lashed out to lick the blood off them. His nose colored black as it changed shape, becoming a square at the end of his snout.
Power rushed over me in a tide. My stomach tore itself apart in hunger. I wanted meat, red and raw and briny. I wanted to lick salty blood off the ice. I wanted to rend flesh, to tear blubber from bone in strips to swallow it whole.
The man convulsed as his body swelled. His skin thickened over muscles that had reknit themselves to three and four times their size. His clothes were shredded, hanging in rags. His square skull brushed the ceiling. Hands and feet had elongated into paws, razor-sharp black talons jutting from the end of each former finger. A deep guttural grunt tore out of him as one last convulsion ran from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head. In its wake, white fur sprouted from his skin, lengthening and growing into a thick pelt.
Inside the kitchen, inside a crack house in the ’hood, stood a fucking polar bear.
Holy shit.
4
I scrambled to my feet as the bear turned to look at me. A roar tore through the air, washing hot and moist over me. My finger squeezed. The gun in my hand kicked back, its roar shorter and sharper, but just as loud as the bear’s. Four .357 Magnum bullets in four blinks of the eye. They slapped center mass into white fur.
And disappeared.
The bear jerked his head down, looking at where the bullets had vanished. His skull convulsed, shrinking back with a shift of bone until it was a mix of bear and man. The voice that came out of that mouth was completely inhuman. It sounded like a garbage disposal trying to form words in English.
“Silver? You shot me with silver?” That mutated face looked at me. “What the hell are you doing with silver bullets?”
My finger squeezed the trigger in response.
The next two bullets disappeared into that expanse of white fur.
“QUIT SHOOTING ME!” he screamed. “IT BURNS!” Sure enough, I could see black spots forming where I had shot him. Tiny wisps of smoke curled out between strands of white fur.
I pulled the trigger on the last four bullets.
The air shook as the bear screamed out. Between my pulling the trigger and the bullets reaching him, he turned, grabbed the refrigerator, and yanked it in front of him. It was so fast I didn’t see it happen. One second he was standing in my line of fire, the next he had the refrigerator in front of him. The bullets splatted against the insulated side of the fridge, tearing holes and leaving marks, but not penetrating through to hit him.
The slide of my pistol locked back, open and empty.
Dammit!
Thumb sweeping the release button made the clip drop out of the bottom of the gun. It fell and clattered on the floor. My left hand had a fresh clip and was already moving to the opening. It slid home and clicked into place. I flicked the slide release and it jerked forward, stripping a round off the clip and seating it in the chamber.
The bear threw the refrigerator at me.
Time shrank around me again as I watched hundreds of pounds of metal fly toward me. The door swung open as it flipped toward me in the air, food tumbling out. Mustard, ketchup, carton of eggs, head of lettuce; my mind took stock of these on one track. On the other was the thought: That damn fridge is going to crush me .
Without thinking, I threw my feet out and dove under the flying hunk of metal and insulation. My shoulder slammed into the floor as I rolled. The door to the fridge whirlwinded over my face so close it brushed my goatee. I kept tumbling to a stop as the refrigerator smashed into the wall behind where I had been standing. Sheetrock exploded into dust, raining down over the kitchen appliance. I was on my stomach. Pain throbbed across my shoulder and my breath was gone.
Get up!
I pulled my knees under me when something slammed across my back like the fist of God and drove me back to the floor. Another blow hit me across the kidneys, this one with a tug and a ripping sound. The
Power rushed over me in a tide. My stomach tore itself apart in hunger. I wanted meat, red and raw and briny. I wanted to lick salty blood off the ice. I wanted to rend flesh, to tear blubber from bone in strips to swallow it whole.
The man convulsed as his body swelled. His skin thickened over muscles that had reknit themselves to three and four times their size. His clothes were shredded, hanging in rags. His square skull brushed the ceiling. Hands and feet had elongated into paws, razor-sharp black talons jutting from the end of each former finger. A deep guttural grunt tore out of him as one last convulsion ran from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head. In its wake, white fur sprouted from his skin, lengthening and growing into a thick pelt.
Inside the kitchen, inside a crack house in the ’hood, stood a fucking polar bear.
Holy shit.
4
I scrambled to my feet as the bear turned to look at me. A roar tore through the air, washing hot and moist over me. My finger squeezed. The gun in my hand kicked back, its roar shorter and sharper, but just as loud as the bear’s. Four .357 Magnum bullets in four blinks of the eye. They slapped center mass into white fur.
And disappeared.
The bear jerked his head down, looking at where the bullets had vanished. His skull convulsed, shrinking back with a shift of bone until it was a mix of bear and man. The voice that came out of that mouth was completely inhuman. It sounded like a garbage disposal trying to form words in English.
“Silver? You shot me with silver?” That mutated face looked at me. “What the hell are you doing with silver bullets?”
My finger squeezed the trigger in response.
The next two bullets disappeared into that expanse of white fur.
“QUIT SHOOTING ME!” he screamed. “IT BURNS!” Sure enough, I could see black spots forming where I had shot him. Tiny wisps of smoke curled out between strands of white fur.
I pulled the trigger on the last four bullets.
The air shook as the bear screamed out. Between my pulling the trigger and the bullets reaching him, he turned, grabbed the refrigerator, and yanked it in front of him. It was so fast I didn’t see it happen. One second he was standing in my line of fire, the next he had the refrigerator in front of him. The bullets splatted against the insulated side of the fridge, tearing holes and leaving marks, but not penetrating through to hit him.
The slide of my pistol locked back, open and empty.
Dammit!
Thumb sweeping the release button made the clip drop out of the bottom of the gun. It fell and clattered on the floor. My left hand had a fresh clip and was already moving to the opening. It slid home and clicked into place. I flicked the slide release and it jerked forward, stripping a round off the clip and seating it in the chamber.
The bear threw the refrigerator at me.
Time shrank around me again as I watched hundreds of pounds of metal fly toward me. The door swung open as it flipped toward me in the air, food tumbling out. Mustard, ketchup, carton of eggs, head of lettuce; my mind took stock of these on one track. On the other was the thought: That damn fridge is going to crush me .
Without thinking, I threw my feet out and dove under the flying hunk of metal and insulation. My shoulder slammed into the floor as I rolled. The door to the fridge whirlwinded over my face so close it brushed my goatee. I kept tumbling to a stop as the refrigerator smashed into the wall behind where I had been standing. Sheetrock exploded into dust, raining down over the kitchen appliance. I was on my stomach. Pain throbbed across my shoulder and my breath was gone.
Get up!
I pulled my knees under me when something slammed across my back like the fist of God and drove me back to the floor. Another blow hit me across the kidneys, this one with a tug and a ripping sound. The
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