by D. M. Guay
Morty pulled me up by the collar. “I think your sword landed in the candy aisle, kid. Grab me a pack of boner pills while you're over there because this whole scene here is making me limp.” He pushed me, trying to give me a running start, but instead, I fell flat on my face.
“Move it, kid.” Morty tapped his watch. “I've got a date.”
“Fine.” I stayed low, as best as I could, to stay out of Bizo guy's sight. The farther I got from tentacle dude, the cooler my name tag became. It was still hot, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't burning “Hello My Name Is” into my chest hairs anymore.
When I looked back, Bizo's tentacles were waving in the air and cracking down, crunching in the floor, and I could hear him slupping as he pulled himself through the store, probably looking for me so he could flatten me into a Lloyd-flavored meat-fruit roll-up.
The chip aisle was completely overturned. I was ankle-deep in bags—Doritos, Conn's and Utz—crunch crunching as I duck walked as stealthily as possible behind the toppled racks, across the store, looking for the sword. When DeeDee stabbed him with it last time, he'd exploded. Clearly, it didn't kill him, just got rid of him for a while, sent him somewhere else. Until Tristan brought him back. Gah. Hipsters!
Man. My thigh muscles were On. Fire. Note to self: If I lived through this, I wasn't gonna skimp on the squats. Dammit. Where was that sword?
Crinkle. Crinkle. Crinkle.
Crap. What was that?
Crinkle. Crinkle.
The noise was close. Really close. The chips bags between my feet rustled and undulated as if something was slithering under them. Oh God. A hell snake. Snake dude was back! He wasn't in the picture with all the other creatures. Crap!
Something black and shiny emerged from underneath a Tostitos bag. Where was that Michael Bolton CD when you needed it? I laced my fingers together to make one big super fist and readied myself to rain down the hardest hit possible on the hell viper. I lifted my arms, ready to strike. Then I saw a number eight emerging from between the chip bags. Phew. It was just my stupid angel! The eight ball rolled around, clearing itself a spot, then landed triangle side up, of course. Always an opinion. “Desperate love will breach the gate...”
“No shit, man.”
The triangle turned, gearing up for the next comment.
“No time for chitchat.” I was not in the mood. I picked the ball up and threw it. It hit the front window with a chink then dropped behind the counter. Good. He could keep Tristan the hipster company. Those two jerks deserved each other. Unfortunately, Bizowhatzit must have heard the noise because I could hear him slurping in my direction now.
Crack. Crack. Slurp. Slurp.
Shit. I'd led him right to Tristan, fish guy's sacrificial midnight snack.
Okay, so I had to give up the duck walk in the interest of speed now because I was seriously out of shape and there was an angry halo of spiky tentacles on my tail. So I crawled like a terrified mouse through the chip bags.
The shelves of the first two aisles were completely overturned, thanks to the shaking ground and Bizo's angry thwaps. The rubble of chips and Top Ramen was a foot-deep all around. The candy aisle, other than Morty's Twizzler raid, was unmolested. The sword wasn't there. Only that stupid purple pumpkin. No DeeDee either. I scuttled, like a cockroach—speaking of, where was Kevin?—past aisle four. Nope. No sword there. Then to aisle five, which I had always gone out of my way to avoid ever since the Demon Caroline incident. But, sure enough, the sword was there under some toppled bottles of drain opener. DeeDee was hunkered down at the other end of the aisle.
“Lloyd, get over here.” DeeDee waved me over.
I grabbed the sword and crawled to her. She was using the electrical tape in the hardware section to strap her knife to one of the dart-thingies that shoot out of the chanting taser. “I'll distract Bizosoth. You cut Bubby free. Close the gate before anything else gets through. Then, we'll send Bizo back.”
Flap. Crunch. Flap. Flap. Crunch.
“What's that noise?” DeeDee asked.
“I don't know.”
“Well, can you check?”
Oh, hell no I can't! But I didn't say that out loud. Instead, I swallowed my fear and stood up, slowly, slowly and peeked over the racks. A neon orange swarm of flying Flamin' Hot Crunchy Cheetos had coagulated into a dozen hell gnats. They surrounded Morty, swirling and diving around him. He was throwing tidbits of something at them, and they were swooping down to eat. He was feeding them like effing seagulls. Why weren't they attacking him? Why did he get a pass? Oh yeah, because he's from hell.
“The gnats are back,” I whispered.
Flap. Crunch. Flap. Flap. Crunch. Morty was laughing now, enjoying his new pets, like he was feeding ducks at the park.
“Free Bubby, and he'll eat them. They're his favorite snack. Oh, no.” She tugged on my leg. “We're too late. They're here.”
“Who's here?” I shouldn't have asked.
Something large and dark passed over my head and touched down a few feet away from me. It was hairy and black, as long as a UPS truck, bent in the middle, and about as thick as a skinny tree trunk. The tip of it thumped down hard on the floor. Then another passed over me. And another. Then another one. Long, black, hairy trunks in a formation around aisles four, five, and six. The light from the fluorescent strips on the ceiling above me went dim. Something was blocking the light. My eyes followed the black hairy trunks up.
Dear, God. They weren't trunks. They're legs. Pressed against the ceiling right above me was a hairy black body. A black body with two segments. I'd seen bodies like that before. Tiny ones. Tiny, terrifying ones, lying in wait in their webs. I pressed the button and my sword lit up like a gas burner. My guts froze in fear, and not a normal winter freeze, an outer reaches of the solar system, rings of Saturn level cold, as a head turned down to look at me. The face had at least a hundred icy eyes and a dozen curved silvery-blue fangs. A spider. Why did it have to be a spider?
Chapter 18
“New plan,” DeeDee said. “You free Bubby. I'll distract the huge, terrifying spider.”
I nodded like it was all good, and I was totally down with the plan, but dude. I had to seriously fake the brave. I mean, I was quaking out of my underpants in terror, every hair in every pore on my body stood up stick straight. My muscles were noodles. I could barely keep a grip on the sword.
Let me add that when you're face to face with death, in the form of your worst nightmare—a spider big enough to eat you—your life really does flash before your eyes. Everything becomes crystal clear. No denying it. I was Lloyd Wallace, twenty-one-year-old loser. I had a list of failures three miles long, and my list of successes was empty, a blank page. Did you get that? No wins. Zero. What was the chance I could win when the fate of the entire world was counting on me? You do the math. I had to face it. I was about to die in a “Who Farted?” T-shirt.
Jesus, if you're listening. If you get me through this, I promise I will get my life together. I'll do whatever you ask, whatever it takes. Pinkie swear.
The massive hell spider eyeballed me with its emotionless eyes, then clicked its fangs together. I swear it was licking its lips. I mean, do spiders have lips? Don't answer that. I'm not getting close enough to that mouth to find out.
“Lloyd, duck!” DeeDee whispered.
I did because I was too scared to think for myself. I dropped to the floor, the sword skittered away, and I rolled up into a ball. Full fetal position, because I really wanted to la la la la nothing to see here, not happening this whole situation away. DeeDee must have dialed up the taser because I could hear low voices chanting.
The taser lines shot out, sinking deep into the spider belly above me. It reared up off its front legs and thrashed its head back and forth, punching out ceiling tiles as it writhed, angry and in pain.
Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. The room rattled. The spider was on the move, its long hairy black legs spread over three aisles, bent at the joints, stomping, turning its body in differ
ent directions. DeeDee was gone. It was stalking her. Phew.
Yes, okay, I felt guilty that I was relieved. Because I hated that DeeDee was in danger, but at the same time, hello, I was cripplingly terrified of spiders and now it wasn't standing over me looking at me like a jalapeno popper. DeeDee was a cool cucumber in a crisis. She could handle it. In the meantime, I had to do my number one job: Free Bubby.
My name tag sizzled. Oh, man. Really? I looked up. Scratch that. Number two job: Free Bubby. Number one job: Stab Bizowhatsit and send him back into the void where he belonged, stat. Because I only had about ten seconds to figure out how to grab the sword, switch it on, and get the best of halo of tentacles dude, who was standing at the end of aisle five giving me the stink eye with his one mean red pupil.
So I did what any reasonable man would do: I jumped up, dusted myself off and did my best Fortnite Electro Shuffle. Yeah. You heard me right. Bizo's eye widened as he watched my fists pump and my Pumas squeak as I shuffled across the linoleum. He seemed totally confused. Ha! That's right. Watch me dance, sucker. I'd seen Guardians of the Galaxy. Dance off distraction!
I certainly didn't make it look as good as a pumped-up Chris Pratt. My gut bounced and my cargo shorts slid down, letting some arctic air tickle the top of my butt crack. But Bam. It worked! I shuffled, scooted and fist-pumped right on over to the not-currently flaming sword, popped down and grabbed it before Bizo was any wiser. “Aha!” I yelled, and I hopped up, sword in hand.
I didn't break eye contact with Bizo as I gripped the sword and fumbled around, searching for the on button. Dude. Where was that stupid button? Why was it so small? He realized he'd been played and made it clear by his anger-squint that he was not amused. Then he—smiled? Wait. Why was he so happy?
Something cold and slimy wrapped around my middle. (I'd say abs, but let's be honest here.) I looked down. Bizo had wrapped me up in one of his tentacle arms. Oh. Crap. I hadn't seen that coming. His tentacle was looped up and over the shelf and had come out behind me. I felt like the game hunter guy in the first Jurassic Park movie. He thought he had the upper hand on the velociraptor until he got sideswiped.
Bizo squeezed me so hard I felt like my eyeballs were gonna pop out. He yanked me down the aisle toward him. My feet fumbled, unable to get any sort of grip on the polished linoleum. I held tight to the sword, but oh my God, he was squeezing. So. Hard. Come on, button. Where are you? Light you stupid sword, light!
No time. He pulled me closer, faster, right at his big naked, mean yellow eye, covering twenty feet so quickly it might as well have been an inch. I put the sword straight out in front of me, the metal tip aimed right at the goo-body center where all of his tentacles met. I fumbled for the button, but too late. Out of time. We were eyes to eye. His body shook and grumbled. He squeezed me tight. Suddenly, something slimy pressed down on my arms, and my fingers felt like they were trapped in coagulating glue. So gross.
Bizo's grip loosened. The tentacle around my middle let go and slurped away. His creepy red pupil looked down. So did I. I was elbow deep in his slime gut, still holding on to the sword. Oh, my God. Ew. His body had swallowed my arms. I'd pushed right into him just as easily as I could stick my fingers into a cup of pudding. I could see my arms and the sword in his lime-green translucent body.
I'll let you in on a little secret. When you're suddenly elbow-deep in the slimy gut of a one-eyed, bloodthirsty hell beast, you can't help but stop and ask yourself some questions. Like, how did I get here? Or, how did my life slide so far off the rails? And, how the hell did I get this job in the first place? Who was dumb enough to think I was qualified to battle a horde of monsters and stave off the apocalypse?
Oh, right. I remember. Student loan debt and the devil.
Oh well. No time to get philosophical now. The sword was in him, so all I had to do was wait for him to pop or explode, right? Okay. Wait for it. Wait for it...Hmm. Why wasn't he exploding? Any time now. He'd been stabbed with a supernatural sword. How long could it take?
I knew I was in trouble when he looked more annoyed than hurt. When he saw the sword inside his body, he rolled his eye. Well, that wasn't good. He wasn't gonna pop, was he? Maybe it had to be lit to work.
He grabbed me by the waistband of my Hanes and yanked. Ugh. Epic wedgie! My arms slurped out of him—without the sword—then I was flying up up through the air, over the counter and face-first into the front window. Chink. Ow. My brain. I slid, like a bug against a windshield, down the glass and onto the floor, and lay there unmoving for a good long time, until the dizzy wore off and the pain simmered down to a low rolling boil.
I must have blacked out for a second because the next thing I remember was Kevin on my face, punching me in the cheek, yelling, “Wake up, kid. Wake up!”
“Wha?” Ow. My head throbbed like someone was hitting it with bricks.
“Hurrrr. Hurrrr. Ha-hurrrp.”
Great. Tristan was curled up on the floor next to me, still sobbing, rocking back and forth like a baby, completely unaware of the literal hell he'd unleashed on earth.
“Get moving, kid.” Kevin pointed up. “The shit's really hitting the fan. Look!”
I moved slowly—ouch my brain—just high enough to see over the counter. The swirling blue vortex had expanded. Almost three-quarters of the back wall of the store was now an open gate to hell. I watched the spider stomping around, looking for DeeDee, dripping blue blood from a deep gash where her rigged-up taser knife must have stuck it. It was yanking fluorescent light fixtures out by the roots as its body scraped against the ceiling, plunging sections of the store into electrical sparks and darkness.
Bubby howled, fighting against the goo holding him in the portal. The spider didn't like the noise. After each howl, it reared its head as if it'd been stabbed in the ears. Finally, it turned its butt toward Bubby and shot a bunch of webs at him. They splattered across him, holding him in place like superglue, and across his mouth, muffling his cries. Oh, God. The goo. It was spider webbing. From hell spiders. Oh, good Lord in Heaven. Why spiders?
Morty was cruising the overturned chip bags, nonplussed, choosing his next snack. The Flamin' Hot Crunchy Cheetos gnats were swooping and flying through the store. But they were acting strange this time. They weren't interested in attacking. They were moving erratically, not as a group, hitting the broken ceiling tiles, then the wall corners. Then, they suddenly made a break for the front door, slamming into it, over and over. Chink. Chink. Chink. They were taking out little bits of glass with every hit. They were trying to get out.
A second later, I figured out why. Even though the store was nearly pitch black, thanks to the spider ripping out the lights, I could see why the gnats were so desperate. Something new was emerging from the blue swirl. A beak. Fat and hard. Something poured out of the gate around it, so quickly and smoothly it moved like liquid. And another thing, and again. The store shook. Tiles fell out of the ceiling, crashing down in bits. Bubby squirmed desperately. The beak moved farther out, revealing a bulbous soft head and rows of deep black eyes, hundreds of them. It reminded me of an ...octopus? Only maxed out, with lots of extra tentacles and eyeballs. And, you know, absolutely huge. Its arms poured into the store and down the aisles like water, filling every row with fat oozing tentacles pocked with suction cups.
Its eyes slowly scanned the room, intelligent, focused, as if it was looking for something. I doubted it was boner pills or microwave mac 'n' cheese.
“I gotta get out of here. I gotta get out of here!” Tristan squealed He looked up and around, watching the ceiling crumble, holding on to the shelves of rocks and weird stuff as the store shook. “I'm too young to die!”
And in a flash, he bounded up and over the counter.
“Dude. No!” I called out after him, but it was too late.
Let's just say he did not exit quietly. He screamed in a long, steady uninterrupted frequency so high-pitched every dog in a three-mile radius was probably like “What da fu...?”
All the hell crea
tures zeroed in on his screams. He ran for the door, disbursing the Flamin' Hot Crunchy Cheetos gnats. He pushed it open and stumbled across the parking lot. His high-pitched wail turned to shouts of “Earthquake! Help! Earthquake!”
He was halfway across the lot when a watery octopus tentacle crashed through the door, sending glass raining down. The tentacle shot out, lightning-quick, and grabbed Tristan by the ankle. He fwapped face-first into the asphalt, and lay there, squirming, clawing at the ground, screaming. “Earthquake. Help!”
The octopus held him in place, tentacle wrapped around his hipster boot, ever so slowly reeling him back in.
Gulp. Now I knew what the octopus was looking for: Fish guy's sacrifice. The creatures responded to the catch. They started to move, carefully, deliberately and no longer concerned with me or DeeDee. They moved as if they were in a trance, guided by some higher power. The spider crouched down below Bubby's television, butt facing the swirling gate. Bizo migrated to the slushy station next to the front door. Octopus guy pulled himself all the way out of the gate and over to the corner at the end of the counter. His zillion eyes were maybe fifteen feet away from me. Counting Bubby, there was now one monster in each corner. The gate responded. It changed. The swirling glowing blue stopped moving. The arctic freezing air suddenly went tropical swamp hot. The gate burned angry fire red.
“That can't be good,” Kevin said. He was on my arm. “Kid. You still got that paper with the poem on it?”
I nodded.
“Well, let's see it,” he said.
I took the crumpled page out of my pocket and smoothed it out. Kevin looked it over. He sighed. “Well, this is it. Apocalypse pending.” He pointed to the creatures in the painting. They've lined up for the ceremony to help the devourer cross over. One at each point on the compass.”
