One Of Those Is Actually True.
Zack, woke up to a nice cold bucket of agua poured onto his face in the most annoying way--At least he didn't have a headache. "Wake up sunshine," announced someone in a rather low voice for a child. Naturally Zack jumped straight up to find a four foot guy with a now empty bucket in his hand. But unlike the other kids this guy had a rather good amount of facial hair.
"This may sound rude but, WHO ARE YOU AND WHY AM I SOAKED!?" the soaked Zack screamed at the man.
"I'm Chris's father," explained the man, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Ohhh...." Zack started remembering what Voc told them about different bone structures.
True, he probably should have found the first adult human he had seen in the last few weeks after he had been told that they all were in another dimension, odd. But by now he was used to waking up to be greeted by the unlikely.
"So if there is a grown up here... why are you guys living in the woods? And where were you when I was running for my life... from your kid!?" Zack asked, still not totally believing the man's family claims.
"Getting supplies."
Zack wondered if the man was even trying to come up with a clever excuse for breaking and entering Zack's tent. Perhaps this man really was Chris's father, but if so Zack wondered if he was going for worse parent of the dimension award, then again he was probably one of the only parents so.... "You left your kid unintended--in the middle of a forest, with sharp pointy things--to go get supplies?" Zack finally asked.
"What? If I wasn't here he would always be unintended." The man did have a point, even if his parenting skills weren't the greatest. "Besides someone had to get the supplies--I wasn't going to eat apricots again--and I'd rather have my kid, whose name is Chris by the way, back here concealed in a forest and armed with 'sharp pointy things', than exploring the Mephistophelian wasteland out there. Now you promised my kid you would slay a giant winged pug."
"Yep. My life keeps getting weirder and weirder. Say could you get out now, you're kind of weirding me out... also I need to change because my current attire is sopping wet, thanks for that by the way."
"My pleasure. Now move it. I don't have all day," the man ordered as he left the tent leaving Zack to follow him, or be left standing there, soaking wet.
"So how far away is this town?" he asked, jogging up to the guy, he was thankfully able to find a change of jeans and an unbiased T-Shirt and hoodie amongst his clothes ball, they kinda had a stale smell to them but it was that or hypothermia. "Also what time is it?" Looking around Zack noticing that it was still dark and there were no kids running around, screaming or chasing innocent self obsessed teenagers. The only sound was the crunch of leaves underfoot, and the wind rustling through the few remaining leaves on the trees.
"Five-thirty, and it's only a few miles away. Now stop asking questions," the short man replied flatly, without looking back. Boy and Zack thought that he wasn't a people person.
The rest of the walk went by amazingly fast. In no way was it the most boring few miles Zack had ever walked. In no way did the man insist on not talking to Zack whenever possible, reasoning that he didn't really care to talk to a moody teen. Although he would really have to get used to it, since there really weren't many other options.
"Wait so if you're Chris's dad... how come Lenny was the chief?" Zack finally questioned, wondering if he just got the names confused.
"He won the paintball fight," the man said, as if it was the most obvious answer, perhaps the man prided himself on his short sentence structure making capabilities.
It didn't take long for Zack to figure out that the man didn't want to talk anymore after that. He only had to say 'shut up,' and 'I think I hear a RipJaw,' like twenty more times.
* * *
They arrived at the town at six twelve A.M., when the sun was just starting to peek over some of the smallest of trees.
It was then that the man finally said, "There are a few things you should know about this beast before you fight it."
"And you're choosing to tell me this now?" Zack asked, sounding fairly annoyed as he stared at the rather quaint little town. Which, aside from the fact that a monster had besieged it, looked relatively unharmed. "Couldn't you have maybe mentioned this a bit sooner. Like--oh, I don't know--maybe during the mind killing waltz here."
"Just listen, the thing is immune to all the gases I tried chucking at it, which really isn't anything more than my knock out stuff at all different levels of strength, but still. It can fly, and is big and scary."
"Wow. Your description is not much different than that of your kid's."
"You know that if this thing eats you, it would save me a big headache."
"Right back at you." And with that Zack silently ran into town, well as silent as you could be with a bunch of crisp leaves littering the ground.
Now when I say town I don't mean your new fancy towns with a population of seventy-thousand people. I mean a nice little town like the ones you see in a western... ok maybe a little bit bigger. Zack, who carefully tried not to step on too many leaves, crept onto the road that led into the quaint town.
Yes, there still were roads, even if Zack preferred not to use them, it's just he was up north, where Michigan and Wisconsin would be. Although with the huge war, the entire idea of states, and even countries, went straight out the window. Along with big roads and what not, most towns like this one were more like just evolved outposts. The only actually well established city for the next few hundred miles was, believe it or not, Zack's home town, A.K.A. Bones Topia, and a town known for its great museum, he visited on a field trip once, called Welkinhimher.
As he approached the town, he quickly flipped up his pocket sword, and was greeted by a nice friendly sign welcoming him to Dayham. Population? Unincorporated. The town was as you would expect. Very quiet and quite empty for a town terrorized by a flying canine. Then again the town was unincorporated and this was probably just an average Saturday morning.
Silently Zack passed a few small abandoned white washed houses, whose doors were flung open and just swung eerily in the wind, occasionally producing a rather disturbing creaking. As if to add to the creepy effect, the day was quickly darkening and a few drops of rain fell on Zack's head every now and then. Great. The last thing he needed was another soaked outfit.
Now, being that it was such a small town, it was not hard for Zack to make his way to the town square. Why would he be heading to the small town's probably not very exciting square? Probably because the beast would most likely be chained to a gazebo there? Or possibly a water tower?
Quietly he passed a few more random shops, all of which had broken windows or smashed doors. Zack had no idea if they were smashed by Bones' gang or the forest kids, either way he didn't have time to care. He continued on creeping through the city for a few more minutes.
Finally he saw it. At least a one ton monstrosity, and as promised it had the body of a pug, and huge purple feathery wings. Thankfully though the beast was fast asleep, chained to a... metal stake in the ground? Hmm... guess everything couldn't be exciting, and original.
"See what I mean," said a voice from behind Zack, scaring the living daylight out of him. "Relax kid, it's just me," confronted Chris's dad as Zack spun around clumsily swinging his sword ready to slice off the man's head, luckily his sword passed harmlessly overhead.
"You don't sneak up on people like that!" Zack whisper yelled. If that's even a real thing?
The man didn't seem to care. "What was that you said before about kids and pointy things? Never mind Chris said you were a little slow--You can probably just go stab it in its sleep. We didn't want to get that close being that we value our hands. But you can go right ahead," said the man, slowly shoving Zack towards it. He then turned around, and ran to hide behind the nearest store. "What?" he asked when Zack gave him a look. I have a kid to feed.... And you don't." he added, as if the second part was not implied. "Get to it!"
With a sigh, that mind you was very quiet, Zack crept forwards holding his sword and walking more like a batter in baseball, than a trained swordsman trying to slay a demon pug. Then again no one ever taught him how to play baseball, or slay demon pugs, so really he was doing pretty good.
For some reason though right as he took another step forward, so he was exactly five feet away from the beast, its eyelids flung open, revealing a pair of terrible eyes with white pupils, red irises, and a pitch black sclera. For a whole minute the Grex (that's what Zack named it, [giant winged pug is too long]) and Zack just stared at each other. But sadly the events to follow were not as fortunate.
The Grex leaped up flapping its wings to gain more momentum. Opening its jaw to reveal not only the two huge bottom fangs that were visible from the outside, but five rows of viciously sharp needle-like teeth. And the weirdest thing about this rather odd beast, was the fact that its entire body had a whole shimmery look to it. If all this wasn't weird enough, when the beast was flapping its wings right in Zack's face, for some reason there were no gusts of wind that should have been able to blow him down. Perhaps the Grex was broken?
The creature stayed in the air for a little longer, and then as if getting bored of doing so, he spit out a huge... FIREBALL?! But instead of the ball of fire barreling straight at Zack, it was heading towards the store Chris's dad was hiding behind. Before Zack even had time to shout a warning, the flaming ball hit the store, dissolving into nothing? At first nothing happened but then like some sort of delayed reaction the entire store burst into flames, scaring the daylights out of the old man. And yes Zack realizes that the man's not necessarily old, probably early fifties, but he is most likely the oldest man within the next hundred miles.
"Hey watch it kid! Can anyone just hide in peace?!" shouted the man in protest. "I thought you were supposed to be good at this sort of thing? Or is besting children in a game of paintball your only skill!?"
Zack decided it would be best not to answer. He watched the beast launch a few more fireballs until all the buildings surrounding the square were aflame with bright red flames. Surprisingly nothing was destroyed yet, and Zack wasn't even hot.
"Hey kid, you have a gun right?!" the man asked angrily, running out of hiding places that weren't on fire. Zack was at first ready to shout back, 'does it look like I have a gun?', but then remembered that he did in fact, have a whole arsenal of deadly assorted weapons in his pocket. Then again the old man didn't know that and must have just enjoyed mocking his general unpreparedness.
Quickly pulling a few coins out of his pocket, like a desperate kid who didn't have enough lunch money, Zack searched for a proper gun. The weapons names were all handily written along on the coins face. Unfortunately though they were all written in Ralam. Zack couldn't read Ralam, should have taken the stupid class. Quickly he sporadically pressed down on the face of a random coin, transforming it into a mighty... toilet bowl cleaner? Apparently the Ralams liked all their tools pocket size. Why anyone would like their toothbrush and something you stick in a toilet just bouncing around in the same pocket? Zack had no idea, he also didn't take the Ralam reasoning course, mostly because half the course was in Ralam.
He was starting to see a pattern here....
Zack, using his brain once again, very smartly chucked the brush at the beast. He then quickly went back to foraging through his pockets looking for a more useful weapon, not even noticing that the brush went right through the beast. Finally he found a laser gun after chucking a fork, sausage grinder, and hair drier behind him. He wondered why Ralams would even bother creating a compatible hairdryer, as they didn't even have hair. But he didn't have time to worry about such tedious questions.
"What are you waiting for?!" Chris's dad shouted, after Zack stared at the beast for a few minutes. Why was Zack staring at the winged demon when he could have been blasting it? Perhaps the sun was in his eyes--despite the cloudy day? Or maybe he didn't know how to pull a trigger? Based on his success at the Zoo fight I wouldn't be surprised. It could have been that he just couldn't bring himself to kill something that was cruelly imprisoned by Phil.
For some reason the thought of this, drew Zack's attention to the chain that was holding the beast there. The only thing was, THERE WAS NO CHAIN! The chain wasn't just broken, giving the beast free range. No, the chain was completely gone, stake and all, and when he looked up, he noticed that the chain was also not attached to the Grex.
"Kid I'm not getting any younger!" Finally Zack shot a few lasers, only to find that just like the toilet brush they passed right through it.
"I CAN SEE THAT!" he shouted back at the annoying little man, "AND YOU DIDN'T MENTION THAT THIS THING WAS TRANSPARENT! WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE TO KNOW BEFORE TRYING TO KILL IT!"
"It's see through?" the man asked, walking out of his hiding place, which was now behind a nearby tree, that surprisingly was not on fire. "Kid transparent means he's see through," he informed acknowledging that the beast was indeed not see through.
"Wait then what do you call this," he said, showing the man as he shot some more lasers through the beast.
"Ah... I don't think there's a word for that. See when they were making words monsters like this didn't exist!" the man wisely reasoned.
It was then when he noticed that positioned on all the trees was what looked like security cameras. But why would one little town square need at least twenty plus cameras...?
"Hey take this!" Zack ordered, throwing a coin at the man.
"Kid, you're three quarters short of a candybar," he stated sarcastically.
"Press the center," he ordered as he aimed at a camera. The man did as told, revealing... nothing? "Oh sorry," Zack sighed, realizing that he really did give him a quarter. "Try this one," and with that, he tossed the man a coin that had the same scribbles as his did.
"Neat... never seen that one before," the man disparaged, most likely lying. "Ok so now what? We already clarified that the thing doesn't react to the lassers. What do you want me to do? Put you out of your embarrassment of not being able to shoot anything?" he jibed as he held his new laser handgun.
"Shoot the cameras!" Quickly, Zack pulled the trigger of his own gun, causing a laser to emerge from it, shattering a nearby camera.
"Why?!" the short man complained, dodging another fireball that was directed at another nearby tackle and bait shop. "--So if you get killed, everybody won't know how you embarrassingly died?" the man suggested, not even noticing that when the camera was destroyed one of the fires, blazing on a poor store selling discounted jeans, vanished.
Hey! Thank you so much for reading! If you made it this far you deserve a gold star or some other cool thing like Pizza Rolls at 10:00 PM! Honestly though, a book is nothing but it's writer's imagination if no one else reads it, and while imaginations are nice--it's nicer to know that someone else is enjoying (or at least seeing) my work. So for real, you're awesome and I hope you have a great rest of your day, or month--yno what make it life--I hope you have a great rest of your life. Thank you :D
You can all expect Chapter 23 whenever 1 person asks for it.