Marcus Pelegrimas - The Breaking

Returning her wary smile with one of his own, Waggoner looked over to the bearded man and asked, “So you got room for one more or not?”

Looking down at Waggoner’s bandaged leg, the bearded man grunted and stepped aside. “I suppose, since it’s you.”

“Yeah. Thanks.” With that, Waggoner eased back and stretched his wounded leg out in front of him. “I’ll just need a little time to heal up,” he told Paige. “Then I can be right with you again.”

“You’ve got a phone?”

“Of course. And now,” Waggoner said, and tossed his keys to her, “you’ve got a truck. Don’t bust it up too bad.”

Paige went into the kitchen to look for the Tupperware. The redhead was right, she couldn’t miss it. At least four piles of the colorful plastic containers were piled high in the far right cabinets with lids stacked neatly beneath them. After she found a piece that was just the right size to hold the pound of flesh she’d extracted from Kawosa, she popped the lid shut and said, “I’ve got to get me some of this stuff.”

Collecting some bottled water, chips, and snack cakes to stuff into her pockets, she returned to the panic room just as the bearded man was closing the door. “Here,” she said, handing the container to Waggoner. “Keep this for me. It’s important.”

“I ain’t out of this fight yet and I sure as hell ain’t sitting it out just to guard some leftovers.”

Crouching down so he could hear her whisper, she tapped the container and asked, “Do you know why you believed what Kawosa told you and I didn’t?”

Although obviously not proud of that instance, he replied, “No, but I was wondering about that.”

“It’s because I finally made something that works.” She held up her hand and showed him her scarred palm. “I met up with that coyote before and he almost got me and my partner to kill each other. I clipped him back in Canada. It wasn’t a bad wound, but it drew blood. Have you seen Bill’s weapons and what they can do?”

Shooting a cautious glance to the others in the room with him, Waggoner nodded.

“We can use those weapons to sniff out things like these werewolves,” she explained.

“I know. I’ve seen that too.”

“Well, I got enough blood to modify my weapon to sniff out that lying shapeshifter. Maybe it’s because I trusted that more than anything else, but when he spoke to me, I didn’t buy what he was selling.”

“If we can put this stuff to use—”

She silenced him with a hand placed gently on his shoulder. “All I got was a warning, and even then it was tough to fight it when he tried to manipulate me. We need his blood to do the trick, and this,” she said while placing her hand reverently on the orange plastic container, “won’t even be enough to treat everybody’s weapons. When you’re feeling better, I think we should see about getting a weapon for you. A real one.”

“I don’t know,” Waggoner sighed. “I like my bow. But I’ll watch this for you. That skinny prick is just a lying little scumbag who cuts and runs.”

“He’s survived worse than us, so there’s got to be more than one trick up his sleeve. This’ll help, though.”

Waggoner’s arms closed around the Tupperware container until it disappeared within his grasp. If anything was going to get to it, they would have one hell of a fight on their hands. “Where are you headed?”

“There’s still a little bit of time to get things prepared. Remember that stuff I was working on at the paint shop? I’ll need a lot more of that.”

“How long will that take?”

“The Breaking Moon won’t be at full strength until around three in the morning. At least, that’s what our sources say.”

“You mean MEG?” Waggoner asked.

“Yeah. You’ve heard about them?”

“Bill told us about MEG. Kinda had to. After hearing him mention that name a few times, we thought he was cheatin’ on his wife with some girl who he called all the time.”

Two of the women from one of the families huddled in the back of the room perked up. Judging by the similarity of their features and age difference, they were most likely mother and daughter. “You mean those ghost guys on TV?” the daughter asked, having overheard the whispered conversation. “We love them! They really know their stuff.”

Paige rolled her eyes and in a normal voice said, “The MEG guys are the rock stars now? Dark days indeed.”

“What?” the mother asked, since she didn’t know the history between Skinners and the paranormal research group. “They’re really smart?”

“They sure are,” Waggoner said. “Let’s just hope they’re more on the ball about this than the Bigfoot that was supposed to be stomping around northern Indiana.”

After pulling in a deep breath and letting it out, Paige stood up and checked to make sure her Beretta was loaded. “I should get going.”

“What you should do is get an hour’s sleep,” Waggoner said. “How long’s it been since you rested?”

“I caught a few hours on the plane over here. Feels like a week ago.”

“Then take an hour. What can it hurt?”

“If my partner’s plan is going to work, we’ll need to move those Full Bloods and any other shapeshifters away from town in a matter of a few seconds,” she explained. “Have you ever herded werewolves, cowboy?”

“No, ma’am. But it might not be a bad idea to sit tight and pick a better spot for a fight,” Waggoner offered.

Paige flexed the arm that required constant movement to keep from petrifying into a stump. “Believe me, I know all about rushing in. The problem here is that we already let the Full Bloods get too far. They can turn people into Half Breeds without biting them. Isn’t that right?” she asked the families huddled against the walls. Some nodded back and others were too frightened to move a muscle.

“I saw people drop to their knees in the parking lot of a gas station,” the bearded man said. “They were fine one minute, and the next, their bones were snapping until they became monsters. Werewolves,” he said, as if the whole situation was just sinking in. “Jesus Christ.”

Paige was all too familiar with the look on his face. “Since there are humans still left in this town, that must mean the Full Bloods have some sort of range or limit to this thing they can do. If they make it all the way through the Breaking Moon, that could change for the worse, and we can’t allow that to happen. I won’t let that happen. Stay in here until someone comes for you. That goes for everybody.”

“What if nobody comes for us?” the bearded man asked.

“Then you might as well get comfortable inside this room because there won’t be much of an outside waiting for you.”

That sent a wave of frightened sobs through the little space, but also served to push the families back against the walls with no sign of moving. Paige resisted the urge to reassure the youngest children and turned her back to the group. At certain times, a dose of justified fear served a good purpose, and if her words kept those people locked away for the next few hours, that was just fine.

“When I’m feeling better, I’ll come help you,” Waggoner said.

“No. Stay here and protect these people.”

“There are others locked up in other houses that need help too, you know,” he said.

“Yeah, and there’s only so much we can do. We either protect a few or lose them all.”

He grunted. “Now there’s one of the shittiest choices I’ve ever heard.”

“You obviously haven’t been around Skinners for very long,” she told him.

Finding the Full Bloods wasn’t difficult. Even a blind man would have been able to follow the growing crescendo of howls drifting from the east end of town. Paige met Al and Jesse outside a convenience store that had been all but gutted by shapeshifters or looters. While filling the tanks of both pickups at a set of pumps, she slapped the window behind Al’s head until Jesse slid it open. “Any word from Milosh or Nadya?”