It's All The Rage
#35 of The Moonrise Chronicles
Edward was beside her a second
later. The blast had torn a hole through her chest. Rolling her over, he saw
blood and tissue. She had no pulse. In the next instant he tore out of his
clothing and crashed through the narrow window, taking plaster and lathe with
him.Rey yelled after him, but he knew
it was no good. With the rage upon him there was nothing that was going to
stop it. He had been there many times. It had to work itself out. There was no
talking down a pissed-off werewolf.The werewolf hunter had a few
seconds lead. It was all he needed. His vehicle was an unassuming station wagon
from the seventies. He jumped in the driver's seat, threw the box on the
passenger seat and turned the ignition. The car roared to life. He glanced in
his rear view mirror only once before dropping it in gear and stomping the
pedal.The wide rear tires bit into the
dirt and gravel, sending up a cloud of dust and debris. By the time Edward made
it out of the house, the debris was settling and the dust cloud was shifting in
the wind. He propelled himself through it, heedless of the nose-clogging
particles. He wasn't going to need his sense of smell for this.The car sped down the road with the
speed of a missile, hitting pot holes and rocks and lurching from side to side.
If it weren't for the weight in the back, the whole car might have flipped
over. Once it hit the paved road, the driver straightened it up and punched the
accelerator. About six seconds later he looked in the rearview mirror and
shuddered. For all intents and purposes, it might very well have been the steed
of one of the four horseman of the apocalypse set lose upon his trail. Edward was in a blind rage. Having
lost her once was bad enough. To find that she was still alive had raised his spirits
enormously high. Now he had lost her for a second time. His claws were ripping
up roadway as he kicked up his speed. Whoever this guy was, he wasn't going to
kill another werewolf ever again.The station wagon was remarkably
fast for an old, out-of-date car, and it picked up speed on the long, straight
stretch of road. Edward kicked it up a notch, gaining slowly, but gaining none
the less. Just ahead was a billboard,
and behind one of the local patrol cars. When the station wagon went by doing a
hundred miles an hour, the policeman hit the light and tore off after him. In the next
instant his light assembly and roof were crushed under the weight of a
rampaging werewolf. Edward had just enough presence of mind to holler back, "Sorry!"All the cop's ears heard was a
roar. Edward was catching up when the
most amazing thing happened. The station wagon pulled ahead, and fast. One
moment it was cruising along at top speed, and suddenly the limit on what the
top speed was vanished.A werewolf hunter used the tools he
knew would work. He had no fear of policeman or law enforcement. They served a
purpose, but he was no part of it. He smiled when he saw the werewolf take the
car out of commission, and wondered to himself that any werewolf existed
anymore that could assume that size. But that had been the concern of the old pope.
Too much power in a single set of hands was dangerous.When he saw the werewolf closing
the gap, he switched on the second engine, the one mounted in the back and
connected to the back wheels. It was an old four fifty four, and when it roared
to life, the car had over nine hundred horsepower. The frame groaned when the
secondary engine kicked in. Smoke poured out the exhaust as the gasoline was
sucked through it to make power.Something inside Edward snapped.
This guy was not getting away. He had thought Albert Fish had been bad,, but in
retrospect he was simply a tortured soul who had been trapped in a limbo-type
existence. This guy, misguided though he was, was doing the things he did under
his own volition. He chose to be a hunter, and now he was the hunted. He hoped
deep in his darkening heart that this guy was sweating, because when he got to him,
he was going to wring every last drop of liquid from his body.Chunks of pavement went flying from
under his feet, and his claws were striking sparks from the stones. His eyes
were scarlet and he could now only see in shades red. The heat from the car's
exhaust made it an easy target. Up ahead the road began to meander
as it followed a river. The car had to slow down lest it leave the road and
careen into the waters below. But it was
still going a good eighty miles an hour. Rubber tires might not have
sufficient traction at that speed, but werewolf claws did. Nor did a werewolf
have to use the road. As the ridge to
the right rose up, restricting the road to the narrow path between the rise and
the river, Edward jumped up and crashed through the brush. Up ahead there was a curve where
the road turned with the ridge and angle of the river. Edward kicked it up a
notch and when the rise turned, he jumped high. His momentum took him forward
onto the roof of the car. His claws ripped into the roof, anchoring him and
keeping him from being thrown. A gun blast ripped through the
metal, just missing him. Knowing that
the out-of-date firearm was a one-shot only, he leaned into the roof and
started to peel it away. The car began to careen out of control as the driver
tried desperately to shake him off.
Edward stabilized his body with one paw while the other opened up the
car like a can in a crusher.The car continued at top speed,
swerving across both lanes as the claws came ever closer. Edward switched his stance and leaned in to
look in the driver's side door. The werewolf hunter looked for only second. He couldn't
watch his foe and the road at the same time. But he did see a huge paw stretch forth
and snag his front tire.It blew out with a resounding bang.
The car lurched off the road and took a dive into the river below. Edward
remained on his perch, never once wavering in his task. He saw the churning
water rushing up to them and he didn't care at all. He was seeing this through
to the end, even if it killed him.The front end of the car smashed
into an oversized boulder, crumpling the bumper and radiator, spraying
overheated water into the air. It stopped for just a second precariously
perched on the stone, then it fell over on its side. Steam was pouring out as the
overheated engines set the cold flowing water into steam vapor. The driver
tried to get out, but his door was crushed. He looked up and saw the roof was
nearly gone and climbed out, looking around wildly for the werewolf. The vehicle
was shifting in the rapid current, and if he didn't leave immediately, he was
in danger of being swept downstream. A huge paw grabbed him and in the
next instant he was flying through the air. He heard a howl of pain. It must
have been the silver. In the next instant he heard the thud of flesh against
rock as he landed on the shoreline below the road.He had suffered enough broken bones
to know that a few more were added to the list. He blinked the blood out of his
eye. A mass of black and red fur was flying through the air towards him. A house
maw opened up and engulfed his head. Everything went dark.A short while later the werewolf
heard the screech of tires on the road above. He didn't care. Let them come! He would tear anyone apart who got in his way. Carrying the werewolf hunter up the
side, he hauled himself over the railing and dropped his load. The car that was
there wasn't police. It wasn't an ambulance or any other emergency worker. It
was a Range Rover. In his mind, it was vaguely familiar looking. Verona got out and morphed. He shook
his head. There was a smell... It was coming from her. He closed his eyes and
shook his head. His eyes went red again. "Stop!" The voice was female. He
stared thought the red haze. "Who dares to order me?""Dammit Edward, it's me, Verona.
You've got to get a grip on yourself. If you keep going crazy like this you're
going to spoil it for everyone and break our cover!""I don't take orders from a female.
I don't take orders period. I, I..." He stopped and shook his head again."Edward, if you lose control, you
might end up staying this way for too long. You need to snap out of this."He roared in anger. "Don't tell me what
to do. I, I; I can't remember...""Remember what?" she asked."SHUT UP! I can't remember why I'm
angry."She hated to remind him. "This man
killed Maggie.""Maggie!" He tuned in on the still
body laying on the road. "He killed Maggie!" He went to snap the body in two."Wait!""QUIT TELLING ME WHAT TO DO!" "Fine. Then kill him if he isn't dead
already. But it won't bring back Maggie. And I think right now it would be a
better thing to recover the box before it's lost in the river for good.""Box! What box?" His mind was all
rage and anger. He didn't care about boxes, or cars or silver. He wanted to
kill and hunt and run. He already had blood on his chin from his attack on the
werewolf hunter. He remembered the feeling of his sharp teeth penetrating the man's
shoulder. He could still taste it. And he was hungry."Leonardo's box! With the ring in
it! The thing Maggie figured out."Her words were confusing him. Ring?
Box? Flesh; that's all he was thinking about. Food. Murder. Killing. Rage. These
were the things that were important. Maggie? What was a Maggie. He tried to
clear his mind. Maggie. The girl. Yeah, that was it. But she was dead. He saw
it with his human eyes. She was dead, with a hole blown clean through her. And this man did it. Why? A box. A
ring. He remembered these things but they didn't seem important. He tried to
sort this out, but there was too much going on in his head. And that smell! He
was feeling his cock slide out of its sheaf. He tried to put it altogether and
couldn't. In a renewed rage he roared and took off down the road. He was gone
within seconds.Verona went to run after him. Her
father halted her. "Don't. You'll only make it worse.""I'm willing to risk it. It's
partially my fault any of this happened. If anyone can bring him around, it'll
be me." She turned and ran off after him.Rey looked down at the body on the pavement. It wasn't as lifeless as it seemed. There was
still a rise and fall in his chest. Blood dripped from a mix of gashes from
broken glass, sharp metal and teeth.Marcus looked him over. "I'd say if
left alone, he'll recover. But if we leave him here, there's going to be a lot
of questions being asked. And even though we're a long ways from home, it might
eventually come back to us. Let's wrap him up and take him back to the farmhouse.
It we have to, we can finished the job that Edward started. But I'd like to ask
this fellow a few questions. I've gotten tired of being chased all my life for
no good reason."Billy handled getting the body into
the back, and in the next moment they turned around and drove back up the road.
As luck would have it, they encountered no car on the road until they got to
the main one. Already there were sirens in the distance as dispatched police
and emergency made their way to assess
the damage. The Rover dodged chunks of asphalt that had been thrown up. They made
it look like the area had suffered a meteorite storm. Between the pot holes and
the chunks it was almost too much for the car to handle. Eventually, Rey took
it off the road where it was less rugged. The car lurched and bounced until
hey made it back to the dirt road. He slid the back end as he whipped it down
the road. When they got to the farm he stopped in front of the barn. Marcus ran
out, opened the door and they pulled it inside.No one moved for a bit, not until a
groan came from the back. Billy remembered who was back there. "Shit! We need
to get this guy stripped.""We'll leave you to do it."It was a little while later that he
came up to the house bearing a naked, but slowly healing body. He dumped the
guy on the kitchen floor and walked into the living room. Everyone was standing
around the spot where Maggie had dropped. She wasn't there. In her place was a
layer of ash.