Minktales
Issue 43
"Yet to Come"
Minerva Mink was wearing a short pink dress that left both arms and most of her legs bare. It was among her favorite styles, though she found that she could make longer, and even poofy hoop skirts look attractive, so long as they were on her. It was one of the many afternoons when she'd gone into town, involuntarily causing traffic to stop and pedestrians to drool on the sidewalk as she'd headed for the mall. Business in the areas she'd passed by had slowed to a crawl until she was out of sight, then the whole thing happened again later in the evening as she headed back home.
However, Minerva Mink's supernatural ability to charm the pants off almost any guy without even trying did have range limits, and no girl had ever been distracted by her in the least, except perhaps when their boyfriends temporarily stopped paying attention to them as Minerva passed them by.
It was, therefore, a surprise to see a woman dressed in a long, blue robe staring at Minerva from a nearby alley, as she passed by as if she'd just seen a ghost.
"Something I can help you with?" Minerva asked, as the woman tried to pretend she hadn't been staring.
"You have one of the most complex futures I've ever seen." the woman said.
"Futures?" Minerva asked, giving the woman a slightly bemused expression, "You must be joking."
"I rarely tell jokes." the woman replied, "I am Yetta Lindblum, and whenever I look into a person's eyes, I see a part of their future. Your future is among the most complicated that I've ever looked upon, but that needn't mean that it will last for a long time."
"I don't believe in your superstitious, mumbo jumbo stuff." Minerva replied coldly, "Even if I did, the future can work itself out for me. It always does."
"If you don't believe, then perhaps I should tell you that tonight, you will go back to your house in the woods. It's made from a log with pink... no, red. Red window shades. You just put them up this morning." Yetta stated, "There, you will try to forget what I've told you, and attempt to distract yourself from its inevitability by trying to be unpredictable. After that, you'll meet a short, thin person in a tie who will take you out into the woods to talk and watch the moonlight. The man will then reveal that he is a tall, stocky person. He will approach you closely, and you will die shortly after that."
The moment Yetta was finished speaking, Minerva's mouth hung open and for a moment, she couldn't say a word. At last, however, she asked "How did you know I had red window shades?"
"This is most serious." Yetta said, "This very evening, after the sun has set, you will be killed by a tall, stocky man in a tie. I wish I had not foreseen that. It is inevitable, I fear."
"I still say it's nonsense" Minerva remarked, "and you're a creep for spying on my new window shades like that."
"There is more." Yetta continued, looking sad as she spoke, "A short while after you arrive home, a vase you liked very much will break. Then, the mailman will arrive, and deliver you a letter from a lab assistant who is more than he appears. In moments after that, you will be in a shower. That is when you will remember most sharply my predictions, and begin to distract yourself from them."
"Man, you've got a lot to learn about being a fortune teller." Minerva said with a smile, "You're being way too specific. There's no way all that stuff could really happen. Well, anyway, it's been a laugh. I'll see you."
"Will you?" Yetta asked, as Minerva walked off.
Pretty soon, Minerva was back home, at her log house in the woods, looking happily around at her bright red window blinds, and wondering briefly if she shouldn't get purple ones instead, but a moment later, she moved over to her bedroom, and retrieved a magazine about hair lotion, to begin sifting through it. The problem was, she'd already read most of it before, and was starting to find it boring. She wondered briefly if she shouldn't give Larry a call, to find out when her next shoot would be, but decided instead to give the poor guy a much-needed break, and just start making dinner.
Minerva shuffled rapidly into the kitchen, then opened the window to get some air in, and started pulling out apples, beef and bread, when she noticed, out of the corner of her eyes, that a glass vase of hers, which she put flowers in every so often, picked and arranged out of the many her adoring fans sent to her, was at the very edge of the kitchen table, and realized that she must have accidentally dragged it there with her tail when she'd passed by. As she watched, the vase trembled, then began to tip over, and Minerva dove forward onto the floor to catch it just in time, before it had been about to shatter on the ceramic tile.
"Phew." Minerva remarked in relief, "Almost lost a good vase there. I just hope that doesn't happen again."
However, just as Minerva was getting up off the floor again, she heard one of the loudest, shrillest whistles she'd ever heard, and spun around to find its source; a large, apparently-male blackbird seated on her windowsill, as the vase exploded in her hands from the pitch of the whistle.
Angrily, Minerva slammed the windowsill closed, getting the bird's feet caught in it for a a moment, but it eventually managed to get loose and fly off, as she pulled out a dustpan and brush, and started gathering up the broken glass. It was only then that she recalled the predictions of Yetta that very day.
"A short while after you arrive home, a vase you liked very much will break."
Minerva shivered as she thought of the chances of the prediction being connected with what had actually happened, but she finished cleaning up the broken glass and mopping up the water and flowers that had spilled as well. Before too long, everything was clean again.
"Now I just have to avoid any letters from lab assistants and short, skinny men." Minerva remarked to herself jokingly, but almost the very moment she said that, she heard the sound of her mailbox being closed by her mailman Reggie, and quickly popped her head outside. She and Reggie both screamed simultaneously as she did that. He screamed because he hadn't expected her to appear like that, her face only an inch or two from his, and the effect of her irresistible charm was magnified by her close proximity, but she'd screamed because she hadn't gotten any fan mail that day. No bills either. Also, no magazines or checks from Emotionutty. All she had was one letter that had "To Minerva Mink" written very badly on the front of the envelope.
"Gah-gah-Gahgugah..." Reggie stammered, collapsing backwards onto the ground, and hurting his head as Minerva seized the letter from the mailbox, tore it open and read aloud.
"Dear Minerva Mink. Narf. I haven't seen you in a while. Please come visit Brain and me soon. We haven't taken over the world yet, but we did make some lovely cheese balls the other day. Troz. I'm sure Brain would be happy to see you again. Pinky."
The letter fell from Minerva Mink's hands as she finished reading the signature on the paper. She and Pinky had been trading letters for quite a while, and although Pinky couldn't write very well, and his spelling was atrocious, Minerva thought it was cute when he tried to anyway. Still, that latest letter wasn't cute at all; almost strictly because of what it meant. Pinky lived in a laboratory, and assisted his friend the Brain, and he looked like just an ordinary mouse, but he could walk upright, talk and hold a pencil, so it was clear that he was precisely who Yetta had been referring to. The chances of the vase breaking, despite Minerva's best efforts to prevent it had been slim, but that letter just wasn't natural.
Close to panicking, Minerva ducked back into her house and slammed the door shut behind her, then she was about to head for the bathroom to try to wash off, before she remembered the other part of Yetta's prediction.
"In moments after that, you will be in a shower."
"Ah-ha!" Minerva thought with a smile, "So it's not inevitable! I just have to stay out of the shower until tomorrow, and I can break this whole, stupid curse!"
Then Minerva pushed open her front door, and stepped outside into a rainstorm.
For a moment, Minerva Mink felt like crying, then like screaming, and that was just because she was drenched. As she realized what the rain meant, however, her feelings of embarrassment and anger vanished to make room for mortal terror.
"A shower." She said aloud as the sudden rain started slowly clearing up, "Not THE shower."
Immediately, Minerva ducked back into her house and began rushing to take down her window shades, and put a new, ceramic vase in place of the old one. She even wound up taking a real shower before she heard her doorbell ring.
"Whatwhat? Whoisitwhat?" Minerva asked, and in a moment, opened the door carefully, looking outside to find Wilford there, in his bow tie and long, baggy pants with suspenders.
"Minerva?" Wilford asked in the nasally voice that his smaller form always had, "Didn't we have a date tonight?"
Minerva had been waiting for a man in a tie to show up, but Wilford was just about the last person she'd expected, for some reason. She knew he transformed under the light of the full moon into a much taller, stockier werewolf form, with large muscles and long hair, and she also knew that that night was a full moon night. She'd marked it on her calendar. The very idea, however, of Wilford killing her had never crossed her mind. Physically, he was capable of it, as Wilford was, in his transformed state, partially-immune to her unnatural charm, though he did still find her very attractive, and he loved her very much in both forms. She just couldn't picture him ever seriously hurting her.
"I may as well go with him tonight." she thought to herself, a million reasons and counter-reasons swirling in her head, "He's so dreamy in werewolf form that even if I do die in his arms, it probably won't be so bad."
"Yes. Yes, a date." Minerva said aloud at last, trying her best to smile at the slim, hunched, bespectacled wolf, "Did you plan on going anyplace in particular?"
"It's been a while," Wilford said, "So I thought we might go sit by the ledge overlooking the pond with the woods all around us from the back and sides, just like when you first told me you wanted another date."
"That magical moment in the woods." Minerva remembered happily, "In a place where we can watch the moonlight. I think it's a good night to... go on a date."
Minerva Mink kept up her smile as she left the house with Wilford, though they remained at arm's length for much of the walk, until they reached the overlook and sat down on a large log about three yards apart, watching the sky, as dusk turned to evening, and evening to night. When the rain clouds vanished over the horizon, and the full moon was visible, Wilford began his transformation.
Both suspenders slid from his shoulders and down his arms, as Wilford's legs expanded to fill the baggy pants he wore. His arms and chest also grew to an enormous size, rippling with powerful werewolf muscles, and his teeth and nails sharpened noticeably, which was probably something that only normally-carnivorous animals like Minerva found attractive. His hair grew out from that one little tuft it had once been, into a long, flowing mane as he removed his spectacles, and the Clark Kent of Wilford B. Wolf had metamorphosed, just like that, into a fantastic Superman!
Minerva was just about to jump into his arms as she often did, but Wilford held both large, powerful hands up as he looked at her; encouraging her to stay back at first.
"Just a moment, my darling." he said, "This time, I come to you."
Then, the absolutely hunky Wilford moved towards Minerva, bent close over her, and kissed her right on the lips.
It was a light kiss; just a little brush, really, but the moment Wilford did it, Minerva's whole head seemed to start expanding like a balloon, and almost immediately after that, it exploded into a monstrous fireworks display that filled the night sky. When the display was finished, a new head popped up, out of Minerva's neck like a pez candy, and that was when she fell backwards off the log, her eyes closed.
Minerva Mink wasn't breathing.
For a moment, Wilford dared not take a breath himself, as he rushed forward to check on her, taking her pulse, which felt perfectly still, and positioning his hand over her mouth, to try to detect even the slightest breath. Nothing.
"No! No, no, no!" Wilford exclaimed, and in one last effort, brought both mighty hands down on Minerva's torso in a swift, pounding motion, causing her eyes to shoot wide open again, and then, she was in mid-air, floating towards Wilford happily on a bed of bright, red hearts that had emerged from her head moments ago.
"Oh, thank goodness you're alright!" Wilford exclaimed, causing Minerva to fall to the ground again, her airborne bed of hearts evaporating.
"Hey!" Minerva exclaimed, "I am alright, now that you mention it! I'm not dead!"
"Well, no." Wilford replied, "But you did give me a scare there, for a second. I couldn't even feel your pulse. How'd you do that?"
"I... I..." Minerva stuttered, realizing in that moment just what had happened, and finally, she smiled in relief.
"Kiss me on the forehead next time, Wilford dear." Minerva just said at last, "I can tell you're new at this..."
Then, Minerva Mink prepared for one of the best dates she'd ever had.
The following day, Yetta Lindblum was setting up her fortune telling booth near the outskirts of the city, when she saw one person she'd never expected to see again, accompanied by two large, burly-looking, but clearly very lovestruck men.
"This is her." Minerva Mink said to the two men, gesturing to Yetta with a flourish, "Just let me get out of your way."
Minerva pranced happily away for a few yards, until three buildings blocked her view of Yetta Lindblum, and a moment later, she could hear the sounds of a very loud struggle, and the two big guys returned to her, each receiving a kiss on the forehead, and a nap of several hours on the sidewalk as their reward. Then, Minerva returned to Yetta, who looked a little roughed-up. Her clothes were disheveled, and her hair was a wreck, plus her crystal ball had been knocked off its base, a great distance away.
"W-what?" Yetta asked; furious, but clearly in no position to retaliate, "Just because I was wrong? Just because you're still alive?"
"I'm not really all that angry with you, Yetta. You put me through a lot of unnecessary fear, and I'm upset by that, but if I was really upset, I would have approached your boyfriend Carl; not you."
"No!" Yetta exclaimed, "You stay away from Carl!"
"Sure I will." Minerva replied, "But in exchange, I want you to listen to my little fortune here. You are going to pack all this junk up and head right on home, and either give up fortune telling for good, or practice, and practice, and practice until you get it right. Lots of people die and come back, Yetta. I see it all the time. Don't go blowing the reaper's horn anymore, unless you've researched it better than that."
Then Minerva walked off, and had an absolutely wonderful day, and as for Yetta... Well, she never told another person's future again as long as she lived.
The End
Minerva: "I have a lot of friends, of course, but you don't hear much about them these days. Still, in the next issue, Annette is back. I haven't seen her since issue four, but it seems like, as she invites me and my other friends to have tea and snacks, and talk about things, she's suffering feelings of deep inadequacy. I mean, Annette's no genius, but she's got a good feel for fashion and organizing parties. I don't see why she's so upset that she's not an entertainment expert like Genevieve, or a clue-hunter like Trudy. Still, she doesn't realize that our tea party is about to come under attack. How will we escape, and will Annette's problems be solved? That's all in the next issue of Minktales, so don't miss it!"
