The ClockTower: Hunt For The Alaskan Brush Stalker: The ClockTower, #1

By Shaun Kinser

Ace is a veteran monster hunter employed by a shadowy organization called WhiteCell. He is known widely as the "ClockTower", yet the reason for the alias is still a mystery, even to WhiteCell. As a young man who's been a hunter for more than seven years, he's become a decorated figure within the profession. Hunters generally don't live long, so many rumors have surrounded the "ClockTower". Many think he's a monster that only pretends to be human or even that he's possessed by an evil spirit that protects him. After hunting a Shriek in Arkansas, Ace was contacted by the US government about concerns with something getting loose in one of their bio-engineering black sites. Strangley the administrators refuse to give him any details until he arrives at the facility. Ace hesitantly travels to the bitter cold forests of Alaska armed with an assortment of strange weapons and technologies. Ace ventures into the decrepit black site unaware of the horrors lurking within. With the odds stacked against him, Ace still has one ace up his sleeve. He posseses a mysterious ability that has been a closely guarded secret ever since the "Yellowstone Incident". Will it be enough to tackle this unknown threat? Only time will tell.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shaun Kinser
• Release date: Apr 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201309459

Book preview

The ClockTower

Hunt For The Alaskan Brush Stalker

By: Shaun Kinser

Chapter 1

The Human Monstrosity

As the winds of the forest howled through the night, a lone figure sat upon a log gazing into a small fire. Empty tents that had been torn to shreds surrounded him with strange tracks surrounding the havoc. Beer bottles were littered about as if a party had been thrown recently. In the center of the campsite, the remnants of a bonfire remained, its charred kindle bundled in a large mass gazing back at him.

The man wore a jet-black coat with coattails that extended down to his calves, long dark pants, a black sun hat, and under the coat an assortment of unrecognizable weapons, gadgets, and bottles.

Dark Snakeskin Boots with an indistinguishable design dug into the rugged earth as he kicked at the ground. He wiped the dirt and grime from his pale-young face which twitched with signs of insomnia. He was a tall man, standing at about 6'2 with shoulders amounting to vast mountains. His eyes were a dark blue and were so dark they could almost be mistaken for black. Under his dark hat, messy jet-black hair escaped like sunlight in between trees on a summer morning.

His eyes held an apathetic and indifferent stare. He puffed on a Cuban cigar, his first and foremost choice for taking a smoke. In his right hand, he caressed and fumbled with a large .50 caliber pistol trying to pass the time.

This man was a monster hunter, contracted by a shadowy corporation known as WhiteCell to exterminate entities of supernatural origin. He hunts and exterminates the nightmares that walk this Earth so the common man may sleep well and be undisturbed by the things that go bump in the night.

Can't believe they have me out here for something like this. This is way below my pay grade, he grumbled. Deep in the forest a loud almost human-like screech wretched its way through the trees. It sounded like someone had been screaming for help on an archaic radio. The man tossed his cigar into the fire and got to his feet. Whelp, guess it's time to get to work, he mumbled.

On his right arm rested a crossbow that could be triggered with a lever in his hand. The bow was loaded with a silver-tipped arrow which was soaked in a potent poison. He gazed into the tree line and spotted a pale blur fluttering through the trees. He raised his pistol and fired into the tree line. The bullet hit its mark and the thing in the trees caught fire and in a spectacular spark of flames tumbled toward the ground. It let out a high-pitched wail that would send ice through an average man's veins.

The pistol was loaded with incendiary tracer rounds which were effective against your average beast.  The monster came into plain view with scorch marks around its face. It was about nine feet tall with pale hairless skin. It could almost resemble a human, but simultaneously everything about it was off.

Its limbs were elongated with razor-sharp talons, black voids for eyes, and long needle-like teeth. It let out a low-pitched growl at the man and leaped at him at an inhuman speed. Its talons came within inches of the man, then in the blink of an eye, the man was walking back down the path from which he had entered and the creature was dead.

An arrow pierced through its chest and ten pistol rounds laid to rest in its skull, slowly sizzling. In the creature's dying moments, it was confused, as it had come within inches of killing the man but within a moment he had been massacred without being able to see his movements. The man glanced back at the creature, not unlike how a child looks at a bug they had stepped on.  He glared at it with an unfeeling gaze.

This is getting stale, I wonder when they'll assign me a hunt with a bit more challenge to it. I'm starting to get too careless, he grumbled.  I let it get way too damn close. I wouldn't have won if I had used it a second later. I probably shouldn't be using it on small fry like this anyway. They always told me the most dangerous thing about being an accomplished monster hunter is becoming bored.

He walked thirty miles back to his truck which looked as though it had been through hell and back. The sun had already risen high in the sky as he made it back to the car. He hopped in, started it, and it came to life with a deafening roar.  He pulled the receiver from his ham radio and contacted the local park ranger.

Hello? The radio crackled.

Hey, it's me, the man said gruffly, I'm calling to give you my report. The radio crackled again.

"Oh! Were you able to get rid