OCEAN WEREWOLF

He hunts the ocean beaches.

    At dawn they found another savaged body. Another beach comber torn to bloody shreds, partly consumed. The sheriff of Lincoln County shook his head as he gazed down at the remains. His deputy stood beside him. The ocean waves rushed in with a constant roar, herring gulls winged overhead, beaks open, laughing.

    Laughing at us, thought the sheriff, laughing at us because it knows what’s going on and we don’t.

 

    The werewolf was hungry, so desperately hungry as it padded silently along a twilight coastline. The sun was setting, igniting the scattered cloud cover. An aquamarine blue radiated outward from clouds, spreading into the fiery red and oranges sweeping across the sky. The ever shifting ocean waters were splattered with this flaming light, as if the water itself was on fire.

    A full pale yellow moon hung in the darkening sky; the werewolf turned his shaggy wolfish head and gazed upward at it, whining in a pitiful fashion. The full moon hurt him, always did. It made his desperate need for raw bloody flesh even more powerful, more urgent and he panted with his desperation.

    It was in the middle of September and the tourist season was winding down. Fewer wanderers on the beach wanting to experience the ocean in all its many moods. Fewer victims for him. Less raw bloody flesh to consume. The werewolf paused, the hungry stalking beast swelling inside him. He threw back his dark shaggy wolfish head and pierced the night atmosphere with his haunting howl. He arched his back, shifting his long dark wolfish hair, then continued padding along the damp sands.

    The werewolf stepped around the large twisted forms of seaweed and the dead sea birds that littered the beach. His silver scarlet eyes burned in the ocean’s darkness, seeking people out on the nighttime sands. The sun was nearly done with its display as it lit the grey ocean waters with the last of its burning colors. In the far distance, where darkness had already crept in at the ocean’s edge, several lights hovered on the horizon, passing sea faring ships.

    All this the werewolf only casually noticed. His wolf nostrils were spread wide, taking in every scent the ocean and the beach had to offer.

    And he smelled her, an old woman walking her small dog a ways ahead of him, taking her little beloved pet on one more walk before turning in for the night.

    The constant pounding of the ocean could not prevent the werewolf from hearing the woman talking to her dog, talking as if the dog were her child. No doubt she felt the little canine was her child, one maybe she never had, or the only one who had not abandoned her in her old age.

    The werewolf’s breath came quickly, he whined in his eagerness to ease the hurt in his body for raw bloody flesh. The full moon rose high in the night sky as the sun finally gave its last nightly performance and seemed to sink some place beyond the ocean, giving the appearance it sank below the ocean’s horizon.

    The werewolf felt the pressure of the full moon, making him feel even more like a savage killing beast.

    I am from Hell, the werewolf thought, a creature of the Damned, a beast from Hell!

    He snapped his lethal jaws, his fangs coming together creating a loud sound similar to a pistol shot that rose quite clearly above the pounding of the surf.

    The little dog heard the sound and paused, cocking his little pointed ears and glancing behind him. The little dog caught the werewolf scent intermingled with the salty ocean aroma and started crying in fear, tugging the leash in an effort to get away, to get the old lady to start walking faster. The little dog barked: Danger! Danger!

    The old lady did not understand and continued her slow walk up the beach. The little dog lunged at the end of the leash, choking himself. The old lady scolded her little dog for such out of control bad doggie behavior.

    The werewolf padded closer, target in full view despite the darkness. His silver scarlet eyes ate the old lady before he even reached her.

    The little dog screamed, making an almost human like sound, his little dog hairs standing on end and he did a horrible desperate flip at the end of his leash.

    The old lady really got mad. What was wrong with her little dog, acting so crazy? She pulled on the leash, dragging her terrified baby closer to her, intending to give him a serious spanking.

   The werewolf was just feet away, his jaws dripping thick saliva, his heart pounding, his breath coming in ragged gasps. The seconds leading up to an attack always made him overly excited. Almost made him feel like he was going to be out of control.

    Kill! Kill! Kill! Everything in his vision rapidly turned crimson. The werewolf felt crazy. Knew he was crazy. The ocean had turned silver with the descending of night, even the crests on the waves were a silver color. A strange glow floating just above the ocean was silver. Even the few gulls that were still flying seemed luminous with silver.

    But the werewolf saw blood red. All that silver was coated with a crimson sheen. It danced before his vision. He smelled the blood and he had not even struck yet. He had not even made his kill.

    The little dog’s frantic screams made him even more excited. The old lady’s oblivion to him made him excited. The moon pulling him gave him tortured pain. He had to kill to stop the pain. He had to eat the raw bloody flesh to stop the torment.

    With a savage roar and a snarl the werewolf launched himself at the old lady. At the last moment she heard his horrible sound and turned. In her very last second she saw a huge wolfish creature from hell arching itself in the night air toward her, saw the silver bleeding eyes, the mouth full of lethal fangs and in that last instant knew why her little dog had been acting crazy and out of control. She dropped her baby’s leash, opened her mouth to scream, but never had a chance to make a sound, not even a squeak.

   Finding himself free at last, the little dog fled into the salty ocean night, yapping his terror!

    The werewolf hit the old lady, knocking her to the cold damp sands, ripping savagely at her throat as he took her down. From the ripped torn flesh blood pulsed as the still alive heart continued to beat. He lapped at this fresh fountain, lapped and lapped, feeling his pain easing. He tore flesh from the old lady’s dying body and swallowed it in chunks.

   The moon’s painful pull was easing. He was feeling better, less pain and more relaxed. It was a hunt of success and triumph, another hunt completed, another meal consumed.

    In the ocean darkness the werewolf padded on up the beach, intending to return to his lair. Sea lice and crabs were already covering the old lady’s body, slowly but eagerly nibbling away at it.

    The ocean werewolf faded away in the ocean’s night, lost amongst the waves pounding a nearby rocky shoreline.

 

    The sheriff looked sadly down at the remains of the old lady and helplessly shook his head.

    Another one, he thought, for God Sakes, what was going on? Some kind of damn animal hunting people and half eating them?

    His deputy was on the phone, calling the detective and coroner. He tried not to look at the remains of the old lady, she reminded him of his grandma, made him imagine his grandma’s dead body crawling with sea creatures slowly eating her.

    S**t! The sheriff thought, got a real serious problem on my hands. A real serious problem. Do I make it public?

 

    The ocean werewolf slept. But only for a while. The ocean’s pounding surf rose and fell in his heart. The moon tugged at him. His desperate blood hunger was already starting to rise again.

Reviews

[Black Cat Fever]

This is a very dark and bloodthirsty werewolf story, just the way they use to be before they became Love Objects, which is fun too. This one is out hunting and ready to tear a human apart and eat them and like the werewolves of old, is controlled by the moon in some fashion. I sure enjoyed this read.

[Lorren Pierce]

Good story. I could see the werewolf stalking behind her, leaving pawprints in the sand, and the dog running down the beach to get away. Nice. ;)

[Wicahpi]

Blood thirsty crabs! lol I'm sorry, but I was watching a movie
and those big black crab looking things were scary! hahaha
That was for Star Wolf :)

This was pretty graphic making my stomach churn for
some reason this late night. Ack! Lady should have listened
to her dog (as I would), but even if she had, I'm sure she'd
still be dead. Poor woman. A werewolf has to do what a
werewolf has to do. Fanatical! Well done.

[Star Wolf]

This is spooky and chilling! Makes we wonder what is stalking the beaches after dark?