Mikey and Spikey

Cold pavement skittered under Mikey's feet as he entered the boiler room from the wall. A rancid smell filled his nostrils. He halted. A (mouse) foot in front of him lay a jutting contraption attached to the block of wood. Wire parts gleamed a faint yellow from the lighted crack in the door leading to the rest of the basement.

It didn't take much time for the mouse to realize it was a trap. A trap that had snapped through a delicate neck of its snacking victim. Several sunflower seeds lay scattered on the floor. and still jaws gaped before them in perpetual unsuspecting. Any blood from the scene had long gone sticky, filled the dark room with its all too familiar mouse corpse odor. Mikey's attention remained on the body before another figure appeared across the room. His friend Spikey had come out from the other wall. Relief washed over him as familiar beady eyes greeted him from the other end of the trap.

"Looks like they've got another one of us," sighed Mikey.

"Us?"

Mikey looked hard into Spikey's eyes. He failed to get a good read on his response before Spikey spoke again.

"I don't know what you are talking about."

"Jerel, he's dead. He's right in front of you."

Spikey looked down at the trap and walked half of its perimeter. He analyzed every angle like a math problem.

"That is Jerel all right," he said in a neutral tone.

"Spikey, he's dead. Stop being so cold."

"Well we don't really know that now do we."

"His head is nearly clean off his body!"

Their small squeaks dissolved into stone walls. They gazed at the wire clamp that crushed Jerel's neck flesh and bone to its wood platform. Spikey licked the victim's ear. Without effort, the loose head bobbled.

"He could just be sleeping, he sleeps with his eyes open all the time," mused Spikey.

"That isn't funny!"

"I'm not being funny, just making observations here. Why do you always have to go to the most extreme conclusions?"

"He's surrounded by a pool of blood."

Spikey put a foot to the coagulated pool and licked his fingers.

"Hmmm, good observation there Mikey. Where you hypothesize the source is?"

Mikey didn't respond to his friend. Instead, he glared at him in the eyes and directed his nose to the crushed spine of the corpse. Spikey snapped into attention and pressed his head against the wires, sliding the trap across the rough pavement floor.

"What are you doing?" asked Mikey.

"This stuff might've came from a deep puddle underneath."

"It came from his neck you bell end."

"Maybe, Maybe"

"No, not maybe. The trap snapped his neck!"

"What did I tell you about your quick conclusions?" snapped Spikey.

He pressed his head against Jerel's side and held his breath, listening. Mikey still watched him in shock as his friend lifted his face from the corpses fur.

"You know what? I think you might be right. There's not a sound from him. He's dead."

"See, I've been right all along."

Mikey gave a sigh of satisfied relief, but didn't end it before Spikey continued talking.

"I wonder what the cause was."

"Nooo!"

"Wait! I think I understand it now. The seeds. They poisoned him."

Mikey groaned and ran back into the wall hole. He didn't want to see any more of Spikey that day. There was no getting to him, no taming the overthinker. (Or the stupid)