Friday Night Live

The morning mist clung to the window of Sheriff Daniel "Danny" Martinez's cruiser like a shroud as he pulled into the high school parking lot. His coffee - black as his mood and twice as bitter - had gone cold hours ago, but he kept sipping anyway. Anything to wash away the taste of bile that rose every time he thought about what waited beyond the hastily erected police barriers.

"Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick," his partner, Deputy Sarah Chen, muttered from the passenger seat. She'd been uncharacteristically quiet since they'd gotten the call. "Did you see Thompson's face when he radioed in? Man looked greener than my mother's attempt at Christmas cookies."

"Thompson's a rookie," Danny grunted, but his knuckles were white on the steering wheel. Twenty years on the force, and he'd never heard the dispatcher's voice shake like that. "'Sides, probably just some punk kids with too much time and fake blood. You know how it gets around Halloween."

"It's March, boss."

"...shit."

They pulled up alongside a cluster of patrol cars, their cherry lights painting the pre-dawn darkness in alternating splashes of red and blue. Yellow crime scene tape fluttered in the morning breeze, creating a garish border around what used to be the pride of East Valley High - their state championship-winning football field.

Now it looked like someone had tried to film a slasher film with a military budget.

"Holy mother of-" Sarah's usual snark evaporated as they approached the scene. "That's... that's not fake blood, is it?"

Danny didn't answer. He couldn't. His eyes were fixed on Principal Howard Matthews, usually the picture of bureaucratic composure, currently retching into a decorative planter near the bleachers. The man's tweed jacket was splattered with what Danny desperately hoped was just this morning's breakfast.

"Mr. Matthews?" He kept his voice professionally neutral, even as his stomach did somersaults. "Think you can walk us through what happened?"

"I... hurk... give me a moment..." Matthews wiped his mouth with a monogrammed handkerchief that had seen better days. "I came in early to catch up on paperwork. Budget reports, you know how it is. Noticed the field lights were still on from last night's practice. Thought those damn kids forgot again, went to switch them off and..." He gestured helplessly at the carnage before doubling over again.

"Take your time," Sarah said, her notepad already out. Her pen shook slightly. "Start from the beginning."

"There's no BEGINNING!" Matthews' laugh held a hysterical edge. "Just... just THAT!" He pointed toward the fifty-yard line, where a cluster of forensics techs were photographing something that made Danny wish he'd skipped breakfast.

"Jesus FUCK," Sarah breathed, forgetting her professional demeanor. "Is that... are those..."

"Teeth," Danny confirmed grimly. "Human ones. Along with... other parts." He squinted at the grass, trying to make sense of the patterns. "Almost looks like something... dragged them? Multiple someones?"

"Bears!" A voice cut through the morning air with the subtlety of a foghorn. Officer Thompson jogged up, his rookie enthusiasm somehow intact despite the horror show around them. "Gotta be bears, right? I mean, what else could do... this?" He gestured at a set of bleachers that looked like they'd been used to tenderize meat. Very human-shaped meat.

"In suburban California?" Sarah's skepticism could have stripped paint. "Since when do bears play football?"

"A really PISSED OFF bear?" Thompson's adam's apple bobbed nervously. "I mean, look at those claw marks! And... and the way things are... you know..." He made a ripping motion that had Matthews diving for the planter again.

Danny pinched the bridge of his nose. "Thompson, when was the last time you saw a bear use a goalpost as a goddamn javelin?"

The rookie's eyes tracked to where the metal pole had been uprooted and thrown with enough force to impale the scoreboard. The digital display flickered feebly, stuck in an endless loop:

HOME: 00 VISITOR: --ERROR--

"Maybe it was a... really strong bear?" Thompson's voice got smaller with each word. "With... opposable thumbs?"

"Right," Sarah deadpanned. "A bodybuilding bear with fine motor skills decided to crash Friday night practice. Probably wanted to make the team but got cut during tryouts."

"Chen..." Danny's warning came too late.

"OH GOD!" Matthews was back at the planter. "The team... the TEAM! Has anyone... have the parents..."

Danny's radio crackled to life, saving him from answering. "Sheriff? You're gonna want to see this. Under the home bleachers."

The scene under the bleachers looked like someone had tried to recreate the shower scene from Psycho using an industrial pressure washer filled with blood. And succeeded. Spectacularly.

"Found some... uh... remains," the forensics tech said unnecessarily. She looked like she was seriously reconsidering her career choices. "Lots of trace evidence. Fabric fragments, personal effects..." She held up an evidence bag containing what might have been a letterman jacket, if letterman jackets typically came pre-shredded and marinading in bodily fluids.

"DNA?" Danny asked, knowing it was a long shot. The FBI was still pushing that newfangled testing, but their department's budget barely covered coffee, let alone cutting-edge forensics.

"Maybe? If we can find enough... intact material." The tech swallowed hard. "But sir? That's not the weird part."

"Weirder than a bear doing CrossFit?" Sarah muttered. Danny elbowed her.

"Some of the... pieces... show signs of being..." The tech looked green. "Eaten."

A heavy silence fell, broken only by the distant sound of Matthews finding something new to throw up.

"Eaten," Danny repeated flatly. "As in..."

"Consumed. Masticated. Digested, probably, though we won't know for sure until we get samples back from the lab. But yeah," the tech's professional facade cracked slightly. "Something had a midnight snack. A very... protein-heavy midnight snack."

"Well SHIT," Thompson's voice made them all jump. The rookie had followed them, presumably to continue his ursine theory. "Must've been a hungry bear!"

"Thompson, I swear to God-" Sarah started, but Danny cut her off.

"Get on the horn to the station. I want every available unit here yesterday. Call the FBI too - this is way above our pay grade. And somebody get Matthews some Pepto before he throws up his entire digestive system."

"What about the parents?" Sarah's voice was uncharacteristically soft. "Friday night practice... there must have been at least twenty kids out here."

Danny looked at the blood-soaked field, the mangled equipment, the evidence of violence that went beyond simple murder into something... else. Something that made the primitive part of his brain want to run and hide.

"Call them in," he said heavily. "But not here. Set up at the station. And get the chaplain. We're gonna need him."

"And coffee," Sarah added. "Lots of coffee. The good stuff, not that break room sludge."

"It's coming out of your paycheck."

"Worth it. Especially if Thompson keeps talking about his CrossFit Bear theory."

As if on cue, Thompson's voice carried across the field: "But what if it was TWO bears? Like, tag-team bears?"

"I'm going to shoot him," Sarah announced. "Justifiable homicide. No jury would convict me."

Danny almost smiled, but then the wind shifted, bringing with it the copper-penny stench of blood and... something else. Something that made his hindbrain scream PREDATOR. He'd been hunting all his life, tracked everything from deer to mountain lions, but this... this was different.

This was wrong. This was inhuman.