Apex Predator

by S. M. Douglas

  “An old one at that,” Vukovich said. “That’s why I know there’s a road better traveled. One that can restore balance prior to the chaos otherwise set to come.”

  Owen dabbed his glistening forehead with his handkerchief.

  Cindy grimaced at Owen sickly appearance, but couldn’t resist answering Vukovich, “This smacks quite a bit of envy.”

  “Do you know how long it takes for wealth once acquired to disappear?” Vukovich responded. “I’ve read your work on the link between poverty and crime. Can’t you see that society’s winners are also predetermined?”

  Cindy cursed under her breath. He was blowing up her academic findings and working them into an integrated worldview.

  “The wealthy are different,” Vukovich added. “I know, for I too was born into privilege.”

  “Just like Osama Bin Ladin,” Brody said.

  Vukovich shot a laser like stare of irritation across the table as Owen smiled and winked at Brody.

  “I know quite a few wealthy people and they, this is ridiculous,” Cindy said. “Stereotyping an entire group? You can’t demonize people for being successful.”

  “I’m not talking about success,” Vukovich said. “Look at the CEO of your biggest bank; he’s little more than an organized crime boss granted state sanction to loot.”

  “So what gives?” Owen said. “In past centuries when it got this bad out came the pitchforks, public executions, and all that fun stuff you seem to admire.”

  “The people have been numbed up by decades of propaganda promoting the mythic free market,” Vukovich responded. “Trust me, the average working person will look for help. In turmoil extremists speak to the people, offering them enemies to hate.”

  “I’m not saying I buy it,” Cindy said. “But what does this have to do with werewolves?”

  “Or more to the point where did we, the werewolf, come from?” Vukovich smiled. “For to know that is to answer your question.”

  Chapter 31

  August 2016 – The Western Ukraine

  “For centuries we were a whisper on the wind,” Vukovich said. “Then the Black Death came.”

  “You’re the result of a virus?” Cindy said.

  “A bacteria would be the more accurate term. Your scientists have identified three of the four types of plague.” Vukovich said. “Each has unique blood based symptoms, but one in particular stands out.”

  “Let me guess, the werewolf plague.”

  “We refer to it as the Lupine Plague,” Vukovich said in response to Brody. “Similar to the Bubonic Plague, transmission comes from being bitten by an infected animal. However, the subject, assuming they survive contact with the carrier, experiences an evolutionary response. The plague reacts with underlying genetic material already predisposed by existing mutation to accept the coding brought by the bacterium. If symbiosis exists then the new host is equipped with the tools needed to survive.”

  “But we’re discussing a disease,” Brody said.

  “What’s a disease?” Vukovich responded.

  “You know, getting sick,” Brody said, recognizing he was out of his element.

  “It’s any transformation or stoppage of normal functioning or structure of any of the body’s systems or organs.” Vukovich replied.

  “Why the Black Death? Why not in tandem with the Justinian Plague?”

  “It lacked long term viability,” Vukovich answered Owen. “With the Black Death the evolutionary advantage shifted to the bacterium.”

  “The sword versus the shield,” Owen said, his bloodshot eyes flashing bright.

  Karlovic and Tanya exchanged worried glances.

  “An organism evolves and its competitor responds. It’s nature’s way, is it not?” Vukovich said.

  “But a werewolf? Evolved from a human?” Cindy said.

  “Scientists recently found in Spain a fossilized human femur one hundred thousand years older than previously thought possible. It came from a Denisovan. Up until then the only other place Denisovan DNA had been found was in Siberia. So how did that DNA get four thousand miles west of any other known location Denisovans have been found? The point is—”

  “There may be extinct forms of humans we don’t even know about.” Cindy replied.

  “Of the one’s we do know there is much still tripping us up,” Vukovich said. “Scientists now believe that Homo Sapiens cross-breeding with Neanderthals may have provided today’s humans with the genetic material needed to handle the climate found outside of Africa. Some of these genes controlled obvious physical differences in people. This means—”

  “That the genes responsible for creating the strength and power of a werewolf may not have come from today’s humans,” Cindy interjected. “It may have derived from the parts of the genetic code modern man inherited from species such as a Neanderthal.”

  “Or DNA inherited from a homo sapien that cross bred with a Denisovan, or a Neanderthal that cross-bred with a Denisovan, and passed it on to us.” Vukovich said. “There are gaps in the human genome where Neanderthal genes must have existed, or Denisovan DNA for that matter, but which scientists now believe our bodies simply removed. What’s most stunning is how quickly we shed the genetic coding that arose from those matchups.”

  “Thus the converse must be true,” Cindy responded, thinking aloud. “If humans can drop much of the genetic code passed on by others, then we can add genetic code to jump up the evolutionary chain.”

  “Why is this so hard to understand?” Tanya sighed, glancing out the window at the darkening sky. “An Amur Tiger is genetically ninety-five percent the same as a house cat. However, tigers are rapidly evolving, exhibiting massive changes in metabolism, musculature, and even enhanced senses. All of which is by definition what happens when I change, just on a more rapid pace.”

  “With the Bubonic Plague systems that took years to develop break down within a single day.” Karlovic added, his needs boiling, “If an infected animal as small as a flea produces such incredible results why can’t the strain of plague passed on from the bite of a disproportionately larger creature produce more dramatic outcomes?”

  “The point is that these microorganisms are unpredictable,” Tanya said. “They react dissimilarly in diverse hosts in conflicting conditions. Here we have a type of natural selection whereby genes that when triggered kill in one context, but a mutated gene in another instance transform its host in a positive fashion.”

  “Assuming becoming a monster and eating people is positive,” Brody said.

  “But again, why did this happen in conjunction with the Bubonic Plague?” Owen asked.

  “Those absorbing the lupine plague experienced an interaction in their genetic code triggered in response to a potential species termination event,” Vukovich said. “The Plague didn’t just happen. It needed underlying conditions such as inequality and instability to wreak havoc on humans consuming at rates beyond the capacity of their surrounding environment.”

  “This makes no sense,” Brody said. “How does any of that relate to bacteria?”

  “During the end of the thirteenth century in Europe a milder climactic period wound down.” Owen said, his mind racing ahead as what Vukovich said began clicking into place. “The human population had exploded as agriculture flourished. Then the temperature fell. This brought down agricultural productivity. By the early part of the fourteenth century Europe’s population exceeded its food base. This produced malnutrition.”

  “Malnutrition leads to sickness and compromised immune systems,” Cindy said.

  “Peasants piled into Europe’s great cities, living in slums. Then in 1314 it began to rain and it just about never stopped.” Owen grimaced as another tremor rumbled through him, “The worst famine in over a century followed.”

  “In the meantime the Black Death spread along ancient trade routes.” Vukovich said. “W
hen the plague arrived in Europe’s malnourished and overpopulated cities—”

  “Social order broke down,” Owen finished Vukovich’s sentence. “In a matter of years the plague killed nearly two thirds of Europe’s population.”

  “Some people had been infected by a different strain,” Vukovich added. “We don’t know who patient zero was, and the assumption is that he or she was bit by an infected wolf, but regardless they had transformed forever. An interesting by-product of this Lupine strain derived from what it did not just to metabolism and appearance, but also to appetites.”

  “Appetites indeed,” Brody said.

  “We have since learned to moderate our needs, but we there’s a reason why our kind must prey on yours.” Vukovich replied.

  “That is?” Brody felt disgusted and intrigued at the same time.

  “Nature’s imperative is to create balance,” Vukovich said. “Remove one element and the system collapses. Look at the Chesapeake Bay. You killed the sharks. But the sharks ate rays. Rays eat oysters. No sharks meant too many rays and there went the oysters. An ecosystem that existed for millions of years was decimated all because one link in the food chain was destroyed. Similarly, in fourteenth century Europe humans created an imbalance. In that case nature created its answer but it spread unchecked. To control that answer nature responded yet again, by creating an organism that could stop those infected from sickening others.”

  “By removing the Plague’s food source,” Cindy said.

  “However, healthy humans proved far from thrilled with nature’s solution,” Vukovich responded, noticing Owen’s anguished glances out the window in response to the sun’s diminishing rays.

  “As a result this new balancing agent needed to imitate something that if seen in passing might be mistaken for an animal that would compel the observer to turn and flee, thereby limiting their ability to identify what they saw,” Cindy said, thinking aloud. “In Europe at that time only one animal could strike that kind of terror in a person. This new organism took the sensory capabilities and cunning of a wolf, mated these abilities to the physical strength of the strongest primate, and finished it all off with the cutting and slashing power of the carnivore’s fangs and claws. That’s nature’s chosen weapon for dealing with armed men who stood in the way of restoring equilibrium.”

  “Yes, and unfortunately many of our kind took liberties,” Vukovich said. “These excesses produced the legends.”

  “Excesses, liberties,” Brody said. “You sound like the head of the CIA inventing weasel words for torture.”

  “I will not deny our past,” Vukovich responded. “But we’ve been there to right the ship every time you’ve nearly destroyed yourselves.”

  “Destroyed ourselves?” Brody said. “Hold on there. That was a bug, virus, bacteria, or whatever that almost took us out.”

  “Haven’t you been listening?” Tanya flushed red, hormones jumping, feeling the moon rising.

  “Calm your tits down,” Cindy snapped back, sick of Tanya’s overbearing self-righteousness.

  Tanya threw a hostile stare at Cindy, before turning on Brody. “Overpopulation, destruction of resources, inequality, political instability, and climate change are what allowed the Plague to spread. These things are happening again as we speak. So though he,” She pointed at Vukovich, “is focusing on inequality leading to fascism and World War Three, my concerns go deeper. What if nature comes up with a different genetic mutation in response?”

  “The truth comes out,” Brody said. “Worried about your own future are you?”

  “Your fates and ours are intertwined,” Vukovich said. “The evidence is in the historical record. The Bubonic Plague returned in 1603 to London, to Italy in 1629, to Seville in 1647, London again in 1665, Vienna in 1679, Marseilles in 1720 and to Eastern Europe in 1738 and 1770. Each time we checked its progress. If you don’t believe me look at the spread of our legend.”

  “He’s right.” Cindy said. “Ernie and I found a history of werewolves in Lviv. The folklore spread with the Plague’s worst hit areas, from the Anglo-Saxons to the Germans before reaching the French. Then the mythology journeyed east, and as the conditions that produced the plague receded the legends—”

  “Faded away,” Vukovich said. “So did our numbers. The first generation that survived the human backlash left behind a smaller, more circumspect second generation so selective in its methods we became invisible. That is until Emily Garard’s writings regarding Transylvanian folklore stirred renewed interest in our kind. Luckily Bram Stoker deflected that attention in other directions.”

  “We evolved to prey on the weak. Like any other predator,” Karlovic said, letting out a deep breath as he battled against it welling up within him. “For most of your history there have been few people who didn’t fit that category.”

  “You had no problem ripping Cameron to pieces,” Brody said. “The man had a family and you killed him for what? To make a political point?”

  Karlovic glanced at Tanya then responded to Brody, “You are meat. Like any other beast.”

  “Open your eyes, Brody,” Vukovich said. “To maintain balance we will do whatever it takes, including by forcibly dialing back the predations of your human ‘one percent’ if I may use the parlance of our current times.”

  “Via killing people? That’s great, how good of you,” Brody said. “By the way dinner was wonderful. Though I wasn’t such a fan of the lecture, maybe Wagner should have been piped in to complete the mood.”

  “Don’t be so naïve,” Tanya said, “How else are we going to stop this madness? Fund a grass roots political organization with the goal of instituting a global wealth tax?”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Cindy interjected.

  “Capital is mobile,” Vukovich said, shaking his head no. “Given the political power this provides it also means it can’t be stopped by conventional methods.”

  “Why are you speaking of this?” Cindy asked pleadingly. “That is unless you’re going to kill us?”

  “If I wanted to kill you I would have dispensed with the explanation, this isn’t a James Bond movie. By sparing your lives I have shown you a path. The idea of being devoured is not pleasant but it’s time to know your place. After all, every other animal on this planet is part of the food chain.”

  “No, you’re the exception there,” Brody said.

  “That’s not entirely true,” Tanya shot a concerned glance at Vukovich.

  “Nature is resilient,” Vukovich said, pointedly ignoring her. “I have no doubt that if we abuse our position she will find an answer. In the meantime, the three of you are more powerful than you think, each with unique skill sets, access to critical information, and serving in networks crucial to protecting your nation’s ruling class. Together we could—”

  “This is madness,” Cindy said. “You’re discussing a revolution launched by werewolves.”

  “As if we’re so odd?” Tanya snarled. “Get the fuck over it. Do you want to just sit back and watch the world burn, or do something about it?”

  “I can bring purpose to your lives,” Vukovich said. “Cast off the artificial construct within which you waste your talents. See man’s world for what it is and not what it’s made to appear.” He rose, motioning toward Owen and Brody, “Nevertheless, time is not a luxury. I will first need the two of you to come with me.”

  “You said a test,” Tanya gasped, leaping from her chair. “Not that kind of test.”

  “What choice do I have?” Vukovich’s eyes softened. “You of all people must understand.”

  Tanya rushed to Owen who had also stood, albeit on shaky legs. She took his face in her hands. Owen’s heart danced in his chest as he kissed her. After a long moment he pulled away, choking back tears, whispering so only Tanya could hear, “I miss him Tanya. I miss him so much. He is, was my—”

  “Shhhh, I know,”
Taya said. “I too have lost, long ago. Even today there are no words that can describe the pain that I have felt. This pain, the pain that I have endured, the pain that can never be forgotten is, however, the pain that has made me into who I am. You too must be strong. Embrace your pain. Learn from it, and promise me that you’ll come back.”

  Owen quelled his trembling lips, nodding ‘yes’ and flashing the broad toothy smile she had come to love.

  Tanya spun on Vukovich, her beautifully sculpted face turning into a dark scowl.

  “You. Fucking. Asshole.”

  Vukovich tried to seem nonplussed as Tanya stormed away, his hands extended to Owen and Brody, “Come. There is nothing to be afraid of, at least not yet.”

  Chapter 32

  August 2016 – Dibrovno, Western Ukraine

  Brody battled the uneasy feeling of his guts sloshing around as the Polish built Sokół helicopter rose and fell with each undulation in the earth. Twin 900 horsepower turbo shaft engines powered the big rotors whomping away above the vibrating ceiling, Owen the only other passenger in the spacious cabin. Movement out of the corner of his eye caused Brody to turn and see Vukovich working his way back from the co-pilot seat. Vukovich crouched down in the passageway, seemingly oblivious to the floor tilting with each juke of the powerful helicopter.

  “This is madness,” Brody yelled at Vukovich over the incessant thrumming of the helicopter’s blades.

  “Don’t talk like that,” Vukovich barked. “You want to sound like one of them, to be one of them, but you’re not. Face it. You’re much more like me.”

  “I’m hardly—”

  “Global elites are waging war on humanity for no reason other than sheer greed. I know how much this vast inequality grinds at your sense of justice. Are the one percent not rentiers? Are they not parasites? They need to be cleansed from the human host, do they not?”

  “It’s murder,” Owen interjected, his eyes shining like glass.

  “Would you rather see millions die?” Vukovich responded. “That’s what I call murder. Especially when the alternative merely involves removing the few hundred individuals responsible for turning progress back centuries.”