by M. O. McLeod
Kurma grabbed Leon’s throat while he thrashed about. He tried to bite at her a couple of times, but she didn’t care. He squeezed her flesh, his nails puncturing her hair and skin. All the more reason not to care. She steadied her arm and raised her dagger. It was Allie’s life for Leon’s. She sawed his head off; she felt the bone and gristle as she moved her arm back and forth. His cries of pain were cut off as she severed his windpipe.
Kosner would have tried to help if it hadn’t been for two girls bending his arms behind him to the point that they popped out of their sockets. Blood rushed to his face, and he groaned in pain. The girls bore their weight down on him, and he tried not to buckle. VIN was knocked out cold—all of that muscle for no reason. Leon was beheaded. Santino was being held hostage by a redhead that flew. Kosner wasn’t dreaming. She was a redhead with fiery lipstick, one of the prettiest things he had ever seen. It was too bad she was on the wrong team. He couldn’t imagine cross-species dating—that would be odd. Well, he would if she would…
“Stay down, you creep,” Jackie yelled at him. She had changed into her Raptor state after Rimselda did. She didn’t know how to fly or how to bring her daggers out, but she was bigger and stronger this way. She needed to get on Kurma’s and Rimselda’s level fast.
Kurma peeled Leon’s head back away from its body and held on to the stringy hair that hadn’t fallen out.
“Kurma, what have you done?” Santino yelled. His mouth was full of spit. He couldn’t breathe or swallow; he felt his air being sucked from him. The pain in his arms was almost unbearable. Whatever was in those daggers was crippling him, and he wanted to rip them from his captor’s body. “I will kill you for that, I swear to God!”
Kurma wasn’t moved by his weak threat. “Chelsea, can you be a dear and pop this sucker’s body into the bay?”
Chelsea jumped at her name. She ran over to the lump of meat formerly known as Leon and began to roll it over and over to the edge of the pier.
“Just like that, right over the edge,” Kurma instructed. She giggled a little bit to herself.
“Kurma, you are dead. I promise you. All of you!”
“Keep a tight hold on him for me, please, Rimy,” said Kurma.
“No problem,” Rimselda said as she tightened her grip.
Kurma walked over to Allie and rubbed his back. His body was trembling and moist with sweat. Kurma heard Leon’s body hit the water and heard her brother’s heart beating. She was so happy she could have cried. He was alive. She tried to lift his body up.
“Don’t touch him. He’s like me—a Phantom!”
Now Kurma had heard it all. “What?”
Santino grumbled and dangled his feet; he just needed to catch his footing so he could better his aim at whatever was holding him.
“Answer me,” commanded Kurma. “What have you done to my brother?”
“Kurma, we should go,” O’bellaDonna shouted. “I can hear sirens coming our way.”
Kurma walked closer to Santino and looked him in the eyes. “You call yourselves Phantoms. Are you telling me my brother will be like you?”
Santino tried to stop his breathing so he didn’t inhale her scent. “All I’m saying is that when he wakes up he won’t be the same. He won’t have the same appetite. He won’t look the same or even act the same.” He shook his arms, which only made the pain worse. He hated this feeling of being trapped with no way out. VIN was down, Kosner was being pinned down, Leon was down for the count, and Leon’s two friends had been no help at all. Santino wished VIN would wake up. “You have to believe me.”
Kurma held her tears back so that the girls wouldn’t think she was weak. She held them back because if they fell she would fall with them. Santino and his spawns of hell were her mortal enemies. And now her brother would be too. Santino would need to stay alive to protect Allie; Kurma couldn’t be there for him. She had no idea how to help him. She understood why Santino had dragged him out of the club and stood watching over him, but that didn’t make the situation any easier to accept.
Kurma backed away. She ran over to her brother and hugged him close, sure to have no skin-to-skin contact. “I love you, baby brother. I hope you can remember this somehow when you wake up,” she whispered in his ear.
She walked over to the guy being held down by Jackie and O’bellaDonna. “What’s your name?”
Kosner spoke up, not afraid for the first time in his life. “Call me Daddy.” He laughed in her face.
“Daddy, huh?” Kurma booted him in the chest so hard she heard a crack as he crumbled underneath the pressure. Jackie and O’bellaDonna let Kosner go and went to stand by Chelsea, wrapping their arms around her. Kurma turned to face Santino one more time. She looked up into his black eyes and saw her own reflection.
“I want you to know that I hate you. I hate you for what you’ve done and the things you’re going to do,” she said. “I’m only sparing your life because my brother will want answers when he wakes up and realizes he can’t go home. But just remember that we have some unfinished business to take care of.”
“Don’t go getting your panties in a bunch, Kurma,” said Santino as he hung limply. “You think I give a damn about some vendetta you have against me?”
“Not you, Santino. All of you. I will make it my mission to kill all of you Phantoms.”
Santino tried once more to get free. He wanted to rip Kurma’s head off. He was beginning to hate this new person. She was too cocky and too arrogant—too much like him.
Kurma picked up Leon’s head as she turned to leave. She caught a scent of the blood, and sniffed again and again. Her stomach growled. She was hungry all the time now. Kurma put her nose to the open wound of Leon’s neck. She felt her throat tense as she opened her mouth. What was happening to her? She didn’t eat people like Santino…or did she? She stuck her tongue out and tasted the dripping silver, and savored the flavor.
“No!” Santino struggled again. “Don’t you dare do it.”
Kurma did. She almost ripped the corners of her mouth wide as she bit into the meat. She had never tasted anything like it; it was ten times better than bugs. She ate Phantoms—that was to be her food source. Now she had an even better reason to kill them.
“Rimselda,” she screamed, waving the head high. “I’m going to save you some!”
Rimselda wasn’t so sure about eating people’s body parts. She would stick to bugs.
“Jackie, girls, let’s go,” Kurma went on. “We have some Phantoms to hunt for dinner.”
If she wanted to play this game then so could Santino. He would take her down; as quickly as she rose she could fall again, and Santino wanted to be in the thick of it. If Kurma thought she could go around killing his Phantoms, he would just have to make some more. Kurma was a nobody; he had to keep telling himself that. These girls who followed her around, they were nobodies too. Santino was better than this and would do better next time. Kurma had won this round but she hadn’t won the game.
“Night night, lover boy,” sang Rimselda. She elbowed Santino in the back of his head as she retracted her daggers from his wrist.
Santino saw bright lights as his body hit the ground. The last thing he heard was the sound of heels click-clacking away and the last thing he smelled was Kurma, a thick scent of her that he couldn’t shake.
The night became more obscure, and Santino lost consciousness.
33.
Seven News Studio Report