The Corrupted Soul

Chapter 12

A loud thud jolted me out of my zoned out state, and I pressed my back against the wall out of reflex. What the hell?!

It had been several hours since I entered the semi, in fact, I had now been out here for over twenty four hours, including my time at Riverview. I was unable to sleep after quite a while of trying, so I decided to simply stare at the wall to pass the time, I was unaware how long I had been doing so, and equally unaware of what that sound had been. The door at the end of the trailer rattled followed by another loud bang that seemed to cause the very air to vibrate. Something was trying to break in.

I doubted it was a human, judging by just how far out in the woods we were currently, and the fact that this could very well be a Crawler infested forest. That being said, I doubted it was a Crawler as the sun still refused to yield. That left two options in this part of the country.

Loud scratching came from the outside of the metal doors. Cougar. I shuffled back and held myself against the very back corner of the cramped space, I was not about to win a fight with a big cat in this tiny space, especially when the moment those doors were opened, I would be blinded from all angles by the reflective metal walls.

Once I had fought a cougar in the past two years, and that was the first time I had ever lost a human limb. The thing tore my arm off at the elbow way too easily, and I struggled to keep it from mauling my face more than it already had. I rathered to not contemplate what would have happened if that group of game hunters hadn't been in the area at the right time and shot the beast.

Another set of scratches made my skin crawl, and I snarled in hopes of deterring the overgrown cat. My efforts were in vain, as it only seemed to make it more determined to break in and find whatever creature had dared make such a sound at it.

I was halfway tempted to slam against the door myself to scare it off, when it sounded as if something else did it for me. Loud snarling and yowling echoed through the trailer in a very unpleasant fashion. Had another cougar showed up? Maybe a pack of very daring coyotes? It didn't sound like a fight with the small canines, but anything was possible.

The sounds of a fight were gradually getting farther and farther away, and I was too curious. It was better if I knew of any kind of big predator that may try to attack me in the area, though it sounded just like another cougar. Maybe another of those mutant wolf creatures are around...

As far as I was aware, the creature that attacked Olive two years ago was some sort of bizarre science experiment that they had been trying to find. Apparently, they were quite enraged I had killed it, but nothing ever became of the situation considering it had attempted to kill three children, and they had no leg to stand on.

I seriously doubted it was somehow another creature from the CRISPR lab, as far as I was aware, that place had been shut down months after Olive was attacked. If there was somehow another mutant in these woods, we would have known about it long before it left the city, let alone gotten this far out.

I slowly and cautiously crept towards the door and very slowly pulled the branch securing it down, and squinted against the blinding sunlight. It was almost as if it was trying to find me. I peered through the small gap, only to jump back with a sharp gasp. My hands frantically came to cover my mouth, hoping what I had seen hadn't heard me.

In my haste to cover my mouth, I forgot what I had been holding onto. The door freely swung down with a loud metallic screech and grinding as rusted components acted as sandpaper for one another. The radiant light shot directly into my eyes from the reflection, and I snarled in reflex and pain as I jumped backwards, my back slammed hard into the metal wall, at the same time as the door made a loud clang against something now laying beneath it on the ground.

Could I have possibly been louder?!

I had seen a disturbing amount of blood out there, and I knew the only thing that was going to deal with that cougar was going to be scavengers. It was a very minute detail, and hardly a victory on my part, as I now had to deal with something much worse than the big cat, though I was not frozen in place like the other times. I knew exactly why too, as now I felt only unbridled rage towards this beast of a Crawler.

Just outside the entrance, I saw furred Crawler legs swiftly approaching through the glare, it seemed he had abandoned his kill to go after me instead. How thoughtful of him.

I snarled in fury, and he would know, even a human would never mistake that for communication, it was painfully obvious that snarl meant nothing more than to show I was not taking any flack. I really wanted to know why and how he was here in the middle of the day and taking out cougars. Though, to be fair, he was much more physically equipped to deal with them than I was.

He crouched down on all fours and looked through the narrow gap that he could see into the trailer, without moving the bushes and ivy near the door. That in itself was odd, it was as if he was trying not to rustle the leaves and make noise. I recoiled in shock when his face came into view, and amazingly, so did he.

He was wearing sunglasses.