How to Kill Monsters

1. How to Watch Your Best Friend Be Brutally Killed and Be Okay With It

Elaine found out that she knew almost nothing about her best friend the day she watched her die.

It had been a surreal scene, more like something out of the first five minutes of a TV show than reality. They'd been browsing idly through racks of clothes, the store quiet on a late Sunday afternoon with only four other occupants. A mother-and-daughter duo quietly argued the appropriateness of sky-high heels that the teenage girl clearly could not walk in; another young woman who might've been around their age was flicking impatiently through a rack of coats on the far side of the shop; the man at the register had a look of long-suffering boredom, the dullness of his features in the fluorescent lighting aging him. Slightly tinny music echoed off the shiny floors and mirrored pillars, trying to create an atmosphere reminiscent of vogue but making Elaine wish she'd kept her earbuds in. Cassie let out a victorious noise from the other side of the rack, brandishing an off-white top vigorously. One corner of Elaine's mouth quirked up, nodding her agreement.

Cassie had turned on her heel, about to stride towards the dressing rooms, when it had happened. A deafening roar and screech, Elaine's entire body shaking with the impact of the noise. It was like the universe itself was tearing beside them, hitting her senses so hard that the only way to cope with them was to collapse onto the ground. She pushed the weight of shock and fear off her chest with a scream, only feeling the tightening of her throat as her voice was lost in the din of other screams, crunching metal and linoleum, and an eerie sort of echo. The stench of burning metal and dust choked her and made her eyes water, but Elaine forced her head up slightly to squint at her surroundings.

A monster burst into reality, something she'd never thought she'd actually think despite their love of the fantasy and supernatural genres. It looked like a bomb had gone off in the store: the bars of lighting hung precariously from gashes in the ceiling, the floor was now a maze of cracks and holes and shattered glass, and mangled metal that had once been racks and poles of clothing now stuck like primitive spikes across the ground. And in the epicenter, a being out of nightmares. It seemed to be made of darkness and evil, all Elaine could register was a hulkng form of shadow and what seemed like hundreds of sharp teeth and glinting claws. A massive roar tapered into a reptilian screech as it turned, twisting its scaly, grotesque head until it focused on something, showing Elaine its profile with fangs and one black eye burning with bloodthirst. Elaine kept her body plastered to the floor, turning her head the barest inch to follow its gaze as horror froze her blood.

Cassie stood in front of the mother and daughter huddled against the wall, reasonably terrified out of their wits, and she was all business. A chilling hiss slithered from the beastly thing as it stalked forward on four legs made of the dark, intent on tearing into its prey in mere moments. Yet, Cassie was steady as she slid a pocket knife shallowly across her arm and murmured inaudibly. As the blood dripped, flames coated in purple and black shadows erupted in her palm, Elaine's own startled yelp drowned out by the shrieks of Cassie's charges.

Chaos erupted for the second time then, the monster and Cassie lunging at each other with equal viciousness. Elaine watched in rapt, terrified attention, unable to even blink as the bizarre scene unfolded before her. Where her foe was all brute strength and snapping jaws, Cassie was graceful sidesteps and elegant, purposeful slashes. The flames elongated from her hands, switching from a flexible whip to a taut sword as she controlled each tiny flicker. Elaine could see Cassie with a clarity sharpened by her own panic; every movement was deliberate and natural, practiced and resolute. The strange flames seemed like extensions of her limbs, and it took her stepping directly in front of Elaine for her to realize she was intentionally darting around the wrecked space, keeping the monster's focus on her and giving the other people the cover to scurry out.

She threw her phone behind her, Elaine's reflexes far too slow as she clumsily scrambled to sit up and catch it in her lap. A paw with claws the length of her arm shot out, Cassie ducking to narrowly avoid it as she grit out, "Emergency call. Tell him to get his ass here."