Hazel Weatherfield

It was a cold winter night. I sat in front of a fire, playing a board game with my pals. It got kind of boring after a while so my friends suggested that I'd tell one of my detective cases. You see, I'm a kid detective and I solve kid-related crimes. I'm a junior police officer, if you will. How I became like this is a story for another day.

I had decided to tell my most interesting case, the Bear Murderer. I'll start from the beginning.

I was sitting in my mother's bakery, having a cupcake that tasted like a chocolate paradise with sprinkles on top, staring out the window at the cold winter day. It was 45 degrees and dropping. A parent and a young boy came into the bakery. The boy seemed to be crying so much that you'd swear he was a living faucet. His mother turned to the bakery counter and the boy came up to me, wiping his tears away and attempting to look a little serious now.

"Are you Hazel?" he asked, sniffing.

“That depends on who wants to know,” I said.

“I do. My name is Billy Mason.” He extended his hand out to shake, which I did.

“Nice to meet you. I'm Weatherfield, Hazel Weatherfield.” I shook his hand and sat back in my chair. “What can I do for you?”

“Well,” he started, “my favorite toy and my sister's favorite stuffed animal were stolen. I was hoping you could find the people that did it and hopefully the items in question.”

“I'll take the case,” I said. It did seem easy enough. “It'll cost you though. My price would be three cartons of school milk and five candy bars.”

He nodded, apparently being somewhat wise to my policy and price. He handed me two photos. One was of the stuffed animal, which was a fluffy white bear. The other was of the toy, which was a rare die-cast race car. I didn't know much about those type of toys, but it certainly looked valuable.

It was quite convenient to find Billy's phone number on the back of the photo of the toy car. I had called him and told him to take me to the scene of the crime, which would be where he last saw the two items before they went missing. We were in his room about around 12:45 PM, which he also shared with his sister. He pointed to his dresser in the corner of the room that seemed untouched. I scanned it closely in an attempt to locate some sort of dust or some clue, but I found nothing.

After about an hour of trying to investigate on further matters in his room, I headed home. I had a feeling this would be the first case I wouldn't be able to solve. I usually always found something at the crime scene. I stopped suddenly as something caught my eye. Even though it was snowing, there was one area of the side walk that had some white fluff in the middle of an area with little snow. I then noticed that there were a few more fluff pieces leading up a shoveled sidewalk that seemed to lead to a large industrial building, though it seemed to be abandoned. The trail of white fluff lead into a small room. I looked around and saw the two missing items. I got a moderate surprise when I saw them as well. The car had been forced through the mid-section of the teddy bear, as someone had apparently stabbed it through. The white fluff was everywhere in the room. Even the car itself had somehow gotten damaged. What really got me was what was written in red above the items on the desk:

Weatherfield, resign from your case and quit now or suffer.

At first, I thought it was written in blood for some odd reason, but I did smell something familiar. I reached out and took some of it off the wall with my finger and tasted it. I was right. It wasn't blood. It was ketchup. Someone had tried to intimidate me with a threat written in ketchup. How childish. I still noticed the trail of fluff continuing into the next room, which made me curious. I followed it into the next room and saw a sight that wasn't pretty for my young girl eyes. I saw hundreds of kid's toys in the room. They were all either seriously damaged or having something stabbed through it similar to what happened to the teddy bear. I then heard the door close behind me.

“Stick 'em up!” a kid said, from behind me.

I complied, sticking my arms up in the air and turned around to face the kid. I was sort of glad I hadn't resisted since the kid had a custom glue gun that took the appearance of an actual weapon similar to a rifle.

“You're done, Weatherfield,” the boy said. “For good, too.”

“Who are you?” I asked. “What's with all this?”

“I'm with the South Valley Toy Mob.” He readied his gun again.

“Yeah,” a husky kid said, walking into the room, with a thick accent. “We set up protection plans with kids. If they don't pay, we take a toy from their establishment after a 'friendly meeting' with the client and bring them here, to destroy for not paying their monthly protection fee. We protect them from the teenagers that try to harass them. With the payments we get, we give half our monthly profits to a committee of teens and bada-bing. They're not gonna bug those clients for a whole month. Recently, we've been down in profits because parents are starting to take business, so we get revenge.” He finished the donut in his hand and chuckled.

“We're making a statement. Kids need protection and the parent's way doesn't work as well as our method did. My big brother established this mob when he was my age and I took his place when he got too old. Now, you are here to shut us down. You're against kids fighting teenagers and the evil adults. You see, we can't let the kids know about our methods. At least not the ones whom consider the protection from my mob.”

“So the South Valley Toy Mob plays dirty, eh?” I asked. “I suppose now you may try to blackmail me? If so, for what crime? Stealing cookies? Or giving a wedgie?”
As I tried to sound as sarcastic as possible to distract them, my right arm slowly lowered. The 'mobsters' didn't seem to notice, so they might of not been very bright. For a few moments as I felt whatever I was touching, I only felt broken toys, but then I felt a can. It was labeled “Crazy String”. The mobsters did seem to notice my sudden grin.

“What are you so happy about?” the boy with the glue gun snickered.

I didn't give him an answer. Instead, I tossed the Crazy String can up and caught it with my left hand.

“She's got a can!” the husky kid yelled, running to another door in the room. “Glue her, you idiots!”

The door suddenly burst open, a few more kids with the glue guns rushed in as soon as the husky kid gave the order. Though it struck me as quite funny as he sounded like I suddenly had a pistol in my hand.

I blinked and ducked a hot string of glue that suddenly shot toward me. I found myself having to evade more and more shots. One shot grazed my arm. The glue was incredibly hot, like it would be as hot as touching a working furnace. I managed to get to two glue gunmen and spray the Crazy String into their eyes, rendering them useless thugs after they dropped their weapons. I picked it up for myself and grinned, dodging more shots. I tend to be dangerous with a powerful weapon and hot glue was a powerful weapon to us kids. The mob wasn't thinking of that possibility though as they kept firing. I took cover behind a stack of boxes and took aim at a gunman and fired. I struck his head like a sniper would strike with a bullet. That's how good I was with a gun in my possession. I then aimed for another gunman, nailing him in the eye. I didn't regret it since they were the bad guys of this story. I then noticed the husky kid, whom I figured to be the don leader Joey Green, run into the next room now with a Super Glue Gun.

“You're outnumbered, detective!” he cackled after more gunman came in from the door.

I continued to stay hidden, waiting for one of the gunman to come and check to see if I was was still in the room and hadn't ran away. I didn't plan to. As soon as the fool rounded the corner, I shot him. He went down fast, like a rock sinking in water. Then I began to fire back with both my glue guns at the same time.

“She's got two glue guns, boss!” shouted a gunman.

“Then use the new weapon we acquired!” Joey shouted back.

I ceased fire as the room suddenly grew quiet. Too quiet. I decided to try and look over the barricade I was using to protect myself. I saw the only gunman in the room, but the difference was that he had a new weapon. He had a large container strapped onto his back, holding the launcher in his hands. It looked like a big see through leaf blower. It was filled with one of the worst substances to get hit by in this weather. Melted cheese. I had heard of this weapon before. I think it was dubbed the title of C-Force. The cheese inside the container would be so hot that you'd swear you got hit with a small rock going at fifty miles an hour that stung as bad as a Sting Ray's stinger.

“Scared yet, princess?” the gunman grinned foolishly.

I wasn't, but this was certainly a bit intimating.

“I just took out half of your organization with two glue guns,” I said.

“What do you think?”

The gunman didn't answer me. In a matter of mere seconds, I had to evade a shot from the C-Force. I quickly decided that I had to jam that thing. I had to make it become obsolete or make it explode, which I did prefer the latter choice. I looked around, searching for the right ammunition to make the latter happen. I happened to notice a box labeled “Experimental”. I grabbed it and opened it quickly, still hiding from the C-Force gunman. Inside the box was a prototype toy, named the Polypon. Although I knew the toy's name, the label that read “Polypon” had the last three letters blackened out by marker and in an attempt to replace it, there was the word “bomb”. The South Valley Toy Mob had made a toy into a bomb. The Polybomb, if you will. It was perfect because now I could make the C-Force explode. If that were to happen, however, I would have to send it straight into the launcher. I waited for the gunman to turn around as he was searching for me, then I nailed him in the back with my glue guns. He screamed in agonizing pain, though overly embellished, and fell to the floor. I got up and took the C-Force from him after unstrapping it and walking up to the door I saw Joey go through. I assumed that if I made the C-Force explode, the hot cheese and the explosion would either create a hole in the door or just blast the lock off. I then placed the Polybomb in the C-Force's launcher and activated it, running back to the downed gunman and took cover.

A blast echoed in the room, sending the melted cheese all over the four walls. Thankfully, I wasn't hit because of the boxes that provided a good barricade. Then I noticed Joey walking out of his sanctuary.

“You've got a good aim,” he chuckled. “But can you avoid my fire?”

He began to shoot is Super Glue gun, which looked like and performed like a machine gun. I again took cover from the ammunition being flung toward me. Joey would be my last challenge before I could successfully say that I had solved the case. All perpetrators had to be brought to justice. I aimed for a stack of boxes beside him. I hit them and they tumbled toward him, but they missed by a few inches.

Joey just grinned. It was a creepy grin, too. He shot at my barricade and I was shocked when the glue seemed to poke a hole through it as if it were acid. That's how hot it was. I raced to find another barricade only to hear another shot and feel a sharp sting on my arm. I didn't spend any time paying much attention to it. I was so close to taking him down that I wouldn't let a shot from his gun stop me. I took a chance and shot blindly. After a few moments of silence, I heard a yell. I looked back to see Joey lying on the ground, hands over his eyes, where the glue had gone. I had won the battle, but not the war. I headed into the room Joey had hid in and noticed two in tact toys and the teddy bear. It seemed like that the other two weren't Billy's, but someone else's. Though he had begun the “murdering” of the bear. I picked up the two toys, making sure they were still in good condition, which they were. I walked back out into the room of the defeated thugs of the South Valley Toy Mob and got to the exit before I dropped my gun.

“You can't beat Hazel Weatherfield,” I said. “She always solves the case and she always wins.”

With that, I walked out into the cold air. To my surprise, it was night fall and the night did feel like a walk-in freezer. I placed the toys in my jacket pocket and headed to Billy's house to return them.

After that case, I felt sort of like a hero. I loved the bravery I got with facing the South Valley Toy Mob and the news of the success is what made me go from detective in my apartment complex to becoming kid detective for kids all over the city. Even some in a few other cities wanted to hire me for cases of missing items.

When I went to school that following Monday, there were two notes in my locker. One of them said in a neatly printed piece of computer paper:

“Meet me at recess, by the Oak tree. We need to talk.”

The other one was clearly from Joey, as it said:

“Stay away from our protection racket. We've put a 5-week free milk bounty on you. Prepare to dodge shells.”

He hadn't given up and it proved how weak he was by setting a bounty on my head. Luckily, I wouldn't be dodging bullets. I'd be dodging eggs and the egg shells. What a life I'll have now.