Chapter 29
Mike's body to stir; slowly at first, but then violently, the muscles of his lifeless body unnaturally rippled and convulsed, tears formed in the highly defined muscle structure of his back. A small growl emerged from inside his body; claws emerged from the back and ripped open the skin, setting itself free from the small confines of its protective exoskeleton like skin. It jerked its head out of the darkness and into the damp cave air. It opened and closed its jaws, letting the air hit the sensitive flesh.
It blinked its human sized eyes and closed them, inhaling and exhaling repeatedly. It pulled the rest of its body out of the armor hide and turned towards its confinement. It was free of the cramped space of its former body, yet it was felt with the urge to eat. It arched its back and let out a roar of relief, it was relieved to be free and out of its now useless armor casing.
It crouched and began to sort out things; there was a bigger monster than it, there was that human female prey to attend to, and there were those other humans… it couldn't remember what their names were but names didn't matter to it anymore. Names were just things that humans labeled so that they could feel secure as it had learned from its existence as one of the lower beings of life.
The brown haired prey couldn't have gone too far, it was only a matter of time until it caught up with her…. Then it would get her back. It looked over at its cast off skin and started to eat it.
* * *
"Vash?" Razor said anxiously and with concern over his friend's body, "Are you alright?" he shook his body, "Hey c'mon! Get up!"
Vash groaned painfully, "Ugh… Damn…" he said, "What the fuck… hit me?"
"Eh… heh, heh… Sorry!"
"You were the one who got me?"
"Yeah, sorry."
"Idiot…" he sat up, rubbing his head, "… Look before you strike next time, will ya?"
"Damn it, I said I'm sorry!"
"Sometimes that isn't good enough… So did you find Kat?"
He shook his head, "No… but I did meet up with a scientist… but she won't be joining us."
"Why not?"
"She was killed by one of those things."
"Damn…"
"And… there is another one of those big monsters around like Mike."
"You mean…?"
"Yeah… Eric Nebel."
"Fuck!" he started to get up, "We've gotta get outta here before we die!"
"No shit…"
"C'mon. Are you gonna fuck around, or are you gonna try and find some way to escape?"
"What do you think…?"
"I thought you would've said that…."
"Heh…"
"So what is it, Razor? Gonna stay here and get Kat or get the hell out now?"
"Damn it…"
* * *
Kat had reached the top of the wide and deep ditch after a half hour of limping for what seemed to be a mile but was in actuality about thirty yards. The illusion of a greater distance resulted from the agonizing pain in her ankle that was actually easing but only slowly.
She stood on the top of the ditch and stared down at Mike's body; then gasped. A creature about the size of him before the changes with pitch black skin with crimson patches emerged from his body. The creature's head was shaped like a normal human's but had a bigger mouth with razor sharp teeth, twin crests protruding from the sides of its head. It had small but tight, powerful muscles on its arms, chest, stomach, and back; its upper leg muscles were well defined for a creature adept to running at fast speeds and jumping at high distances. It had a small and useless tail; its fingers were tipped with five inch long talons as were its feet which had two foretoes and a third toe in the back. It seemed to prefer bending its back forward in a hunch. She watched in curiosity as it began to eat its old skin, watched as it devoured each muscle and piece of skin.
She made a sharp sound as she watched, and gasped in shock as it looked up at her. It seemed to screech as it identified her, finished its meal, and rose to jump right at her. She ran as it reached the top, heading for the labs. She saw it shake its head and start to chase her once more.
It made a strange inhuman sound: a thin, shrill cry— half whisper, half shriek.
She ran even harder, feeling as though her ankle was going to break but she didn't care... she had to live. They approached the labs and she hopped the wall, glad when only her feet made contact with the metal floor, and continued to dash; she had to lose him somehow.