When Given a Lemon

Part 23

We've almost reached the spot where we had been bombarded with those spheres by the villagers, an area that still makes me a little nervous to walk through despite being certain now the locals would never purposefully attack us again. Not to mention, they know that we are here. I'm not paying enough attention to what's in front of me, so when Denyel suddenly stops in his tracks, I slam right into the back of him, then Lemon into me, the double impact knocking all the air from my lungs.

I brace myself, leaning over, then heave when my breath finally returns.

“How did I fall and not you?!” I demand, jumping back up and brushing off my knees. I don't know why I ask, Denyel doesn't talk so he won't be answering me, and he's made like an ox so the answer is already obvious. He's not acting like he even realized that I had literally run right into him, and distracted with my discomfort I hadn't noticed that anything was amiss either.

Lemon roughly tugs my sleeve, annoyingly enough that I try to swipe their hands away but they go right back to tugging at me again.

“What?–” I snapped, but when I finally looked back at them, their eyes were giant as if fighting to break out of their head and they trembled as they jerked their chin rapidly toward what had caught everyone else's attention. Bemused, I turned around to look.

“Whoa…!” cold fear instantly grabs me.

I can't properly explain what it is I see.

Ahead of us is a figure.

Not just a figure.

A monstrosity.

Megalithic in terms of size and the dark intent it emanates.

It's so large that for a fraction of a second I mistook it for the shadow formed from all the trees growing clumped together next to the roadside. It's lurking within them, a massive entity, bigger than any creature I have ever laid eyes on before.

At least half of it is obscured by branches, leaves, and shade.

It's facing straight at us.

A malignant orb, giant and made of midnight, stares unblinkingly, inhumanly, and without any sclera. It doesn't move, sitting as still as stone as it stares us down. It's attention binding us in place.

My whole body trembles in response.

Hidden in the shade like this, it’s the color of an angry bruise; all purples and blues and sickly greens. I feel that if I saw it moving, the whirl of motion might make me sick.

I can't tell through the foliage its actual body shape nor just how large it really is. But its desire for blood is made clear; palpable in the growing tension.

What I can see are its arms, it has at least three, and teeth that are as big as my torso. They make my heart stop as the thing raises its lip to show off even more of them protruding in layers from its dark gums. Whether it's sitting or kneeling in the undergrowth, I cannot tell, but it can still easily reach up high enough to touch limbs far above my head. The arm span promises that little is able to out climb, out pace, or out reach it.

None of us are moving, suspended in time we are frozen still to the spot in shock and terror, unable to conjure a plan of escape.

All of us stare back at it, unmoving, and it at us; yet the world around russells with the wind and the water nearby gargles stones being tugged by the current, unaware or uncaring of our plight.

Time feels endless for that moment, then somehow I unfreeze and my body moves forward. I hazard a small step and its eye watches every minute change I make. Its lip pulls upward the same distance I had moved, baring all its sinister teeth in warning, telling me another step and you're dead.

Again at an impasse, afraid to move, afraid to stay. I am frozen once more, and worse, in an unstable position.

This has happened before, this same type of situation, my brain somehow has time to recall. I had been caught in the dilemma of running versus staying when those spheres dropped on us. A terrifying situation that suddenly feels like a trifle in comparison to now.

I've lost my will to move once again, trapped in this stance, unable to breathe or think for fear that any of these things will cause this monster, this true monster to react. To move against me. And all the gods know, I am powerless against it.

Fwoosh!

Thwack!

The sounds come from nowhere and shatter the silence and for a heartbeat nothing happens afterward. Then a deafening roar engulfs us, frightening away any living forest creature within earshot!

I flinch, over balancing and smacking my knee hard against the ground, but don't seem to feel it and before I know it I'm already back on my feet running for the opposite treeline.

I learned much later that while it had been distracted by me, Saiya had pulled her bow free and loosed an arrow, barely missing its one eye. Maiming instead the soft skin at the edge of its eye socket. The thing reacted, frazzled and flailing, then roared loud enough to shake the loose shale, arms crashing through tree trunks as if they were dried up twigs in its fury!

Despite my head start, I barely had a chance to flee more than a few steps before it was upon us.

It had ripped the arrow out of its face and smashed through the remaining trees standing between us, splintering them into infinite slivers picked up by the wind and blowing them all over, creating a vortex of needles and leaving cuts and scrapes in its wake.

Then, with another resounding roar, it shattered a large stone on the embankment mere steps behind us. I feel the shrapnel whirring past my head though I dare not turn to look.

No more than ten steps had I gone before it was here, close enough for the wind to carry the stench of it, a miasma of blood, rot, and feces; likely it's last gruesome feast.

I could hear the scream and the sickening sound of bones snapping and rocks breaking when it smashed Bill into the ground with a reverberating thud. Under its foot, his screams muffled and gurgling, imprinted into the ground by a single stomp with its oversized and wickedly clawed front foot.

I was too terrified to stop; running blindly, unable to turn to see if he was okay, if he was even still alive. It didn't stay distracted for long, already in pursuit again before I could gain another step. Its two hind legs, while much smaller, were still powerful enough to outpace the fastest of us as it flipped its body around to charge so fast it was practically a grotesque blur.

We frantically split apart as it came up on us. I'm tripping over myself, hell bent on reaching the safety of the wood, where I might find somewhere, anywhere, to hide myself. I could hear it, feel it. Its growls sounded like it was only a breath behind but I couldn't make myself move any faster nor peel my eyes from the potential salvation ahead as I stumbled about trying to keep to my feet.

Too afraid to look and see which of us it had decided to chase after. Afraid to hope too loudly that it wasn't me.