There came a rustling in from the woods behind them. Four beings who were more fish than man emerged from the night’s shadows into the moonlight. The tallest of the four gave a cry that sounded as if the thing’s lung weren’t fully adjusted to breathing on land. At the sound of its voice, dozens and dozens more of the creatures came out of the woods all around the lake.
It wasn’t the fish men that captured the trio’s attention, however. The center of the lake bubbled and stirred as if something monstrously large was moving beneath it. The surface of the water parted as it rose up.
Cassidy promptly pissed himself. Hunter dropped his weapon, falling to his knees from awe and fear. Hewes clutched the dagger he held in a white knuckled grip, reminding himself of its power.
The godlike being in the lake towered over them, looking down with jet black eyes that sent chills deep into their very souls. Hewes guessed it stood somewhere close to eighty feet tall. A mass of tentacles writhed about the lower portion of its face where a human’s mouth would have been. The thing’s arms ended not with hands, but even larger masses of thick tentacles that collided and uncoiled as giant wings unfolded from its back.
In a single fluid movement, Hewes flipped the dagger in his hand to where his fingers held its blade and threw the weapon at the hideous abomination before him. The dagger spun through the air, end over end, until it reached its target, thudding home into the slimy tissue that passed for the Great Old One’s flesh.
A blast crackling energy knocked about the three men, sending them flying, to land rolling in the grass at the edge of the forest. The blast produced a flash of white light so intense it was like an exploding sun. Both Hewes and Hunter managed to cover their eyes but Cassidy wasn’t so lucky. He screamed in agony as his eyes themselves burst into flame. Hewes opened his own eyes to see Cassidy staggering about with bright, blue flames raging out from within his eye sockets. Cassidy’s body twitched until it finally lay still and moved no more.
The lake was enshrouded by a thick cloud of stream the intensity of the blast had brought into existence. Hewes tried to peer through it, praying the mystical blade had done its job. The sound of utterly mad laughter snapped his attention around to where Hunter sat. The ex-soldier hadn’t even bothered getting to his feet. He had just sat up, grinning the smile of a madman, his body shaking from laughter.
“Looks like we lost Hunter,” Hewes snickered, pointing at the lake. The godlike thing in the water stood there as tall and powerful as ever. There was no sign of the dagger. It was simply gone.
“You are not him!” Hewes shouted. “You are merely his spawn and I command you to leave this world!”
Hewes heard the being’s thunderous laughter inside his head.
The spawn raised one of its arms, tentacles unfurling in Hewes’ direction.
“By the power of the blade that pierced you, be gone!” Hewes bellowed, even daring to take a step towards the lake. Then it hit him; the blade hadn’t done anything more than cause the spawn pain. That pain, however, had given the thing the push it needed to finally finish rooting itself to the world of man. Hewes was so lost in the horror of what he had done, he didn’t notice the swarm of Deep Ones approaching him until one of the creatures closed the webbed fingers of its clawed hand over his face from behind. More cold, wet hands grabbed his shoulders, his arms, his legs, their claws drawing blood. Hewes struggled in vain against them, but they were too many and they were too strong. In his final moment, he said a desperate prayer for the world of man as what remained of his sanity splintered. His muffled whimpering went silent as three razor sharp claws tore out his throat.
The Spawn in the lake flapped its wings, taking flight, and the darkness of the night grew more intense as it spread across the Earth.
About the Author
Eric S. Brown is the author of numerous series including the Bigfoot War series, the Kaiju Apocalypse series (with Jason Cordova), the Crypto-Squad series (with Jason Brannon), the Homeworld series (with Tony Faville and Jason Cordova) and the A Pack of Wolves series. Some of his stand-alone books include World War of the Dead, War of the Worlds Plus Blood Guts and Zombies, The Weaponer, Last Stand in a Dead Land, Season of Rot, Barren Earth (with Stephen North), Kaiju Armageddon, and Zombie Kaiju Apocalypse to name only a few. The first book of the Bigfoot War series was adapted into a feature film and released in 2014 by Origin Releasing. His short fiction has been published hundreds of times in the small press and beyond. His short story The One That Got Away will be appearing in the anthology Onward, Drake! from Baen Books which is set for release in Oct. 2015. Over the course of his career, Eric has also scripted comic books for Unstoppable Comics and continues to write an ongoing column entitled “Comics in a Flash for The Guide”. He lives in rural North Carolina with his wife, and two children where he continues to write tales of blazing guns, hungry corpses and the monsters that lurk in the woods.
Other novels, novellas, and collections
by Eric S Brown
Dark Karma (collection with Jason Brannon and John Grover)
Bad Mojo (collection with Jason Brannon & John Grover)
Space Stations and Graveyards (collection with John Grover and Jason Brannon)
Dying Days (collection)
Poisoned Grave (collection with John Grover and Gail Davis)
Madmen’s Dreams (collection)
Cobble (with Susanne Brydenbaugh)
Zombies: The War Stories (collection)
Zombies II: Inhuman (collection)
Viruses and Vamps (collection)
Still Dead (collection)
Season of Rot (novella collection)
Anti-Heroes (with David Dunwoody)
Unabridged, Unabashed, and Undead: The Best zombie stories of Eric S Brown (collection)
War of the Worlds Plus Blood Guts and Zombies
Bigfoot War
Bigfoot War II: Dead in the Woods
Bigfoot War: Outbreak
Bigfoot War III: Food Chain
Bigfoot War: Frontier
Bigfoot War IV: Legion
Bigfoot War V: Planet Sasquatch
Planet Sasquatch: Retaliation
Bigfoot War: Heavy Carnage (with Jeff Jake)
Bigfoot War: Tales of the Sasquatch Apocalypse (collection)
Bigfoot War: The Movie Edition
Bigfoot War: The End
Barren Earth (with Stephen North)
Season of Death (collection)
Kinberra Down
How the West Went to Hell: The Collected Horror Westerns of Eric S Brown
The Beasts and the Dead (collection)
The Human Experiment
Martin Kier and the Dead
Into the Light
Boggy Creek: The Legend is True (novelization/with Jennifer Minar Jaynes)
The Bloody Rage of Bigfoot (novelization)
Crypto-Squad (with Jason Brannon)
Crypto-Squad II (with Jason Brannon)
Crypto-Squad III: Dead Wolves (with Jason Brannon)
Crypto-Squad IV (with Jason Brannon)
Homeworld (with Tony Faville)
Jack Bunny Bam Bam and the Weeper Apocalypse
Jack Bunny Bam Bam: World Hopper
Night of the Squirrels (collection)
Snarlers (collection)
After Z day
Last Stand in a Dead Land
Cowboys and Zombies
The Queen
The Queen II: Ragnarok Island
Undead Down Under
A Pack of Wolves
A Pack of Wolves II: Skyfall
A Pack of Wolves III: Demon Dead
The A Pack of Wolves collected series hardcover
The Dwellers of Oar Knob (collection)
Bloop (with James Baack)
Bloop II (with James Baack)
Straws (with James Baack)
The Terror of the Abominable Snowman (with James Baack)
The Witch of Devil’s Woods (with James Baack)
The Wea
poner
The Eric S Brown Zombie Omnibus
Kaiju Apocalypse (with Jason Cordova)
Murder World: Kaiju Dawn (with Jason Cordova)
The Hand of God (with Jason Cordova/pending publication)
World War of the Dead (also from Great Old Ones Publishing)
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
includes The Monsters At Midnight
A new Eric s. Brown story
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
When a tribe of native people in the Northwest Territories of Canada are snowed in from the world, they are forced to resort to inhuman ways of survival. When a presence is drawn to their suffering, an evil blankets over their continued existence until a misfortunate occurrence results in the spread of the terror to more populated lands. With its ensemble cast, the novel takes paths that lead to a serial killer, demonic monsters, and a police department that slowly discovers that there may be something deeper into the crimes that have transpired in their small farming town in Manitoba.
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
includes BASE 001
A new Eric s. Brown story
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
Also from Great Old Ones Publishing
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER
Great Old Ones Publishing is a press dedicated to genre and dark fiction. We specialize within the horror, science fiction, fantasy, thriller, techno-thriller, mystery, pulp and grindhouse narrative. Our intent is to produce top quality anthologies, collections, novellas, and novels and present our artists, both author and graphic, in the best of light. Our contributors are experienced authors, rising stars, and those that are first time published. You can find us on the web at http://www.greatoldonespublishing.com.
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