The Demon Wolf - Chapter 32：Special Effects

“That’s coming out of my paycheck,” John states as he brushes some glass shards off his clothes, “Now I’m pissed,” He takes off into the mansion, lunging at the skinwalker It slashes one of its giant claws at him, stabbing into his stomach. John clings onto the creatures arm though, preventing himself from flying into something else. He claws at its skinny arm, tearing at its pale flesh, revealing an almost black-blood red muscle underneath.

John digs his other claws into the side of its head, moving the ones in the back to the other side, before placing a foot on the skinwalker’s back. Everyone covers their ears as the creature lets out horrifying shrills as John proceeds to tear off its head. The shrills cease as its head is torn off, blood spraying on the ground in front of John, almost hitting some of the people in the group.

“Cindy!” John calls out. A scared looking woman emerges from a door, dressed in a pale blue dress and make-up on her face to make her look as pale as a ghost, “Can you get the others? This needs to be burned, now,” The woman nods, a mixture of complete shock and terror on her face as she realizes his eyes, claws, and the giant corpse sitting next to him. She disappears into a room and other people in costumes appear. They’re all cautiously walk up to John, not wanting to touch the thing.

“Nevermind, I got it, just, continue on with the normal show, I need one of you to tour them through the place, I should be back by the time they reach the front, alright?” They all nod in response.

“Thanks,” John grabs the disembodied head with one hand and one of the legs of its body with the other, slowly dragging it out through the back door and taking it to the far side of the mansion, soon disappearing out of sight. Everyone is staring at where he disappeared off to, then someone starts clapping.

“That was amazing!” They shout, and soon some more people start cheering and applauding. Meanwhile the actors just play along, trying to hide their fear and nervousness. The rest of the walk through the mansion is filled with jumpscares and gruesome scenes telling of the owners of the mansion who would give some of their guests to vampires who lived there, but eventually stopped, and were killed by the vampires who used the mansion as a secret hideout.

They reach the end, where John waits for them, his eyes and hands back to normal, though he’s still pretty badly wounded, especially in his chest and back where his clothes are torn and show all the blood and ripped skin.

“Well, it seems like you all survived the mansion, though we still have to escape the forest,” He says with a smirk, “So, let’s start the journey back shall we?” And he leads the group down the trail.

“Man, look at that make-up, it looks so real,”

“I know, and the whole thing wit the eyes and claws,”

“How did he change into them so fast?”

“He’s an actor, he’s probably done more outrageous costumes changes in less time than that,”

“Man, let’s come here every weekend for the rest of the month,”

As the group heads back there’s more scenes, one showing a graveyard filled with the living dead victims of the vampires and another showing the vampires in monstrous, human-bat forms. They soon reach the end of the trail, coming back to town. Several people ask to take pictures with him, which he happily obliges to.

“We should take a picture!” Red exclaims. Jerard glances at John, whose currently taking a picture with some of the other visitors. Then to Randy.

“I mean, he did save our lives,”

“Alright,”

The three of them walk up to John as the other people leave.

“Can we get a picture?” Red asks.

“Of course,” John replies happily.

They take a picture with Red standing in the middle, Jerard behind her, Randy to his left and John to his right. They wave goodbye and head to Jerard’s truck.

“So, could we go again?” Red asks as they drive through town.

“What?” Jerard asks, a bit baffled, “You wanna go again after, whatever that was, tried to attack us?”

“Well, it was very scary…but John stopped it didn’t he? And plus, it could be good for you to talk to another werewolf,” Red states without thinking. Jerard nearly misses the right turn they need to make to head home.

“Talk to another werewolf? Red, what on earth do you mean by that?”

“Well…you don’t really talk to anyone a lot besides, me and grandpa. Maybe you two could become good friends, plus he already knows you’re one, he could smell it,”

“…How do you know that?” Red doesn’t respond immediately.

“…Well, I mean, he must have, since you know dogs have sensitive noses and can smell each other. I, read about it in one of the grandpa’s books,”

“You let her read those books?” Jerard asks Randy.

“Well you are a werewolf and we’ve had personal experiences with a demon,” Randy replies.

“Randy, the stuff in those books could give her nightmares. Red, do not read those books anymore, you are too young for those,”

“Sorry…” She replies, relieved that she dodged a bullet.

During the month, John would get bombarded by people who were there during the skinwalker attack, asking when they’d be able to see those “special effects” again. One time when Jerard, Randy, and Red were at the diner for dinner they encountered John, who seemed much less cheerful than normal. After that, Red offered the house during days Jerard and Randy worked as a place of silence.

“You need anything?” Red asks as John sits on the stairs to the outer porch.

“No thanks, just having a place away from all those people is more than enough,” He replies, glancing over his shoulder at her before turning back to the woods. As Red goes to close the back door and go back to watching TV, John says something.

“Are you always this trusting of people?” He asks, still staring at the woods.

“Well, you did save us from that monster back on the trail,”

“That’s still no reason to isolate yourself with one,” He gets up and walks over to her, a serious expression on his face, “Your father’s a good man, but don’t go around giving other werewolves your full trust,” He says with a serious but concerned tone, “Werewolves are dangerous, extremely, dangerous, I’m sure you remember how I was fighting that skinwalker. I’ve never seen a werewolf like your father or myself, one that has that level of self-control. It takes a lot of strength to do it, trust me…”

They hear vehicles pulling up to the front of the house.

“I best take my leave, I’ll see you later,” And with that he walks off the back porch and into the woods.

“See ya,” Red replies as she waves goodbye before heading back inside.