Claw

by Katie Berry

  Harry shouted over to him, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, man!”

  “I think we have a major wildlife problem,” Max yelled back numbly. His fingers fumbled as he grabbed for the phone next to the door. Yanking the receiver off the hook, he dialled the local number for the Lawless Police Department posted on the wall next to it. He needed to speak to somebody in the immediate area right now, not some centralised dispatcher in Kamloops.

  The phone rang once at the other end, and went directly to voicemail, “You have reached the Lawless City Police Department,” Fred Paulson’s recorded voice said soothingly. “If you are listening to this recording, we are currently unavailable and serving other residents of Lawless. Please leave a message at the tone, and we will get back to you as soon as we can.”

  “Merveilleux,” Max muttered as the message played. After the beep, he shouted into the handset, “Hey! This is Max Renaud out at Frostbite Fred's! I think we may have some major problems out here. Something broke into our compound in the back to get at the smoker and then trashed the place! We’re here until midnight if you get this message, and want to take a look, thanks!”

  The music was so loud now that he was forced to use what he called his ‘manual digital volume control’, and stuck his fingers in his ears. He hustled through the crowd toward the bar, glancing toward the stage as he went. Shaggy was still howling away into the mic.

  Jenny Smith, working a table next to the bar, smiled at Max as he approached. She rolled her eyes over toward Carlene, who was back chatting with her friends next to the stage where the band was rocking out. When Max didn’t return her smile, she frowned, figuring something was up.

  With his mouth to Greg’s ear, Max said, “We’ve got a big problem, mon ami!”

  “I know, mate,” Greg responded irritably, looking toward Carlene. “She keeps humping the dingo when she should be bouncing ‘tween the tables like a joey !”

  Max scratched the back of his head as he tried to translate the bartender’s mixed metaphors. Greg’s West-Australian brogue was definitely not helping the Frenchman’s comprehension. When Max finally followed Greg’s line of sight with his own, he hollered, “No, not her! We have bigger problems out back!” Max’s frustration was now ascending his emotional mountainside toward the peak of panic.

  “Bigger problems? Like what?”

  “The Toker is gone!”

  “What do you mean, gone, mate?” Greg asked, incredulous.

  “As in it’s not there anymore, along with half the compound fence!”

  “What? That’s impossible, that fence could withstand a bloody bulldozer!”

  “I don’t know what to tell you; you’d better start looking for some rib-eating bulldozers, then!”

  “Jesus, I guess we’d better call the feds!” Greg said, picking up the phone from under the bar.

  “I already did,” Max shouted above the music as he looked over at the stage. Shaggy was still on stage, wailing away and gyrating his hips like some anorexic Elvis Presley. It sounded like the band must have found the number twelve on their amplifiers since the music seemed even louder than before.

  Greg yelled to Max, “Better make an announcement, then.” He started to bring his fingers to his lips for another ear-piercing whistle.

  The keyboard player was winding down the set with a remarkably faithful rendition of Sweet Home Alabama’s last few honky-tonk piano riffs when the plate glass window beside him exploded. Razor-sharp glass shards rained over the band and crowd nearest them, slicing into exposed skin wherever they struck.

  Shaggy turned to face the window just as claws as sharp as a straight razor whisked through the shattered window frame. They carved through the man, slicing his abdomen in half. His lower torso was raked forward off the stage into the screaming audience below while his upper body flew across the room, smashing into the mirror-covered wall behind the bar. Bottles of liquor exploded from the impact along with Shaggy’s remaining internal organs, showering everyone nearby with sparkling, scarlet shrapnel.

  Carlene, screaming next to the stage, took the full brunt of the creature’s strength as it tried to squirm its powerful shoulder farther through the broken window. The massive paw caught her on the rebound, and in a blur of motion, the girl was backhanded across the room, her body slamming into one of the large, hand-hewn support columns that dotted the interior of the pub. The force of the blow wrapped her backward around the thick wooden beam, snapping her spine with a dry crack.

  Jenny saw this and shrieked. She dived behind the bar next to Greg, who was hunkered down in the sticky glass shards, loading a shell into the magazine tube of a sawed-off Mossberg pump-action shotgun. The Mossberg was kept under the bar for times when the bar had some extra-rowdy customers who needed to be settled down, fast, and Greg figured this was one of those times.

  Another crash added to the deafening discordance as the remaining band members dropped whatever instrument they were playing and abandoned the stage like rats fleeing a sinking ship.

  The paw was withdrawn, and a gargantuan head now filled the window frame. Piercing fangs and sickle-teeth snapped and slathered as the beast roared at the huddled patrons inside. Their screams reached a new crescendo, ratcheting up from loud to ear-splitting in only a millisecond.

  Max covered his ears from the deafening cacophony and began backing toward the relative safety of the kitchen. The beast’s energy level surged to new heights as it sensed the fear of the huddled masses inside. Worming its way farther into the broken window, it suddenly managed to get one shoulder through the frame as well its head. It howled and gnashed its teeth, raking its free, gore-covered paw across the floor, the claws gouging huge furrows into the hardened maple.

  Trapped in the corner next to the ruined window, the bass player had nowhere to go. He tried to dive off the stage out of harm’s way, but his foot snagged on a cable, and he went sideways, falling face-first onto the stage instead. Quick to capitalise on the man’s misfortune, the predator slammed its huge appendage down on top of the now ‘ex’-HipBone bass player, spraying his essence across the shrieking customers nearby.

  Trip knew a rock and a hard place when he saw one. But even worse, sitting behind his petite table in the corner of the room, he realised he was now stuck between an insane, ravenous bruin and a blazing-hot fireplace. Thanks to the dangerously long reach of the massive bear, he was cut off from the rest of the room. After seeing the bass player become bear-pâté, he wasn’t too keen on trying to get by the crushing paw himself, so he was biding his time, looking for an opening, but he knew time was growing short.

  The bear roared once more, its mouthful of knife-edged fangs glistening with blood, but not from eating any patrons that Trip could see. Its muzzle appeared torn and bloody, with bits of swollen skin and singed fur hanging from its mouth as it roared. Looking at the wound, he wondered if the beast might have been attracted to Max’s Midnight Toker out back and had been trying to snack on the steel contraption. Yeah, Trip figured, trying to swallow hot steel would certainly be enough to piss that thing off and make it crazier than it already looked.

  While the monstrous bruin tried to further its journey through the window frame, the remaining customers who hadn’t already stampeded toward the main entrance decided that now would be a great time to do so. An elderly couple who were already moving toward the door were pushed aside by three burly sledders, getting trampled by the men as they fled.

  Angered that it couldn’t reach more of its fleeing prey, the beast roared once more and renewed its efforts to drag itself through the window frame with its one free paw. It flung its head back and forth in a frenzy, snapping its mouth open and closed with a cringe-inducing crack each time it did. It was as if it hoped to snag someone stupid enough to be wandering by its open mouth at the moment. With another mighty pull, it inched itself into the pub, shredding the maple floor with its talons as it moved. The thick timber in the window frame began to creak ominously, threatening to tea
r loose.

  Greg popped up from behind the bar and levelled the Mossberg at the beast. He began pulling the trigger and jamming the pump back and forth in rapid succession, blasting at the demon from hell across the room. The stock of the gun dug into his shoulder as the ear-ringing blasts erupted from the short-barreled weapon. After each brief flash, a burst of steel buckshot sprayed toward the beast. But the distance was too great for the shotgun’s pellets to have any effect and only peppered the bear in the side and shoulder. This served to anger the beast even more, and it renewed its efforts to gain entry into the pub.

  Greg hopped up onto the bar, spinning his legs over it as he moved. His heavy-booted feet dropped to the dusty floor on the other side, and he strode toward the beast. Fire erupted from the shotgun’s muzzle as he pulled the trigger and rammed the pump back and forth repeatedly, trying for a killing shot until pulling the trigger only resulted in a metallic clicking noise. He was out of ammo.

  The bear continued to shriek and roar, working its way through the window frame. Almost all of the customers had finally fled the scene, abandoning their drinks and meals in favour of a chance of seeing the light of another day. Most of them were quite sure the pub would be comping their meal this night.

  Trip was now in an even tighter place. With the bear was halfway through the window, but its muscular bulk and fur had impeded it from gaining entry into the bar, for the moment.

  Greg jammed a handful of shells from his pocket into the magazine tube of the Mossberg and took aim once more, approaching the beast from the front this time.

  The bear renewed its insane shrieking howls as it struggled to pull itself through the window frame. It swiped its paw ineffectually, trying to reach Greg, tearing chunks out of the wooden floor. With one mighty stretch of its limb, the predator reached in just a bit farther and snagged the corner of a heavy redwood dining table with one of its hooked claws. Revolving like a top, the table spun around and slammed into Greg’s hip, sending the Aussie flying backward into the bar. The shotgun clattered from his hands and spun across the floor, skidding to a halt only a few metres from Trip.

  Trip knew he had a decision to make; he could wait for the monster to get the rest of the way through the rapidly deteriorating window frame and devour him and anyone else unlucky enough to be still inside the pub. Or he could make a grab for the shotgun and try to save himself, and hopefully others.

  He had to make a choice, and he had to make it now.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Austin sat down on a rectangular plastic bench inside The Lawless Community Complex. It was 8:30 P.M. If everything had gone as it usually did, he knew the practice should have ended, and his son would be in the shower by now. While he waited, he passed the time chatting with some of the other hockey parents who were also waiting for their children.

  Alex came bustling out of the locker room several minutes later, his hockey bag slung over one shoulder. He waved to his father from across the gleaming, white lobby. "Hey, Dad!" Alex called out as he approached.

  "How'd it go, buddy?" Austin stood but resisted the urge to ruffle the boy's hair. It was an old habit that was hard to break. At home, the boy didn't mind, but in public, he was getting old enough and 'cool' enough now not want his dad make him look like a little kid when they were out and about. This was especially true if there were any girls from Lawless Secondary School anywhere in the immediate vicinity.

  "Not too bad, I scored two goals!" Alex stated, proudly.

  "Excellent! Way to go!" Austin held his hand up for a high five, and his son reciprocated this time, but grudgingly, since high fives were still not particularly cool at the moment.

  "Ready to grab a bite to eat?"

  Alex's face transformed. The slightly embarrassed look it held during the recent half-hearted high five morphed into a beaming grin. "You bet!"

  Austin could hear the boy's stomach snarling for food as they walked to his Honda in the parking lot. No big surprise there, he mused, the boy's hollow legs constantly needed refilling, especially after his high-intensity hockey workouts and especially on after a game. Those nights, Austin usually took his son out for a snack at one of his favourite fast food joints, The Burger Barn. Tonight, seeing as Alex had done so well, and in addition to it being Saturday tomorrow, Austin decided he was going to treat the boy to some of Frostbite Fred's mouth-watering ribs. Of course, once they were there, he would be able to indulge in some prime rib for himself, feeding what Alex called his father's 'roast beast addiction'.

  Minors in British Columbia under nineteen years of age, if accompanied by an adult, were allowed to eat in public houses and bars that served food, right up until 10:00 P.M. Austin looked at the dashboard clock and saw it was only 8:35 P.M. right now — they still had plenty of time to get out there and get some tender beef on the table in front of them before the cut-off.

  "Then let's go get you some good eats!" Austin said, starting the Honda's engine. He added, "Tonight we're going to Frostbite Fred's!" That comment elicited a 'woohoo' from the boy as he settled into the passenger seat and fired up his cell phone.

  After several minutes of driving through the barely visible, mist-filled streets of downtown Lawless, they finally joined the highway heading toward Fred's. Friday nights were usually a busy time for the pub, especially at the end of the month. But for whatever reason tonight, the traffic was all going in the opposite direction — car after car, speeding toward them on the other side of the road, bumper to bumper in the fog.

  "That's strange," Austin said.

  "What is, Dad?" Alex asked, looking up from his phone.

  "The traffic is all going the wrong way. Usually, on a Friday night, there's a string of cars heading toward Fred's and the resort, not away from it."

  And it wasn't just the traffic that was concerning to Austin; it was how they were driving that troubled him as well. As he steered the Pilot around a particularly sharp corner with a yellow, diamond-shaped fifty kilometre per hour warning sign, a Chevy pickup rapidly approached them head-on. The driver had been cutting the corner to maintain control due to his high rate of speed. At the last minute, the reckless Chevrolet driver veered back into their own lane, horn blaring.

  "Shit!" Austin shouted. Though he was always on guard for crazy drivers due to his job with the public works department, this one was something special. He'd driven onto the shoulder to avoid the idiot, but could only go so far due to the ditch and vertical rockface next to it -- if he'd been forced off the road, it was a two-metre drop onto sharp, slush-covered rocks below. Alex's side would have taken the full force of the impact, possibly with tragic consequences. "You crazy bastard!" Austin swore once more, narrowly avoiding the maniac. "What in God's name is his problem?"

  "Must be late for his next accident," Alex said, shaking his head ruefully.

  Alex's joke made Austin chuckle, feeling some of the tension from the close-call dissipate. The boy always seemed to know when a little humour would help the situation. Austin smiled, but it was tinged with sadness. Alex's fantastic sense of humour was just like his mother's used to be before Alzheimer's erased it all, along with everything else about her that made her the amazing person she had been.

  After several more minutes, the inexplicable conga-line of traffic ended, and they were alone on the highway once more. "That was just plain weird," Austin said. They drove for several minutes in silence until they saw the neon sign outside Frostbite Fred's flashing dimly in the mist.

  "We have arrived, but…" Austin peered through the greyness ahead.

  Pulling into the lot, Austin stopped for a moment and gaped — it was surreal to see the lot so empty on one of the busiest nights of the week. Had it not been for several vehicles belonging to the staff parked along the far side, it looked like the bar might have been closed.

  "What the hell?" He continued driving forward, moving slowly onto Frostbite Fred's lot. Off to one side, Austin saw that one of the remaining vehicles was Trip's battered blue F
argo pickup. This was not unexpected, given Trip's penchant for sports, beer and good food, but that didn't make Austin feel better either because that meant Trip was somehow involved in all of this strangeness as well.

  Just as Austin almost pulled to a stop, he spiked the brakes suddenly, causing Alex to jerk forward, his seatbelt locking in place at the last minute. "Whoa! What's up, Dad?" Alex pulled at the tight shoulder harness, trying to undo it and get out of the truck when the sound of two shotgun blasts rang out.

  Austin put his arm across Alex's chest just as the boy released his seatbelt and said, "Stay in the truck and don't move."

  "Why, Dad, what's going on?"

  Not wanting to panic his son, Austin neglected to tell him the reason he'd stopped short. As he'd pulled up to the side of the building, out of the corner of his eye through the fog, something huge had been lumbering around near the side of the pub where the picture window faced the mountains. And it looked like it was currently trying to get inside through that scenic window. Austin jumped down out of the truck and shouted at Alex, "Lock the doors and stay here until I come to get you!"