Larry Correia - Monster Hunter Alpha

“What’s the deal, Van?”

“He’s a holy man, Mr. Wolf. He’s come a very long way to find you.”

“No. I mean with that chicken.”

“He’s telling the future.”

Van was an earnest fellow, and I’d never known him to be the superstitious type. The old man whispered something. Van had to lean in real close to translate. “An animal gave its spirit to a man. The spirit was tricky and thought it could change the man. The spirit had always changed the man. But this man would not change. Instead, he made the animal spirit change its ways.”

My condition was not to be spoken about. “I’m sure hoping you didn’t tell him anything classified, Van.”

“No, Mr. Wolf. I didn’t tell him. He said the mountain spirits told him you were coming.” Flexible mind, I preferred to think that this old man’s mountain spirits were whispering to him rather than my translator was talking about things that could get him in trouble. The old man kept on whispering. “He says that the animal spirits have waited…I don’t know the word…A very long time for one that could change them. The animal spirits will listen to you…the mountain spirits will help you…in the war.”

“Tell him thanks. In a war, you’ll take whatever help you can get.”

Van told him. There were flies buzzing around the chicken, and the hut was so humid it made Alabama seem frosty. The old man kept on in a monotone whisper. Van looked confused. “Not this war. The big war.”

“This one ain’t big enough?”

“No. The coming war…Sorry, I don’t understand. The mountain spirits told him it is coming. The war to end all things. You are one of the four.”

“What’s that mean? Four what?”

The creases of the old holy man’s knuckles were filled with dried chicken blood. “The Mountain Spirits won’t say. Before you can lead the animal spirits, you have to teach someone. Make them ready for the war that will end all things. You have to prepare the way…There will be many battles. Many changes. If you fail, the animal spirits will fight on the enemy’s side instead. When the time is right, you will announce the war, and all the spirits will follow you into the dark place.”

“None of that makes a lick of sense.”

“He says you are the one that prepares the way…I don’t know the word. One that prepares the way…A harbinger? Yes. The mountain spirits say you are the harbinger.”

The holy man fell silent. He scooped up the plate of guts and tossed it out the door to the dogs. He was done. He’d delivered the message from his mountain spirits. We were dismissed.

Harbinger. I liked the sound of that.

The Briarwood company Cadillac was stuck. “On three,” Stark ordered. “One, two, three! ” He threw all his weight against the bumper. The tires spun uselessly in the snow. “No! Damn idiot! You’ve got to rock it! Rock it!”

Ryan Horst stuck his head out the window. “I’m trying, okay? Quit yelling at me.”

Stark stood up with a grunt. His back was killing him, having wrenched something during his jump from the hospital window. They’d managed to lose the zombie-werewolves right before Horst had spun them off the side of the road into a ditch. The other Briarwood Hunter, Lins, was trying to help push the front end of the truck out. It was hopeless. It would probably take a tractor to drag them out.

The two of them stopped to take a breath. Stark looked back the way they’d come. The monsters were bound to catch up any second, but he couldn’t even see far enough through the snowfall to tell how much time they had left. “All this shit on here and you don’t have a winch? You’ve got rims that spin, and no winch? Are you kidding me?”

Lins shrugged. “Weren’t expecting none of this, man. This was supposed to be a cakewalk.”

“No heavy weapons. No clue. It’s amateur hour.” Stark glanced around. His parka was back at the hospital, and the wind was cutting right through the seams of his armor. He needed to warm up, but if they hunkered down the monsters would tear them apart. There had to be something they could use, somewhere they could go. “I can’t believe I trusted you idiots.”

“Hey. Look at that.” Lins pointed at something in the distance.

Squinting, Stark could barely make out the lights. “I think that’s the high school. I drove by there earlier.”

“You got a better place to be?”

Stark’s face burned from the cold. His ears were probably going to turn black and fall off. Odds were there was nobody worth a damn at the high school, either, but if they had lights, then they had a generator, so at least he could die warm. “Better than being out here.” He slammed his fist on the hood to get Horst’s attention, then regretted it immediately as the impact stung his frozen hand. “Come on, stupid. Let’s go.”

Horst gave him a sullen glare as he got out, but he was smart enough not to say anything. Stark wasn’t in the mood.

The three of them gathered around the back of the Cadillac so Stark could take stock of the situation. Horst and Lins both had rifles, but there were only a couple of mags left between them. Stark had his issue Glock and a combat knife; that was it. He had pouches full of SCAR mags filled with composite silver 7.62, but his rifle had been left leaning against the wall during his hasty escape from Deputy Buckley. To make matters even more embarrassing, there was a Suburban full of top-of-the-line MCB equipment sitting in the hospital parking lot surrounded by zombie-werewolves.

“Before we make a run for those lights, you guys have any more cold-weather gear you can spare?” Stark asked through chattering teeth.

“If we did, I’d be wearing it,” Lins answered sharply as he sat on the Caddy’s bumper. Balancing his M-4 carbine between his legs, Lins pulled his sweater up over his mouth and nose, then shoved his hands into his armpits. “What’re we supposed to do about Jo?”

A slimy hand landed against the interior of the back window. A horrible visage rose behind the hand. The face was slack and pale, dripping sweat past bloodshot eyes. Drool spilled out as the mouth opened wide. The monster’s face hit the glass with a wet thud.

“Threat!” Stark shouted as he went for his sidearm.

“No, wai-”

BANG.

A hole appeared in the glass. The horrible face disappeared.

Lins fell off the bumper. “Son of a bitch! You shot Jo!”

Stark slowly lowered his Glock as the hand slid down the glass until it also disappeared from view. “Jo?” He looked to Horst, but the lead Briarwood man was just standing there, mouth hanging open, apparently in shock. “Who’s Jo?”

“ That was Jo Schneider,” Lins said as he got to his feet. “She’s with us. She’s Horst’s girlfriend! Shit, man, you just capped our secretary!”

It took his numbed hand a few tries to get the Glock back into the holster. “The one with the sexy voice?” Stark mumbled. “Well…Huh. I pictured her as better looking.”

“She was, before a giant scarecrow robot puked her up,” Lins said.

Horst stepped forward without a word and opened the back of the Cadillac. Stark looked past Horst’s shoulder. The woman had been wrapped in a blanket and appeared to have been in really rough shape even before the gunshot wound. He’d seen healthier looking zombies. “In my defense, she looked like a monster.” Jo Ann was still alive, but probably not for long. Stark’s bullet had punched through her shoulder, and from the amount of blood, he assumed that he’d severed the axillary artery “Well…Shit. Sorry, I guess.”

Jo Ann squinted at Horst. She was having a hard time focusing. “I…I was just gonna…tell you I was feeling…better.”