Chapter twelve


TERRORS


    “Did you hear that?”  She asked breathlessly, while pushing with her hands against his chest and breaking his embrace.
    “Hear What?”  Jimmy Byrd asked with irritation.  The Junior at Nebraska State University was used to getting what he wanted.  Twenty years old and buff from five years of weight training, he was confident.  His six foot tall, massive frame and all American boy looks, had made him successful in scoring both on the football field and with any chick he wanted. Usually.  He had thought himself invincible in sexual attraction and prowess.  Sheila Donahue was frustrating the hell out of him.
    She was an all State champion cheerleading Captain.  Her body was exquisite.  He wanted to add her to his trophies of conquest.  He would have her one way or another. Anything he had to do, short of actual Rape, he would do to that end.  However, she wasn’t proving to be as easy as her reputation at school made her out to be.  The word around school was that she spread easier than hot butter for any guy at school who was considered in. Well, Damn it, he was certainly in!  He was Captain of NSU’s Varsity football team, President of the student body, honors winning Captain of the debating team, and on the Dean’s list of higher achievers.
    So far though, she had managed to hold him back since the kick off.  He hadn’t gained any yardage with her at all.  Let alone, scored a touchdown!  He had tried to get his tongue past her tightly clamped teeth unsuccessfully, and got his hand slapped away when he tried to blade it in between her also tightly squeezed thighs.  Now this!
    She was peering out of the car windows nervously.
    “What? There’s nothing out there.  We’re all alone here.”
    “I’m telling you, I heard something.”
    “Okay...so maybe you heard something. It’s gone now. It was probably a stray dog ... or maybe a coon.  These woods are full of them.  “Now...” He tried to put his arm around her again.  “Just relax and let Jimmy make you feel good, Baby.”  She forcibly removed his arm.
    “Come on, Baby!”
        “I want to go home.  I’m not your...”
    CRASH, WHUMP!  The sound had been dull Like something heavy falling on the ground behind the car.  It was enough to elicit a sharp shriek from Sheila though.
    Jimmy took advantage of her attention being diverted, to try to spear his hand inside her blouse and bra.  He was almost cupping her large breast, when her hand lashed out and slammed into his cheek.  He yelped with the sudden pain that flared in his face and withdrew.
    “See!”  She screamed at him.  “I told you I heard something.  Don’t try that again!”
    “Oh, for Shit sakes!  It’s nothing.”  He leaned back into the seat rubbing his burning cheek.
    “Nothing?  Are you crazy?  Didn’t you hear that crash?”
    “Shit.”  He said in defeat.  He stretched his arms forward out over the steering wheel.  Then, he reached under his seat and removed two objects.  Moonlight streaming in the side window, reflected dully off the blue steel of the revolver he placed on his lap.  Sheila gasped out loud at the sigh of it.
    “What the Hell are you doing with that?”  She asked with unconcealed suspicion.
    “Protection.  I should think since you are about to wet yourself, you’d be glad I had it.”
    Jimmy hefted the flashlight he held in one hand, opened the driver’s door and climbed out into the night.  He picked the pistol out of his lap as he went.
    “Wait here.  I’ll check it out.  Okay?”
    “Oh, great.  My hero.”  She answered with a voice dripping sarcasm.  She stared at the sub nosed pistol, and finally just gave him a nod of her head.  He was getting more pissed by the minute, and slammed the door of his brand new Mustang convertible.  If someone was screwing around out here, they were going to be very sorry.
    Jimmy stood by the car, flashlight in one hand, Smith and Wesson .38 in the other.  He reached both high above his head and stretched his back.  Lowering his arms, he snapped on the flashlight.  The beam stabbed a tunnel of light through the darkness towards the woods behind the car.  For the briefest of seconds, two yellow eyes reflected in the beam’s intensity, then disappeared.  Damned Dear, he thought.  Maybe, these woods weren’t the best make out spot after all.  He had damned near ran into one coming up here.  Maybe even this one.  He dropped the beam into the closer distance and immediately saw the cause of the disturbance.
    The dead tree branch lay crossways over the tread marks his tires had left in the soft dirt.  Also in the dirt near the rear of the car, and leading off into the direction of the woods, were paw prints.  Boy, he thought, that was a big animal that left those tracks.  The branch appeared in his beam to be about seven feet long, and maybe four or five inches in diameter. Heavy enough to make some noise falling.  Moving it back out of the way, would definitely give him some exercise.  Nothing he couldn’t handle though.  He laid the gun down on the soft convertible top and positioned the flashlight to shine down on the branch from the roof.
    Stepping around to the fallen branch he noticed something strange.  First, there were no large trees close enough to the clearing they were parked in, that it could have fallen from. Most of the large trees were further back behind where the curve started in this dirt road.  The branch itself was weird too. Where it had separated from the parent tree, the ragged trailings were still green wood.  Where the flashlight beam landed on it, there were a pattern of deep, ragged cuts in the bark. As though a steel rake had been dragged across the surface.  Fresh sap was oozing from the wounds.
    Jimmy looked above his head into a moonlight filled night sky.  The illumination made it hard to see any stars.  He could clearly see that there was no possible way the branch had simply fallen to it’s current resting place.  It could only have been propelled there.  For the life of him, he couldn’t figure, by what for God’s sake?  There wasn’t a breath of wind.  The nearest trees of any size, were nearly twenty-five yards or so behind the car.  No one, not even him, could have picked it up and lobbed it that distance.  He felt his bravado begin to desert him.  He felt a raw emotion creeping into his mind.  One he hadn’t felt since childhood.  Fear.
    CRACK!  Another branch loudly snapped in the distant darkness of the woods.  Then came the rending sound of wood ripping loose.  He snapped the light back up and down the road towards where it curved right and was lost in the dark trees. Silence.  He suddenly became aware of the dead silence of the night.  Not even crickets chirping or the fluttering of the wings of night birds reached his ears.  Something was out there. Something...that had scared the rest of nature into a profound silence.  Something, he was suddenly sure, was watching him. Something...or someone?
    A thought occurred to him.  No one man possessed the strength it would have taken to hurl this branch so far.  Although, what about...say, six or more of his friends?  Yeah. That was it!  They are all big muscular guys on the team.  They followed him out here and were screwing around for a joke.
    “All right, Assholes!  I’m on to you!  Come on out guys.”
    “What is it Jimmy?  Who are you talking to?”  Sheila asked from inside the car.  Her voice was now laced with acidic fear.
    “It’s nothing.  Just my fuck up buddies from the team, screwing around!”  He shouted towards the woods.
    That was when he saw it.  The huge branch.  It dwarfed the one at his feet, as it arched silently up and out of the trees. Sailing through the air, it came crashing down to Earth a mere three yards from where he was standing.  He yelled out loud.  His shout being drowned out by the noisy crash of the foot thick branch, and Sheila’s scream.  As the sound died, silence again rushed in to fill the void.  Now, the only sounds were Sheila whimpering in the car, and his own jack hammering heartbeat.  He struggled to calm himself.  Digging deep inside, he tried to find righteous anger.
    “Hey, you fucking Morons!  You could have kill...”
    He was cut off by the sounds issuing from the amongst the trees.  It started as a low menacing growling.  Quickly escalating into snarls and finally, a blood freezing, unearthly howling.
    “What the fuck is that?”  Sheila screamed from the car.
    Now, Jimmy was scared.  No longer did simple fear dance on spider’s feet through his mind.  Now, outright panic threatened to make his beer swollen bladder let loose.  He started to stagger backwards on shaking legs to the car.  GET THE GUN! GET INTO THE FUCKING CAR AND GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE, his mind screamed at him.  Then, he froze in mid-step...his eyes going as wide as the muscles would allow.

    It...something, stepped out of the trees and into the light of the full moon.  It stood there in the dirt road, breathing like a locomotive.  Steam huffed out of it’s nostrils and cruel jaws.  Saliva dripped in long moon silvered strands.  Some were landing on the massive fur covered chest.  The rest, stretching to the breaking point and falling to the dirt at it’s feet.
    A memory flashed in Jimmy’s mind.  It was like a scene in a horror film he had seen.  The seven foot tall, hairy monster, was standing on grossly bent, Dog like, hind legs.  It was silhouetted in moonlight and tree shadows.
    It stood there staring at him across the distance with what...?  OH, Dear God.  With Hunger.  That broke his paralysis, and he staggered back.  At the same time, it leaped forward. CLUMP...CLUMP...CLUMP.  It’s foot falls landing with it’s great weight as it began racing across the distance after him.  Jimmy grabbed for the gun.  He fumbled with and nearly dropped it into the black shadow cast by his car.  He dimly heard Sheila screaming in terror.  Finally getting a grip on the weapon, he aimed and fired three consecutive rounds at the approaching nightmare.  It didn’t stop.  It didn’t even stagger or break it’s stride.  It showed not the slightest sign of having been hit by the bullets at all.
    In mindless panic, he ripped open the driver’s door, dove inside the car, and slammed the door shut again.  With a twist of the key in the ignition lock, the big engine roared into life.  He threw the shift lever into reverse.  He had no choice of direction to go in.  He was forced to go backwards towards the rampaging creature that was hurtling towards them.  A log barrier mounted on two steel uprights, blocked forward movement because of the eighty foot drop off that lay beyond.  Neither, could he turn to one side or the other because of the barrier’s near proximity.
    Jimmy stomped down on the accelerator.  The Mustang rocketed back three yards.  CRASH! BLAM! Light flared around him.  The sudden stop and bouncing, along with the non use of seat belts, tossed him and Sheila into a collision with the roof and then the dashboard.
    He shook his head and struggled to regain his senses. Looking at the rear view mirror, he saw the beast was nearly upon them.  He stomped the gas pedal again, and was answered by the powerful engine screaming into the night.  There was no movement, and he realized what had happened.  The rear tires had hopped over the smaller branch, and sent them onto the bigger one.  Now the tires were completely off the ground.  They weren’t going anywhere.  He looked frantically again at the mirror.  The creature was airborne.  It had leaped towards the rear of the car.  He watched it sail through the air in stark relief against the full moon.  Time slowed.  The horror came in slow motion.  It hit the apex of it’s leap and started down towards the trunk lid.
    THE GUN!  Oh, Christ.  Where was the fucking gun? It had somehow flown from his grasp in the impact of the crash.  Now, it was somewhere in the inky shadows of the floor boards.  He reached down and in a frenzy, felt blindly with his fingers for it.
    “Sheila!  The gun!  Help me find the...”  The words died in his mouth as his eyes fell on her face.  Blood was streaming down across her nose and lips and dripped into that magnificent cleavage.  It’s source, was a perfectly round little hole in the center of a puckered crater. It was perfectly centered between her eyes.  Oh, God!  Oh, my freaking God!  The light flash!  The gun had accidently discharged during the crash onto the branches.  Well, he thought insanely, she won’t frustrate anybody again.
    Sheila’s body lurched and he screamed, as the fanged, clawed, monstrosity landed on the car’s trunk with a sound of metal crushing.  Four razor sharp claws popped down through the material of the convertible’s top.  A non human scream of triumph erupted overhead, as Jimmy’s questing fingers finally found the hot steel of the revolver.  With a sob, he grabbed it up, and brought it to bear on the roof...and fired.  There was a satisfying shriek from above, but the claws continued to rip a path through the canvas roof.  Then, the beast poked both paws into the opening and spread the ripping material wider.  It’s terrible snout shoved down through, followed by those evil golden eyes.
    Jimmy fired again.  The resulting flash momentarily blinded him again, as well as his attacker.  The acidic odor of cordite filled the confining space.  The blast rang in both sets of ears.  The Werewolf, he now knew that’s what it was; shook it’s massive head to relieve the pain to it’s super sensitive hearing.  How could this be real?  He thought, as a hysterical laughter started bubbling up from his throat.  He squeezed the trigger repeatedly.  CLICK!  CLICK!  Jimmy listened with horror to the sound of the hammer falling on spent chambers.  Oh Shit!...  Oh, God...  Please, God...  I DON’T WANT TO DIE!  He had never before been too interested in religion.  Though now, he was quickly crossing himself with a fervor.
    Something passed through the Monsters eyes.  It was a mocking, glee-full expression.
    “Good, fear.  Blood...GOOD.”  It said in a voice that sounded like broken glass being scrubbed across a washboard.
    Jimmy felt the hot fluid coursing down his pants leg, and saw the steam rising off of it, before he even knew he had wet himself.  He wanted to beg to live, but his voice no longer worked.  It was strangled in his throat by raw terror.  Instead, all that would come out was a high pitched, keening whimpering.
    Outside, an Owl landed on a nearby sapling.  It watched and listened in curiosity.  The hairy form forced it’s way in through the rags that had been the roof of the Mustang.  Snarling and growling as it went.  Then, as the car rocked to and fro on the big branch, the screaming started.  The Owl listened, as the sound died in a wet gurgling, and some liquid sprayed in a fountain through the opening in the roof.  The red blood appearing black in the monochrome light of the moon.
    The Mustang slowly came to a rest on the tangled branches.  Quiet tried to reassert itself over the idling engine.  Only for a moment.  A loudly wet gnashing and slurping came from inside the vehicle.  The Owl, watched the shadow dance that was played out on the fogged up windows, backlit by the instrument panel’s green bulbs.
    The big V-eight idled until half an hour after sunrise, then coughed roughly several times and died.  The vapor that had been rising into the crisp morning air from the twin exhaust pipes, began to dissipate.
    Forty minutes into the new morning, the sounds of life filled the woods.  Birdsong, the chittering of Cicadas in the trees and brush, and the loud drone of hundreds of tiny wings coming and going from the Mustang’s ruined roof.  Life had awakened and set about searching for it’s morning meal.  The roiling cloud of flies had already located theirs, as had the high circling Buzzards overhead.

 

 
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