HYBRID KILLERS

by Will Decker

  Like a glutton, I ate until I thought if I tried to force even one more down my throat, I would gag on it. Pushing the plate aside, I leaned back into the wood chair and stretched. The sound of the wolves on the roof had all but dissipated. Though I felt contented and relaxed for the first time in ages, I forced myself to my feet and fixed a cup of coffee. Returning to the table, I sat down and savored the harshness of scorched grounds.

  While I pondered the journey that lay ahead of me, I wished for a cigarette. The sun had since disappeared behind the snow-covered mountains, leaving a solid blanket of black in its wake.

  The top layer of snow had melted during the day, and then refroze with the coming of the cooler night temperatures, creating a paper-thin sheet of ice on top of the snow. It was the wolves’ toenails that I could hear now as they pranced across the crust-laden snow surrounding the cabin. They were busy scouring the immediate area in search of more of what they’d already gotten from me. Would they be content with the pancakes I intended to leave them, or would they want more? And if they wanted more, would they come after me for it?

  While I contemplated these thoughts, I sadly realized that I should have gone out while it was still light, and procured the remainder of the firewood. Cursing myself, I pushed the empty coffee cup across the table, inadvertently striking it against the plate. They clanged together, emitting a loud chink that startled me. It was with some chagrin that I realized just how tightly wound I still was.

  It was too late to go back. Because I hadn’t fetched in the remainder of the firewood before the sun had gone down, I would just have to brave the night and make my way out there in the dark, despite the wolves. The alternative was facing a freezing morning in the cabin.

  Pushing myself up from the wooden chair, I fetched the revolver from where I’d left it lying on the cot, and carefully strapped it on my hip. Taking the lantern down from the wooden peg where it hung from over the stove, I begrudgingly headed toward the door. Although I wasn’t looking forward to going out there in the dark and cold, I realized that I needed every advantage I could give myself to prepare me for the journey that lay ahead. If having a warm cabin in the morning might help me in the least, then I needed that firewood out there, and no number of wolves was going to keep me from it.

  As I pulled the door open, I began to sing. At the top of my lungs, I sang, “Oh Susannah, oh won’t you cry for me.”

  It had been a long time since I could remember having sung this particular song. In fact, not since Amy was a baby. While she lay in her crib at night, I would slip into the nursery and sing it to her. There wasn’t any particular reason that I chose ‘Oh Susannah’, except that I just so happened to know most of the words. Any other song would probably have worked equally well at soothing her and sending her off to sleep. If anything, it was probably just the sound of my voice that relaxed her and not the song at all.

  But right now, I was singing loudly to let the beasts know that I was coming out and that they had better clear out. It wasn’t my intention to surprise them any more than I wanted to be surprised by them.

  With the lantern held out in front of me in my left hand, I rested my right palm on the butt of the gun. Moving quickly, I headed straight along the front of the cabin to the remainder of the woodpile. After setting the lantern down, I filled my left arm with the few bits of wood that remained. Leaning over, I picked up the lantern in my right hand, and then transferred it to my left. As I turned back towards the front door, a low growl descended from the dark fringe directly above my head.

  **4**

  Without thinking, I ran madly for the front door, slipping precariously on the snow as I turned the corner and ducked beneath the jamb. Dropping wood everywhere, I spun around, slamming the door shut with a crash. My heart was pounding, my breath heaving in my chest. Flinging the latch closed, I timidly stepped back from the door, fearful that the beasts were about to come charging through. I had always heard that wild animals were more afraid of us then we were of them, but in the heat of the moment, I wasn’t so sure. Even though I’d spent most of my life in the city, I’d always felt like a country boy at heart. Yet, now, I was shaking like a leaf in a strong gale as I stood back from the door, my eyes riveted to it as if I could hold it shut by sheer will.

  Slowly, I turned away from the door, forcing myself to relax. My wild dash into the cabin had been an irrational act, leaving me breathless and spooked. The wolves weren’t after me; they hadn’t pursued me to the door.

  With shaking hands, I poured the remainder of the coffee from the pot into my cup. It was blacker than black, just the way I needed it. I also needed a cigarette.

  Plopping woodenly into the chair by the table, my thoughts turned not to Amy, as they had been doing for so long, but rather to Sandy. She had struck something in me that I could only assume had been missing since the tragedy. With sudden clarity, I knew it was her cabin that I had to hike to, rather than the landlord’s place. It was a long ten miles or so to Sandy’s cabin. It was much farther to the landlord’s.

  Despite having to wear snowshoes the entire way, it didn’t seem so horrendous all of a sudden. Moreover, I couldn’t deny the fact that the idea of seeing Sandy again so soon made it a lot more appealing. And if she doesn’t seem excited to see me when I arrive, I’ll simply spend the night before heading on to Fred’s place.

  Although I was growing excited about seeing Sandy again, I wasn’t deceiving myself about the trek ahead. Anything could happen to me out there, not the least of which, involved the wolves. The elements that I was about to face could be very cruel and unforgiving. Except for the snowsuit and boots, I would be putting myself completely at their mercy. But to see that lovely face and hear that warming laugh of hers made it an adventure worth risking. Suddenly, I felt as if I could walk through the valley of death without working up a sweat!

  When my beating heart calmed, and the coffee in my cup was almost gone, I gathered several sticks of wood and stoked up the woodstove for the night. Closing the damper down, I went to the cot and slipped out of the snowsuit. The air in the cabin was warm and comfortable, and I quickly fell asleep, my thoughts drifting to Sandy, and our future reunion. Smugly, I wondered, did she think of me before drifting off to sleep, also?

  Sometime in the middle of the night, I suddenly shot bolt upright, my heart pounding, my body wringing with sweat despite the fifty-degree air. The tail end of my recurring nightmare was still fresh in my mind. The stove had burned down, but the lantern was still glowing dimly.

  Reaching over, I turned it up, the light quickly sending a new array of shadows about the cabin. As I rolled out from under the heavy blankets, I snagged a log from off the floor and stuffed it into the old cookstove before scooping up the coffee pot and heading for the door. I was intending to fill it with fresh snow and return it to the stove to make a fresh pot of coffee. It would probably be the last hot coffee I’d get to enjoy for a while, when suddenly, I stopped dead in my tracks. For the first time since waking, I realized that I was hearing a noise out of the corner of my sleep-fogged mind. It was a noise of such familiarity that it hadn’t registered because of the anxiety that my mind was dealing with.

  Straining against the quiet, I tried vainly to pinpoint the exact location from which it was coming. Cocking my head to the left and then to the right, I finally ascertained that the sound was coming from the roof area, just above the fireplace. Yet, the more I considered it, the less sense it made, considering the depth of the snow up there. But the sound was definitely coming from near the chimney, where it entered the cabin roof. In fact, as the turmoil in my mind settled down, and my hearing attuned itself to the noise, I was certain that the sound was coming from the area adjacent to the chimney.

  Moving closer with the lantern held above my head, I noticed that the sound was also coming down the chimney, and that I wasn’t just hearing it through the roof. Something must have cleared the snow enough to get at the shingles on the roof and was at this very mo
ment pulling up the cedar shakes. It was the sound of nails being pulled out of the wood lathes that had eventually aroused my senses.

  Someone or something was working its way down into the cabin by gaining entrance through the roof. But why?

  The longer I stood and listened, the more unbelievable it seemed. Yet, there was no denying the sounds that I was hearing. Whatever was making the sounds was working at a steady, unrelenting pace. While I stood mesmerized by the unreality of the situation, snowflakes started filtering down through the cracks in the lathing, only to melt on the floor in dark little spots, not unlike drops of blood.

  Moving as if in slow motion, I transferred the lantern to my left hand and back-stepped to the cot. Once there, I bent down and reached beneath the snowsuit, feeling for the revolver. To the casual observer, I appeared calm and steady. Inside, my heart was fluttering and I was having difficulty breathing. My hand closed over the butt of the gun, the comfortable feeling of its grip in my hand doing nothing to alleviate the knot in my stomach. I was scared.

  Without taking my eyes from the place in the ceiling where the noise was still steadily continuing, I stiffly and quietly edged toward the door, the palm of my hand holding the gun feeling moist from perspiration. Being careful not to clink the handle of the lantern against its glass mantle, I eased it down on the table and reached for the door latch. Carefully, so it wouldn’t jingle, I raised the latch from its mooring and slowly eased the door open.

  To my immense relief, the noise continued unabated from the corner. So far, it appeared to be oblivious of my actions. Sliding silently into the cold, dark night, I immediately regretted having left the lantern setting on the table, and wished now that I had opted to bring it along. In that same breath, I also wished that I had taken a moment to slide into my snowsuit and boots, as the subzero temperature quickly penetrated my single layer of clothes.

  It had snowed again during the early part of the night, obliterating all evidence of comings and goings from the cabin. All, that is, except the fresh trail of tracks originating from the clearing and leading straight up to the front of the cabin.

  Looking down at them, a lump suddenly formed in my throat making it difficult to breath. Even in the dim starlight reflecting off the glistening snow, I could see that they were the tracks of a large, dog-like animal. With a chill going down my spine that had nothing to do with sub-zero temperatures, I knew they were the tracks of wolves, many wolves.

  Crouched over and shivering, from both the cold and fear, I crunched along the frozen snow, following the tracks to the end of the cabin. Where they should have turned and headed back toward the woods, they instead turned and went past the nonexistent pile of wood before heading up the snow bank and onto the roof. The small hatchet that was used for chipping kindling still leaned against the side of the cabin where I had left it earlier. From my crouching position, it was on a level with my line of sight. Without another thought, I reached out and grasped the end of the handle, thinking that I would take it back into the cabin with me.

  The handle was cold; so cold that it stuck to my sweaty left palm. Momentarily panicked, I shook it loose. It flung from my hand and struck up against the side of the cabin with a thunderous thudding sound. It sounded like a stick of dynamite going off in the absolute quiet of the still night.

  Almost instantly, the thrashing sound of many feet scurrying across the roof of the cabin assailed my ears. The pack was aware that their prey had gotten outside. Without hesitating, I leaped to my feet, running headlong for the open door. Diving through and landing on my stomach, I rolled over, oblivious of the pain in my chest, and lashed out behind me, kicking the door shut with a bang. Scrambling to my knees, I lunged forward, throwing my shoulder against the door while fumbling madly for the latch. Almost simultaneously, the cabin shuttered as a great weight crashed against the door. Fortunately, it was a well-built cabin, constructed almost entirely out of stout, fir logs. The split-rail door held securely.

  My breath was hammering against my ribs, each of which felt as if it had broken on impact with the unforgiving wooden floor. But the pain in my chest was the furthest thing from my mind. In the terror of the moment, all I could think about was the wolves, and their irrational behavior, it didn’t make any sense. I’d never heard of wolves attacking humans before, except in very rare occasions. And only then, if the human was injured or defenseless, or the wolf had felt that either it or its young was endangered by the human. Neither of those scenarios was the case here. The only thing that even remotely made any sense was the possibility that the creatures were hungry, very hungry. In fact, they would have to be hungry enough to over-ride their natural fear of human contact.

  But just as quickly as I considered that possibility, I rejected it. If my biology classes had taught me anything, they taught me that wolves were territorial by nature. That meant this had to be the same pack of wolves that stole my meat allotment. And that also meant, they couldn’t be hungry this soon, at least not hungry enough to attack a man!

  There was one other reason for their brazenness, but I wasn’t sure that I was mentally prepared to go there. If I compared them to the hogs in the Midwest that escaped captivity, it meant something much more involved than simply a wild beast and hunger. Back in the Midwest, due to a large number of hogs escaping confinement, a bounty had been put on their head. This was the government’s way of controlling a beast that was a threat to the safety of children and domesticated pets. No license or special permit was needed to hunt them. They were more dangerous than any wild animal indigenous to the area. But what made them such dangerous creatures was nothing more than their flagrant disregard for man. Because they’ve been raised in captivity, they have no natural, instinctive fear of humans.

  That is what makes this particular wolf pack so dangerous. But that doesn’t explain where they could have acquired their disdain for man, if that is indeed why they’re acting the way they are? Is it possible that they’ve tasted human flesh before? And if so, where? Where have they tasted it before? Where could they have gotten the sweet fragrance of human blood in their nostrils?

  My mind was reeling with the possibilities, none of which were very encouraging. I couldn’t help but think that if these creatures tasted human flesh in the past, then someone must have suffered severely, possibly even died because of it.

  The cabin was suddenly growing smaller. The walls were closing in, the air getting heavier. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. The direction my thoughts were going was too horrific, I couldn’t consider anymore.

  They were back on the roof tearing at the shingles again. With the lantern held above my head, I went and stood before the fireplace, directly beneath the spot. Looking up past the light, I realized for the first time that once they removed the shingles, there would be nothing more than a thin layer of lathe between them and me. For the briefest of moments, I felt like a trapped animal. There was no denying their intent.

  Yet, if I was their prey, why hadn’t they just leaped through the windows?

  Looking nervously at the front windows, I realized that until this afternoon, they’d been boarded over. It would just be a matter of time before they saw the light through the glazing and tested its resistance. Within minutes, they could be in here.

  A large cloud of snow suddenly dusted down from above, drawing my attention back to the ceiling. What I saw struck a chill in me; the area where the wolves were tearing their way through showed signs of having been recently repaired. From my position on the floor, it looked like a large patch had been installed in the original roof. The new wood used in the repair stood out starkly from the smoke-darkened wood of the original ceiling.

  While I stared in disbelief at what I was seeing, a new and more horrifying thought entered my mind. Was the person that had been leasing this cabin prior to me also the same person that had died, allowing Fred to lease the cabin again so unexpectedly? And moreover, was the prior tenant the human flesh that whetted this wolf pack’s appe
tite for more?

  My thoughts were unsettling, adding to my feelings of urgency. In less than four hours’ time, the sun will be. I can hold out until then, I have to. In silence, I watched the frantic progress of the wolves. Whether the roof would hold them out that long, I wasn’t sure. But I still felt that the windows left me more vulnerable than the roof.

  I suddenly needed a cigarette and a cup of coffee. Moving on wooden legs, I set the lantern on the table and took the coffee pot from the stove. Going to the door, I quietly released the latch, and then gingerly pulled it open a crack. Holding the pot in my right hand, I looked nervously into the blackness, sure that a vicious mouth full of teeth was about to pounce on me, tearing me from limb to limb. There was only silence, and the dark.

  Quickly, like a child playing a game, I reached out and scooped the pot full of snow. Then just as quickly, pulled it back in and pushed the door shut, realizing for the first time that I’d been holding my breath the entire time. Taking a deep breath and exhaling a deep sigh of relief, I slid the latch back into place.

  Setting the pot of snow on the cookstove, I opened the firebox and threw in the last of the firewood. The coals were glowing hotly, and within minutes, the fresh wood was crackling sprightly. With the fire going good in the stove, and the coffee in the pot heating, I sat down on the edge of the cot where I could keep an eye on the wolves’ progress. Almost casually, I took the revolver from the holster and checked again that it was loaded. Without being aware of my next actions, I felt the bulge in my pocket, finding security in the fact that I had many more shells; there were a lot of wolves out there!

  My fragile mental state was only being held intact by the security that I was able to draw from the cold hard steel of the gun. Even if the wolves broke through the roof before daylight, I could keep them at bay with the gun. Although I’d never shot any living thing before in my life, I believed in the magnum and the damage it could do to living flesh, either a man’s or a beast’s. Once daylight sets in, if they persist in following me, I will be forced to use the gun on them. And though I don’t relish the thought of killing, I’m equally not ready to die just yet.