Hunter of Vengeance

A drawn-out fight would just waste what time the survivors upstairs had left We quickly worked out a plan together to trap the wandering were in the first floor’s secure armory. Not many of the business workers on this floor would have even known it was there. As long as my access wasn’t canceled when ARC disowned me it would be easy. We made our way through the mess left behind by the attack as carefully as we could.

Lisa insisted on stopping to check everybody we passed for a pulse, but after the twentieth corpse, she stopped being as hopeful for finding other survivors. Most of the bodies as we passed further into the facility were in worse shape, some being torn apart and others appearing to have been fed upon. They were all dressed in business outfits, like everyday office workers, most of them hadn’t even had enough time to realize what was happening before it was over. As we got closer to the armory there were a few wolf bodies scattered among the carnage, someone had made a last desperate stand there… all that was left of them were bloody chunks inside the weapons locker.

Both entrances to the armory were banged up but they would still lock, the racks of weapons an empty mess. It was good we had brought our own supplies since there was nothing left for us here. We set Mara and Lisa up at each of the doors and I went out looking for our prey. With Holly’s help, it was easy enough to find the creature. He was in an office slightly farther back in the complex from the more centrally located armory.

As soon as I reached the room I recognized it, it was the receptionist’s area. The were was feasting upon a body laying atop a desk just a few over from where Blake’s had been. Part of me sincerely hoped he had actually quit in his fit, annoying or not, no one deserved to go out like this. I shouted at the snarling thing, making noise to draw it back to the trap. The beast only glanced up at me briefly before returning its attention to its meal. I grabbed things off of desks and threw them at the creature, but still no response. I looked around the office for something big enough to break the thing’s concentration.

I saw a coat rack standing in the corner. I remembered Blake had whined for almost two years to get one in the back office for his hats before they had put one in place. I decided at that moment that there was never going to be forgiveness between myself and my former assistant and broke the coat rack over the werewolf’s back. With a snarl the were tore himself from the corpse and turned its attention to me. There was a long half-second where I simply froze under the attention of such ferocity… my brain telling me you got its attention, now what?

My mind finally released the hold on my body and I ran back to the armory. I ran past where we had left Lisa hiding and into the trap, waiting for the creature to show up. In a whirlwind of fury, it swept into the room, locking eyes with me, and charged. I stepped back towards the exit ready to escape as soon as Lisa closed off the entrance. The were paused in the entrance… another step and we would have had him. Instead of taking that step, he sniffed the air, turning his head over his shoulder. I had to bring him back on task.

“First you won’t come when I call and now you won’t heel?” I slipped my hands into a pair of silver-plated brass knuckles in my pockets and lay a right hook across the were’s nose before it could finish turning. “Bad puppy!”

With a roar the were turned on me swinging wildly. I hopped back out of its range, trying to bait him into the room with me. He fell for it finally stepping fully into the armory with me. His claw lashed out at me again, I punched out at the inside of its arm as it came at me, countering its momentum. With a couple of quick jabs and an uppercut, I definitely had the things full attention. Lisa slammed the door shut behind it, locking me in with the monster. It turned at the sound of the door shutting, it was only distracted a second before turning its fury back onto me. It wasn’t a second I was about to let go to waste.

I ran outside the far door faster than I’d run in my life. I burst out the door to where Mara was waiting, feeling like the very hound of hell was on my heels. I stumbled as I passed through the door, hearing it shut behind me. The beast hit the door with all the force it could muster, nearly knocking Mara over herself. I scrambled back to help her hold the door shut. The door latch had bent with the impact leaving us to desperately try to contain the beast within.

The door bucked open and closed beneath our hands. I could see the muscles in Mara’s arms bulging and flexing, she screamed with the effort as she tried to keep her change at bay. The increase in strength would be a welcome aid to locking the creature away but in the time it took her to complete the door would collapse and Mr. Sunshine inside would make sure we had a very bad day. A last push of the door shut it and the latch clicked, maybe the violence had bent it back or maybe some benevolent deity took pity on us, all I knew was the door shut… and held.

“Yeah, maybe he’ll feel better after a little time out.” I sat down on an overturned desk, catching my breath after all the excitement.

“Need a little nap, ol’timer?” My gaze snapped up to Mara’s a rush of anger passing through me that vanished just as quickly when I saw the mirth filling her eyes.

“You should show some respect, young lady, when addressing the world’s first inter-species boxing champion.” We both chuckled ruefully, knowing the night was nowhere near finished. The trapped wolf sounded to be having a tantrum inside the armory but he wasn’t going anywhere. I barely had a full moment before we heard someone running towards us. We brought our weapons up as one towards the noise. Lisa came running around the corner, out of breath.

“C’mon guys… Unc is still in here waitin’ on us. We gotta go.”

With a smile on my lips, I stood up. Swapping out my knuckles for a pistol we followed Holly’s directions towards the stairs. We climbed up to the second floor, Holly telling us the last few survivors seemed to be concentrated in a conference room overlooking the water not far from us. We approached cautiously, making our way towards the closed doors to the conference room.

Peeking through the doors we tried to assess the situation. I’m the first to admit that in twenty years on the job I’ve seen some weird things… but what was beyond those doors quickly skipped several ranks up the list. The conference table was propped up on its side with several people huddled behind it for cover. Chairs were strewn about haphazardly, and the large windows taking up the majority of one wall showed cracks and breaks from the fighting.

In the middle of the room, screaming out in some sort of blood rage, was the largest werewolf I had ever the misfortune to lay eyes upon. Nine feet tall at least, he had to duck to fit under the few hanging lights intact in the room. Its arms, long enough to drag on the ground, left gouges on the floor where its claws met. All that seemed positively normal, however, compared to the monster’s second head.

“What the hell is that thing?” Mara whispered under her breath.

“That’s what happens when you let vampires play god.”

“More importantly,” Lisa said. “That’s the thing that’s gonna eat me unc’ if we don’t hurry and do something.”