Jack's Back ((Ascension: Book 2)) (17 page)

The End

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Excerpt from Meat by Adam Moon:

2/9/2064
 

Here’s a thing you might not know about the end of the world: It already happened.

Shit, some people didn’t even know it at the time. Those lucky fuckers half a century ago heard rumors and innuendo and they shrugged it off because they were a bunch of pansies living the good life. How could their world go to hell when they had it under such iron fisted control? They were insulated from danger, or so they thought.

But who could blame them for doubting? The rumors were ridiculous, even silly to those not personally attacked those first few nights. Even the infected couldn’t quite relay just what had happened to them in any way that made sense. By the time entire cities were decimated by the scourge it was too late.

Humanity didn’t quite die off but it was limping from the wounds. Were the wounds fatal? We’ve yet to find that out.

They had different names for them back then, but the PC cops got involved after everything was under control, and they forbade certain names. Well, they’re not exactly forbidden, but you know, the way saying faggot is sort of forbidden, like that. In the beginning they called them beasts, monsters, or werewolves.

We call them Bentos nowadays. It has something to do with some type of Portuguese myth about first born sons and the curse of the werewolf, I forget. But when the coast is clear and no Bentos are within earshot you can bet your ass we’re using the W-word, in whispered tones of course; no one wants labeled a bigot.

Anyway, the very beginning of the outbreak was the worst. Within five weeks America’s population had dwindled by about twenty percent and by the time serious regulations took effect like mandatory lock downs and werewolf registration, a third of the country was gone, digested and pooped out. Of the two thirds left, half were already turned.

And
America got lucky. We had money and a fuckin’ bad-ass military. We could handle this shit. Africa’s a wasteland now, as is most of Asia. South America took a big hit until we provided aide. All told, the planet is now home to just under a billion people. Those old Clinton era tree huggers would’ve probably got a collective boner if they knew the human population that was supposed to keep on growing to the point of collapse would actually decline so abruptly. Their eventual champions: werewolves.

Anyway, I should start off by saying that this is a memoir of sorts. My grandfather wrote one and when I read it, it changed my life, so hopefully mine will do the same for one of my descendants one day (adoptive because I can’t have kids) or even for a complete stranger interested in unadulterated truth. His memoir chronicled events without sugar coating them. What a relief this was to me. My school history books didn’t hold a candle to his simple diary. His memoir is the reason I became a cop.

2/10/64 

I’m not sure at what point I should stop writing this, maybe when I run out of interesting stuff to say, maybe when a Bento finally runs me to ground.

Let me start by introducing myself, I’m Jack Thomson and I’m thirty three years old. I’m an old man by our standards but I feel like I’m still nineteen most days. I’m a police officer but no run of the mill cop; you know, one of those fat gassy idiots who write down statements in a little notebook long after the body’s already cold. Man, fuck those useless bureaucrats. Nope, I’m on a very exclusive task force. I answer to one man, his name’s Carlos and he’s also one of my only real friends.

It’s always a good idea to befriend your boss: Just a little grandfatherly advice.

I have a partner who’s a little nuts but he also might just be a genius, the jury’s still out on that. His name’s Carlos too but for the sake of readability I’m going to refer to him as Olaf from here on out. Olaf’s the only person I trust with my life but that’s mostly just because he’s saved me from imminent death so many times. I’ve kept him from becoming dog food plenty too, so don’t go thinking I’m some damsel in distress.

For the sake of making this a good story I shall now describe Olaf to you. He has black hair. He’s as tall as me; that’s a tad over six foot. When I told him I was writing this he wanted me to make sure I added that he has a huge dick, but alas I can’t as I’ve showered with the man and it’s definitely much smaller than mine. He’s lean and fit and I’m pretty sure he shaves his whole body, eyebrows too. I don’t know why he does this and I’ll never ask. He’s a couple years younger than me; he’s a Scorpio and likes long walks on the beach.

In all truth though, the man’s a fucking killing machine when the situation presents itself and it all too often does in our line of work.

Ok, now instead of describing myself, because I’ll probably lie and tell you I’m the most devastatingly handsome man the world has ever produced, I’m going to let Olaf do it for me…and you better not fuck around Olaf.

This is how I, Olaf Rodriguez describe my partner Jack Thomson
: My dick is not small. It’s at least average, if not above average. It’s thick too, like a can of shaving cream. Speaking of which, I shave my body because your wife likes me like that. Fuck you Jack.

Sorry about that. He’s an idiot. It’s extremely small. I guess I’ll try to be as humble as possible trying to describe myself. You already know my name and age and height so here’s the rest:

I have dark brown hair.

2/10/64
 

This diary might serve to cleanse my soul the way that alcohol and drugs haven’t. They’ve helped of course but never in any way that makes the nightmares go away completely. Maybe I can jot events down here so I don’t have to remember them. It’s worth a shot. Plus, my shrink will piss her pants when I tell her about it. She thinks I hold too much in.

You see, what I do is dangerous. It still baffles me that the task force I’m on is sanctioned by the government. There are four of us on this task force, five if you include our handler, Carlos. It’s our job to stop Bento hunters.

There are crazy fools who venture out at night and risk their lives to kill werewolves and it’s my job to make sure they don’t get away with it. Does this sound uncle Tom-like to you? Well it’s not. I do firmly believe that Bentos are people too, just not after sundown of course, and that they don’t deserve to die unless you’re left with no other options.

So I hunt down the criminals who hunt Bentos. I’m a hunter’s hunter.

I especially like to thwart the newest type of hunter, the hillbilly in the pickup truck. These guys are absolute idiots. They’re almost always twenty years old, lacking education and morals but not lacking in firepower. What’s nice about them though is that they have no cause and usually their numbers are restricted to whoever can fit inside the pickup truck. They also always fire upon us at first sight. Because they are unaffiliated with any of the bigoted organizations it cuts down on paperwork if I have to use deadly force because then I don’t have some stupid group coming after me telling me what a nice young man he was and that I may have used excessive force.

That brings me to my second least favorite hunter: the passionate follower. These dumbasses usually get recruited by a cult to mete out god’s wrath upon the wicked. That’s just double-speak for murdering Bentos. If you kill one of these guys, you’re lucky if your house doesn’t get torched and you don’t end up on a slab. On more than one occasion I’ve had to add security patrols around my house to keep my wife safe from these lunatics.

The worst is the serial killer. I hate these guys the most because they’re almost impossible to catch. Shit, some of them operate during the day, when our task force is off duty. I’ve only caught a couple of these bastards so I don’t rightly know what makes them tick. My best guess is that they probably already had cruel tendencies that were heightened by the constant fear and anxiety of living alongside monsters. But what do I know.

The easiest killers to catch are the ‘friends and family’. Sometimes when a werewolf kills someone’s friend or family member, there will be retaliation. Of course it’s all but impossible to tell which Bento killed little Jimmy so these dorks just go find the nearest Bento which is almost always an innocent neighbor who is infected. The neighborhood’s a safer place now with one less Bento and a death has been avenged. But not so fast: I will find you. It’s as easy as pulling up profiles on the residents of said neighborhood. If a Bento (in human form of course) is found dead inside their own home, a neighbor with a recently eaten friend or family member did it. That’s a fact.

You’re probably thinking: I see why you said your job’s dangerous; all you do all night is catch armed murderers. You’re only partially right though Einstein, my life is threatened by these people but it’s the Bentos who make my job deadly. This is why I’m paid more than the President, no joke.

If all the rules and laws were obeyed, I’d be out of work. And I’d be writing in a little notebook, scratching out a living.

Let’s talk about the rules.

The first rule is sundown curfew. It changes throughout the year, from season to season, but generally, if you stay safely indoors at night you’ll probably avoid becoming a snack. Pretty straight forward but you’d be surprised how often this one is broken.

The second rule is identify yourself the moment you’re infected and your basement will be fitted with a cell (at the taxpayers expense) which you are to lock yourself up in every evening without fail. Some people are pieces of shit and shrug it off but more often than not; you’ll hear some escapee say they simply fell asleep on the couch in the afternoon and woke up at sunup in a ditch the next city over with a mouth full of man. Mistakes happen.

They happen so often that the laws have had to loosen up a bit to avoid prison overpopulation. Now all an escaped Bento gets is a ticket and a tracking implant to make sure they never do it again. A box cutter and a little bravado is all it takes to remove those things though, so like I said, the laws are loose, tailor made for a guy in my profession.

Last week I heard about a lady that got caught outside after sundown. She got furious at the beat cop who gave her a ticket. She struggled like hell when they implanted her. I’ve often wondered if she really understood the magnitude of what she had done. Chances are she killed or infected dozens that night. Was she still mad about the ticket as she shit and vomited up the soft parts of her victims?

It’s a little more than ironic that as I’m tracking down these hunters, their would-be victims are in turn tracking me down. I don’t get much job satisfaction in that regard.

Here’s a quote by Sigmund Freud that should shed a light on how I feel about most of the people I meet on a day to day basis:

“I have found little that is good about human beings on the whole. In my experience most of them are trash…”

And Sigmund didn’t have to live alongside Bentos or hunters. Imagine how pissed he’d be then.