Crash and Burn

It had taken me a good few weeks, but I was finally getting used to working at Potter’s Playground with Theresa, my boss, Sharon, and several other female workers who were employed at the small business.  The shop was quaint and bright and colorful, and was decently fun to work at.  Sharon usually scheduled Theresa and I during the same shifts, so I actually had become better friends with her through working as well.  She was a quirky girl, with interesting catch-phrases and taste in indie music, but we seemed to get along well enough.

            We had both been working the evening shift on a Wednesday night, and the shop was not very busy at all.  A few people had been in to paint, and a few more had stopped in momentarily to pick up their item s which had been glazed in the kiln.  Sharon was not around; she’d gone to deliver a few things to certain regular customers, and wouldn’t be back at all that night.  We were in charge to close shop at 9:00.

            Around 8:00 it started getting dark.

            “If you clean up the tables in the back, I’ll close up the register and put the paint away,” Theresa compromised after about an hour of absolute nothing besides the two of us painting sample dinner plates.

            I stared at the plate I managed to do a sloppy cheetah print design on. “Okay.  Deal.”

            The back windows were still cracked open in the back painting room, and a strange, chilly, yet laggard and forceful wind seemed to lull in through the windows.  I could see the tree branches moving fluidly to the rhythm of the ominous wind.  Shivers scampered down my spine in the always uncertainty of what lay concealed in the dark.

            Theresa had turned up the radio in the other room, so John Mayer was now blasting from the front room as I gathered up the messy paint brushes from all the back tables. 

            John was singing a whiny, high pitched note, when I realized it wasn’t him or the music at all.  It was something outside.  Something that sounded like an animal.

            I froze what I was doing, and I held the brushes tightly in my left hand, starring at the chalkboard in front of me, concentrating on the noise rather than the instructions written on pastels on the board.  I heard it again; a squealing, whimpering sound, and an uncertain scuttling around as though the animal was trying to escape the jaws of a predator.  There was an ugly snarling sound that came next, and the whimpering ceased.

            The hair on the back of my neck was at a complete standstill.  I noticed the trees moving in a jerky way that did not match the lazy lull of the wind pattern. 

            My attention was drastically turned in the other direction, as I heard a voice coming from the back room, and it sure didn’t sound like Theresa’s. 

            “Theresa…is Sharon back?”

            “Uh…no, she isn’t Soph,” Theresa said, turning down the music.

Gently setting the brushes back down on the table, I made my way towards the two windows along the right wall, and closed them quickly without much interest for what lay on the other side of them. Just as I was closing the final latch on the window closest to the pottery room, the lights went out.

            Theresa shrieked out from the entrance room, and I heard several paint trays hit the floor with a splat.

            “Soph! Was that you?”

            “No,” I shouted back, groping along the wall, afraid I was going to clear an entire shelf of pottery to the floor. “Do you know where the circuit breaker�"”

            There was a deafening crash coming from the next room over�"the back room where Sharon’s kiln’s and shelves of ready to go pottery were�"and the sprinkling sound of broken glass raining on the tiled floor.  My heart jumped, afraid at first it was I who knocked the pottery over.           

            “Who-Who’s there?” Theresa called out, her voice shaking fiercely, and then at a scratchy, lower tone, she added to me, “Sophia someone’s in here, oh my God…”

            Sight suddenly came back to me as the lights flickered back on, and I realized I was literally inches away from knocking the biggest vase in the shop off its shelf.  Quickly moving my hands away, Theresa came running into the pottery room where I stood, grabbing my arm in a vice-like grip.

            “What the hell was that!” She spat out, blue eyes wide in terror.

            “I-I don’t know,” I admitted, scanning the room nervously. “Did you see anyone over there when the lights came back on?”

            “No!”

The music never came back on.

My heart was pounding ferociously inside my chest…something was not right…not right at all.

We waited there like that for a few minutes, speechless.  There wasn’t a single sound in the entire shop for several moments, and then I heard a noise from the back, like something faintly hit one of the long, back windows behind the wall in the painting room.  Theresa’s grip tightened around my forearm.

Looking each other in the eye, we both nodded to continue into the next room while the lights were still on.  Still, there was nothing.

“Maybe it was just something in the kiln shattering?” Theresa suggested. “Sharon told me I had to turn them off before we left…there’s things just finishing in there now.”

For some reason, this idea was not sitting well with me.

“Yeah, maybe that was it…” I said anyways.

“I’m sure we’re fine, right?” Theresa tried convincing herself, letting go of my arm to nervously twist several of her violet strands of hair together.

“Mhm.” My heart was beating so fast within my chest, but I felt responsible for keeping my voice controlled and being the strong one in the situation.  I made a move to the other side of the painting table we were standing beside and nervously tried grabbing several of the bowls and sponges, but with my twittering hands, I knocked one off the table, and the water spilled to the floor.

“S**t,” I cursed, bending down recklessly to pick it up.   Something caught my eye from the vent on the wall beside me…I could see a pair of feet...coming from the washroom beside where Theresa and I were standing at the moment.

Breathing hard, I jumped backwards, stumbling to my feet.

“Theresa, we need to get�"”

The lights blacked out once more without any warning, and there was yet another shrill explosion of glass, this time coming from behind the wall in the back party room.  Even though it was dark as the night outside inside of the shop, I could still see a black figure coming rolling into the room, and before I could utter a single word, it wrecked directly into Theresa, taking her down effortless with a petrified scream.

Without even thinking, I darted around the table and raced into the next room.  Before I even had the chance to finish the thought in mind, the heavy vase I nearly knocked over early soared forcefully off its place on the shelf, crashing fiercely on top of the predator attacking Theresa.

The attacker shrieked out in agonizing high pitched decibels, as I grabbed Theresa around her arm and yanked her quickly to her feet, just as the washroom door to the right of me burst open, and another figure jumped out, hissing menacingly, ready to charge.  I regretted the decision as soon as I considered it, and as Theresa screeched in my ear, I concentrated on the entire shelf complex in front of me, which came crashing down on top of the monster before us.

The front door burst open, just as three more figures and two wolves raged inside, teeth barred hungrily.

“Move!” I shouted to Theresa, pulling her with all my strength into the entrance room as one of the creatures behind me lunged  onto the tallest figure in front of me, latching around him and bringing him down.  Theresa yelped out again as we ducked, under the collision, and together, we flung ourselves behind the long front counter, crawling under the register against the wall.

“Stay here!” I ordered, realizing my arm was bleeding terribly, and Theresa was a bloody mess as well.  I looked over the counter and saw none other than my own Owen leg press the vampire attacking him, sending him flying through the large doorway, wrecking airborne against the tall shelf of mugs and glasses in the next room, as Owen expertly jumped from flat on his back to his feet in seconds, charging yet again.

“What the hell�"is�"happening!” Theresa demanded, sobs cutting through her words as she reached up for me from under the counter.

“I don’t know,” I lied desperately, over top of a wolf whimpering and the sound of an entire row of pottery wiping out onto the floor in obliteration. “Please stay here; I’ll be right back, promise.”

The look on her face was utter terror, as she fell backwards against the wall, bringing a shaking hand to her bleeding wounds.  Regretfully, I spun back around and tried to make out the scene unfolding.

There were two wolves and three men fighting against two vampires; I realized that much.  Owen was in the pottery room wrestling with a long haired bloodthief alongside a wolf I did not recognize, while the red wolf Isaac was fighting beside Blaise and another male I did not recognize either against the other male vampire.

Stepping out from around the counter, I realized I had made an immediate mistake.  Because of my wounds, both of the vampires in the other room flashed their eyes which fevered red for my blood, and they began thrashing about uncontrollably, breaking the restraint the wolves had them pinned down with.

I made my move.

Racing through the hallway to my left, I charged towards the larger party room, thinking I would duck under a table for concealment, where I could wipe up my wounds on my arm.

“NO!” I heard Owen’s voice bellow, just as a pair of ice-cold arms latched around me, bringing me down to the chilly tiled floor with a hiss as sharp as his daggers at my ear.

I screamed just before I imagined those fangs would make contact with my exposed throat.

            However…they never did, and I heard the snarling of a wolf as Isaac latched onto the vampires leg, dragging it backwards across the tiles.  I could hear its decrepit nails digging into the floor, screeching unpleasantly as Isaac dragged him backwards.

            I turned over onto my back just in time to see Owen charging with a support beam from one of the broken shelves, giving a good, hard, full force swing at the bloodthief’s head, slamming it against the glass door we were sitting in front of.  Flinching, I tried crawling away, but it felt like some bones were either sprained or broken. 

            The next thing I knew, Blaise had scooped me up in his arms, and ran into the pitch dark party room, ducking me under the big oval table and protectively standing in front of it.

            The long, greasy haired bloodthief Owen and Isaac were attacking was rather relentless, however.  Trying to get to his feet and make yet another vigorous lunge towards me, Blaise picked up a chair and beat him across the face with it, breaking the chair legs off.  The vampire bounced back fast, and was at Blaise’s throat in a second, slamming him against the wall that separated the party room from the kiln area.

            I could hear Blaise’s skull make contact with the drywall, and the sound of the pottery inside the kiln shifted around angrily.

            Which gave me an idea…

            “The kiln!” I shouted as Blaise took one more blow to the face before Owen ripped the bloodthief away from him and Isaac gnawed on his leg again, attempting to cripple him.

            “What?” Owen shrieked, panting heavily as he attempted to pin him on the ground.

            “The kiln! Behind this wall�"it’s like 800 degrees�"” I didn’t need to say anymore, without another word Blaise, Owen, and Isaac struggled to drag the writhing vampire into the room, and the next sound I heard was an ear shattering wail and high-pitched screech, followed by a sickening sizzling as the paper thin flesh fried and boiled.

            “Tyrus!” The other vampire suddenly shrieked out for the first time, followed by a string of words in Latin, and came charging by.  But he did not seem intimidating in the slightest, on the contrary he sounded terrified.  And as he dashed by, flying through the back window which was already open, I noticed he was missing a right hand, the murky black substance leaking from the gaping wound.  Before long, the shrieking stopped and the second vampire managed to escape the kiln, the smell of burning death lingering in the room now, and fled through the broken window as well, disappearing off into the blackness of the night.

            There was silence besides the heavy panting and gasps coming from the werewolves all around me.  And then I heard the heavy, hysterical sobs coming from the other room.

            “Theresa,” I gasped under my breath, somehow managing to bring myself to my shaking legs from under the table and making my way through the hallway to her.  She was standing amongst the wreckage of the broken shelves and pottery, our blood, their black carnage, and shattered glass.  She was crying in a way that expressed her confusion and her body was pulsing violently.

            The other’s had followed me into the room, I could hear them stepping on the broken pieces of ceramics all around us.   The other male werewolf I did not recognize in man form came over and took Theresa by the wrist, and dragged her towards the love seat sitting in the entrance way and sat her down, trying to calm her.  She was babbling through her sobs and hyperventilating at the same time, so I couldn’t really make out what she was saying.

            I looked up at Owen and Blaise, whose bloody nose had already dried and was caked all around his face, and the two shared the same drained looks.  Isaac and the other wolf had transformed back as well, and were standing there in jeans and no shirts.

            “Wha-what happened?” I blanked, feeling the room shaking all around me.  And then realizing it wasn’t the room, it was just me.  Owen rushed forward and grabbed me with one arm, setting me down on the wooden chair next to the paint shelf, which luckily was one of the only things that didn’t manage to get broken.  In horror, I looked back up at his beautiful face, glowing in the moonlight streaming in the shop. “I’m going to be fired!”

            “Don’t be dramatic!” Owen scoffed with a sarcastic laugh. “This was not your fault, you did everything you could to stop the intruders…robbers…I think you deserve a promotion, is what you deserve.”

            Somehow, starring around the once perfect, adorable little shop, I begged to differ with him.  Because in a way, I felt very responsible indeed for this disaster.

            “How bad is she injured?” Blaise asked on behalf of Thersesa, who was still convulsing uncontrollably on the couch, saying my name again and again in horror.

            “Eh…She’s just cut up really…nothing too bad,” The male sitting next to her assessed the damage. “Lucky enough for her she didn’t get bit anywhere that it looks like.”

            “Good,” Owen said while gently caressing my shoulder.  I felt as though my entire body could have been healed from that single touch. “Trent, call the police and tell them what’s happened.  Make it sound as though it were any other burglary…let them know they got away.”

            “Got it covered, chief,” The tall boy next to Isaac said, stepping around the counter for the phone.

            “Everyone else…we just have to wait here until the police come,” Owen ordered authoritatively. “It’s the most responsible way to handle the situation.”          

            No one dared disagreed.

            “How did you know this time?” I spoke quietly as I looked up at him through my eye lashes.  He kneeled down to my level, and despite the heroic fight he had just endured, he still smelled delightfully like subtle, manly spices.

            “Trent, the one on the phone, is your official watch dog for when you’re working here,” he said quietly too, so that Theresa would not over hear anything. “He was circling the place when he picked up on a suspicious scent, and knew they were closing, so he went ahead and let us know.”

            “Well, tell him thank you then,” I said, looking down at my arm, which was still bleeding pretty good through my blue plaid flannel shirt, from wounds I did not know how I received. “What a nice man.  Wolf. Wolfman.”

            Owen starred at me blankly for a minute.

“You’re delirious,” was all he came up with. “We need to get you girls patched up.  Pronto.”

A part of me knew he was probably right.  Owen was always right.