For many of us Gen X leftovers, the Nineties were defined by a wave of interesting music that swept the charts and started a cultural revolution. I can still clearly recall the pivotal point in my life where I became a shaggy-haired Doc Marten enthusiast. It was the first time I heard the song, “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana.
It was a pleasant October afternoon in 1991. I was hanging out with a friend in his garage, sipping a beer and shooting the shit, when our attention was captured by a crude, spiky guitar riff drifting out of the speakers of the radio. It erupted into an explosion of sound and fury that was quite unlike anything I’d ever heard before. We both stopped talking and looked at the radio with a slightly stunned expression on our faces.
We sat there and listened to the entire song in silence. I found myself air drumming and headbanging along to the beat with my polite little mullet hairdo. My mullet was just barely long enough to cover the collar in the back, and the front was hairsprayed into a poofy side part. Such was the style of the time in Middle America… but that was all about to change.
Within a few months, we were both growing out our poofy little mullets and completely changing our wardrobes. The deck shoes and button-fly 501s were tossed aside in favor of ripped jeans, the aforementioned Doc Martens, and plaid lumber jackets from a second-hand clothing store. The alternative rock movement had hit the mainstream, and millions of young people were instantly hooked.
Soon enough, I was discovering the punk rock roots of the grunge scene, and all the related music that came along with it. I discovered all kinds of challenging music that ranged from beautiful to almost unlistenable. I loved it all. I’d finally found myself a niche in the narrow microcosm of youth culture, and life was starting to make sense.
Unsurprisingly, Kazimir was completely unfamiliar with this cultural shift in popular music. Our late night conversations in the gazebo revealed that Kaz had never heard of Nirvana, Soundgarden, or even the massively popular Pearl Jam, let alone the more esoteric acts like Jesus Lizard or Mudhoney. I decided to correct this mistake and talked him into listening to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on my portable CD player. Kaz listened with growing impatience. He didn’t even last ninety seconds before he tore the headphones off in a fit of indignation. He raised an eyebrow at me and gravely shook his head.
“That is dreadful. It is awful in every way. Is this a joke?”
I burst out laughing and said, “Come on, man. Really? You didn’t feel anything while you were listening to that? Nothing at all?”
“I felt I might suffer from a fatal stroke if I did not stop listening,” Kaz retorted. “Is this what young people call music? You all suffer from brain damage, there is no other explanation. This country is doomed.”
I chuckled a bit at his bewildered anger and said, “You know, I can totally imagine you doing that weird dance to, like, some polka band with accordions and shit. You know what I mean? Like, that dance where people get into a squat position and start kicking their legs with their arms crossed? Ha, everyone would be cheering you on, all drunk as shit on Vodka and yelling ‘Hey! Hey! Hey!’ while they clap in time.”
Kaz frowned faintly and grunted back, “I will admit I have done this, but that is not my favorite music. I like good rock music from a better time. They call it ‘classic rock’ on the radio. Pink Floyd! Now, there is some good rock music! You can listen to them and drink all day and all through the night.”
“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with Dark Side of the Moon,” I agreed. “But that was a long time ago, Kaz. You gotta change with the times, you know? Give the new stuff a chance. Evolve a little.”
“Evolve?” Kaz repeated in an incredulous tone. “These people sound like they have somehow devolved into a troop of screeching monkeys. You are clearly deranged.”
He pushed the Discman across the picnic table with a look of distaste, and he added, “I will never listen to this terrible noise again in my life.”
I shrugged and stowed the CD player in my cooler bag. There’s really no accounting for taste, I suppose. I stifled a yawn and said, “This is our last night. Back on the day shift next week. Thank God for small favors, right? I don’t sleep very well during the day. I’m always tired.”
Kaz gave me a cryptic smile. He said, “I have much difficulty sleeping at any time, day or night. I have been tired for many years. One day, I will become too tired to continue, and that will be the end.”
I shook my head and snorted, “You’ve gotta be the dourest, most completely friggin’ cheerless person I’ve ever met in my whole life. You missed your calling, man. You’d be great as the Ghost of Christmas Future in a production of ‘A Christmas Carol’, no shit. You’d kill it.”
Kaz stared at me, clearly confused. I waved away his questions and said, “I know you don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, you weird old Soviet son of a gun. That’s why it’s funny. Don’t worry about it. Listen, I wanna go talk to Salvatore tonight. It will probably be my last chance to do that for a while. I need to ask him something.”
“Do you think that is wise?” Kaz asked quietly. “I think maybe not.”
“You’re not my dad, fella,” I countered. “Feel free to stay out here and chainsmoke if you don’t want to get involved. Either way, I’m gonna go talk to him.”
Kaz fell silent, looking darkly at his field lighter with his lips pursed beneath his salt-and-pepper mustache. Finally, he shook his head and curtly muttered, “I think you are being a fool.”
“Maybe I am,” I admitted, “but I need to get something straight. It’s been bugging me since the last time I talked to him.”
“Go on, then,” Kaz grunted. “Go milk the bull.”
I rolled my eyes and mimicked his speech patterns under my breath as I walked back to the exit door. Salvatore and Vic had both told me very different stories regarding the events which led to Sal’s imprisonment at the zoo. Vic had claimed Sal was already a vampire when he first encountered him. A vampire with gambling debts, nonetheless. In Sal’s version, he had also been a longtime member of Jimmy Nickels’ crew, and he became a vampire when he was betrayed by Vic. Who was telling the truth?
I wanted to know the real story, and I instinctively trusted the vampire more than I trusted Vic. Sal wanted nothing more than to be allowed to die. He had no reason to lie to me. Vic, however, sat atop a throne built on an empire of lies. It was clear who the real monster was in this situation, and it wasn’t the vampire.
#
Salvatore gave me a toothy grin as I stepped into his bleak habitat, the strap of my lunchbag still slung over my shoulder. He called out, “Well shit, if it isn’t Billy Whitebread! Back for another visit, huh? Hey, I seen you get hauled away by Len the other night, didn’t I? Good ol’ Lenny the Barber! Shit, I ain’t seen that crazy bastard in years! I figured you got yourself planted in a cornfield somewhere, but here you are, full of blood and ready to mingle! Be a pal and throw that chain away, wouldja? I wanna chew your head off.”
I rewarded his gruesome attempt at humor with a polite smile and said, “Nope, I’m good. The chain stays right where it is, thank you. Uh, why did they call him Lenny the Barber? Is it because he shaves his head?”
Sal looked surprised for a moment, and then he let out a sharp peal of laughter. He rasped, “Ha, that’s a good one. I keep forgetting you don’t know nothin’ about these people. Nah, It’s got nuttin’ to do with his bald head. It’s because he’s a sick fuck that used to scalp people while they were still alive. I think he calmed down a bit as he got older, but back in the day? Take it from Sally Two Shoes, Lenny the Barber was crazier than a shithouse rat.”
I forced myself to walk a little closer, my squirt gun clenched in hand. I lowered my voice and said, “Vic warned me to not believe anything you say. He told me you guys crossed paths because you weren’t paying off your gambling debts. He never said anything about you being in the crew.”
“Omission and half-truths,” Salvatore snarled. “A good liar always bases his bullshit on half-truths. Here, I’ll tell ya how it really happened. Say, where’s the Russkie?”
I shrugged and said, “He doesn’t want anything to do with this, so he’s waiting out in the gardens. I guess I don’t blame him.”
Salvatore nodded and muttered, “Good. He’s a pain in the ass. Anyhow, after Victor fed me to the vampires, he locked the door and left me there to rot. All the doors and windows were covered with a sheet of silver. Every crack and hole in the foundation was patched up with concrete. It was locked up tighter than a bank vault in that place. I went over every square inch of that whole building, but there was no way out.
“Counting me, there were seven of us in that warehouse. The others all seemed like they were older than shit. They’d been vampires for so long, none of ‘em even spoke a modern language. When they weren’t feeding, they would just curl up in a corner somewhere and basically turn off. They’d stay that way until the next time Vic showed up with another poor bastard who crossed the line. For weeks and months at a time, it was just me and a pack of feral animals in the darkness. I mean, sure, the dark doesn’t really mean anything to a vampire. We can see just fine in the dark. It’s more the principle of the whole thing, you know? It was adding insult to injury.”
I pondered out loud, “Where the hell did Vic find these things?”
He flapped a hand in the air and snorted, “Pfft, it ain’t hard to buy a vampire on the black market. Vic got ‘em from some guy in Tunisia. Fuck knows where that guy found ‘em, but I imagine they were getting bought and sold for hundreds of years. This whole ‘zoo for cryptids’ thing, it ain’t exactly a fresh new idea. Come on, you think a blockhead like Victor dreamt this up himself? Fuck no, of course not. Places like this have existed for a long, long time. Victor musta encountered one of ‘em somewhere during his time as a hitman, so he decided to open a zoo of his own.
“That nest of vampires was his first acquisition, but he wasn’t ready to open the zoo yet, so he used them for executing people who really pissed him off. Me, I saw through his bullshit and recognized him for the treacherous snake he really is. For someone like Vic, that’s an unforgivable sin. They can only exist by not being seen.”
I absorbed this information and slowly nodded. I felt mildly nauseated. What kind of a ruthless, black-hearted monster would feed his enemies to a pack of feral vampires? Well, none other than the lovable used car salesman, Victor Bonicelli, that’s who. My boss.
Sal croaked, “Vic never let anyone else get turned, not like me. He’d shoot em’ in the chest with an arrow as soon as they bled dry. He stood back and allowed me to turn, just so he could keep me under his thumb, even after death. That’s how angry it made him to be seen like that. Think about that, Billy Whitebread, and ask yourself something… are you sure ya wanna know any more? Think about it good and hard, kid, because I’m telling ya, Vic is a fuckin’ bloodhound. He can sniff out your deepest secrets.”
I took in a big breath, let it out slowly, then answered with a simple, “Yes,” and waited.
Sal grinned at me, his eyes shining like silver dollars in his head, and he sneered, “You don’t wanna end up as a vampire, Billy. I’ll tell you something, being a vampire ain’t no way to live, and being eaten by a vampire ain’t no way to die. Take it from Sally Two Shoes, kid. I’ve done both.
“Alright,” he sighed, “if you really wanna know, here’s what happened. I spent a couple years as a prisoner in that warehouse before I finally figured it out. See, I couldn’t bust my way outta the warehouse, so I finally realized I was gonna have to bust my way into the warehouse, instead.
“So, we got this mind control thing we can do, but it takes a lot of practice. I started with cockroaches. When I got good at making bugs do my bidding, I moved up to capturing animals through the window. I controlled rats, bats, possums, stray cats and dogs, all kinds of shit. When I got the hang of stealing the more complex minds, I started trying to grab people as they drove past the window at night. After a few weeks, I finally managed to snag some guy in a delivery van. I made him crank the wheel and gun it into the side of the building. The crash made a crack in the wall, and I was out in a blink of the eye. That’s all I need, kid. Gimme the barest crack, a tiny little pinhole, and I’ll slide right through.”
I asked, “Did the others escape, too?” and Sal gave me a look of disgust.
“No,” he said softly. “Not them. They didn’t even understand modern civilization, those horrible fuckin’ things. They woulda started wreaking havoc out there, and then what? More vampires? Fuck that. Nope, they all had to go. I burned the warehouse down. I hollowed the driver’s femur real quick and used it as a straw to siphon gas from his tank. I can’t taste anything but blood anymore, so it didn’t bother me too much. Kinda cold on the teeth, I guess, but whatever.
“Anyhow, there I was, a gangster-turned-vampire on the loose. All I wanted to do was find Victor Bonicelli and throw his guts around like party streamers, but I knew it wasn’t going to be that simple. Bonesaw Vic wasn’t no ordinary Joe Shmoe. Even back then, he had a small army of trigger men who answered only to him, and he always wore a silver chain around his neck. I couldn’t just storm in and grab him. It was going to take some planning to get my fangs in his throat.
“First thing I did was slip into a department store and clean myself up in the restroom. Then I helped myself to a new wardrobe in the Menswear section. I got some nice suits, new shoes, hats, the whole works. I let myself out the front entrance with ten grand worth of stolen merchandise in my arms, easy. It made me almost feel normal again, you know? I was a gangster, doing what I do best, and it felt good.
“I holed up in a motel before dawn. When the sun went down, I was ready. I chose a new face from the front of a magazine at a news stand. It was Burt Reynolds. I decided my name would be Clarence, just like my Irish uncle on my mother’s side. Good guy, my Uncle Clarence. He made a nice living smuggling whiskey, if I recall correctly. He could drink like a fish, that man. Big bastard, probably three hundred pounds. I’ll tell ya something, Uncle Clarence fuckin’ loved his pancakes on Shrove Tuesday-”
“You got a new name and face,” I prompted gently, and Sal stabbed a finger in the air.
“Right, sorry,” he apologized. “Anyhow, I went out and made a risky bet with every bookie in town. Now, don’t get me wrong, vampires can’t see into the future. But we are pretty sharp at guessing the outcomes of any given situation. Heightened senses and all that, I suppose. Anyway, betting on sports is child’s play. Vic told you I wasn’t paying my debts, but it was actually the other way around. The bookies couldn’t pay me, because I was winning most of my bets. I was cleaning house out there.
“It wasn’t long before some fat prick from the East Side refused to pay out. He said, ‘Fuck outta here, ya Burt Reynolds-lookin’ cocksucker. We don’t pay out money like that to a nobody like you.’
“I said, ‘Sure you do, fatass,’ and I reached over the counter to snap his wrist. Then I pinned his face to the counter and broke the other wrist, too, just to really drive the point home. After that… well, there weren’t no more arguments about getting paid, but that wasn’t really the point. I knew my name was going to end up on a piece of paper. Nickels ran the betting racket on that side of town, so it wasn’t gonna be long before I would get a visit from one of Nickels’ associates.
“Sure enough, two gorillas came knocking on the door in the middle of the night. I pretended to be afraid until the door closed behind them, and then I beat the ever-lovin’ shit outta both of them. Just pow-pow-pow, knocking them around like it was nothing. I tossed ‘em in the street and told ‘em, ‘Send in the big guns next time. Don’t fuck around.’
“The next night, Vic Bonicelli kicks in the door and shoots me six times in the chest. Hurt like hell, but bullets can’t kill me. I laid there with my eyes closed and let him come closer. I heard him say, ‘Shit, he really did look like Burt Reynolds!’ And then he was like, ‘Hey, why ain’t he bleeding?’
“I opened my eyes and showed Vic my real face. His look of surprise was priceless. I jumped up and told him, ‘Nobody gets one over on Sally Two Shoes, you backstabbing fuck.’
“Vic backed away and said, ‘You’re the one who torched the warehouse, arentcha? You burned up all my vampires, Sal. Do you know how much those bloodsuckers cost me?’
“I laughed and told him, ‘Money is the least of your problems right now, Victor.’
“He pulls out his chain and goes, ‘You can’t touch me, Sal. I’m wearing the silver.’ So I pulled out my piece and aimed it at his crotch. I said, ‘I can’t touch you, but my bullets can. Take it off, or I’ll shoot you in the dick.’
“Just then, someone shoots through the window with a sniper scope and hits me in the side of the head, bang! I wasn’t quite fast enough to get outta the way. The impact knocked me right off my feet. At the same time, some of Vic’s goons came charging through the door with a big-ass fishing net. They threw it on me and I was instantly helpless. Vic had dipped the net in that horrible silver nitrate crap. There wasn’t nothing I could do but curl up on the floor and beg for mercy. It sapped my strength and burned me like fire. I was sizzling under that thing, no joke.
“So Victor stands over me and says, ‘I thought you might be the one who was robbing us blind out there. When I heard Tony and Big Mikey got put in the hospital, I knew it was you for sure. Well, lemme tell you something, Sally. You fucked up. Not only were you fucking with the family business, you crossed me on a deep and personal level.’
“He leaned over me and whispered in my ear, ‘Them vampires didn’t come cheap. I promised the guy I’d take good care of ‘em, too. I fuckin’ promised this guy they’d be safe in my hands, cross my heart and hope to die. But you had to go and burn ‘em up, dintcha, Sally? You vindictive little muskrat-looking fuck! But don’t worry, Sally. I got a solution. You’re gonna work it off.’”
Salvatore gave me a grim smile and motioned around us, the stark walls and concrete floor. He let out a humorless chuckle and said, “This is what he was talking about. And this bullshit debt ain’t never gonna get repaid. I’ll be here in this miserable dungeon until he doesn’t need me no more, and then he’ll bury me alive and forget me. This is hell, Billy. Do you understand me? I’m in hell.”
Sal sat down cross-legged on the floor and stared at the cement in the space between his bony legs. He said, “ I used to sneer at junkies, but not anymore. I understand now. All I can think about is ripping you apart. I want it so bad, you have no fucking idea. But you know what, kid? It wouldn’t stop the hunger. I’d want more, always more, because I could never get enough. You can’t even begin to imagine what it’s like. I would do anything - and I mean fucking anything at all - to get my teeth into your neck, little man. Any living person I see is fair game. Anyone and everyone. All of you. I don’t even give shit.”
I opened my mouth, unsure of how I was even going to respond, and I heard myself say, “I’ll kill you when the time is right, but not yet. I might need you.”
Sal gave me a sharp glance and slowly asked, “What are you thinking over there, Billy-boy? Tell old Sally what’s on your mind.”
I shook my head and muttered, “I don’t know yet. I’m just thinking about stuff, and that’s all for now. Hang in there, Sal. I should go.”
I carefully walked backward until I reached the exit, keeping my eyes on the starving vampire at all times. I paused with my hand on the door and quietly called out, “Hey, Sal, one more question. Why did they call you Sally Two Shoes?”
Sal gave me an embarrassed grin and said, “Oh, that started years and years ago, way before I met Nickels and joined the crew. Back then, I was heisting shipments of booze, cigarettes, whatever I could sell. Anyhoo, the cops tracked us down after we did a job and came busting into the warehouse, so we all booked it into the woods nearby. Right away, I lost one of my shoes in a marsh, so I ran almost two miles through the woods with only one shoe. After that, guys would always be saying dumb shit like, ‘Hey Sal, you better make sure you got both your shoes on before we go!’ After a while, they just started calling me ‘Sally Two Shoes’ and the name stuck.”
Sal saw my expression and sourly mumbled, “Yeah, I know, it’s pretty dumb. What can I tell ya? A lot of those guys aren’t the brightest bulbs in the pack. Stop busting my balls and get outta here with all that blood of yours, ya snotty little prick.”
I exited with a meaningful nod and started for the exit to the gardens, meaning to round up Kaz and get on with our night. As I put my hand on the push bar, the escape alarm began to wail from the overhead speakers, making me jump half out of my skin in a sudden rush of adrenalin. A robotic voice blared over the alarm, “CODE RED IN PROGRESS IN THE TERRESTRIAL WING. ALL CARETAKERS AND SECURITY MUST PROCEED IMMEDIATELY TO THE TERRESTRIAL WING.”
Kaz came slamming through the door and started running for the end of the corridor, dragging me along behind him at a brisk rate of speed. He yelled over his shoulder, “We must stop at the equipment room to grab a tranquilizer gun! Move quickly!”
We both grabbed a tranq gun and hustled over to the Terrestrial wing. My stomach knotted as the door to the service tunnel swung open. I had a sinking feeling it wasn’t going to be a false alarm, not this time. This was the real deal.
#
We found one of Vic’s security goons cowering outside the door to Harry’s habitat. Kaz asked, “What happened?” which was swiftly followed by, “Where is the other agent? There should be at least two of you on duty tonight.”
The goon shook his head. He croaked, “Uh, Vic told us to bring a camera guy in there to shoot some test footage of the ape. He started filming, and the ape lost his mind. He went after the camera guy, so my partner took a shot. He missed.”
Kaz gave him a grave look and prompted, “What happened then?”
The crew-cutted thug took in a deep breath and tried to compose himself. He whimpered, “When Aimsely fired, the ape changed course and went after Aimsley instead. That thing is so fucking fast, it’s unreal. Aimsley let off another shot, but he missed again. The ape gave him a backhand and he went flying. I think his neck was broken. I squeezed off a few shots, too, but I don’t think I hit him. He roared at me and threw a big fucking log. It missed me by six inches at most. I felt the breeze when it whistled past. The ape started coming for me, so I… uh, yeah. I dropped my gun and ran for the door. When I looked back through the window, I saw the ape stomping on Aimsley with both feet. Just jumping up and down like he was on a trampoline.”
“Where is the operator of the video equipment?” Kaz demanded.
The security goon pointed at the ceiling and stammered, “The camera guy dropped his shit and climbed way up into a tree. I think he’s okay.” He hesitated, then added, “The emergency button didn’t do anything. It didn’t deploy some magic weapon to neutralize the threat. Vic is full of shit. It’s just an alarm button. It won’t save you.”
Kaz and I exchanged a look, and then he turned back to the goon and growled, “This may be true, but be quiet and listen to Kazimir now. You must never enter a habitat without a Caretaker present, and never, ever without first equipping yourself with a tranquilizer gun. Shooting at a creature with live ammunition could result in injury or death. How do you think Victor would react if he lost one of his exhibits to your stupidity?”
The thug turned pale as milk, and a sheen of sweat popped up on his brow. Kaz nodded and said, “Precisely. It would be very bad for you. Step aside and let the professionals do their job. Come with me, boy. The security agent can stay out here and watch the door.”
Kaz gave the security agent one last look of disdain, and then we entered Harry’s forest habitat with our fingers curled around the triggers of our tranq guns. We stood still and let our eyes adjust to the gloom. A weak shimmer of moonlight filtered through the treetops, revealing the bent and broken corpse of the other agent. His rifle lay in a twisted ruin beside his splattered remains.
I shone my flashlight on the body and breathed, “Holy fuck, man. Harry obliterated this guy. Do you see what he did to the rifle? God-damn, he’s strong.”
“Harry can lift eight hundred pounds over his head without a struggle,” Kaz whispered. “I have seen him tear strips of bark from the side of a living tree with the greatest of ease. He is very dangerous, this one. Your only hope is to hit him with a dart and bring him down from a safe distance.”
“That’s some really sound advice, Captain Obvious,” I whispered back. “Where is he?”
Harry was extremely adept at blending in with his environment. You’d think a massive giant like Harry would be bad at playing hide and seek, but you’d be wrong. He was a fucking champ at melting into the background and lurking there, unseen. Even in the daylight, he could be pretty hard to spot amongst the undergrowth if he chose to make himself scarce. At night, it would be next to impossible.
As we crept deeper into his habitat, I heard someone call out in a muted voice, “Hey! Be careful!”
Kaz shone his flashlight into the treetops. A terrified face peered down at us from a tree branch almost thirty feet in the air. A battery holster was dangling from a strap around his neck. He urgently hissed, “Turn that shit off, man! Do you wanna make that thing angry again? Did you see the security guy? That was almost me instead of him!”
“He already knows we’re here,” Kaz called back. His tone was patient and calm. “The hydraulic door bolts are very loud. I think he is likely watching us from somewhere close by and deciding if he will kill us.”
The camera operator shifted his weight on the branch and let out a shaky laugh.
“Great. What’s his problem? Everything seemed fine, and then he just went fucking nuts! I think he might’ve smashed the camera on the ground, but I don’t know for sure. I was too busy running for my fucking life.”
Kaz shook his head at the man in the tree and answered, “His problem is that he is a prisoner, and all living things yearn to be free. You cannot enter this creature’s prison and expect to be safe from harm, are you an imbecile? The entities held within these walls do not wish to be here, and many of them could easily kill you.”
I also wanted to join in reprimanding the outsider, so I piped up and added, “Yeah, kill you or even worse!”
Kaz nodded at me approvingly and said, “Yes, that is correct. Far, far worse.”
I opened my mouth to talk some more shit to the camera operator, and Kaz calmly said, “Look out, boy. He’s coming.”
Kaz shoved me out of his way and whirled around, dropping to one knee and firing the tranquilizer gun as Harry came bursting from his hiding spot in the undergrowth. A split-second later, Harry was on top of us, towering over us in a giant blur of brown hair and snarling mouth. I didn’t even have time to scream; I just fell on my back as he charged and fired my shot. I heard a loud, meaty thud and Kaz was suddenly gone, swept away by a tidal wave of muscle-bound Bigfoot fury.
I struggled to my feet, just in time to witness Kaz being shaken like a ragdoll in midair. Harry bellowed up into his face, a terrifying roar that made me want to run for the door. Instead, I threw my empty rifle at his back and screamed, “You drop him right NOW!” at the top of my lungs.
Harry flinched in surprise and froze for a heartbeat. Kaz slid bonelessly from his massive paws and fell onto the ground in a heap. The sasquatch sniffed the air, then rose up to his full height and turned to face me. His eyes were wide and wild with rage in the speckled moonlight. I felt my heart freeze in my chest. For a horrible second or two, I thought I was about to suffer a fear-induced heart attack and simply topple over, dead as a stone.
I whimpered, “Come on, Harry! Come on, big guy! I’m your friend, remember? I give you brushies, right? Please don’t… Please don’t hurt me, okay?”
Harry erupted in a murderous shriek, his fangs glinting in the yawning cave of his mouth, and I immediately sprinted for the camera guy’s tree. It was the only one in sight with branches low enough to climb, a piece of cake for a young man who’s fucking terrified and full of adrenalin. Harry ran after me and lunged to grab my foot, missing by mere inches. He tried to climb after me, but even the sturdy lower branches were unable to bear the burden of his enormous girth, cracking beneath his feet and sending him tumbling to the ground. Harry bellowed in rage and tried to shake us out of the tree instead, his massive arms bulging beneath his long fur with the effort. Thankfully, the trunk was sturdy enough to resist the violence of this attack, but just barely. I heard a splintering groan from somewhere far beneath me, and I whimpered in terror.
I clung to a branch just beneath the cameraman and croaked, “Holy shitballs, he almost got me. I thought he was gonna rip the whole fucking tree down for a second. Jesus Christ.”
“That thing is so crazy-strong, it’s unreal,” the cameraman panted above me. “I mean, it’s just un-freaking-real, like a supervillain or something, you know? This whole thing is almost like a comic book, if you think about it-”
I snapped, “Shut up, numbnuts! I don’t wanna hear your bullshit right now, okay? Just shut up. Hey, Kaz! Are you okay, man? Kaz!”
Kaz didn’t move. I felt a hard lump form in my throat. I yelled at the security guard to call an ambulance, but there wasn’t any reply from the intercom. Either he didn’t have it on, or he had abandoned us and run off to hide somewhere. I glared up at the hated interloper on the branch above me and hissed, “You better pray he’s not dead, Mr. Hollywood. You better fucking pray.”
The cameraman yelled back, “Hey, don’t blame me for this shit! I was just doing what I was told! How was I supposed to know this was gonna happen? They told me everything would be fine.”
“Well, it isn’t,” I grumbled back. “Here’s the situation, Camera Guy. There’s only two security guards and two Caretakers on the night shift. The only person who could possibly help us right now is the other security guard - you know, the one that isn’t dead yet - and he can’t enter the habitat. He’s supposed to watch the door and make sure Harry doesn’t get out. That’s the protocol. He can’t enter the habitat until someone else comes along to watch the door. I don’t even know if he’s still there, for Christ’s sake. He’s not answering me.”
The cameraman absorbed this information with a deeply dismayed expression. He stammered, “So, like, what does this mean, exactly? I mean, are you saying we’re fucked over here?”
I let out a deep, defeated sigh and muttered, “We could be stuck here until morning.”
There was a brief silence, and then the cameraman whispered, “I don’t know if I can hold onto this branch for that long.”
“Me neither,” I answered bitterly, and I reached up to take a swat at the battery pack that was dangling from his neck.
He jerked it out of my reach and squealed, “Don’t fuck around, man! Don’t make me lose my balance!”
I snarled, “Shut up, idiot. You’re fine. Just let me think for a second, okay?”
I stared down at Harry, who was stomping around the base of the tree in a furious little circle. He looked up at me and wrinkled his lips back, revealing his wickedly pointed canines. Still maintaining eye contact, he sank his claws into the trunk and casually dug four long, deep grooves into the bark.
Mr. Hollywood adjusted his weight on his branch and moaned, “Did you see that? Jesus, this thing is fucking awful. I can’t believe Nick asked me to do this shit.”
“He’s not a thing,” I barked at him. “His name is Harry, and he’s a living creature who thinks and feels, just like you and me. Speaking of which, I think and feel that you’re a huge, gaping fuckin’ asshole of a human being.”
Mr. Hollywood wisely held his tongue. I jabbed a finger at him and demanded, “What did you do to set him off? Harry didn’t just go nuts out of nowhere, that bullshit.”
Grudgingly, he said, “It happened when I aimed a light on him. I didn’t know he’d lose his shit like that, I swear.”
I gaped at him in disbelief. I gritted my teeth and growled, “There’s no way Vic didn’t have someone warn you about shining a bright light in his face. That’s the last thing he saw before he got shot with a tranq gun and captured in the wild, dumbass!”
The cameraman grimaced and mumbled, “It wasn’t that bright. I mean, come on, man. I couldn’t see shit in here! I wanted to capture something more than just a tall shadow wandering around in the background. I was trying to shoot some test footage, for crying out loud.”
I let out a harsh laugh and said, “How about you fuck right off? You just ignored what you were told and did it anyway. You fucking idiot, I should grab you and pull you off that branch. I don’t care if we both fall. I guess we’ll see which one of us Harry goes after first. Are you ready?”
He shrieked, “No, don’t!” and hugged his branch for dear life.
I savagely mimicked him in a wavering falsetto, then snarled, “Stop being a little bitch. I’m not gonna do that. I’ll tell you something, though… I really, really want to.”
Down below, Harry had discovered my lunch bag. He tried to eat my leftover Oreos and promptly spat a mouthful of brown, mushy gunk onto the ground. He sniffed my empty Thermos, then stuffed it into his mouth and bit down, crushing the stainless steel tube into a flat piece of scrap metal with almost no effort at all. He hurled it aside and pulled out my Discman. I immediately died a little inside. The Discman was purchased with the cash advance I received from Vic on my first day. It was a symbol of my newfound success.
I pleaded, “Come on, Harry, put it down! Don’t break it.”
Harry showed me his teeth and started poking at the CD player with an extended claw, carving aimless scratches into its surface. He accidentally hit play and skipped to the last track on the Nevermind album, a mournful dirge titled ‘Something in the Way’. I could hear Kurt Cobain’s voice drifting out of the headphones, softly crooning that the animals he’d trapped had all become his pets.
Harry was instantly entranced. He snapped the plastic band that held the headphones together so he could press them against his ears. Harry began to softly whine along with the lyrics. When the song swelled into the first chorus, his whine rose into a howl. He stood beneath the tree and swayed in time with the beat, releasing a river of inharmonious sasquatch blues from the very depths of his soul.
Mr. Hollywood made an angry sound in his throat and snapped, “What the fuck is this? He’s making my ears bleed.”
I made another grab for the dangling strap and said, “Shut up, asshole. Just shut the hell up.”
When the song ended, Harry held up the Discman and made a soft hooting noise at me. The rage in his eyes was gone, replaced by a deep and abiding sadness. Slowly, carefully, I climbed down and stood beside him. He thrust the CD player into my hands, and I started up the song again. Harry began to sway and shuffle in time to the music, whining and grunting along with the first verse. When the chorus came, he threw back his head and howled, and I joined him. We howled together beneath the tree, and when the song ended again, Harry suddenly knelt down and buried his face against my chest. I froze like a statue and looked down at the top of his shaggy skull in terror, but nothing happened. He just hid his face against my torso and started to make a mewling sound. His body began to shiver and tremble, and he wrapped his arms around me in a blanket of musty-smelling fur.
I suddenly understood what was happening, and that hard lump immediately returned to my throat. Harry was crying.
I stroked the top of his massive head and murmured nonsense words of comfort into his fur. Harry gripped me a little tighter and ground his face into my torso. His breath hitched in his chest and he started to sob like a small child, releasing a rolling flood of snotty tears on my Kevlar as I held him close. I realized that I was crying, too, and it was okay. We both let it all out, all the bad feelings, and it was okay because we weren’t alone. It hurt, sure, it fucking hurt like hell, but we were hurting together.
I heard Kaz groan, and I gently disengaged from Harry’s decidedly stinky embrace. I knelt down by Kaz’s side and asked, “Hey, are you okay? Talk to me, man. Say something.”
cont’d below