Virtual Season Two – Episode #26
"Can't Have Just One"Part Three of Three
John frowned as Julian's progress stopped right in front of a small cabin at the edge of the lake, about a mile away from town.
"Who's place is this?" he asked. Observing the poorly cared for exterior and the thick underbrush that was currently trying to take it over. Made to look all the worse by the overcast grey sky above them.
"I think my job is done." Julian chimed as he turned and began to walk away. Black boots crunching against the natural debris strewn over the ground, as he slipped into the heart of the forest with a speed and agility that was surprising. Even for a Skinwalker. "You'll find the answers you're searching for in here."
"Hey!" John protested, making a move to follow him.
"Let him leave." Matt ordered. Eyes still on the house. "He's right. His job is done."
John turned back to look at him. Observing the grim lines upon Donner's face. "What do you mean? Do you know this place?"
It was a moment before Matthew replied. His gaze flickering out over the surrounding forest before coming back to rest on the front door, beginning to walk towards it. "Yeah. Yeah, I do."
"What the hell happened here?" John asked, trying to make sense of the sight that greeted him when he stepped through the front door, following Matt.
"Hell is what happened, John. But not to this place; To the man that used to live here."
To say that is was a mess would have been an understatement. To say that it looked like an explosion had gone off would have been a little bit closer to the truth.
The walls had been shredded. Furniture had been reduced to matchsticks. The shattered glass of windows glittered dully on the floor. The small kitchen nook's refrigerator and stove were now sitting against the cratered wall of the living room, where they had apparently been thrown. The smell of rotting food permeated the air. But it wasn't the most noticeable stench in the small cabin. The blood streaked across what remained of the walls and splattered over all the trash was.
John swallowed, and looked at Matt standing a few feet in front of him. His back still turned. "Who lives here?"
Matt picked up the broken rim of a coffee mug, sighed, and let it drop to the floor with a crash. "Buddy does… or did."
"Buddy? As in Tyler's number one goon?"
Matt finally turned back around to meet John's gaze. "Uh huh."
John blinked and looked around a little bit more closely. Subtly inhaling through his nose. "The blood in this room isn't human."
Matt sighed. "Yeah. He knew he was getting out of control. He was probably trying to staunch the cravings by feeding off of animals."
"You don't seem terribly surprised by all of this."
"For the past year I've noticed an increasing amount of "disappearances". All people that I believe can be traced back to Tyler in some way or another. Of course, I never had enough proof to put together something solid, but I believe that those people were killed because they had either out-lived their usefulness, or had tried to turn on Tyler."
John's brow rose a fraction. "So you think Tyler fed them to Buddy?"
"I don't think it's quite that simple. Tyler doesn't have any moral qualms about killing. It's what makes him so unpredictable. He doesn't need Buddy to do his dirty work. Especially if he knows that by doing his dirty work, he's compromising his second in command's abilities. Becoming addicted to the meat of a human is like a human becoming addicted to heroin. Except this isn't something you can get better from. There's no such thing as detox for man-eaters."
"What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that I think Tyler knew his friend was addicted, and he was trying to save him in the only way he knew how. By delaying the inevitable outcome by supplying him with the "fixes" that could potentially buy him some more time. He knew Buddy would become unstable if he started to attack and feed upon random targets. At least with the system of elimination that Tyler had set up, he was able to control Buddy's urge to kill by directing it only towards those Tyler wanted destroyed."
"But then how did Buddy become addicted in the first place?"
Matt shook his head. "I have no idea."
Silence fell uncomfortably between them, and they continued to search the living room. Flipping through the debris in the hopes of finding some little clue on its occupant's whereabouts.
Suddenly John stiffened. Looking around him at the walls. "Matt?"
Matt glanced over at him from where he was rummaging through the closet. Its door swung precariously wide by only one hinge. "What?"
"The blood… the blood in this room…" his voice trailed off as he slowly stood.
Matt put down the pile of crumpled papers he had fetched from the interior of the closet. His attention centering on John. "What about it?"
"There's not enough of it." He finally answered. A look suddenly coming across his features. "There's not enough of it on these walls to warrant this type of smell. Besides…" he turned to look at Matt before finishing. "Isn't the scent of animal blood not supposed to register this strongly while we're still walking around on two legs instead of four?"
Matt stilled. He didn't even have to look in the particular direction to realize where the smell was actually coming from. It was the only room they hadn't made it to yet.
Later on, he wouldn't even remember the trip from the living room to the bedroom's door. He wouldn't even remember John's attempt to tell him to slow down, or his hand turning the knob. He would only remember the pressing need to see what was behind its, oddly enough, unmarked and still soundly closed door. He had to. He could do nothing less.
Even if the sight before him would haunt him for the rest of his life.
He stood in the doorway and stared for a while. Unaware of John's presence at his shoulder, also equally stunned. His brain tried to make sense of what his eyes were trying to tell it to see. It just couldn't understand… and why did it smell so bad? Blood shouldn't smell like that.
But it wasn't just blood rotting in that room. All those things that his mind didn't want to compute, all those lumps and pieces strewn across the mattress and floor and walls… had once been a part of two separate human beings.
Enough. He had seen enough.
"Oh, my God." John uttered under his breath as Matthew turned away. Pulling the door shut behind him to block out the scene. "He gorged himself. He gorged himself and then came back here and… "
"Regurgitated." Matthew finished for him. "He'd eaten more than his stomach could safely hold. More than two stomachs could safely hold."
"We've got to catch him. We've got to stop him before he does this to someone else."
Matt made his way back in to the destroyed living room. "It's too late. Can't you tell? He hasn't been back here since that night. Buddy may be unstable, but he's not stupid. He knew he was going to get caught, and he knows that the only thing left for him now in Wolf Lake is his execution. He ran."
"So what are we supposed to do now?"
"There's nothing we can do. The only one that might be able to track him down is Tyler, but if Tyler had been here than none of this would have happened in the first place. With Tyler controlling his strings, Buddy would have been under control. But now… now he's a loose cannon, and he's out there somewhere... And I pity the next person he hunts."
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Smokey Mountains
She loved the night. Loved to walk along her familiar trails at midnight, and appreciate the wildness thriving around her. She loved to lean against the trunk of a tree and tilt her head back to lose herself in the stars. She'd been doing such things since she was a child, and tonight was no different.
It was close to 2 am in the morning, and she was wide awake. But then, that really wasn't much of a surprise. She had always been very nocturnal. Preferring to sleep during the bright, boring days in favor of spending her time awake during its darkest hours.
Her dark hair swung freely, tangling about her shoulders as she an unrecognizable path that she knew like the back of her hand. Her feet unerringly finding purchase along the steep, rough terrain. She slid through the spaces between trees much older than her, and passed unconcerned wildlife as she stepped over bushes and pressed crooked, low hanging branches out of her way. The wind shifted, blowing across her face. Carrying with it the scent of the night.
And the sound of a gunshot.
Flinching, she jerked her head to the side towards the direction where the jarring sound had come from. Eyes sharpening and once relaxed, serene features hardening with awareness.
These woods, in fact this entire mountain, was protected not only by the government, but also by her. Her resources. Her connections. This place, as well as all the living creatures within it, had become her world. Her home. Her fortress from a life she wanted to forget. A life that wanted to forget her. It was the only place where she felt at peace. The only place where she found comfort.
And the very idea of a hunter poaching illegally on her land was enough to send an uncharacteristic wave of rage through her heart.
Stormy, pale blue-green eyes narrowed to mere slits, and she altered her path. Quickly, quietly making her way over the crest of the mountain towards her destructive trespasser.
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John stood about fifteen feet away from what used to be Buddy's porch. Waiting grimly for Matt to complete his task inside and leave. Finally, he did.
"Are we finished here?"
Matt made his way over the rickety porch. Boot heels clicking across the brittle wood. Empty gasoline container held in one hand. He stepped off the porch and then stopped. Turning back around to face the cabin while he produced a match from his pocket.
Lighting it, he flicked it back into the house along with the empty container through the yawning front door. And was rewarded with the resulting 'whoosh' of the flames as the lit match caught on the accelerant.
"We're finished."
John turned to look at Matt, and Matt, sensing his gaze, met it levelly with one of his own. They didn't speak for a moment, and only the sound of the fire racing through the small cabin and licking along its interior heavy in the late afternoon hour.
"Go on home to your wife, John." Matt finally said. "There's nothing else we can do here."
John's eyes went back to the cabin, the heat coming off of it incredibly overwhelming. After a few minutes of watching the flames as they began to swallow up the outside, he turned away. Disappearing into the forest as he did as Matt had instructed, and made his way home. His thoughts already turning to his pregnant mate who was surely waiting for him to return.
Matt didn't leave. Not even when the fire finally became a hungry, raging entity that lit the destroyed cabin into a torch. Thick black choking smoke trailing into the dusky sky as the heat from the fire radiated off of it. Causing beads of sweat to roll down the sides of his temples and soak into the back of his shirt. The scent of the smoke burning the back of his throat a relief from the lingering scent of other bloodier, meatier things. Things that he knew better than to try and label as the bits and pieces of what had once been two human beings.
And he had just become a part in covering up their hideous murder, while the one responsible had slipped out of his grasp and into an ignorant world of so many humans to feed upon. A world where people disappeared everyday, never to be found alive or dead again.
And for an addicted Skinwalker who would never be able to stop himself from stalking and killing and gorging, it was the perfect hunting grounds. A paradise for a creature never meant for the light of day.
Matt remained until it was safe to go, and then, only then did he leave when the cabin had been reduced to a fiery, collapsing pile of refuse. Submerging its secrets in the glowering embers, turning them into ash.
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She listened carefully from behind the trunk of a tree while the drunken hunter stumbled about clumsily. Miraculously maintaining his footing as he tripped over exposed roots, and slid down various embankments. Cursing loudly as bushes and brambles snagged his clothes and scratched his skin. Searching for his prize.
She knelt close to the ground, her body as still as the surrounding outcroppings of rock. Eyes narrowed, she watched him pause long enough to take another swig of the nondescript bottle clasped in his beefy hand. The other hand carelessly clutching a rifle. He swayed precariously on his feet. The smell of spilt alcohol apparent on his clothes even from where she hid.
Apparently having drained the bottle, he let out another slurred obscenity and hurled the bottle. It smashed into the side of a tree about five feet away from him. Shards of glass twinkling in the muted light of the night sky. She made herself even smaller. Curling in on herself to even further lessen the chances of being exposed. Although she doubted he would even be able to see her if she stood up and did the hula, judging by his inability to even make out the trees and bushes directly around him before smacking into them.
But he was still armed. And as long as he was armed, he was dangerous and unpredictable.
He was looking for whatever it was he had shot, and wasn't having much success. But if the dead or wounded animal was still in the general area, then it was only a matter of time before he found it, if by no other way then simply falling on top of it. But she couldn't do anything to stop him, unless he put that firearm down.
No sooner though had that grim thought crossed her mind, that the ridiculously drunken redneck decided that he suddenly wanted to take a nap. His loud, heavy breathing echoing in the surrounding threes as he literally dropped where he stood. The rifle rolling harmlessly away from his hand to rest in the crushed leaves a few inches away.
Slowing unfolding herself, she warily made her way towards him. Wanting to get her hands on that rifle before she attempted to look around for whatever it was that he had shot. She didn't want him waking up and mistaking her for his wounded game.
She wrinkled her nose as she got closer. Not even wanting to distinguish what the other smells present under the liquor were.
Leaning down to pick up the fallen rifle, she was rewarded with an obnoxious snort and a hideous whiff of what the passed out cretin's breath smelled like.
Fighting back a gag, she quickly stepped away while the hunter remained comatose. She turned and threw the rifle as hard as she could into the forest. Allowing the underbrush to swallow it up. Then, and only then did she ignore sleeping beauty, and start to look around for signs of life.
She didn't have to look long. Just as she had feared the intoxicated hunter would just moments ago, she practically tripped over it. Coming to a halt, she stared down, lips parting, at the ground in front of her feet, hardly daring to believe her eyes.
It was a wolf, pale in color, and soaked in blood. It was visibly struggling to breath, although it didn't appear to be conscious.
Kneeling down, she looked closer at the wound. Her mouth forming a grim line. Wolves had supposedly been extinct in these parts, although there had been a few times in the past where she believed she had heard them. There had once upon a time been a rehabilitation and breeding organization that had wanted to bring wolves back into this region, but the locals had complained. Stopping the project dead in its tracks. As far as anyone knew, the animals had been recaptured and taken somewhere else. But she had always wondered if they had gotten every single one.
She now had her answer.
Knowing that it was probably a lost cause, knowing that he wouldn't live long enough to see the sun again., she still peeled off her coat to wrap around the large furry body as a temporary gurney. She looked over her shoulder, calculating the distance to be about ten minutes from here to her cabin if she stuck to the deer trail. She looked back down at the wolf. Fingers lingering in the soft, thick fur and coming away sticky with warm blood.
She didn't know if she should continue on with this course of action. It was probably going to rank up there with one of the stupidest things she'd ever done, but she wasn't going to leave him here. If there was any chance at all she could save it, she had to act quickly while there was still something left to save.
Pulling a bandana out of her back pocket, she secured it tightly around the animal's muzzle, just in case, and slowly, carefully, slid her arms underneath and hoisted it up. Muscles along her thighs and arms rippling from the effort to balance close to a hundred pounds of almost dead weight.
Forcing her lungs to take in deep breaths despite the pressure of the animal held tightly to her chest, and praying that her physical training would see her through this, she began her walk home. The sensation of hot blood soaking into her clothes and sliding over her arms providing her with all the urgency she needed in ordered to keep holding on, keep walking…
Keep breathing.
Because she knew if she stopped long enough to try and catch her breath, the creature in her arms would die.
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End of Episode #26, "Can't Have Just One"
First Part of Episode #27, "Nature of the Beast", coming soon...