Almond (ONC2021)

Chapter 7 - Gun to a Nut Fight

I was pretty sure that most toddlers would envy my cushion fort. Well, that's what anyone walking into the room would think it was. The reality was that it was a crude, but hopefully effective, sniper's nest. From it, I had a clear view of the kitchen island.

This brought me to step two—the bait. I busted open the tree ornaments and dropped the new almonds into the bowl. Now, when the thing came back to fix the note—blam! I snatched some snacks and a beer and hurried back to my fortress.

The first thing I learned is that I would have been a terrible sniper. Patience was not my virtue. The nervous energy burned off after about twenty minutes, boredom set in and I began to play with my phone. Twice I had to shift positions due to limbs falling asleep and both times resulted in my bumping a cushion which led to a chain-reaction-total-collapse of my bunker. The crunching of the pretzels was too loud, and I forgot the bottle opener. Finally, convinced that this was never going to work and battling fatigue from lack of sleep, I dozed off.

I awoke later with the sudden jolt of someone who instinctively knew they had overslept. The room was shadowy with the reddish dusk visible through the windows. Only the Christmas lights and the overhead light in the kitchen kept the room from darkness. I yawned and then began to feel very stupid that I just took a nap, armed with a very real rifle, in a very fake fort, while waiting for my possibly imaginary monster. Not expecting to see anything I peeked out of my cushion-gap rifle port.

There it was.

The creature was standing on the edge of the counter next to the bowl of almonds. It made no attempt to hide nor run. It wasn't being sly or cautious. It was parked there as if it lived there. And it was staring right at me.

I drank in the details. It really looked as if God had taken a monkey, an armadillo, a teddy bear, and a really big almond, put them in a magical sack, shaken the crap out of it, and dumped out this monstrosity.

It was maybe two feet tall and light tan in color. In various parts of its body, like a haphazard suit of armor, were smooth, hard plates that really resembled the skin of an almond. In between these plates fluffy fur poked out. Its body was stout and round, like a bowling bowl, and its arms and legs, while short, were solid and powerful looking. Both its feet and hands had three thick digits that were mostly talon, like knives with tiny handles. Its face was ape-like with an armadillo-ish snout lined with small, but fearsome teeth. Its black beady eyes never blinked. It was dressed in Santa Bear's clothes.

I was so stunned that the first thing I absurdly thought was how does it handle the almonds with those knife-hands? The fine motor skills must be for shit. Then I noticed the tinier hands wiggling and I nearly puked.

On its palms, just underneath the talons, grew a cluster of more normal-looking, albeit diminutive, fingers. These looked designed for nut handling. I would have chuckled at my puerile joke if I hadn't been so nauseous.

My phone. I fumbled around for it without looking, unwilling to take my eye off the beast. It must have shifted around somewhere during my nap, so I gave up the search and instead aimed the rifle. I could take as many evidence pictures as I wanted when it was a corpse. With trembling hands, I lined up the shootey-end and thumbed off the safety.

Before I could squeeze the trigger, the thing hopped off the counter, hit the floor with a rolling somersault, and sprang back to its feet. It moved with an awkward, but efficient gait, like a toddler who never learned to fully walk and instead stuck with, and mastered that goofy waddle. As I had only a tiny cushion porthole for me to sniper through, it quickly scampered out of my view, but it was definitely now in the room with me. The bells jingled in circles around my fort.