Things have a funny way of coming around.
I don’t know that I’ll ever get all of the story. Those that knew all of it are dead, all except one, and he wasn’t in a mood to talk overly much when I saw him.
A short time ago, the rumbling of a steam engine on North Road caught my ear. It wasn’t that steady, thrumming of a locomotive, but the odder, more peculiar sound of steam engine autos. I’d neither heard nor seen one in at least twenty years, so I confess my curiosity got the better of me.
The sound faded away, and I could tell it was headed into town.
I saddled one of the horses and followed after without any sense of urgency, although that would change by the time I reached town.
I’d no sooner gotten within a stone’s throw of the library when I heard the heavy thud of a submachine gun. The noise came from the university, and I set my heels to the horse’s side, sending the mare into a gallop.
The watchmen sprang out of the way, and I soon saw a curious-looking auto, the shape and design of which were utterly foreign to me.
Within a heartbeat, I was out of the saddle and moving towards an open door in the small building that housed the university’s fledgling department of zoology. I had both Colts drawn when a trio of strangers emerged from the building.
Two of them were men.
The third was an ape of some sort.
One of the men, wearing a bowler hat, carried a Thompson submachine gun, a weapon with which he seemed terribly uncomfortable. The other man wore the uniform of a driver.
The ape was undeniably in charge.
He carried a swagger stick, and he wore a suit, his own soft cap worn jauntily upon his head. As the door was held open for him, the ape nodded to me.
“No need for those, Blood,” he told me in a crisp British accent. “I’ve taken care of the bastards. They’ll not come into my town again, that’s for damn certain.”
Without another word, he climbed into his vehicle, his man slipped in beside him, and the driver got in behind the wheel.
I holstered my Colts as they left, and then I did the same.
There was nothing more to do.
#horror #fear
