Skinwalkers (22 page)

15 March 85, 7:30
P
.M.

We awoke to find Steve missing. He must have finally
taken
one too many drugs. Both trucks are still here
,
and Steve’s gear remains packed inside his tent, even his water. The desert will prove unkind to a man wandering without provisions. We search
ed
the entire day but
f
ou
nd
no trace of him. Finally, with the sun setting, we
decided
to return to camp and make the most of the evening left to us. Steve will return when he sobers up enough. This is the last expedition I’m taking that son of a bitch on.

1
6
March 85, 3:01 A.M.

Minutes ago,
I
was
awakened from a series of horrible nightmares by the sound of coyotes howling. I
left
my tent to find Dave and Sarah already outside checking the equipment. Everything
was
intact
,
but the readings
were
scrambled
again (
And it’s cold. Very fucking cold
!).
We
flashed
lights across our perimeter. The coyotes
had to
have
been
close to
make
such a racket, but I’ll be damned if we could spot a single one.

16 March 85, 8:15 A.M.

This morning, Sarah
was
gone. Dave is furious and thinks she’s run off with Steve. I don’t have the heart to tell him that can’t be true as I’m actually the one banging her behind his back. We
agreed
that
he’d
search for
her (and Steve)
while I stay behind to mind camp.

1
7
March 85, 2:12 A.M.

Dave never came back. The howling started again at midnight and it’s colder than
shit
out here despite the presence of the roaring fire I built. About 12:30 A.M. I said, “To hell with it!“ and packed up the gear in the trucks only to find neither one of them would start. I’m no mechanic, but it looks to me like someone’s tampered with the engine. It’s got to be fucking Steve! That goddamn maniac has finally flipped his lid. God knows what he’s done with Sarah and Dave. Probably killed them or worse. Jesus Christ
. Why
didn’t we bring a gun?

1
7
March 85, 3:30 A.M.

I was wrong about Steve. He, Sarah, and Dave were here not thirty seconds ago. They stood side
-
by
-
side on the edge of the fire’s light. I didn’t hear them come
into camp
. They just appeared there. I shouted at them, but they didn’t speak. They didn’t move. Hell, they didn’t breathe! And there was movement in the shadows behind them
—
hundreds of black shapes swirling just beyond my field of vision. Then they just disappeared. I mean exactly what I wrote. They were here one second, then gone the next. I’ve never seen anything like this
.
What the fuck is going on, here? God help me! I don’t want to die!

17 March 85, 6:15 A.M.

This will be my last entry into this journal. I’m alive, but I might as well be dead. I opened the cooler this morning to find the meat crawling with maggots. Somehow, overnight, it all spoiled. Even the power bars are rotten. And the water is gone
—
evaporated right out of the bottles. How does that happen? Even if I were to make it through the day, I know if I stay here tonight, I’m a goner. The trucks are done for, and the water gone, but San Ramirez can’t be more than thirty miles north of here. I
might’ve
possibly been able to make
out where North actually lay
if not for the strange, greenish fog that has formed in every direction. It’s blocking out the sun and the compasses refuse to work in it. Thanks to the fog, my chances of finding San Ramirez are next to none. But it’s the only hope I’ve got.
I’ll
leave this journal behind. If I
don’t
find San Ramirez and meet death by dehydration, or more likely, by (Dare I say it?) evil forces from beyond the grave, this notebook, if discovered, may be the only warning anyone else unfortunate enough to come to this accursed place
—
a place rightfully once known as Perdition (of that fact, I now have no doubt
)—
will ever have.

Yours sincerely with sound mind to the end,

Nathan Morrison

THE MISSION FALLS

P
rivate Hector Antonio Sanchez was burning up. His head was pounding and, despite the heat radiating off of him,
he’d
begun to shiver. He felt as though blazing red coals were crawling out of his gut and spreading through his body.

What the hell is wrong with me
? Pain leaped into his chest and the private swooned at his station behind the Gatling gun.

“Now!“ Dewayne said
. Then
he exited the church
, Wilson on his heels
. Little Joe
pressed
the
open
door
within a foot of its twin, leaving a gap large enough for Farnsworth to squeeze through
.

“How long should we give the writer?“ the reverend asked.

“You heard the bounty hunter,“ Maxine said. “Five minutes. He’s still got time
.“

“He’s already dead, God rest his soul,“ Reverend Phillips argued. “You know that. Little Joe might as well go ahead and bar the door before one of those monsters forces its way inside. It’s the only smart thing to do.“

“I said he’s still got time
!
The least we can do is give him his five minutes. Little Joe?“

Little Joe folded his tree-trunk arms over his chest.
“Five minutes
.“

Phillips threw up his hands.
“God in heaven!“

Sanchez wished they’d all just shut the fuck up. They were making him crazy. Couldn’t they see he wasn’t feeling well? Couldn’t they show him some goddamn courtesy? He’d lost everyone he knew in the entire world
—
had had to shoot and fight all night, even after having his stomach torn out by a fucking
skinwalker
. Was a little peace and quiet too much to ask, after all that? It was a sorry son of a bitch who couldn’t give a man a little rest after almost dying. Yes, sir. That was the worst kind of cocksucker. Sanchez wondered how they’d feel if they’d had their guts laid open. And then he imagined it, his thoughts occurring with startling clarity.

Sanchez saw himself leaning over Maxine as he plunged a knife into her
belly
. He wrenched it across her so that pink entrails bloomed from the wide gash in a bouquet of blood and gore. Sanchez found himself strangely exited by his vision. He looked down to see an erection pointing up at him from beneath his trousers. Before Sanchez realized what he was doing, he reached down and rubbed himself through the cloth of his pants. As he did so, he concentrated on the image, zooming his mind’s eye in closer as he hacked and slashed at the no
-
longer
-
so
-
lovely Maxine. He focused his mental gaze until he saw that he wasn’t holding a knife at all. He was ripping Maxine apart with his bare
hands—
no, not his
hands
, his
claws
.

Sanchez doubled over on top of the Gatling gun as another bolt of pain seared a blazing, white-hot path through his body.

Reverend Phillips placed an arm across Sanchez’s shoulders.
“Son, are you all—?“

“Get the fuck off me!“ Sanchez rose from the
Gatling
gun and backhanded the reverend. Maxine screamed as Reverend Phillips’s body flew across the room to slam against the church doors. He dropped to the ground in a heap beside Little Joe.
 

“I’ve had enough of your shit!“ Sanchez yelled. “All of you, shut your goddamn
—!“
Sanchez screamed in agony. “Too fucking hot!“ His words became an inhuman wail as he tore off the bandage covering his torso. Sanchez’s wounds were now only tiny scars
. But
they glowed with the
same
sickly green
light
as
the mist
.
 

Fur began to sprout
along
Sanchez’s body. His limbs whipped and snapped into new, pseudo-lupine shapes, their bones elongating and reforming beneath skin and muscle. Sanchez’s screams continued all the while. It was a scene of right out of the bowels of hell.

“He’s one of them!“ Maxine screamed. “God help us, he’s a
skinwalker
!“

M
axine bolted from the room for the rectory. Little Joe wanted to join her, but found he
couldn’t
move. He stood frozen with horror, rooted to the floor as Sanchez transformed before his eyes.

The
private’s body swelled. New ribs popped audibly into place along Sanchez’s elongating torso. The private’s clawed feet exploded from his boots. His heels lengthened and lifted off the floor to snap into place below lupine hindquarters. Sanchez’s face and skull pulled away from each other, the former morphing into a canine grimace, the latter sloping backward so that two large, pointy ears rose into the air several inches above it.

At last, Private Sanchez towered before Little Joe in the shape of a snarling
skinwalker
. Little Joe thought the change had seemed to take an eternity. In truth, it had only lasted seconds.

The beast that had been Private Sanchez seized the Gatling gun in its claws. At first, Little Joe had the crazy idea that the
skinwalker
was going to shoot him
—
use the
Gatling gun
to blow him into a thousand little pieces. But it quickly became apparent to Little Joe whatever intelligence this monster had possessed as Private Sanchez was now gone. Only an instinct-powered predator remained.

The
skinwalker
roared, straining until
it
at last heaved the Gatling gun out of its path. The gun crashed against the stacks of pews with a loud clatter. As it
landed
, one of its wheels broke away and its six barrels bent into scrap metal.

The commotion shocked Little Joe back into the dire reality of his situation. He gazed into the monster’s yellow eyes and, in that moment, he knew the truth. This was not Private Sanchez, nor any mere
skinwalker
. This was his dog-brother from so long ago
—
the one he had killed to win Garrett’s approval. And now the rabid beast had come back from the spirit world to claim its revenge.

Little Joe felt his upper lip curl into a snarl
. His
own growl
rose
in the back of his throat. Suddenly, his knife was out of his belt and in his hand, held so that the blade pointed downward.

Come then, brother. I am ready. Come and we shall dance one last time
.

Little Joe lunged forward and crashed into the
skinwalker
. The beast was caught off-guard by the native’s attack, and went tumbling backward. As they fell, Little Joe repeatedly sank his knife into the monster, using the blade to search for that special crevice between its ribs that
opened to
the heart.

They hit the floor and the
skinwalker
roared, its voice a mixture of pain and anger. It seized Little Joe in its long claws and flung the native from its body. Little Joe tumbled across the floor, but the knife remained locked in his grip.

Little Joe halted to see Reverend Phillips skirting away through the gap
between
the doors. But
the native
had no time to worry about this. In truth, the reverend’s flight only registered in Little Joe’s subconscious mind. All form of higher thought had left
him
. Like the
skinwalker
he battled, Little Joe was now an
animal—
the very monster Garrett had always wanted him to be.

He whirled
and saw
the
skinwalker
already on its feet, charging toward him. Little Joe ducked and rolled
,
and the beast crashed into the wall. While the
skinwalker
was dazed, Little Joe leapt on top of its back and sank his knife into the soft spots between the monster’s shoulder blades. The
skinwalker
roared in agony. But this time, its howl was accompanied by bright red blood pouring from its mouth.