Choosing The Right Path, Tag: Heather Edwards!

Pete strolled through the woods, trying to remember whether it was the left or right path that’d lead him back to civilisation. Crap. He didn’t fancy farting around the whole morning in these stupid backwards fucking scrubs, but it beat trying to blend in with others on the bus or in the street.

He’d already made the idiotic mistake of using the former yesterday, the mugginess and closed in space exacerbating his rotten meat stink. Shit loads of people had given him aghast, revolted and even offended looks. Christ Almighty. He’d longed to kick the flaming piss out of them.

The journalist subconsciously straightened the collar of his black leather jacket, his scarf covering most of his grisly wound, superglued there by exposed tissue and gunk. He was unable to hide the raw nicks and scratches scarring his cheek, which didn’t seem likely to heal. At least none of them caused him any pain.

Shit. What was wrong with him?

He had a small inkling, but that was just- No. That was crazy.

Pete decided to gamble and stride down the right path, flimsy brambles raking across his white trousers and leaving yellow-green stains. Brilliant. They were already flaked in his browning blood. He fidgeted with the strap of his camera, still indecisive about his next course of action. Should he hurry to accident and emergency? Track down that manipulative vampire and demand what he’d done to him?

... Go back to work?

It was morning again, and Heather had reverted to her normal human form. Lying naked in the middle of the clearing, covered in blood and entrails of some poor dead creature she’d probably killed the last night, she groggily pulled herself back up to her feet. Heather looked down at herself, attempting to get at least most of the foreign material off of her skin. After a few minutes of this, she sighed in frustration, and swore to herself she’d eat a big meal before her next change. Maybe then the wolf wouldn’t get hungry, and she could avoid this tedious process the next time.

After a search, Heather had managed to find the clothes she had stashed the previous afternoon. She pulled them on as she jogged, eager to get out of the trees and back to her shower. Work was in a few hours, and she most certainly was not heading to her shift like this. Pulling on her jacket, Heather stepped onto the path from a much smaller trail she’d been traveling on that led back into the forest. Beginning to trek back to her apartment, she noticed another presence near her.

Stopping in her tracks, she looked up to the man several feet away. She wouldn’t have been so alarmed if he was just a normal man, but he had a wound on the side of his face and was covered in blood. Several possibilities ran through her head over what this could be - maybe he was attacked. By another person, or an animal. Was it her? No, it didn’t look like claw marks. At least he wouldn’t end up like a wolf. But, wait a minute, shouldn’t he be in pain from the injury? He looked relatively calm, if not a bit angry. Shouldn’t he be bandaged? Calling for help? Strolling along in a forested pathway was very peculiar behavior with it wide open.

While she was wondering all this, she stood very still, and very silently. Noticing she hadn’t said a word yet, she attempted to try her best to appear casual. Like he didn’t look like he was rotting away and like she hadn’t came out of nowhere covered in blood and dirt. She very awkwardly said with a bit of a wave, “Um.. good morning.”

Pete froze at the sight of a woman, covered in bits of mud, leaf and maybe even blood. What the fuck? Don’t say she was a pissing vampire on the prowl. He wasn’t prepared to deal with any of them at the moment.

He ignored her feeble greeting, which was surely a ploy to disarm him. Sneaky bitch. The journalist raised his camera to eye level and snapped her photo, the sharp, biting flash like a streak of lightning brightening the dull woods. He gave her an acrimonious scowl, before consulting the screen, double taking as it actually contained an image of the lady. How could he have been fucking wrong?

“You must’ve had some night on the tiles,” he remarked icily. She was lucky that a vampire hadn’t taken advantage of her and ripped out her throat. Luck only lasted so long. “Try not to get as hammered on your next pub crawl, otherwise you might suffer from worse than a hangover the next morning. Rapists and murderers aren’t a patch on what’s really lurking in the shadows.”

That probably sounded like meddling, clichéd bollocks to the kid, but he didn’t give a shit as he’d passed on his warning. He wasn’t to blame now should she fail to heed his advice and the vampires drain her of blood.

PTJ thought about clearing off before she got wind of the rancid stench, but he was beginning to doubt his navigation skills again. He didn’t recognise this rough, spongy track, weaving in and out of overgrown shrubs, towering trees and clusters of white mushrooms. God forbid he might have to request her help.

Heather blinked rapidly, trying to get the flash spot out of her eyes. This began to put her in a bit of a sour mood, clouding her initial curiosity of the wounded man. Meet a stranger in the middle of the forest, and they take a picture of you? Yeah, because that’s not odd behavior at all. Secondly, it was in the middle of the day, why would he need flash? It wasn’t that dark in the forest - but, maybe her senses were still heightened from last night’s adventures. But, maybe he was just trying to be as big of a prick as he could manage.

“I’m aware of that,” She said, her eyes narrowed. Although she was a werewolf, she was a naïve one, really only partly aware of what supernatural creatures lurked around in the darkness - but that didn’t mean she was going to stand there willingly and let him talk down to her like a child. Heather got enough disrespect from men. She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms like an annoyed teen. “I can take care of myself without your input, thanks ever so much.”

With another glance at the stranger‘s face, she caught wind of the smell of rotting flesh. She resisted the urge to make a face, looking away before she started to gag. Fresh meat caught her attention like waving a chocolate bar in front of a five year old, but this was different. He smelled… dead. Like a corpse. Like one of the carcasses she would’ve killed in the woods in the morning. In fact, he reeked of death. It piqued her interest again slightly, even if she was thoroughly grossed out. He was still a prick though, no matter how dead he smelled.

“Uh… not trying to be rude - not to mean that I should be apologizing to you - but are even you sure you should be talking? What with your cheek hanging off and blood oozing through your clothes, I mean,” Heather rose a brow inquisitively.

Was she really aware of the dangers lurking in the shadows? He let out a sceptical, bitter little laugh. She didn’t know. Nobody knew. It was his responsibility to let the world know about this fucking threat.

“I must have a high pain threshold,” he shrugged indifferently. Or no pain threshold. Did his cheek look that bad? Pete resisted the urge to touch the discoloured flesh, in case it broke off in his hand. He felt as though his willpower was the only thing keeping his body in one half-decent chunk. “You’ll probably think I’m nutty, but a vampire caused these wounds. I was trying to expose him, so we’d have a lot less missing person cases and deaths.”

He frowned and outstretched his arms, creases forming in his leather jacket. “He escaped and I woke up in a fucking mortuary. I frightened the piss out of some bloke and bird. It kind of put me off popping in Accident and Emergency.”

They might’ve panicked and contacted an X-Files-esque organisation to haul PTJ off to some top secret building, where they’d poke and prod him. Too farfetched? He didn’t give a toss about his future or degenerating health, too hellbent on revenge and saving humanity from the murderous bastards. That wasn’t too difficult a mission...

Fuck. This young bird would never fucking believe him. Muttering and swearing, he stormed off into the woods.

The End!