Pack

by Mike Bockoven

  “Sir!” Antonio yelled. “The van is …signaling.”

  Sure enough, the Suburban’s left turn signal was blinking a fluorescent red, made all the harsher by proximity.

  “He’s not going to turn,” Stander said, leaning forward in his seat. “What the hell is he doing?”

  Slowly, and as if merging politely into traffic, the Suburban started changing lanes but before Antonio or his boss could see an inch of daylight, the motorcycle who was leading the pack roared to take its place. The motorcycle rider didn’t turn around, confident in his bearings and in that moment Stander no longer cared about what the hell they were doing. There was sky in front of him and Stander wanted to seize it.

  “HIT HIM!”

  •••

  The switch was as smooth as if they had practiced it. Carl swerved, Dave got in front and the second he heard the cruiser’s engine rev, he accelerated, his eyes hard and focused in front of him. He had driven this road literally thousands of times and knew every slight turn, every crack in the pavement.

  Every historical marker made of granite and weighing well over a ton and buried deep.

  Dave also knew, all too well, that when the sun was starting its descent, it was sometimes hard to see. He had almost hit the damn thing dozens of times. Now his life depended on a stranger making the same mistake.

  The granite marker came up fast, faster than Dave had anticipated. The plan was to stay on his wheels as long as he could, but to lay the bike down in the soft Earth off the road if that wasn’t possible. Everything happened so fast that Dave immediately knew he’d have to lay the bike down, and slammed on the break for as one of the longest seconds of his life, then turned hard away from the marker. The bike immediately went down, sliding along the Earth that was now decidedly not so soft, and Dave slide for a few meters before going in to a roll. He spun and spun, his arms up next to his head.

  •••

  If anyone had a great view of the action, it was Ron. He was the support car and his job was to “play the invariables.” If anyone got hurt, his job was to help. If gunfire were needed, he and his revolver riding in the passenger seat (shotgun! Ha!), could handle that as well. As it stood, he saw Dave come up on the marker, saw him lay the bike down and tumble, and saw Stander and crew plow, head long and at a speed of roughly 45 miles an hour, square in to the thing. The car hit the marker on its driver’s side, crushing the headlight and hood and sending it spinning across the other lanes. The ditch was a little higher on that part of the road, so when the cruiser spun at high speed into the ditch, the car tipped over on its side. Momentum continued carrying them over on the hood and come to a rest, wheels spinning, engine smoking and a dank smell of oil coming up from the scene.

  For the monument’s part, the car took a big chunk out of one side. Other than that, it wasn’t going anywhere.

  Ron checked on Dave first and was surprised to see him already up and walking toward the road. He pulled over along the side.

  “You OK?”

  “That was …a ride,” Dave said.

  “Bleeding or anything?”

  “I’m sure I am somewhere,” he said, knowing full well his chest wound from earlier had torn open and was bleeding badly. “Let’s move. Nobody’s getting away today.”

  Ron suppressed a smile as he hopped out of his car and followed. The other cars had pulled around by this point and were making their way back to the wreck. On the way, JoAnn drove up and rolled down the window.

  “Everyone OK?”

  “Yeah,” Ron said. “You might as well drive off. You’re not going to want to see this.”

  The windows on all sides of the cruiser had shattered from the impact, and Stander had already exited the car and was crawling, fist over fist, through the wet dirt and grass that had survived the cold of the season. One leg was at a terrible angle, obviously broken and the other seemed fine, but Ron wasn’t about to ask why he wasn’t using it. Kenny pulled up next, followed by Carl who had the windows down and the radio cranked. That was fine, Ron thought. Covering up the screams was probably a better idea than not. Besides, he had always loved this song, even the creepy kid prayer at the end.

  If I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take …

  Stander never stopped crawling, even when Dave and Ron and Carl and Kenny made their way down in to the ditch, but crawling is a slow way to move and the men, wearing big smiles and removing their shirts, caught up to him in a few steps. The company man was grunting with exertion and pain, his face caked in blood and dirt. His bow tie was nowhere to be seen.

  From inside the car, Stu had awoken with a jolt to find himself in a crunched and leaking car and staring out the window at the naked backs of four men. And hearing Metallica for some reason.

  Hush little baby, don’t say a word

  He felt the presence of the men behind him and even sensed that they had begun to change but the company man on the ground continued to claw big fistfuls of mud in an attempt to pull himself somewhere, anywhere other than where he was. He knew something very bad had happened to his leg, but didn’t want to see. Tears came to his eyes, partly from pain and partly because he didn’t even want this, didn’t want this job or this life. He wasn’t a killer, not a bad guy. He had a temper, sure …

  …and never mind that noise you heard

  Inside the car, Stu’s memories flooded back and while he couldn’t yet put two and two together, he remembered the danger, the sneaking around, the torture, his sister and all the rest. He also saw the man in the driver’s seat start to mess with his door.

  It’s just the beasts under your bed …

  For most of their lives, the pack had to draw on very specific memories in order to transform. That was not the case anymore. There was prey, wounded and supine in front of them, bleeding and desperate. They transformed quickly and without pain.

  In your closet, in your head …

  Stu saw the wolves lunge in one, fluid motion at whatever was on the ground. One of them threw what looked like a body, hard, against a nearby telephone pole while another grabbed the body in its jaws and threw it back toward the car. Then they all descended, mouths open, latching on to arms, legs, shoulders, thighs and any center mass they could find to tear skin away and feast on the blood that gushed forth. Every part of the body was covered in fur and teeth, except the head. Stu was able to see Stander’s face as he was torn apart by the wolves, as chunks flew off he was able to make a last, fleeting eye contact with Stu and convey one final message.

  It was something Stu had seen once before.

  “I want to take this back.” That was the understatement of the decade.

  A sharp sound drew Stu’s attention away from the carnage as Antonio, the driver, was making a break for it, managing to shimmy out through the broken window. The driver was limping, badly but was moving quietly, trying not to draw the attention of the wolves who were currently feasting on their boss.

  Stu looked at the door, tried it and saw found that it was undamaged and opened easily. He was even more surprised when he realized a shotgun, which must have belonged to one of Stander’s men, was among the debris inside the car.

  …grain of sand …

  Testing his tender and sore joints and muscles, Stu rolled onto the pavement, gingerly stood up, aimed his weapon and shot Antonio in the back as he fled. The man went down and a split second later, one of the wolves had left the snarling mass in the ditch and was investigating the noise. The beast, large and lean and savage, poked at the body before grabbing it in its jaws and tossing it, easily 20 feet, to the rest of the pack.

  Stu got his first long, full lit look at the wolf. The creature was tall, easily over seven feet, but hunched and ready to leap or run. There was blood across its snout and his claws were covered in viscera, but the eyes were another story. The eyes weren’t desperate or murderous.

  They were proud. Most likely, it was Dave, Stu thought.

  The wolf gave Stu a quick snort an
d joined the rest in giving Antonio the same treatment they had given Stander just moments before. The “wolf who was probably Dave” gave a loud, long howl as “Enter Sandman” faded into nothing and the wolves took off across the field at a high rate of speed, back toward Beaver Creek. There were two bloody spots in the road, a couple of cars pulled off the Highway, and an overturned cruiser that Stu had no idea how he was going to deal with.

  “Hope that went well, fellas,” the radio DJ was saying. “Either way, we’re back after the break with some Rush and maybe some Van Halen if you’re lucky.”

  •••

  The Lead Wolf ran at a full clip toward his mate and his child and found them cradling the White Wolf. He was bleeding badly.

  The Thin Wolf slightly whimpered. The Young Wolf, also bleeding, held his grandfather in his wounded arms that were still strong despite being torn up. Josie noted that some of the Young Wolf’s bullet hole injuries had already stopped bleeding and were starting to heal.

  Josie had been trying to fix this, trying to figure out what to do, but there were so few options and she didn’t do her best thinking as a wolf. Every time the problem solving part of her brain would engage, she would smell something or hear something and any serious thought fluttered away. She had tried to transform back, but too much adrenaline was coursing through her. She was stuck, and so was Willie, who let out a yelp of pain every so often.

  The Young Wolf looked at his mother.

  “Help,” he said. “Mmmom, help.”

  The other wolves started lightly howling as well, trying to speak but unable.

  “He needs to change back,” Josie said, surprised by the tightness in her chest that was making it hard to speak. “If we changed back, I could get him to a hospital.”

  At the word “hospital” the White Wolf’s eyes shot open and he stretched his neck so he could see who had said the word. Josie ran through the pack to get in his line of sight.

  “No,” the White Wolf said. He attempted to raise his paw, failing at first then summoning more strength so he could gesture at the ground.

  “Here,” he said.

  His meaning was clear but it caused the Young Wolf to throw his grandfather to the ground and scream.

  “NO! NO! NOT HERE! NOT HERE!”

  Thrashing, his long limbs pawing at the ground, the Young Wolf clawed and slashed at the air in his grief. The Lead Wolf rose up, just as high as his son, taller than he’d stood in a long time, and roared back at him. The Young Wolf howled but complied and fell to all fours as the rest of the pack gathered around and pressed their noses and bodies to his fur.

  “Not here,” he said, the “here” trailing into a howl.

  His breath starting to rattle, the White Wolf got to his feet. The fall had knocked the air out of him and he was lucky to have gotten it back, but he was on his feet. Josie could see his hind legs drag and his front legs quiver.

  He fixed the Young Wolf with a stare and the howling stopped. It was as if exerting some control gave him strength and his legs stopped shaking.

  “A wolf dies … running,” he said. “We die running.”

  The voice that came out was as much William Rhodes as it was the White Wolf, the growl modulated to a higher timber. It was the voice of a man speaking on his own terms and a wolf being gentle with those he loved. He whispered something else in a different language that the Young Wolf didn’t understand but carried with it ancient meaning, a benediction with meaning only to him.

  “Taimid bas ag rith.”

  Without warning, the White Wolf ran in to the woods, stumbling ever step or so but with a speed the pack hadn’t seen out of him in years. He was 20 yards away before they followed, tearing through branches, leaves, spitting dirt and mud behind them. They all caught up and kept pace, the seven of them in almost a line broken only by terrain or tree. They ran until the White Wolf started to fall away. They heard the gurgles of fluid in his breath and the beating of his paws start to slow until they finally heard the thud of his body as it hit the earth.

  The pack kept running, at a trot. The Young Wolf started the howl, followed by Josie, then the Thin Wolf, the Straight Wolf, the Large Wolf and finally the Lead Wolf howled and ran sending a cloud of sound past the tree line and into the sky. They howled because they were no longer what they had been. They howled for loss and for the change and for the blood they had to shed. But mostly, they howled out of pain. It all hurt and howling was the only thing that made any sense.

  They ran until they collapsed, exhausted, by a stream where they stopped howling and turned into humans once again.

  THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF WILLIAM RHODES CREATED AND CO-SIGNED JANUARY 11, 2011

  I, William James Rhodes, presiding at 104 Rural Route 118, Cherry, Nebraska, declare this to be my Will and I revoke any and all wills and codicils I previously made.

  Article 1 – Burial

  I couldn’t care less. Bury me in a pine box or leave me to rot. Don’t give a shit.

  Article 2 – Distribution of assets

  Lacy gets the house and the car and all that. She can give what she wants to anyone she wants except for my asshole brother. I leave him sole possession of my diddly squat and he’s lucky he’s getting that.

  Signed and notarized.

  PART 10 – SON OF A BITCH

  The people of Cherry were pretty accommodating, considering their town had been taken over and by men with guns.

  Phrases like “something like this was bound to happen” or “we knew you boys would handle it” or even the odd “well, that’s all over with now,’ were bandied about the usual gathering places. Chuck had run interference with a lot of his regular customers at “Bar” and possibly spun a tall tale or two in the process. Not that the actual story wasn’t exciting enough.

  “All those bodies, they had been ripped apart and their guts laid end to end to spell “Stay Out,” Chuck had told Stu over a hamburger lunch. “I swear that’s what I heard.”

  This was the fullest and most complete sentence Stu had ever heard Chuck utter, and he smiled.

  “I don’t doubt it for a second,” Stu said. “I’m sure a drone or something picked up the message.”

  “Damn right it did,” Chuck said. “Those things are everywhere.”

  In reality, Stu had limped back to Dana, gotten her and Robin home safe and then slept for a good 12 hours in their guest room, waking only to receive medical attention from Robin. Diligent, tender Robin with a great bedside manner and the kind of eyes that would make a man work hard to get better. Of course, she was not interested in him “that way,” nor he in her (not really, as the consequences would be more than several humans could handle), but it had been a long time since he had any sort of female companionship in his life and he was starting to feel it. Plus the whole “fearing for your life, surviving torture and being pushed hard enough to shoot a man in the back” thing really made him wish he had someone to share the experience with.

  But, for now, all he had was Chuck and the hamburger. It would have to do.

  “The drones, they can be tiny. They can be in your car and you wouldn’t know it,” Chuck was droning on. “They know everything you’re doing and if you don’t believe that, you’re an idiot.”

  “I don’t know,” Stu said between mouthfuls. “I still think there are places where you can keep a low profile if you want to.”

  He got three-fourths of the way through his burger before Dave walked in and saddled up next to him.

  “Got time for a beer, Sheriff?”

  “I’m on the clock, but meet me after? Six-ish work for you?”

  “If it’s OK with the bartender.”

  Chuck gave them a look and walked back to the kitchen without saying a word.

  “Six o’clock, then,” Dave said.

  Stu pulled himself off his bar stool with a grunt. It had been two weeks since the torture and car wreck and other car wreck and he was beginning to think the soreness was going to stick around forev
er like an unwanted cousin sleeping on your couch.

  “I won’t have any trouble staying busy till then,” Stu said and it was the truth. He had made the decision, with the blessing of his sister and his sister’s beautiful partner, to pretend the last week had never happened, to clean up as much as he could and to go around to the community and talk with everyone he could to make sure things were cool. But not using the word “cool.” The phrase he had come up with was “are you OK after the recent nastiness last week” and go from there.

  So far, everyone he had spoken to had been “OK” and everyone had an opinion on why the town had been overrun, ranging from “it was the government coming for our guns” to “it was the United Nations coming from our guns” to “wanna see my guns?” Stu would have felt terror at the future of his country had each person not been friendly, hearty and understanding. No one threatened to use said guns and no one seemed overly afraid of something as monumental as a siege happening again. No one blamed the Rhodes and their friends.

  One conversation in particular had stuck with him. Sidney Layton, who lived next to Kenny’s repair shop, had seen Stu coming and waved him off.

  “I don’t need you stopping by,” he said. “I heard all about it, you sneaking around, trying to get help. You did good. Don’t worry about it.”

  Stu slowed his approach but he still wanted to talk a bit and Sidney let him up on the porch of his shabby home. The older man threw himself on an old rocking chair that creaked and shifted under his weight but held.

  “I’m making sure everyone is OK after last week,” Stu said, going in to his stump speech.

  “Got roughed up a bit,” Sidney said. “So I’m not asking questions about where everyone went. Figured I’d find some bodies if I went looking for ‘em. I ain’t looking.”

  “That’s good,” Stu said. “I want you to know we’re working to make sure nothing like this ever happens again.”