PREDATOR IF IT BLEEDS Read online

  5

  “Got that sombitch!” Johnny Boy shouted, as the branches overhead shook. Then he flinched, raised a hand to his cheek and smeared his fingers across it. They came away wet and luminous green, like he’d smeared firefly guts across his skin. “What the fu—?”

  Johnny Boy’s confusion—and body—were cut short by a spinning metal disc. It came and went in a whoosh, leaving the stricken man still and silent. Then he fell to his knees, and the impact loosened his severed head. Blood seeped from the wound and allowed the head to slide free and thump to the ground in time with his body.

  Gator, unfazed by the recent violence, crouched down by Johnny Boy’s still confused face. He didn’t even flinch when Johnny Boy blinked. He just swiped his finger through the green smear. Smelled it. Tasted it. “Dat blood.”

  Stonewall slowly drew his pistol. He’d lost three men in under twenty minutes. Johnny Boy had managed to wound their adversary, but the bright green blood confirmed what Ames’s men believed, and what Stonewall had begun to fear. They weren’t being hunted by a man, or even by a group of men. It was that Devil himself that’d come for Stonewall Jackson. “Lord Jesus,” he said, praying aloud as he did before every battle, “see us through this trial. Give us the strength of Samson and wisdom of Solomon. Guide us through these woods to safety and spare our lives. Your will be—”

  Stonewall stopped. He finished every prayer the same way, ‘Your will be done.’ But God’s will was a tricky thing. It might be for the greater good, far outside the grasp of mortal men, but it didn’t always line up with human desires, even those of good Christians. So, instead, he said, “Please don’t let the Devil kill me. Amen.”

  Finished with the prayer, he realized his compatriots were staring at him, Goose whispering his name. His real name. “Thomas.” Nothing more needed to be said. It was time to go. Goose just needed a direction.

  Stonewall turned to Ames. “Closer to the Union lines?”

  Ames gave a nod. “By a few miles.”

  “I have your word that we will be returned safely to the Confederacy come first light?”

  A second nod. “On my life.”

  “Lead the way. Fast as you can.”

  They ran through the night, guided by Ames’s sense of direction and a lone torch. Just ten minutes on, Stonewall’s lungs begged for respite, but he didn’t believe, not for a moment, that the hunter had given up—certainly not after being wounded.

  Ames stopped, hands on knees, chest heaving as he caught his breath. Before Stonewall could smack some sense into the man and get him moving again, the hunter bellowed in pain. The roar sounded similar to a man having a bullet pried from his body. It was wasting no time tending to the wound. He had little doubt it would pick up their trail soon enough, but at least the noise spurred Ames back to running.

  After another ten minutes, their pace slowed considerably, but they didn’t stop. Stonewall felt a surge of hope. The forest up ahead was framed by a dull light. A clearing. The Union forces wouldn’t be too far beyond.

  Gator must have seen this, too, because he picked up the pace and said, “Almost dare!”

  He hit full speed in five steps. Then came to an abrupt halt, as though he’d run into a wall… that wasn’t there.

  Tiny streaks of what looked like lightning crackled from the point of impact, moving up and down, revealing an immense and inhuman form.

  Gator fell back, rolled head over heels, and returned to his feet in a crouch. He looked up at their revealed enemy: “Is a gator man.” He drew a long knife from his hip. “Like me.”

  The fearless alligator hunter lunged, blade swinging in a wide arc. The Devil reached out and caught Gator’s face in its palm, but the man managed to complete his strike, swiping the knife across its midsection. The blade didn’t sink deeply enough to eviscerate the beast, but it drew more luminous blood.

  Whether or not the creature had even noticed the wound, Stonewall couldn’t tell. While much of its reptilian-skinned body was exposed, it also wore a strange kind of armor, which included a sinister-looking helmet, or at least, what Stonewall hoped was a helmet. He had never seen or imagined anything so horrible in all his life, but he wasn’t yet hopeless. This creature could be injured, and that meant—he hoped—that it could be killed.

  With a shout muffled by the creature’s large, clawed hand wrapped around his head, Gator drew his knife back, preparing to thrust it into the thing’s gullet. But he never got the chance. The beast twisted its arm, spinning Gator’s head 180 degrees, cracking his neck.

  At the sound of Gator’s snapping vertebrae, Goose opened fire, first with his rifle, and then his revolver. Every fired bullet was a perfect headshot. Had he been aiming at a man, there would be little left of his head. But this creature was far from a man, and its silver helmet deflected the barrage, showing only slight dents in the metal.

  Goose saved his last round. “It’s like shooting an iron plate.”

  The creature turned its glowing eyes toward Goose, as though merely annoyed by his assault. The woodpecker growl made Stonewall’s hair stand on end. It was the only part of his body able to move. Then the creature’s shoulder came to life, as a strange, third appendage, like a malformed arm made of metal, snapped into place. A triangle of red lines cut through the dark, emerging from the side of the creature’s helmet, creating red spots on Goose’s chest.

  Goose took aim at the creature’s torso and pulled the trigger just as a burst of bright blue light exploded from its shoulder.

  Stonewall flinched away from the light, and the heat it threw off. He looked back in time to see Goose thrown against a tree, his body scorched. The creature stood still, looking down at its wrist, where a crackle of orange light revealed the damage caused by Goose’s final shot.

  “Sir,” Goose groaned, reaching up. The front side of his clothes were burned away. His skin was red hot, cracked, bleeding and steaming, like a roast pig. “Give me… your pistol. And go.”

  Stonewall didn’t want to leave the man. He’d rather put him out of his misery first, as he had done for Cotton and Cracker Jack. But Goose might be able to buy him precious seconds. He looked up at the sound of rustling leaves. Ames was beating a hasty retreat toward the forest’s edge. Stonewall didn’t know if the man was a coward, or just smart, but he decided it didn’t matter. Running was the only sound option left. He handed his pistol to Goose, who winced, as his raw fingers wrapped around the pistol.

  “Go,” Goose said, teeth grinding. “Make it back… to your family.”

  Those final words propelled Stonewall after Ames without another word. He followed the faint orange light of Ames’s torch, hoping the man knew where he was going. The clearing loomed brighter ahead.

  And then a gunshot rang out.

  It was followed by three more.

  Two more shots, Stonewall thought. He has two more.

  But the only sound that followed was a gut-wrenching scream that somehow seemed louder than the pistol reports. Stonewall stumbled to a stop at the forest’s edge, torn between living and loyalty to the man he had left behind.

  Then the Devil screamed at him from the dark woods, and Stonewall sprinted away, running into an open clearing, miles across, where his army would fight, kill, and die the very next morning. And where he suspected he might do the same, before the sun could rise.

  6

  Out of breath and more afraid than he would ever admit, Stonewall stumbled to a stop in the field’s core. He was surrounded by tall yellowed grass, undulating in the night’s breeze. The stars blazed overhead. Had he been with Mary and Julia, his thoughts would have been on the beauty of the Lord’s creation. Instead, all he could think about was the Devil, set loose to torment him. Like the Biblical Job, but more personal.

  He stood in front of the only sign of Ames he had seen since the man fled the forest. The man’s torch stood upright in the field, like a beacon. And it had drawn Stonewall straight toward it, expecting to find Ames resting, or waiting
in ambush. But all he found was the torch, casting a thirty foot ring of orange.

  He was about to curse Ames when he heard a shushing behind him. Someone, or something, was moving through the grass. He turned slowly, having little doubt about who had followed him into the clearing.

  The Devil emerged from the darkness, standing tall and bold. Luminous blood leached out of its sliced stomach and from two fresh bullet wounds, one in its thigh and one in its shoulder. Neither seemed to slow the creature down or cause any discomfort. Either shot might kill a man on the battlefield, from blood loss perhaps, but more likely from infection. He didn’t think either would be a problem for the beast.

  Stonewall drew his second pistol. “What are you?”

  Three red dots hummed from the creature’s helmet. The weapon on its shoulder targeted him.

  The result of a shootout with this creature only had one potential outcome, Stonewall realized. Goose was a better, and faster, shot than Stonewall, and he hadn’t been able to put this creature down. If Stonewall pulled the trigger, his fate would match Goose’s.

  Stonewall lifted his sidearm out, and then released it, letting it fall to the grass.

  The monster cocked its head to the side, and then relaxed. The three red lights flickered off. With a clucking growl, the Devil unclipped its armor and shed the weapon mounted to its shoulder. Then it loosened the helmet and peeled it away with a hiss of fog.

  Stonewall took a step back, as the helmet lowered.

  Then four more when he saw its face, stopping only when the torch’s heat licked up his back.

  “Lucifer,” Stonewall said. “In the flesh…” He drew his sabre, the long, polished blade glowing orange in the firelight. Gathering his courage, Stonewall shouted, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to—”

  The creature leaned forward, opened its muscular arms wide and bellowed. The hot stinking breath clouded around Stonewall, somehow both hotter and more humid than the thick early summer air.

  With a metallic zing, two jagged blades extended from the creature’s right forearm. It reached behind its back with its left hand and withdrew a razor-sharp disc, its fingers looped through five holes. Stonewall recognized this as the weapon that had severed Johnny Boy’s head. It still held a thin coating of his blood.

  The monster hunched in an attack position and began circling. Stonewall spun in a slow circle. His blade was longer than the creature’s, but its long arms still gave it a longer reach. And he couldn’t outmuscle it. But perhaps he could outsmart it? The way he saw it, his only hope was to make it strike first, hopefully dodge the blow, leaving the creature overextended and vulnerable. It was the same tactic that guaranteed victory against the Union during the upcoming battle, but would it work against a predator such as this?

  After a few moments, the creature stood upright again, its horrible mandibles twitching as its eyes looked Stonewall up and down.

  It’s reassessing me, Stonewall thought. It knows I’m trying to outthink it.

  With a flick of its wrist, the Devil sent the metal disc soaring off into the dark. The only evidence it hadn’t flown away was the whirring of its blade through the air. The weapon was circling them. When the sound grew suddenly louder, Stonewall ducked with a shout. The blade soared past overhead.

  It’s controlling the weapon, Stonewall realized. As long as I’m not fighting, I’m vulnerable. It’s forcing me to engage.

  So he did.

  Stifling the urge to let out a battle cry, Stonewall lunged forward, stabbing out with the sabre, hoping to sink the blade into the Devil’s chest. But the strike was parried by the creature’s bare hand.

  Stonewall swung the blade, adding desperate fury to the strike. The sword sparked off the monster’s armored wrist. He swung again, aiming low for the femoral artery, but he had no idea if the creature could even bleed out. The top half-inch of metal tugged through thick hide, leaving a two-inch slice.

  Encouraged by the small victory, Stonewall raised the sabre over his head and hacked down, aiming for the Devil’s shoulder. The sword came to a jarring stop that nearly pulled the weapon from his hands. The demon had caught the sabre between the two blades extending from its wrists. With a quick twist, the sabre was sheared into three pieces and yanked from Stonewall’s hand.

  He stumbled back away from the predator. His heel rolled on something hard and he fell to his backside.

  Looking down, he saw his pistol resting between his legs. He snatched it up and began a slow crawl backward, away from the torch, and the monster it lit in hellish orange light.

  Then a voice rolled over the open field. It was faint, but recognizable as Ames, and clear as the sky above. “Grapeshot!”

  Stonewall’s eyes widened. Grapeshot was composed of metal balls, the size of large grapes. When fired from a cannon, they could devastate an advancing infantry or cavalry. With a sudden clarity, Stonewall understood the torch’s purpose. In the dead of night, it was a target, working in the same way as the creature’s red-dotted triangle.

  Backing up further, Stonewall adjusted his course, drawing the creature into the fire’s light. Cast in the monster’s shadow, Stonewall waited. The creature stopped again, peering first at Stonewall, and then the flame behind it.

  It knows, Stonewall thought. It’s going to move.

  He raised the pistol and fired. The bullet struck the creature’s side, snapping its attention back to him. He aimed higher, but heard the familiar whirring blade swooping in from the right. He flopped down onto his back, just as the blade cut through the space where his head had been. He raised his hand to fire again, but the boom that filled the night was much more powerful than his pistol could manage.

  Luminous green burst into the night, covering Stonewall from head to toe.

  He wiped his eyes clean. The Devil stood above him, its body ravaged by grapeshot, its head shredded into two halves. Stonewall rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding its falling body.

  As he stood, a voice.

  “You need to go!” Ames, on horseback, was carrying a canister of liquid.

  The young captain slid off the horse and handed Stonewall the reins. “I made you a promise I intend to keep. Now go!”

  “We can’t let anyone know about this,” Stonewall said. “No one will fight if they think the Devil makes his home here.”

  “Taking care of it,” Ames said, sloshing liquid onto the body.

  Recognizing the smell of kerosene and the sound of approaching men, Stonewall climbed atop the horse. “If we meet upon the battlefield, I will not hesitate.”

  Ames smiled, picking up the torch. “Then I will do my best to avoid you.”

  As the Devil’s body was turned into an inferno, Stonewall kicked the horse into action and rode into the night, taking a direct course through the forest where his men had died. He rode without ceasing, feeling the Devil’s claws reaching for him in the dark. He didn’t slow down upon reaching the far side, or when the Confederate lines came into view, or even when he heard men shouting for him to stop.

  What stopped him was a bullet, fired from his own men.

  Stonewall lay in the grass, looking up at the sky, thinking of his wife and daughter, listening as his men shouted about the glowing green man, and he watched as a streak of light rose up out of the forest and winked up into the stars.

  * * *

  Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson died May 10, 1863, from an infection caused by a bullet put in him by his own men, upon returning from a reconnaissance mission. The exact reason his men fired on him remains a mystery.

  REMATCH

  BY STEVE PERRY

  Something is wrong.

  The old sense hadn’t been active much, only a twinge now and then, since the disaster in Alaska nine years back, but it was here, now, as strong as it ever had been.

  Something is wrong. Danger! Death!

  Sloane didn’t pause, he kept moving, took the turn that circled the big oak, where the old deer path veered into the woods
. Birds chirped, but he didn’t hear anything else save his own breathing and soft footfalls.

  Somebody was out there.

  Who? The bikers? From the meth lab set up in the old RV parked by the pond deeper into the forest?

  Nope, not them. Those clowns tromped through the woods like a herd of rhinos; you could hear them a mile away. They were stupid-dangerous, but, no, not them.

  It was an overcast Oregon summer morning, and he was still a little stiff—these days, it sometimes took twenty or thirty minutes before he worked the kinks out. Back in his heyday, he’d slogged through the jungles of Vietnam carrying a full backpack, extra ammo, his rifle and scope, fifty, sixty pounds of crap, and he could come out of a dead sleep, ruck up, walk ten miles without blinking, set the sight, and center-punch Charlie from five hundred meters with a cold shot. He’d been good at his job. Long gone, those times. Had a birthday coming up, with a big number in the front and a zero following that, and he’d lost a step or two…

  Somebody was watching him. He knew it.

  He didn’t want them to know he had any idea they were.

  The path descended a little, weaving into the scrub fir and alder. Usually the mosquitoes weren’t bad this time of morning, and he had planned to get five miles in and be back before Mary got up.

  Not now. Now, he needed to cut his walk short and get home, where he had resources.

  It had been a long time since he felt the need to carry a gun. He had a pocket knife, a little ZT tactical folder clipped inside his jeans pocket, but it wasn’t a serious weapon, it had a three-inch blade. As a forest ranger in Denali, he had slung rifles that could hit hard enough to stop a charging brown bear the size of a small pick-up truck. Necessary there, not here.

  These days, he saw squirrels or rabbits, and there didn’t seem to be any bears locally, not even the little black ones you could shoo away by waving your hat.