Wereduck

by Dave Atkinson

  “They’ll be here any minute,” said Marcus.

  “All right,” said Dirk, glancing around the space to make sure they were alone. “Just point me at a spot where I can hide with my camera, and I’m out of your hair.”

  Marcus took a deep breath. “Listen,” he said. “Maybe I’m having second thoughts about this.”

  “You can’t have second thoughts,” said Dirk, becoming serious. “I’ve been working on this story for years. I’ve been living in a mouldy old house for the last month.”

  “I’ll pay you,” said Marcus.

  Dirk scoffed. “I don’t want money. A deal is a deal: you deliver me werewolves, and I’ll never bother you again,” he paused. “Look, don’t worry. After tonight, I’ve never heard of you. You’re free.”

  Marcus let out a long sigh and looked back at the sky. “It’s just….”

  “Just nothing,” said Dirk. “We had a deal. You contacted me, remember?”

  Marcus pursed his lips. “All right,” he said. He pointed across the clearing. “You see that maple? There’s an easy spot to climb to that’s concealed from the clearing. You’ll have a full view of everything.”

  The sound of distant voices drifted up the trail.

  “Better hurry,” said Marcus.

  Dirk scurried into the trees.

  Marcus nodded to himself as he made a silent decision. He was sick of running. Sick of slinking away at the slightest sign of danger. Sick of dragging his son from place to place. Sick of never being able to find new friends, let alone new love. He’d been running for nearly fifteen years—since the fire that took everything from him. His wife. His freedom. His life.

  Maybe John was right. Maybe Bea was worth staying for. He could see now there was just one obstacle standing in his way.

  Dirk Bragg wasn’t going to make it out of the woods tonight alive.

  Kate’s feet crunched on the gravel of the trail as she tried to keep pace with John.

  “Why don’t you just tell your dad?” she said for the third time. “If you guys are leaving tomorrow anyway, what’s the difference?”

  John maintained his stride and stared straight ahead. “Because we have a plan, that’s why.”

  “But maybe he can help us. Maybe we can tell my parents, too,” argued Kate.

  “We don’t need their help,” said John. “As long as Bobby does his job, we’ll be fine.”

  “I don’t like this,” said Kate.

  “You think I do?” said John. He stopped. “I don’t want to leave tomorrow. I feel like if we can do this ourselves, maybe I don’t have to leave.”

  “But your dad said—”

  “I don’t care what he said,” interrupted John. He looked at the ground.

  “Did you guys have a fight?”

  “Another fight, you mean.”

  Kate touched his arm.

  “I think the sun’s about to set,” said John. “We should go.”

  A few minutes later, they entered the clearing to find Marcus standing by himself in the moonlight.

  “I was beginning to think no one was coming,” he said.

  John and Kate said nothing.

  “Still not talking to me, huh?” said Marcus. “Great. Did you at least finish packing?”

  John dug his hands into his pockets and stared at his dad.

  “Did you finish packing?” repeated Marcus.

  “Yes,” said John.

  “Good.”

  Bea stepped into the clearing from the trail. She stopped abruptly when she saw Marcus.

  “I suppose you’re not speaking to me either,” said Marcus.

  Bea slowly exhaled before answering. “What would you like me to say?”

  Before Marcus could answer, Kate’s parents and grandmother entered the clearing.

  “Sorry we’re late,” said Brian, rubbing his hands together and looking at the sky. He was clearly oblivious to the tension in the group. “Sun’s about to set. Everyone ready?”

  “Ready,” said Marcus.

  “Your second night as a duck,” said Lisa to Kate. “Big plans for the evening?”

  Kate looked at John. “We’ve a few things we want to do, yeah,” said Kate.

  The group turned to the west. The only sound was the light breeze in the leaves overhead. They watched as the sun slipped below the horizon.

  “Whooooo?” came the call. “Whooooo?”

  Dirk was dumbfounded.

  He had been prepared for some amazing sights, but what unfolded through his viewfinder was stranger than he’d ever imagined.

  At first, most everything happened just as he had expected. As the sun set, the group turned toward the moon. Most of the group called out in a collective howl and transformed into a pack of wolves. But the girl…he couldn’t believe it.

  The girl quacked. Like a duck.

  Each subsequent quack from her mouth sounded less human and more…duck-like. Dirk trained his camera on the girl and recorded video as she transformed before his eyes into a small brown duck. He followed her flight with his camera as she left the clearing.

  Dirk was so distracted by the duck that he lost track of which person became which wolf—except for Marcus.

  The giant black wolf was difficult to miss. A spiked ridge of fur at his shoulder blades made him appear even bigger and more intimidating. He sat silently in the middle of the clearing as the rest of the wolves dispersed into the forest.

  Dirk stayed perched in his tree, watching. He would wait until Marcus left, then sneak into the forest to grab a few more candid photos before he hit the road. He had an early morning date with a TV studio and international acclaim.

  The big black wolf sat holding its lonely vigil with the moon. Ten minutes passed, then twenty. Dirk’s leg fell asleep. He adjusted his weight in the tree.

  The noise from the branches stirred Marcus from his trance. He turned to face Dirk’s tree.

  “Nice doggy,” said Dirk, causally pulling a banana from his jacket pocket and peeling it open. “Want a treat?” A low growl erupted from deep within the black giant. Dirk felt the blood drain from his hands and face. The grin faded from his lips. The banana peel fell to the ground.

  Marcus padded slowly to the base of the tree. His growl deepened. His eyes shot an unmistakable look of hatred at the dishevelled man in the tree.

  A lump rose in Dirk’s throat. He now understood what a mistake it had been to make a deal with a werewolf.

  Bobby thought about how simple their plan had been, and how it had already gone so wrong.

  His job had been to watch the clearing for any sign of Dirt Bag. That’s how he’d come to be lying flat on his stomach beneath a bush at the edge of the clearing. Once he found Dirt Bag, he was to sneak off to find John.

  If Dirt Bag was in the woods, as they suspected, he’d need his truck to get away. Kate’s assignment was to survey the forest from above, find the truck, and lead John and Bobby to it.

  Once Dirt Bag showed up at his truck at the end of the evening, they’d have a little chat. Bobby would explain that if Dirt Bag didn’t hand over his evidence—likely his camera’s memory card—Bobby would sick his “wolf-friend” on him. At this point in the conversation, John would growl and try to look as wild and menacing as possible. They were pretty sure Dirt Bag would see things their way.

  Their simple plan didn’t account for what Bobby was watching unfold in the clearing.

  “Hey, Marcus,” called Dirk from his tree. “Can’t we talk about this? I mean, we had a deal, right?”

  Marcus growled again.

  “Right,” said Dirk. “Listen, heh, heh, maybe we’re having difficulty with our inter-species communication. See, I’ve never spoken with a werewolf before. Maybe you aren’t threatening me like it seems you are. So…give two howls if you really want to, y�
�know, kill me, or three quick yips if you don’t.”

  Marcus’s growl was immediate and deep.

  Dirk yelped and scrambled higher in his tree. His sweaty palms clung desperately to the bark.

  “Remember that chat we had just a few minutes ago? That one about me just forgetting this werewolf story? I think it’s a great idea. In fact, what werewolves? Am I right?”

  Bobby glanced back and forth between the reporter and the giant wolf. This was bad. He needed to find John and Kate before it was too late. They hated the idea of Dirt Bag writing about them in his paper, but they didn’t want him dead.

  Bobby crawled slowly along the ground away from the clearing. Once he was far enough away, he rose to his feet and crept silently through the forest.

  Marcus approached a patch of underbrush at the edge of the clearing. He was sure he’d heard something.

  It took just a few sniffs of the ground for Marcus to know who had been there—little boys have distinctive smells. Bobby had been watching. So he knew Dirt Bag was there. And he knew Marcus had invited him. If the boy told anyone, it would ruin everything.

  Marcus and John had moved so many times trying to evade the reporter. There had been many close calls. It took years for Marcus to realize he could use Dirk: make him an ally. All he had to do was promise to give the reporter the very thing he’d been searching for: evidence of werewolves.

  It isn’t easy finding other werewolves. He’d chased down so many rumours that had turned out to be nothing—in each case either the pack had long since left, or it never existed in the first place.

  Marcus discovered these Canadian wolves a few months earlier. He had chased one of those rumours—an article in the local weekly newspaper about a man who swore he’d heard the howling of wolves. The paper quoted local wildlife officials who said it was impossible: wolves had been eradicated from this part of the country for more than a hundred years.

  Still, Marcus thought it was worth a check.

  John was never much of a bother when Marcus was searching. He slept through most full moons. Marcus walked all night in a grid pattern as if he were searching for a lost child. So many times, his search turned up nothing. This time, he found what he was after. Wolves. And a story for Dirt Bag.

  Marcus contacted him soon after. He confessed to be the wolf that Bragg had pursued over several years through several states. He made the deal over the phone. He would deliver Bragg a pack of unsuspecting wolves. All Marcus asked for in return was to be left alone.

  But the deal was off. The reporter had to die. And now that Bobby knew what was going on, well, he had to die, too.

  Marcus stitched a new plan together in his head. He was sure no one would miss Dirt Bag. Bobby was a bit trickier.

  His parents couldn’t go to the police. Only a handful of people in the nearby town had a vague idea that anyone even lived out here. Bea had told him that, officially, none of the members of that family even existed. They’d have a hard time explaining to the police that a boy with no birth certificate, no health records, and no school registration had gone missing.

  There would be no reason to suspect foul play or Marcus. The family would just have to come to accept that Bobby was gone. Little boys sometimes run away. And since Bea would be shattered by the news of her missing nephew, maybe Marcus could help her pick up the pieces.

  Marcus looked to the tree where Dirt Bag sat trembling in fear. He wasn’t going anywhere. Surely, Marcus had time to track down the brat, take care of him, and still finish off the reporter before sunrise.

  He plunged into the woods. The boy had a few minutes’ lead on him, but Marcus could make up the distance.

  Minutes later, he heard Bobby’s clumsy human footsteps ahead of him in the forest. But he could hear something else.

  Another wolf.

  Marcus stopped and slunk low to the ground. He couldn’t take down the boy in front of one of the others. He would wait for his chance. There were still a few hours of darkness left.

  Perched in his tree, Dirk assessed the situation. This was the worst predicament he’d ever been in—even worse than that time he was tied up in that Vegas dressing room while working on a story about an artsy troupe of Martian circus performers. Marcus wanted to kill him.

  But Dirk had a more immediate problem. He had to pee. Really badly.

  Where Marcus had gone, and why he had left so quickly, Dirk could not guess. But with the big wolf gone, he decided it was time to take care of business. He scrambled to the ground and found an appropriate bush.

  Dirk considered his options. Only he knew where he had hidden his truck. He had no idea how soon Marcus would return to finish him off, but the desire to get away from this place and plop himself in front of a television camera was strong.

  Dirk ran into the woods. In spite of the still very real danger, he smiled. In five minutes he would be speeding his way toward fame, and with any hope, a proper breakfast.

  “Marcus wants to kill Dirt Bag!” said Bobby.

  Two blank faces stared back at him. The duck and the wolf didn’t seem to have trouble believing he’d found Dirk. What was harder to swallow was the idea that John’s dad was about to murder him.

  John shook his head. He knew his dad was an angry man. He knew his anger had recently grown into a brooding darkness that never seemed to go away. He knew how much Marcus hated Dirt Bag. He just couldn’t believe his dad was a killer.

  Without waiting for further explanation, John sprinted through brush and trees toward the clearing with Bobby and Kate following close behind. They arrived to find it empty.

  No Dirt Bag. No Marcus.

  “I swear, they were right here,” said Bobby. He scrambled up Dirk’s tree. “Maybe Dirt Bag left a mark, or dropped something, or….”

  John approached the base of the tree. He had no idea why Bobby would be lying about his dad, but that was the only explanation. He sat on the ground and took a deep breath of night air.

  He smelled something.

  He inhaled again, his heightened canine sense of smell identifying the different aromas of the forest. Trees, grass, moss, earth. And something else.

  He followed the scent to the other side of tree and found its source on a bush: human urine.

  There were other smells: unwashed clothes. Sauerkraut. John followed the trail of scents and came across the discarded peel of a banana. He picked it up.

  “What?” asked Bobby.

  John turned back to Bobby and Kate. The yellow peel dangled from his mouth.

  “Banana,” whispered Bobby. “It’s Dirt Bag, right?”

  John dropped the peel and took a few more steps into the woods. He smelled something else, something familiar.

  “Marcus is following him,” said Bobby. He jumped to the ground.

  John nodded.

  “I told you. He’s going to kill him,” said Bobby. “We’ve got to stop him.”

  John paused, then nodded again.

  “Let’s go!” said Bobby.

  “Quack!” said Kate. She flapped her wings and flew into the air.

  Dirk found his truck parked on a long-forgotten logging road hidden under a layer of branches. He breathed a sigh of relief. His camera was full of images that would prove the existence of werewolves. He had a juicy story full of sneaky deals, deception, danger, and—of all things—a wereduck.

  He pulled the branches off his truck and rehearsed in his mind what he would say later that morning on national television.

  I always knew in my heart that werewolves were real, but I never knew to what level of physical danger I would have to put myself through to prove it. Had I known that my very life was on the line, I may have been too terrified to attempt it, but in the end, I believe the truth is worth it.

  He chuckled. People would eat it up.

  He removed the last branch f
rom the hood and reached for the door handle. As his fingers touched the steel, a low growl rumbled directly behind him.

  Dirk turned slowly around, hoping to find any other creature in the world but Marcus.

  The giant black wolf stood just paces away, his body slung low, ready to pounce.

  “Oh! There you are,” said Dirk with a nervous squeak, pressing his back against the truck. Marcus’s teeth dripped saliva into the dust.

  “Yeah, like, I was hoping we might talk again about that deal….”

  Dirk snuck his hand behind his body and grasped the door handle. “Y’know—the one where I don’t write about you or your son, and I, um, live?”

  Dirk pulled up on the handle. It was locked.

  “Oh, crap,” he whimpered.

  Dirk prayed for a miracle. It came from the sky.

  A meteor of brown feathers crashed with a boomph! into the roof of Dirk’s truck and began to scream quacks at them.

  The duck distracted Marcus just long enough for Dirk to slip his hand inside his pants pocket. He found the cold metal and plastic of his car keys and pressed the unlock button on the remote.

  Ca-chunk!

  The mechanical sound pulled Marcus’s attention back to Dirk. He growled. Marcus wouldn’t hesitate again. Dirk shut his eyes and braced for Dirk’s attack.

  “Oh, crap,” he whimpered again.

  Before Marcus could act, he was distracted again: this time by the roaring charge of another beast emerging from the woods.

  Dirk dared a peek through one eye and saw a second, smaller wolf locked in combat with Marcus.

  Marcus was surprised by his attacker, but he quickly regained the advantage. Snarling and growling, he flipped the smaller wolf onto its back, pinning it to the ground, his jaws clamped around its neck. The duck hopped to the ground, quacking desperately.

  Fascinating as the whole scene was, Dirk didn’t feel like sticking around to see how it would end. He jumped into his truck and turned the key in the ignition. The truck’s tires spun briefly in the dirt before skidding away.