THE HOUND


The furtive figure hurried along, frequently looking over his shoulder, and occasionally stumbling as he did so. His errand must be quite urgent to impel him out onto the moors at night, as he was so obviously terrified to be here, mused Daria Holmes. Silent and sure-footed as a panther, she paralleled the path, keeping her quarry always in sight. Suddenly the man froze in horror, and the hair on Daria’s neck stood up in sympathy, as a ghastly sound rolled out across the moors.

It was the baying of a monstrous hound.


“Shut up, Buttmunch!”

Daria Morgendorffer sat up in bed, breathing heavily. Groping on her nightstand, she found and ignited a lighter. Buttmunch, the monstrous hound, growled faintly and laid his massive, ugly, gray and black head back on his front paws. Daria lit the candle stub on the nightstand, put down the lighter, and looked around her isolated mountain cabin by its dim yellow light.

Her laptop, her most prized possession, sat on the kitchen counter/table/workbench that occupied one whole wall of the small, almost tiny cabin. She’d built it entirely by herself, and the size of the cabin had been determined by the size of the logs she could drag. But no one knew it was here, and that was what counted.

The computer’s value now was mainly the value of one document stored redundantly on its hard drive, and on two floppies for good measure. That value was immeasurable. Her Cynic’s Manifesto was done now, and only a few hours ago she’d finished the second proofreading. One more to be sure, and she would send it out to many selected web sites and email boxes all over the internet, and all over the world.

It would be an instant worldwide sensation, she knew, a mighty light pushing back the darkness, illuminating the myriad traps and pitfalls Man had built into his world view and his socio-economic system, and revealing the human race to itself for what it truly was—a bunch of morons.

And to help them get started up the path of recovery and enlightenment- stacked neatly beneath the workbench were seventeen diabolically clever bombs, every one unique, none looking like a bomb, sisters to the many others already in position, or ready to be deployed by various means, at various times, with no further action required from her. The people would see the traps and roadblocks being destroyed, and some of the worst of the reactionary obstructionist morons eliminated, and some of them would understand. A few would even be able to figure out what came next, and they would become the leaders. Enlightened by her Cynic’s Manifesto, and perhaps with an occasional bit of guidance from her from behind the scenes, they would lead mankind out of the pit of his ignorance, into the clear light of a new day.

Daria yawned, brushed back her unkempt, more-than-waist-length hair, idly wondering why there was so much gray in it at age twenty-nine, and was wetting the pads of her thumb and forefinger to pinch out the candle wick when another growl from Buttmunch stopped her. It was a very quiet growl, totally inaudible outside the cabin, intended as a warning to her.

No animal except a grizzly was a threat to her inside the cabin, she knew, and she had never seen another human being, nor any trace of one, anywhere in the area. But... Her eye strayed to the laptop and its priceless contents. Daria pinched out the candle, stepped to the door, and silently opened it.

She felt rather than saw or heard him go. Soundless as a tiger (and damn near as big) and perfectly camouflaged for noctournal hunting, Buttmunch was a fearsome and fearless foe. Closing the door, she seated herself at the computer by touch and memory. She fired it up, suffered agonies through the bootup process, and further agonies through the logon sequence.

A man’s scream rang through the night, choked off untimely.

Oh, no. It’s true. They’re here. They’ve come for me. Illuminated only by screenglow, Daria’s fingers flew over the familiar keyboard.

Another scream, a shot, a snarl that was almost a roar, more shots, shouts, another scream. The prepared addresses loaded, a short cover note typed, Daria faced further agonies of waiting while the email program attached her Cynic’s Manifesto.

The internet connection had been hideously difficult in time and effort, and hideously expensive for one who had so little money, but it was about to prove its worth. Just as Buttmunch was proving his. He’d terrorized Daria for a week, flitting in and out of her lousy peripheral vision, just a huge dark form amid the trees. Finally he’d nerved himself to approach her, carrying (not dragging!) a fresh-killed deer as a gift. After a long session of mutual timid staring, she had slowly held out her hand and he had slowly approached, quivering like a puppy. After that, the bond had formed very rapidly. Now, he was probably the last living thing on earth that Daria loved.

He’d named himself when he exhibited the first of his several gross habits. And he smelled almost...

There came another deep-throated snarl, another scream, quickly changing to a gurgle, and many shouts, edged with panic and confusion, but some getting nearer. The tiny hourglass on her screen tormented Daria.

Buttmunch, Buttmunch, burning bright
In the forest of the night,
What immortal hand or eye...

Buttmunch’s attack snarl came again, followed closely by two men’s screams,then several shots, a deep yelp of pain, several more shots, a whine, many more shots.

Buttmunch! Oh, no!

Daria blinked back tears, looked again at the screen. The hourglass still mocked her. She waited in the dark, alone, as the armed morons closed in. At last, it winked out! Quickly she hit OK, returned to the Compose screen, moved the arrow over the send button. Her finger stabbed down on the enter key. The Cynic’s Manifesto was away! It belonged to the world now. And so did she.

Daria’s hand moved away from the keyboard, formed itself into a fist, and hovered over an unremarkable spot on the benchtop. Hidden there was a trigger switch, one of several throughout the cabin, located so that one would always be within her reach. She could hear them now, creeping and whispering, just outside. They had her, but they’d never be able to prove it. The switches were wired to enough high explosives to vaporize her, the cabin, and anyone within twenty feet of it. There wouldn’t be enough left of her for DNA matching. She would vanish away without a trace. Daria Morgendorffer was about to become a legend. And the bombs, going out from remailers for the next seven years, would keep the legend alive.

They crashed through the door, yelling. Daria cried, “I’m coming, Buttmunch!” as her fist slammed down. There was a blinding fla...





Daria Morgendorffer sat up in bed, eyes wide, breathing hard, hands feeling herself. She wasn’t vaporized. Her right hand grabbed her glasses off the nightstand and put them on without waiting for orders from her brain. She looked around. Gray padded walls, lit by dawn’s early light, reassured her. The clock told her she’d be getting up in about fifteen minutes anyway. Might as well beat Quinn to the shower for once. Daria picked up a stinky sock to leave on the bathroom floor to irritate Quinn, and headed out into the hall.

In the bathroom, Daria turned on the shower’s hot water tap and let it run. She carefully examined her luxuriant mane of auburn hair in the mirror, looking for gray or white hairs and finding none. She decided she’d dig out that floppy on which she’d saved the downloaded Anarchist’s Cookbook, format it, and find something else to store on it, say, records of bizarre dreams. She took off her sleeping clothes, adjusted the shower temperature, and stepped in.

Luxuriating in the steamy hot shower, Daria thought of her Montana Cabin Fund. She thought of all the unused camping gear in the garage, already paid for. She could load some of that on her mom’s mountain bike, also unused, add a week’s worth of grub, have her dad drop her off near a suitable mountain, and get most of the benefits of a cabin for nothing. Perhaps another use for that money would occur to her. She let Quinn bang on the door and whine for a few minutes, then stepped out of the shower and toweled off.

Back in her room, as she dressed, Daria considered writing down her dream- within-a-dream while it was fresh in her mind, or at least making some notes, but then she realized that she wouldn’t forget this dream for a very long time. She smiled. Jane was going to get a kick out of this one.


I wrote this to be the beginning of a fic titled The Hound of the Barksdales, exploring Daria’s relationship with Amy and the Barksdale family. Alas, all I have so far is this, the title, and a couple of scene fragments. Don’t know if I’ll ever come up with a story idea worthy of the title.

No monstrous hounds were hurt in the writing of this ficlet, or fragment, or whatever.