CHAPTER 23
CONFRONTATION
Elizabeth awoke confused, cold, and aching. Why were her arm and shoulder throbbing, along with her poor aching head? She was obviously outside, lying on the ground. Where and why?
Just as she remembered Small Bear’s betrayal and falling from the cliff, she opened her eyes. Over her in the moonlight stood a nightmare creature, humanoid, but not human. Long black hair covered its otherwise naked body. A wolf-face with glowing red eyes stared at her. Dark!
She sensed movement out of the corner of her eye, and with a thud Dark was gone, knocked away by a figure that suddenly stood in the monster’s place. “Johnny!” exclaimed Elizabeth softly.
He knelt and gently held her in his arms. “Did he hurt you?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think so. I got hurt mostly by Small Bear and falling off a cliff.”
“I know. Leave here if you can walk. Head down the trail for the Great Tree,” he told her. Gently he helped her to stand up. The whole time he never took his eyes off Dark, however, who was watching them from where he still lay.
“Very impressive for a mere human, Goth,” hissed Dark. He only partly stood and instead assumed a crouching stance, coiled like a steel spring, only five meters from Johnny. “I didn’t sense your arrival. You flew here, of course.”
“Elizabeth is leaving. I’m the one you want.” He stepped left slowly, putting himself squarely between Dark and Elizabeth, who began limping away slowly.
“Oh, I’ll kill her too, though not until after I’ve killed you. But first you need to tell me a few things, which is why I wanted to meet you here.”
“Sure thing,” Johnny replied, as he pulled Two Bears’ knife out of its sheath. “I’m your man. Let’s have a nice pleasant conversation. Exactly what do you want to know?”
“You get a boost from that mirror thing over there, don’t you?” He pointed a clawed finger at the Cube. “It makes you stronger.”
“And you don’t get a boost at all? Not surprising. I have a theory about that.”
“You humans are full of theories, aren’t you? My theory is that you all have to do that because you are so weak. Human theories and science bore me; but very well, tell me your theory.”
“The Cube is somehow tuned to strengthen normal Earth life, not beings such as you. You aren’t alive in the normal sense, are you?”
“We aren’t related, if that’s what you mean. Your biology is closer to that of an earthworm than it is to mine. What you call the Cube has indeed tuned me out, but when you and the rest are dead I’ll get it to feed all of its power to me alone.”
“Are you in a hurry? Aren’t you immortal? In any case, I don’t think you’ll ever be able to control the Cube.”
“You’re stalling.”
“True; I do want Elizabeth to get away.”
“She can’t get away.” He crouched even further as though preparing to leap, and took a threatening step towards Elizabeth. “Out of curiosity, what do you think that you know about this thing that you so ignorantly call a Cube?”
Johnny shifted his position slightly to stay interposed between Dark and Elizabeth. “Alright I’ll gladly tell you what little I know. In a nutshell, the Cube is beyond our understanding or control. We know almost nothing about it, except that it’s been here for a very long time.”
“Your friends The People are interested in it, or they wouldn’t have their One Tree here.” Dark nodded in the direction of the big aspen. “Does that give you a hint about its origins?”
“They’re here because they’re interested in concealing it and themselves from human society.”
“They have a closer relationship with the Cube than that, much closer than they can remember. They have mostly forgotten what they are and who I am. That is part of my plan and it will be their downfall.”
“Their One Tree, which is normal life or close to it, gathers strength from the Cube,” said Johnny.
“And unicorns? What do you know about unicorns, Goth? And what do the unicorns remember about the Cube? Not much; I’ve seen to that too.”
“I know nothing that will help you.”
“We shall see.”
With a roar Dark pounced; so sudden and swift that Johnny was barely able to dodge to one side and avoid him. The creature, screaming with rage, immediately span around and leapt again at Johnny, brandishing slashing claws and jaws.
Johnny met the second attack head-on, was knocked down backwards but kicked up at Dark’s body with both feet, flipping Dark over and past him, while slashing up at the wolf man with the knife of Two Bears. They ended up again crouching and facing each other.
“You’re bleeding, Goth,” snarled Dark. Even in only Moonlight, Dark could see that four deep gashes had been inflicted across Johnny’s face by his clawed hand. “My claws are poison. Your wounds won’t heal. You’re already dead, Goth, within minutes, no matter what else happens.”
Johnny smiled. “I don’t think so.” As Dark watched, the wounds on Johnny’s face disappeared in moments.
“Interesting, but you only delay the inevitable.” Shrieking, Dark leapt yet again, but instead of landing on Johnny, he found himself floating several meters above his adversary, his claws hopelessly slashing at empty air. After a few moments he stopped struggling and looked down at Johnny. Using his own telekinetic powers he tried to oppose Johnny, but quickly found that he was no match for the human. “Very impressive. But I doubt you can do this forever, Goth. My physical strength far exceeds yours, and I weigh twice as much as you do, human. You’ll exhaust yourself and be helpless very soon.”
“I suspect that I can do this for several hours, Dark. As you say, I get a boost from the Source. While we wait for help to arrive why don’t we talk again for a while? You appear to seek knowledge, and I am also curious about you. Perhaps you could tell me things about the Cube that I don’t know.”
“Indeed I could, but your curiosity is pointless. You’ll soon be dead, after I’ve beaten and taken what I want from you.”
“Humor me. What could it hurt? You are a walking mystery. Why the wolf shape, for example?”
“I’ve become very used to and fond of this shape, much as our little goat friend is used to his goat shape. I enjoy being a wolf. I find that it helps my victims get into the right mood for their deaths. I find that they taste better terrorized; not only their physical parts, but echoes of their dying terrified psychic essences are exquisite.”
“I feel both insulted and envious of someone that can actually look like a wolf. My Tribe name is White Wolf.”
Dark laughed. “You amuse me, but I don’t much like surprises. Your pin-filled death will feed me.”
“You like to be in control.”
“I AM in control, human,” snarled Dark. He pointed a clawed index finger at Johnny, which suddenly flashed with intense blue-white light.
Johnny dodged when he saw the flash, but even so, his right side and leg were singed as a bolt of lightning knocked him painfully to the ground. His concentration disrupted, Dark dropped halfway towards Johnny before the human could regain focus and stop the decent.
Dark reached down towards him with a clawed hand. It should have still been impossible for him to reach his foe, but the black-furred arm stretched like it was rubber, until thinned, elongated, talon-like fingers grasped the forearm that Johnny had thrown up reflexively for protection.
Johnny shouted more from surprise than from pain, as blue fire from the watch in his breast pocket cascaded over him. He felt a surge of impossible strength. As Dark landed in front of him, Johnny twisted out of his vise-like grasp and at the same time sliced at Dark’s elongated arm with the shaman hunting knife.
The knife sliced deeply into the creature’s arm, who with an angry snarl checked his progress towards Johnny and backed away cautiously. Though the arm had been cut nearly all the way through, there was no blood and it re-formed itself in seconds.
“I understand well whe
re you get most of your power, Goth. It’s not just that Cube over there that you sometimes aptly call the Source, or your inherent human-based skills. It’s the parts of your unicorn friends that you carry with you as artifacts. Soon they will all be mine, and their power will be mine. But you’re still no match for me, human. You can’t begin to match my power.” He again advanced on Johnny.
“But we can,” said a new voice, a whinnying voice that twinkled and sparkled like chiming bells on the wind.
Dark roared in anger as he turned to look at the newcomers, then bounded away into the shadows, disappearing.
When he at last was sure that the danger was past and he turned to view the newcomers, Johnny’s face broke into a broad smile. Approaching from the One Tree, with their perfect white bodies and crystal-blue horns glowing brighter than the Moon, pranced two magnificent unicorns.
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Secrets of Goth Mountain Page 51