Tales of Rick Engel: The White Bear

By Rich Beck

Gregor Hacksler was haunted by the loss of his twin at a young age. Now, with failing health, he seeks answers with the help of Rick Engel, stalker of the supernatural and unexplained. Struggling his whole life from the aftermath of mugging, Rick has devoted himself to trying to solve life's unexplained. In this tale Rick employs a local guide as he scours the Missouri hills.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rich Beck
• Release date: Dec 15, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463829899

Rich Beck

Rich Beck lives these days with his wife and a few of her cats. In his life he has been a laborer, engineer, surveyor, auto mechanic, blender, cook, comic, musician, postman, and is a father and a husband. He is today, as he has always been...a storyteller.

Book preview

White Bear, The

Beck, Rich

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved, Copyright 2018 by Rich Beck

Cover image and design by Katrina Joyner, http://www.apocalypsewriters.com

Edited by Bruce Anderson at: [e-mail]

Prior also by Anna the Editor

The White Bear

Prologue

The subway car bucked and rattled as the A train traveled toward South Ferry Station to keep its appointment with the Staten Island Ferry. In the strobe flashing of the ceiling lights sat Rick Engel, former Army MP. He could intermittently see the young couple who had boarded three stops prior. Rick was hoping to catch the 12:45 a.m. ferry back to Staten Island where his car was parked. He had spent all day in the city.

Born in New York City, he was the only child of a German father and an Italian mother. They were good parents. He was always a big kid, larger than the other kids his age, and because of this he had always played sports. He was good but never great. Academically sound, he followed his high school years with attending college at SUNY, Stony Brook.

It was during his senior year that his father had become ill. Rick left school that December to return home and run the family automotive business. His mother suffered a hard fall during that winter just after he had returned home. Complications had set in from the fall, and she died in late January. His father passed not too long after.

He was just 20 years old. After the loss of his parents, he no longer wished to continue school. He didn’t really want to do anything, so Rick sold everything he inherited and put the money in mutual funds. Between what his parents left him and what he received from the family business he was able to stash away a large sum. His father was a Navy man, so Rick decided he would try the service. For no apparent reason, he chose the Army. Test scores allowed him to pick his field, and he chose corrections.

After completing his training at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri, he graduated and was sent to Fort Leavenworth prison in Kansas. While serving there, he met a college student—a girl his age, from New Jersey, who had been studying at the University of Missouri in Kansas City. They fell in love and married. Rick was pleased with his life again. She finished college around the time his commitment was done, and they packed up and moved east to New Jersey.

Sadly, fate struck Rick again. His wife died suddenly from an aneurysm, leaving him alone. If there was to be a person bitter about what was dealt to them, it should have been Rick. But it wasn’t. Rick was upbeat and optimistic, almost to a fault. If one did not immediately like him, he would eventually win them over with his exuberance for life. And now at forty-four years of age, Rick’s life was being jarred again.

As the train reached Houston Street, the lights came on long enough for Rick to see three young men, all in their late teens to early twenties, board the train. The shortest of the three looked about the train. He moved into the seat directly across from the couple. He now eyeballed Rick. Without a word, he motioned to the other two who then slid into the unoccupied seats on either side of the young couple. Rick watched the scene out of the corner of his eye.

The doors closed and the train began to move again, rattling and bucking away from the station. In the strobe lighting, Rick saw the three young men begin to harass the couple, speaking in Spanish both to them and to each other. The conversation was almost audible over the rattle of the train. It was escalating, and it became physical.

The smallest of the three now yanked the young man from his girl. The two others slid closer to the girl. Never one to watch from the sidelines, Rick rose up and, in the suddenly-steady lights, walked slowly into the fray. Speaking in perfect Spanish, Rick explained that it would be better for everyone if they all returned to their previous places. At six feet three inches and 245 pounds, Rick could be an imposing figure. This alone had been enough to defuse many situations, and of course Rick had been trained to back it up.

Rick heard the short one ask from his left as he faced the girl and her unwanted bodyguards, Want some, mister?

The youth had quickly pulled out a short wooden object from inside his jacket. It looked like a table leg that had been cut down to allow concealment. Despite being fairly small, it had been hollowed out and filled with lead for maximum striking force, which is exactly what it applied to the left side of Rick’s head.

He heard the crushing of his orbital bone, nose, and jaw. Mucus flew from his nose along with a few teeth from his mouth. The vision in his left eye went out like the flipping of a light switch, and the explosion inside his ear rolled across to the other side of his head like thunder.

His perception of what followed remains blurred. Thankfully, the young couple had remained to tell their version to the authorities.

Time and motion slowed. Rick had seen the kid draw back for another swing. He remembered telling himself to remain conscious and to react. As the kid’s backswing turned into a forward motion, Rick reacted. He slid his left hand into his belt line and withdrew a shiny snub-nosed revolver.

Before the attacker could make contact a second time, Rick placed the barrel of his gun to the short man’s forehead and squeezed the trigger. The gun made a muffled pop to Rick, but to the recipient it caused the exit of brain matter and skull onto the train’s wall. Rick felt the recoil from the first shot. Slightly groggy, he leaned forward and did the same to attacker number two, tall and very thin, wearing a knit hat. In his panic, he was creating a jam near the door between the cars as he and the last thug attempted to escape.

Struggling to remain upright, Rick moved forward in the train with what little adrenaline his body could muster. The young couple finished the story from there.

Staggering still forward, their hero leaned into the third attacker as he fought to climb over a slumped body and get through the subway door to the next car. Placing the barrel to the back of the head of number three as he went for the door, Rick again squeezed the trigger. Fragmented pieces of bone embedded themselves in the wall. Rick collapsed into one of the molded seats. He looked at the two he saved and smiled.

He lost the hearing in his left ear. Surgeries had come to repair his face only so much. His left eye drooped, and cold weather worsened the tinnitus he developed. But he smiled. To live like this was a challenge, not a deterrent. Rick, now in his fifties, soldiered on.

To My Dad and His Brothers

whose stories filled my head

with great imagination.

Tilford (Uncle Tip)

Wilford (Uncle Bill)

Henry (Eddie, my Dad)

Charles (Uncle Chuck)

I am going to kill you… and you know what..... …you totally deserve it.

Kelly Thompson, The Girl Who Would Be King

Chapter 1

The winter was as cold and harsh as the past summer was hot and dry. Cold winds pushed the snow into enormous drifts as giant clouds of white powder curled down the slopes of these Missouri hills. The trees’ branches, bare of all their leaves, which had fallen long ago, were encased in ice. They sparkled with the first light of day as the sun elevated above the tree line to the east.

A snow-covered cabin, of decent size, was built into the hill. It was a safe and comfortable haven to its inhabitants. A large stone chimney on the east end gave off a steady stream of bluish smoke which the wind grabbed and pushed down to the snow. The smoke curled along the slopes of the hill in long, horizontal, tornado-shaped funnels.

Inside, seven year old Gregor Hacksler was walking slowly. The smell of salted ham filled the cabin, along with a soft crackle of eggs in an iron skillet. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes and pushing aside his mop of dirty blond hair, Gregor sniffed the enticing aroma and slowly picked up his head and peeked down from his bedroom loft. He gazed into the great room below, looking to see who was awake.

His three brothers, fourteen year old Jaye, thirteen year old Axel, and his twin Rald, lay sleeping. Gregor could see his father Gerhard gently placing a log onto the fire.

His father was a large and powerful man—close to six and a half feet in height and well over 250 pounds. Gerhard had a full head of sandy-colored hair and a thick mustache, which was slightly darker than his hair. Above his high cheekbones was a pair of pale green eyes that Gregor’s mother loved.

Gerhard swung a large pot, which hung from an iron hook, back over the fire. It contained a simmering ham. As his eyes focused, Gregor could see his mother, Ada, working the eggs on a wood stove. Ada was a tall woman, with striking features and long blonde hair that she wore in a bun on the back of her head.

Together they had come to Missouri from Germany at the young age of seventeen; the year was 1912. Gerhard was the son of a prosperous wood cutter, handsome, rugged, and determined. It was easy to understand how he caught the fancy of young Ada, daughter of the town’s prominent banker, Nico Leihgerat.

Her father was against the marriage and yielded only after his daughter had informed him she would leave. They were married and the elder Leihgerat purchased a large parcel of land for them in lieu of a dowry.

It took them nearly two years to settle in Missouri. First through England, and then by sailing to Baltimore to meet with Ada’s uncle Max. He was a land broker who had chosen the land for them at Nico’s request. They traveled by train to Saint Louis and were met with a horse-drawn wagon full of supplies, with two German mules and two massive tan draft horses.

It was spring in the Midwest when they had arrived, and a surprisingly warm, gentle wind greeted them. The couple traveled north for two days. It was a time of great expanse in America—motorized vehicles passed them, construction abounded, the river was full of steam-powered ships. Ada was excited by the bustle of the city.

After