I’m sorry, Bryce. I tried. I tried very hard. I have been so good until…I’m sorry.

It’s the moon, you see. The moon gets into my head and my heart. It gets into my soul! I can’t make it quiet no matter how hard I try. Don’t you see? Don’t you understand? It starts out quiet but gets louder day after day after day until it is so loud. I think you did understand, Bryce. I think you knew it would be so loud and nothing would make it quiet. You helped me try to make it quiet. I remember, Bryce. Don’t you remember?

No. I don’t guess you will remember. Not now. Not anymore. I’m sorry.

I’m so sorry.

We even tried the chains! They hurt, Bryce, way worse than anything else. Worse than the shots. Worse than the serious men in the suits who came and said the strange words from that book. Worse than anything. Worse, even than you telling me you’d leave me here if I didn’t learn.

The chains hurt me bad, Bryce. The silver was pure, right? The oil came from fresh plants? You cut them the same day, right? But they didn’t matter. None of it mattered. They broke like foil. I was just too strong.

But you said I was! You said I was the strongest yet. You said there wasn’t one like me ever before! You said you were proud of me. But you also said you had to leave me. Because I couldn’t learn.

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Honest. I really did try to do everything you wanted, even when the serious men in the suits said I didn’t pass all their tests. I couldn’t do all the things they wanted me to do. But some of them were wrong, Bryce! I could see you knew it, too! You’d say so right now if you could. If you…oh what did I do?

Nothing matters now. I know that. I think you tried to tell me that right before…before…oh, Bryce, I’m sorry! Nothing matters at all. I should have killed all of them. I could have, you know. Even the children. Even the big children like me and the small ones. The ones who haven’t even tried to learn even though they’re supposed to be better and smarter and stronger and faster because you made them after me. But I’m still your favorite, right, Bryce? Because I didn’t kill them? Because I came back to you instead? Because I came back to my room here? Even though I…did such a terrible thing? Even still?

I’m going to kill them. They have to die. I know that. Then I’ll be the only one in this place with the hallways and the shots and the examinations and the machines and the serious men in suits and the voice of the moon and the smell of blood.

The blood! Why does it taste so good, Bryce? And the meat? And the fear? Why?? Why did you make me like this? I don’t understand. I just don’t understand. But it doesn’t matter. I’m going to kill them all and then the serious men in the suits will let me go.

It will be the last thing they do. The last thing before I kill them. I’m sorry, Bryce. You know I am sorry, don’t you? You could have told them to let me go. I know you would have if I hadn’t…if you had…if your throat…

I’m sorry. I need to go. Now. The serious men will be here soon with the book with all those strange words that make me hurt. They heard the noises. You screamed too loud. They heard. They’re coming. I’m sorry, Bryce. I didn’t want to. But it is what I am. Who I am.

I’m a monster. I tried not to be. I did. But it didn’t work. The moon…all in me. Like you made me, Bryce.

You shouldn’t have made me, Bryce.

Then I wouldn’t have killed you with my wolf mouth and my wolf claws and the moon power.

But you did. And I did. And I’m sorry.

Are you sorry?

Are the others sorry? The serious men in suits? Are they sorry?

I don’t think they are. But they will be.

Because the moon is loud, Bryce, and I’m the best wolf boy you ever made. And your blood has made me so strong.

Today’s Monsterlogue is fairly dark, but it does leave room for some light and perhaps even joy, depending on where you own mind takes the story from where I’ve left it.

I don’t have a firm bit of inspiration for this piece except that, one day, I was wondering about how shadowy government labs (or corporate labs or private labs or what have you) seem to pop up in horror fiction quite a lot. Carrie and Stranger Things come to mind as examples and I’m sure you could think of more. I got to wondering how a lab that made werewolves and, though I didn’t get very far into answering that question, I did imagine what it might be like to be one of the children created in such a place and how such a program might go catastrophically awry.

This is the result of that, written pretty much in one session with a good edit to clean up the frayed bits that inevitable happen when your brain is spinning out the scene faster than your fingers can collect it and set it to print.

In other news, I might have another little surprise for you tomorrow if I can set it up in time. I won’t give it away entirely, but the word “newsletter” is involved. And “soon”. And “fun”.

Okay! Same deal as yesterday. Rachael Sinclair is awesome. There are more stories with her incredible art to come. If you like this, feel free to share it around to all your friends and social media buddies and anyone you think might like a little shiver on a cool autumn day. Or night. Say…what phase is the moon in right now anyhow?