Even right then, with the dogman bobbing and weaving there between us, eyes – blood-red, did I mention? – looking from Ingrid to Louis to Ben to me and back to Ingrid. Even right then, I’ve got to confess – scared as I was, I was kind of psyched to be there. With my buds. About to throw down with a werewolf. Or weredog. Whatever.

Louis, I gotta confess, was the first to go full-on hero. He’s got a little of the Don Quixote in him, does Louis. Don’t know who that is? Spanish guy. Thought he was a knight. Always trying to save damsels in distress, only the damsels weren’t usually really damsels, and mostly didn’t need saving.

Ingrid whacking the air under the dogman’s nose with that redwood and Louis galloping in to save her – Don Quixote II all the way.

So Louis charged forward, making this kind of high pitched screaming noise. An awesomely brave high pitched screaming noise. Honest.

Ingrid swung that log back over her shoulder like she was up to bat to get some momentum going, and Ben kind of jiggered forward like two inches, then jiggered back again, and I knew he was thinking if Louis was charging in he’d better be ready to go too, or he’d never live it down. Truthfully, Louis would probably forget about it by supper, especially if Ben’s dad does the grilling.

Me. Well, I’m me. Ben could pretty much count on me never letting it go.

And what was yours truly doing?

Well, I could see just exactly where things were about to go all sideways.

Now, the biggest part of coming up with a plan in any strategy game is being able to see trends, identify patterns, predict the future based on the present.

So, here’s the present: Ingrid swinging a redwood tree through the air. Louis running right towards it. Both of ‘em looking at the freaky dogman and only at the freaky dogman.

A quick calculation or two, numbers flying through my head, trajectories estimated and confirmed, a crystal-clear picture of a time something like three seconds into the future forms itself in the air right there in front of me.

OK. Maybe I just guessed.

Either way, the gist of it: Louis was about to get smacked in the face with a hefty home-made club.

In the meantime, Dogman was backing away from Ingrid and her tree, kind of angling back towards the woods. Kind of angling towards Ben, who was kind of watching it and kind of watching Ingrid, I think waiting for her to club the beastie before making his move.

Ben might not be Don Quixote. But don’t think for a second Ben’s a scaredy-cat. I’ve seen him run his Pally into the heart of a wipe and heal and tank and keep enough guildies alive and going to turn the tide against some serious bosses. And yeah, maybe it’s a little easier to sacrifice a digital you, especially when you know you’ll rez and just have to make a quick jog from the graveyard to get back into the fray.

But I’m telling you. Ben would so do it in real life. But Ben’s also smart. Ben wasn’t going to rush in and get clubbed by friendly fire.

Which is what was happening to Louis at that very second.

Ben rocked back on his heels, dug ‘em into the ground, got ready to charge in. Ben was going to try to push Louis out of the way.

I looked at him, looked at Dogman. Let’s say numbers floated around my head and all. Calculations. Math stuff.

He’d have gotten there about six seconds too late. Except he wouldn’t have gotten there at all.

Because Dogman had figured it all out. It started backing closer to Ben, away from Ingrid. It shifted its weight just so, hunkered down just like that, took a step to one side — and put Ben between it and the woods.

So it could grab him up on the run, and vamoose into the wilderness.

Why did it want Ben? At the time, I figured as a hostage. Maybe for supper. Maybe for supper after a little quality hostaging time.

Turns out I was wrong. Let’s leave it at that[Lacina Family, 11/29/2018 8:19:24 PM Look at this section — either work in explanation, or indicate happens in future book here. Or cut.] for the time being.

So. The whole scene looked like a carrom board in mid-game.

Let me explain. The objective of carrom is to use your striker — this wooden disk — to knock your carrom men — smaller wooden disks — into the pockets around the board. Think of using the cue ball to knock all the colored balls into the pockets in pool. Then you go after the queen — think the eight ball. Like I said — it’s pool, shuffleboard and marbles. And here’s where the marbles comes in: you’ve got to make the striker do all that with just a flick of your finger.

My Dad is obsessed with the game. My Mom, not so much.

Guess who gets to play with him?

So I know my stuff.

The redwood’s trajectory arced across Louis’s, and I could see exactly where the point of impact was going to be — just like sending that striker at a carrom man. And as soon as Dogman started moving I could see when he was going to get Ben, which was going to be like a second after Ingrid brained Louis, and while Louis gushed brains and gore all over the place and Ingrid went all like “oh no — what have I done?” or more likely “seriously, brains on my club? Nice job, you dipwad.”

I knew what I needed — and I found it on the ground just by my left pinkie toe: a flat rock not too much bigger than a carrom striker.

It’s a beautiful thing when it all snaps together like one of those model cars they make for kids who can’t be trusted not to glue their fingers together if you got them a real model — when all the pieces follow the little arrows in the instructions and make a Model T, an X-wing, a battleship.

I had it.

I snapped my toe down on that rock, flipped it up into my left hand. Rolled it around onto the back of my hand, raised my arm to eye-level, readied my flicking finger, tucking the pointer of my right hand under the thumb, flexing the lumbrical muscles of my right pointer finger, muscles turned to steel by a thousand carrom games, used the inward pressure of my thumb to coil energy like a spring being wound and wound and wound, tight.

I lined it up behind my striker stone, sighted over the top of my pointer finger.

And I flicked the heck out of that baby.

It didn’t leave a trail of fire through the dark as it flew to its target. But geesh, it should have. The striker shot off the back of my hand. Flew straight. The dogman reached for Ben, the redwood fell towards Louis’s kind of empty head and Louis still thought he was going to save the day.

My striker struck true. Right into Dogman’s right eye.

And the chain of events rattled out, just like I’d seen them:

One second before snatching Ben, Dogman closes its eyes, one of them seeping this yellowish puke, the other one shutting as like a reflex. Ben finally notices Dogman coming at him, and putzes a little to the left. Dogman’s momentum and Ben’s clumsiness result in tangled feet, Ben falling one way, Dogman the other.

Into Louis. Louis thinks he’s about to be Dogman-meat and puts his arms around his head and ducks. Dogman kind of falls over him.

Right into the descending fury of Ingrid’s mighty cudgel.

Brains don’t fly. But there’s a meaty thunk of meaty thunks, and Dogman goes down. Then Louis. Then Ben.

Amir Hamza is the last man standing. Ingrid’s the last woman.

The striker hits the ground with a thud.

No one applauded. But you know they all wanted to.