Marcus Pelegrimas - The Breaking

“They nest?” Cole asked as a chill worked its way down his back. “Where?”

“Damn near anyplace. They like cities because they can fold themselves up to fit nicely in all those angular crevices and narrow corners between buildings or under ledges. They ain’t got much by way of muscle, but they sure do have something to make up for it.” Jessup twisted his blade once more and pulled open a flap of skin he’d been cutting like a trapdoor. A spray of what looked like murky water emerged from the opening, which didn’t do anything to dim the smile on the Skinner’s face. Holding up a flat tube the size of a long water balloon, he declared, “This was worth the trip. If we don’t get a few more to use against that Full Blood friend of yours, we’ll have to improvise.”

“You think it would help if I knew what you were talking about?”

“Take a look at them claws,” Jessup said while tapping the chunk of creature Cole had brought into the truck. “Remember them scratches on the statues?”

“Yeah.”

“And the flat spots on their backs? That’s from this right here. Take a look.” Jessup held the tube as if he was about to decorate a cake. Instead of icing, a clear gel oozed from the end of the tube. The instant it touched the seat cushion between Jessup and Cole, the substance hardened with a soft creaking sound.

Inside the truck it was easier to block out the sounds coming from the northern side of town. Even with the Ford’s superior insulation, however, Cole could now hear the occasional chatter of automatic gunfire and the thumping bass of helicopter blades.

The bottom of the creature had an opening just like the mouth pressed against the window, except now he could see rows of tiny bristles just inside the opening. With the thing dead, a flat length of skin capped by four barbed hooks that could have been a tongue lolled from its mouth. Too much experience in handling deceased nightmares gave Cole the stomach to reach out and squeeze the tonguelike protrusion. Sure enough, it was a flattened tube that ended at the top of Jessup’s incision. By now the gel squeezed onto the seat cushion had formed a thick gray shell.

More of the pieces came together, finally coalescing when Cole tapped the barrel of his gun against the gray shell. It was solid and unmoving. After feeling the shell with his bare hand, he asked, “Is that rock?”

“Near enough.”

“So those statues are things that these bat-things swarmed and injected with this goo?”

“Not injected. Just coated and smeared around on the inside of their wings. Them claws sink in to keep whatever it catches from squirming away. The more they struggle, the more that stuff gets spread into a nice even coat.”

“Then what?”

“Then, after the stuff hardens, the rest of the gargoyles come back to feed. We think they must eat organs and soft tissue, because they sure as hell don’t got the choppers to tear off any meat. We’ve found little holes and slits that they could stick their tongues into and then seal up again to preserve the rest of the meal for later.”

Cole looked at the flattened portions of skin that scraped the window and kissed the glass. “How come they’re so quiet now?”

“Because they ain’t flying,” Jessup replied as he worked to tie up one end of the tube he’d extracted. “Pull off some of those talons. They’re light and durable. Make for great add-ons to our weapons. See anything going on outside?”

“No. There’s too many of those things on your truck. They’re persistent, I’ll give them that.”

“It’s how they’ve survived this long. They can hide like nothing else, and when they’ve been found out, they don’t stop attacking until they’ve put down whatever stirred ’em up. Soon as one of them is injured or if a statue is cracked open enough for them to smell their own juices inside of it, they swoop in to clean things up.”

“Kind of like a flying rodent ninja hit squad,” Cole said.

Jessup looked up from the knot he was tying and said, “Yeah. I guess that sums it up.”

“So you’re thinking of turning Cecile into one of those statues?”

“That’s the idea.”

“She seems like a good kid,” Cole sighed. “Shame to have her get taken out by these flying creeps and then get her guts sucked out.”

“I doubt this’ll kill her. We don’t know a lot about gargoyles, but if they had that kind of punch, they would have killed one or two Full Bloods over the years. Odds are a whole lot better they can contain one. Friend of mine did some hiking over in Hungary and found some statues that looked a lot like werewolves out in the middle of nowhere. Took enough pictures to find the scratches and smooth patch on the back later on, but he didn’t exactly know what he was looking at. We’ve always wanted to go back there, but the damn Gypsies would only chase us away again. I don’t even wanna know how he smuggled his camera back to the States. From what we can piece together in some old Skinner journals, we figure gargoyles migrated over here on a boat that passed through or originated from Greece on its way to the New World.”

“They’re from Greece?”

Jessup nodded while checking his guns, then dug out a shotgun kept under the seat in a specially crafted rack. It held the weapon in a hollowed space that would pass all but the most extensive inspections. “You heard of the Medusa myths?”

“You mean the reptile woman with snakes in her hair?” Cole asked. “I guess something’s gotta balance out the nymphs, huh?”

“Them myths came about the way lots of them do. Misinformation. As far as we can tell, Medusa was either the woman who crafted these things or first set them loose after stumbling on a nest buried deep somewhere. As for the snakes and such, I don’t know. Maybe the woman was just butt-ugly. All I can tell you is that here and now, these ugly little suckers are gonna save our butts once that Breaking Moon rises.”

Cole pulled in a deep breath and let it out. “I was just getting comfortable in here. Sure you don’t want to tell me some more about gargoyles and misinterpreted mythology?”

“There’s more guns under the seat. Ammo too. Fill up. Sounds like we’re gonna need it.”

Grabbing a few pistols, some preloaded magazines, and a shotgun, Cole said, “It sounds like someone’s already found Cecile.”

“It’s more than that,” Jessup grunted. “I wasn’t with that girl for long, but she’s not the sort to stir up whatever the hell is goin’ on out there. She would’ve just run away before the National Guard or whoever else is out there came for her. Besides, can’t you feel it?”

“Yeah,” Cole said while brushing his fingers against his scars. “There’s more than one Full Blood out there.”

“You ready for this?”

“Sure. There’s helicopters in the air, gargoyles slapping the windows, a werewolf howling, and now,” Cole added as a distinctive chatter crackled in the distance, “it sounds like there’s automatic gunfire. We’ve got some shotguns and weapons that require us to stand toe-to-toe and swing at a meat rendering plant.”

“But we got something they don’t.”

“Please don’t say courage,” Cole sighed.

Jessup held up the tube he’d tied, and showed him a smile that verged on the insane. “And there’s plenty more of this to be had. More than we’ll need if we play this quick enough.”

“How much of that stuff did you get?”

“Not what’s in here. It’s what’s out there we need to put to use.”

Cole looked outside where the frantic, nearly transparent flaps of skin and talons continued smearing their fluids on the truck. Since the window or hood hadn’t turned to stone, he could only assume that was a whole lot of slobber. “Can we at least point them in the right direction?”