Primeval (Werewolf Apocalypse Book 2)

by William D. Carl

“Howard?” she asked.

  When he raised his head, she saw that the transformation had already started. His ears were elongating, and his mouth was punching itself outward into a snout. His nose was blackening, and fine dark hair sprouted all over his face. His teeth were shuffling within his growing lips, pushing out in every direction until he looked like a shark.

  “Please,” he said, holding his hands out towards them. His speech was warped by the unnatural number of fangs that filled it. “Please… kill me.”

  They understood, but Sandy shook her head, even as she stepped backwards away from him. “No.” She turned to Nicole. “I can’t.”

  Nicole said, “I don’t have any bullets left. I can’t just shoot you. All I’ve got now is a knife.”

  “Please…” Howard said again, although the word was unrecognizable. “Kill…”

  “It’ll be hard,” Nicole said, pulling the knife from her jacket. “And this’ll hurt.”

  “Please…”

  Howard held his hands out to her, and he cried out in pain as extra joints snapped into place and his fingers elongated and became webbed in the corners. His eyes were turning yellow, as though someone had dropped dye into the whites, the coloring pluming out in several directions, filling the oculus vitae.

  “Please…”

  “Christ, just do it,” Michael sobbed, turning away.

  John had his face in his hands. He sobbed quietly.

  Sandy stepped closer to him. “You can’t,” she said to Nicole.

  “Honey, look at him. He’s hurting, and you know what he’ll become.”

  “Yeah, but I know him. I liked him. He could have been a friend.”

  “We’d be doing him a favor.”

  “You’d be killing him. Killing someone we knew, someone we liked.”

  Howard fell forward, catching himself with his expanding hands. He arched his back, and his shirt ripped down the center, exposing a backbone that was growing sharp, pointed ridges. Hair was spinning out of follicles on his bare skin in twirls of brown. He cried out in pain at the transformation.

  “It’s horrible,” Nicole said. “But it’s necessary. You know that.”

  “Sandy,” Burns said, stepping up to her. He had also removed his knife and was pointing the eight-inch blade toward the agonized man at his feet. “He doesn’t want this, to turn into an animal.”

  “But, to just slaughter him? It’s not human.”

  “Well, sweetie, look at him. He isn’t human any longer. He’s something else, and he’ll be coming after us if we let him finish the change. He’ll become a hunter, a killer.”

  In her mind, Sandy knew Burns and Nicole were right. It was the only thing they could do to save them and to give Howard some dignity in death. Yet knowing it in her head didn’t prevent her from feeling the ache in her heart. On some level, she had connected with Howard. She wouldn’t call him a friend, but after all they had been through together, they were close comrades, and that could have one day developed into a friendship. Now, he was grunting and sobbing, arching his back, his bones snapping into bestial positions beneath his dark skin. He was becoming a monster.

  “Oh for God’s sake,” Nicole said, and she straddled Howard’s back. He swung his head around, opening his mouth to expose the long, darkened tongue and the rows of teeth. Nicole grabbed him by the fur behind his pointed ears and pulled hard. Then she plunged her knife into his exposed neck, drawing it across, severing the jugular. He thrashed a few times beneath her, his life blood spilling out around his feet. His death cries were terrible – loud and savage and like the last scream of a species going extinct.

  Finally, he collapsed face-first into the expanding puddle of gore, and he became still. Nicole stepped away from him, wiping the bloody blade against her pant leg. Sandy watched her with wide eyes.

  She had always known what Nicole did for a living, had even been proud of her lover’s job. She kept everyone safe, kept the monsters at bay.

  By killing them, she now realized. It was disturbing, bloody work, even more so when you had to watch the person you loved committing what amounted to sanctioned murder. Knowing she killed Lycanthropes was one thing; seeing it in Technicolor and close up was another situation altogether. Nicole’s hands were wet with Howard’s blood, these beautiful hands that had touched her with love and tenderness, these hands which had opened her up and delved deep within her body and soul, these hands that had filled her with so much love and pleasure. These same hands were being wiped clean on her jacket, but the bright red stains remained on them, and Sandy wondered if she could ever think about those hands in the same manner again, if she could kiss them or allow them to hold her and caress her.

  She turned and vomited across the floor, and Nicole moved to her, rubbing her back. She was startled when Sandy flinched away from her caress, huddling away from her as she wiped her mouth clean.

  “Don’t touch me,” Sandy muttered. “Not now. Please.”

  “Sweetie, you know we had to do it.”

  “Yeah,” Sandy said, standing up straight and looking her lover in the eye. “But now all I can see is you killing him.” She pointed toward the corpse, which was nearly halfway back to Howard’s human form. The fur had withdrawn into his dermis, and his ebony skin was bathed in sweat and blood. His face almost looked normal again, although the eyes were still a jaundiced shade of yellow.

  General Burns moved toward Sandy. “We don’t really have the time to stand around debating this. We need to keep moving or we’ll all end up like Howard. Dead or changed.”

  Sandy moved up towards Michael and leaned into him. The homeless man put an arm around her shoulder and said, “This way.”

  He led them, keeping hold of Sandy as he walked, and she pressed herself into him, anxious for the human contact. John stumbled behind them, finding it easier to get around. He felt immensely better, if somewhat weakened.

  “Sandy…” Nicole said, and Burns gave her a slap on the shoulder.

  “She’ll be all right,” he said. “Give her some time.”

  “I can’t lose her, Taylor. I’ll die if I lose her.”

  “It’s the brutality of it all,” he said, and he started following Michael down the subway tunnel. “She hasn’t seen what we’ve seen, and now it’s all right up in her face. She’ll come around eventually.”

  “She looked at me like I was some kind of savage. She has to know what I did I did for all of us, Howard included.”

  “She does know that. Inside. Give her some time. She still loves you.”

  “Thanks,” Nicole said, walking next to her commander and friend. “Guess I just needed to hear it from someone else.”

  “No problem.”

  “This whole situation sucks.”

  “It does, indeed.”

  The tunnel echoed with their footsteps.

  “Do you smell gas again?” Nicole asked.

  Chapter 49

  10:40 p.m.

  They trudged onward, each person in the group lost in their own disparate thoughts. The emergency lights in the tunnels had dimmed to a faint glow, so their flashlights and headlamps pierced the darkness in shafts of stretched-out illumination that picked up every dust mote but withheld any details in the shadows. They all remained alert, even though they were exhausted, and they raised their feet as they moved, careful not to accidentally cause a spark. The smell of gas still suffused the air of the tunnel. It wasn’t as strong as before the fireball swept through, destroying everything in its path, but they didn’t want to take any chances.

  Sandy kept replaying Howard’s death – killing, murder – in her head, like a gruesome piece of Zapruder film footage on a loop. The way Nicole had straddled the transforming man, how her face looked when she plunged the knife into his throat, the blood spilling from the wound she’d created. She could still hear his pleas ringing in her ears, but the thing that disturbed her most was the expression on Nicole’s face when the knife went down into his skin. It had been a grima
ce, animalistic, a primeval leftover from when human beings were little more than the savage creatures outside the caves. It frightened her, and it made her doubt the life that she and Nicole had built together. As she walked silently along the tracks, Sandy wouldn’t allow herself to look over at her lover. She was terrified that she would once again see that expression play over Nicole’s eyes.

  For her part, Nicole couldn’t stop glancing over at Sandy. Her heart ached at the thought of her girlfriend’s rejection. She wished she could go back in time, let Burns handle the assassination of Howard. But time didn’t work that way, and as her grandfather used to say “Wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up first.” Nicole realized too late how she would appear to Sandy, but she also knew she had done the right thing in killing the infected man. If he’d been allowed to live, he would have followed them, tracked them down, and killed them mercilessly. He was a detriment to the group and had to be eliminated. She only wished (there’s that wishing thing again) that Sandy hadn’t witnessed the act. If it had been out of sight, it would have been out of mind. Now, she was afraid she may have lost the love of her life, and her heart ached for Sandy. If their relationship survived this night, it would be a miracle. Nicole found herself praying for just such a miracle.

  General Taylor Burns found himself thinking about what kind of a world was going to greet them when they climbed back up to the surface. It had been immeasurably bad when he and Nicole had sprinted to the subway. They had constantly been under attack by one kind of creature or another, barely having time to breathe. He was trying to hold what was left of the group together, and he was especially worried for Sandy who seemed to be under the misconception that everything was going to be fine and dandy once they got out of the city. But Burns had seen New York as it had started to fall, and that had been a good five or six hours ago. He wasn’t even certain if Tommy Hemmer would be waiting for them with his helicopter or if they were going to surface in the city with no possible escape route. Also, he wasn’t naïve enough to think this new strain of the virus was going to be contained so easily. The Army could blow the bridges and destroy the ferries and boats, but something would always get out. If just one single rat creature escaped through a sewer, then the rest of the boroughs would fall within days. After that, the United States was fair game, and then the whole world would turn into one snarling, ferocious, and primitive planet. Humanity and all the creativity and passion and love would be gone in a few days. Burns decided he would be one of the survivors. He wasn’t going to take the destruction of humanity lying down. He was a fighter. He would wrestle this virus until it rolled over or until he was consumed by it. There had to be a place where people could live outside of the roiling bestial state the world was heading for. If not, he would be the founder of it.

  Michael was wondering if it was all worth it. He was on the verge of collapsing from exhaustion and lack of food. He had been running on sheer adrenaline, and now that it had dissipated in his system, he was spent. He almost wanted to lie down and wait for his death to come. If only he hadn’t assumed the responsibility for these four people who were following him, especially John, who seemed to be keeping up with little aid from the others. He knew if he hadn’t assumed leadership, he could have closed his eyes for the last time. Only, he was in charge of this group, and their lives depended on whether he could get them out of danger and into Brooklyn. As he walked, he thought of his girlfriend and her daughter. They were a part of him, but a part of him that had died long ago, replaced by this underground dwelling mole man. He wished he knew what they looked like now – were they still human? If he could have that bit of fantasy to clutch to his heart, he knew he could find the energy to go on. If he could only know they were safe, that he could find his way back to them once the horror show had finished. If only… If only…

  John moved along, stumbling now and again, but refusing to lean on anyone, to become dependent upon anyone else. They were all tired, and the reporter knew they didn’t need someone leaning on them and dragging them down. Still, although he continued to improve in body, his spirit was growing more and more disheartened. He’d always related his entire self to his job. He was a reporter, damn it, from the old school of journalists. Even when working for a ridiculous yellow rag like the World Weekly News, he held himself up as a real newsman. He’d never developed relationships, other than those that helped him professionally. He’d never married or had kids or even serious girlfriends. He was too busy with The Job. Now there was no job, no World Weekly News, probably no place left where he could keep a desk and a computer. And without The Job, who was he? Grimacing in pain when he turned a corner, he reached back and touched his shoulder, feeling the wound. The pain was like a knife, but it stirred him out of his ruminations and back to the real world and their real problems.

  The group splashed through the tunnel, their flashlight beams growing increasingly dimmer as they moved. They stayed silent, waiting for something to spring out of the darkness at them. They kept their thoughts to themselves, hoping and praying.

  They were surrounded by the dark, which was filling with the sweet scent of natural gas.

  And they each wondered if they would make it through the night.

  Chapter 50

  11:10 p.m.

  Michael noticed the tunnel obstruction a hundred yards off, but he couldn’t see how effectively it blocked their way until they were within spitting distance. The roof had collapsed into the tunnel, or it had been purposefully blown to stop anyone’s progress through the subway and off the island. From floor to ceiling, the way was barred by chunks of collapsed concrete, collapsed rafters, shattered bricks, mortar, and earth. Michael leaned against it, shoved at it hard in the corners. When the barrier didn’t give way, he turned back to the others.

  “We aren’t getting to Brooklyn through here,” he said. “We’ll have to go up top and take our chances.”

  General Burns marveled at the destruction, running his hand along an exposed iron beam that now traversed the space from floor to ceiling. He said, “This is an Army demolition job. No way was this done by accident.”

  Nicole asked, “You think everything’s blown like this? Sewer tunnels, too?”

  “If they thought to blow the subways, then they’ve remembered the sewers,” Burns answered with a nod. “Admirable, actually. They’ve done a thorough job of it.”

  “And stopped us dead,” Sandy said. “How are we going to get off Manhattan now?”

  Michael added, “It’s got to be terrible up there. All these years I’ve lived underground like some kind of mole, but even though I didn’t enjoy life up top, I was never afraid of what I’d run into. Now…”

  “We don’t have much choice,” Nicole said, interrupting him before he became too maudlin and dragged them all down with him into his own abyss of despair. She could tell Sandy was precariously close to that edge already. “Can we call the helicopter, General?”

  He tried again, punching in the number on his cell phone. He was a bit worried at how low the battery charge was getting, but he didn’t tell anyone about his concerns. “No,” he said finally. “No signal down here. Not that that’s so surprising. Once we’re on the surface, or near it at least, I can try again. We’ll get that helicopter here to pick us up and get us someplace else.”

  “Which will hopefully be better,” Sandy said, leaning her back against the pile of rubble barring their way.

  “You know where we are, Michael?” Burns asked.

  “We just passed the Fulton Street platform. It’ll get us close to the water, by Pier 17.”

  “That’s the East River, right?”

  “Yeah. Pretty close to the Brooklyn Bridge.”

  “Are there ever boats on the piers?”

  “The South Street Seaport is right out there. There are usually a bunch of boats and water taxis. Most of them are historical, though, pretty old. You think we can hijack one and cross the river in it?”

 
“It’s worth a try if we can’t get hold of the helicopter,” Burns replied. “Anyone know how to drive a boat?”

  Nobody stepped forward. Sandy kicked at the ground, disturbing a pile of dirt at her feet.

  “Well, how hard can it be?” Burns asked, feigning a cheerfulness that he didn’t actually feel. “The Lycanthropes can’t swim. We saw that in Cincinnati. They’re top-heavy, and they sink like rocks in any kind of deep water.”

  “What about the rats?” John asked.

  “Well, they’re new to me, so I don’t know for sure, but they are larger than normal rats in the head and shoulders. Chances are pretty good that’ll throw them off their swimming game. Make them top-heavy.”

  “It’s better than sitting here inhaling gas fumes,” Nicole said. “I say we go for it.”

  Michael nodded. “We certainly aren’t going anywhere this way. It’s worth trying.”

  “We’re all going to die up there, you know,” Sandy said, her voice low, her eyes full of unabashed fear. “You can all be as hopeful as you want, say all the right things, but you all know we can’t survive on the surface.”

  “We can’t stay down here, honey,” Nicole said, moving toward her girlfriend. “If that gas ignites, we won’t be as lucky as the last time.”

  “I’m starting to think Beth and Alice were the lucky ones. They went quickly, died before they could even get the scream out of their lungs. I wish that’s what had happened to me.”

  “You don’t mean that, Sandy,” Nicole said.

  “Don’t I?” the woman practically spit the words at Nicole, who shrank back a bit. “We’re probably going to die at the hands of those monsters, ripped apart, scratched and bitten and dragged away to some den someplace. Or worse, we’ll turn into one of those creatures, like Howard. We’ll become fucking savages without any sense of ourselves, like soldiers, like killers. Like you.” She glared at Nicole.