The hunt

Daylight hours showed a different side to the calm and serenity the late shift offered at Gennex laboratories, the hallways were filled with lab techs and engineers walking to and from the many labs that dotted the floors of the research facility, the echoing sounds of phones ringing off along with the low hum of electronics buzzing and whirling would have made the noise deafening if not for the plexiglass doors and windows cutting off the noise pollution of each lab from one another.

In one room, people in protective gear worked over petri dishes in a controlled environment, the room sealed off hermetically to avoid anything getting out or in while robotic arms with syringes injecting droplets of fluids into the dishes under them, where a cellular microscope recorded the results over a digital screen nearby for the scientists studying the effects could observe and document. The Phage virus was a complex and sensitive retrovirus that reacted dynamically to DNA sources, requiring the facility’s technicians to keep the processing lab clean to avoid any contamination. Some of the labs were closely guarded and sealed to maintain sterilization procedures, requiring decontamination sprays and double doors to keep product quality at its highest. Others however where the samples were known to be safe or inert could be used and treated with, out in the open with no fear of hazard.

Every room was busy with activity... Save one.

Blocked off by two orange pylons, strung together with security tape around the now repaired mechanical doors which were locked. Days ago, there was a chalk outline of the security guard marking where he had died. The body removed, the blood washed away, and the chalk cleaned up now that part of the investigation had been categorised where the floor was littered with yellow markers indicating items of interest in the evidence pool.

Behind the locked door, the flicker of cameras going off in the room’s interior was the only means of light as every foot of space was documented. Even days after the body was removed, the epicenter of the explosion had taken longer to go over, what with all the damage done. Three people in haz-mat suits gathered broken tools and equipment for analysis, carefully and painstakingly picking up every item for identification and to map out the events that caused the end of five lives that night. The process having taken over 90 hours to do so with all the items finally collected.

Gathering what was left, they allowed a group of engineers in haz-mat suits belonging to the company to take over, cleaning out the lab of destroyed equipment so that it can be reconstructed and used again for further research.

That was 2 days ago…

Walking through the main lobby towards the main desk of the facility, a pair of detectives; a man and woman waited as the secretary confirmed their identities and scheduled a meeting, the pair standing idly with one holding a briefcase in hand and nodding as the blonde secretary waved them through, gesturing for the two to follow her as she led them to the office of her employer. Knocking on the office door, she opened it and let them in.

At the main floor of the facility near the back of the building was the administrative branch of the laboratory, a few scant offices for secretary and record keeping staff along with the head of research sitting at his desk in the main office. A small room in comparison to the labs all around the building, there were no signs of opulence or luxury usually seen in such offices. The desk was quite plain, a dark mahogany surface with metal legs and framing sat towards the back, facing a window that was screened off with grey blinds, the view would have only showed the parking lot and steel fencing marking the perimeter anyway.

A red goose neck lamp overlooking a writing space and lap top computer along with a couple pictures of his family and a pen holder with various writing utensil. On one end of the office was a series of drawers storing paper backups of previous research and records while the other hung various degrees and doctorates. Sitting at the desk was a Doctor Timothy Jordans, a short, overweight, middle-aged man looking from one folder to the other. Files splayed over the smooth surface like leaf ended magazines filled with photos and chemical reports.

Sitting in front of the head scientist's desk were two detectives: both representatives of the investigative team responsible for examining the lab accident.

“As you can see from our report, the explosion had been caused by what we found to be a substandard test tube that suffered thermal shock when it was put through the rotary mixer, we found trace amounts of the fluid it contained seeped into the motors, causing a short circuit followed by an explosion when the fluid ignited.”

“There appeared to be a gas line with a frayed feed tube that picked up the spark and exploded, taking the lab with it.”

“Tragic. We’ll have to check the lab equipment again to make sure we don’t have a repeat.”

Sitting back in the office chair Dr. Jordans rubbed the bridge of his nose, shifting his glasses out of the way before he turned his attention back to the computer screen at his side. The typed copies of his condolence letters waiting to be printed off and mailed to the loved ones of the fatal accident.

“What about security officer Flemmings? Did you determine what killed him?”

Looking to each other with a discomforting shrug, one of the two detectives leaned forward to slide a folder open, revealing the photographs and details of the security officer's ****.

“Whatever it was it was incredibly strong, the coroner informed us his arm had been torn clean out of his socket and his bones were snapped like twigs... To say the least of his lacerations.”

Looking at the photos briefly, the lab administrator winced and pushed away the file from him at his end of the desk.

“The explosion ruined any prospects of determining what belonged to whom, not to mention the sanitation procedures taken by the facility after the second guard found the damage and dead body. But from all the ruined cloths and blood on the floor, we believe whatever had killed officer Flemmings had done the same to the four scientists, the room has already been sterilized by your people to avoid any airborne toxins if any kind to contaminate the building.”

“Our labs are equipped to deal with any threat of viral agents from escaping in case of an accident or explosion. A lockdown occurs in case of such an event, sealing the doors and vents and flooding the labs with sanitation agents to sterilize everything inside. Anyone inside during such a procedure would be unharmed… Though they shouldn’t be surprised with the first layer of their skin peeled off or their hair bleaches white.”

Taking the file back, one of the detectives skipped through a few pages to a bundle of photos clipped to a report on the surveillance records from the labs.

“The explosion also knocked out the camera in that hallway, but we did manage to get a series of photos from the security camera in the halls adjacent to the emergency exit.”

Taking the bundle out she sifted through a half dozen photos before finding the desired ones and placing them in a row in front of the man at the chair.

Picking one up, it was fuzzy from being blown up to zoom in at a specific spot in the hallway, the camera itself was more than 50 feet from the emergency exit and only showed images every other second to save on memory. The image itself however offered a glimpse into something abhorrent as Dr. Jordans eyes widened. Whatever it was, it stood almost twice the height of a man, with sweeping horns that curved forward like some kind of bull or ram, its back had these... Spikes that lined down its spine, following a thick long tail that trailed past it more than 3 meters.

“I've never seen anything like it.”

“That's a shame, we were hoping you would have shed some light onto what your people were working on up there.”

Leaning back to stand up from his chair, the head doctor in charge moved over to the file cabinet and pulled out a single folder, leafing through its pages before handing it to the two detectives.

“Doctors Strentum, Chambers, Simmons, and Hilbert were working on a project on cellular regeneration. Their goal was to introduce key animal genes into a host using the Phage that would promote rapid healing, but for the last 4 months they were met with failures.”

Looking through the lab results, recorded in the folder, Jordans continued.

“They weren't working with any live animals to test one if that’s what you were wondering, we've had a strict policy against that after the mice experiments failed miserably and we had to appease animal activists by dropping animal testing all together.”

Shaking her head, the detective closed the folder and handed it back to Dr. Jordans, the man returning it to its place in the filing cabinet before sitting back at his desk.

“We've got animal control checking the perimeter of the facility as we speak, we found traces of scratch marks on the fencing leading out opposite to the main entrance of the facility, if we find anything you'll be informed.”

Shaking hands with the two officers as they gathered their folders to return to the city, Doctor Jordans looked over to the screen at his desk and squinted at the condolence letters one last time, pressing send, he called for his secretary to cancel any further meetings as he sat back and rubbed the bridge of his nose in exhaustion.

“Just what the hell were you people working on up there?”

***

Three weeks later...

Cal smiled to himself as he walked his way back to the den, another successful hunt in the fields yielded a fresh kill to offer up to his pack to feed. Normally he would have taken the deer that were grazing but he felt embolden to try something bigger, trekking back through the woods on all fours the male Amalgam carried the body of a freshly killed moose in his jaws. Stomping through the soft earth, his heavy footsteps left behind deep prints behind him as the dead 1500-pound animal hung from its neck by Cal's powerful jaws. Last week he would never have been able to do this, but days of eating hundreds of pounds worth of deer and elk had an effect on him, he had grown!

Walking on all fours, he was gigantic, his arms and legs had swollen with muscle and fat from his large meals, no longer sporting abs he had a gut that rounded out from his sides as he walked, his neck had stretched out a foot as corded muscles framed his shoulders and throat. Even his tail had grown, well over 15 feet long it was broad and thick with muscle and bulk, nearly twice as thick as his leg as it swayed behind him with every step. His spines and horns had grown longer, twice as long as their original length, nearly rivalling the antlers of his kill for width and size. Had he been standing he would have been 12 feet tall, but even on all fours he stood twice the height of a man. He had become the apex predator of these woods, nothing else competed with him for food or territory save his pack-mates. Thinking of his three lovers, he growled low as he sped up his pace, by now they would be hungry, and he did not wish to keep them waiting any longer.

Smelling the familiar scent in the air, the powerful male amalgam smiled as he reached the grounds of his cave, trees marked by his own musk alerted rivals to his nesting grounds, not that he had any but the instinct to stake his claim on these lands was too hard to resist. Bones littered the entrance where crows picked at the spots he and his mates missed in their meals, previously carved rock and earth laid in piles around the cave, the opening clawed out to be wider. Even so Cal had to squeeze himself through the stone opening to enter his underground home, with all the digging his pack had done over the weeks the cave was now three times larger, a single open space they all shared when they fed or slept and even then, the space was still crowded, for he was not the only one who had grown.

“Well girls, look whose home.” Moaned Rebecca as she laid on her side, the red furred amalgam had grown large since her transformation, almost matching Cal for size and bulk. Six hefty breasts easily the size of her own head sat full and proud from her chest, tipped by thick nipples the size of glasses that stood firm in the cool cave air. Her arms and legs were thick with muscle, her tail grown long and fat from her many meals, tapered by broad hips and a round ass. Her spines jutted a foot from her back while her long sweeping horns extended a meter behind her head like an antelope past an outstretched neck over a foot long. Bringing a claw to her round belly Rebecca closed her eyes and moaned, pursing her fanged lips as her clawed fingers met with strong kicks from her crowded eight-foot round womb.

Dropping the carcass onto the cave floor Cal stood up to look at his mates with pride, days after they declared themselves a pack when they didn't return to normal, they slowly discovered that Cal had impregnated them all after their little tryst together, even more interesting was that with their altered genetics, their fertility had multiplied, and their pregnancies accelerated. Whole litters of children were growing weeks’ worth of gestation in mere days inside their crowded bellies.

“Oh, you brought moose this time, such a strong provider you are love.” Husked Michelle as she stood on all fours to tear into the dead animal in front of her, Rebecca pressing next to her to join in.

The blonde den mother gasped as her womb shook with a storm of kicks and jolts, they loved it when their mother ate. Like Rebecca, Michelle had grown large and powerful, her thick 11-foot-long tail swished slowly back and forth like a cat as she bent down for another bite, her longer neck giving her the reach she needed over her massive breasts. Since joining the pack, Michelle's personality had turned completely around, becoming confident and proud, she presided over the den like a queen. Flaunting her size and strength to the others, it was like seeing a kitten become a sexual lioness overnight. Bringing a claw to calm her belly, she purred guessing how many she carried, she KNEW she bore more than one, the storm of kicks proved that as she counted each one bumping the surface of her stomach.

Watching the two eat, Cal turned to see Tina walking over to greet him on all fours, the dark furred amalgam was the biggest of the three, her arms and legs bulging with strength and bulk as her tree trunk thick tail swung behind her. Well over 11 feet tall and nearly half that wide, she wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders and kissed him deeply, pressing her breasts and belly against his powerful body.

“They won't stop kicking Cal, I've been so hot since you've been gone.” Biting her lower lip Tina rubbed against the amalgam in her grasp, bringing his claw to roam over a spot on her belly and calm her unborn brood. “I need you in me Cal, it’s the only way to calm them down.”

Smiling down at his lover Cal leaned down to kiss at her neck and chest, growling as he heard her whimper from his attention.

“You should eat something before your pack sisters finish that moose.”

Smirking down at him, Tina playfully squeezed at his crotch, massaging his rising erection as she traced a clawed finger around his heavy sac. Shoving him away, she turned around and offering herself to him, her tail raised to give him space to mount her from behind.

“Satisfy me and I'll get right to it.”

Snorting at the beast woman as she smirked over her shoulder, he moved up to line himself up with her gripping pussy and slam into her, roaring as he pleased his pack mate with wild abandon. After all, how could he resist?

***

The police station was an old building, an antique that had been standing since the colonial days less than 150 years ago, its brickwork polished and refurbished time and time again. It was hard to tell what the original building was and what was tacked on or replaced over time. Stone pillar columns stood between reinforced glass doors. The floors were a patchwork of old wood, waxed and aged to the point of being stone, while black marble tiling decorated the head office and hallways. The station was a mix of precinct and museum, pictures of the station's past hanging like murals on the walls along with the portraits of retired and fallen officers once part of the ****. To the far right of the building at basement level stood a pair of jail cells, occupied by the local drunks when happy hour lasted longer than it should have. For a small town it was a small station; only two stories tall, it doubled as the highway patrol for their section of town, the freeway taking up more activity to deal with then the local rift-raft on the streets.

Gennex had told the two detectives that they desperately wanted more information or proof of what had killed four of its top researchers and a security guard at their lab installation. The evidence they gathered pointed to some creature that had escaped into the wilderness. It had been over a month so far and neither animal control or the highway patrol came back with anything conclusive, mostly because they've had their hands full dealing with bear and wolf migration in the area, like something was scaring them all away. They had tried to find anything that could point to such a creature and its activities but had come up empty handed. The only thing they found were a double suicide at a hunter's cabin ten miles from the facility, a cabin that had burnt down for good measure. Along with property damage at a ranch fifteen miles from there. And neither seemed connected in any way apart from their proximity.

“Fucking bullshit... Give me a mugging to solve any day now please.” Grumbled Detective Samson, the man leaning back in his office chair and rubbing the sleep in his eyes. Det. Greg Samson had been on the **** for over a decade, having moved up to detective work when he was unsatisfied with the beat. Leaning forward to rest his shoulders on his office desk and pulling away from his eyes to reach for his coffee mug, the moustached forty-year-old looked over to his partner across the desk from him and nodded to her. “What do you think?”

“I think the coffee’s gone bad.”

Detective Sara Clemmings had been partners with Greg for over a year. A woman in her early thirties, she wore her blonde hair short, her blue eyes framed by glasses that she used for reading when back at the station typing reports.

“I mean none of it makes any sense, if this thing did go into the woods, why haven’t we seen any sightings of it yet? No photos, no Youtube videos, not even a tall tale at a fucking bar.” Looking up from her screen at her side of the desk, Sara peered over to the cabin incident report nearby, thumbing through pages of photos and reports from the autopsies.

“There’s still that double suicide out there, but there's no evidence claiming that thing was there or not. But it does raise questions about the fire... Too convenient.”

“Yeah, the bones were too charred to know what happened to them before the fire began, all we got are two dead bodies in a burnt down cabin. And then there’s that weird ass phone call we got from that rancher; someone stealing his laundry and fucking up his tractor? Doesn't sound like the actions of an animal to me.”

Looking over the transcript of the phone call to 911, it was almost dropped as a hoax by the operator, after all the couple who owned the Gullywoods ranch had a history of drinking when they weren't saddling horses, and the notion someone dismantling their tractor's wheel guard and moved their laundry to the shed seemed more like too much scotch at dinner was the REAL culprit.

“Still... It would have taken the Jaws of Life to pry off the wheel guard from a tractor, but that just raises more questions. Why didn't it kill Mr. And Mrs. Gullywood when he hobbled into his barn? Why didn't it kill any of the horses? And why steal laundry?!”

Stretching her arms over her head and leaning left and right to straighten the cricks in her neck and shoulders, Sara went back to the folder with the photographs from the security camera back at the Gennex research facility. Gathering the photos in front of her and shuffling them one at a time to see the image of a tall creature sneak through the parking lot and jump the fence, Sara frowned.

“This thing looks like it could take on a Grizzly bear, where the hell did it go?”

“Real shame Gennex didn't let us keep the files on their research, would have helped some in finding out what the hell happened or better yet what this freak show is.” Thumbing the photo towards his end of the desk, Greg shook his head at the blurry photo of the creature.

“Greg, if I guy drops dead in a Coca Cola factory it doesn't give us the right to demand the formula for a soft drink.” Taking a sip from her mug of coffee, she pursed her lips at the hot beverage. “Besides everyone knows this Phage thing breaks apart after 48 hours, if this thing was made from it, then it should have died off somewhere after the weekend… Or turn back into a hamster or whatever.”

“Well, it’s got to be alive in those woods somewhere, have you seen the files we got from animal control? They caught a damned mountain lion running through the freeway in some kind of mad panic.”

Going over the scattered reports, Greg shook his head in disbelief. A pack of wolves had been picked up a week ago after they ran through mid-day traffic, pissing themselves with their tails between their legs as they were caged and relocated out of town. A bear big enough to flip a car over had staggered into the freeway, mad with a fever and frothing at the mouth. The authorities were **** to put it down before it became a menace and wandered into the public. Its body had nasty scars lining its shoulder, possibly from a rival predator but the claw striations didn't match any known species of bear on record.

“I swear it Sara, that thing is hiding in those woods and I'm willing to bet if we follow the trail through these locations, we'll find it.”

“Provided we do go out to find this thing on our own, aren't we a little under-gunned for the job? That security guard back at Gennex had a 9mm and shot it twice, point blank! But there weren’t any other pools of blood except for the dead lab techs and said guard at the scene.” Checking her drink, she found her mug empty. “Got anymore coffee?”

Standing up to straighten himself, Detective Samson picked up his own mug to be refilled.

“Look Sara if this thing is still out there, we gotta find it before anything else bad happens, and if it’s already dead then the families of the victims deserve to know... Here, I’ll give ya a refill.”

Offering her cup, she watched as her partner walked out of the office to get a refill for them both, looking back at the picture, Detective Clemmings looked at it more closely. The creature, although blurry and being spotted in the dark was hunched, intentionally keeping low as if it knew where the cameras were and what they could and couldn’t see.

“Funny... It almost looks like a man.”

***

A mighty roar echoed out over the forests, the birds flying high into the sky in response to the pain filled howls that filled the air. Deep inside the cave, Rebecca was on her hands and knees, a puddle of slick fluid pooled between her muscular thighs as her pussy throbbed, her belly tensing as she howled in pain again. It had now been over a month now since their pack had been formed, every day since her belly had grown larger and her pregnancy progressed at a rapid pace. Her unborn brood became more excitable growing within her, kicking and thrashing within her for food and attention, demanding to be born. Now in the pleasure pain of labour, she howled out again and her nether lips crowned, a shape coming into view as she pushed with all her might.

Tina and Michelle had their litters the day before, their cries of pain scaring off everything for over a mile as they bore their cubs. Laying on her side with an open palm holding her head up, Michelle sighed in contentment as her five pups nursed from her engorged breasts. Two boys and three girls suckled from her beanbag sized tits as she expressed her milk to her brood, moaning as their mouths tugged at her sensitive nipples. Tina had given birth to a litter of six; four boys and two girls who fought for space to drink from their mother's milk. Each cub was the size of a large pig, their fur slowly growing in, but their heads and backs were absent of the horns and spikes their parents possessed. The dark furred female stretched as her litter cried out from the interruption, squirming, and retaking their places to drink from her. She looked down blissfully as they pressed against her warm flesh to find her teats again.

Cal stood nearby, staring at Rebecca as she gave birth to more of his children, a look of pride on his face as his pack expanded. Moaning in pain, Rebecca pushed again, another furry form escaping her stretched pussy as another travelled down her birth canal to be next. Sweat matted Rebecca's head and neck as she fought on, with over an hour having passed she counted the number of crying forms squirming at her knees just as she pushed again, adding another to that pile. One, two, three, it was getting easier for her as her body healed rapidly, the strain on her hips disappearing as her abs regained their strength.

After a sweaty, gruelling, two hours of labour, the red-furred she-beast rolled onto her side as the effort of giving birth had finally ended. Five pups, a boy and four girls cried for their mother's attention, flailing on the stoney floor of the cave as the afterbirth slid out of her. Her body recuperating in seconds what would take a human woman several hours if not days to simply regain her strength. Looking down at her litter, she gathered them up and started cleaning them off, licking their fur as she nipped their umbilical cords off their bellies with her own teeth. Now clean and crying in hunger, she moved them up to latch onto her full breasts and drink of her milk, lolling her head she felt the blissful peace of motherhood, while her litter drank their first meal. Falling to all fours, Cal stomped over to Rebecca, nuzzling his new children before moving up to lick at his mate’s face. The two nuzzling as they purred a deep rumble in their throats.

“They're so big Cal, so healthy... I love them so much...” Rebecca moaned as she felt her newborns nip and tug at her plump nipples, sighing as sleep finally claimed her.

“Yes they are, and they’re all ours.”

Looking over to the others as they all fell to sleep, Cal smiled as he found a spot for himself to curl into. Just before he allowed sleep to claim him, he tried looking back at his old life as a human... And laughed. That puny little creature only wanted to make a name for himself in the scientific community, Cal no longer cared about such things. He was now a twelve-foot-tall super carnivore, the alpha male and patriarch to a race of unstoppable predators. His priorities were simple now, to hunt and feed his mates and sire more cubs to add to his pack, nothing else was important to him now.

He could see it now, the entire nation filled with their new kind, reestablishing the pecking order of the food chain as humanity is knocked off the top and his kind take their place. He couldn’t wait to see that future. Yawning deeply, the giant male amalgam finally curled his body around in a relaxing spot and went to sleep. The sounds of his children nursing from their mothers filled his ears as he snored.