I was just an ordinary girl living in the southwest suburbs of Chicago in the year 2011. I had a family that loved me, friends that I adored, and a pleasant, ordinary job at the local grocery store. I spent all day labeling and got paid well. I still lived at home with my parents and my younger brother because I was just starting college. I was pretty normal. That is, until I met The Doctor.
My story starts on a cold December night. It was just after Christmas, but not yet the New Year. Plans and preparations were beginning so we could welcome the New Year with a celebration. Little did I know that someone else was planning the destruction of our planet at the same time. I was working at Dominick's, a local grocery store, labeling the incoming stock. It was boring, but really easy and my mind wandered. I started thinking about the New Year and all the things that I wanted to do, buy, or see within the next twelve months. I wanted the new iPod Touch. That looked really cool. My old iPod broke and I needed my music to listen to while I was studying. That reminded me. I still had to get my books for the new semester starting up in January. They were so expensive. Maybe I would have to get the iPod later.
I was still analyzing the initial cost of my textbooks in my head and calculating my budget to see if I would have enough for an iPod when I heard a crash from the store-room. I knew that Adam was working back there that night and he didn't have the greatest eye sight. That old man would probably get fired if Jackson, our manager found out that he knocked another shelf over. I knew that he needed this job desperately. America was in a recession and if he got fired he would never be able to pay his wife's medical bills. I knew that he worked hours of overtime just to cover her expenses. I decided to go help him clean it up. I put down the boxes of cereal that I was pricing and yelled.
"Hey, Adam! Are you all right? I heard a crash."
I got no response so I tried again.
"Adam! Do you need my help picking another shelf back up?" This time I heard a scuffle of feet. The light in the store room flickered.
"Adam. What are you doing back there? Are you okay?" I said as I stood and started to make my way around the piles of products gathered around me. It wasn't like him to be so quiet. Usually he would hum or whistle a tune to make the work go faster. The store room was oddly silent. I got a funny feeling, like my stomach was tumbling and turning around inside my body. The air was thick with energy. It felt like there was a whole bunch of static electricity in the air. I slowly crept around my little work station and headed for the store room door.
"Adam. Adam, are you there?" I tried not to be scared. I knew that as soon as I got scared and ran for help Adam would turn up just fine and everyone would laugh at me for watching one too many horror movies. So I continued alone toward the open store room door.
"Adam this isn't funny. If you're hurt I'll call for Jackson and we'll make up some excuse for you." I thought about what I had just said. What if he had fallen and gotten hurt? What if a shelf fell and he was trapped underneath? And he was an older man. He could've broken any number of bones if that had happened, maybe even his neck…I ran through the doorway and looked around. The room seemed empty. Maybe he was working towards the back.
"Adam, where are you? Can you speak to me? Tell me where you are?" I started to worry for my co-workers health. If he wasn't answering me it was probably because he couldn't. I turned left and started down the rows of shelves, looking for the evidence from the crash I had just heard. He was probably around there somewhere. I turned right at the end of the aisle and saw the shelves on the floor at near the back of the room. I quickly approached, all the while calling Adam's name. I slowed as I got closer to the mess of broken jars and bottles. I realized that if Adam had gotten trapped under all of this glass and metal he was probably already dead. That thought nearly made me stop looking for him and run from the room screaming. In hindsight, I probably should have done just that. But I kept going. Slowly and fearfully, but I kept going. I couldn't leave without finding out what happened back there.
I stopped right in front of the fallen shelving and looked for any trace of Adam. As I gently stepped over and around glass fragments I searched for a hand sticking out from under the shelves, or something equally nightmarish. When I finished with my exploration of the mess, I still hadn't found any trace of him under the shelves. I looked up in confusion. If he wasn't lying under the shelves dying or dead, why wasn't he answering me? That was when I saw it. A bright red smear of blood across the next row of shelves. Almost as if he dragged himself along the row of products ready to be put out for sale.
At this point I should've run for the door shouting for Jackson to help me find Adam. But I didn't run for help; I stayed and walked cautiously down the aisle of products smeared with Adam's blood. It was like a poorly written horror movie. The ones where you wind up shouting at the TV yelling "Don't go that way! Run! Get out of there!" Unfortunately I was unable to break myself away from the mystery of what had happened to Adam. I continued slowly down the aisle, standing as far away from the blood smear as I could. My heart rate increased and I started breathing heavily. Adrenaline poured into my body and I started to shake. I don't know about you, but when I get nervous, my immediate reaction to adrenaline is shaking. I couldn't hold my hands still. My legs felt like pudding, but still I walked on. I had this uncontrollable need to know what had happened to poor Adam Lewis.
I got closer and closer to the end of the aisle and as I did I began to hear strange crunching and grinding noises. I tried to determine what could be causing that sound, but it was hard to think with my heart beating so loud inside my head. I reached the end of the corner and turned. What I saw in that corner of the store room that cold December night will haunt me for the rest of eternity.
When I turned to find the source of the noise I saw a monster munching away on the leg of what I believed to be Mr. Adam Lewis. I let out a strangled cry, barely audible over the crunching of teeth against bone and backed up against the shelves. All four of the monster's eyes swiveled in its head and locked right on me. I stared right back, frozen. I couldn't move, couldn't breathe, couldn't think.
This was impossible. I didn't believe in monsters anymore. Those were children's fears. The things that go bump in the night simply didn't exist. And yet, here was a monster, sitting right in front of me with Adam's blood dripping down its chin, staring straight at me. The thing in front of me dropped the leg it was holding and stood. I took a good look at it. I couldn't do much more than that; I was frozen with fear.
The monster was fat, gray, and its skin looked rather rough and bumpy. It was as tall as the shelves, which were ten feet high. It had four tiny eyes set in its massive head, along with two wide holes in the center of its face for nostrils. It had no ear cartilage that I could see but it had two holes that it must have heard out of. Its mouth was wide and bloody after finishing his dinner. I took a closer look and saw that its teeth were dull, but they were flat and made for grinding and snapping things, like bones. I heard the grating noise of Adam's bone being ground between those massive jaws echoing through my head. I saw the world through a haze and I wondered if I was going to faint. I'd never fainted before, and in a moment of clarity I realized that if I fainted I would end up the same as Adam, just a pile of bloody bone and flesh left behind after this giant's meal time.
I took all of this in within a second. Then the monster took a step towards me. That spurred me into action. The icy fear that had covered me from head to toe had melted and self-preservation kicked in. My body moved and before I realized it I was running past my work station. I was clumsy, but fear made me fast. I ran as fast as I could toward the emergency exit. The door to the rest of the store needed a code to get in and out. I knew it would take too long, so I sprinted in the direction that the big, red exit sign pointed. I could hear the thing breathing heavily and thumping along behind me. It may not have shot off quite as fast as me, but it had a large stride and was quickly catching up to me. I was 20 feet from the door when it burst open in front of me.
The bright streetlamp right outside the door blinded me and in surprise I lost my footing and fell. I looked back up into the light to see what or who had opened the door. A shadow fell over me and I heard a voice say, "Ah. There you are. I've been looking all over for you. You've been causing me some trouble."
The beast behind me roared and I scurried away into the shadows. I was hoping that the monster would forget about me while it had this stranger in its path. I still couldn't see his face. The man who spoke strode confidently into the processing area and stood right in front of the monster. I sat crouched in my hidden corner behind a crate of bananas and watched. If I had been thinking clearly I probably would've warned him that the beast was going to eat him. Then again, he wouldn't have needed the warning. He knew that this monster was capable of completely devouring a human being. I was amazed at his courage. He stood before a giant that was painted in my co-worker's fresh blood, snarling and spitting at him, without fear. He pointed something wrapped in a bright blue light at the giant and commanded, "You will leave this planet and never come back."
The monster only snarled at him. His response was, "That was your first and final warning." A grumbling erupted from the giant's mouth. Its laugh was gravely and as rough as its skin.
The stranger then said, "I warned you. All Portaletins hate honey don't they?" The monster grew still and looked almost nervous. Then the stranger pointed the blue light at a crate to the left of the monster. The device made a noise and the jars of honey in the crate exploded with a violent bang. The monster was covered in the sticky golden honey. There was a moment of silence where the monster stared at the stranger, the stranger stared back, and I stared at this entire strange scene. Then the moment was broken with the giant's screams and cries of pain. I could see smoke curling up from his skin and winding toward the rafters. I watched as his whole body dissolved into a boiling raging gray cloud of smoke and floated up into the air.
"Are you all right?" I heard his voice and jumped. I hadn't realized that I stood up at some point during the demon's demise and the stranger was now in front of me.
"Are you hurt?" he inquired again. I shook my head to tell him no.
"Well, that was a bit frightening for you was it? No one's hurt though which is good. Normally when you get attacked by a Portaletin there isn't an abundance of honey. Lucky for us, eh?" He smiled at me. He actually smiled at me. I cracked. I found my voice and I took a step forward in anger.
"How can you be so happy about this? That THING just tried to EAT me! And it got Adam…Oh God. It got Adam." My anger quickly dissipated. I thought about how narrowly I had escaped being that thing's meal and I grasped the stranger's forearms for support. I felt like I was going to puke. My eyes glazed over. I felt the haze come back and this time I did faint.