Prologue mishap

                                                  Prologue
                                                    Mishap

I was walking down the sidewalk. The pavement lifted, cracked, and followed along Hopi Street. I stopped; a streetlamp shed flickering light in a circle around me.

I turned toward the sound. Instinctively I reached down and picked up a rock -- no, not a rock but an orb.

I glanced at my hand. A pool ball was nestled in my palm. It was dirty. It was a thirteen ball.

The noise dropped minutely as I turned to face the threatening creature. My eyes darted downward, to the edge of the light.

Two luminous orbs hung in the air, at the outskirts of the flickering light. Stepping into view, first paws and maw, a black Labrador fell momentarily silent, and then began growling again.

I had had a cousin who was mauled by a dog. The animal was killed, and my cousin died after a week in the hospital. I still remember the torn flesh, the empty socket where an eye should have been…

The Labrador moved slightly forward, and I was distinctly aware of its proximity to the softer tissues of my body. Of course, this was probably just someone’s pet, nothing to worry about; the dog would go away.

The dog stepped forward quickly. In my haste, I threw the pool ball. It missed entirely, hitting the pavement and bouncing harmlessly into the street.

I made a terrible mistake; I turned and ran.

You don’t run from a dog. It now knows you are cowardly; you are acting like prey.
However, it was only someone’s pet. It would chase me for awhile, and then quit. But that didn’t stop my heart from beating wildly. I’m ten years old, the same age that my cousin was maimed and killed. The skin was pulled from the face…

I noticed that my feet no longer ran on pavement. I was in the middle of an intersection; the green from a streetlight tinted my hands and face. The dog wasn’t chasing me anymore…where was it. It took a moment to realize I was bathed in whiteness. My eyes were slow to discern the chrome glinting from a truck. The world was suddenly black.

  *    *      *

“Stop licking me,” I said, but the dog kept licking my face. Finally I covered my face with my hands. Pushing myself up from the ground, I fought the urge to collapse. “Where I’m I?”

The black Labrador backed away and sat on its haunches. Its eyes almost appeared thoughtful as it studied me.

I rose dizzily to my feet. The sun was halfway in the sky, filtering through the boughs of an oak tree. Snow was packed on the trunk and limbs. The area was oddly bereft of buildings and streets, an expanse of snow.

“Where I’m I?” I asked the dog. The dog replied by walking over to me, and I reached down and rubbed its head and neck. “Why are you so nice to me now, doggy? You scared me when we first met. Well I guess I’ll have to name you...how about Thunder?”

“Come on Thunder, let’s start walking.” I took a few steps in the direction of the sun, and I heard a growl. I turned around and the dog was growling at me. “Be a nice dog, Thunder.” When I stopped so too did the Labrador. The dog turned as if urging me to follow.

“You want me to follow you? Ok, lead on.” The dog fell in beside me as we walked east. Our shadows elongated as we followed them. Our feet and paws sank into the snow, making our progress slow. Where is everything? Surely we couldn’t be too far out of town.

Suddenly I froze. In front of me was Granite Hill, the same hill I saw every day of my life, but it wasn’t the hill that stole my attention, it was the absence of a town at its foot. I stared at the south slope, which I knew well, due to the bare patch of granite that gave the hill its name.

Thunder began growling again, a deep vibration that seemed to emanate from the whole animal. I thought it was funny that as soon as I took another step the growl relinquished. The Labrador didn’t want me to stop moving.

“Get out of the way!” A voice bellowed nearby.

I swiveled my head in search of the voice, and although I couldn’t find it, I understood the nature of the words, for a twenty foot conifer dropped from its upright position, falling in my direction. The tree grew larger in my vision.

Thunder collided with me, surprisingly hard, and we tumbled out of the way of the felled tree. Our landed was softened by a snow bank. “Get off of me Thunder,” I said.

Thunder’s attention was on two men in furry clothing. One man had a grey beard, and in one hand a huge ax. I thought that the blade probably weighed more than I did.

As I brushed myself off, an idea intruded on me, watching these two grim-looking fellows, I thought of a nuclear winter, and these two as part of the few that would survive the environmental devastation after either nuclear war, enormous meteors, or massive volcanoes, an unpleasant, fleeting thought that I knew was wrong. If the town was destroyed so too would I have been.

Thunder stiffened, his hackles raised, and a low growl escaping his maw. I felt that the dog protected me, but I couldn't be completely sure. Somehow, the small dark animal seemed very threatening, even facing a man with giant ax.

"Where did everyone go?" I asked the silent figures.

The younger man replied. "Have you lost your company?"

"No. I mean, yes. Where is the town, the people, the buildings?"

"You must be lost. Control your dog, and you may accompany us back to the village."

The larger of the two men wrapped his arms around the trunk of the felled tree, and lifted. Then, together, both hefted the tree into the air. The tree should have been too heavy to carry. Nevertheless, carried it was.

Thunder’s attention had since shifted, alternating between the east and Granite Hill, as if the animal contemplated some important decision, or was aware of things unseen. Then, as if coming to a resolution, he fell in beside me, as I followed the men who bore a tree.

Now the cold seeped into my body, for when I set out for home it had been sixty-degrees Fahrenheit and I knew it was below freezing. My estimate was that it was well below. The t-shirt I wore felt like tissue paper, too thin to keep me warm.