Author's Note: A long, long time ago I wrote Interview with a Werewolf Hunter.  This is a completely different version with the same overall concept.  Part two will be here later today.

Silver and the Bullet
By: Robert Kahil


Welcome to these fellow pages new Lunar Rider.  You have chosen to rid the world of a great and dangerous evil.  Here is how you do so. 

At times a human will get in your way of killing a werewolf.  Whether they are a protective spouse or a concerned citizen; it does not matter.  You will find a few of them reluctant to help you.  So simply get rid of them. 

Personally I don’t care if you kill them or not.  You have a job and I wish to implore you complete it at all cost. 
However the local authorities will be inclined to stop you.  Oh no, don’t protect the humanity of our collective civilization.  That simply will not do because it is their job!  Police or any other agents are quite nosy.  Please refrain from getting near them. 

While we are on this dark note please also refrain (I love that word, refrain)… From using too many credit cards.  I generally take to stealing the money of my intended victim.  Or identity; but in this time period that is getting increasingly difficult.  Using another’s electronic money can come in handy.  If they are dead, they are missing.  The authorities will notice their (the card’s) use. 

The authorities are not inept.    Soon after this, you may find yourself in their hands.  I can assure you those hands are occasionally corrupt.  At this time I feel to mention that some werewolves are powerful business men.  They have connections with the authorities.   

So what do you do about this?  Why it’s simple my dear hunters; use cash.  Find a job like any other innocent citizen and move on.  The authorities own the grid.  Hunters, including werewolves and other beasts of the night, have inherited the “outer gridâ€�.  It is a place where you will learn to thrive as the lycanthrope has adapted to their wilderness. 

Land has a much more primal matter in the hands of us hunters and the werewolves.  It is a war that has been raging since the Beast of Gevaudan.  I will explain in plain words a brief history of this monstrosity.  Among the years 1764-1767 a beast terrorized the previously said French community.  By terrorize I mean the sixty confirmed deaths of citizens.  However as is the nature of the werewolf; it branched its territory to the neighboring three counties. 

Needless to say, that land is what kept it alive for so long.  They grow a bond within their fur covered black souls with the earth.  Our organization began with Jean Chastel; the killer of the Beast of Gevaudan.  He did not formulate us no, but he did inspire us.  We took up in arms and declared a war on werewolves.

Jean Chastel won one of the first battles between man and this particular breed of beast.  Now, over three hundred years later we are still doing so.  It is getting intolerably hard to defeat them.  For a long while I felt as if I was betraying Jean because we were going nowhere.  Why must it be that way?  You might find yourself asking. 
Like us regular mortals, they are evolving.  Much faster though.  The Beast of Gevaudan was a quadruped.  It ran on four legs like that of a wolf.  Unfortunately they have begun walking on two.  Do you know the implications it brings upon us?  Mating between human and the infected has caused the blood lines to adapt in unimaginable ways. 

All it took was three generations before the true evolution.  One way to become one of us and fight for the cause is to learn not of their history but their current status.  Today werewolves have ignored their own past.  Not their fault.  Evolution is to blame. 

Now they are creatures which tower above us without a second thought as to their intended nature.  Try pointing a gun at a creature which can see your actions before you can.  Their analytical brain keeps most of the human smarts with the survival tactics of a wolf.  Werewolves can, in a way, predict your moves ahead of you.  The trick to learn is predicting their movements too. 

View the battle as a handicapped chess game.  Werewolves have an unfair physical advantage, as well as psychological; depending entirely on what breed they are.  Try to goad the werewolf out of its personal winnings within five minutes.  Any longer and it would have studied you long enough, run off to its nightly hiding-hole, or brought a partner. 

Now before we speak of those characteristics of new; the partner I find is far more intriguing at this point.  Bear with me as I tell you this person will save your life.  Werewolves re generally too… How do I put this?  Ah yes, favored against you for one person to take them on.  So the partner and or apprentice are there some yards off- out of your way but close enough to send assistance.  Plainly; never hunt a werewolf alone. 

Ah, now for the apprentice.  If you are so able and patient enough to teach one; can be either gender.  We don’t have that sexism bullshit.  If anyone wants to join this war so be it.  They, the apprentice, should be taught at the ripe age of eighteen.  Or if say; one (being any poor sap) loses their entire family and vows vengeance, please save the bullets.  Train them how to hunt safely. 

Your own family will do fine too.  For example a wife or husband who loves to travel.  They willingly go out and blow the faces off of any werewolf who passes near.  Good?  Good, now let’s move.  Oh and another thing I guess- I’ve found that the excitement of hunting werewolves can get a woman quite randy.  If you catch my drift my good folk; whoops.  Must not let the shaft below speak ahead…

Yet with all good things there is a bad thing lurking in the darkness.  Suicide is a vital factor for us hunters.  One of the rules you’ll learn: If bitten, the hunter must promptly commit suicide before turning.  We are not like Blade; we don’t want to risk becoming the creatures we hunt.  Why should we?  To become as strong as those beasts or think like them?  Trust me, it is not worth it. 

In our nature though is the challenge of life.  One bite can ruin it all but a bullet- ruthlessly effective and quick- decides the ultimate fate.  It is hard to find love as a Lunar Rider.  That is why another of our rules is to not find that “L-Wordâ€� to begin with.  While some people do want to willingly off themselves; there is often such a pause it doesn’t happen in our experience.  A lover surely wouldn’t and your partner (if not your lover) will more than likely fail at his job. 

We do have werewolf, werewolf hunters.  They are wanted criminals in our stance.  My leader, our leader actually, is extraordinarily strict on this fact.  My wife, whose name I will keep in secrecy, proved him wrong for me.  She is not wanted and I will never willingly chase her.  We have two children to pass our legacy on. 

At times it was hard for us in the beginning.  For a few months we stopped hunting altogether.  Something snapped within me.  I couldn’t believe it.  Hunting didn’t have to be my entire life.  We lost contact with the others for her safety.  Not all of them would have understood.  Our apprentice, a young naïve man, was one of our only allies.  He proclaimed us dead. 

Me and her, we bought a Laundromat on the corner of a silent street… I must move on.  This is a testament for you hunter; this isn’t about my life.  It is about me saving yours. 

To hunt them yes, yes I like that.  To hunt a werewolf you must understand how they look in the human realm.  One of the easier ways is to shake their hand.  Werewolves do not have fingerprints.  Please don’t ask why, after decades of research we’ve concluded they’re just being assholes. 

What of the canines?  You may ask yourself if curious.  I will say now the canines are slightly longer than a regular man or woman.  It is a natural reaction they have for a faster transformation.  They’re unnaturally wolfish face can only rarely determine lycanthropy.  I mean some people have weasel-like faces.  Does that mean they are were-weasels?  I thought not… Weasels, humph!
 
On graceful strides they move about as the jock of our worldly high school.  They are after all, supernatural superstars!  Why wouldn’t they gloat?  Being well endowed has nothing to do with it either… Things can only get harder…  Or perhaps become thicker from here… Oh dear, where the hell is this going?  Damn the gutter mind, mind him no… Mind, sigh; this is a long night.

Ah yes, the short temper.  Everyone has one at times or are cursed with them permanently.  Werewolves genuinely want to fit in.  Like a professional soldier or hit man.  Their identity correlates with everyone else’s mood.  To almost blow some steam they must either stay calm or go berserk.

Such as the edgy, crowded places they must experience.  Otherwise there is no definite way to identify them while un-furry.  In other words stalking them is the best way.  Unbutton any curtains onto their lives.  Follow them.  You have a week, or should wait that long, until putting the bullet down their throats.   

You’ll want to use binoculars.  They are rather more silent than what comes after the rifle blast.  If you are distracted enough to take a gun, strap it- the shotgun or rifle you should take- upon your back.  Once there at the hiding spot you will want to stay for a while. 

Once you are discovered they will run towards you or run away.  If they run, they are brilliant at hide and seek.  Good luck finding them.  There’s a reason no one can find Big Foot; werewolves are no different.

Werewolves know what weapons look like from afar.  They’re sight is a mixture of black and white with heat cycles.  As in, they can see you in the dark.  A splotch of black along your face will be obvious to them.  If this happens, act like a surprised hunter of deer.  As if you weren’t hunting them.  Hopefully they will run off.

Now in the case of an early attack and you find yourself weaponless.  Don’t run.  Running triggers the wolf’s natural instinct of chasing prey.  Prey generally fears the hunter and run so they are obvious.  Werewolves are really damn fast.  Most have been reported to go at least 38-40 mph.  Humans move at an average fifteen for a short burst.  They can chase and stalk you for miles.  One of the reasons for killing them quickly as I mentioned earlier is the strain.  Even the strongest men can go down in a flurry of claws and heat.

If this happens you are unlucky.  By then the beast would have taken over the human mind.  A scene from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde will generally follow.  A much darker form of evil residing within the human soul is unleashed.  The primal nature is simply to inflict pain.  Death is slow at the hands of these particular types of werewolves.  They are Feral. 

Even still they can enact such revenge for merely looking at them.  I’ve seen it.  You won’t be enough.  Younger members of the hunters can’t take it.  I will explain later just what they are capable of. 

They go after everyone you know.  If you have family your arms would have been a filleted, useless mess to warn them via phone.  Feral werewolves have such a dark sense of revenge and justice they must have twelve limbs for an eye.  Somehow within their minds, they know.  One taste of your blood and they’ll know everything there is to know about you. 

Occasionally, if they are old enough, feral werewolves will even steal that entire identity.  More than killing or stealing your family.  It is worse to think of not being able to tie my soul with my wife’s own now.  It is the beast, the feral creatures out there, who become you.  For the first time in their long life; they will fit in. 

Fit in how?  You may ask; when they are simply and literally monsters.  Deep within their animal soul the human resides.  The werewolf will finally let you go.  It will endlessly watch you.  For years even; just to steal everything that you claim to be.  Eventually, when it feels the time is right; they will almost literally transform into the person you once were.  The transition is almost seamless.  Any of your old friends (who aren’t werewolf hunters) won’t know what’s going on. 

If they aren’t ignorant, it is still too late.  Oh you would have been eaten by carrion at some point in all of this after starving or- if lucky- bleeding to death. 

As to killing these beasts; you will need silver.  Either to the head or to the heart works.  However I will say the former works better.  Not many are expert shots for a raving, squirming monster heart.  There are potentials to miss.  While it will take a while for the said heart to heal, pissing werewolves off in such a way is a horrible idea. 

Decapitating works as well.  Be warned though; their thicker fur and necks make for a hard target.  If it is not a silver ax even a deep slice will heal.  Blood loss from a shredded carotid artery only works upon the silver not allowing the wound to close.  A werewolf who smells its own blood goes into something we like to call ballistic. 

Kind of like a werewolf Hulk, really nasty business.  It will move around so quickly and ferociously a mere scratch almost accounts for a severed limb.  Until they heal- which only takes a couple of moments- you would be wise to just finish it off.  Drive a blade into its brain or use the ax with an overhead strike.  I’ve done it before.  The ax will do either of two things: 1) deeply slice a chunk of its crown open; 2) travel below the ears, between the eyes, and finally split the muzzle in half. 

Knives are messy business but effective.  While dangerous, getting close enough to a werewolf for a boxing match with knives is incredibly fun.  If they see you- and I assure you they will- getting into the stance; the werewolf will match it for a while.  Just watch for the clotheslines which are generally followed by a skull crushing right or left hook.  Oh and the hooks use five claws. 

At least- hopefully- you’ll be dead before hitting the ground. 

On the case of fire be aware that we hunters generally try to be environmentally friendly.  Burning a werewolf to death is easy.  However if not controlled in a woodland area; it might cause a forest fire.  Forest fires mean business so please make them die down.  Besides, burnt fur smells absolutely horrid.  Add to the horror of a flaming, enraged, seven foot beast.  They won’t run towards water first; they’ll charge you.  Take it from experience; being tackled by a werewolf is dreadful (especially when they are on fire.)

To find all of this silver will be difficult.  It can be expensive and depending on the size of the bullet; smelting the right amounts has faults.  Generally a former Lunar Rider will pass the techniques on to you.  Along with the weapons and whatever rewards were reaped.

Last edited by robkahil (2012-04-23 21:51:04)