In Laymon's Terms

Alison screamed, struggling with the boy. She had lost her knife during the fight with the man, the bloody black creature that stood over Steve’s still body licking blood from the open wound.

Darkness.

She opened her eyes to dim light. She was inside now, breathing stale, musty air, the tangy scent of fresh meat. Her head rested on someone’s lap. The person’s fingers smoothed her hair in a soothing motion.

“Steve?” But the legs were too small, skinny and soft, not the firmness she was used to. “Steve, what happened?” She turned her head and looked up.

The girl smiled, breathing foulness onto Alison’s face. “It’s okay.” She spoke slowly. Her face was a mottled pink mass of scar tissue. Long, thin scars that had healed poorly leaving bubbled white masses on the tender flesh. Her left eye was lower than the right and half closed; the other was a bright blue and it stared at Alison. “Kylie’s here.” Her hands kept patting Alison’s hair, moving the blonde strands off of her face. She repeated her name over and over. “I’m Kylie. Kylie, Kylie. That’s me. Kylie. Kylie is here to help.”

Alison pulled herself into a sitting position, Kylie’s hands still stroking her hair. She pushed them off.

“Kylie, where’s Steve?”

Kylie shook her head. “No—Kylie. Kylie here. Kylie, Kylie,” she sang like a child.

Alison made out movement on the opposite end of the room and moved to see better. A pack of men—man-beasts—were gathered around something on the floor. Alison knew it was Steve, knew it but would not believe it, because if that was Steve, what was going to happen to her? She looked around for a window, a door, but she couldn’t leave without Steve. She had to make sure he was alive...and get the car keys from his pocket, presuming they hadn’t fallen out.

All of them were hunched over on hands and feet, covered in slick, black hair. The boy was still smooth and brown; he had not changed. One of the man-beasts let out a howl and padded over to Alison, tongue hanging out. His erect penis swayed with the movement. The leer on his face told Alison everything she needed to know

Oh God, Alison thought. Oh, no. Her gorge rose but she held it, swallowing hard, as the man sniffed at her. She kicked him in the face, ignoring the pain that flared in her knee, smiling at the crunch. Maybe she’d knocked out a few of those sharp teeth. He wasn’t the one who had mangled Steve, but she’d take revenge on this one, oh yes. She kicked again as hard as she could, pummeled his head with her fists.

He came back snarling and raked her face. She grunted and pushed, punched, trying to remember what she had learned at the self-defense course she took three years ago. The boy ran up, yipping, and stopped between them. He stood on his hind legs and looked at the beast. The beast snapped at the boy’s face but walked slowly back to the pack.

The boy dropped back to all fours, nudging his head against Alison’s side, lifting her shirt and placing his cheek on her belly. She found herself petting the boy’s head, much as Kylie had patted hers.

He padded back across the room. Alison stood, shaking, as tears ran down her face. What was she going to do now? There were so many of them. If she dared to make an escape, to run out the window behind her, would she be quick enough? She looked at Kylie, sitting cross-legged and humming. How did she fit in? Would she stop Alison from making a break for it? Alison reached up to her cheek and winced, wondering if someday her skin would look like Kylie’s. The scratches burned. I should be scared, she thought. But this isn’t happening.

The boy scampered in front of the beasts and they moved aside to let him in. Alison got a glimpse of Steve’s gored body. He was naked, arms and legs bloodied, stomach flayed open. The boy bent his head down, took a bite of something, and shook his head as he fought to free it. There was a loud sucking noise and he rolled onto his back eliciting yelps of laughter from the others. He took the prize in his mouth and trotted away with it, pulling when it got stuck. One of the elders leaned forward and snapped the intestine with his teeth.

Alison sank to the floor, blanking the scene out. She should be crying, she knew, but she couldn’t. This wasn’t real. A snippet of song came to her, “I’m not here, this isn’t happening.” She sang it in her head to drown out the chewing sounds as the pack began to eat.

One of them buried his head in Steve’s torso, shifting his body. His hand flopped onto the ground, the hand she had held earlier in the day, the one she had expected would caress her tonight.

“Oh, Steve.” She concentrated on the song, singing first in her head and then out loud.

The boy dropped his earlier prize and went back to lap at a pool of blood on the floor.

Tears came, and Alison wondered if they were as salty as Steve’s blood. Hands stroked her hair again and she heard Kylie’s sing-song voice. She let her head fall back.