Chapter Seven: The caern and the mill
The sun rose the next morning and they were up with it. The first few hours of daylight were spent bonding items of clothing to Garrett's body, so they wouldn't rip off when he shifted. They wouldn't show up on his body while in his other forms, but would reappear on him when he shifted down to Homid or Sokto.
They got a bite to eat and prepared to set off for Potter's Mill.
The trip was fairly short and uneventful. They made it to Potter's Mill around lunch time. Both of them were hungry, so they decided to stop in a little diner called Suzie's, just inside of town.
They walked into the establishment and sat down in a booth. They ordered lunch and soon, it was laid out before them. John eyed his food with hunger and went to take a bite. Garrett stopped him before the fork could reach his mouth.
"You don't want to do that," Garrett said, pushing John's fork back down to the plate.
"Why not?" John asked, puzzled.
"Can't you smell it?"
John, paying a little more attention now, inhaled deeply as his eyes widened slightly.
"This shit is tainted," he whispered across the table.
Garrett nodded and looked around the diner. So many people must come in here on a regular basis and have no idea what they're doing to themselves he thought. The food was corrupted with Wyrm energy.
Then, something caught his eye.
Two men were seated in a booth near the door. Both of them had a sallow look to them, both dressed head to toe in greasy black leather. The diner smelled of Wyrm taint but these two reeked of it.
Garrett and John observed them inconspicuously as they conversed among themselves. Neither of the men noticed that they were being watched. They might not have even cared.
"I'll see if I can't get a little closer and see what they're talking about," John said as he got up from the booth. Thankfully, the bathrooms were situated by the door, not far from where the two men were sitting.
As John passed by, he listened in as closely as he could on their conversation.
"Everything seems to be going according to plan. Now that we got rid of the last of those bitches, the mill can get back to business."
"But how are we going to catch that little bastard when we can't even find him?"
"I already told you ... if we keep up what we're doing, we'll have him without a chase."
John walked on by and pretended to use the bathroom. He came back to the table as the two unsavory men paid for their meal and walked out, riding away on loud Harley Davidson motorcycles.
John relayed the information to Garrett. They discussed their next move and decided to check out the mill later on that night. It was apparently the biggest source of corruption.
Now they needed to find the caern.
They paid their tab and walked out of the diner.
After getting in the truck, they drove around, finding a good place to park near the Potter's Mill Hotel. They got out and headed into the wood line.
When the dense foliage concealed them from prying eyes, the shifted to their feline forms to get a better feel for their surroundings. The scent of blood was soon picked up and they followed through the woods. A clearing in the trees opened up to them after a few thousand yards of tracking. There was a large blue standing stone in the center. Suddenly Garrett and John both knew exactly where they were. Though the place was thick with the smell of blood, the trail didn't end here.
On the other side of the clearing, they found the end of the blood trail. A black wolf lay tucked away in a patch of tall grass. Blood oozed from many wounds on her body. As the two pumas drew near, she opened her eyes and looked at them.
She drew a labored breath and spoke. "Oh great," she said in the speech of the changing breeds. "Not only is it two cats that finally come to our aid, but they're males as well."
"You're wounded," Garrett replied. "Let me help you."
The werewolf growled. "I don't need any help … from a male."
John broke his silence. "Regardless of his gender, if you don't let us help you, you're going to die."
She directed her eyes toward John and narrowed them. "I was already dead before you arrived," she managed to say before coughing up blood. "My whole pack is dead. We fended them off as long as we could, but it was no use. Now our caern will fall to the Wyrm."
"Not yet it won't," Garrett said. "There is still hope. We will do everything we can to keep this caern under Gaia's control."
She managed a pained laugh. "What can you do?" she asked. "My entire pack went down fighting, how can the two of you really expect to make a difference by yourselves?"
"I don't know," Garrett said, "but if a difference can be made, we will make it."
She looked at Garrett and took another labored breath. "You're serious aren't you?" she asked, as her eyes began to fade. "Find Ursula, she can help you …"
Her eyes lost focus and her breathing ceased as her body shifted to human form. Garrett and John looked at each other and shifted to their Sokto forms to give her a proper burial.
They left the woods in human form, intent on ending the corruption that was plaguing this town.
But for now, they needed accommodations. They were probably going to be here for awhile.
The two drove down to the only hotel in town, the Potters Mill Hotel, owned and operated by Sarah Miller, the mayor. The two entered the hotel to book a room for the next three nights. Upon entering, they noticed a young girl behind the counter. She looked bored.
They procured a room and just out of curiosity, they asked if anyone knew a person named Ursula. All they got were confused looks and shrugged shoulders. It was worth a shot, even though it didn't pan out.
The sun fell and the two Bastet set out for the mill. They proceeded on foot, leaving the truck at the hotel, fearing that it might be identified, putting them at the scene.
The mill loomed over the dark, foggy landscape, a hulking wooden building looking old in some places, new in others. There was a single light in what appeared to be an office on the second floor.
Moving silently, they crept to the door in their Sokto forms, Garrett with his .45, John with a 12 gauge shotgun. They went inside and found the main floor of the mill dark and empty. On the opposite wall, there were stairs leading up and stairs leading down.
They cautiously moved up the stairs, headed for the office where they saw the light. They positioned themselves on either side of the door, waited for a moment, then opened it and moved in quickly, each covering a different angle into the room.
The office appeared empty. A tape player on the desk turned on and began to play when the door was opened.
"Well, this is a pleasant surprise," the voice on the tape said. "You really should visit during normal operating hours, but I know you didn't come here to talk. You are trespassing on private property and are breaking the law. You will now be dealt with in an orderly manner."
They turned from the desk and realized they were no longer alone in the office. Two men, or what used to be men, were moving toward them very slowly. They didn't appear to have many mental functions left. They looked like something out of an old B horror film.
Then from behind the two zombies, a canister sailed through the open doorway and bounced off the floor. It began emitting a thick smoke into the room. The lights went out and a slam was heard as the door was shut.
"Quick!" John shouted. "Cut and run!"
John shifted to his crinos form and leapt at the plate glass window on the other side of the desk. A loud thud was heard as he impacted the double-paned, bullet resistant glass and slid down to the floor. John sat on the floor for a second, shaking the stars out from in front of his eyes.
Garrett also shifted to crinos and charged across the other side of the room, ramming through the door and the Pentex first-teamer on the other side. As he hit the stairs however, the weight of his body was too much for it, sending him crashing through it to the concrete floor below. Shards and splinters from the stairs found their way into the skin of his legs and feet.
Sporadic gunfire was heard as he hit the ground and instinctively rolled to cover under the raised metal walkway.
John also charged for the doorway, but in the dark, missed it slightly. He took a portion of the wall with him as he went. When he cleared the doorway, he reached out in the darkness and found one of his attackers. Still moving for the stairs, he grabbed hold of the man and slung him out over the open main floor where he bounced off the concrete a few times before coming to rest against a large piece of machinery.
John also crashed through what was left of the stairs and came to rest to the concrete floor, making a slightly better landing than Garrett did. Now that he could see, he also ducked under the metal walkway and took cover.
For now, they were relatively safe from the gunfire. Neither side could really make a move without putting themselves in harm's way. John shifted to his sokto form and fired a shot through the floor with the shotgun. It created more problems than it solved. The hole created in the floor was quickly taken up by a gun barrel that sprayed bullets down at them. The two dove out of the way and dashed for a large piece of machinery on the open floor. John dropped the shotgun in the process.
Upon reaching cover, they noticed the man that John had hurled. His body lay crumpled on the ground, but his MP-5 submachine gun lay at John's feet. Not thinking anything of it, he picked it up to lay down some cover fire for their escape. When he did, hundreds of needles popped out of the handle. John winced in pain and struggled to free his hand. When he finally managed to pry it off, Garrett fired some shots at the walkway and they made a run for the door with bullets landing and ricocheting all around them.
John crashed through the door in chatro form and kept on running. He stopped when he reached the road just in time to be blinded by a pair of oncoming headlights. The truck tried to stop in time, but to no avail. It slammed into John and sent him rolling into a ditch by the side of the road. Without thinking, Garrett shifted to crinos, ran up to the truck, opened the door and pulled a man out from behind the steering wheel. He tossed the man some thirty feet before running over to John. He wasn't in great shape. Garrett did his best to half walk, half carry him to the bed of the truck before getting in and speeding off.
Just before getting out of sight of the mill, Garrett heard a shot and looked back to see that a sniper had caught John in the shoulder.
After ditching the truck and letting John heal up a bit, the two made it back to the hotel for some rest and recuperation. It wasn't going well at the moment. Now they had lost the element of surprise.
As Garrett drifted off to sleep, the visions began again.
This time he was in the caern. It looked no different than it did earlier in the day, serene and quiet. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the fox tail dart into the underbrush. He followed it through the woods, always close behind but never catching up. He ended up at a small cave on a hillside. The fox scrambled down into it and Garrett followed as best he could. On into the darkness, he bumped into something large and furry. A set of eyes pierced the darkness and two tremendous paws closed on his shoulders. He felt startled, but not threatened.
Hiseyes opened suddenly and he sat upright in bed. He knew now where to find Ursula and he had a good idea of how she would be able to help them.