Full Moonster [BUREAU 13 Book Three]

by Nick Pollotta

  Extricating myself from the brambles, I found my bottle of Healing potion and took a swig. The pain diminished. Ah. Now, where was the gang?

  Over here! Ten meters towards the volcano.

  The what? Oh there it is. Wow.

  Hurrying, I found them in a small clearing of bare ground, with a matching set of chairs and sofa surrounded by lush vegetation.

  Already hard at work, George had a long stick that he was frantically trying to sharpen a point on with a jagged rock. Nimble fingers busy, Father Donaher was tying his ceremonial purple sash around three stones to fashion a crude bola. Jessica was plucking leaves off a vine already knotted into a garrote. Way to go, Tunafish! We were down, but not out.

  Removing my shoes, I knelt and filled a sock with dirt. Called a tap, cosh, persuader, blackjack, sap, whatever, was one of the oldest weapons created by humans, but it was still here because it worked so well. Totally silent and reusable, a sap hit like a sledgehammer and could kill in trained hands. Mine.

  Testing a swing on a palm, my flesh stung from the mild impact. Cracking open a skull and pulverizing the brain should slow down even the strongest werewolf. Hopefully.

  "Okay, standard search pattern,” I said. “But this time we stay together. Double coverage. Me and Jess, George and Mike."

  "Hold,” Jessica whispered urgently. “There's something out there."

  We moved into a defensive posture. Straining vision, I could dimly perceive a misshapen thing moving through the jungle circling our position. We could clearly hear the steady tap of multiple feet.

  "What is it?” George asked, peering against the darkness of the trees.

  "Another tarantula?” Father Donaher guessed, starting to swing his bola. The stones clicked once and soft as the noise was, the creature instantly scuttled forward in our direction.

  "Manticore!” Jessica shouted, as the monster burst from the foliage.

  The silver-blue illumination from the magical sky highlighted its bloated hairy body. Ugly bugger. Part-spider, part-scorpion and part-cockroach, the very name of the demonic insect meant death in several dimensions.

  As it came near, George heaved his makeshift spear and missed. Mike threw the bola and hit, but with no effect. Before the rest of us could move, a stream of brackish liquid squirted from the mouth of the monster and hit George in the face. With a hideous gargle, the man fell, clawing at his smoking flesh.

  The manticore vomited a second stream of death at me. I ducked as Donaher leapt upon the back of the beast and buried his cross into its mottled hump like a dagger! Poison blood squirted across the glowing crucifix and ignited as Mike dove for the bushes. In a juicy crackle, the mutant bug burst into flames. Bleeding fire, it charged into the bushes. A moment later we heard its death scream fading into the distance. Downward.

  But congratulations for the victory were put on hold as we sprinted to our wounded friend. Biting his tongue not to scream, George clawed feebly for his canteen. Pushing the hands aside, I poured a full bottle of Healing potion on the soldier's face. There was a violent hiss and he relaxed. As the fumes dispersed and his countenance became visible, we tried not to gasp in horror.

  Looking worse than a week old corpse with a hangover, George's face was a ghastly greenish yellow, the flesh puckered into ravines of gnarled skin. But even worse, his eyes were featureless orbs of solid white.

  "Will I live?” he croaked.

  As a friend, I had no other choice but to give it to him straight. “Yes. But you're blind."

  He took the bitter news stolidly. “Healing potion?"

  "Tried already."

  Gingerly with fingertips, the man probed his face. “How bad is it?” George asked in a small voice.

  "Oh, I've seen worse,” I lied. “Makes you look sort of like Tommy Lee Jones on a bad hair day."

  He flinched. “Never play poker with me, Ed. That terrible, eh?"

  Trapped, I told him the cold truth.

  A little awkwardly, the soldier stood. “Come on, we still got a world to save, bud."

  Stout fellow. With Donaher on guard, Jessica was already busy. Holding a forked branch by the ends, she walked around in circles searching for a secret door, hidden entrance. Maybe even the elevator. That would be nice.

  Fat chance, bucko. She stopped. “We dig here."

  Using our hands, we scooped aside the loose soil until we reached concrete. Guided into place, George slammed the steel reinforced heel of his Army boots onto the material and after a few tries it started to crack. Pieces came loose and, bending low, we pried them aside. Below was a hotel corridor.

  "I'm staying here,” George said, crawling to the nearby bushes and pulling branches loose. “I'll cover the hole and try to sidetrack any werewolves."

  Blind and armed with a stick? Damn what a man. I would add the name George Renault to the heroes roll call of Horatio, Audie Murphy, and Ken Saunders. Probably for the last time, George and I shook his hands, Jess gave him a hug and we dropped down inside.

  We found ourselves near a curtained window at the end of a hallway lined with doors. The carpet was decorated with party favors and every door had a dining tray loaded with plates and liquor bottles, plus, women's underwear hung from the doorknobs. These occult conventions must be pretty wild.

  There were no numbers, each door had a brass plate and was named after a President. Yep, this was the convention floor. I tried a knob and found it unlocked. Peeking inside I saw the ocean. Donaher cracked a door and confronted a desert plain. Jess peered at the Alps as a goat wandered by.

  We closed the doors. How many dimensions and places was this poor befuddled building occupying at the same instant?

  On the wall, a clock dramatically ticked.

  As the doors would lead us nowhere, in a triangle formation we skirted forward in the corridor, ready for attack. This deep in the enemy citadel, anything could happen.

  Turning a corner, we encountered an elderly woman with white hair and a cane.

  "You!” the gnarled oldster and Jess gasped in unison.

  My wife grabbed the amulet around her neck as the elderly woman extended a fist adorned with a huge signet ring. Motionless, they stood there locked in silent battle. It was only specks at first, then glowing sparks started swirling about the two telepaths, and soon they were encased in a vortex of static discharges from the awful load of mental energies unleashed.

  Father Donaher started to reach for them and I stopped him.

  "Don't,” I warned. “It'd kill you in a microsecond."

  Frowning deeply, Mike touched the empty shotgun holster on his belt. A single 12 gauge round would have ended the matter, and I would have given anything for the big priest to have a load for his weapon.

  "Come on,” I said and forced myself to take that first step away from my wife.

  Two floors away we ran straight into a pair of werewolves. They were in flak jackets and carrying M-16 machine guns.

  Moving fast, we stepped close to the monsters. Now standing behind the muzzle, the guns could no longer harm us. It was apparently a trick the Scion agents had never heard of, as their jaws unhinged. In grim satisfaction, I swung my cosh and Mike smacked the other in the face with his armored Bible. Bones crunched in stereo.

  Reeling backwards, the wolves stumbled to the floor. We pounded them again for a while until they stopped moving. Quick as lawyers, we stripped them of everything valuable; flak jackets, pistols and ammo clips. They even had one grenade apiece. How nice! True, they were old World War II pineapples loaded with blasting powder and gelignite, but serviceable nonetheless.

  Sprawled on the carpet, the werewolves were already starting to moan back into life. It takes more than a simple beating to kill a were. But hey, no problem, Bureau 13 agents are most obliging.

  Dragging the bodies around a corner, we jammed them into a closet. Then Donaher and I each stuffed our sole grenade into the mouth of the respective victim, pulled the pins, slammed the door and ran. Thunder and flame filled t
he hallway in our wake, but we kept going. Let's see how quickly they heal with no heads.

  As we raced along the corridors, I checked the load on a clip. U.S. Army issue regulation 5.56mm perfectly imbalanced tumblers. Nasty bullets that enter a shoulder and ricochet around chewing the major organs into mincemeat and then exit from the opposite hip. I had been hoping for phosphorus tracer rounds, hardball AP rounds, or mercury-tipped explosive bullets. But I might as well wish for blessed silver while I was at it. Still, they were better than trying to beat a zombie to death with a club sandwich. I did that once. It takes hours.

  At the elevator bank, a sign on an easel announced the times and locations of numerous convention functions. There was no listing for the moon rock.

  With a musical ding the central elevator doors parted to display a score of werewolves with fire axes and pistols.

  "Pinocchio!” I screamed, aiming the M-16 at the wall above the cage. Donaher added the firepower of his M-16 and we spent an entire clip chewing a hole in the wall. Crack!

  After the initial shock of seeing us, and the gunfight with nobody, the grinning and drooling werewolves started towards us. Then with a sharp crack, the weakened elevator cable snapped and down they plummeted.

  "Blast, this only bought us a minute at best. The safety brakes will stop them from crashing in only a few stories,” Donaher grumped, peering into the dark shaft.

  "Only there aren't any more stories,” I reminded.

  Suddenly, a bright light bathed his face as the cage left the shaft and dropped through empty air, building speed on its way to a rude visit to Mother Earth as their screams faded into the distance.

  Good enough. As the doors automatically closed, we returned to business.

  "Okay, now where?” I asked, glancing around.

  "NASA doesn't allow you to charge admission to see the rock,” the priest said thoughtfully, flexing his big hands, “so it must be in main public area."

  "But immediately near your ticket booth to entice folks inside to see more marvels,” I added.

  "Main conference room?"

  Shouldering my assault rifle, I nodded agreement. There was a map of the floor on the wall. We smashed the glass and peeled it off the frame. Hmm, big hotel.

  His big finger stabbed at the map. “There's it is. Down this corridor, make a left, three doors, right."

  I rolled the floor plan and tucked it into my belt. “Oddbotkins, that's groovy, homeboy. Let's rock."

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  We had only taken a step when Mike gasped in pain. I turned about and saw the priest taking a hand away from his right hip. The palm was covered with red.

  "They must have shot me,” Donaher said, sounding amazed.

  The priest started wobbling a bit and I slid a chair underneath to stop him from falling over. Gently raising the cassock, I found his pants and shirt were dripping with blood. Tenderly as possible, I probed for a wound.

  He inhaled sharply. “It's in my hip."

  "Can't get a tourniquet there,” I stated. Feeling in my pockets I found the bottle of Healing potion. Empty.

  "Mine's also gone,” Father Donaher groaned. He was a bit pale by now and starting to sweat.

  That was the way most small caliber bullet wounds worked. At first your body rejected the pain, but with blood loss it was soon undeniable. I touched his throat searching for the carotid artery. His pulse was up, yet his temperature was down. Sweaty and clammy. There was major internal hemorrhaging. He was dying.

  "Wanna do a George?” I asked, feeling a lump in my throat.

  He exhaled mightily and nodded yes.

  I ripped off my white shirt and folded it into a pressure compress, using my tie to hold it in place. The belt would have worked better but I needed that to keep up my pants.

  With Donaher's weakening assistance, I moved the chair to the wall and dragged a sofa in front. His back was protected and the furniture gave him some cover to hide behind. It would have do suffice. Dripping sweat, Mike gave me a shaky thumbs-up and I hurriedly departed. It was my job now. Alone.

  Rounding a corner, I bumped into somebody holding a Wichita Thunderbolt .475 pistol. Adrenaline flooded my body and with blinding speed I aimed and fired the M16 in the same motion.

  Scowling in annoyance, J.P. Withers looked down at the line of puckered bullet holes in his chest, the gaping wounds exposing a wealth of very odd looking internal organs.

  "Well, if you didn't want my damn help,” he growled, “you only had to say so. No need to be rude.” In a flash, Withers vanished.

  "No wait!” I cried to the empty corridor. Blast the man! Then I paused. Wait a minute, if he Gated in, then were the runes down? Was help on the way? There was no way to know. I hurried onward.

  At a pair of double doors with tiny decorative widows set in them, I stayed low and peeked through. Exhibit Hall A.

  Surrounding a ticket booth, sparkling layers of non-reality swirled and spun in a multicolored light show of dimensional instability. Countless phantasms strolled along, crossing from one world to the next: transparent fish swam by, ghostly flocks of birds, spectral racing cars, an ethereal cavalry charge, a spirited elephant stampede. The floor bucked and writhed like a living thing. The walls pulsed and the ceiling constantly broke apart, the acoustic tiles sliding over each other to endlessly rearrange themselves.

  On the ground were the charred bones of the Marine honor guard that accompanied the moon rock wherever it went. Behind the velvet ropes was a little old lady poised in the act of lifting the unearthly object from the Lucite base. Bingo!

  Something hit me from behind. Burning pain filled my skull and I felt my heart slow ... down ... and ... st..art again!

  Completely healed, I sat upright and blew smoke out of my mouth. The copper bracelet on my wrist gave one last tingle and went still. Whew. That was the third and last Jump Start I had ever experienced. My quota was filled. I could never again use the death-or-life emergency Healing spell. But whoever had killed me, left too soon. They would pay for that mistake.

  Once more, I peeked into the main exhibit hall. Stalking around on patrol was a werewolf holding a crimson splattered fire axe. That was my blood and brains on the blade! Boy, was I pissed off now! In a curse that was more snarl than words, I kicked open the doors and cut loose with the M16.

  "Eat silver, bozo!” I screamed.

  The stuttering stream of Army tumblers stitched the monster's torso, shoving him backwards until it hit the marble wall and collapsed to the floor, twisted and bleeding.

  "...should have known ... silver bullets,” the monster coughed weakly.

  Trying my best to radiate confidence, I moved towards the lady and rock. I was almost there, when the werewolf clawed at his chest, pulling one of the slugs free with a faint sucking sound. Intently, he stared at the grayish lump.

  "Just a darn minute,” the beast growled, the flow of blood from its wounds noticeably slowing. “This isn't silver!"

  "Hey, so I lied. Sue me, creep,” I sneered, hosing another clip into the monster.

  As the air cleared, I could see that the nightmare creature had literally been cut in half by the fusillade. Howling in agony, the werewolf was writhing about on the floor, his claws digging sharp furrows into the crimson-splattered stone. Ha!

  Then I watched in horror as the Scion werewolf pulled on its legs as a man would don a pair of pants. Whole once more, the beast stood and hobbled forward in a weak charge.

  There was no time for this! Glancing at a huge clock placed prominently on the wall, I saw that one hand was spinning backwards, while the other hung limp. Swell.

  "Gonna eat, then kill you,” the manbeast snarled insanely.

  Slamming in the last clip, I didn't bother to reply. The heavy combat rounds made the creature jerk with every impact, but nothing more. Out of bullets, I hurled the rifle and hopped over the velvet ropes. There was still a chance to rescue the lady. I had a teleport bracelet. If
I used it on her instead of me....

  Something got my collar and I was yanked backwards to hit the floor. As claws reached for my face, I delivered a killing karate chop to the kidney. Now I was no Mindy Jennings, but I had been trained by some of the best.

  As the werewolf howled in pain from the dirty blow, I rolled to my feet, and spinning about, kicked the monster's knee, feeling the bone crunch under the edge of my shoe. The beast staggered and almost fell. Then he stood, whole and undamaged, and rising to its full eight feet in height roared like the primordial beast it was!

  "Aw, shaddup,” I growled and kicked him in the groin.

  Gasping in pain, the werewolf raked its claws at me.

  Gracefully as a willow tree, I bowed beneath the blow, stepped in and rammed both of my fists into the jaw of the creature with triphammer force.

  Merely bruised, the werewolf shook off the tap and butted me hard. I saw the ceiling go by as I went flying to smack into a wall with a sickening crack. Badly disorientated, I staggered to my feet. Bemused, the unshaven Scion agent laughed, a mistake that nearly cost him a jaw. Shouting a martial arts battle cry, I leapt and hit the man-beast in a flying kick, powered by my full hundred and fifty pounds of Wyoming ranch muscle. Kill me, will you?

  Spitting teeth, the stunned werewolf staggered about, so I pressed the attack home. Had to get this yutz off me so I could teleport the old lady out of here. How close were we to O'Hare? How soon till the missiles blew us all to hell? My sunfist broke the nose of the monster, cupped hands slapped against its pointed ears rupturing eardrums. A finger jab nearly removed an eye. As I had been trained to do, I was concentrating on the werewolf's head, probably the only vulnerable spot the creature had. If it had any.

  No longer amused by this game, the enraged werewolf thrust his paws downward to rend me apart. I barely managed to sway out of the way, the front of my bodyarmor ripped away and three shallow red lines on my stomach began oozing blood. Oh crap! This close to the epicenter of the ethereal vortex, the protective spell on my T-shirt had been nullified!