"All right," said Calvin, "let's go over the checklist."
He pointed to Hobbes, his tiger best friend, who looked down at a piece of paper in his paws. "Baseball bats?"
"Check."
Calvin had had enough. Almost every night, the monsters under his bed would scare and threaten him. They were determined to eat him. Well, tonight, he and Hobbes were going on the offensive. As the sun set, almost gone, the two prepared for their attack.
"Flashlights, to see and shrivel them up with?"
"Check."
"Water and dart guns?"
"Check."
"Dartboards to use as shields?"
"Check."
"Cookies and juice boxes?"
"Che… what?"
"In case we get hungry or thirsty. Expeditions can really work up an appetite, you know. If you don't want your snacks, I'll be happy eat them for you… maybe I should just stay here and properly take care of all the snacks…"
Calvin glared at Hobbes. "Oh no, you're not getting out of this that easy! You're coming down with me, and I'll eat my half of the snacks, thank you very much."
Calvin looked out the window. The sun had just dipped below the skyline, leaving only dim color in the sky, soon to be transformed completely into night.
He cleared his throat. "Men, I won't lie. This will be a mission of the highest danger. We may not come back. We may not live. We may not come back alive. But we will risk it all, with the brilliant plan my genius produced, for a good night's sleep." Hobbes wiped a tear from his eye.
It was now completely dark. Calvin peered down over the side of the bed, and gulped. "W-well, it's now or never. Come on, Hobbes."
They both carefully and quietly climbed out of bed, holding their baseball bats, Hobbes with a backpack containing the guns and snacks. The looked at each other, got down on their knees, and crawled under the bed.
It was dark all around them. They crawled a few feet, before Calvin cautiously reached up and felt around. "I think we can stand up now," he said.
As they stood up, took out his flashlight and turned it on. They were in a large cavern, with rocky, damp walls and stalactites dangling above them. "I didn't know under your bed was so big," Hobbes said. Calvin nodded. "For creatures with no brains, they sure know how to maximize space."
They continued on down the cavern, shivering in the cold. Hobbes asked "Do you know how many monsters there are down here?"
"Um… no."
"Oh."
They walked on.
"So… when we find them, what's our plan again?"
"We fry them with the flashlights, beam then with the bats, and shot them with the dart and water guns."
"Oh, yeah."
More walking.
"Um… what do they look like, again?"
"Big, slimy, bug-eyed, forked tails, some have tentacles, some have claws. We've been over this."
"You mean… like that?"
Calvin jumped and shone the flashlight up. A hulking mass of slime and muscle advanced on them, claws clenching, tentacles waving.
Calvin and Hobbes blinked. Then they looked at each other.
Hobbes chuckled. "Heh, heh… a monster."
"Yeah, ha ha."
"Should we, um, panic now?"
"…yeah, I guess so."
They both started screaming and flailing around, waving flashlights and baseball bats and shooting the guns willly-nilly. After about six minutes, Hobbes stopped screaming looked up. "Hey, it's gone."
Calvin looked around. "Yeah it is!" He leaped into the air and let out a whoop of victory. "Ha ha! Stupid monster! Dim-bulb abomination! Running scared now, huh? Bring it on!"
The ground started to rumble. Calvin stopped, and said "…Hobbes? That wouldn't happen to be you, would it?" Hobbes shook his head.
Toward them, from deeper in the cavern, came a chorus of roars. The ground shook more as a swarm of monsters, of all shapes and sizes, ran and galloped and slithered and flew at the duo.
Letting out matching screams, Calvin and Hobbes fled back through the cavern, back the way they came, a wave of fiends close behind.
They kept running, up the now-rising cave floor, out from under Calvin's bed, out of Calvin's room, down the hallway and into bed with Mom and Dad.
Calvin's dad woke up. "Wh-what?" Mom said "Calvin had a bad dream, dear. He can sleep with us tonight." Dad groaned and rolled over, muttering something about wanting a dog.
Calvin, still shivering, snuggled up to his mother and whispered to Hobbes "Tomorrow night. M-maybe tomorrow night."
-End-
