Larry Correia: Monster Hunter Alpha

Heather shrugged noncommittally. “I just did what I was trained to do.”

“Whatever. I heard about-”

“Kid needed protecting. I was the only one around to do it. No big deal.” One crazy case involving a sex-slavery ring could get you quite a rep. One sloppy gunfight later, she’d been publically cited for bravery, privately reprimanded for stupidity, and been on the fast track to a promotion to detective until her family’s health issues had brought her back to her hometown. It didn’t matter now. Copper Lake was a much quieter place than Minneapolis. She made sure to change the subject so obviously that Temple would know better than to bring it up again. “We got an ID on our biter yet?”

“Every time we ask for a name, he just stares off into space and mumbles about something humming. Still no idea who he is yet, but we’re still checking.”

One of her friends had just been eviscerated. She wasn’t in the mood for dealing with random stinky lunatics, but the U.P. was virtually the edge of the world. Lots of crazy people ended up here for some reason. It’s like they wandered out of Chicago or Minneapolis and walked through the woods until they hit Lake Superior, where they became her problem. “Anything else going on?”

“Those hikers down in Baraga are still lost.”

“Probably eaten by the same bear,” she muttered. Lost hikers weren’t any sort of surprise. Except for a few clusters of small townships and farms, northern Michigan was thickly forested hills. It was easy to get turned around if you got off the trails. The locals loved the tourists’ dollars, but finding lost suburbanites got old quick.

“Other than that, well, some federal agent called from Washington, wanting to know about the bear attack.”

“Who?” Heather asked. That was fast. The Department of Natural Resources guy must have passed it up the chain to whoever it was he’d been talking to the sheriff about.

“I don’t know. The guy was named something Jefferson, real snooty type, but I kicked it over to the sheriff. They were asking if there had been any other animal attacks or any unexplained disappearances, that kind of thing. They said they wanted to send some people to interview Buckley if”-he corrected himself-“ when he wakes up. I told him he better hurry if the weather reports are accurate. Huge storm coming in tonight. He was real adamant that we call if anything else unusual happens.”

Unusual? The little black bears that were native to the area normally stuck to knocking over trash cans, not smashing their way through car windows to eat healthy, armed men. Unusual was an understatement.

Agent Doug Stark of the Monster Control Bureau of the US Department of Homeland Security answered the ringing phone on his desk. He had already had a busy day, seizing a camera and video files from some teenagers who’d blundered into a Type 2 Unnatural devouring a homeless guy at the bottom of a drainage culvert. Stark didn’t necessarily enjoy the part of his job where he intimidated witnesses and survivors into keeping their stupid mouths shut, but he was extremely good at it. “Agent Stark,” he answered sharply.

“Hello, Doug,” said the voice at the other end, and he recognized it immediately. Washington was calling. Damn it. Washington only called when something was wrong, and he had been hoping to get off early so he could catch his daughter’s trumpet recital. “This is Grant Jefferson.”

Stark didn’t like the new guy-he was too smooth-but Director Myers thought Jefferson walked on water, had taken him under-wing, and had delegated all sorts of responsibilities to the former MHI man. Grooming him for leadership, probably because Myers had come up from the private sector, too…Just like those contractor bozos to get all the money, glory, and then come into his bureau to take all the promotions. “Mornin’, Grant. What can I do for you today?” he asked with zero sincerity.

“There’s been a potential attack in your region. The profile fits a lycanthrope, but that’s currently unknown. One survivor.”

So much for getting off early. Regulations said they had to check it out as soon as possible. “Bitten?” Stark reached for a pad of paper and took a pen from the pink clay mug labeled “#1 Dad.”

“Probable, but unknown. You should assume the worst. Take a test kit. You may need to eliminate.”

Stark grunted in acknowledgment. Who was this upstart punk to tell him something so obvious? As a rookie MCB agent recruited straight out of the SEALs, Stark had learned how to take care of witnesses from the holy terror himself, Agent Franks. Stark was old-school MCB. Back when he’d run the Phoenix office, he’d once had a family of four get torn apart by reptoids, and he had managed to blame the entire incident on coyotes. Stark was still bitter he’d been given the Chicago SAC job instead of the interim director position that Dwayne Myers had scored. Myers had been Dallas SAC before the promotion, so they’d been equals, the jerk. “Location?”

“Copper Lake, Michigan,” Jefferson said.

“Where the hell is Copper Lake?” He leaned back and studied the laminated US map on the wall. The office chair creaked under his weight. Though no longer in his prime, Stark still loved pumping iron and had biceps as big around as most men’s legs. He took pride in the fact that he could still keep up with agents half his age.

“Up by Lake Superior…I think,” Jefferson said. “Hang on, I’m pulling up Google Earth.” It figured. Not only was he going to have to work today, he was going to have to drive to the damn U.P. and probably freeze his ass off in Yooper country. “Wait a second, Agent Archer is here with me.” There was a pause. “He says that he grew up right down the road in Calumet…He says to pack a coat.” Grant laughed.

Just like those headquarters assholes to have a laugh at his expense, Stark thought. He’d been doing this for nearly twenty-five years. He knew more about this business than Director Myers did. Who were they to laugh at him? Stark idly wrote down the details as Grant kept on talking, but Stark’s mind was somewhere else. He glanced at the PUFF table tacked to the wall beside the map. Government employees didn’t get to collect PUFF, but those contractors got paid damn good money per lycanthrope…and by the time he said his good-byes, he knew exactly what he was going to do.

Like most things that depended on secrecy, the MCB was a relatively small agency. Even the ICE and FBI staff they shared the building with had no clue what the ultra-secretive MCB did for a living. As Special Agent in Charge, he had six agents working under him in the north-central region, and more that he could pull out of Minneapolis, but he’d keep this one close to the vest. He called for Agent Mosher, gave him the lowdown, and told him to get an SUV ready. Requisitioning a chopper was out of the question. The weather was turning nasty, and besides, the key to keeping a monster attack low profile was keeping a low profile. Land a black helicopter at some rural airfield and the locals got to talking, and since the locals were already calling it a bear, why go and mess that up with a Blackhawk?

“Should I put together a team?” Mosher asked. “If it turns out to be a werewolf, that could be dangerous.” Gaige Mosher was the newest agent in his office. He was a tough kid recruited out of Force Recon, but even tough guys didn’t screw around when it came to shapeshifters.

“Naw,” Stark said. “I need to get out of the office. Just the two of us to talk to the witness. My intuition is telling me that it was probably just an animal,” he lied. “And if it does turn out to be the real deal, we’ve got a few days before the full moon. Myers can send out his strike team, and they can use up their budget.” In truth, he just wanted to do the minimum amount of work needed and then get a little kickback on the side. Extra agents could make that a hassle, and Mosher was so eager to prove himself to the experienced Stark that he could be trusted to keep his mouth shut.