The Tome of Bill Compendium Vol. 1 (Books 1-4) (78 page)

I reminded myself that was probably bullshit. It was absolutely quiet out there. In such solitude, a fox could step on a twig and it would sound like cannon fire. I was probably psyching myself out for nothing.

Suddenly there was a snort from directly in front of me. Brush obscured my vision, but I could make out a shape beyond it and it was bigger than me...a lot bigger. Oh, crap. I hadn’t even considered that I might run into the Alma, Sasquatch, Grendel, or whatever the fuck they were called. What if they were making a preemptive strike to take me out? I wouldn’t put it past the filthy, shit-flinging fuckers.

I began to back up. I had gotten a taste of what these guys could do when I was over in China. I wasn’t about to underestimate them. The shape in the woods matched me step for step. I began to crouch down in a defensive stance - learned from countless hours of kung-fu movies - when it stepped from the brush and I found myself staring into two large, brown, and not overly intelligent eyes. A set of antlers nearly four feet wide sat atop a large head. A fucking moose.

I breathed a sigh of relief and chuckled as it just stood there, dumbly chewing its cud or whatever the fuck a moose chews on. Damn. There I was, almost shitting myself and for what, an oversized deer? On the up side, it was the first one I had ever seen outside of a zoo. Now that the scare was over, it was actually kind of cool.

Figuring a photo would make for a neat souvenir, I pulled my phone from my pocket. I aimed the camera and pushed the button. The flash went off causing the moose to jump in surprise. It made an angry snort and then, without further warning, charged straight at me. Oh, fuck! Forget what I said about Bigfoot. Being trampled by the equivalent of a freight train on legs wasn’t particularly high on my list. I turned and ran. Judging by the crashing sounds behind me, the moose was following.

Thank God, vampires are fast. Used to be, I was the fat kid in high school who came in dead last in every single track event. Nowadays, though, there wasn’t an Olympic sprinter alive who could keep up with me once I got going. There were just two problems. For starters, this wasn’t ideal terrain for me to go all out in. Secondly, my pursuer had both the home field advantage as well as an extra set of legs. I had just burst from the tree line, I could see the car ahead, when this deficiency became painfully clear.

I was mowed over from behind. It felt like a bus plowed into me. I went down, but was that enough for my moosey friend? Of course not. I felt a pair of hooves slam into my back. The air was forced from my lungs and I was pretty sure I could feel some of my favorite body parts cracking. Then the fucker did it again. It was stomping the shit out of me.

I curled up into a fetal ball as it continued trying to turn me into a puddle of vampire mush. Talk about embarrassing. In the past few months, I had come out on top against two master vampires and a trio of vamp assassins. Hell, I had even managed to survive Gan. Yet there I was, getting my ass handed to me by an animal with less brains than my nut sack. What a way to go.

I was starting to get a bit woozy from the continued attack. I heard my roommates’ voices yelling for me. Hey, there was hope. Ed had his shotgun with him, maybe he could use it to...oh, hell, by that point I’d have been happy if he had used it to end my misery.

I was just thinking these thoughts, when suddenly there came another loud cracking noise and suddenly the assault stopped. A scant second later, there was a heavy thud on the ground next to me.

“Bill!” came Tom’s worried voice. “Are you okay?”

“No,” I replied, still face down on the hard ground.

A strong hand grabbed me by the arm and hauled me to my feet. I got up, surprised to find I could still stand. Thank goodness for vampire healing. It was already starting to patch up the worst of my beating.

I turned to find Sally standing next to me, the look on her face conveying slightly less than worshipful awe.

“That was badass,” said Ed, walking up to us.

“Thanks,” I replied. “It’s not every day one survives a...”

“Not you,” he said. “
Her
.”

“Huh?”

“While you were getting stomped, she ran past us, jumped on its back, and snapped its neck like a twig.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yeah, dude,” Tom confirmed. “It was pretty fucking awesome.”

“I’d say that sums me up nicely,” she replied with a smirk.

I tried to play it cool, not an easy thing to do when you’re covered in hoof prints. “I’m sure I’d have eventually...” I stopped as she raised an eyebrow at me. “Okay, fine. Thank you for saving my ass...
again
.”

She smiled, which would have been tolerable except that wasn’t the end of it from her. “It’s turning into a regular habit, isn’t it?” she asked, still grinning, “Although I have to admit, Bill, saving you from elder vampires is one thing, but an oversized cow? That’s just embarrassing.”

“It’s a little more than an oversized...”

“It would be a damn shame if the folks waiting for us were to learn of this incident. The fabled Freewill, laid low by
Bullwinkle
.”

Sensing where this was going (
wasn’t the first time I had been blackmailed by Sally, and it probably wouldn’t be the last
), I held up a hand. “Alfonzo can stay.”

Her grin widened. “Great! You know you really should let him give you a pedicure.”

“Let’s not push it.”

“Your loss,” she said dismissively, and then to Tom and Ed added, “Okay, meatsacks, show’s over. Get that car refueled before I do the same thing to both of you.”

My roommates both gave her a mock salute, then turned back to the car. After a few steps, Ed whispered to Tom, “She is so fucking hot.”

My vampire ears easily picked it up, so I had no doubt Sally’s had too. The smug look on her face as we walked back confirmed it.

Along the way, I casually asked, “Have you ever tried moose blood?”

“Don’t make me smack you.”

The last hundred miles took far longer than I would’ve liked. Thank God for four-wheel drive. Had the weather been any worse, I don’t doubt we’d have had to find a village or traveling hockey team and trade in our wheels for a couple of dog teams.

At long last, though, we were driving through dense, dark woods, following a trail that was just barely wide enough for our vehicle, when the portable GPS finally told us we were close. It was about time. We had maybe one more tank of gas left in the trailer and our supplies were beginning to run low. I had been starting to wonder whether we should have drained that moose just in case. Another couple of days and I would’ve probably needed to start keeping an eye on Sally around my roommates. On the upside, Tom’s constant zombie moaning and groaning had lessened considerably (
albeit not entirely
). So there was that. What can I say? I’m a “glass is half full” kind of guy.

We all kept lookout through the windows for...something.

“Jeez,” I complained. “This is only a conference to decide the fate of the world. You’d think they’d at least have signs telling us where to park. Are you sure we’re in the right area?”

Ed turned and gave me his best withering glance. “We’re in the middle of fucking nowhere. How the hell am I supposed to know if it’s the
right
middle of fucking nowhere?”

“Don’t get testy...” I started to say in a condescending voice, but immediately had to change my tone. “HOLY SHIT! STOP!”

He turned back to the trail and immediately hit the brakes. The car skidded to a halt just inches from the thing in front of us. It had appeared from out of nowhere.

“Is that what I think it is?” Tom asked excitedly.

From my vantage point in the backseat, I could only see the front of the car and a pair of hairy, heavily muscled legs standing in front of it.

“Well...” The question was answered as the owner of said legs bent down and peered into the windshield. The face that looked in at us pulled back its lips in a snarl. It was one hell of an ugly motherfucker. Take the creature from
Harry and the Hendersons
and then beat it with the ugly stick for an hour or two and you might be in the ballpark.

Sally, Ed, and I just stared at the gruesome visage in front of us. Tom, ignoring the basic tenets of sanity, lifted his cell phone and immediately started snapping pictures. The creature noticed him and looked none too happy about it.

I reached forward and smacked him upside the head. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“What?” he complained. “We just proved Bigfoot is real. These babies are going up on Facebook.”

“Are you absolutely sure I can’t kill him?” Sally asked.

I glared at her out of the corner of my eye and replied, “Let me get back to you on that.”

“
Get out
.”

“Huh?” I asked. “What, Ed?”

“That wasn’t me.”

“Then who...”

“
GET OUT...NOW!
”

“Did that thing just talk?” Tom asked, echoing what the rest of us were thinking.

I turned to Sally. “They can speak?”

“How would I know?” she snapped back. “Do I look like Jane Goodall?”

“Weren’t you supposed to ask Boston about these things?”

“How the hell would I even know to ask? The only apes I’ve ever seen are in the Bronx Zoo. Last time I was there, they didn’t talk back.”

“
NOW!
” the ugly face before us demanded again. This time it brought one cantaloupe sized fist down onto the hood of the car. The entire vehicle shook from the impact.

I looked each of my companions in the eye and said, “I think he wants us to get out.” Never let it be said I didn’t have a grasp of the obvious.

* * *

“Uh, Ed, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Not being stupid,” he replied, stepping out of the car, shotgun in hand.

“Your funeral,” I commented, likewise getting out.

Once we were all standing again, we got a true sense of scale for the creature looming before us. At over eight feet in height, it dwarfed my roommates and me. Sally was just barely over five-feet in heels, so I could only imagine that she felt like a Munchkin, assuming they had strip clubs in Oz.

The thing - Sasquatch, I guess - looked us all over. Upon seeing the gun in Ed’s hands, it threw back its head and let loose what I think was a laugh. It was hard to say. Imagine trying to chortle while gargling gravel and you’d get an idea of what it sounded like.

While it did that, I felt Sally give my shoulder a nudge. “What?” I asked.

“Introduce us.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’re the star and we’re just your entourage.”

Some days I really hated being the vampire “chosen one.” Okay, if I was going to do this, I might as well try and act tough. Sure, the thing in front of me looked like the Hulk wearing a fur coat, but if so, I was Captain Marvel...yeah right! Even the most deluded sections of my subconscious weren’t buying that one. I took a deep breath. I could handle this. I was a gamer, dammit. Ogres were bigger than this pile of shit (
literally, now that we were out in the air, the smell of this thing was hitting us. I don’t think there’s enough Febreze in the world to fix this guy’s odor
), and I had faced down dozens of them over the years. Sure, it was only on paper and with a twenty-sider, but same general principle...right?

I stepped past my friends and looked up into the face of the brute. I smiled, fangs extended for a little bit of extra menace. “I am Bill, Freewill of the vampire nation. I believe you’ve been expecting me.” (
Damn, should have gone with “Dr. Death”...way more menacing sounding
)

The creature stopped laughing and looked down upon me. I had a distinct feeling that the next words to come out of its mouth would be, “BIGFOOT SMASH!” followed by a pummeling that would make me look back longingly at my encounter with the moose. For some reason, this thought struck me as funny. I don’t know why. A painful demise wasn’t something I normally considered to be chuckle-worthy. Either the surrealness of the whole situation was getting to me or I was losing my mind. Either way, I felt the corners of my mouth curling up into a smirk.

Oh, well, in for a penny
, I thought. I locked eyes with the creature (
which I seem to recall learning from National Geographic wasn’t a particularly smart thing to do with gorillas
) and continued speaking. “These are my companions. We’re here to meet with your leaders.”

“
And why should Grulg take you?
”

Grulg? What the hell’s a grulg? Oh, fuck this! While I try to avoid getting beaten to a pulp as much as possible, I am also of the mindset that if I have an ass-kicking coming, then I might as well deserve it. “Listen, Kong, I don’t have time for your shit. I have business to discuss with your
betters
.” At that, I heard multiple gasps of breath from behind me. Gotta love everyone’s confidence in my abilities. Of course, how would I even know that this guy wasn’t the one in charge? Oh, boy.

There was a tense moment of silence, during which my sensitive vampire ears heard Ed slide the safety off his gun. Maybe we’d all get lucky and he’d just blow my head off rather than let me stick my foot any further into my mouth. Finally, though, the smelly-ass Sasquatch in front of me simply nodded his head.

“
You follow Grulg.
”

“Uh...”

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” Sally spat. “
He’s
Grulg, you fucking idiot.”

“
Your concubine speaks with much fire,
” Grulg said in a tone that sort of sounded bemused, although maybe it was just me.