Nightside 10 - The Good the Bad and the Uncanny

they grabbed the front wheels and the undercarriage, forcing the car to a stop. The pack was running in circles around us by then, jumping and leaping and howling beneath the huge Moon. Long, jagged rents appeared in the car’s roof as the wolves above us went to work. One wolf reared up beside Lord Screech, and punched the side window. The reinforced glass shattered, leaving a jagged hole through which a huge hairy hand came clawing, reaching for the elf, who calmly grabbed the hairy arm with both his slender hands, and broke the arm in three places with quick, efficient moves. The werewolf yelped piteously, and snatched its arm back. Screech kicked the side-door open and left the car so quickly he was little more than a blur. He grabbed the nearest werewolf, lifted it off the ground and turned it over, and broke its back across his knee. He threw the broken body aside, tore out another wolf’s throat with his bare hand, then grabbed another and used it as a club to beat other wolves.
    He was hurting them, but he wasn’t killing them. They healed almost immediately and came at him again. And the moment he slowed down, they would be all over him.
    A werewolf hauled open the driver’s seat so quickly he ripped it right off its hinges. Ms. Fate’s hand snapped forward, and a silver shuriken sprouted suddenly from the wolf’s left eye. He howled horribly and fell backwards, turning half-human again as the pain maddened his mind and he lost control. Ms. Fate stepped quickly out of the car, a shuriken in each hand, and dared the werewolves to come to her. They prowled back and forth before her, showing her their teeth, wary of the silver; waiting for her to drop her guard for just one moment.
    A wolf pulled open the door next to me, hauled me right out of my seat, and threw me into the road. I curled up instinctively and hit the ground rolling, but the impact was still enough to knock the breath right out of me. The werewolf loomed over me, snapping its long jaws mockingly. Up close, it smelled really bad, a harsh, rank mixture of musk and blood and wet dog. And then it must have got something of my scent, because it hesitated, and lowered its wedge-shaped head for another sniff. Because of circumstances not easily explained, I have some diluted werewolf blood in me. Not enough to make me were, but enough to accelerate the healing process. The werewolf could smell it on me; and while he was trying to figure that out, I punched him in the throat, hard enough to feel cartilage crack and break under my knuckles. The werewolf fell back, fighting frantically for breath as it scrabbled helplessly on the ground. I rose painfully to my feet and kicked him hard in the balls and in the head, to give him something else to think about.
    I looked about me. Werewolves were swarming all over the Fatemobile, tearing bits off it and pissing on the roof, but the reinforced armoured frame was still keeping them out. One of the tail fins had been bent right over, and long runnels of pink paint had been torn away all down one side. One wolf grabbed at the silver figure on the radiator, then howled miserably as his hand caught fire.
    Ms. Fate was still spinning and kicking and lashing out with the silver shuriken in her hands, but she was getting tired, and the werewolves surrounding her weren’t. Screech danced and pirouetted gracefully through the heart of the mayhem, but for every wolf his elven strength put down, more rose up to take its place. He was strong and he was magical; but he wasn’t silver. Ms. Fate and Lord Screech were fighting well and fiercely, but the odds were stacked against them.
    Which meant, as usual, that it was all down to me.
    People say that werewolves only fear silver, but that’s not strictly true. There’s one thing they fear even more, because it rules their lives. I concentrated again, raised my gift, and reached out to the oversized Moon that hangs over the Nightside. It took me only a moment to find the right ultraviolet frequency in the moonlight and change it subtly; and just like that, the whole damned pack howled and shrieked as the change raged through them, stripping them of tooth and claw and fur ... and suddenly the street was full of naked men and women, running for their lives. Except for those who didn’t react fast enough and got the crap kicked out of them by Ms. Fate and Lord Screech.
    They soon ran out of victims and returned to the car. Ms. Fate wept bitter tears of rage and