by M Ennenbach
As if to answer, the other window exploded inwards. Cody’s head landed on a table next to the bar. The gaping holes where the eyes once were and flesh eaten off of the cheeks caused no shortage of screaming as Bradley ushered the women out of the room. Mary Jo shrugged him off, as did Jia-Li.
“We stay.”
“Baby, go. Please. This thing took at least ten shots and we were sure it was dead.”
“You don’t shoot as well as I do.”
“I can’t lose you.”
“You won’t.”
“Coooooooome unnnnnnntoooo meeeeeeeee”
Mary Jo fired a few shots out the broken window. “Come and get me, you shit heel!” She stomped out the front door. Karl followed her. Mikhail and Jia-Li stood staring out into the street through the empty window frames.
“It is a hunter. Be wary.” Karl cautioned her.
“I shot the balls off of a gopher once at fifty yards. I ain’t scared of no gray skinned freak.”
“I don’t doubt your skill. But this thing is a killer.”
“Well, I ain’t been killed yet. And I’ve faced down some real bastards.”
“I reckon you have.”
No sooner did the words leave his mouth then a black streak, darkness on darkness flew in front of him. One moment Mary Jo was there, the next her legs and boots were spurting blood onto the street. He heard her scream in the distance and gunfire. He stood in shock staring at the boots as they fell over. Mikhail was suddenly there and pulled him back into the bar.
“It moved so fast.” Karl still stared in shock out at the street. “I never saw it coming.”
Mikhail and Jia-Li steered him to the back room and slammed the door behind them.
“Where’s Mary Jo?” Bradley asked. Karl stared at him. Jia-Li and Mikhail looked at the floor. “Where is she?”
“Gone. It happened so fast. I couldn’t do anything. She’s gone, Bradley.”
Bradley made a noise of rage that seemed to vibrate from his very soul. He grabbed his shotgun and made for the door. Mikhail grabbed his shoulder but he shrugged it off. Kenzie cried out but he ignored her and walked out the door. Mikhail went to follow but Karl stopped him.
“I’ll go. Get everyone upstairs. It is fast but I doubt it can fly. Lock yourselves into the rooms.”
“Then I’m going, too.”
Karl saw the look on Jia-Li’s face and he patted Mikhail on the shoulder. “No. I’ve got this. Keep everyone safe until I get back. It wants us to chase after it.”
“Then why are you doing it?”
“Because it isn’t the first thing to want me to chase it. I don’t die here, not like this. Trust me.”
And he walked out the open door.
15
The Tribes
The gathering of chiefs danced around the fire, their songs filling the tent and spilling out into the night. The stars above seemed to pulse and fade with the cadence of their singing. They tossed powders onto the flames and colors sparked into life. A hush had fallen over the tents outside as the effects of powerful magic sent reverberations through the air.
Hasse Ola twitched as the ink laden sticks broke his skin. The beginning of intricate patterns took form upon his bleeding chest and stomach. Wards against evil carefully etched from memory, passed down from generation to generation, infused with holy protection. As the song built in power around him, he began to thrash more and more. It was as if the evil had already tried to desperately take root in his body and mind and fought against the ritual. Hours remained until it was all complete, but the faces around wore grim determination.
His head thrust back and his entire body tightened. He let a bellow of anguish and rage into the tent that made the song falter slightly. It resumed with even more power as he screamed. His eyes snapped open and stared malevolently at the hides above him. His left eye pained, brown with a pupil as small as the tip of the wooden needle. His right eye all black filled with hatred and hunger.
***
Bradley stood in the street, staring at the boots laying on their sides in two pools of blood. Tears ran freely down his cheeks as he clenched the shotgun with white knuckles.
“Get back here, you dumb son of a bitch,” Karl whispered, watching the shadows.
Bradley didn’t move a muscle. He stood frozen.
“Bradley. C’mon, snap out of it. Getting your damned fool ass killed doesn’t bring her back.”
He turned and faced Karl. “Why? What did we ever do to this thing? What did she ever do except get drunk and paint?”
Karl put an arm around his shoulders and guided him back to the bar. “They don’t think the same as us. They are driven by need. Evil isn’t bound to the same rules as we are. Let’s go back inside where it’s safe, alright?”
“We gotta make it pay, Karl. For Cody and Mary Jo. And Tracey, too.” He began sobbing against Karl’s shoulder. Karl awkwardly patted his back while trying to stare in every direction at once.
“We will. Let’s go inside. We are exposed out here. Close quarters will be best. You head inside. Everyone is upstairs. Go and lock yourself in with Kenzie. She needs you now.”
Bradley stood taller and wiped his face with his sleeve. He tried to center himself and walked back into the bar. Karl smiled at him encouragingly. Then he turned back to the street.
“I’m right here, you mangy bastard! Come out and face me!” he shouted into the night.
“Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii’mmmmmm heeeeeeeeeerrrrr eeeeeee.”
Karl whipped around to find the source of the voice. His jaw dropped as Bradley turned toward him, mouth moving soundlessly. As he watched, it was as if Bradley came apart at the seams. He stood pale faced with his lips moving and his intestines and guts poured out in a rush of blood and viscera onto the bar floor in a torrent. Bradley stared down at the floor as he tried to comprehend what was happening. He desperately reached down to pull the bloody ropes back into the now empty cavity. He fell to his knees in slow motion. Karl couldn’t blink or convince himself to move. He watched as the Wendigo smiled, darkness against the dark. It swiped one claw casually and Bradley’s head tumbled off his still moving corpse. It stared at Karl for a long second, the grin never fading, and then turned and ran for the stairs.
“Mikhail! It’s coming up the stairs!” he shouted. He saw the curtains flutter above him. He forced himself to move, his body fighting against him. His mind screaming to get on a horse and ride as fast and as far away as possible. Instead, he began to run inside, screaming warning to those upstairs.
The screaming began as he reached the bottom of the stairs, soon followed by gunfire. He took the stairs two at a time and ran through the splintered doorway into the bedroom. It had been seconds. Ten. Maybe fifteen. But that was all it had taken for Tara to have been slit from inner thigh to throat. She lay gasping on the bed as her life drained into the feather stuffed mattress. Amber was sticking out of the wall. Literally. Her cotton stocking covered legs twitched. Her arms were pinned to her sides as she had been forcefully thrust through the wall. Her Derringer still clutched in her hand.
“Amber, are you still alive?” he asked. Sounds of gunfire came from the opposite side of where she has been rammed.
“Help me, Karl! My face is broken and I am stuck. I’m bleedin’ bad. Please get me out of this. I’m . . . ”
“Amber!” Karl pulled on her legs to free her. He tugged and she began to scream. “I’ve got you! Just a little mo . . . ”
He fell backwards with her in his arms on the floor. The wind knocked out of his chest and his head cracked the floor hard enough to send sparks across his vision. He lay there dizzily for a moment still clutching her thighs. Gunfire rang throughout the building. He shook the cobwebs out of his head and looked down to see how she was faring. He felt bile surge into his mouth as he saw he held onto half of her. He turned his head and vomited on the faux Oriental rug that was already saturated with Tara’s blood and kicked the half body off of his legs. He staggered to hi
s feet and stared through the hole in the wall. The Wendigo was there stalking towards Bella. Kenzie lay crumpled in a broken heap, her head turned sickeningly too far to the left
“Per favore, Dio no! Per favore abbi Pietà!” she cried.
Karl shot through the hole in the wooden timbers. The Wendigo shook as each bullet hit but continued moving forward. Karl fired again and again until the hammer clicked on an empty chamber. He tossed the gun and pulled his other and saw the creature raise its lean, muscled arms with long jagged claws into the air. Karl murmured a prayer and fired once more. The creature screamed out a bellow of unbridled fury as the bullet slammed through Bella’s eye. Karl felt hollow in his action but knew he gave her a quick death. A faint bit of mercy at best that tasted like ashes when mixed with his failure.
“Yoooooooooou’rrrrrrrrreeee laaaaaaaaaaasss ssssst,” the Wendigo hissed in rage at him. Then it leapt forward into the sturdy wall in front of it and crashed through like it was made if rice paper.
Marie screamed in terror and the sound of a double barrel percussion exploded. Robert was yelling incoherently. Karl ran toward the door, then found himself falling face first onto the floor with a crunch as his nose was broken. His feet had gotten tangled up in Amber’s legs and tripped him up. He would have laughed at the black horror of it all, but he could barely breathe. His eyes were watering as he pulled himself up and staggered into the hallway in time to see Robert’s body thrown over the railing of the landing to land with a crash as it hit the wall of liquor behind the bar.
Karl looked over the railing and saw Robert was not going to be getting up from that anytime soon, if at all from the way he lay on the floor. The mirror with Mackenzie etched in acid lay as shattered as it’s namesake in the room in front of him. To make the situation worse, the spirits sprayed across the bar and walls. The candles flared bright blue as the alcohol ran down the wall and into the sconces. Flames licked across the wall and danced upon the liquor.
“Shit!” Karl exclaimed as his fears tripled in front of him. “This is the last God damned thing we need.”
Marie screamed but it was cut off mid-yell. He threw himself into the door only to bounce off of it. He tried again and received a sore shoulder for his efforts. Instead of a third attempt, he pulled his rifle off his back and blew a hole in the door and frame where the lock had been. He kicked the door and it flew open. Marie lay on the floor. Her throat torn out in a ragged wound. Her left arm was snapped in half at the elbow. Her dress was torn open and it appeared her heart had been ripped out of her chest. The Wendigo was nowhere to be seen but the door to the outside balcony was open. He ran out into the night and saw the monster leap through a window into the next room. Karl ran past it and ducked his head as shots were fired, praying a stray bullet didn’t hit him. He saw Otto spin with a fountain of blood erupting from where his face had been. Frank was backed against the door trying desperately to reload his shotgun.
He looked in the next room and saw it was empty and kept moving, hoping against hope Jia-Li and Mikhail were in the last one. He got to the window and barely avoided the shot that came through the glass.
Mikhail realized it was him and opened the door. “What the hell are you doing out here?” he whispered. “I could have killed you.”
“C’mon. It’s down the hall still. We can climb down here if we are quick.”
Jia-Li came out and touched Karl’s cheek gently. Her eyes were filled with tears. Mikhail helped her over the railing and she scurried down the heavy corner beam with surprising grace. Mikhail looked at Karl who motioned for him to go. Mikhail didn’t have quite the same effortlessness but made it down with a few grunts and groans. Karl lifted his leg to follow when the door to the room they had just vacated splintered open. Karl stared at the black eyes of the Wendigo. Its flesh was covered in gore and streaks of black ichor. It smiled at him and he felt his bowels shudder.
“Aaaaaaaaaaat laaaaaaassssssttttt”
Karl gulped as it ran towards him. He looked down at Mikhail and Jia-Li watching each other and staring in horror at him. “Ruuuuuuuun!” he screamed.
And then he felt the impact as the Wendigo launched itself into him. The railing cracked, as did his left femur, and pain burst through his side. He wrapped his arms around the Wendigo’s and they both went over the edge. He somehow managed to use the force of the creature to spin enough that he landed on top of it. He rolled off of it and lay still on the ground as the beating he had taken left his entire body wracked with agony. He felt his breaths come in wheezes and the telltale signs of broken ribs. The creature lay still beside him. He reached for his gun, but it wasn’t on his side. He felt around on the ground but it wasn’t within reach. The Wendigo began to twitch next to him and he just stared at the stars above.
Then he heard the crunch of footsteps and lifted his head to see Mikhail and Jia-Li standing front of him. Jia-Li raised her shotgun and shot the Wendigo point blank in the face. The sound was deafening at such close range and he felt the remains of the head splatter against his face. She took her time and reloaded. Mikhail grabbed Karl by the shoulders and dragged him away. Again the shotgun exploded into the night. And again. And again.
“You gonna be alright there, Hoss?” Mikhail asked with concern.
“Told you to run.”
“You think you can tell the missus what to do? You’re a damn bigger fool than I had previously believed.” He laughed and propped Karl up against a barrel. “Baby, I think you got it.” He called out to Jia-Li.
Another shot rang out in the night which sounded funny in Karl’s ears. He added concussion to his list of injuries. He watched as the happy couple picked up chunks of the Wendigo and began tossing them into the fire that raged through Kenzie’s. The blood red writing began to blacken as the flames slowly ate their way up the outside wall.
Let the bastard come back from that.
Jia-Li had quite literally blown it to pieces with a surgeon-like efficiency. They tossed limbs and then finally the torso and bits of head that remained into the fire. A smile formed on Karl’s bloody and battered face through the pain and then the world went black.
EPILOGUE
Duncan
The rider reined his horse as he got to the center of the one-road town. He looked at the mess that greeted him with a scowl. One side of town was nothing but burnt timber. Even the church was nothing but a charred steeple on barely standing timbers, gutted by whatever had started the fire. He got off his horse and tied it in front of the general store.
“Hello!” he shouted. Only his echo rang out in greeting.
He peeked his head into the store and shouted again. Nothing. He looked about and found that it had been thoroughly ransacked. His hand went to the weapon on his hip as he walked down the street. All of the building that remained, a damn sight too few from what he had been told to expect, were empty. He walked to the end of the road and saw a small house, a quaint little thing really, and went to the door and knocked. As his fist hit the wood, it opened up. He stepped in cautiously. It was as abandoned as the rest of the town. He looked around and his eyes landed on a bloody paper on the table. Old blood, he noticed. At least a week or so. He picked up and read the carefully written words.
Of Monsters and Men, Hunger on the Chisholm Trail by Cody ‘Sawbones’ Higgins.
“What in tarnation is this supposed to mean?” he asked softly. Next to the paper, he saw the glint of metal. The sheriff’s star he had come to town to receive sat in front of him. He picked it up and looked it over. Then he tossed it back on the table and shut the door behind him. He got back on his horse and shook his head in disbelief before trotting it over to a water pump. He filled the trough and washed the dirt off of his face as his horse drank thirstily.
“Looks like we came all this way for nothing, girl. Whatddya say? Head back or keep moving West?”
The horse ignored him as it drank and he pulled out a brush and began to clean the dust off of its flanks.
“We
st it is, then. No need for a sheriff in a ghost town.”
***
Abilene
Karl lay in bed staring out the window. Mikhail and Jia-Li sat quietly at the table to his side.
“You sure?” Mikhail asked for the thirtieth time.
“Take your beautiful wife and get on that goddamned train already. I’m fine. You’ve got an address to send me a letter once you are settled. In a couple of weeks, I’ll be back to my old ways and head up to Wisconsin. Once I finish my business there, I’ll head East and then take a train out to see you. I don’t know how many times I can explain this until it sinks into your thick skull.”
“Leave him be, Pup. He has his own journey, just as we have ours.”
Mikhail shook his head. “A fool’s errand. Chasing Luck. You could pan for gold with us. Retire. Find yourself a pretty lady and settle down.”
Karl didn’t look at him. “It isn’t for me. It’s to save the world. Besides, pretty ladies and I don’t tend to work out so well.”
“You didn’t know what was gonna happen in Duncan. None of us did. We barely survived, wouldn’t have without your help. Blasted idiot. The offer stands.” Mikhail’s eyes were softer than his words betrayed.
“Tell him!” Jia-Li said excitedly.
“Tell me what? If it is another ploy to lure me out into a river looking like a moron with a pan, I swear . . . ”
“She is pregnant.”
“What?”
“Jia-Li is pregnant.”
“How?”
“We had sex. Mikhail and I. It was quite lovely. See, a couple months ago he came home in a foul mood. Tense. And I realized the best way to relieve his stress was to have . . . ”
“Damn it, I know how it happened. How long have you known?”
Mikhail laughed. “She told me as we tossed bits of the Wendigo into the fire. You had gone to sleep already.”
“Two weeks! You’ve known for two weeks and just now tell me?”