Skinwalkers (12 page)

Let me out,
her fractured mind—Max—told her.
Let me out, Maxine! You need me!

The monster
spasmed
as the bounty
hunter’s
bullets rocked its body until it fell lifeless in the dirt. Maxine starred at her would-be protector as he reloaded his weapons, the mixed emotions of shocked disbelief and gratitude coursing through her.

The remaining soldiers and civilians came barreling out of the door, still firing their weapons down the hallway, the mad, howling monsters in pursuit.

“To the mission! Run!“

Maxine scooped up her son and took flight beside the bounty hunter—the man keeping them alive.

No, Max
. Maxine thought.
I don’t need you
.

Not with him here!

H
ank skipped-ran through the dense green fog, favoring his wounded foot. The baying of coyotes sounded in every direction.

He was lost.

He didn’t know how it had happened. One minute Robby and the others had been right beside him. The next, they were gone, swallowed up by the sickly mist that now covered the entire town.

Tears leaked from Hank’s eyes and he began to whimper. He dared not cry outright or call for help, lest the noise bring one of those
goddamn fucking dogs
his way.

Hank secretly knew this was his fault. God was punishing him. Punishing him for all the lies he’d told. For all the whiskey he’d drunk. For all the gambling he’d done. For constantly cheating on his clueless wife back in Newman City. But oh, how he wished he was with
Glara
now. He’d listen to any amount of pissing and moaning if he could just be tucked into bed with her ice-cold butt lying against him right at this very moment.

A howl sliced through the night. The mouth that had made it was close. Too close.

Hank picked up his pace, hobbling through the fog like a broken rocking horse, pain shooting up his leg. Where the fuck was Robby? Just like that little cocksucker to abandon him when he needed him most. Was the mission even in this direction?

Growls. Low and guttural. Directly behind him.

“Oh, Jesus! Oh, God! Please, no! Please!“

In his panic, Hank tripped and went down. He smacked the earth and the air left his lungs. He looked down and saw what he’d stumbled over—a bloody, half-chewed leg jutting out of the fog.
Jimbo’s
hat and a swatch of Lacey’s dress lay beside it. Hank clamped his hand over his mouth to stifle the scream in his throat. He kicked the hat away and began to crawl, dizzy and grasping for breath.

“Robby!“ he called, but instead of a yell, his words came out in a breathless hiss. “Robby!“

Hank inched along through the mist, using his hands to feel ahead of him. His fingers fumbled upon something that wasn’t sand or rock. Something hard like bone—
or a claw
. Hank felt up its length and began to shake with terror when the shape of a furry paw filled his palm. Hank looked up and the growls came as pools of slobber dripped into his eyes.

No
!
I don’t want to die like this. Alone. No one to be with me
—!

With the drool curdling in his eyes, Hank never saw the clawed hand that ripped his spine out through his back.

“C
ome on!“ Reverend Phillips pleaded with Gertrude. She squatted, gasping for breath as the hands at the end of her locked arms rested on her immense thighs.

“I—“
Gerdie
panted, “I can’t.“

The reverend stood, gazing through the thick fog in the direction the others had fled.

“Everyone has left us!“ An inhuman howl echoed through the night. “In God’s name, woman, if we stay here, we’ll die!“

“Can’t—not another—can’t—“

The reverend’s eyes went wide. His jaw dropped as he saw dark shapes moving in the fog behind Gertrude.

“I—I—“ the reverend stuttered, his terror preventing him from coherence.

The reverend began to shake as twin golden sparkles appeared among the shadows.
Are those eyes or glistening fangs?

The shapes, now lupine in form, began to
growl
. The reverend knew they were being hunted—toyed with before the kill.

“I—I—“ the reverend continued. The shapes at last revealed themselves as the monsters from the saloon, though the reverend had never had any doubt. They were mere feet behind Gertrude—seconds away from striking.

“What—?“ Gertrude
shook her in head confusion
, her multiple chins swinging to and fro in the mist.

“I—I—God forgive me!“

Reverend Phillips shoved Gertrude backward into the beasts’ midst. As he’d hoped, they fell upon her, forgetting he was there at all. The reverend
didn
’
t waste the opening. He bolted
after
the
other townsfolk
, the
s
cream of the damned upon his lips.

T
he doc decided he must be dreaming. There simply was no other explanation.
That’s the last time I do the laudanum
, the doc thought as he scrambled through the fog.
Fucking Peg Leg Saul and his shit. Worst
goddamnest
trip I ever had!

The doc struggled to keep pace with the wounded private.
The solider ran several yards ahead of him.
Wounded, or not, that son of a bitch is sprinting like a thoroughbred.

Behind him, the doc heard the last few survivors of the private’s company firing their muskets and screaming as they fell under the teeth and claws of the abominations that had attacked the saloon.

Better them, than me
.
I didn’t ask for this shit. I never ask for this shit! But they call, and I answer. Good ol’ Doc Howard. They always need me to clean up there messes, and this is what happens. Goddamn them!

“Hey!“ the doc said. “Wait up! I can’t see—!“

But it was too late. The fog swallowed Private Sanchez, and the doc was alone.

Goddamn them! Fucked me again. Save their fucking lives and they
shit
on me but good every time, the bastards. Wait until I catch up to them. Then they’ll see what ol’ Doc Howard—!

The mist parted and the doc starred directly into the dead eyes of the ancient. The doc yelled. His feet
pistoned
in the dust as he tried to reverse direction. The change in momentum sent him tumbling face-first into the dirt. He scrambled onto his back, and crawled away from the ancient. But the doc’s appendages failed him again, and all he did was spin-out in the sand.

Terror gripped the doc as the ancient walked toward him. No.
Walk
wasn’t the right word. The Indian seemed to
glide
through the fog.

The doc had never seen someone so old—old as sin—
old as death.
The ancient’s face was ugly and wrinkled beyond description. And the milky voids that were his eyes sent shivers racing up and down the doc’s spine.
What did those eyes, blind to the world, truly look upon?
The doc quickly decided he didn’t want to know—he was sure the answer would drive him mad.

The ancient reached into the pouch he carried at his waist.

“Please!“ Tears streamed from the doc’s eyes. “I’m not one of them! I swear to God: they threw this on me! You have to believe me! I just clean up the mess!
I just clean up the mess!“

The ancient retracted his hand from the pouch and brought it up to his lips. The Indian blew and the luminous dust sprinkled over his palm clouded the air to envelope the doc.

Doc Howard grimaced, sneezed, and snorted as the substance invaded his nose, mouth, and skin. But, seconds later, the doc was shocked—and pleased—to find the irritation had vanished.

The doc starred in up at the ancient in expectant horror. Doc Howard knew when the old man realized his poison hadn’t worked, he’d call his demon-dogs down on him to finish the job.

But the call never came. The ancient simply continued to scowl at the doc. Then the old Indian receded into the fog—gliding in just as he had glided out.

The doc dared not move for several long seconds. He starred into the fog, expecting the ancient and his monsters to leap out at him at any moment. But they never appeared.

The doc listened. All was quiet. The howls and screams that had ripped through the air had fallen silent.

Where in
tarnation
are they?
Are the bastards hiding? Toying with me? Waiting to pounce?
Dear God, just get it over with!

Minutes crept by. Nothing happened. Finally, the doc rose to his feet. He braced himself anew, knowing now, at last, the death blow would come.

Silence. Just the doc and the fog swirling around him.

The doc began to humor the belief that the ancient and his coyotes-things had lost interest in him, and he just might make it out of this alive after all.

He took a step forward, the rocky dirt crunching beneath his boot. The doc flinched and peered over his shoulder. No coyote monsters. No blind, thousand-year-old Indian.

The doc took another step, hesitated, and then took another. Moments later, the doc was trotting along through the mist for the mission. He was going to make it. Everything was going to be all right. The doc was entertaining this thought when a wail—a baby’s wail—pierced the night.

The doc froze, listening. The cry came again, this time echoed by another. The doc resumed his walk, quickening his pace.

It’s just your imagination
.
Nothing more. Nothing to be concerned about.

The cries of infants now sounded all around the doc. He continued his trek for the mission, keeping his gaze forward, not daring to turn and see what was making the flickering movements in the fog that he caught out of the corners of his eyes.

After a time, the doc realized the terrain
had changed. The earth gave beneath his feet
, and he heard what sounded like twigs snapping with every step he took.

Doc Howard looked down, trying to peer through the fog. As if to accommodate him, the green mist peeled away. He was walking on a pile of fetus carcasses. Doc Howard shrieked.
He tried to run, but his feet sank into the rotting flesh beneath them, causing him to stumble. He felt something seize his ankle and he fell forward into the mass of dead bodies. He tried to regain his footing, but couldn’t find purchase among the pint-sized corpses.
The doc went into hysterics, bawling and uttering nonsense, his mind unable to deal with the horror it was experiencing.

The last strings of the doc’s sanity came unraveled when he saw the fetuses weren’t dead at all. They began to paw at him as they squalled and cooed. The doc howled in terror as hundreds of tiny, undead hands rolled him over onto his back.

The doc peered up to see a gigantic dead baby looming over him. It babbled with glee as it
hoisted
the doc’s spike-ended hammer high above its head. The last thing the doc saw—
ever
—was that spike—already black with pig blood—plummeting toward him through the mist.

F
arnsworth saw the mission’s massive wooden doors spring out of the fog just in time to keep from colliding with them head first. His reprieve was foiled as the bounty hunter slammed into his back with a grunt and mashed him up against the church’s entrance. The bounty hunter raked J.T. aside
, knocking him to the earth. Farnsworth looked up
and saw Pablo and the woman waiting as the bounty hunter strained to open one of the large doors. For once, rather than wasting time with verbose accusations and obtuse diatribes, the writer leapt to his feet and assisted his captor word unsaid
, the pain of his burned left hand forgotten in the rush of adrenaline he was experiencing
. The noise of their grunts and the clinking of Farnsworth’s severed shackle joined the horrific song of howls and screams filling the night air.