Supernatural Fresh Meat - By Alice Henderson Page 0,72
the mountain, is she?”
Dean shook his head. “No. Believe it or not, I lost her inside the resort.”
Susan let out a short laugh. “Well, the place is a maze. ‘Luxury skiing at its finest.’ Lots of meeting rooms and places where guests can get a drink or sit by the fire. When the place isn’t empty, that is.”
“Everyone clear!” Steve shouted suddenly, and Susan pushed Dean back with the others.
With the help of two of the ski patrol, Steve loaded a massive four-foot bullet into the howitzer. When the others had moved away, Steve gripped a long cord trailing from the cannon.
“Ear protection! Don’t forget to open your mouths so your eardrums don’t burst!”
Dean slapped his hands over his ears as the howitzer went off with a deafening boom. Black smoke billowed around them. As Steven had predicted, the wheeled cart holding the howitzer shot backward, skittering across the ice, and lodged itself into a snow bank a few feet behind them. People coughed as the acrid smoke cleared.
“Okay! Let’s do it again!” Steven yelled.
Immediately, three of the ski patrol dug around in the snow bank for the cart. They found it and with great effort pulled it free from the drift.
Dean looked up on the slope where they had just fired. He couldn’t see anything but low-hanging clouds. Haze and fog drifted across the mountain, completely obscuring it. Visibility on the ground had cleared a little, though, and he could see the loading area of the ski lift, where it wound around and people jumped on.
“How can you know what you’re firing at?” he asked Susan.
“Certain areas are more prone to avalanching than others. We obviously can’t do it by sight right now, so Steve uses the map and adjusts the sights on the howitzer as best he can.”
“You mean he’s guessing.”
She looked away, and he could see that despite her businesslike tone, she was afraid. “Yeah. Basically we are guessing right now.” She gestured toward Hank. “Hank’s been up on the slopes for two days, throwing hand charges. He got caught in a little mini avalanche while he was up there. He managed to swim to the surface as it swept him down the mountain, but he still lost his water, his pack, his compass. He wandered for a bit before he found us again.”
That explained the condition of his lips and face.
Hank and the others repositioned the howitzer and Steve started adjusting the sights again.
Susan tugged at Dean’s sleeve. “You need to get inside now. What does your friend look like?”
“Five-two. Short blonde hair. She’s a ranger.” He added, “If you see her, keep her around a group of people who can watch her.” Dean thought people would be safer in groups. “It’s possible she has concussion. I’m worried she may have passed out somewhere,” he said, giving more weight to his lie.
“Okay. Will do. When we finish here, a couple of us will go inside and look for her.”
Susan gazed out toward the ski lift.
“What happens now?” Dean asked her.
“We wait. See if this triggers a directed avalanche that will release some of the tension down a safe channel. Then some of us might have to go up on the mountain again and throw hand charges.”
“Good luck,” he told her, and started off for the lodge again.
As he passed through the door into the welcome warmth, a man’s voice called from across the room. “Dean?”
He looked up to see Jason standing in front of one of the huge fireplaces.
“Jason!”
“No way! I thought you must have bought it on the mountain!” Jason sauntered toward Dean, clasping his hand warmly.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“Hell, I didn’t mean it like that! It almost got me.”
“Where did you go?”
Jason looked around nervously. “Anyone around?” His face was covered with red exposure wounds, his lips chapped even worse than Hank’s.
“They’re all outside.”
“That thing came in the night. Swooped down and grabbed me before I could even pull my gun.”
Dean noticed torn holes in Jason’s parka, in the same places where the talons had ripped through Sam’s shirt.
“It flew over the trees, bee-lining for some cabin.”
Dean knew now why the blood trail had been perfectly straight.
“That thing dumped me by the door and went straight into the kitchen. It seemed desperate to check something—or maybe it wanted to get a knife and fork.” He laughed a joyless laugh. “Anyway, I took a chance and ran out into the storm. Then I just wandered. Got lost. One of the ski patrol guys