All of the heads were facing forward, all placed equal distances apart. And all of them were red. Red foxes. Like the one he had seen as he pulled into The Ridges, chasing the gray fox.
Nothing made sense at the moment. Kyle shook his head and slammed the door shut.
“Help me.”
It was a whisper.
Baba’s voice.
But Kyle couldn’t see anything, couldn’t begin to process that he had somehow missed Baba when he came into the garage.
He cracked opened the refrigerator door, ignoring the severed fox heads as best he could, to give himself a bit more light. His stomach lurched at the sight.
This time he saw Baba.
His father was balled up in the corner of the garage, naked, holding his throat as tight as he could, keeping blood from pumping out. It looked as though the carotid artery had been cut clean open.
Baba’s eyes were filled with terror, and Kyle had the distinct feeling that something, or somebody, was standing directly behind him.
7.
A million questions ran through Kyle’s mind, but there wasn’t time to do anything but try to save Baba—he wasn’t thinking, wasn’t afraid, wasn’t anything but focused on helping his injured father.
If there was something behind him . . . it could just
bring it on. Baba was hurt, and he’d tear through cement walls to get to him if he had to.
Kyle took a step forward, but he didn’t move. A strong hand appeared out of nowhere and held him back. He cocked his head and came face to face with the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Vivian Volman was staring back at him, holding him with more strength than he thought a woman could possess.
“He won’t recognize you yet. Wait.”
“But . . . he’s hurt,” Kyle said.
“I am here to make sure nothing happens to him.”
Confused, but oddly comforted, Kyle submitted even though he was afraid and could not even begin to forget the fox heads in the refrigerator. “You’re too late.”
“Maybe.”
Vivian had soft, thick, red hair—the most beautiful hair he had ever seen, though the sheen seemed to be fading, becoming less lustrous by the second. Her eyes were almost golden with distinct vertical slits, almost like a cat’s eye.
When she blinked, the pupil was normal, black and round . . . he must have been seeing things . . . and the color was more green than golden. The light in the garage was playing tricks on his eyes.
He pulled to get to Baba again.
“Wait.”
Kyle watched his father struggle, watched the wound on his throat close up and heal itself as though it had never been there in the first place.
There were also wounds on Baba’s legs . . . it was a wonder he could walk, they looked so deep. At the very least, Baba had limped into the garage. In another blink, those wounds vanished, just like the slit on Baba’s throat.
Vivian Volman relaxed her grip. “We haven’t much time.”
Kyle rushed to his father, ignoring his confusion.
Baba reached up to him. “I’m sorry.”
There was a lucidity to Baba’s voice, to his eyes, that Kyle had not seen or heard in a long time.
“Are you all right?” He took his father’s hands and allowed himself to be pulled down so they were face to face.
“I’m dying.”
“No.”
“Yes. I should have prepared you, but I didn’t expect to be sought out.”
Vivian Volman was suddenly standing next to Kyle. Her fists were clenched. “You were hunted,” she said to Baba.
“I was foolish to believe no one would notice us now,” Baba said. He looked up at Vivian. “He does not know what we are.”
Vivian nodded, started to say something, but another loud thunderclap exploded overhead. Fingers of lightning reached in through the side-entry garage door. Her words stopped in her throat. After the thunder subsided, all Kyle could hear was a low, gurgling growl.
Mrs. Shirkline was standing in the doorway with Dippy stuffed in one arm, a butcher knife dangling from the other hand. She was not alone.
The Pinters, with all of their growling, snarling dogs, stood behind her . . . armed with picks, axes, and shovels. They were trapped. But Kyle didn’t know why or by what.
8.
Kyle stood up, but Vivian pushed him back down. “Leave this to me,” she said.
There was no mistaking that she was a warrior. Her muscles were flexed, her eyes focused like those of the most highly trained martial artists he had ever seen.
Vivian cocked her head up and yipped three times as loud as she could.
Mrs. Shirkline laughed. Her face looked mangled, all twisted up with hate, scratched down the side, caked with blood, as if she had already seen battle. In one swift motion, the old corgi, Dippy, jumped from Mrs. Shirkline’s arm and came running at Vivian with its teeth bared, snapping wildly.
Kyle cowered, protecting Baba as best he could.
Vivian kicked out to the side, and the dog went flying with a loud yelp, falling to the ground with a whine. It was a powerful kick. The dog wasn’t getting up any time soon.
Rage crossed Mrs. Shirkline’s face. Kyle wanted to; call out to her, tell her to stop, ask what she was doing, she was supposed to be his friend. Well, maybe she wasn’t his friend after all. Something told him she had hurt Baba, tried to kill him.
Mrs. Shirkline rushed toward Vivian, swinging the knife. The Pinters followed. They let their dogs loose as soon as they broke through the door.
The storm continued to clap and boom outside.
Mrs. Shirkline and Vivian were engaged in serious hand-to-hand combat. They looked equally matched. Mrs. Shirkline was surprisingly agile for such an old woman.
The dogs charged Kyle and Baba, surrounding them
immediately. They snapped and barked. Kyle could smell the dogs’ breath. It smelled like blood. The Pinters and all their sons laughed.
Kyle was not only afraid for Baba, but he was certain he was going to die . . . and he wasn’t sure why. The neighborhood had gone nuts.
Vivian yipped again. This time louder, more desperate, as Mrs. Shirkline punched her square in the nose, sending her flying against the same wall as Dippy. The dog attacked Vivian’s ankle, and she screamed as if she had just stepped into a vat of acid.
Kyle was trapped, cornered. He heard Baba say something . . . but he couldn’t quite make it out right away.
“It’s time. It’s time.”
The big double-bay garage door flung open, letting in the rain, the wind. The movers Kyle had seen cart in the refrigerators, still dressed in white Oxford shirts, black cuffed trousers, and tasseled slip-on loafers, rushed into the fight.
The two movers immediately attacked the Pinter boys. Randy and all of Kyle’s cousins rushed into the fight. But not soon enough to get at the dogs that surrounded Kyle and Baba. One of the dogs, a German shepherd mix, had Baba by the throat. Baba did not fight or struggle. He did not fight back. It was almost as though he wanted to die.
Kyle reached out to Baba, tried to stop the dog, but it bit him, drawing blood, stirring something deep inside of him that he had not known existed. He was changing, transforming, becoming his one true self.
But he was too late to save Baba. He heard his father yelp, then saw the life go out of him, saw him fall limply to the ground and transform into the wet, mangy,
old gray fox who had jumped across the road in front of Kyle only an hour before.
Kyle fought with an enthusiasm that suddenly came easily to him. It was kill or be killed. The melee continued for what seemed like an eternity but in reality was probably only a few minutes. Time for a fox was much different than it was for a human.
When the last bite had been taken and the last drop of blood had fallen to the ground, Mrs. Shirkline lay on the floor dead. Baba was dead. Kyle had a few scrapes and bruises as he stood up on two feet, transforming back into a human.
His legs fell out from underneath him, and he collapsed to the floor.
Vivian was alive, her injuries not life threatening, but she would be out of commission for the foreseeable future. She was on the floor next to Baba, sobbing.
The Pinters were nowhere to be found. A few of their dogs lay dead.
Randy helped Kyle up. “Come on, let’s get you home.”
The two movers were unhurt. They set about cleaning up the mess as quickly as possible.
Kyle had a million more questions, but now wasn’t the time. His heart was broken. He had lost Baba. But at least he had been given the chance to stand and fight for him. Alzheimer’s did not steal Baba away in the middle of the night.
9.
Vivian was sitting next to Kyle’s bed when he awoke. “It wasn’t a nightmare was it?” he asked.
“No.”
“Baba’s still dead, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
Kyle hesitated. “If Baba is really dead . . . then what are you? What am I?”
Vivian had a scar under her eye, but other than that she looked unhurt. She was still the most beautiful woman Kyle had ever seen. “Do you know the legend of werewolves?”
Kyle nodded. Of course he knew the legend. He’d seen the movies as a kid. Lon Chaney, Jr. was his favorite Wolfman.
“They are our cousins,” Vivian continued.
“Cousins?”
“We are werefoxes. Canines still. The strain does not just affect wolves.”
“Baba was a . . . monster?”
“A werefox, yes. A monster, no. There was never a gentler creature than your father.”
“And my mother?”
“No, she was human.” Vivian said. “That is why she died at your birth and why you only showed varying signs and talents but did not transform fully. Your father felt that guilt for many years. He hoped that you would be saved from the pain of knowing the truth. But now you know.”
“When it was too late to save Baba. Why didn’t he tell me sooner?”
Vivian shrugged heavily. “I failed you, failed your father. He was a fine leader for many years . . . he was protecting you, just as I was charged with protecting him, once we knew for sure that he was dying.”
“Why did Mrs. Shirkline want to hurt him?”
Vivian stiffened. “She was a slayer. The Pinters worked for her. Your father was strong enough to keep them at bay for a very long time. Randy and your cousins
were his strength. There are more slayers out there. More that want to wipe us from the world. This will not be the last battle.”
“I don’t want any of this,” Kyle said. “I want to live my life like I was living it before, writing C++ programs in the basement, loving Baba as much as I could. I don’t want this.”
Vivian stood up, leaned over, and kissed Kyle on the forehead. “None of us do.”
She headed for the door but stopped when Kyle asked, “Why are there heads in the refrigerator? How do I know you’re telling me the truth?”
“Because you walked in the skin of the fox. You became. You are one of us. You can smell me now. Just like I can smell you.” She hesitated. “If a slayer takes one of us, they take our power. They cannot take anything if they don’t have the entire body. We will bury our dead now that your father’s power is safe within you. We will be safe from the slayers for now.”
10.
Kyle stood at the window watching the two fox kittens playing in the back yard. He and Vivian had built a den under the shed, and he had been given a son and a daughter. Baba would have been proud.
Loving Vivian was not difficult. She was gorgeous. She knew his one true self and accepted him for what he was—unlike Ramona Withers.
Kyle did not know he could be so happy. He only wished Baba were around to see it—and he worried, now that he had children, about Mrs. Shirkline’s old house across the street, which was for sale. He was more than a little concerned the new neighbors would have
dogs, would be slayers looking to strike the werefoxes from the world.
As Kyle listened to his children laugh and watched them romp with their mother, he took a deep breath and knew all was well in The Ridges.
For the moment.
ABOUT THE EDITORS
Martin H. Greenberg is the CEP of Tekno Books and its predecessor companies, now the largest book developer of commercial fiction and nonfiction in the world, with over 2,100 published books that have been translated into thirty-three languages. He is the recipient of an unprecedented three Lifetime Achievement Awards in the science fiction, mystery, and supernatural horror genres—the Milford Award in Science Fiction, the Bram Stoker Award in Horror, and the Ellery Queen Award in Mystery—the only person in publishing history to have received all three awards.
Kerrie Hughes lives in Wisconsin after traveling throughout the states and seeing a bit of the world, but she has a list of more travels to accomplish. She has a marvelous husband in John Helfers, four perfect cats, and a grown son who is beginning to suspect that his main purpose in life is to watch said cats and house while his parental units waste his inheritance on travel. Thank you, Justin. She has written seven short stories: “Judgment” in
Haunted Holidays,
“Geiko” in
Women of
307
War,
“Doorways” in
Furry Fantastic,
and “A Traveler’s Guide to Valdemar” in
The Valdemar Companion.
And with John Helfers: “Between a Bank and a Hard Place” in
Texas Rangers,
“The Last Ride of the Colton Gang” in
Boot Hill,
and “The Tombstone Run” in
Lost Trails.
She has also written nonfiction, including the article “Bog Bodies” in
Haunted Museums,
and has edited two concordances for
The Vorkosigan Companion
and
The Valdemar Companion. Gamer Fantastic
is her seventh coedited anthology, along with
Maiden, Matron, Crone, Children of Magic, Fellowship Fantastic, The Dimension Next Door,
and
Zombie Raccoons and Killer Bunnies.
She hopes to finish the novel she’s been writing forever in between getting her master’s degree in counseling and working full time for an evil corporation.