The Things We Bury - Part 1: In Anticipation of the End of the World [Completed]

Chapter 4: Me and My Bad Luck (Part 2 of 6)

Off in the distance, over the buildings, Camelback Mountain loomed.  Named after its resemblance to a giant camel resting in the desert, the brown humps of the reclined animal basked in the morning sun.  Should the beast ever rise, it would be a monster that would terrorize and destroy the city that had grown up around it.

Tray Cullen had been watching it for fifteen minutes, while the little bit of leftover ice cream in the carton on the dash turned into a nasty, warm, sugary milk.  He finally worked up the nerve to hit talk on the burner phone.

"You're late."  It had barely finished one ring.

"Oh, me?"  Tray pitched his voice to a hyper-friendly tone.  "I'm a little freaked out, thank you so much for asking.  And how are you today?"

"Am I to take it from your sarcasm something happened last night?"  It was the same monotone drone he always spoke in. 

This guy must be a riot at parties.

"Your fucking right something happened.  She's a werewolf.  A fucking-were-holy-shit-wolf!"

"There is no need for profanity, Mr. Cullen," Palmer said. 

Tray pictured a man at the other end of the line in his late forties with gray, sagging skin, and wearing a limp, threadbare suit.  A guy who always voted Republican; never owned a dog; had a wife who slept around because she didn't get any at home, but he was too busy with work to notice; and when he was home, he was too busy building model ships, or collecting stamps, or some other stupid shit.  It was an image that came disturbingly close to his father, but Tray's mind refused to make the connection.

There was no way to know if his musings about Palmer were right.  And for all Tray knew his contact was a computer.  Maybe it was some sort of artificial intelligence.  After last night, anything was possible. 

"I believe that is what we all assumed she was," Palmer continued.  "It shouldn't have come as that big a shock."

"I'm sorry. Were you there?  Did you see it?  Did you hear the noises it made?  No, I don't fucking think so.  This was no fluffy Hollywood werewolf that's going to fall in love with some teen heartthrob and live happily ever after.  This thing was a...  It was completely...  It was like..."

"Yes, Mr. Cullen.  What was it like, exactly?"

"It was a fucking demon!  It was a monster straight from the bowels of hell."  His voice echoed around him in the tight confines of the Civic.

"Interesting.  Please tell me everything from the beginning.  And spare no detail.  But please cut out the profanity.  This call is being recorded for our records."

Tray closed his eyes and massaged his right temple.  "You don't understand.  There is no goddamn way to describe it without fucking profanity."

When he was done with the debriefing, his exhaustion had finally kicked in.  It felt like he had spent the last twelve hours being badgered by the police.  Like he had been sitting in an interrogation room getting good cop, bad cop played on him, but the only person asking questions was Palmer.  And in the end, he told him everything.

Well, almost everything.  He left out the part about pissing himself and screaming in terror until Emily Kendrick sedated him.

She had given him the shot while Gracie and Jamie were busy performing CPR on Benning.  She had dosed Tray with ten milligrams of diazepam.  The shot would have zonked most people out.  But Tray wasn't most people.  His tolerance was cranked up to eleven, as he used to like to brag.  The sedative barely took the edge off, but at least he stopped screaming, he just wasn't able to stop shaking, until he reached the parking lot and looked up at the sky and the rising sun.

How was he going to face her tonight? 

The way Emily looked at him when she noticed the condition of his jeans was seared into his brain.  He had forgotten that he could feel so humiliated.

She had quickly occupied herself with discarding the syringe and hadn't said anything to him for the rest of the night.

He wondered if Emily would get in trouble for giving the shot to him.  Wiley wasn't going to be happy about it.  Not even a tablespoon of cough syrup, he had told him.  But it wasn't his fault – he didn't ask for it.  Wiley couldn't blame him.

On the plus side, if I can score some Valium, the urine test is already screwed.

Shit, the urine test!

"I almost forgot, after I helped them get Dr. Benning stable," he told Palmer, trying to act casual and pretending what he was about to say was no big deal.  "The doctor, Gracie, treated me for shock with a sedative.  I told them not to give it to me, but that woman is a total psycho.  She didn't care what I said.  So, like, that's why you may see some traces of something in my next sample."

"Why were you helping the psychiatrist instead of observing the Subject?  Our willingness to help you is predicated on information on the lycanthrope.  We do not care what happens to anyone else in there.  Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"And, we will be taking special care with that next sample. Thank you for the warning.  The last thing we want is for you to flush our investment down the drain.  Any signs of recreational use, and the deal is off.  Not only will Whitney be dropped from the program, we will make a call to the DTAA.  Do you know what they will do to you when they find out you're a mole?"

Threats?  The last fucking thing I need right now is this shit.

"You wouldn't do that?  I'm the only one you have.  And if I go down, I'll take your company with me." 

There.  Take that.

"Mr. Cullen, it would be wise to keep that information to yourself.  You think you're scared of that little girl; you've never seen a member of our security forces.  Trust me, you do not want them paying you a visit.  And you may think your sister can't be any worse off than she is now, but—"

"Okay, okay."  Tray stopped him from going on.  "I get it.  Look, there's no problem here. I'm not using.  Honestly, they gave me the shot, I had no say in it."

He stared back up at the mountain, but all he saw was the nothingness of the sky.  His bellyful of ice cream had curdled.  Monsters.  Everywhere I look.  Monsters.

"Do they still think she'll change tonight?" Palmer asked.

"No one's sure."  The words dripped from his mouth slowly.  He felt a lead blanket of defeat pushing him down into his seat.  "The report says the moon will be ninety-nine percent visible, which is believed to be enough.  But they were wrong before."

"I want you there tonight.  Understand?  I want you to follow my instructions."

"Okay, what are they?"

"Your priority is to get data on the Subject.  Say yes to whatever they ask of you.  Volunteer for anything so long as it gets you closer to it."