Read Online Hyenas by Michael Sellars - Free Book Online

away,
pulling his scarf up over his mouth and nose. There was no real smell of decay
— it was far too cold for that — but there was an insistent sour tang that wormed its way down the
back of his throat.
    “Okay, okay,” he said. Another dry retch. “Just get
some food and fuck off.”
    He scuttled around the body to a counter on the far
side of the kitchen, with cupboards above and below. He stood his backpack on
the counter and went through the cupboards as quickly as possible, just letting
anything he didn’t want fall to the floor and feeling, despite everything, like
a lawbreaker about to be caught in the act. He grabbed crisps, a bag of
sultanas, a packet of Rich Tea biscuits, bread sticks, a couple of tins of
peaches and a jar of Marmite, stuffing them all into his backpack. Once it was
full, he shouldered the pack and turned to the door.
    The hyena, face and hands still bloody from its
encounter with the plate glass window, was crouched at the threshold grinning,
and Jay realised he’d left the knife on the counter behind him.

 
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 9
     
    Still grinning, the hyena hopped forward, for all the
world acting like a child pretending to be a frog. It didn’t take its eyes off
Jay for a second. It didn’t even blink.
    Jay shuffled backwards, toward the counter and the
knife. The hyena hopped forward until it was an inch away from the jawless
corpse. It looked at the dead man, looked at Jay then barked laughter.
    “Look,” said Jay, holding his hands up, palms out,
like someone confronted by a mugger, someone confronted by a more rational
stripe of violence. “Look, just, I don’t know, just, you know, don’t.”
    As he spoke, the hyena’s eyes darted about, seeming to
follow something that was moving around Jay’s head, a fly perhaps, though Jay
could hear no such thing. Or maybe it was simply fascinated by Jay’s breath as
it condensed in the cold air around him, a brief, crumbling white lace.
Abruptly, it lost interest in water vapour or the flight of the silent
whatever-it-was and leapt.
    It struck Jay headfirst in the stomach. Winded, Jay
staggered back until he felt the counter against his spine. He reached behind
him, patting the worktop, in search of the knife but finding only crumbs and
grease. The hyena, back on all fours now, displayed scaly teeth, and launched
itself at Jay once more. Jay tried to sidestep the attack but his feet slid in
a puddle of what looked like Branston Pickle and he hardly moved at all. The
hyena’s shoulder slammed into Jay’s chest and his back arched until his head
struck the cupboards above. The hyena hopped back a step then clawed at him
with bloodied hands. Jay raised his arms to fend off the assault and heard his
coat tear as long nails raked into the fabric. He kicked out at the hyena but
twice it leapt back, avoiding the blow, then lunged forward again and renewed
its attack. On the third attempt, the heel of his boot connected with the
hyena’s knee and it let out a yelp of pain and scuttled back a few feet, out of
reach.
    Before it could recover, Jay bolted for the door,
knowing he wouldn’t make it and even if he did, then what? It would get him in
the corridor or on the stairs or out on Lord Street.
    Jay didn’t even make it to the door. He tripped on the
jawless corpse’s outstretched arm, falling to his knees next to the
sour-smelling body.
    The hyena laughed.
    Jay snatched at the knife in the dead man’s hand and
clawed it free. He heard the hyena grunt as it leapt, could sense it in the air
above him. He flipped onto his back, his pack propping him up, like an extra
pillow for an infirm loved one. He thrust the knife out above him in both hands.
    The blade slipped into the hyena’s chest with such
ease it was as if there was already a perfectly sized slot there just waiting
to house it. A mist of blood speckled Jay’s face and then the hyena’s dead
weight hit him. His arms buckled and the stinking thing was on top of