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Adventures In Living With The Mythical |
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A military veteran is adopted by a werewolf and brought into his pack. Insanity ensues. About "Life With A Werewolf" Life with a werewolf is a dramatic blog. As such the characters in this blog are not real but maybe loosely based on real people. The situations represented are not real but maybe loosely based on real things that have happened in my life. There are a multitude of ways to view life, this is simply one of the ways I have chosen to view mine. Updated Every Friday unless I can't or don't want to. If this is your first time reading this...start here: https://www.writing.com/main/books/entry_id/1040400-Welcome-To-The-Pack |
| Now, Sean is an easy guy to paint as an idiot surfer dude. The type of guy who just has endless sandy beaches and eternal waves running through his mind, who never has a worry or care other than getting back out on the water one more time. In truth however, a laid-back attitude does not necessarily mean a blithering idiot. He does care about things. His attitude is, however, that things just don’t get better with rage. Sean had been driving, to quote him “with blind panic, dude”. The gas pedal to the floor, white knuckles on the steering wheel, with fervent prayers going up to whatever deity maybe listening at the time. His car wasn’t a sports car, or even a sedan. Still, the small cross-over, that wouldn’t be amiss with a pair of surf boards on it if I’m being honest, was doing speeds around corners and down straight aways that Sean had never done in that vehicle before or since. The address given was an old grain store house on the edge of the county that looked like it hadn’t been in operation since the nineties. A simple, rusty metal building with a metal silo sitting outside of it designed to feed into semi-trailers that have long since abandoned its use. Sean didn’t see much he said. “I didn’t exactly examine it’s architecture,” he told me later. Which, I understand. Although I didn’t go inside it, I have seen it from the exterior as I drove past it later, granny slow, in my granny mobile. And I can confirm, it did look like the set of a cheap nineties action flick on the outside. All that was missing was Billy Zane running around in purple spandex. He parked his car in front, jumped out, and sprinted inside as quick as he could. A single body lay on the cracked and dirty concrete floor beneath a single light. Sean raced towards it. Rolled it over and… It wasn’t Kris. It looked to be just some older guy that Sean had never seen before. To quote him, “grey hair and everything, dude”. And that was when he was hit from behind and knocked unconscious. *** Eleanor tried calling everyone directly and got nothing. She tried the trackers on their vehicles, and it revealed nothing. Through the magic of, well, some techno wizardry that I didn’t understand but Eleanor tried to explain to me later, everyone appeared to be sitting in mainland China. “Donte,” she said, “they’re gone. I mean, literally gone.” “Where were they last,” he said, stepping towards the door. “I’ll drop you a pin. But what will you do if you get in trouble,” Eleanor asked. He looked at her face, at the nervous way she rubbed her hands together, and gave her the biggest smile he could. “It’s me,” he said. “I can talk my way out of anything.” “Don’t,” Eleanor replied. “Just do it with silver.” Donte nodded and grinned wider, “I got this. Don’t worry!” Then left. *** Plain stone walls and chipped paint greeted me when I woke up. If I didn’t know any better, I could have sworn it was our basement with how similar everything looked. Dusty old shelves, grungy corners, same sad steps leading down into it. There wasn’t much on the shelves and I doubted that whatever house we were in had been used for much in a long while. Zack sat over next to the stairs; Kris next to him. We were all tied to some old chairs that looked to have been taken from an old dining room table. “This is another fine mess you’ve gotten me into,” Kris said, with a half-grin. I, of course, mis-interpreted it. “Sorry,” I muttered. “Just…sorry. For well…everything.” “Will you stop it,” he said. “This is not your fault. They’re the assholes who attacked us. We did nothing to them. We lived our lives and they invaded our homes. They kidnapped us for existing. This is NOT your fault!” “But,” I said, “I thought you were mad at me. And the blog?” “I’m mad at everyone, that’s my nature. Product of my lovely upbringing. And your blog? Who cares! If they’re attacking people because they wrote bad words on the internet then these idiots are just crazy anyway.” What can I say? It wasn’t Shakespeare, but it got the job done. It did make me smile. After a while the door upstairs opened up, and Helena and Christopher Dylan came down, dragging Sean in, kicking and screaming the whole way. The photos I saw didn’t do them much justice. Helena’s brown hair looked mussed up as if she’d been wrestling with a child. She had a scowl on her face. Behind her was her husband Chris, looking less like a sleaze bag presidential candidate and more like the sleaze bag reporter covering for the candidate. They barely said a word to us, and I was uncharacteristically quiet at that moment. Sean was struggling and fighting, well as much as a guy being lifted a foot and a half off the ground could, anyway. When he spotted Kris, he shouted his name, pain in his voice. “Sean,” Kris asked, more surprised than anything. “What the fuck happened?!” “Quiet,” Helena said, glaring at him. “Or We’ll rip off his limbs in front of you.” As they tied Sean to a chair near us, Sean and Kris looked at each other. Kris with hurt, Sean with tempered relief. Eventually they left, and Sean and Kris stared at each other for a long time before Kris finally said, “What the hell happened?” “They sent a heart in a box. Thought it was yours,” Sean muttered. “That’s fucked up,” Zack said from his corner. “Well, to be fair, we never said who’s heart it was.” The sound of footsteps echoed through the basement as a figure walked down. He had blonde hair and the winning smile of a well-paid underwear model. “Verner Behring I presume,” I said. “Ah, my reputation proceeds me,” he replied. “And you’re Jason Forte. Your reputation proceeds you. Although you’re not as short as they claim.” A weak attempt at an insult. I shrugged and smiled in response. “Who?” Kris asked. “Leader of the American division for The Nobility, a werewolf extremist group who believes in the purity of the blood line or some such crap. Also the guys who hate my blog.” A dark look crossed Behring’s face for a moment. “First off, we’re the Werewolf Confederation, not ‘The Nobility’. That name is a mongrel insult. Second, what blog?” We looked at each other, confused. “Isn’t this because I drew attention to our group through my blog?” He laughed at that. Not a huge guffaw like the super villains do in the movies, but more of a ‘heh’. “No, we wouldn’t waste our time on such things. No, this is about the war.” “What war,” I asked, looking up at him. “You see, us werewolves are always at war. We’re the only things protecting you humans. We’re the creatures in the night that keep the other creatures at bay. You give us food and shelter; we give you security. That was the original deal made with my ancestors thousands of years ago. But you see, in the late nineteenth century there was a group of werewolves who grew tired of this conflict. They wanted to live peacefully, not kill the vermin like the trolls and vampires. To actually breed with you humans.” He made a face when he said that. I rolled my eyes. “You don’t like us. You’re above us. We get it.” “No, I don’t think you do,” he said, walking over towards me. “What your friend, the one you call ‘Crash’ is doing is unnatural. But we let it slide. His existence is an abomination. We let that slide. His family though owes a debt to the confederation. They owe a debt of blood. He is to be punished and replaced, so we can continue doing what we always do,” he held his head high for a moment, smiling wide, “protecting you from the real monsters. And from each other.” “Oh, come on, please for the love of God, stop already,” I said. “I’m sorry if the truth offends you,” Behring grinned. “Truth is, you’re going to lose.” “Why,” he asked, leaning closer to me. “We have all of you. Crash came once already and sacrificed himself at the merest hint of your danger. Do you not think he will come again?” I rolled my eyes. “You lack conviction.” “How,” he asked. “I once had an officer above me. He went to Afghanistan like the rest of us at the time. He thought he was God’s gift to the army. You know the type. Well, you should, you see him in the mirror every day.” Behring rolled his eyes at that. I continued. “He was determined to get a combat patch. So, we were to run a simple supply run. There were a few different routes to go, but he insisted we take the most dangerous route. And wouldn’t you know it, our convoy was attacked. So, with him crying in the back of the truck, the rest of us had to literally save his ass. When the convoy was over, and he reported it, he looked, well,” I nodded at him, “much like you. You see, you’re like him. That lieutenant who thought he was Captain America. When shit hits the fan, and it will, you’ll be cowering in the corner. You don’t have it in you to do the dirty work. You let ma and pa clem back there do everything because you can’t stand to get your little claws dirty you pathetic…” I think I remember telling you it’s a bad job to rant on a werewolf? Cause it is. Behring couldn’t roar as loud as Crash, especially in his human form, but he certainly screamed loud enough to hurt my ears. “What is wrong with you,” he asked. “Are you always like this?” Kris, Zack, and Sean all nodded at the same time. “Yeah, uh-huh,” they said. “Dude never shuts up,” Sean replied. “Aww, I love you guys too,” I said. Then grinned. “But really, I’m just stalling. I figure someone will be here in about,” Four small devices landed in my lap. The trackers that Eleanor had painstakingly installed on me. “Are you talking about that,” he asked, grinning. I looked down at them and sighed, “well shit.” Right there in that moment, I thought we were done. Of course, if you think you’re beaten grin wider. That’s something I’ve learned. If your opponent has hit you with everything they have, don’t sit down between rounds. So, I didn’t. I just smiled, and tried to think of any way I could make things as bad or worse for them through this. As for Donte, he’s is a clever guy. One of the cleverest guys I’ve ever ran into. And If it wasn’t for him, then most of this would probably have had a much different outcome. So, Donte, if you’re reading this, thank you. Though, we’ll still argue about your taste in movies sometime. |
| Cecily and Killian had the perfect banter of brother and sister. Inside jokes. Strange werewolf jokes and innuendo that I won’t be putting in this blog. The sorts of things that shows the close ties of a brother and sister who are used to working and fighting together. So, of course I got along great with them almost from the start. After all, a soldier recognizes a fellow soldier, regardless of what war they’ve fought in. “So, remember,” Cecily said, “You won’t see us. But that’s okay, cause we’ll see you.” “So,” I replied, “Just don’t be afraid of the two over grown dogs stalking me through the day as I run my errands and try to get kidnapped by other overgrown dogs. Gotcha.” Killian placed a heavy hand on my shoulder, “You know,” he said, growling a bit, “some werewolves might take offense to being called a dog.” “Oh, come on,” I said, trying not to wince at the strength of his grip. “It’s a term of endearment. Besides, it’s not like I called you mutts,” I dragged the word out and chuckled as Cecily leaned forward and smirked, “that would be bad for you. Perhaps we’d be a little late in our intrepid rescue, hmm?” “Do that,” I smiled, “And Crash may get mad.” It was like I poured ice water on our light teasing. A tenseness grew in the room, and Killian removed his hand from my shoulder, turning to work on a backpack of sorts. We were standing in the living room prepping for my first round of “errands.” It was to be a simple thing. Go out a few places, ask around about Crash and Zack and Kris. In general, make myself as exposed as possible without looking like bait, to which there is an actual art form to it. We had been teasing all morning through this. I didn’t expect my small joke to have such an impact. “What,” I asked. “What happened?” After a heavy sigh, Cecily said “Let’s just say that we owe Crash. Especially dad. We owe him a lot more than this. More than that, it is not our tale to tell, unfortunately. Perhaps Crash will relay it to you one day.” I nodded. There was a sense of something there. A loss of sorts that felt as if it was cavernous enough to lose more than just a friendship in. But I kept my suspicions and wonders to myself for a change. Even I could feel that it wasn’t the time for digging where I wasn’t wanted. The plan was simple. It was something Roam, Tanika and I had been cooking up since they arrived. I go out, make myself as available to kidnap as possible. They would monitor my movements: Cecily and Killian from somewhere close by, while Donte and Eleanor monitor my trackers with Sean from the house. This plan we had created a few hours after everyone had arrived, giving the crew and us time to try and rest some after essentially being up almost a full day. So, after resting a day, and prepping and prepping and prepping again, checking equipment three and four times (at my behest, to be honest) I went out and did my best to try and be the most attractive bait I could possibly be. Which is to say, I ran errands. Talked about Crash. Asked about our missing roommates. And moved on. Bought food, went to the bar (something I’m not sure I’ve ever done before in this small place), and was seemingly ignored by just about everyone as I did so. It’s a good thing the trackers were small. A thin one in my shoe that had a small battery and antenna so everyone could see my GPS location. A small one in my belt buckle. And of course, my smart watch. The days of taping wire and microphones to people have been gone since the nineties thank God. But still I felt naked, exposed somewhat. You always do during these things. But it’s a good type of naked exposure. The kind that keeps you a bit alert. Let’s you see things even I would normally over look. Like the old lady who kept opening the same app and closing it again on her phone while she stared at me through the reflection on the window in front of her in the donut shop. Or the guy pumping gas and talking to his friend, while casting glances in my direction. Of course, it could be paranoia. But a little paranoia in the business of being bait is healthy. After all, just because you’re paranoid, don’t mean they’re not after you. Killian and Cecily were excellent at their jobs. During the two days I wandered around, I never saw them once. Even though by the end of the second day, I was looking for them, seeing if I could see their dark hair, their olive skin, their smirking face amongst the people I was weaving through in the bank, at the post office, at the restaurant. Perhaps searching for a sense of that blanket that was protecting me from far away. But all I saw was nothing. Just more of the crowd. And more of those suspicious glances. When it finally happened, my paranoia had been sharpened to a fine razers edge. I expected to feel the stiff press of a weapon in my back. A growl of a threat in my ear. To be told to ‘act natural’. Or to simply be grabbed and thrown. Though when the white minivan pulled up next to me, I did feel my heartrate quicken. I was leaned over my trunk, setting a bag of groceries inside when it pulled up. They were smart. Let me unload all of my groceries. Let me close the trunk and put the cart away. Then the door opened. And something hit the back of my head. And everything went black. *** While I was under the ever-loving care of The Nobility, Donte and Eleanor was monitoring my progress at home. They could see my movements, going from the minivan to another vehicle, to a third and finally to a private residence on the outskirts of the county, out amongst the simple Amish folk that everyone leaves to their own devices. “Working like a charm,” Eleanor said. She sat on our couch where Zack would always sit playing his games, tapping away at her keyboard. “You trying to clear up the signal,” Sean asked, leaning over Eleanor’s shoulder. He held a mug of coffee in his hand that trembled a bit with nerves as he spoke. He was never good with large groups of people, always leaving that part of things to Kris. “Oh no,” she said. “That program runs in the background. All I have to do is sit here and watch it, really. I’m readying another script, typing up something that will ring everyone and the authorities in order if need be. A big red panic button, so to speak.” “Oh,” he said, standing back up. “Is everyone settled,” Tanika asked. She was standing in the door way, dressed as if for battle with her hair pulled back in a pony tail. Though she had no visible weapons, one could never say a werewolf was ever unarmed. “Appears so,” Eleanor said. She tapped a couple of buttons on her cell phone. “Sent everyone a pin to where the cell signal stopped. I suspect Killian and Cecily are there already.” Tanika looked at Roam, fire in her eyes. “We should go.” Roam smiled, “Yes, Killian and Cecily aren’t likely to save any fun for us if we let them.” And then, like Sean later told me when he told me about all of this, they “like left, dude.” Donte, never one to let a good silence go to waste filled it with all sorts of conversations about movies, games, music, anything he could think of, really. It felt like hours, according to Sean. But really was probably only ten minutes later before there was a knock at the door. “I’ll get it,” Donte said, motioning to Sean. “You should still stay out of sight.” He disappeared through the front door, then came back holding a plain cardboard box. The top of it was open. Donte’s usual jovial look was gone. He looked down into the box with a vague look of shock and horror. “I don’t…” he muttered, “I just…” “What,” Sean asked as he stepped forward. He peered inside. Inside the box was a human heart, whole and intact. Next to the heart was a note that read “If you want the rest of him, come to this address.” “Kris!” He shouted, then sprinted for the door. “Wait!” Donte shouted. He tried to grab him, but Sean had the power of panic at his side and slipped from his grip. “Shit!” Eleanor shouted from the couch. “What?” He asked. “Our trackers. They just jumped four different locations and disappeared. Jason, Mom, Dad, Cecily and Killian. All gone.” She stared at the screen for a moment, then looked up at Donte. He began rubbing his head absent-mindedly as he paced. “And then there were none,” he said. “What are we going to do?” “I don’t know.” Eleanor said. “I honestly don’t know.” |
| Sean called in from work. They understood with his boyfriend / almost husband missing, that took priority over printing a few T-shirts. So, he hung back and waited with me as we both sat and stared at the television for the next three and a half hours. It was some Netflix documentary on spam or something. I’m not entirely sure. I know the director was trying to make some point about food, but all I remember of it was spam. When the headlights washed over the windows, me and Sean were already outside greeting the two vehicles that arrived: A smart looking late model cross-over SUV, and a Wrangler. I’m told by the individual who owns it that I’m not allowed to call the cross-over a station wagon in his presence. But since this is my blog, IT’S JUST A STATION WAGON! Both vehicles looked reasonably decked out for war, with the Cross-over having some crack running across its windshield. There’s a story there if I’ve ever heard one, but I didn’t ask. Sometimes it’s best to just not dive into these sorts of things. After a brief bit of pleasantries, we invited everyone inside with the usual exchange of niceties. The ‘hello, how are you’s’, so to speak. Introductions were saved for the front door. Cause though the werewolves could see just fine outside in the dim light, me and Sean were at a loss, so it waited until we could get a good look at them. The flood light outside had given the new party a sort of gloomy quality, one that didn’t quite relate to their mannerisms and cheerfulness when they pulled up. The two individuals in the modern glorified station wagon both had a Mediterranean complexion. Dark hair, smoldering eyes, the typical werewolf height and build on the guy. Both appeared to have that movie star, ‘I could be thirty or I could be sixty’ quality to them. The guy had a goatee with a bit of grey peppered through it, and silver streaks through his hair. The woman had a soft, strong muscular nature as well, that appeared as if she hit the weight bench more than the yoga class at the gym. But if I had to guess, I was willing to bet that she barely had to work out to keep that figure. “Hello,” she said, with a faint touch of Spanish in her voice. “I’m Tanika. This is my husband, Romero.” He smiled, and pulled a fedora off of his head. “Call me Roam,” he said. There was a touch of Spain in his voice as well. But not enough to say he came directly from the country. It was more of a ‘I used to live there before the Midwest claimed me’ sort of accent. “Just not Indy, huh,” I grinned. He grinned right back. “Well, I have his hat, but not his whip. So no, I’m not Indy today.” Tanika smiled, right back, patting her husband on the shoulder with tenderness, “perhaps I should get you that whip.” “Eww,” another woman said as she stepped through the door. “Could we not hear that, please?” She resembled Tanika in almost every way, though getting her father’s stronger chin. “We already hear too much from you on the other side of the property.” “Why, Cecily,” Roam said, “How can you say such a thing? Me and your mother, we close the doors, play the music.” A younger guy stepped through the door after Cecily, looking more like his father, with the goatee, only younger. “Yes dad,” he said, “that works for the strays but we’re werewolves too, remember? Turn the music up as loud as you want. We can still hear everything.” “Very funny, Killian,” Tanika said, rolling her eyes. Sean waved everyone through, pulling them into the living room. A taller black man followed behind, who appeared to be in his late teens or early twenties, and a shorter Scottish woman with fiery red hair. The black guy introduced himself as Donte’, and the woman as Eleanor. “We’re the strays,” he said with a grin. “Nice place! I like it, it’s got a sort of Addams Family vibe going on.” “Why thank you, Lurch,” I said, grinning back. Eleanor rolled her eyes, “forgive him,” she said, “he’s been dying to use that line ever since he saw photos of the place online.” “It’s alright,” I replied. “I know what that’s like.” I waved them through to the living room. “Donte’ we’ll have to have a conversation one day about my theory on where colored Easter eggs come from.” Sean’s eyes went wide. “No! Don’t!” He waved his arms frantically, shaking his head. “Seriously, dude. Don’t. My stomach can’t handle that again.” “All I’m saying! If you think about it,” I began. “Dude,” he said, “I still can’t eat Skittles because of that.” Donte’ smiled, “It’s all good. I don’t even like Skittles that much, anyway.” Sean shook his head. “Trust me.” “Anyway,” Eleanor said, rolling her eyes. “I think it’s time we got down to business.” “Right,” Roam said, jumping in. Everyone was seated in the living room at this point, with me and Sean standing near our respective corners. “You two, stay out of the way. Killian, you and Cecily go scouting. You know what to look for.” Roam pointed a finger at the two of us. “Do you two have anywhere you can go for the time being? Neighbors, friends?” “It’s his boyfriend who was stolen,” I replied, pointing at Sean. “And I’m not really one to back down from a fight.” “This isn’t some drunk guy in a bar, my friend,” Roam said. “This is a bit worse than that.” “I know,” I replied. “This is a group of werewolves who want to kill us. We’ve already had a bit of an encounter with them.” Roam gave me a sad little smile. “You got lucky,” he replied. “Normally, they would have shredded all of you for that little stunt. This, no. You will not survive this.” I shrugged. “I’ve gone through four tours overseas, blown up once. Had two fights with a lawn gnome, two different encounters with Hulderfolk. Helped catch and kill a meth-headed vampire. And went bobbing for apples with zombies, which I never want to do again. I think I’ll be okay.” Roam sighed. “Look,” he said, “I know you think that you can help. But you really will just get yourself killed. Eleanor, could you explain to our new friend hear why he’s being an idiot.” “For the record,” Sean said, “being an idiot? It’s kind of his thing.” I gave Sean a look. “What?” He said, “You’re the one who keeps getting involved in these things, not me.” Well, he does have a point about that. After a quick trip to the Wrangler that she and Donte’ arrived in, Eleanor came back inside with a backpack. “Here,” she said, pulling a tablet out. “This is who you’re dealing with.” The first image was of some underwear model or something. He had blonde hair, a perfectly chiseled chin, and was wearing a slim cut suit that looked to be both Italian, and expensive. “This is Verner Behring. He’s the head of the American arm of The Werewolf Confederation.” “Who,” I asked. “You know them as ‘The Nobility’,” she said. “It’s a derogatory term we started using here sometime after the war. I think you can guess why.” “Yeah, high and mighty, my ‘shit smells like roses’ types of individuals. The type of person who never feels like they should ever have to work hard in their entire life because they exist. That they were blessed by their deity with divine wisdom and it’s their goal in life to bear this divinity on us peasants. Yeah, I know the type.” Donte’ looked at me for a moment and chuckled, “damn you’re wordy.” “You know I’m right,” I replied. I didn’t get any audible comments, but I did get a few slight head nods. “He’s assisted by two generals,” Eleanor continued, pulling up another photo. This one was a smiling selfie of two individuals. “They’re husband and wife. The Dylan’s. The guy in the photo is Christopher. The woman is Helena.” The guy had dark hair, strong chin and an easy smile. He looked like the type of person who could be a good presidential candidate, but never president because they keep getting caught sleeping with all the secretaries. The woman had a practiced smile, brown hair and a smart haircut. She looked like the type who planned spontaneous vacations right down to how long you have to get in a pee break. “They look like the mob,” I said. “Kind of like that,” Donte’ replied. “They operate the same way. They don’t destroy the countryside or nothing. But they take ‘tribute’ from other werewolves and things. Will also kill and replace politicians and judges with their own if need be, to get something done.” “So,” I said, “they play 4-D chess.” “They think they do,” Donte said. “But they’re dangerous if you don’t know how to play them.” I began to pace the room. “Well,” I said, “It sounds like they’re the type of people who look down on guys like me. They hate me cause I won’t stay still, cause I won’t stick to my ‘own lane’ or my ‘own kind’.” “Baby, can you talk some sense into these guys, I’m going to bring in the stuff then help out the kids,” he kissed Tanika with practiced ease then stepped back outside. “Actually, you’re just annoying to them. It’s Crash they can’t stand,” she said. “Your blog just reminded them that him and his family are alive.” “Wait,” I said, turning to her. “Why are they pissed at Crash?” Tanika turned her head down, and crossed herself for a moment. “You’ll have to ask him,” she said “That tale of woe is not mine to tell. But they’d prefer if he was dead.” Sean clenched his fist hard when he heard that. “Will they, you know, hurt or,” “If Crash surrenders, your loved ones should be okay. But if he doesn’t, they’re not above harming them to get at Crash.” “Do you like, know where they are or anything,” Sean asked. “Not yet,” she said. “We’ll have to start searching the county. Even for a werewolf, that will take time.” “See there dude,” Sean said, looking at me.. “I call them, they get ahold of me, you can like, follow them or whatever and,” “Stop it, Sean,” I said. “Even I know that idea is dumb. Besides, you’re a nice guy. I know you can fight if you need to, but I don’t think you’d be able to handle them.” “If they harm one hair on Kris’ head, I swear I’ll,” he began. “No, you won’t.” Tanika said, stepping in. “Going off half cocked will only get yourself killed, your boyfriend probably killed and won’t save Crash. Besides, we already have a plan to get your boyfriend your roommate and Crash back all safe and sound.” “Okay, I’m all in dude, what do you need me to do,” Sean asked. “Actually,” Tanika said, looking at me, “no offense, but we’ll need Jason for this one.” |
| Shifting into werewolf form is a process. One I traditionally don’t stick around for all that much unless I’m needed. It’s painful. Muscles contorting and wrenching. Bones cracking, growing, shrinking. Fur sprouting and pushing. Crash once described it to me as giving birth in multiple places on your body all at once in the span of about five or ten minutes. Although I cannot attest to the pain of bringing a new life into this world, I’m certain there is more than a couple women out there who are now crossing themselves and saying ‘thank God I don’t have to deal with that’. The key thing is the five or ten minutes. I’ve never timed him on it, but he claims to have a record for about four minutes forty-seven seconds from human to monster form. That night he beat that record by at least thirty seconds flat. “Okay big guy,” I started, and he turned and glared at me. A snarl on his muzzle that I had never seen before directed towards me. My blood ran cold for a second as I was given a sudden reminder that God or nature or whoever had gifted humanity with a far superior predator to keep us on our toes. “uh….” “Out with it,” he snarled. “Look,” I said, waving my hands in a downward motion. As if that was going to calm him down? Has that motion ever calmed anyone down? Why do we do it? Anyway, I digress. “You’re a werewolf, they’re werewolves. You honestly think running off like this will help?” “They want me. I give myself up they’ll let them go,” he said. That was his big plan? To make a sacrificial play in some sort of vain effort to save us? I had no idea I was clenching my fist until I raised it. “That’s your big idea?! To sacrifice yourself?” “Yes,” he snarled down at me. “And Mitch was supposed to keep you away from here until they were done! But you had to go and talk him into destroying my house!” “Don’t give me that,” I spat back at him, “You’re about to go out there and sacrifice your fucking life so that group of psychopaths will HOPEFULLY release our friend!” “They will,” he snorted. “It’s the only way to keep you safe.” I gritted my teeth until they hurt. I suppose it was time for one of my infamous ‘open mouth and insert foot’ statements that I’m so good at. But this one kind of turned into a bit of a speech. I’m terrible at speeches. I once in the military turned an award I was receiving into a reprimand when my squad leader at the time told me to say a few words, so I read off my grocery list and sat back down. In my defense, they never said what kind of words to say. But this speech, well, it came from the heart. So, despite it never going to be recognized as one of the all-time greatest speeches out there, it’s at least decent. “Go ahead, jackass, get yourself killed!” See there? Strong opener. Told you it was decent. Okay, sorry for the interruption. Here’s the rest of it. “That’s all you’re going to do, you frickin flea bag! I thought you werewolves were supposed to be smart or some shit. That’s your big plan? To let them kill you, possibly torture you first, in the hopes that they’ll maybe release our friends?! You know in the list of all time dumbest plays, that’s number one! You may not understand this, but these assholes want us all dead! Because we committed the crime of loving you! That’s right, I said it. We love you, you stupid, ungrateful, moronic, walking, growling, childhood nightmare! All of us do! Or did that whole ‘stand and fight’ thing we did not get that through your thick skull! You got fur growing inward as well when you shift, because that is just pure asinine! You’re our big brother! The father we never had! The strong, cool uncle! You’re the one who helped all of us heal some part of ourselves! You think we’re going to turn tail and run now, then you better check your legs and see if maybe you got neutered on your last checkup you…” A werewolf’s roar can stop a lot of things. It certainly stopped that speech. After receiving a full volume saliva shower (thanks Crash), I found myself curled up on the floor for a moment, with him standing over me, flexing his claws as if he was ready to do damage to someone. And I was the only one around. “Damn it, Jason! I love you too, but do you not think I have a plan? It’s my job as the alpha of this little pack to protect you all!” He huffed for a moment longer, then stepped through the door, slamming it behind himself. I was still huddled on the porch, shaking a bit, trying to force myself into a standing position. “Uh, you okay dude?” Sean asked after a moment. He patted me on the shoulder and it took everything I had in me to not jump. I swallowed. “I think I saw his lunch,” I muttered. “You should know better than to lay into a werewolf, man,” he said. Then after a moment, he muttered “I really wish Kris and Zack was here.” I looked him in the face, and patted him on the shoulder. That turned into a quick hug. Hey, we’re not a hugging group, but when your loved one who’s as close to you as a spouse disappears and might have been kidnapped and you might never see again, you get a hug. I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t give a hug in that instance. “I know,” he said, “I’m like, usually the chill, go with the flow guy. But this is bullshit. Kris never hurt anyone. Why him? Why did it have to be him?” A lot of people would be incline to blame me in that position. It’s understandable, after all, I started the blog that kind of started this mess. I felt more than a little bit of guilt for The Nobility showing up. However, Sean for his credit never once through that part of things blamed me for anything. He took it as a sort of “why can’t we all just get along” type of vibe. Go with the flow, I suppose. I swear they’ll put it on his tombstone one day. What will be mine? “Pepperoni and Cheese”. But that’s because I’m a sucker for an old joke. “We got two people missing. A pissed off werewolf. And now, we’re standing here alone with just my pistol to keep us safe,” I grumbled. “We got to find him,” Sean said, looking down. “What,” I asked. “We got to find him,” he said again louder. “We got to get Kris back! Can’t you like, text them or something like you did last time?” I sighed and leaned against the fridge. “Sean, that would only work once. Next time I do that, if they even bother to come back here, it will be to blow the house up, or something. They won’t make the mistake of coming in twice.” “We could always follow them back,” he muttered. “What,” I asked. “We, I dunno, call them up or somethin, then follow them back to wherever it is they go after they give up and don’t find us,” he said. I snagged a beer from the fridge and handed it to Sean. “I know you miss him,” I said with as comforting of a smile as I could muster, “and I know you want your boyfriend back. I understand. If it was my lover, I’d want them back safe and sound too! But,” “Don’t patronize me,” Sean growled. “It’s a good plan.” “Sean! This is me you’re talking to. The king of bad plans. And even I’m telling you, that’s bad! IF they were regular humans, I’d be all for it. But Sean, those are werewolves. WEREWOLVES.” I tapped his skull. “Heightened senses, remember? Can hear a billion times better, see a billion times better, especially at night, not to mention the sense of smell. They’d see us before we even made it ten feet. Besides, that sort of tailing takes a team of people highly trained communicating constantly to pull off.” He sighed. “Or a werewolf,” he muttered. I nodded and swallowed. “Yeah, and ours disappeared.” He stood up, a grim look of determination on his face. “I’m going to do it, dude,” Sean muttered, then left the room. I scratched my head in confusion at his words. A few moments later, he returned, holding a piece of paper in his hand. “Crash told us,” Sean said, “if anything bad happened to him, and like, he doesn’t return or whatever to call this number. And dude, I think this situation counts.” I took the number from him and dialed it. After a few deep breaths, I got the hesitant “hello?” someone gives when they get a number they don’t recognize and expect at any moment to be told that their car’s warranty is about to expire and the only way to prevent themselves from dying in a horrible ball of fire is to buy an extended one right now. “Dude, just tell him,” Sean started, but I waved a hand at him to hush. “Look, I don’t know who you are, but Crash just ran off, our roommates are missing, and apparently I’m told we need to call you for help,” I said. There was a pause on the other end of the phone. “It’s a five-hour drive. We can be there in three.” There was a crash heard in the background like something had just landed on something else and knocked it off a table. “Better make that four.” |
| Cops. Interviews. Drama. Clean up. All of it filled with growled remarks and gruff responses. Surprisingly by all of us humans. Crash didn’t much concern himself with the proceeds and goings on. Being the actual ‘victim’ this time instead of the official must have been quite the turn of events for him. He seemed to take everything with humor. But I’ve learned Crash masks a lot with a joke. I guess it only makes sense. I mask a lot with sarcasm and mean behavior. Just like my statement prior to the attack. It dug at me quite a bit, but everyone brushed it off. Though it appeared that the temperature in the place had dropped some, and I wasn’t referring to air conditioning. Zack played more games in his room than in the living room. Shawn and Kris stayed upstairs when they weren’t shopping or working. We all seemed to go into our respective corners so to speak, avoiding eye contact except when we absolutely have to interact. Some people have snark. I’d like to point out here that snark is NOT sarcasm, though sarcasm can be snarky. There is a huge difference between the two, and not everyone understands it. For example, when Kris walked into the kitchen and told me that it’s my turn to cook, so him and Shawn are eating out to avoid food poisoning, that’s not sarcasm. That’s snarky, true. An attempt at a mean comment yes. But no sarcasm. Sarcasm was me telling him “Oh good! I was hoping to be able to keep my dinner down, thank you.” That went about as well as you’d expect. When I said I’m an asshole, that’s what I mean. I’m sarcastic. I like saying mean comments with the point of getting a laugh, not with the point of hurting people. When I said that, it was said to get a laugh of some kind, despite there being only me and Kris in the room. However, there are farts that have gone over in church better than my comment did. And that caused all kinds of issues. It’s like that comment I made many years ago that caused me to get banned from family gatherings involving the hunting of eggs from egg laying and decorating rabbits. What can I say? I was asking a simple, basic question involving skittles that lead to children asking their parents more uncomfortable questions than they were ready for. This is also yet another reason why I no longer drink at family functions. Or attend family functions in general, really. So, things were getting bad. I wasn’t helping the matter any by just being the jerk that I am. It was the first real time I felt my new found sobriety threatened. The desire to drink just to forget the issue was strong, but the desire to deal with the issue and get the problem resolved was just as strong, if that makes any sense. Like two warring factions in my brain who both wanted their side to win at all costs. If you don’t have an addiction, let me explain it to you. When you’re addicted to something, no matter what it is, the desire to do it doesn’t just randomly spring back like a weed. It’s not something that suddenly grows within you or upon you. It’s brought about because of both external and internal things. Your brain developed stress responses to things. For those with addictions, those ‘bad habits’ are stress responses in many ways. For some people it’s cigarettes, for others it’s pornography. For me, it was drinking. A habit that can slowly kill you. Believe me, I wish it was porn. Cause at least that wouldn’t cause so many physical health issues. Mental health is a different story, and an argument for a different time. This is how an addiction dominates you. You have an issue happen, say like a fight with a friend who has become like family to you. This issue leads to stress and anxiety. Now we all have learned responses that alleviate said anxiety. Zack’s is to kill monsters on a video game. Mine is to drink. The drinking relaxes the brain and causes your body to release endorphins that will make you begin to feel better about the situation, the world, whatever it is. Quite literally, the alcohol would make me feel better about being me. Even though it was at one point, killing me. Crash’s solution to this was far better than mine’s. He’d been put on desk duty for a few weeks while this whole mess clears up, so we were getting a more regular nine to five with him. He hated it of course after a while, cause well, according to him “werewolves are not meant to be caged up at a desk.” Which makes sense if you think about it. Crash told me to sit everyone down and talk to them, give them a real apology. A half-hearted “sorry, we still good” out on the front lawn after a major incident that I might be partly responsible for just wasn’t going to cut it. I had to Get it out there, release the garbage into the world and be done with it. Which I understood. Zack brought to the group good times, good games. Kris brought some snark to rival my own sarcasm, it’s true. But he also brought funny stories, and unique outlook on things, as well as those damn cookies he does so well. Shawn brought a relaxed surfer outlook that kind of evened everything out. We all brought something unique to the pack. Something that was greatly missing after the initial attack. Kris was at work. Shawn had the day off, for which I’m glad. I was able to tell him what was what, and ask him to sit down with everyone. He was in their room at his computer, but he smiled when I said “I want to talk to everyone. I want to apologize, and just get this crap flushed once and for all.” “Sure dude,” he said. “I’ll tell Kris. Honestly, he’s been acting a bit bitchy man I know, but he really just wants to like, put this all behind us.” “He ain’t the only one,” I said. “I’ve been bitchy and mean too, dude.” Then I patted him on the shoulder and left the room. So, we sat around and waited. It was supposed to be six o’clock when Kris got home from his retail job. Six thirty, no Kris. Seven, no Kris. Zack was supposed to get home about seven from his shift. Seven rolled around, and no Zack. Shawn was almost in a panic. After about nine at night, Crash summed it up with one phrase. He was standing on the front porch, sipping on a beer. His arm hair was standing up a bit, fur ready to ripple out of it. “The Nobility,” he growled. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t say anything. After all, what as I going to do? My only hope was to sit there, and wait. Then pray for something to happen. Anything. |
| When we last left off, I believe all of us, Shawn and Kris, Zack and myself was being held captive on our own front lawn by The Nobility. A group of stuck-up asshole werewolves who wanted us dead because we had been allowed to be part of the pack of a werewolf, and were not weres ourselves. The house had three colorful expensive looking European SUVs in front of it on the street, two down one side, and a third down the other. Each had their headlights on. Our outside light, which flicks on of course at the slightest of movements was glowing bright as well, effectively cutting off all of our night vision. I don’t know what it did to werewolves. I do remember thinking that this would be the last thing that went through my mind before a claw or something did. I saw Crash held between two werewolves thrashing and fighting as he stared at us, despair, and fear on his wolfish face. I never thought I’d see a look like that on any creature other than human. I hope and pray that I never see that look again on anything else not human. Mitch was behind us, being held by two of the wolves. The placement of people is important to understanding the next part. In front of our house was us three humans. Behind us was Mitch, being held by two werewolves. In front of us was Crash and the other two. The jerk on the phone was standing next to the car, by the bumper, still on the phone. A vehicle’s engine revved down the street. No one paid it any heed. I’ve learned about such things. A normal human probably wouldn’t even see anything other than the cars. If they saw anything, it would be a group of people standing on the front lawn and think ‘party’ or something. Nothing out of the ordinary. They wouldn’t be able to tell what was going on. That’s what I figured when the tires squealed, anyway. Street racers will be street racers after all, and the dead of night in a neighborhood with decent roads is as good of a place as any, I guess? I never was a street racer, so I really can’t say for certain on that one. I have no knowledge of that culture. When the car jumped the curb and barreled straight at the werewolves holding Crash however, even I was able to figure out that was no street racer. It had the desired effect; I’ll give them that. We all dove, us three humans towards the right to avoid the car. The two werewolves jumped straight up to avoid it. Then Crash leaped backwards onto the hood of the SUV. Out of the woods zoomed a humongous brown figure, that crashed into the rear werewolves with a loud growl and pinned them with a snarl. I never thought I’d ever see something bigger than a werewolf in my life. Let me tell you, do NOT mess with a were…bear? Is that a term? Well, that’s the term I’m using, so it is now. I had no weapon anymore, being forced to leave it behind in the upstairs room. So, I did the sensible thing, and ushered everyone upstairs, getting us out of the fight as quick as possible. Though by the time I got through the front door, it really was over. No deaths. I’ll give them that much. I had expected a lot more bloodshed. At the end the massive creature had two pinned to the ground, Crash clutched one against one of the vehicles, and there stood Charles on top of his car, grinning like a fool. “Did good! I know I did good,” he shouted. “Yeah, you did,” Nancy shouted back to him from the passenger seat. I blinked for a moment. “Charles,” I asked, stepping back outside. “Owed you,” he said, then looked down. “And Crash.” One of the wolves pinned down snarled an insult at the bear holding him down. The bear leaned forward and snarled back, “You forgone the treaty. You’re not allowed on these shores. The Nobility does not exist here.” He looked up at me, and grinned. “The Nobility is everywhere.” It sent a chill down my spine. Despite a creature leaning on him that could literally tear a werewolf’s head off as easy as one could tear off mine, he was grinning like none of it mattered. It’s a look I’d seen before. When you watch enough videos of suicide bombers at check points, sat through enough After-Action Reviews and studied enough footage of these types of people, you begin to see the signs. More than a goose walked across my grave. An entire heard of geese did the chuck berry duck walk, complete with guitars and that cheesy Cheshire Cat grin. “Down,” I shouted as I hit the ground. That’s when things went a bit sideways. The SUV sitting by itself on the side road erupted. Explosions like this, you feel the force first. Then you hear explosion, feel the flames. It’s not like in the movies, where you see this giant fireball of flame that erupts while you get the opportunity to walk away from it wearing sunglasses and a stare cold enough to freeze ice cubes. The boom threw chunks of the car almost everywhere, including one door that embedded itself into a wall. Then flames licked and danced through the vehicle. Thankfully they hadn’t loaded any shrapnel into the car. No one died, but the explosion was a good enough diversion. The werebear was knocked backwards. Every window in our house, and almost everyone on our block shattered. Thankfuly Zack, Kris and Shawn were on the front porch and mostly protected from the blastwave. I was laying down, so most of the shockwave passed over me. Though, I was still stunned. Sitting up, all I saw was one SUV in flames, two gone, a werebear, Crash and Mitch. We sat there for a good long while on that lawn. I got checked and eventually cleared. Crash and his boss got cleared. We had a conversation, most of which turned into me berating myself with him patiently listening to me. Why won’t I detail it? Well, I promised him I’d keep him out of the blog. We talked later after everything happened and this was as far as I could get him to be included. Though, I was able to get this much within it. I sat on the front lawn, police and ambulances around us. Taking our statements, (none of them went inside the house, thankfully. Otherwise, I’d have to explain the Home Alone set up), and basically cleaning up the scene. I had taken in and exhaled a shuttering breath. Staring at Crash standing over in the distance. He was in human form, wearing a pair of shorts and a simple shirt and telling the police…well something. Not my business I guess what they were talking about. “Am I just making his life harder,” I asked. “I mean, I’ve been trying to help, but all of this insanity, is it because I’m meddling? I’m just screwing things up?” “Fuck them,” he said. “You can quote me on that. The Nobility would have come anyway. You’re just a convenient excuse.” Charles laid a heavy hand on my shoulder later on. His car was still on our front lawn. I wasn’t sure if it ran or not. He stuck around I think because no one had told him he was allowed to leave. “You have a habit of sticking your nose where it’s needed,” he told me. “But not where it’s wanted.” “Yeah,” I said, looking down at the ground. “I’m a handful to put up with.” Charles laughed. “Sometimes. But you know, if you’re feeling aquatic, just remember: not everyone gives each other the same gifts.” I thought about what Charles had said when we went inside. Hulderfolk have their own twisted logic at times which can turn out to be correct. A simple truth that we often overlook because we dismiss them as being, well, simple. But also, we were exhausted. Going on day three of no sleep, and we now had a house full of broken glass to go along with our Home Alone set up. We had windows to tape up. All of those traps and the fight to clean up after. And, oh yeah, that little matter of sealing the windows so the incoming rain didn’t destroy our stuff more. My eyes burned I was so tired. I wanted to sleep. I wanted to eat. I wanted to just be anywhere at that moment, but right there. I followed Crash as he turned to head inside. Most of the police were gone, at least we had that much. And the house itself was still standing, though it would need major repairs over the next several weeks. “Did we win round one or lose it?” His shoulders dropped a bit. “I think they got us on points. You know they’re not done, huh?” “Dude, they brought a Vbid to use as a distraction. Anyone who does that won’t be stopped by a small Macaulay Culkin routine.” “You’re right,” Crash replied. “Don’t tell Kris, Shawn or Zack that I think they’re at their limit.” “What puzzles me is why make it so weak? I mean, they could have made that thing strong enough to blow down our house, the neighbors place, and leave a nice crater in the road. You werewolves would have lived but hated life. The rest of us would be dead. Why did they make it that weak?” “I don’t know,” Crash admitted. “Unless they’re not actually out to kill you four.” I looked at Crash. My jaw dropped open a bit. “What could they possibly want with us?” “That part,” he said, “I don’t know.” |
| The hardest part of my plan was honestly getting everyone on board. I had to explain it more than once to Kris and Shawn, both of whom was very skeptical of turning our home into a death trap. “What if Crash comes home” came up more than once. I promised Mitch, and well, everyone that if Crash came home, I’d be the one to stop him from coming inside before we disarmed the traps. Then there was the manner of traps we could use. I’m not certain a claymore would stop a werewolf, though it would slow it down and piss it off. That’s what we would be going for. Slowing them down, at least until we could do something a bit more to them. Unfortunately, silver doesn’t work like it does in the movies. A simple touch or glance at it does nothing. It has to get into their blood stream to hurt or kill a werewolf. I wasn’t desiring to kill any of them. At least, not yet. This did feel a bit like kittens protecting the den from a lion. In the end, there wasn’t much we could do if they decided to, say, forgo all subtlety and jump from the ground to the second-floor windows to literally bite our heads off. But it was better than sitting and waiting for them to come get us. Plus, being pro-active against a problem feels better than waiting for your problem to come and maim you in the middle of the night. I’m not much of a sportsman so I stopped by the store to pick up some fishing line. It makes a great trip line that’s hard to see. I stretched the fishing line across a few of the stairs and in one door way. Then I did a couple things you’d expect. A nail or two on the stairs, some trip hazards in a small hallway, Soapy floor in the kitchen, then we set inside upstairs, and waited. If we had the home set up the same way the kid did in the movie, I would have definitely set up some paint cans to the face style traps. But as it stands, I felt confident in our ability to at least piss off our attackers before they killed us. That made me feel a little better. When we had completed the trip back to the house, all the shopping, and were upstairs in Kris and Shawn’s room it was almost morning. Mitch was downstairs preferring to have a bit more open room to fight, especially if he was going to “get his claws dirty” he said. Although all of us had seen Crash shift more than once between human and wolf, Mitch preferred privacy to do it so we let him perform that feat alone. Getting The Nobility to walk into our trap after we had set everything up, we thought would have been a challenge. However, as we worked setting the house up, I had an epiphany. Instead of hoping they might happen to show up to get us, I just texted Crash and asked him when he was coming home and told him that everyone was worried here. There wasn’t much more that could be sent. “The party’s here”? “Don’t forget we’re hunting”? Anything of the like and we might as well just text them, “bye the way, we know you’re not actually Crash and we’re setting a trap.” As it stood at that moment, I still wasn’t sure that I had done exactly that. Expectations were non-existent. After all, were they going to just show up in black SUVs like in the movies? Maybe a few old Cadillacs or something like in a Scorsese flick? We didn’t know. We certainly didn’t expect three colorful, expensive and very out of place European SUVs. They waited until nightfall before they showed up. We ate, we talked, we planned, and we jumped at every little shadow and vehicle that rolled down the road. Tension is like pulling on fishing line. After a while, it starts to cut into your skin, leave lines. It can even cut you if you keep it tight enough, long enough. It started to cut us a bit. I won’t go over everything that was said, but to sum it up: Kris at one point said this was all my fault for starting this little blog. Shawn of course backed up his man. Zack tried to point out that fighting is stupid when everyone was about to show up. And I said…. Well, I’m ashamed of it. But I didn’t start this blog to sugar coat anything or make myself feel any better about the world. I really started it to try and make sense of the insanity that was happening, to try and screw my head on right. To also try and get a little bit of therapy through these words on the screen, cause anyone who’s ever attempted to get mental help from the VA can attest to, they ignore you till you almost die, then they treat you. And when they treat you, you go back to wishing you’d just been ignored. What I had said was “Well, I guess instead of just helping Crash with things perhaps I should be more like you free loaders and do absolutely nothing.” That was the most hurtful thing I could come up with on short notice. Yes, there was more curse words in it, and maybe the word wasn’t exactly “free loaders”, but closer in tone to a curse word. Hell, this blog isn’t censored, I don’t know why I’m doing it now. The words used was ‘useless fuckers’ not ‘free loaders.’ I’m still ashamed I said it. Though it did give everyone a pause. The one good thing that came out of that fight was the silence. It allowed us to hear the engines running outside. One individual stepped out of the lead vehicle, a blue Mercedes of some kind. He was in human form, talking on his phone. I couldn’t see more than that thanks to the encroaching night. Front and back door slammed open under the heavy feet of the werewolves. Zack, Kris and Shawn all jumped out of their skins and into each other’s arms, a cry dying in their throat. I didn’t blame them. Experiencing this sort of thing was frightening at first. Heck, I can’t really count how many times I’ve seen it whether it’s with training or through real life situations in my previous occupation, and it was still frightening for me. My fear response had just been trained to be pulling a pistol instead of crying out. Crash in wolf form has a brown and black fur pattern that blends in with the night. So, if he wants, all you see in the darkness is his two eyes shining and his teeth glistening in the full moon light. He pulled this little prank on me when I was going to the pisser on one of the first nights living with him. That’s why I saran wrapped his toilet seat by the way, I did literally wet myself because of that. Mitch’s fur pattern is pure nightmare fuel. A mix of silver, white and grey, so it almost glistens in the light, making him seem even larger than his already humongous frame. He looks like a ghost of a monster come to life in order to rip you to shreds. When the door kicked in and the first wolf came barreling through, he pounced, twisted and chomped their shoulder. They crashed to the floor and into a wall, with a snarl and a wail. Then after tackling them, he leaped through the dining room over to the kitchen and landed on the kitchen table, which creaked under his weight. Two came in through that side door, and launched themselves at him. The soap beneath their claws slipped, and they hit the floor, their jaws snapping shut in a loud clop! Mitch leaped off the table, landed on them. Digging his claws in he leaped forward throwing them into the table and wall behind him. As he was doing this, the first wolf made it to the stairwell, stepping on a nail and yelping loudly. He snarled something, then tried to take the stairs two at a time. He missed the first trip wire, then like an expert hooked the second, landing face first on the stairs and got tangled in the third. That made a perfect path for the other two. They had just finished sliding around our kitchen and just about destroying it and was racing upstairs, with Mitch in tow, literally snapping at their heels. The first of the two brown wolves leaped up the stairs, landed on the first wolves back, then leaped into the doorway, snarling at me. I glared back at them through the site of my pistol. “Far enough,” I growled. The first one of course, didn’t listen. He smiled at me, his ears twisting back as he did to make it look more vicious and stepped forward, drool dripping onto the floor. He growled some sort of threat that I couldn’t understand. Mental note for everyone out there. Threats only work if people understand them. If you try to threaten someone in a language they don’t understand, all they’ll hear is gibberish. I understood the pointing with claws and snapping of teeth, but the language barrier just left me feeling confused instead of scared. “Hey moron!” I shouted. “I think I can blast your buddy in the eye through your nuts. You want me to try? We live with a werewolf; you want to bet this isn’t loaded with silver?” That’s when he said the first thing I could understand. “You want to see your friend alive? You come with us.” “Bullshit,” I growled. “Either he’s dead already, or soon will be.” I didn’t see the looks everyone exchanged when I said that. I didn’t have to. But it was a fact. If we left Crash’s life, Crash was effectively dead. Loneliness is the biggest killer of werewolves out there. It also does a number on people as well. Loneliness breeds depression, which breeds despair, which breeds death. First the death of any desires and joys in your own life, the death of your hopes and dreams, then your own literal death. It had nearly killed me when Crash came and pulled me out of there. It nearly killed him all those years ago before we moved in. I wasn’t about to let it finish the job on him. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I have a gun aimed at your jewels,” I said. “Release Crash.” “You’re under arrest,” he snarled. “I don’t think you get this, but I’m American. I’m also a combat veteran. Which means, I’m hurting. Which means I’m already pissed off, and you just invaded my home in a state that says I’m allowed to kill you for that. You know the only cure for cheering up a combat vet? Killing. And buddy, you ain’t giving me many reasons to keep your dumbass alive.” I pulled the hammer back on my pistol for effect. “Try me.” He grinned viciously. “Look out the window.” I didn’t move. Zack took a moment and peered down. “Holy shit,” he said, “They have Crash.” “What,” I asked. “Yeah. Two of them have Crash by the throat,” he said. “Either you come with us, or he dies,” he said. “So, we die and then he dies slowly, or we all die now, huh,” I said. Then raised the pistol at his head. “I choose,” “Don’t!” Kris shouted. I sighed, and looked over at him. “What?” “Just don’t,” he whimpered. “Crash can’t die.” I sighed and nodded. “Alright,” I conceded. “You go first, then we’ll follow.” It was slow going, but we made it out onto the lawn. There were very few stars out, but we did have a beautiful moon above us. I looked at it and thought about how strange it was that the moon should be the last thing I saw before I died. Crash snarled at his captors, thrashed in their claws to try and free himself, but could not. Two werewolves could very easily restrain one. I wish I had beautiful words to tell him but could only stare like the rest of us. Don’t look, I thought, Don’t watch. Please don’t watch this. It’s here that I must say thank God for our lovely neighbors. I am sincere in saying that. Cause if it weren’t for them, I certainly wouldn’t be typing this out for you now. Zack, Kris, and Shawn would be long gone. They said they owed us more than one and that’s why they interfered, even if it was interfering in the affairs of werewolves. Honestly, I’m just surprised that they could come up with such a complicated plan. I guess you should never underestimate them, even if they do seem simple. |
| I never thought I’d see Mitch so soon. The fast-food werewolf I figured would go back to his life and his family or whatever he was doing with his spare time. So, it was a bit of a shock when he turned back up unannounced with a hangdog look on his face. It was as if someone had kicked his puppy and peed in his cornflakes all at once. “I just want you to know,” he said, “I’m really sorry about how things are gonna go down. And I’m doing everything I can.” “What,” I asked. It was early morning. Crash hadn’t arrived from work yet. He was on night shift, and it was a bit late for him, but not late enough for us to worry about anything. “I just…” he began. Then sighed. “How much do you know about werewolves?” “That you shed enough in wolf form to make another one of you. It’s a pain constantly sweeping all the time,” I said. My intention was to lighten the mood. However, those things rarely ever go the way I’d like them too. Instead of even getting a polite chuckle, I got a glare. “This is serious,” he said. “I know a bit, I guess.” “Well, then you don’t know much about The Nobility then. Grab your bugout bag and meet me out here with your roommates. I think we can get you all to safety before they come.” “I’m kind of lost,” I said. “Can’t this wait till Crash gets home?” “He won’t.” I head tilted at that. Darn annoying habit I picked up from Crash. “What?” “Get your roomies. Get your bag. Let’s go.” I did what he asked, grabbing Kris, Shawn, Zack and each one of us grabbing a small bag with a couple changes of clothing in them and what meds we needed and got back outside. Mitch’s SUV was large enough thankfully to house all of us. Though it was pretty old butdurable, as durable as an old Suburban could be, I suppose. We left town in relative silence, and headed south, reaching the state line in a few hours. After a fast-food lunch, and wasting a couple hours, we headed over to a cheap motel beside the interstate. I collected our phones, turned them all off and placed them in the freezer. Kris turned on a mindless reality TV show of some kind and turned the volume up. My six-hundred-pound mother’s dog’s boyfriend’s life or something like that. All of those shows are the same, anyway so who can really keep track? Kris crossed his arms and glared at Mitch. “Start talking.” “I don’t know what you mean,” he said, looking around. Despite Mitch’s massive frame he was looking smaller and smaller now, looking around the room in a few nervous glances. “We’re about as secure as we can be. Tell us about The Nobility.” I replied. “And where the hell is Crash,” Zack added, glaring up at him. “I’m missing GTA for this.” “And I’m missing work, dude.” Shawn replied. “Look, I know you’re all a bit confused about everything,” he said, “but I promise it will be alright.” “Mitch,” I said, stepping forward. I patted his cheek, and smiled. “Our friend needs our help. For one reason or another he’s saved all of our asses at one point in time. Mine multiple. So if he needs our help, we’re going to help him. Now, you can either tell us what we require, or we’ll go find him. By handing out flyers and shouting his name out the car window like we’re looking for a lost dog, if need be, but we WILL find him.” “Yes, but how the hell are you going to rescue him from five werewolves,” Mitch asked, his face growing dark. “Oh.” It was Mitch’s turn to cross his arms. “Oh.” “The Nobility.” He snarled it like it was a curse, then began to talk. “There are two theories to the origins of werewolves. One is evolution. Hunters/gatherers worked better when one had better hearing, sight, smell, was stronger and faster. A tribe with a couple werewolves could dominate other tribes much easier in theory and take whatever territory they wanted. The other theory is The Nobility. The original bloodline. Their family name would be quite familiar to, well, just about everyone. So among the rest of us ‘mutts’ as they call us, we just call them The Nobility. They say they were blessed by the direct hand of God himself, who reached down and dictated them to rule. A couple hundred years ago, right when America was having its civil war in fact, there was a bit of a civil war among werewolves. The secret war was fought in plain sight among humans and treated as random political killings or just regular murders. I won’t go into great detail of every battle, but the result was, we lost. The Nobility kept their power in Europe, and we fled here.” “I don’t get it,” I said. “What does this have anything to do with Crash?” “Well, The Nobility deems werewolves to be automatically part of their nation, whether they want to be or not. It’s membership by birth and only revoked by death. This is part of the reason why we fought. The other reason was xenophobia. You see, The Nobility sees humanity something to be protected, kept, guided. You know, like a pet. You’re never supposed to know about us. You’re never supposed to live with us. And you’re never supposed to be in a pack with us. Since Crash has all of you as his pack, then by their law, he’s supposed to die.” “How did they find out about Crash, anyway,” Zack asked. “Because,” Mitch said, “someone decided it was a smart idea to start a blog.” I smiled sheepishly, then shrugged. “It’s not like anyone reads the damn thing.” I got a couple of glances, but no glares. “They probably already knew about all of you anyway,” Mitch said. “Can’t say for sure, though. My family fought against them to the last wolf. Finally my grandmother fled here so our family name would live. She met a human, she fell in love with and well, here we are. The Mutts. The Nobility has Crash. They’re having a ‘discussion’,” he threw air quotes around the word, “about his life choices. Their choices will be to kill all of you and Crash. Or to just kill Crash.” “Great,” Kris grumbled. “Those fuckers will kill him either way.” “Crash could be lucky. They could tell him to just kick you out,” Mitch said. “So, kick us out or die. Mitch, you do realize kicking us out will kill Crash, right,” I asked. He nodded. His eyes were watery for a moment. He looked out the window. The cracked parking lot stared back up at him. I was smart enough to ensure we had something on the second floor in the middle. That way we wouldn’t be easy to grab. I didn’t ask why Mitch chose the rundown Motel over a nicer hotel though, despite us being able to pool or cash together to afford it. Cause in a pinch, he can easily go through the walls here and make us an escape route. At least that’s what I choose to believe. It could also be because he’s really cheap. I don’t know. According to Mitch The Nobility are a funny bunch. They expect ones like Crash to either just marry the first werewolf they run across or live in solitude forever, even if solitude is what kills most werewolves. They consider werewolves of those from a human parent to be “mutts.” When he said this, he spat the word out. We had been sitting in that Motel room for the longest time, as the sun began to set, it was Zack of all people who finally put things into perspective. “We all have jobs and lives to get to. I understand hiding out in this motel if they’re after us. But it sounds like they’re after Crash instead.” Kris nodded. “Besides, Crash really can’t live without us. We don’t want to live without him. And who says it’s their damn business anyway who he chooses to have as a pack, anyway?” “They do,” Mitch said. “And their thousands of werewolves they can call upon to fight for them at moment’s notice. If The Nobility chose to, they could literally wipe your town and any memory of it off the map.” We sat there for a long time, listening to the sounds of the people on television talk about their frustrations living with this 600 pound dog’s wife’s girlfriend’s brother or whatever they were going on about. As the mindless monotony droned on, we all stared at the floor. Or the wall. Or the ceiling. Kris and Shawn held each other for comfort. But a single thought kept running through my head. In guerrilla warfare, those who know the home have the advantage. They’re the ones who understand every shortcut, every nook, every cranny. They have the memories of the people who lived nearby, of dead-end roads, of which paths through the forest twists around in circles and which one leads directly to the other side. Or to the creek. Militaries in the past have studied local maps, interviewed local people, have fought hard to mitigate this advantage, but no amount of satellite photography, of talking to other people could eliminate the boon of having the home field. “We could go back,” I said. Everyone looked at me. “How,” Zack asked. “Well, easy. Mitch gets in his surburban and drives us. Then we might have enough time to get ready,” I said. “You know this will be incredibly stupid,” Mitch said. I grinned. “Well, I’ve been accused of being brave before, but never of being smart.” “What’s the plan,” Zack asked. “We follow Kevin McCallister’s example,” I said. “What are you talking about,” Mitch asked. “What? Haven’t you ever watched Home Alone?” |
| It’s my theory that everyone is magnetic of some magnitude. Meaning, they naturally attract certain things. Some people attract riches and wealth, others attract fun people and parties, still others attract nothing but trouble. I try to stay away from those that do attract trouble, and stay near those that attract goodness and kindness. Those are the qualities I need, after all. The qualities we all need in our lives. I don’t need trouble around me. Charles had done every bit of those things. He was the kind of personality that attracted trouble. It’s not his fault, I suppose. Being hulderfolk, he rather enjoys human company. Even if he doesn’t fully grasp or understand it. Nancy does as well. These blond haired, blue eyed chiseled beauties could have before been seen just about everywhere about town if they weren’t at home. Working outside together, working out at the gym or going on runs. Doing all sorts of things. Until the divorce that is. After the attack, strange threats, and subsequent break up I thought I was done with those two. No amount of curiosity could make it worth chasing them down to find out what exactly happened to these tailed and crazy kids. But I suppose just because you maybe done with someone, doesn’t mean that they’re exactly done with you. Charles didn’t take the break up well. I could see that from the first moment I laid eyes on him outside of the grocery store. His face looked more broken up than the ancient, sun-bleached parking lot out front. He wasn’t in his Mercedes. He was staring longingly through the glass at the front door, like a kid at an amusement park that is just two inches shy of getting on the rollercoaster. “Charles,” I asked. “Jason,” he said, snapping his attention to me. There was a half-crazed look in his eye. “Look, if you attack me,” I said, starting into a standard threat. Charles cut me off as he turned, grabbing my shirt in both hands. “Look, I’m sorry, okay! I was grief smitten and bitten down by the terrible tragedy that had occurred at my domicile.” I held back a gag when he embraced me like this. Charles had undergone many things in the past several weeks, but it smelled like a shower wasn’t one of them. Neither was a clean change of clothing. His over priced designer pants and shirt looked as if they had rolled around in the dirt and been dragged behind a car. “Okay, okay. Apology accepted,” I grumbled, pushing against him to try and get some space and clean air between us. “What are you doing here?” “Nancy’s in there,” he said. “She doesn’t want to see me.” “Okay,” I said. “So?” “I don’t want to see her.” See what I mean about these head scratcher statements these hulderfolk always seems to give you? “Then, I have a great solution. Why don’t you, I don’t know, just go away. Let her shop in peace and you won’t see each other.” “But,” Charles said, “I have to see her.” I sighed. “I’m going to regret this. But why do you have to see her?” “Because, I love her.” “Charles, my sweet dear friend. Then why do you not want to see her?” I asked. His face darkened a moment. “Because I hate her.” He snarled. “I will piss on her toes if I see her again.” In as patient of a voice as I could muster, my anger rapidly increasing from the proximity of his stench and the strangeness of the conversation, I asked, “Charles? Is that why you have to see her again? Cause you need to pee?” He gave me that look he gives me sometimes as if a strange wart had suddenly sprouted out of my nose. “No! You humans are so weird. Why would you ask me that?” Why indeed. I slid my hands into my pockets to keep me from crossing my arms in annoyance and anger. After staring at him for a few moments, he finally said “I don’t know why. I hate her but I love her. Most of my kind mate for life, you know.” I didn’t, but I guess that makes sense in a…Charles sort of way. “Why don’t you go talk to her?” His eyes welled up for a moment, emotion breaking through on his face. “I tried that. She ignored me, made me run across five yards and through a ditch to just get her attention while she drove away. No amount of pontificating or vocalizing my emotions could over come the destructive volume of her audio equipment in her vehicle.” If you’re as tongue tied as I am about that mouthful of monstrosity, don’t worry. I’ve figured out what he was trying to say. He was chasing her car, and she was blasting her music. She probably didn’t even see him. “I followed her here. Shouted her name, but she didn’t even look around,” he said. I sighed. “Look, I got groceries to get.” Crestfallen, he slunk away from the door. “My life has no meaning without my Nancy,” he said. “Even after she betrayed me.” “Okay,” I growled. “Fine! I’ll talk to her. But, I want you to promise me, if I get her to agree to meet you, that you’ll stop staring through this door like a lost puppy. Okay?” Confusion painted his face for a moment. “I’m no lost puppy,” he said. “I’m Charles.” With a heavy sigh, I nodded. “Of course, you are. Give me about twenty minutes.” If he started literally counting the seconds when I left, I wouldn’t have been surprised. However, he simply nodded then stepped back, walking over towards my car. Turning, I stepped into the cool air of the super market, and grabbed a cart to begin shopping. The grocery store wasn’t some hi-tech marvel, but it had everything I was coming for at reasonable prices. Shelves stocked high with goods in crowded isles that were placed with just the right amount of space between them to get two carts to barely squeeze through: all so they can bring more goods to you the consumer. I rounded through the produce isles with their fresh fruits and vegetables stacked in as many arrays of pyramids and slanted display cases as they could possibly hold and grabbed a couple things. Then, maneuvering my way through the next isle, I found her. Nancy’s blonde hair was brushed backwards and allowed to fall down the back of her pants suit. She had selected one that, to me looked as if she was trying to be a stand in for Hillary Clinton at an appearance somewhere, but I guess made sense for her. She was staring at a list as if it seemed to mystify her with its’ confound nature. “What are you looking for?” I asked. “I cannot find this,” she said, pointing to the top item on her list. “It was nowhere in produce.” It’s not good to make fun of Hulderfolk. There has been more than one incident that has occurred when someone had been foolish enough to make fun of their unique nature. However, at times it is REALLY hard not to do it. “That’s because Apple Jacks is a breakfast cereal,” I said. “Come here, let me show you.” We went a couple isles over and I grabbed the familiar green box off the shelf. “Here you go.” “Jason, you are always such a great boon to one such as me when I’m in a time of calamity,” she said. It seems to me that hulderfolk will purposefully use larger words when they feel dumber. A sort of safety mechanism against a world that is, in all honesty, a bit harsher against their kind than seems reasonable. Anyone could make a subtle joke about them and laugh at their expense, but to me that is a bit like kicking a lost puppy. Especially when they’re so good at the lost puppy look. “Charles used to do all the shopping. May his toenails grow fat and fall out,” she cursed. I nodded. “You pay the bills?” She smiled. “Yes. I used to feel his was unworthy of my attention and time, but I see that shopping can be quite difficult.” She placed a hand on my shoulder. “Perhaps you’d like to help me finish my shopping list? I can make it worth your time.” At some point in time, that would have been an easy yes. Accept her offer, help her shop, go back to her place, bring in the groceries, and well, you know. But seeing the lost look in her eye, it awoke the protective instinct in me, I guess. Or maybe I’m getting softer in my old age. “It sounds like you and Charles make quite the team,” I said. “Please do not speak his name.” She snarled. “So what if I had intercourse with the mailman, and the gardener. And the pool boy. So, what! It’s not like he hasn’t had his flings either. To hear him talk, you’d think it was my fault for having sex with so many people.” “I know I’m going to regret this,” I said. “But how is it not?” I looked down and rubbed my eyes in preparation for the batshit insanity that was coming. I wasn’t disappointed. “Cause Charles was always too tired to give a good performance. I like more,” “Okay!” I interrupted. “Let’s not go that far. I don’t need a picture.” “What. It’s not shameful. I like it when a man gives me his full attention. And full,” “But all I am saying,” I said, talking over her. Look I know it’s rude, but standing in a grocery aisle next to the kids cereals is just NOT the place to be talking about how you enjoy having sex. “Charles seemed to handle more things than you give him credit for. One half of a whole team doesn’t work.” It wasn’t Shakespeare, I admit. Still, she paused in thoughtful reflection. “I believe you maybe right. Let us talk, me and Charles. You bring him to the house, tonight.” “Seven o’clock,” I asked. “Sure,” she replied. With that, she was done; walking away from me down the isle, staring at her grocery list as if deciphering it could give her the keys to life itself. I finished my shopping and to my complete lack of surprise, Charles was standing by my car. “There was some lawn gnomes who tried to come by,” he said. “I made them flee in fear, though. Told them that they’d better not mess with my friends’ transportation mobile or they would have to answer to me.” “Okay, well thanks.” I wasn’t sure what he was talking about at the moment, but I didn’t ask. I was afraid I’d get an answer. “Tonight, at seven. We will meet at her place.” “It used to be ours.” Charles whimpered. His bottom lip quivered a moment, then he snarled. “I will bite her thumbs!” “You’re going to need help tonight, aren’t you?” He nodded. “okay,” I sighed. “Charles, I’ll go with you tonight. On one condition.” “Name it,” he said. “If it is within my possibilities to make this come true, I will.” “Stop with the weird and creepy threats.” “Done.” Charles nodded. “I will not threaten my beloved beautiful Nancy. Even if she betrayed me.” As I began to load the groceries in the trunk, he opened my passenger door and sat down. Remembering my zombie adventure, I grumbled, “I should just start a damned super natural taxi service,” and climbed in next to him. When we got back near the house, Charles insisted on climbing out in front of the drive way. “If I go back onto your property,” he said, “werewolf will eat my head.” I didn’t doubt that in the slightest. The last meeting between Crash and Charles didn’t go all that well. So, I let him out, and he sat at the stop sign at the end of the street, staring fore longingly at his own home, waiting. What did I do? I brought in groceries, then gave him a couple bottles of water. Saying our goodbyes, I told him I’d meet him there. I expected him to go back to where he lived, but he just sat there. When I asked why he didn’t go home, he said “I couldn’t figure out how to pay the rent. So, I lost my home.” Not much more I could have done from that point. And no amount of asking would get him to come into the house. Crash was on one of his day shifts, so he wasn’t around to give Charles permission – so there he sat. I did check on him every couple of hours, stepping out and having a conversation with the man. After a couple of refills on the water, a few strange conversations that would make any passerby believe he was dying of heat stroke or something, and a candy bar that he got somewhere, seven o’clock finally came. And with it, the dreaded meeting. Nancy, for her effort looked beautiful. Her hair was pulled back behind her head in a beret. She was wearing a blouse that complimented her hair and eyes. A skirt that seemed perfectly cut, and a smile that made you feel more at ease. However, Charles looked as if someone kicked him in the gut. They stared at each other for a bit, then both looked away. “Alright, I guess we should start this off with,” I began. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t perform.” Charles said. “But the scent of other men in here, on you. It made me ill.” “I grew bored Charles,” she said. “I just don’t want to perform intercourse the same way over and over again.” “But, I thought you were pleased!” “I was, but I wanted to try new things.” I held my hands up. “Okay! Before we go down that little road. How about this. Why don’t you Nancy write down some of the things you want Charles to do.” “That part is easy,” she said. “I wanted you to go away. And never come back.” Charles face fell at that comment. “But!” She shouted, looking at me. “It’s like what you said, Jason. One team cannot do what one person makes.” “Yeah,” I replied. “Or, something like that.” “We’re a team, Charles. I thought I was smarter than you cause I pay bills and you take care of the house. But maybe I’m wrong. It is very difficult to take care of this place without you.” Charles nodded. “Exactly! We are a team. We cannot do what one person makes. We must do together.” She had a pen and paper in front of her. To take notes with, I guess. She wrote down some, well, let’s just say explicit things that she happily showed me before she showed Charles. He didn’t seem to mind one bit. Charles added one addendum that seemed to be apropos on his part. “The only thing I want, Nancy,” he said. “Is for you to respect me. Not hate me because you have a better job and pay bills.” A tear formed in her eye for a moment. I sat there unsure of what was about to happen. But she walked around the table, and kissed him. Deeply. Then said, “I will, and always will respect you.” I think they forgot I was even there. The shirts started coming off next, and that’s when I turned and left. And that’s how Charles and Nancy re-united. Two halves of the same coin. They seemed to work out a system thanks to that little notebook. If she wanted to try something different, she wrote it down and kept it in that drawer next to their bed. If he did, it was the same thing. Communication on a different, yet strange level that seems to work for them. This little mis-adventure stuck in my mind for a bit, due to the strangeness on the surface. Yet, after a while, like anything with hulderfolk, it began to make a strange sort of sense. She cheated on him because she was bored. But really it was because she didn’t respect him. Didn’t think Charles was, well, troll enough because her job and role seemed more important than his in the relationship. Mutual respect is a earned and given thing. It’s not something you just automatically have. One party has to prove themselves to be worth it. And then the other party has to give it, and sometimes more than their fair share of it to see things through. Just because your role in a relationship may seem more important to you doesn’t automatically make your role better, or make you the better partner for having it. It’s that kind of ego and pride that erodes and destroys a relationship. And that’s what I see broke Charles and Nancy up. Ego and pride. Not just hers. Charles’ too for not talking to her, for not listening to her. Nancy’s for not talking to him. For placing herself upon a pedestal that shouldn’t exist between them. They do really seem like they’re happy together again. Charles is back at it, mowing in his boxers, trimming the occasional hedge. And Nancy is back at it as well. Occasionally, I do see someone enter their house at night and either Charles or Nancy or both answer the door. The way I look at it, it’s not my business. I don’t ask questions. Not because I’m afraid they’ll get offended. But because I’m afraid they’ll tell me. |
| I have a rule about war stories. I don’t repeat war stories unless the person who owns that story gives me permission to do so. Even then, I’m not likely to talk about it. Simply because, it’s not my story to tell. I’ve heard my fair share of these kinds of stories. IEDs. Friend stepping on a landmine. Schoolkids being used as human roadblocks. Those images and scenarios that stick with you, and demonstrate the depths humanity can and will go to at times to bring a version of hell to life here on earth. I am not relaying those stories here. Those stories belong to those individuals who lived them and I’m not going to betray them by stealing their thunder. Instead, I’ll tell a story that I do have permission to tell. One that shows even werewolves can have those moments of weakness, doubt, and pain. Crash came home that morning in a mood. Normally when Crash comes home in “wolf-mode” as I’ve called it, he starts to shift back to human, will maybe grab a cup of decaf coffee or something then go to sleep. This day was different. A thunderstorm was pouring down Armageddon upon our little county. The rain formed puddles and streams in our yard, pooling and pulling in directions that grabbed leaves and loose grass and twigs toward ditches and the forest. Crash stepped through the door, soaking wet. He went to the shower, and shook himself off, his fur slinging water droplets every which way. When he had gotten himself reasonably dry, he toweled himself off as best as he could, then came back in. Dry, but still very much dark. At this point, I’d already poured him a whiskey and gotten myself a glass as well. It wasn’t a time to drink alone. He took the proffered glass, and took a small lap at it, werewolf version of a sip. His ears were folded and his eyes downcast in the worst bout of depression I’d ever seen. Picture your dog when he looks as if he was thinking over all of his life decisions, all of the bad ones. That’s the look that Crash had on him then. The weight of the world had dragged his nose, ears, and tail to the floor, and he wasn’t fighting back. “I messed up,” he sighed. He looked out to the woods. “Look at me. I’m strong, quick. I can almost leap over the second floor of this house. Yet, I still couldn’t…” he drifted off for a moment, his face scrunching up in pain. I put my arm around him as best as I could. He didn’t say anything for a bit, just sighed and said, “let me tell you how this happened.” “It was an ordinary assignment. Just a simple stalk and check. I sniff around the property, make sure nothing is going on and disappear before the homeowner ever knows. A cop was called over thank to a nosey neighbor who kept close tabs on all the comings and goings of the couple and noticed that for the past week or so their habits had changed. Instead of going outside to do the yardwork every Saturday or so for a couple of hours, the man seemed to avoid it. A new guy showed up and did it every day. It looked as though he had lived there, never leaving the house and even sometimes driving the man’s car. When the cop went to check, he said the woman seemed nice enough, the husband to, but the new guy and their relationship just felt, ‘strange.’ This new guy was massive, neighbor’s words, not mine. He had this wife beater on, showing off these huge arms of his. Cop was pretty green, didn’t know the ins and outs of what we did as much as the more seasoned officers, so instead of reporting it back like he should have, it was an almost end of the shift thing. So, it was almost midnight when I got the report. The home sat in the middle of a new suburb being built. Blue paint, white shutters. A literal white picket fence. The all-American dream, being lived out by a couple whose only crime was running into the wrong person. I could see a light on when I went around back. Stepped by their perfectly selected patio furniture for their perfectly landscaped lawn. It was more than cared for, it was cultivated, sculpted. Looked like a work of art. That was my first clue of what I was dealing with. You see, minotaurs have their own way of doing things. Part of their religious expression is in lawncare and gardening. It’s part of the way they give back to their deity so to speak. Another part is being outdoors. When I was told that the new guy was always outside and seemed doing something, I should have raced over immediately. But I don’t know if it would have been soon enough. Their religion also dictates that being outside is better than being in, so they tend to be outside almost all the time. Plus, minotuars are always nice, pleasant creatures. Still, it just didn’t click when I ‘clocked in’, I guess. Or maybe it did and I knew it was too late? Who knows. Second guesses. Regrets. These are the things that destroys a werewolf. Silver bullets and second guesses.” He took another sip, then set the glass back down on the counter and stared out at the storm. “I don’t try to destroy property. It makes it messy with paperwork, which is I can’t stand doing, and leaves a bad impression of what we do. So I walked over to the sliding glass door in the back and just lifted it off the rails and yanked it open. It slid open easy. The scent of copper and fear hit me like a sledge hammer when the door opened. When I stepped through the door, I heard a snort from my left. Looking over, standing by the bar that separated the kitchen from the dining room was him. His fur was as dark as mine, with gold glowing eyes. His horns glistened with red blood dripping down. A thick growl built in my throat. I twisted and was hit when the guy charged me, horns down. I crashed through an expensive dining table behind me. Tables don’t splinter like they do in the movies. They crack, snap, and break. Jagged edges slicing into you like knives. He lifted his head, and thrusted it down, on top of my head, stunning me. Then he stood, his tail swishing a bit as he walked away, a chuckle in his throat. “I knew you’d come,” he said. “I told them you’d be here. You’d be far too late, but you’d be here.” We heal quickly, us werewolves. The pain from the broken boards stabbing through me had already begun to subside. The blood loss didn’t bother me much. I wasn’t even dizzy. The wounds had begun to close and heal already. “You want to see them?” he taunted. “I’ll bring you to them.” Then he walked over and grabbed my foot. The dining room slid by, then the hallway. The coppery scent that I smelled when I first opened the door had reached a fever pitch. When we got to that room, I planted my other foot right at his tailbone and kicked as hard as I could, knocking him into it. He stumbled forward, his foot hitting the pool of blood that I knew would be there and slipped. His head crashed through the wall. Standing up, he snorted, then shook his head. “Tricky vicious beast,” he growled. “Angry that I stomped on your pets?”” He paused a moment, then looked at me. “Do you want me to go into the gory details?” “You know, I’ve seen, done and heard far worse,” I said. “There’s no judgement here. You go as deep as you like.” He nodded. “They were brutalized. That much I’ll say. Most minotaurs are peaceful creatures. They stay outside more than in, are the ones who will be first to invite the whole neighborhood to a party, are generally mainly vegetarians though they’ll eat meat here or there. But this guy, he was none of those things. I could tell from his laugh, from his stance, from his growl. I could see it in his eyes. Hell, I could smell it on him. He was insane. He stomped his foot, then dragged it on the ground, like a mad bull. I stood, my claws in front of me. He bent his head down charged forward. I stood still, prepped, ready. A growl rising in my throat. Everything happened in slow motion. His horns bent down, I jumped, grabbing them, then landed on his back, and wrenched. The snap sounded like a board breaking in half. First his neck went. Then, I took his horns. He lay limp beneath me with me holding his two bloody horns in my paws, growling, snarling. “Do it,” he snarled. “Do it for Gaia’s sake. Just do it.”” He paused again, taking another lap at the whiskey. “Well, did you?” I asked. “I already did,” he sighed. “Your sentence,” I growled down at him, “is to live the rest of your miserably long life knowing that those you despise enough to destroy will be the ones who are caring for your every need. They’ll be feeding you. Washing you. And making your every decision for the rest of your days. And you’ll have no power to move or hurt anyone ever again.” I stood to leave, to call this in. I almost left when I heard a chuckle. “You think I did this because I despise them,” he asked. “No. I did this because I love them. I love humans so much, but they just never love me back. Like that couple. Absolutely adored me until they saw what I was. Now, they can never leave me. They’ll always be apart of me, no matter what.”” I had a hunch. “He ate their hearts, didn’t he?” Crash nodded. “If I had just come earlier. If I’d just went directly there. Would they be alive? If I hadn’t waited. If I had been told earlier. If, if, if. During the waking hours, before the sun dawns. When I’m walking through those woods making my way home after a long, hard day’s night. No matter how much I try, I’ll still have all of those ifs. They’ll always haunt me.” We finished our whiskeys in silence, staring out the kitchen window out the porch and the storm. After a refresh of our drinks, we both made our way onto the porch as the rain slacked, then thinned. The drops growing thinner. “Look,” I said, “here comes the sun.” Crash gave me a look. His ear twisted in that way as if to say ‘really?’ “You were waiting to say that, weren’t you?” I smiled. “Yes. You started it, Mr. ‘hard day’s night.’” There was another brief pause as we both watched the beauty of the coming day grow and slowly cleanse a piece of that hurting part of our souls. “Dude,” I said. “You’re a werewolf. You can almost leap over this house. Stronger than any creature I’ve ever seen probably. Faster than my car.” He laughed. “You drive a Topaz. Turtles are faster than your car.” “Very funny. You bought me that car, remember,” I said. “Still, you can do all of these things. But you’re not God. You can’t be everywhere at once and see everything. There’s still only so much even you can do.” Crash nodded. “I know.” “But still the ifs,” I asked. He sighed. “Still the ifs.” “Come here,” I said, throwing an arm over his shoulder. “You see that sunlight over there?” “Yes,” he said. “That’s what you’ve been for my life. Always remember that. I was literally committing suicide with alcohol. You saved me. No matter what ever else happens in your life. You did one thing right. You saved my life.” He smiled, “thank you,” he said. “You know, you saved me too.” I shrugged. “All I did was talk to you on the phone.” “Yes,” he said. “That small gesture, it meant so much. The small things you do and the small things you don’t do in life matters.” I nodded. “True. But if ‘If was a fifth, we’d all be drunk.’” “Huh,” Crash replied. “You can’t be everywhere, Crash,” I said. “You can’t do everything. Despite all of your natural born gifts, you still can’t save the world.” He smiled. “I saved you.” I smiled back, raising a glass. “And I saved you.” The glasses made a small tink as the collided. “You know, that makes us family,” I said. “More than that,” Crash replied. “That makes us a pack.” |
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