“We may be witnesses to a Biblical prophecy come true - 'And there shall be destruction and darkness come over creation, and the Beasts shall reign over the earth.'” –Dr. Harold Medford,
Them!, (1954)
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Part Three: Revelation
Unfortunately, the rain hadn’t let up any by lunch time. Actually, the distant rumble of thunder was getting worse, and there were definitely flashes of lightning in the distance. The weather report said it was a freak storm that would last the next day or two, which really sucked; I wanted to buy some local hooch in town.
Hisao and his family came over for lunch as promised. Akio clung tightly to his father's leg as they stepped inside, frightened by the thunder. After waiting for him to peel his son off his leg, and give him a little push to continue inside, I set a serious look on Hisao. Turning his attention to me, he assumed a similarly somber expression.
“Hisao, I wanna talk to you-” I started, but he held up a hand to thwart the rest of my question.
“Later, okay?” he requested, heaving a sigh and setting his jaw.
Raising an eyebrow at him, I found his sudden seriousness distressing, prompting me to ask, “why later?”
“I don’t want to put a damper on today, okay?” he explained, maintaining that somber look.
For as long as I've known him, I could count on one hand how often he looked that serious, so I decided my questions could wait. Nodding slowly, but setting my eyes on his sternly, to make sure he knew I was as serious as a heart attack, I rejoined the family.
Thomas was trying to reassure Akio while the twins played with the other girls. Hanako had gone upstairs to place Refia in the backup crib, the baby monitor already attached to her belt, while George and Daichi were discussing some literary hipster thing. Settling down with Hisao and Lilly over some tea, though I thought something stiffer would’ve been nice, we focused on idle chit-chat.
“This storm seems a bit odd,” Lilly mused aloud.
“Yeah, but it should end in a day or two,” I said.
“It better end before then!” Akio squeaked from under the coffee table.
“I’m sure it will,” Hisao said, smiling at the coffee table.
Though that serious look was replaced with a somewhat forced smile, he kept glancing at me, his kids, and finally Hanako when she came back down to join us. There was something written on his face, something he was trying to hide, but I couldn’t read exactly what. When he and Lilly started talking about H.G. Wells, I turned to ask Hanako if she heard anything strange last night.
Sipping her tea and fiddling with her long hair, she replied, “no, but I think Hisao did." Glancing at her husband, she leaned a little closer to me, her eyes seeming conflicted. Finally, she set down her tea and continued, "he seemed upset this morning. When I asked him if anything was wrong, he just said it was a work thing with Kenji.”
Leaning back, I raised an eyebrow and wondered aloud, “what would Kenji know about what’s going on around here?”
Hanako shrugged, looking a little frustrated as she replied, “that’s what I asked. Hisao has always been very quiet about what he and Kenji do at the Agency." She straightened up and evened her eyes at me, looking determined. "But if it involves something dangerous around us," she continued, "I want to know.”
Expecting her to continue, I waited a moment, but, when she didn’t say anything more, I prompted, “so what did he say?”
Sighing, she shook her head and answered, “he said it was probably nothing, but if it was something, he’d take care of it. He said he could handle it, whatever it was. So I left it alone.”
“Well, I want to help him, and I’m going to," I replied, twitching my thumb towards Hisao, "it’s my family, too.”
Hanako smiled that adorable, earnest smile of hers, “if you do, would you look after him? I’ve never questioned what he’s done with Kenji, even when he comes back scratched and b-bloodied, because I know Kenji would die before he let something happen to Hisao. I know you’d do the same for me or Lilly, but-”
“Absolutely,” I cut in, “if something wants Hisao, it has to go through me first.”
Hanako’s smile, if possible, got even bigger. Nodding slightly, she said simply, “thank you.”
Later in the afternoon, just after dinner, I cornered Hisao in the hallway near the bathroom. Folding my arms across my chest and blocking his exit, I asked, “you ready to talk?”
Looking a little perturbed by my insistence, he stopped and sighed, resigning to the promised conversation. “Yes," he replied, "but not here. I’m going back to our summer house, and I want my family to spend the night here. Is that okay?”
“Only if I can go with you,” I insisted.
Smirking, he sighed again, “I figured you’d want to help. I’ll need someone to watch my back, but, before I say yes..." Trailing off, he leaned in close, set his jaw again and gave me that serious look before continuing, "I want you to know there's a very good chance if you help me, one of us will die. Are you willing to take that risk?”
Pausing to take in the enormity of his claim, I didn't really believe him, but his face was the most serious I had ever seen. “If it protects my family," I replied, carving a similar look into my own face, "yes.”
Assuming a somewhat unsettling, mischievous smile, Hisao crossed his arms and nodded. “Alright then, play along," he said as he brushed past me, "and try to keep up.”
Following him toward the living room, I dropped the serious look and assumed something closer to neutral. Once there, Hisao started patting his pockets. “Shoot, I forgot to take one of my pills," he claimed, "Hana, I better go back and take it.”
“I believe we have extras of your prescriptions here,” Lilly mentioned from the sofa, "Akira?"
“I forgot to bring them,” I lied, “my bad.”
“Why don’t we just go back early?” Hanako asked.
Hisao shrugged, clearly already having planned this out, “I figured the kids would enjoy a sleepover," he explained, "but we should stay and supervise. Is that okay?”
“I think it’s a great idea,” I agreed. Becoming an accomplice to coercion hadn't been my plan, but we had good reason; protecting our respective families was justification enough. My lawyer training in practice… that came out wrong.
“Me, too,” Daichi said.
George shrugged and added, “sure, why not.”
Lilly and Hanako simply nodded.
Heading for the door, Hisao assured them, “we’ll be back in a bit.”
“Why is Akira going with you?” George asked.
“In case that dog shows up,” I explained, which was more or less the truth.
“Be careful out there,” Hanako said.
“We will,” I replied, following Hisao out the door.
With the rain falling in heavy sheets, lightning flashes growing ever closer, and rolling thunder shaking the ground, it was a forbidding night. Unfurling his umbrella, Hisao beckoned me to follow as he stepped out to head across the driveway. Doing so quickly, I could barely see his car, and the pattering rain atop the umbrella made hearing anything else difficult.
Once we reached the car, and were relatively safe inside, I asked, “what the hell is going on?”
Sitting in the disquieting darkness, Hisao sighed, “something terrible." Becoming eerily quiet for a moment, it was hard to see his expression in the prevailing dark, but his silence spoke volumes. Finally he turned toward me and asked, "did you hear more howling last night?”
Recalling my late-night excursion, I blew out a sigh and replied, "yeah, I even saw a pair of yellow eyes." The thrum of the engine starting broke my thought for a moment, and in the dim light from the control panel I could see a grim look on Hisao's face. "Creeped me the hell out," I continued, "so I grabbed a baseball bat to go outside and kick its ass. I stopped when it moved away.”
Hisao nodded, his dark expression remaining, though split by a faint smile. “Good, you’re willing to fight, and you know when to pick your battles," he paused, shaking his head, "and hopefully there’s only one of them out there.”
Raising an eyebrow, I asked, “one of what? Stray dogs?”
“When did you hear the howling?” he asked, not answering my questions.
After telling him, he nodded. “Good, there is hopefully just one," he replied, blowing out a relieved sigh, "I heard the noise less than an hour after you did.”
“Shouldn’t we call the police or something? Or animal control?" I suggested, then smirked and added, "or a Chinese cook?”
Shaking his head as he started backing the car into a three-point turn, he sighed, “they couldn’t handle this." Once he finished the turn and we were on our way down the dark, rainy driveway, he added, "we can; I hope.”
As he drove, I observed Hisao's face as it assumed a certain grimness, and creepiness, unlike any I had ever seen. Hard-edged and drained of all mirth, his face reminded me of something I had only seen in war veterans; seeing the elephant, they called it. This elephant was apparently really freaky, because Hisao wasn’t making any damn sense.
Driving carefully on the muddy gravel road to his summer house, we sat silently. The patter of rain and the roll of thunder mixed with the dulcet hum of the car engine, providing little distraction from the unsettling situation. Whatever creature was stalking the area, Hisao was, if not outright terrified, at least very concerned; I could tell that much, despite his calmness.
Parking in the garage and bolting out towards the inside of the house, Hisao seemed in a terrible rush. Where a science teacher with a heart condition found that much energy, I wasn't sure, but I began to get the sense he wasn't just running to keep in shape of late; maybe his work with Kenji was more than clerical. Following him, I passed by a shelf full of motorcycle parts and the frame of what looked like an Indian; in addition to riding them, Hanako was very, very particular about who maintained them- her, and only her.
Hisao’s summer house was one story, with a small living room, bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom. Stepping inside, I saw him darting for the bedroom and followed close behind. Throwing the closet open, he pulled on an Old-West-style, brown oilskin duster and brimmed hat, tossing another set to me when he noticed me standing in the doorway.
“Here,” he said, “Kenji’s a bit shorter then you, but it should fit fine.”
“And what's this for?” I asked suspiciously as I slipped on the duster.
“Protects against the rain, the cold... and bites and scratches,” he explained. Sighing, he rolled the hat over in his hands and added, “if you get bit, you’re as good as dead.”
“What are you talking about?!” I practically shouted. He knew what was going on, and it was about time he told me; no more cryptic dodging.
Moving over to the bed, he left the hat on top and started reaching underneath. “After the Russo-Japanese War, a few former Russian POW’s settled up north," he explained, continuing to feel around, "a few weeks later, there was a murder, then several more over the next year."
Finally finding whatever he was looking for, he knelt beside the bed and started shoving it away. Walking into the room, I came to stand behind him, looking down at the spot of the floor he had just uncovered. There, one of the floorboards had a hole drilled into one end; a secret compartment.
Regarding me with his analytical gaze, he continued his explanation methodically, "the first victims were Ainu villagers, so no one paid much attention at the time. Over the decades, every now and then there was a new murder; usually three or four a year. The bodies are found in a similar state to the one mentioned yesterday, and all were in Hokkaido.”
Perplexed, I stood there for a moment, dumbfounded. If that was his whole explanation, it was severely lacking. “So," I prompted, "what’s doing it?”
Settling his expression on that very same square-jawed grim visage he displayed earlier, he stated simply, “a werewolf.”
A crackle of lightning split the sky outside the window, and the rolling thunder reverberated through the floorboards. The timing couldn't have been more appropriate, or strange, I remember thinking. Laughing, I shook my head and balked, “you’re kidding, right? You have to be.”
Hisao didn’t say anything, instead removing the faulty floorboard and setting it aside. Reaching into the space beneath, he pulled out a large black case, which he hefted onto the sheets. Unlatching it, he reached in and drew out an old, black leather-bound book.
“Here,” Hisao said, handing me the antique-looking tome.
Taking it, I looked at the cover and found squiggly English script. Opening it to a random page, I found more English writing which appeared to be detailing some old Russian legends. Finding a bookmark, I flipped to that page and frowned. There, wrapped in plastic, were a series of newspaper clippings. All of them appeared to be stories about other murders over the years, and the similarities were disturbing. Setting the articles aside, I noticed the bookmarked page was about werewolves.
Smirking at the absurdity, I glanced at Hisao and gave him an incredulous look. “So you have an old book on some mythology and a bunch of murders," I stated, feeling a little betrayed, "how does that mean werewolf?”
“Three reasons,” he said, “one, yellow eyes, two, howling, three, the murders always occurred during a full moon.” Strangely, over the years Hisao had started talking like Kenji sometimes; it would have been comical had he not been speaking so emphatically.
Sighing at his faulty logic, I remarked, “you’re a scientist, how can you really believe such a string of events would mean werewolf?”
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy,” he replied, quoting Shakespeare.
Despite the appropriate usage, I scoffed, “okay, then why hasn’t there been a murder every full moon for the last century?" Not hearing an answer right away, I continued battering his theory, "and how does something like this live that long? Not to mention why someone hasn’t stopped it.”
Hisao pat the air dismissively and began to explain, “either it’s biting someone new when the time comes, or the transformation extends its life." Pausing to retrieve his hat, he set it on his head and grinned stupidly, apparently finding something amusing about the situation. "As to your other question, don’t forget that twenty-nine- or twenty-seven, in this case- days a month that monster is a human being. The poor bastard who turns is probably in some control of where he is when it occurs, which likely reduces the number of fatalities dramatically."
Finding his calmness disturbing, his methodical explanation did make a certain amount of sense despite remaining completely absurd. Whatever his reasons, he apparently believed this story. While I pondered that, Hisao reached into the crate and revealed a very old looking rifle.
Surprised by the inclusion of such a dangerous weapon in his family home, I balked, “what the hell is that doing here?!”
Ignoring my concern for the moment, he continued his explanation, "the fact it doesn’t do so entirely is a testament to the wolf’s power. It's also likely the reason he’s been able to stay free, moving around the remote north." Turning the rifle over in his hand, he brushed the stock and held it up to his shoulder, looking down the barrel; checking the sights. "Besides, I don’t think it eats all of the parts of the corpses that are missing, just most of it," he added, raising an approving eyebrow at the gun, "like many dogs, it probably buries or hides food for later.”
"So what about the rifle?" I asked as soon as he finished.
Looking at me sidelong, he sighed, “Kenji noticed the connection between the murders and the moon a few years back. He wanted to be prepared for anything, so he made this secret compartment and box in case we had to do some werewolf hunting.”
Disbelief still streaking my face, I settled an angry look on him and questioned, “you have a rifle... in your summer house?!”
“Not just any rifle! It’s a Model 1891 Mosin-Nagant," he explained, ignoring my real question. "Nice rifle, if a bit old. Kenji has a thing for older weapons," he continued, reaching his free hand into the box. "Oh, here,” he said, pulling out an old, dark gray revolver, “Webley revolver, made around 1914, according to the serial number.”
Blinking away the bewildered expression, I tried to shake some semblance of sanity back into my head. Failing that, I remarked, “you’re… serious about this, aren’t you?”
Accompanied by another flash of lightning, Hisao rolled his eyes and smirked derisively. Sighing, he retorted, “I’m handing you a ninety-year-old British revolver while holding a century old Russian rifle, and I’m dressed like a cowboy. Do I look like I'm kidding? I told you this was dangerous.”
“This isn’t dangerous, this is madness!” I yelled in frustration.
“No, this. Is. Reality,” Hisao said, smirking for some reason, “I didn’t believe Kenji either, but I won’t begrudge him his planning and plotting. Until last night, I thought he was being paranoid, if not completely nuts. But I saw those eyes out there, too. The eyes of a creature that is no longer human, but once was. You can call it the spawn of Satan, a freak of nature, a genetic mutation, it doesn’t matter. But it is real, it is out there, and it will kill all of us if we don’t stop it.”
Reaching into the box, Hisao extracted a small cardboard package and handed it to me, saying, “here, six shots, make them count.”
Taking the box with shaking hands, I opened it slowly and found six unusually silvery bullets lining the inside. Snapping my eyes back on him, I balked, “I’ve never even held a gun before! Do you have any idea the laws you’re violating right now?”
Nodding calmly, Hisao shook the revolver at me some more, beckoning me to take it, which I did so grudgingly. Fumbling with the surprisingly heavy hunk of metal, I groaned and looked it over with a baffled expression. Seeing my apparent inexperience written on my face, Hisao calmly showed me how to load it and explained how the mechanisms worked.
After taking it back half-loaded, I glared at him for a moment and muttered, "I don’t suppose seeing a bunch of horror movies qualifies me as a werewolf hunter.”
Watching me finish loading the silver bullets into the cylindrical chambers and locking the revolver in position, Hisao shrugged. “You’re one up on me," he remarked, "suspense isn’t good for my condition.”
“And going out hunting mythological creatures is?” I snorted.
Hisao responded with another shrug as he shoved a stripper clip into the magazine; or so he called the thing holding the oddly silvery bullets together. Guns really aren't my thing.
Still, I didn’t believe him entirely, but he had no reason to lie. Honestly, it did make a twisted sort of sense. Shrugging away the confusion, I asked, “anything else in there?”
“Yep,” he replied. Pulling out a small, folded shovel, he used a length of rope from the box to tie it to his belt. Offering a nod as he slung the rifle over his shoulder, he explained, “we’re gonna need this to bury the body when we’re done.”
Blinking with confusion, I asked, “why are we burying the body?”
Hisao rolled his eyes again, and sighed, “you’re a lawyer, think about it. Oh, and here,” he tossed me a small black book; an English translation of a Russian Orthodox Bible.
“What’s this for?” I asked.
“When I said burying the body, I meant a proper burial- ashes to ashes, valley of death, six feet under, etcetera, etcetera," he explained, waving his hand dismissively, "you know English better than I do. Kenji figured he’d be up here for this, but it’s just you and me, okay?”
“Alright,” I replied as I pocketed the Bible, “but why just one rifle, and why is this thing a wolf more than one night?”
“Like I said," he retorted, "Kenji was planning on being here, and he isn’t allowed to use a rifle after Kyoto.” His grim expression as he mentioned that incident gave me pause.
“Are you ever gonna tell what happened there?” I asked. All I knew about that case was Hisao came back with a limp and a hole in his fedora. One night during a bar crawl, I'd noticed the hole and asked how it got there, but he refused to explain and swore me to secrecy; Hanako probably didn't want to know, really.
“Maybe,” he said, still looking in the box. A moment later he grinned and pulled a small silver flask out from its recesses. “Ah! Figured he’d pack one,” he said, uncapping the flask and tossing a swig down his throat.
Recapping it, he tossed it over. Barely managing to palm it one-handed, the other hand occupied with the revolver, my nervous shaking added to my clumsy catch. Downing the remaining bourbon in a single swig, I let out a sharp breath and took another deep one, hoping the little buzz might help settle my shaking. They didn't call it liquid courage for nothing.
“Oh, and there are dozens of myths about werewolves, if not hundreds,” Hisao remarked, answering my earlier question, “some involve one night transformations, some involve several nights, some are at will. This one happens to be able to transform for several nights, apparently, and I have no doubt tonight will be such a night.”
Accepting his flimsy explanation, I offered a nod, but asked, “I don’t suppose there’s a solution that doesn’t involve a gun?”
“Possibly, but we don’t have the time for it," he lamented, "and I don’t have any wolfsbane with me anyway.”
Drawing a pair of daggers out of the box, he slipped one into his belt and held the other one out to me, saying, “here, silver blade.”
Stepping forward, I tossed the flask back into the box and took the dagger from his hand. Kneeling, I set the revolver down and laced the dagger around my ankle. Retrieving the gun, I stood and looked at Hisao, who was finishing attaching a shining silver bayonet to the end of his rifle. That unusually grim, determined expression remained, and I started to believe he really was serious about all this absurdity.
Still, I was about to open my mouth and make one last protest, but a sudden noise caused the words to catch in my throat. From the nearby fields, a long, malicious howl pierced the air, making me shudder and tighten my grip on the Webley. Feeling the hairs on my neck stand, and the pit of my stomach churn, I turned a surprised look on Hisao.
“It’s here,” he commented, stating the obvious. Working the bolt on his rifle, he gave me a grim nod and asked, “you ready?”
“Hell no,” I muttered, suddenly reconsidering this whole idea. Feeling pale and a little sick, my eyes were wide, my neck hairs were on end, my hands were shaking, and I was starting to sweat. Meanwhile, he looked somewhere between calm and excited, which I found extremely unsettling; and maybe a little bit awe inspiring. I couldn't figure out why he seemed so calm, but I didn't want to seem any less ready, so I added, "but I'll manage."
“Good enough," he replied with a smirk and a resigned shrug, "let’s go.”
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Next Chapter
Who wants to go hunting mythical creatures? C’mon you apes, you wanna live forever!?
.)
