Breeds (24 page)

“Walt Borland’s dead.”

“Whaaa?” Doug’s face sagged with shock.

“Killed by wild dogs.”

“What?” Firmer now.

“Yeah, and a pack of them might be heading this way.”

Doug’s thick brow, the only hair south of a dome that shone brightly in the flashlight’s glare, crumpled as if his thoughts had been doing eighty into a dead end. “
This
way?”

“That’s right?”

“Well, just close the door is enough, ain’t it?”

“Yes, Jesus Christ Almighty, dat’s enough,” added Dorothy, supporting her man.

“No, that’s
not
enough,” Ross blurted out, knocking his shotgun against the wall. Doug and Dorothy Cook both focused on the weapon before regarding their insisting company in a new and wary light.

“He’s got a gun,” Dorothy whispered into Doug’s substantial shoulder.

“Sawed off piece, y’got there, Ross,” Doug said. “Where ‘cha get it?”

“It’s Walt’s. Look, you got a phone?”

“Jesus, yes, got one. Dead, though. Y’been drinkin’ Ross?”

I fucking wish.
“No.” Ross shook his head.

“Drugs?”

“No!”

The flashlight’s beam blinded him.

“He doesn’t look high,” Dorothy said, completing her own inspection.

A gunshot thundered outside.

“D’hell is that?” Doug asked, eyes darting to his closed door.

“I don’t know,” Ross answered, also looking. “Might be a guy I know. He told me to get everyone back.”

Two more cracks from a gun. The Cooks jumped at each report.

“Back?” Doug said, face screwing up with concerned puzzlement. “Back where? There’s nowhere to go around here. There’s nothin’. He a cop?”

Ross blinked.

“You don’t know?” Dorothy asked, incredulous.

“No, I don’t, but… but he knows stuff.”

“He tell you about the dogs?” Doug questioned.

“He
saved
me from one of them dogs.”

“Whaaa?”

“We found Borland dead in his cabin. Went to call the cops at his place but there were two of the animals there. They jumped both of us. Clawed up my arms.”

Ross showed them both.

“Dey might have rabies,” Dorothy whispered, gazing upon Ross as if he possessed the Bubonic plague itself. “Jesus, Dougie. Dey might have rabies.”

The words made Ross’s stomach lurch like a knob of ice in the Atlantic.
Rabies
, his mind panicked, prompting him to inspect his forearms with greater scrutiny. The terrible thing was his arms, more specifically the
cuts
in his arms, were
burning
. Everything below the elbow seemed hot and itchy.

“You haveta get to the hospital,” Doug declared, nodding grimly.

“How can he get dere?” Dorothy asked behind her man. “De roads are covered. I mean
covered
.”

“Who’s got a snow machine?” Doug asked, pulling Ross’s head up. Who
did
have a snow machine?

“Clifford Spree has one,” Dorothy answered, hope in her voice.

“Not Clifford,” Ross said, fearing the Sprees were already gone.

“Oh, Cliff and Marie will take you, guaranteed,” Dorothy insisted.

“Tom Dawe’s got one,” Doug added, before his wife could continue on that thread of conversation. “Cathy and Bill Byrne, too.”

“Yes!” Dorothy exclaimed. “Dat crowd’s got all kinds of it over dere. Christ our Savior. Quads, boats, cars, trucks, you name it. You best head over dere.”

Doug squinted and stepped by Ross to peer out the window. “Someone’s comin’ here.”

“What?” Ross asked, leaning in to see, but Doug Cook’s respectable mass eclipsed him.

“Jesus, whoever it is––” Doug’s profile grimaced in the light. “There’s––well,
Jesus!
”

A growing, maddening huffing from beyond raised Ross’s hackles and paralyzed him until a fist smashed through the door. Doug shrieked. Dorothy squawked. Ross shouted
get back get back
a second before clawed fingers ripped into the shuddering hole, widening it. The glass exploded inwards and a second hand clamped down, jeweled shards slashing flesh. Someone growled outside, and the flashlight beam glimpsed a bulbous eye and a fanged maw.

Just before the whole door came off its hinges.

Jesus Christ
, Doug thought while retreating in a raw shot of terror, lifting his shotgun.
There’s
two
!

A naked man charged into the hallway and straight into Doug Cook’s bulk as its companion wrestled with the door. Doug raised a heavy arm but his attacker uppercut with a jackal’s giggle of wicked glee. The big man fell to his knees, gurgling, as Dorothy stood and screeched at the sight of her husband going down. Ross raised the barrel in a rush and fumbled his shot, blasting the ceiling. The recoil and his own instinct for self-preservation combined to land his ass flat on the floor. Doug slumped over, took a breath, and kept on gurgling. A second hand closed around his neck and impossibly
yanked
all of him towards the maelstrom of the wrecked door. Dorothy turned for the hallway and that motion attracted the attention of the Giggler, who was already deciding who to attack next. It streaked for Dorothy, slamming Ross into a wall. He glanced up to see muscular legs flash by in a wildly shaking beam of light. Clothing ripped and Dorothy
truly
began to sing. Ross got to his knees, pumped the shotgun, and aimed at the muscular back of the Giggler who was shredding the woman he’d known for twenty years. He fired, flaying a chunk out of the creature’s flesh and flinging it farther inside the house. Ross started for Dorothy’s form, now soaked in red, one arm propped up and twitching. A man-sized howl cut the air and Ross spun around to see the first freak heave Doug’s sizeable lump into the blizzard. The doorway framed the beast in darkness for a heartbeat before Ross shot it in the ribs and blew the monster outside. He whirled to see the Giggler about to tackle him, baring teeth belonging to a nightmare. Ross pumped and pulled the trigger––

Empty
.

The man-thing blared hatred and took two steps before diverting course and pouncing on Dorothy. She didn’t cry out as a claw slashed out, draping the far wall in a thick arc of scarlet.

That was all Ross needed.

He bolted out the wreckage of the door, past the recovering horror that was lifting itself up out of the snow.

And ran for his life.

His hurried departure from the Cooks’ residence carried him though growing mounds of snow. Shrieks and screeching of the beasts seemingly all around him merged with the wind. A hard blast of air staggered him and he fell to his hands and knees, almost losing the shotgun. With a choked cry he twisted over onto his ass, scanning the ferocious screen for signs of pursuit. A disoriented Ross stumbled to his feet, turned, and took three running steps before flipping over the guardrail shielding motorists from the cliff drop––the metal cutting him off at the knees.

A grunt of pain and fright punched past his lips as he went over the guardrail, knowing
exactly
where he was and immediately flailing with both limbs. The snow exploded into his face, smothering him like a freezing pillow. His body torqued to the side. He landed on his ribs, slid a foot, and clutched for anything to halt his slide a second before realizing he’d already stopped.

“Oh fuck,” Ross whispered. His leg stretched out and felt air. The cliff’s edge dropped away right at his left elbow. “Oh fuck, oh fuck,” he panted, rolling into the guardrail and gasping for relief when the metal stopped him. His left knee felt unsteady from its rude hyperextension, and Ross favored it when he flexed, but far from broken. Not so far below and altogether too close for comfort, the sound of waves crashed upon beach rocks like titans bashing grand drums. A few wisps of saltwater even spattered him.

Images overwhelmed his mind, of things hauling big Doug out the door like a piece of carpet. The violent spray from Dorothy. Ross grimaced against the cold metal, bordered on losing his mind, and took quick, deep breaths that made him lightheaded, eventually getting his nerves back into line.

Then he discovered he’d dropped the shotgun. He sifted through the mini-craters of snow and nearly lost control once again when his gloved fingers grazed the barrel. He seized the firearm, drawing it up and wiping the stock as if it might magically grant a wish.
Ammunition
flashed in his head. He’d gathered up all the shells he could find on Borland’s cabin floor. He groped at his pockets and thumbed three into the breech. The damn thing hadn’t been able to slow the monsters down, however, remembering with horror how he had shot both the brutes with disappointing results. He’d wounded them, probably hurt them, and no doubt pissed the bare-assed bastards off, but he wasn’t able to kill them.

Then he remembered the knife, Doug’s silver knife now down his boot. He reached down and breathed a sigh of relief when he touched the pommel. That pig sticker got the job done. Silver. He clearly recalled the speech Doug had given him at Borland’s house.

You a superstitious man? Believe in vampires, werewolves, that kind of thing?

He sure as fuck did now.

That knife of yours, that’s silver, ain’t it?

Yeah.

Yeah.
Ross gripped the shotgun, no longer confident in its power but refusing to throw away its security, despite being lessened. If anything, it knocked the things off their feet for a few seconds, and the one dog he’d blasted the head off of back at Borland’s house hadn’t moved too fast either after the fact.
Head shots
. Head shots did some damage. It slowed them down, at least until he could stick the knife into them. Then a moment’s sickness as he realized he’d
forgotten
he had the blade at the Cooks’ house.

That smacked him cold, leaving him feeling pretty useless for a fleeting moment. Then he took a deep breath and swore not to make the same mistake twice. Not with the others. He’d die before someone else did.

The blizzard shoved Ross around as he got up and carefully stepped over the guardrail. The road lay under an ever thickening cream. It forked after only a few steps, up the hill and straight ahead.

Up the hill led to the next nearest house. Flossie Jones.

What time was it? The question lingered as he steeled himself and started up the incline, hanging close to the right side so he wouldn’t go past her drive and walkway.

A great, skeletal tree took shape, thrashing as if it sought to escape the garden, and just below its frosted limbs lay the path leading to Flossie’s front door. Ross got his new story straight. People weren’t about to leave their house for a few wild dogs. They would if they thought it was something else. Walt Borland. Man was dead, anyway. Might as well get some use out of him.

He stumbled towards the dark shell of the house, feeling uneasy about the gloom, and spotted deep tracks filling in. Ross dropped to a knee and winced, noted the closed front door and the lack of a window. Horror gripped him, but he gathered his nerve, aimed the shotgun and proceeded. The tree, one that bore sweet cherries in the summertime, continued to head bang in the wind while a potato garden, ringed with beige beach rocks, slept under about two feet of snow to his left. Blackness surrounded all in a stormy background, making Ross feel as if he were on the very cusp of reality itself. The spectral scene could’ve decorated a wall as a mural.

Snow foamed at his knees and hadn’t quite managed to erase the grooves of how Flossie had swept her door open in a wide fan, rivaling any pattern in a Japanese rock garden.

“Oh no,” Ross moaned.

He tried the door, discovered its heavy bulk locked, but still managed to rattle it with growing fury.

“Flossie!”

The night screamed back.

“Flossie? You in there? It’s Ross Kelly.”

Nothing.

Then he sensed a sudden presence, permeating the wood like a bad smell, creeping him out enough to jerk back and point his sawed-off cannon at the door. Seconds passed and nothing ventured from the house. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the tree, how it waved, directing him to walk around the house.

Weapon leveled just in case something flew out of the storm, Ross followed the tree’s directions, escaping the brunt of the wind, and discovered the coal-black mirror of a window looking in on Flossie’s main floor. This he put his face to, cupping a hand to the glass. A small couch could be discerned in the dark, along with a fridge polished hard enough that it glowed. Weak light smoldered at the end of a hall.

The light abruptly flickered. Puzzling over this, Ross squinted and held his breath when a face flashed before his and the window fogged before teeth. Ross staggered back, fright electrifying him as the thing’s eyes swiveled in its skull and fixed on him. Jaws snapped and a voice strove to be heard above the blizzard, coming across like raspy gibberish. Ross stumbled away from the window, heart crashing as if it had just taken a killer shot of adrenaline, abandoning his attempt at saving the widow, knowing it was too late.

He pushed on to the next home, following the map line to the southwest. Doug had said they would be forming into a pack. The guy was wrong. They were hitting houses in ones and twos. Perhaps even more.

Knowing he didn’t have much time left, Ross staggered through the glacial drifts, each step like wading through fresh cement.

Max saw the man stumble away from the window. He cried out, hating the way his voice sounded, and pounded the wall with his newly formed hand. For the last few minutes, he’d been walking about on two legs, using whatever was nearby for support, trying to adapt to these new limbs. He’d hovered over Flossie’s body upstairs, nudging and licking her face to no effect, and just feeling miserable in the dark of the house. He’d moaned and latched onto the shoulder of Flossie’s sweater, attempting to pull, but only serving to stretch the material and bunch up the rug.

The shout below had given him a surge of hope.

Max had damn near killed himself in his rush to figure out the puzzle of the stairs, and in the end slid halfway down over the uncomfortable slope as if he’d just taken a dump, something he knew had to be done outside if the urge took him. Then he used his legs again in an awkward walk, supported by his arms, and navigated the rest of the way. When he spotted the face in the window, Max forgot trying and just
did
. He ran to the face––everything working in a burst of relief.