4am Jitters Year of the Snake Day 25: 4 AM Jitters & The Thing on the Porch

 The 4am JITTERS 

Year of the Snake Day 25: 4 AM Jitters & The Thing on the Porch

By Captain Hedges

Star Date: 01252026.0415

Location: The Kitchen, Shreveport Cabin 

Status: CAFFEINE LEVELS CRITICAL / PERIMETER BREACHED?

You know that specific silence that happens at 4:00 AM? It’s heavy. The fire in the main room had died down to embers, and the cold was starting to creep back across the floorboards.

I was in the kitchen, trying to be quiet, measuring out the coffee grounds by the light of the stove. The smell of the brew was just starting to hit the air when I heard it.

Thump. Scrape. Thump.

It wasn’t a knock. It was something hard hitting the wood of the porch, right outside the kitchen door.

Uncle Bill was already awake—he never really sleeps when the weather is this bad—sitting in the shadow of the dining table. He didn't say a word; he just looked at me and slowly reached for his walking stick.

I wiped a circle in the frost on the windowpane and looked out.

At first, I thought it was a piece of cypress driftwood that had blown onto the deck. It was gray, jagged, and covered in moss. Then, the "driftwood" sneezed.

It was a Cypress Bark-Drake (Lesser Mud-Drake, for you monster taxonomists).

Usually, these things stay deep in the mud, perfectly camouflaged. But the freeze has driven everything out of the water. This poor little guy was huddled right against the doorframe, shivering so hard his scales were rattling against the wood. He looked up at me with these big, pathetic yellow eyes, basically begging for a spot by the heater.

I looked at Bill. "He's freezing, Bill. It's a baby."

Uncle Bill took a sip of his coffee, eyes narrowed, staring at the lizard through the glass. "That ain't a baby, Cap. That’s a walking set of lockpicks with a tail. You let that thing in, and say goodbye to the ham in the fridge."

"He's shivering," I said.

"He's hustling you," Bill grumbled. "That's a predator. A cold, calculating... look at him. He looks like a frozen pinecone."

So here we are at 0415. The coffee is hot, the cabin is cold, and I have a decision to make. Do I open the door and let the swamp in? Or do I let nature take its course?

Angela is going to wake up in a few hours. If she finds a swamp dragon sleeping on the rug, 

I’m either going to be a hero... or I’m going to be sleeping on the porch myself.

Stay warm out there.

– Captain Hedges