Village of the Full Moon Curse

by Daniel Griffin

  “Titus won’t be easy to defeat, just as hard as Dietrich was, maybe even more. But what little I lose from not being a werewolf, I’ve more than gained back with being a vampire also. When fighting Dietrich, there were advantages of being a werewolf naturally, with its teeth, claws, and aggressiveness, but also disadvantages, in being unable to control it, or nonstrategic when fighting. The werewolf just wants to bull rush in at full speed, like a wild animal in attack mode, biting and ripping without thinking, and leaving itself open to a possible counterattack. But now, because of my new vampire side, I feel just as strong now as when a werewolf under the full moon, if not stronger, and will be able to use my brains, weapons, and strategy when fighting them. Ideally, though, it would work out the best if they showed up on the night of a full moon, so I could have both options at my disposal.”

  “I wonder if you’ll still need to regenerate the following day, if you choose to use the werewolf side,” Brian said.

  “That, I’m not completely sure about yet,” answered Buck. “But I’m hoping that I’ll be able to regenerate just from drinking blood instead.”

  “Well, just please, both of you be careful with your blood consumption, and try to consume as needed,” said Brian. “I don’t want to sound like your dad, and really can’t understand what blood feels like for a vampire, but as a pharmacist, I’ve seen many good people become addicted to painkillers, and their lives changed for the worst because of it. I’ve even seen people become hooked on food, to the point where food was all they could think about. If you ever get hooked on blood like that, you might not even be able to stop yourselves from hurting your friends.”

  “We don’t see you as a nagging dad,” replied Buck, “but as a really good friend who cares. Thanks again!”

  Brian and Carl shook Buck’s hand, and gave Phyllis a good-bye hug one last time, before climbing into Carl’s truck and heading back to Fairville, waving good-bye as they drove away.

  “Sure going to be a long drive back to Fairville with no windshield,” said Carl. “Good thing that we brought lots of warm clothes and sunglasses.”

  Brian didn’t reply to what Carl said, as he had drifted off into a daydream state of mind, thinking about Buck and Phyllis as Carl drove over the wooden bridge and back down the Reese Highway toward home.

  CHAPTER 17

  Carl slowly stepped down on the accelerator of his truck as they began to ascend up the steep hill toward the top of Hawk Summit, with Circa thirty-five miles behind them. “I wonder if we should have stopped back at our campsite and collected our tent and supplies we left behind before continuing home,” he said aloud.

  “Perhaps we should have, but I bet Buck’s werewolf took care of it for us,” Brian joked. “When we get to the top of the summit, let’s pull over, get out, and stretch our legs and take some pictures. It’s such a beautiful February Sunday morning, and it’s such a great scenic view on top!”

  “Ten-four to that!” exclaimed Carl as his truck continued around the road’s many sharp turns and corners, climbing toward the top, before finally leveling into a straight section of the road, where they could now see the 3,800-foot peak just a mile ahead. “Interesting,” he said as he and Brian noticed a huge white cloud of snow dust rising up from the road, near the top, which also clung to a steep mountainside. “What is going on up ahead?” he asked as he drove a little farther for a closer view, and pulled to the side of the road and parked.

  “It looks like another avalanche happening!” exclaimed Brian. “See all the snow coming down from the mountainside on the left side of the road?”

  “How can this be happening?” Carl said with agitation. “It’s a beautiful day out, and there’s not a cloud in the sky! There’s not even any wind!”

  Brian grabbed the 7-21x40 binoculars from under the seat and began to survey the area. He first looked at the road. “It looks like it’s blocked off with snow again, and we can’t get through!”

  “Damn it!” barked Carl.

  And then Brian scanned the top of the mountainside, which hung above the road, trying to spot whatever could be causing the current avalanche. “What the hell?’

  “Do you see something?” asked Carl as he watched Brian scanning the top of the mountain with the binoculars.

  “Oh, no!” said Brian with extreme concern in his voice. “It can’t be! Not this soon! Please tell me it isn’t true!”

  “I can’t see very well without the binoculars, Brian,” responded Carl. “What is it?”

  “I see six people dressed in black leather up on the top and near the peak. And one of them is stomping with amazing speed and power on the snow with his left foot, causing the avalanche! And the one causing the entire ruckus looks a lot like Dietrich!”

  “Oh, hell no!” exclaimed Carl with extreme worry in his voice. “Titus and his minions are already here?

  “And he’s blocking Circa and us all in, and keeping everyone else out!” answered Brian.

  “How’d they get way up there? And how’d they travel to Alaska from Europe so quickly?”

  “They’re very powerful supernatural beings, which can do extraordinary things, and it’s hard for us humans to comprehend it,” answered Brian. “If it’s any consolation, though, at least his army is a lot smaller than I would have guessed.”

  “We’ve got to get back to Circa and warn Buck and Phyllis!” exclaimed Carl as he turned his truck around slowly, hoping to go unnoticed by them while driving back toward Circa. He increased his speed after they were out-of-sight distance from them.

  “Hope we get there before they do,” said Brian with concern. “We don’t have any bullets, weapons, or any sharp blades other than our hunting knives.”

  “Maybe the store has some.270 ammunition on the shelf, but if not, hopefully, Buck has a rifle or shotgun that we can use,” replied Carl.

  “Anything that we can get our hands on is better than rifles with no bullets,” replied Brian. “I’ll even try looking for a bow and arrows if need be.”

  “That gives me an idea,” replied Carl.

  “What is it?” asked Brian.

  “If we could find a bow and some arrows, along with some black powder, we could design small explosives with small fuses to tie at the end of the arrows, and light them as we shoot them. They won’t affect Titus, but I bet they’ll slow his minions down.”

  “I like it, Carl, I like it a lot,” replied Brian, as Carl continued driving a fast but safe speed back toward the direction of Circa. Brian was about to ask Carl a question when he was interrupted by a very loud thunderous noise on the rooftop of the truck, which momentarily startled them to the point of Carl almost losing control of his vehicle and sliding off the highway, nearly crashing over and down the steep embankment.

  “What was that?” Carl said loudly as he regained control of his truck.

  Brian was about to roll down the passenger window to see when a white male’s upside-down bald head peeked down from the top of the truck’s cab roof and looked at them through the glassless windshield. Carl and Brian were both in stunned silence as they had a stare down with someone who they knew had to be one of Titus’s minions. Brian hoped that his movement would go unnoticed as he slowly reached his right hand down to retrieve his hunting knife from under the seat.

  The minion briefly sniffed the air from inside of the truck’s cab. “I smell your fresh, warm blood, and it will taste most satisfying and also gratify us!” he exclaimed before he began to reach inside the cab in an attempt to grab Carl and yank him from behind the steering wheel.

  “Get the bastard away from me!” shouted Carl to Brian, as he attempted to swat the minion’s hand away with his right arm, while at the same time, trying to drive without crashing.

  The distraction gave Brian the perfect chance to quickly grab his hunting knife and thrust it deeply into the right side of the minion’s neck. The minion became enraged as he clutched the knife’s handle and disappeared out of sight, back up onto the rooftop of th
e truck’s cab again. Brian and Carl were dead quiet as they listened for any possible sign of the minion still being on top. Bam! The noise was as loud as a gunshot, as the minion’s right hand and arm came crashing down through the metal rooftop, clutching the handle of Brian’s knife, trying to slash at them and cut them with the sharp blade. Brian and Carl were both desperately dodging and weaving in any direction possible just to avoid being cut by the hunting knife while frightened out of their minds.

  “I’ve had enough of this nonsense!” exclaimed Carl, and he slammed onto his trucks brake pedal as hard as he could with his foot, and from a speed of sixty mph, which propelled the vampire minion from off the rooftop, and rolling down over the truck’s hood and falling down hard onto the road, tumbling head over heels, again and again, finally coming to a stop fifteen yards in front of them.

  “Run him over! Run that SOB over!” shouted Brian with fright.

  “With pleasure,” answered Carl as he now pushed the throttle fully to the floor, and rapidly increased the trucks speed in the direction of the minion, who was now staggering to his feet, and glaring at them with an icy stare and frightening expression of anger and revenge on his face!. Wham! Carl’s speedometer was hitting fifty-five mph when the truck’s front grille smashed into the vampire minion, forcing him underneath the truck as they run him over. The tail end of Carl’s truck briefly bucked into the air as one of its rear tires rolled over the minion and quickly came crashing to the ground again. He observed in the rearview mirror the minion lying motionless on the ground as he sped off and out of his sight.

  “Do you think we killed him?” asked Brian.

  “That would be great if we did, but somehow, I doubt it. But even if not, we sure put an ass whooping on him that he won’t forget for a while!” quipped Carl as he and Brian gave each other high fives and continued on toward Circa. “Now I got a busted windshield, a hole in my roof, a smashed-up left side, and dents in the back! My insurance company will be asking a lot of questions.”

  The vampire minion, who still lay in the middle of the road, began to regain his consciousness and movement after five minutes, and Carl’s truck was now long gone. He slowly sat up in the road to inspect his short and stocky battered body, noticing his wounds were just slowly beginning to supernaturally heal, when four other people had walked up and surrounded him. “Titus,” he said to the person who was standing in front of him, and looking down on him. “I think I need some blood. I’m healing at a slower rate than usual, but I’ve never been hurt like this before, either.”

  “The blood that you and the others needed was inside that truck, which you failed to stop!” answered an angry Titus. “What happened?”

  “I’m sorry I failed you, Titus, but they ran over me, and the two of them got away before I could recover,” answered the wounded minion. “I miscalculated in my failed attempt and I promise that it won’t happen again.”

  “Failure is not an option, nor is miscalculation permitted. Get up, Thomas!” barked Titus.

  “Yes, Titus, forgive me,” replied Thomas as he stood up. “Have mercy,” pleaded the doomed Thomas, who, just ten minutes earlier, was on the verge of killing Carl and Brian, but now was in fear for his own vampire life.

  “Mercy and forgiveness are for the saints to give, not for me!” responded Titus.

  Thomas gasped for his last breath of air as Titus thrust his left hand and forearm through his stomach, to his spinal column, where he firmly gripped his six fingers onto his spine and yanked with extreme force, pulling his spinal cord, vertebra, and brain stem back out through his stomach and away from his body, then tossing it aside. Thomas, the 150-year-old vampire minion, was dead in an instant and collapsed back down to the road in a motionless heap.

  “Such a waste of vampire potential and talent, but it shouldn’t require many minions to take down a small village, so it’s doubtful that Thomas will be missed. Move him off the road and into the woods for the ravens to feed on,” commanded Titus to three of the minions. “And then we’ll go to Circa and accomplish what we came here to do.”

  “Sir, if I may ask, are you okay?” one of the female minions asked Titus. “You’ve been very angry and intolerant with us recently, and killing one of your own servants seems odd behavior, even for you.”

  “Perhaps you’re right, Billie, and I don’t intend to frighten or intimidate you,” answered Titus. “But Dietrich’s connection can no longer be felt inside me, and it has me disturbed. I’ve felt his connection for 3,000 years and now it’s gone, which means he’s dead. Dietrich and I are nearly indestructible, and have fought against thousands of foes over the centuries, so it’s beyond my comprehension as to how he managed to get himself killed in a small village in Alaska! And I’ll tear the whole village apart—piece by piece if need be—to find those who are responsible! They will suffer a cruel, slow death, I promise!”

  CHAPTER 18

  Carl hurriedly drove his truck over the wooden bridge and toward the store in Circa, hoping to find Phyllis and Buck there.

  “If they’re not at the store, then we’ll check the bed and breakfast and Buck’s cabin, but we need to find them in a hurry,” said Brian.

  “The store isn’t open on Sundays, but maybe they just dropped by there quickly,” replied Carl. “Hopefully, they’re not out looking for a caribou.” He turned his truck into the parking lot of the store and saw Buck and Phyllis outside, attempting to repair the damages that were done to the wood shed by Dietrich, him, and Brian.

  “Nice timing,” said Brian as Carl drove up to the shed and shut his truck off, while noticing a look of surprise on the faces of Buck and Phyllis.

  “Did you guys forget something?” asked Phyllis.

  “I wish it were that simple,” answered Brian. “We have a serious crisis now and we don’t have much time.”

  “What is it?” asked Buck. “I hope you’re not referring to what I think you might be referring to.”

  “Titus and five of his vampire minions are already as close as the summit, and are heading toward Circa!” answered Brian. “Titus even caused another avalanche, so we’re trapped here again!”

  “And one of them put another whooping on my truck and tried to kill us,” said Carl. “We were very fortunate to escape.”

  “Oh no,” gasped Phyllis. “They’re here much sooner than I expected. We really haven’t had a chance to prepare yet.”

  “We need to prepare in a hurry then,” said Buck.

  “We need to look in the store and see if there are more.270 Winchester ammunition on the shelf, if that’s okay,” Brian said. “If not, we need to find weapons in a hurry.”

  “I’ll take them inside,” Buck told Phyllis. “Can you warn the remaining people in the village to not open their doors to any strangers, and especially not to invite them inside their homes under any circumstances? And if you see Titus before we do, do not approach him without me.”

  “No danger of that,” replied Phyllis as she and Buck quickly hugged and kissed each other on the lips, and encouraged one another with whispers, before she disappeared to warn their people.

  “Let’s go inside,” said Buck to Carl and Brian, escorting them into the store to look for ammunition.

  “I should try to call Nancy on the pay phone, to tell her we’re stranded again,” said Brian.

  “You can use the phone inside the store,” Buck said to Brian.

  Carl walked over to the shelf with its various kinds of hunting ammunition stocked on top, hoping to find any kind of.270 caliber bullets, while Buck handed the phone to Brian.

  “I think the phone is dead,” said Brian.

  “Really?” Buck replied as he took the phone to check for himself. “Dead as a doornail! I wonder if Titus had something to do with that.”

  “There’s no. 270 ammunition, either,” Carl informed them.

  “Let’s go over to Ron’s garage,” replied Buck. “He had a lot of guns and knives there, and I know he had a.308 rifle. I’ve g
ot a 30/06 rifle, but no bullets.”

  Carl drove into the large, open parking lot of Ron’s garage with Brian, which was a medium-sized red building with a large garage bay door on the front that was big enough to fit a school bus through, two night security floodlights above the door, and two small windows on the front, one on each side of the large bay door. Buck was already there and unlocking the main side door with a key that Ron always hid under the outside floor mat. Buck pushed open the door but stood outside waiting for them.

  “You’re going to have to invite me in,” said Buck as Carl and Brian stepped inside the door of the darkened garage with its small windows, which didn’t allow for much sunlight to shine in. “And the light switch is on your right.”

  “That must be a little annoying for you,” Carl told Buck as he flipped the lights on.

  “Come on in, Buck,” said Brian, inviting him inside.

  “Yes, it is a little annoying, and if not for Phyllis, I couldn’t have gotten into my own cabin, but I think I’m beginning to get used to it,” answered Buck. “Ron’s room was in the back of the garage. We can start there first.”

  Brian and Carl observed and glanced through the inside of the garage with its various kinds of different tools that Ron had hanging on his garage wall, above and on a workbench, as they walked through the garage bay and past a hydraulic car lift toward the back. Brian also noticed a big, red toolbox with a nail gun on top, which he thought could be a possible weapon to use against the minions.

  “Check that out,” Carl said to Brian, pointing to a calendar on the wall with a picture of a 1969 Ford Mustang, and a gorgeous female blond wearing a yellow bikini sitting on its white hood.

  “Easy, Carl,” chuckled Brian.

  “I was looking at the Mustang, not the hot girl,” Carl said, laughing.

  “Awesome!’ exclaimed Buck from inside Ron’s room.