scared shriek as she turned and ran back down the hall, her lace-edged nightgown billowing and gunshots booming after her.
Crawford was screaming, too. He’d brought his weapon out of the holster, working things pretty fast lest those things go rotten even much faster. The gun was coming up now, coming up to take aim, his finger on the trigger, ready to squeeze, his eyeballs expanding in their sockets with ever increasing fear of the creature whose flight seemed to be on the verge of outpacing Crawford’s own celerity.
The gun blasted again and again, bullets gouging walls and whining away like some banshee spirits in a terribly foul mood.
Even as his heart pounded wildly against his rib cage, and even as he gritted his teeth and squeezed the shit out of the trigger, Crawford McGinnis felt himself lifted off into the air, and with that came an indescribable pain.
He had been stabbed in the shoulder.
Deputy Allan Moore watched Holly’s eyes change from being filled with pugnacity to fright, and he wondered what had come upon her again. He hated the woman, anyway. Earlier, he’d thought she was very strange and remarkably annoying, considering how she sometimes came unglued when least expected, especially in the middle of a conversation. He was still wondering what had come upon her until the noise delivered to him a complete package of understanding.
Wheeling his head to the left, Allan saw Crawford’s frightened countenance, saw him make a move to draw his gun, and then saw a huge figure lope from the shadow behind the kitchen wall, airborne towards Crawford. The figure, flashing a chimp’s head atop a huge human body, crashed right into the screaming young deputy just a split second before Crawford started to shoot. The assaulter rammed its knife into Crawford’s right shoulder while it applied its momentum to knock him off his feet, and simultaneously parried Crawford’s gun-hand towards the wall. Bullets chipped away woodwork, filling the living room with smoke and dust. While in midair, Crawford lost his grip on the gun, which flew right underneath a couch at the opposite end of the room.
On the floor with his attacker, Crawford wailed in pain as the giant repeatedly stabbed him along the entire length of his torso.
Meanwhile, Allan had ducked behind a couch to shield himself from being hit by stray bullets. It took him just about five seconds to screw up his courage and come out of his hiding place, but the time seemed to stretch into eternity. He was training his own gun now, wishing more than anything to blow the monster’s head away, but also aware of the possibility of accidentally killing Crawford in the process.
The first chance came when the ape-man yanked its knife out of Crawford’s flesh so forcefully that it slid away from Crawford a little bit.
Allan opened fire. Didn’t hit his target. Only chipped off the wooden flooring beside the big monster.
The chimp-faced man growled and launched its knife at Allan.
Allan stumbled back a step, ducking away from the path of the sailing missile, and although he lost his footing in the process, he didn’t stop shooting as he went down.
At first, he thought the monster would come for him, but the huge creature only bounced to its feet and ran out the door, into the quiet, moonlit night.
“Oh, my baby,” Holly cried, and ran back into the living room as Allan attempted to place a call to the Sheriff’s Office. “He’s stolen my baby, Deputy Moore.”
With a show of his teeth, not hiding his anger, Allan said, “Someone’s got to take the kid, Mrs. Smallwood. If the police don’t, then some prowling ape will come along to help. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”
“How dare you talk to me that way?”
“Oh, what way is that, ma’am? I actually thought you locked all the doors,” Allan said sarcastically. “The
After the intruder had fled, Allan discovered the back door was also open.
“Yeah, I already know that,” she said, mopping her face. “So, should that be the justification for your callousness? You have no human feelings whatsoever, and-”
“Mrs. Smallwood, could you please keep your voice down so I can make a call for help?”
Allan’s breath was still rough around the edges when he spoke on the phone.
Emily Bateman who answered the call at the Sheriff’s Office said, “Hey, Allan. Have you been running uphill, or what? You breathe like you’re gonna have a heart-attack pretty soon.”
“Tell you what, kid, I’ve just had something about worse than heart-attack.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah, really. I’ve had a terrible brush with death. Crawford’s down. We need ambulance. And we need back- up. Sixteen Bran Street.”
“Oh, no,” Emily gasped.
“Oh, yes. We need both, and we need them right away. I ain’t kidding.”
“I didn’t mean ‘Oh, no. There ain’t no back-up for you, ‘cause you’re a lying son-of-bitch.’ I meant ‘Oh, no Crawford’s down. That’s no good.’”
“No, it’s not. And thanks for the clarification,” Allan said, turning towards Crawford. “Hang on, buddy. Help’s on the way. You’ll be fine.”
“How bad is it?” Emily asked.
“Very.”
“Oh, my God. Could you-”
“Back-up and ambulance, Emily. Now, please.”
“Working on it,” she said, and was gone.
Allan moved to Crawford’s side, giving whatever little therapeutic support he could offer without upsetting his wounded comrade. Blood flowed along the wooden floor without any restriction.
Holly lay face-down on the floor towards the hallway, mourning the kidnapping of her son.
Not long after, the phone rang.
It was Sheriff Brian Stack. “Make sure Crawford’s hanging on there, no matter how bad the situation is,” he told Allan, as if Allan was a first-class trained medical emergency technician, or as if the outcome of Crawford’s survival was exclusively in Allan’s possession.
“I’m doing the best I can, Sheriff.”
“Good,” Brian said. “I don’t expect any less from you. Help’s on the way. I’ll be on the way, too. Did you have an idea of where he ran to by any chance?”
“All I know is that it ran out the front door,” Allan said. “And I locked all the doors right away.”
“It?”
“What, Sheriff?”
“You said
“Well, I don’t really know whether to call the
“Ah,” Brian said. “Might be some monstrous creature from the Himalaya Mountains.” He hung up.
Allan didn’t know if that was a joke or serious talk.
Chapter 13
“You think he’s gonna make it?” Allan stood to the left of Brian, across the street from Holly’s place. His oblong face was a tablet of deep worry. Two other deputies stood by their cruisers at the other side of the
