Chapter 32

An entry from the diary of Damien Slayer,

We boarded the bus at the outskirts of Seattle, both Stryker and I blending into the crowd of travelers seamlessly. The hum of the engine served as steady, soothing background noise as we left the city behind. I gazed out of the window, contemplating the changes unfolding in front of me.

The scenery outside morphed gradually; the densely populated suburbs with rows of neat houses giving way to sparser neighborhoods. The farther we went, the more the landscape transformed. I had seen this area's urban expansion and loss of wilderness over the years, but this time a reversal was taking place as nature slowly reclaimed her ground.

Our journey continued, and the concrete and asphalt turned into lush, evergreen fields. As I stared out of the window, I watched the vast meadows give way to a patchwork of woodland. Tree-covered hills rolled past us, casting their leafy shadows over the bus. The soothing green hues steadily thickened, and the rich scent of pine filled the air.

Gradually, there were fewer and fewer signs of human intervention. The clusters of houses became scarcer, and the previously tamed roads began to twist and curve, becoming narrower as they wound through the increasingly dense forest. The trees began to press closer on either side of the bus, providing a canopy of green foliage that was occasionally splintered by shards of sunlight that managed to find their way through. Alongside the road, moss-covered boulders and ferns peeked out from beneath the wooden giants, and fallen logs decayed silently, returning to the earth from which they had sprung.

As the bus pushed further north, the forest grew wilder and more untamed. The serene beauty of the landscape was captivating, yet an undercurrent of danger, a sense of the untamed wilderness, lurked beneath the picturesque surface. It was the domain of creatures waiting in the shadows, giving off a primal and magnetic energy.

Stryker leaned in, his voice a bit softer, "So, where exactly are we headin'? Gonna fill me in on this friend of yours?" I tried to hush him, but he barely spoke at a lower volume than usual.

I whispered sharply, "Jesus Christ, Stryker, what the fuck are you trying to do, draw the whole bus over here as an audience?"

Stryker scoffed and replied, "From my experience, and I've been doing this kind of shit a long time – since before you were an irresponsible thought in your folks' heads – I've found whispers draw ears faster than anything."

I paused for a moment, taking in the din of the bus, people talking or listening to headphones. I responded, "I've been doing this a long time as well, Stryker. And I've done it without the resources of a huge, enigmatic, all-powerful secret society. So, maybe I know what I'm doing too."

Stryker waved his hands dismissively. "Whatever, just fill me in. I'm coming this far to keep you from getting yourself eaten again, so I might as well know what's up."

I sighed deeply and leaned in to talk to him. I wondered if his extra dose of obnoxiousness stemmed from the fact that he hadn't had a drink yet. Back at Razmik's mansion, he'd usually be half-stoned on whiskey by now.

I began, "You know my story, Stryker, don't you?"

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Stryker nodded, "Yeah, yeah. Girlfriend murdered by Prowler, authorities couldn't believe in anything so unnatural, and you, the last guy seen at the scene and the boyfriend nonetheless, became suspect number one. You fled the scene, which honestly made shit a lot worse if you ask me. You'd have been better off staying put, and DNA would have set you free, but anyway – you took off and spent the next decades in a clichéd state of angst, melancholy, and a determined revenge quest seeking to kill a creature you wouldn't have an inflated football's chance in a Patriots locker room of taking on."

I grimaced, trying to ignore the shitty attitude that was emerging from the sea of overly extended sobriety. "Well, Prowler went back to my hometown about 20 years later. I went there when I caught wind of what he was up to. Prowler has a thing for redheads; can't say why, but he loves ladies with red hair, like my Penny."

I paused, emotion catching in my throat even after all these years. Stryker managed to silence his inner asshole as well, and though he didn't say anything, his face softened into an expression of awkward empathy.

I continued, "There was a woman there, Avril. As far as I can tell, she was sent there by the Order. She had no idea, of course; she thought she had picked up a freelance writing gig with paid accommodation. I think the Order was trying to draw Prowler out, so they sent O'Conner out there. There's a long version of the story and a short version; which one do you want?"

Stryker replied, "I guess I'll take the short version for now. I know some of this; I just want to make sure I've got all the pieces in a row."

I said, "When the dust settled, O'Conner was basically in a coma in the hospital, Avril's little boy was a headless corpse, and at least three more people were dead at the hands of that monster. And the thing he did to Avril was what he's done to Penny and countless others."

Stryker, confused, asked, "He killed her?"

I explained, "No, he raped her. But unlike the others, she survived, and even worse, she was pregnant."

Stryker sat upright, exclaiming, "He knocked her up, and she carried his child?"

I replied, "That was a few years ago, so she's probably been done carrying it for a while. I don't know what the chances of offspring between Prowler and a human have of surviving, but Bill said he saw her heavily pregnant, so at the very least, she carried the child for a while."

Stryker whistled, low and somber, "Fuck, carrying a rapist's baby inside you must be crippling to the mind, but carrying the child of an inhuman ape monster rapist, not knowing what kind of demon is inside of you… who can imagine something like that? Why didn't she get rid of it?"

I said, "When he attacked her, he had just taken the head off her son and wreaked a campaign of utter terror on her. Then he did what he did to her – a truly brutal experience, probably beyond human compare. The being that was discovered in the house after Prowler left, the Avril that Bill found… it wasn't Avril anymore. It was a broken shell of a thing. Through the blood and the carnage of what they found, I don't think anyone imagined what had happened – not then. I understand some folks were still blaming me for it."

Stryker nodded, "So they sent the broken shell of a post-traumatic stress victim somewhere she could get care."

I said, "They sent her somewhere they thought she'd get care, but I have concerns."

Stryker asked, "You don't think she went somewhere benevolent?"

I replied, "The place she was sent claimed to be part of some kind of charitable program where they extend their state-of-the-art care to victims of abuse. But I know the place is linked to the Darkley Corporation, and Bill said he could never penetrate to her after. The red tape, the political protection – she basically disappeared from him when she went in there."

Stryker asked, "And is that where we're headin' now?"

I said, "Yes."

He stared out the window, his visage dark and terrible and filled with rage, and quietly said, "Good."