The Dragon's Blood (Part 46)
In which Lorelei Price meets Doctor Turnquist....
46
Her eyes closed and she saw him again, grinning maniacally into the night, the full moon bright and alive behind him, his once nice, neat business suit now stained crimson with that woman’s blood. Then he became the wolf, though this time he didn’t leap away, he remained, those dreadful teeth going straight for her own throat.
“You’re too late, pig. Way too late.”
It replayed over and over again in her head. During her waking hours and during her sleeping ones, behind every corner, within every shadow he lay in wait, the wolf-man.
She didn’t let the others know, no, she dared not. She was nothing but cool and collected, the model officer. She’d seen already what allowing one’s fear to show got you. It got Pedro Nicasia a one way trip to retirement.
Maybe not showing it got yourself something too. She was about to find out about that, she supposed.
She was in an interrogation room in the 13th precinct on that side of the table she’d never been on before, a fitting place really for the end of one’s career.
Despite it all, despite the ghostly werewolves, the waking nightmares and the possibility of retirement at the age of twenty five, she found herself in some sort of strange peace. She’d seen something not many others had seen, something not very many even believed could possibly exist. She knew now, even though no one else seem to believe her. She KNEW, and there was something maddeningly liberating about that.
The world was a larger place than she’d been told it would be as a child. Something about that lifting of the veil had left her feeling clearer, more open to the possibilities.
Now if only she’d stop seeing wolfmen behind every fucking corner, she’d be fine and dandy.
The door opened after what seemed like the better part of an hour and two men walked in. The first was Doctor William Turnquist, the fellow who’d been her bestest friend in the whole wide world for the last week and a half. The other was a fellow she’d never seen before, a tall, lanky, far too pale fellow with more than a fair share of tics.
She eyed them suspiciously, keeping her cool as best she could, trying very hard not to let her eyes dart past them to that dark spot in the corner, that damned shadow where her fucking mind was certain Lon Chaney Junior’s godforsaken cousin lay in wait.
Doctor Turnquist, resident mind-fucker extraordinaire, adjusted his hornrimmed glasses. “Good evening, Officer Price, I apologize for the wait, I’m afraid it couldn’t be helped.”
She waved it away impatiently, tired of the bullshit. “Just get to the point, Doc. Am I gonna get cleared to get back out there or not? How many more damned sessions do I need before you pencil-pushers finally give the all clear or send me the fuck home?”
Adjusting those goddamned glasses again, and not for the last time that minute, Turnquist went right on ignoring her in pretty much the same way he’d been doing since they’d started their dance ten days ago.
“This,” he gestured at Mister Jittery, “is Captain Christopher Eastman, head of Strike Force Sword, a special Division of New York’s finest.”
Strike Force Sword, now things were getting interesting.
She leaned forward, the werewolf in the corner gradually beginning to fade out of existence.
“Go on.”
“Officer Price,” Eastman cleared his throat, his voice surprisingly deep and cultured. “--- Detective Price…”
“You’re promoting me?” She cocked her head to one side in surprise.
“Yes, maam,” he grinned, all those ticks fading away, just like that werewolf had, once he started speaking. “You have to be a Detective in order to join Sword. Of course you’ll be taking the appropriate exams, following the usual channels, but it will be escalated, Miss Price, it will go faster for you. Not easier, get that straight please, but definitely faster.”
“Wait, wait, wait, I don’t get this,” one hand shot up, palm out, stopping the man. “I’m getting a promotion, getting assigned to some Special Strike I’ve never fucking heard of and all cause I saw some goddamn monster in the park? What’s the deal? I mean, most people get locked up in the goddamn loony bin for this shit, not promoted. What the hell’s going on? What’d I do to deserve this?”
He grinned a little shit-eating grin. “It will go faster for you not so much because of what you saw but because of how you handled what you saw.”
She leaned back and away from the pale bastard, her mind starting to race a mile a minute. If only they knew how poor she really was handling the whole damned thing.
“Now if you will,” Eastman went on, halting any more retorts from her, at least for now. “My assistant, Mister Tanaka---”
A little Asian fellow shambled in pushing an equally miniscule wheeled table with an ancient looking slide show projector on top of it.
“--- will show you something we show every new recruit entering Strike Force Sword. I like to call it a … preview of who and what we deal with on our team.”
Assistant Tanaka plugged that little machine into the wall and aimed it’s now humming projector onto the far wall.
And Officer Lorelei Price, soon to be Detective Lorelei Price of Strike Team Sword, realized with that very first slide that werewolves were just the beginning.
End Part 46
If you find yourself interested in the whole damnedable thing and wanna throw me a few bucks, here's a link to it on Amazon.