Blood

5. Some Sort of Freak?

"God damn it, Falcon! What the hell was that!"

"I think I'm some sort of freak," I said, brushing some rusty bolts off a stool so I could sit down. I didn't feel so good. I was shaking.

"Did your uncle just threaten my life?!"

"Afraid so."

"And what's with the eye thing!? Are you both turning into zombies?"

"Vampires, I think."

"I'm serious! Did you see yourself?"

"How would I do that?"

"Not to mention that you cut a hole in my wall and almost got me killed by wolves..."

"Uh, I think it's the U.S. Government's wall. And you were doing fairly well at putting your life at risk before I even got here. Were you actually planning to ride that crazy chair over the wall?"

"You better try to calm down, Falc," he said, looking worried. "Your eyes are starting to do that thing again. Check it out." He pointed to a cracked mirror in the corner and I hurried over to it.

Shit! He was right. My eyes have been brown all my life and pretty normal looking. Now the irises were almost as large as my entire visible eye, like a cat or dog or some wild animal. The outer ring was pale golden brown. The inner ring? A mix of earthy brown and flecks of bright gold. I mean really bright, as in glowing. "What the...?"

"You're freaking me out," Hedges said. "But not as bad as your uncle. Is he gone or do you think he's lurking outside?"

"He's gone, but the wolf pack's still out there somewhere. I can smell them."

"Smell?" He came over and stared at me. "What's happening to you?"

I blinked. Hard. Repeatedly. My eyes slowly faded and shrank back to normal and the pungent scents flooding me faded into the distance. I felt weak. I stumbled back to the stool. "That's the question I came to ask you," I said. "There's something in my mom's bloodline, at least if Uncle Weirdo is to be believed."

"Is your mother, uh, like this?"
"No. Boringly normal. Still, I think she knows something."
"You should talk to her," he said.
"She doesn't talk. To me. She mostly talks to clients on her phone." "Find out what she knows," he said. "And I'll look into your uncle." "You will? How?"

"He pointed at his homemade and very powerful desktop computer. "In case you weren't paying attention, I ran my own fiber optic cable to the main one under the sidewalk. I've got super high speed access and I'm really good at online detection."

"Of course you are," I said. "I'll send you a snap of the family photo my mom has of him."