The Turning

by Micky Neilson

  There were pants, a shirt and knickers lying on the floor near the entrance to the loo. Alexander snatched up the pants and dug into the pockets; in the left front he found what he was looking for—a bottle with a plain white label, filled with oblong pills. He pocketed the bottle and turned back to the prey.

  In the small of his back, tucked under his pants, he had hidden the silver-coated commando knife. He pulled it free and straddled his insensate foe. There was no time for physical torture, which saddened the hunter deeply, but there was another variety of torture that Alexander had found to be almost as effective, though not quite as satisfying: the psychological variety. He dipped into his front left pocket and retrieved the rectangular moon pendant.

  “I have something to show you,” he said. “A tawdry bauble, but one you’ll recognize…”

  He held the necklace by the chain with his left hand and dangled the pendant before his quarry’s eyes. It amused Alexander to see those eyes widen ever so slightly, the eyebrows lift just a hair. The hunter leaned closer.

  “That fire was no accident. Your bitch, she fought hard. You see, she had learned well the law of club and fang. But I taught her the same lesson I’ve been teaching you vermin for years…”

  Alexander leaned still closer, so that he was whispering into his quarry’s ear: “You are NOT the top of the food chain. I am the boss. You are my slave…”

  The hunter pried open his prey’s mouth and stuffed the necklace inside. He moved his left hand to the quarry’s shoulder, and with his right he placed the tip of the silver blade against its abdomen. “I am your master!” he said, pushing the tip until he felt the point puncture skin.

  As he did so, the prey shut its eyes tight. At first Alexander felt a sudden rush at the response in his victim… but then, the hunter paused. It closed its eyes. How was it able to close its eyes?

  ***

  The bastard had Celine’s necklace. He was dangling it right in front of him. How could he—

  “That fire was no accident.”

  As if from a great distance, the real Brandon remembered the words of Ghost: “There are people out there who know fuckers like you exist.”

  So this person had… killed Celine.

  “Your bitch, she fought hard.”

  The world went out of focus. Rage, raw, pure and indomitable welled up within him. A rage fueled by powers beyond human understanding. Brandon may have been under some form of sedation, but the beast was guided by something far more formidable than some elixir. The beast would not be chained. Brandon’s body chemistry was undergoing a massive change, and he knew, without knowing how he knew other than that he could feel it, that whatever drug cocktail this man had introduced into his system was battling against a primal force unleashed by the turning, by Ghost’s pills, but most especially now by an insatiable hunger for vengeance… and the cocktail was losing.

  His mouth was being pried open, the necklace being stuffed inside. Within, the dark current tugged at the real Brandon once more. He knew that if he went under now, he would not resurface. Pain flared, a searing pain that blazed throughout his entire body, starting from his abdomen. In response, the beast came charging forth, as unstoppable as the tide.

  Brandon was not a religious man. Nevertheless he offered this prayer:

  Lord, forgive me for what I am about to become.

  These were the last human thoughts that passed through Brandon Frye’s mind.

  ***

  The prey opened its eyes and Alexander froze, his mouth hung open. Those eyes shone like fiery amber.

  It’s turning.

  A hand shot out and closed around his right wrist, pulling the knife away. The grip was iron. Alexander’s right hand went immediately numb.

  Those lambent eyes turned to him, and within their depths the hunter beheld only unfathomable rage. The body convulsed beneath him. The beast’s mouth opened wide and the teeth, most especially the canines, lengthened. The necklace disappeared down its gullet as saliva bubbled forth. All across the abomination’s body, its skin rippled. The beast’s right hand flew to Alexander’s neck and shut like a vice as a hacking gurgle escaped the hunter’s throat.

  Alexander’s eyes bulged. His face turned purple. Starbursts danced at the edges of his vision. In a few scant seconds he would pass out, if his neck didn’t break first.

  An insistent knocking came at the door. The hunter reached up to his neck and with ebbing strength, grabbed hold of the creature’s little finger. He closed his grip on it and pulled out and down, eliciting a sharp crack from the base of the digit.

  Some strange, inhuman sound escaped the beast, a kind of cross between a roar and yell. It let go just long enough for Alexander to reclaim a bit of his senses. He reached for the discarded tranquilizer gun on the couch. Below him the animal held up its right hand, and as the hunter brought the gun to bear, he saw the little finger snap back into place; watched as the entirety of the arm lengthened with a sound like creaking wood; stared as the fingernails blackened, lengthened; beheld the hair on the arm and hand extending and thickening into a thin coat. That aberrant limb grasped Alexander’s gun arm below the wrist.

  The hunter heard a female voice say, “Brandon! If you’re in there, I want to talk!” just before the malformed hand twisted, effortlessly breaking both the radius and the ulna in Alexander’s left arm. An unrestrained bellow of pain escaped his mouth.

  Beneath him the abomination’s body continued to undergo gut-wrenching spasms. The thing sat up, teeth clamped tight, cords standing out on its neck.

  For Alexander, the imperative to survive surged. He leaned his head to the creature’s hand that held his right arm at the wrist, found a finger with his teeth and bit down until he tasted blood. It was enough to force open the grip as the creature continued to struggle with its own metamorphosis. Distantly, the hunter thought that whatever pain he was causing the creature was inconsequential in comparison to the pain it was already undergoing on its own. He reached over and pried the clawed fingers off of his broken arm.

  That same arm hung limply at his side as the hunter finally stood. There was another knock, louder this time. The creature curled into a fetal position and rolled, still between Alexander’s legs, but it had turned over so that it lay atop the hunter’s dagger. As Alexander twisted to reach once more for the tranq gun, the beast continued rotating into a kneeling position. The creature propped one hand on the couch and pulled its right leg up so that its foot was on the floor. The same female voice from before shouted, “Brandon!”

  Alexander’s fingers had nearly closed on the butt of the gun when the beast stood, turned, and pushed the hunter back against the counter opposite the couch. The mouth opened like that of a snake unhinging its jaw to swallow a large meal. Slaver dripped and foamed as the beast twisted its head to a better angle from which to strike at Alexander’s neck. The hunter fumbled on the counter behind him, happened upon a small glass, and shoved it as far down the creature’s throat as he could. In a fury the beast grasped Alexander by the shoulders, turned, and with one effortless toss hurled the hunter toward the door.

  Shards of pain exploded in the hunter’s lower back as he flew sideways and struck the corner wall that marked the end of the short foyer. He fell to the floor, the bones in his ruined left arm grinding together. The beast dropped to all fours, hacked and convulsed until at last it dislodged the glass. Its back hunched as bones in the spine popped, shifted, realigned…

  Alexander struggled to a sitting position, his mind searching for some way to shut out the pain.

  Go into shock now, and you’re dead.

  With a loud sound the door to the room burst open then; one of the Nepalese security officers rushed in, followed by the beast’s whore. The security man took in the scene quickly, assessed Alexander’s condition and helped him to his feet. Without a word the man spun and led the hunter toward the entrance, shoving the wide-eyed hussy backward into the hallway. Once there, the man quickly turned and shut
the door.

  ***

  Ginny could feel her heart pounding against her chest. Pressure built inside her like a superheated boiler about to explode.

  Breathe. For God’s sake, just breathe.

  What exactly had she seen in there? She had come to talk to Brandon, to see if he had calmed down enough that they could have a reasonable conversation. She had knocked, waited, and yelled that if Brandon was there, she wanted to talk. Then she had heard someone, a male someone, cry out from inside the room. A heavyset lady strolling down the hall carrying an umbrella drink and wearing a shirt that said “Juneau Ju Love Me” had come to a stop just two doors down, her room key in her free hand.

  Ginny had run to the woman and said that someone was in danger and could she please call security immediately? The woman had complied and Ginny returned to the door and knocked again, louder. She had pressed her ear to the door and heard sounds of scuffling. She had shouted, “Brandon!”

  More tussling sounds had come from within, followed by an impact that shook the wall and door. She had then heard a voice then saying, “Step aside,” and turned to see Poonyeah. Ginny had stepped away as he inserted a key card, turned the handle and shoved the door open with a loud crash.

  The shorter man had rushed in and she had followed and seen… something, on all fours next to the couch, visible by the light of a small lamp in the back of the room. There had been a thin coat covering it, and in the brief glance she had gotten, it had looked human. Mostly. Its back had been arched; there had been stretching and popping as if whatever part of it was human had been in the midst of becoming something else.

  Poonyeah had brought her back into the hall. He was speaking now into his small radio: “Zulu team to deck one, cabin one one four seven. Repeat, Zulu team to cabin one one four seven.”

  Ginny regarded the man who had come out of Brandon’s room: he was tall and thin and wore layered clothing that looked fairly expensive. He was sweating, holding onto his left arm, which was swelling rapidly, and his eyes drifted about. There was something to him, something Ginny couldn’t quite pinpoint, that made her uneasy. Not to mention the fact that he had been in Brandon’s room. The two had apparently been fighting. What the hell had he been doing in Brandon’s room?

  Even as these thoughts were racing through Ginny’s mind, the man seemed to regain some sense of lucidity and simply began walking down the hall as if to leave. “Sir!” Poonyeah shouted. He grabbed Ginny by the arm and lead her a short distance down the hall as he called after the stranger. “Sir! You’ll need to stay here until—”

  Poonyeah stopped speaking as two other security personnel, all wearing the same white outfits as Poonyeah, sped into the passageway. The chief security officer rattled off orders in a language Ginny didn’t recognize, pointing to both the stranger and Ginny as the men nodded their heads.

  A stout man with straight black hair, whose name tag read “Chandra,” took Ginny by the arm. “Ma’am, what cabin are you staying in?”

  “Hm? Oh… uh, five two one two,” she said.

  “I’m going to escort you back to your cabin for now and ask you some questions, okay?”

  “What about Brandon?” she asked. “You need to get in there and find out what the fuck is going on!”

  The heavyset lady poked her head out from her room. “Yeah, what is going on?”

  “We’ll take care of everything, I assure you,” the man answered both women, in his unrecognizable accent. Then, to Ginny: “Now please come with me.” The man had Ginny by the arm and it was clear that he was not asking. The lady closed her door, and as Ginny was led away she heard another security officer, this one thicker, telling the stranger that he would be escorted to the infirmary.

  The stranger, who seemed out of it, did not respond.

  ***

  Within room one one four seven Brandon’s metamorphosis continued.

  Squirming on the floor, his/its joints dislocated, shifted. Bones cracked and extended and in some cases shortened. New bones grew; other bones were simply reabsorbed into the ever-changing form. Shoulders turned to thick, muscled withers. The feet extended as the heels became tarsi; the tibia and fibula of both legs shortened as the lower limbs began to take on a digitigrade shape. A sheath grew around the penis, and a baculum formed within it. The coccyx lengthened and burst through the skin as new skin formed over it, and a thick coat of fur sprouted from the appendage.

  Within the face, the maxilla and mandible began breaking and re-staging as they jutted forth. A muzzle formed; additional teeth filled existing gaps within the maw. The tops of the ears tapered to a point and traveled upward along the skull. Ligaments, tendons and muscles snapped, grew and transitioned to keep pace with the morphing anatomy. Organs repositioned and the cardiovascular and nervous systems rerouted accordingly.

  The transformation was excruciating but at the same time rapturous, for that which dwelled in the deepest recesses of Brandon Frye, after much too lengthy a hibernation, was being birthed once again into the world.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Poonyeah Banepali was raised in an indigent hill village in Northeastern Nepal. His ancestors practiced a religion that predated both Hinduism and Buddhism. He danced in the sacred Sakela festival, and grew corn and cotton. When he came of age, a bride was chosen for him. Shortly after she became pregnant with their first child, Poonyeah passed the test to be chosen as a soldier by running forty miles uphill with seventy pounds on his back.

  From then on, he was Gurkha, carrying on a proud tradition of the Nepali people. The name Gurkha was conferred to them by the British during the Anglo-Nepalese war. The Brits had already enlisted defectors from the Gorkha Kingdom, and recognized in them the qualities of an ideal soldier: loyalty, sacrifice, endurance of sun, starvation, thirst and war, but most of all the Brits acknowledged the Gurkhas for their fearlessness. The motto of the Gurkhas was simple: better to die than to be a coward. After suffering heavy casualties, the British East India Company signed a treaty with Nepal allowing the British military to actively recruit Gurkhas.

  Throughout the years, Gurkhas fought in India, Afghanistan, China, Tibet and more. Two hundred thousand Gurkhas served in World War One, and ten regiments battled for Britain in World War Two. The redoubtable soldiers were known for the eighteen-inch, curved khukuri blades they wielded—knives that served as both tool and weapon.

  Poonyeah had shed blood—both the enemy’s and his own—in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995, and in Kosovo in 1999. He had made his wife pregnant three more times when he had been able to see her, and he had worked his way through the ranks as best he could, though Gurkhas would always remain subordinate in rank to British soldiers. In the year 2005, at the age of thirty-four, Poonyeah retired from military service. He moved with his family to Hong Kong and there he had pursued a career in security, a path that eventually led him to the Fiesta cruise line, where he sailed for six months out of each year, barely making enough money to feed and clothe and educate his family.

  It was, for the most part, a good job. It consisted of breaking up the occasional fight, neutralizing the occasional drunk, and investigating the occasional assault. This applied to both crew and passengers. It was a good job, but Poonyeah was a warrior. He worried that in his older years he was going soft. He believed that there would arrive someday a test. Perhaps a pirate attack, perhaps a collision or some other major catastrophe, and on that day his ancestors would look on him either in shame or with fierce pride.

  There had been an altercation earlier in the evening at the High Seas dance club. It hadn’t been a major event, but there had been interviews to conduct, and paperwork to be done. When these tasks were completed, Poonyeah had already been on his way back to deck one when he received the call from Guest Services that a man in cabin one one four seven had requested to be “locked up.” Poonyeah had rushed into the hallway to see the woman he had spoken to earlier in the evening, who had registered the concern about a potentially disturbed man. He had
acted immediately, entering the cabin she had been in front of to find an injured passenger… and something else as well. Something that seemed to be an animal, but an animal such as nothing Poonyeah had ever seen.

  He had assisted the injured man out of the room, and now as he stood before the closed door, waiting for his fellow security officers—also Gurkhas, though not as experienced as he—to return, he thought about the thing on the other side of that door. He thought of how his people were known to be without fear, and he considered how that brief glimpse of whatever that thing was, brought him as close as he had ever come to being truly afraid.

  Poonyeah had wondered for years now if he would be truly tested during his time as a cruise ship security officer… something told him that now, at last, that time had come.

  He keyed the microphone on his two-way: “Charlie, Charlie, Charlie: Zulu team,” he said and switched languages, saying to the men in Nepali: “Deck one, zone three. Pack heavy.” The chief security officer sighed and said a silent prayer to Kali. “Pack heavy” was a code he used with his team in particular, and in all his years of service with Fiesta, this was the first time he had used it. It was the code for his men to ensure they brought their khukuris.

  ***

  Inside cabin one one four seven, the transformation of the beast was at last complete. A thick coat of black fur now covered the creature, its brilliant golden eyes shining out like drops of amber against a jet-black sky.