Chương 34: Intruder Alert

I heard the crash, and my mind, as is the wont of minds like mine, immediately jumped to the worst-case scenario. Then I remembered we were in the midst of the apocalypse, and I relaxed. It might be mana-crazed squirrels down there. Hell, it might even be goblins or terrifying nightmare lizards. But it was highly unlikely to be my alcoholic ex, home after another binge and breaking things because he was too drunk to stand straight. Yeah, it had been almost ten years, but the damage was done.

The dogs, of course, went wild. Bear was already off the bed and pawing at the door; Zelda was up, hackles raised, giving a low growl; and Riley threw back his head and howled, warning all intruders that this was his territory and he would protect it.

"Good job, guys," I muttered, still half asleep, as I pushed the covers off and stood up. I rubbed my face with both hands, trying to wake up and process this start to a new day. I felt weird. Wrong. But right-wrong, if that makes any sense. The ankle that I'd sprained more times than I could count didn't ache. The twinge in my shoulders from too many hours spent over my drawing board was gone. I felt great, actually. But it was strange to feel so good. The System at work. There was no more sound from downstairs.

If the dogs hadn't responded, I would have wondered if I'd imagined it. Was that good news or bad? Was a monster lying in wait? I picked up Zelda's treat bag, which had been lying on the nightstand within arm's reach, and slipped it over my head. Sure, it looked a little strange with my pajamas, but it was less strange than sleeping with a shovel in my bed, which had been my other option. With a thought, Warden's Edge appeared in my hand. I made my way to the door and nudged Bear out of the way with my leg.

Resting my hand on the knob, I looked down at the dogs. If I opened the door, they'd go tearing down the stairs in full attack mode, ready for anything. If this had been yesterday morning, I would have done so without a second thought. If the crash had been an intruder—unlikely, but possible—the dogs were my defense.

If the crash had been a bird flying into a window, a squirrel falling down the chimney, a precariously placed dish in the sink unbalancing for no real reason, the dogs would do no harm and take no risk. Well, the squirrel might be in trouble. But it was not yesterday morning, and whatever was down there might be dangerous. Except… was anything around here currently dangerous to Zelda? She was at least Level 14 and, as Jack would say, seriously OP.

The monsters would grow stronger over time, but right now, Zelda and I ought to be well ahead of anything native to Earth. So I could let Zelda out and keep Bear and Riley in the bedroom until we knew what was going on downstairs. There was just one problem with that: Riley was the pack leader. It would break his heart if I sent Zelda to investigate and didn't let him join her. Zelda wedged her way between me and Bear. Open up, her tail said, arched high over her back. Our den.

She gave a little wiggle of her hips, adding, Protect the den, pack tenet. Pack tenet? Really? Okay, I was probably projecting, but that was an awfully complex thought for a Jack Russell. It wasn't wrong, though. If I was going to pick a core belief for my pack, protecting the den would be at the top of the list. Right behind protecting the pack. With a sigh, I opened the door and let the dogs barrel out, exactly the way I expected them to.

They scrambled their way along the short hallway to the stairs and down, Bear taking point by virtue of her longer legs, but Riley right behind her, Zelda nearly trampled in the fray. I followed them, shovel in hand. The stairs ended in the living room and the dogs separated there. Bear had her nose to the ground, scouting the territory. Riley was at the front door, tail half-wagging, waiting for me to come open it. Zelda, though, had gone straight for the kitchen and was poised at the door to the sunroom.

Intruder, she told me, lifting her right paw and pointing, just as if she were some kind of hunting dog. You know how you can live in a place without it ever becoming yours? This house was like that for me. It was still my dad's office, my dad's shed, even my dad's bedroom upstairs. I hadn't even cleaned out his closet. All his clothes still hung where he left them. The kitchen held my dad's dishes, his art hung on the walls, most of the bookshelves were filled with his books, and the junk drawer was all his junk.

But the sunroom was mine. I spent ninety percent of my waking time out there, working, reading, hanging out with the dogs, and so the idea that there was an intruder was… well, my response was disproportionate. I yanked open the door, Warden's Edge clutched in my hand, fully prepared to slice the head off even the toughest goblin. A tiny voice in the back of my head suggested I might not want to splatter my favorite room with green blood, but I ignored it. Any goblin invading my sanctuary was dead.

Zelda darted into the room ahead of me, Bear came hurrying up behind us, and poor oblivious Riley whuffed at the front door, as if to say,'But the noise came from here.' He was wrong. The noise had clearly come from the sunroom, but it was no goblin. An orange cat, mid-size, somewhat fluffy, leaped from the back of the sofa as Zelda jumped on it, and scrabbled up the shelves of my bookcase. From the top, it turned and hissed at us, its fur standing on end as if it had stuck its finger—claw?

—into an electric socket. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. I set the shovel down, resting it against the doorframe. A quick scan of the windows showed that none were broken, but an old metal bucket that usually sat next to the door was overturned, spilling its contents—junk, mostly—onto the floor. That was the noise, but how did a cat get into my sunroom? Zelda was barking non-stop from her place on the sofa. Cat, cat, cat, there's a cat in the den.

What are you doing here, cat? This isn't your den. Bear joined in, although her bark held more of a Kill it, kill it, we have to kill it message. I made my own noise, a hiss between my teeth that ended in a sharp T, and stepped between Bear and the bookshelves, pressing my finger against my lips in a librarian's scold.

"Z, hush," I added with a snap. Bear gave me a recalcitrant look, the one where the shoulders almost hunch as if to say, Don't wanna, don't wanna. I met her eyes with a steady, unblinking stare. She dropped her gaze, her tail, and her attitude in one fell swoop, turning her head away from both me and the cat.

"Good girl," I told her, giving her neck a rub in the exact spot she favored: behind the ears, but not too deep. If it had been a day earlier, Zelda might have ignored me—playing the privilege of age for all its worth—but today she settled immediately, sitting on the sofa and eyeing the cat with interest. The cat hissed again, less terrified, more defiant. I did not speak cat. I'd never owned one, although I had nothing against them. I kept rubbing Bear's ears while I considered the cat's presence.

"How did you get in here, cat?" I asked rhetorically. The cat did not answer me, unless its fur slowly settling was a statement. Maybe it was. I stared at the cat, trying to make sense of its presence. It stared back at me. I blinked. It didn't. I shrugged.

"Okay, cat, whatever you say." I opened the French doors that led to the flagstone patio and whistled for the dogs. Time to go out. Bear went eagerly, Zelda reluctantly, saying, But cat? as she did, and I had to call Riley to join them. The cat didn't move. Fine. I left the French doors open and went into the house, closing the sunroom door behind me. I started coffee, then went into the pantry to scoop kibble into the dogs' bowls.

When I came back into the kitchen, the cat was sitting on the counter next to the sink. I didn't drop the dog bowls. In fact, I didn't do a thing. I just stood there, mouth agape. I'd closed the door. I knew I'd closed the door. Could cats open and close doors now? Clearly, I was still asleep and dreaming. Or it was a hallucination. Except the dogs had seen it, too.

"Did the System send you?" I asked the cat, feeling like an idiot. The cat just looked at me. Yeah, it clearly thought I was an idiot, too. It lifted a paw and patted the faucet handle.

"You need a drink?" I ventured. I set the dogs' bowls down in the right spots, then picked up the closest water bowl and stepped warily over to the sink. I didn't think this cat was going to attack me. It wasn't acting like the squirrels. Of course, I hadn't expected the squirrels to attack, either. With probably a vastly unnecessary level of caution, I dumped yesterday's water, turned on the fresh water, swished a sponge around the bowl, rinsed, dumped, and refilled the bowl.

Then I set it on the counter next to the cat. The cat twitched its whiskers at me. As I said, I don't speak cat. But if I did speak cat, I would have said that the whisker twitch meant thank you. In the corner of my vision, the red blinking dot told me I had a new notification waiting. The cat bent its head and drank. I opened my notifications. Skill gained: +1 to animal communication. What? I stared at the notification before blinking it away and looking at the cat.

It was lapping at the water's surface with a delicate precision, completely unlike the way dogs slopped it down. The odd numbness that had been plaguing me ever since I found the rift in my backyard was starting to crack, splintering on the surreal normality of a cat that shouldn't be here. I waited until it lifted its head from the bowl, and then asked, "How did you get in here?" The cat did not deign to reply. Instead, it turned its head away from me, and licked its shoulder.

My animal communication skill was just good enough to know that it was a comment, but not good enough to know what the comment meant. It felt a little like, "Don't ask stupid questions," but it could have been, "I don't want to talk about it," or "Do I know you?" just as easily.

"Fine, be that way," I muttered. I pulled open the door to the sunroom and crossed to the French doors to call the dogs in for breakfast. There were only two dogs in the yard. Riley was doing his thing, roaming the yard, nose down, checking out the newest smells. Zelda was sitting before the iridescent patch of mist that I knew was a rift entrance. But Bear was nowhere to be seen. That was odd. Not a problem, though. Of course not. The backyard and the front yard were effectively one contiguous space.

Sure, they had different names, but they weren't separated by a physical barrier. Bear must just be in the front, out of my sight. Deep down, I knew better. Bear was never late for breakfast. Here's a thing about dogs: a dog that has never gone hungry can be nonchalant about mealtimes. Dogs are predators and scavengers, and in a natural environment, eating every few days is typical for them. A dog that's gone hungry, though? That had to rely on itself for every one of those scavenged or hunted meals?

That dog eats when the food appears, stocking up on calories for the times when it doesn't. Before Bear showed up in our lives, I kept kibble on the floor at all times. Zelda and Riley ate what they pleased, when they pleased. Bear couldn't live that way. If there was food, Bear ate it. Her appetite had no off-switch. And Bear never missed breakfast.

"Puppies." I clapped my hands three times, hard.

"Breakfast." Riley, my darling goofy boy, lifted his head, then galumphed over to me like any middle-aged dog with an enthusiastic soul. Food, I felt him saying, as he wedged past me and into the sunroom. Yes, time for food. Zelda flicked an ear in my direction, then glanced over her shoulder. Then she looked back at the shimmer. I reached behind me and grabbed Warden's Edge, still sitting by the side of the door where I'd left it five minutes ago, and ran. I did not put on my shoes.

If you live in a normal place, where people occasionally go barefoot, that might mean nothing to you. But we don't do barefoot in inland Florida. You only have to get bitten by a fire ant once to know that shoes are mandatory at all times. My animal communication skill was hard at work, though. I knew Zelda was sitting outside the rift, wondering if Bear was coming back, because Bear had gone into that hole in space. Barefoot, in my pajamas, carrying my shovel, I ran headlong into the iridescent shimmer.

Was it stupid? God, yes. It was stupid like dancing outside in a thunderstorm, like not paying your taxes, like ignoring your own instincts. Like running barefoot in fire ant territory stupid. But I did it anyway, because Bear was part of my pack. Not like Zelda. Not my girl, not my heart dog, but still much more than a pet. Family. Bear was my family and I was not leaving her to face the unknown alone.