by Terry Yates
“How are the rest of them?” he asked.
“They’re fine,” FranAnne answered. “Sam, Pvt. Jordan, and Cpl. Williams, all have cuts, bruises, or broken ribs.”
“How about the young ones? I didn’t see Anthony.”
“Denny said that he died killing a werewolf, and wanted us to go back and bury him proper.”
“The twins and Peter Valkenberg are dead,” he told them sadly, walking away from Potts’ bedside. “Where are we going?” he asked Dr. Phillips.
“OKC Hospital,” Mary Sue answered. “We should be there soon.”
“Can I finish now?” the lady doctor asked him, looking quite perturbed.
CHAPTER 89
Dawn was approaching as The Lobo stood on a hill overlooking Greater Los Angeles, or what had been Greater Los Angeles. There was very little of it left now. So many of the stone huts, both large and small, had sunk into ground, swallowed up whole as if a giant mouth had swallowed them all.
It had not seen the pesky little two-legger since the quake had started, although it still had several of the bullet holes to remind it of the last couple of evening’s activities. Its instincts told it that Simon Shoals AND Mother Nature had accomplished their goals and sank LA into ground.
The Lobo felt tired and weak from its fight with the two-legger, and the whole night in general. It would find a cave somewhere, probably in the Nevada Desert, which wasn’t that far away from where it stood. It had done what it had come to do and now it needed to rest, so that it could come back one day as both Simon Shoals and The Lobo. It let out one long, great howl, and then waited. Nothing came in return. Instincts told it that its new pack had either turned or died. But not all were dead…it could feel the ones that were still alive…the ones that would do its work, and start new packs of their own, until it returned to take over. It let out one last, long wail, and then began to sprint away, knowing that one-day, it would indeed return.
CHAPTER 90
The Oklahoma City Community Hospital was the nicest hospital that Kyler had seen in a while. It was clean, sanitary, and completely devoid of werewolves…as far as he knew. The lady doctor, a Dr. Nicole Branch, had also been a medical student at Stanford under Dr. Phillips. She must be one tough bird, he thought. Very few lady med students lasted under Phillips.
Once they reached the hospital, she had put twenty-two stitches in his chest and shoulders. That’d leave a scar, he thought. The doctor in charge, a Dr. Wysong, and his staff, seemed quite relieved to see three new doctors at his hospital. He was understaffed and overworked, and now had a hospital full of patients to deal with. A few more doctors was a sweet relief.
He’d checked on Jordan and Williams who both had cuts and some broken ribs, and Sam, who was recovering from the clawing that the monster gave him. Denny had some mercury marks on him from throwing it on the werewolf, Meredith had a bad cold and a few abrasions from the rocks, and Lauren, Jefferson, FranAnne, and Mary Sue were all fine.
He’d slept all day in one of the private rooms that the hospital had given him for the night, probably trying to induce him into helping out there. That’d be fine with him. He was tired of fighting and tired of…well, everything. As long as there were no werewolves close, he was fine. It would be dark in another hour, and everyone was keeping their eye on the moon after it had changed right in front of them the night before. At the moment, it hung at quarter-moon just above the sun, and it was supposed to stay at quarter-moon all night, but Kyler and the moon were having trust issues at the moment. He hoped that someone was still headed for Tennessee to protect little Kayla Dixon. He was also hoping that Michael, Zack, and even Zora were okay, even though he felt more sorry for whatever Zora ran across…man OR beast.
He would go take one more look at Potts, even though technically, he was no longer his patient. Kyler wasn’t sure what they were. They’d fought side by side and they’d each saved each other’s lives, although Potts had saved his ass about five times over during the last four months. They weren’t brothers, friends, or gay…at least he wasn’t…and no gay guy would ever clock Potts as being in the closet. He shook his head and chuckled at the thought of Potts in a gay bar dancing with other men. He chuckled at the thought of Potts even dancing. He supposed they were just Comrades-in-Arms and would leave it at that. He did wonder how the man was going to deal with the loss of his hand. He’d done alright with the loss of half of his face, but losing an appendage meant learning to do things a different way…I.E. tying his shoes, putting on a belt, and only being able to hold one gun at a time. THAT would be the killer.
The hallway was busy with doctors, nurses, and patients, some walking, some in wheelchairs, and some on gurneys. Kyler dodged two burly orderlies who were having to roughly escort a screaming wild-eyed lady down to, Kyler guessed, the psych ward.
He stopped at room 333 and put his hand on the door handle. What would tonight bring, he wondered. Would there be more people turning into werewolves, and more importantly, were there any here in the hospital? Dr. Wysong had assured him that they checked every patient that came in for bite marks. Kyler hoped the man was right as he sighed, pushed down the door handle and walked inside.
CHAPTER 91
It was dark and Michael Blum was walking with his crutches, well half walking, half hopping across the enclosed, plastic bridge that the city had built for the Rolling Stones when they played at RFK. Washington, D.C. had built a bridge from the top floor of the hotel that they were staying at, all the way across the street where they started their show by coming down an electric platform that alit on the stage just as they were hitting their first chords. His father told them that they would tear it down just as soon as he addressed the people who were meeting at RFK tomorrow, where he was giving a speech. He’d been told not to walk on it without him or his mother to walk with him, but hell, he was twelve…almost thirteen.
He’d stepped through the plastic strips that covered the opening and had stepped out onto the bridge, a little nervous at first, because he could see the street ten stories below. The plastic made everything look distorted like plastic has a tendency to do.
He’d just finished watching the news with his parents, most of which was about the werewolf problem in Oklahoma and Los Angeles. He wondered if Dr. Kyler and Col. Potts had heard about the werewolf problem way out in Florida. Sure, they’d heard about it…at least Col. Potts had. Even with communication as bad as it was, he would have a hard time believing that they hadn’t heard that there were werewolves in the states. Michael also hoped that Lauren was happy in her new home and that she lived with good people who understood her.
Michael was about halfway across the street…by his standards anyway. It was hard to see through the plastic, but he thought he was over the median when he heard a noise behind him. He turned around, putting both crutches under one arm, and looked at the entranceway. Someone…his mother, father, he wasn’t sure…was standing behind the plastic strips. He couldn’t tell which one it was, because all he saw was a silhouette…a silhouette that was looking at him. Damn, he’d gotten busted.
“Sorry!” he said loudly, putting his crutches back under each arm and quick hopping it back toward the other side of the street. He had to stop for a moment and adjusted his glasses that had started to slip off of his face. When he looked up, he saw that the silhouette was now inside the plastic strips and was waiting for him. It was too dark to tell if it was his mother, his father, or a bodyguard. Whoever it was, their body language told him that they were pissed. “I’m coming,” he sighed, trying not to sound like he was whining.
Whoever it was, was pissed, because they weren’t answering him back Michael went as fast he could, his glasses slipping again. He stopped one more time to adjust them. When he looked up this time, he saw or thought he saw, something he thought that he would never see again. No more than forty feet in front of him, Michael saw two big yellow, angry eyes.
His brain told him that no, those couldn’t be werewolf e
yes, because there weren’t any in D.C. There couldn’t be. They wouldn’t have had time to make it this far north…logic told him that, but once again for the umpteenth time in the last four months, logic had no place in his world, because there was a werewolf standing in front of him, and now he had no one to save him. No Col. Potts, no Dr. Kyler, no Sam, no FranAnne, no one. They were hundreds of miles away from him now, and now he was truly alone.
A thought occurred to him. The hotel room was connected to the bridge. The thing had to get into the hotel room to get here. Had the thing gotten his parents? He almost panicked at the thought of this thing eating them. Tears formed in his eyes as the silhouette, first growled, and then began to move toward him.
Michael couldn’t run, he could only stand there and wait for the inevitable. He would try to go out like a man, although Col. Potts, Dr. Kyler, and Zack would never see it, maybe, just maybe, they would somehow know it. Michael closed his eyes and thought of his parents and his friends from No Name Island.
He could feel the bridge bouncing up and down as the werewolf got closer. He heard its familiar guttural growl, letting him know that the thing couldn’t be too far away from him now. He closed his eyes tighter…and waited.
Suddenly he heard the plastic around him shattering as the bridge began to implode in on him. Something had crashed through the bridge, and whatever it was, crashed into him, slamming him into the opposite wall. Pain shot through Michael’s whole body as whatever it was…Michael was guessing a werewolf…slammed into his own body. Just as quickly, he was suddenly yanked backwards. His glasses flew from his face as he felt himself being pulled roughly through the hole in the plastic bridge
Even with his eyes closed, Michael knew that he was flying through the air, a pair of arms wrapped around his chest from behind. His leg cast felt like it weighed a thousand pounds as he was pulled straight up into the night. For a split second, he opened one watery eye and saw the street, now hundreds of feet below him. Michael’s fear kicked in and he began to struggle with whoever or whatever had hold of him.
“Be still!” he heard a strange voice yell into his ear.
Even though he was terrified that he was flying straight up into the air, the voice had calmed him. He’d almost forgotten about the werewolf as he found himself suddenly clinging desperately to the arms. The wind was at first cool, then cold as he continued to rise up into the sky, his eyes closed. Just when he felt that he couldn’t get any colder, it was warm again, and suddenly there were several pairs of hands grabbing at him. He began to struggle again, until he felt himself being lowered onto a floor and then onto his butt, his cast sticking straight out.
Michael finally opened his eyes. At first glance, the only thing that he could think of, was that he had been kidnapped by aliens…aliens that shouted in several different languages, including English. There were almost a half dozen bodies dressed in a one piece uniform and a helmet with a dark shield covering it. But on closer inspection, he saw that they weren’t aliens. He wasn’t sure who they were, but he did know that whoever it was, just saved him from the werewolf.
Without his glasses, everything was blurry and out of focus to him. He guessed that he was in an airplane or a helicopter, as there was a trap door closing that he and whoever had brought him into the flying machine had obviously come up through. There were two cables, one connected to a harness worn by the helmet wearing person that was on the floor next to him.
Michael flinched as the person next to him jumped up, unhooked themselves from one of the cables, and then reached out and took the other cable, pulling it inside. There was nothing at the end of the cable. Michael could tell by body language that there had been someone on the other end of the line, and now they weren’t. The werewolf must’ve gotten them.
The body that had saved him from the werewolf walked quickly toward him, frightening him enough to scoot back a foot on his butt. As the body reached him, it bent down to one knee and removed its helmet.
“Hello, Michael,” a familiar voice said.
It took a few seconds for Michael’s bad eyes to adjust to the light, but when they did, he saw a recognizable face that was smiling weakly and sadly down at him. It was Zora LeMarque.
CHAPTER 92
Lauren was humming as she moved in and out of the hospital staff and patients. She was carrying a few pieces of turkey that she hadn’t eaten, and was on her way to give them to Joe…who was not allowed to roam freely around the hospital. A wet, disheveled, and muddy mutt was not high on everyone’s ‘like list’, so they had put him in a room with a guard until they could find somewhere else to move him.
When she reached the room, she had expected the guard to be stationed outside the room as he had before, but no one was there now. He must be inside playing with him. Those eyes of his were just too adorable to justifiably ignore.
Lauren opened the door to the room, which was actually a rather large food storage room…not a good place to put a dog, even if everything was in cans. Joe-the-Werewolf-Fighting-Dog would figure the equation out and be eating Beef-a-Roni in no time.
She was surprised to find the light off. She reached in and felt around for a wall switch. When she found it, she felt three switches and pushed at least two of them into the up position, she wasn’t sure. The room was dimly lit as she entered it, making sure to leave the door open behind her. On the floor lay a body…a human body, dressed in military fatigues. She moved up close to the body, not surprised to find that it was the young man who’d been guarding Joe. His cap lay on the floor beside him. Although nervous, Lauren continued to look down at the corpse. The soldier’s throat had been cut and his head was lying in a pool of blood, although it looked black in the dark.
There was no sign of the dog, although there were two small drag marks going right through the middle of the blood, and one single, bloody paw print at the edge. Someone or something had dragged Joe away.
CHAPTER 93
Kyler adjusted Potts’ oxygen tube, then pulled the covers up around him, but leaving his arms out on top of the covers. He’d checked the bandages that Dr. Phillips himself had put on the colonel’s left stump. Boy, if the old son-of-a-bitch saw him doing that, he would probably be livid. Screw him. Potts was his patient and that’s just the way it was.
The door opened just as he sat down in the hard chair beside the bed. It was Mary Sue.
“Sheriff Carter,” Kyler said, standing back up.
“Please, it’s Mary Sue, Doctor,” she said, smiling as she closed the door behind her.
“Then it’s Richard, Mary Sue.”
Mary Sue nodded her head as she moved closer to the bed.
“How is he?” she asked as she reached the bed.
“Looks like he’ll make it.”
“Good,” she answered, still looking down at the man.
She smiled quietly as she looked back up at Kyler.
“Is something wrong, Mary Sue?” he asked.
“Not really…it’s just…” she stammered.
“It’s just what?”
“Well,” she drawled, “I reckon it’s no big deal, but when we found you, I saw the body of the werewolf that’d been giving ya’ll fits all night…the leader of the pack. FranAnne didn’t…she was too busy looking for you two.”
“Who was it?” he asked her.
“Somebody I went to school with…they were a freshman when I was a senior.”
“Who was it?” Kyler asked again.
“EllenJo Cobb.”
“Excuse me?”
“EllenJo Cobb.”
Kyler knew that he must have the appearance akin to a confused jackolope.
“He was a she?” he stuttered. “Uh…it was a she?”
“Yeah. She was a six-foot, six-inch, High School All American, from Harmonville. She was a lesbian. She never told anybody, but we knew…as a matter of fact, I’m thinking that it was Jenna McPhaul, her…girlfriend.”
“Holy shit,” Kyler muttered before catching hi
mself. “I’m sorry…”
“Holy shit is right, Doc…Richard. It was FranAnne that decided to bring down the mate…and she’s…”
“Yeah…” he sighed.
“I was thinking that maybe we don’t tell her,” Mary Sue said to him, putting her hands in her pocket. “I don’t know her very well, but I reckon that it wouldn’t go down well.”
“It would kill her,” replied Kyler, looking down, his own hands in his pockets. “I don’t know if you know, but she’s been through an awful lot. She’s a toughie, but she’s also…”
“A girl?”
“Yeah.”
“Sure…I figured as much, but I just thought you ought to know.”
“Thank you for that…Mary Sue.”
“Your welcome, Richard.”
With this, she smiled, nodded her head, and walked out of the room.
“So we got our assess handed to us by a lesbo, huh?”
Stunned, Kyler whirled around and looked down. Potts was awake. His eye was slitted and glassy looking, but he was awake. Kyler just now noticed that Phillips or Dr. Branch had put a fresh, clean, white bandage over the crushed side of Potts’ face.
“You’re awake.”
“Very perceptive of you,” he retorted weakly.
The two stared at each other for a moment, before Kyler decided to speak.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“I’m missing a hand.”
Kyler didn’t know how to come back on that one, so he didn’t even try.
“Turn on the TV, will ya’?” he asked. “I wanna see what’s going on in California.”
Kyler started to tell him that much of LA was gone, just like much of Florida, but he guessed he’d just let Potts find out on his own. Kyler squeezed the IV drip to let a little morphine through, and then picked the remote up off of the bedside table. He pushed the power button several times, but nothing happened. Potts reached over with his right hand and snatched the remote from his hands, pushed the power button once, and the television crackled to life. Kyler was looking at the TV, but he thought he saw Potts sneer at him from the corner of his eye.