Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre(87)

Leave him there. Recover our weapons. Scan for other attackers. That was the right choice, the one we’d planned for. Gray had to be dying, and dying or not, he couldn’t hurt us anymore. I remember Carmen bracing her feet against the heaving ribs, and the spurting streams that followed her retracting blade. I remember her jamming that blade right back in, her red-stained teeth grinning wide. I remember Dan retrieving his spear, striking Gray in the chest, the stomach, the groin. I remember the old ape’s splotchy, sun-damaged face, upside down as I kneeled above it, eyes clear, mouth opening, driving the rock down.

Bouncing off the skin-covered bone. Again. Teeth breaking, lips torn. Again. Muzzle cracking. Again. Skull giving. Again. Broken bone slicing up through damp fur. Again. The first hint of brains. Again. Again. Again. Eyes popping, skull collapsing, brains spilling out into the ash, onto my jeans, a mass of hairs and liquid and steaming, shiny meat. I remember everything.

I remember laughing.

No words, words are for thinking animals, for human beings. Laughing and grunts and tight little moans of joy.

Then the scream.

Up and alert. Me again.

All of us scrambling. Remembering where we were, who we were.

One mistake. That’s all it took.

There were others out there, braving the dying flames, watching for the shadow of stakes and flicker of broken glass. We’d stopped thinking just as they’d started. Moving through darkness, silent, creeping up to the Common House behind our backs.

The scream was Bobbi. It had her by the hair. Dragging her in a puffing furrow, spindly legs kicking, delicate, pale hands grasping backward at air. Screaming, sobbing, pleading.

I don’t know if what happened next was an act of self-defense, the old lady, Dowager, using Bobbi to ward off Dan’s charge. All I saw was Mrs. Boothe, still writhing, swung back and up into the air. Like Yvette, spun in a complete circle. I pray that her neck broke quickly. The Common House roof thudded as her body broke on its edge. She had to have been dead by then, by the time my eyes followed her down, and caught on the image of Dan’s spear rammed up into the killer’s chest.

That was when we all heard the second scream.

Pal!

Juno had slipped completely past us, right into the Common House without a sound, right over to the pile of blankets hiding her.

“Palomino!” Carmen ran after the withdrawing titan. Like Bobbi, this one had Pal by the hair. Unlike Dowager, Juno wasn’t looking for a fight. She was limping, bleeding from her right foot. A stake? Probably why she’d gone after Pal. Easy pickings, limited risk. Withdraw, escape, feed somewhere quiet and safe. That was what must have been going through the pregnant sow’s mind.

Carmen and I were running toward them, with Effie—the only one still armed—leading the charge. She threw her heavy, clunky spear in a high arc. Over Effie’s shoulder, I saw it thunk into the small of Juno’s back. A shallow hit, maybe glancing off the pelvis. Enough to get her attention though, force her to turn and swipe at Carmen with her free arm.

The open hand caught Carmen on the side of the head, grabbing it, lifting. I saw her feet rise off the ground. I heard the crack as Juno crushed her skull.

Juno hurled Carmen’s body at us, forcing us to stop and duck. With a growling hoot, she held up Palomino, dangling her like a taunt, or a warning.

“Don’t come any closer. I’ll hurt your baby. Get back. I’ll kill her!”

Intelligence, reasoning. I know that’s what it meant, and I think it might have worked except—

“Mamma!”

That was the only word I’ve ever heard Pal speak, and before I could react, I witnessed that word’s power.

Effie shot forward, springing past her daughter and into her captor’s grasp.

Hands out, clawing the sides of that watermelon head, thumbs jamming into Juno’s tiny eyes.

The snarl. Effie’s snarl. I didn’t know human beings could sound like that. Rising to a sandpaper screech as the back of her head disappeared under the monster’s chin.

Juno staggered back, dropped Pal, and raised her arms above her head. Those arms came down like hammers, smashing Effie’s shoulders.

She dropped to Juno’s feet. Eyes open. Broken doll.

Effie.

Mamma.

Her mouth was full of fur, skin, and blood. She’d literally torn Juno’s throat out with her teeth. The giant fell back, hands groping for the holes that had been her eyes and windpipe. I rushed over to Pal, who was already crawling toward me. Struggling to rise, she reached up as I fell to my knees beside her. I think I said something like, “C’mon…” and turned us both to the Common House. The door was right there, only a few dozen steps away. But there was something wrong. The shape. It’d changed. The rectangular door now seemed triangular, like it was framed in some kind of arch. And that arch seemed blurry, the edge of light and dark in soft focus.

Fur. Legs.

I followed them up to the scratched stomach, over the scars and torn breast, past the singed, raw, oozing mouth into those two glinting points staring down.

Was she as surprised by Effie’s actions? Or just savoring the sure kill?

Still on our knees, I tried to move Pal behind me. “Get ready to run.”

Alpha roared.

“GO!” I shoved Pal sideways, crawling in the other direction. I knew the blow would land. I just wanted a few more steps. A few more seconds to give Pal time and space. I didn’t expect the padded vise grip on my ankle.