Wings of Death

They have a weakness

 It was 1 AM when Nathan set up a conference call with Alex and Margaret. Since they all lived in the same town, they were familiar with each other. Nathan was just hoping they hadn’t gone off to sleep. Meanwhile Mr. and Mrs. Browning turned off the lights and went to sleep on the couch. Nathan wished them good night and promised to go to sleep when he was done talking to his friends.

Alex picked up the call and started speaking in a rather excited manner, “Bro, those monsters are all gone now. I think the army finally took care of them. I saw some feathers lying on the streets.” Alex still hadn’t heard the broadcast on the radio.

Nathan continued in a relaxed tone, “I don’t think the army did anything but yeah, those Bloodwings are temporarily gone.”

Alex was quite surprised to hear the term, ‘Bloodwing’. He chuckled a bit and continued, “Is that what you want to call these monsters? Bloodwings sound scary enough.”

“It wasn’t my idea to give them that name. Dr. Von Hart gave them that name”, replied Nathan.

“Who’s this Dr. Von Hart?” questioned Alex.

“That means you have not heard the radio announcement. Okay, no worries, I will tell you the basics”, said Nathan.

Margaret was silently listening to their conversation all this time. She finally decided to speak, “I heard the announcement on the radio as well. I think Dr. Von Hart is the only one who can actually find a way to counter these creatures. She is very good at analyzing animal anatomy and character traits.”

Alex joined in and said, “Someone mind telling me what Dr. Hart said on the radio?”

Nathan and Margaret went over the basic details of the radio announcement. They decided it would be best to leave out the survivor’s account.

Margaret concluded by saying, “So, from what we know, the Bloodwings kill their prey by screaming. The only safe places for now are underground shelters such as caves and basements since their screams can shatter glass, wooden and penetrate plastic surfaces”.

“Yep, I think as long as we don’t hear their screams, we should be safe. Killing them might be difficult due to their toughened scales and feathers which deflect bullets but I am sure avoiding them is still possible. We should try to find out more about them and stock up on necessary resources”, added Nathan.

“Do you guys think they are active at night too?” asked Alex.

“Oh yes man, they stay active even at night. I just heard the screams again while I was outside. Luckily I managed to get back inside in the nick of time”, Nathan replied.

“I had gone outside when it was raining and I could not hear them anymore. I thought they had retreated. You know, like maybe they are diurnal creatures who go to sleep at night and hopefully don’t go around murdering humans”, said Alex.

“Nathan was it raining when you had gone outside?” asked Margaret in a very curious manner.

“Yes, it was. I got completely drenched in the rain” answered Nathan.

Margaret continued with her questions. It seemed she was on to something. “Did you notice anything strange while you were outside?”

“Well, there were these clumps of scales outside. I found a red feather in one of them. Do you think these feathers could be from those Bloodwings?” said Nathan.

Margaret could not suppress her excitement. She let out a jovial shout and exclaimed, “It fits perfectly! Don’t you get it guys? The Bloodwings do not like the rain. I think that those clumps on the ground were the remains of Bloodwings. Maybe the rain is harmful to them. We can’t be certain until we see the effects with our own eyes but all the evidence suggests that Bloodwings are vulnerable when it is raining.”

Alex jumped out of his chair and shouted, “Holy s**t! I can’t believe these monsters actually have a weakness. Margaret, you are a genius, I swear!”

A smile flashed on Nathan’s face. He understood that this was an incredible discovery! ”Marge, we need to contact the military and share this information with them. You might have just figured out the most important piece in the puzzle.”

“Yeah, I have their number. I just wanted to share my theory with you all first. I will call them first thing in the morning.” replied Margaret.

Nathan knew they were on to something big and he came up with a plan, “I have a feather with me right now. We can’t wait for Dr. Erica to do everything. I am sure they can use our help.  I think we should meet up. There is a research facility nearby. Marge, do you think you can find out more about the Bloodwings from this feather?”

Margaret was a very rational person and this plan of Nathan seemed quite dangerous to her. “I think we should only go outside when it rains. If it does not rain then I don’t think we should risk our lives. I can try to run some basic tests on the feather and analyze the cells. It should give us some idea about the origins of these monsters and their cellular structure.”

“Okay then, we stay vigilant and wait for it to rain. More importantly, we have to make sure our parents do not get to know about this. We will wait for them to fall asleep and then sneak out of the house at night. I just hope it rains soon”, with this Nathan concluded the conversation.

There was only one thing they could do now, wait for the perfect opportunity to sneak out and hope that it would rain soon.

It was almost 2 AM and they all decided to get some rest. They knew that they would need all their strength in the coming days. At least they could all sleep easy now after finding out that these creatures might have a glaring weakness. Only time would tell how accurate Margaret’s theories were. Too many thoughts kept racing across Nathan's mind. It was almost 3 AM when he finally managed to fall asleep.