Fred made the coffee as the sunrise shooed away the night. He loved the stillness of this time. The sounds of his home on the ranch came to him in whispers, the sharp but faint tap of his booted footsteps on the floor, clear and distinct but not loud enough to wake Betty and the kids, the odd creaks and groans that haunt all old houses, the random clucking of the hens in the yard outside as they swept the yard for food. That was a sign that this still time was ebbing away, the animals, the ranch and soon the house would be fully awake to life.

This is what he had given up his business for. The long hours, the rat race, talking to clients, company buy-outs, and mergers all gone. Now he and his family lived out on this small farm (he liked to call it his "ranch" a symptom of watching too many westerns with his grandfather as a kid) self-sufficient, with a carbon footprint the size of Amazon's tax payments and fresh air and homeschooling for the kids.

The first real stirrings of the day came as the coffee maker began filling the pot with black bitter liquid; Scooby came into the kitchen ears pricked, tail wagging. A thin mongrel mix of what appeared to be German Shepard and whippet, the black and blond of the Alsatian was there but petered out into light chocolate brown with flecks of gray which mirrored the aging fibers in Fred's own hair and beard. Reinforcing the popular myth that dogs and their masters molded themselves on each other.

They greeted each other as they always did. Fred running his hands through Scooby's fur behind the neck and head, the dog's rough tongue licking his face, front paws on his arms as he bent down to greet him. He was always the first to come and seek him out. Betty joked that they were having an affair behind her back. Domestic infidelities aside, Scooby was a part of the family. They had had him since he was a pup.

After coffee, Fred and Scooby went outside, Fred attended to his chores around the yard. As he finished emptying the van of feed and seeds for his trip to town, Scooby turned towards the house with loud barks that started deep and ended with high whelps with rolling growls in between. "OK, let's go see them, boy." Betty and the kids were up.

As they entered Hanna and Barbara rushed to meet them both, the two girls swirling around the barking dog who spun in a wild, excited dervish playing a mock game of tag with them. Betty came in, still in her pajamas and bathrobe, and shot them a vexed look.

"Hey, What's Sauron the destroyer of sofas doing in here, you know the rules," She said.

"Sorry, but he just wanted to see the kids," Fred replied.

About a week ago Scooby had pretty much totaled the sofa and Betty was still fuming and had made a new no dog in the house Family policy.

Scooby's ears perked up and almost seemed to express a wounded look on his face as if he knew they were talking about him. Fred recognized that look on Betty's face and knew that in this case discretion was the better part of valor. "Come on boy," he called and lead the dog back out to the yard the girls sighing out their disappointment as their favorite playmate left.

He came back in for more coffee, leaving Scooby whimpering at the back door. Betty ushered the two little girls to the breakfast table on the first step of their getting ready for school routine. "I'm sorry guys but until that... dog," she struggled to not use a less derogatory term "learns to respect this house he is not welcome inside," She explained more for the kid's sake than Fred's although she still shot him a "can't you for once back me up on this" look. "Your mother's right, we can't have Scooby mucking up the place" He complied, knowing full well that this was a battle not worth fighting.

"What's on for today?" she asked him as she started pouring homemade pancake mix onto a hot pan.

"I've got to go into town and pick up some fencing," he said "Then I'll spend most of the day fixing the enclosure up north, besides Johnny's Place"

"Well, take Scooby with you. I'm recording today and I don't want to spend all evening trying in vain to edit his constant barking out of the video," she said.

"Yes Ma'am" he answered in an exaggerated southern drawl, arms bent, fists at his chest, and did a silly bowlegged jig, in a caricature of some small-town bumpkin, trying to lighten the mood. "Can I pick up some gingum for ya dress?"

"Moonshine would be better, so I don't end up getting rid of that dog," she answered smiling and shaking her head at his ridiculousness. He stopped his dumb dance, and struck a ramrod pose "red or white for the lady?" now switching to his awful posh British accent. "Red, something in a Merlot please." He smiled and planted a kiss on her lips, happy in the knowledge that his clowning had lifted her misgivings about her day. "OK, Merlot it is," he said finishing his coffee in one quick swig.

"Are you recording your video alone today?" he asked just before leaving. "No, Elaine's coming over, we're meeting for class" she replied "Don't worry, I won't be alone." Fred nodded his answer and sighed. The local community had been rocked by several disappearances of young women. Fred didn't want Betty to be alone while he was out, which would be most of the morning. So much for escaping the dangers of city life. Satisfied she'd be safe he said goodbye to the kids and left.

Fred set out with Scooby in the passenger seat, in the old Volkswagen beetle van he'd fixed up and resprayed a modest burgundy and white, instead of the psychedelic green and purple it had been before. He pulled into Doug's hardware place and let the dog out with him. Doug loved to see Scooby and always kept some doggy treats behind the register.

A missing person poster of Daphne O'Neil was on the wall, a beautiful redhead with bright green eyes from which a bright inquisitiveness seemed to shine out. The disappearances had shocked everyone in the town. It was another sign for Fred that maybe the decision to uproot his family and come here may not have been the best idea. He knew Betty had sacrificed the most to follow what most saw as his crazy dream. She'd given up a career in scientific research at an ivy league university after obtaining that most holy of grails - tenure. However his wife never failed to surprise him, and her perfectionist workaholic enthusiasm had helped her to adapt quickly to their new life. Hell, her Youtube cooking channel regularly received tens of thousands of hits which was impressive considering a couple of months ago she could have burnt water.

Only Betty could have gone from high flying academic to domestic social network goddess without breaking a sweat, but still, that guilt hovered just beneath Fred's thinking that faithful day. It wouldn't be the last time he felt guilty about something.

As he pulled into Doug's, he caught a glimpse of a bearded man, who looked as though he'd been pulled through a bush backward, smoking on the corner. There was something slightly familiar about him. Scooby started barking at the sight of him, as if in agreement.

The man squinted at them as they got out of the van, and approached them.

"Fred? Is that you?" the man asked. As soon as he heard his voice, Fred knew who it was and groaned deep down inside. Scooby growled an echo and bore his fangs.

"Scooby, down boy, easy fella," Fred reprimanded.

"Dick? Dick Bush? I didn't know you were back in town," Fred replied

"Ah man, come on! Call me shaggy, you know, like back in the day"

Richard Bush had spent most of his life running away from the unfortunate name his parents had put alongside his surname. The great writer had even published under a pseudonym. Once he and Fred had been childhood friends, best friends. He had adopted the nickname of the cartoon character back then.

"What are you doing back in town?" Fred asked.

"I'm writing about the missing women, doing a little Truman Capote," Shaggy answered scrunching up his hairy face in that way he had as he tried to form a grin like someone had seen other people smile but had never gotten the hang of it.

"Yeah, you'd have to be a little cold-blooded to write about that I suppose. Still making a living from your old hometown, I see." Shaggy wrinkled at the comment "You're not still sore about my book, are you? That was a long time ago." he replied.

Yeah, the book. It was a small town, smaller back then and you couldn't choose your friends so much as put up with what you got. They'd both spent their youth trying to escape this place and now they were both back in some awkward social Mexican standoff. Only Shaggy had written a best-selling novel about small-town life and his depiction of the people had been less than kind.

"We used to investigate mysteries together remember? Old man Dawson. Come on, man! You remember if it wasn't for you and that pesky dog!" Shaggy gesticulated wildly as he spoke causing smoke and ash to go everywhere. Scooby got a little nervous and started to growl a little. He didn't like the smell of cigarettes.

"Easy boy," Fred patted Scooby to calm him down again.

"Yeah, I remember. I remember that Old man Dawson was innocent of whatever crazy made-up crime we were trying to pin on him, and I remember the dog that messed up his lawn wasn't our dog. I remember a lot of the blind leading the blind back then." He said trying hard to keep the bitterness from his voice.

Shaggy took a puff on his smoke, laughed his jittery nervous laugh, and agreed. "Yeah, we did raise some hell back then. Your dad left your backside red as a lobster after that. I'm sorry to hear he passed away."

"Yeah, well he's gone to a better place now," Fred said. Left my backside red, while your father did nothing. It had always irked Fred that Shaggy could skip away from his problems without ever having to deal with the consequences. As soon as he cashed his first royalty check; he'd gotten out of here and left the tensions in his stories bleed out and ruin relationships.

"Sorry, I couldn't get back for his funeral I was in a lot of meetings with divorce lawyers."

"That must be tough," said Fred

"Yeah, about a year back I guess. That's why I'm back too, tryin' to clear my head a little," Shaggy answered sheepishly.

"I'm sorry to hear that".

"How's Betty?" Shaggy asked.

"How do you know my wife?"

"She's the other local celebrity, man. I checked out her videos. You're a lucky man. She's a great cook,"

"Since when do you like cooking?"

"I don't, I'm more of a takeaway guy, not that there's much of that around here. I admire how much passion she has for what she does. I hate to sound like a fanboy but maybe you could introduce me to her one day. Maybe we can meet for lunch?"

"Are you cooking?" Fred answered back. The last thing he wanted was Shaggy telling Betty about their old adventures.

When Fred reflected on that moment later, all he could do was feel guilty. Had the sofa been a sign? Had his dislike of Shaggy somehow rubbed off on the dog? Had he transmitted aggression in his body language and Scooby had simply reacted out of loyalty?

Whatever the reason, Scooby attacked Shaggy.

He leaped, his jaws clamped down on his leg centered between the ankle and the knee. The dog shook his head from side to side using his teeth like a saw to cut away clothes, skin, and muscle, the animals' feral instincts seeking out the bone. It took all of Fred's strength to pull Scooby off Shaggy, and even then he still tried to pull away and lunge at the injured man, blood mixed with spit speckling the pavement with every bark.

Shaggy was screaming with pain, bent double and rolling on the ground clutching his wound, trying to stop the bleeding. Luckily, Doug and some of his customers rushed out to help whilst Fred held back the dog.

They bandaged his wound with a first aid kit and put him in the back of someone's car and drove him to the local hospital. As soon as they left; Scooby returned to normal as though the sudden spark of savageness had disappeared back under a cloak of domesticity.

Fred went home. He couldn't think of anything else to do or where else to go. He'd built an oasis to escape the modern world, to get back to nature and now nature had reared its bestial howling head and he didn't know how to deal with it. Whether in the middle of a city or on the edges of civilization; dark coyote shadows seemed to circle his life, menacing the simple peace he was trying to find.

As he pulled up to the house, the kids surprised by his early arrival, came out to greet him. Scooby began barking in excitement, specks of still not dry blood kept moist by saliva, splattering out.

"Look mammy Shaggy's wearing lipstick like you!" Betty came out from behind them her face distorting into instant shock.

"Get the kids back into the house Betty!" Fred shouted over the barking and dragged Shaggy to a pen just off from the yard where he kept sick or pregnant animals. He locked Scooby in with a heavy padlock. They both calmed down a little in that brief moment. Scooby skirted around the boundaries of his cell whimpering. Fred paced, the effects of the shock diminishing but not disappearing. The dog's whines lessened in frequency; like apology letters, the sender knows are being burnt unread.

Elaine took the kids inside as they asked concerning questions. Betty ran to him and held him tight her fast mind having drawn the necessary conclusions.

"Who was it?"

"Dick Bush."

"The writer? I'm not so upset, now." She joked. Betty had been incorporated into the local gossip circles and sometimes she seemed to know more about Fred's hometown than he did.

The sheriff's car pulled into the yard and broke them apart. Phil had been the town's sheriff for as long as Fred could remember. His tendency to treat the local bar as his office meant that he had acquired a pot belly that in some circles would give him bragging rights.

"Fred, Betty," he nodded and removed his hat. "Would you like the good news or the bad news first?" he asked.

"I'm guessing the good news is that Dick Bush is injured but otherwise OK," Betty answered.

"Well, it's a little better than that. When he was brought to the hospital the nurses found a necklace from one of the missing girls. The nurse recognized it from the photos we put out. He had been our number one suspect but we couldn't find anything to pin him on it. At least until now, that is."

"And the bad news is you still haven't found those poor girls" Betty continued.

Phil sucked out the air between his teeth and his cheeks and circled his hat in his hands.

"That's true, but we're looking hard and forensics think that they can get some new information based on what they found in his old folk's place. I can't go into too much detail, you understand. But that's not the only bad thing" he paused as he searched for the right way to approach things from. "Eyewitnesses tell me that the attack wasn't provoked."

Fred looked him in the eye "No sheriff, it wasn't" he knew he could have lied but he also knew it was the wrong thing to do, and it would only delay the inevitable.

"Look, Fred, Betty I know this is hard to hear, but the law is the law. I'm afraid you're going to have to put the dog down." The sheriff sighed and dropped his shoulders glad to have gotten the words out.

"But he attacked a serial killer!" Betty's voice bubbled over with anger.

"That may be the case, but the fact is, the dog has a taste for human blood now and..."

Betty was about to launch into a lecture at the sheriff on how Scooby was a hero when Fred put his hand on her shoulder.

"Honey, and what if he attacks the kids?" he said trying to keep his voice steady.

She held his gaze a little before breaking eye contact.

"You're right, but what are we going to tell the Kids?

"The kids love that dog." was Fred's answer.

"Just the kids?" Betty echoed Fred's thoughts.

The sheriff said a hurried goodbye, got in his car, and left his duty done. Betty turned to Fred after he had gone.

"I'll explain it to the girls if you..."

"Yeah, all right," he interrupted. Betty kissed him and left him to his thoughts. He couldn't help but think about his father. As he had rotted away in his hospital bed to throat cancer the doctor had come to him one night.

"Your Father's body has had one shock too many and is at the point of passing away. We could keep him alive, however even if we do he won't survive much longer, a couple of days at best. I have to inform you that it's your legal right to ask me not to intervene."

Fred had asked him to keep his father alive. He passed away a few days later. He knew it had been a selfish decision. A desire to continue being a loyal son, an attempt to make up for the years he had spent running away from this place, and perhaps his father's shadow. I cannot tell you if it was this memory, the shock of what had just happened, the guilt Fred held in his heart both for his father's death, or his dog's behavior, or perhaps a little of everything, but Fred decided that few people would have taken at that moment. He went inside and unlocked the rifle he kept for hunting coyotes and other pests. It was his father's rifle. He had taught him how to hunt with it. He wrapped it in a blanket in case Betty or the kids saw him leave. He left with the rifle and Scooby in his van.

He dug the grave first, trying to buy himself some time from the task he had set himself and the moment before the action became inevitable. The head of the shovel bit into the earth with a clean crunch each time, except the occasional sharp dinging sound, as he caught a hidden stone on the edge. He felt like a one-toothed animal gnawing away at the earth. He worked slow and steady, he was in no rush. He dug deep he had no desire for anyone to find his handy work. He and Scooby often came here for long walks along the river and around the trees of the small grove. Even now the dog nuzzled his snout through the Autumn leaves searching for rabbits and rodents to hunt. "Is that where the blood lust came from?" He asked himself. "Is that where he had gone wrong?" No, he pushed the thought away, it was just instinct, he was an animal after all. Only he could bear the responsibility. When the grave was deep enough he stopped.

"Scooby" he called and the dog came running. He found his favorite red Frisbee and spent some time playing catch with him. It always impressed Fred that sometimes Scooby could leap and catch the disk midair. When Scooby was tired out, Fred wrestled with him a little trying to remember the sensation of his fur in his hands and take away his smell with him.

Finally, he gave in and continued on the path he had chosen. He aimed the rifle. He pulled back the bolt and loaded the round into the chamber. "Is this how Shaggy felt as he killed those young women?" he asked himself as he breathed in and pulled the trigger on the exhale; as his father had taught him. The shot caught Scooby in the head and he dropped to the ground and went limp and still. He pushed the body into the grave and cried as he filled in the hole.

Fred kept the shell from the bullet for the rest of his life.