“What if he’s a spy, uh?” The werewolf hunter asked. In many ways, he looked a lot like Dylan. Same build, same suit, same hair. The only thing that was a sharp difference was his pair of clear blue eyes. “What if we take him to the agency, our heaven, and he brings all of them with him? What then?”
“I-I sincerely doubt that,” stuttered Grant. “Look at him, Scott, he’s clearly not like the rest.” For the first time since the discussion had begun, the scientist turned to the others. “Jake, Dylan… won’t you help me out here.”
Scott said, “Well, I bet Dylan is on my side, aren’t you, Dylan?”
Jake had already finished his call; he had begun listening to the debate intently after putting the phone down. “Well, I trust him,” he declared. “I know he’s a werewolf, but I’m not going to deny a perfectly sound human being the help he needs just because of his stench.”
Rebecca didn’t think that last comment fit Jake’s personality. The truth was they were all still vampires, and just like Dylan, deep down they seemed to believe their race was better than the rest.
“You believe his stupid story?” defied Scott.
Jake rolled his eyes. “Look, Victoria believes him. You know that woman can’t be wrong. Maybe you don’t know her as well as I do, but she is the real deal.”
This only annoyed Scott more, “Well, what if he believes he’s telling the truth but-“
“But the werewolves have him confused?” teased Grant. “Clearly that’s not the case.” He then turned to Dylan. “You’re awfully serious there, Dylan. No doubt everyone here would like to know what you bloody think.”
Dylan remained motionless in his spot. Slowly, he turned to look at the director of the agency, the man whose opinion actually mattered. It took him a while to answer, almost as if he didn’t want to say the wrong thing or compromise his position; not yet. Before he spoke, he took a quick glance at Rebecca. “I don’t know.”
The crowd looked more than disappointed.
“You don’t know?” demanded Scott. “Gee, Dylan, that’s so helpful, you-“
Only then they all stopped. The director stood up, walked to the middle of the room and said, “Listen.”
All of the rooms in The Pecan were soundproof, and yet all the vampires could clearly hear Will shouting in the other room. Even Rebecca knew what that meant.
“They’re coming, aren’t they?” she asked softly.
Immediately, Dylan opened the door to their room, walking across the narrow hall to open the one on the other side. William’s shouts stopped briefly as he saw Dylan enter his room; his face was of pure terror. It didn’t take him long, however, to resume his agitation.
“You didn’t check me, did you?” The werewolf began to yell at the werewolf hunter, his eyes now blazing yellow for the first time since they had arrived; he was afraid. “Don’t you see? You found the key and you didn’t keep looking for them. You missed a tracker, you idiot!”
Rebecca was sure those were the last words Dylan expected to hear. She did not see him stir in anger, on the contrary, Dylan cursed quietly as he ran to the werewolf patting him head to toe.
“What are you doing?” Will demanded, giving a step back, “The tracker has to be inside of me, Dylan!” Turning to the rest of them he yelled, “Get it out of me!”
“Where is it?” Rebecca asked foolishly, she too was scared of what was coming; she could hear the footprints clearly now and smell their blood as they moved through the forest. She didn’t need much experience to know how fast they were approaching and what that meant for them.
William turned to look at her incredulous. “I don’t know! How am I supposed to know?” he asked, “They must’ve put it in me somewhere - somehow.”
Grant gave a step forth declaring in a calm voice, “I have a portable X-Ray machine in my plane. If we take him there I can find whatever is inside him and take it out.”
For a moment, they all froze. Nobody moved a muscle, the only thing that seemed to keep moving was the werewolves that kept closing their distance between them and the small house in the middle of the forest where the vampires waited. There had to be dozens of them.
The witches interrupted their silence; the two of them came storming out of the conference room where they had been waiting for the vampires to make a decision about the werewolf. Josh followed close behind them, his face looked almost serene, yet all the vampires knew the panic he was hiding between his brave front.
“What is it?” Victoria demanded with her usual tone of superiority; she was, after all, the leader of the American coven, “What is all this shouting?”
Lucius, who had been hearing the others argue quietly, left his place behind his subjects to explain. “We are being attacked by a pack of wolves. Several packs by the sound of it, in fact.” He thought he needed to elaborate, “Werewolves are coming. At least fifty of them; which means we are greatly outnumbered. We need to get you out of here and out of harm’s way.” He turned to the younger witch, Jasmine. “I need you to take Josh out of here when you go. Is this something you can do for me?”
“Yes,” Jasmine, now looking terrified, nodded immediately.
“No,” Victoria was quick to contradict her. “We need to get you out of here, Lucius. You are more important.” She would not look at Josh. She knew if she left him the man would surely die or worse – be turned into a werewolf.
Seeing the obvious panic in Josh’s face, Lucius interfered. “The human goes first, Victoria. I will not budge.”
This decision seemed to anger Victoria to no end, but apparently, she was used to the director’s stubbornness.
Turning to Jasmine, she said, “Then I need you to teleport all three of us.”
“I-I can’t, I-“
“You must, Jasmine,” the older witch said, her black dress ruffled as she raised her hands to hold her arms firmly. “Think of our coven, our house. Concentrate and take us there.”
The young witch looked tense. It seemed she knew her limits and what was being asked of her was dangerous. “I have never done it with so many bodies before. The energy I’ll need, I-“
Her leader reassured her. “It will be all right. We don’t have much time, Jasmine.” Without listening to any more of her complaints, Victoria took Josh’s hand in hers and forced the director to take her other. All that was missing now was for the teleporter to take a hold of them herself. Quietly, she looked at the free hands that awaited. Victoria prompted, “You can do it, Jasmine. I believe in you, my darling.”
“Victoria,” the director pleaded as if he were asking his old mother permission to do what he wanted, “You don’t have to do this, I will be all right. I can stay and fight”
Ignoring his words, the witch superior turned to Jasmine, waiting for the young witch to hold the terrified human’s free hand. Relief seemed to fill Josh after the witch held him. It was obvious he was more than happy to escape, but looked worried about the outcome. If the teleporting didn’t work, then anything could happen. “Ready?” Jasmine asked the rest of the travelers. They all nodded, taking a deep breath together. Closing her eyes, the witch whispered something under her breath quickly and they all disappeared. Whatever happened after, the rest wouldn’t find out until hours later.
The vampires and the werewolf who had been left behind didn’t have time to waste.
“If we’re going to go, let’s go now!” Dylan broke the silence.
“Grant and I are unarmed,” Jake told him. “We would not be able to-“
“Here,” said Scott, handing him a gun, “Take my spare.”
Jake took it while Grant said, “There is a room that’s filled with weapons here, we should visit it.”
They all nodded and followed Grant to the room where Dylan had spoken with Lucius a few hours before. Rebecca didn’t need a weapon, she had already taken hers from her back, holding it tight. Instead, she stood with William in the hallway as the rest worked hurriedly and quietly. Turning to the young looking man, s
he realized this werewolf was the most defenseless creature left to protect.
“Can he have a weapon?” she asked the three men as they walked back to the main hallway.
Scott turned to Dylan, who threw a gun in the werewolf’s direction. Will caught it, surprised by the sudden and immediate trust.
“Great,” Scott added, “if you are all ready, we should go. Now.”
“What about my car?” Jake asked.
“Forget the car, let’s all go to the plane,” Dylan said, “They can follow and outrun a car in these woods, but not a plane once it takes off.”
“If we can get it to take off, that is,” Grant added. They all knew they were only wasting precious time by talking without taking any action. Rebecca couldn’t wait to start running.
“Then, let’s move!” Dylan finally led the way.
The party stepped out of the protection of the safe house and into the open forest. Around her, a silence filled her. Everything except the heaving breath of the attackers that now surrounded them could be heard. Rebecca was running behind Scott when a big furry mass jumped on the vampire in front of her.
“Go!” Scott yelled. The first werewolf to reach them attacked with his huge teeth, but the werewolf hunter quickly overpowered it. He took out its heart just in time to feel another werewolf fall on top of him. And then another. “Run!” he yelled between his fangs, his red eyes gleaming.
Rebecca did. Leaving her comrade behind, she sped in the direction of the landing field following the others. Soon she heard guns and growls and leaves rustling behind her and around her. Her sixth sense acted immediately, avoiding the first werewolf that jumped at her swiftly and giving her enough time to shoot it between the eyes. Like a heavy piece of meat, the werewolf dropped in front of her. Knowing a dozen more enemies approached, Rebecca forgot everything she knew about herself and, without thinking twice, she pulled her arm back before guiding her hand directly to the beast’s heart. Her fingers snapped as they broke the animal’s rib cage and then, searching blindly inside the monster’s body, she found its beating heart. For the first time in her life, she took out the life out of a living, thinking being.
Unfortunately she didn’t have time to dwell on what she had done. In front of her, Dylan was jumping on another wolf, Jake was shooting and reloading his weapon and Grant had taken Will’s hand as he dragged the anxious werewolf to his airplane, his free hand shooting any werewolf that approached them.
The battle was far from over; one after another, Rebecca engaged the beasts she had once been so afraid of as if she had done it all her life. It was almost as if her body had taken over, but her mind relished in the sense of control and power her unleashed abilities let her have. It was glorious. Finishing one wolf after the other, the young ballet dancer had turned into a fierce, killing machine. There was no stopping her, the pile of bodies left a trail of blood behind her.
“Becca, get on the plane, now!” It was Dylan. Like her, he was now panting while covered in blood from head to toe. The bodies of wolves and werewolves turned human surrounded them. No matter how many of them they killed, there were many more coming.
“Where’s Scott?” Jake asked.
But they knew the answer to that question. They had heard his last breath, the last time his heart had beaten.
“Come on!” It was Grant; he was on the plane, guarding the stairs. “Get in here, now!”
They all found their way in, one by one. Dylan, Jake, Rebecca.
Once they were all inside, Grant started the engine. The werewolves were all over the small white plane. Will braced himself to his seat, buckling his seatbelt with shaking hands as he saw his old “friends” scratch at the windows angrily.
“Let’s go, Grant!” Dylan shouted from behind. “Get this thing on the air!”
The plane finally began to move. Rebecca heard the werewolves outside, the window next to Will cracked after the wolf had hit it enough times with its head, blood smeared on the glass. Above them, the ceiling began to deform under the werewolves’ incessant beating and clawing. They were helpless to do anything about it as they waited to get off the ground. The werewolves wouldn’t be able to follow them then.
They soon accelerated enough to take off. One by one, the werewolves that had attached themselves to the metal began to fall to the ground. Soon, they would be safe.
An alarmed sounded.
“What is that?” Will, who was frantic with anxiety, his fangs threatening to sprout, his eyes still yellow, asked.
“We’re losing pressure,” Jake informed as if it was just an everyday event. Of all of them, he looked the calmest. “The plane suffered too much damage.”
Dylan hurried to the cockpit; Rebecca had sat down with Will in the back of the plane, holding on to the armrest and almost damaging it with her strength.
“How are we doing, Grant?” she heard Dylan ask one more time. Her ears popped and healed, popped and healed, as the pressure changed. The air became colder around her as they gained altitude.
“I don’t think we’ll be able to go very far,” Grant confessed. “Dylan, can you fly the plane while I scan Will? I just need a couple of minutes. If we don’t take out the tracker, then we won’t ever be safe.”
“Unless we let him go,” Dylan suggested. Grant must’ve silently protested, because Dylan added. “Yeah, I can fly the plane. Go.”
Grant then turned to the rest to say, “I’m sorry to say this plane only has two parachutes. Best case scenario is we have a rough landing, worst case scenario we all jump off the plane.”
“What?” Rebecca was finally afraid; more afraid than a werewolf could ever make her feel again. Not after battling them that day, anyway. It was the thought of jumping from miles up in the air that sounded truly terrifying.
Grant didn’t seem that worried; instead, he opened one of the top compartments to produce a strange looking machine Rebecca had never seen before. Next to Grant, Jake stood up ready to help, hanging onto anything he could to avoid tumbling over throughout the turbulence.
Leaning over to Will, Grant turned the portable x-ray machine on and started scanning. In a matter of seconds, he found something. Searching his pockets frantically, he said, “Quick, somebody give me a pen.”
Rebecca patted her own body even when she knew she carried nothing but her gun and her phone. Fortunately for them, Jake, the lawyer, was always prepared with his own kind of weapon. “Here.” The pen he handed looked expensive, not that it really mattered. They all, including Will, watched as Grant marked the spot.
“Keep searching,” Rebecca heard Will say.
Grant listened and did as was suggested. “You’re right, there’s more,” he announced.
By the time he was done, he had marked five or six spots.
“Do you need a knife?” asked Jake.
He did. Immediately Grant stood up and opened another compartment. Inside, he found another bag from where he extracted a small surgical knife. Rebecca watched the entire scene in astonishment. The plane was clearly not stable enough for Grant to start cutting Will open. In fact, just before he made the first cut, there was a loud noise and a big bump that made all of them jump.
Rebecca was thrown from her seat but when she regained her footing and turned to see if Grant had lost the knife, she found him already making the first cut. She watched as the scientist put his hand inside the werewolf’s skin, forcing it to open enough to make way for his fingers to look around until he found what he was looking for. Will looked to be in pain, but apparently not so much for him to complain.
“Any idea how all of these got here?” Grant yelled to be heard over the sound of the plane falling apart. The marks he had made were everywhere on Will’s body. Three were on his abdomen and one on each leg.
Will shook his head; his answer looked truthful enough.
“I can only deduce,” Grant told him, “that the ones in your abdomen could have been in your food. “
“Yeah,” Jake agreed, “They
probably made him eat them and he didn’t even realize. They look small enough.”
By then Grant dropped the second tiny device on the empty seat next to Will. The plane didn’t have that many seats and each row had three. Will sat by the window; Rebecca sat in the single seat across from him. She had a perfect view of Grant slicing the werewolf’s flesh and then reaching to take out the small pebble-like trackers.
The scene suddenly changed completely. There was a big bang, followed by an exploding engine. The fire spread around the wing next to Will, partially coming in through the window. The plane shook enough to cause the wing to detach. In the blink of an eye, the wing had crashed against the plane’s tail, taking it with it flying to the ground. The opening in the back of the tail made the little pressure that was left leave the small airplane. Rebecca didn’t have time to think, she didn’t have time to do anything. In a moment, she was flying out into the open space. She didn’t even have time to compute the scene before her. The plane, now open in half, kept flying in a swirling motion losing altitude. Smoke and fire left a trail as it dived quickly into the forest below.
As for Rebecca, the momentum was suddenly gone as she started her descent, aided by gravity, to the ground below. If she hadn’t been gasping for air, she would have screamed.
The drop was fast, everything around her blurred as she kept gaining speed, the ground getting closer and closer.
She hit the ground so fast she didn’t really feel anything. No pain. There was just darkness.
CHAPTER FOUR
IT WAS THE last bone snapping back into place that finally woke her up. When she did, she screamed like she had never screamed before. Not even when she had endured the transformation from human into vampire, when her every vein had burned, had she felt something as horrible as crashing into an open field from a flying airplane. Fortunately for her sanity, the broken body had begun its process of healing while she was still unconscious.
Rebecca lay in the middle of a grassy area surrounded by an ocean of trees. The soil had sunk under her body where she had landed. Her neck, which had just come back together with the rest of her spine, was now allowing her nerves to continue sending messages to the rest of her body. Even when she should have been happy to be alive and moving, the excruciating pain that had come and gone made her remember how far from being only human she was.
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