celebrating only to find a store-bought chocolate cake, a card taped to the plastic lid, all of their belongings in garbage bags and the locks changed.

Showing up at mom’s doorstep with no idea where else to go, Mom took them in, giving them their own rooms and honestly treated them better than their own mother ever did. Never in my life had I seen mom so angry. Ducking into dad’s old shop.

From outside, I could hear her screaming at Itty, the twin’s mother. About how could she be such a horrible mother? That those kids deserve better. Calling Itty every name in the book and a lot of names I never imagine my mother using.

After she pulled herself together, she came in rounded up the boys and I told them to never mind their mother. The woman wasn’t worth their time, then took us all out to dinner. Doing everything she could to cheer them up.

After mom passed away two years ago, the three of us became the only family each other had. Making it work somehow.

Discreetly pulling out my cellphone to see if they had texted me a heads up to what I was about to walk into. Nothing. Cursing at them, shoving my phone back into my pocket.

“Anything?” Ben asked.

Shaking my head as he pulled into the chipped up parking lot in front of the low slung white metal building of the police annex. Inside, set the twins on the bench stretched out in front of the low wall that made up the receptionist’s desk encased in Plexiglass. glancing at them, their face frozen in a half bored expression staring at the base of the Kathy’s desk. Their dark curly hair hooding their eyes. Swearing under my breath.

buzzing us through. Mr. Carvers’ voice booming from down the hall. Dale Carver owned a small construction company that rented out heavy equipment to locals.

Following Ben into the interrogation room, Mr. Carver was leaning over the table screaming at Jackson, stopping in mid-sentence, taking us in for a split second before Jackson handing Ben the file, leaving us to it. “What are you going to do about my bulldozer?”

Ben using the report as a diversion glancing over it.

“I assume you have eye witnesses?” I asked.

“I already know they stole it.”

“So you have a severance video, then?” Ben asked.

“How do you know the Waller boys stole your equipment then?"

“Who else would steal a bulldozer?” Dale yelling.

“I’ll be taking them home then.”

“they know where my equipment is at.”

“Until you have something more than allegations, I’ll be taking my brother’s home.” with that, turning on my heal leaving Ben here to deal with him. Busting through the door, both of them jumping to their feet without a word falling behind me. The heat catching us. Herding the twins to the car.

“We can explain.” Ford starting.

“Did you take the bulldozer?” cutting him off before he could get further

“Yes, but there are extenuating circumstances.”

“Just get in the car.”

Both of them climbing into the back seat. Their dark features set in pouting expressions. They were only ten years younger than me, but sometimes it felt like they were twelve. If they had better circumstances growing up, both of them really could have ended up at some MIT think tank, but they only had an eight-grade education. Their mother and their teachers called them stupid, but anyone paying a half bit of attention could tell they were just bored out of their minds at school.

“what happened?” I asked as we pulled out of the parking lot.

Slouching in the back seat, both of them staring out the windows. Neither of them answering me.

“Now.”

“we were hanging out playing pool when we heard Mr. Carver bragging that he was going to buy up this town for cheap and get the city to annex it. That he was going to make a fortune selling it off to people wanting a second home.” Ford said.

“After he left, we were just thinking that he deserved some of his own medicine. honestly Abby, we were just going to mess with him a little, but when we got to his place, we found a massive pit that he had dug out. He had a small herd of goats penned up in it.” Mustang added.

Already my head was hurting. All I really wanted was a nap. Driving through the one red light making my way the last three miles back to our place.

“Abby, don’t you get it?” Ford leaning over the seat. “there isn’t a herd or even a cow for miles around. Everyone had to sell them off because of the lack of water. So what is a large predator to eat around here?”

What he was getting at finally hitting me. What better way to drive everyone off than by fire? I felt sick. “He’s going to get a lot of people killed.”