It took both the cap and the sheriff to push the dead weight off me. I was covered chin to bollocks in warm blood that stank in the way only a slaughterhouse could and I still had the taste of it in my mouth; right then I thought I might be tasting it forever more.
I didn’t get time to thank the others. As I was getting to my feet, Wilko shouted out.
“Incoming.”
The two other big males came up out of the tunnel, bellowing their rage. They didn’t stand a chance. All five of us, lined up across the shaft, fired at the same time, the retort blasting at my eardrums like a cannon going off, the air in front of our lights filling with thin smoke, the shots blasting the things to the ground in a second that seemed like forever. They went down to join the other one with chests full of holes and heads that were mostly gone above the mouth.
I gave them all a kick to make sure they were dead, just in case, but it was obvious there would be no big movie-ending comeback from any of them.
“Is this what you mean by sanitised?” the sheriff asked, having to cover her mouth as the odor of fresh pish and shite rose from the bodies.
“Not yet,” the cap said grimly. “The worst is yet to come.”
He was right about that.
The female was waiting for us on the floor of the lowermost part of the shaft. She was no longer pregnant but cradled two newborns, one at each massive teat. She looked at us in silence, huge eyes accusing us as we filed into the chamber. It took me a few seconds to spot that what was left of Watkins and Jennings lay in a pile of dismembered limbs, white bone and hollowed out skulls in a corner. The female didn’t take her eyes off us.
“Couldn’t we just…” the sheriff began, but her voice tailed off. She knew, we all knew, what had to be done. That didn’t mean we had to like it.
An unspoken command had us all raising our weapons at the same time, and the best I can say about it is that it was quick. Afterwards we couldn’t get out of the shaft quickly enough and I think we were all feeling the same. I could hardly have felt any worse had it been a human mother and children we’d left down there and I knew I was going to see those eyes in my dreams long after the smell in my nose and throat dissipated.
“Okay, where’s this fucking wolf then?” I said. “I came here to kill monsters, not babies. It’s time we went home. I need a beer.”
- 17 -
It was a wee while before anyone else said anything. We stood in silence between the shaft mouth and the woods, smoking and thinking, all lost in their own thoughts.
“I’m open to suggestions,” the cap finally said. “I’d like to think there’s only the one big fucker left. We could do with a bit of luck. But how do we find it? It doesn’t seem to be too bothered about finding us.”
I was only half-listening to him. The stench of blood and shite and pish was still heavy in my throat and nose and it wasn’t going away until I could get rid of the parka and have a good wash. But at the same time several things were running through my head; the sheriff’s mention of ‘the wrong kind of bait’ for one, along with my earlier roller-coaster Skidoo ride and poor Jennings’ final, brave attempt to do something right. And that’s when my big mouth got me into trouble again.
“I might have an idea, Cap,” I said.
I walked just behind him on our trek back down to the research station, outlining my plan. By the time we reached the cabins I had him convinced. The sheriff was going to take more time to bring around.
“I don’t like it,” she said. “It’s too risky.”
I laughed at that.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, risky is kind of what we do.”
She smiled thinly.
“And in case you hadn’t noticed, this is Canada and you’re not Canadian. If you’re set on doing this, you’ll have me along on shotgun.”
And that’s how, ten minutes later, I was sitting on the Skidoo in the forecourt of the main building with the sheriff tucked in behind me, both of us with rifles and the wee black box zap switches, both of us already beginning to regret signing up for it. The cap and the lads were busy bringing the trucks back round to reform the gauntlet. My grand idea was to recreate Jennings’ last ride, but get it right this time, and bring the big wolf back with us, a lamb to the slaughter.
Of course, if there were more out there than just the big one, I was probably setting myself and the sheriff up as lunch, but I was trying not to think of that as I loosened the brake, turned the throttle and the Skidoo buzzed and rattled taking us across the forecourt and down the same deer trail I’d come up in a hurry the last time out.
This was as far as my plan had taken me; I had no more other than to drive around the deer trails in a widening circle and hope the big bastard got curious or hungry or both. The foul stench still rose from my clothing and if I could smell it, a wolf was certain to. Whether it would attract or repel remained to be seen.
I drove us down the trail as far as the hollow with the garage, hoping it would be that simple and the big beastie would be there, but we had no such luck. It was an easier ride than the last time though; we were going mainly downhill, and the sheriff, unlike Watkins, was able to follow my moves into and out of any curves to ensure the machine kept balance. I turned at the garage, ninety degrees to my left to take us up out of the bowl and uphill. The trail brought us up to the main track. I crossed that and kept going uphill, new territory for me now and a deer trail that was originally good and wide but narrowed alarmingly with every second we kept going up.
I was about to stop and try to reverse to better ground when the sheriff tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to my left.
Something big… huge… was pacing us through the trees; it looked to be on another deer trail parallel to ours, a narrower one that was causing it to force its way through the foliage, disturbing snow as it went and alerting us to its presence. I tried to take aim but the Skidoo bounced too much and I knew that if I stopped I would be losing any, however tiny, advantage we might have.
So I did the opposite; I pushed the throttle to its top setting and we shot up that trail slicker than shite. I was looking for a path or an offshoot of this trail that would take us round to the camp. I knew the wolf was between us and safety but I’d deal with that if I needed to; for now, my plan was to get ahead of it, make a turn left and hope that the bastard followed us back to the station.
The trail ahead wasn’t narrowing any more, but it was getting lower, the branches now skimming the top of my parka hood. It looked like little more than a shoulder-width tube ahead of us.
“Get down,” I shouted, hoped that the sheriff had heard, and bent to the handlebars like a speed rider as we entered an almost pitch-black tunnel. I had visions of us getting stuck in there while the Skidoo engine whined and the wolf turned up to find its dinner pre-packed but we burst out into broad daylight seconds later. I was so surprised I almost didn’t notice we had come out on the rim of another basin-shaped hollow. The Skidoo lurched alarmingly as we went down into it, and almost toppled on straightening up at the bottom. I kept the throttle running high, hoping for enough momentum to get us across and up the other side. At the same moment the wolf made its entrance, launching itself over the rim even as we passed underneath it. If I’d had time and forethought I could have lifted a knife and gutted it from sternum to balls as it went over but right then I was just thankful to duck under it, head left and launch the Skidoo into open air over the rim of the bowl. Its bushy tail brushed my face then we were off and away.