Howling Legion (Skinners, Book 2) (5 page)

“More monsters? Do we really need that?”

“These monsters aren’t just new character models. They’re the old monsters that transform into bigger, stronger, or faster ones. It’s a real evolution of the game and it’ll only require a few more animations to go from one to the other. Trust me,” Cole added. “I’ve researched them thoroughly and they’ll kick our players’ asses. I’ve got everything drawn up and laid out as far as how it all fits together. It sounds like a mess right now, but it’ll be so cool.”

“Sounds like it.” This time Jason seemed genuinely pleased.

“But wait,” Cole added in a voice pulled straight from a late night infomercial, “there’s more. I wrote up some tweaks for the now infamous painted hammers that will upgrade the stats.”

“You mean the different colors and handles won’t just be pretty?”

“Nope. I came up with ways to modify the weapons so anyone who bought that first batch of downloadable content will do more damage or get more attacks or even—”

“I get it, Cole. Will it be easy to implement?”

“The changes should just fit right into a patch that—” Knowing Jason was more concerned with the bottom line, Cole cut himself short. “It’ll just be another download. I thought we could make it free as a show of goodwill.”

“And a way to apologize for the first bunch of crap we put on the market.”

“My way didn’t sound so brutal, but yeah.”

“Send what you’ve got as soon as you can,” Jason said.

“I just did. Hopefully this will keep me employed for a little while longer.”

“I wasn’t going to fire you, Cole. Well, not yet anyway. Apart from the whole Hammer Paint fiasco, you’ve been turning in better content than any of our other part-time contractors.”

Part-time contractors. A fancy name for the guys who sent in pages of ideas to get a small commission. He might not have clawed too high up the corporate ladder, but the part-timers didn’t even have a rung. Now it seemed he was down there with them.

As if picking up on the gloom settling in over Cole’s head, Jason asked, “How’s Paige?”

“What was that?”

“Paige. You mentioned her in a few of your other e-mails a while ago. It sounded like she might be something more than just a friend, but you hadn’t quite…you know…sealed the deal.”

Jason was never good at guy talk. He knew the basics, but couldn’t commit enough to the subtle banalities to be truly fluent in the language.

“She’s been kicking my ass,” Cole grumbled.

“I hear you, man. Women.”

“I’m going to stop you before you try to call me bro.”

“That’s probably for the best.” Jason shifted enough to make his chair squeak and then said, “The e-mail just arrived. It looks like some good stuff. Your old job is waiting for you whenever you decide to come back to Seattle, but don’t take advantage of our friendship. Another Hammer Paint fiasco will sink our download division for good.”

“Read through everything I sent you. If you still want to scold me after that, I’ll bend over and take it like a good cell mate.”

Kansas City University of Medicine
Kansas City, Missouri

Lisa Wilson knew better than to walk by herself at night. Not only had her parents drummed that into her head ever since she was young enough to have strangers offer her candy, but she had enough common sense to avoid certain spots after the streetlights came on.

She’d enrolled in the University of Medicine because it was located in a section of town she knew well and, thanks to a few student loans and a partial scholarship, the tuition was within her range. The little apartment she shared with a roommate was a short walk from the university on Highland Avenue, and Lisa knew how to get there without straying into any danger zones.

There were always some potheads hanging out near the buildings between school and home, but they were more hungry than harmful. A few bums shuffled across the street, and Lisa smiled at the dirty, familiar faces. That smile faded a bit when she pointed it at a man slouched against a light pole bordering the parking lot where she kept her red Nissan. The man sat with his skinny legs bent and his lanky arms resting upon his knees. His back was against the pole and the color of his skin made it look as if he’d spent a lot of time under a rock. Lisa politely turned away from him and kept walking.

“Hey,” the man shouted in a guttural English accent. “Got time for a chat?”

Rolling her eyes, she shook her head and kept moving. Between the Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, and countless other religious salesmen roaming the apartment complexes near the university, she’d gotten lots of practice in the art of courteous apathy.

“Hey!”

The sound cut through the air like a shovel that had been swung at the back of her head. It stopped her in her tracks and got her heart racing within her chest. She turned to see what the man was doing and found him standing upright with his back to the light pole, watching her silently. His gleaming eyes looked vaguely attractive, but were framed by a sunken face and a leering smile.

Suddenly, Lisa was very aware of what she was wearing. It was hot and humid, but perhaps the denim shorts she’d chosen were too short. Maybe she’d been stupid to make the walk to her apartment wearing the Kansas City Chiefs shirt that barely made it down to her waist. If she moved in the slightest, her bare belly could be seen, along with the little shamrock tattoo she’d gotten over the last spring break. Nervously fidgeting with her short, light brown hair, she almost ran away. Then she spotted a few of her friends gathered around a white pickup in the nearby parking lot. One of them was a big sports medicine major named Ryan. The other guy was Ryan’s roommate, and he was with a tattooed girl who carried pepper spray in her purse.

“Come here, girlie,” the skinny man by the light pole said. “I got somethin’ for ya.”

She might have been nervous, but she wasn’t going to be abused by some freak on the street. As much as she wanted to give the guy a swift kick, she knew better than to go near him. Instead, she dismissed him with a backward wave and hurried toward her apartment building. “Whatever!”

“What’s the matter, dude? Couldn’t find any hookers to yell at?”

Lisa glanced over her shoulder to find Ryan strutting toward the English accent freak in typical macho fashion:
chest puffed and arms out. She did not usually find that sort of thing appealing, but it was more than welcome now.

“You wanna yell at someone?” Ryan asked. “How about you yell at me?”

Lisa turned around to ask Ryan to walk her to her place. The freak looked even bigger and bulkier now that he was standing up straight. He reached out to grab Ryan’s arm, then pulled it from its socket with a loud crunch. Ryan let out a high-pitched scream, which was immediately washed away by a wail from the freak that seemed like a primal mockery of the younger man’s pain.

The man was even larger than he’d been a second ago, and his clothes were suddenly consumed by a coat of black fur that spewed from his skin. His cheeks were still sunken, but he’d grown a long snout and pointed ears that were flattened in a way far more menacing than Ryan’s puffed chest. The creature that had once been the freakish man opened its mouth and let out a rasping gurgle that almost matched the sound Ryan made after his throat was torn open.

The fatal motion had been so quick that Lisa barely saw it. The creature pulled Ryan closer and then swiped its claws under his chin to send a bloody spray through the air. Once that was done, the only thing left for Ryan to do was bleed. All the while, the creature hacked as if gagging on his own drool.

“Your turn…little lady.”

It leaned forward to step toward her, stretching both arms out before dropping onto all fours. By the time it started running at her, the thing had shifted into a hulking animal with the frame of a wolf but the mass of a bear.

A blanket of cold fear dropped onto Lisa’s shoulders. One of the guys in the parking lot was yelling something but seemed unable to do much else. The girl with the tattoos was fumbling with her cell phone, so Lisa turned and ran.

Highland Avenue felt crooked beneath her feet. Her breath came in quick, frantic gulps. Her ears filled with the churning of the air and the pounding of her heart. When she got to her apartment building, she stuck her hand in her pocket to fish out her key.

If she made it just a little farther, the thick metal of her front door might hold the thing back until the cops could get there. Surely, her friend in the parking lot was calling for help.

The footsteps padding against the concrete behind her seemed light and heavy at the same time, brushing and stomping the ground in a rhythm that blended almost seamlessly with the panicked chorus inside her own body. Little cries fluttered at the top of her windpipe. A strained wheeze rattled within her chest as something pounded against her back.

Then Lisa was shoved face first to the sidewalk as though she hadn’t even been moving. When she tried to crawl away, all she could do was scrape her fingers against the cracked cement and kick one leg against the ground. Her other leg had crumpled beneath her, snapping in three places. Before she could wrap her mind around that, bony spikes stabbed through her shoulder.

The werewolf picked Lisa up as gently as his current form would allow and carried her away so only her heels brushed against the cement. Cars sped toward him, but the creature warned them away by curling his lips up to bare the teeth that were halfway sunken into Lisa’s shoulder. Driving his fangs in deeper and holding her with them, he crouched down and launched himself into the air. Another couple of jumps put a few blocks between himself and Ryan’s bloody remains. The screams were quickly left behind in the short time it took for the creature to find a nice quiet spot at the easternmost end of North Terrace Park.

Dragging Lisa behind a row of trees, he panted anxiously. His breaths churned back and forth like hot wind passing in and out of an old set of bellows. He kept his head low and twitched at every little sound. Then the beast slowly opened his jaws to let her slide off its teeth.

Lisa Wilson was brought back from the edge of unconsciousness when she fell on top of her broken leg. Choking back the agony that came when she moved her arms, she sobbed while trying to pull herself to safety. North Terrace
Park was thicker where it bunched up around North Chestnut Trafficway, but there were usually people hanging out in the thinner section bordering Cliff Drive and Gladstone Boulevard. The trees were thick there as well, providing plenty of natural cover from the few cars and trucks that ambled through the area. But if she could scream, she would be heard by someone.
Anyone.

Only a few feet away, the beast dug into the wet soil. Its tongue lolled out the side of its mouth and its paws tore at the earth in a frenzied blur.

In a short, agonizing chain of motions, Lisa turned away from the creature and filled her lungs. Before she could expel the breath she’d collected, however, it snapped its head down to aim a pair of perfect, multifaceted eyes at her. The teeth it bared were coated in slick layers of her blood. Thick rivers of saliva flowed from its gums.

The warning snarl lessened and its gaze lowered to the cracked bones protruding from her ravaged shoulder. When a sudden, burning stab of pain shot through Lisa’s upper body, the creature cocked its head ever so slightly. After that, it clawed at the ground a few more times to uncover a pit-sized hole that had been hastily covered with chunks of earth.

Just as Lisa was about to pass out, her wounded shoulder was invaded by what felt like two rows of crooked steak knives. Fangs tore through her tender, shredded flesh and sank into the splintered bones below so the beast could lift her from the ground and toss her into the hole with a casual flick of its head.

Lisa was dropped into a pit that reeked of decay and feces, and was shoved inside until the earth pressed against her cheek. At first she thought the shape beneath her was a log. When the log shifted and let out a shuddering breath, she realized her mistake.

She heard the rustling of a thick coat and felt a claw scrape against her face. Although the thick bony finger didn’t move, the claw twisted to curl delicately along her chin. Too weak to protest, she allowed her head to be moved again, and
whimpered at the pain sent through her torso, to die in her numbed legs.

The creature looked down at her. As it drew closer, the black fur covering its face was sucked back into its pores to reveal distorted human features. A white patch sprouted from a deep scar that ran along the bridge of his nose and straight down to his left cheek. “Be quiet now,” he said. The words came quickly and were sharpened by a leering cockney accent. “I can make it hurt worse, you know.”

“Please don’t,” Lisa gasped. “Whatever you want to…just…please don’t.”

“Your mates seemed to like you. If they got the salt to come this far, maybe you’ll have some more comp’ny down there.”

Cars raced along a nearby street. Sirens drifted through the air like pets that started barking after a burglar had already cleaned out the house. The beast lifted his scarred nose to the fragrant air, pulled it in and mused, “Maybe they’ll find you. Maybe they won’t. It don’t matter now, luv. If I was you, I’d get comfy down there with your new friends. Always nice to have an ear to bend, eh?”

As he began to cover the pit’s opening with chunks of solid earth, he sighed and grumbled, “Good an’ quiet in there. I envy you, luv. Damn humans can’t go anywhere or do anything without makin’ noise. As for the lights, there’s no escaping them.”

“Please stop,” Lisa sobbed. “I want to…go home. I won’t tell.”

Something twitched inside Lisa’s body. It writhed, flailed, wrapped around her innards and squeezed a pained grunt out of her.

As dirt was heaped over the pit’s opening to blot out the distant sirens, different sounds skittered into her ears. One of the other bodies stuffed into that hole grunted a few unintelligible syllables. Muscles tore loose and became wet mulch, only to be stuck together again. Bones strained to the breaking point, held, and then snapped within their quivering, tortured shells.

Sickness poured in from where she’d been bitten and
seeped into her bones, tugging at the very frame of her body to shape her into something else.

One of the others choked on a pained cry.

When Lisa Wilson realized she was too broken to stick her hand out through the dirt wall piled in front of her, she cried too.