Smoothen Silky vs The WereCougar Read online

  SMOOTHEN SILKY VS THE WERECOUGAR

  BY DEREK SLATON

  © 2018

  CHAPTER ONE

  It was Thursday night, and Kerr was on the prowl. He casually walked along the upstairs balcony of the two story dance club, the very walls shaking from the generic beat of the overproduced techno music. The robust bass pounded through the railing and into his hand as he leaned on it, eyes raking over the packed dance floor below.

  His phone vibrated in his pocket and he pulled it out to see Rose had texted him.

  Silky says, and I quote, she’d written, “What you got, Cracka?”

  He rolled his eyes and took a swig of the cheap beer that was rapidly warming in the sweaty air of the club. He set it down on a tall round table next to him, clinking against the dozen or so empties sitting there.

  Tracking a pack of potentials. He typed back. I’ll be in touch. He pocketed his phone, and narrowed his eyes as he honed in on a group of frat boys huddled in the corner of the dance floor. There were four of them, three having ganged up on the fourth in some kind of twisted pep talk ritual. They popped his collar and sprayed him down with so much cologne that Kerr was sure he could smell it on the dank updraft.

  Fucking frat boys. He hated fucking frat boys.

  Kerr reached back for his beer but the table had been cleaned by what felt like a ghost waitress, and he swallowed his disappointment to turn back to the dance floor. The popped and loaded frat boy strutted across to the bar, where there was only one figure sitting alone that he could have possibly been targeting.

  Her back was to him, her elbow resting on the bar, unlit cigarette raised in the air. Her nails were six inches long and the brightest pink he’d ever seen, practically glowing under the lights of the club. Her leopard print top had three quarter length sleeves and was more form fitting than it maybe needed to be given the shape of her. The back of her neck was obscured by shoulder length black hair in a puffy perm that didn’t particularly look like it was from the current decade.

  The likely stank-filled frat boy approached, clearly nervous, biting his lip and visibly shaking as he leaned on the bar next to her. It was clear he was trying to look cool, but failing miserably if his tomato red cheeks had anything to say about it. Leopard Print laid a dangerous looking hand on his arm, claws and all, and that seemed to calm him down. She leaned closer to him, appearing to whisper something in his ear, and he totally relaxed, a giant grin erupting on his douchebag face. She hopped down from her barstool and took the kids hand, and Kerr caught a glimpse of a giant hoop earring before they were obscured by the throng of dancers.

  The Agent was instantly torn. He knew that his mission was to take out as many demons as he could at any given time, but he didn’t want to risk this poor woman being ripped apart. He pulled out his phone and opened the surveillance photo of the demon marked ‘Ezra’ that had been provided to him. He eyed the group of remaining frat douches in the corner, but none of them fit the picture. That was the deciding factor for him, so he hurried down the stairs, keeping an eye on the woman’s fluffy hair as it bounced through the crowd.

  He swiped away from the picture and sent Rose a quick text: Got a live one.

  Leopard Print led the frat dick like a poodle at a dog show, all the way to the fire door that had been propped open for ventilation. Two hundred sweaty, gyrating twenty-somethings generated a hell of a lot of heat, especially in Austin where the average temperature hovered around the boiling point, even at night.

  Kerr paused as they exited, and then slid up to the door, putting his back to the wall right next to it. He reached into the deep pockets of his jeans and casually slipped his hands into a set of brass knuckles. He took a deep breath and then slipped out the door into a wall of humid night air. He nearly gagged; it was like breathing soup.

  He cautiously moved down the dank alleyway towards a nearby dumpster, and raised his brass fists at the sound of whimpering. It was not the happy whimpering usually associated with a young couple getting it on in an alley, and the Agent took a fighting stance.

  “Alright, you demon possessed prick,” he warned loudly, “let go of that innocent young woman and get out here for an ass beating.”

  The whimpering ceased, and an eerie quiet fell. The only sound was the creaking of the old building that struggled to maintain structural integrity from the onslaught of shitty techno bass.

  “Well, come on!” Kerr urged. “Let’s do this!”

  There was a metallic groan and suddenly the dumpster rocketed towards the Agent. He dove out of the way just in time, hugging the wall at the whoosh of the deadly weapon narrowly missing his face. It landed with a gargantuan clang-thud right in front of the fire door.

  Kerr leapt back out into the middle of the alley to face the demon, and blinked in confusion at the sight before him. The frat boy lay flat on the asphalt, spread-eagled, blood pooling rapidly beneath him from the massive hole in his chest. Leopard Print stood above him, revealing herself to be in her mid-forties, not the early twenties that he’d originally assumed.

  The most grisly part of the demonic tableau, however, was the fresh heart in her hand, oozing crimson all up her forearm.

  “What. The. Fuck.” Kerr breathed, jaw dropping in horror as the woman took a hearty bite out of the heart, blood running down her chin to stain the crushed velvet animal print barely covering her cleavage.

  The Agent banged his brass knuckles together to get her attention, and her head immediately flicked to him like a bird’s. She screeched and pitched the partially devoured organ at him.

  Kerr ducked and barely registered the sickening squelch behind him as the heart hit the brick wall before the harpy was on him. He managed to roll out of the way of her razor sharp pink claws as she tried to get him with her considerable speed. He attempted to hit her, but she easily dodged his blows, reciprocating in kind with kicks laden with stiletto heels.

  He ducked down into a squat before launching his body forward, fists held in front of him like a battering ram. She leapt into the air with impressive grace, flipping forward and lashing out to scratch the back of his neck with one long fierce claw.

  Kerr hit the ground and tucked into a roll, springing back up to his feet and raising his fists once again. But she’d already turned and sprung onto the wall, and he watched with his jaw on the ground as she parkoured up the building like a coked up cat.

  When she vanished over the top into the night, his body relaxed and he fell down onto his ass to take a breather. What the fuck had just happened? The frat dicks hadn’t turned out to be demons after all, but Leopard Lady sure was. Where she’d come from and what her purpose was remained to be seen, further than eating frat hearts that was.

  His pocket vibrated and he fished his phone out, glancing at an SOS text from Rose.

  “Well,” he groaned as he pocketed the device, “looks like it’s time for Kerr to go save the day.” He paused as he was about to get to his feet and put a hand to his forehead in bewilderment. “Crap, that talking in third person stuff is contagious.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Silky ran across the hardwood floor, dragging his 9-iron behind him like a samurai running head on into battle. His white fur jacket fluttered gracefully behind him, giving the effect of an avalanche thundering towards his victims.

  The first one to reach him was a stocky demon with wild stupid eyes, shouting a battle cry fit for a bad action movie. Silky swung his club upwards in a tight arc, catching his opponent in the armpit. There was a pop and a sickening crack as the force of the blow severed the demon’s arm. He staggered backward, staring open mouthed at his sudden wound that was spewing blood like an uncapped fire hydrant.

&nb
sp; Silky spun and whipped his club around like a baseball bat, smacking into the falling appendage and sending it sailing across the room to embed into the drywall. The pimp strolled casually over to the arm jutting out of the wall, palm up. He removed his precious jacket and placed it in the demon hand, punching the forearm to get the fingers to clench around the white fur. He inspected his handiwork, making sure that the jacket was safe from touching the ground on it’s new organic hook.

  He pulled down the sleeves of his white long sleeve shirt and smoothed his pristine white slacks, inspecting his shiny white leather penny loafers.

  “Silky would like to give his humble thanks to each and every one of you demonic cocksuckers for patiently waiting while Silky be tendin’ to his jacket,” he declared loudly. The dozen or so demons glanced at each other in confusion, some scratching their heads in bewilderment. “With all the moral outrage these days it’s becoming harder and harder for a pimp to be findin’ real fur, let alone fur as rare as this.

  “Now. Silky ain’t gonna be borin’ you with the details of how he acquired this magnificent work of tailored art, or which endangered species gets to live on in perpetuity thanks to the care Silky be providin’ this jacket,” he continued as he slung the club over his shoulder, strolling up next to Rose, who had her head in her hand in exasperation. “All Silky be sayin’ is this. If any of you motherfuckers come within ten feet of Silky’s glorious jacket, Silky is gonna be bendin’ you over and shovin’ his 9-iron so far up you ass that you gonna feel like you on a date with Long Dong Silver!”

  “Really?” Rose sighed, cocking her head so that her long red ponytail fell down over her left shoulder. “The jacket speech again?”

  “What?” He puffed out his chest a bit and raised his chin. “Silky be proud of the work his tailor did. You have any idea what that magnificent bastard had to go through to be gettin’ that fur?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Australian outback, wiped out an indigenous tribe who didn’t take kindly to him killing their god, and lost a toe or some shit.”

  “That ole honky lost his big toe,” Silky corrected with a wag of his finger. “Now the man doesn’t have the proper weight distribution to be supportin’ his gigantic set o’ balls. Brings a tear to Silky’s eye when he’s seein’ that seventy year old mammoth of a man wobblin’ across the shop to collect Silky’s wares.”

  Rose sighed again. “Are you done?”

  “One day Silky’s gonna be educatin’ you on the finer things in life.” He shook his head.

  Rose slipped a knife from the back of her dress’ bodice, and pointed her signature metal baton at the group of demons eyeing them.

  “You assholes want to fight now, or keep hearing about the jacket?” she asked, and her opponents looked back and forth at each other, then took fighting stances, echoes of cracking knuckles and necks permeating the dim space. “See, they’re ready to go,” Rose said to her comrade. “Are you?”

  “Baby, Silky always ready to go.” He grinned at her, revealing the custom grill that read S I L K Y.

  Screeches ran out amongst the demons as they darted forward, and the two Agents sprung to action.

  Rose sprinted forward, leaping into the air and catching a demon in the chest with a flying knee. She drove him into the ground and dipped into a lithe shoulder roll, whipping her knife in the upswing to slam right into the chest of another enemy. She reeled back with her elbow as the first demon sat up, knocking him back down as she rained three vicious blows to his face, caving in his head with her fist.

  The redhead leapt to her feet and a pair of arms encircled her from behind. The attacking demon opened it’s mouth with a hungry snarl, ready to take a bite out of her neck. She jabbed her baton back and embedded it directly into her assailant’s throat. The momentary shock and pain staggered the demon back far enough for her to retrieve her knife and plunge it into it’s chest.

  Silky released twin blades on his 9-iron and swung into a surprised foursome of demons, whose panicked heads detached from their bodies from the force of his mighty backhanded swing.

  “Looks like it’s all y’all’s turn,” he declared as two more demons flanked him. “So y’all wanna spitroast ole Silky, do ya? Sorry to be disappointin’, but Silky ain’t into threesomes, at least not with the likes of you’s ugly ass mothafuckas. I tell you what, though, Silky’ll at least give you’s a fightin’ chance.” He hit a button on the club to retract the blades, put the head extended out with a flash to smack one of his opponents directly in the face.

  The other charging demon leapt as the first one fell backwards, and Silky managed to land a series of blows, bones crunching with each hit.

  “Whoo-ee, Silky’s workin’ them ribs, got them crack-a-lackin’,” he said with a grin. The first demon dove back in and the pimp dodged the first blow, retaliating with a golf club to the goody bag. As the demon doubled over, Silky smashed the head into his face, holding him upright against the wall, head slamming back against the brick with a thud.

  The demon with the cracked ribs cried out as he ran full tilt at the pimp’s back, and Silky dropped into a split that would have made James Brown proud. His opponent’s flying sucker punch sailed over his head and directly into the demon against the wall, and Silky leapt back to his feet and hit the blade release. He used the momentum of his spring to stab the blade into the back of his opponent’s head, securing both of them to the wall.

  He let go of the 9-iron and it stayed in place, both demon heads pinned through the center against the wall.

  “Rose, you see this shit?” he cried excitedly.

  She grunted, shoulder to shoulder with two demons. “Little busy right now.”

  “And you be thinkin’ Silky needed to hit the gym?” He puffed his chest out. “Shiiiiit girl, Silky don’t need to be doin’ free weights or any of that new age yoga and shit.”

  Rose landed a direct shot to one of her opponent’s faces with her baton, sending him tumbling backwards. The other turned in shock and concern for his partner, which gave her the opening to stab him in the heart.

  “No!” the demon on the ground cried, throwing his hands up just a second too late to protect himself from her plunging blade.

  “Now, what do you want?” Rose asked, turning to Silky, who was standing by his gruesome display of power like a proud five-year-old with his drawing on the fridge.

  She opened her mouth to respond, but another demon ran towards her, screeching like a banshee. She unleashed a volley of blows with her baton, a vicious dance that drove her enemy back. He hit the ground with a groan, and Silky bristled.

  “Mothafucka,” the pimp snapped, tearing the 9-iron out of the wall and retracting the blades. The two pinned bodies crumpled to the floor in a heap as he stalked over towards Rose’s victim.

  “What is it?” she asked, brow furrowed.

  “He better hope, he better hope,” Silky muttered as he tossed the 9-iron to the ground with a clatter. He knelt and took the fallen demon’s hair in his fist, lifting his lolling head to point it at the jacket on the wall. “Ten feet,” he said firmly. “Ten mothafuckin’ feet. You not listenin’ to Silky? Silky be layin’ it all out there for yo ass. One rule. One. Simple. God. Damn. Rule. Do not get within ten mothafuckin’ feet of Silky’s jacket.”

  “That doesn’t look like ten feet.” Rose sighed. “And besides, we need this asshole to talk.”

  “Don’t be worryin’, Rosie,” Silky assured her. “This asshole can still talk with Silky’s club hitting from the rough.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Rose muttered, closing her eyes momentarily and taking a deep breath. “Can we just call it ten and a half feet and move on to the interrogation?”

  The pimp dropped the demon’s head with a clunk against the cement floor and huffed as he crossed to his jacket. He pulled out a tape measure and knelt, hooking it to the baseboard before moving towards the demon.

  “Silky’s got standards,” he said, “we ain’t ey
eballin’ this shit.”

  Rose crossed her arms in defeat, cocking her head as he stopped at the demon’s toe.

  “Nine feet, eleven inches!” he cried in disgust, and threw down the tape measure. It skidded across the floor as he snatched up the golf club. “Silky be apologizin’, cracka ass demon, but he didn’t bring no lube!”

  His opponent’s eyes went wide as saucers with fear, and Rose humphed, stepping forward to hook her arms underneath the demon’s shoulders. She dragged him a few inches and then dropped him again, both he and the pimp staring at her in confusion.

  “What?” Silky finally asked. “You gonna help Silky pop this demon’s cherry?”

  “No, I’m preventing you from doing that,” Rose snapped. “For starters, just, ewww. Secondly, we need information from him and I guaran-damn-tee he’s going to be a lot more likely to co-operate if he isn’t feeling Mandingo’s wrath. Thirdly, and the most important point, we don’t have a place to stay in town yet and I’ll be goddamned if I’m riding around in a car with something that smells like demon ass.”

  “Fine,” Silky conceded. “Do what you gonna do. Silky’s gonna go make sure his coat’s okay.”

  Rose sank to her knees and slid her hand around the back of the demon’s head, tightly fisting the hair at the nape of his neck as she lifted it.

  “Look, I’ve had a long day, so I’m going to make this short,” she said firmly. “Answer my question quickly, and I end you quickly. Refuse, and I’m going to let my friend over there do whatever the fuck he wants to you because I’m going to find a nice hotel with an even nicer bar. You with me so far?”

  The demon nodded jerkily, as far as the movement was allowed with the fingers clutching his head.

  “Good.” Rose nodded. “Have you seen this demon?” She produced her phone, a picture of the demon Ezra on the screen.

  “He’s in town,” her captive said shakily. “I don’t know where exactly.” He winced as she tightened her hold on his scalp, hair tearing free. “I swear. He summoned me two nights ago. I didn’t even want to come up to the surface, he just brought me here.”