AWOO: Chapters Two and Three
Decided on a twofer this week because Chapter 2 is a little bit short.
Chapter 2
Angela Martin, werewolf huntress extraordinaire, or so she thought of herself, even though she’d only tagged three wolves thus far, steadied her aim as the werewolf known as Robert Vincent opened his apartment door.
The face on the driver’s license she’d found in the rucksack had been clean-shaven and vaguely smiling. This face had a dark beard and mustache, bloodshot eyes with angry black smears under them, messy brown hair roiling around his head like a confused tsunami. But it was definitely her wolf.
Robert Vincent’s eyes went wide, and he backed up with his hands over his head. She pushed inside.
“Alright, wolf,” she said.
“Wolf?” he repeated.
“Yeah. Don’t leave your ID in your hidey hole where a hunter can just go look at it.”
“Shit,” said Robert. “Wait, so you’re just here to kill me?”
“That’s the idea,” said Angela.
“But…ok, think about it. I’m in human form right now. You kill me, you’re just killing some guy. And you’ll go to jail for like, a long time.”
“You’re not just some guy.” Venom dripped over the words. “You’re a monster, and you have to be put down. We can’t have—”
“I’m not a monster most of the time,” Robert cut in. “Most of the time I’m just me. Robert Vincent. Aspiring astronaut. Guy who likes good books and a decent medium rare steak. And really, that was only my second moon. I’m still learning how to keep myself and the rest of the world safe from my wolfish side. Yeah, I got free last night, but I learned a lot. Next time I’ll find a good solid basement or something. I don’t know why I even bothered trying the woods – it just seemed like a good option. It wasn’t. I know that now.”
“I don’t care,” said Angela, and her finger twitched on the trigger.
“What do you have against werewolves anyway?” Robert Vincent’s voice cracked like a teenager who’d been caught doing something embarrassing. “Why do you feel the need to hunt us?”
“Shut up.” She pushed further into the apartment, keeping the gun trained on the wolf, who stumbled backwards.
“You’re hesitating,” said the wolf. “That’s good. Try putting the gun down and we can talk.”
She gave the wolf a hard look. His bloodshot eyes were wide and staring, angry black streaks under them. He looked like a guy staring down a gun, scared out of his wits. Not like a dangerous animal.
Can I really do this?
She’d been able to kill her previous quarries while they were in wolf form. Easy to abstract the trauma of killing something when it looks so clearly like a predator.
Can I really kill something that looks this close to human?
She took a deep breath and steadied her aim. This guy was dangerous, whether he looked like a wolf or not. Visions of her sister, neck torn open, gagging on her own blood, hardened her resolve.
“Sorry,” she said, unsure of why she’d said that, and started to squeeze the trigger.
Sudden sharp pain in her head and stars in her vision, and she fell to the floor. The gun clattered away from her. The last thing she saw before the darkness took her was a strange face, half of it glinting like silver.
Chapter 3
Behind Angela’s slumped form, Robert saw Clyve, the metal man who’d stalked him in the woods, holding a baseball bat.
“Clyve?” said Robert, putting his hands down and kneeling to retrieve the gun.
“That’s me.”
“How—”
“Followed her here,” said Clyve. “Figured her for a hunter.”
“Wow, ok, you’re an enterprising one. Or a stalker. Not sure which. Either way, thanks for the rescue,” said Robert.
The wolf was now out of the bag, so to speak, although Robert still didn’t know what this metal man’s deal was.
“Here, help me get her out of here,” said Clyve.
“Wait, why don’t we just call the police?”
“No cops.” Clyve bent down and grabbed the hunter by the ankles. “Grab her shoulders.”
“What?” Robert bent down and grabbed hold of the hunter’s shoulders. Together, the two of them lifted her off the ground.
“You get her arrested, there’s a chance she makes a cop think twice about a thing he shouldn’t know.”
“Ok,” said Robert.
Together they heaved the hunter out of the apartment and down the steps, hoping nobody would see them and wonder what the heck was happening.
“That’s her car,” said Clyve.
They sat her down on the ground in front of her car, because the logistics of stuffing her into the car were too much to figure out.
“She’ll be back for me,” said Robert on the way back to his apartment. “How do I defend myself?”
“You gotta get yourself a pack,” said Clyve.
“A pack of what?” Robert opened his apartment door and motioned for Clyve to enter, which the mysterious metal man obligingly did. Robert followed behind him.
“Wolves,” Clyve said, turning to face Robert. “You gotta meet the pack. I know where they hang out.”
“How do you—”
“Told you,” said Clyve. “I’m a friend.”
“You did tell me that. So where do I meet the pack?”
“The Tooth and Claw. Dive bar on the east side.”
“The Tooth and Claw,” Robert repeated. “A little bit on the nose, isn’t it?”
“What, you think anyone sees that and says, ‘oh hey, that’s where werewolves hang out?’ Folks miss things right under their noses all the time, my friend. We could name a place ‘Real Werewolf Headquarters’ and they’d be all ‘ooh, I bet they have great deer burgers.’”
Robert motioned for Clyve to sit. The metal man perched on Robert’s couch.
“And you’re…not a werewolf?” Robert asked, settling into the club chair opposite the couch.
“Nope,” said Clyve. “An ally. An otherling. Regular folks look at me and go ‘what’s his deal.’ Good ones, like you and me, gotta stick together.”
Clyve paused and took a breath. “I know what it’s like to be hunted.”
“Military?” Robert guessed.
“Yeah.”
“How many tours?”
“Too many,” Clyve said, and rubbed absently at the metal covering half his skull.
“I’m sorry.”
“Anyway, I came back, fell in love with a man who turned out to be a wolf…that’s maybe a story for another day.”
“What happened to the wolf you fell in love with?”
“A hunter got him,” Clyve said, and Robert heard the tremble in Clyve’s voice. “It’s why I’m here. Didn’t want a hunter to get another.”
Robert looked at Clyve, unsure of how to respond, but feeling sympathy for this man who’d clearly been through a hell of a lot of trauma in his life. He grabbed a box of tissues and handed them to Clyve, inadvertently touching a metal finger. It felt surprisingly warm, soft even.
And then, before he even consciously realized he wanted to do so, Robert asked Clyve, “Can I buy you a coffee or something?”
“Coffee’s a good start,” said Clyve.
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'Real Werewolf Headquarters.' 😂