The Cannibal Cure

by Jeff D Ellis

  He patted her hand. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to drag things down. Now that things are quiet for a moment, the Windigos are bothering me.”

  “Why? Willow didn’t give us any choice in the matter. If she had lived, she wouldn’t be bothered about killing Hammer and the rest of us. She would be dining on our bodies.”

  “I know, and I know killing her was in self-defense. I wish I could have saved Hammer, but I’m thankful he made sure you and Ash got away. I don’t know what I would do if it had been you.”

  She bent over the couch and hugged him hard. “It wasn’t me and I can take care of myself. In many ways better than you. But you aren’t telling me something.”

  He snuggled his cheek against hers for a moment, and finally nodded. “I’m a bit upset about the two Windigos I had to kill in cold blood. That’s just not me. The Chief ordered me to do it. He couldn’t risk sending the cleaners with them alive. I can understand why, but it didn’t make things easier.”

  “What choice was there? It’s not like they would have come quietly, and it would have been cruel to let them starve to death in custody. You saved them from continuing to suffer.”

  “It’s one thing to be thinking of the practicality of the situation, but it’s very different to be swinging the axe.”

  She came around and sat next to him. She grabbed his hand and kissed the back of it. Putting her cheek against the back of his hand, she smiled up at him. “David, you are a good man. You’re not a hired killer. All you did was act as a protector of the people by removing infectious monsters, who would have killed and infected innocent people creating more monsters.”

  She could always make him feel better. He smiled despite himself. “I can always trust you to be my conscience, even while keeping me focused on my duty.”

  She laughed and snuggled closer. “We make good partners and we keep each other honest. I know what you did was hard, and I love you for your concerns. Trust me, you will never be the monster.”

  “What if the Chief orders me to do something wrong?”

  “Then we leave.”

  “And if the Marshals don’t want to let us leave?”

  “We still do what we think is best. What brings this all up?”

  “The things Hammer worried about got me thinking again.”

  “You mean worrying again.”

  David nodded. “Yes, it got me worrying.”

  “Remember your parents were happy here and hoped you would follow in their footsteps and we can trust them.”

  David smiled. “Yes, we can.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Vision of Humans Transformed

  OTIS THORN SMILED darkly as one of his guards came into the lab.

  “Time for your bloodwork, Jones. Please take a seat.”

  The security guard took a seat and rolled up his sleeve. Thorn took a blood sample.

  “How are you feeling today?”

  “I’m feeling great, now that you gave me the medicine.”

  “How are your co-workers doing?”

  “They’re all feeling great too. Whatever you gave us is good stuff.”

  “Have they brought me my dinner?”

  “They found him just where you said to look.”

  “Have him prepared and ready.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Abby woke with a start. “David, wake up!”

  “What is it?” He turned on the bedside light.

  Abby was shaking. “I just had the most horrible vision. Otis Thorn has given his guards the same infection and treatment that he did to Hammer and is somehow controlling them.”

  “I don’t see how they could let him carry on like that.”

  “That’s not the worst of it. He has them bringing him people to eat.”

  David looked at her grimly. “Then he must be a Windigo hybrid of some sort.”

  He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and looked at the clock. 3:00 a.m. “Okay, I’ll call the Chief.”

  David made the call. “Yes, Chief I know it’s 3:00 a.m. But Abby had a vision that Thorn is some sort of Windigo and has transformed his guards like he did Hammer and is controlling them. … Okay … I’ll tell her … Good Night.”

  “Well, what did he say?”

  “He said he understands the urgency, but he doesn’t want a team of half-asleep deputies getting killed by Windigos. We should get into work early and we can talk about it then.”

  ***

  After Abby’s vision, David felt a sense of dread and there was no way he was getting back to sleep now. Willow was at his limit and facing Thorn plus a team of new Windigos didn’t leave him with much of a chance to make it out alive. He waited till Abby was asleep, and quietly got out of bed. He needed advice on how to handle Thorn. He went to the other room where he could meditate and connect with his spirit guide, Jaguar. He sat on the floor and focused on his Were-jaguar totem.

  The room faded from view. He was now sitting in a rain forest, facing Jaguar. He sensed Jaguar’s concern.

  “You are ill prepared for the battle you will soon face. You don’t face a Windigo, but something more. His mate was a Windigo. The ones he had locked up were Windigo. He has made a deal with an evil from the spirit realm and you are not going to defeat it.”

  “I’m going to die, and that monster will take over the world?”

  “You would have had a better chance with the Eye of the Jaguar where you could fight him here, but that is no longer yours and you must fight him where it’s strongest.”

  “What can I do? I can’t let him turn the people I protect into his slaves.”

  “In times of old, my Shaman had other weapons than tooth and claw. I will give them to you, and you must learn them.”

  David bowed his head. “Tell me what I must do.”

  Jaguar waved his paw and pointed at what looked like a museum display rack containing the clothes and props of a Jaguar Shaman like the Aztec and Mayans might have had. It was similar to what he looked like as a Were-jaguar, but looked as if it was a costume.

  “Take up the armor and weapons of my Shaman.”

  David stood and moved to the display and placed the Jaguar helmet on his head.

  “Not that way.”

  David placed the helmet back. “Please instruct me in the proper way.”

  “Transform into the Were-jaguar, and then feel the paws transform back into hands and your head take on your own features. One by one, feel those parts of your body transform, leaving the rest alone.”

  After shifting into his Were form, he settled his mind. He imagined the feeling of the claws retracting as normal, but kept them going and his paws getting smaller with his fingers pushing through. Flexing his fingers, he felt his palm form and his wrist. His hands were his again. Now he meditated on how his head and face normally felt. It was a lot like how he shifted back into being Human, focused on his head and neck. Opening his eyes, he knew it was right.

  “Very good, now take up my armor.”

  David set the jaguar-inspired helmet on his head, then he added what he thought of as a kilt around his waist with a buckle and finished it with the jaguar fur cape. A strange wooden sword and a round shield finished the look. The sword was about three feet long. Its sides were embedded with prismatic blades, as if made from obsidian. The wooden flat sides were covered in ceremonial carvings of Jaguar and the Shaman he must look like at the moment.

  “The totem you normally carry will now look like this as you master shifting to this form. In the future, focus on it and shift directly as you are now.”

  “Is this how I learn new forms to shift to? I always thought I needed a personal connection to focus on.”

  “As you mature as a Shapeshifter, I will teach you other forms, but for now learn what you know to its fullest.”

  “Thank you, Jaguar.”

  “You beat this monster’s virus, now kill the monster and live.”

  ***

  Abby took a seat in Chief Knight’s office and told h
im about the vision. The Chief’s eyes glowed with anger. Several breaths went by in silence.

  “That is very serious, Abby.”

  “I know, Chief, but my visions have yet to be wrong.”

  “I totally agree. I’m taking it very seriously. It seems that your fears of trusting Otis Thorn were justified. The problem is very political. If he can actually control the people he has turned, it makes things that much worse.”

  “After all of the killings he has done, he gets away with more of it?”

  “I didn’t say that, Abby. I only said it is a politically charged issue. We can’t take action until I’ve investigated the ramifications more.”

  “We can’t stand by and do nothing.”

  “We aren’t going to do nothing. I have to find the right approach to cover our office before we go in with guns blazing. Speaking of which, I want you to talk to Jeff again. The guns he made weren’t as effective against Willow as you needed, and if the worst happens, you will need something better.”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  Abby collected David at his desk and headed up to Jeff’s office.

  “Hi, Jeff! Chief sent us to go over our weapon performance against Windigos.”

  “Why don’t you both have a seat and fill me in.”

  Abby recounted how things went against Willow.

  “David, how did it go against the ones in the cells?”

  “Actually, they worked fine there. I don’t know if the Windigos couldn’t heal as fast from not being as old or from them being starved.”

  “Then we can’t make assumptions on why it worked better there. From your descriptions, it seems like the tracers helped but weren’t enough. It could be that going to higher caliber rounds would perform better, but that also becomes more of a liability since they can also go through walls and could hurt members of the public you can’t see. It also seems you’ve identified two points of attack: neck and heart. Seems like a stake through the heart would work until it was removed, and the monster could maybe heal from it.”

  “Are you saying we have to carry wooden stakes now?”

  “I’m saying if you put enough rounds through the heart to pulverize it, that might bring it down long enough to remove its head. Just like if you put enough rounds through the neck, it might also disrupt the spinal cord, but it’s a small moving target that would be hard to hit. I don’t advise shooting in the neck for that reason.”

  They all got messages on their phones to return for a team meeting.

  ***

  Chief Knight gathered the team. This wouldn’t be an easy mission and it required more trust in Abby’s visions than ever before.

  The room was filled with the team waiting for his orders.

  “Thanks, everyone, for gathering so quickly. Abby, I have to ask you again how sure about your vision are you.”

  “So far it’s been one hundred percent.”

  “Not open to interpretation? Please think carefully before you answer. Lives are in the balance.”

  “All I know is exactly how I described it. Any interpretation is up to you.”

  “Are you confident in the accuracy of your description?”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  “Then we have the best intelligence for this operation. We have been ordered to terminate Otis Thorn. Any guards under his current control are also to be eliminated if needed. Anything that turns into a monster is to be cremated. If the guards don’t show evidence of being able to transform, their bodies are to be preserved along with all research.”

  David cleared his throat. “Then we are to become cold-blooded killers?”

  “Hardly, David. Expect that everyone there will be trying to kill you, and if the guards were test subjects for Thorn’s super soldier project, it’s not going to be easy.”

  “What would we be facing if he succeeded?”

  “From what I understand, the project was to create Human hybrids with the ability to combat monsters or Veiled when needed.”

  “They were looking to replace us?”

  “Let’s face it. We don’t have enough Veiled Marshals to provide the support needed and monsters seem to be on the rise. Ash, do you think Otis could have already come up with something?”

  “Only if creating Windigos counts. Frank wouldn’t have been considered any sort of super soldier. He only had some healing and anti-aging abilities. It’s why Frank didn’t survive the damage from the Windigo. If he had fully been a Windigo, he would have recovered.”

  “But could he have developed something he didn’t use on Hammer?”

  “It’s possible, but if he did, I don’t know about it.”

  “Then the guards we face will be Windigos or slightly enhanced Humans. In either case, they are trained in weapons and have thought through the defense of the lab, and will be acting as a team if they detect an intrusion. Think of them more as bodyguards than jailers, and expect Otis Thorn to be a bigger threat than Willow was, if he is a Windigo. If we go in armed for problems, he will know it’s not a social call.”

  “Can we draw him out away from his guards for an interview here or something?”

  Chief Knight shook his head. “In his situation, he would smell a rat. He is due to be transferred to the high security prison where he must expect to continue turning everybody there into his personal army in the next forty-eight hours. If any of you have any issues with the mission, I need to know now. David?”

  “If we use non-lethal force, will it work?”

  Ash shook her head. “No, David they would shrug off most things and would recover from tranquilizers before you could restrain them, unless you used enough to kill them.”

  “I don’t have any issues then. We’ll need to quickly work out a plan.”

  “David, do you have any ideas how we are going to handle greater numbers of what could be Windigos?”

  “New Windigos aren’t as hard to kill as old ones, but even if they were Human, being outnumbered by armed guards is a problem. I think stealth and trying to take them on in small groups is the key, but once someone sets off an alarm or is found missing, they can turn the tide. We really need to be doing this with several teams of four each.”

  “I know you keep harping on that, David, but I can’t bring in any Human Deputies who don’t know about The Veiled, and even if more knew, I can’t expose Humans to Windigos. Look at where it got these guards.”

  “But Chief, seven to two is tantamount to suicide.”

  Jeff cleared his throat. “If I may, Chief.”

  “Go ahead, Jeff.”

  “I can reroute the surveillance and block comms, but they will suspect an attack.”

  “That is the type of ideas we need. Anyone else?”

  “I volunteer for action.”

  “Perry, you know you could be infected by a Windigo.”

  “I know the risks.”

  “I’m willing to take the risk as well.”

  “Thank you, Gwen. David, you now have a full team of four. I expect you all to keep to shooting from a distance if confronted by a Windigo.”

  David shook his head. “Chief?”

  “David, I expect you will get your hands dirty at some point. Jeff, do we have enough P90s and ammo for everybody?”

  “Actually, I was thinking that maybe something else would work better. The team’s experience with the P90 showed the tracers helped but the Windigo still healed quickly. The P90 basically uses twenty-two caliber ammo. What if we go back to the Kriss Vector submachine gun? Its 45ACP rounds make much bigger holes in the target to heal from, even if they didn’t expand. I was able to get my hands on some WW2 tracer rounds in that caliber. If we go that way, why don’t we mix hollow-point with the tracers when we load the magazines?”

  Chief Knight nodded. “Let’s cover all of our bases. Use two P90s and two Kriss Vectors.”

  “I’m okay with the idea.”

  “Jeff, take care of it.”

  David asked, “Do we have floor plans?”
<
br />   “Only of the public areas you have already been in. We don’t have them for the lower area where Hammer had been held. We did install cameras, but no floor plans had been drawn up and filed. Maybe Ash can fill in the details of that level better.”

  “I didn’t know about the underground passage we found, and there may be other areas I don’t know about. That level had a small lab area, kitchen, supply closet, the large loading bay, three areas set up like studio apartments, and the elevator to the second-floor private lab in Thorn Technologies.”

  David nodded. “Thanks, Ash. Jeff, how much of that level has cameras?”

  “The lab, loading bay, and the hallways. In the Thorn Technologies area, the private lab, key hallways, exterior doors.”

  “And you can take over them all from here? What about blocking their comms?”

  “I can do it all from here. Our comms are handled differently and you’ll be okay. Where do you want to make the entry from?”

  “I think the loading bay will be best. It could be the level where Thorn is, and is the most hidden from the public. It’s mostly a hallway with rooms on both sides. We will have to be careful as we clear each room.”

  “Collect your gear and get ready to go.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Raid

  DAVID RADIOED JEFF. “Six, we are on location. What’s the status?”

  “Team-1, target plus two is in the lab. Two Tangos in main building. Two unknown location.”

  “Roger, Six.”

  “Let’s all get geared up. Use silencers to start.” David handed Perry the other Kriss Vector. “Perry and I will the use magazines with subsonic rounds to make the most of the silencers. Abby and Gwen, use the armor-piercing rounds first. If something transforms into a Windigo, swap magazines to the ones mixed with tracers.”