BLOOD DREAM (Ongoing)

11.3: Mom Come Pick Me Up I'm Scared

The shadow swam through the tall grass stems of an overgrown field, an errant ripple cast out by the night. His burly canine physique was made sleek by the wind, ears twisting in constant surveillance and nose flaring, drinking prairie scents. Between the breathing beats of his running paws, the hunter tuned in not to the sound of prey, but his own missteps, in case he snapped a twig and warned the doe up ahead of his approach.

Theron smelled her from miles away. There was a herd of deer roaming north of the city on the east side of the Red River in a strip of wilderness between residences. He vanished easily into the trees, estimating from the wind that one doe had ventured off from the group, and confirming it thirty minutes later when he spied her nestled in the grass by the base of a tree. Her eyes flashed like mirrors in the night. His did too.

He lurked downwind of her, crouching so that his midnight fur made him a round, obscure mark in the distance. His pink tongue flicked his nose. The wolf crept closer by the minute, long legs drawing him forth like a beast out of a nightmare, carefully articulated steps of a spider. He was the predator again, wicked bloodlust inspiring him to success. Theron salivated thinking of a hot meal, but his excitement soon spread to the thrill of the chase, the primordial satisfaction of the oncoming killing grip. He realized it didn't help his violent impulses to become wolf and shred with his teeth—if anything, being Dire only exacerbated Theron's brutality. He remained aware of it, this idea that he shouldn't be as savage as he was, and it stilled his steps for a moment's doubt. Would his bloodshed tonight condemn another of his packmates?

He wouldn't survive if he second-guessed every instinct. He paused close enough to the doe that when the wind turned, it exposed him, but the wolf had become so distracted by his thoughts that he wasn't ready when the doe suddenly sprang away from the tree. Annoyed, Theron took off after her. Apparently watching his footing didn't matter—now his own self-doubts were the sabotage he had to look out for.

Theron flew over the grass, jaw open and grunting. The bristles of his tail were all that distinguished him from the amorphous shadow of his flight, a monster flattening the earth in its hungry wake. The doe darted around trees and leaped between two trunks sprouting close together, too close for Theron to fit through. He dashed around them and lost a couple meters behind the doe. Frustration powered him on, regaining speed as the doe struggled to navigate the trees in the dark. He couldn't outrun her, so shepherding her through the woods instead of letting her escape into the open field had to be his best chance. They ran together, spirits united in the natural flux: predator and prey, defined by one another.

For an hour they played this game. The doe kept her distance in sprints that lost speed as time went on. Theron counted on his endurance to outlast her, trapping her in the woods until the shadows took their toll. A noise that wasn't Theron sent the doe flying in his direction. He erupted from cover and intercepted, sinking his teeth into her rear leg. She ran a few more paces, but the weight of the wolf quickly sapped what hope she had of escaping these dark woods alive.

Within minutes, the doe crumpled to the ground, bleating helplessly. Theron's teeth moved to her neck. He felt a heartbeat on his tongue, tasted wild and musky meat and blood that stained the velvet hide. He plunged his teeth deeper and relished the wave of endorphins—his victory—as the doe jerked with a death rattle. Panting, Theron braced above his prey until the struggling ceased. She wasn't dead yet, but she'd conceded to her fate. He caught her eye and saw his fiendish fangs reflected in her moonlight. Heart pounding, he felt nothing when he ripped open her belly, salivating over the steaming innards of his prize.

He needed to be merciless if he wanted to survive. It came so naturally, peeling skin off of muscle and snapping ribs. So why did he feel like even this would incriminate him once somebody found the aftermath of his hunt?

Maybe it wasn't the violence, but just existing that became the crime?

That angered him even worse. Theron's bloodlust fueled his carnal dismantling of the doe, removing chunks that he didn't bother to ingest, just like the goats. There was no symphony of terror ringing around him like last time, only insects in the silence, only the wet squelch of flesh shearing. He wasn't putting on a show for anybody; this was just his raw rage manifesting again, him hating himself for his feral hunger that he couldn't help. His rage was the downward spiral of negativity in a self-contained brain, like what happens when a person imagines catastrophe and can't separate imagination from the truth. Because what if it was true, and this was evidence that he was the monster everybody said he was? He was only trying to eat. They got in his head and made a mess of the carcass.

Crimson saturated the grass and mud, stinking like iron above the feeding beast. The doe's ribs made a cavern that he raided for the treasures of her liver and heart. Theron devoured in the midst of his carnage, and when he was finally done, he pulled his head back and felt red. Slick, hot red tamping down his oily fur. Red on his mouth and lips, red in his teeth, red gleaming against his blue eyes. Theron puffed, breath visible in the moonlight.

A twig snapped.

The wolf whipped his head to look. In the trees, he spotted another obscure smear, another hunting predator, only now he was the prey. The stench must have drawn scavengers.

Theron stood, bristling. He was ready to defend his kill before the wind gave him his chance to run, too. The smell of his hunter activated primal fear, despite recognizing who the smell belonged to, because it was no longer the smell of an ally.

He tensed as the other wolf pulled itself out of the shadows, licking its maw like it was anticipating a free meal. Only the meal wasn't the doe.

For Liam, the meal was Theron.