Wings of Blood and Cruelty
A Hemlock Grove fanfic by Glamoured By-Eric
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.-Friedrich Nietzsche
Chapter 4 - Sweet Escape
The chunky deputy who went by the handle 'Neck,' still smarting over the fact that somehow Roman Godrey had forced him to eat his own gun, was parked near the entrance to the cemetery, drinking a cup of coffee and munching on a tuna sandwich. He jumped when he heard the shots, causing him to spill some of the coffee into his lap.
"Dammit!" he exclaimed, setting the cup in his cup holder.
Neck grabbed his radio. "Unit three to dispatch, shots fired in the vicinity of the cemetery! I repeat shots fired! Send backup now!"
Former sheriff Tom Sworn's rifle was empty, and the creature was nearly out of the grave, seemingly unaffected by the bullets.
"Fuck me," he said, pulling his handgun out of the waistband at his back and started running across the cemetery in the direction of the Godrey family tomb, still carrying his empty rifle.
Standing on her hind legs, the werewolf shook herself to shed some of the dirt and turned her eyes toward the retreating man who had attacked her. She hesitated for a moment unsure of whether to give chase on four legs or two. She stretched up on her hind legs, and called out her eerie howl again, with her head to the sky. Lowering her front legs to the ground, she began to close the distance, zooming in on her prey.
Hearing the snarling behind him, Tom didn't dare look back. His heart was pumping fast, making him wish he'd lost about thirty pounds instead of only five, and his lungs felt like they were on fire and weren't getting the vital oxygen that his body required. He felt his legs about ready to give out on him when he reached the tomb... and found it locked.
"Dammit!"
Knowing he'd never make the distance to the sanctuary or his purloined vehicle, Tom did the only thing he could do. Placing his handgun back in his pants, he climbed the nearest maple tree, struggling a bit because he still had the rifle. He'd kept it to use if blunt force was needed.
The werewolf had reached Tom by then and swiped her claws at him as he ascended the tree, hooking one of them onto his boot.
Tom cried out as he felt himself unable to move further. He hooked his remaining leg around a branch and used the butt of the rifle to hit the werewolf. She snarled and then sniffed his leg as some distant memory of another time and place overwhelmed her. Looking up in confusion, yet still smarting from the butt to the head, she pulled his leg down more and licked the skin of his leg that was exposed. Tom hit her again, and she bit him above the boot line.
Screaming at the sudden pain in his leg, Tom hit the werewolf again to try to loosen its grip on him.
A scream sounded as Neck reached the scene and saw the former sheriff trying to escape the most hideous creature he'd ever beheld.
"Good God! The demon dog," he muttered to himself as he watched the thing latch onto Tom's leg.
When he pulled his sidearm from its holster and fired at it, it hadn't even occurred to him that it might come after him until it was too late.
Neck watched what he had named the demon dog as it released Tom's leg, fixed its gaze on him and snarled. He promptly pissed himself as Tom yelled, "Run, dammit, run!"
As night fell on Saturday, Roman was sitting in the parlor holding Michelle as she slept peacefully in his arms. He was in awe of his own daughter and how beautiful she was to him. So like her mother Letha.
Norman walked into the room with a sifter of brandy and sat down next to Roman and turned slightly so that he was facing him. "Now that we are alone, would you care to explain to me how Michelle is your daughter, Roman? How could you possibly fuck my daughter, your own cousin?"
Knowing this was coming eventually, Roman's stomach tightened as he looked sideways at the stony face of his uncle. "My mother has this ability, Norman. She can make you do things that you don't want to do and then she can make you forget you have done them. She did that to me and Letha."
He threw Letha in there as well because he didn't want to reveal that he also had his mother's ability.
"Let me get this straight. You are blaming your mother for you impregnating my daughter and having her lie to us saying that an angel was the father? What kind of a fool do you take me for?"
"I'm telling you the truth. My mother isn't what she seems. You can't look her in the eyes or she will take away your free will. She's been doing it to me for years!"
"Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?" scoffed Norman.
"It's true. Every word of it. She only revealed it to me last night, and what those revelations were, made me ill, Norman. I loved Letha; she was my cousin. I've always been protective of her. Yet the past few months, I never knew why I was suddenly so jealous of her with other men, even Peter, until now. It was because we had been closer than I knew, and the thought still sickens me. The only good that came from it was Michelle."
"Roman, I have loved your mother since before you were born. Olivia would never do something like that to me or to you."
"Just how would you know if she had? You wouldn't remember unless she wanted you to."
"She loves me too, Roman."
"Love? My mother doesn't know the meaning of the word. She drove my father to suicide. I was there that night. I saw it. She's sick, so I sent her away. She's gone. She won't be back."
"Where did she go?"
"To hell for all I care. She won't be back."
"I don't know if I can ever forgive you as it stands. If you hadn't knocked Letha up, she would still be around," said Norman.
"You think I don't know that? How that makes me feel? I loved her too. I'll never forgive my mother for this or myself for being too weak to resist her mind control!" Roman castigated himself.
As a thought occurred to him he said, "Ask yourself this, Uncle Roman. What did my mother stand to gain by eliminating Letha from the picture? I can hazard a guess. If, as you say, you and my mother have loved each other since before I was born, then what was keeping you with Aunt Marie? My father has been dead since I was a small child. Letha was keeping you at Marie's side. My fondness for Letha was keeping me from being solely my mother's. Letha was in the way. A threat."
"So, now you are asking me to believe that your mother also orchestrated Letha's death? That's ridiculous!"
"Is it? I wouldn't put anything past her. You never saw how cruel she was with Shelley. Belittling her. Making her cry. You weren't here. You didn't know how she could be. You've seen only what she wanted you to see."
"Here's what I see, Roman. I see a young man that doesn't want to face what he's done and is looking for someone to blame. I think losing Letha has started you spiraling down into a delusional state, and that you should come to the hospital with me for observation until you are feeling more like yourself."
"So what. So you can get custody of Michelle? That's not going to happen. She's my daughter."
"Would you agree to a paternity test so that we can establish that she is yours?"
"Sure. Whatever it takes. But you aren't locking me up with the nut jobs at the freak farm."
"Would you go to counseling if I recommended someone to you?"
"Would that make you feel more comfortable?"
"It would."
"I'll think about it," replied Roman.
As the deputies and feds arrived at the cemetery, their eyes met a grizzly sight. Neck was lying on the ground with his left arm torn off and his entrails spilling out of his middle. He was still gurgling blood from his mouth when they gathered around him while the rest fanned out in search mode. Neck breathed in his last breath.
A shout of, "Over here," had a number of them quickly following the voice.
Their flashlights found former sheriff Tom Sworn unconscious about a third of the way up a tall maple with blood streaming down his leg. After calling rescue, and with some considerable effort, they had him in the ambulance, cuffed to the gurney, and left for the hospital.
The EMT's noted a pink substance in the wound and took a swab for the emergency room doctor before they wrapped the leg tightly to keep him from bleeding out further before they arrived at their destination. They also started an IV drip to keep him hydrated and kept track of his vitals. Temperature was 99.8 degrees Fahrenheit. Pulse was 72 and regular. Blood pressure was 150/90 mm Hg, and his respiratory rate was 18.
In the emergency room, Tom seized as the doctor's went to work on him. Finally getting him stabilized, they cleansed the leg, obtaining more samples of the substance, sent them to the lab for analysis, and took him to surgery to repair the worst of the damage. After surgery, he continued to have mild seizures which perplexed the medical staff.
Through this all, a bruised Chin gritted his teeth anxiously awaiting Tom to regain consciousness so he could question him, ignoring the government agents milling around the lobby. The medical examiner and the ER doctor both confirmed that the attacks were made by an animal and that the strange substance was found on both Neck's body and Tom's leg as yet to be determined as they were awaiting lab reports.
Earlier Roman had given Michelle back to Amanda. They were still working on getting the nursery set up so Amanda was keeping her in a bassinet in her room until it was ready.
Roman didn't trust himself to be around her any longer as his stomach was growling with unusual hunger that was making him shake all over and look at his daughter as if she were a tasty side of bacon.
Downstairs Roman was ravenous so he visited the kitchen. Their cook, Conchita, had gone shopping and had stocked the refrigerator earlier that day. He bent over to see what she had purchased. He found himself especially drawn to the bloody meat in the butcher paper much like Peter had in the days before. He sat down at the table, unwrapped the paper and began to lick the blood from the meat. His fangs dropped down, and he tore into the meat, devouring it all in no time at all. Afterwards, he felt sick to his stomach but managed to keep it down.
"Is this my life now, Mother? The blood? The hunger? You should have prepared me instead of trying to control me!" he said aloud to the ceiling as his shoulders shook with emotion.
Dr. Johann Pryce visited the morgue that night planning to gloat over Olivia's corpse. Much to his surprise, her drawer was open, and her body was missing.
"Well, that's most unfortunate," was all he had to say before he tore the door clean off its hinges.
AN:
If this was an episode of Hemlock Grove, this would play through the credits. Imagine Dragons - Demons