Duel Nature

by John Conroe

  The forest quieted by degrees, falling into a complete silence. Then the stench of rotting flesh and feces rolled over me, giving me a split second before it appeared on the twisted trunk of the maple. It could have been the same monster from the night before or its twin. Same ugly elongated, skeletal build, covered with grayish skin and cabled muscle. Same needle sharp teeth and wicked claw-tipped hands. Goblin ears and huge light-catching orange eyes. Those lantern eyes stared straight at me, penetrating the dark shadows I was hidden in. It hissed. It leapt.

  I was watching all this as an observer, my Grim side running the show from the moment I awoke. My combat persona surprised both watcher-me and the Cheeno. We/I sprang right at the oncoming monster, meeting it in mid-air, shooting under its outstretched arms like an Olympic wrestler. My body twisted in mid-air, changing both our direction of flight and the sudden landing that came after.

  Grim, my second personality, is a savant. My therapist, who is also my liaison with the federal government, thinks that part of my mind split itself when I was eight. When my family was axed to death in front of me. Somehow I compartmentalized the primitive, savage part of my mind that a million years ago help Grok, my caveman ancestor to fight and survive. I packed that fighter-self into its own section and left it to face the demon that killed my folks. Gina says that when faced with traumatic horror people, especially children, may split off a part of their personality to deal with it.

  In my case, Grim sat silent for years, absorbing every martial arts class, every defensive tactic, every combat lesson I ever learned. And he (if I can, in fact refer to a part of myself that way) assimilated and meshed those lessons with genius. When I was exposed to demonic blood, it bound itself to the Grim part of me, giving my savage self a boost of ruthless ability that was, frankly, scary. Grim would have been a frightening adversary in a normal body, being able to push it beyond human limitations. In my V-squared riddled, metabolically jacked, exponentially stronger vampire-like body, equipped with my God given aura abilities, well, Grim was like Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer mixed with Wolverine and Sargent Slaughter on steroids. And he’d (I’d?) apparently been thinking about my/our last bout with Cheeno beast.

  I/we landed on the gray skinned rubbery monster, my limbs and torso wreathed with mono-molecular aura blades, including the forearm that was against its throat. The Cheeno screamed a short abbreviated screech as its body exploded into at least seven individual and highly disgusting chunks, plus whole slew of smaller, mushier pieces, all liberally coated with an oil thick, black blood-like fluid.

  Knowing it was demonic in nature, I wrestled back enough control from Grim to try and push the evil essence from the body, er, chunks. But the particular spidey-sense that I use with demons gave me some strange feedback. The demon wasn’t spread throughout the body like the Hellbourne I was used to dealing with. Instead it was all concentrated in the spattered mush that used to be the thing’s chest.

  Reaching my left hand into the black and gray goo, I encountered a large hard lump. An ice cold pod the size of a grapefruit. Pulling it out I found myself holding a frozen black heart that practically screamed with demonic evil. I threw it straight up into the air overhead and called to Kirby in my head. My mental cry was answered with the mother of all raptor shrieks as the giant, cloudy-dark form of the God’s Hawk flashed into our realm of existence, snatched the demon heart in a talon that could have been at home on the end of a logger’s Cherry picker, and blinked back out of the sky. All told, the whole exchange took a shade over two seconds.

  Everyone around me was frozen in place, staring with eyes wide, even the two remaining Cheenos that had just crawled to the top of the leaf strewn tree trunks they had knocked over to breach the wards.

  A number of things happened at the same time as the others unfroze. The moon chose that moment to break over the edge of the forest, its cold white light making the resort daytime bright to my enhanced vision. Jake, in his circle, Changed, screaming with pain as his limbs and body first deconstructed then rebuilt into something new. Britta, who had moved closer to the circle that held Jake, screamed and whirled toward him, her right foot scuffing the salt line that made up the magic circle. At the same time, both Cheenos moved forward twenty feet in a blur, keeping all Grim’s attention on them.

  I moved to intercept the closest monster, but they moved as a team, each as fast as I. There are tricks to fighting multiple opponents at the same time, but it is very difficult to prevail against coordinated fighters. But I didn’t have to win, I just needed to stall.

  Darting closer to the fire, I grabbed two rounds of firewood, each oak and each about a foot in diameter. The one in my right hand got flung at the far ghoul, who jumped aside with liquid ease. That freed up both hands to piston fire the second chunk like a super dense medicine ball. The distance was shorter and the speed greater, so the monster closest to me had to work a bit harder to dodge the projectile. Grim’s throw was slightly off center, coming closer to the monster’s left arm. Naturally it jumped to its right side, running into my aural whip. The lash of energy sliced across the Cheeno’s chest and abdomen, opening a deep gash that shone wetly with black intestine. The wound started to close itself almost as soon as it was made, but I was faster, using my left hand to call the monster’s digestive tract toward me. A wet rope of black innards yanked through the open wound, stopped from exiting by the self-zipping wound, which in turn was kept from closing by the hose of guts. I didn’t know a lot about Cheenos or Wendigos but I learned something that night….they hate having their guts ripped out!

  The seven foot ghoul screamed in agony, then lowered its hate filled gaze and charged. My left hand yanked again on the intestine leash, succeeding in pulling them out far enough to trip the Cheeno.

  That was as far as I got with that one, as a freight train suddenly ran me over. The third Cheeno went right over me, slashing with one set of razor claws. Fire flashed across my back as I ate dirt. But the weight was momentary, as the monster kept running straight for the circle that was now broken. The vulnerable werewolf at its center was still finishing his Change.

  I bounced to my feet, but was too far away to catch up with the awful speed of the Cheeno. It leapt for the circle, mouth agape and ready to rend. A brown and black blur met it in mid-air, Awasos in wolf form speeding to intercept the demonic ghoul. The wolf was smaller than the demon, but that was only momentary, because as soon as his hind feet left the ground, Awasos Changed. The big wolf became a much bigger bear and the Cheeno was knocked completely away from the circle by a half ton of grizzly. Bones crunched and flesh shredded as my were bear-wolf indulged himself in a rare blood frenzy. The gray monster literally disappeared in multiple sprays of flesh and black blood.

  Behind me, Jake stood unsteadily on four heavy feet, shook himself and began to move unerringly toward Britta and the breach in the circle. Gaining speed with every step, the young were charged right out of the circle, knocked the blonde teen over on his way and darted into the forest. The gutted Cheeno screeched at the disappearing were, completely ignoring the fate of his fellow demon. It slashed the rope of its own intestines away with one set of horrid claws, then leapt after the running wolf, even as its stomach finished healing. Moving much faster than the wolf it sped into the forest. A black-haired, blue-eyed blur sailed past me at full vampire speed, chasing the monster that was chasing the wolf.

  Moving over to the bear and the dripping black mess he had made of the Cheeno, I reached into the mush and groped for the frozen heart. “Help Tanya!” I said to Awasos. He slapped the skull of the ghoul, crushing it flat with one giant paw, then changed form to the faster wolf shape and flashed after my vampire.

  I wasted no time in finding the demonic seed in the ruins of the Cheeno’s chest, hoisting it high and calling Kirby in my mind.

  The giant bird flashed in, grabbed the Cheeno heart and flashed back out, leaving me free to race after my bear-wolf and mate.

  Chapter 17

  T
he trail was clear. Jake’s wolf form wasn’t the most graceful of weres and he had to weigh close to 400 pounds. Smashed logs, broken saplings and piles of leaves that looked bulldozed led me along his trail. The three supernaturals following him left much less evidence but small signs of their passage were still visible. In the thirty seconds it had taken me to deliver the other Cheeno into Kirby’s iron grip, Jake had managed to cover the better part of a third of a mile through the thick forest.

  I caught up to the group just before the big swamp. Sometime in the past few years, a storm of some type had blown over a pair of old pine trees. Their root bases had been wide but shallow and when they got ripped from the ground, the root structures had formed giant discs that stuck straight up twenty feet, forming a wall of sorts that the new werewolf hadn’t had time to get past. Jake was on the far side of the little clearing near the base of the root bundles, guarded by the smaller wolf form of Awasos. Smaller doesn’t always mean weaker, as Awasos commands strength beyond that of normal weres. At only 250 pounds, he was still easily able to keep the bigger Jake away from the combat that was occurring twenty feet away.

  The Cheeno had met my vampire and her tungsten swords and I got the distinct impression that it wasn’t enjoying the introduction even a tiny bit. Every move it made was countered at a speed that more than matched its own. Super hard, razor sharp tungsten was clipping body parts from the demon faster than it could regrow them. The whirlwind of gray monster and black-clad vampire was moving almost faster than I could follow.

  The mayhem paused for a moment, the Cheeno frustrated by its inability to get at the were. I had no idea why they hungered for werewolves so much but that mystery was going to have to wait, as the monster spotted me.

  It moved my way in an awful blur, Grim automatically moving up to the forefront of my consciousness to meet it. Tanya started after it, which in hindsight was likely the reaction it wanted. Stopping its forward momentum completely, it whirled to face her, actually stretching back to catch her in its claws as she barreled in our direction.

  The Cheeno lunged toward my vampire, razor talons open to clasp her arms before she could regroup to swing her swords. In a micro second it became clear its intent and every possible way that the whole thing could go wrong for Tanya flashed through my head. I’m not saying that it really would have had her – my vampire is really, really good in a fight, but I wasn’t happy with the implications of her forward momentum and its grotesque athletic performance. Grim wasn’t either. Fast as all of this flowed through my head, Grim was moving.

  The Cheeno was by necessity balanced on one leg, the other pointing back my way to balance its reach. I grabbed the outstretched leg in both hands and pulled, which first stopped its lunge and then started to drag it my way.

  Of course, Tanya was privy to most of my thoughts, as our personal comm link had ratcheted up to full combat mode in the blink of an Elder vampire’s eye. Anticipating my action, she stepped sideways to her left, then spun counterclockwise, letting her right leg sweep over the ground as momentum did the work of turning her completely back around. Both swords swept up, around and down, the right blade cleaving the hands from the monster while the left blade snatched its head from the trunk of its neck.

  My rearward pull had enough power to yank its body off the ground and my own spin sent the headless, handless carcass flying through the air to crunch into a thick beech tree. Oily black blood sprayed everywhere while the broken body convulsed on the ground, while thirty free away the needle lined mouth continued to snap and the disconnected hands clenched over and over.

  The body stopped its motion when Awasos in grizz form landed on it with all four turkey-platter feet. He growled as he stepped off (actually, it was more like stepped out of) the mess. I reached into the flattened chest and pulled out the partially crushed and frozen black heart. A second later, Kirby caught the third and last demonic organ of the night and screeched in triumph as he flickered out of sight.

  For a moment we all just looked at each other, then we all turned looked at the remains.

  I burned the body where it lay, blasting it with aura till it came apart and blew away like sand on the beach. I can’t always muster that much power unless I’m angry, but fighting demonic monsters that consume werewolves apparently gave me the necessary motivation.

  Jake tried to take off, but Awasos, back in wolf mode, brought him back in line. Jake seemed to think that because he was bigger than ‘Sos he got to be boss. My wolf disabused him of that idea right quick. Awasos was stronger, faster and had spent enough time around the New York pack to pick up the wheres and hows of establishing dominance.

  We got back to the resort to find Garth and Tom burning the Cheenos on one of the big bonfires. A pall of greasy black smoke that stank of charred flesh stretched into the moonlit night. Erika and Britta were spreading salt over the two black blood soaked patches of ground where the demonic monsters died. Everyone froze when the two wolves trotted out after us, but ‘Sos simply led Jake back to the circle and lay down next to him. Jake got the idea and settled in while Quinby closed the circle with fresh salt and re-invoked it, after letting Awasos back out.

  The Clevelands were gone. They had packed their stuff in a flurry and left, something about trees falling and demonic screeches in the night being too much for them. It was the first smart thing I had seen from Cleveland.

  Mitch and Gordon were up and watching the cleanup with open mouths. No one had said a word to them so I took them aside and had a little chat.

  “You ever hear of Wendigos?” I asked.

  “Of course!” Mitch answered after glancing at his partner.

  “Well those are the remains of a couple of them that lived in this forest. They’re demonic in nature and from what I can gather, are particularly dangerous to weres.”

  “Weres? As in werewolves?” Gordon asked, glancing at Jake in the circle and Awasos a few yards away.

  “Yeah, the Dogman sightings are based on werewolves, of which Michigan has a healthy population. This forest though has been off limits to the local packs because of the wendigos.”

  “How can anything prey on werewolves?” Mitch asked, a thousand more questions bubbling behind his eyes.

  “Demons can project a sort of cloak, not so much of invisibility but of ‘you don’t see me’. It effects humans, weres and vampires as far as I know.”

  “How do you know, Chris? Who are you? How did these wendigos die? And vampires? ” Mitch asked in a flurry.

  “I specialize in demons. I’ve done it my whole life. Some people will tell you I was chosen by God to live this life, but I don’t know. It’s just what I do. Tanya, Awasos and I are a team, we trouble shoot problems in the supernatural world,” I said with a wave at the bonfire and its greasy pall of black smoke. “And yes vampires.”

  “I don’t understand what’s happening here? Who is the wolf? “ Gordon asked.

  “The wolf is Jake. He’s a new were and was coming here to be secluded when the moon made him Change. His presence brought the wendigos around. They had always avoided the Boklunds before, but the draw of a young were was irresistible to them. I still don’t know why the wendigos prefer to hunt weres except that if they fed on life force then supernaturals might provide a greater dose. We didn’t know where the demons had come from or what gave them their abilities, but we are reasonably sure they have been eradicated.”

  “The bird thing? That was part of the…what do you call it? Exorcism?” Mitch asked.

  “Yes,” I said, nodding. “He removes them from our realm or dimension if you will and hauls them back to their own.”

  “How did that thing know to come for them?” Gordon asked.

  “I called him,” I answered.

  “What? You have a cell phone to heaven or something?” Mitch asked, incredulous. ‘This is ridiculous.”

  “You know what? You’re right. Just a big joke and now you’re on to us,” I said, standing up from the picnic table we were se
ated at and dusting off my pants.

  “Wait, you can’t do that! You can’t tell us this fantastic story and then tell us to forget about it or provide proof,” Gordon said.

  “Listen, if you want proof, just sit back and watch the wolf in the circle. In a few hours he’s gonna change back into a naked guy. But no photos!” I admonished with a finger wave. “In fact you can’t write up any of this!”

  “What! Why not?” Mitch asked.

  “Because the supernatural world wants to stay hidden and it protects its secrets viciously. If you try to publish any of this stuff I can’t be responsible for what happens to you,” I said.

  “That’s a threat? You’re threatening us?” Mitch asked, getting angry.

  “No Mitch, I’m explaining the facts of life to you. Should you try to publish this stuff, you’ll find yourselves out of jobs, with broken credit ratings and completely discredited. There are really powerful people who have a vested interest in keeping this stuff quiet. Their reach is long and deep.”

  The two men exchanged glances then turned back to me.

  “So that’s it? We get to watch a real werewolf turn back to human but can’t study it?” Gordon asked.