Judge Who Barred Witches from Adopting Children Turned into Guinea Pig

He was grocery shopping when he began to hear the whispers. Dressed in a pair of jeans and a button-up shirt, standing in the middle of the canned soup aisle.

"There he is."

Gerry whipped his head around, his deep brown hair fluttering over his brow. Eyes wrinkled around the edges narrowing as he squints at the end of the aisle. He shrugged when he didn't see anything and placed a can of chicken noodle into his metal cart.

He was comparing the integrity of different bunches of bananas when he heard it again.

"We'll follow him home."

Gerry turned to the man behind him.

"Did you hear that?"

The man looked startled.

"Judge Tearheart? What are you doing... out?"

Gerry looked down at his bananas as if this was an obvious question. "I'm grocery shopping."

The man waved a dismissive hand at the fruit. "Yes, I see that. But why are you out? Haven't you heard what's going on?"

The Judge cast a questioning look at the man. "What do you mean?"

"The witches!" The man gesticulated wildly, brining his voice to a whisper. 

"The Amerson women?" 

"Yes!" 

"What about them?" Gerry didn't understand what this man was blathering about. Last week he had passed a judgement in the Amerson v. State case that the women, three sisters aged twenty-four, thirty-two and thirty-five, would not be allowed to adopt a child. He thought it was pretty reasonable, considering they were witches. For god's sake, just last week they burned down the school house because some of the children were making fun of them. No one was harmed, but it was the principle of the matter. In his opinion, they were unfit to be mothers and he quite thought that everyone agreed with him. Well, the more sane people anyways but you can never get away from those crazy woman's activists, right?

"They're planning something, Judge Tearheart. I'd watch your back if I were you!" And the man pointed a threatening finger at him as he backed away towards the cereal aisle. 

Gerry scoffed and went about his shopping, trying to push the incident from his mind. Those witches wouldn't do anything to him, would they? Sure they were irrational and probably more than a little upset with him. And they did burn down that school house. But it was at night, they weren't really aiming to hurt anybody- more like make a statement. Still, they burned down a school house, that's a pretty bold statement. Unease started to grow in the pit of Gerry's stomach as he paid for his groceries and drove home. It didn't help that he kept hearing those strange whispers coming from seemingly nowhere that couldn't possibly have anything to do with the Amerson sisters. Could it? 

He was a nervous wreck by the time he got home, fidgeting and shaking as he loaded up his cabinets with the food he bought. His house was dark and quiet, which he was used to since he lived alone and had no family to speak of, but that night it felt ominous. The whisper of the wind outside his window seemed to be calling his name and the groan of the heater as it kicked on sounded painful and aware. 

He turned on every light in the house and sat in the large leather armchair in front of his television. The spicy burn of red wine running down his throat soothed him a little as he attempted to zone out the world around him. 

Suddenly they were there. As if they had ridden the whistling wind beyond the walls of his house on a current that lead straight to his living room. The three of them stood exactly before him, looking terrifying and scorned. All three had long identical locks of blond hair falling messily around their shoulders and their clear blue eyes bore straight through him. 

"Gerry Tearheart." The middle one spoke calmly, her lips quirking into a smirk. "You will not deny us again."

Gerry stuttered in fright, his body paralyzed with fear. "I- I- n-no, I w-won't." 

"Oh no," The youngest of the sister standing on the right spoke. "We don't mean for you to take back your judgement. We mean that you won't be able to deny us again."

Gerry gripped the stem of his wine glass so hard it snapped in half, pouring dark red liquid all down his button up shirt. 

The eldest sister took half a step forward, raising one perfectly manicured finger slowly as she did. 

And then Gerry Tearheart felt as if his entire body was attempting to collapse on itself. A horrible pain shot through his spine and every bone and ligament and muscle in his body retracted, reformed and gave a sickening crack. And then Gerry Tearheart was no more. Sitting on his large leather armchair was a tiny, furry guinea pig. Tan and white body quivering as it squeaked helplessly.

"Aww, it's so cute!" The youngest sister squealed, moving to scoop the rodent into her hands. "Can we keep it?"

The oldest sister rolled her eyes. "Yes, we can put it with the rest. Now come on, let's get home."