Larry Correia - Monster Hunter Alpha

Harbinger grabbed her by the coat and held her upright. “What’s wrong?”

She tried to answer, but her jaw hurt too much to form words. Maybe she screamed; she couldn’t tell. Heather grabbed the straps on the front of Harbinger’s armor and clung to him. The pain got worse, radiating from her head down her spine and from there out to her bones. Something cracked inside her as a joint realigned, and this time she knew for sure that she screamed.

Harbinger’s mouth was moving. He was yelling orders. She focused on her hands, curled around the fabric pouches on his chest. Blood was coming from around her fingernails. The pain moved down her face to her teeth. Closing her eyes tight, she tried to make it through the pain, but beyond the pain was terror, and the pain actually felt better than the terror.

When she opened her eyes, the world had changed. Colors were different, faded. Only life and shadows to hide in stood out. She could see the blood pumping in Harbinger’s neck, and she wanted nothing more than to reach up and set it free. He was still shouting. “You, pop the tailgate on my truck. Unlatch the big stainless box. Move!” He turned back to her. “Come on, Kerkonen. This way. Hang in there.”

“What’s wrong with her eyes?” The voice sounded too slow, like when you play a video at half speed. The action of a gun was worked. “They’re yellow. She’s one of them.”

“Calm down,” Harbinger said, and it seemed to take forever. “Get out of my way.”

“Shoot her!”

At some point, in addition to the pain in her bones, she must have caught on fire. Her hands were burning. Instinctively, she jerked them away from Harbinger. Bewildered, she watched them, turning them from back to palm. They weren’t on fire at all, but her fingernails were so long. She bit her nails. It was a terrible habit, so she’d never had nice nails before. Too bad they were on fire and bleeding.

“I said get out of my way,” Harbinger growled at the unseen roadblock.

“Do what Earl says.” Aino sounded scared.

A fresh wave of pain, somehow even bigger than the last, came, this time from her rib cage. The sound of breaking bones was audible even over the humming noise. It twisted her down. She had to drive her hands into the snow to keep from falling over.

“Step aside, stranger.” Distantly, Heather recognized the voice. Something Prescott. She’d cited him for DUI once. He was a real asshole. He seemed really frightened, though; it was probably because of all that screaming. Oh, wait, that’s me. “I’ll shoot you both. I mean it.”

“I ain’t got time for nonsense.” There was a sudden movement ahead of her, and a thud, but Heather couldn’t focus enough to lift her head. Somebody hit the ground. “Any of you other slack-jawed idiots get in my way, you’ll get the same,” Harbinger said. “You, boy. Do what I told you. The rest of you, get out of here. Now! ”

The fire spread. Now it was a competition between the skin fire and the bone pain to see which would rend her apart first. It was worse than anything she’d ever imagined. The fire was winning, though. The heat kept getting worse. She ripped her coat off and fell into the snow, but it didn’t help. A hand wrapped around her duty belt, and suddenly she was being dragged through the snow.

“Hang in there, Heather. You can do this.”

A tremor ran down her legs. The bones of both feet broke simultaneously. She kicked out involuntarily and collided with something. Harbinger went sprawling. The burning wouldn’t stop. She began tearing off the rest of her clothes. Her belt buckle fought her. The complicated thing was too confusing, so she curled her hands around each side and ripped the leather in half. She tried to let the pain out through her mouth, but the screams weren’t taking much pain along with them.

“The first one’s always the hardest,” Harbinger muttered in her ear as he lifted her from the snow.

He sounded like he was in pain. I’m sorry! she thought, but now, behind the pain, the burning, and the fear, was something else. Excitement. It beckoned to her. If she could make it past the first three, the last one called. Harbinger’s hands felt like ice blocks on her naked shoulders. He was steering her toward something. It was a silver box. Inside was darkness.

Don’t go into the hole. There is only death in the hole.

She shoved him away. Her push was enough to send him flying across the street. I’m really sorry! In horror, she looked down at her hand again. It was covered in red hair. Fire was red. The burning was leaking out of her skin. Her nails had turned into knives.

Harbinger sat up in the snow, ten feet away. There were new tears down the front of his armor. He winced as he felt the blood. He looked over at Heather and lifted his gun. “Aw, damn it.”

I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! She reached out to him, but then her pelvis snapped. Her spine pushed her skin to the bounds of elasticity. Teeth sawed through her gums. She fell again, screaming. But the scream had changed, this was a new scream, and it let out much more of the pain. No, this was no scream. This was a howl.

Looking up, there was Harbinger, standing over her, bleeding. “I’m sorry,” he said. She saw nothing but meat.

Now she understood why Joe Buckley had begged her for death. She understood why Harbinger had given her the gun-forgotten in her coat-with the silver bullets. The change was starting to feel good.

Kill me! Please! Hurry.

Harbinger lifted his gun.

She lowered her head. Kill me before I kill you.

Everything went black.

A single tiny candle flickered on top of the pathetic little cupcake.

Happy birthday to me.

Happy birthday to me.

In a mine shaft with a bloody werewolf,

Happy birthday to me.

All across Copper Lake, dead bodies rose, powered by the waves emanating from the amulet of Koschei. Anyone that had been killed by one of the Alpha’s pack was born again as one of the wretched vulkodlak. They were remarkable creations; undead lycanthropes, caught somewhere between man and werewolf, nearly mindless, driven only by a single instinct: the need to spread their curse. They would never tire. They would never stop. Smelling prey, the creatures were already surrounding the survivors clustered at the school.

They would kill, but not feed on the flesh. The vulkodlak were vampiric. They would rend the flesh, drink the blood, and within moments the deceased would become one of them. Once the last of the survivors was turned, the vulkodlak would set out in every direction. They were swift on foot and could cover many kilometers before the magic driving the storm died off.

Lucinda knew that the American government would never allow the vulkodlak to spread. Northern Michigan would be burned to ash before they’d let that happen. But the Alpha had thought ahead. Before the government bombs fell, she would use her magic to whisk herself and the Alpha to another prepared location. She had a portal rope tied around her waist, just waiting to be activated. Werewolf-killed corpses had already been prepped and hidden across the country. Vulkodlak would arise elsewhere. Chaos would ensue. Her new god would be pleased.

The plan was brutal and blunt. Her father would not have approved. Martin Hood had been discreet; he’d wielded magic like a surgeon’s scalpel. He’d planned his every move years in advance. In contrast, the Alpha’s plan was like a sledgehammer.

Martin Hood had served the Dread Overlord with the utmost devotion, but in the end, it had been for nothing. MHI had killed her father and her god. Her church had fallen apart, and her hand had been torn off by that super-bitch vampire. Alone, she’d built a new hand with magic and steel, and set about recovering much of her father’s work. It had been a depressing time.