by Damon Novak
“Anything. I want to keep Yamir safe. He’s a smart boy, so needless to say he’s scared.”
“Being afraid can keep you alive. Thank you, Naya.”
“Thank you, Micky.”
He walked away from the woman, hoping nothing he did would let her down.
The conversation had bolstered Micky’s hope about the other people who had joined them, and of those still on the way. If the majority of people who answered the call to confront Climbing Fox Wattana were even close to the same mettle as Naya Joshi, their chances for success were great.
Ω
Henomawi Indian Reservation
The Home of Climbing Fox Wattana
Magi sat on the floor of the small nook, staring in the direction of the carcass lying just outside the sliding glass door, its bones nearly picked clean. He could see it only intermittently, for at the heavy sliding glass door were six of the blood-soaked skinwalkers, scratching at the glass, their moans and snarls muffled from the thick slider.
“I did not mean for her to be hurt,” came the weak voice across the room from him.
Magi turned his gaze from the skinwalkers to Climbing Fox, who leaned against the opposite wall, his eye blackened and swollen, his cheek badly bruised; dried blood caked down his chin.
“You already said that a dozen times,” said Magi Silver Bolt. He stood and walked toward his former spiritual guide and chief.
Wattana crossed his arms in front of his face and cowered.
Magi had arrived the evening before, after leaving the home of Atian Shining Eyes, having found his friend dead, and no trace of his Dancing Rain; his Anjeni.
And so, as he had planned, he came here, the place she said she was going.
Wattana had lied to him. Magi asked him if Anjeni had arrived, and Mundunugu had sworn he had no idea where she was.
But as he had answered, his eyes darted toward the sliding doors leading to his back yard. Had he not been watching him intently, Magi might have missed it. Panic. Guilt.
Chief Wattana may as well have stood up and pointed, saying, “She’s out there.”
Silver Bolt had charged to the door and thrown open the vertical blinds, immediately noticing the shoes and identifying the shredded clothing on the ravaged, bloody corpse sprawled out on the patio.
At that time, many of her bones were exposed, but three of the savage creatures still clawed deep into the cavities of her body, feasting on the remainders.
With a primal scream, Magi had turned on his Mundunugu, ripped the rifle from the old man’s hands, and pummeled him in the face until he fell unconscious.
Magi, exhausted from grief and anger, had collapsed onto the floor across from the man he’d beaten, numb.
He had remained there, staring through the glass, immobilized by depression, to where his betrothed lay dead. He did not know whether sleep had taken him at all.
Now, Wattana’s swollen eyes turned to follow Magi as he walked past him and into the kitchen. Sliding a knife from the butcher block on the counter, he turned.
“Please do not kill me!” he begged. “I would not have known of the text had it not been for her!”
The words burned in Magi’s mind. Was the old man blaming Anjeni for his carelessness? Closing his eyes, Silver Bolt took a deep breath, raising his eyes again to the skinwalkers outside the glass door.
Their numbers had not grown.
He stepped over the bent legs of Wattana and walked to the door. As he reached for the handle to pull it open, the old man screamed, “No! Do not open it! They will kill us!”
He pulled. The skinwalkers turned toward him. Magi gripped the butcher knife in both hands and jabbed upward, into the soft neck and chin of the first one, a female with multi-colored ceramic beads woven in her gray-black hair, driving it up into her brain.
“You did this!” screamed Magi, shoving the dead one aside. With a scream that originated from deep in his shattered soul, he gripped the knife with both hands and drew it across the neck of the next creature, just a foot away.
Nearly decapitated, black goop oozed down its bare chest as it tripped on the dead female and dropped to its knees before Magi. Gripping it by the hair, he cut its gurgling growls off by jabbing the blade into its ear, all the way to the hilt.
It too, crumpled to the ground.
He shoved the third one backward, and it staggered and tripped over the bones of his beloved Anjeni. Kneeling down, Magi placed the knife on the ground and reached down to unclasp a silver necklace from around his late fiancée’s ravaged neck.
The skinwalker, ignoring him, had moved toward the open slider. Magi, clutching the necklace in his fist, picked up the knife again and stood.
He walked behind the monster. It stumbled toward Mundunugu.
“No! Nooooo!” cried the chief, his eyes closed, terror on his face. He squirmed, trying to press himself into the cabinets against which he leaned, but still, the skinwalker advanced.
When it got to within six inches of him, Magi charged forward and stabbed the knife in at the base of its skull, letting it fall on the frightened elder.
He walked back to close the door, opening his palm to look at the bloody necklace.
Wattana’s eyes were wide with fear and confusion. “How … why didn’t they … they …” he trailed off. He tried to crawl out from beneath the weight of the dead skinwalker, grunting. His hands slipped in the putrid liquid running down his chest and pooling around him.
To Magi, he sounded weak. A useless man in any society, and no use to most of the Henomawi people now.
Climbing Fox Wattana had only one value remaining, if it was even possible.
Magi walked over and put the knife on the counter, then slipped the fine, silver chain over his head. He looked at Wattana.
“You’ll die when I say it’s time. Now get up and bring me the book.”
Sabine Pass, Port Arthur, Texas
Aboard The Monaco Skiff
Liam stood beside me, holdin’ onto Nokosi’s collar with his right hand, his left grippin’ a stainless-steel handhold for all he was worth.
Nokosi was on her hind legs, barkin’ up a storm. She had good reason.
The goddamned water was teemin’ with croakin’, jaw-snappin’ gators, and the sons-of-bitches weren’t shy. They crawled over one another, tried to bite the sides of the yacht, and generally defined the word relentless.
Their mouths open – all of ‘em – and I swore every ugly eye was on us.
The fresh meat.
We all stared back, and I know that I was hopin’ there wasn’t any shit out there we hadn’t seen yet. Hell, we knew these killers existed, and I think I was more freaked out right then than I’d been back at Baxter’s.
And that was no picnic in the swamp.
Some of the gators had body parts in their chops, and I’m only talkin’ of the human variety. Arms, legs, headless torsos, and every other goddamned combo you could come up with.
The dead floaters were mostly of the zombie variety; I could tell from the pitch black stainin’ on the edges of the severed limbs.
But when the bow of the Monaco Skiff hit an overturned life raft, a torso that still had its head attached slipped from beneath the yellow rubber, rolling onto its back.
The dead eyes stared upward, like a promise of what was to come. There was a bullet hole in the center of its forehead.
“God,” said Roxy, turnin’ away. “That’s horrible.” Terry put an arm around her and joined his friend on the bench, out of view of the melee below.
The second the gators saw the untainted meat, it was like a frantic starburst pattern of slashin’ teeth and swishin’, armored tails, fallin’ away from our boat as they stopped swimmin’ and fed.
The water-logged torso quickly became a dozen separate pieces, bitten and ripped apart by a handful of the crazed zombie gators.
“Wow,” mumbled Liam, his face gone pale. “I’m going downstairs.” He let go of the handhold and pulled the police ca
nine back down the steps with him. He’d begun to use pieces of cereal to coax Nokosi into following him around.
Nokosi was good with the boy. She let him pull her along. Maybe she couldn’t stand seein’ the only species beside her own that ever befriended her bein’ ripped to pieces.
I stepped sideways and pushed the throttle forward, bringin’ us up to 10 knots. There was a lot of debris in the inlet, but I figured even if I did breach the hull, we’d make it to the dock well before she sank.
“Hey!” said Lilly, down on the bow, pointin’. “Parking lot! Lots of trucks!”
I spied the dock. There was one huge platform supply vessel docked further up on it, and another several large ships free-floatin’ just off it, but there was room to bring in the 80-plus footer safely.
“Danny! You’re up man.”
He knew what I was sayin’, so I didn’t bother pointin’ to the thruster controls. We’d only get one shot at it. I was more likely to bounce us off the dock and into one of the other loose boats.
“Y’all ready to hit the highway?” he said, spinnin’ the wheel to port as he reduced speed. The big yacht responded, and he started turnin’ it back to starboard about twenty feet off the dock.
“This boat’s nice, but I wanna plant these boots on terra firma,” said Garland. “And this might sound crazy comin’ from me, but I never wanna see another gator in my goddang life.”
I chuckled to myself, but kept watchin’ Danny’s hands on the controls, tryin’ to guess what he’d do next.
I was right. He kept pullin’ the throttle, all the way back into reverse. When he’d countered the forward momentum, we sat perfectly still.
Danny engaged the thrusters as I eyed the approachin’ dock. It was pretty high outta the water, and no gators had made their way up onto it.
I looked off to the left and saw the refinery had put up a helluva fence on the south edge of the parkin’ lot. They probably did it to keep their employees safe from whatever normally roamed the wildlife preserve on the Texas side of the pass.
I let out a breath. My increase in speed had left almost all of the undead gators behind, too, so we were in the clear.
“CB!” called Lilly. I looked down at her, holdin’ the bowline in the air. “Quit daydreamin’ and get the stern line!”
“Oh, shit,” I said, turnin’ to run down the step. Georgie was sittin’ beside Roxy and Terry, and she shook her head with a smile. I smiled back.
We got the boat tied off without incident. When it was secure, Danny came clompin’ down the steps. “Should be a boarding ramp stashed somewhere, CB.”
“I didn’t see it. We got on at the stern.”
He opened a large hatch. “Got it,” he said. “We did it the hard way. Give me a hand.”
I headed to where he crouched, and we lifted it out and laid it flat on the deck. After pivoting the handrails up into their locked position, we lifted it over the low rail and spanned the gap.
“Like a goddamned glove,” I said.
Everything was already stacked on the rear of the boat. We were ready to start unloadin’ once we found vehicles to unload into.
Everyone made their way to the stern. I turned and said, “Y’all give the boat another once over if you want. If you wanna help us find transportation, grab the gun of your choice and follow us. We’re lookin’ for a quad cab truck and an SUV.”
We jumped the rail and crossed the ramp. “Heads up,” I said, pointin’. I saw several figures staggerin’ between the cars and trucks in the half-full parkin’ lot.
“Gotcha,” said Danny. Just then, Lilly and Terry came runnin’ up behind us. I didn’t give my sister a second thought. I looked at Terry and said, “You sure, man?”
He nodded and raised the barrel of his shotgun. “They won’t get anywhere near me.”
I nodded at him. “Welcome to the jungle.” I liked the kid a lot. So did Roxy, and he was a good lookin’ guy. I figured if he didn’t wear the other team’s jersey, she’d be all over him.
We stopped and scanned the parkin’ lot.
“Two over there,” I said, pointin’. “Same overalls. Employees, I’m guessin’.”
Terry punched me in the arm, and I jerked my head toward him. “Yeah?” I rubbed my arm. I think the kid frogged me.
“Keys,” he said. “They were in the parking lot, right?” He pointed toward a footbridge leadin’ over the waterway. “They have to go through a security gate to get over there, so maybe they just got back from lunch or something.”
“Pretty damned good thinkin’,” said Danny. “Hey,” he said, pointin’ to the south side of the lot. “Couple more over there. Let’s split up.”
I reached over and frogged Terry on the arm, my middle knuckle extended.
“Ouch!” he said, rubbin’ it.
“Turnabout’s fair play. Whatever the fuck that means. Anyway, we ain’t splittin’ up Hansel and Gretel there, so let’s you and me be … umm … Starsky and Hutch.”
“Who?” he said, lookin’ at me like I had sixteen heads.
“C’mon,” I said. “Find me a red Gran Torino with a white stripe and I’ll kiss ya.” I took off and heard him followin’.
When I turned to look at Danny, he was smilin’ big, shakin’ his head. Hell, we needed a little fun. It’d been a long-ass boat ride and I was still swayin’ a bit.
As we approached the first rotter, Terry’s steps slowed. “I know it was my idea,” said Terry. “But … maybe you do the honors?”
I shook my head. I was serious. “Nope.”
“What?” he asked, and I saw the color drain from his face.
“Terry, I’m doin’ you no favors if I handle this for you. You pump a round into that gun yet?” I asked, lookin’ at the 12-gauge.
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“You’re tense and it’s makin’ ya forget stuff ya already learned. Now, hold it steady, and push that pump forward, and you’re ready to go. The second it seats toward the front, you pull that trigger. You can shoot as fast as you can slam it home. They call it slam firin’.”
“Okay,” he said, kinda tentatively. “There’s only two, and you’re taking one, right?”
“You can do it. There’s a term called keepin’ your head on a swivel. Be aware of your surroundin’s and be prepared for anything.”
He took a real deep breath. “Let’s go get some vehicles.”
Lilly and Danny were already halfway past the first row of cars, trucks, and SUVs, and almost made it to the shamblin’ dead things.
“Keep your eyes low, too. You saw ‘em a bit at that marina in Marco, but gators and crocs can surprise you from under a car. That sucker in your hands can do some damage, maybe blow their jaws apart.”
“Jesus!” he said. “Can I go back?”
“You really want to?” We were just approachin’ the first row of vehicles, and these had to be management’s. Some nice big quad cabs, and a good lot of SUVs, too.
“I’m just nervous.”
“Good. Keeps you alive.” I pointed. “You got a friend,” I said, noddin’ my head toward the first gray-faced deadeye to get to us.
“Now?”
“Yeah, now!” I said.
He raised the shotgun, the stock against this shoulder. Kid had good form.
“Raise that barrel, Ter. You shoot him in the fuckin’ pocket, we’ll screw up any keys he’s carryin’.”
Terry actually laughed and took two bold steps toward the advancin’ thing.
I had my eye on the other one. He’d been millin’ around the front row when we saw him, but he was about ten spaces over.
I heard a distant boom and looked over to see Lilly and Danny watchin’ their first kill fall.
The next explosion was closer. It was like a water balloon filled with rancid blood exploded. It was rainin’ reddish-black pus in Florida-sized drops.
Me and Terry both ducked down, takin’ the disgustin’ after kill on the backs of our shirts. I was wearin’ a
baseball cap, so only a little of the shit got in my hair.
Terry’s pretty hair would never be the same.
“God!” he said, standin’ up.
“Yeah,” I said. “You let him get a little closer than I would’ve.”
“I wanted to hit him.”
“You did that. Check his pockets. I don’t think he’s a danger now. That other dude has some extra shit on the front of his overalls. Maybe a bigwig. Nicer car.”
I marched off toward the other remnant of humanity. He was a heavy boy, buncha pens still intact in the pocket protector in his overalls. I stopped about ten feet away from him and held up the Remington 770. It was a cheaper gun, but it was it in the .30-06 Springfield caliber, and I liked the feel of it.
I raised the scope to my eye, centered the wobbly dude’s head, and fired.
His head spun sideways, and his legs buckled. I could still hear the shot echoin’ through the enormous clearin’ of the parkin’ lot when he hit the pavement.
“Cole!” shouted Terry, and as I walked toward my kill, I saw him holdin’ up a set of keys. I threw him a thumbs-up.
I got to my guy, saw a big bulge in his right pocket, and felt it from outside. Hell yeah. It was keys. I reached in and grabbed ‘em.
Chevy, complete with key fob. I stood up and pushed the button.
A double-beep sounded, but I wasn’t impressed. Too high. I hit it again.
And I turned around to see a goddamned Chevy Cruze, mockin’ me. Hell, that car would barely haul me, Danny, and a couple guns and six-packs.
I tossed the keys on the ground and pretended to feel bad about killin’ a dude for his compact car.
Seein’ what I’d done, Terry hit his remote. The horn that sounded in response was more like it. Kinda throaty.
I followed the noise. He’d hooked us up with a big, blue Ford Excursion. I headed over to him.
“Nice job, man! That was like Russian roulette, though. Coulda been anything.”
Terry smiled. “Nice car you got,” he said.
“Fuck off.”
Just then, I heard an engine turn over, and saw a big red Silverado rocket out of the second aisle over. Danny whipped that big sucker around and jammed right toward us. I saw Lilly in the front seat, her teeth flashin’ through the glare of the windshield.