Cripple Wolf Page 4

  Dax leveled the plane when he reached what he thought was a low enough altitude. There was no real way to be sure. But they were not knocked out, so he must have been successful.

  “I think we’re OK,” said Dax.

  One of the punks shushed him.

  The cockpit got quiet and they all listened. Beneath the floor came a strange scratching sound.

  “What the hell is that?” asked Chavez.

  Suddenly, all the instruments in the cockpit began sounding alarms or just shutting off.

  “We’ve got massive failure across the board. We’re losing control of all vital systems,” Dax informed.

  A hole burst open in the floor and a small furry blur burst out. The baby werewolf began bouncing around the cockpit like a basketball slashing and biting. All five started screaming and blindly striking at the creature.

  Kana took out the taser and struck forward. The beast squealed and hopped on top of the instrument panel. It giggled and its claws dug into the controls, damaging them even more. Chavez smacked it with the back of his hand and the little monster grabbed their bag of coke and dove back into the hole it emerged from.

  “What the fuck just happened?”

  “I think a baby werewolf just stole our coke.”

  “This is getting stupid!”

  Kana grabbed Dax and started shaking his shoulder to get his attention. She was pointing frantically out the window toward the left wing of the plane.

  Dax squinted, trying to see what was going on. “There’s . . . something . . . on the wing of the plane.”

  He could see a large blob on the wing of the plane but he couldn’t make sense of what he was looking at. The lights on the wing blinked on an off briefly illuminating it. He saw what it was but it took his brain a moment to make sense of it.

  The werewolf in the wheelchair was on the wing, somehow staying in place. The wind whipped the thing’s fur against its body. The beast howled at the moon and Dax swore he heard it above the noise of the plane.

  The beast began to tear into the wing, prying back paneling and attacking wires.

  “Oh . . . oh, this is so bad,” said Chavez right before the plane started violently rocking side to side.

  “OK,” said Dax. He took his hands off the steering joystick and sat back examining his ruined instrument panel. He pushed a button and the speakers blasted, “Ziggy Stardust” by David Bowie.

  He felt surprisingly calm as he lit up what he knew was his last joint. “Try to hold onto something. We’re going down.”

  “Let’s rock and roll,” Yousei nervously said.

  Mohammad woke up in the hallway. He must have passed out from exhaustion. He could feel the plane going down.

  He assumed that he had slept through the rest of the trip and that they were landing in Portland. This was what he was waiting for. He pulled up his shirt and opened the hidden compartment in his chest. He armed the bomb and closed his eyes, saying a silent prayer.

  There was a screeching sound and he opened his eyes to see a miniature werewolf coming out of the hole in the floor. Some kind of white powered was covering its snout.

  “Praise be to Allah,” he said and the bomb went off.

  In the cockpit they heard and felt the explosion. The plane was only a few yards above the water when the bomb blew. The cabin split open and the cockpit was sent rocketing forward, flipping over.

  Kiichi saw Chavez’s chest cave-in as he was thrown into the steering joystick.

  The punks went bouncing around the cockpit and Kiichi tried to reach out to one of his friends but his head hit the ceiling and the world went black.

  Kiichi was aware of the wet and the cold but nothing else. Then he felt open air and his lungs gasped for oxygen.

  He opened his eyes to see Kana and Yousei leaning down over him, grinning.

  “Nine lives,” said Kana.

  “Like a mongoose,” said Yousei laughing.

  Kiichi shook his head and regained his senses. He sat up and looked around. The three punks floated atop an inflatable emergency raft. About a hundred yards away, the burning wreckage of the plane was slowly sinking below the waves.

  “Flyboys?” he asked.

  Kana shook her head. “No.”

  He grimly nodded. At least the three of them had made it.

  High above them, the full moon illuminated the open ocean and the last bit of wreckage sunk beneath the water.

  Yousei started shouting and pointing. Kana and Kiichi turned and looked in the direction of his finger. Through the darkness they saw another raft drifting in their direction and there appeared to be someone on it.

  All three began yelling and waving, they were so happy they weren’t the only survivors.

  The other raft drifted closer and all three punks fell silent when they got a good look at it. In the center of the raft, still sitting in the wheelchair, was the cripple wolf. It howled at the moon and waved its paws eagerly in their direction, like it was trying to will them closer – and it was working.

  The two rafts were approaching each other at a quicker speed. The punks dropped to their knees and tried in vain to paddle with their hands in the opposite direction but the cruel ocean currents were too strong.

  In moments the two rafts were touching and the werewolf lunged forward, falling off its wheelchair but directly on top of Yousei. He screamed as the werewolf tore into his stomach. Kana jumped on the beast and pulled out the taser. She tried to shock it but weapon was soaked with salt water and rendered useless.

  The wolf reached back and grabbed the top of her head with its powerful paw.

  Kiichi rushed the creature and it lazily backhanded him, sending him flying through the air right onto the other raft. He sat up and Kana’s shrieks reached an unnatural pitch. He managed to get to his feet just in time to see the beast pop Kana’s head from her body.

  He froze in shock and the beast tossed her corpse overboard. He noticed that Yousei was still alive and moving but for some reason he was smiling. Yousei’s hand made a quick motion and something metal flew through the air toward Kiichi. He caught the object and looked down to see he was holding the switchblade they found onboard the plane.

  The sudden movement attracted the werewolf’s attention and it turned to face Kiichi. The punk flicked the blade open and moonlight glimmered off the weapon.

  Yousei flashed him devil horns, “Rock and roll forever.”

  Kiichi returned the sign, “Party every night.”

  The werewolf howled and slashed Yousei’s neck, finishing the kill.

  Kiichi flipped the weapon in the air, caught it by the blade, and whipped the knife straight at the center of the raft. There was a loud Pop and the raft quickly began to deflate. The beast saw what was happening and frantically began to try and crawl back to the other raft where its chair was. Its movements only pushed the air out faster.

  Yousei’s corpse went beneath the water and the monster thrashed about with its arms. Its legs hung useless and the beast slipped beneath the waves.

  Kiichi looked over the side of the raft and watched the monster desperately try to doggie paddle, its muscular arms and wet fur slapping against the water. Bubbles erupted to the surface as it lost its struggle and sunk below the waves. Then the ocean was quiet and Kiichi was alone.

  He collapsed. His body was weak and soaked to the bone. He rolled over and threw up, his nerves beyond shot. With great effort, he managed to sit up. The monster’s wheelchair still sat on the raft. He snorted in disgust at it and pushed the contraption over the side into the water.

  Far off in the horizon, the first rays of the long-delayed dawn finally broke, the sky just beginning to turn the deepest shade of purple. When the first stabs of yellow pierced the sky, Kiichi began to laugh and cry.

  HHHHHOOOOONNNNNNKKKKK

  Kiichi turned around. Not more than a few hundred meters away was a small fishing ship. He waved at the vessel and lay back down in the raft.

  Now he was just laughing. He
survived. He would live to see another day.

  He felt so good that he didn’t even notice the bite wound on his ankle.

  Frosty the Snowman stepped onto the stage for the third time that night. With one icy hand he grabbed the stripper pole and swung his hips to Bing Crosby’s voice crooning over the club’s PA system.

  A gang of bikers crowded the club. Every seat was filled with tattooed, leather jacketed, pierced members of The Crack Pipe Kings Motorcycle Club. They had been here all night, just like last night and the night before.

  Frosty didn’t know why they were always there. He figured they liked the girls of the club and he was a snowman. But he seemed to be their favorite and they did tip very well.

  The stage lights illuminated his snow body and the crowd went wild. They cheered, clanked beers, and head butted each other in excitement.

  Frosty the snowman was a jolly happy soul.

  Blue sequin bikini briefs glittered in the spotlight on his pelvis. The light was hot and Frosty could feel his snow beginning to melt. Fortunately, his dances were only four minutes long.

  He began to dance around.

  That was his cue. He turned slowly, facing the audience, reached down sliding his finger under the special Velcro strap and quickly tore off the briefs revealing his smooth snowman physique. Frosty ground his hips against the pole and the audience roared.

  Karen, Jackie, Billy and June were building a magnificent snowman. He was almost as tall as the stop sign he was next to. They had given him two pieces of coal for eyes, a red button for a nose, and even a corncob pipe.

  The last touch was the black silk hat that Karen had found. It was hard to reach, but with help from Jackie and Billy, Karen got the hat on top of the snowman’s head.

  All four children stepped back to admire their creation—straight into the path of an oncoming snowplow. The driver wasn’t paying that close of attention, he was shitfaced. All four bodies were very small so there wasn’t even a thump as they got overtaken by snow and pushed by the plow. They were crushed into a large mound of ice and their bodies weren’t discovered for two weeks.

  It turns out there was a little magic in that old silk hat they found. The snowman they had built leapt to life and began to dance around.

  A bum walking by yelled “Yay! It’s Frosty!”

  Frosty waved back. “Good day, Sir.”

  He went walking down the street, as happy as could be. Everyone waved at him and shouted greetings as he strolled by.

  He came to an alleyway and there was a very skinny man wearing a very dirty trench coat leaning against the wall.

  “Good day, Sir,” said Frosty.

  The man, whose name was Alan, beamed the biggest smile he had in years. Instantly, he was transported back to those childhood Christmases and remembered how in-between his dad beating him and putting out cigarettes on his arms, he would escape into the magic of those television specials: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, A Garfield Christmas and his favorite, Frosty the Snowman.

  So Alan offered Frosty the one thing he had.

  “Hey Frosty, wanna do some ice?”

  Frosty assumed, since he was a snowman, that “ice” must be something good for him. He did not know what was being offered was methamphetamine.

  Frosty hit the pipe and the drug went straight to his head and heart. Euphoria overtook him, he loved it! As it turns out, snowmen are quite addition prone. Frosty was instantly addicted.

  Bing Crosby stopped singing and the PA began to blast The Beach Boys rendition of “Frosty the Snowman.” The sweet sixties pop had been specially remixed by the Club’s DJ to include a booty-shaking, boot-stomping bass line.

  The bikers cheered louder, this was their favorite song for Frosty to dance to and every set he did ended this way.

  A skinny and sickly looking biker climbed onto the stage and rushed at Frosty. His lust making him forget proper club decorum.

  From the shadows, two obese bouncers moved with surprising agility grabbing the biker. They lifted him up, one putting him in a headlock and the other grabbing his legs. They carried him off the stage and through a door. The stage invader would be found in the hospital the next morning. This was not the first time the club had aggressively enforced the no-touching rule. It was that kind of club.

  The rest of the gang paid him no mind, their beer-and-boner-goggles keeping them enraptured with Frosty and his stage show.

  So Frosty spent his days smoking and hanging in alleys with other bums and wastes of life, and it was a happy time. Each day blended into the next in his drug haze and Alan and Frosty became the best of friends.

  But one day the money ran out and Frosty and Alan found themselves with handguns holding up a liquor store. The store clerk had a shotgun. The first shot took Alan’s head clean off, splattering the snowman with blood and brains. But when the clerk turned the gun on Frosty, the buckshot passed through Frosty’s torso of snow with no ill effect.

  Frosty fired back and ran, leaving the clerk to bleed out. In a short time he was caught. The red stained snow made it an open and shut case.

  On his first day in federal prison, he was cornered by a group of Crips. They mistook the blood stains in his snow for Frosty reppin’ the wrong colors. They formed a circle around him and pushed him back and forth hurling insults. In the jostle his hat got knocked off and Frosty immediately turned back into a plain old snowman.

  When a guard finally put his hat back on, Frosty found himself covered in sticky, white goo. After a trip to the med ward and a few meetings with the prison counselor, Frosty understood what happened to him.

  That was how he learned to perform “snowjobs.”

  He used this peculiar talent to get through his time in prison. He was able to trade snowjobs for protection, smokes, and when the prison served ice cream, extra dessert. This gift to leave his body proved vital for the survival of a snowman who, for some unknown reason, aroused the lust of the biggest and meanest inmates.

  Frosty sat in his private freezer/dressing room. The club owner had been nice enough to build a special room for Frosty to refreeze his snow after every dance.

  Frosty took a drag from a cigarette and placed it into the ashtray on his dresser. He looked at his reflection in the mirror. The years had been hard on him; his once pure white snow was now an ugly grey.

  In front of the mirror was his only personal possession, the corncob pipe he came to life with. He thought of all he had been through and all he had smoked with that pipe; meth, crack, marijuana, and on the rare occasion, tobacco.

  There was a knock at the door and Cinnamon poked her head in.

  “You got a private customer in booth three,” she said and shut the door.

  Frosty sighed and took a hit of ice from his corncob pipe.

  He stood up and left the room. The private booths were just down the hall, each one labeled one through six. Frosty walked into number three.

  Eventually his sentence was up and Frosty’s debt to society was paid. But what was a living snowman with no job skills and a criminal record to do?

  He found that his snowjob skill from prison had use on the outside as well. In no time at all, Frosty was trading snowjobs for his precious ice.

  One day he was lying in an alley, the same alley where so many years ago he met Alan, stoned out of his head, when a fat greasy man walked by. The man stopped when he saw the snowman. This man owned Jezebel’s the city’s most notorious strip club.

  He had been looking for something new for the club, something to revive customer interest and looking at the down-on-his-luck snowman, he had an idea.

  The man helped Frosty to his feet.

  “Hey kid, I gotta business proposition for you.”

  The booth was small, barely enough room for the burly biker and the portly snowman. The walls were lined with mirrors and a single bare light bulb hung from the ceiling.

  Over the room’s private speakers, Alvin and the Chipmunks were singing.

  And the c
hildren say he could laugh and play just the same as you and me.

  That damn song. It didn’t matter what time of year or what month it was. His customers always requested the same song. Sometimes different artists—The Jackson 5, The Ronettes, Ella Fitzgerald, Cocteau Twins, Fiona Apple—but always the same damn song.

  Frosty wondered all the time about the song. Was there another snowman that came to life before him? Was that one lucky to lead a happy life? Or was it really about him? Everyone did call him “Frosty.”

  The biker stood up and approached Frosty. No matter how hard he tried, Frosty never got used to this. He felt the heat of the lightbulb above his head. A tear ran from his button eye but was indistinguishable from the just-beginning-to-form slush.

  The biker kissed Frosty softly on his lips of coal. Flecks of snow dotted his bushy beard. He gently removed Frosty’s hat and unbuckled his pants, preparing for his snowjob.

  BLACK SCREEN

  Male narrator with a deep voice: In the year 3012 mankind faced its most dire crisis. As the world’s population approached eighteen billion, the legalization and encouragement of cannibalism solved many concerns of food shortages and overpopulation. This created a booming demand for chefs of all kinds. There were so many people in the world and so much food that needed cooking.

  But then came the crash—there ended up being just too many chefs.

  Screen flashes images of bustling, packed cities from all over the world. The streets are filled with dirty and broken people wearing chef hats and aprons. The camera lingers on a man holding a cardboard sign that reads, “Will Sauté for Food.”

  Narrator: With so many people vying to cook, some method of selection had to be implemented. An arena was created for contestants to prove themselves worthy of serving the world. That battlefield is called . . .