"Nice shooting Tex!" "It's Sam, sir." "No, you're Tex now."

There once was a magical kingdom known as Chesdek. It was a land torn by war. Chesdek was divided right down the middle into two regions: Whiteboard and Blackboard. On the far side of Whiteboard, was Castle Whiterook, from which the King and Queen of Diamonds and the King and Queen of Hearts ruled. On the opposite side of Chesdek was Castle Blackrook, where the kings and queens of Spades and Clubs reigned. From their castles, they ordered their armies all over Chesdek, sending knights and jacks, bishops and aces, all across the wartorn kingdom.
But, caught in the middle of it all were the poor villagers of Chesdek. While the royalty used violence as a twisted game, the villagers tried in vain to survive. Most of the stronger Chesdekians survived, but the 4's, 3's, 2's, and lowliest f all, the pawns, all suffered. They were the ones that ultimately payed the price for the savagery of their leaders.
One such villager was a pawn named Arthur. He lived in a village right in the center of Chesdek, and so his village was not a peaceful one.
One day, a White Knight rode into Arthur's village and murdered a pawn that happened to be crossing the street. Arthur felt something inside snap. He had enough. He grabbed his tiny sword and charged the knight. Before the knight knew what was happening, he was slain.
Arthur sheathed his sword and began walking north to Castle Whiterook. The journey was long and he met with much resistance along the way, but he could not be deterred.
Finally, after many weeks, he reached Castle Whiterook. As he stepped inside the gates, something incredible happened. He was now clad in shining gold armor, and his tiny dagger of a sword was now one to rival Excalibur. He grew taller, and he now appeared a warrior of the most fearsome kind. All of the guards stepped out of the way as he climbed the steps to the thrones. Then, with one fell swipe of his mighty blade, he beheaded the kings. He turned to the warriors that stood below, watching him. He then uttered the words, that, as per tradition, made him the rightful King of all of Chesdek: "Checkmate."
He took his throne.
Within days, the Royals of Blackboard surrendered, and Arthur's rule restored long-sought peace to the land.

I'm Not Mad, I'm A Different Kind Of Sane!

One day, an angel was flying over the earth. He soaring above an average suburban neighborhood when he saw a woman walking on the sidewalk carrying bags of groceries. He thought that she was absolutely beautiful, and so he landed beside her.
"May I help you with those bags?" he asked.
"Oh!" she said, startled, "I didn't even see you there! I'd appreciate that, thank you."
He took the bags from her and walked beside her. He gazed at her longingly, believing her to be even more beautiful up close.
"Sorry for startling you. My name is Isaiah. I'm an angel."
"An angel?" she laughed, "Well if that's true, I've been waiting for you my whole life."
"It is true! Look at my wings!"
"Oh my..." she murmured. "Those are wings. Well I guess you are an angel!"
"May I ask your name?"
"You may ask. But I might not answer, " she teased.
"I think you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen," Isaiah said as they reached her front porch. They went inside and set the bags down in the kitchen.
"And I think you're the most beautiful man I've ever seen. You're perfect."
"I'm not a man, really. Just an angel."
"Maybe that's why you're so beautiful."
"I must be going now, but may I see you again?" Isaiah asked.
"I'd love that," she answered.
Isaiah said goodbye to her and walked out the front door and took off into the sky.
Every single day from then on, at the same time each day, Isaiah would take a break from his flight around the world and walk with her on the sidewalk. She'd tell him how perfect he was and he'd tell her how beautiful she was. Then they'd get to her house, and Isaiah would take off again, only to return the next day. And so it went for an entire year. On that day, after he left her house, Isaiah decided that he wanted to marry her, and so he flew up to heaven to ask for God's permission. He walked in threw the pearly gates and kneeled before Him.
"Lord, there is a woman on Earth that I have fallen in love with and wish to marry. I have come seeking your blessing," he said.
"This is happy news!" said God. "What is her name?"
Isaiah paused.
"I don't know. She hasn't told me."
"Well I suppose a name is irrelevant when loving someone. What does she do?"
Isaiah paused again.
"We haven't talked about it."
"Well," asked God, "is there anything that you do know about this woman?"
"I know she is beautiful, that I love her, and that she loves me."
"That is all?" asked God.
"Yes. That is all," said Isaiah.
God sighed. He remained silent for a long while.
"What you think you have, Isaiah," said God, finally, "it is not love. You do not have my blessing."
"Then I must give you back my wings," said Isaiah.
"This is a mistake, my son."
"I have to." Isaiah removed his wings, which he placed at God's feet. He then fell out of heaven and back down to Earth, where he found her walking.
"Hello," he said.
"Do I know you?" she said.
"Of course," he replied, "I'm Isaiah. You've walked this road with me for a year and a day!"
"You're not Isaiah," she said bluntly. She climbed the steps of her porch and unlocked the door.
"I am! You love me, and I love you!"
"No," she said as she closed the door in his face, "The man I fell in love with was perfect. Come back when you have wings."

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 2

"A... what?" Horatio said. "I don't believe I heard you correctly."

"My name is Zylphia," replied the woman, "and my husband and I, we are werewolves."

"You are in shock," Thaddeus stated bluntly.

"Tactful, Thaddeus. Ma'am," Horatio said gently, "I believe you may be in shock. You just told me you are a werewolf."

"Your partner is made of metal. Is it so hard to believe I might be different as well?"

"Fine," Horatio said after a pause. "We'll come back to that. What were these other killings you mentioned?"

"You may have noticed, but this neighborhood is a bit... different. Most of your neighbors are zombies, werewolves, vampires, a few ghosts, a witch, and others. The past two days, a zombie and a vampire have been destroyed."

"You are in shock," repeated Thaddeus.

"Thaddeus, do shut up. So, Zylphia, was it? How did these murders stay covered up?"

"Our people don't want to be discovered. We are all very peaceful, but that would be a hard thing to maintain if our true natures were to be brought to light. We had no choice but to hide the bodies and tell no  one."

"Interesting," murmured Horatio.

"You are in shock," Thaddeus said once more.

"Dammit, Thaddeus!" Horatio smacked the robot's chest to fix his voice pipes. "Better?"

"I wasn't malfunctioning, sir," Thaddeus said, unfazed. "But if you insist on taking on this case, I suggest taking a blood sample from the victim to verify her outlandish story."

"Good thinking. Would you object, ma'am?" asked Horatio.

"No, not at all, whatever helps."

Horatio took a needle and drew a vial of blood from the body. He the placed the sample back in his bag. He instructed Zylphia to hide the body and told her that they would be in touch. He and Thaddeus then returned to the house and climbed the stairs to Horatio's study. Horatio removed the blood sample from his bag and put a few drops onto a glass slide. He placed the slide under his microscope and examined it for a long while.

"There's certainly something wrong with it, Thaddeus," Horatio said without looking up from the lens. "However, it isn't necessarily a werewolf."

"How do we confirm her story then?" asked Thaddeus, who was carrying armfuls of books back and forth across the room in an attempt to organize them.

"We can't unless we catch a live one. And, assuming they're real, we'd have to wait for the next full-moon. No, we just have to go on the assumption that she was telling the truth, and focus on trying to find the killer. Either way, we know a man was murdered, and that's all that matters."

"So I suppose then that our next order of business is to find the maker of that silver bullet?" asked Thaddeus.

"I will take care of that. I need you to go back to the crime scene and go over it more carefully for evidence. And pay a visit to the mourning wife to see if you can examine the body for further information. Holmes won't be getting this one, Thaddeus."

"Very well s--" Thaddeus was interrupted by a crash from the ground floor, followed by rapid foot steps pounding up the stairs.

"Bolt the door!" barked Horatio. Thaddeus rushed to wooden door, but was knocked backwards as it flew off of its hinges. Three creatures walked into the room. They were all well over seven feet tall, and covered in brown or gray fur. Their faces were long canine-esque snouts with prominent and razor-sharp teeth. They had long claws, tails, and wore tattered human clothing.

Werewolves. They growled and stepped over Thaddeus, and moved quickly towards Horatio.

"Shit."

To be continued...

The Strange Casefiles of Horatio Morgan, Chapter 1

Victorian Era, London, England, Dawn, Autumn:

"Those bastards!" exclaimed Horatio Morgan, slamming the day's edition of "The Times" down on the scratched wooden table, spilling his coffee. "Thaddeus, listen to this headline: 'Holmes and Watson Foil Robbery in Progress.' They happened to be in a bank at the right time and they get all of the attention. I swear, if those two phonies keep hogging every crime in London as they have been, I'll be out on the streets!"

"Too true, sir, too true," replied Thaddeus in his metallic, hollow voice, as he wiped up the spilled drink.

Horatio Morgan was London's premiere detective. That is, until Sherlock Holmes came on the scene. Now Horatio is old news and can't find work anywhere.

"For God's sake, Thaddeus! I invented a robot, and no one even knows. Those two could get a cat out of a tree and make the front page!"

"Too true, sir," replied Thaddeus, who was scrubbing Horatio's dishes in a sink already piled high with them.

"Thaddeus, I believe your voice pipes are malfunctioning again."

"Too true, sir."

Horatio walked over to the sink, nearly tripping over piles of books, and smacked Thaddeus in his cast-iron back.

Thaddeus is a robot.

"Much obliged, sir," Thaddeus said.

"My pleasure. Now what can we do about this lack of business?"

Horatio paced back and forth behind Thaddeus. He was wearing black trousers held up by overalls and a white button-up shirt. He had shaggy black hair that jutted out in different directions and a short but full black beard and moustache. Thaddeus was made entirely of iron and ran on steam heated by coal. His body was a huge cylinder with a hatch on the front for putting more coal in. His head was a dome on top of the cylinder with two round eyes indented into it and a grate through which exhausted steam poured out constantly. He had two bulky cylindrical arms and two legs of the same description.

Thaddeus was responsible for the general upkeep of Horatio's extremely narrow five-story house. The house was one of the strangest pieces of architecture in London, and therefore Horatio could live in no other dwelling. There was a spiral staircase that went straight up through the middle of the circular house, which consisted of a kitchen and dining room on the first floor, a bathroom on the second floor, a library on the third, Horatio's bedroom on the fourth, and his study on the fifth. Due to the stairs going through the center of the house, it was impossible to get anywhere above the first floor without walking through the middle of the bathroom, which would have been an extremely uncomfortable situation if Horatio wasn't the only human being in the house. Horatio was an avid reader, and every iota of free space in the house was taken up by books, paper and pens.

Horatio was still pacing back an forth in the kitchen when a gun shot rang out. Both Thaddeus and Horatio grabbed their belts with with their holstered guns and ran out the door. Horatio snagged his black bowler's hat and bag off of the hook next to the door as he shut it behind him.

Running in the direction of the sound, they both came upon a narrow alley where they found a man's body with three bullet wounds in it and a pool of blood forming around him. The sun was just starting to spread its fiery light over the distant horizon, bathing the scene in orange.

"Thaddeus, search for the shooter, quickly!" Horatio ordered. Thaddeus darted off around the block. Horatio knelt to inspect the body. He lifted the left arm and felt for a pulse.

"Already dead," he murmured. He took a pair of tweezers out of his bag and set to work removing the bullets.

"No sign of anyone," said Thaddeus, returning to the alley.

"Well maybe these will help," said Horatio, holding up a blood-drenched projectile. "Any idea where one can acquire silver bullets, Thaddeus?"

At that moment, a woman in her nightgown dashed into the alley.

"Oh God," she whispered. "No. Roderick, no!"

She fell to her knees as tears began to fall in tragic torrents from her eyes. Her gown was a deep purple and her hair a jet black. She sobbed into her hands.

"Ma'am," Horatio said gently, "who was he to you?

"My husband," she choked.

"I'm sorry for your loss. Do you have any idea who might have done this? I'm a detective, and it's imperative that we act as swiftly as possible to catch the murderer."

"I don't know who. Must be the same as the other killings," she mumbled.

"What other killings?" Horatio asked, alarmed.

"Someone has targeted our people. We thought it was a coincidence with the first two, but this confirms it."

"Your people? Who do you mean?"

"He never hurt anyone. He was always in control. Why did this happen?" she said, now getting louder.

"Ma'am, you're in shock. Please tell me, who are your people?" Horatio asked urgently.

"My husband," said the woman, "he was a werewolf."

To be continued...

I Can Feel It In My Blood, The Hunger.

The lifeless green light from the clock on her bedside table read 11:59. Even through the closed shutters, specters made of moonlight swam across the walls. She rolled over restlessly, unable to fall asleep. A feeling in the pit of her stomach told her mind to stay awake. She didn't know what it was for, but it made her uneasy.
The clock's light morphed into midnight, and her doorbell rang. She jumped in surprise at the noise, and then swore to herself under her breath as she walked towards the door in her sweat pants and tank top. She peeped through the hole in the door and saw him outside.
It was the man from last night. She was at a night club and had met him. He was tall, handsome, and had a glimmer of mischief and mystery in his eye. She had asked him to have lunch with her but he had refused. She had no idea what he was doing at her doorstep at midnight.
She opened the door.
He apologized for waking her and complimented her appearance. She thanked him asked what it was he was doing.
He explained that he had had some friends over to his apartment, and they started a huge party that he had no interest in, and after a failed attempt to get them to leave, he had walked out. He needed a place to stay for the night and she was the first person that came to his mind.
She invited him inside and he thanked her and assured her that he'd be no trouble.
They entered and she told him to sit on the couch while she fetched some blankets and a pillow. She returned with them and set them on the table, then sat on the couch next to her visitor. She crossed her legs and chatted with him for a long while. He told her that he shared his apartment with his brother and asked if they might be able to join him if they needed a place as well. She told him that they're more than welcome to stay. He thanked her for her graciousness and asked if he might be able to open a window. She stood and opened the nearest one.
No sooner had it been cracked then two bats barrelled inside. She screamed and swatted at them and they flew up the stairs and out of sight. He rushed to her side and asked if she was alright. She told him she was startled but fine. He comforted her by saying that they were probably even more afraid of her.
They returned to the couch and sat down. He smiled at her and she back at him. He leaned in closer and brushed a strand of hair from her eyes and was about to kiss her when she pulled away.
"Wait a second. How did you know where I live?"
The lights went out instantly.
She screamed and curled up into a ball on the couch. She glanced around in a panic, but could see nothing in the darkness. She heard the stairs creak under the weight of footsteps. Her breathing was rapid and she was shaking. She looked to where she had last seen him. She could see two glowing red, lifeless eyes, piercing through the darkness.She felt something cold touch her leg and a soulless voice whispering.
"Just relax."
She calmed at the sound of the voice, even though she knew she shouldn't. It was a voice that intrigued her and excited her. She looked up and saw two more pairs of alluring red eyes in the darkness. She felt a strong, cold embrace and then six little pricks in her neck.
Then it went black.

A Mystery. Broken Into A Jigsaw Puzzle. Wrapped In A Conundrum. Hidden In A Chinese Box.

Her purse is gone. Mugging? he thought. Too simple. Why kill her?

The rain beat heavy and fast on the back of the leather coat worn by Detective Colt. He was hunched over a bleeding body in a tight dark alley somewhere in the tight dark bleeding city that he called home. He rolled the woman over and inspected her closer. His fingers hovered over the freshly made orifice in her abdomen. There were no other marks on her body. No abrasions, scrapes, or cuts.

No signs of a struggle.

His fingers and eyes moved up the corpse to its face. There was a bruise on her forehead.

Not much to go on. Probably hit it in the fall. She was dead before she hit the ground. Why does she look familiar?

He moved back to the bullet wound. It was larger than normal, indicating something other than small arms fire.

This wasn't a gun you could carry around stealthily.

He rolled her back over and examined the entrance wound. It was in between the shoulder blades.

Why is it so much higher? The angles is extreme...

His hand brushed something in her pocket. He reached in and removed her wallet. He opened it up and read the driver's license.

Martha Farleone. The crime boss's daughter. This is bad.

He slipped the license back in the wallet and the wallet back into the pocket. He dropped the body back into the pool of grime, blood and rainwater that he found it in and stood up.

She was my contact. They know I'm the mole.

He pulled out his cell phone and turned to face the street. He leaned against the building, hiding in the shadows. The phone rang in his ear as his eyes darted around nervously.

"Johnny?" answered the voice on the other end. "I thought I told you to call me on secure lines only.""

"Mr. Farleone, I think that I've been--"

The detective caught a glimpse of gun barrel's flash from the window of a building across the street, and immeasurable moments later, a bullet pierced flesh, skull, gray matter, skull, and then flesh again. The body fell lifelessly to the ground next to the woman.

"You've been what?" said the phone. "Johnny, what was that noise? Johnny? Johnny...?"