The Stray Human: A collage age urban fantasy with werewolves, werewolf community center book 1

by Abigail Smith

  David’s head snapped sideways. “They’re here,” he whispered.

  Chapter 17

  Sure enough, a few people wearing those same black clothes appeared. “Why do they make themselves look so obvious?” I asked.

  The police officer cocked an eyebrow at my statement and followed my line of sight. He unholstered his gun and pointed it at one group coming from the halls, “Freeze!”

  The area had four feeding hallways, which had groups of three pouring down each of them. A few more came around from stairway entrances. To our south side, the only clear side, were the doors to our north.

  “I don’t know, and I don’t care. They’ve got us nearly surrounded. Run!” He pointed to the doors, and we both got up quickly and ran for them. Every one of the black-cloaked guys ran after us.

  “I said Freeze! Put your hands up!” The cop demanded.

  We burst through the front doors to nearly a mob of black-cloaked people, men and women alike. I cursed, realizing what had just happened. “Isn’t that wolf tactic 101?” I asked David.

  “What tactic?” he asked, like he’d never heard the word before.

  The people around, noticing a group of black-clad people surrounded us, called the police. A few students even called campus security. The black-clad people were slowly swarmed by the nearby security staff. Local police started to run over to the area.

  “You there!” one of the cops called out in a booming voice. “Leave those two alone and disperse or we’ll have to make you!” He took out a small Taser.

  “You know, in the stories I read, it’s usually not up to campus security and the cops to fight off the bad guys,” I joked to David.

  “I hope for your reading pleasure, the bad guys aren’t this open and stupid,” David said as he grabbed my arm and ducked behind the bushes beside the entrance.

  The group spouted their talk about sinful people, then there was a loud smack. Guess that security guard was having none of that.

  David skirted around the group and a few took out their silvered knives and rushed us.

  “Can’t you run any faster?” I asked as they were right on our tail.

  “Not with people watching!” David said, trying to be quiet.

  The group chased us until we heard the whine of sirens. Red and blue lit up the slowly darkening landscape as four cruisers arrived, one of which was nearer to us. The cops got out and pointed their guns at the group chasing us.

  “Should we go with them or keep running?” I asked David.

  “I think it’s legal to flee from people attacking you,” David said, shrugging.

  We kept running as the officers tackled some members of the group. The sheer size of this organization was frightening. There must have been at least ten dozen people there, not to mention the group that was murdered previously.

  “I hope none of them tell the cops about our organization,” David said, gritting his teeth.

  Once we were safe in an alleyway, a block away from campus, we slowed down. “Okay, I think we should be— Gah!” David said as a hidden black-cloaked man jammed a blade right into his right shoulder.

  The man looked at me, his eyes burning with hatred. “Make your choice, humanity or the devil!” he commanded as he yanked the blade out of David’s shoulder, tearing his clothes enough for me to see the wound.

  The area around the wound sizzled, like it was on a frying pan. In fact, the cut almost looked like it’d cauterised itself. Thick red jagged lines crisscrossed his skin. It was like the silver dagger was poison festering inside David’s body.

  I looked to David’s strained and pained expression, and then to the man’s, and then I took my fighting stance.

  Chapter 18

  The big beefy man brought his hand down hard with the knife firmly gripped, and I tried a block. I just barely got it away from scratching up my skin as he smacked away my arms. I backed up, and David rolled out of the man’s way, and he focused on transforming. His left hand turned into a claw as it clutched the wound, but his right stayed human.

  We were at both ends of the alleyway, and the man thumped towards me.

  David focused on his right hand, as I tried to kick the knife out of the man’s hand and keep him away from me. David tried again, but it seemed the signal to his arm refused to take the hint and partially transform.

  “Shit,” David said under his breath as he took his own fighting stance with just one arm.

  The right could still move. It hadn’t been severed or anything, but the area appeared to be a non-transformation zone. He came over to me, and the man, slashing at my attacker, and quickly retracting his arm so it couldn’t be hit. One counterattack could mean the loss of any solid weapon, maybe even werewolf strength, and this guy was much bigger than David.

  I stepped around David, further into the alleyway. My arms trembled, and my heart beat so fast it was practically all I could hear.

  “No, I can’t freeze up now,” I said.

  My mind flashed back to the time when we were hiding from the gunman. I mentally kicked myself. Yes, we’d taken his guns, but I wouldn’t take them to class, even though I should have. The mental scene continued, though. We hid behind the entrance when Silvia said she felt helpless.

  David front-flipped over the man, further into the alleyway, and slashed through his leather coat. The man grunted and quickly turned and tried to cut with his blade. David just got back in time to stop from being hit. His right arm looked redder by the moment, and the wound seemed to be festering or filling with pus.

  I whimpered as the man grabbed David’s limp arm and slammed him into the wall. David ducked right before the knife would have been in his head, making it land in the brick. His head transformed, he leaned down low and bit at the man’s leg. The leather was too thick for it, and David was flung back, ripping leather and not flesh.

  David was now at the left of the entrance to the alleyway, with the man between him and me.

  My mind played Silvia’s howl over and over, how I told her to inform the guys. I tried to focus on the task at hand, wondering what my subconscious or whatever magical force was trying to tell me.

  “Elizabeth!” David shouted as the man was about to take a swipe at me.

  I dodged just in time and got back into the fighting stance. The man’s big meaty hand reached for my hair. I put my hand in the way, and he caught my wrist. I leant into him, then pulled back suddenly, ripping it out of his grasp, and ducked under his arm to get away. It was a simple move David and Gavin showed me for getting out of a hold. I stumbled further into the alleyway.

  “That’s using your head,” David praised, looking a little worse for wear.

  “Use my—” I stuttered. The man went after David again, and I threw down my purse.

  I retrieved my compact, and the plastic containers I’d brought to label. If they could make tiny sparks while submerged in Russia’s pride, outside of it they should be able to do more. David ducked and weaved around the man, but I could tell he was slowing down while the man had stamina to spare.

  “Come on, come on,” I said, pulling out the various containers, trying to remember the combo that made sparks fly.

  “Never thought I’d be killed by a human,” he said wistfully.

  The man focused on David again, twirling the knife around and looking for a good angle.

  I scooped up some of the electromoss powder and pyro putty in the two parts of my compact. Not the best measuring cups, but it was all I could do without mixing them with my hands. I slammed it shut, losing a bit of powder to the ground, which sparked. I then rushed towards the man and opened the compact.

  I smiled as my guess was right. The two ingredients mixed and created a bolt of electricity, which arced right into his backside. His muscles tensed and went rigid, and he fell, effectively tased.

  “That,” David said, looking down at the man who’d come this close to killing him, “was some quick thinking. You could be a pretty good alchemist,” he admitt
ed.

  “Alchemist, that sounds fun,” I said as I cleaned up the pile, but it had to be easier than having all these containers.

  I sealed up the containers and replaced them in my purse. David grabbed at an electrical conduit and the plastic cracked as wires tore from their counterparts with snaps and electrical sparks. David yanked out some wires and used them to tie the man up.

  “It’s good to capture him but… with the community centre bugged and them attacking it where do we go?” I said, furrowing my brow.

  “Even if they know where it is, it’s still safer than any place out in the open, especially if they have magic users of their own that they haven’t deployed…” David admitted as he helped me hogtie the man.

  “How so?” I asked.

  “Well, one, the building’s magically reinforced, two, there’s about one hundred werewolves there at any given time, three, there’s mages and witches, etc. We’ll just have to… work around the bugs. Perhaps some of the mages can make a whirlwind inside to cause the bugs to hear nothing but that.”

  David took out his phone and called for a ride.

  Chapter 19

  It’s a very contrasting feeling when, on one hand, you’ve made use of the police for aid so you wouldn’t be slaughtered by an entire group of people, and then you have to capture someone against their will and bring them back to your place.

  It is also quite difficult when you’re in a city and your werewolf can’t transform. “Goddammit,” David said, holding his wound.

  “So, guess that was alchemical silver?”

  “I— Yes,” David grunted.

  I tried to shoulder as much of the man’s weight as I could. He glared at the two of us while nearly choking on David’s overcoat, tied around his mouth. We couldn’t go out into the open, but without being able to transform, David was unable to get anywhere else.

  We kept him in line as we waited for Gavin and Lorenz to come by with a car. The man struggled against his bonds but couldn’t do much with two people thwarting his moves.

  Eventually, the car came, and Gavin jumped out to help take the guy’s weight. David gestured to Lorenz, who also ran out to help.

  “My arm’s nearly destroyed. You’ll have to drive, E-lis. You know how, right?” he asked.

  I gave him an insulted look. “Of course, I know how to drive,” I complained as the two helped the man into the back seat. I got into the driver’s seat, and David got into the passenger’s seat and pushed the button to transform it into a roofed car.

  I started to drive, and to giggle.

  “What’s so funny?” David asked, attempting to buckle up.

  “Did you buy a convertible because it’s the only kind of car that can… transform, too?”

  David gave me a look, which I couldn’t quite focus on while driving. “That’s it, I’m selling this car,” he said, looking out the window.

  “What? No! Come on, it was just a joke!” I whined.

  “I personally never liked this car,” Gavin added.

  “To be honest, a van or minivan would probably serve our purposes better than a simple five-seater,” Lorenz said.

  Lorenz had a habit of lifting his arm as he talked. I mean, most people talk with their hands, but it seemed as though he had to have one in the air to speak. It was distracting me in the rearview mirror.

  The man in the middle mumbled something, which no one could hear, as we drove over to our little hideout.

  “Turn in here,” David said, activating a garage door opener, which led down into the depths of the building.

  “Well, that’d explain why the bar area is so small,” I said.

  “You didn’t notice the giant garage opening before? It’s the building’s road facing side…”

  “Yeah, I know. It makes you pass it over when you’re looking for the place. If you weren’t a secret organization, I’d get on your case about putting a sign up, so people knew where to go!”

  Lorenz chuckled. “Well, aren’t you two a lovely couple?” he asked.

  “Like you’re one to talk. How many hearts did you break this week?” David said.

  It was in that kind of tone where you’re teasing them, but you’re also pissed off, so you mean it a bit more.

  “I’m going with twelve this week, but only because I had to tell a trio I was straight. Though one of the girls I’m counting might not have swung that way,” Lorenz said, putting his hand to his chin to think.

  We got in, and there to greet us was Minerva, Dan, and a wolf that didn’t have any distinctive fur patterns I could use to identify them.

  “We’ll take him from here. You guys get David to the infirmary, and I guess counsel E-lis there?”

  “I’m fine, really,” I said.

  “Your adrenaline has been running high all week. You’ll realize the horror you’re in and start having nightmares. Trust me, you need to talk about what you’ve been through.”

  “Possibly with a psychiatrist,” Dan added as they carried the man into the main section of the building.

  I paused to look at the number of cars inside. There weren’t many, just three regular vehicles, three cars like David’s, not necessarily convertible but fancy like that, and two white vans.

  Gavin stepped behind me, breathing softly. I turned, and when I saw him I jumped, startled.

  “You alright?” he asked.

  “Like I said, I’m fine! I’m strong and stubborn, just like in the books.”

  “Well, I’m not one to disagree, but I know being strong and stubborn typically tires one out quickly. How about I show you the bedroom?”

  I looked at him with a cocked eyebrow, and he quickly backpedaled. “I mean the dormitory, which is meant for keeping people rested and not for personal matters,” he blushed and turned away.

  “Alright, I guess I could use a nap before my shift.”

  We walked into the building, to the hallway area just outside the bar, and walked up the stairs to the first floor.

  Silvia, apparently having caught sight of us, came up and said hello.

  “Hey, E-lis, you’re back, how was school?” she asked eagerly.

  “Same boring stuff really, except for the freaks in black turned up again, and then the police got involved. We also managed to capture one of them, so we will hopefully get some good intel.”

  “Oh, oh, oh! Does this mean you’ll need a truth potion?” Silvia asked.

  “You can make one of those?”

  Chapter 20

  While I rested on one of the surprisingly soft and comforting bunk beds, Silvia told me what she knew of alchemy. How we might be able to use it to help me deal with these bad guys.

  We made sure to text our thoughts about the buggers and keep anything in our speech away from the fact of their existence.

  Apparently, the base alchemicals were a bit limiting. Most of the preparation work was making a solution into the right state of matter to get it to bind with others. As you did that, you’d be able to make more complex potions than just, fire, water, earth, electricity, darkness, etc.

  She tried to explain to me exactly how she got to the concept of truth in liquid form, but I was pretty tired from the ordeal.

  Carlson came in soon afterwards and laid down atop a bunk just opposite us. “Most alchemicals are obtained from the earth elemental plane, so there isn’t much we can go off, but we also have a good stock of them so we can experiment.”

  “How much stock do you have?” I asked curiously.

  “When our families shifted us here to protect this portal, they sent us off with about three tons of most things and one ton of everything else. They had to be shipped in those big shipping containers. It was cool!”

  “You’re telling me there’s one ton of dragon salts somewhere in this building?”

  “No, that’s one of the ones that came in three tons. The people back in Europe make way too much of it and just ship it to the other colonies all over the world.”

  “Is it an a
ddictive drug?” I asked, thinking about Daniel.

  “No, but it does make some older people happy. It even helps make someone who’s cynical and bitter work through their issues.”

  “All that by just increasing your eyes’ saturation,” I said, looking through the room.

  “It can also help make a lot of stuff, kinda like a chemistry catalyst. Only, in most cases, it’s also used up, since magic catalyst.”

  “Neat!” I said, thinking back to my eleventh-grade chemistry course.

  “So, the only problem is if we don’t want to be ordering a ton of glassware, and load you down with so much, we’re going to need some alternate method of carrying and mixing the ingredients,” David said, walking in.

  “How about a machine that could spray them out like a super soaker?”

  “I dunno. One thing is that a pinch of the wrong alchemical can change the entire outcome of the product. I mean, if you had some aqua mushroom left in there and you wanted to do the zappy mixture, you might get electrostatic clinging sludge or something.”

  “That complicated, huh?” I asked.

  “And where is there a water gun that doesn’t leak?”

  “Sounds like a simple problem,” Carlson said.

  He’d been writing something down in what looked to be a journal. His eyes bulged, and he went tense when he realized he’d spoken. Both our eyes turned to him, expecting a response.

  “Well, uh, that is, I could see this from an engineering standpoint,” he said, loosening his collar.

  “Okay, shoot. How could you engineer a solution?”

  He gulped and slid off the bed to sit on the one next to Silvia and me.

  “Well, you can’t put different reagents into the same compartment. Meaning, the chambers where mixing occurs would have to be set to specific effects.”

  I tilted my head. “I guess that’d work?”

  “Then instead of pumping air in to increase pressure, you have a two-faced air canister. One side for blasting, one side for refilling.”

  “And I guess some insulation would have to go on the outside in case one of those reactions involves electromoss,” Silvia added. “For now, though, we might wanna try a few pre-prepared, vacuum-sealed flasks.”