Boneswulf...Part 2

I was so happy to get back to being functional again, I virtually kicked Mike and his crew out of the Bonesmobile. I only half listened to Mike as he mentioned something about him and the crew heading off to a hotel closer to the City itself, just in case I needed further repairs in the course of this assignment.

Once I had them packed up and out of my home, I spent the better part of the rest of that day and night getting my sense of balance back and practicing with my new arm and hand. I couldn’t actually feel them, but there was a sense of stiffness about the limbs. It was probably purely mental, but I still felt a need to work out the kinks.

With everyone out of the bedroom, I put away the examination table and cleared the space to use for physical and mental meditations.

In my mind, I replayed the encounter with Grendel, trying to wrap my mind around just how fast and agile that thing had been. It was easily faster than I was, and probably close to having the same brute strength I did. It had advantages in various things like arm length, leaping ability, razor sharp claws, and a mouth full of teeth that could crush through my armor-plated skeleton and bite my hand right off my arm.

I certainly hoped that I had some advantages. I felt that I had slightly more brute strength, and was slightly heavier to boot, so there was a chance that I could get ahold of him and use my size and strength to hold him down, but to what end? I had been told that this thing was probably immune to most modern weapons such as firearms and explosives, and magick likely made him stronger rather than harming him. My baton had hurt the thing before, but it was hard to bludgeon something that quick and that strong to death, if it could even die.

After the exercises, I got online and read through the research material that the Professor had been able to dig up in the intervening time. Most of that material was historical in nature, some of it consisted of different translations and interpretations of the original Beowulf tale, while other stuff seemed to be even more obscure. The most interesting stuff was rather recent...stories from local newspapers in half a dozen languages (with translations) from war torn and chaotic areas where ‘strange, murderous creatures’ were often blamed for some of the most gruesome killings.

Overall it appeared that these creatures (or something quite like them) had appeared in different places where strife and violence were commonplace. Of course those who saw these creatures were often belittled or disregarded as crazy. Each incident or sighting seen individually didn’t seem very noteworthy, but when put together by someone as good at research as the Professor, the evidence was rather compelling that creatures like this Grendel and his mother had been around for as long as men had been killing each other.

I stayed up all night long reading through the dossier of information and stories that the Professor had compiled, losing all track of time until I heard the rather insistent knock on my door and the shouted impreccations, “Rusty, you better still be in there or I’ll be roasting whatever flesh those creatures leave behind over a spit!”

Ah yes, Ravyn to the rescue!

I got up and openned the door to the waiting cavalry. Standing front and spunky center was the defiant and agnry looking Ravyn. Her face softened somewhat when she saw me open the door, and even smiled as she exclaimed, “Oh, you don’t look half bad now!” Her jaw tightened though as she finished with, “Now let’s try not to get let it get all messed up again, shall we?”

Standing behind Ravyn were a healed and refreshed looking Herne and another man, with raven dark hair and strongly oriental features. Herne grinned and introduced him, “Rusty, meet our friend Fang.”

The man smiled extended his hand and spoke with a California accent, “Daniel Wang, actually, but most people like to call me Fang.”

I shook his hand, and motioned for everyone to come on in.