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Johnny gasped awake, but it was a mistake. Dirt filled his mouth upon opening and fear ripped through his body, jolted into action by adrenaline. He flailed his head — at least he attempted to — and became aware of the pressure settled over him like death. No, not death. He was alive. He could feel it, but he needed to get out from under here, he realized quickly as the pieces slowly connected in his mind.
Buried alive.
A nightmare on the best of days, and apparently his current reality. If he got out of this before he suffocated, there was a good chance this would top the list of his worst days.
Using what little leverage he could muster, Johnny squirmed in the dirt — not unlike the worms he could feel writhe against his skin as he moved.
Not today, worms, thought Johnny. Go find your food someplace else.
He didn’t know how long he struggled under the earth, or how deep he had been buried but by the time he broke the surface, Johnny was gasping. He was sure he had been only moments from death.
What a sight he must have been, erupting from the earth like something out of a cheap zombie horror flick, eyes wild and mouth agape. He pulled himself free from his earth grave and collapsed on the fresh soil.
How he had ended up here, where he was, or anything that could have filtered through his mind then, Johnny found himself only thinking one thing: he was hungry.
Home. That’s where he needed to go. Home.
Lanee sighed as she stared out the window. Rain fell from dark clouds and the sun had set hours ago now.
“If he’s not back by now, maybe we should assume the worst,” drawled Lance as he leaned against the windowsill next to her, taking a drag from his cigarette.
Lanee glared at the private investigator.
“We don’t know that just yet. Maybe his phone died. He hasn’t been the best at keeping up with it before, you know,” offered Maria from her seat in the living room. She flipped through a magazine Johnny had set out on his coffee table. It was at least three years out of date, but it was something to occupy the time.
Waiting was the hardest part of the job in Maria’s opinion. Lanee seemed to appreciate it to some degree, but only Lance seemed uncharacteristically comfortable with it. Normally, he was itching to pull the trigger on something — both figuratively and literally — but when it came to waiting for one of them to return? Eerily silent.
Lanee pushed away from her spot next to Lance, wafting the smoke away from her face.
“I’m going out to look for him,” she declared to the room.
Both Maria and Lance looked up at her with puzzled expressions.
“You want to go out in this?” Maria peeked out the nearest window at the steady drizzle outside. She could just barely make out the ambulance she kept for the hunters’ use, its lights dark as it sat empty. “You know it’s not safe past nightfall.”
“I know,” Lanee replied. “But we have to try something in case he ran into trouble. What if it was one of us? Johnny would do the same.”
Lance snorted. “And that’s why we’re in this mess to begin with.”
“Shut it, Pertkin,” snapped Lanee as she stomped over to the front door.
“Alright. Your funeral.” Lance smiled, the smoke from his cigarette curling around him like a snake. “Just know that I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger on that pretty face of yours should you run into trouble, too.”
Lanee rolled her eyes and wrenched the front door open.
Lightning struck, illuminating the dark porch and the collapsed figure in a heap on top of the damp wood.
Lanee gasped and surged forward. “Johnny! What happened to you?”
She launched herself at her friend and grasped his arms, her eyes searching him for any sign of injury. It was hard to see in the darkness, but she could feel the dirt caking his skin and slowly turning into mud from the downpour of rain.
Johnny’s head lifted. His eyes seemed glassy, Lanee noted. A dark mass marred the back of his head and by the time Lanee reached forward to discover caked blood, Johnny lunged.
Lanee stumbled backward, her back slamming into the wall as she fought to keep Johnny off of her as his hands grasped tightly, blunt nails digging into her flesh and teeth gnashing for her neck. The snarls that were coming from him weren’t human, they were near-animal. He was never the strongest of the group, but Lanee was struggling against him now, her arms shaking with the effort of holding him back.
Luckily, Lance grasped the back of Johnny’s shirt and hauled him away from Lanee, shoving him from the entryway and onto the pavement.
Johnny landed with a snarl as Maria appeared in the doorway to take in the chaos.
Lance drew his pistol and aimed at Johnny, but Lanee grabbed his wrist and pushed upwards.
“You can’t!”
Now having gotten back to his feet, Johnny lunged again but Lanee was prepared this time. She met his attack with a kick to his chest, pushing him back and just out of reach once more.
“He’s gone, Lanee!” Yelled Lance over the rain. “You can’t save him now!”
“You don’t know that! We know they’re not beyond reasoning!” Lanee and Lance both retreated backwards as Johnny launched himself between them, missing once again as the audible click of his jaws reverberated through the night air.
“Oh, so suddenly you want to reason with them when it's someone you know,” snarled Lance with a frown. He grabbed Johnny’s arm and used his weight advantage to drive him into the ground, twisting the limb painfully. He planted a knee on Johnny’s spine and placed the barrel of the gun at the nape of his neck.
“Let’s at least try to talk to him, first! We need to find out what happened!”
Lance bared his teeth as he glowered at Lanee. “Does it look like he’s in the mood to talk? Use your head, Lanee, for fuck’s sake!”
Maria rushed forward from the house and ripped open the door to her ambulance. “Get him in the back. Help me restrain him!”
Lance’s head whipped around to stare dumbfounded at the youngest hunter before he cursed and ripped himself and his gun away from the thrashing body of Johnny. Lanee quickly replaced him and Lance stood to the side as he watched the women wrestle the fledgling into the back of the ambulance.
Maria got to work grabbing the nylon straps for his limbs as Lanee manhandled what once was Johnny into a gurney. One of his arms was secured to the gurney beside him, while the other was strung up toward the ceiling and secured to a metal loop mounted there before strapping both his legs down.
His jaws snapped and screams of frustration left their former friend as he struggled against his restraints.
“We need to get him out of here before he draws any more attention,” Lanee ordered. Maria nodded and slipped into the driver’s seat.
Lance stood in the driveway still, his eyes dark as he watched a pathetic display of empathy, in his opinion.
As the ambulance roared to life, he lifted himself inside and shut the back doors before whirling on Lanee.
“You’re lucky I’m a changed man because if this was even 5 years ago, you’d have been dead along with him for that stunt.”
Lanee leveled Lance with a glare of her own. “We’re not rookies anymore, Lance. We’re not going to get very far by shooting first and asking questions later!”
Lance took a step forward, bracing himself against the ceiling of the ambulance as it rocked around a corner.
“I seemed to be doing just fine before you and your paintings came along,” he retorted.
“And look where that got us.” Lanee gestured to Johnny, still covered with dirt and blood. He let out another yell of frustration. “Look what they did to him!”
“That’s hardly my fault.” He turned away from Lanee and sat down along the wall. “This is why I don’t do teams. Everyone always gets too misty-eyed when things go tits up.”
Lanee frowned at Lance again before turning away. She didn’t need him to understand what she was trying to do. They all knew the risks of this job.
Admittedly, though, most of the risk was turning into corpses, not one of them. This was more disconcerting than Lanee wanted to admit. She’d been through the military, she’d hunted bounties and the country’s most dangerous criminals before, but seeing someone she knew changed into the very monsters she now hunted made her stomach turn.
Lance was right about one thing: this wasn’t Johnny anymore. But she still needed information from him and that wasn’t going to happen if he was trying to drain them dry the entire time.
Lanee rifled through the small cooler. They had a number of bags saved for an emergency transfusion. Maybe they’d get the job done here, too.
She grabbed a blood bag and shoved it between Johnny’s gnashing teeth. His fangs punctured the plastic and blood spurted out over his face and into his mouth. Almost immediately, his body shuddered as he spat the bag out of his mouth and dry heaved. He turned his head to the side as his face twisted in disgust as he vomited the blood right back up onto the floor at Lanee’s feet.
So that was a no-go then. This was going to be a long night.
Maria finally parked the ambulance on the outskirts of the city where the wetlands blended with the forested coast and every step had a risk of discovering that it wasn’t solid land beneath.
Johnny had settled into a tense stillness once he realized he no longer needed to breathe and his frantic panting ended. His eyes followed the movements of the others as they opened the back doors once more.
“How are we going to get him to tell us what happened,” questioned Maria. She looked down at her friend’s face that twisted with rage and hunger as he stared back at her. He was covered in even more blood now that their blood bag trick didn’t turn out.
“You could always threaten to leave him out for the sunrise,” Lance provided blandly from his perch against the metal wall. “Usually works for me.”
Johnny didn’t react, however. Maria studied him a bit closer. “But he seems different from the ones we normally deal with, even the particularly nasty ones.”
“He’s just a fledgling now, practically a newborn. Even so, you’re right. He’s not usual.” Lanee crossed her arms as she tried to shut out the recognition in her brain from staring at his face. “His eyes are distant, almost blank. I’ve seen it before.”
“And?” Maria asked.
Lanee shook her head solemnly. “They can’t be reasoned with.”
Lance pushed himself up from where he sat. “Finally! I’m glad you’ve decided to catch up with the program.”
Maria’s eyes softened, her brows knitting together. “So he’s really gone then? But look at him, he’s not even struggling anymore.” She gestured to his still body in the gurney just inches away from where she stood. She was right, but maybe sweeping her hand over a bloodthirsty predator wasn’t the smartest idea. Johnny took the opportunity and lunged forward. His teeth sank into the meat of Maria’s hand as she let out a shriek.
Invigorated by the taste of fresh blood, Johnny’s struggle renewed with increased fervor. He ripped one leg free and rocked the gurney until he unseated the metal hook from the ceiling. The stretcher tipped and its wheels trapped Lanee against the wall as Johnny lunged for Maria.
His jaws closed around her throat before she could even react and he pulled back, ripping into her neck like a starving dog with a steak.
“Maria! No!” Lanee exclaimed as she fought to climb over the gurney’s legs and disentangle herself.
A gunshot rang out and Lanee could only hear a high-pitched ring in the moments that followed.
Lance had landed his shot in the back of Johnny’s head, and the creature jerked back but did not die. It turned and snarled before lunging again with its hands grasping for purchase in Lance’s coat.
Another series of shots echoed in the metal bed of the ambulance as Lance emptied his handgun into Johnny. A body hit the floor and shook the suspension with a thud.
Lance cooly tucked his pistol away and pushed the gurney out the back doors as Lanee rushed forward at the wet gurgle that came from Maria’s slumped form.
“Shit,” she cursed as she desperately tried to stop the flow of blood with her hands. It was useless, she knew it was. Maria definitely knew it was useless, but wasn’t lucid enough to stop her friend’s pointless fussing. It’s a lost cause, Maria would have said.
Lance stood over Johnny’s body and tilted his head to the side with a prod of his foot. His eyes were truly lifeless now, from what he could see of them. Good, he thought. The less recognizable, the more dead he was.
“May this serve as a lesson,” he drawled slowly. “Shoot first. Always shoot first.”
Then he departed, and Lanee was left to pick up the pieces.