Demon Driven (11 page)

It’s a fact of life that older weres and
vamps heal faster than newbies. George couldn’t keep up.

His blows grew feeble and finally, I threw
him down in disgust. Now he lay on his side, panting, and instead
of a growl, he let out a whimper. A whimper! Like a lost puppy, hit
by a car.

That whimper cut through the blackness like a
razor, cut straight to observer-me. Cut me to the core.

I
was back in control, the rage
snuffed and shoved away, locked down by my self-disgust. My job was
to put down a rogue. That’s it. Clean, precise, merciful. This was
nothing like merciful. I had never even grabbed silver. No, my
intent, it seems, had been to beat the poor, insane, desperate,
man-creature in front of me to death with my hands.

The yellow light of insanity dimmed in his
eyes, leaving a very human-looking pupil in an oversized socket.
That eye, light blue in color, begged for release. Release from the
pain, release from the madness, release before he could murder.

The silver dart found its way into my hand
without thought, and I approached him with my side turned away to
hide it. He focused on me, his eye hopeful, and when I slid the
needle through the back of his skull, he didn’t seem to feel it.
But as the light faded from his gigantic eye, the look changed from
begging for release, to pity. Pity for me.

I turned my head and puked.

Chapter 13

“
My secret side I keep hid
under lock and key. I keep it caged, but I can’t control it, ‘cause
if I let him out, he’ll tear me up, break me down…”-
Skillet

I returned to the campsite, unsure of what I
would find or not find. The young guy was still lying on the
ground, hopefully just knocked out. The girl had found a flashlight
and was shining it about, trying to find the monsters in the dark.
It suddenly struck me that she had had to listen to unholy combat,
completely unable to see what was happening. Her heart was beating
as fast as a scared rabbit, but she wasn't panicking and when she
pinned me with the bright beam of her light, I decided she wasn't
very rabbit-like.

“Do you mind? The light?” I asked, keeping my
voice low and quiet.

She dropped the beam to my chest and legs,
giving me a chance to get my first good look at her. It was quite a
look. She was naked except for a pink thong, and not especially
aware of it.

Some people will run out of a burning house
with nothing on and not be aware of it for a while. This was
different. She wasn't so much unaware of her lack of clothes as she
was unconcerned. Her eyes were wide and green, alert and nervous,
but not blank with shock or catatonic with fear the way most people
would be after an experience like that.

Her hair was platinum blond, as were her
eyebrows and it looked to be her natural color. Her face was
beautiful, with the smooth perfection of the young. I put her age
at seventeen or eighteen. Pixie-like features. Her body, well, her
body was a problem in and of itself.

Very few people should go naked. I'm sorry,
but that's just how it is. All that crap about the body is a
beautiful thing in all its shapes, forms and ages is just that –
crap! Now, of course, if you're gonna seek out people who look good
naked, girls in her age range are prime candidates. But this girl
was another level or three altogether. Let me put it this way: if
the United States had an Olympic naked team, this girl would be a
captain.

In addition to her naked beauty, she also had
a bleeding wound on her left calf, with a werewolf-sized tooth
puncture right in the middle. My focus, which had been decidedly
distracted, suddenly snapped back to a sharp point. I re-looked at
her wound with my Sight, and found it crawling with green. The LV
virus liked her, no, scratch that, it adored her.

Immediately, a dozen things ran through my
head. Primary was the image of this girl in a cage, deep in an
underground government lab, mad as a hatter. If Briana Duclair
discovered Miss Soon-to-be Teenaged Werewolf, the girl's life was
over.

I looked her in the eyes.

“What's your name?” I asked, softly.

She licked her lips to wet them, then
answered with only the slightest tremble in her voice.

“S-stacia. Stacia Reynolds,” she said.
“What's your's?”

She wasn't the stereotypical blond
cheerleader type; this girl had cojones.

“I'm Chris. Listen Stacia, we don't have a
whole lot of time before others arrive. I have a lot to tell you
and no time to be delicate about it,” I said. I took out my own
light and lit up the body of poor Mr. Lassiter, who was as he died,
still a werewolf.

“That is a werewolf. A rogue. It bit you and
in one month you'll be a werewolf too.”

“Like that! I'll be like that!” she hissed,
her eyes glistening with moisture and one little tear leaking down
her tan cheek.

I shook my head. “No, not like that. I
guarantee it. He didn’t have anyone to guide him. You will have the
best of help, you'll be guided through it and you'll be fine!”

I realized that I meant every word of it. If
I had to move the planet, I would get this girl the help of the
most powerful weres in this part of the world. And she would make a
great wolf, because the virus fit her like a glove. I had screwed
things up enough, this I would make this right.

I explained how I would get her help, and
what would happen when the feds arrived. That she couldn't let them
know she had been bit and not to trust them. As I spoke I looked at
her wound, almost in a panic about how to hide it, but then the
knowledge came to me. It was like something unfolded in my head,
sort of unpacked itself, and then I was reaching for her calf with
both hands. I put my right palm over her wound, my left at the
other side and I poured clean violet power through her leg, telling
her cells what I expected of them.

She jumped a little as I did it, and when I
pulled my hand away, the wound was gone, just pink skin. I wiped
off the blood, both hers and mine where it had dripped down my arms
from my own now healed wounds, using an antiseptic towelet from my
vest.

“Now, I need your help with two things,” I
said, swiping my hair with a shaky hand. “First, I need you to get
dressed, ‘cause you’re distracting as hell, and second, where are
those hot dogs I smell?”

* * *

The others arrived fifteen minutes later, the
result of my radio call to Gina. The Blackhawk swooped in low
overhead and five ropes dropped, followed by five bodies
fast-roping down. It would have been an impressive display, but
it's hard to be impressed when you, yourself can just jump the
twenty feet to the ground.

The five strike team members fanned out,
rifle lights lit and shining in every direction, looking for
threats.

The black SUVs roared up thirty seconds
later, followed by the state trooper cars, and another fifteen or
so agents, weapons at the ready.

I was kneeling by the fire, roasting the last
two hot dogs. Stacia and her boyfriend, whose name was Dan, were
sitting on the remains of the tent a few feet away. Dan had some
cooler ice in a towel and was holding it to the egg-sized knot on
his forehead. Stacia was sitting a little apart from him, her
watchful gaze finally lifted from me and now on the dog and pony
show.

Agent Duclair stormed up in federal fury,
planting herself, hands on hips, on the other side of the fire from
me. Gina was moving more sedately behind her. Adler went straight
for Lassiter's remains, a half dozen CSI types on his heels.

“Explain!” Duclair demanded.

“Well, the hotdog rolls are all gone and
these are the last of the franks. Why do they always give you eight
rolls and ten hotdogs? It's criminal, really,” I said.

She froze, unable to work up words, just this
side of a really decent sputter.

The girl, Stacia, answered my question.

“It's economics. If you never have the same
amount of rolls or dogs, you'll have to keep buying one or the
other. Unless you buy five packs of rolls and four packs of
hotdogs, then you'll be even,” she said.

I glanced at her, surprised. My contact
information as well as Afina's, were in the girl's back jeans
pocket. The cell reception at this campground was adequate and I
had called in every favor I had with the Pack. Stacia had even
spoken a bit with Afina , and the Pack would do absolutely
everything in its considerable power to make her transition to her
new life smooth. But it was her calm, almost eager acceptance of
this major life change that was unnerving. Perhaps it was the
invitation from Afina to come to the Big Apple and work directly
for the Pack while she learned their ways. Aside from her beauty,
clear head and obvious intelligence, Stacia Reynolds did not appear
to have much in the way of material things. Her clothes were clean,
but worn and not the latest fashion or even last year’s fashion. I
don't think her family had much money, but we hadn't gotten to
that.

* * *

Duclair could finally form sentences.

“What happened to the wer...bear?” she
hissed, glancing at the teenagers as she covered her slip.

“It died,” I said with a shrug.

“HOW did it die?” she asked, her eyes bugging
out a bit.

“Well, I encouraged it to.” I answered,
pulling a greasy dog off the stick and eating it in two bites,
while I watched her.

Gina had moved up and was studying me
carefully and I felt surprisingly uncomfortable under her gaze. She
always stared at me, it was her job. But I was feeling soul sick
and lower than pond scum.

Duclair was just about to rip into me at the
loss of her hoped for lab project, when Adler moved up to her and
whispered in her ear. Didn't matter, I could still hear him.

“
Ma'am, before you go…ah…expressing your
opinion of him, you should maybe consider this: he just ran down
and beat a werewolf to death with his bare hands.”

Her eyes widened as she took that in and she
turned to him.

“You sure?”

“
That's how it appears to the techs,
Ma'am. And I agree.”

Her eyes turned thoughtful as she turned back
to me. I didn't much care for her expression. It would seem that
the cat and its bag were miles apart.

Abruptly, she turned and strode toward the
were, with a “Show me!”

A couple of EMT types went to the teenagers
to check them out, quickly concentrating on the wounded boy. Gina
stepped up as I ate the final hotdog.

“You – outta that vest! Let's see the
damage.” she commanded.

I wiped my greasy fingers on my pants and
stood up, unbuckling the vest with my other hand. I shrugged out of
it and then at her gesture, stripped off my shredded tee shirt.
This is pretty standard for cases where physical contact has
occurred, but she has yet to find an unhealed injury on me. I was
aware of a whole lot of faces turned our way. I'm pretty freaky
looking in clothes, with my shirt off I'm worse. At first glance an
observer would notice that I'm ripped, like a bodybuilder just
before competition. But closer inspection will show something is
off, at least if you know your anatomy. My muscles are arranged
just ever so slightly differently, the attachments and insertions
just a bit off, one of the V-squared’s little gifts.

I don't like it, so I keep my shirt on
whenever possible. Sometimes I can’t help it.

Stacia was obviously getting an eyeful, but
she had barely taken her eyes off me since the fight. I couldn't
blame her; some guy beats a mythical monster to death almost in
front of you and laughs while doing so. Then he tells you that
you're gonna become one too. You might wanna keep an eye on that
dude.

Aside from her, the entire strike team and
most of the techs were staring as well. I ignored them all. I had
something important to address.

“Gina, you have a plan, don't you? You and
Lydia?” I asked, softly.

She stopped her damage assessment and looked
at me carefully.

“What are you talking about, Chris? What kind
of plan?”

“You know, like this,” I waved my hand at
Lassiter's body. “For when I...you know?”

“No Chris, I don't know. For when you
what?”

“For when
I
go rogue! For when I go
bad...worse. Gina, tell me you have a plan to put me down!”

She took a deep breath. “What happened,
Chris? Why do you think you'll go bad?”

My freakin' voice shook like a
ten-year-old's.

“This...all this..it shouldn't have happened
the way it did. And I shouldn't have handled it the way I did. It's
wrong Gina ... I'm wrong.”

“Well, Chris, you didn't have a firearm. So
you had to go close quarters.”

I shook my head vehemently, “Not like this! I
could have thrown a spike through his head at fifty feet! Did I?
No, I beat that poor, miserable, half-mad bastard to death with my
hands and I enjoyed it!”

She stood back and crossed her arms. Then she
nodded, as if to herself. Finally she spoke and I was dreading her
words. But they weren't what I expected.

“Chris, do you remember last Halloween?” she
asked.

I frowned. “Of course!”

“Do you remember getting a hypodermic full of
demon blood?” she asked.

Now I rocked back, surprised.

“I didn't know that Lydia shared that with
you.”

“Chris, Lydia and I get along so well because
we share a vision. That vision centers on you and Tatiana, and it
transcends our jobs!” she said.

“What? Okay, you've already lost me.”

“Lydia has always known that Tatiana was
destined for something big. When you came into the picture, she
knew pretty quickly what it was.
I
have known that you were
destined for something special since I saw you go into a
demon-ridden house and eradicate one of the worst I'd even seen,”
she said, her voice a whisper, “So, the answer is yes, we discuss
the two of you all the time, and, yeah, I know about the demon
blood,” she said.