Ravage

by Jeff Sampson

  In practiced unison, the four cheerleaders spun on their heels and matched one another’s strides. As they walked around the bleachers, Amy looked back over her shoulder and said, “You’d better not be getting us into trouble.”

  Plastering a smile on my face, I raised a hand and said, “Nice chatting with you too!”

  “I’ve never seen Amy so pleasant,” Tracie said once the cheerleaders were out of view.

  Standing over us, Spencer put his hands on his costumed hips and grinned. “That went well, I think! See, I knew I could get them to talk to us.”

  “Shouldn’t you be out there, Gary?” I asked. “The cheerleaders may be able to do backflips, but you’re the real star.”

  “Oh yeah!” he said. “Better resume my duties. I’ll see you guys in a bit. Have fun practicing.” With a salute and a wink, he was off, half walking, half shuffling to avoid tripping over his feet and the fake tail he dragged in the dirt behind him.

  Tracie and I spent the next hour continuing to practice going hybrid—she even managed to get a few of her fingernails to stretch into claws. Before I knew it, the crowd was cheering once more and the game was over, the Cougars victorious. I never pay attention to football unless it’s on Friday Night Lights, but the people in the bleachers certainly made it sound exciting.

  Spencer showed up in his street clothes, still sweaty and smelling of boy musk, and after Tracie put the blanket back inside the school where she got it, the three of us walked to his minivan.

  The parking lot was dark and mostly empty by then. The school bus for the visiting team was just pulling out, and some guys and girls were hanging out by cars, laughing and squealing over the team’s victory. But those cars were on the other side of the gravel parking lot from where Spencer had parked. His van stood alone.

  It wasn’t until we got close that I saw the shadows of two people standing next to the van.

  For a moment, I thought I was seeing more shadowmen—first over webcam, now here even though my eyes were from Nighttime and not the werewolf.

  Then the shadowy figures came around the front of the van, into the streetlights. Before they disappeared behind the vehicle, I could clearly make out that both figures were tall and slender. One was female with long blond hair. The other, a guy with black hair.

  Megan and Patrick.

  Without saying a word, I broke into a run, leaving Spencer and Tracie behind me. My sneakers went from grass to gravel, and I almost slipped on the loose rocks as I skidded around the minivan to catch up to them.

  Even though there was no place to hide, and even though I hadn’t heard any car start and drive off, Megan and Patrick were gone.

  I could have left it alone. Maybe I should have and just chalked it up to Megan turning into a weird creeper in light of all that had happened.

  But I didn’t want to think of her that way. And between the aura I sensed from her that morning, and her strange demeanor, and thinking I saw her in my bedroom window, and now this?

  I couldn’t save the mystery for another day.

  Footsteps thudded on the gravel behind me. Spencer grabbed my arm, his expression worried. Tracie stopped beside him.

  “What is it?” Spencer asked me. “Why did you just take off?”

  With one last look at the empty lot beyond the minivan, I turned to meet his and Tracie’s eyes.

  “Do you guys mind if we make a stop before going home?” I asked. “I need to get to the bottom of something.”

  8

  YOU THINK YOU KNOW A LOT, EMILY

  Fifteen minutes later, we pulled up in front of Megan’s house.

  She lived only a few blocks from me, but that was where the houses got smaller and more run down. Not that I was rich or anything. My family did okay, even though my dad’s construction work was inconsistent at best. I only now wonder if our ability to have such a nice house was funded by BioZenith. Yeah, no wonder my parents took that deal—mutate your child, never worry about finances again!

  Anyway, Megan’s house was usually quiet and dark, save for the times her brother’s band—the Bubonic Teutonics—were getting all rock-tastic in the garage.

  But that night, the whole place was lit up, cars were lined up on the street out front, and a bunch of college-aged people were standing on the front lawn and in the open garage, drinking cans of beer and partying it up.

  Not exactly Megan’s scene. But I didn’t know where else to look for her. Maybe her brother or her parents—if they were there—would know.

  Spencer, Tracie, and I climbed out of the van and wound past the cars in the driveway toward the garage. Tracie stuck close to me, doing her calming breathing exercises and constantly patting herself, as though feeling for something. Only then did I realize that it was past eight, the time when our personality changes came unbidden before we learned to control them. And Tracie had only learned how to go hybrid a few hours before.

  I reached over and clenched her shoulder reassuringly. “You can do it,” I whispered as the yellow lights of the garage washed over us.

  She nodded but didn’t say anything. Just breathed in, one, two, three, four, five. Then out.

  Two girls sat at the drum set, one showing the other how to play while slurring the instructions. In the bed of a pickup truck on the other side of the garage, three guys and another girl lounged, telling loud stories, while a dog I’d never seen before walked between them, tail wagging, tongue lolling, waiting to get petted. The storytellers halfheartedly obliged.

  “It’s just, like, man,” one of the guys drawled as he tickled the dog under its chin. “You think you know a girl, and then she, like, she just cuts you off. Just severs. And it hurts so much, man. Like, in your chest. A chest hurt.”

  The others nodded knowingly. The guy next to him took a sip from his can and said, “That’s rough, buddy.”

  The three of us walked past these unfamiliar people, nodding cordially and being ignored, then through the door into the house itself. There were more people milling here, too, most paired off and having deep conversations while looking into each other’s glassy eyes. Mellow mood music swirled through the rooms.

  No one seemed to take notice of us as we made our way to the living room. Which was fine by me. It was there that I found Megan’s brother, Lucas, all beanpole body wrapped in shredded black clothes, his white-blond hair swept over half his face.

  He was chatting with two people on the couch, whose backs were to me. I didn’t want to be rude and interrupt, but when he ignored my insistent wave to get his attention, I walked straight up to the couch, placed my hands on the back, and loudly asked, “Hey, Lucas, have you seen Megan?”

  Lucas snapped his attention to me, apparently startled by my sudden appearance. At the same time, the two people he’d been talking to craned their necks around to look up at me over the back of the couch.

  I recognized them immediately.

  “Jared?” I asked. But I wasn’t surprised so much at his presence—being Lucas’s band mate and all—as I was by the girl sitting next to him. “Dawn?!”

  Jared—aka Deputy Jared, the clean-cut, totally hot, but totally Boy Scout–y police officer who’d helped me out after “discovering” the dead body of Dr. Gunther Elliott in Spencer’s backyard, aka drummer of the Bubonic Teutonics—leaped to his feet, as though he’d been caught doing something bad.

  Dawn, my stepsister, smiled and shook her head as she got to her feet at a normal person pace and stood beside Jared. She looked great, but that was nothing new—the girl was basically a Victoria’s Secret model even when wearing an oversize shirt and face mask to bed. Today she was wearing some killer boots and a short skirt along with a tight, black Bubonic Teutonics T-shirt.

  “Hey, Emily!” Jared said, forcing a smile and raising a hand in greeting. “Staying out of trouble?”

  “Not really,” Spencer said beside me. I nudged him and he laughed.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I said. I looked between him and Dawn, brow furrowed. �
�So, uh, I didn’t know you two knew each other.”

  Dawn moved in close to Jared, her arm brushing his casually. “We haven’t known each other that long,” she said. Then, turning her attention from me to Jared, she slapped his arm playfully and said, “Dude, you didn’t tell me you knew my stepsister! Wait.” Looking back at me, her expression went wary. “How do you know my stepsister?”

  “We—” he started.

  “Through Megan!” I shouted before he could answer. “Yeah, he’s always over here practicing with Lucas, so we’ve, y’know. Crossed paths.”

  Dawn raised her eyebrows. “Interesting. So, Em, tell me, is this dude chill? Be honest.”

  I grinned and met Jared’s eyes. “Jared is a perfect gentleman, an all-around good guy, and has done nothing but look out for the safety of us teenagers.”

  A trio of revelers came out of the kitchen, clinging to one another as they laughed and slurred their way toward the door. Dodging them, Lucas rounded the couch, then leaned against it directly in front of me and crossed his arms.

  “Who are your friends?” he asked.

  “Oh,” I said. “This is Spencer.”

  Spencer waved, then nodded at Jared. “We met. Remember?”

  Jared glanced at Dawn, then nodded back. “I wouldn’t forget.”

  Gesturing toward Tracie I said, “This is Tracie Townsend. She’s our class president.”

  “Welcome, Tracie!” Lucas said, sounding more light-hearted than he’d ever been. Well, around me, at least.

  Tracie didn’t acknowledge him. In fact, she wasn’t acknowledging any of us. She stared off into the distance, her breaths shaky, her fists clenched.

  “Is she okay?” Lucas asked, turning back to me.

  The shift. It must have been happening, and she was fighting it, and here I was getting all jovial with a bunch of college kids.

  Grabbing Tracie by the shoulders, I gently shoved her toward Spencer, then hissed at him, “Get her to the car. Stay with her.” As he started to lead her out, I turned to Lucas, Jared, and Dawn and shrugged. “You remember her, Jared, she had a panic attack at last week’s party, too. She’s not good with crowds. She just needs some air.”

  Time was wasting. I needed to focus on the reason I’d made Spencer drive us there: Megan.

  “So, Lucas,” I said before anyone could try and spark a new conversation. “Is Megan around?”

  In a low, serious voice, he said, “I’m not sure she wants to see you yet, Emily.”

  I waved my hand dismissively and forced a laugh. “Oh, that. No, don’t worry about it, we were having a fight. But we made up at school earlier and she asked me here.” I shrugged and tried to look innocent. “You know us chicks, always getting emotional about something.”

  “Yeah,” Lucas said, his voice distant as he looked over my head at some girls behind me in the kitchen. Apparently bored of talking with me, he said, “Should be in her room, guarding it from trespassers. Been there all night.”

  “Cool, thanks,” I said.

  He didn’t seem to hear me, choosing instead to brush past me and go chat up the new object of his focus. I said my good-byes to Jared and Dawn, and they went back to cuddling on the couch.

  As soon as I turned around, I dropped my smile. Weaving past the college kids in the wood-paneled hallway, I came to Megan’s bedroom door and knocked.

  No answer.

  I’d hate it if someone burst into my room without my permission, but considering I’d just seen Megan at the school and we drove there faster than she and Patrick could possibly walk, I guessed she wasn’t inside. I twisted the knob, slipped in, and shut the door behind me.

  And was surprised to find Megan sitting at her computer, clicking away while reading the internet.

  “Oh!” I said, startled even though it was, y’know, her room.

  Megan retained her cool. In fact, it took her what felt like ages to even acknowledge I existed. Slowly she twisted her head to face me. She looked me up and down. Then looked back at her computer.

  “What do you want?” she asked me.

  Rolling my shoulders back, I tried to regain my composure. “Actually, I came here to ask you the same thing. I saw you and Patrick after the football game hanging out by Spencer’s car. If you don’t want anything to do with me, why were you there?”

  “I wasn’t,” Megan said flatly, the blue glow of the monitor reflecting in her eyes. “I’ve been here all night.”

  Brow furrowed, I shook my head. “That’s not possible. I saw you. In fact, I keep feeling you watching me all the time.”

  She scoffed. Shutting the browser window, she spun her chair around to face me. “I’m sorry, are you accusing me of stalking you? Like I’m that desperate to be friends? Ego much?”

  Softly I said, “Actually, yeah, I do kind of think you’re that desperate. You certainly were a week ago when you begged me to make you a werewolf.”

  She flicked her hand at me. “Please. I’m over it. I don’t need you. I’m good. I’m better than good.”

  Sitting on the edge of her bed, I leaned forward on my knees and tried to catch her eyes. She looked anywhere but at me.

  “Megan,” I said. “I don’t want you to hate me. And I know you don’t want me to hate you. I know things are weird now. I know—”

  “Oh, you know, you know.” Getting to her feet, she began to pace in front of me. “You think you know a lot, Emily. I know this about you, that’s what I learned recently when you decided keeping secrets from me was a grand idea, that you’re suddenly Encyclopedia Webb just because you can grow fur.”

  She stopped pacing, staring into the corner of her room away from me. When she spoke again, her voice was low, eerie.

  “But there are lots of things you don’t know, Emily. Lots and lots of things.”

  Slowly she turned to face me. A smile was plastered on her face, but her eyes were narrowed. Crazed. Even at her most surly I’d never seen her look like this. A chill ran over my arms and I shivered.

  “Maybe I have been watching you,” she said. Shrugging, “Or maybe I have much better things to do. Who knows?”

  I stood and took a step toward her, but she raised a hand, stopping me.

  “Megan,” I said. “You’re not acting like yourself. I’m worried that what happened in the woods did something to you.”

  She shrugged again. “Maybe if you worried a little less about yourself and more about your friends of eight years, I wouldn’t have had anything happen to me in the woods at all.”

  “Megan…”

  Pointing toward the door, she commanded, “Go.”

  I opened my mouth to protest and she dropped the fake smile. Practically roaring she repeated herself: “Go!”

  I had nothing else to say. She wouldn’t listen anyway. So I did as she asked and left the room. The partiers in the hall outside were a ruddy blur as I sped past them. My whole body felt hot. My arms trembled.

  Seconds later I was outside, swallowed by cold night air. I walked to Spencer’s minivan, opened the door, and said, “Hey, I’m going to walk home. Can you make sure Tracie gets home all right?”

  Tracie was still in the backseat, focused on controlling her shift.

  Spencer nodded. “Yeah, of course. Will you be okay?”

  No.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Though he was obviously concerned, Spencer did as I asked. I slammed the door shut and he drove away. I watched him go until his taillights disappeared around a corner. Then, I ran across the street into the woods.

  Once I was out of sight, I shed my clothes. Splaying open my jacket, I shoved my sweater, my jeans, my shoes, and my underwear on top, then pulled it all together into a bundle. Shivering uncontrollably, dirt and twigs biting into my bare feet, I closed my eyes and focused on changing.

  I didn’t want to be my human self right then; not Daytime or Nighttime or the mix of the two that made up who I was now.

  I wanted to be the wolf. To go on instinct and ignore
the problems that kept arising even as I made plans to solve others. At least, for a little while.

  Black and brown fur bristled over my arms, enveloping me in smooth warmth. My limbs elongated, whatever pain there should be distant and numb. My face followed, smashing and stretching into a snout, my teeth becoming sharpened fangs, my ears rising atop my head as they narrowed into points.

  I grabbed the bundle of my clothes in one arm and held it close to my taut, muscular wolf-girl chest. Instincts took over then—the woods exploded into hundreds, thousands of smells and achingly loud noises that my ears twisted and turned to pick up.

  Craning my head back, I closed my eyes and let out a long, loud howl. Out rushed anxiety and anger. In rushed freedom from stupid human worries.

  Fully wolf, I dropped down and caught myself on my free, clawed hand. Then, pushing off with my powerful legs, I raced into the night.

  9

  ENVISIONING THE BRIGHTEST STARS, TO LEAD OUR WAY

  I don’t remember much about the rest of the night. What memories I can conjure up are mostly of chasing smells and fleeing human sounds and speeding through trees.

  What I can remember is the feeling of complete, worry-free freedom. There were no people to make demands of me, no worried thoughts to consume me.

  And thankfully, no shadowmen out watching me.

  But it had to end eventually, and at some point in the middle of the night my wolf self made her way to the backyard of my house, where I reluctantly turned into a human again. Shedding my coat of fur was like jumping into the ocean, the cold air enveloping my exposed body and momentarily shocking me. Shivering uncontrollably, I slipped into my clothes.

  It’s funny how uninhibited being a werewolf had made me. Too bad my clothes couldn’t transform along with me to make my story family friendly.

  Fully dressed, I patted my jacket pockets to make sure my keys and phone were there. Both were—and when I pulled out my phone, I saw I had a text from Evan.