Randy awoke to find the giant black bear sitting on the edge of 
his bed.  

	"Who are you?"  the fox stammered, jumping panicked at the 
unexpected visitor.

	The bear nonchalantly flipped open a cigarette lighter, lit it, 
and put it to the cigarette he held in his lips.  The room was dark, but 
in the glow from the lighter Randy could see that the bear wore a 
black leather jacket with a silver pin on the collar.  The pin was in 
the shape of a dagger.  

	"Me?" he said, as if the fox had a selection of people sitting on 
his bed to question.  "My name is Muscles.  I work for the Enforcer 
Guild here in Gateway."  

	"The enforcer guild?" Randy gasped out.  

	The bear nodded,  took a puff of his cigarrette, and flipped the 
lighter shut.  "That's right.  I have worked there for about 6 years 
now."

	Randy got over his shock of being surprised in bed, and began 
to panic instead about what a member of the enforcer guild would be 
doing in his bedroom at 3 in the morning.

	"Oh my god!  You are an assassin!  You are here to kill me!" he 
cried, trying to pull off the covers up and leap out of the bed.

	The bear was sitting on the covers, keeping the fox pinned to 
the mattress.  He took a long puff of his cigarrette, causing it to glow 
red in the darkened room.

	"Well, you know, that is the damnedest thing." the bear flatly 
replied.  "I was originally hired to kill you, yes.  I was instructed to 
make you suffer great pain and agony for at least two hours before 
finally ending your life."  

	The bear then took another puff, and blew the smoke right into 
the foxes face.  He did not think of Randy as another sentient, feeling 
creature.  He made it plain that he thought of Randy only as a piece 
of meat, or an inanimate object.

	Randy hated cigarrette smoke.  He coughed and gagged at the 
bears exhalation.  "Well, your *COUGH* smoking is certainly *COUGH* 
a good way to begin the torture session."

	The bear smiled, and took the cigarrette out of his mouth.  
"Like I said, fox.  It is the damnedest thing.  I was supposed to kill 
you slowly and painfully."  

	The bear then took another puff on his fag, and stared at the 
fox with an amused look on his face.  Randy saw that the bear was 
grinning.

	Randy was frightened.  The bear could make him into a 
greasespot with little trouble, and he couldn't even get out of his 
covers to run.  He was going to die here in bed, but certainly not 
peacefully.

	"Can you answer a question for me first of all?" Randy asked 
the bear, voice trembling with fright.

	The black assassin shrugged, uncaring.  "Sure." he rumbled 
deeply.  "Why not?"

	"Who sent you here to kill me?  I really need to know before I 
die, just who it was that hated me so."

	The bear reached over the side of the bed with his cigarrette, 
and tapped the ash so it would fall to the floor.  "Your ex-girlfriend 
Peggy.  She hired me."

	Peggy!  Ouch!  They had broken up about a week ago.  Randy 
knew that the vixen could be possessive, but something like this 
never even crossed his mind.  He never dreamed she would be this 
upset about their breakup!

	"But it is still the damnedest thing..." the bear repeated, 
bringing the cigarrette back to his lips.

	Randy laid there panting with worry.  "Why do you keep 
saying that?" he gasped.  "Why don't you just get this over with?  Am 
I your first assignment or something?"

	The bear then quietly laughed.  Deep and slow.  "No fox.  You 
certainly are not the first creature I have killed.  I have put about 50 
or so people into their graves over the years.  But your case is 
unique, fox.  Very unique, in fact."

	Randy laid there unmoving, half terrified and half curious.  
"Just what do you intend to do to me?"

	The assassin then took another puff from his cigarrette, and 
laid his left hand menacingly on his chest.  "Well little fox.  Your ex, 
Peggy, was quite pissed at you for breaking it off with her the way 
you did.  So she left the proper message on the proper machine, and 
she met me in the proper booth at the proper restrauant.  She paid 
me in advance, just like she was supposed to do."

	"She told me to start by tearing your pelt off in one inch strips, 
beginning at your neck and ending at your rectum.  She also got very 
graphic about what she wanted me to do when I got to your private 
parts."

	Randy could just bet she did.

	"Anyway, so I got up and told her that you were as good as 
dead.  I was making my way toward the door to go get everything I 
needed.   Then suddenly, she up and told me to wait a minute.  So I 
walked back over to the booth, sat down again, and let her go on.  I 
was thinking that she remembered some extra plans for your 
demise."

	"Instead, she decided that death was too good for you, so she 
then changed her order and just wanted me to put you in the 
hospital for a couple of weeks.  She wanted me to do the usual: Brass 
knuckles, broken bottles, just your standard fare severe beating."

	"So I said, sure babe.  Consider him in intensive care.  And I got 
up to leave again.  And again, the vixen tells me to wait."

	"So I sat back down once more, and let her continue.  She 
rambled then for a minute or two about how good you were in bed."

	Randy nodded.

	The bear squinted at him.  "And don't you get any funny ideas, 
fox.  You ain't my type.  Besides, I am here on business.  Remember?"

	The bear pressed his left hand down harder a bit on Randy's 
chest.  The foxes eyes widened, and he nodded rapidly again.

	The assassin let up the pressure, and continued his story.  "So 
the chick goes on and on about how much she enjoyed you in the 
sack.  She then decides that having you in the hospital wouldn't be 
any fun for her.  So she changes my orders yet again, telling me just 
to break both of your legs in 4 different places."

	"So I got up, and I told her that you would be in the next 
wheelchair leaving the hospital."

	The bear took another puff from his cigarrette as his index 
finger tapped on Randy's chest.  "Now then fox, see if you can tell me 
what happened next."

	"umm... She told you to wait again?" Randy nervously 
responded.

	The bear blew another puff of smoke at the prone fox.  "Hey, 
you have heard this story before, haven't you?  She up and tells me 
that she has changed her mind once again.  I then replied that if she 
didn't hurry up, I was going to start charging her by the hour.  To 
make a long story short, she changed my orders about 12 times.  I 
stood up, and I sat down, over and over again."  The bear took his 
hand off Randy's chest, and tapped another ash from the cigarrette 
off on the floor.  The butt was about half gone.  The bear let out a 
resigned sigh.

	Randy stared at the leather-clad killer sitting on the bed beside 
him.  "Sorry about that Muscles." he said sympathetically.  "Peggy 
never could make up her mind."

	The bear angrily turned and growled at Randy, causing him to 
lean back into his pillow.  "Look, couldn't you just stay with the 
chick?  Do you think I enjoy this kind of crap?  I'm a busy bear.  I 
don't have time to deal with heartbroken vixens that can't even keep 
a straight thought!"

	Randy just laid there, trying desperately to force his pillow 
through the mattress.  Obviously, the pillow prefered life on top of 
the pad, and it didn't budge.  

	The bear sighed again, and stubbed out the cigarrette on the 
sleeve of his jacket.  "Oh well." he exclaimed.  "I guess I had better 
get this over with.  The night isn't getting any longer."

	Randy desperately tried to squirm out of the blankets and 
make a run from it.  But the bear was too fast and grabbed him by 
both of his shoulders, pinning him securely in the bed.  He wasn't 
going anywhere.

	Randy closed his eyes quickly, and waited for the tremendous 
pain he anticipated to begin.

	Instead, he felt a rubbing motion on his shoulders.  A 
massaging.  

	He opened his eyes again, slowly, and looked at the black bear 
hovering over him.  The assassin was giving him a massage?

	All at once, the bear stopped rubbing the foxes shoulders, and 
pulled away from him.  "There." he exclaimed.  "That is done with.   
Another day, another dollar."

	Randy was too stunned to move, and just laid there as the bear 
pulled back.  "What do you mean, done?  Is that it?" he asked.  "All 
you are going to do is rub my shoulders?"

	The bear stood up and got off the bed.  "Yeah.  The silly vixen 
changed her mind, over and over again.  By the time she got through 
thinking it over, the worst thing she could imagine for me to do to 
you, was to rub your shoulders in a brusque manner."

	Randy sat up in the bed.  Increduously he asked "You mean 
that you, an assassin in the Enforcer Guild, are going to do nothing 
worse than massage me?"

	The assassin then closed his jacket, and chuckled at the 
puzzeled fox in the bed beside him.  "I told you this was the 
damnedest thing..." he said laughingly.

	Randy suddenly perked up his ears, thinking of something.  
"Well then, Muscles.  Since that is over with, I need to talk to you 
about something." the fox said excitedly.

	Muscles stopped closing his jacket.  Looking seriously again at 
the fox, he asked "What do you mean?"

	Randy pulled his arms free of the covers.  "Since your 
assignment is over, you should now be available to hire.  Yes?"

	The bear paused for a couple of seconds, then nodded.

	"Well then, how would you like the chance to get even with 
her?"  the fox said.

	The bear scowled.  "You aren't going to change your mind on 
me, over and over again, are you?"  he inquired of Randy.

	Randy shook his head.  "No Muscles.  I am not.  And I don't 
want her hurt either.  I just want her frightened a little bit, like you 
did to me tonight.  Can you handle that?"

	Muscles smiled.  "Well, normally I charge a fee for my services.  
But this time, I think I will work Gratis.  Even assassins have to have 
amusing stories to tell the other fellows in the business.  Besides, I 
owe her, and this sounds like fun.  What did you have in mind?"

	Randy told him...