Alex watches as Van Helsing comes closer toward him and Rusty. He sees that the man before is very serious and yet wistful at what he is about to do. With hackles raised and teeth bared, Rusty growls and barks. And for a moment, Alex swears to himself that he can understand what his dog is saying.
<This strange human is threatening me and the pup, and just when the pup’s True Self is just making itself known. I got to do something without either one of us getting caught.>
Unsure if he just imagined what he ‘heard’ from his dog Rusty, Alex steps in front of his dog to protect him. But he finds himself so afraid that he simply wants to run away.
“What are you going to do with us?” He asks the strange man.
Alex then ‘hears’ something from his dog again as Rusty barks and growls some more.
<Sorry, my pup, but I don’t want you to get between me and this intruder.> Rusty squeezes his way past the pup’s protective stance. <I got to protect you, I can’t let you get hurt on my account. And I must show that this man is not welcome in our territory.>
As Alex splits his attention between Rusty and Van Helsing. Helsing realizes that the dog is actually ‘talking’. Rusty must not be an ordinary dog. Could he be one of the victims of the plague instead? Helsing asks himself. But he quickly pushes his curiosity aside. He’s got a job to do. And the first part of this job is to find the dog that is spreading the plague and gather up those who have been infected by it.
“There’s no need to be alarmed, young one. I am here to merely take you and your dog somewhere safe and sound, that’s all.” He calmly and reassuringly tells the boy.
“But why do you want to do that?”
“I have to because you and your dog have contracted an illness that could have serious consequences not only for yourself, but for your family and friends as well. I am here to help you. You do want me to help you, don’t you?”
He carefully eyes Rusty while trying to win the boy’s trust. As he knows that the virus in its initial stages makes its victims more dog-like in personality with each passing minute. And with regards to the boy being at this stage of the infection, the boy should see him as being friendly and come with him peaceably.
Alex feels, looks and surprisingly enough smells his own uncertainty. He looks down at his tail, which is quickly gaining fur.
“What kind of illness is this? I mean, I never caught a bug that made grow fur or gave me a tail like Rusty’s here.” He tells Van Helsing. “It’s really weird...can it be cured?”
Alex ‘hears’ some more from Rusty, and now he is sure that he isn’t imagining things. His dog really is talking.
<Yes, human, I am going to keep my eyes on you at all times. I am going to make sure that you don’t do anything to hurt me or the pup.>
Van Helsing looks at the boy and his dog while trying to come up with a plausible story for the boy.
And while he is doing that, he feels sad for the boy because so many of the plague’s victims were children, whose lives were dramatically shortened by it.
“Nothing to seriously worried about my young friend, what you got can be cured.” He tells Alex while trying to look as friendly and reassuring as possible. “But I’ll need you and your dog here to come with me to my lab so that I can administer the cure properly.”
Alex looks at Van Helsing nervously.
“I really want to believe you, mister. I want to believe that what’s happening to me can be cured...” He tells him while trying to calm his dog. “...but don’t you think we should my parents first?”
<I smell that there isn’t something right about this man> Rusty growls.
“Well just before I met you and your dog here, I did have a nice chat with your parents about what was wrong. And they gave me their permission to take you and Rusty to my lab for the cure.”
Rusty flicks back his ears while his fur bristles.
<No one is going to take a member of my pack.> He thinks to himself, calming only slightly at his pup’s reassuring touch.
Rusty glances back at the house and starts barking to gain the attention of the other humans in his pack.
“But...” Alex tries to say before quickly turning glance at his tail. “This tail of mine just started to grow. How could they know that I am sick? And why aren’t they here?”
Van Helsing’s eyes widen a bit as things begin to spiral out of control for him. He isn’t winning the boy like he thought he would. And on top of that, the boy’s dog is going to bring some unwanted attention down on his head. He finds himself having to act quickly.
“My mom always stays with me whenever I am sick.”
“My boy, your parents have known of your illness for sometime, and they grew very worried about it. So they called me over to take a look at you and your dog. And I told them to keep their distance while I checked you out, so they wouldn’t catch whatever you got. Do you understand?” He calmly tells Alex. “Your mother will come by the lab later to see how you and your dog are doing.”
Rusty cocks his head in surprise and puzzlement. As most humans trespassing in his territory would run away while he barked at them or when his barking brought more of his human pack outside. He grins toothily and wonders how this human will look like in one of their ‘pounds’.
Van Helsing slowly slips one hand into his coat and pulls out a dart gun, knowing full well that the situation has just figuratively gone to the dogs.
“Easy, Rusty, easy. I still feel uneasy that my parents aren’t here to see me leave with you, sir. And you don’t really look like a doctor to me.” Alex tells him while instinctively feeling what his dog is feeling right now.
Rusty barks some more while wondering why the pup is trying to calm him down.
<Why is he trying calm me down? This man is a danger to the pack!>
“Mom? Dad? There’s a man out here with me who’s telling me that I am sick and have to leave with him. Can you please come out with me? I am scared.” Alex shouts back towards the house.
Van Helsing swears softly to himself as he dramatically whips out the dart gun, aims and quickly fires two darts at the boy and his dog. Alex gets hit by one of the darts and screams as he goes down. The other dart misses Rusty just as Alex’s mom opens the sliding glass door and looks out into the yard.
“Oh my god! Frank, call 911, that man we just met is trying to kidnap our son!” She screams.
Van Helsing ignores her scream for help and runs back to the fence with Rusty running only a few feet behind him.
He makes a running leap onto the fence and starts pulling himself, while hearing the police sirens in the distance. He swears some more as Rusty barking and growling leaps after him with teeth bared.
The boy’s mother runs up to Alex who is lying there on the lawn in a tangled heap. She picks him up in her arms and holds him.
“Alex! Oh my god, Alex!” Alex’s mother cries as she tries to shake him and wake him up.
But as she does so, she notices how furry her son has become. Her eyes widen and she gasps.
“Alex, what has happened to you? What’s happened to my baby?”
Rusty briefly stops trying to bite at Van Helsing’s legs, looks at the boy’s mother and barks some more to get her attention. But she is too busy holding her son and rocking his body back and forth in her arms.
Van Helsing reaches the top of the 10ft fence and scrabbles over it just as the boy’s father comes out of the house to see what’s happening. Rusty makes one more leap to get him but misses.
Alex’s father sees his son on the ground being protected by his frantic wife just as he sees Van Helsing disappear over his backyard fence. He runs past his wife and heads over to where his dog is.
“Come back here, you monster! Come back here so I can hurt you for what you have done to my son!”
But Van Helsing doesn’t stop to listen to him as he runs over to his van, gets inside and hurriedly drives off.