Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set (92 page)

But, again, it was not something to worry about now. For now, he needed to worry about that goddamn werewolf.

George thought he heard the crack of a branch to his right. Apparently Prescott wasn’t a total ninja.

His stomach really hurt. He just wanted this over with.

If you die, that’s a pretty crappy legacy you’re leaving behind. Lots of people’s lives are worse because you were born. Even if you died this morning, before you met Ivan, there’d be no good reason for anybody to mourn, except maybe Lou since he’d have the hassle of finding a new partner. If an angel seeking his wings went
It’s a Wonderful Life
on you and showed you a world where you’d never been born, it would probably be a festival of smiles and balloons and merry children.

His stomach really, really hurt. Throwing up might actually make him feel better, but he didn’t want Prescott or Angie to see it.

He wiped some sweat from his forehead. He looked at his hand, which seemed to have more blood than perspiration on it.

Focus on the positive
, he told himself.
When this is over, you and Lou will check yourself into a luxury hotel--separate rooms--and spend the next seven days soaking in a hot tub. You’ll catch up on all of those books you’ve never quite found time to read. Drink fine wine and eat grapes. Watch porn.

He came around a slight corner and, about a hundred feet ahead, he could see Bateman’s van.

Son of a bitch. Ivan really was here.

George forced himself not to run.
Stay calm. Don’t get too excited.

The back doors of the van hung open, and George could see the cage inside. Somebody was in there. Had Ivan actually gotten back into the cage? Why the hell would he--?

No. It was Michele, huddled into the back corner.

Shit.

This had to be a trap. But how could Ivan have known they were coming? He couldn’t, unless the reinforcements were actually working for the werewolf, and that idea was really dumb.

The situation was making George uncomfortable and paranoid, but he had to stick with the plan. The absolute last thing he needed was for Ivan to rush off and find another well-populated area for a killing spree. George’s official role was “werewolf bait,” and he was going to play it out.

He walked over to the van. Michele was seated, head down, arms wrapped tightly around her legs, her whole body quivering as she silently wept.

“Michele...?”

She looked up. Her eyes were red and puffy and her whole face was blotchy from crying.

“I’m here to get you out of there,” said George. “Where’s Ivan?”

“I don’t know.”

“Which way did he go?”

“I didn’t see.”

“Michele, I need you to focus. Everything’s going to be all right. I promise, I’m not going to let him hurt you.”

“You can’t promise anything,” Michele said. She sniffled, then held up her right hand, revealing a curved row of deep puncture wounds.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

The Wolf’s Bite

“It’ll be okay,” George assured her. “That’s an ugly bite but it’s not too bad. Lou got clawed up a lot worse and he’s still kicking around.”

“Don’t pretend to be dense. You know what this means.”

“No, he doesn’t play by the werewolf rules. This doesn’t mean anything.”

“He said it did.”

“Well, Ivan’s a liar. He just said that to scare you. Don’t listen to anything he says. I swear to you that you’ll be fine.”

Michele shook her head sadly. “No. I can feel it.”

“You’re just stressed out. It could be anything.”

“I’ve been stressed all day. This is something
horrible
. As soon as his teeth went into me I knew what he’d done.”

George hurriedly glanced around the area for any sign of Ivan. There was none. “Okay, okay, for the sake of argument let’s say that he did make you into a werewolf. Is that really such a bad thing? He seems pretty happy.”

“He can control it.”

“Maybe they all can. Maybe that’s why we never hear about werewolves--they all have total control over their powers, so only the lunatic idiots like Ivan let out the secret.”

“You shouldn’t be here.” She began to sob uncontrollably.

“Just calm down. I know you don’t believe me, but it’s all going to be fine. I need to know, did Ivan set a trap?”

“
Me
, maybe.”

“Why did he leave you? Was I supposed to find you?”

Michele shook her head. “He looked nervous all of a sudden and just left.”

“Good, good. So he’s either running or watching us.”

Ivan spoke. “What the hell do you want, George?”

George spun around. He couldn’t see Ivan’s face, but he was at the edge of the trees, mostly obscured by some tall bushes.

“I want the girl back.”

“Bullshit. You wouldn’t put yourself at risk for her. Why are you here?”

“I just want her back. That’s the truth.”

“You weren’t even around when I nabbed her.”

“It was on the news.”

“Then where did I catch her?”

Crap.
“A gas station.”

“Wrong. How did you find me?”

“There were several reports of the van coming this way. You should be more careful.”

“Uh-huh. Then why aren’t the cops here?”

“How should I know? Maybe they’ve got the area surrounded. Do you really think I work with the police?”

“George, I’ve had a good time ruining your life today, but I’m tired. I know you’re tired, too.”

“Exhausted.”

“Why don’t we just go our separate ways and work this out some other time, huh?”

“See, I’d love to, and if you give me the girl, I will.”

“What’s stopping you from taking her? I’m all the way over here.”

“Not a goddamn thing.”

Ivan stepped to the side, revealing his smiling face, which was now missing a tooth. His wounds were no longer bleeding, though his entire face was so caked with blood that he was almost unrecognizable. “I should warn you, though, that she’s damaged goods in a big way. My recommendation is that you just discard her.”

“Why would you do that to her?” George asked. When the hell was Prescott or Angie going to put a tranquilizer dart into that prick?

“I guess there are a lot of possibilities,” said Ivan. “Maybe she’s the first inductee into my werewolf army. Or, this should have you quaking in your booties; maybe she’s the
thousandth
one. Maybe my whole purpose is to enslave humanity, and you just got caught in the middle. You could be humanity’s last chance, George. Hell of a bad deal for the human race.”

“I don’t buy that one. What’s the next possibility?”

“Oh, gosh, I don’t know. Let me think. Maybe I’ve been looking to get it on in my werewolf form, but I can’t find any chicks who are into the whole bestiality scene, so I decided that my only option was to make a she-wolf who can handle me.”

“That sounds more reasonable.”

“But, no, that can’t be it, because it’s way more fun when the coin is bigger than the slot, if you know what I mean. You probably do. Despite our differences, you seem like you might be pretty well-endowed.”

“So how does this end, Ivan? I know you don’t want to just stand around and gab all day.”

“You’re right. I’ve actually been pretty bored with this conversation for the past thirty seconds or so but I didn’t want to say anything. The plan was actually to just hide out for a moment, wait to see who was coming, and then give them the ol’ Cotton Mouse Tavern treatment. I had no idea it would be you. Where’s Lou?”

“He’s in police custody.”

“Aw, man, that’s too bad. You must be pretty bummed. Well, my original plan was to murder whoever came down the path, and I can’t think of any good reason to change that, so I think it’s all over for you, Mr. George.”

Ivan stepped onto the path.

George took out the pistol and pointed it at him. Ivan stopped walking and stared at him for a moment.

“And...?”

“This is loaded with silver bullets.”

“Really? And where exactly does one acquire silver bullets these days?”

“It was a shop for Goth kids. A novelty item.”

“You are a
good
liar,” said Ivan. “You don’t blink, you don’t break eye contact, you don’t put your hand over your mouth--I’m impressed. The only problem with your lie is that you’re standing there talking instead of shooting me with the legendary silver bullet.”

Ivan stepped completely out of the bushes. His hands transformed into claws as he strode toward George.

A dart struck him in the side of the neck.

Ivan looked confused for a moment, then positively furious. He plucked the dart out of his neck, tossed it to the ground, then transformed into a full wolfman and leapt back into the bushes.

George resisted the urge to raise his clenched fist into the air and let out a victory shout. They got him!

Still no sign of either Prescott or Angie, but George heard the rustling as Ivan ran off. Hopefully the tranquilizer wouldn’t take too long to take him down.

He stood there, listening carefully.

“What happened?” Michele asked.

“The cavalry’s here,” George said. “He’ll be snoozing any second now.”

“What’ll they do with me?”

“Nothing. I mean, they won’t hurt you. I won’t let them. We’ll get you help.”

“You’ll deliver me just like you were going to deliver Ivan.”

“No. That’s not part of any bargain.” He thought he heard something, and gestured for Michele to stop talking. “Shhhh.”

He stood as still as possible. The only sound was Michele’s rapid panicked breathing.

And then a scream.

Not from Ivan.

Prescott’s scream was a mixture of agony and terror. George couldn’t hear any attempt at bravery--this was the sound of a man who knew that screaming would be the last thing he ever did.

The scream did not cut off. It did not fade.

What the hell was George supposed to do? He couldn’t just go running off after them. He’d get himself killed, too. Ivan had been hit with the dart, so maybe he’d succumb to the drug’s influence before he could finish off Prescott. If not, thanks to the noise, Angie had to know exactly where they were.

George thought about running back to the other van, but if Ivan came back for him, he didn’t want to be on the unprotected path. Instead, he slammed the back doors of the van shut, then hurried around to the front and climbed into the driver’s seat.

He really wished the windshield wasn’t missing. And there definitely wasn’t time to hotwire this one.

The screams continued.

“Damn you,” he whispered.

Finally the scream began to fade. Not quickly. It was obvious that Prescott never got to use his cyanide capsule. George wondered if Lou and Sam could hear it, too.

After what felt like several minutes but couldn’t possibly have been that long (could it?), the screaming stopped.

“I think the cavalry is dead,” said Michele.

“I saw the dart go in his neck.” What if the tranquilizer didn’t work on supernatural monsters? Or did a werewolf just require a second dose? Or had Prescott stopped screaming because Ivan fell asleep on top of him?

Rustling in the bushes.

“I think he’s coming back,” George said.

A dark shape, like a basketball, flew into the air from amidst the trees. George realized that it was Prescott’s severed head about two seconds before it splattered against the hood of the van. It rolled off and fell to the ground.

Damn it. That wasn’t the action of a sufficiently tranquilized werewolf.

Something else flew into the air. Half of an arm. It sailed right through the broken windshield and landed on the seat next to George. He recoiled in horror.

A leg followed. This one came up a few feet short and landed on the dirt path in front of the van.

The second leg struck the front hood, only a couple of inches from where the head landed. It remained there.

“Stop it, you son of a bitch!” George shouted.
Oh, nice one, dumb-ass.
As if Ivan would cease his grotesque attack based on George’s request.

The rest of the first arm missed the van. The second arm, thrown in its entirety, hit the roof. Michele screamed.

Where in the world was Angie? Ivan was out there throwing body parts at them. How could she not find him?

The next wave was a volley of internal organs, flung quickly, one after the other. And, finally, Prescott’s bloody and shredded jumpsuit.

George just stared at the carnage in a state of disbelief. Even having seen Ivan’s malicious thrill-killing ways up close, it was still hard to imagine that he’d tear somebody into pieces and pelt a frickin’ van with them!

He wondered what happened to the ribcage and spinal column.

Ivan stepped onto the path, still fully transformed as a wolfman. He wasn’t holding Prescott’s ribcage--that was presumably a mystery never to be solved.

Ivan rushed at the van.

Something swished through the air toward him.

The net struck Ivan, knocking him to the ground. He immediately began to roll around in panic and fury, getting himself more tangled.

Angie ran onto the path on the opposite side from which Ivan had emerged.

I never stopped being bait
...

Though he was more inclined to stick with the phony perceived safety of the van, George threw open the door and got out to help her. Angie pointed the rifle at Ivan’s thrashing body from about ten feet away and fired a tranquilizer dart into him.

He didn’t stop moving.

Angie pulled her crossbow off her back and notched a bolt. It appeared to be a makeshift silver bolt--a silver tip duct-taped to a regular one.

“Shoot him!” George said.

“I don’t want to kill him!”

“Look what he did to your partner! Shoot him!”

Angie kept the crossbow pointed at Ivan, yet didn’t fire. George understood that it would be her ass on the fire if she killed the werewolf, but Prescott was in chunks all over the ground!

His claws slashed through the net, cutting through the webbing like scissors. George’s stomach plummeted.