Nature and Science

The engine needs fuel.

Otto glanced down at the dashboard. Sure enough, the gas gauge was in the red.

Small towns had littered the route south, and rest stops along the way had been few and far between. Anxiety had haunted him all day, but there was no escaping the need to gas up. A sign along the side of the road promised a service station several miles up the road and Otto decided that would do.

“Elle?” he said, gently moving the clawed actuator in Elle's lap. “We'll need to pull over soon.”

She stirred, blinking and inhaling, before stretching her arms above her hand and running her nails down the upholstery of the ceiling.

“Why?” she mumbled, looking blearily about her unfamiliar surroundings.

“Gas. Not a bad idea to stretch our legs, hm?”

Elle grunted and yawned, the noise trailing off into an unhappy little growl. She slumped forward for a moment, her hat brushing against the glove compartment and sliding down her back as she rummaged through her purse.

Otto scrunched his nose at the stink of weed but chose not to say anything as Elle straightened up with a rather nice looking black, white, and blue leather wallet. She opened it up to show him the cash stuffed into the bill pocket.

“We're good.”

The gas station was on the same lonely strip as an old motel that had seen better days. A sign with broken fluorescent letters read 'The Red Cardinal Gas and Motel' and, noting its wide open parking lot and lack of any landscaping save for the weeds growing up through cracks in the asphalt, Otto quickly determined it was for truckers and bed bugs.

“Retro,” Elle said, gesturing to the faded 1950s script in the window that, perhaps once upon a time, read 'Restaurant'. “Maybe they still serve food. Maybe it won't kill us. Maybe it will. Either way.”

Pulling up beside a rusted pump with large sign letters reading '87' at the top, Otto had barely eased onto the brakes when Elle opened the door and hopped out of the van. He followed suit, sighing heavily as the pain in his back dissipated for a moment of relief before simply migrating to his shoulders. The tentacles coiled tightly under his jacket, hiding themselves almost entirely from view as Otto reached for the pump handle and flipped open the panel. Practised hands made quick work of the gas cap and Otto leaned against the van as he filled the tank.

Across the lot, by the motel with crumbling brick work and a roof desperately in need of new shingles, a man sat inside the lobby, idle and, if his posture was any indication, possibly even asleep.

“Oy,” Elle surprised him, appearing from behind the van in a cloud of blue smoke, a lit joint in the corner of her mouth. “They do serve food. The lady doesn't speak any English but I think she told me to pick a table when I asked to use the bathroom.”

Otto finished up and replaced the pump, screwing the cap back into place and closing up the panel. He turned to Elle and shrugged with mild interest, his stomach empty for the first time in days. Elle grabbed her purse out of the van after Otto parked it closer to the shop front and, flicking her finished smoke into a sewer grate, they entered the building.

A woman wearing a white blouse, red pants, and a name tag that read 'Carmen' greeted them from behind a counter panelled with fake wood and topped with a block of old vinyl. Behind her was a wall of cigarettes and 'electronic vapes', making Otto squint in curiosity and mild distrust. A fridge, light flickering with neglect, held soda bottles and energy drinks, and a rack with packaged snacks was by a door leading into the restaurant half of the business. Other shelves held liquor bottles and boxes of beer, spaces in between products indicating the convenience store sold more booze than much else.

Elle grabbed a map book off a rotating rack and handed the woman cash. Carmen then led the two to one of four booths in the restaurant attached to the convenience store as the lady followed with a set of menus which she laid down on the chipped and carved tabletop.

“Place is tiny,” Otto mumbled to Elle as he manoeuvred and crammed himself into his seat. He looked up to nod at the woman in gratitude but paused, frowning slightly as he spotted the yellowed bruise on the woman's face before she turned to Elle.

“Drink? Coca-cola?”

“Eh, yeah, uh, dos...cerveza por favor,” Elle said, her tone sliding up to make it sound like she was asking a question. “And, uh... yeah, two cokes? Why not.” Holding up two fingers and looking hopeful, Elle shrugged as the woman nodded and walked away.

“I take it you don't speak Spanish,” Otto said, staring down at the simple menu which was, fortunately, written in English.

“No, but I think 'bacon cheeseburger' is understood everywhere,” Elle replied, not even looking at the menu as she stared out the window across the parking lot.

Otto followed her gaze, finding himself once again looking at the clerk in the motel lobby. A pair of trucks had parked out front of the motel, one looking rusted and well-used.

“What time is it?” Elle asked the air, squinting at the dark sky. “Like...six? Seven?”

A glance around the restaurant revealed a single broken clock on the wall above the kitchen window.

“It's a quarter past eight,” a young girl said, wearing the same white shirt and red pants combo that the older lady was but bearing a brown tray.

The girl had the same wide brown eyes, her jet black hair pulled back into a high ponytail. She wore no name tag and, unlike the other employee, spoke with no trace of a Spanish accent. She was young, barely into her teenage years; Otto suspected she was the daughter of the cashier, working illegally in order to help the family business.

Small town, small dollars, small crimes.

“Oh, thanks,” Elle remarked, smiling broadly as the girl set two bottles of beer down in front of them alongside two red plastic cups of cola.

“Ready?” the girl asked.

They ordered, and Elle downed her beer in the time it took Otto to finish speaking. Another beer was requested, and the girl walked into the kitchen through a swinging door.

“I don't think we'd be welcome, sleeping in the parking lot,” Otto remarked lowly. His eyes, no longer hidden behind his sunglasses that perched upon his crown, once again wandered to the hotel clerk across the parking lot. The other man was now watching them.

“Should we...book a room? I mean, this place isn't actually dirty once you get inside.” To prove her point, Elle held up her soda cup, turning it from side to side to show there was nothing suspect about it. “Might not be so bad?”

Otto grunted, his upper lip curling back in mild distrust at the prospect of a comfortable rest.

“If they take cash, I'm not adverse to it,” Elle added. “We're by the highway but we can park behind the gas station so the van isn't visible to anyone driving by. I can sleep on the floor, anyway; you can feed the local bed bugs.”

The girl returned with two plates of food, mostly french fries crammed next to their burgers. She set Elle's beer down and began to turn away when she spotted something near the entrance and froze.

The store bell chimed and a group of three men entered the restaurant. Laughing and speaking far louder than necessary, they ignored Carmen at her counter and took up one of the booths near the emergency exit across the small dining room. Behind them, Carmen hurried with a tray of beers, stopping only to hastily shoo the girl back into the kitchen. One of the men paused his laughter to leer at the girl as she scooted behind the door, only to immediately turn back to his companions.

“Oh, ew,” Elle muttered to herself. Otto was inclined to agree, gripping his coke a little tighter.

“Guess not everything is as clean as you thought,” he growled quietly.

Elle rolled her eyes at him but dug into her food.

“Oho, man, I wish I had a woman that would do that to me!”

Elle looked up at the man's voice, confused at first before her face darkened into an unimpressed scowl. The man made a slurping noise towards her, prompting guttural guffaws from his companions.

“Ignore them,” Otto cautioned her, not wanting to draw attention to them. The last thing they needed was to show up on the news because Elle had eaten someone instead of her burger.

To her credit, Otto thought, Elle remained perfectly calm. She merely carried on eating, taking gulps of her soda and beer in between bites. Every few minutes, one of the men wold turn and whistle, or simply look at her whilst licking their lips.

“That's enough,” Otto loudly snapped after a particularly dirty remark concerning Elle's mouth and what she could use it for, thoroughly disgusted with how unpleasant their dinner had become. He turned towards the men, glaring heatedly while they merely chuckled among themselves.

Elle reached across the table, placing a hand gently on his arm. She shook her head, barely lifting her eyes off her plate.

“Easy, gramps.” One of the men, sporting curly red hair and a camouflage patterned jacket, sneered at him. “We're just bored of your mother's dentures slicing us up!”

“I could break them in half. In one go,” Otto grumbled sidelong to Elle, who merely shrugged.

“I know,” Elle softly said. “So could I. But talk is cheap, so let them run their mouths.”

She pushed her empty plate away and immediately turned her head towards the men.

Then, she stared.

Otto watched for a few minutes, wondering if Elle had some sort of hidden ability that enabled her to not need to blink. Her eyes, unbelievably blue, never wavered, never shut, never moved.

He wasn't the only one who noticed.

The trio at the other table shifted uncomfortably, their cat calls petering off into uncomfortable silence. After nearly ten minutes, one of them turned towards her.

“Fuck off, already! We were just joking around.”

Still, Elle stared.

Eventually, the men decided they'd rather leave than be so unsettled. Without asking for the bill or putting any money on the table, they got up and left their mess of empty bottles and untucked chairs behind.

“You're like a border collie.”

The girl from before had reappeared, causing Otto to jump in his seat. She was looking at Elle with a mixture of amusement and admiration. She plunked a fresh beer down in front of the woman.

“Men are just dumb sheep, for the most part,” Elle explained, brushing imaginary dust off her coat. “Once they know you're not intimidated by them, they either get angry or get scared. Simple creatures, really.”

“I was never like that,” Otto protested, unable to help himself from grinning. “I did my homework and recited poetry to my girl.”

“Well, aren't you a breath of fresh air,” Elle teased, offering him a wink.

“Those are Paul's friends. My mom's baby daddy, I mean. He's an ass. Obviously his friends are sus, too.”

“Tch. You got to get yourself a better job the moment you legal and g-t-f out that door.”

“What?” Otto asked. “What does 'g-t-f' mean?”

“Finna, but my mom totes simps for him, even had his covid-baby, and I don't trust him to take care of them. No cap, life's a bitch and so is Paul.”

“Word,” Elle grunted.

Otto squinted at them both.

“He's the douchebag at the motel. If you have to stay there, my mom and I keep it clean and running otherwise he'd let the roaches take over the place. Some truckers are nice and all but most are pretty ratchet and wouldn't bat an eye at setting the carpet on fire just because they can.” The girl paused, wincing. “Sorry, spilled too much much tea.”

“All Gucci. A little shade is good for your vibes.”

“What is happening?” Otto blurted out.

Elle looked at him quizzically. Her eyes widened as a wide smile stretched over her face.

“Oh my god, I'm dead! You missed like...twenty years of memes and internet culture.”

She turned to the young girl and, through a snort of laughter, held her hand out in front of her as though showing the other something.

“He's so old when he looks at memes, he looks like a confused Winnie the Pooh!”

She proceeded to mimic pushing glasses down her nose and squinted at an invisible object in her hand. Both girls giggled, the younger only turning away when her mother called to her.

“Kay, let me know if you need anything else. My name's Maria, by the way. Just give me a shout!”

“Just...the cheque, please,” Otto grumbled, unsure why he felt embarrassed.

He had missed twenty years of culture, pop or other. What scientific discoveries and technological advancements had been made while he was “dead”? Who had come and gone, where had humanity been to since?

“Okay, so, wish I still had my phone but since they're basically trackers I couldn't take the chance. Buckle up, Doc. I'm a Millennial and I have a lot to complain about...”

Otto had a feeling he was about to find out more than he was prepared for.

Three empty beer bottles on the table and Otto was still shocked.

“The Queen actually died?!”

“Yeah.” Elle frowned at him. “Sorry, dude, didn't know you'd be upset about it.”

“I'm not, I just...didn't think she could.”

Both shared a quiet laugh as Elle pulled out some cash and laid it on top of the bill. They both stared at it, Otto noticing how generously Elle had tipped, before he leaned as far back as he could comfortably manage and looked out the window towards the motel.

“Do we...want to stay with Paul the douchebag?”

“I can sleep on a pad of muskeg in a swamp, Doc. Honestly, it's...probably no more dangerous to stay here than in the van on some deserted road.”

“Well then,” Otto sighed, glancing towards the convenience store. “Mind spotting me a twenty for a pack of cigarettes? In case we have to smoke the bugs out. Also, learning how we've gone from cats wanting cheeseburgers to 'tick tock' is just a lot for me, right now.”

“Aha!” Elle proclaimed as she scooted out of the booth. “A vice! A very vile vice! Stinky man.”

He didn't know if it was her way of being endearing, but she obliged and let him pick out his brand. Adding a bottle of bourbon to their purchase, Elle bid thanks to Carmen and they strolled across the parking lot, Otto having a cigarette.

“Well, at least we'll not have any mites,” Elle chuckled.

“Does it bother you?” Otto asked, waving at the smoke with his hands.

“Yes, and no. I smell things far harder than any human. A lot better, or worse. But I've worked my whole life, and I've learned to live with it. You didn't complain about my smoke, so, enjoy yours, Doc.”

The lobby of the motel wasn't as kempt as the restaurant. The striped red and white paint was peeling from the walls, a potted plant in the corner sat sadly wilting and, coming from where the ceiling bore brown stains of water seepage, the entire room smelled damp.

The man at the counter smelt even worse; chemical smoke, mildew, and sweat emanated off of him like waves. His pressed red shirt bore a name tag reading 'Paul'. He eyed them up and down while nonchalantly smoking his own cigarette regardless of the closed windows. An open door off to the side of the counter he sat behind showed a darkened passage lit by the sad blue glow of a television; somewhere beyond the light's reach, a baby was crying. It wasn't the soft whimper of a child waking from sleep but rather a strong and loud wail of a babe who had been forgotten and needed attention.

Otto felt Elle bristle. She turned to him, shoved the wallet in his jacket pocket, and left to go sit in the van.

“Yeah?” the man, Paul, addressed Otto in a gruff manner as though his customer were an inconvenience to him.

One room? Two rooms? One room, two beds, maybe. Is this slob of a man smart enough to be suspicious or will he notice us as much as he notices a crying baby?

“I'd like a room for the night, please.”

Paul snorted.

“Yeah. That's why you're here.”

He reached behind him to the wall where a key rack was hung. Out of the six hooks, three were empty, and he picked a key with a numbered plastic tag.

“Six. On the end. Fill that out,” he said, nodding towards a clipboard on the counter.

Otto filled the form out, using a fake name.

“How much?”

“One twenty-five.” Paul leaned forward, his lips stretching back into an ugly grin. “Tell that one that I'll have some more business for her when she's done with you.”

The wretchedly casual remark dropped Otto's jaw slack and he stared at the other man, completely dumbfounded. Paul merely shrugged, leaning back in his chair and smirking haughtily.

“Ain't judging, old timer.”

“That's-” Otto started. Angrily, he flung the cash across the counter, bills fluttering down as the other man's seedy expression turned sour. “-my daughter!”

The words were barely out of his mouth and Otto felt the oil of a terrible lie coat his tongue. He wasn't particularly good at lying, never had to be. A few untruths had been spoken between threats when the actuators had been in control as he rebuilt his fusion reactor, but that had been different; anger and desperation that combined with artificial determination, making it easy. This time, however, it was out of indignation and a sense of owed protectiveness, and it had fallen so flat that even Paul gave him a sympathetic, if smarmy, look.

“Sure, sure, pal. Just like the waitress is mine.”

Otto snatched the key out of Paul's hand and stomped out of the office, making sure to open the door with far more force than necessary. He made his way to the van, fumbling with a fresh cigarette only to realize Elle had the lighter.

“Trash,” Otto barked as he flung the passenger door open.

“Yeah, I got that feeling, too,” Elle replied. “Some small towns are smaller than others.”

There motel wasn't actually part of a small town but a glorified truck stop, but Otto didn't feel like arguing; he understood what she was implying. A feeling of pity for the young girl working in the restaurant and her mother sunk his anger but Otto still shouldered their motel room door open with too much force, prompting Elle, following behind him, to pass him her lighter so that he could light his cigarette.

The sound of metal and flint scraping proceeded the soft orange glow of flame. Otto's face lit up from below, his features surrounded by grey and white smoke as he passed Elle back her lighter.

“I presume you...sleep on your side?”

Otto looked up from the doorway, Elle squeezing past him into the dark room. He slid his hand along the wall until he found the light switch, flicking it and barely flinching against the dim light the ceiling fixture gave off.

Elle was already in the middle of the room, her eyes narrowed and sniffing at everything. She opened the closet with such swiftness, Otto did not doubt she would have gotten the drop on anyone she suspected of hiding within. Finding nothing, she made her way over to the double mattress, dragging it up to look over the box spring. She inhaled, deeply, and dropped the mattress back down.

“No bedbugs. No dead hookers, either. That's two points better than what I expected.”

The entire room looked like it had stepped out of the 70s, with fake wood panelling the walls where yellowing wallpaper hadn't been laid over. The one dresser in the room was chipped and scratched, its sharp edges looking unkind to anyone not paying attention.

Closing the door behind him, Otto twisted the deadbolt and latched the chain lock. He pocketed the van and room keys, removing his jacket and laying it over the wicker chair that had been tucked away by the closet. Slowly, stiff from having been seated all day, he took his boots off, curling each leg and bringing his foot to rest on his knee as he undid the laces while leaning against the back of the heavy door.

The carpet felt stiff and wiry, but he didn't feel any grime or crumbs despite the numerous stains that dotted the already garish pattern. As Elle minded herself in the bathroom, Otto lowered himself onto the bed, barely hearing the creaking of the old springs beneath him as the mattress sunk beneath his weight. The tentacles uncurled and helped lower him while turning him onto his side, then front, and he buried his face into a thin pillow. A small groan of comfort escaped him and he determined he likely wasn't getting up any time soon.

“Oy,” Elle's voice came after the sound of a toilet flushing an a faucet running. “You should...probably have a shower. Been a while since I pulled you out of the river.”

Otto groaned again, this time in annoyance. He refused to move, but the sudden onset of being able to feel how greasy he was made him roll to the edge of the bed and eventually sit back up.

“Where're the keys to the van? I want my duffel bag,” Elle asked, already rummaging through his coat pockets. She pulled out the arc reactor, gave it an unimpressed look, and put it back with a grunt.

“Just...in there somewhere,” Otto answered, fatigue adding an irritated edge to his voice.

“Ahah!”

A metallic jingling sound announced Elle's hunt was over.

“I'm grabbing my guns, too. Want them in here with me where they'll be useful.”

A disinterested shrug was all that was offered; too tired for a proper response, Otto thought about waving her off but opted to save his strength for standing up. As Elle left the hotel room, leaving the door open behind her, he made his way to the bathroom, stripped his clothes off, and stood in the tub with the curtain barely drawn.

The water was freezing at first, and tiny bumps quickly covered his shivering skin. The cold, however, woke him up just enough to put effort into his task. As the temperature finally rose, the metal arms began to alert him to their limited visual feeds, misted with steam. There was no pondering if the water would damage the CPU or the arms in any way when their resistance had already proven effective in the past. Looking down at where the harness met and tangled with his skin, Otto reminded himself that electricity was far more frightening a force.

He was littered with scars and bruises, the fight from the previous night further marring the canvas of his hide. As a reminder, the tasers had left red patches of burnt skin, surrounded by bruises from where he had been struck, dragged, and thrown about like a ragdoll. Where Dillon had used harsh static to shove him out of the window at the condo, faint bruises still remained to remind him of the Goblin's treachery, and the consequences of him not seeing it soon enough. Most ugly of all, the Lichtenberg marks wrought by his own failed fusion experiment streaked away from the metal belt, forking across his stomach and wrapping around his back. Through a foggy camera in the head of a tentacle, he could see the smooth scars that stretched up along the metal spine that reinforced his own.

Every single one was a reminder of his failings. He cranked the hot water up, furious that he simply could not wash the memories away.

It is too warm, one arm warned him.

Father will burn.

Let me burn, then, he thought. Leaning his forehead against the wall, he took a deep comfort in the stinging pain that washed over him and contrasted with the cold tiles.

His fists clenched as he scolded himself. Fooled by his own mind returning to him, Otto had trusted Norman to maintain control of himself; naturally, that would have failed. Norman had lost control of his marriage, his company, and even his own serum. Of course he would have been a danger to everyone, Otto scolded himself. Same thing with Dillon; he had come to power by mere accident, a small man of small mind, wanting only to use and abuse his power while failing to comprehend it was not free of consequences.

Himself. Arrogant, too confident to check his work again, to reconsider any of his ideas or available options. It had cost him his freedom from the AIs, cost him his Rosie. Now, with the T.M.H, it robbed him again.

A white light flickered at him, nudging his shoulder hard for his attention. Otto growled, looking up and finally turning the hot water down when he could barely see the claw through the steam.

Hurry.

It barely seemed like his own thought, whispered from so far away and hardly perceivable.

“Why?” he asked, already picking up his pace as he washed his hair with the watery motel shampoo.

The red light, hovering in the mist, snuck around the shower curtain and outside the bathroom. It stayed, acclimatizing to the cool air until it defogged. Then, with Otto's vision outside his eyes, it showed him the door to the room, still ajar from when Elle had left.

She's not back yet.

He turned the water off, grabbing a towel as his arms lifted him effortlessly out of the tub.

“Has she come back at all?”

A negative waggle from Harry.

“How long has she been gone?” he asked, and the arms' sensors answered.

Twenty three minutes.

“Damn it,” Otto swore, drying his hair while simultaneously trying to pull his pants up. He swung a tentacle forward, snatching up the towel and leaving his hands free to swing his jacket around his shoulders. Jamming his feet into his boots, he lengthened the metal arm to stretch back and hang the damp towel in the bathroom before he darted outside, calling for Elle.

He swung the tentacles around, each claw whipping about in a low circle, searching for a scrap of her presence. Noticing the van's back doors were open, he rounded the vehicle to find her half-open duffel bag on the ground surrounded by clothes strewn carelessly about. A claw lifted her hat, almost hidden beneath the van, into Otto's hands.

“Find her,” Otto ordered, and each arm took on a separate task; one scanned the parking lot with its thermal heat sensor while another used its regular camera to search around the vehicles. The third arm searched the van for any other signs of what may have happened.

A tentacle suddenly reeled in and angled towards a door along the strip of motel rooms, the claws opening as they prepared their joints. Faint heat signatures indicated several people occupying the room behind the walls. Its siblings joined it as Otto marched forward, oblivious to the red glow of each light.

He got about half way down the walk when something hit the window of the room. It fell, dragging the blinds down as it collapsed beneath Otto's line of sight. He quickened his pace when-

-the door burst open from the inside, and a man spilled out, screaming in terror.

Otto recognized him from the restaurant, and began to reach out with a metal arm-

Elle stepped out of the room, hoisting another man into the air with her claws dug into his stomach. Part of the man's chest and his shoulder had been torn from him, spurting rivulets of blood across the angry beast. From the ribbons of flesh clenched between Elle's jaws, blood dribbled down and soaked her stained fur, clumping mats together with sticky red.

Otto, startled, immediately backed away several steps until he stumbled.

Elle hurled the corpse at the first man, who collapsed onto the pavement with the audible thud of his former companion slamming into him. Snarling, she launched herself onto the two bodies. Bones audibly broke beneath her weight and the unfortunate man on the bottom of the pile began to scream in a feral pitch. With both claws and teeth, Elle tore into them, ripping through tendons and flaying flesh from bone.

No sooner had Otto registered the sound of a woman screaming did his actuators indicate the presence of two others witness to the horrifying scene.

From the motel office, both Paul and Carmen gaped at the gory display. Carmen drew a deep breath before launching into another scream, backing away from the desk and into the back room. Paul followed her, banging on the door she had managed to both close and lock behind her, but his yelling did nothing to enable his escape.

Otto watched as Paul turned around and locked eyes with him. Immediately, both men made mad dashes, Paul to the landline phone on the desk, Otto's tentacle speeding across the lot and into the lobby through a pane of glass before slamming the phone base into the wall. The clerk, his entire body shaking, dropped the useless handset as the serpentine arm wrapped around him and dragged him towards the other man.

“Stop screaming,” Otto ordered, annoyed at having not been a day out from the cabin and already finding trouble. He squeezed a little harder than he needed to keep Paul still in his grasp; the clerk wheezed, and, pleading for Otto to let him go, began to sob.

“What happened?” Otto growled, raising himself onto his bottom tentacles to approach Elle. He glared from the mess of blood and torn limbs to Elle, who rose onto her hind legs to meet his face. “We're trying to stay quiet, hide, Elle. Not make such a damned mess!”

“They tried to accost me,” she explained, then gestured towards the motel room door, barely clinging to its hinges. “Third one is dead in the bathroom. I'm gunna go eat him.”

“And what am I supposed to do with this?” Otto, his voice slowly raising, demanded, holding up Paul.

Elle stared at him.

“He's rude, but he didn't try to attack you!”

She continued to stare at him, her eyes, impossibly blue, boring into him.

“No!” Otto yelped. “No. Don't try that on me!”

“Well, you can't let him go,” Elle sighed and rolled her eyes. “We can't trust him to not call the cops the moment we do. I'll just...have to eat him too, I guess.”

“How many people can you eat in one sitting?” Otto quietly asked, trying not to let his genuine curiosity bleed into his voice. “Be serious. How about we just...tie him up and stash him in a shed. Buy ourselves some time, and nobody has to be killed. We're not monsters, Elle.”

Elle squinted at him, her lip curled up as she thought. She pointed a scythe-like claw at him.

“Are you...making fun of me?”

“No,” Otto sighed, lowering himself to the ground. “Let's just not make it easy for those who may be interested in following our trail. The woman ran back inside, and is no doubt calling the authorities as we speak; if we leave now-” Otto paused to look pointedly at the clerk still writhing in his tentacle's grip, “-then nobody else needs to die.”

“That's not true,” Elle said, her tone level. Her face, slathered in blood, remained coldly stoic.

“Wait!” Paul pleaded, all but screaming to catch their attention. “Wait, please! I-I won't tell anyone! I swear! Don't kill me! My w-wife, she doesn't have a cell phone, just the office phone, so she can't anyone for help!”

“It's 2022 and your wife doesn't have a cell?” Elle snorted, her brows shooting up and ears swivelling around. Baffled, the beast prodded at the man wrapped in Otto's tightly coiled tentacles.

“She doesn't speak any English! Wh-who would she call?” Paul, through tears and a dribbling nose, tried to reason with the werewolf, who's face fell flat at the answer.

“Her family?” Elle replied, clearly unimpressed. She trotted back to the hotel room, making to duck beneath the door frame. “Anyways, I still want to eat this last guy.”

“Elle!” Otto snapped, launching a metal arm forward to block her path. The wolf turned with curled lips, her teeth bared at him in annoyance.

“We can't...just kill people,” Otto continued, sighing in defeat.

“Yes we most certainly can!” Elle growled. “No witnesses, no problems. Trust me, my dude, this is for the best.”

“Wait, please!” Paul began sobbing again. “Please don't kill me! I'll tell everyone Edgar did it! I-I-I'll tell the cops he was on another meth bender! I swear! I'll tell the police he killed the others! Please, don't kill me!”

Otto looked at Elle, his patience thinning like the droplets of blood than drizzled down her matting fur. Elle sighed, throwing her paws into the air and waving Otto off like an errant insect.

“Do what you want! Never known a boomer to listen to me, anyway!” she groaned, gnashing her teeth in frustration.

Otto began to lower Paul to the ground, the man's broken cries becoming desperate choking noises as he realized he was being freed.

“Thank-you,” Paul began to repeat, over and over, pushing the metal tentacle away as Otto uncoiled and retracted it. “I swear, I won't tell anyone, I swear, th-thank-k you, thank-you...”

The clerk stumbled back, desperate to lift himself from the bloodied asphalt, but the metal arm cut off his path, the claw clacking its pincers menacingly at him.

Otto raised his index to his lips, hushing Paul and chastising him with a waggling finger.

“We'll know,” Otto warned. Paul nodded, burst into a fresh round of sobs, and scrambled from the concrete. He turned and began to flee to the comfort of his broken shelter.

“He'll squeal,” Elle muttered, crossing her arms over her wide chest and pouting. Her tongue, long and pink, darted from her maw and circled about her face, smearing and drawing blood from her fur and whiskers. “I'll just go clean up the room, then. No sense in letting dinner go to waste.”

Otto whirled about and struck out with the same claw that had menaced Paul. It clamped shut around her muzzle, forcing her head to twist towards him. The other two arms lifted him up so he could look her in the eyes, and he found a minute sense of satisfaction shaking her head in every direction as he began scolding her.

“You know the meaning of a rolled up newspaper?” Otto snapped at her, and his arm answered for her by moving her head side to side. “You pull something like that again and you will. You could have simply beat the crap out of them! Yelled for help!”

Elle grabbed onto the claw, scrambling to find purchase with her claws. Her tail curled against her stomach, her low growls becoming high-pitched with alarm. Otto shook her some more, grinding his teeth as he carried on.

“Parting way isn't a good idea for either of us, yet, but if you try anything like that again, if I find I can't trust you, I'll put you down like a damned dog!”

From the corner of his eyes, Otto thought he glimpsed red light reflecting off the blood. Elle's face glowed a soft scarlet around where the actuator had hold of her, and the AIs told him, whispering, to crush her skull.

Papa?

The upper left, Harry; its voice was suddenly loud, speaking as clearly as a person standing beside him.

“No,” Otto growled, his anger directed towards the arms. “Drop her. She gets the point.”

Elle collapsed backwards, pawing at her face and gnashing her teeth at him in warning should he decide to approach her again.

“Okay, boomer, she growled, glaring heatedly at him. “When's the last time anyone used a freakin' newspaper anyway...”

Regardless of her sass, Otto watched her tail stay tucked as she backed away from him.

“Look,” he began with a pointed sigh, gesturing between them with his hands, “We can't make ourselves obvious. The...the blood stains alone, never mind the missing persons, are going to raise questions. If we attract the attention of the police, I'm not particularly worried about any investigations, but...the T.M.H may follow up on strange stories in the news. We've been weaving in and out of the back roads all day; it'd be a waste to have fled this far to just...to just...”

Elle was looking beyond him, her eyes widening as she raised a claw to point.

He followed Elle's gaze, turning to squint across the parking lot into the motel lobby. Through the flickering fluorescent lights, Otto watched as Paul fumbled around through a drawer, finding something and darting to the door his wife had locked on him.

“What does he have?” Otto growled.

“That's a cell phone,” Elle answered, not bothering to hide her smirk as she rolled her eyes to rest on Otto.

Otto began to move forward, keen to drag Paul out of the motel and let Elle gloat over her prophecy come true. Impatiently, and somewhat prompted by Elle's smug look, Otto shot a tentacle out, the metal joints clattering loudly across the pavement. The clerk looked up, his eyes widening in terror before he began to furiously scream and beg, using the cell phone in his hand to pound on the door even harder than his previous attempts.

Otto's breath caught as the door swung open, and Paul began to triumphantly try to bully his way past the threshold, only for somebody to force him back. The man stumbled, and immediately crawled backwards.

The tentacle's video feed, hovering just outside the lobby, zoomed in to allow Otto to see what had happened.

The girl from the restaurant stood in the doorway pointing a shotgun right at Paul. She backed him out into the parking lot, speaking to him in a level tone. It was hard to hear her, but Otto found himself made wary of Maria's even, controlled manner of speaking to her stepfather.

“Every day since you came into our lives, you've been a monster. What you've done to my mother...what you've done to me-”

Her face was a mask of pure vehemence, unwavering eyes locked onto the man as she set the gun against her shoulder.

“-is over. Your horrible friends got what they deserved. Now it's your turn.”

“No! Wait-!”

A blast rang out, pinning Elle's ears flat against her skull and causing Otto to freeze in place until his heart rate slowed again. Paul immediately collapsed to the ground, blood quickly beginning to pool around him. He gurgled once, reaching forward as though to grab at the gun now hovering inches from his face. Then, his head lolled to the side, his arm dropped, and he was unmistakably dead.

There was silence. The air was thick with the smell of gun powder, blood, and fear.

Trembling, the girl looked over towards Otto and Elle. Otto swung his tentacle out, placing it between himself and the gun-wielding teenager. Padding quietly to his side, Elle put a giant paw on his shoulder, gave him a single pat, and slowly approached the girl.

“Are you...going to be okay?” Elle asked, taking each step with dainty precision.

Maria stared at her before looking back down at the body. She dropped the shotgun, looking from the weapon to her hands, her entire body shaking.

“I...”

“There, now,” Elle mumbled, drawing ever closer. “You're safe. You're not in any trouble. You did what you had to do.”

Tears began to run down the girl's face, her breathing coming in heavy, panicked gasps.

“What have I...oh god, what have I done...”

“You protected yourself,” Elle said, swatting away Otto's actuator and pulling the girl close to her. “You protected your family. That takes a lot of strength. Your fear, that's not needed. Take a deep breath. Here, hold my paw. Take a deep breath...and hold it for a few seconds, that's it, and then we're going to let it out...there...let's do that again...and again...”

Despite being spoken to by a giant wolf beast, Maria accepted the paw and Otto watched Elle console her with a frightfully focused ease. Her blood-soaked pelt never once brushed against the girl, Elle giving her a heavy arm to hold onto and bury her face in when breathing could not stop a hysterical cry from escaping. Speaking softly, holding her, and telling the girl over and over that she had done nothing wrong, Elle let the child cling to her even as Maria pulled out clumps of fur.

Otto felt his gut twisting with both a heavy regret and horror at the scene that had transpired.

Four people were dead and it was their first night out of the cabin. The girl's mother, Carmen, was going to call the police the first chance she got, and why shouldn't she when her husband was murdered on their doorstep...

“Elle,” Otto gasped, realizing that he had been holding his breath. “Elle, we need to leave. We need to-”

“Hush,” Elle said, turning her eyes from the girl to him. “I'll take care this.”

With clenched jaw, all of Otto's arms began windmilling about, first gesturing to Paul on the ground, still oozing blood, to the two bodies across the parking lot, to Elle's blood-stained bestial visage.

“How?!” Otto asked, unable to control his volume. “How can this disaster be 'taken care of', Elle?”

“Young Maria and I are going to calm ourselves down, and when we're able to talk, we'll think of something.”

“This is ridiculous. Elle, we need to just leave!”

Elle turned her massive head towards him, her eyes narrowing slightly before she sighed.

“Otto, go to the room. Close the door. I'll come get you if we need help.”

Again, Otto's arms pointed and hovered over each aspect of how there was no way the situation could be remedied. Elle simply ignored him, soothing Maria with warm fur and deep breaths. Furious, frustrated, and highly alarmed, Otto stormed back to the room and slammed the door behind him.

“Absolutely insane,” he said, whirling about the motel room and wondering where to begin. “That...bitch is absolutely insane!”

A clawed head swung to look at him, its pincers quickly rotating in a counter clockwise direction.

“Literally, figuratively,” Otto growled, waving it away. “She's destroyed any chance of secrecy we had. I think she wants to be found! That's the only reason she...”

He thought of her bag, abandoned by the van with its contents scattered around. She said the men had tried to accost her.

“No, no, she didn't go looking for a fight,” he warned himself, stretching and wiggling his fingers as he tried to think through the angry haze that clouded his mind. “...but she still did it anyway?! She could have just...yelled for me!”

Maybe she had, he realized. Maybe she had and the sounds of the shower, of his own thoughts, made him deaf to her.

Four voices spoke as one.

We detected no noises of alarm from Elle.

“Then again, if I was a ten foot tall literal werewolf, I suppose...I wouldn't really cry for help, either.”

Otto sat down on the edge of the bed, his head falling into his hand as he propped his elbow upon his knee. He could barely think through his exhaustion; the excitement of the evening, driving all day, and a heavy dinner had made him sluggish and weary. He thought about getting back up, leaving the door open so he could spy on the wretched beast that was his travel companion, but he found himself staring at the wall.

“She's insane,” Otto concluded. “She's just...an animal! An unpredictable, wild animal. Damn it all...”

A clawed head peered down at him through barely parted prongs. Otto reached up to it, running the pad of his thumb along the shallow gouges Elle's own claws had made. The light had glowed white then but, Otto remembered, his temper had overtaken him and the red light had returned.

The AI had been able to influence him again.

He squinted, running his hand over the actuator as though petting nothing more than a lazy house cat, wondering how, with the new inhibitor chip, it had happened not once but twice since returning to his universe.

The AI had learned, he realized; it was adapting and learning, as it was supposed to do. It had manipulated him before, when his experiment had first failed and his Spider-Man had battled him over the preservation of New York City, but the inhibitor chip stopped it from taking over his mind. With lessons already learned and his temper having grown thin, and perhaps having gotten a sliver of taste for the power he wielded, the AI wasn't manipulating but acting within the realms of his influence, enhancing his negative emotions in order to get him what he wanted.

“A theory,” he mumbled to himself, “Nothing more. But a disturbing one that, ultimately...makes sense, provided one is familiar with your programming...”

The claw opened slightly more, tilting and rotating its head at him in curiosity.

We anticipated Father's needs based on real-time context.

We acted according to Father's secondary awareness.

Are you pleased, Papa?

“Of course,” Otto answered the voices, thoughts in his head echoing his own. They were him, physically, mentally, and such extensions would react accordingly to the more shadowy side of his mind.

“I should probably apologize for grabbing her like that,” Otto grumbled bitterly. “But...she should not have murdered everyone.”

He held the claw in his hands, stilling its serpentine swaying.

“I suppose we're even. Still. A conversation might be necessary... Well. We'll see how this transpires.”

Otto awoke with a start, immediately noticing how pained and stiff his neck was from having fallen asleep sitting upright while waiting for Elle to return. Slouched forward, he barely managed turning his head to watch Elle drop her duffel bag onto the chair and, naked, stroll leisurely into the bathroom with the now half-empty bottle of bourbon in her hand.

The shower started up and Otto used his arms to shuffle back on the bed and ease himself onto his side.

“What...time is it?”

Five thirty-seven in the morning.

“What?” His eyes, already beginning to close again, snapped open. “We need to leave,” Otto said, hoisting himself up on his tentacles.

“It's fine,” Elle said from the doorway of the bathroom. Leaning against the frame, she offered him a shrug. “I took care of everything. Maria isn't going to rat us out to anyone; if we go down, so does she, and that kid has ambitions for her future so...” Another nonchalant shrug. “...it's all good.”

“What...happened?” Otto reluctantly asked, seeing the wet red stains spread across the entirety of Elle's body.

“Well, I ate most of the evidence...and Maria and I bleached the fuck outta everything else. And vacuumed. Her mom's got a steam-cleaner; real handy. I tore up some of the carpet in the fellas' room and we burnt it, tossed the ashes down the gutter; Maria says there's some spare in storage for just such a messy occasion. If anyone asks before she fixes it, she can just say the carpet got fucked again by another trucker.”

“And their vehicles? What about them?” Otto hastily asked, searching for loose ends that could ruin them.

“I drove the trucks down the road and into the woods, and spread their drugs out everywhere. Oh!” Elle gave him a sly smile, showing teeth as rouge as her body. “They had a lot of drugs. So much meth. Like, so much. And coke, too! If anyone finds their trucks, it'll be like they went out there for a bender, got lost in the woods, and they'll wind up on Buzzfeed Unsolved or some other YouTube channel that spreads the lore of the lost. It's fine. Everything is fine, now.”

“Buzz...what now?”

Elle allowed herself a single, breathy laugh. She smiled at him, far too gently for someone who had recently eaten four human beings.

“Go back to sleep, Otto. We'll head out in a few more hours. I want to clean myself up and get a cat nap in, if I can.”

“What about the guy's wife? Maria's mother?” Otto asked, wincing as he recalled the woman's screaming face at the sight of Elle hoisting a mauled corpse into the air.

“Maria said her mother is a drinker. Don't blame her, being married to that asshole, but it's... it's not unusual for her to mix booze and her pills after Paul would beat her up. A nightmare, some gas lighting. Oh, and dependable racism! Because, you know, who would actually believe a Mexican immigrant that doesn't speak a lick of English claim she saw a werewolf maul someone at her motel?”

Elle rolled her eyes, chuckling softly as she backed into the washroom.

“If she says anything, she'll be risking losing her littlest to Child Services. As far as anyone will ever know, ol' Paul and the boys went on a bender one night and just disappeared in the woods. Never to be seen again.”

The door clicked shut and Otto was left alone to ponder the plausibility of anyone falling for the ruse, should someone even come looking for the sleazy deceased. A thought struck him that simultaneously impressed and disturbed him, based on a simple recollection of something Elle had once said during those first few days together in the woods.

“Most people in the city that carry a piece have a handgun, and they aren’t aiming at deer and squirrels.”

“I’m not a redneck, you know. I have as many as I need. One for big game, one for small. They both make a good show for anyone who comes trespassing on my territory.”

“I think your teeth would do just as well.

“Usually.”

“Usually,” he repeated her, swallowing the instinctive disgust that accompanied the realization that she may have done things like this before.

How many people had Elle killed simply for crossing her? For trespassing? For...for what had happened to her in the past?

Otto closed his eyes and listened to the shower water run, washing away the blood of her feral savagery, and he thought of the girl from the restaurant. She was no beast, but...neither was he, and he had done terrible things to get what he wanted. As recently as mere hours prior, his temper had influenced the actuators to be far more aggressive with Elle than was reasonably necessary.

They were not monsters, he had told Elle about themselves, and while he had sincerely not been teasing her, Otto wondered if he had been lying to himself. Perhaps, he mused as his tentacles turned him to be more comfortable on his side, some monsters could simply be trusted more than others.