Critter Volume 2 Chapter 5

Sirens. They never sounded right to Clayton, every time he heard them it just brought him back to when his parents died. All he heard were sirens. The seat belt was digging into his collarbone and his arm was covered in glass. He looked to the side. Everything looked weird, the fact that he was upside down didn’t occur to him just yet. The shock was too much.  His cheeks still wet from his tears, his clothes now wet from his blood. His cell phone was ringing, but it lay outside on the pavement. The rain eventually killed the ring, now just sirens.

“ARE YOU OKAY? SIR! CAN YOU HEAR ME! YOU WERE IN AN ACCIDENT! YOU’RE GOING TO BE OKAY!” a man was knelt down at the drivers side door that was crushed. He yelled into Clayton’s ear but he was not responsive. His eyes wide open and pupils dilated, but silent. He came to consciousness when a drop of blood carried itself to his eye. He threw his arm to clear it away but was mesmerized by the amount of cuts on it. “WERE GOING TO GET YOU OUT OF HERE!”

Clayton then awakens in an ambulance. The neck brace made it difficult to turn, but there was someone else in the car with him. Kyle was unconscious with serious looking injuries on his legs. Clayton stared at the ceiling and passed out. He awoke what seemed like seconds later but was actually closer to 15 minutes. He was being rushed through the ER, people were shouting. Nothing really came through as actual words. Kyle’s chest was being pumped a couple of feet from him. There’s no heartbeat. The flat line that carried across the screen then rippled. He was back.

Clayton heard the automatic door slide open again “JANE DOE, LOOKS TO BE ABOUT 27 YEARS OF AGE, SAVERE TISSUE DAMAGE, SEVERAL BROKEN RIBS. SOMEONE FOUND HER LYING ON THE SIDE OF ROUTE 33” a paramedic was yelling “HOLY SHIT THAT’S ASHLEY! SHE WORKS HERE!” Clayton turns his head to the right to see his friend being rolled past on a stretcher “wait…WAIT THAT’S MY FRIEND!! ASHLEY!”

Warren steps out of bed, he can smell fresh hazelnut coffee roasting in the kitchen. Lena must be up. He begins walking over to the kitchen when he see’s Lena standing in the living room with a crib set up. She is hanging a toy story themed curtain around the crib when she notices him watching her “HEY!” she says “ok I know this may look weird to you but hear me out, this is where out baby could sleep” Lena’s big smile turned into a concerned look when warren stared back at her with a look of death “what?” she said. Lena turns around to see outside her window that same truck watching her, Rachel’s truck. Warren runs out the front door and catches up to her before she drove away. He reached in and pulled the keys out of the ignition “I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE!” he took the key and sent it piercing through Rachel’s leg. She let out a loud scream. He took the key out and underneath the blood jean fabric, her skin healed immediately. Rachel grabbed Warren’s hand “I’m not here to hurt anyone! I’m here to protect her, from them!” she said “WHAT ARE YOU! WHAT DO THEY CALL YOU?”  Rachel released her tight grip on his wrist “we don’t have a name, but what we do, you already know. We can’t die. “

Mitchell hid behind the rose bush long enough, Jordan was dragged in behind the witch’s wall and he was going to find out why. He hopped through the wall and hid behind the tree line to stay hidden from the group of men. Jordan was encased in silver and thrown into a deep hole in the ground. Traci then emerged from her chambers to discuss something with the men.

They wondered off talking and Mitchell wasted no time. He ran to the hole and peered down where Jordan was curled up in a ball at the bottom. The chains has fallen off from the fall and Jordan began to become conscious “JORDAN!” yelled Mitch in a quiet whisper. He opened his eyes and turned his head towards his old friend Mitchell.

Jordan didn’t want to tell him just yet of what he had become. He wanted Mitchells help getting out, he couldn’t risk it. Mitchell threw down a rope he found coiled up in one of the men’s bags. It looked like it had recently been cut in places. Mitchell threw down the rope and Jordan grabbed it. He was stronger then usual and was out of the hole in seconds. “THANK YOU!” said Jordan “come on! I have a truck a few miles up parked in the woods! LET’S GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE!” the two of them headed for the truck, all the while Jordan was thinking to himself how much he has changed. He killed Tyson, and other men and woman; he changed who he was to become more powerful. Then he remembered why he did it in the first place, to get Lena back.

Mitchell was driving along the highway and Jordan was sitting in the passenger seat not saying a word “okay so are you going to tell me what happened to you or am I going to have to choke it out of you?” Mitchell asks. Jordan looked at himself in the rearview mirror as the moon glared at him through the glass. He turned to Mitchell and shot out his fangs. Mitchell stared at them for a second and then slammed on the breaks “GET OUT!” he yelled. Jordan was confused; he thought Mitchell was like him, special. Jordan began crying tears of blood as Mitchell reached over opened the door and kicked him out. Jordan lay on the side of the road as he watched Mitchell take off into the night.

Lauren grabbed her purse and keys from the counter and hopped in her car. She cranked the key and drove 5 minutes down the road to her job. She parked her car where she usually parks it, and turns to walk in the front door, but to her surprise, the bar is gone. Lauren began shaking as she was stricken with so many questions “Hello!?” she yelled, she heard another car coming down the road. As it parked, Warren and Lena emerged. Warren slowly exited staring at the empty lot where the bar used to be. Lena stared at the bar and saw Mitchell sitting in the front window, he was crying. Lauren and Warren could not see anything. Mitchell wiped away his tears and stared into Lena’s eyes as he grabbed a shotgun and headed for the front door. 

A man approached Clayton's bed as they wiped off red residue from his legs. "IS THAT BLOOD!?" Clayton yelled with concern. "No actually it's paint, red paint. The man that hit you had buckets of it in the back of his truck, they exploded everywhere on impact."