Varney stood and every ounce of darkness in the room shifted with him. "Do you hear that, Doctor? That is the agonizing death of you and your friends, knocking at your door."
Hank could barely move. The shuttered door warped and bent down the middle. Otero dropped the keys back into the coagulating blood on the floor and stared along with him. He was distantly aware of Whitey and Bullet running down the hallway. The building shook. Dust settled from the ceiling. The plaster around the storm door cracked.
Varney's voice captured him. "Monkshood, Doctor. Are you familiar with it?"
"What? I - "
"Monkshood. Wolfsbane. There is some nearby. I can smell it."
"I don't understand."
"Of course you don't."
The shutter began to buckle. One of its corners ripped free from its moorings. The streetlight glow seeped in. Hank could see the silhouettes of hulking things.
"Get the monkshood, Doctor. Drape it around the thresholds."
The storm door twisted in on itself with an earsplitting shriek. It clattered to the floor.
"Come back to me if you live, Doctor!"
Hank slammed the office door closed behind him. The last thing he saw was a Cheshire smile floating in the black. Bullet got to the hospital intersection first. "What was - Oh, God."
Something more monstrous than wolf or man barreled into the ER. It filled the doorway, blocking out the light. Pointed ears. A quick gait. One of the arms was as big as a man. The other was shriveled, a malformed claw that twitched at the shoulder. Panzer. She let loose a growl that Hank felt in his chest.
"Sweet Jesus," Whitey said.
Otero stepped forward, crossing the ER. She shuffled towards Panzer and raised an imperious finger as she spoke. "This is unacceptable. This is my hospital and you barge in here. I demand you take this nonsense outside. Immediately. I will not stand for this disrespect."
"Simone . . . " Hank said, but the sound of his voice evaporated as it left his lips.
Bullet clutched at his arm. Her fingers dug deeply into his bicep. He barely noticed.
The Panzer-wolf snarled. A torrent of saliva dribbled from her maw and caught in her matted beard. Behind her, the rest of the pack howled. The laughter of jackals. They perched on the backs of their bikes like gargoyles or paced through the parking lot, but did not come inside.
"Right now!" Simone said. "I will not stand -"
Panzer lashed out with the giant arm and swatted Simone aside. She flew across the room and smashed into one of the tables, leaving only a flecked trail of blood on the marble floor. The beast rushed. With no traction on the floor, her claws skittered for purchase. Whitey raised and shot without aiming. Both barrels of the shotgun boomed. Panzer spun as blood sprayed. Bits of her ear disintegrated. Hair and blood flew off of her side in chunks. The pained yowl was ear-splitting, louder than the shotgun.
Bullet rushed. Before Hank understood what was happening, the lean nurse moved at the wolf-thing. She held a fire-axe high over her head like some barbarian. Panzer slipped in the pool of blood at her feet. Silvery eyes gleamed and she growled as she tried to stand up straight. Bullet brought the axe down hard. It buried into Panzer's cheek with a wet thunk! Panzer fell back onto her tail and grasped at the axe. Bullet didn't let go. She planted a foot onto the thing's teat-covered chest and pulled.
Hank looked back at Whitey. The old man was slack jawed. The shotgun rested in his hands. "Reload, Whitey."
The man's eyes swam into focus and he looked at Hank with confusion.
"Reload the damned gun!"
Whitey frantically patted his overalls for shells.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It was bleeding. Bullet could kill it. Its face was flayed open from lip to ear. The thing scrambled to its feet. Panzer was its name. It was the big woman who had been missing an arm. It had to be. The eyes were the same. The posture, in spite of being shaped like a wolf, was the same. She wasn't human, but she was bleeding. Bullet would kill her.
Bullet wrenched the axe loose and a gout of blood covered her. The gunshot wound in her shoulder was a geyser of pain. She pushed it down, suffocated it. Panzer flailed and pawed at the new wound on her face. She shrieked and somewhere within the guttural, lupine agony was a woman. Bullet swung again. Panzer held up the shriveled arm. Two fingers severed. The thing's mouth opened, impossibly wide with a sharp forest of yellow teeth made even wider and more crazed by the bloody gash from the axe. The howl hit Bullet with an almost physical impact. It wasn't pain. It was rage. Panzer hit her like a linebacker.
The blow shook Bullet. Agony radiated out from her sternum. The air in her lungs rushed out. Panzer's clawed feet carried them both across the ER. A shotgun blast rang out again, but Bullet couldn't tell if it hit anything. Panzer rushed to pin her to the wall and Bullet imagined her own head smashing like a melon. The wolf couldn't get traction, though. The tips of her feet scraped across the floor. Bullet squirmed, twisting in the wolf's grip, getting in closer, forcing Panzer to hit the door to the lab head first. The door shattered. The shards of wood raked across Bullet's back and neck, but she was spared the full impact. They tumbled through the wreckage. Panzer fell forward. Momentum carried Bullet up onto one of the tables in the small room. Microscopes and glassware went flying.
It was nothing but a narrow closet full of drugs and basic lab equipment. Bullet lay on the cold steel table and moaned. Her lungs refused to take in air. She felt thick splinters digging into her back. The axe was gone, the arm that held it, numb. She looked up. Panzer pulled herself upright. The axe wound on her face was knitting back together. Bullet reached out for something. For anything. She found a wire with a weight at the end and pulled hard. The microscope at the other end flew over her shoulder at Panzer's chest, but the wolf woman swatted it aside and growled. The fury was demonic. Bullet skittered backward on the table top, knocking aside boxes of rubber gloves and tongue depressors. Anything near her, she threw at Panzer. The werewolf lunged. The claws, each a 3-inch blade, stabbed into Bullet's torso. Bullet screamed and kicked, delivering a solid boot to the thing's jaw. She threw Bullet, slamming her against the opposite table. Stars erupted in Bullet's vision. A gray tide rushed in and everything went quiet. She could see a wolf-like shape over her, could feel its heat. Panzer grabbed her again and the claws dug into the flesh around both of her clavicles. A spray of spit and hot blood dribbled onto Bullet’s face.
In her hand, Bullet felt something plastic and cylindrical. It felt flimsy. She lashed out anyway, smashing it into the open wound on the thing's face. Panzer screamed and immediately released her. The smell of cooking meat and burnt hair overwhelmed Bullet as her vision righted. The wolf woman was stumbling backward, trying to put out the white fire on the side of her face. She thrashed, knocking over what little was left standing in the lab, and Bullet thought she could make human words out of the agony. "Bitch! . . . Fuck . . . bitch . . . kill you!"
And Panzer was gone. She flew from the room, leaving a trail of rancid smoke in her wake. Bullet felt her right eye swelling shut. She looked down at what she held. It was a tube of long sticks, like fireplace matches. It read: Praetor Corporation Silver Nitrate Applicators - 60 count.
"Fuck you, too," Bullet muttered and collapsed.
***
With no idea what he would find, Hank ran into the lab. It was tucked away on the side of the ER, behind the nurse’s station, and always locked. Now the door was kindling. Panzer exploded from it, wisps of smoke curled from its face. She ran past him and out into the night. Outside, the pack laughed and hooted. The laugh was neither of animal or man, but something in between.
"Doc?" Whitey asked.
Hank shook off the disgust and surprise and pointed to where Otero fell. "Check on Otero."
Whitey nodded and ran to the prone nurse. Hank stepped through what jagged shards of wood still hanged in the door frame. The room looked like a bomb had gone off. Everything was in pieces. Everything was bloody. Bits of scorched h
air and flesh peppered the floor. It reeked. Up on one of the steel tables lay Bullet. Hank rushed to her and started to assess.
"Bullet? Bullet, talk to me."
She moaned. "I'm good."
She was battered. One side of her face was a swollen mess. Her entire abdomen was covered in punctures and blood. Hank scrambled to find supplies. On the floor, in destroyed cabinets, and cast aside wherever, he found what he needed.
"I'm going to tear off your shirt."
Eyes still closed, she smiled with split lips. "You never give up, do you?"
He tore the shredded blue t-shirt up the middle and looked at the wounds. They were deep, but didn't seem to have damaged anything vital. He started to clean her up. His hands shook and he spilled the alcohol everywhere. Bullet didn't wince at the sting that he knew must have set her skin on fire.
Whitey appeared in the door, holding Otero by the arm. Three ragged claw marks split the side of her face open. She shuffled dumbly next to Whitey. "Are they coming?" Hank asked.
Whitey shook his head. "No. They're just prowling around the parking lot, chattering. Never heard anything like it, Doc."
"How is she?" Hank asked, nodding to Otero as he applied the bandages.
Whitey looked Otero up and down. "My professional opinion? Real fucked up."
"Okay. Okay. One thing at a time." Hank looked down at Bullet. "Bullet? Jan? I need to get you over to the x-ray."
Bullet opened her eyes and sat up. Hank tried to hold her down, but she waved him off. "Just tape my ribs and find me a shirt. We don't have time. They'll be coming back."
She slid off the table. As Hank reached for her, she pushed the now empty canister of silver nitrate sticks into his hand.
"What's this?"
"This is what lit that bitch up."
Hank looked at it and couldn't make himself piece it together.
"I'll be damned," Whitey said.
"Silver?" Hank asked. "You've got to be kidding me."
Bullet stood there, leaning heavily on the table. Even battered and bloodied, she was gorgeous and Hank caught himself staring at her lean form, now in just khakis and a sports bra.
"Hank? The shirt."
Hank gave a sheepish smile, pulled off his bloody doctor's coat, and wrapped it around her. She gingerly slipped her arms through it. "Such a gentleman."
Hank went to work on the claw marks down Otero's cheeks. He deadened the area with a local and went to stitching. Her face was in ruins, just flaps of torn meat clinging to bloody tissue. She stared into space the entire time. Whitey poked his head around the corner to spy on the ER, leading with the shotgun.
"Are they coming?" Hank asked.
Whitey pulled his head back inside. "Nah. Doesn't even seem like they care."
"What are they doing?"
Whitey peeked out again and shrugged. "Just hanging out, I guess. Waiting. Laughing."
"At least they're not shooting at us anymore," Hank said.
"Yeah, Doc. Dealing with fucking werewolves is a whole lot better."
Bullet tried to stand up straight and bit her swollen lips as she did. 'But why aren't they coming in? If they all decided to rush us - "
"Or if even two of them came in . . . " Whitey said.
Hank thought of Varney, sitting in the shadows and leisurely sipping tequila. "I think it's him."
"The vampire fella?"
Bullet and Hank just looked at him. It was a word no one had dared utter. They weren't even comfortable yet with 'werewolves', but there it was. Hank spoke. "Vampire, Whitey?"
"Yup. I'll bet my left nut he is. I've seen enough Dracula movies."
"But that - "
"Shit, Doc. Don't start. I know what you're gonna say. That that just ain't possible. Well, possible got out of town once those fuckers started howling at the God damned moon. They're scared of him. And frankly, I don't want to be in here with him, neither. Either way, it won’t be much longer before another one – or all of them – get brave enough to come in here after us."
Hank nodded and ran the thread through Otero's face as quickly as he dared. "Do you know what wolfsbane is?"
"Well, yeah. I mean, it's in the movies," Whitey said.
"Do you know what it looks like?"
"No. Can't say that I do."
Bullet shook her head. "Why?"
"Varney. He told me to get some, to place it around the doors. Like I'm some damned voodoo priest. He said there was some nearby. Said he could smell it."
Hank finished the stitches as the others contemplated. It was a messy job, one that would leave a hell of a scar. He tried not to worry about it and wasn't sure that Otero cared herself. As he placed the bandage over the sutures, he looked her in the eye. "Simone?"
Her eyes swam in and out of focus, pupils dilating. Her pulse was strong and her blood pressure was normal. It didn't seem to be shock, but she was far from okay. Whatever was left in her head was mostly broken. After he repeated her name, slowly and quietly, her eyes fixed on his. Tears began flow down her cheeks.
"I want this to be over. I have to go home to my kids."
"I know, Simone. We're going to get you home. Do you know what wolfsbane is?"
Her look was one of disgust and confusion. "Wolfsbane? No. Why? Why do you want to know about this? I don't understand."
Hank snapped his fingers, trying to remember. "Umm. Monkshood. It's also called monkshood. Do you know what it looks like?"
She nodded. "It's in the gift shop. By the baby's breath."
For a moment, hope. Hank's eyes lit up. "It's here? We have some?"
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
7:20 PM
They crept down the main intersection. Hank lead Otero by the hand. She trudged through a miasma of catatonia. Bullet and Whitey trailed behind them with their guns trained on the now gaping opening between the parking lot and ER. At the sight of them, the wolves gathered. Some growled. Some tittered, but they didn't enter. They just watched. Everyone moved away from the wolves with the slow, steady pace of someone walking away from a wild dog. No eye contact. No sudden movements. The four of them passed the East Wing, the nurse's station, the West Wing, and then finally entered the lobby.
The smell was worse now. The carpet was tacky and dark. It smelled of copper, spoiled meat, and shit. Hank tried to just focus on the shuttered door to the gift shop. He didn't look at the Rorschach blots of blood across every surface. He didn't look at Castle's feet sticking out from behind the fern. He didn't notice the way one of them was twisted 180 degrees in the wrong direction. He didn't notice the viscera stuck to the upholstery on the chair.
Bullet and Whitey stayed at the threshold. From there they could still see the wolves and the wolves could see them, but Hank pulled Otero out of sight, over to the gift shop door. He threw the bolt to its shutter and raised the door as carefully as he could. It didn't help. It was warped with rust and screamed with every inch, a noise he could feel in his teeth. The door on the other side was glass. Still intact, still locked.
Hank cupped his hand over his brow and looked inside. The gift shop was miraculously untouched and still filled with flower arrangements, balloon samples, and tchotchkes. It was quiet inside. Every wall of the hexagonal annex was floor-to-ceiling glass.
"Oh shit," Hank whispered.
They would be completely exposed. "Keys," he said to Otero, extending his hand.
She just stared at his empty palm.
"Simone. I need your keys."
"I lost them," she said, weak and stupid.
Hank stood and made a point of making eye contact with her. "Simone. Where are the keys? We need them."
She slowly shook her head. "I don't know."
Hank sighed. He turned back to the door and pulled at it. It wouldn't budge. "Damn it."
He grabbed a chair, one with the least amount of gore, and dragged it over.
"Doc?" Whitey asked.
"I have to. Simone lost the keys."
"Oh, Jesus Christ. The nois
e."
"I know. Just keep an eye on the Goats."
Whitey refocused and adjusted the shotgun's butt against his shoulder. Bullet kept Agent Castle's Glock ready.
"Simone," Hank said. "Step back."
He raised the chair and shoved it at the glass door. It wasn't hard. He more pushed on the pane rather than smashed it, part of him hoping for gummy safety glass. Instead, it shattered. Giant wedges of it fell apart. The clatter was shrill and distinct. Hank hurried. He pushed the chair aside, reached in, and unlocked the door.
"Simone, let's go."
***
The wolves milled about. Even with the entirety of the hallway and emergency room between them, Whitey could feel their gaze on him. Eyes that gave off light that was not light. A preternatural gleaming that was the moon reflecting off of a still lake. Dozens of them. And their hungry teeth seemed to glow. They licked their maws. Some shuffled around, hunched over with their nails scraping the ground. Others strode on hind legs. Yet others crawled on all fours, not fully wolves, but far from man.
A larger one stepped forward. His hair was dirty gray, thicker and longer than the rest and matted into dreadlocks around the head. Gideon. As he came to the doorway, the others gave him room. He stood looking at Whitey and Bullet, a silent challenge. Then he began to piss. The stream decorated the threshold as he waved his pelvis back and forth. His gaze was locked with Bullet and Whitey's the entire time. He smiled and showed all of his razored fangs before walking back to the pack. Some howled. Others slinked up and smelled the spray of urine.
Whitey lowered his gun a bit, but didn't take his eyes off of the pack. "You got this for a minute, Bullet?"
"Sure," she said, and Whitey could almost feel the disgust in her voice.
She looked like she'd been dragged down three miles of bad road, but he still wouldn't want to piss her off. Beneath the bruises and blood was twenty pounds of rage in a ten pound bag. Whitey tried to watch every wolf at once while he walked carefully to the West Wing. Once there, he headed to the room where they kept Sawed Off.
The Black Goat Motorcycle Club Page 13