“That’s no tick!” Aerion said. “It’s a centipede!”
Mouse had managed to avoid the wall. He ran straight for the group, joining them. “That bat’s trying to eat me!” he yelped.
Andrew stepped back, tucking himself behind the group, his mind racing as he tried to put together what was going on before him.
“Wait, where’s Christine?” Andrew asked, having seen a handful of Keepers but not her. He had not seen Godlin yet either and hoped she had stayed with him.
“Er …” Mouse hesitated.
The slug shook off the injury. All of the Keepers pushed backwards toward the hallway. The slug crept closer, swaying left and right, evaluating the group.
“Mouse!” Raptor yelled at him.
“I’m sorry!” Mouse motioned with his hands as he spoke breathlessly. “The power went out, that thing appeared, it went after Christine, and it ate her!”
“Ate her!” Andrew felt panic bubbling up inside of him in addition to the fear already paralyzing him. The slug pressed forward, forcing the Keepers around the corner and down the hallway farther.
Raptor said to Andrew, “She’s alive, just in another dimension.” Addressing everyone she said, “Don’t let it touch you; it’ll transport you, and don’t show it fear. Where’s Walker?”
Mouse pointed past the slug.
“Communications?”
Vigorously shaking his head, Mouse said, “Had to reboot the system. It’ll be three more minutes, at least. The power loss interrupted the upload. The virus is free to go wherever it’s headed.” He hung his head in defeat.
“Well, that’s just great. Excuse me.” Raptor took off at a run right toward the slug. It turned its attention toward her and lunged. Ducking as she pressed herself into the wall, Raptor slipped past it. She continued down the hallway and around the corner.
The slug turned away from her. It slimed its way across the floor, creeping toward the Keepers with loud squelches. Globs of slime dripped off its stomach and splattered to the ground. It bellowed a deep, gurgling sound that rose in pitch until it sounded like a hiss.
“Er … run?” Tran squealed.
“Yep!” Aerion said.
Everyone sprinted down the hallway, the slug keeping pace behind them.
“I thought we weren’t supposed to show it fear,” Andrew said as he ran. A mixture of concern and dread filled him for what had happened to Christine. He wished Raptor would come back and tell him where she had gone.
“You want to go shake hands with it, be my guest!” Tran turned into another hallway and darted into the coffee room—the others close behind.
Tran spun around and stood next to the door, opening a compartment hidden in the wall. Inside were the controls for the door and a pair of glowing orbs like the ones Tech had used.
Aerion grabbed Tran. She pulled him out of the doorway just as the slug’s head came through. “Power, remember?”
Tran pointed to the orbs. “But the backup—” he started.
“Too late!” Mouse yelped. The slug heaved the rest of its body through the doorway, leaving a coat of slime in its wake.
The slug turned to Andrew. He ran across the room, dodging a table in his path. The massive creature plowed its way through the table, getting itself entangled in the chairs and delaying its progress by a few moments.
Mouse took shelter near the fridge. He grabbed whatever he could find and threw it toward the monster. A block of cheese sailed across the room and smacked into the back of it.
The slug shifted its attention to Mouse.
“No fear, no fear,” Andrew muttered to himself. A coffee maker sat on the counter beside him. Andrew grabbed it and jerked the plug from the wall. He chucked the full pot of coffee first and followed that with the coffee maker.
Tran and Aerion joined them. They grabbed things from under the cabinets—bottles, cans, fruit, anything that they could throw.
They pelted the slug from both sides. Seeming unable to decide what to do, its attention shifted between its assailants. The Keepers pushed the beast toward the opposite end of the room.
“We can’t keep this up forever!” Aerion said. She threw a sandwich at the slug, but it fell to the ground with a pathetic plop.
The slug inched back toward the Keepers.
“Escape!” Mouse yelled as he ran for the now clear doorway. Andrew and the other Keepers followed him out, running to the end of the hallway and making a sharp left. The slug had not yet emerged from the coffee room. Everyone stopped, keeled over, trying to breathe. Andrew leaned against the wall, leaving behind sweaty handprints.
Tran peeked around the corner. Then he fell back, tripping over Aerion and causing both of them to stumble. The slug had caught up. It squirmed its way around the corner like a predator stalking its prey.
Its front half lifted off the ground, and long filaments of slime dripped like snot all over the floor and walls. Shuddering in disgust, Andrew started to back away when he saw movement behind the creature.
Two more Keepers joined the melee—Godlin and Dynamos. Godlin carried a long, black sword, and Dynamos held a gun.
“Hey!” Godlin yelled.
Dynamos fired the gun several times at the slug. The bullets seemed to annoy it, but not hurt it, as they sprung off its thick hide. It writhed a bit as small pockets of green blood welled up from the bullets, but it still chased them.
“Do not follow us,” came a stern warning from Dynamos, directed to the group.
Dynamos and Godlin ran around a corner with the slug following. A few tense seconds passed and then an explosion rocked the base. Bits of the hallway cascaded in all directions. A screech like nails on a chalkboard followed.
Andrew flinched in surprise at the explosion.
“Dynamos! That’s my room!” Andrew heard Raptor yell.
Poking his head around the corner, Andrew spotted Raptor and Walker standing at the far end of the hallway, near the coffee room. They ran and disappeared into yet another long hallway.
The Keepers’ headquarters came back to life at that moment. The main lights flickered on and the humming sound returned.
“Oh, thank God,” Mouse said. He reached up and touched the edge of his glasses, pausing for a moment as if listening or reading, Andrew could not tell which. Pointing in the direction Godlin and Dynamos had gone, he said, “That way. … No Andrew, wait!”
Andrew had reacted before Mouse said anything. He ran past the other Keepers, toward the hallway the explosion had come from. The bomb had taken a few chunks out of the walls, and sticky slime coated everything. The floors and walls glistened with alien guts, and a rank smell overtook the room.
At the far end of the hallway, Walker and Raptor watched on, their eyes wide in shock, but their attention was not on him.
Raptor yelled, “Drop!”
Andrew threw himself to the ground just in time. The slug lunged for him from behind. It had come from another hallway farther down and had narrowly missed swiping his head off. Flipping over to his back, he lifted his hands in self-defense.
Walker stepped forward, pointing in the direction of the slug. A portal opened on the floor under it, and the slug fell through, lashing about as it went. Then, with a pop, the portal vanished, leaving behind the tangy odor of ozone.
Andrew stood up, breathing hard. “What was that?” The slime had vanished with the creature, but the damage in the hallway was real. “Where’s Christine?”
“First, don’t run toward man-eating beasts anymore. Thank you,” Raptor said, surveying the damage in the hallway. “As for Christine, she’s been kidnapped by a Quester named Arachnid.”
Interrupting Raptor, Andrew said, “We need to go.”
Raptor pressed her lips together. “He owns the Stone of Fear—one of the Quester Stones we need—and is extremely dangerous. I can’t stress this enough: Extremely. Dangerous.” She drew out the last two words.
“I don’t care.” Andrew was determined to not only use his pow
ers to save Christine, but to prove he was ready to become a Keeper.
“I thought you might say that. You and I are going to go get her, right now.” Raptor turned to Walker. “We’re going to need a portal.”
Chapter Fourteen
“Where am I?” Christine whispered. The last thing she remembered was a giant snake grabbing her. Everything had gone black after that and then nothing. Shuddering, she drew her arms closer to her body.
She found herself in a small room made of interlocking bricks. No doors or windows where visible, but a faint light filtered in from the cracks in the bricks. A dark shape loomed in the corner. She approached it with bated breath, only to discover an old wooden chair. The rest of the room appeared barren—no sign of an exit.
The chair seemed better than sitting on the floor, so Christine eased herself into it. The wood felt cold and uncomfortable. She set her arms on the armrests, and a pair of shackles clasped over her wrists. When she tried to pull free, they tightened themselves down.
A raspy voice rang out. “Shouldn’t struggle, no, no. Your fears we know.”
Something brushed up against her leg. She started pulling her feet up, but a great snake looped a muscular coil around her ankles, pinning her legs.
She broke out in a cold sweat. Fear gripped her chest and throat, making it hard to breathe. Trying to kick the snake loose proved fruitless; it just swayed back and forth with the motions.
The voice laughed. “Such a small thing. So afraid. Yes, yes.”
Christine felt the room began to spin. Darkness consumed her.
* * * * * *
Lightning flashed and thunder shook the windows. Christine jumped in surprise, gripping tighter onto the sides of her book. The rumble slowly trailed off, rain rhythmically splattering on the windows.
“Boy, that lightning is close,” she thought, pressing herself deeper into the purple chair she sat in, taking comfort in its warmth. She lifted her book, trying to focus on the words, but a loud, grinding screech interrupted her. A second later, the electricity went out, plunging the house into darkness.
“That sounded like a car wreck.”
Another lightning bolt flashed and illuminated the room. She thought she saw something move out of the corner of her eye on the ceiling. Christine flinched, clutching the book to her chest. A ceiling fan slowly spun around, creaking with each rotation. She could barely see the fan—the long blades reaching out across the ceiling.
A loud crash from behind her caused Christine to jump, and her book fell to the floor. She spun around, just as a flash brightened the room, ricocheting off the pieces of a broken lamp strewn across the ground. A calico cat darted out from behind the chair and took off running into the hallway.
“Stupid cat,” she muttered. She reached down, trying to feel for the book. Her hand wrapped around the cold, smooth cover. She needed to find a flashlight and clean up the mess. Hopefully, her mom would not be too mad at her, or the cat.
She grabbed the book and sat up, meeting a pair of glowing, amber, cat-like eyes staring at her. Thunder clapped as lightning turned the room a brilliant white, revealing a massive snake hanging from the ceiling fan. It flicked a forked tongue at her.
Christine froze in terror as the snake lunged forward with a terrible hissing sound. It clamped its jaws around her neck as its body streamed down from the ceiling, crushing her in its coils.
* * * * * *
The voice hissed to itself. “Uncreative, boring, mundane. We can do better. Indeed.”
The young woman may have feared snakes, but it was not her greatest fear.
* * * * * *
Christine laughed. She relaxed in the backseat of a car with Andrew. Their friend, Robert, drove. His girlfriend Melissa sat in the passenger seat beside him. They had just left the movies after watching the last showing of the night and were headed home. Traffic on the road was light.
Ahead of them, a light at an intersection changed from red to green. Robert did not think much of it and zipped through the intersection.
An eighteen-wheeler slammed into the side of the car. The driver had run the red light on his side of the intersection. The smaller car was pulled down the street, even as Robert pressed both feet down on the brake. Metal squealed as the truck dragged the car under it. A shudder shook the truck as its brakes brought it to a halt. The car wrenched free of the truck and went flipping end over end down the street.
Christine held onto her seat, barely aware of her own screams. As the car flipped over a second time, she jolted loose from the seatbelt and hit her head on the roof, knocking herself out.
She did not know how much time had passed before she came around. She opened her eyes, but everything blurred. A sticky liquid, smelling of blood and oil, matted her hair and stuck to the side of her face. She reached out a hand and touched cold metal. A crumpled door and part of the car laid on top of her legs, pinning her in place.
A siren blared nearby, and shadows moved about outside the car.
“Help!” she tried to scream, but it came out as a faint cry. A voice answered her from next to the car.
“Christine? Are you all right?” It was Andrew. She choked on tears, and they ran down her face. A few drops landed in her mouth, tasting metallic.
“Yeah, yes,” she lied. Her vision cleared, and she could see the front half of the car had pushed itself into the back half. Robert and Melissa had been in the front, but nothing indicated if they lived or not. She hoped they lived; she hoped they were not pressed under the metal that weighed down on her legs.
“Are … are you?” Christine asked. From inside the crushed car, she could not see Andrew.
“It’s all okay. We’re going to be fine. Don’t worry,” he whispered.
It was a lie. Christine knew it. He had spoken quickly, his voice lacking its normal strength. Andrew had never been good at lying, even when it mattered.
“Hey,” she choked out past the tears. Her friends meant the world to her, and Andrew was her best friend.
No response.
“Andrew?” she called out. “ANDREW!” Her words hung in the air like a forgotten balloon.
Trapped, helpless, she closed her eyes, not wanting to lose him.
Christine sat straight up, expecting to find the wreckage of the car caging her in. Instead, she found herself in a pristine, white hospital room. Even the air smelled sanitized, weighed down by the amount of ammonia clinging to it.
Her mother jumped up from a chair at Christine’s bedside. Hugging her with tear-stained cheeks, she cried, “Oh! You are awake at last!”
Christine blinked in surprise. She had never seen her mother so upset. Something terrible must have happened. Pushing herself up in the bed, she felt relieved to discover she could feel her legs again and wiggle her toes. It was a momentary victory.
“Where’s Andrew and my friends? How long have I been here? Are they all right?” Christine tried to voice all the questions spinning in her head, but they came out garbled. Her tongue pleaded for water.
“You have been in a coma for days now.” Her mother reached out to hold her hand. “I’m so sorry, but you are the only one that survived.”
“What?” Christine yelled, vigorously shaking her head. “But I talked to him …” She refused to accept that. Gone? How could he be gone already, when she never had the chance to tell Andrew how she really felt?
“But it is, it is. All true.” A slight smile pulled on the corner of her mother’s lips. She reached out to touch Christine. “Should believe us.”
Leaning away from her mother, she asked, “What did you say?”
“Nothing dear, should go back to sleep now. Yes, yes!”
Christine yanked her hand away. “No, this isn’t right.” She leaned over and pressed her hands into the side of her head. Everything felt familiar and yet wrong at the same time. Her mother would never be so callous about her friends. She would be a rock of emotional strength, not standing there gloating over their deaths.
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Her mother stood up. “You’re just confused. Misguided, disoriented … lost.”
Christine ignored her and pulled out a gold locket she kept under her shirt. Pressed into the front was a large sapphire. She used both hands to pull it open. On one side of the locket, an inscription had been scratched into it, but now had faded into obscurity. On the other side, she had placed a picture of Andrew.
A memory of the night she stole the locket returned to her. She had obsessed over it ever since she had first seen it on a fieldtrip to the town hall several years before. A little placard beside it told the story of two men from Texas in the 1800s who had killed each other in a duel, fighting over the locket. Then the locket became entangled in a family dispute, resulting in the deaths of two more people. Considered to be cursed, the locket remained in the town hall for decades.
Despite its infamous history, she had felt drawn to it and knew she was meant to own it. It took years, but Christine finally got up the gumption to steal it when she was just eleven years old.
Her mom crouched down beside her, appearing more like an animal. “Stone holder! Cannot be! It must be; it resists!”
Christine hardly heard the words as a sharp pain in the side of her head overwhelmed her. She had not noticed it before, but as she focused on it, it started to become more intense. She gritted her teeth, trying to force it from her mind.
Her mother snarled and leapt forward to grab her. “Be still!”
“You can’t make me!” Christine jumped up out of the bed. Her feet hit the cold, hard floor and everything went white.
* * * * * *
Christine woke with a start. She sat in the brick room again, strapped into the wooden chair.
A strange man stood in front of her, his hand resting on the side of her head. He stood about seven feet tall and had dark violet skin with a dog-like head. A long skirt made of gold wrapped around his waist and shimmered when he moved. It matched the gold markings on his neck and face.
He jerked his hand away from Christine’s head, his eyes wide as he stepped back from her.
“Shouldn’t be able to do that. No, no!”
Stone of Power (Keepers of Earth Book 1) Page 18