Sharon’s note: When the big bad is defeated, it’s always fun, and romantic fireworks are sure to ensue. Warning: Stay tuned for the next, and last, episode.
It was a kaiju. The evil god of a killer carnival was a giant chicken/lizard hybrid. If he wasn’t running for his life, Jim would have laughed. A tail like the world’s longest bullwhip cut through a line of booths to his right sending up a rain of wood and plastic. It hit the ground just a few feet away with a crash that rattled the world and sent the fleeing humans to the ground.
Jim looked back for the woman who was supposed to be following him. The mother was curled in a ball in the dirt, trying to protect her baby from the fall. He scrambled to his feet and grabbed her arm, trying to pull her up. “Come on! We gotta go!”
Around them, even the toad-men and mutant clowns were running for cover. Even the monsters were afraid. Another roar tore through his ears, and he looked back. Wendy was down. One of the monster’s feet was pulverized, and she was on her knees, clawing at the bloody stump, trying to get her staff out from under it.
“Go on ahead. Head towards the exit.” He lightly shoved her down the debris littered lane.
“”What?” Her voice was shaking. “You’re leaving me?”
“I gotta help Wendy. If we don’t kill this thing we are all going to die.” He looked around, then pointed at the Tunnel of Love. “If you can’t run, go hide in there. It looks like it’s out of range of the tail.”
She stammered for a second, but when Jim pushed her again she hugged her baby close and ran.
He hefted the cleaver Wendy had given him and bit his lip. There was no way he could kill the thing on his own, but maybe he could help. The tail twitched and he wound up the cleaver like it was a baseball bat. Flesh peeled effortlessly away in a long fillete and blood so hot it boiled splashed across his face.
Jim fell onto his back, knife thudding into the dirt next to him. He swiped his hands over his face, trying to protect his eyes and a whistle loud enough to drown out the monster’s screech preceded a gale of wind followed by a vacuum of missing air as the tail whipped over his head.
The scaled head turned, viciously curved beak snapping in the air with a noise like a car crash. It shifted, raising its bloody stump of a foot into the air. Wendy let loose with a joyful howl that was as bone chilling as the roar. Jim shoved himself up to his elbows just in time to see her seize her staff and drive into the creature’s other foot. It screamed as it pitched to the side.
It fell like a toppling skyscraper, and Wendy jumped onto its leg, running up its body. As it hit the ground the impact threw Jim into the air. More of the colorful booths collapsed and he landed with a bone jarring thud. Through pain scrunched eyes he watched Wendy fall staff first through the monster’s head in a spray of blood, bone, and chunks of something gray.
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Gray Matters: The Works of Sharon and James Gray 