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Where We Left Off:
The Winchester-Nabu Detective Agency faced one of the most intriguing and strange cases of all time involving a mummy.
This case file contains the investigation into real deaths of a chipmunk and squirrel.
Collateral Damage:
I considered not writing the deaths of one of our chipmunks and a little red squirrel into an official case file. Instead of focusing on the sadness of the loss of these little friends, I turned to Gus and Ollie. They’d get to the bottom of this tragedy.
The sun rose at 6:11AM on April 21, 2026. The temperature felt great to me and to Gus. Officially, it was considerably cooler than the average of that date. We were going to enjoy it and make the best of it. Ollie didn’t seem to mind it either since the sun was bright and he would get treats while we fed the critters.
As we do most days, we went to Big Rock. This is one of our favorite places to leave critters their snacks and pay our informants their wages of peanuts. We owed the Chipmunk Mafia and the X-Munks a lot. The day prior to this, The Cook told us that a chipmunk was killed in one of the Grumpy Old Man’s rat traps. Collateral damage. I was upset. There were a lot of animal funerals in April, mostly mice. I wasn’t given the chance to identify that chipmunk or lay it to rest.
The Grumpy Old Man reset the rat trap and overnight, another bycatch creature was killed. This time, I found it while I had Gus and Oliver outside for their adventure and work. I looked down at the ground and saw the trap with a red squirrel body ensnared. My anger and sadness made a cyclone in my brain. The cats were sad too.
Ollie sat up taller in his buggy. “Before you do anything, we need photos for the file. Then you can release it and take it to the farewell place.”
I did as Oliver suggested. I knew there would have to be a case file for this murder especially since we had the body. Gus stood nearby on the rocks and used his Super Smeller to pick up any traces of the squirrel’s identity. We knew who the killer was; in this case, our own Grumpy Old Man was the one who set the trap for the rats he’s after.
“Something is strange,” Gus said. “Don’t take the body yet. Let me get closer.”
I held my gloved hand with the victim’s body closer to Gus for olfactory inspection.
“That squirrel isn’t alive,” Gus said.
“Obviously, you nincompoop,” his cousin said. “The body was impaled and it’s in rigor mortis. Look at it! Stiff as a board!”
Fortunately, the body was not in a foul stage from being torn apart by a predator or in advanced decomposition. For me, it was like holding a taxidermied squirrel.
“I mean, it wasn’t alive before it was killed.”
My pre-frontal cortex was not online to solve riddles. I didn’t know what Gus was saying. Ollie issued another directive for me.
“Get out our maging detector and take a look.” Ollie pawed at the floor of his buggy pointing out to me that our high tech magick finder was beneath his seat in the basket.
I placed the body down to set up the maging detector and then held the body up to it.
“Gus is right.” I snapped a photo with the our proprietary lens engaged. “This is a vampuirrel—a squirrelpyre.”
“Told ya,” Gus snarked. “Not alive.”
We had a dead undead creature on our hands. We hadn’t had a squirrelpyre case since June 2025. We hadn’t had a case of a red squirrelpyre before, only the larger grey species. The oldest known were Theo and Synthia Scurius. Was it possible that they weren’t particular with which species they sired?
“Maybe it’s a good thing to have one less vampire around,” Gus said.
Ollie and I agreed with him. Vampires never bothered us, but we don’t have any idea whether they get permission to turn other animals into immortal undead beings.
“The trap didn’t completely impale him,” I said. “Do you think there’s a chance he’ll rise again?”
Gus deferred to his cousin to answer this. Ollie said, “Anything is possible around here.”
Identification
Name: Red Rod
Age: Immortal at adult stage
Date of Mortal Death: unknown
Date of Immortal Death: possibly 21-April-2026
Case Findings:
Ollie and Gus discovered the body of an adult red squirrel, but they noticed it wasn’t exactly typical. They used some proprietary technology to reveal that the body was Red Rod, a squirrelpyre. The vampire’s body was given a funeral. We have no idea if Red Rod was able to recover to his squirrelpyre undead state or if that was truly his final farewell.
Case Status: ClosedÂ