Summer, July 5th 2035, Thursday – i-15 North
3:30 PM
It was a busy day on i-15, the highway Roxanne was driving on earlier, more and more cars headed Northbound towards Salt Lake City. From the forest nearby a half synthetic flesh, half animatronic beast was watching patrons through it's heads up display at the rest stop that Roxanne, Gregory and Chica were at earlier. It clicked it's jaws dying for it's next meal and a chance to recharge it's internal battery.
It's AI software was primitive, still in it's Alpha stages of development, but had enough basic functions programmed in it's OS to make sure it took any steps it needed to carried out it's programmed mission. A mission Silver Parasol built this creature for, but would never admit to the public. To hunt down and kill a boy and his two animatronic protectors.
"Grrrrr…." It growled from behind the trees.
A man was coming out to his parked SUV in front of the rest center. There was no other cars in the parking lot. He was bringing out to go bags of food for his wife and 3 children. The beast used it's nasal sensors, an improved version of Roxanne Wolf's nasal sensors built using stolen schematics. It could smell the freshly cooked beef in the bags, and coming from the smoke stack of the rest stop center. But it also could smell the humans in the area.
The Twisted creature was not picky about where it got it's next meal, cooked or raw.
It also…smelled the child it has been looking for. Normally it preferred to hunt in the quiet of the night, but it needed food for it's experimental nanomachine enhanced stomach and a way to recharge it's battery.
Time to make the move.
It leaped out of the forest into the parking lot starling the man. It stood on it's massive tree trunk legs in a digitigrade stance, the creature appeared to be 12 feet tall in total height when it wasn't on all four's.
"Please…please get away!" The man said backing up to his vehicle, his back to it. His wife saw what was happening and stepped out of the car with pepper spray in hopes of stunning the creature long enough to leave.
Twisted Wolf inhaled the pepper spray and shot it back out it's nostrils into the woman's face, while he barred a toothy grin on his face. Her own pepper spray burned her eyes distracting her. He then slashed at her with his 12 inch claws tearing her stomach open with her insides spilling out. The kids in the car screamed in horror. The father dropped the bag of beef burgers and managed to get a baseball bat from his son whose window was open on the driver side. The man attempted to beat the creature, to no avail as he was backhanded by the wolf landing on the ground with a solid thud injuring his lower back. The wolf approached him with saliva dripping from it's maw. But it took the bag of burgers on the ground and tossed it into the air letting it land in it's mouth with a solid closing of it's jaws, thoroughly enjoying it's meaty goodness. He then turned his attention to the man again, while his kids shouted at it telling it to leave their father alone, one of the kids was holding a smartphone and attempting to call 911 and the wolf's HUD informed him of this, he turned away from the dad, now pleading for him to leave his children alone. It took the child with the cellphone and ripped him out of the vehicle sending him flying into the woods after crushing the cellphone on the pavement. Someone was just walking out of the rest stop as the wolf then flipped the SUV over with it's brute strength. It then crushed the vehicle killing it's occupants. It saw the person run back inside with another cellphone. Too bad for them, the wolf smelled the scent of it's target coming from inside the building and that's where it was headed next once it was done with dad.
It lifted the man up with both it's hands around him, licked it's lips, then opened it's large muzzle and then proceeded to devour him like a fresh hot pocket.
The few staff inside the building stared at the scene out the window barricading the front door and back door to the building. There was other cars on the highway near the rest stop, but the parking lot was out of view from the highway hidden behind the building, where the front entrance was. The building was designed in a way that it was the reverse.
It tossed the body at the window like a ragdoll after it was eaten down to the waist. This broke the window and terrified staff. The wolf made a blood curdling roar then made it's way to the entrance making out heat signatures of the humans inside on it's HUD.
3 New Targets Identified
New Secondary Directive Received: TERMINATE INCIDENT WITNESSES
The staff prayed state police would arrive on time or that more cars would make a pit stop.
But no one answered them.
Twisted Wolf surprised them by breaking down the back entrance to the building, he could smell the child he seeks. At first everyone paused and the wolf didn't pay much attention to them, focused on the smell of a nearby table next to a vending machine. The same table Roxanne, Chica and Gregory were sitting at hours earlier. A staff member, a young man, tried to play hero by throwing hot grease from the kitchen on Twisted Wolf. He did not feel pain but this did was anger him. The wolf picked him up by his neck bit into the top of his head taking a chunk of his skull and brain, then spat the contents at the countertop where a young girl another staff member looked on in fear. She ran for the front door, in hopes of getting away from the rest stop and the creature. She made it to the open back door behind feeling something stab into her from behind her back, Twisted Wolf managed to get his talons through her back and out her chest, she died instantly. He tossed the body at a nearby wall.
One more staff person was cowering behind the counter under it, still hidden from the creature. This was the woman who served Roxanne, Chica and Gregory earlier. Their smiling faces will be the last friendly faces she might see today or ever. Her friends were dead, she was the last one and had no plan to try to figure out how to escape the creature without being seen.
She peaked out briefly to see the wolf picking up an power cord from the vending machine and biting into it, and rather then a large electrical arc emitting, it made a light hum as Twisted Wolf's batteries were being charged back to max rather quickly. The wolf closed it's eyes almost feeling euphoria from the charge cycle.
The woman slowly made her way to the back door trying not to make a sound as she steps over the body of her co-worker. She could hear the creature still making pleasurable growls behind her, it hasn't noticed yet.
She made it outside and ran into her car, a 2035 Nissan Altima. She just might be able to get away, putting the keys into the ignition. However the sound of the car staring got Twisted Wolf's attention. It leaped out of the open back door, running on all fours towards her car.
She put it in gear.
"Eat this bitch." As she floored it ramming the creature with her car sending it to the ground.
She put it in reverse then forward again, making her way out of the parking lot and onto the on ramp back onto the highway, lucky to get away from the creature as it started getting back up, just as she saw blue and red lights near the rest stop making it's way in.
