We lifted Sylvie onto the Sled and wasted no time booking it outta’ there.

Tanner whistled in awe as we came up to the mess I’d made near the double doors.

“Wow man. Remind me never to piss you off-CHRIST?! Where did its jaw go??” he had an over exaggerated look on his face with his mouth gaping open.

I winced at his words.

We halted our escape briefly so I could move one of the bodies aside and as I was about to do so, I got distracted by a small floating wisp of Shimmer.

It noticed my presence and rushed to eagerly greet me as if I was going to leave it behind. I held out my hand and it quickly flew to my palm, disappearing into my skin.

Nothing was created and I didn’t cough up any black crap, just like how Tanner said his experience was..how strange.

After clearing the path I quickly moved on and we decided to carry the sled off the ground to stop it from scraping on the floor, alerting any more nightmares lurking.

Focusing on not puking our guts up, we made it past the bodies and down the stairs with no further confrontations or issues.

Apart from absolutely pissing ourselves laughing, hugely inappropriately of course, at the strange sight of Sylvie unconscious, on a red sled, going down the steps in this nightmare hospital. Her head would sometimes bob up and down if we took a step too quickly. Resulting in more eruptions of us trying to hold in our roaring laughter..but then losing it at the next ‘head bob’.

It really didn’t help when Tanner kept saying “No no that's enough - It's serious time now okay! Ain’t that right Sylvie, we should grow up right?”

*head bob*

“ffffmmmmffffhAHAHA!”

Sorry Sylvie! It’s always the hardest to not laugh when it is the most inappropriate!

I prayed she wouldn’t remember this and even though I was laughing, in the back of my mind I was terrified that she wasn’t going to make it.

We made it outside, only slightly out of breath and I directed us over to the car.

I had mentioned to Tanner to watch out for the insanely tall stickman thing which I hoped to hell wouldn’t show up and we carried on carrying the sled rather than dragging to avoid any more noise…or head bobs.

I couldn’t cope with another one.

Once we reached the car, I put the seats down and we put the sled in through the boot and then climbed in ourselves.

“MATE! I’m so glad your car is alright.” Tanner let out a breath of relief.

“Well, it has been playing up and the dash ain’t working anymore” I replied. “But she is doing me proud.”

I patted the dashboard.

“Yeah but all the other cars are gone man, they just disappeared overnight. One of the neighbours said his wife saw one melt down. But whatever happened, people sure didn’t drive away in them. My poor A4 man..”

I groaned.

Sounds about right.

“Great, even more spooky shit to deal with..” I muttered, shaking my head.

“It’s probably true. I saw a person turn to dust in front of me. And perhaps it’s something like the shimmer stuff. Kinda’ hard to deny it’s anything else but magic right?”

“Hocus pocus…Yeah mate..to be honest, I would’ve called you a wizard-nutter, if not for the fact that I can do some crazy superhero stuff now. Not to mention the magic *cough* drugs that healed me.”

He spoke some “magic words” that were infused with pure juvenile swearing.

I still laughed. It was funny ok…only a zen master could avoid not laughing after hearing ‘wingardian-dickens-cider’ after killing 5 nightmare creatures, Tanner nearly dying and dragging a heavily wounded maternity nurse.

“Hahaha oh lord…Right! Enough horsing around. Let's keep moving, I’ll need to get back to Sylvies place in Wood of the Squirrels. You live close to her I take it?”

“Spot on, same road. Take us home young lass!” he tapped the dashboard which made me chuckle as I started up the car.

The car whirred and the aircon came on, but no dashboard still. I put my foot down gingerly and was relieved when we started to move.

“WOOOHOOO!” Tanner Whooped as we started towards the exit.

I sunk into the chair as I started to relax a little, and, out of driving habit, I checked my mirrors.

Relaxing, of course, is the worst thing you can do when the universe has decided your world needs ‘spicing up a bit’ with nightmares and monsters.

Of fucking COURSE there would be something chasing us.

“Tanner. Can you look back and tell me if you see a huge fuck-that trying to keep up with us, or if it is my stupid imagination?”

He practically squealed and his voice went ten octaves higher.

“Fuuuuck me with a stick! Naw mate, that is not right. Yeah I see it but fuuuuck it is fucking tall!”

Naturally, it was the Stickman that we’d seen before.

I wasted no time speeding up, it could take long strides but it was moving pretty slow in comparison so we started gaining distance and it started getting smaller.

I turned the corner and shot down the long straight road before making the next left, only 2 or 3 minutes of driving left to go.

“Well hopefully it should be alright, we should be able to escape it. I just don’t want it to follow us back since I have no fucking clue how we could fight that-”

“Dude! Mate! Never say the ‘A’ word in these situations!” Tanner shot out.

I went quiet. The car decided to join me.

Oh for Fuck…I’d done it again.

The aircon stopped.

The steering wheel became very heavy.

The car started to slow down to a crawl.

The car came to a stop.

I frantically started pushing the start button…but no dice.

“ARE YOU SERIOUS!?”

“FUUUUCK!!” I checked the mirrors and all the windows frantically.

The streets were still empty and dead.

“Okay. Fuck it all! We gotta run the rest of the way - let's go quick”

Grumbling, I hastily pushed the door open and sped round to the back of the car.

“Lovely weather for a stroll anyways..everything will be alright..” Tanner muttered.

A piece of my soul died at that word..

I tried to yank open the boot, but the lock didn’t disengage. I tried the back doors but they were the same.

A slew of curses came out before I remembered there’s always a way to open the car boot door manually from the inside.

I scrambled back in through the front door and hopped into the back, carefully making my way past Sylvie to the boot door.

I felt a rising panic, my insides felt cold and I started to shiver.

Looking for a small rectangle clip that's embedded in the door, shakily popping it off it was attached to a wire so I pulled it.

And the boot lock went *clunk* and opened.

Tanner, a smart man, had realised what I was doing and patiently waited without asking questions.

He grabbed one side of the sled and pulled it as I got out holding the other end.

I heard the sound of wood splintering, branches heaving and cracking and then crashing down onto bushes.

“WE GOTTA MOVE! RUN!!! GO! GO! GO!” Tanner roared out and started to run, practically dragging me along by the sled.

I dared a glance back at the source of the noise and saw the stickman had taken a shortcut and was cutting through the treeline 50 metres away

AKA TOO FUCKING CLOSE!

The stickman started making a low guttural growl as it bumped into the abandoned car.

Its abnormally large head, still bald, still having the bulbous nose, still having pupiless white eyes with its dislocated jaw, was now furiously swaying as the head snapped left right left right. But with a radar-like focus, it narrowed our direction down.

Its long thin legs were moving noticeably faster, now that it knew its prey was near.

The very quiet footsteps contrasted its large skinny size, considering it was as tall as the houses around us, 6-10 metres, possibly more.

I was heaving in the air as we ran, probably 3 minutes of running remaining until we made it back.

Come on, we were so damn close!

We were running pretty fast, but there’s a huge difference between 6mph on foot and 30mph+ in the car, metrically, 10kmph / 50kmph.

Dammit we were so fucking close!

The difference in speed was even more evident by the fact that we weren’t gaining distance on the stickman.

It was closing in with its damn huge strides.

“SHALL WE - TRY ONE OF THE - HOUSES??” I shouted at Tanner in between breaths.

“NO - KEEP GOING - GO TO - CONSTRUCTION AREA!” he shouted back.

My legs and arms were burning as we took the next right.

One more turning before we were on the straight and narrow to the Wood of Squirrels development.

As we turned left, I felt a whoosh of wind behind me followed by another, much louder guttural growl that turned into a cry as I heard wood splintering, glass smashing then sounds of thudding mixed with brush or branches snapping.

FUCK! DID THE THING JUST SWIPE AT ME!?

I glanced back and it seemed to have tripped then swerved into a house and tumbled into someone's fenced garden and its legs were scrambling manically, much faster than it walked.

Facing forward I laughed and informed Tanner “HA-HA - THE DUMB FUCKER - FELL OVER!” as we came up towards the big sign map showing the development.

We rushed past and I glanced back hopeful…but no, it was coming for us and gaining fast.

We need to get Sylvie to the house first.

I felt like that was the next step. The right step.

As we entered the development I shouted out to Tanner.

“GO - TO HER HOUSE FIRST - HER SISTER WILL GET HER IN - THEN WE LURE IT TO THE SITE!”

Tanner seemed to hesitate briefly, but he didn’t respond as he turned down the road towards her house.

There has to be time, please let there be enough time.

I glanced back again as we rounded the bend. The last glimpse I saw of the creature was it had paused at the entrance, snapping its head left and right.

If it follows the road, we’ll make it. If it takes a shortcut…

50 metres ahead of us was the T-Junction where we would need to run down and then backtrack.

The reason being we would need to backtrack and try and lure it away, else we would be trapped in a dead end road and the monster looked like it had the power to ruin any house we tried to seek refuge in.

I think Tanner knew this yet still decided to go with the plan, what a kind bastard, in the most friendly way. I hope he doesn’t regret it.

An outside observer may have thought I was trying to be heroic or brave, but truthfully I was selfishly focused on trying to keep it away from Marri and Lone while maximising my chances of escaping alive.

We turned down the final right and I could see a face looking out the front ground floor window.

Shortly after the front door burst open so I bellowed out.

“ERZA TAKE SYLVIE INSIDE AND HIDE!”

We got to the driveway and met Erza’s absolutely panicked face and not so gently, dumped the sled before turning tail and running back towards the abandoned construction area.

There was a chance we could have hidden inside the house but I dismissed that idea as I spotted the stickman was ahead of us on the opposite end of the road, making a beeline directly for us.

It had gone straight ahead instead of right at the entrance but right behind it was a grassy park area and behind that was the construction site.

We hurried forward in a full blown sprint, straight towards the giant creature as it clocked us but turned left at the T junction, back onto our entry path.

A few seconds later the stickman roared out as it followed down the same road.

Not having to carry a sled made us faster so we hurtled forward and then took the next right to circle around back towards the grassy area and then onwards to the construction site.

We might just lose this bastard!

We arrived at the construction site and it was surrounded by a fence made of big white sheets of wood. There was a doorway cut out of the fence so we burst through it as I followed Tanner towards the row of half finished houses.

We made it 15 steps before we heard a crash and clang as the stickmans leg hit the fence and demolished a chunk of it in its stride.

“IN HERE QUICK!” Tanner rushed into one of the middle half finished buildings and I followed him in.

We moved to the back of the building and struggled to stay quiet as we caught our breath.

Outside we could hear the soft thumps as the stickman slowed down and then a thump as it came into contact with the front of the house.

It let out a low rumbling of grumbles & clicks and then a repeated wheezing sound.

Is it…sniffing?

It unleashed a chittering screech.

Oh shit, the sweat! It can smell us!!

It knew we were hiding in there.

The house started to shake, threatening to collapse on us, as the nightmare started to smash it from the outside.

A leg came piercing through the plasterboard dry walls, into the room we were in.

Tanner swung for it with his hammer and barely scraped it before it retreated back.

I stared in shock as it shot another appendage back in, the legs were much thicker than I initially thought, a stump with hardened skin at the end, like the pad of a dog's foot.

Two claws curled out and started trying to grab things.

Claws?! or FUCKING TALONS?!

We both raced back out to the garden and looked up over the house. The creature snarled, stared right at us and started scrambling over the house in a frenzied attempt to get to its prey.

We scuttled back inside, feeling like a couple of sneaky bugs trying to avoid getting smushed.

Rushing around the inside, we were blocked by plaster and insulation debris that had fallen so we frantically started to push and pulled bits out the way.

Behind us, the stickman had made it into the garden and continued its rampage, smashing and stabbing against the house.

My thoughts were overwhelmed, frenzied and chaotic.

I barely had time to think about anything as a leg narrowly missed crushing me.

Need to clear faster! Need to escape!

As we cleared enough debris to get to the next room, our luck ran out and a long leg burst in and whipped into us at chest height, smashing us both into a drywall.

I was dangerously winded and dazed.

It felt like a steel beam had hit me right in the chest as I dropped to my hands and knees.

Tanner got up shakily and stumbled out the door in a daze, heaving and clutching his chest.

As I was struggling to recover, I heard the stickman scrambling back over the top, towards the front where Tanner was.

DAMN IT! I CAN’T…SHOUT…TANNER STOP! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!

I saw one leg come thumping down right behind him and I desperately tried to stand up, but failed and fell down.

My spinning vision was filled with black spots.

I tried to speak but all that came out was a weak rasp, my body was still stunned by the heavy blow to my chest.

Then a second leg came down and the two claws groped and eventually clutched onto Tanner's shoulder and pinned him down.

I was on all fours as I started to make my way slowly towards him.

He reached into his pocket and in his hand I could see he was holding a pack of pills and he was reaching out towards me with them.

He was looking at me with tears welling in his eyes.

As I dragged myself up to the door, I saw the fucking monster was lowering its head towards him.

Tanner just kept staring at me and started to shake his head.

His lips were trembling as he mouthed “Don’t” and chucked the pills over towards me.

I looked down in confusion at the pills as the box bounced twice and then skidded to a stop.

This person, whom I’d only met barely a couple of hours ago, was only concerned with making sure his child got the medication they needed.

This guy knew that, if I tried to save him…I would probably be throwing my life away.

So he didn’t make it hard for me, in fact he was trying to insist that I stay back, fighting against his own instincts to scream for help.

Refusing to beg for help.

Refusing to put others at risk.

The tall inhuman lanky piece of shit was widening its disgusting mouth, closing in to engulf Tanner's head.

I stared in disgust as the mouth moved closer and closer as he punched and tried to push it away.

A huge second jaw was peeling out from its mouth which had rows of human teeth and it started gnashing as it telescopically extended towards Tanner's head.

NO. NO.

I DEMANDED adrenaline.

I DEMANDED cortisol.

I DEMANDED noradrenaline

I didn’t even know those words, but I felt a huge surge of movement run through my body, rippling under my skin and tensing up my organs and muscles.

It gave me goosebumps and made me shake with restlessness and excitement for violence as I started rapidly panting.

The rush blotted out any shreds of pain I had been enduring and I felt overwhelmingly aggressive.

I burst forward into a full blown sprint, a slight blue haze surrounding me as I dove into a tackle into the side of the fuckers wide neck.

It barely moved as I was thudded to a complete stop, completely unphased as it continued its cautious but horrible assault on Tanner.

He was screaming in fear, desperately trying to push back the monster's mouth as it came within a few centimetres of biting his nose.

With every kick of resistance, it would flinch slightly, trying to carefully get a safe bite.

Puzzling, because if it was any smarter, it would simply stomp Tanner until he stopped moving before attempting to consume him.

I started desperately punching it in the throat with my fists, before switching to hysterically jabbing and clawing its cheek with my fingers, trying to wrench its face to the side.

It started letting out a growl as I tore a chunk of thick skin.

Tanner kicked at the gnashing jaw but he miscalculated and let out a blood curdling scream as his foot was crushed by the teeth with an unforgettable audible crunch.

Blood poured out as the teeth opened again releasing him.

I could hear swallowing and slobbering noises from the monster's mouth as it lapped up any blood it could find.

My mind exploded with incoherent screams and roars.

DiSgUstINg fUCkINg tHINg!

pIECe oF sHiT!

DIE.

Roaring, I shifted closer to its front and pulled back my fist as it gathered a noticeably more intense blue haze and smashed it into its huge eye then pulled back and dove another fist inside, swirling around to inflict maximum damage.

The large eye dome collapsed and split open, with gooey liquids and blood pouring out like rotten pancake mix.

That got its attention.

Hope you like pain fuckface.

It sucked in its second jaw and reared up screeching.

It released Tanner and I immediately tried to drag him away as the creature swiftly moved back up and then started trying to scratch at its wounded eye.

I have to get him out.

I have to get him far away.

He was screaming in pain and some of my fingers didn’t feel responsive.

Quickly checking, I instantly felt sick.

Some of them were twisted and broken at horrendous angles but I couldn’t feel them.

Only my thumb, ring and little fingers were closing properly but the others were fucked.

I lifted him up onto his good leg and fumbled to get his arm over my shoulder to support his bad leg side.

“LETS GO! LETS GO! C'MON MAN YOU CAN DO IT!” I screamed at him.

As we moved faster, I was practically dragging him along whilst he groaned and whimpered in pain.

Thirty metres left.

If we get through the fence doorway we might be able to do something..there must be something.

Twenty Five metres left.

We couldn’t go back into the half built houses, the thing would just smash them to bits.

Twenty metres left. I heard a screech with soft thuds..it would only be a matter of moments now before it stomped us.

My thoughts started focusing on Marri and Lone and the hopelessness of the situation.

Do I drop him and run? We can't won't. We can't outrun it. What more can I do???

An internal conflict started raging but some part of me still refused to give in.

It wasn’t the right thing to do.

THE RIGHT THING? ARE YOU SERIOUS? FUCKING DROP HIM AND RUN! YOU HAVE ONLY KNOWN HIM A FEW HOURS?!

Fifteen metres left.

The creature roared and thumped closer behind us.

My hands still refused to let go.

I didn’t dare look back.

WHY ARE YOU STILL CARRYING HIM?! DROP HIM RIGHT FUCKING NOW OR YOU ARE GOING TO DIE YOU STUPID IDIOT! YOUR FAMILY DEPEND ON YOU!

I couldn’t do it. I just couldn't. That voice wasn't me. It wasn't who I'd want Lone to be raised by.

If I don't try, who will? If I don't set the example, who will?

If it was the other way around, I wouldn’t want him to let go.

If Lone or Marri was in Tanner's shoes…I'd beg the other person to just keep trying!

There’s still a chance! We can make it!

We started moving faster towards the exit but my heart plummeted as I tripped on some rope.

We tumbled and rolled over onto our backs. I hit my head on something hard.

Dazed, I stared at the sky, on the verge of giving up… but I recovered.

Ohh piss it all to shit...

There were soft thuds as the stickman approached and as I lifted my head to look, I could see the second jaw already extended out, gnashing away, stalking towards us.

Its head wasn’t twitching anymore, it was just locked directly onto us, but it was being slower and cautious for some reason.

Fuck sakes. Get up. GET UP.

I mustered up the last dregs of strength and got to my feet. I put my arms underneath Tanners and continued to drag him back.

He had gone quiet and was murmuring and lolling his head around, slipping in and out of consciousness but worst of all, he was becoming limp and difficult to drag.

I started weeping with anger and frustration as the relentless monster reduced the distance in a few seconds and started letting out a stuttering, snarling gurgle noise…was it fucking laughing at me?!

The noise disoriented me and I tripped up on some more rope AGAIN and fell backwards.

I stumbled and tried to stay on my feet but the creature stomped down nearly crushing me completely, but instead, it gashed my leg with its claw, leaving me sitting on the ground in immense pain with Tanner unconscious at my feet.

“ARGH! FUCK YOUUUUUU!!!” I screamed at the beast as it started to lean down towards us.

I looked up at the horrible death that was coming, this nightmare, sobbing, exhausted, in pain…defeated.

I stared as the mouth drew closer and the gnashing, snapping teeth that could crush bones, pushed out wafts of rot and decay and made my ears ring.

Fear pushed me into overdrive as I desperately tried to drag us both away.

But I barely made it half a meter before I couldn't pull Tanner any further.

It was no use, we had run out of time.

There was no way we could get out of this ourselves-

*Whirrrr*

*Clap*

*Bzzzzzzt*

*Whooooosh*

Something wooshed past my head and made a loud thud as a bright light burst and shone through my closed eyelids.

I snapped my eyes open as I heard the monster bellowing in pain and it started to stumble back, blood dripping from its jaw.

I could see the second jaw itself had a large chunk severely burned with tissue vapourized down to the bone. Bone that had been charred black as it withdrew back inside the mouth.

“What the fu-”

*Whirrrr*

*Clap*

*Bzzzzzzzzt*

*Whooooosh*

A violet…comet? projectile!...shot past me and slammed into the creature's face, exploding into a bright flash of dark fire before dissipating.

Where this second one impacted, I witnessed tissue and skin shrivel up like bacon fat as it was blasted by high temperatures.

It vapourised part of the cheek skin and half of the previously undamaged eye dome.

"THEY'RE HERE STILL ALIVE! HURRY!!!"

I heard a large number of running footsteps and shouting as I heard a familiar voice screaming orders.

“THE ROPES! GRAB THE BLOODY ROPES! WRAP THE LEGS! THE LEGS!”

I looked back as people rushed towards us and I saw Lyra and Sylvie.

I managed a pained smile.

Sylvie, I’m damned glad you made it.

Behind them I saw Marri trying to push past some of the slower fearfully moving crowd with a panicked face.

She frantically looked around before locking eyes with me.

Damn you are so beautiful.

Was all I could think before people started shouting and screaming.

“LOOK OUT!!!”

“SHIT! MOVE!!”

Time seemed to slow down as I turned back to face the creature.

I felt a calming emotion flash in my mind.

It was gunning straight for us as it shot forward, intent on finishing what it started, it was going to crush us into paste.

“GODU!! NO!!”

I felt no fear as the monster lunged head first towards us, its burnt face opening up, revealing the inner jaw gapingt wide.

The ground started vibrating as a transparent shimmering wave burst out from around us in a circle, refracting the light. In slow motion, it started crawling up, forming the most perfect glasslike honeycomb structure, covering us in a dome.

Everything rushed back to normal speed as the confused monster slammed into the dome with a muted thud and then slipped off and fell to the side.

I saw a girl rush past unnaturally fast and skidded round the back legs, looping a rope that tied them together before coming back with the end.

The creature, wailing and screeching, tried to stand up but staggered, then tripped on the rest of the lines of rope that people had managed to start wrapping around its legs.

It fell fast and slammed down into the ground with a hefty thud.

There were dozens of people now, grabbing onto any kind of rope and either looping around the legs or tugging and pulling on existing ones.

In a short amount of time, the result was that the creature's legs were completely bound and each side had multiple lengths of rope, anchoring them to whatever solid structure was available.

The air was filled with shouting, screaming, cursing and people giving orders and acknowledgements.

It was chaos but with a single focus in mind, I'd be damned if there wasn’t a sense of community spirit.

I even heard a few laughs. What was this Madness!?

Unbelievably, the creature was done for.

It simply couldn’t get leverage to pull its legs out and its large mass was useless against the angles the legs were being bound into.

People had started to throw more and more ropes over its torso and tie it down even further.

It looked completely and utterly disarmed and it was hissing and screeching but it could barely budge an inch.

Inside the dome encasing me and Tanner, there was a purple greenish mist seeping up from the ground and familiar streams started wrapping around Tanner's wounded leg and flowing into his nose, mouth and ears.

I lifted my hands and watched as the mist collected and pooled in my palms and then separated off into thin streams, snaking around my broken fingers.

I watched in mild horror as my hands went numb and my fingers readjusted themselves, popping and cracking with only a dull pain, until they were completely healed but left with a small achy itch. The wound on my leg visibly bulged out as fresh pink skin tissue built up underneath, the old damaged tissue slowly getting absorbed.

The dome then dissipated and a few people rushed over to Tanner and me.

A young woman who was sobbing hysterically, wrapped her arms around his still body.

“Ugh, jeez woman. I’ve got a splitting headache, keep it down would’ya - I’m alright, I’m alright!” Tanner croaked out.

She gasped.

“WOMAN!!? I’LL GIVE YOU ‘WOMAN’!! - YOU - YOU - STUPID BASTARD!” she shouted in his face before pausing, eyeing him up and down, then ramming forward and plastering him with a long kiss.

I chuckled as I groaned, only out of habit as I felt great, and got up to my feet.

Looking over at Marri who was grinning, welling up.

She was holding Lone.

I ran over to her and gave them both a big gentle cuddle and received a gentle kiss on the cheek.

“Hey, Honey. How’s your day going?” I whispered.

She let out a burst of laughter.

“Paha - you are such a tit where the hell have you been you idiot! It's a good thing you got me and Lone watching your back else you could’ve…” she trailed off and she started shaking in my arms sobbing.

“I know, I know I’m so sorry…thank you so much Marri. Thank you so much..”

“...*sniff* no worries…you tit…*sniff*”

“Listen, I will explain everything later but first I’m going to go help the others, with that, but I’ll be back okay?”

She held on tightly, but nodded, wiping her face onto my shirt.

“If you make the tears, you gotta dry them” she said with a grin.

She nodded in the direction behind me.

“Go on, I’ll be here to keep your idiot but cute butt safe.”

I grinned back and pulled away.

It's mental but we need to sort this out sooner rather than later.

I moved up to Erza and Sylvie.

Sylvie turned to me after barking out some orders to some people and gave me a stern look.

Is she some kind of ex-military commander?

“Mr Slaeyru good to see you and yours are safe. I hear you are to thank for getting me home to my family safely?”

She definitely was someone who’d been through hell and came out tough as nails. Her voice was calm, collected and she wasn't interested in any bullshit.

She held out a hand and I shook it, nodding in the direction of Tanner.

“Thanks, but that guy is the only reason we managed to get you back here."

I glanced over at the moanimg creature returning to her.

She smiled softly and gave a single nod of thanks.

“Right. Well we can have more pleasantries later. Perhaps we should do away with this bloody creature first?”

Erza snorted a laugh “Right you are Syl, lets get on with it.”

I nodded dumbfounded by the situation “Sounds good…what’s the plan?”

Turns out that the plan…well there was no plan.

..

.

Everyone quickly gathered in a large semi circle between the buildings that the monster was tied down to, and had started a discussion.

Someone had suggested fire, but that was dismissed because it could burn the rope.

Another, Captain obvious, pointed out we had no machinery to run it over with, or a car to smash into it.

Both ideas were not the best anyway.

We needed something to deal a tremendous force to its head, or, damage it enough to bleed it out.

People grimaced at one guys suggestion that we could start making spears and stab the crap out of it.

“That’s going to be a long and grim process Steve! I mean, it would totally work but I’m not sure if I could stomach it, even if it is a monster..it just seems…inhumane?”

A bunch of murmurs agreeing with one faint voice muttering “fucking knew steve was a psycho..”

“Well..fine..OK fair enough! But at the very least, we need everyone to deal damage or throw something at it as that should give them E-X-P!” Steve protested.

Oh someone said the E word. Shit just got real.

“Ughhh for god sakes Steve! Don’t call it that, this isn’t a bloody game!”

“...But he’s right though!” The fast girl called out.

“...Are we really suggesting our children all throw rocks at this thing?” a woman, clearly aghast with the suggestion spat out.

“Well let's figure out how to actually put it out of its misery first..” a man responded.

Murmurs rose, agreeing.

Yet again, someone muttered “fucking pyscho Steve…he’s right…but fuck Steve…”

“...So any more ideas?” Sylvie seemed to be an important, respected person of this community…or were we about to deteriorate into a rabid horde, stabbing the equivalent of toothpicks into the nightmare until it died.

It was quiet for a second before a rather stocky burly chap stuck his hand up eagerly.

“Uhh, yes…Sir? Sorry I don’t believe I’ve met you before?” Sylvie’s voice sounded a tad suspicious which made the man slightly nervous as he shuffled his feet and looked around.

“Ohhh Ayee Ma’am, I’m on of ta’ building contractors that wus’ workin’ down ere’ wen all this shite started”

He had a scottish accent but it wasn’t inchorently thick, nobody in England really had difficulty even with the thickest of Scottish accents…but if there were any Americans or Europeans here, they would probably have some difficulty.

“Ma names Anton and Ah’ think E’ve got a solution to yuh’ problum” he nodded with a grin.

“Okay, nice to meet you Anton. Please, go ahead.” Sylvie smiled and placed her palm out, signalling that Anton had the floor.

He simply pointed to the sky and we all looked up. There was a crane holding a steel beam very high up.

He went on to explain that he had been staying in the on-site office. But two days ago, he’d been attacked by a bunch of mutated rats that looked like they had crab legs with no head or facial features.

They had broken into his office and were trying to eat his food.

He’d killed them and then the next day, after having a “weird dream”, he knew he could turn on his kettle. After which, he started testing and he confirmed that, essentially, he could generate and control electricity to some degree.

Obviously, being surrounded by British people, the mention of him being able to power a kettle for a cup of tea, increased his popularity by a factor of one million, evident to the man "oo tea!" Murmurs.

They just brushed over the fact that he had electricity powers and went straight to the tea Messiah is here!!

“And Ah’ think I can power the crane, jus’ enough ta’ move it over here an’ release tha’ beam. Nothin’ can survive an impact of that I-Beam ‘angin there, not even a monsta’”

Absolutely everyone just nodded in extreme approval. Nobody was going to dare speak against the tea lord.

Jokes aside, I think it was more the fact that we wouldn’t have to all turn into stone age hunters and bludgeon or spear attack the creature to death.

So it was quickly agreed since it “couldn’t hurt to try” or “hell I want to see some Majik” - “what? You mean magic with a G surely?” “Nah fam. Magic is bunnies out of the hat. Majik is the real shit.”

Huh.

Majik it is then.

***