Moonweavers

by Savage, J. T.

  15

  Within the confines of the wolves lair, the slow changed occurred. Zoth and all of his troops slowly change into their wolf forms. All of the moans and bones popping, along with howls, drowned out the lonesome echo of the water drop that echoed the chamber as they slept. They all squeeze through the corridors of the caves dwellings going in and out of water chambers until they reach the exit that is capped off with clay. They wait. Zoth shuffles through the crowd to get to the front and with a tackle from his shoulders, just like ramming a door, he breaks through. They all quickly make their way down the mountain, jumping, until they get to the forest at the mountains floor. They all seem to run in pairs, making sure that their partner wouldn’t be slowing down for anything. They all seem to have the look of malice. The only agenda is to please their leader. They follow Zoth through the woods. They all have the same mane as their maker. Each of the three wolves were slightly different. The one that challenged Zoth long ago was brown. Zoth was completely black. The other was grey and white. You would think they would make a lot of noise on the leafy canopy of the forest floor, but they don’t. All you hear is branches snap or pop now and again. Any leaves that you would happen to hear were mainly from the wind as it rustled about. They move fast through the night, keeping a good pace. They quickly cross the highway. The blur from the speed made it look like a small hairy train crossing the road, but there were no cars on the highway that night. The pack is now near where the carnage happened at the suburb. They don’t enter the suburb, but stay on the outskirts of it, while heading closer to town, ignoring the small houses on the way. The hairy train of death moved forward in unison, like it is running on invisible rails. They cross a gravel road and end up in a cornfield. They are running up and down the rows of the cornfield hardly putting a dent in the impact of their speed as they roll on through on their death mission, to search, seek and destroy. As the moonlight shines down on the death train, it seems to fuel the wolves as it shines down, pumping them with an adrenaline rush as they run wild and free towards the town of Marblehead Ridge. Now as they appear on the other side of the cornfield, a car quickly skids to a halt in front of the wolves path. The brown wolf stops and growls at the man in the car and jumps straight through the window and attacks the mans throat. The wolf rips the juggler right out of the mans throat and chews. The blood runs down into the mane staining it pink under its beard. The wolf man quickly turns and jumps out the window. The car slowly glides forward as the dead mans foot releases the brake. The car rolls right off the embankment into the ditch in front of the cornfield. The headlights are barely noticeable through the murky water in the ditch. As it sets, vertical, exhausts shoots out the back end. The wolf turns to join the pack, more invigorated than ever with the taste of blood. An isolated truck stop was the first place hit. The men sleeping in their trucks with the engines running, didn’t stand a chance as the wolves entered, changing some and killing others instantly. The wave of carnage spread like a plague throughout the parking lot. One of the wolves bash through the giant glass window of the establishment. The others quickly swarm in. The woman behind the counter puts her head between her knees and starts to pray, afraid to look up. Zoth jumps on the counter and stares down at the woman. He bares his teeth and growls. His blood stained teeth drip with stained saliva that is pink and clear. The woman slowly builds up the courage to peek upward. She sees the completely black eyes of the wolf. She stares in awe at the black pearl eyes. She whimpers, “No, no please no!” and hangs her head once again back down. The wolf jumps down on her and claws through her uniform, ripping it completely off, leaving a giant scratch along her spinal cord. Blood quickly oozes out. The woman feints and lies motionless behind the counter on the hard tiled floor. Zoth jumps back up on the top of the counter and over to another victim. A big trucker runs and grabs a bottle of whiskey off the counter from a display rack. He swings it and hits Zoth in the ribs, bolting him over on to his side, sliding a little down the counter top. His back paw clings to the counter corner and Zoth leaps down on to the trucker. Zoth pins the big man down. His nostrils flare in and out as he looks down face to face at the truck driver. Zoth picks the whiskey bottle up off the ground, raises it above his head and jams it, nozzle first into the truck drivers eye. He then takes his index claw of his right hand and scratches the big mans chest all the way down to his belly button. He leaps off and runs through the broken window. The long florescent lights flicker on and off submerging the whole station in blackness, seconds at a time. Some of the customers head in the restrooms with the door locked. The wolves beat at the door, ramming it with their massive shoulders. Splinters fly in the air as the door hit’s the floor. Blood splatters all along the tile of the bathroom wall. The wolves rip and tear at their victims, growling and howling. Bones snap in their canine teeth as they continue to devour. Another batch of wolves do it to the men’s room door, leaving similar carnage. After no one is alive or either infected, they all jump out the window, that much closer to town. They smack their lips as they catch their breaths. The pack grows four more stronger as the victims stagger out of the gas station window. The pack begins to run again toward the small town. The victims slowly change and follow later, slowly emerging out of their trucks heading in the direction the wolves went. They all have visible paw marks on their face and hands though the clothing. As the moonlight heals their wounds and turns them to scars, they gather in the gas station parking lot before they pair up and continue on the wolves course, to search, seek and devour. The parking lot becomes completely empty of life. Plastic bags fly in the air around it in the wind. The light that was flickering is completely off leaving the old interior of the gas station bleak, dark and silent. The only other light besides the moonlight was the light poles that didn’t get knocked down from the wolves attack.

  At the very corner of the parking lot, the semi lights turn on and the engine roars a pulsating hum as it idles. In the sleeper of the cab of the semi lies a mangled dead trucker. The wolf that executed his demise was the wolf man that drove the truck in his previous life. With a plan to raid the bases, the truck slowly pulls out to the end of the parking lot and down the highway toward Marblehead Ridge, gathering speed as it turned right. Then a honk from a red blazer sirens around the truck and quickly passes it. The wolf completely ignores the truck as it drives by rapidly. He turns the CB on and listens as the other humans communicate on it. He picks up the mic, holds down the button on the small radio through his long clawed paw fingers. He growls and howls into the microphone. Then growls and howls into the microphone again. When he releases the button, the people start speaking angrily at him, telling the kids to go to bed already, thinking it was some kind of practical joke that the local kids would play on the CB’s of their parents and cars and houses. One makes a joke saying it sounds like that kid they call Superman, that kept yelling ‘Superman’ all the time into the mic, henceforth giving him the name Superman. Another one says, “No, no, that ain’t Superman. He don’t sound that scary. If you ask me, someone is torturing a dog or something.” Another man interupts and says, “When I drive through Wisconsin, they got a guy around them parts they call the Crazy Peanut. He keeps yelling stuff like that. That’s the first time I ever heard some crap like that, over.” The werewolf quickly changes the band on the radio to the police emergency station, one strictly meant for emergencies. Then he gives an eerie laugh, almost growl like as he picks up the mic once more. An exaggerated long, thumb like paw, grips the button down. He holds it up to his snout and starts to talk into it. “Little pig, little pig.” Then howls into the mic. A white car comes toward the truck. Its headlights flash and then it honks as it drives around the massive truck driving straight down the middle of the road, taking up both lanes as it flies toward town once more. He yells into the mic, “Little pig, little pig!” He hears some squeaks and beeps come out of the speaker and a woman’s voice appears. “This channel is meant for emergencies only,” says the voice on the other end of the r
adio. “Please, do not use it again.” The wolf repeats into the microphone, “Little pig, little pig.” The curly cord snaps as it breaks off the unit of the radio and pops the wolf as it coils back to its original form. The wolf sees what happens and throws it quickly out the broken window of the passenger side of the truck. The voice on the radio says, “Thank you.” The wolf shuts it off and turns on the radio. Some country twang comes through the speakers of the radio. The wolf changes gears and speeds up a little more as he heads straight down the highway literally on the lines. More cars honk and pass as they drive by. The big semi never leaves the middle lane. The giant claw of his index finger hits another button on the radio and some rock and roll comes out of the radio from this preset button. He quickly howls to the sounds of death metal drums and heavy guitar riffs and an ever so often cowbell. A deer runs frantically into the road, startled from something in the woods. The semi quickly disposes of it as it explodes from the impact of the grill leaving only small remnants, bits and pieces and a giant red stain in the road. Barely slowing the semi down, the wolf licks his long fangs as the windshield wiper he just turned on cleans off the bloody mess from the windshield. The wolf switches yet to a higher gear as he drives down the highway, laughing and howling all the way. He then pounds the steering wheel with the back of a furry gripped fist, keeping the rhythm of a more pronounced cowbell sound on the radio. He sees the red bronco disappear over the top of the hill up ahead. He puts the truck into one more gear as he floors it. He grips the steering wheel harder, giving the big semi all it has. He turns the thrash metal up higher, bangs his head up and down, as the truck speeds over the hill. He almost jackknives the semi but quickly corrects the positioning of the back trailer so that it doesn’t come back on him, with a reaction time much quicker as a wolf than a man driving a semi. Somehow he manages to get all the wheels to land straight enough on his descent down. He howls with glee. The red bronco is no where to be found. He thinks they must have turned off somewhere. He then goes back to thrashing his head up and down again, forgetting about the red bronco entirely heading down the strip of highway to town.

  16

  As the professor and his team drive down the road in the bronco, the wolf pack is barely visible, far off to the right in the woods next to the highway. The perverted slave driver is having issues in the semi in front of him, driving straight down the middle of the road. He honks in frustration as he drives by and speeds up the bronco. The left front wheel slides off the pavement now and again as he glides by, making him honk more and get more frustrated at the same time. They manage to get by the semi. Tab is in the back seat and tells the driver, “Turn right here. It’s far enough away from town that no one will get hurt. Drive straight down this gravel road and stop right up there where the clearing is. It’ll be a perfect place to set up.”

  The driver doesn’t say a word, but does what she says and turns into the clearing to park . They all scramble out of the vehicle to set up the gravity mines. “Hurry, hurry!” Tab yells to the others. “I can hear them coming!” The driver quickly sets the last one down. The mines form a complete straight line next to the road. The professor hit’s the on button of the remote control and points it to the VCR on the ground that controlled all the mines. The electrical pulse hums once more like in the cellar. They keep speeding on and on directly into the trail of the path that leads straight to the gravity mine. As wolves enter the gravity mine field, they fall straight down, getting sucked down like a magnet to metal. A few of the wolves attempt to crawl but can’t. At the most, they can only wiggle their arm or leg just a touch. They are all now completely stuck to the ground. Tab laughs and jumps up and down yelling, “It’s working, it’s working! You did it professor,” giving him a big hug. The professor wasn’t expecting this and drops the remote control onto the ground. When it hit the ground, it hit the power button, therefore turning off the VCR that ran the makeshift gravity mines. All the wolves are starting to get up from the dog pile they made from crashing into each other as they stopped suddenly. Tab yells, “Oh, shit!” As the smile runs down into a frown on her face. The professor hit’s the power button on the remote control once more but nothing happens. “There must be a loose connection from the wires that go to the cigarette lighter.” He double checks the connection of the extension cord, making sure that it is plugged in securely and hops out of the bronco and tries the remote once more. The little red light in the corner of the device pops on and the wolves drop to the ground again. He pumps up the volume button to make sure they stay stuck as it makes the gravity force stronger. He takes it from five to seven on the volume scale. The wolves yip, growl and bark as they lay there motionless unable to do a thing. The captain pulls his sword out and says, “Aye, matey, lets go thin the herd.” He points to the wolf pile with his blade. With his left hand, he reaches inside his coat and pulls out an ancient pistol. He takes aim at one of the werewolves and fires. The musket ball shoots out rapidly as the black powder flies through the air, making its mark into a wolf’s skull and out the back end, killing it completely. The professor reaches into his pocket of his white coat and grabs two pens from his pocket protector. He grips them tight with both hands. Zoth and the others are so stuck to the ground, they can’t even open their mouths. The only thing the guardians see when they look down at the pile are eyes jittering back and forth and the growls and whimpers from the beasts from the pile . Jade grabs a big stick that is laying on the ground and Tab grabs a rock. The captain was the first one to make an attack. He cuts off the head of a wolf in one big swoop. He kicks the head as far as he can. He keeps using this method as he goes down the line. The professor raises the pen with his right arm and jabs it into a wolf’s ear, completely submerging it in, then pulls it out and wipes it on his coat. You can hear the thud from the stick that Jade swings. It thumps and thumps with an eerie, squishy sound at every drop. Tabs giant rock does the same with a little louder thud. Soon the growls are silent. The other humans and animals farther down out of the gravity mines field, stop and stare in awe as their leaders die they disperse into the woods, literally running in different directions for their lives. Tab sees what is happening as she is holding up the big boulder ready to smash another skull. She quickly tosses it to the side and yells, “Look! Their getting away!”

  “We have to dispose of the leaders first,” the professor replied as he pokes his pen through another ear back and forth, up and down, making sure to wiggle it around within the brain stem. Jade stabs her stiletto heal into Uno the rat, that even in death lays next to his master, Zoth. They poke, cut and smash forever it seems, until they are positively sure that the whole area has been dispatched of the virus completely. After the bloody deed is done, the professor walks toward the remote control, picks it up and turns the machinery off. The perverted human driver, picks up all the mines and puts them into the bronco for the team without hesitation.

  “Why didn’t the other people turn into their human form after their leader was dead?” Tab asks the professor. “That’s how it always happens in the movies.”

  Jade replies, “Yea, they just ran off.”

  The professor says, “Because they are infected. It’s not like the movies, young lady. We will have to just wait and see if they can infect others or not. If so, we might have an epidemic of epic proportions. We will never be able to find them all. The only thing we can really be thankful for is that they are not running into the town. “

  Tab suddenly yells, “Oh my God! Patty! My daughter lives out that way! We have to go check and see if she is alright. Please, Professor! Don’t let anything happen to my baby. She is all I have.”

  “We will have the driver swing by there, Tab. I promise. But we will have to keep a low profile and park down the road. Anyone sees this guy driving around, they will be sure to be suspicious,” the professor said while pointing toward the perverted driver.

  Jade grabs Tab shoulder and escorts her to the vehicle. They get in and head to Patty’s house. Just
before they get onto the highway and off the gravel road, they see a convoy of red and blue flashes from police lights heading away from town, their very direction. They stop only four miles from where the battle took place, at the truck stop just before town.

  “It must have been the wolves!”, Jade yells “Before their attack on us.”

  The captain laughs, “Aye, you mean before their demise, me lassie.”

  They gawk harder as they drive by.

  “How are we going to capture the rest of the wolves, Professor?” Tab asks.

  “It will take some time, that’s for sure,” he replied. “We will have to ask Links when we get back to the cabin. He’ll know more about it. He can figure this out. I have nothing but the utmost respect for the man.”

  Jade says, “I just feel terrible for all those innocent people that got hurt.”

  “It is a shame, isn’t it Jade. But think how much more carnage would have happened if we didn’t intervene,” the professor said.

  “You’re right Professor,” Tab interrupts.

  “Aye, it is so.” says the pirate. “During the black plague, the bodies were piled three stories high to be set on fire. Stench was awful. There is some things that you just don’t forget.”

  “Oh my God, Captain, you saw the black plague?” Jade asks astonished.

  “Aye, it is nothing I care to remember. I told Links when we first met, knowing he would understand living back then, it was hard times. People just didn’t get as old as they do now, aye. And that damn plague.” He looks into the distance at nothing when he says this, “was the biggest curse on humanity that the moon ever bestowed on all of us. The black death took out a big chunk of the population. I was just a kid. My mother and father were dead. My brothers and sisters left. I never saw them again. It was the day I started my sea voyage. All I wanted to do was to get as far away from that damn disease as I could. Scared for my life, I stowed away on a boat. They found me three days later, cold and hungry, trying to get me some food out of the galley. That’s when they hired me to help the cook, who took a liking to me and showed me the ropes of the sea, to make me the captain I am today. I thank ole Jim. He was a very good man. The work was cold and hard, but I managed to grow to love the ships and the sea. For the rest of my living days, I lived upon the oceans. They were hard times indeed.” He looks down and becomes silent in the back of the bronco. Tab who was sitting next to him, gives the captain a hug and tries to comfort his memories. The rest of the drive is pretty silent.