by Brian Harmon
This thing was something new.
Eric held onto the handle with all his strength as the monster jerked its arm back, slamming his knuckles into the door, mashing them. Smoke was already boiling from the bleeding wound. If he could hold on just a little longer…
With its other hand, the monster beat against the outside of the door, trying to break it down. It wouldn’t last much longer.
“Get out of there!” begged Holly.
“Just another second…” he groaned.
Finally, he gave the dagger a hard twist, turning the edge of the blade away from the door. This time, when the monster jerked its arm back, the weapon slid toward the thing’s hand, opening a deep gash that gushed black, smoking blood all over his hands.
The monster howled again. Eric thought it was more in pain than in rage this time.
He jerked out the dagger and stepped quickly backward, wincing at the pain in his bloodied knuckles.
The monster arm vanished, leaving only an empty hole behind.
Holly rushed to his side. “Are you okay?
“I’m fine.” He turned and surveyed the room. Margarita and the rude brunette opened fire on a super imp that was trying to force its way through the living room window. Doug was holding his own with the post mallet, but he didn’t look like he’d last much longer. Sweat was dripping off his face. His shirt was half-soaked.
Meanwhile, Delphinium hadn’t taken her eyes off the water. She and the others were working hard to get the blanket back up.
More shouting and gunfire erupted from the back of the house.
“Somebody check on them!” Eric ordered.
Cierra ran for the hallway. The blonde with the axe followed her. But as soon as Cierra entered the darkened corridor, she was knocked back and off her feet by something large and monstrous. Then it turned and hurled itself at the blonde, knocking her to the ground and perching on top of her. A super imp, its claws spread and ready to slash her to shreds.
She screamed.
“Helen!” shrieked Holly.
Eric ran, his dagger raised, but he was too late. Before he could reach the monster, its claws slashed downward. At the same instant, a steel pipe sliced through the air and collided with the creature’s long teeth, shattering them like glass and knocking the monster off the girl and onto the floor.
Emily stood before him, staring at him, her blue eyes huge in the gloom. “Please tell me that was a bad guy!”
He recalled what Holly had told him about the girl being partially blind and realized that in this light, she must barely be capable of distinguishing friend from foe. “You did great,” he told her.
Bernie appeared from the hallway and finished off the super imp with a swift shot to its head as it tried to regain its feet. “Is everyone okay?” he asked.
Holly knelt at the blonde’s side. She’d called her Helen. Eric didn’t think it was nearly as good a stripper name as “Margarita” but it was better than “Limber Lucy.”
“Are you okay?” asked Holly.
Helen nodded and sat up, rubbing at the back of her head. “I’m good.”
There was more shouting from the back of the house. Bernie turned and ran back into the hallway to check on it. Cierra regained her feet and disappeared after him, determined to prevent any more enemy breaches.
Eric scanned the room again. Margarita and the brunette seemed to have the windows on that side of the room covered, so he turned to check on Doug and Norval.
As soon as he approached, Norval turned suddenly and grabbed him by the shoulder. “It has to be you!” he said.
“What?”
“It’s why you’re here!”
He was confused. What the hell was he talking about? “What’s why I’m here?”
“The truth is too painful for her! It has to be you!”
“Who? What truth? What has to be me?”
Norval blinked. “What?”
“What has to be me?” repeated Eric.
But Norval had no idea what he was talking about. “What has to be you? What are you talking about?” He realized that his hand was on Eric’s shoulder and snatched it back. He looked completely puzzled.
“Never mind,” said Eric. “Sorry.”
Suddenly, the air changed again. It grew warmer. His ears popped.
“Got it!” shouted Poppy.
“It’s much smaller now,” fretted Delphinium. “It barely covers the house. But the blanket’s back up.”
“So why are they still coming?” shouted Doug as he swung the mallet again, crushing the life out of another imp.
“Some were already inside the perimeter,” replied Charlotte as she ran over and joined him at the window. “Get back.”
Doug stepped aside obediently as she lifted her hand and fired another thrust through the window, obliterating everything that was gathered outside it.
“Nice,” he said.
Charlotte gave him a smile and then hurried away to check on the girls at the other windows.
Someone was screaming at the back of the house. Eric turned to help, but the voice grew louder. A moment later, the bald bouncer burst from the hallway. “Get it off me!” he screamed as he tried to shield his face from an imp that had perched itself on top of his shoulders and was slashing at his shiny scalp with its claws.
Ponytail ran in behind him, his machete raised, screaming, “Hold still, damn it!”
But the distressed brute didn’t hold still (and Eric didn’t blame him one bit). He turned instead and stumbled toward Emily, who cried out in alarm and swung the pipe again.
Unfortunately, her aim wasn’t so good a second time.
“Ow!” cried the bald man as he staggered backward and fell to his knees, clutching his forehead in his hands.
“Oh, God! Richie! I’m so sorry!”
Of course his name was Richie.
Eric ran to Richie’s side, the dagger raised, his eyes fixed on one of the monster’s ears. If he could get a grip on that, like he’d done with most of the imps he’d fought during the night, he could hold it safely while sliding the blade in for a kill.
It occurred to him suddenly that those alligator hunters on television were not likely to ever impress him again after today. He’d like to see one of them take on a pissed-off imp, much less any of the other freakish things he’d seen.
But as he knelt down and reached out his hand, the monster leapt off Richie’s shoulders and perched itself atop the back of an empty kitchen chair, where it fixed its huge eyes on Shondra.
Shondra screamed and stumbled backward.
The imp leapt at her.
That’s when Siena rose to her feet and shouted, “Stay away from my mom!”
A stiff gust of warm air rushed through the room and an invisible force passed over the chair, sweeping away the unfortunate imp, propelling it across the room and smashing it into oblivion against the wall.
The ruined, smoking corpse hung there, half-embedded in the wall in the center of a perfect, four-foot circle of crumbling, indented plaster.
Everyone turned and looked at Siena. She shrank back into her seat, embarrassed.
“Crushing thrust,” observed Jude. “Nice.”
“I’ve never seen anyone use one without being taught,” said Poppy. She frowned. “I still haven’t even learned to use mine yet…”
“I told you she might surprise us,” said Delphinium. She hadn’t even taken her eyes off the water. If she hadn’t spoken, one might have thought she hadn’t even noticed what was going on around her.
Eric stared at the girl. She really was one of them. A little witch, with her own awesome powers.
In fact, she might be the most powerful of them all.
She didn’t even look drained.
He recalled the first time he saw the girl, sitting there at the bedside, silent, looking deeply troubled, clinging to her dying mother’s hand. It had seemed perfectly natural at the time, not at all unusual. But now he realized how intently she’d be
en sitting there, her eyes fixed on her mother, hardly even acknowledging them. Suddenly he understood that some part of her had been working hard to fight back the monster in the basement. She’d been keeping her mother alive. Although he and Charlotte had actually slain the beast and saved Shondra’s life, without Siena’s power, she wouldn’t have lived long enough for him to arrive.
“There!” said Delphinium, dragging him from his thoughts.
A great pulse shot outward from the bowl. Outside, the swarming monsters exploded into smoke and dust.
Doug lowered his hammer and stuck his head out the window, taking a look around.
Delphinium stood up. “That’ll buy us some more time. Poppy, take over. Keep feeding the blanket.”
“Where are you going?” asked Jude.
“It’s time.” She looked at Eric. “He’s out there. I can feel him.”
He nodded. “What’s the plan?”
“I need you to keep everyone safe in here.”
Eric frowned. “And you?”
“I have to face him.”
Holly and Poppy both gasped. Jude stood up and shouted, “No!”
But she put out her hand and hushed them.
“I’m going with you, then,” insisted Charlotte.
She shook her head. “I need you all in here, with the water. If the blanket falters again, everyone in this house will die.”
But Charlotte shook her head. “We won’t let you. We need you.”
“I’m the only one who can do this.”
“No!” snapped Holly.
“I won’t let you!” agreed Jude.
“Enough.” Delphinium’s voice was firm and final. Everyone fell silent. “I’m sorry, but it’s time.”
It has to be you! Eric thought. Norval’s voice, only a moment ago, but not his words. It’s why you’re here! It was the same message he heard through Mr. Hamblin at the hospital. It has to be you. The only way. “No…” he said. “You can’t.”
“I have no choice.”
“You can’t beat him.”
She put her hands on his shoulder and said, “I need you to trust me.” She looked into his eyes and suddenly Eric realized what she intended to do. The pain and heartache she’d seen in her spells… The sacrifice… She intended to be that sacrifice. She intended to give her life to save her family.
“No,” he said firmly. “I need you to trust me.”
She frowned. Her confident eyes narrowed.
“It won’t work.”
“How—”
But Eric cut her off. “I can’t explain it now. It’s complicated. But you have to trust me. You told me that I was going to save you. You said you saw it.”
“I saw that you’d save us. I also saw that there would be a sacrifice.”
“You said you believed in me.”
Her expression twisted suddenly into hurt. “Of course I believe in you. You’re our savior.”
“Then trust me now.”
She wanted to protest, but he could tell she saw the truth in his eyes.
“It has to be me.”
“No…” said Holly.
But Eric ignored her. “This part right here,” he told Delphinium, “is the part where I save you so you can save everyone else.”
“But…”
“No. You have to stay with your family. It’s what you’re meant to do.”
Now her eyes began to shimmer with tears. “Always standing between us and him…” she recalled. “Like a shield…”
He nodded. “Believe in me.”
Holly reached out and took his hand. “I’m going with you,” she said. “We’re a team.”
Eric shook his head. It has to be you. “Not this time. I need you to stay with your sisters. Look after them. They need you.”
A fat tear streaked down her pretty face.
“Besides, I’m going to need all of you.” He turned toward the table. “Those pulse things you keep sending out… I’m going to need a big one, something to clear a path for me.”
Poppy wiped at her eye. “I think we can whip something up.”
“It might drain us all,” warned Cierra, who had appeared from the hallway. “But we’ll do it.”
“Everything we have,” promised Marissa.
“Without giving up the blanket,” added Eric.
“And we’ll take it from there,” promised Norval.
Eric withdrew his phone. “Can you tell where he is?”
HE’S HEADING YOUR WAY. MOVING TOWARD THE BACK YARD. DUE NORTH
He nodded. “Let’s get this over with.” He turned toward the hallway, but Holly surprised him with a fierce hug.
“Please come back!” she begged.
It was awkward as hell, but he didn’t pull away. He placed his hands on her shoulders and gave her a reassuring squeeze. “I’ll do my best,” he promised.
Finally, she let go of him.
He met Delphinium’s eyes one final time and saw the sadness in them.
Sacrifice.
Then she turned and walked over to the table. “Let’s get to work.”
Eric looked around the room once more. The women he’d come to know in the past few hours. The men and women of The Dirty Bunny. All of them counting on him.
He looked last and longest at Holly.
He turned away and walked out of the room. As he approached the back door, his cell phone chimed at him.
I HOPE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DOING
“Me too.”
Chapter Forty-One
Eric unlocked the back door and stood with his hand on the knob, waiting. Bernie and the receptionist were standing with him, ready to slam the door closed behind him.
Outside, the monsters had begun to break through the blanket again. An imp was clawing at the window.
“You sure you don’t want us to go out there with you?” asked Bernie.
He might’ve laughed if the situation weren’t so grave. The big guy looked scared out of his mind, and yet he was offering to join him on this suicide mission?
“This is what I came here for,” he said. “I have to do this alone.”
The receptionist laughed nervously. His eyes remained fixed on the window. “You’ve got some balls, man. I’ll give you that. I’m going to have nightmares about this shit for the rest of my life.”
“Sorry to drag you into all this.”
Now he turned his gaze to Eric. “Sorry? For what? I’ve never felt more alive!”
Eric blinked. “Seriously?”
“It’s like I’m a kid again. All of this… Witches. Monsters. Magic spells. Don’t you feel it? It’s like anything is possible!”
He considered this for a moment. “Huh.” He supposed in an insanely optimistic sort of way, it was true. All this time, he’d been fixated on all the bad things, on all the other horrors that might be out there. He hadn’t considered the other side of the coin. How many more miracles might there be? How much more wonder?
“If I died today, I think I’d go happy,” agreed Bernie. “Just knowing I got to be a part of something like this.”
“Totally worth it,” said the receptionist.
Eric smiled. He remembered that eleven dollars it cost him to get into The Dirty Bunny the previous night, how annoyed he was by that. But now… It was worth it, he decided. Every penny.
The pulse shot past him. The scratching at the window immediately stopped.
“That’s your cue,” said Bernie.
Eric jerked open the door and ran out onto the porch, his dagger held high, ready for any imp, super imp, ogre or other miscellaneous monstrosity that might have survived the pulse. But as Bernie slammed the door closed and snapped the lock shut behind him, he found nothing waiting for him but thick smoke blowing in the wind.
Lightning flashed overhead. Thunder rolled. Wind howled. But nothing stirred.
The scene was so eerily dark and ominous that he had to fight back the urge to turn and pound on the door until they let him back in. His eyes
stung. Great, black smoke devils swirled in the gloom. To the left, a tree was burning. The flames cast an angry, red glare upon the haze. Distant howls drifted to him from far out in the fields.
It was such a strange storm, with fire and smoke, but not a single drop of rain. In fact, the air felt baked. It dried his lips and parched his throat.
Coughing, he lifted his phone in front of his face and read the screen.
ONE O’CLOCK
Eric turned a little to his right and started across the yard.
STRAIGHT AHEAD
He raised the dagger again and blinked tears from his stinging eyes.
His stomach felt like it was full of slithering eels. His heart was racing. How did he get himself into these messes?
Then something moved to his left. He turned to face it, his dagger poised to stab, but his heart sank as he saw the shape that was moving through the settling smoke, a shape that was twisted and crooked and as tall as a tree.
A giant.
Eric dived out of the way as an enormous, horned fist fell from the sky and struck the ground.
Knowing well that he was still in danger, he leapt to his feet and backed away, narrowly dodging the giant’s other hand as it swept across the yard, carving a shallow trench in the grass with its immense fingers.
He couldn’t outrun this thing. The best he could hope for was to run back to the farmhouse, but not only would that not save him, it would put everyone inside in danger. The blanket might kill the thing, but its smoking corpse would probably flatten most of the building on its way down.
His only chance was to stay on his toes and use the dagger.
He stuffed the phone safely back into his pocket and fixed his gaze on the massive beast.
The thing bent over, its misshapen head descending through the clouds of smoke. Lightning flashed. The smoke parted. And for just a moment, he saw the thing’s face.
He’d seen a lot of terrible things, but this was particularly horrible. Its mouth consisted of oozing folds of glistening, black flesh and countless rows of jagged teeth that took up its entire face. Its bulging eyes were both crowded to one side of its head. It had no neck, and where it should have had a chin, a huge, warty growth was sprouting from between sagging folds of wobbling flesh, oozing yellow slime down its meaty chest.