A PUFF of SMOKE

Silence. So quiet was the forest, it was eerie. After a woman had screamed in fear, she and the many animals of the wild forest suddenly quieted down and the silence that was heard was pure. It was as if the world had been frozen for a minute or two. Very few times in someone's life does a human hear absolute silence for at other times there is always some noise. Always something stirring, but not now as the strange man limped toward her in the night.

"I've come for your beloved husband, lady" The man sneered. Again the woman yelped.

This woman, a generous soul to all, was a brunette with deep green eyes. She lived in a small, but pleasant cottage out in a distant forest away from city life along with her husband, George, a loving farmer with brown hair and brown eyes. Although it was the twentieth century, the couple lived simply, as had their parents.

At 4:00 in the afternoon, earlier that day, this young, pregnant woman of twenty-nine, Martha, had come out of her house as she did every day at this time to tend to her plants in the garden.

"Who's thirsty today? Are you my little daisy?" She had giggled. She bent down but gently straightened back up.

"George, dear!" She called out, "Could you help me out here? The baby keeps me from my work." Again she giggled.

"Ah, be out in a minute my darling!" George replied nervously from inside the house. "I, uh, have something I AH! NO!!.. Need to attend to.

Look, sir, I don't know why you are in my home, but you need to vacate immediately or I'll have to force you out!" he yelled to the stranger he saw before him.

"I'm here to take you away, man. Now you'll be coming with me or I'll have to force ya." The villain speaking had ragged yellow teeth.

"No! I'm not going with you to wherever you wish to take me. Go! Leave my family in peace!" shrieked the innocent husband.

"You must die ya sicko. It's my personal order and deed to see to it that you are killed stone dead and brought back to my boss. He'll be plenty happy to have you dead." the stranger chuckled scornfully.

George turned pale then red at his cheeks. He gripped the ax that he was holding all that while and ran to the villain to kill him.

"Ah, ah, ah! I wouldn't do that if I was youse. You might get hurt. Heh heh." As the farmer ran up to him and yelled, a puff of black smoke snaked into the kitchen running its course to the open back door. With it, the strange young killer disappeared into the air leaving George staring at the now empty space the stranger had stood at just that moment, in surprise. His mouth was agape and the words in his mind wouldn't push through his dry throat. He tried to form these words but his mind was racing and his knees were so weak he collapsed to the floor. All this he did not realize for he was still timid of the whole situation that just took place in his little hut of a home.

After several moments he stood up calmly and dazed with a twisted, frozen look on his face. Then he burst his words to his sweet wife who had raced in trying to calm him down for his screams scared her out in the garden, and she did not know of the stranger's visit so she was quite bewildered with questions in her eyes as she had knelt beside him during these past few moments, but then got up as he stood right where he was. "Martha! MARTHA! WHERE ARE YOU?!?"

Martha leaped back in surprise. " I'm right here George, dear. Whatever did happen here? What scared you so?"

"A.a.a man was here about to KILL me for his boss!! I tried to defend myself, but he suddenly disappeared right in the clear blue like that." He snapped his fingers as he said 'that'.

"Oh you must have simply have imagined it dear. You are much too kind to be wanted by bad men. Come I'll fix you up some nice supper, now wash up." Martha replied serenely.

"However it was seemingly as real as could be," the husband protested.

"Sure, sure. Now hurry up. That false fear of yours must have given you quite a great appetite." she simply replied.

Still wary of what just took place, he followed his beloved wife's orders. After his simple meal of fish with water for gravy (no salt), homemade bread, and nuts and berries for a sweet dessert, just when he was about to smack his lips in pleasurable desire of his finished meal, the stranger appeared before him once again, this time with the wife watching.

"Okay man, this was your last slim chance of survival, but I changed my mind," He laughed at his quick change of plans, "Therefore I'm gonna just kill ya right off the bat, so ya'll comin' with and by the way, my name's Sly. Means I'm a tricky guy!"

"Come again?! By no means would I go with you! Get away!" For a second try of attempt, the farmer grabbed a nearby shovel from a shadowy corner of his one room hut, and ran toward Sly. Sly then clapped his hands with extreme gusto and black smoke poofed out of his hands, and as if by some magical force, the smoke pushed George onto the hard wooden floor beneath him. He landed with a hard thump while his wife, who had been silent in fright this whole time, stifled a scream. Sly then smirked and vanished in the air.

"I'm going out for a moment to see if he's there. You wait here." Martha ordered.

She went outside. Her footsteps crushed the dead leaves beneath her. Sly popped up behind her, he tapped her on the shoulder. Martha screamed at the top of her lungs, which resulted in alarming every animal in the forest. Sly sneered out, "I've come for your beloved husband, lady" She yelped again while watching him in silence disappear before her. She raced back to the single room in her cottage.

"Okay, I'm back, now I will destroy you. I have no time for this!" Sly reappeared as suddenly as he had left. He now threw thick black smoke toward the farmer. Martha grabbed a hand mirror she had laying on an upturned box, used as a chair, and held it out in front of her. At the same time as she bent forward in pain, for her baby just then kicked, the smoke bounced off the mirror and toward the wide-mouthed Sly who fell backwards once it hit him and fell up into the air. He escaped with his astonishing powers again but just before his head was gone he cried out his final words, "You may have won the battle, but the war ain't over! I'll be back in many years to get ya son instead!!!" Then he was gone.

Martha staggered, with a hand over her stomach, to George, "Honey, he's gone. He is finally gone."

"Yes he is." Is all he said in response.

The next day Martha gave birth, to just as Sly had predicted (or known? ..) to a beautiful healthy baby boy.

A few days later, in the garden, Martha held her baby as she stared into space while instinctively humming an old lullaby. George kneeled beside her. He gazed into her deep green eyes knowing that she was thinking his thoughts. They both were scared for the baby for sometime much later he could be hunted down by the mischievous Sly, but until then they were to just wonder in fear and to wait for the unpredictable future.

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This story was written for school. I got a perfect score! Yay for me! Um... please review!

(I know nothing is indented but that got messed up. Sorry about it.)