Best New Werewolf Tales (Vol. 1)

by Wilson, David Niall; Lamio, Michael; Newman, James; Maberry, Jonathan; Everson, John; Daley, James Roy

  The blue one was moving.

  In an eye-blink, the letters slid down the wall to form a glowing pool on the sidewalk. In another blink, a humanoid shape rose radiant white from the pool--female torso, face, hair, the shape of clothing, then colors, facial details.

  The face of the murder victim from last night.

  “Carla! Behind you!” Kate yelled.

  A spear of light stabbed from the creature’s hand, striking Kate full in the chest and Jan in the shoulder. Electricity flamed into him. Numbed, he collapsed to watch as the thing grabbed Carla by the throat and lifted her into the air.

  Slush seeping into his clothes, choking on ozone, Jan tried to move. A violent tremor shook Carla. Jan’s arms twitched. The creature held Carla higher, its glow brightening, colors cycling. Jan could feel his legs again. Carla fell limp, and the thing slapped her down like a wet towel. It turned to Kate.

  Gasping, Jan heaved himself to his knees and lunged forward. Somehow he got his hands under Kate’s armpits and dragged her just out of reach. “Get up!” he cried.

  “Can’t...move,” she gasped. He pulled her to her knees. The thing’s colors were fading, its features melting back into a smooth humanoid shape. It shimmered and changed again. And became Carla. The Carla-thing smiled. It stepped toward them.

  Inches from its outstretched arms, Jan hauled Kate up, and they lurched into the road. Stumbling but with returning strength, Jan scanned the street. From a dark alley across the road a small round figure waved, a jerky motion from a stiff arm.

  Half dragging Kate, Jan struggled towards Solly. Footsteps sounded behind them. The back of his neck tingled as if an electrical charge was building at his back. He pushed Kate into the alley as something brushed his coat. Shoving a trash can behind him, he heard a thud and a sound no human throat ever made. The alley was dark, and Jan’s eyes still burned from the electrical flash. Ahead, Solly’s gray form disappeared to the right. Jan moved along the wall, Kate’s hand in his.

  “Now that thing looks like Carla!” she panted.

  “It takes the form of what it kills,” Jan gasped. That was why her description of the suspect had matched an earlier victim.A hand grabbed Jan from the darkness and yanked them both sideways. He could see nothing but he knew the smell. Solly pulled them along. Jan could feel walls to either side. They stopped. Jan reached ahead in the dark and touched another wall.

  Solly had led them into a dead end.

  “No!” Jan screamed. His nightmare seized him. Trapped in the dark with a monster. And with a woman who trusted him.

  * * *

  Thirty-two. In a church basement outside Budapest. Waiting to die. Total darkness. Lying on damp earth, bound hand and foot. Stale smell of mildew stinging his throat. As he fought to awaken, a scream sliced the black, clearing the flames of pain in his head like a bucket of ice water. Stasia.

  He raged against his bonds. She screamed again. “Jan! Oh God, no! No! Help me!” Jan threw himself forward and managed to roll once. Her cries were clearer. But so was another sound.

  The sound of something feeding.

  Jan threw himself again but something held him fast. He could do nothing but lie in the dark, listening to the beast feed on the still-living Stasia. Praying in the dark for her screams to cease. Praying in the dark for her to die.

  An eternity passed. Then only the grunts of the beast remained. The stench of rotting meat grew strong. A huge shape moved in the darkness. Moved closer. Jan screamed.

  Blinding light suddenly flooded the room, and the roar of the were-wolf echoed in the roar of gunshots. Blood, thick and black and hot, struck Jan’s face as Garos shouted his name.

  * * *

  In the dark alley, Jan shoved Solly away and turned to run back. Solly grabbed him, holding on with surprising strength. “No! Stay here. Out of the light. Solly knows!”

  A glow began at the entrance to the dead-end, but Jan still couldn’t see. Kate’s hand found his. “Jan?” she said.

  Hearing her fear, his panic fled, replaced by a feeling of resolve he had almost forgotten. He squeezed her hand. She would not die. “Solly, talk to me. Tell me what you know!”

  Solly’s voice quavered. “It don’t like the dark. We’re safe here. Right?” At this, Kate groaned.

  Jan swore, his mind racing. Light was the key. “It must feed off electricity, hiding as parts of signs. When you chased it last night, it joined with the sign in the alley.”

  “That’s why the alley was brighter last night,” Kate said.

  “Sunlight must sustain it in the day, plus electricity. But when night comes...” Jan stopped. When night comes, it needed more. It needed its real food: human life force.

  The light at the entrance grew and the glowing form of Carla appeared. “I thought it doesn’t like the dark,” Kate whispered.

  Jan swore. “It must still be hungry and figures we’re worth the risk. Solly, how long can it go without light?”

  “Five minutes,” he whined, “but a lot more if it just ate.”

  “Wonderful,” Kate said.

  Twenty paces away now, the thing lit the entire area. Its glow was dimmer but Jan doubted that would save them. At least now he could see. He looked around, and his heart leapt. The wall behind them and the walls on either side each held a door.

  Jan grabbed the door handle behind them. Locked. So was the one to their right. He tried the last one. The handle turned a bit. He leaned on it and heard a click. He threw his weight against the door and it squealed open with rusty protests.

  “Inside!” Kate cried, rushing forward, Solly in hand.

  “No!” Jan grabbed her, an idea forming. The thing was ten paces away. Pulling out his flashlight, he stepped into the room and flashed the beam around. The stock room of a store, twenty feet square. Not much space to maneuver. Could he do it? Could he finally face his darkness? By walking into it? He turned back. The thing was five paces away. He aimed his light at it.

  “No!” Solly cried. “It eats light!”

  Jan ignored him. “Kate, take Solly into the corner. After I lead it inside, close the door and don’t open it.” Kate turned pale but nodded and pulled Solly back. Jan stepped up, playing his beam over the creature. It turned to him. Keeping his light on it, he backed into the room. Darkness closed in on him and with it his fear. What had he done?

  The thing stepped inside. The door slammed shut behind it.

  It stopped and looked back. Its mouth opened, and a sound like fingers tapping fine crystal, filled the room. And somehow, in that sound Jan heard its hunger and its pain. A wave of empathy flooded him. They were alike. Hunters. Hiding their true shape. Fearing the night. The creature reached for him. I’m sorry, Jan thought. He turned off his light.

  The thing trembled, and its aura dimmed. But then Carla’s features and clothing faded, seeming to melt back into its body. A featureless human form remained, glowing blue-white.

  It’s conserving energy, Jan thought. It no longer needed to pretend to be human. He swallowed. How intelligent was it?

  A deadly game of tag began––the thing pursuing with the same plodding step––Jan retreating, avoiding corners, always leaving two paths of escape. With each passing minute, the thing’s aura dimmed, fading to blue, then yellow, then red.

  Finally it stopped, arms drooping. Jan sighed and relaxed. He noticed too late that the arms weren’t just drooping.

  They were growing.

  Both arms flashed out, three times normal length, easily covering the space between the thing and Jan. Taken by surprise, Jan dove aside but a hand brushed his thigh. Electricity numbed his leg. He fell. Looming over him, the thing reached down.

  And stopped. Its colors cycled the spectrum then faded to gray. A sound like breaking glass fled a suddenly grotesque mouth. Its feet melted into a pool. The arms flowed back into a shrinking torso. Soon only the pool remained, faintly glowing.

  Jan walked to it. The pool bulged once toward him, then its last light died and Jan
stood in the dark. He waited before flicking on his light. The pool was a dull gray. He kicked, and it shattered with a crystal cry, imploding into sparkling powder.

  He opened the door, and Kate threw her arms around him. Back on the street, Solly checked every bit of neon in sight, then fixed Jan with that eye. “Gotta know the signs,” he said.

  Jan phoned the police about Carla’s body and left a message for Garos to call.

  “So what now, hunter?” Kate asked.

  Solly stared up at Jan. “You gonna get the others too?”

  Jan and Kate turned to him. “Others?” Kate groaned.

  Jan shrugged then looked at her. “I could use a partner.” She said nothing but took his hand as they walked Solly home.

  They took Talbot.

  * * *

  Thirty-five. A midnight street. He waits in the dark, watching the signs. She waits beside him. He knows the ways of the beast; she knows these streets. A town pays well to be rid of its creatures of the night. Creatures that breathe ozone like a summer breeze, wear glass for skin and burn electricity in their veins. Creatures that feed on this realm of the lonely.

  Once, he shunned the dark where shadows hide their secrets. Now he stalks the night streets, a shadow himself slipping from alley to alley. Now he keeps to the dark.

  And stays out of the light.

  HUNGRY LIKE THE MOON

  ROB E. BOLEY

  I wake up to the noise of zombies moaning. Sounds like a breeze gliding through a broken seashell.

  I’m trapped in a cramped diner with seven zombies: three men, three women, and a little girl. The seven zombies are a mess of torn flesh, bite marks, and gashes. Their flesh is pale, and their eyes are horribly dull—like rotten egg yolks left out in the sun. I’ve woken up in plenty of bad situations, but this is the worst.

  I try to sit up, but can barely move.

  The diner is a long, skinny rectangle cut in half lengthways by a bar-top. Behind the bar is what’s left of a greasy spoon kitchen. The walls are covered with gore, claw marks, and matted hair—evidence of an unquenchable hunger. A horizontal strip of mirror runs along the diner’s side and rear walls, most of it now shattered, cracked, or splattered with blood. At the rear of the diner is a short hallway with a unisex bathroom and a boarded exit. The front is simply a door and a window, both reinforced with broken tables.

  One of the zombies locks eyes with me, and I know then that my time has come. Before dying, the zombie was a man named Chef. I met him just last night, when he reluctantly offered me shelter.

  Apparently, that was his last mistake.

  * * *

  Last night.

  The sun was already low in the sky when I found the diner.

  I’d just gotten into town, hopeful that Brooklyn would have a rescue center or shelter for survivors. It’d been three weeks since the zombie outbreak, since the moon had been a waning crescent. I’d spent most of that time tracking my daughter, Melanie, after discovering that her mother, my ex, had been killed. Melanie’s trail took her through multiple survivor camps in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and now here, in Brooklyn. It was a trail of desperation and fear. As recently as a few days ago, Melanie fled with a group of survivors to the Big Apple.

  Brooklyn was worse than I’d imagined. The streets were filled with abandoned cars, dead animals, the crumbled remains of toppled buildings, and a mix of abandoned possessions: clothing, television sets, high-end jewelry. I imagine those first nights, there’d been a lot of looting—before everyone realized how out of control our world was going to become. Before gasoline and shotgun shells became more valuable than diamonds and cash.

  Less than an hour into my walk downtown, a pack of zombies—more than I’d ever seen gathered in one place—started chasing me through the city. I was faster than them, but they were everywhere, cutting me off at every corner. There were hundreds of them, in varying states of decay and dress. A businessman missing an ear. A rotted corpse wearing a blue dress covered in mud and maggots. A teenager in a Twilight t-shirt missing an arm.

  When I saw the diner, I knew that people were in there. It wasn’t just the thick wood covering the window or the single word spray-painted on the front of the building:

  HELP

  No, it wasn’t just that. I could smell them.

  I pounded on their front door, screaming for help. “Please. Please let me in. They’re after me. Oh, God. Don’t let me die.”

  Behind the barricaded door, a man and a woman talked about whether or not to let me inside, though I couldn’t tell who was taking which side.

  “Please,” I begged. “I’m just trying to find my daughter.”

  When the door finally opened, it wasn’t hard to tell who was arguing in my favor and who was against. A tall man with thick forearms and wild curly hair had a shotgun leveled at my heart. Next to him stood a fit woman, probably in her thirties, with a fashionable haircut and exhausted eyes. She pushed the shotgun aside and pulled me into the diner.

  “Knock it off, Chef,” she said. “We’re in this together. It’s us against them. If we don’t stick together, we’re going to lose.” She turned her attention to me, offered her hand. “I’m Abbie.”

  Apart from Chef and Abbie, the only other occupants of the diner were two women, two men, and a little girl.

  Chef placed the shotgun in the corner and looked me up and down. “You got any food?” he asked. I shook my head. “What about ammo? I’m guessing that’s too much to ask.”

  I shook my head.

  Abbie led me to the rear of the diner and introduced me to the rest of the crew. The two women were likely a couple. I can’t remember either of their names; I’ve never been much good with names, or people for that matter.

  Abbie introduced the little girl, Gail, last. The child was tied down to a bed made out of two booths nested together.

  Inside my skull, I heard a growl.

  The child was pale and sweaty. A blood-stained bandage made from a kitchen apron was wrapped around her forearm. Her eyes were pale as the full moon. I’d seen this before. She’d been bitten, and she was going to turn. Soon, by the looks of it.

  “And this is my niece, Gail,” said Abbie. She held up a hand, as if to block what I was about to say. “Don’t say it. I know. She’s going to become one of them soon. I’m not a fool. I know the situation. But before I lose her forever, I’m going to make the most of the time we have left.”

  “And after that?”

  She held up a shiny handgun and her face became a mask of resignation. “After that, I’ll put a bullet in its head.”

  * * *

  It’s morning now, and the seven zombies shuffle toward me. Little Gail is the most hideous of all, the front of her tiny dress covered in blood and a huge chunk of flesh missing from her neck. When she moans, her neck makes a hideous whistle.

  I stand up slowly, staggering backward. I try to scream, but I can’t. It’s like my throat is stuffed with gauze.

  What comes out instead is a howling moan, the sound of a large dead tree creaking in the wind. At the sound of my moan, the seven zombies cock their heads. Their blue lips fall back over their grey teeth, and their dull yellow eyes drift away.

  I take an awkward step forward, and the zombies shuffle away, giving me space. Now is my chance. I take another step, trying to sprint for the front door. My joints creak like rusty hinges and my muscles feel like play-doh. I fall face-first onto the floor, and my eyes catch my upside-down reflection on a bent spoon.

  Staring back at me are two dull yellow eyes.

  I’m one of them.

  I stand up and stare at the strip of mirror on the wall. Shake my head. Dammit. I’d only wanted to find Melanie. I place a hand over my chest. No heartbeat. Instead, there’s an emptiness. A void.

  And my heart, it’s just rotting inside me.

  * * *

  Last night.

  My heart quivered as I stepped onto the diner’s roof. I needed to get out of here, far away from thes
e good people before the change came. I was plotting my escape when the smell of cigarette smoke distracted me. Sharp teeth bit into my urgency and tugged it to the back of my skull.

  Abbie stood on the roof’s edge, a cigarette held at her side. She looked at me. Her lopsided grin was like a crescent moon. That wicked smile in the sky that yawns open into an unblinking, laughing eye. I shuddered.

  The rooftop offered a beautiful view of the city. Nearby, an old church thrust its steeple into the sky. In the distance stood the Statue of Liberty. I half-expected the statue to be moaning and staggering into the water. Below, the zombies moaned and pounded futilely against the diner’s reinforced door. Abbie flicked ash at them lazily.

  “The odd thing is, I can’t hate them,” she said. “As much as I want to, I can’t. They’re just pathetic and hungry. I can’t fault them for that.” She holds up her cigarette. “I can’t smoke up here during the day. Chef’s worried that I’d be spotted. But at night, I can go through two packs. I’m as bad as they are.”

  In my skull, claws paced restlessly, clacking on bone.

  I shook my head. “No, you’re not.”

  “Do you know what I obsess about, when I’m not thinking about Gail? I think about running out of cigarettes. How lame is that?”

  I shrugged. “You’ve got a beast inside you. It’s hungry and wants fed, no matter how much it might hurt you in the process. The only way to make the beast go away is to starve it, but that doesn’t always work. You can tie it in chains or lock it in a cell, but deep down you know the beast will always find a way out. So, you just do your best. You try to make it through the day.”

  “Sounds like you speak from experience.”

  I shrugged and tapped my skull. “I’ve got my share of monsters in here.”

  “You know, this probably isn’t the safest place in the city,” said Abbie, tapping her heel on the roof. “I mean, now you’re locked in here with a monster.”