Village of the Full Moon Curse

by Daniel Griffin

  “Okay, okay, I’ll tell you what happened!” responded Buck.

  “Don’t tell him a thing, Buck!” gasped Brian with concern. “Let him kill me instead!”

  Titus tightened his grip a little tighter on Brian’s throat, enough so that Brian could no longer speak.

  “It wasn’t exactly me who killed your brother, but it was a beast from within me, or inside of me, that came out under a full moon and killed Dietrich,” Buck told their tormentor.

  Titus released his grip on Brian’s throat, allowing him to live for the moment as he fell to the ground. “Please explain,” he responded, who seemed to go from anger to curiosity in an instant.

  Phyllis felt helpless to help as she listened to Buck’s report to Titus, and for now was just glad that Brian had been released and was okay.

  “Every month, during the nights of the full moon cycle, I turn into a beast that some would call a werewolf, and my beast is what killed your brother,” said Buck to Titus, telling him about his werewolf, but unwilling to tell him that he was now a hybrid. He hoped to find wisdom as to the perfect time when to attack Titus, and signaled for Brian with his index finger to slowly move away from Titus while he had him distracted with conversation.

  “Are you telling me that you’re a lycanthrope?” asked Titus with excitement. “Fascinating! My minions, whom you killed, and myself, spotted some animal tracks of an unknown origin near a small cabin, which seemed to transform from the tracks of a beast into the tracks of a barefooted human! By chance, were those tracks yours?”

  “Yes!” answered Buck, who was now beginning to become weary of his questions.

  “How did you come to be such a remarkable creature and killing machine, and are there more of you?” asked Titus. “Neither Dietrich or myself have ever seen one!”

  “I doubt that any other werewolves exist, unless your brother unknowingly created more, as he had with me,” answered Buck.

  “You’re saying that Dietrich created you? Explain!” demanded Titus.

  “Your brother couldn’t finish the job on a wolf, which he started, and the wolf escaped him, and bit and infected me with his and your nauseating full moon curse virus!” snapped Buck as he was becoming more annoyed with being questioned, but also wanted to cease his questions before his hybrid secret risked being exposed. “Now, can we please stop the questions and just get on with the show?” he demanded, as he noticed that Brian had now moved a safer distance from Titus, while also managing to grab the shotgun again.

  Titus’s facial expression went from curiosity back to anger again because of Buck’s remarks. “What to do with you?” he questioned aloud. “It will be dark in roughly thirty minutes, but the last full moon of the month is still a few hours away. Do I take you away by force, lock you inside a cage, and make you my guard dog and pet after I force you to watch your friend and girlfriend die? Do I just kill you and your friend now and, instead, take your pretty little girlfriend away with me by force, or do I just kill you all now, then burn down your village before I leave? Obviously, I don’t want to hang around until the full moon and watch you turn before I kill your beast, as it would seem to be risky for me, as it was with Dietrich.” He was enjoying his intimidating style of questioning himself with their certain deaths, attempting to also cause them more anguish and mental suffering before he killed them. “I know what to do!” he exclaimed with excitement. “It seems that I now know how to create my own lycanthrope, as I will just find some wolves to bite and infect tonight during the full moon, release them into your village to bite and infect whoever returns here, and then take them away by force, cage them, and make them my pets! That, of course, will be done after I first kill you all!”

  Buck felt himself become very angry with Titus’s threats to turn someone else from his village into the horrific werewolf beast that he had become, which had caused him so much grief, pain, and anguish. And the threat of his village friends becoming werewolves, along with being caged by Titus for entertainment purposes, was totally unacceptable. Buck now regretted telling Titus about his werewolf and knew that his new evil plan made it even more crucial to kill the older vampire. “I’ve got a much better option for you!” he replied to Titus’s threats. “I’m going to kill you now, so that you, with your wild and psychotic ideas, will never put anyone in harm’s way ever again, and you will join your wicked brother in Hell tonight!”

  CHAPTER 26

  “Indeed?” responded Titus, as Buck nodded his head at Brian, giving him the signal to shoot, while also winking at Phyllis, signaling her that he was going to make his move. “And without your lycanthrope to aid in your fight, I must say that your foolish courageousness is what will be your downfall!”

  Brian had to use his middle finger to squeeze the trigger of the shotgun, as he was unable to move his broken and painful index finger, then he fired it into the right side of Titus from a short distance away. The buckshot barely nudged Titus as it sprayed him in the right arm, and caused the ancient vampire to glare at him with an evil look of hatred.

  “I should have killed you!” barked Titus as he turned toward Brian, but not before Phyllis was in front of him, thrusting both of her wooden stakes into his heart at once, which did cause him some pain and discomfort, but did not kill him. He was becoming furious now with their attacks and clamped his left hand with its six fingers around the back of Phyllis’s neck and slammed her head into his chest with such force that it nearly knocked her out cold, and she fell backward to the ground from being dazed. “I’m going to save you and my best for last!” he told her in order to torment her.

  “No!” yelled Buck angrily in response as he dove hard into Titus, put him into a bear hug, lifted him up from off the ground, and slammed him down hard and onto his back. Buck was on Titus in an instant and began punching him in the face several times with both fists, which seemed to surprise and hurt Titus much more than Titus could have expected, but also further enraged him.

  Titus aggressively responded and backhanded Buck with his left hand from the ground with such power that it propelled Buck off him, throwing him several feet through the air. Buck crashed hard into the ground and struggled to collect himself, as his head was spinning from the hardest backhand that he had ever felt.

  Titus was back on his feet again, and the enraged and powerful vampire put on a shocking display and frightful show for them that none of them could believe with their eyes. Titus’s head and face began to contort, twist, and reshape into a hideous-looking creature with pointed bats ears, yellow eyes, brown hair, black nose, and fangs, along with his body also convulsing, as immense, membranous type, bat’s wings sprung from his back, with intimidating features like shafts, barbs and razor sharp tips, which tore through his leather suit with ease, and long talons protruded from his twelve fingers. Titus was enraged, screeching with anger and displeasure as he pulled the two wooden stakes from out of his own chest. “I’m going to ram these stakes through the two of you so hard, it will rip your hearts out through your backs!” he said as he glared at Buck and Phyllis.

  “He’s even more menacing than Dietrich!” Brian said with extreme fright. “How is that possible since they were twins?”

  “Because I was the firstborn, the first to be bitten, and sustained many more vampire bat bites than my brother had sustained on the night of our wonderful transformations!” responded the enraged Titus. “Now I command you to die!” He began to flap his wings, which lifted him off the ground and into flight while Phyllis, Buck, and Brian stared upward in horror.

  Brian’s look of disbelief quickly changed to a look of fear that was followed by trembling, as Titus was flying toward him, with his piercing yellow eyes affixed onto him, which cut through him like a hot knife through butter. He quickly raised the shotgun up again, aimed it at Titus’s wings, and fired the remaining shotgun shells, which were loaded with buckshot, hoping to at least remove his ability to fly and to cripple him. His plan appeared to be working, as Titus began to flutt
er around in the air, struggling to maintain altitude as he fell back toward the Earth again.

  Buck seized the moment and quickly leaped high into the air and onto the back of Titus, after summoning all of his inner strength from the combined species that hid inside of him. “I don’t know what’s worse, you flapping your gums or you flapping your wings!” he yelled as he grabbed onto the base of each giant bat wings with both his hands, which were rooted deep inside the Titus’s back, and pulled as hard as he could, ripping them from his back, causing Titus and him to crash to the ground together in a heap, rolling over and over and finally coming to a stop with Titus on top of Buck.

  Titus was wounded and felt extreme pain like never before, and he seemed to finally be weakening, making him slightly more vulnerable. But he was still powerful, dangerous, deadly, and very angry, similar to a wounded tiger or bear, and now had Buck in a vulnerable position. Buck gasped in pain and struggled to remain conscious as Titus clamped his left fingers tightly around his throat, slamming his head up and down three times into the ground before holding and pinning him down by the throat, while shoving his right hand and forearm into and through his stomach, wrapping his fingers around his spine, ready to yank it out, as he had previously done to kill his minion, Thomas.

  “What are you?” asked Titus. “Speak now or lose your spine and life! The full moon hasn’t arrived just yet, so your lycanthrope hasn’t appeared yet, and you’re much too strong to be just a new vampire, so tell me, where does your strength come from?”

  The fidgety Buck was trying to reposition himself, attempting to ease his pain and also hoping to quickly counterattack before Titus killed him. He was determined to die before giving up his hybrid secret to Titus, which would most likely encourage him to also create hybrids, along with more werewolves and vampire minions. Such a force in the wrong hands like Titus’s would be unstoppable and a serious threat to all humankind.

  “He gets his strength from love and from his friends!” shouted Phyllis with anger as she leaped onto Titus’s back from behind, and as fast as she could, which was enough to knock the surprised Titus off Buck again, helping to save him. She now had Titus in a rear choke hold and bit into the right side of his neck in the same manner as she had done with Dietrich, beginning to feed on his blood, drinking and gulping as quickly as possible, hoping to weaken him, while also wanting to strengthen herself.

  “Get off me, you little wench!” shouted the furious Titus as he jumped back up with Phyllis clutched to his back and began to grab her head with his hands, wanting to snap and break her neck with a powerful twist of his wrist.

  “Let’s see how you like this!” shouted Buck as he appeared in front of Titus within a split second, thrusting his own powerful right hand and forearm into and through the stomach of the ancient vampire, and clamping his own fingers firmly around Titus’s spine.

  Titus responded by successfully knocking Buck away from him with a right elbow cross to Buck’s face, which nearly broke and fractured Buck’s jaw and skull, and sent him spiraling backward. But the move also backfired on Titus and proved to be costly for him, as the grip from Buck’s hand and fingers were strong enough to also pull and bring a chunk of Titus’s spine back out through his stomach during the process of being knocked backward to the ground. Buck shook his head from side to side, and opened and closed his mouth several times while trying to clear his vision again, and see if his jaws still functioned after the vicious right elbow. He noticed that he had a chunk of broken-off spine in his right hand that belonged to Titus, who was several feet away and slumping to his knees, and then to the ground, as Phyllis released her blood drinking, rear choke hold from Titus and cautiously backed a few feet away from him. Phyllis wiped the bloodstains from her mouth with the shirt sleeve on her right arm and felt tremendous satisfaction when she saw that Titus could only move his arms but not his legs, and was severely weakened by his blood loss from her feeding, as well as fatally wounded from a missing chunk of his spine that lay in Buck’s hand.

  “Stay back, Brian!” said Phyllis to him when she saw him approaching Titus. “All he has to do is drink your blood and he’ll be miraculously healed and powerful again in a mere minute!”

  “Gladly,” replied Brian as he kept a safe distance and watched.

  “Give me your friend Brian’s blood to drink, and I promise that I’ll leave here and never come back again,” pleaded the wounded Titus.

  “Rot in Hell!” barked Phyllis in response to him. “How many people have pleaded with you for their lives, only to be cruelly killed by you after, and now you have the audacity to plead to us for help?!”

  “Well then, if I can’t drink his blood, then I’ll have to drink yours instead!” replied Titus angrily as he clamped onto the left leg of Phyllis with his powerful right hand, yanked her off her feet, and dragged her near his side. “Give me my blood back, wench!” he exclaimed as he bit into her left upper thigh with his fangs and began to feed, slowly draining Phyllis of her blood and strength, but in return, also began to slowly rejuvenate him with healing power and strength during his feeding process.

  “No!” screamed Phyllis loudly and tried to free herself by punching Titus in the face and kicking him with her freed right leg, but her desperate resistance was unsuccessful.

  “I now command you to die!” shouted Buck, who was now furious with Titus and wanted desperately to kill him. His rage seemed to somehow trigger his werewolf side, and his upper body suddenly begun to rip through his flannel shirt as his rapidly enlarging pectorals, deltoids, biceps, and triceps, covered with brown hair, tore out and emerged. His face remained in its human form, but his eyes turned red and long claws grew from his brown, hairy fingertips, as he pulled the last explosive arrow and lighter from his rear pants pocket, lit the fuse, and leaped onto Titus, forcing his jaws open and yanking Titus’s head and mouth from the thigh of Phyllis with such force that it snapped his neck. Titus glared at Buck, who was straddling him, as he helplessly watched Buck shove the lit explosive arrowhead deep into his mouth with extreme force, pinning his head to the ground, then the arrowhead went all the way through and out the rear of his skull, wedging deep into the frozen ground. “By the way, I’m a hybrid!” shouted Buck as he leaped off Titus, grabbed Phyllis’s right hand, and quickly rushed both of them to a safe distance away from Titus’s soon-to-be-exploding head.

  Titus desperately tried to yank the arrow back out, but it was too late.

  Brian quickly turned his head and eyes away from Titus, not wanting to see the gruesome sight as he heard the arrow explode. When he reluctantly turned his eyes back toward Titus, he shouted with excitement when he saw just the headless body of Titus lying in the snow. “Yes!” he exclaimed with excitement as he began to dance around in the snow as if he just scored a touchdown and was doing a victory celebration that would have landed him a fifteen-yard penalty in a football game. “Halleluiah, the wicked witch is dead,” he added as he ran over to celebrate with Buck and Phyllis, who were now engaged in a deep, romantic kiss and hug.

  Buck shook Brian’s hand and told him, “Great work, Brian!”

  “Yes, thank you!” added Phyllis as she gave Brian a big hug of celebration.

  “Thank me?” he asked with marvel. “I want to thank you two, as you both did all of the dirty work, and the hardest part!”

  “We were a good team, and it took all of our efforts, working together to kill Titus, just like with Dietrich,” replied Buck to Brian.

  “And especially Carl,” added Phyllis. “If he wasn’t willing to give us his blood, I’m positive that we’d all be dead now! We desperately needed to feed at that time, to continue on with the fight and defeat Titus.”

  “Carl died a hero,” replied Brian with sadness. “And I’m not quite sure how to break the news to his wife Jessica and daughter Cindy. I was thinking of going with Carl’s plan of telling them that he tried to save a village child on the Yukon River, who was falling through thin ice, but fell through hims
elf after saving the child, and disappeared underneath and was swept downriver. Whatever story I come up with, they’ll both be demoralized.”

  “I’m sorry about Carl, and sorry for his family,” replied Phyllis.

  “And I’m sorry about your friend Ron also,” Back said.

  “Everyone from our village should be coming back tomorrow, and Phyllis and I plan on holding a village memorial service for Ron at the school on Tuesday, and we’d love to include Carl in our service also, if that is acceptable with you,” Buck told Brian. “Ron will most likely be cremated later in the week by the village elders, and if you think Carl should be cremated with him, I could tell the elders when they arrive, and they easily could at that time also.”

  “I would like that very much,” answered Brian. “And I know that Carl would like and want that as well. Speaking of cremation, I better burn Titus’s body to ashes now.”

  “I approve of that idea!” replied Buck as he tossed his lighter to Brian.

  “Buck?” Phyllis said, curious about something that was on her mind, as Buck turned to look at her. “Before you pulled Titus off my leg, you partially transformed into your werewolf, but not fully transformed. Do you know why that happened? The full moon is still around two and a half hours away, and when you previously used thoughts to attempt turning without the full moon’s help, you were unsuccessful. Only with the full moon were you able to transform, but it appeared as if you were trying to transform before you saved me.”

  “I’m not sure what happened really,” Buck answered. “I became really angry, and I did think about turning a little, but I was mostly just very angry and wanted to kill him.”

  “Maybe with anger or rage, your werewolf side kicks in, or becomes the dominant side. Your rage could have also been partially fueled by your werewolf, and normally, you might be at a fifty-fifty split, but when you become enraged, your werewolf becomes dominant, especially since you were first a werewolf. Or maybe your werewolf is always the more dominant side, but I can’t really claim to be an expert when it comes to that,” said Brian with a chuckle.