August 10, 1935
Kyuquot, Barnes Island
Rain Island Anarchcracy:

        The sky above his head was dark, that peculiar shade of dark slate blue like a summer thunderstorm about to burst.  Unlike a summer thunderstorm, however, this sky stretched from horizon to horizon, utterly blank and featureless.  No birds flew across its dark sameness, and although thunder rolled there was no sign of lightning.
        The man stood facing the sky before looking around at his other surroundings.  He stood on a spur of rock that reared above the canopy of trees – pines, oak and maple – that stretched to the horizon in all directions.  Despite the dark sky, their shades of green seemed bright and vibrant.
        He turned, feeling a Presence come into being behind him.
        The Presence was playing with him this time; he faced himself on top of the rocky spur.  “Why are you doing this?” he cried out, and a wind rose, ruffling his thick fur.  “What do you want?”
        The simulacrum of himself didn’t answer, but instead pointed to the east, where the dark sky was getting darker . . .

        “Kelso?  Hey, Luke, wake up!  Snap out of it!”
        Light flooded into the tiny sweat lodge and the otter inside blinked, squinting against the glare.  “Wha - ?”  The vision swam away in his mind’s eye, to be replaced by himself.  He took several deep breaths and closed his eyes briefly as he reminded himself that he was a policefur.
        The fox who disturbed him eyed the otter critically.  “Sorry for interrupting you, Luke, but the Boss wants us both in his office.  And he don’t mean this afternoon, neither.” 
        “Okay, Jack,” Luke Kelso said as he reached for a towel.  “Give me a couple minutes to get cleaned up and we’ll go see what he has to say.”  He clambered out of the sweat lodge, wrapping the towel around his waist and padding off to the showers as Jack went back to his desk.
        The hot water felt like ice after the concentrated heat inside the lodge, and the otter shivered even as he started soaping himself clean.  He finished quickly, his eyes still smarting a bit from getting soap in them, and after a few minutes with a towel and his furbrushes he managed to get himself fairly presentable.  He stepped out of the shower area and got dressed, making a few last-minute adjustments to his shirt before he buckled his pistol to his hip.
        “About time, you two,” the duty sergeant, a bobcat named Circling Eagle (although most called him Pete) growled.  The feline sat behind a desk cluttered with reports and files, the product of a long and busy morning.  “Kelso – ah, dammit.’  His features changed from anger to concern.  “Look, Luke, I don’t mind you using the sweat lodge on your breaks.  Hell, if it makes you feel better, you might recommend it to the others – we can all use a little quiet time, it helps.  But,” and his expression grew stern again, “I can’t have my best man spiritwalking all day.”
        “Sorry, Sarge,” Kelso said.  A check of the clock while he was dressing confirmed that he’d been in the sweat lodge almost three hours.  “It won’t happen again.”
        That drew a laugh from the bobcat.  “It will – you’re just hoping I’ll forget before then.  Now, to why I called you away – take a really close look at this guy,” and he tossed a file folder to the otter, who caught it.
        The file contained a photograph and a brief record on a fox with the odd name of Ferenc Sarkozy.  He was thirty-two, of Hungarian descent and a recent immigrant to Canada.  Height, weight, build, fur color, charges . . . he stared at the list of charges while Jack, looking over his shoulder, whistled.  “Now that’s a naughty fox,” the vulpine remarked.  “Five counts of fraud, fifteen counts of grand theft, and . . . murder?”
        “Yeah,” the sergeant replied, “and according to the RCMP the guy’s headed this way, fleeing from their cops.  He busted out of jail in Saskatoon, killing a guard in the process before disappearing.  Best info the Mounties can give us is that he’s headed for Rain Island.”
        “Which makes him our problem,” Jack said.
        “Damn right,” the bobcat growled.  “We’re free here; last thing we need is a bunch of Canadians or worse traipsing around without so much as a by-your-leave.”  By ‘worse’ the sergeant meant Americans.
        “Are we sure he’s coming out this way, Sarge?” Luke asked, eyes still riveted to Sarkozy’s picture.  He gazed at the photograph, then gasped as the World around him started to fade.
        Great, that’s the last thing I need, he said to himself as the external world grew distant, snapping back as he willed himself to return.  He looked up to see Circling Eagle staring at him.  “Nothing,” the otter said defensively.  “Like I said, are we sure he’s coming out this way?”
        “Maybe,” the bobcat replied, looking at his subordinate closely.  “All police offices and posts throughout the country are on the lookout for him, and every officer, constable and town marshal from Seathl to Little Wolf Lake’s been notified.  But if he fetches up here on Barnes Island, I want him found and arrested.”
        “Dead or alive?” Kelso asked with a grin.  Trashy old Western novels were Pete’s one real weakness.
        The bobcat smirked.  “Either way’s fine with me,” he said.  The fox and the otter started to leave the office when Pete said, “Luke, come back here.  Close the door.”
        Jack shrugged and kept going as Luke closed the door and sighed.  “What is it, Sarge?”
        “Care to talk about it?” the bobcat asked.
        Luke waved a paw, trying to dismiss it.  “Just overwork.  Linda’s due soon, you know, and I think it’s natural to be concerned about that.”
        “Hmm.  It’s more than that,” Pete said flatly, “and both of us know it.  You need to talk to the shaman or a priest about it?”
        Kelso shrugged.  “I’m not sure it’s something they could handle.  I’ll be okay.”
        The feline seemed far from convinced.  “You’re one of my best, Luke.  I don’t want you getting distracted while on the job.”
        “I won’t,” Luke said.  “I’d better get to work now,” and he walked out of the office.


        Sometimes being short and nondescript had distinct advantages.
        The fox had stowed away on a railroad train leaving Saskatoon for Vancouver, giving the police the slip (he hoped).  Had he been caught and faced a jury after his escape, there would have been no doubt that his journey would end at the loop of a hangman’s noose.
        He had broken into a chemist’s at the earliest opportunity, as soon as the train had stopped for servicing in Victoria.  He now sported a hurried but thorough dye job that changed his usual red coat to a charcoal gray.  Filching a few odds and ends off clotheslines had helped him as well, as had the money that the dead jail guard had on him.  So far, he was quite fortunate.
        But Canada was no longer safe for him; Sarkozy realized that.  Where should he go?  America?  Possibly; he recalled stories of his youth that it was a country paved in gold and held limitless opportunities.
        But America had her own troubles, with gangsters and people of low quality running things.  No, that would not be to his liking either.  Perhaps he should continue west, into Rain Island’s territory.


        Kelso stepped off the small bus that served as Kyuquot’s public transport, remembering to pay the driver, and headed up the lane to his house.  He had been born in the small town, and had lived most of his life there with the exception of a brief stint at the regional police academy in Naikoon.
        “Hi, sweetheart,” he said as he walked in, stepping up behind his wife as she stood at the stove and hugging her as he kissed her cheek.  Linda Kelso smiled, leaning back into his arms as he caressed her very pregnant belly.  She returned to stirring the soup as he asked, “How was your day?”
        She gave him an arch glance over her shoulder.  “Do you really want to know, Luke?”
        He chuckled and sat at the table.  “Sure.”
        “Would you believe that Sam was out of fresh meat today?” his wife asked rhetorically.  “I had to buy salted, and you know I hate having to soak it.”  She sighed.  “I wish we could afford one of those new refrigerators.”
        Luke nodded.  Linda had seen the appliance in a magazine, and the idea of keeping food fresh without having to manhandle large blocks of ice distinctly appealed to her.  “We’re saving more money, you know that,” Luke reminded her.
        “I know,” she said ruefully, then smiled at him.  “But there’s no harm in wishing, is there?”
        “None at all.”  He beckoned to her, and she left the soup for a moment and sat on his lap.  He put his arms around her waist and they kissed.  When she broke the kiss she asked, “Is that your gun, or are you just happy to see me?”  They both laughed at that, and she got up to take the dinner off the stove.
        The soup was delicious, served with iced tea and freshly-baked bread slathered with butter.  Linda started to get up to pick up the plates and Luke said, “Stay right there,” and she watched as he cleared the table.  At her questioning look he said, “You’re getting close, aren’t you?”
        She giggled.  “Sometimes it feels like I’m going to have an elephant, not an otter,” she replied.  “And the midwife dropped by along with a nurse from the clinic.  They both say I’m doing fine, and the baby’s due in about a week.”
        “A week?” he repeated, his eyebrows going up.


        A paw shook the slim gray fox awake.  “Excuse me, Miss?” the deer said.  “We’re here; you might want to gather up your things.”
        Ferenc Sarkozy nodded.  He had always been a bit on the delicate side, too small and thin to engage in sports, and his size had even gotten him out of the Army in the waning weeks of the Great War.  Stealing women’s clothes had been a clever way of hiding himself even more thoroughly.  He got to his feet and gathered up the small bundle that held his other clothes.
        It was raining, just a light drizzle, and he squinted up at the limp red and black flag as it hung from its pole.  The sign beside the flagpole read Welcome to Barnes Island.
        He took a breath and followed the other passengers off the ferry.


        Luke was asleep when the dream came to him again. 
        Again he was standing on a rocky spur, watching a darkness gathering in the east.  Now he was able to guess what it was, and he rounded on the Presence standing behind him.
        “You know,” he said, his voice sounding hollow in that other place, “it’s really awkward having a Bear for one’s totem when . . .”
        “. . . You’re an otter,” he said aloud as the alarm clock started to ring.
        Linda mumbled something in her sleep and rolled over as he silenced the alarm and sat up, rubbing his paws across his face before getting out of bed.
        “Are you going to talk to someone about it today?” she asked suddenly as he finished cooking breakfast.  She leaned against the doorjamb in her nightdress as she asked, cocking her head quizzically.  “Please, Luke?”
        “I will, I promise,” Luke replied.

        When he got to the small station house he immediately sought out his partner.  He found Jack seated at his desk, sipping tea from a chipped mug.  The fox looked up at the otter curiously and asked, “What’s the matter, Luke?”
        “Don’t ask me how I know this, Jack,” Luke said, “but I think Sarkozy is here.”



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