“Have we met before? I don’t recall that we had. And how do you know my name, since I have never introduced myself to you?” a mysterious voice with a foreign accent asked him from the shadows of small willow trees, which separated the clinic from the Yukon River. It was Dietrich, slowly walking toward him from the trees.
At first sight, Brian didn’t see a frightful-looking individual or beast, as he saw with Buck’s werewolf, but more of a dark, handsome, mysterious, and elegant man, who seemed very smooth and alluring. He could understand why Phyllis had been infatuated with Dietrich upon first sight, as there was something magical and appealing about him, but also, at the same time, something inherently evil.
“Such a perfect time to be calling for me, as I was becoming a little thirsty for blood,” added Dietrich in a sarcastic and frightening tone. “I was just about to search for an animal to feed upon, or possibly someone who I could whisk away for a drink, although it’s not easy in this village, as everyone seems to be missing, but then you called, excellent!” In just a split second, he, who was at least twenty-five yards away when he was walking from the trees, was now in the back of the truck with Brian, now just one foot away, face-to-face and eye to eye.
The speed with which he moved was instantaneous and stunned Brian to the point of taking his breath away. “Wait! I have important news for you!” he desperately told him, fearing for his life.
“Really?” replied Dietrich. “And what important news would I need to hear from you? What possibly could be more important than having you quench and satisfy my thirst and hunger at this time?”
“It’s Phyllis!” answered the frightened Brian while trying to keep himself from hyperventilating. “She wants to talk to you at the store as quickly as possible, and she said it was important.”
“I know where she is!” exclaimed Dietrich in an agitated tone. “I’m the one responsible for forcing her to stay there, or else I would kill all of her friends! And if you don’t tell me something worth hearing quickly, you’ll be the first one I’ll kill!”
“I heard,” responded Brian, nervously trembling. “She’s the person who told me about you, and what your name was. She also said that if you hurt anyone else, she would kill herself before tonight.” He could feel his legs shaking with fear, to the point of nearly collapsing on him, but was determined to continue seeing his important plan through. He quickly thought about his wife, Nancy, a beautiful blond with an infectious smile, and their four-year-old son, Josh, who would start kindergarten in September, and began wondering if he would ever see them again.
“Kill herself?” questioned Dietrich angrily. “Must I keep her restrained somewhere after I go talk to her just to keep her from harming herself before tonight?”
“Why do you want her so much?” asked Brian.
“I ask the questions, not you!” he answered loudly and angrily. “Recently, I’ve been observing you and another man, and you two have been in the store, talking with Phyllis quite a lot. I’m curious as to what you both have been discussing with her.”
If Brian ever wished that he was a great poker player and could come up with the perfect poker face, it was then. “Honestly, we were talking about you, at least on our latest visit, which was after you killed her friend,” he answered. “My friend and I managed to convince her to listen to you, and even go with you, in order to spare Circa and, hopefully us, from your wrath. Surprisingly, she listened to us and agreed that it would be a selfless act, and has had a willing change of heart, which is why she wants to talk to you, providing you don’t hurt anyone else here. She also would like to learn more about being a vampire and what she can expect from being your kind.” His response seemed to be the perfect poker chip, as Dietrich seemed to buy into what he was selling him.
“Excellent! I have often found over the years that humans are the same, regardless of what generation they come from. They are more likely to try and save themselves before others, like you and your friend, but Phyllis is not like that,” said Dietrich with admiration. “She is meek and selfless, humble, compassionate, and thoughtful, full of morality and love for her friends, all the good and desirable qualities a girl or any human could have. Her innocence and beauty arouses me like no other! I could smell the virtue in her blood when I was near her, which is one reason why I’ll take great joy in breaking her will, unique spirit, and love-filled heart when transforming her tonight, giving her, instead, a heart of evil and disdain for humans, even her human friends! A personal conflict that she won’t be able to fight! Once she is a vampire like me, and under my control, she will have to feed on the blood of animals or humans like you and her friends, or die from starvation and thirst! The drinking of blood will eventually destroy her humanity and morality, and crush her spirit, fully completing her transformation, and that will be, and always has been, one of my greatest satisfactions!”
“So that’s why you want Phyllis?” asked Brian. “To destroy her humanity and virtue just for the pure satisfaction of it?”
“That’s only part of the reason. As compassionate as she is toward humanity, she’ll be even more passionate toward the vampire life, and dedicated to me. She’ll be going from one extreme to the opposite extreme and giving herself over completely to me! She may fear me now, but she will be in servitude to me then! We will accomplish great things together, she and I,” answered Dietrich arrogantly. “I prefer not to turn humans into vampires, and would much rather feed on them! Turning a human into a vampire is rare for me to do, unless I need loyal minions or a mate and encounter a female specimen as enticing as Phyllis! I’ve had to kill off my previously created minions and another past mate, over fifty years ago, when they became too reckless and out of control, attracting far too much attention to our presence! Enough of the chitty chat now, as my Phyllis awaits me at the store! I will spare you for now, since you seemed to have helped me with my quest, but if I come to find that you have been deceiving me and trying to hinder my plan, it will be your fatal last mistake! You will die most miserably! Do I make myself understood?”
“Yes, sir,” answered Brian with relief.
Before he left, Dietrich paused briefly to look at the ashtray on the dock, which was filled to the top with cigarette butts. “It appears that someone inside is a chain smoker and needs to come outside to smoke often,” he said. “Smoking outside with a vampire nearby could be hazardous to one’s health.” He also noticed the dents with its claw marks, made by Buck’s werewolf, which was embedded into the back end of the truck. “Curious. Where did these come from?” he asked Brian.
“A bear was responsible for those, around last September,” answered Brian before Dietrich bent over to closely inspect and smell the dents for bear odor.
“Most interesting, because the animal odor residue remaining on the dents isn’t from that of a bear, but instead, smells like a combination of human and wolf. Curious!”
Brian didn’t have a chance to blink, let alone respond, before Dietrich vanished in an instant, while the darkness of the night slowly began to approach with the setting of the sun. He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and his nerves finally settled down by taking deep breaths. He remembered that Carl was at Buck’s cabin, so he drove in his direction to meet up with him. He knew that it would be very difficult to defeat Dietrich, maybe impossible, and desperately hoped that Phyllis could pry some kind of fatal weakness information from him. Dietrich was evil, inhuman, and possibly some kind of a supernatural entity, and he knew deep down inside that Carl and he needed to kill him, or die trying if necessary, for the sake of Circa and of mankind.
CHAPTER 9
6:00 PM
Carl had just finished his 200-yard hike down the snow-packed trail as Phyllis had instructed him, and spotted Buck’s rustic log cabin sitting at the end. The trail had paralleled a power line trail that led to, and supplied electricity for, Buck’s cabin. At first glance, he estimated it to be an older cabin, possibly built in the early 1970s, and its size at 20x20.
It had a fifty-gallon drum attached to the outside of the cabin, used for containing heating oil, with two five-gallon fuel cans underneath, had a metal roof, two small windows on the front, and a thick wooden door. He also noticed a packed trail that led to an outhouse, twenty yards behind the cabin.
As Carl approached the door of the cabin, he noticed many tracks in the snow of the front yard, some old and semi-filled with snow, and some fresh tracks mixed in, made as early as the night before. He noticed rabbit tracks, squirrel tracks, some older moose tracks, and then what appeared to be fresh, barefooted human tracks, coming from the forest thirty yards away and heading toward the door of the cabin. Interesting, he thought to himself as he walked up and began knocking on the door. He knocked several times as loudly as he could, but heard no response from inside acknowledging his presence.
He was becoming a little concerned now because of the fading daylight from the setting of the sun, and knew that his time was short. He had a small flashlight in his jacket pocket, which he figured he would need when exiting the trail for his truck after visiting with Buck, but also desired to put Brian’s plan into action as soon as possible, before it was too late. In three hours, the full moon would be completely up, meaning that Dietrich would abduct and turn Phyllis at the exact same time Buck would be in his werewolf transition. After several more loud knocks with no reply, he slowly opened the front door of Buck’s cabin and stepped inside, causing him to feel incredibly uncomfortable.
“Hello? Hello? Are you here Buck?” asked Carl in trying to alert Buck to his presence. He quickly glanced around the inside of the cabin and noticed a small monitor heater, which was being fed the fuel supply from the fifty-gallon drum outside. He noticed some old shelves, stocked with canned foods, and a box of cold cereal, cupboards, a propane stove for cooking food, a small refrigerator and microwave next to a cast-iron sink, a ceiling fan that hovered over a small couch, and a thirty-two-inch flat screen T.V. “Buck?” he asked again as he stepped farther inside and noticed a small bed in the left corner of the darkened room, with a long-haired native man under some covers, and still sleeping. When he’s wiped out, he’s really wiped out! he thought to himself. “Are you awake?” yelled Carl loudly at Buck.
Buck slowly rolled over to see who was calling for him, while at the same time, trying to clear and focus his blurry vision and eyes from their pupils’ stigmatism. “Do I know you?” he asked in a mumbling, half-asleep tone. He slowly lifted himself up into a sitting position. “Phyllis or Ron must have told you where my cabin was.”
What Carl first saw on the shirtless Buck were the multiple red and partially swollen welts covering his muscular chest and abdominal area. “What happened to you?” he asked.
“Someone shot me several times last night,” answered Buck. “That wasn’t you, was it? If so, then now is a good time to finish the job, before tonight!”
“Phyllis told me how to find your cabin,” replied Carl.
“I figured as much,” answered Buck. “You wouldn’t have been able to find my cabin otherwise, and if she trusted you enough to tell you where I live, then she had to trust you enough to tell you about my monthly problem also.”
“Buck, my name is Carl Grogan. I’m from Fairville, and I’m sorry to say, that I have some very bad news for you.”
Buck quickly snapped out of his drowsy state of mind and alertly demanded to know what the sad news was.
“It’s your cousin Ron, and I have to inform you that he was murdered today,” said Carl.
Buck looked as if his lower jaw was about to hit the floor when he heard the tragic news, and was fighting hard to hold back the tears that were forming in his eyes. “What? Ron is dead? Murdered? That can’t be!” said the despondent Buck “How? And by whom?”
“Ron was murdered by a very evil and sadistic stranger,” answered Carl. “Please accept my deepest condolences, and I am very sorry for your loss.”
“Why did Phyllis send you, a stranger, to tell me? Why couldn’t she come herself?” asked the curious Buck. “Is she all right?”
“I’m afraid that there’s some bad news with her also, which is the other reason why I’m here. Phyllis is in extreme danger from the thug who killed Ron, and she desperately needs your help.”
“What?! Phyllis? My baby doll is in danger, too? Please tell me she’s okay!”
“The stranger who killed Ron said that he plans on coming back to the store tonight, at around 9:00 PM, to abduct Phyllis and force her into an unheard-of life of servitude to him!” exclaimed Carl. “He also told Phyllis not to leave the store before then, or everyone in Circa would die!”
“What? Where is this stranger now? I’ll give that stinking moron a big taste of his own medicine!” said the angry and vengeful-minded Buck. “And if he lays one hand on Phyllis, I’ll literally rip him to shreds! I promise that!” He stumbled up out of his bed and began to get dressed, with retaliation and protecting Phyllis as his number one priority.
“Hold on just a minute, and please calm down, Buck,” pleaded Carl. “I want you to rip him to shreds also, and I plan on helping you, but there’s a whole lot more about this stranger that you need to know about before you go rushing in to tangle with this bastard. You’re not strong enough to take him on right now in your condition. You’ll need to be at full strength tonight, and I mean werewolf strength, to stop him! Phyllis is fine for now, please trust me on that.”
Buck stopped immediately from his plan of storming out of the door and heading for the store, and sat back down on the bed to listen to Carl with a perplexed look of concern on his face.
“This stranger’s name is Dietrich, and he claims to be a vampire,” said Carl. “And from how Phyllis told us that he killed Ron, I’d have to say that he’s not human, but indeed a very powerful vampire.”
“A vampire?” asked the shocked Buck. “Vampires exist?”
“Well, until now, no one thought that a werewolf existed, either, so it does seem like a possible reality,” answered Carl. “Dietrich intends to return to the store tonight and turn Phyllis into a vampire like him, and then run off with her to God knows where.”
“What?!” responded the angry Buck. “If I lose Phyllis also, I’ll have nothing to live for! We both lost our parents in tragic accidents, have no siblings, and now you say that Ron is dead. Phyllis and I will need each other more than ever, and I just can’t lose her! We have to kill him, we just have to!”
“I totally agree,” replied Carl. “My friend Brian has a plan, and I think it might work. At least, I hope it works. Before I fill you in on his plan, there’s one other important thing you need to know, Buck.”
“What is it?”
“It’s very possible that the reason you’re a werewolf is because of Dietrich.”
“What?! Are you serious?” asked Buck. “Tell me more, please!”
“Before Dietrich killed Ron, he bit him in the jugular, drinking his blood, which left Ron with two puncture wounds in his neck. The same kind of puncture wounds that were found on the neck of the dead teen girl from Hublick back in August are the same puncture wounds that were found in the wolf that attacked and bit you. We now have to consider it a possibility that Dietrich bit the wolf, which, in turn, bit you a few days later, turning you into a werewolf. If so, it’s very possible that you could be a new supernatural species, which was created knowingly, or unknowingly, by Dietrich.”
“Wow!” responded the stunned Buck. “Sure seems now that I owe him double the ass whooping and payback then! But my first priority is helping Phyllis. What’s your friend’s plan?”
Before Carl could respond, they heard three knocks on the front door, followed by the door opening and Brian walking inside.
“Buck, this is my friend with the plan, Brian Griffith,” said Carl, as he introduced him to Buck. “I told him about everything, except for your plan.”
“Excellent,” replied Brian. “And please accept my deepest sympathies for the loss of your cousin, Ron.”
“Yes, and I’m afraid we don’t have a lot of time left, so I’ll quickly fill you in,” replied Brian. “Phyllis should be talking with Dietrich at this moment, attempting to gain valuable information from him, which might help us to kill him.”
“What?!” exclaimed Buck. “She’s at the store with that psycho now?”
“She will be fine, Buck, and you’ll have to trust us and Phyllis to do this. Dietrich won’t hurt her now, because he needs her for tonight. Please trust Phyllis to help us with this plan. It could be the difference maker. And we need you to be at the store sometime just before 9:00 PM. We need you to transition at the store when Dietrich arrives, and not a moment sooner. Do you think you can control the werewolf enough to attack Dietrich? You might be our only hope of killing him.”
“I don’t know,” answered Buck. “I’ve never been able to control it before, and if there is a way to control it, no one has figured it out yet. Your plan could be risky. My werewolf has a will and mind of its own, and it just overwhelms me and I lose control! It could attack Dietrich, or it could attack you instead, or even worse yet, hurt Phyllis!”
“We have no choice,” replied Brian. “We have to take that risk, for Phyllis, for her life depends on you. She could be doomed otherwise if we don’t at least try!”
“I’ll be there just before my transitioning time then. You can count on it!” exclaimed Buck. “Just promise me that no matter what happens to me, you’ll protect Phyllis at all costs. If I can’t kill Dietrich, maybe I can distract him enough for you to escort her out of harm’s way. And if I so much as try to turn on or attempt to attack Phyllis, then you do whatever it takes to stop me, too! I could never live with myself if my werewolf hurt her! Heck, I’d even rather see her become a vampire than for her die at my hands!”
Village of the Full Moon Curse Page 8