Feeding Frenzy (Watty Award Winner)

The Entity Has Risen: Chapter Forty-Six

"Are you guys okay?" Tonya couldn't see anything until Ducky switched on his phone's flashlight app. Its blue light revealed her friends' faces in highlights and shadows. Priya's teeth glinted in a smile but Ducky's mouth was dark, agape. He backed away from Tonya as far as the narrow space allowed.

"How did you do that?" asked Priya.

"Shh." Tonya held her finger to her lips. She whispered: "I'll tell you once they've gone."

They stood silently, listening to the firefighters' and ambulance attendants' boots tramping above their heads. When all was quiet, Tonya pressed her fingertips to the roof of the cave, feeling for life energy on the ground above.

Nothing. She was about to tell her friends they could go when the Entity boomed in her head: Feel me rise!

The voice made her gag as if it were ramming itself down her throat. Her breath came fast and shallow. She swallowed acid reflux. They mustn't get trapped underground. The Entity knew where they were.

"We have to leave." She drew energy into the tree roots around her, animating them one by one. Like pythons, they wormed upward and punched passage into the light.

To make sure it was safe, Tonya scrambled up the root ladder first. As she emerged the ashy ground began to shake.

"Hurry!" She pulled Priya up by the hand. Ducky climbed out with Lynette slung over his shoulder.

A crack split the Earth beside Tonya, tumbling dirt and trees deep into the ground. They backed away as the widening crack tilted charred trees left and right, like a comb parting hair. The rift shook the forest so loudly it could be heard over the fire, which suddenly went out with a whoosh.

Tonya had no time to wonder at this miracle because a giant head and hands emerged from the crack in the earth, followed by shoulders, and then a torso. The Entity was composed of dirt and bones, roots and flesh entangled. It stepped out of the hole, rising to fifteen feet tall. Turning its head to smile down on them, it revealed too many undersized teeth. The effect was comical until she realized they must be human teeth, grave-robbed from the cemetery. Waldock had raised a gruesome colossus made of rotting bodies, roots, and earth.

Priya and Ducky stood staring with Lynette propped up between them.

"Run!" Tonya shouted but Ducky set Lynette down and picked up a shovel. He started hacking at the giant's shins, dislodging clods of dirt. The giant stood arms akimbo, watching Ducky tire himself as each clod of earth chipped off, flew back into place.

Blowing Tonya a kiss and waggling his tongue obscenely, the giant picked Ducky up with both hands, turned him over his knee and started to spank him. "Naughty, naughty little man. Never attack your superiors."

Priya ran at him, launching herself up his knee and torso like climbing a cadaver tree. When she reached his shoulder, she hacked at his neck with the side of a shovel. Ducky wriggled free as the giant turned on Priya and blew with hurricane force, sending her toppling backward.

Well, aren't you going to attack too? The voice was in Tonya's head.

"If I did, you'd probably make me kill myself with an axe."

The giant's voice boomed: "Some other time." He dusted his hands and strode toward the Highway. Over his shoulder he said: "Ta-ta. I have things to destroy and people to slaughter."

# # #

Priya was so surprised by the giant's retreat that at first she didn't notice the firefighters closing in. She shouted: "Run!"

Priya led Tonya and Ducky, who carried Lynette, to the barn where she'd hidden her car. For once it started on the first try. She hit the gas and headed out of town until she saw two fire trucks parked across the road ahead.