Chapter 2

He stood and tried to walk on his cramping legs out of the meadow. His mind wandered.

He had lost his name along the way these past three years. His employers called him Hunter because that is what they had trained him to do, to hunt monsters. His trainers called them monsters because their natural prey was human beings. Monster was an absurdly loaded term and Hunter wasn't convinced. For one thing, while no one had any clue as to their evolutionary track, it seemed to him that they are a part of the creation.

In the darkening shadows of the evening, Hunter looked about for the two and half bodies that should have been laying around, but could find only the lower half of the bald man. He didn't know what had caused the disappearance of the other bodies, but since they had not been human to begin with, he wasn't that surprised.

Every muscle ached. In fact, every kind of tissue protested. Even the cartilage in his ears hurt. He felt like death and resurrection.

Moving as quickly as he dared, Hunter staggered into the woods, trying to find the game trail that led to his blind. He had an irrational fear that it had disappeared until he pushed his way between two bushes and chanced upon it.

The woods were getting darker. Turning left he followed the path to the road. His small sedan was hidden just off to the side at the head the trail. Safely inside, he ingested a handful of analgesics, caffeine, and a wide spectrum anti-biotic. It took half a liter of water to quench his thirst.

Hunter drove quickly to Vilnius. In the western suburb of Zêvrynas, a former Russian officer's spa had been converted into an exclusive private establishment. Hunter had a reservation.

They would charge him a lot, but it was worth it. In a private room, they helped him onto a warmed metal table and carefully peeled him out of his clothes. The four gouges in his arm were crusty with dried blood and yellow bits of something he couldn't identify.

They bathed and bandaged him. He accepted a glass of something green and thick, and drank. They had him soak in a tiled hot tub and he took a dip in an arctic bath. They washed his hair vigorously with a shampoo whose smell he couldn't identify. When his cock finally arose to attention, the lovely woman gently kissed it, licked it and finally sucked it until he had a happy ending.

He let sleep envelop him with a contented sigh.

In the morning, the same black haired beauty roused him from his sleep in a luxurious manner. Taking his cock in hand, she escorted him to a private shower where she produced a loofah and scrubbed his skin with bracing strokes. Feeling revived, he returned the favor, knowing where the wet foreplay was leading. Under the spray, she leaned against the wall and presented her shapely butt to him. Never one to turn down a lady's request, he slid his cock into her depths from behind. They both moaned and soon his hips were slamming against her ass in a delicious rhythm.

"Ah, God!" he exclaimed between clenched teeth as she started squeezing his cock with her well trained internal muscles. He reached around to rub her cleft and found her hand had beaten him there. Sneaking a finger between hers just to add to the party, she rewarded him with a guttural cry deep in her throat that spurred him on.

Hunter managed to maintain their coupling only a moment more. When she began to tremble and cry out, he lost all control and shot an almost painful release deep inside of her. Their breathing echoed off of the tiles in the shower room.

Usually Hunter was up for a second round but not that morning. His joints ached.

The shirt and jacket were beyond saving. In a borrowed shirt, which he was sure would be added to the bill, he drove the car back to the rental agency. From there he took a cab to the bus station because Vilnius still had lockers there. Seemingly Lithuanians were unafraid of terrorist threats unlike other parts of the world. Retrieving his stuff, he took a different cab to the airport. Half a day later, Hunter emerged from the main terminal of Charles de Galle airport and took a local bus to pick up his car at the Shell garage. Details mattered and the car had been due for an oil change and brake pads.

Hunter's phone beeped with a text message. His employers had assessed his brief report dictated on the drive to Vilnius and wished to speak with him in person. He replied, suggesting a particular restaurant for the dinner hour, which is 9:00 p.m. in Paris. He hadn't expected them to be on the European continent, not that they confided their travel itinerary to him.

He had a small third-story flat in the seventh arrondissement. It was a walkup built just before the turn of the century that consisted of a kitchen, two rooms and a bathroom. The windows were taller than he was. It had been his home of the previous nine months. His neighbor was the widow of an assistant curator at the Louvre. When he was in town, she would invite him for tea or wine in the late afternoon. Her flat was an art gallery of paintings and sculptures that was sublime.

Hunter's mind kept returning to the meadow. How had the dark man appeared? Hunter had read that scientists had been teleporting photons from one end of a room to the other for nearly a decade. Scientists were convinced that such geographical shifts were actually a natural phenomenon. Hunter had proof.

He smiled with anticipation of visiting his neighbor. He would gladly give her his early evening in exchange for her conversation and her wine. After the adrenalin of a hunt, the calm of her apartment and her patient friendship would be a balm. She knew art, and her stories of artists and their ways were entrancing.

But even his friend's bubbly stories couldn't hold his attention this night. Hunter let a quick daydream amuse him. The dangerous, dark and brooding monster hunter sits in the dark corners of the Parisian nightclub. Sitting back with the practiced demeanor of a trained tracker, he swirls a warmed shot of Irish whiskey while discussing the latest art installation at the Musee de Orsay.

"Cut," screamed the director. "You are supposed to be discussing fast cars, Monte Carlo, and the weather on the French Riviera. How are you going to get the hot babe in bed with art history?"

He couldn't stop my mind from wandering again, far too many times since awakening in the meadow. Hunting monsters wasn't like hunting human predators. He had only killed nine in three years but as far as he could tell, monsters only ate for food. Only God knows what motivates serial killers, child rapists, and pedophiles to take their victims. Monsters may be harder to kill, but they are a better breed than the Ted Bundy's and Jeffrey Dahlmer's of the world. Strike two against his trainers' opinions.