Foster's

Kevin 1

It was one of Angelica's day's off.

Not in the sense that she didn't have work, because she didn't usually work weekends, but in the sense that she didn't have any monster chores today.

Both Chad and Kyle had eaten last night and Kyle didn't need to go hunting anytime soon. Chad had organized the living room again, she had already played a game with Kyle the day before. She could have Angelica time.

This just meant that she could do her own thing. She chose to unwind by sitting in her favourite armchair by the fireplace with a good book, a cup of tea and a snack.

She chose a mystery book she had put off reading, brewed herself a cup of her favourite vanilla Earl Grey tea picked out an orange as a healthy snack and then settled herself into the arm chair.

Once she was comfortable she started reading. She could already see white edging in and out of her peripherals, and Chad had gone back to straightening the living room. Even though he didn't need to, but she had come to realize that he was slightly OCD. He liked everything in a certain position and if it was off by only fraction of a millimetre he'd move it. She didn't mind of course, it just meant that her living room always looked like a Martha Stuart centerfold.

She was maybe one chapter in when she spotted this red furred hand out of the corner of her eye. It reached out of the chimney, took the orange off of her side table and she didn't even blink.

"Thank you," came out of the fireplace in a thick German accent.

"You're welcome," she said back without even thinking and then she went back to reading.

For all of two seconds.

Then she straightened, realized what had just happened and turned back to the fireplace.

The fireplace in her home wasn't functional. They had bricked off the chimney forever ago, so it was purely for decoration. Usually, she put flower arrangements depending on the season inside, but the vase was empty at the moment.

It looked normal to her, like her fireplace did on any regular day. But that apprehension was back. The tingling up her spine that indicated something else was near her. And it wasn't one of her known monsters either.

She had two monsters in the house, the apprehension and tingling she felt when they were watching her had all but left now. But now the feeling was back.

Had another monster gotten in?

"Uhm... hello?" she called softly.

"Hallo," came back at her and then she bolted out of her seat and away from it.

"Kyle..." she said softly. Immediately there was a shift, a sort of heavy presence in the air that indicated that he was standing near her.

She blindly groped until she got a hold of his arm.

"There's... there's something in the chimney..."

He stood there beside her. His eyes narrowed in at the fireplace. Chad came out from under the couch and he too stared at the fireplace.

Kyle moved first, sweeping her back towards the couch and Chad. Then he slowly moved towards the fireplace. He looked at it, put his massive bony fingers to the bricks above the mantle place, and then slowly and carefully stuck a hand up into the chimney.

A hiss broke the silence that had fallen, it had Angelica crying out in surprise, Chad jumped up off the floor and onto the coffee table. Kyle however, yelped, and she had never heard him yelp before. It was a guttural sort of cry that was short but it was his version of a yelp and she knew it.

He quickly withdrew his hand shaking it. The universal symbol of someone who got both a surprise and a minor injury all at once.

"Are you okay?" she asked but he didn't answer.

He was staring at that chimney, clearly unamused. His mouth descended, a roar echoed out of him. Chad squeaked, dropping to the floor and disappearing under the couch again. Angelica yelped his name, starting forward in the hopes of calming him down.

But she wasn't quick enough.

He slammed his shoulder into the mantle. The hit cracked the stone of the mantle, it jolted the picture frames and candle stick holders off and to the ground.

But worst of all. It caused whatever it was that was hiding in her chimney to come out.

And even though she had heard a voice coming out of there, even though she knew something was most likely in there, she still wasn't expecting it.