Breeds (5 page)

In an honorable world, a sane world, two
Weres
would fight
after
their change. In Borland’s, his fight started with a hard, unexpected knee to the balls. Honor meant nothing to the dead. And in the coming days, the approaching battle, he would utilize all the tricks of an age to survive.

The door swung open with a click and whine and Borland dragged his victim outside. The cold enveloped him. He should’ve stopped to gather up his coat, he knew, and cursed because of it. The cold made him yank on his victim in spite. Blackbeard lurched forward and stopped. The dangling leg caught the edge of the doorframe, clogging the entryway with a bunched-up torso and almost toppling Borland with the abrupt halt.

“Y’disagreeable little shit.” He jerked the leg hard enough that the body banged against the wood.

“C’mon,” he urged, annoyance in his voice, but the body would not right itself of its own accord. “Goddamn little
bitch
.”

He bent over the dead form, savagely angry at having to make the extra effort. His back threatened to snap as he gripped the offending leg. A short shake freed the corpse and Borland wrenched it through with a pissed-off grunt. Blackbeard’s head bumped off the two steps of the front porch like a bowling ball. Snow speckled his ruined face and eye. Borland didn’t pity the dead. Law of the land was kill or be killed, in the wild or in civilization. One had to be on guard at all times. To think that the Elders kept sending in one young fuck at a time to put him down galled the hell out of him. Snarling, Borland bared his old teeth to the freezing breeze. White spattered his face and beard as he pulled the corpse along the partially dug trench, towards his old store.

Already he could hear the dogs. Both furious and scared shitless to be kept within that wooden, single-story bunker of a building. The store he nailed together years ago with no help from a damn soul. The dogs he had gathered more recently.

Above the door hung another imposing set of moose antlers. A piece of wood in the shape of an old-fashioned bed’s headboard, nailed through the center, kept the front door of the weathered storage structure closed. Borland gripped this dwarfed Napoleon’s hat and twisted it, allowing the heavy slab of wood to be pulled open by a strip of cold-stiffened leather.

The barking intensified.

“Shaddup,” Borland yapped back. The lifeless weight at the end of his arm dragged on him, and he jerked the carcass over the three steps. The head rattled across the threshold.

The gray light from the open door and pallid beams illuminated the interior as Borland trudged into this cavern of canine terror, hauling his victim behind him. Crude holding pens constructed of thick planks and chicken wire ran the length of the building on either side. Jaws snapped behind the lattices. Some pulled the mesh inwards. Claws poked and rasped. Growls and howls marred into an unnerving screech of something not yet realized, but suspected. Borland’s shadow darkened the caged animals as he passed, infuriating them more. A black-and-orange Rottweiler eyed him with a killer’s reproach. A trio of white Shih Tzus bounced in their pens like angry popcorn. A Golden Retriever sang piteously as if staked to the floor. A Siberian Husky flashed teeth and gnawed at the wire, its eyes a haunting ice blue. A whooping cough of a bark erupted from a Bull Terrier as Borland shuffled by, making him stop in his tracks for a moment and turn on them all. He released a flash of the
Were
, and snarled at his captives with his elongated teeth.

The entire pack broke into whines, cowered by a single blast.

Curs
, Borland thought with disgusted anger. Nothing but curs. But they were
his
curs, and he would impose his warlike will upon them. Blackbeard’s fingers grazed the wired doors of the pens. Noses came forth fearfully, if not a touch eagerly, sniffing at the tips. Borland knew it was the smell of blood, remembered from the last victim he’d cut up in back. Dogs weren’t finicky eaters, but if hungry enough, if
starved
, they’d eat damn near anything.

These dogs had been starved. And fed. Fed a rarity in delicacies, a dish no one would ever
consider
feeding them. A feast derived from dark sorcerous arts only recently discovered.

They had eaten the flesh of a dead
Were
.

And they were more than ready to dine once again.

With some effort, Borland finished dragging Blackbeard to the back of the store, onto a wide wooden pallet laid on top of the bare floor. Hateful eyes bore into his back and Borland turned to lock eyes with a German Shepherd, locked away in his prison. That great brute didn’t flinch. Didn’t break away.

A fanged smile lit Borland’s face. “No fear in ye, though, eh?” he hissed. “Not like dese others.”

A faint rumble from the Shepherd’s throat. A twitch of black lips. What were usually soft, brown eyes now glinted dark thoughts.

Tough
, Borland recognized. This one was the most recent addition to his collection, and probably the last.

“Too bad,” he sneered and showed the animal his back.

The other dogs started to bark once again. Borland ignored them and took down a sharp, curved knife––a fisherman’s filleting tool. The wooden grip felt fine in his palm, and for a moment, he made the blade dance in his hand, flipping it up, down and over with the confidence of a knife fighter. Of all the hand tools known to man, knives were the most frightening, the most chilling, and Borland knew how to handle it well.

A tickle hitched in his throat and choked off his thoughts. He bent over, barking at the floor. When the coughing fit subsided, he wiped his mouth with a sick moan. Yellow-green butter straight from his guts coated his hand. Specks of blood spotted the sample and Borland studied it for only a moment before smearing if off on a leg. He winked at the Shepherd.

“Not finished yet, brudder. Not I. Make no mistake.”

Borland turned to Blackbeard. Within the next minute, he cut though the outer clothing and stripped everything off the corpse, paying no heed to the hairy, pallid flesh being uncovered. This was the easy part. The
clean
part. Borland gathered up the shreds of clothing and tossed them into a corner, which he would later use to soak up the remainder of the blood and burn in a stove. Leaving the naked man on the pallet, Borland rolled over a thick junk of birch wood, used for chopping up smaller chunks. Next, he spun about, flipped the lid of a trunk, and produced a compact chainsaw, which would be for the torso. But he wanted to punish Blackbeard a bit first. Rubbing his jowls, Borland reached to the rafters and pulled down a hand axe. He had a chainsaw for the heavier bits but there was something…
personal
, and oddly satisfying, about hacking up a body with an axe.

The last thing he did was pull on a full-length, clear plastic coat which covered him from head to foot, as well as a helmet with a clear, plastic mask. He didn’t bother with gloves. This, he wanted to feel.

Borland released another shot of wereblood as he grabbed the ankle of his victim, empowering him to manhandle the limb across the chopping block of wood.

Borland met the Shepherd’s hateful eye, only for a moment, before the axe came down and chomped into the ankle. The foot jumped into the air and rattled dumbly off the pallet. Gore splashed planks with rotted knots. Borland worked efficiently, humming to himself at times, and when he’d removed the arms and legs, he dropped the spattered axe to the floor and took up the chainsaw. It screamed to life with one tug on its rip cord, and the dogs howled at its song. Borland hooted back and dug into the head and torso of Blackbeard, who wasn’t looking so healthy anymore. The chainsaw smoked, whined, and bubbled. Blood spritzed the old man’s plastic coat and mask in ghastly designs as his hands turned a ghoulish red.

Once done with the cutting, Borland dropped the saw and took a deep, mind-clearing whiff of the lingering gasoline smoke. Then he went to work with the knife once more, parting fat and flesh from muscle, removing the organs and guts which he’d later burn outside in a fire. With almost revered satisfaction, he cut out the heart of the ravaged man, and held the dark muscle up to the Shepherd, who finally looked away with a sad whimper. Borland flipped his visor. He held the meat up to his face, opening his fanged maw and wheezing with feral delight.

“Dis part’s
mine
,” Borland declared in a vibrating voice as he plopped the delicacy onto a nearby porcelain plate.

The rest of the body he cut into thin steaks, enough for all. He was almost high from the stench of meat and blood.

“Now den,” he announced to the waiting dogs when all was done. “Who eats first?”

The store exploded with sound.

Minutes later, after feeding his dogs, Borland faced the cage of the Shepherd. The animal had refused to eat the last time, clearly possessing a stubborn streak. But now it was weak. Ready to be turned. He summoned the wereblood again. It shot through him like a jolt of nitrous oxide, punching the breath from him as the power ripped up the length of his spine, close to splitting. Years ago his body had no difficulty handling this surge of power, but now, even though he needed it and still relished it, a dangerous feeling accompanied each shot when he allowed it to flow, as if something, somewhere might burst from the pressure. His old bones could barely take it anymore.

Fuck it,
Borland thought blackly, stubbornly daring something to rupture. He’d go to hell swearing his last breath on it.

Standing before the cage of the Shepherd, Borland basked in the burn, feeling blood-gorged arteries and veins as thick as cables bulge and protrude in his neck and wrists, feeling the growing pressure energizing and
expanding
him.

The trapped dog whined and pressed itself against the back of the cage, searching for escape, brown eyes no longer defiant.

Controlling his change, Borland opened the door with a hand that ended in claws. He flashed a toothy grin at the dog and grabbed it by its leather collar. With a terrified yelp, the Shepherd came free of its cage and Borland held it high, easily, with one arm. The dog kicked and thrashed, cursing the man-thing and raking talons over his plastic coat, but Borland held it up like a fisherman showing off a trophy catch. When he grew tired of the game, he grabbed a foreleg, stretched it out like a chicken’s wing, and bit into it. He sank his fangs into the meat of the animal, his mouth salivating in a gush.

The Shepherd wailed in pain, kicked weakly, writhed.

With a roar, Borland threw the near unconscious dog back into its cage. He heaved in a human steak before slamming the door shut. The meat hit the dog in the ribs and it yelped at the contact as if poisoned.

In a sense, it had been.

“Have a taste!” Borland commanded. He locked the cage, lapping at the juices on his lips. The dog found its balls and glared. A saucy look didn’t bother Borland. The animal would see his way soon enough. They all did in the end.

Having done that, he paused and listened to his other captives as they fed.

The smile creeping across his face dripped blood.

The automated doors of the Halifax International Airport opened with a gasp, flooding the interior with winter air and causing the crowd nearby to shiver. A couple of late afternoon travelers looked to see who was coming in from the outside and saw a dark figure, ominous against the smoking tailpipe of a disappearing taxi. Free falling snow, thick and stomach-turning, coated almost everything except the concrete, completing the illusion of a near-white canvas.

The trapped heat stamped Kirk’s face and made him feel uncomfortable. He much preferred the cold to the multi-level oven of an airport. Carrying his small, black suitcase, he proceeded inside and stopped far enough from the sensor to allow the outside doors to roll shut behind him.

The smell hit him like a freight train jumping its tracks.

It engulfed his hypersensitive sense of smell, stopping him cold, forcing him to reach inside a pocket and get out a facecloth. This he slapped over his nose and mouth and held there, though it didn’t really help much. The cab had been bad enough with the driver reeking of lunchtime chicken and swine assholes, but
this
… Kirk took a breath and winced. This was olfactory hell. Some people eyed him, bored, while waiting for their time to check in and completely heedless as to how badly they offended his nose with their pissy perfumes and carbonated colognes, coffee breath and all-round rude body odor. Some travelers stood with designer coffee cups and smartphones, oblivious to everything except a glowing screen, idly multi-tasking as they sipped and fingered. Some of the more forward-thinking ones checked in with the automated terminals and nonchalantly punched in codes like quick drawing gunslingers firing from the hip. A pair of young women dressed in t-shirts and stylish pants––unfit for the winter––cackled excitedly about their upcoming cruise. One of them was on her period. A man dressed in a sharp black suit complete with overcoat sneezed loud enough to draw stares, and Kirk knew there would be people complaining about him on their flight. An obese man protested loudly about being bumped from a flight to an airline representative. Another younger, varsity type guy was trying to jam a carry-on bag into a bin two sizes too small, arguing that the airline allowed him to take the same bag on board last time.

People
.

In all their shapes, sizes, smells and attitudes.

Kirk fucking
despised
gathering places like the airport.

Glowering with the facecloth firmly in place, Kirk stomped his hiker boots clean of slush and moved through the masses. Outside, thick clumps of snow flecked the large windows looking out onto the parking garage, while storm clouds blotted out the sky, almost completely obscuring the view. Right season. Angry weather. Furious planet.

Kirk had packed light: just a single change of clothes. He wore a winter denim coat ringed with a thick, white-furred collar. A black stocking cap covered his head. Bright signs of the corporate carriers lay on his right, one right after the other. When he found his airline’s check-in desk and saw the dismal length of people waiting in front of it, he sighed and got in line. The middle-age man in front of him had to be coated in a near-nauseating deodorant, and he couldn’t help patting his fingers at his bald spot and the feeble comb-over. It surprised Kirk to see it in this age, where head shaving was so much more accepted. A carry-on bag lay at one side of the guy’s ankles while a pink plastic carrying cage was on the other. An unhappy looking cat stood behind a metal grate, fearfully studying Kirk, as if it knew exactly who he was and feared for its life.