Affective Defense

WOM-07 should never have emerged this early. The rest were dormant in the tunnels below, in the intricate labyrinth wrought to frustrate, to confound both those who’d pursued their flesh for eons etched into tribal memory and the New Ones that had intruded into this world as theirs had betrayed them and they sought fresh prey under heightened competitive pressure.

WOM-07 had held tight to the stream line, where even during these harsh months, the waters offered up vegetative scrub, insects, the occasional snails he needed paradoxically to fuel the crucial slumber. And the channels offered escape from those too large, too bluntly powerful to negotiate saturated and slippery creek banks, narrow and treacherous tangles and passages, and the insubstantial weight of water. As for the Others – the ones whose curiosity was alien to understanding, whose behaviors seemed removed from instinct or adaptation, whose violence seemed darkly beyond imperatives of survival or defense, they disappeared during these harsh months, perhaps migrating, perhaps slumbering.

But as sudden pain seized WOM-07 – a stabbing bite of pain from nowhere he had experienced only once before – he knew it was The Others. Lethargy began to set in – the last time, he had awoken to find himself safe but now bearing the Device. Its purpose had never become clear, and thus it was quickly forgotten.

As he stumbled and slumped against a fallen oak, WOM-07 felt only the coolness of The Other’s looming shadow before darkness fell…

**

“If they call you into that little room over there, don’t speak any more than you have to,” Tripsen advised, gesturing toward the conference room to the right of the huge wooden doors of Circuit Court #4. “Don’t pull any attitude, don’t make excuses, don’t try to play anybody, don’t get pissed or try to talk your way around shit. It’s almost certain they’re going to pull your license – maybe for a year if you hit the right state’s attorney in a charitable mood, but I thought I saw Tricia Norwall lurking around a minute ago, so brace for five or even 10. Your goal here is to stay out of County Jail. Traffic school, a shrink, you tell Trish or whoever please and thank you. Got that?”

The kid nodded somberly under the anxious gaze of his mother. First DUI, a few thousand in municipal property damage, nobody hurt, but the kid looked ready and perhaps eager for the Earth to swallow him. Which was good, because Mom should have scrounged out the old confirmation suit whether or not it still fit and sheared off his cheesy-ass smudge of a mustache.

Tripsen impulsively patted the kid on the knee. “I think you’ll be OK. Don’t beat yourself more than you have to, and just don’t fuck up again. Sorry, Mom.”

Mom shrugged.

“And if you do,” Tripsen added. “This right here is not a great idea. You really should’ve hired a lawyer.”

“I seen you on TV,” the kid mumbled, smiling for the first time.

“I don’t take DUIs,” Tripsen stated.

“What are you here for, then?” Mom asked. “That lady beat the shit out of the guy at her office? I saw about that in the paper. She was nuts, sorry, insane? You said she couldn’t help herself because she was depressed, sad?”

The attorney suppressed a chuckle. “We’re pleading diminished capacity because of seasonal affective disorder, or SAD. Ms. Crutcher suffers from a near-debilitating case, and I represented her about a year ago when her boss turned her down on working at home. You heard of the Americans With Disabilities Act? Well, I argued the ADA applies to SAD. Few years back, the 7^th District Court ruled a Wisconsin school district discriminated against an elementary school teacher with severe SAD by keeping her in a windowless classroom despite her repeated requests to be moved to a room with natural light. Her panic attacks and fatigue had gotten worse, and she was having suicidal thoughts, so she requested temporary leave and the school fired her.”

From the politely skeptical expression on Mom’s face, Tripsen was glad she hadn’t been on the 7^th District bench and that he’d had Molli waive a jury trial, even if Judge Raskom’s patience for his defense seemed to be wearing toilet paper thin.

“That why she beat that dude with her keyboard?” the kid inquired.

“The ‘victim’ had been trying to get Molli Crutcher’s job for years, and had reported her several times for behavior related to her disorder. Groundhog Day is a special trigger for my client, and the day before her boss demanded she come in for a staff meeting, she spotted of all things one of the varmints in her back yard. And I don’t know how you tell, but she insists it saw its shadow. As did Punxsatawny Phil the other day. The victim, Barry Nash, says he simply tried to talk about the weather with Ms. Crutcher, which in her state, was like rubbing salt in the wound. Which is just what he aimed to do.”

“Can you prove that?” Mom asked.

“Meh,” Tripsen grinned. “Look, my client and my expert witness are running late, so best of luck, and remember. Please and thank you.”      

 **   

“And what is your occupation, sir?”

“District wildlife biologist with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, attached primarily to Wild Oaks Moraine State Park.”

Terry Proeber sounded like he was auditioning for the Millington Community Players presentation of A Few Good Men, and Tripsen realized instructing him to wear the uniform might have been a mistake.

“Excellent. I understand you’re something of a groundhog expert.”

“I actually prefer woodchuck, if you don’t mind.”

Tripsen worked to keep his teeth out of the next question. “But the woodchuck and the groundhog, they are the same species, correct?”

“And family. Sciuridae, which includes both arboreal and ground squirrels,” Ranger Rick kinda clarified. “In fact, Marmota monax is also known as the ground squirrel. Or more generally, a marmot. All groundhogs are marmots, actually, but not all marmots are groundhogs. They’re all rodents, so I guess I feel ‘groundhog’ is a taxonomic misnomer—”

“The prosecution will stipulate that a woodchuck is a marmot is a groundhog, if that expedites things.”

“So stipulated,” Judge Raskom muttered with an expectant glare at Tripsen.

“Fascinating creature, the woodchuck,” the attorney hastened. “Cornell University scientists have studied the connection between woodchuck hepatitis virus and human hepatitis B, a potential contributor to liver cancer. Apparently, woodchuck hepatitis processes 10 times faster than the human form, enabling a quicker turnaround in analyzing viral impacts. You’ve read those studies?”

“Yes.”

“And just recently, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ranked the long-term accuracy of weather prognostications by groundhogs across the United States. Pennsylvania’s legendary Punxsatawney Phil came in at a mere 35 percent, but a New York woodchuck named Staten Island Chuck has been credited with 85 percent accuracy.”

“Objection,” Linklater whined. “Are we about to get into wood-chucking capacity?”

“Merely establishing widespread credence given the woodchuck’s prognosticating abilities,” Tripsen vowed. “At least according to NOAA.”

The judge waved it off. “Get moving.”

“So, Mr. Proeber, I understand you’re engaged in some very intriguing research in partnership with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service?”

“Oh, yes. We’re attempting to track in greater detail woodchuck hibernation, feeding, mating, and possible migratory patterns particularly as they may be impacted by climate shifts and their effects in geographical range and populations. Over the past year, we’ve tracked 23 woodchucks indigenous to the Moraine, using Wildlife Computers Inc.’s microPat satellite compact pop-up tag. It collects and transmits data on a small mammal’s location and behavior. We’re hoping to tailor conservation efforts to changing habitat and environmental trends. See, we could use radio frequency ID tags, you know, like livestock guys use, but satellite tags transmit precise location data in real time, even across continents and oceans. We can track each animal’s movements and behaviors as they happen.”

“I’m sure we’re getting our greatest woodchuck bang for the buck, but I have to ask how in the world this is relevant.”

“About to pull the trigger on that, Your Honor.”

“Good. Put us out of our misery.”

Tripsen strolled to the defense table and yanked a clipped sheaf of closely-lined Excel tables. “I’d like to place into evidence Exhibit K, a log compiled by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services, for the period January 1 through January 31, 2025. Mr. Proeber, could you please describe the data included in this document?”

“This is satellite data on each of our tagged woodchucks. At the time, of course, most were in fall-winter hibernation.”

“With the notable exception of the woodchuck identified as WOM-07, commonly referred to as ‘Rover,’ I see?”

Proeber chuckled into the Great Void. “Woodchuck hibernate around here from late October through April, depending on the severity of the winter. Rover, well, tends to be a rover – his energy reserves run low more frequently, and so he tends to emerge more often for food.”

“But something odd occurred on, what, January 8?”

“Ah, yes. We actively monitor real-time location at roughly six-hour. Anyway, Rover – WOM-07 – seemed to simply disappear from our radar – um, our immediate GPS range, the moraine and surrounding farm and woodlands. Rover was in his burrow at 8 a.m., and when we checked his tracking log for the morning, we discovered he had emerged and was foraging along one of the secondary streams in the park’s southwest quadrant. He left the park at around 11:45 a.m.”

“When you say WOM-7, AKA the woodchuck Rover, ‘left’ the park property, do you mean he seemed to migrate or meander off-site?” Tripsen pursued.

“Not moving at roughly 25 miles per hour,” Proeber stated. He unconsciously glanced up for a collective gasp, but half the bleacher crowd was hung over from their DUI Hearing’s Eve blowout, formulating a Judy-proof assignment of automotive blame, pissed they were spending the morning in court because some assholes just watched too much Lincoln Lawyer. “Twenty-five miles an hour is the posted limit for motorists on the park grounds, and once Rover reached Interstate 39, ‘he’ accelerated to 70 miles per hour, well beyond groundhog ground speed.”

“And in which direction did our wayward woodchuck travel?”

“Approximately 17 miles, past the corporate limits of Millington, Illinois, along Commerce Street, turning right onto University Avenue and left onto Sumner Drive. The trail ended relatively equidistant between Fillmore and Buchanan on Sumner.”

“Which, I would note, is the approximate location of the Molli Crutcher home, at 1425 Sumner Drive. At this time, I would like to enter into evidence Exhibit L, an enlarged segment of a map of the City of Millington tracking the woodchuck Rover’s GPS-verified route to virtually the defendant’s doorstop.”

“Objection to defense counsel’s leading narrative.”

“Sustained,” Judge Raskom sighed.

“Mr. Proeber, did you continue to receive transmissions from Rover’s satellite tag?”

“Yes, for the next 22 hours, in fact, within a very narrow range at the Sumner Drive location.”

“How might you explain that?”

“I dunno, maybe Rover was injured, or most probably trapped in a confined space.”

“Like a fenced-in yard, perhaps? Within your scope of expertise, could a burrowing animal like a woodchuck escape a fenced space?”

“Oh. Yes. Digging’s what they do.”

“After the 22 hours WOM-07 spent at the Sumner Drive location, what happened to him?”

“We tracked him heading southwest for about 75 minutes. Then we lost the signal,” Proeber related glumly.

“Why might it have taken so long for Rover to leave a theoretically confined space?”

“I mean, Rover had been transported to an utterly foreign urban environment. He would likely be disoriented, highly stressed, and would need time to assess this new environment. There would be no scent markings – either his or another woodchuck’s – to guide him, Rover would have spent additional time determining where best to dig and escape along the, uh, the theoretical fenceline.”

“Based on the woodchuck’s general instincts, do you believe he would voluntarily have entered such a fenced space?”

“‘Voluntarily’ implies human sentience!” Linklater snapped.

“Seriously?” the judge muttered. “Overruled.”

“Mr. Proeber?”

“Woodchucks are cautious -- they wouldn’t risk an environment without clear means of escape, unless there was an incentive like abundant food or shelter. And, obviously, there was no clear escape route.”

“Counsel hasn’t remotely placed the rodent in question at the Crutcher property, and I still have absolutely no idea where this is headed!”

Tripsen jogged back to his case and retrieved the 8X10 and the Ziploc bag he’d been antsy to pull out of his hat. “At this time, let’s introduce Exhibits M and N.”

“Shit,” the prosecutor said.

“Opposing counsel is highly observant. Exhibit M is a stool sample collected in the fenced rear lot of the Molli Crutcher home under the supervision of Millington Animal Control officers. Mr. Proeber, you’ve conducted a genetic test of the submitted scat, right?”

“I have. We took a DNA sample from each of our tagged woodchucks, including WOM-07. The feces you hold is a precise genetic match for Rover’s original sample.”

“Thank you,” Tripsen smiled. “Exhibit N is a photo taken, again in the presence of Millington Animal Control personnel, along the rear fence line of the defendant’s back yard. You’ll see an excavation of roughly a foot in diameter that begins on the north side of the fence, under the fence line, and into the open right-of-way on the south side of the fence. Mr. Proeber, could you identify the animal that created this excavation? I’m sure Mr. Linklater will assert this is the work of Canis familiaris.”

Proeber shook his head vigorously, “Even when a woodchuck’s burrow is intended for a quick escape, it still tends to be more organized that a dog’s dig. Note the neat, circular nature of the entrance and the soil piled neatly about its circumference, rather than scattered around the perimeter. A woodchuck did this.”

“Thank you, Mr. Proeber. By the way, are you familiar with Illinois Wildlife Code 520 ILCS 5/3.5, and if so, could you explain it for us?”

This time, Proeber nodded grimly. “Under ILCS 5/1-110, unauthorized taking, possession, or transportation of wildlife can result in fines up to $500 for a first offense or up to $1,000 in fines and up to a year’s imprisonment for subsequent offenses. But if it can be proven that theft or poaching resulted in the death of an animal, it can be classified as a Class 3 felony, with fines up to $25,000 and imprisonment for up to 5 years.”

“Thank you, Mr. Proeber.” Before the judge could speak, Tripsen strode briskly to the defense table and hefted the heavy-duty black Hefty bag that had gone largely unnoticed during Proeber’s testimony. The attorney dropped the bag before the witness stand with a somewhat wet thump. “During the lunch break, my investigator went on a little hunting expedition on and around Sumner Drive. I want you to take a breath, sir – I truly wish I had better news…”

Proeber sank back, and, simultaneously, Linklater pushed from his chair, brushing away Barry Nash’s plaster-encased hand. “Your Honor, I’d like to request an hour’s recess to confer with opposing counsel. I think we may be able to resolve all this to the court’s satisfaction.”

“Hallelujah, amen,” Raskom declared.

**

“No, I do not want to see it,” the prosecutor insisted, skirting the Hefty 2-mil lawn bag the defense had hauled into the conference room. “Let’s cut right to it. Mr. Nash has made it clear he will not cooperate in Ms. Crutcher’s prosecution. I’m not so inclined to just let your client walk on an aggravated assault.”

“Terrific,” Tripsen smiled, rising. “I need to see who I have to blow to get a warrant for Nash’s vehicle.” He patted the bag, and Linklater turned a Procol Harum shade of pale. “This wasn’t a lost goldendoodle Barry was dealing with, and there has to be trace in his trunk or backseat and, I suspect, a few nicks, abrasions, and nibbles on his person. Your victim not only will have to explain to the judge how and why he ripped one of God’s creatures from its peaceful riparian home to gaslight an emotionally ill coworker into a breakdown or termination, but also explain to Channel 25 and the IDNR guys and probably PeTA how his actions resulted in the poor woodchuck’s senseless death. And you can explain how this mansplaining, misogynistic, marmot-abusing menace put one over on the prosecutor’s office right before lawn sign season.”

“One year’s probation with mandated counseling and monthly court evaluation. Can you handle that, Ms. Crutcher?”

“House arrest?” the defendant inquired, hopefully.

“Yeah, sure,” Linklater sighed.

**

“Since I was mostly working from home anyway and Mr. Tobolowski’s fired Barry, he didn’t give me any hassles about the sentence,” Molli smiled, looking out over the corn stubble to either side of I-39. “I kinda think he was relieved.”

“Imagine.” The March thaw was complete, the sky clear, and the lawyer had cracked all four windows. The client wouldn’t be getting out a lot the next 12 months, and he thought this might be good therapy. Besides, Tripsen wanted if not some assistance at least someone to run screaming for Ranger Terry if it all went sideways. He’d felt like some plausible deniability was the least he’d owed the biologist. “By the way, I’ve lined up Dr. Behrens -- he handles a lot of PTSD and anxiety stuff, and he's agreed to Zoom sessions twice a week. OK?”

“Absolutely,” Molli smiled, perhaps a bit tersely, and Tripsen let it go. A low snore arose from the back seat. It had been a rough couple of weeks, and Rover deserved a little rest before repatriation. Tripsen was simply grateful he’d escaped having to enter either a mangled ground squirrel or a spiral-sliced honey-baked Smithfield as Exhibit O.