Psycher Chronicles

Chapter 75

Vehicle Versus Alpha

(Amoni Jacobs)

Amoni was pretty sure she was being messed with.

Her car suddenly working by putting her feet on the brake and accelerator at the same time. Then placing the phone on the dashboard, while keeping the line open with Misha.

But despite how absurd the whole process seemed, Amoni couldn’t deny that it was working.

Vrroom.

The car moved smoothly, though Amoni knew this was due to her connection to Misha.

There was a time when they went through a dead zone, where Amoni thought she lost connection to Misha. During that time, the car which had been running perfectly to that point began to sputter and cough wildly. The whole steering column went wild and she had to fight to keep her vehicle on the road. Fortunately, she was able to keep the car going relatively straight, which helped her get out of the dead zone.

That time more than any, let Amoni know that either Misha was just the luckiest person alive. Or Misha was somehow able to control machines.

It had been joked about, speculated even.

“The girl was a machine, both on and off the court, why can’t she be the queen of machines as well.” That was the running gag, but right now Amoni couldn’t refute the claim too much, as right now every instinct in her mind told her that losing Misha would mean she would be stuck out here.

Finally, after a while of just driving, where the fear in her mind began to subside due to how close they finally were to town, Amoni let out a sigh and thought she would thank the girl.

“I, I think I owe you an apology.” Amoni began, but whatever she had been expecting from Misha was abruptly changed by Misha.

“Actually, before this goes any further, I am going to need you to speed up a little bit,” Misha noted, her voice calm, but with a slight hint of panic that sent shivers of fear down Amoni’s spine.

VRRROOOOMMMM!

“What?” Was all Amoni could get out, before the car started picking up speed and barreling down the pothole filled road she was on.

Thump-tha-dump.

Then just as she began speeding up, a large figure jumped out of the cornfields nearby and tried to land on her car. In fact, even with the sudden increase in speed, the creature would have managed to land on the vehicle, had the car not forcefully swerved to the left by two feet. After which, the car seemed to correct itself and move back to the right, just in time to avoid a rather odd assortment of potholes.

So focused was she on the car seeming to steer itself, that it took her mind a half second to look back in her rearview mirror to see what she had apparently swerved out of the way to avoid.

There staring back at her were the glowing red and yellow eyes of a predator.

Instantly Amoni knew what the solid form was that had just appeared, as fear gripped her mind and body.

She felt fear as she had never seen any beast with glowing red eyes like that, but she knew what it meant. The glowing red eyes and feral appearance of the creature meant a fractured fratricide had occurred. Myths and legends of such events had been spoken about such events in the past.

This was why getting willing pack members was stressed above everything else.

For a fractured fratricide occurred when the converted member of a pack went mad during the transformation process and rather than being subdued by the pack alpha that converted them, they instead went wild with rage and began killing everyone and everything around them.

Seeing the crazed wolf, Amoni knew that she as a fellow lupine would not be accepted, as she would likely be seen of as a threat to the deranged monster.

Fortunately, Misha was still there with her, on the phone.

“Okay, we are going to take you the back way around town to our shop,” Misha stated, her voice as calm and cold as ever.

“Wait, you can’t there is a monster chasing me,” Amoni began.

“I know, that is why we are going the backway, plenty of straightaways and open fields to really get some distance,” Misha noted.

Vrr-ooom.

Once again the vehicle responded as if it was not under her control, as the vehicle began to speed up.

Wobble.

As the vehicle sped up, Amoni felt it begin to wobble in a way that would normally be concerning, but quickly evened out and began rolling smoother than ever.

For a moment Amoni felt that she could do this, that she could get away from the crazed beast pack killer.

Of course, that moment of relief only lasted a second, before her mind inadvertently looking down and saw the other ire of her concern.

“Misha, I’m running out of gas,” Amoni confessed, her voice low as if she expected Misha to yell at her for being so negligent.

“I know, there’s nothing we can do about that at the moment, but you will get here and you will be safe when you do.” Misha stated, her voice calm and collected.

Exhale.

Hearing her calm tone, Amoni could only breathe in relief that she had such a great friend.

The entire thing seemed to be a vision from a dream, or maybe a never-ending nightmare. The only thing that let her know that she was alive and awake were the cold tears that gently began forming in her eyes and rolling down her cheeks. Tears that spoke of fear, anger, and hope.

Amoni realized that she never cried in her dreams, and perhaps that was the best litmus test going forward, pain, grief, joy, happiness, all of those emotions could be faked during a dream, for they were all easy to relate to. But tears, true eye watering tears, those were enough to break the delicate tapestry of dreams, as they all but changed the consistency of how resting eyes interacted with the world. By her crying now, she truly felt that she was both awake, and furthermore as long as she had Misha she had hope.

“I, I just wanted to say thank you.” Amoni began, once she gained some composure over her body.

“Shh, none of that now. For now, I need you to focus and realize we are going to take this right turn sharply here, hang on.” Misha stated.

Then before Amoni had a chance to comprehend what was being said, and what the words actually meant, her car began turning hard to the right. The steering wheel turning on its own, as Amoni could all but feel the pedals shifting and thrusting in breaking and speeding bursts.

Click.

Even the emergency break popped itself up, for a moment, before dropping back down once the hardest part of the immediate turn was complete.

For a moment, it felt like a professional racecar driver was here with her, sitting in the seat and guiding the car wildly.

Swoosh.

Amoni for her part was not actionless. With the wheel spinning violently Amoni first reached up to grab the Jesus handle with her free left hand. Then when the car began to spin about wildly, causing the phone to slide about, Amoni instead decided to reach out for that as well. That was why with one arm on the Jesus handle and one arm reaching out for the sliding phone, Amoni missed the fact that the car began to straighten out and begin only slightly drifting to the right, as it continued to make the slightly meandering turn towards Phil’s Rustbucket Garage.

Ding-ding-ding.

Just as Amoni thought she was almost done, the emergency fuel light came on in what had to be its lava hot orange color. A color that all but seemed to burn into the darkness of night.

Seeing the light, Amoni could only cringe internally, for that meant she had roughly twenty miles, but that was under optimal conditions.

Meanwhile, what she, or rather what her vehicle was being forced to do at the moment was anything but optimal, as she was clearly speeding up.

For a moment Amoni hoped that no cops were out. While they almost never came out here to the boonies, one could never bee too careful.

Though Amoni felt that her excuse for speeding today was a bit better than her normal ones. The whole, my car was possessed by the spirit of a formula one racer, while being chased by a fractured fratricidal werewolf was a good enough excuse to speed. However, even she realized that no one would likely believe her.

Still, for the moment, she had a chance.

And that was more than she could hope for at the moment.

Holding her phone in her right hand, and the Jesus handle in her left, Amoni felt odd. It took her a moment to figure out why exactly something felt off.

Only after a few seconds did she realize that the reason she felt so out of place was the fact that she had neither foot on the pedals, nor was she touching the steering wheel, but the car was driving safer, and more smoothly than she could ever do on her own.

Once she realized how much faith she was putting into the ghost driver of her car, and most importantly into Misha who seemed to be directing the ghost driver, Amoni realized she needed to make one confession before she died.

“Hey, I need to tell you something…”

***

(Ursala Jarnic AKA Ms. Clayton)

Rage.

Anger filled every fiber of her being. Ursala was so angry that her life had turned to this, that she had been forced to forever give up on being who she was. That her life and career as a Psycher was over. That even now she could feel her mind, the bastion of safety afforded to all Psychers was slowly being eroded away, and left with nothing more than a pale memory of who she was.

She hated them, everyone of them for turning her into this. For making it so it wasn’t enough to just be killed, but for her to be changed and humiliated in such a way.

That was why she made it her last mission, that so long as this body of hers existed, she would spend every waking moment hunting down every werewolf that she came across.

Relentless.

She was relentless in her pursuit, they ran fast, she would run faster. They got away, she would track them down and find them when they rested.

There was nothing that could keep an operative like Ursala down for too long, and she knew it. She demanded that of herself, which was why even now she continued to chase.

Vrr-errrt.

The vehicle she was chasing suddenly stopped and pulled off a nearly impossible turn. All while somehow gaining speed and traction on the roadways.

The car turned right, and then began veering further right.

While Ursala clearly lost sight of the vehicle, her other senses told her where the vehicle was, and better still, her other senses told her that by cutting through the forest, she could make up much needed ground.

That was how Ursala found herself running through a densely packed forest. Then before she could have a misstep and fall into a drainage ditch that would severely delay her, her newly heightened senses and reflexes told her when and where to jump. Most importantly, her instincts all told her how far to jump as well, letting her easily jump over a ditch that would have cost her valuable seconds to climb out of, if her mind could remember to climb that is.

Fortunately, the fear of falling and the ditch were short lived, as she easily made the jump and with a few more paces she was back to her full speed. Then a few more paces found her back on the road, where the scent trail for her next target was the thickest.

Ahh.

Once she felt the scent of her prey fill her nostrils once again, Ursala felt relief fill her mind as a feral smile filled her lips. She was back, and better still, once again she could see the vehicle that her chosen target was leaving in.

If Ursala had any luck at all, the creature would be taking her directly to more pack members. Pack members were delicious, for they offered powers that any normal Psycher would hesitate to grab onto. Unfortunately for Ursala, she was all but forced to take the forbidden powers, but they worked wonders on her body and mind, letting her push both to new limits that she had never experienced before.

Gurgle.

Even now, with the flesh of her captors and former tormentors on her lips, Ursala still felt hungry. This was the disadvantage of having such a powerful body that was able to overcome so many of the body’s normal limitations, was that it required a lot of food. Particularly, when you pushed the body to its fullest.

Still this was nothing for Ursala, she would live for the hunt, just as she would die for the hunt. If she happened to die now, then that was a worthy death in her eyes. At least that was what the last part of her Psycher mentality told her, as she continued to push her newly adapted body to its limits and beyond.

Crunch-rumble-rumble.

The speeding car quickly turned off and began going up a gravel road.

Hearing the sound of her prey finally slowing down, Ursala smiled as she realized she had cornered her prey, and all that was now required of her was to stalk, and wait for the chance to make her kill.

Sniff, sniff.

Better still, the scents on the air told her that the girl was not alone here, as there were other snacks available to eat as well.

Laughter.

Realizing that these people, didn’t know what was awaiting them what was now stalking them, Ursala snarled evily to herself as she began to slowly stalk her way forward.