This story was written by picking from the "Creative Block" by Lou Harry. I got the word "naked", advice about limiting choices, and "a man walks into a bar".
Also, I'm still stuck on bad puns this week. I'd say I'm sorry but I think we all know that's not true.
Trouble, a Bruin (989 words)
I wander into the bar still trailing fen grass around my bare ankles. The men in there, and it is mostly men, look confused by a woman starting out the evening naked. A fire is roaring and lamps are lit.
I lean against the counter. “A whisky, if you please. If you can make it hot, so much the better.”
The barman looks me up and down. “You got money? I don’t see no pockets.”
Trouble looms in though the door, upright on his hind legs. Outside the fog is thick as cream and beads of water gleam in his shaggy black fur. He’s been paying off our ride. Men eye him slant-ways. They might’ve seen a Bruin before. They’ll definitely have heard stories.
Trouble unslings our money bag. “A beer. A good one,” he growls, making the barman jump.
The man hustles with our drinks. “Come from the other side of the Fens?”
“Shortcut,” Trouble snorts. He glares down his muzzle at me. I shrug. I’d always wanted to see whether the stories about the Fens were true. Turns out, they are.
“Lucky this time, Serena,” says Trouble.
“Oh, stop griping. The Gillymen spotted our distress flare and here we are. Everything’s fine.”
“Undress flare.” He huffs, which is his way of laughing.
Trouble can usually sniff his way out of anything. But when the fog came down five days into the Fens, we stumbled about, falling into sucking, sludgy pools and having to ditch most of our kit to get out. The fog does something funny to your head; even Trouble lost his sense of direction out there. Our trail back was gone, the other side too far to scent. No use sitting tight and waiting for sunshine, either. A Grand Slinker can hang around for weeks. We had some oil, and a flint and steel, but the only combustibles left were my clothes. A Gillyman on a raft, poling towards us at speed, had been a most welcome sight.
A bosomy waitress shoves a smelly blanket at me. “Put that round you, or you’ll piss Suzy off.” She nods to a small stage where a woman is flashing her frilly knickers under a short skirt.
“Thanks.”
“Blankets ain’t free,” she says. “Twenty big ones.”
That’s all we’ve got left. “For that I’ll take a shirt, a coat, trousers and boots, thank you.”
She pouts, but leaves me wrapped in the blanket and goes off. The barman settles his face into a blank expression. That is when I know we’re in trouble. The waitress is talking to five bulky men in the corner. Twenty big ones is a chunk of cash around these parts, and I must be touching hypothermic to own up to having it. People will pay a lot of money for a slave Bruin, no matter what the law says. And I’d be another tragic accident in the Fens.
Trouble flicks his ears at me. He’s quick to my mood changes; he says he can smell them. I can see him running through his options. “Lot of people here,” he says to the bartender, but for my benefit. “With guns.”
I nod to show I understand. We run or kick off and we’re likely to get perforated.
“The Gillies come out of the Fens in the fog,” says the bartender. “Take some smoked fish now and again. Guns scare ‘em off.”
Trouble orders another beer and I poke him in the ribs.
“Don’t get settled in. We’ve got to get back out there and find the rest of our haul - er – stuff.”
He grunts, looking puzzled.
“You lose something?” says the bosomy waitress. She hands me a bundle of clothes. The leather coat is suprisingly good apart from the bullet holes.
“We dropped some of our things out there in the Fens. Valuables. Trouble should be able to sniff them out. Maybe some of you folks could help us look? We’ll pay you, of course.”
“Sure,” she says with a broad smile. “We just love to help out.”
I go into a back room and dress. I take the blanket too, and we all head out into the fog.
Trouble leads the way, loping along on all fours, pretending to sniff at the ground. When he glances up at me I give him a signal and we drop, roll in opposite directions, and take off running.
“Get them!” a man shouts and there is a lot of splashing and swearing.The fog is now more cheese than cream, but some idiot still lets off a gun, and everyone yells at him.
When my lungs are burning, and I’ve climbed out of a few pools, I wrap myself in the blanket, lie down and wait. A Gillyman paddles by silently with webbed hands, eyes as wide as the moon. I listen to the townsfolk sloshing and stumbling. There’s no way they can catch Trouble.
Even out here, soaked and wrapped up, my scent will carry. Trouble looms out of the mist on quiet, padding feet. When he’s hugged me warm, he starts sniffing his way back along our trail to the town. We run into another Gillyman on a raft and he agrees to take us further down to a friendlier settlement.
“See,” I say to Trouble. “Your options aren’t limited to fight or flight. There’s negotiation and deception too.”
He makes a rude sound.
“Oh come on, grumpy boots. I’ve got some clothes now, and a blanket.”
“Huh.”
”But you understand how that worked, right? They think we’re stupid. I give them a reason not to kill us in the bar, lure them into the Fens with lies of ill-gotten gains. Even if they don’t buy that, we’re oblingingly walking to where they can kill me out of sight, and drug or chain you, but first they’re going to make sure there isn’t any loot....”
“I remember for next time.” He huffs. “Perhaps tomorrow.”
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