Read Beneath a Winter Moon Online
Authors: Shawson M Hebert
Thomas’s words were soon drowned out by the whir of the rotors, but Snow had heard enough of them to quell most of his suspicions. He thought that he could trust Thomas. “Come up here and sit in the co-pilot’s seat,” Snow called to Thomas. “You have to tell me what happened.”
Thomas strapped in next to Snow, and slipped on the flight helmet just as the helicopter lifted off. He turned to Snow. “There is too much to tell…so why don’t you just ask me some questions and I will answer them as best I can.”
“Okay,” Snow answered, shifting some of the controls and maneuvering the helicopter. “What happened to Captain Deluth and the rest of his men?”
Thomas shook his head. “They were attacked on their way to investigate the thermals you saw this morning. Deluth lived long enough to make it to the cavern where Jack and I were recovering from our own attacks.”
“And he told you to leave him and come to me?”
Thomas frowned, “Not exactly…he told me everything, asked for my help, deputized me, and then he—well, he died.”
Snow felt that was not the whole truth, but he decided not to press the issue just now.
“What about Jeremiah? What about him?”
“Dead,” Thomas answered. “I killed him just after sunup…and removed his head.”
Snow looked at Thomas. “How did you do what the other failed at?”
Thomas looked away. “Trapped him in a pit inside a cavern. He could not get out. I lost my best friend—and almost lost Jack in the process.”
“What about the Svensons? Can you tell me what happened?”
“Steven died in the helicopter. Jenny…” he paused, pushing away the memory of her gruesome death. “Alastair—Jeremiah killed her. He also killed Daniel, another of my friends.”
“So you know all about what he was?”
“I do now,” Thomas said. “Seeing is believing, Lieutenant Snow.”
“Deluth told you the rest?”
“Nothing I didn’t already know…or suspect. That he was a part of a larger effort to contain these attacks. He said that another man who was infected by Alastair is on the loose at the coordinates I gave you. He said that we need to do our best to find him and keep him from getting off the grid. Another team like
Deluth’s
is supposedly on the way, but won’t be here for hours.”
Snow nodded, banking the helicopter.
“I promised to help, Lieutenant, but Jack needs medical attention as soon as possible.”
Snow nodded. “We don’t have enough fuel to do a whole lot. We’ve enough to get to the wrecked van—and to look around a bit, but that’s it. We’ll be back on the ground soon enough.”
“How long before we reach the area?” Thomas asked.
“Thirty-three minutes if these coordinates are correct. Did Deluth give you instructions as to how to handle Alan if we find him?”
Thomas looked away, turning his head to look out of his window. “If we find him, I’m going to kill him, Lieutenant. This is going to end.”
Snow didn’t like the answer, but knew it was the right one. “I know him, you know…” Snow said before thinking.
Thomas looked over at him. “No. You don’t,” he said, flatly.
Snow looked at him incredulously, but then understood. He said nothing more, and turned back to his controls.
* * * * *
Alan struggled to get the motor home back under control. He was driving up a particularly steep incline when the backend of the vehicle started to fishtail. He cursed as he swung the steering wheel left and right, finally satisfied that the motor home was straight again and under control. As he reached the bottom of the incline he noticed a small building in the distance at the base of another tall hill. He hoped that the place was open and had a phone. He had seen road signs indicating the highway that he was on, and thankfully, it was one he was familiar with, but hours away from home. He didn’t get out this way much, and if he did, it would have been in his Cessna, and not in a vehicle. Highways were for chumps, he used to say to his friends…the sky is the way to go.
He pulled up to the building a minute later, and was disappointed to see that although it was a gas station, it appeared to be closed or perhaps even abandoned. He hopped out and walked up to the front door where he could peer through the window. He could see the various shelves of odds and ends that anyone might expect to find in a small station in the middle of nowhere. He saw no indication of a telephone but decided that he had no choice but to take a closer look.
After walking around the station, looking for any signs of life and finding none, Alan took a small brick from outside the door of the station, probably used to prop it open on warmer days, and smashed the glass near the lock. Inside, Alan found what he was looking for, a phone. It was ancient-looking, huge and black with a spin-dial, but it would do.
Yes
, he thought, hearing the dial-tone.
He tried Kathy’s house, but there was no answer. He left her a message that he did not have a number to give her to call, but that he was okay for now and in desperate need of getting into touch with Captain Deluth. He told her to tell him—no one else, not any other police of any kind—that he was on highway eighteen and headed back into town. He said to tell Deluth that he was in a motor home, an old brown one, then Alan chided himself for not having checked the license plate. He ran outside and memorized the tag, but by the time he got back, Kathy’s answering machine had stopped recording. He cursed and dialed the number again, this time leaving the tag number. He told Kathy that he loved her, but to stay away from him and reiterated that he only wanted Deluth or one of his men to know all of this information. He hung up the phone.
Alan thought about calling his parents’ home, but he had no idea what to say, and if they heard his voice, they might call the police out of concern—well, his mother would have. His father would call them with the
hope
that Alan was in trouble. Realizing he was hungry, Alan grabbed some bags of chips and stuck a soda in each of the coat pockets on his way out the door. He hopped back into the motor home and began driving.
A half hour later, Alan saw a roadblock up ahead. His blood ran cold as he thought that the roadblock might be somehow connected to his actions. He quickly realized that it was useless to try to turn and run. The police would catch the old motor home in seconds. Shaking with fear, he slowed the vehicle to a stop and jumped out.
Captain Russeux, cold and pissed, tapped a junior officer on the shoulder. A vehicle was coming, the first one they had seen in an hour. Russeux shook his head, silently cursing the higher authorities in the RCMP. They had woken him at dawn, with orders to form road blocks on three separate roads, telling him to stay at the one on highway eighteen. They were looking for Alan Tucker, no less, who had escaped from the hospital the day before. Russeux could not understand the high priority of this, and he was skeptical of the escape story. He had it on good authority that Alan was carried out of the hospital by some government types.
Russeux cursed as he saw the vehicle stop, still some three hundred meters away. “He’s running!” Russeux yelled. The other officers were already moving. Russeux jumped into the lead car as the tires spun on the icy road. They finally gained traction and the vehicle raced toward the motor home and the figure that was running toward the wood line.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
“This is Lieutenant Snow. To whom am I speaking?”
Thomas could not hear the other side of the conversation. He frowned and listened to Snow as he explained where they were and what they were doing. Thomas raised his eyebrows as Snow explained that
Deluth’s
team was down, and that Thomas had put the werewolf out of commission—and had been approached and deputized by Deluth himself.
Snow finished the conversation with “Roger…understood—we will be over the area within three minutes.”
Thomas looked over at Snow, an eyebrow raised.
“That was
Deluth’s
supposed commander. Alan Tucker has been spotted near the wreckage. He was supposedly driving some old motor home and jumped—ran into the forest.”
Thomas didn’t say anything.
“We will be there in one minute.”
“He’s on foot? Are you sure?”
“It’s what the man said.”
Thomas unbuckled his safety belts and hopped into the rear of the aircraft.
“What are you doing,” Snow asked.
“I’m going to help out Mr. Tucker, Lieutenant,” Thomas answered as he threw back the cabin door, icy wind swirling through the cabin. Thomas clenched his teeth against the cold as he strapped the huge weapon’s safety belt around his waist. “I’ve got a lot of time firing one of these,” Thomas yelled through the microphone of the flight helmet. “Get me close, Snow.”
Snow looked back at Thomas. “If we can even see him,” he said.
Thomas looked over at Jack, who had stuck his snout out from under the blanket that covered him. “You just stay put Jack, and try to ignore the loud noises.” He knew that the weapon fire would likely scare the dog, but hopefully he would get used to it after a few moments. Thomas reached over and tugged at the blanket, once more covering Jack’s head from the icy wind. He patted the blanket and moved back to the gun.
They saw the road block below, two cars stationed in the middle, and two other vehicles on the side of the road a few hundred meters west. There, they saw three men, one speaking into a microphone.
Snow switched the radio dial as he swung the helicopter low over the officers. Russeux held the radio handset to his mouth, apparently trying to call the helicopter. Thomas again heard a one-sided conversation in which Snow said they were going after Alan, but stopped short of explaining why or on whose authority. Snow told the officers not to mount an on-foot effort to catch Alan—not that Russeux was about to run into the forest after the boy. Thomas raised an eyebrow and looked back over to Snow.
Snow shrugged. “They told me to tell the officers to stand down and not to pursue on foot in the forest.”
Thomas nodded. He removed his flight helmet and pulled his parka hood over his head, then put the helmet back on. Snow pointed to a set of goggles hanging on the back of the co-pilot’s bench. Thomas grabbed the goggles and removed the helmet again so that he could don them.
Snow flew the helicopter in a zigzag pattern over the tops of the trees. He told Thomas that he was now over the area that Russeux had believed Alan ran into the wood line. Thomas gazed down through the trees, trying to catch a glimpse of anything moving, and he cursed each time Snow banked the helicopter in a way that had Thomas facing skyward, rendering his view ineffective. Thomas finally conveyed this to Snow, who apologized, saying that he should know better, as search and rescue had been his job for two decades.
Within a couple of minutes, Thomas spotted Alan, running through the snow. He shouted at Snow and pointed downward. Snow saw Alan just as Alan looked upward towards the helicopter. The pilot felt a twinge of guilt when he saw Alan, recognizing the young man’s face, even at this altitude.
It has to be
, Snow thought.
Sorry, Alan. It has to be.
Thomas felt no guilt as he swung the weapon around, trying to get a bead on Alan. He felt empty inside. He expected to feel the same slight butterfly-like sensation that he felt during combat. It wasn’t guilt, and Thomas had always thought it was the sensation that should always manifest itself when a person, no matter what the situation…but it was not there as he pulled back the charging handle and released it, slamming a round into the chamber of the massive door-gun.
Thomas grunted with the first burst of weapons-fire. The gun hopped and vibrated in his hands as he held down the butterfly-trigger, releasing a long burst. He cursed when he saw Alan dive behind a tree just as the rounds left the muzzle. It was as if Alan knew the rounds were about to come his way.
“Watch him!” Thomas shouted through the headset. “Stay over him! Do not lose him.”
“What in God’s name…” Russeux muttered. He and two other officers watched as the rounds jolted out of the helicopter. “What the fuck are they doing?” He scrambled into the front seat of the squad car and frantically grasped the handset. “What the fuck are you doing, Snow? Have you lost your damned mind?” Russeux yanked the cord so that it would allow him to stand outside the vehicle. One of the junior officers shook his head while pointing to the helicopter. Another long burst of weapons fire burst forth.
“Lieutenant! Who has ordered you to fire on this man? Answer me, damn you!”
In the helicopter, Snow frowned and switched off the radio. He could not get into this conversation.
“Those are tracers, sir,” an officer said to Russeux. “Every third round or so is a red tracer. That’s military-grade ammo.”
Russeux had seen the tracers. He threw the handset back into the car and shouted a curse. He kicked the door of the vehicle. “Damnit! He’s just a kid. What the hell are they doing!”
Thomas fired the weapon again and again, hoping to drive Alan out from his cover behind the trees as Snow expertly maneuvered the helicopter around the grove to approach it from the other side. Alan darted to another tree and jumped behind it.
“This isn’t going to work,” Thomas shouted. “There is too much cover down there.” He looked over the forest and saw an opening about a hundred meters away. “Can you set me down over there?” He saw Snow trying to look over his shoulder. Thomas pointed frantically. “There!” he shouted. “Can you set me down there?”
Snow nodded. “I can, but I will have to land and shut down. We are running low on fuel and I can’t hover while you go on foot.”
“Sonofabitch, I can’t believe I am doing this!” Thomas shouted. “Set her down. I have to go on foot.”
Snow maneuvered the helicopter over the clearing, and then brought it gently down into the snow-covered ground below. Thomas was already out of the door-gun restraint and was slinging the MP-5 over his back. He looked at the 10-guage for a moment, but then ignored it. He had the MP-5 and three magazines of silver bullets, as well as
Deluth’s
Glock
. He nodded at Snow and then shouted over the whir of the rotors. “I’ve got a radio. Whatever happens, you have to promise me that you will get help for Jack and then make sure he goes home to my sister. Promise me.”
Snow nodded. “I’m not going anywhere. You do what you have to do.”
Thomas leaned over and put his face against Jack’s, nuzzling the dog. “Thanks again, boy, for saving my life.” Then he was gone.
Alan ran with everything in him. He fought against the deep snow and tried to ignore that his body was beginning to sweat and overheat. He knew he should shed the winter coat and gloves, but there was no time. The helicopter had landed nearby and he knew instinctively that someone was coming for him. Maybe a whole group—perhaps Deluth himself. He could have swore that he saw Lieutenant Snow’s face when he looked at the pilot of the helicopter, but he might have imagined it.
He ran blindly, not even paying attention to the direction. He took the easiest routes he could find, staying away from thickets and heavy brush. He thought that he heard someone coming after him, but disregarded it as fear and imagination. The helicopter had just set down. No one could be on him that fast.
A minute later Alan was forced to choose left or right as the open path he was on forked sharply in either direction. He slowed for a moment and chose to take the right. Before he had taken a step on that path, however, something hit him hard and he went down. His mind didn’t register the gunshots until it was too late.
He felt a burning in his chest and the pain was unlike anything he could have possibly imagined. He felt more of the same as he heard more shots ring out from nearby. In fact, the shots came from only a few feet away. Thomas fired the MP-5 on full auto, watching the down feathers fly up from Alan’s winter coat. They floated in the air as blood bubbled up through the holes. Alan’s world was swirling, swimming, and darkness was approaching.
Thomas stepped forward, his chest heaving as he gasped for air. He had never run so hard in his life, and he thought that his chest was going to explode. He looked down at the twitching form, and purposely stepped into view.
The young man’s eyes were open, and he was still alive. Shallow breaths produced a bubbling sound, and a moment later Alan coughed up blood. “Nothing personal,” Thomas said, keeping the MP-5 aimed at Alan’s chest. “Nothing personal, son. But you are a part of a nightmare that has to end. You have to die.”
Thomas could have sworn that the kid nodded in acknowledgement just before he stopped breathing. He lowered the MP-5 and then swung it around so that it hung loosely on his back. He switched on the small, hand-held radio that had belonged to Deluth. “Lieutenant Snow, can you read me?”
An unfamiliar voice cackled over the radio. “I can hear you, you sonofabitch. Who the hell are you?”
Thomas raised his eyebrows and looked at the radio. Thankfully, Snow’s voice came through. “I’m here.”
“I’ll be back at the bird in five. I won’t be alone.”
“Snow, Damn you! What the hell were you doing firing on that boy? Who gave you the authority and why? Is he safe?”
Thomas heard Snow answer the man. “I’m acting on orders above yours, Russeux. And I can’t tell you anything more.”
Thomas switched off the radio, deciding that he did not want to hear any more. He cursed, recalling that the machete was tucked into the frame of his backpack. He could not take care of the kid right now, and would have to wait. He knelt down and grasped the left arm of the still form, pulling the body into a sitting position. Then, with one mighty heft, he hauled the body up and over his shoulder. He began moving back to the helicopter.
Ten minutes later, and just before Russeux and two of his men made it to the clearing, Snow lifted off. He saw Russeux and the two officers burst into the clearing, looking up at the aircraft and gesturing wildly. Snow sighed and ignored them, and set the course for the airfield.
“I should take his head off right now,” Thomas said through the headset. “He’s going to regenerate and wake up.”
“Aren’t those silver bullets?” Snow asked. “They are supposed to keep him down so long as they remain in him.”
“Maybe so, but I have a bad feeling about leaving him intact, even for a short time.”
Snow held up a hand, and once again he was speaking on the radio. Thomas was prepared this time, and removed the cord from the flight helmet headset and plugged it into the handheld. He scanned the channels until he hit the one that Snow was using.
“…back to the hanger. You are to leave Tucker as he is. I repeat—you will not take anymore action against him, other than to secure him in any way that you can. Bravo team is
enroute
and will be at the hanger within the next hour. Copy?”