The bus stopped to a jerk and my eyes immediately flew open. Dawn seemed to be around the corner as the sky lit up very faintly with the sun's light. I looked out and saw that this wasn't where I was supposed to be according to the location I had given him.
I narrowed my eyes and looked to the front of the bus where the driver let out a huge sigh and unbuckled his belt. Then he looked into the centre mirror, meeting my eyes that looked at him with great suspicion.
"Oh my, Miss," he said kindly in his sweet voice. "How are you still here? I thought you got down at your stop when we came to it. Now, what shall we do? I have already registered the bus at the bus terminal to have returned as its shift is over."
"If you even reached my stop," I said through gritted teeth, holding onto the rails tightly to hold in my rage, "you would have had the sense of waking me up. Did you think that I was stupid enough to believe your child-like tales?"
"My, my, Miss. You have a rather strong head and temper. I thought women were very sweet and would give their knight in shining armour anything they wished. I saved you from having to walk all the way home, didn't I?"
The aged-looking man suddenly changed form and turned into a young man with a sweet face that one would never mistake to be evil. I furrowed my eyebrows at the strange transformation and started to think if the nightmares were really starting to take some unfathomable form.
'This is the start of some strange trial,' I thought to myself. 'Why am I being tested in this manner?'
"For someone as young as yourself," I said in a quiet voice with a tilt of my head, "you think you can take advantage of me very easily."
"You don't seem surprised," came his reply. "I usually kill people when I see them fret, but you don't seem to be moved one bit."
'If you're that strange creature in my dream, I would definitely run for my life,' I attempted to tell him with my mind, knowing very well that voicing it would lead to my quick demise.
"Do you know about our kind?" he questioned with narrowed eyes, turning me alert and jittery.
"I don't know what kind you are talking about," I answered plainly and truthfully.
He took a few steps forward like an approaching prey. I pursed my lips and fidgeted with my finger and toes, wondering what fate and peril I had been put in.
When his eyes changed colour from the usual dark brown to gold, I knew that I had indeed fallen into the trap that had been set up for me. I narrowed my eyes at him, wishing myself to fight although I felt afraid of remembering the creature that was ready to rip my very neck from my body.
"You know something that not one single person on this earth seems to know," his deep voice came. "Except for some authorised people. Would it be better to kill you or turn you into one like us just like those corpses have come to be?"
I looked at him with wide eyes, wondering just what he was speaking about when most of the world would always come to know what was happening in the world around them. I couldn't believe that even after keeping up to date with the news, I had somehow missed out on something that could be beneficial for my survival.
The next second my mind remembered that there was a piece of news going around about people going missing and the sightings of some strange creatures. The news that had been published online had been later removed and now there didn't seem to be anyone who knew about it at it had only existed for a few minutes before it had been taken down.
"A strange, wild animal with human-like behaviour roams the city of Tafra," I recited the headlines from my memory. "So that was the news that needed to be hidden from all the eyes of the normal eyes of humans, was it? Do you think someone wouldn't remember it?"
"The entire nation was made to forget it, but it seems like you still remember it somehow," he said staring right into my eyes.
"That vaccination drive was the reason behind the eradicating of the memory, wasn't it? The government scared us by saying that a strange virus was going around that caused sudden deaths although the bodies were never shown to the media. What a beautiful lie to cover up something so important for a person's survival."
"Fear kills, and that is exactly why we bite such people as they taste rather delicious to us. It is irresistible when you see a wonderful feast in front of you, right? And with a pretty one like you in front of me, it would be any man's desire to make you his own and he would do anything to do so, wouldn't he?"
The moon had started to set and vanish slowly, but there was no stopping it from peeking in from the bus's windows. I was trying to make an opportune moment for myself so that I could escape easily without any scrapes. But no such opportunity could be created or was shown to me.
The person in front of me had the same golden gleaming eyes that I had seen in my terrifying dream and gleamed with the same intensity as it had in the fantasy looking vision. When he bared his teeth, I saw them grow into the canines of the beasts that were known to roam the wild. But the astonishing thing was that his whole form changed again: his skin turned into a dark brown coat of fur and his face changed into a mug's snout.
"A werewolf..." I gasped, taken aback by the fact that such creatures existed in our world and not in myths. "But why..."
His clothes tore off and hung loosely on his sturdy frame as he grew into the vicious beast. My trembling hand clicked on the power off button on the phone as it had been doing when it had been fidgeting. I couldn't even dare to break down the window and run away or bang him on his head with something hard and metallic so that he would keep away from me.
My heels prevented me from running away quickly and my last option would be to take to my feet without them. The corner of my eye noticed the hammer that was used to break glasses in case of emergencies. But with him advancing towards me, my mind had blanked out on
Before he advance another step towards me, I sent the hammer hurtling straight at his head. I was surprised beyond my imagination at my ability to aim so well because the hammer made a hole in his head like a bullet. For a second, I stood there, watching the beast, to know if its life still existed within it instead of running away.
But the head that had been thrown back became straight again. The eyes of the werewolf on me and its mouth baring those fangs of his appeared to smile with obvious glee. Then he gave out a snarl as the wound on his head closed up and advanced towards me.
I panicked and ran for my life to the back of the bus. I threw another hammer at it but it just caught it in its paw-like hands and crushed the plastic and metal. My eyes went wide at its strength and my poor, trapped self was now frightened for her life even more than ever.
I was still holding onto my phone whilst holding my clutch bag firmly. My last option was right in front of me yet I was afraid to make the leap.
'You only live once,' I told myself to get my courage back. 'So save yourself. Do it already!'
I looked at the back seats for one more hammer as I watched the beast crawl towards me slowly, watching each and every movement of mine instead of speedily attacking me. When I shattered the glass beside me, the beast became alert as it thought that I was escaping. But I had other ideas.
I used the shards of glass to attack it as quickly as my hands could so that I could make an easy escape for myself to freedom. I threw multiple of them at once but the beast's movements were too fast compared to a normal human's. It either caught some of them or let it penetrate its thighs and body. But as the beast was quick to heal, my time to escape was reduced.
I took another few shards of glass and shot it towards its eyes and hoped that with it being blinded I could run away quickly. The trick worked well enough as it growled at the glass that had penetrated both of its eyes.
Shocked at my excellent aiming skills, a talent I didn't really know about, I didn't waste a single second this time. I used the spare seconds to unlatch the rusting lock on the emergency exit. I couldn't open the door as it had been shut really tightly. The beast had already removed the shards off its eyes, crying out in pain. I couldn't look at the bloody and gruesome sight I had created as I neither wanted to pity it nor have to stay frozen in my spot with fear.
I kicked open the door and made my attempt to jump out of the bus with the things in my hand. My terror of injuring myself had gotten a good hold of me, thus delaying the leap for a few seconds as I watched the height I had to jump from. But the growl from the furry creature behind me made me do it for my dear life.
I had hardly landed on the ground when I heard the beast make a run for me. The thudding sounds against the floor of the bus made me step away from the bus to run away on my bare feet. But fate had other ideas.
The creature had gotten a hold of my collar and picked me up before I could even charge towards the opening and closing bus terminal. I screamed into the night, hoping that someone would hear me and come to my aid. But none were present to hear my pleas.
I prayed and begged the beast to spare me but such creatures had lost all sense of sanity and understanding. It didn't seem to hear a word I was saying. Even if it did, it was unwilling to show mercy upon the being it had somehow captured in its hands.
My last prayer was to the heavens to make this a difficult journey for me as I had kept up with all the wishes that the Almighty had wished from me. The tears trickled down from my face as my heart felt like it would pass out from it thundering against my ribs.
On my closed eyelids, I felt a glow around me and heard the werewolf grunt. It immediately let go of me as if I had suddenly become like hot water for it to hold me. I tumbled down onto the ground as I watched it cover its eyes and shun away from me like I was poison for it.
I groaned as I felt the pulse in my arm thunder. I was sure that the fall had left me with a broken bone somewhere for the fall had seemed too high to me. An alarm sounded from somewhere far away, something that only my ears could make out as I passed into the darkness of oblivion with the approaching footsteps.