Wayne's eyes got big and he reached around me to slam the metal door shut. "Cash out, boys. Game's shuttin' down for a little while. My good friend Bubba here brings me word that there's a bunch of revenuers comin' down here looking for backroom games like ours, so we gotta get gone." The men around the table grumbled a little, but when the waitress pulled a t-shirt on and pulled out a money box to start cashing folks out, they obediently lined up, got their money and left. The girl locked the door behind them and came back to stand next to Billy Wayne.
"Go up front, get Mama, and go to Aunt Joyce's place in Knoxville. I'll call you when it's safe to come home. If you don't hear from me in a week, don't come back. Tell Mama that thing we been worried about has happened." The girl looked confused, but Wayne didn't explain. He just waved a hand at her and she scurried out the door.
"You made an escape plan in case my Pop came back?" I asked. I looked at Wayne in a little bit of a new light. He'd never seemed all that smart, but he'd managed to stay ahead of the law all these years somehow, and now he had a monster apocalypse escape plan in place.
"Not just for him. For him, you, or any of that shit you hunt. I made plans with Christine and Mama to get the hell out of town if any of that crap ever came down on us here. And now it has. I don't hold any of it against you, Bubba, but if we're gonna live here we gotta be prepared. Now what do you need?" He pulled back a curtain on what looked like redneck heaven. Or the armory of a small island nation. One or the other.
"What do you have in a silver-jacketed round?" I asked, mouth watering at the rows and rows of AR-15s, MP-5s, Smith & Wesson pistols, a rack full of Desert Eagles, and leaning in one corner, a Stinger missile.
Wayne led me back through the maze of shelves to a couple of pallet racks where he kept his ammo. He handed me a small shopping basket, the plastic kind like you get at the grocery store if you're not buying more than a six-pack of beer and some Hot Pockets. I grabbed ten boxes of silver .50 hollow point for Bertha, giving me 200 rounds for the big pistol. I pulled half a dozen Desert Eagle magazines off the shelf and tossed them into the basket. Then I grabbed a bulk package of "Satan's Toothpicks" for Skeeter. The 12-gauge flechette round looked like a normal shotgun shell on the outside, but was loaded with darts instead of lead balls. In this case, the darts were all silver. A couple of boxes of 9mm ammo, also in silver, and we're pretty well loaded for bear. Or wolf.
"What do I owe you?" I ask.
Wayne waved a hand at me. "Call it even for all the poker money I ain't never gonna pay you."
I held out a hand. We shook. "We're even. And thanks." I said, turning for the door.
"I still think you're a shithead."
"Yeah, well." I didn't bother telling him that sometimes I think I'm a shithead, too. Especially when I realized that my family squabble is so scary that normal people are leaving the state so as not to be around when I throw down with my old man for the last time. I was starting to understand why Batman wore a mask.
I walked back out to the truck and motioned for Amy to pop the lock on the tailgate. I loaded all the ammo into the back, then gave her back her pistol as I got into the passenger seat. I put my seatbelt on and popped open a box of Desert Eagle ammo. I started loading magazines while Amy pulled onto the highway.
"Where to next? Your place?" Amy asked.
"Yeah. Skeeter'll give you directions."
"I don't need directions. Your house is programmed into the GPS." She didn't look at me, and I very carefully didn't look at her either.
"Why exactly is my house programmed into the GPS in a government vehicle?" I asked very slowly.
"I told your ass, Bubba, the damn government is keeping tabs on all of us! I bet they've even got black helicopters that have a silent-flight mode, and brainwashing TVs, and all that Men in Black stuff." Skeeter said from the back seat.
"Skeeter, you're paranoid." I said over my shoulder.
"Says the man who found me in a panic room under my house where I'd been trapped by a pack of werewolves. Let's face it, Bubba - if you ain't paranoid nowadays, you ain't paying no attention. And I am paying attention. Now Agent Amy, can I get a ride on one of them black helicopters? If we don't end up eaten or turned into werewolves, I mean."
"Skeeter, there ain't no black helicopters. Tell him, Amy. There are no black helicopters, are there?"
Agent Amy was silent.
I repeated myself. "Are there?"
She still didn't look at me, just kept her sunglasses pointed straight at the windshield.
I pushed a little more. "Well? Are there or are there not any black helicopters with run0quiet mode?"
"Maybe." Agent Amy's eyes never moved from the centerline of the highway.
"Maybe?" I asked.
"I can neither confirm nor deny that there may be black helicopters."
"So there are black helicopters?" I couldn't look back at Skeeter. I knew the smartass look on his face would make me want to puke.
"I didn't say there are black helicopters. I didn't say there are not black helicopters. I will neither confirm nor deny the existence of black helicopters." She still never took her eyes off the road. "Can we talk about something more pleasant, like killing werewolves?"
"Yeah, Bubba. What's the plan? And if you say something stupid I'm gonna smack you." Skeeter chimed in.
I didn't say anything for a long time. I just kept seeing the look on my college girlfriend's face as her life bled out into the creek behind my house after Pop killed her. Then her face changed, and I was watching Amy die in my arms. I closed my eyes, shook my head, and tried to focus. "There ain't much of a plan, Skeet. If he ain't at the house, I don't know where he'd be. And I know he'll kill Uncle Father Joe if we don't get there fast. Or at least what he thinks is fast. But to be honest, brother, I don't know. I haven't seen him in a long time, and lycanthropy changes stuff in the brain, so I don't know how crazy he is."
"Bubba, your Pop was pretty crazy to start with." Skeeter said quietly.
"Yeah, well, you don't get to stay a monster hunter for too long if you ain't a little bit nuts. Turn here." I pointed Agent Amy down a side road that would bring her around to a little hunting trail about a quarter mile east of my house. Or at least what used to be my house. I never lived there again after what happened to Britt, but I still owned the property. It was the only place that made sense for Pop to be keeping Joe.
We got out of the Suburban and loaded up our gear. I had Bertha and Grandpappy's sword, with enough ammunition to take over a small island nation. Which probably would have been easier and more fun than chasing down a pack of werewolves through the hills of Georgia. Skeeter had his Mossberg with the flechette rounds, nine in the shotgun and another dozen or so in a bandolier over one shoulder. Agent Amy had her pistol with about half a dozen spare magazines, and probably some kinda magic mind-eraser pencil or some other science fiction story BS gadget hidden in her bra or something. I stopped cold for a minute thinking pleasant thoughts about Agent Amy's brassiere, then snapped back to myself when Skeeter elbowed me.
"Quit it, Bubba. We're working." Skeeter whispered.
"Quit what?" I whispered back, painting on as innocent an expression as I could manage.
It didn't work. "I saw that look on your face. You were thinking about boobies."
"How could you tell?"
"You had the 'boobie smile' on."
"Boobie smile?" I was confused. I mean, boobs make me smile, but I didn't know there was a particular smile.
"Yeah, it's this happy look you get when you see, think about or hear the word 'boobie.' It's a stupid grin, but I've learned to recognize it over the years. And since you were looking at Agent Amy, and I'm pretty flat-chested, I figured you were thinking about her boobs."
"Okay, you win. I was thinking about boobs. What does that prove?"
"That you ain't dead. Now let's try to stay not dead."
"Sounds like a plan." I drew Bertha and headed off into the woods. We were parked on a hunti
ng road that curved around behind my old house. I took a deer track through the trees in an attempt to gain a little edge of surprise on anything that might be lurking around the house. Of course, maybe trekking through the woods with Skeeter and Agent Amy wasn't the best idea for stealth, but either way we didn't find anything. I stopped just back of the treeline to check things out. The clearing around the house had grown up a bunch in the years since I'd left, but the house was still there. A little run-down, but basically sound. The porch steps had started to rot, and there was a pine tree growing through the roof in the back corner of the house.
"That's where Jason's room was." I chuckled a little. "I always told that boy he'd have something growing in that room if he didn't wash his underpants. Looks like I was right." I stepped out into the clearing and took a better look around. I didn't see or hear anything dangerous, and the birds were still chirping in the trees, so I figured I was probably okay. The whole place looked just like it did all those years ago, the day Pop killed Brittany in front of my face. The day I thought I'd killed him right back. Britt's red tennis shoe was still lying on the ground between the house and the barn, a faded red canvas tribute to the woman I thought I might spend the rest of my life with.
As I got close to the house, I saw something fluttering on the front door. It was a scrap of black fabric, nailed to the door and flapping in the breeze. I stepped up onto the porch and yanked the strip of cloth down, then turned back to Skeeter.
"He's close."
"What's that you got, Bubba?"
I held the cloth out to him. "It's part of Joe's shirt. There's a little bit of blood on there, but it might be for effect. Pop's not above making a dramatic statement."
"Yeah, your whole family's always been dramatic." Skeeter took the cloth, rubbed it between his fingers, and put it in the back pocket of his jeans. "Let's go get my uncle."
"Guys?" Agent Amy's voice had a little waver in it that made my head snap around. "I think we might have a problem with that."
Amy was pointing off towards the barn, and I followed her arm with my eyes. I stepped off the porch to stand next to her and drew Bertha. About half a dozen wolves slid out of the shadows around the barn without a sound. Not a growl, not a howl, not a single sound. Somehow that was a lot scarier than having them come barrel out at me snarling and snapping. This was like they were on a mission, and I guess they were.
The first sound I heard was the scrape of claws on wood, and when I turned back to the house, there was another six or eight wolves on the porch, with more sliding out of the woods like brown and grey shadows. We were surrounded by at least two dozen wolves the size of Great Danes, and every one of them looked like they had bad intentions toward us.
"You know he'll kick your ass if you kill us. That ain't how he had this planned out. He wants to watch us suffer." I hoped my voice didn't shake as much as my knees were.
The biggest wolf on the porch rolled its neck in a disturbingly human fashion, then the air around it seemed to shimmer. When my eyes could focus again on the beast, she'd shifted to her half-human form, a six-foot tall wolfwoman with long claws, a human-ish face, and more teeth than should fit into it. "We have our orders. We cannot kill you, alpha-spawn. The Alpha said nothing of the others. Them, we shall eat while their hearts still beat." Then she threw her head back and let out a howl. The other wolves picked up the cry and we were in the middle of the Harlem Boys' Choir of werewolves. Just before I figured I was going to start bleeding from the ears, they stopped howling, and charged.
Some of the wolves had shifted while howling, and some stayed in their four-footed form, but two dozen werewolves against three monster hunters was pretty bad odds. We evened things up as much as we could before the Lassie patrol got close, Skeeter cutting three of them in half with his shotgun and Agent Amy dropping four with 9mm rounds to the face. I took out the legs on several wolves, then they were on us.
I barely had time to holster Bertha and pull Grandpappy's sword before the lead wolf-chick was right up in my face. She went for my face with her claws, and I ducked and slashed at her legs. She jumped about seven feet straight up and I cut nothing but air. She came back down and knocked me almost completely around with a right to the jaw. I dropped to one knee to get out of the way of her snapping jaws, and punched her in the side of the knee, She let out a yelp of pain and I felt four lines of fire open up across my shoulders as she raked my back with one hand. I came up sword flashing, but she danced back out of my reach. I caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye, and whirled around with my blade low, cutting through the midsection of the wolf that was inches away from ripping out my hamstring.
"Nice try, bitch." I sneered.
"Nice reflexes, human." She sneered right back, then dove at me again. I stood stock-still and caught her in midair, spinning her to the ground in a belly-to-belly suplex that would have made Magnum T.A. proud. She looked up at me as I swung the sword down, but I hit nothing but red clay as she rolled out of the way at the last instant. My sword buried halfway to the hilt in the tough Georgia clay and I knew I didn't have time to work it free, so I let it go. The she-wolf hit me with a tackle like nothing I'd felt since I left UGA, and we went down on a flurry of claws, blood and ponytail. I caught her one good shot to the side of the head, but she punched me in the jaw and crossed my eyes for me. From my vantage point on the ground underneath a werewolf, I could see Skeeter barely holding off two wolves using his shotgun as a club, and Agent Amy spinning in a circle and firing, trying to keep three wolves from flanking her.
The she-wolf got the upper hand and reared back one huge clawed fist to finish me off. "Wait!" I yelled. "He wants me alive."
"Too bad." Her claws flashed down, but just before I expected to feel her rip my still-beating heart out, a thunderous boom came from behind me, and the she-wolf's head disappeared in a cloud of pink mist. Her decapitated body collapsed off me, and I scrambled to my feet. I yanked Bertha from her holster and put a round in one of the wolves circling Agent Amy. Then more shots rang out from the treeline, and wolves started dropping everywhere around us. Skeeter went from fighting two wolves to none, then the other two on Amy dropped, bullets in their heads. In a matter of seconds, there was nothing standing in that clearing but me, Skeeter and Agent Amy.
We looked at each other, then turned to the woods. My jaw dropped about to my knees when half a dozen men in camouflage came out of the woods carrying rifles. I recognized all of them. Billy Wayne was there, as was Clyde Harrison, the local principal. Barrett Lloyd, the chief of police was there, with Jason Pursley, his deputy. Reverend Bryant, the local Baptist preacher was there, which was odd enough, but the real surprise was the man pulling up the rear. Skeeter slung his shotgun over his shoulder, and walked over to the older white man coming out of the woods toting an ancient Winchester and a bottle of Jack Black.
"Hey Daddy. Thanks for coming."
"Nobody kills my kids but me." The two hugged, something I didn't think had happened since Skeeter got taller than his daddy's belt buckle. It made me a little nauseous. Or maybe that was the stink of dead dog all around me. One of those.
I walked up to the passel of rednecks and stuck out my hand to the preacher. "Reverend. Boys." I nodded at the men. They nodded back in the way that Southern men communicate when there's a lot of shit unsaid that needs to stay that way. The silence hung in the air for a long minute before I cracked. "What the hell are y'all doing here?"
The men looked at each other, then down at the dirt, then Reverend Bryant stepped forward. "We're paying a debt, Robert." There are two people in the world that have never called me Bubba. My mother, who I haven't seen since before I started kindergarten, and Reverend Bryant. I reckon the man who baptized me gets a pass on calling me by my given name.
"Preacher, I don't mean no disrespect, but what the hell are you talking about?" Billy Wayne snickered a little at me cussing in front of the preacher, but since I had wolf-bitch brains on my shirt I didn't feel mu
ch like standing on formalities.
"Your family has done a lot of good in these parts for a long time. Helped a lot of people." He paused for a long time. I opened my mouth to say something, but he held up on hand to me. I shut up. "Let me finish, son. I'm not proud of how we handled the death of your grandfather and your brother, and we're here to make that right."
"Y'all didn't do nothing..." I started, but the preacher cut me off.
"That's exactly my point, son. Gene made us all promise a long time ago that if anything ever happened to him because of his line of work, that we'd look after you boys, and to make sure that . . ." Reverend Bryant's voice trailed off, and he turned away. It had been a long time since I heard anybody use Pop's name, and even longer since I heard anybody talk about him like a friend instead of a monster.
Skeeter's daddy stepped up. "Gene made us promise that if something got him, we'd put him down. He told us how to kill most of the stuff y'all run up against, and we always figured if something got to him, we'd be able to take care of it with numbers, even if we didn't have all the experience y'all do." The old man took a long swig from his bottle of Jack, and held it out to me. I took it and drank down a slash. The amber liquid burned my throat and warmed me all the way down to my toes. I held the bottle up until I cold process everything they were saying.
I pulled the bottle down and passed it to Amy. She took a sip and handed it to Skeeter. I looked my best friend's father in the face and said, "So you're telling me y'all promised Pop that if he went bad y'all would kill him? And you're here now because you chickened out fifteen years ago?" My words were hard, but when half a dozen heads snapped to me, I knew I'd gotten their attention.
Mr. SKEETER'S NAME looked at me for a long minute before he said anything, then heaved a sigh and said, "Yeah. That's what we're telling you. We got scared, we didn't hold up our end of the deal, and there's a lot of blood on our hands because of it. Not the least of which was your girlfriend."
"Brittany." I said, my voice small as I remembered holding her in the middle of the stream while her blood made the water run red around us.
Scattered, Smothered and Chunked - Bubba the Monster Hunter Season 1 Page 31