July 13, 2011

12:19 am

Navajo Nation

Chapter 7: Fight

Kyle Khattab POV

I was full of shit and I knew it. I had no idea what I was going to do. The question was whether Tse knew if I was full of shit or not. Probably, with his wolfy senses. I looked up for an answer, only to find that he had passed out again. Great. Everyone was down for the count or human, except me.

What the fuck was I going to do? I had no combat training, and my physical conditioning was awful; no better than that of an average human given my lack of exercise and caloric intake. I needed Seth to be able to protect me, like the original plan. I needed a lot more time to prepare for this. I needed to not have weakened myself to this degree. But there was no way I could get those things. But there was one thing I might be able to get: I needed motivation.

Still a bit dizzy from the blood loss, I pulled myself to my feet and stumbled over to the structure where the Navajo civilians were holed up. I knocked on the door.

An elderly female voice soon answered, "Rain?"

Oh shit. They have no clue who I am. The truth would likely cause panic, though. "Uhh… Rain sent me over to make sure everyone is okay. She told me to tell you that you guys need to stay in here a few more hours. Don't expose yourselves no matter what you hear going on out here. We're gonna take all the heat out here and then let you know when it's safe."

"Okay… a few more hours, right?"

"Yeah, she promises." One way or the other, it WOULD be over then. Wait a sec! That was it! Heat! "Say, uh, what do you guys do for heat in the winter? Or any time it gets cold at night here in the desert?"

"Not much wood around here. We've got some propane tanks over in the storage building, why?"

Propane. Score! "Oh, I just wanted to make sure that everyone who's injured is nice and warm. Please remember to not come out no matter what!"

"Okay. Tell Rain I love her!"

"Will do. See you in the morning." I had said that with way more confidence than I really felt. But I did have considerably more confidence than just a few seconds ago. I just had to hope that the propane tank was at least half full and not drained from usage or leaking. I shuffled over to the storage building and inspected the tank. The dial was somewhere around the two-thirds or three-quarters mark.

"Thank fucking god," I muttered to myself.

I next inspected the door to the storage building. There wasn't too much of a gap between the door and the floor of the building. The building was also relatively isolated from the rest of the settlement; that was key as well.

"Okay motherfuckers, game on."

My bravado was short-lived as my stomach flared up with a severe hunger pang. I made my way back across the settlement ignoring the burning and clenching in my gut. I hadn't been this active in months. This night was going to suck for several reasons. Gritting my teeth, I opened the door to the side building that housed the sick shifters.

I put two containers of instant pasta in the microwave to cook, hoping that I could keep it down. While that cooked, I collected all the remaining weapons on a table and began to game out how this would work. My custom anti-vampire pistol had three rounds remaining; those were going to have to all be head shots. No way around it. I groaned as I realized that would be the easy part. The other weapons were a .22 rifle with a 10-round magazine and fifty two rounds and a very sharp hunting knife. I ran my hands over my face as I tried to figure out how to make this work.

I could release the methane gas into the storage building, effectively creating a bomb. However, even if I could get all the diseased wolves around the thing before I detonated it, I couldn't count on it to actually kill any of them. Best case, which was really the only case, I'd be able to get my head shots in at this time with the penetrator ammunition. That would leave two wolves. I had no idea how well their fast healing worked in their conditions, but I couldn't count on a .22 rifle to stop either one of them, much less a knife. I needed something else. But what?

My musings were cut off by the microwave timer. I retrieved the pasta and checked on everyone's condition while I ate. Of the shifters, Tse seemed to be in the best condition, with calm, even breathing. Yiska and Gad were only a bit worse off with slightly labored breathing. The other two, whom I never got to meet, were not responding nearly as well. This really concerned me, but there was nothing to be done at this time. I had already vastly exceeded maximum doses of all medications.

I had saved Rain for last. The patient I dreaded most. Either she was dying, or being changed into what I was. Whatever that was. I checked her vitals, and to my amazement, her temperature had already dropped to almost normal levels. She was occasionally wracked by shivering, but otherwise seemed to be out of imminent danger. I guess a direct blood transfusion worked fast. I had no idea when she would wake up, however, so I had to continue to plan to go it alone.

I sat down at the end of row of cots to continue contemplating my plan. I sat there for what seemed like only ten minutes, but when I looked back at the microwave, over an hour had passed. I was running out of time to make preparations. I needed another weapon or advantage desperately. Unfortunately, my ravenous hunger was making concentration very difficult.

"Fuck me," I muttered, shuffling back to the microwave. I retrieved two more pasta meals, hoping I could keep them down as wll. I wasn't sure how much this would help, as I realized that I was probably suffering from severe protein deficiency. As I shut the microwave door, the words on the top of the door seemed to jump out at me.

"1000 watts"

1000 watts was a lot of juice. There was also the lights and a couple of other appliances in this makeshift infirmary. That meant that the generator that ran this place had to be pretty substantial. Maybe substantial enough to be used as a weapon. I quickly went outside to look at the generator, following the noise to behind the building.

I easily located it, and as I suspected, it was rated for an entire house. It was pretty large, but mounted on wheels. It was fortunate I came to look at it, as it was quite low on fuel. I had seen some fuel that was probably compatible back in the storage building. Sighing, I turned to go back to the storage building.

As I made my way back, I checked all the other generators in the Navajo camp, to see if any were rated higher. None were. After sliding the creaking door open, I checked to make sure the propane tanks were holding steady. No problems there. I easily found some diesel fuel in a corner.

As I bent down to pick up a can, a thought struck me. Even if everything worked perfectly, and by some miracle I managed to kill or incapacitate all five wolves, they would still serve as bioweapons in the form of corpses. However, the diesel fuel could possibly fix that. I could use it as an accelerant to burn all the bodies and hopefully render any pathogens inert. Because of this revelation, I took the time to carry extra diesel fuel back to the infirmary building.

Now I had to weaponize the generator, and determine where to set it up. I found a spare cot and used my hunting knife to strip off the fabric, leaving a metal conductive frame. Upon inspection, I found that that the generator would be easy enough to disconnect from the back of the building and attach the leads to the metal frame. I would have to lure the two remaining wolves into a doorway where they would have to come in contact with the bedframe and be electrocuted. Which doorway?

The storage building would be completely destroyed in the first stage of the plan. The largest main building was out because of exposure risk to the Navajo. I could try to lure them to an empty building, but if they didn't buy in, and came to the infirmary, it would be a massacre. I'd have to lure them here and incapacitate them. There was no choice about it.

Grunting, I hauled the generator into the infirmary and started it up again. I then placed the stripped cot across the doorway. Its frame didn't completely block the doorway, but that seemed okay, as I would need some way to get past it quickly so I could attach the lead at the right time. I decided to nail it to the door frame, putting some insulating fabric between the cot frame and the door frame so the electricity wouldn't run through the metal building. I left myself about a foot to crawl underneath the cot frame. The wolves were man-sized, and would find it impossible to get underneath it without being electrocuted.

After my electrocution trap was ready, I looked at my useless cell phone to see that is was now about 4 am. It was time to fill the storage room with gas. I went to the storage room, placed some old rags everywhere that seemed remotely leaky and opened the gas canisters fully. I then placed a ladder on the side of the building. The initial part of this was going to suck. No two ways about it.

I went back to the infirmary to collect my pistol, the .22, and the hunting knife. I also created a detonator from a jar of kerosene and an old rag. Crawling underneath my cot frame trap, I brought all of these things with me over to the storage building. I climbed up the ladder to keep a look out from the roof. I'd need to see them coming and lure them to this building first for this to have any shot of working. I had to see them coming from as far away as possible.

Shit.

Sighing, I shifted my vision to infrared, so they would stand out sharply from the desert night. And then I waited.