The Demon Wolf - Chapter 20：Grandpa's House

Running through the backdoor, the group enters a large yard fenced off with tall wire fencing on all sides. Though most of the yard is empty, some police cars are parked. They run to the nearest one, Jerard and Randy making sure that Helena and Red get into the back before they enter, Randy getting in the drivers seat and Jerard in shotgun.

Randy shoves the keys into the ignition and turns it. The car stutters as it struggles to wake up.

“Come on, you son of a bitch,” Randy mutters as sit fails to start again. Meanwhile everyone else is looking around to see if Gerald is approaching. With another turn off the keys the vehicle finally works, Randy finally able to breath. He throws it in reverse and slams on the gas, the car slamming right through the fence and onto the street. He quickly turns it so its straight with the street and as he throws it into drive they see Gerald, his feet just barely in the outer reaches of the headlights.

“I was hoping to save my strength,” It speaks, everyone in the car somehow able to hear its voice perfectly clear, “But you all know too much,”

They all watch in utter shock as Gerald starts to walk forward, its body slowly melting into a black ooze like substance that starts sinking into the ground. Randy guns it, jutting forward and making a sharp left onto a different road. Red looks through the back of the window to see a large pool of darkness slowly enveloping the street.

As they drive down the road, a void of complete darkness seems to swallow everything around them. Everything around them becomes nothing but impenetrable darkness, the headlights being the only thing shining through the night. Randy keeps his foot on the gas, swerving left and right to avoid cars and buildings that seem to jump out from darkness.

“What are you doing?!” Jerard exclaims as him and the others do everything to keep themselves in their seats as the car tries to throw them around.

“Taking us to my home!” Randy replies.

“How?!”

“It’s gonna take a lot more than some darkness to make me forget the layout of this town,” He replies. He makes a sudden right and soon makes another left. Soon the light stops showing pavement as they drive onto dirt.

“We’re almost there,” Randy states as he lightly eases up on the gas. They all look out at the darkness, wondering if what they’re seeing is real or not. As Jerard stares into the darkness, he starts to feel like something is constricting him.

Everyone jumps as something lashes out at the car, scratching the drivers side. They’re unable to see what attacked them. Another swing comes, on the passenger side. Randy presses down on the gas again to pick up speed, his grip on the now sweaty wheel tightening. Something slams against one of the windows and they catch a glimpse of something brown and green. It looked like a branch. The attacks start to get more rapid, and the glass starts to crack.

After a seemingly endless drive through the darkness, the attacks suddenly stop as they exit the darkness. Randy slams on the brakes, throwing everyone forward, their seatbelts barely catching them as they stop mere inches from a messy looking one story house. Randy pulls out a flashlight from his pocket and opens his door, quickly grabbing the shotgun from the center console.

“It’s safe, come on,” Randy commands. Everyone quickly gets out, seeing that the house is seemingly surrounded by a pitch black cloud, as if they’re in a globe, “Everyone inside,” He says, holding the front door open, shotgun at the ready. They quickly head inside, Randy slamming the door shut behind them and locking seven different locks on the door.

The air inside the cabin is only a bit warmer than outside but feels much more safe, if a bit stuffy. The smell of leftovers comes from the living room, what little of the room they can see being unkempt and messy. Randy flips the light switch to turn on the lights, but they don’t turn on.

As they gather into the living room, they have to brush off napkins and paper plates from the couches to sit down. Randy walks over to the fireplace, made of old red bricks, and quickly starts a fire, helping light up the room and blanket them in its warmth. Helena gets up and kneels by the fire, holding her hands out to warm them.

“I permanently changed to a desk clerk to avoid getting into shit like this…” She says as she focuses on the flames, trying to forget what she just saw.

“Well I retired,” Randy says as he stands up, “And now Pierre is the one whose at home sleeping like a baby,” Feeling a bit cold, Red gets up from the couch to join them by the fire. Before she takes her first step she notices her father int he corner of her eyes, hunched over, leg shaking, and hands held together in front of his mouth.

“D-dad?” She asks as she takes a step toward, both concerned and scared seeing him like that, “Are you alright?”

Before he says anything to stands up.

“I need to get out of here,” He says before heading for the front door.

“Wow, wow, wow, hey!” Randy exclaims as he runs over to him and steps in front of, preventing him from leaving the living room, “Demon Wolf or not, you’re not leaving this house, the damn trees themselves were trying to kill us,”

“Randy, you don’t understand. I’m…” He glances over at Red whose by the fire and just turned her head back to it. “Can we speak in the kitchen?”

“Alright,” Randy says and he shows him to the kitchen where he tries to turn on the lights to no avail.

“I’m starting to lose it, I’m getting claustrophobic and I can feel myself getting weaker each second I fight turning into my wolf form,” Jerard says, starting to sound out of breath, “I can’t stay in here with you guys,”

“Are you getting urges to kill?”

“Y-yeah…”

“Gosh dammit…” Randy starts tapping his toe as he folds his arms and looks off to the side, “Do you think you could keep yourself in the basement at least if I lock you in there? It’ll probably be a tight fit, but…Red nearly thought she lost you once, do you really want her to have to go through that again?” Jerard looks at Randy’s stern, yet worried expression. He glances over towards the living room, contemplating.

“…I guess it’ll work, just…don’t hesitate to shoot me if you have to, I can take a couple shots,”

“Yeah, I know,” He says with a slight chuckle, trying to lighten the dense mood. Randy shows him to the basement door and after Jerard steps down into it, he locks the door and heads back to the living room.

“Where’s my dad?” Red asks, seeing only Randy entering the room.

“He’s safe and sound in the basement. Needed some alone time,” He replies as he kneels down by the fire.

“Do you think we’re gonna be safe here for the night?” Helena asks.

“Well, whatever that dark shit is, it doesn’t seem to be able to touch the house, so I’m guessing it’s safe to say yes. All those prayers, holy water sprinkles, and herb singes seem to be working their magic finally,” They all turn away from the fire and to the hallway as they growling from the basement. There’s a sudden sound of something clawing at cement as snarling erupts from the ground below them.

Randy makes sure he has a hand near his gun if he needs to draw it. However, the sounds seem to stop and it goes quiet again with only the crackling fire talking. It takes awhile for them to ease up enough to finally catch their breath and start breathing again. Red goes and sits down back on the couch with Helena taking a seat on a chair.

Looking around the room to try and distract herself, Red sees a somewhat faded, old picture with the colors barely visible laying on top of a short bookshelf. Getting up and walking over to it, she picks up the photo and looks at it. A young man with medium length brown hair is kissing the cheek of a smiling woman with long flowing blonde hair. She looks nearly identical to her mother, and though she’s never seen the man before, something about him seems familiar.

“Randy, who are these people?” She asks. Randy looks over at her and quickly recognizes the photo. He gets up and holds out a hand, gesturing for her to hand it to him. She hands him the picture and he looks down at it with a smile.

“That would be your Granny and me,” He says as he caresses a thumb over the face of the woman, “This was taken two years before we had your mother,”

“Uhh…yeah..?” He says a bit awkwardly, realizing how bad of a situation they’re in to be dropping such a bomb like that, “Granny didn’t really want you to know that cause she was worried you’d start thinking it’d be okay to talk the way I do,”

“How many things did she hide from me?” Red asks as she looks over at the fire, thinking about all the times her and Granny spent on rainy days wrapped up in blankets and drinking hot cocoa as a fire warmed the room while they watched tv.

“Red, she just wanted to-” Before Randy can finish speaking, there’s a sudden banging on the front door.

“Randy? Randy?! You in there?!” Pierre’s voice asks. They all glance at each other before heading to the front door, Red and Helena staying behind Randy. Randy looks through the peephole before unlocking the locks and opening the door, ready to draw his weapon if need be. A confused and irritated Pierre stands in front of them in a blue sweater and grey sweatpants.

Everyone in the house looks around utterly baffled. The darkness that had enveloped everything but a small area around the house was completely gone, though it was still pretty dark since it was still the middle of the night.

“Would you mind telling me why I woke up to you hauling ass through town? I had to go a hundred once you suddenly sped up shortly after getting into the woods,”

The group just looks at him in utter confusion. How on earth could he have been following them? They saw no headlights from behind, and they’ve been in the house for at least half an hour, there’s no way he could have been right behind them.

“And why is the car so badly damaged? Looks like you drove through some stores or something,”

“It’s a long story,” Randy says as he looks around to see if there’s any sign of someone else watching, “I’ll fill you in on the details tomorrow though, it’s been a long night for us,”

“Randy whatever the hell happened I need to-”

“Pierre,” Randy says sternly.

“…Alright. Do, either of you need a ride home?” He asks Red and Helena, not trying at all to hide his confusion as to why they’re there. They both shake their heads in response.

“My phone’s connected to the same number as the one at the station, so if anyone calls I’ll get it,” Helena says.

“Okay, I want to see you at the station first thing in my office,” Pierre tells Randy.

“Soon as the suns up,” Randy replies. Pierre gives them one more confused look of slight distrust as he goes to is vehicle and takes off back to town.

“You’re welcome to sleep in the guest bedroom, I’m sure neither of you want to lay in my room. It’s down the hall, second door on the right,”

“I’ll take the couch, you can have the bed Red,” Helena says. Red nods in response and the two make their way to their sleeping areas. Randy goes into the living and takes a book out of the shelf.

He goes into the kitchen and opens it up, revealing pages about supernatural creatures and the folklore behind them. He starts flipping to the pages about demons, looking to see which ones are capable of manipulating the flow of time.