Death by any other name …

After work, he tossed his Wal-Mart clerk’s vest aside, put on his leather jacket he bought at Good Will (the one with all the cool zippers), and headed for the park at the end of town.

Edmond (he preferred "Mondo," meaning "extreme" – it seemed to offset his 105-pound frame), sat down on a wooden bench and waited.

From amid the darkened trees came the sound of footsteps crushing fallen leaves and twigs into mulch. Mondo shuddered audibly and fought off a tremendous desire to flee.

It came out of the brambles like an eating machine, its massive jaws snapping wildly in anticipation of the midnight snack sitting on the bench, its rear legs supporting a barrel-like body strewn with muscles its thick fur couldn’t disguise.

The Wal-Mart clerk, who, only six hours earlier had argued with a 97-year-old woman who was sure he had overcharged her for some Ajax, felt his courage slip away.

The beast was nearly upon him when his hands tightened on a box sitting on his lap. He lifted it, held it between himself and the monster, and turned a small button.

"This is Brit Hume with the news," the portable television uttered as it blinked to life.

The beast froze, staring wide-eyed into the screen.

"Today a bomb went off in a Baghdad hotel killing 19 people," the anchor said as a video showed people running from the smoking building. "Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack. Meanwhile, in Israel, seven gunmen raided a local college campus, killing 23. The killings are thought to be in retaliation for Israel bulldozers destroying 50 homes in a Palestinian refugee camp." More images, this time of families huddling together by their ruined homes, reeled across the screen. "Two American soldiers and several Iraqi children were killed when an RPG blasted …."

For nearly two hours the beast stood mesmerized as terrible news played itself out.

Suddenly the werewolf’s lip began to quiver. The creature started sobbing uncontrollably, his massive claws limp at his sides. The Wal-Mart clerk smiled inwardly, slowly set the TV down and approached the beast, placing an arm gently over his shoulder. His aim had been to destroy the beast’s spirit, and that’s exactly what he had done.

"There, there," he said. "There, there."

He walked him over to the bench, and the two sat together in the moonlight, the monster wailing like a newborn baby, his tears streaming down the shoulder of the clerk. After a few moments, the beast stopped sobbing and stared quietly into the horizon.

"What I don’t understand," the creature finally said, holding back tears, "is how humanity has let itself deteriorate to the point of self-destruction. We werewolves, we have voracious appetites. It’s nothing personal. But you …."

"Look," the clerk said, "it’s okay to kill, as long as you’re doing so for a higher purpose. It’s okay to kill as long as you are killing people to stop people from killing. It’s okay to kill someone who’s thinking about killing you in the future. And it’s okay to kill someone to punish them for having killed. God gave us our intelligence, and we used that intelligence to invent the electric chair. And so it goes that if we have the best weaponry to fight and win a war, that’s just a further sign of God’s love for us.

"See, being human means coming to terms with your inhumanity. Thousands of Indians died in the Indian wars, but look what we have to show for it, super highways … Pay-Per-View television … Kentucky Fried Chicken. If we had been meek, we never would have won the land that is now the United States of America."

The beast looked puzzled.

"Let me put it this way," Mondo said, "God helps those who help themselves, and if helping ourselves means that we have to, from time to time, take a few lives, then so be it."

"I think I understand," the werewolf said. Rising from the wooden bench, he glanced up at the stars, swallowed the man whole, and ambled off into the moonlight.