Prattle over the radio kept Ross company. Often he would listen to the scanner when the girls weren't home. He'd speed off toward the next incident before they called on the FBI. In the Portland bureau, they'd nicknamed him 'Speedy'. While he hated the name, it made perfect sense.

"Dispatch, this is Engine Seven," one of the firefighters said over the radio.

"Go ahead, Engine Seven."

"We're on scene. Looks like a one-car MVA. How far out is the ambulance?"

"The closest ambulance we have is coming from Salem. It'll be about 20 minutes."

"Forget the ambulance. We need Life Flight. We've got an approximately seventeen-year-old girl with severe trauma."

"I'm afraid Life Flight is down."

"What do you mean it's down?"

"Life Flight went down on Halloween. They were transporting a pregnant woman."

"I hadn't heard."

"Do the best you can until the ambulance gets there or transport the girl to Dallas Hospital yourself. They're also pretty understaffed since the incident."

"Thanks, but she needs a level one trauma center. We'll get some I.V.'s started, but she's lost a lot of blood."

"I'll let the Paramedics know."

"Thanks, Dispatch. Seven, out."

"Dispatch copies, Seven. Good luck."

Ross hoped the injured girl wasn't Alexa's daughter. The thought of having to make a call to her with devastating news made his jaw clench. What would he say? "I'm sorry Dr. Mason, but I didn't get there in time. Your daughter was ravaged to death by a beast." He shook his head, remembering the horror he'd witnessed at the police station. Those images would stay with him the rest of his life and possibly beyond the grave.

"Dispatch! Dispatch!" a panicked voice came over the radio.

"Go ahead, Seven."

"Are there any officers in route?"

"That's affirmative, Seven. SWAT and the FBI should be there any minute."

She said it as if Ross had the entire agency with him. Anything to get the freaked-out firefighter to calm down, I guess.

"Thank the lord," the firefighter said. "I think we have one of those things here. It ain't moving, looks hurt pretty bad. Little girl ripped off its balls...with a goddamn tire iron."

"Copy, Seven. And thanks for the details. Dispatch out."

"Seven copies."

At near ninety miles per hour, the lights from Engine Seven came into Ross's view. Rain clouds rolled through the sky, threatening a downpour. Not a good sign. The Trills weren't just ruthless, downright vicious, with primal desires; they also began to show signs of cunning. Finding one in the dark would be much harder. How in the hell did a little girl take one out with a tire iron? If she had taken it down by hitting it in the gonads, they may have found the Trill's Achilles heel. A fact he'd need to get to Alexa as soon as he proved it.

Ross pulled behind two Sheriff's Deputy's cars. A cloud of dust blew over the rig. Before he could get out someone slammed their hand on his window. Ross jumped and promptly flipped the firefighter standing next to his car the bird.

He rolled down the window. "Thanks a lot. You trying to give me a fucking heart attack?"

"Sorry. Didn't mean to scare ya." A firefighter with broad shoulders, flat face, and mustache, which looked as if it could crawl off his lip and attack, stuck his head into the car.

"No worries buddy." Ross leaned away so the killer insect on the man's face couldn't get him.

"You gotta see this. Where's the SWAT team?" The firefighter looked around. "And the other FBI. guys? Thought you guys were bringing an army."

Ross looked down the empty road behind him. "No clue. SWAT should be behind me. What you see is what you get from the FBI."

"Lot of that going around right now." He opened the door for Ross. "A couple of days ago Life Flight took off from Rogue Valley Hospital helipad up and disappeared. Guess it crashed in Gold Hill, near the Oregon vortex. Place is like the Bermuda Triangle. Some things go in and never come out. If ya know what I mean?"

Ross ignored the witless conversation. "What's your name, buddy?"

"The guys call me Beef."

Ross smiled. "As in...beefcake?" An easy assumption, given the man's burly physique.

"Nope. As in 'Where's the beef?'." A large grimace scrawled across his face.

Ross climbed out of the driver's seat, motioned Beef out of his way, and opened the back passenger door.

"Those guys nicknamed me in the shower...if ya catch my drift?"

"Don't let idiots like that get you down. They're just a bunch of ass hats in uniform."

"Firefighter ass helmets." Beef slapped his knee and howled as if he'd just told the funniest joke on earth.

Ross had never heard a worse joke but chuckled anyway. Then he gave his serious face as he'd retrieved the necessities to go into the field. "Are the girls safe?"

"Two are. The other died a few minutes ago. You shoulda seen her, privates all torn up like someone turned her inside out and ran her through a wood chipper." Beef ran his hand along the barrel of the riot shotgun. "Wow. You gonna use that thing? I heard one of them monsters can take a shot point blank with a shotgun and live. That true? Guess we're gonna find out, huh?"

A steady panic festered inside Ross. One of the girls died. My God, what am I gonna tell Alexa? "Did you get an ID off the girl?" He swung the riot shotgun over his shoulder and closed the back door.

"Yeah. Name's Ali Roth."

Ross stopped and made sure to check his sidearm. "You mean Alyssa Roth?" He sighed. Sad for the dead girl and her family, but somehow relieved it wasn't Teagan.

"Yeah. That's her. Guys were wondering if she's related to Old Man Roth in Salem. The customer's always right, why?"

"...because there are more of them than us." Ross remembered reading an article or something where Old Man Roth made his now famous quote.

"Where's the Trill now?" Ross paced back and forth.

"The what?" Beef looked perplexed.

"Oh...sorry. You don't know what they're called."

"You talking about that creature what looks like a boy?"

"Did you see another male?"

"Yeah. He's not a baby. Ever seen the movie Blue Lagoon?

"I think I saw it when I was a teenager." This guy's train of thought had to be the most insane Ross had ever come across. "Why?"

"Well. That thing's the spitting image of that kid on there; the one with the curly blond hair. The guys are calling the monster Curly on that account."

Ross figured if he could call one Guy, they could name one Curly. "Beef. Focus. Where is he?"

"Who?" Beef asked.

"Curly, where's Curly right now?" Slow and steady wins the race, Ross.

"We strapped him to a backboard. Nothing can get out of them straps."

"Show me." Ross motioned for Beef to lead on.

Beef stuck his thumb out like a hippie trying to hitch-hike back to Portland. "This way." He strode like a true cowboy, clomping his boots without a care in the world.

The two walked down a steady slope of dirt into a small grass field. Fire engine high-beams illuminated the scene. Skid marks from Teagan's car where it had flipped and slid mapped out a perfect path to the crash site. Ross imagined the girls being thrown back and forth and injured as the car made its way to its final resting place. "Poor girls."

They worked their way through a patch of tall grass Teagan's car had bunny-hopped when it flipped. Ross saw the tires of the upside-down car poking above some shrubs and grass in the distance.

"Thar she blows." Beef made an exploding head gesture.

Curly laid face up on the backboard, strapped down with multicolored glare-intensified straps. His face curled into a grimace, eyes fluttering.

There couldn't have been more differences between Curly and Guy. A full head of near white-blond tufts of hair atop of Curly's head directly contrasted Guy's slick baldness. Curly had a slight bump in his brow bone, whereas, Guy's prominent forehead stood out amongst his features. Beef hit the hammer on the sixteen-penny nail. Curly did look kind of like the kid from that movie.

Blood between Curly's legs puddled and dripped off the backboard. Firefighters had attempted to pack the groin with large gauze pads, but the pad had turned a dark crimson. It didn't seem as if the bleeding would stop anytime soon.

"We've got to get this thing to the hospital." Ross knelt next to Curly and studied him closely. From the blank look on his face to the ashen color of his skin, Ross knew he could die any minute. Unless the creature had some sort of healing going on inside.

"What the hell are you talking about?" A tall, slim firefighter turned Ross around by the shoulder. "After what this thing did to the girl, we should string it up or dismember it. Do whatever we can to kill it."

"Curly here could hold the keys to our salvation. We must save his life. And...we need him alive."

"For what?" Beef yanked on the suspenders holding up his firefighter turnouts.

Ross glanced up at Beef. "To study, find out what we can, see how it ticks and whirls."

Beef hawked a string of spit at the backboard, missing Curly's feet by inches. "So we can kill 'em all?" He beamed and replaced the wad of chew in his cheek.

"Shut the fuck up, Beefy, no-one's talking to you." The slim firefighter glared at the bigger man.

Beef bowed his head. "S...sorry."

In Ross's mind, he reeled around and cracked Slim in the nose with the butt of his gun, sending shards of sinew into the man's brain. Instead, he whipped around and grabbed him by the lapels of his firefighter jacket and curled the smaller man to him. "I'll let it slide this time." He placed his nose between Slim's eyes. "But if you talk to Beef again like that...I'll find a reason to throw your ass in jail. Or I'll just kick it from here until next week. You understand?"

Slim nodded and Ross set him down in the grass. Slim traipsed over to the medic kit next to the backboard. He knelt and rummaged through the equipment, pulled out another large gauze bandage and packed it on top of the other one. Curly stared into space. If it wasn't for his chest moving up and down, Ross would have thought he'd died.

"What the fuck did you do that for?" A girl's voice drew Ross's attention to the back of the fire engine where two teenage girls sat with firefighter's coats draped over their shoulders.

One of them, a tall redhead, had an air splint wrapped around her right leg. She had her arm around another girl, who sobbed into the redhead's shoulder. The second girl bore a striking resemblance to her mother, except she had a bit more curves and black hair.

"Let the fucker bleed to death. It killed Lyssa." The redhead glared at him.

Ross walked up to the girls. "You Teagan?" He touched the crying one on the shoulder.

"Yeah. Wh...who the hell are you?" She pulled the hair covering her eyes behind her ears.

"I'm Agent Harris."

"Is that supposed to mean something to us?" the other girl asked.

"You must be, Ellie?" Ross gave the girls a warm smile. He had to put on the friendliest face he could to win the girls over to his side. "I'm a friend of your mother's." His eyes fell on Teagan. "She's worried about you."

Teagan cocked an eyebrow. "Friend? How did..."

Ellie interrupted, "I might have texted your mom while you de-balled that bastard."

Teagan shook her head. "Great, now my mom's going to go psycho and never let me out of her sight."

Ross waved his hand around the area. "It's not a bad idea, given the situation."

"What?" Teagan snapped him a quick, volatile look.

"Your mom wants me to bring you back. And, we need to take Curly over there with us." He thumbed over his shoulder at the Trill.

"No way. I'm not traveling with that murderous rapist piece of horseshit." Teagan humphed and folded her arms.

"None of us are." Ross held up his keys. "We'll take my car. SWAT can transport Curly. I just hope he doesn't die before your mom has a chance to dissect him." He smiled.

Teagan responded with a sinister grin. "Okay. I'll go. But I want to watch."

"Me too," Ellie said.

Teagan groaned. "Who's gonna tell Lyssa's mom and dad?"

"Don't worry about that. I'll let them know." Ross hoisted Ellie into his arms and showed the girls to the SUV, around the back of the firetruck, avoiding the men carrying the body bag.