by K X Douglas
Changing into a humanoid shape but not taking the form of a specific human, he ran into the lobby. Eyes formed all across his body, giving him an almost complete three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view of his surroundings.
He didn’t recognize anyone in the lobby. Everyone was panicking, having heard the sound of a gunshot; it wasn’t clear if they had noticed the presence of a protoplasmic ooze creature standing in the lobby or not.
Peter checked his messages. There were several asking where he was, in addition to one from Tadhg saying that Kevin had run to the stairwell.
He ran over to the elevators and saw that both of them were on the first floor. Looking over to the door that lead to the stairwell, he saw that it was slowly closing, as if someone had just gone through it. Running to it as fast as he could, he began ascending the stairs, looking down each hallway as he came to it.
All the while as he climbed, he could see nobody that he recognized, nor could he see any signs of people fleeing to their hotel rooms.
If he went this way, he must be either heading back to one of the suites up top, or to the roof. But why? Both are dead ends.
It took Peter a few minutes to climb all fourteen floors. At each floor he looked for signs of recent traffic, such as open doors or shoeprints. He found none.
Once he reached the roof, he saw that the door outside was open. Upon walking through it he saw Kevin Wilkinson standing on the edge of the building, as if he were going to jump off.
He’s got to be planning something. There’s no way he’d kill himself just to escape being shot.
Peter extruded the gun through his face and aimed it at Kevin while looking at his phone through one of the eyes on his torso. He opened a mouth and began speaking
“Kevin, you’re cornered. I’m here to kill you. Do you have any last words?”
Kevin spoke, but he said nothing that Peter could understand; he was chanting. A pool of light formed in the space right behind him, on the roof of the hotel.
“I don’t know what you are, or why you’re after me,” he said, “but you won’t be killing me today.”
A winged hand, like the foreclaw of a bat but much larger, reached out from the pool. It pulled out the body to which it was attached, that of a scaly thing the size of an elephant. The creature was draconian, with a crest of spines running down the centre of its back and a prehensile tail. It bowed to Kevin like an obedient hound, and he climbed upon it.
Without a command from him, the beast took flight and soared away.
Peter ran towards the ledge and jumped. Extending two tendrils out from his back, he flattened them until they were wide, thin and membranous. He flapped his new wings, stumbling through the air much like a baby taking its first steps.
It took him a few minutes to catch up to Kevin’s alien steed. He kept the gun held inside his face, so that he would be able to aim easily while flying.
If anyone on the ground noticed them, they paid no heed; traffic did not grind to a halt, and crowds did not form in the streets.
Peter fired at Kevin, but missed. He tried to fly closer, but the creature managed to outpace him.
Kevin turned to look at him. He reached out as if to grab him, but instead held out a flat palm and began chanting again.
Alarmed, Peter folded his wings and tried to nosedive out of the way. He entered a free fall, scrambling to unfurl his wings again and maintain flight. Just before he reached the height where he would collide with pedestrians on the sidewalk, he managed to begin flapping his wings again and ascend. Upon reaching the same height as Kevin and his beast, Peter chanted the spell that he had learned from Von Unaussprechlichen Kulten.
Unfortunately, the spell struck the beast rather than Kevin. Otherworldly flames swiftly consumed its scaly hide, but they did not seem to burn its rider.
As the beast reeled and Kevin struggled to hold on, Peter gained ground. He extended a tendril towards it and, forming a bony claw on the end, slashed at its hide in an attempt to grab on. It sliced through the creature’s scales and a liquid that might have been blood sprayed out, but he did not manage to embed the claw into its body. As the creature flapped its wings, Peter aimed his gun at one of them. Forming an eyestalk on top of his face, he laid it along the gun’s barrel, through the iron sight. He fired, hoping to pierce a hole in the wing and send the creature hurtling towards the earth.
A hole formed in the beast’s wing, but it seemed relatively undeterred and kept flying.
At this rate he’s just going to get away. I can’t let that happen.
Peter tried to move his wings faster, but as he wasn’t used to flying yet it wasn’t much use. They were moving north; by now they had flown over the hospital and were approaching the river.
If I can take that thing down right now, he could fall into the river and drown. I can’t pass up this chance.
He cast the spell again, and the beast caught fire. This time it let out a roar and squirmed as if in discomfort. Immediately, he shot at it, accidentally pressing the trigger twice. Through the fire he couldn’t tell if either of the bullets hit his target or not.
However, he could see the creature start its descent; it was clearly too injured to continue flying. It swerved from side to side as it flailed about with its wings.
Peter tried his best to hover in place as he watched Kevin and his mount fall to the earth, but he found himself unable to. Instead he retracted his wings and stretched the skin of his back out into a mock parachute. It worked well enough; he was able to watch as Kevin and the beast he summoned both fell into the river.
If he had a mouth at that moment, he would have smiled.
Once he landed on the riverbank, he looked out to the river; it would be hard to miss a winged lizard the size of an elephant swimming in a river that was at most one hundred and fifty metres wide and a couple hundred metres deep.
He did not see the creature, but he did see someone who he was almost certain was Kevin treading water near the opposite bank. With a running start he dove into the water and swam as fast as he could towards the man. As he swam, he didn’t spare a moment to look forward, only concentrating on getting to the other side of the river as fast as possible.
When he reached the other side and climbed out of the water, he saw that the RCMP were waiting there, guns drawn. There had to be nearly a dozen of them, and they were all aiming at Peter. Their faces were pale and sweaty; blood trickled from their mouths as they stared at him.
“What the fuck is this thing?” one of them asked.
“Is that a gun coming out of its face?”
“Just kill it! Kill it before it can hurt anyone else!”
They all opened fire.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Peter didn’t have time to react.
To him, the bullets felt like tiny pinpricks, not even enough to draw blood. By the time they had emptied their magazines into him, he felt legitimately sore. It was an alien sensation to him.
Once they had no more bullets to shoot, they stood there and stared at him. They were all visibly shaking; their eyes looked as though they would pop out of their heads at any moment.
Peter withdrew the gun into his body before walking back towards the river.
I’ve failed. He got away.
He didn’t bother to swim, rather, he walked along the bottom of the riverbed. The current buffeted him as it ran past, but he dug his feet into the soil with each step.
What the hell am I going to tell everyone when I get back?
When he rose from the water on the other side, he was covered in grime. Not bothering to assume human form, he walked through the streets in plain view as he approached the hotel.
People gawked and screamed as he walked past them. Traffic stopped in its tracks, and people pulled out their cell phones to film him.
He didn’t care.
Upon reaching the hotel, he climbed the stairs to the second floor. It was at this point that he assumed human form, right before entering his
room.
Heidi was waiting on the other side.
“Hey,” he said.
“Peter, oh my god! Where have you been? Why haven’t you been answering your phone?”
She ran up to hug him, but recoiled when she got close enough to smell him.
“What the fuck happened to you? Why are you naked?”
“He got away.”
“What? You mean Kevin? He got away? Is that what you were doing this whole time, is chasing after him?”
“Yeah.”
“Go shower. I’ll get everyone together in the lobby; meet us there and explain just what the hell happened.”
“Okay.”
Peter showered quickly, using the little hotel bottle of shampoo to cover up the scent of the river.
I should go to the roof and get my clothes. They’re probably still there.
He stepped out and dried off. After pulling his phone out of his stomach to check his text messages, he got dressed.
He had never seen so many texts or missed calls before.
I guess it’s time to come clean. Tell them everything.
Putting his phone into his pant pocket like a normal human, he ran up to the roof and saw that his clothes were still exactly where he had left them; it seemed that nobody else had been up to the roof in the meantime. Tucking the clothes under his arm, he returned to his hotel room and stuffed him into his duffel bag haphazardly.
When he reached the lobby, he saw that everyone was waiting for him.
“Peter, you’re okay!” Lachlan said. “We weren’t sure what had happened to you! You just sort of disappeared before everything happened!”
Peter sat in one of the lounge chairs next to the coffee table.
“Yeah, well, a lot happened. My plan failed.”
“Do you know anything about that lookalike of Professor Carter who came in and tried to shoot Kevin?” Serena asked. “It was surreal. It was like he came back from the dead.”
Tadhg burned a hole in Peter with his eyes.
“That was me. I can explain, but it’s going to be a lot. We should go up to one of our rooms for this. I don’t really want anyone eavesdropping.”
“Alright,” Heidi said.
They all climbed the stairs back to the second floor and gathered around one of the beds in Peter and Heidi’s room.
“Okay, so…I failed to kill Kevin Wilkinson. What’s more, I almost got caught by the RCMP in doing so.” He paused to take a deep breath. “Okay, Peter, here we go. Moment of truth.”
He transformed into his shoggoth form in front of everyone.
There was no response from anyone; those who were not aware beforehand seemed to go into a state of shock.
Forming a replica of “Peter’s” face atop the mass he continued.
“I’m not human. I’m a creature called a shoggoth. I was created by pre-human creatures called elder things long ago.” He transformed into a replica of Solomon Carter. “I can shapeshift; this is how I turned into a replica of Solomon Carter as part of my attempt to kill Kevin Wilkinson.”
“What in the bloody fuck?” Tadhg asked.
“What…what happened to the real Peter?” Heidi asked. “What did you do to him? What did you do to my boyfriend?”
“There is no ‘real Peter’. Peter Nelson is an identity I created to live amongst humans.”
Heidi looked as if she were about to implode. Tears welled up in her eyes.
Peter slithered into his clothes and returned to his human form.
“I wasn’t sure when I was going to come clean until today happened. After fucking up like this, I had no choice. My plan failed. Kevin got away. There were so many people who saw me, and I’ve been shot at by cops. I…I don’t know where to go from here.”
Lachlan sat on the bed next to Peter and hugged him.
“It’s okay. This was an enormous undertaking to begin with, man. We still have a couple of weeks. We just have to come up with a plan.”
“You may not be human, but you’re no better than human,” Silas said. “It’s only natural that you make mistakes.”
“Yeah,” Victoria said. “We have some time to make preparations for Samhain.”
“I don’t know what to do, though,” Peter said. “I have no idea where to start.”
“How did you find out about this hotel again?” Isabelle asked.
“I hired a private investigator,” Peter said. “She sent me all the details.”
“Did she give you any other information? Like where he lives?”
“Yeah, she gave me his address. Although I’m not sure that’ll be very useful now that he knows someone wants to kill him. He’s probably gone into hiding now, or been taken into protective custody. The RCMP is probably preparing for an alien invasion or something now that they’ve seen me. Combined with the shooting at Mabon, there’s probably going to be a lot of security at Samhain.”
“Why don’t we give it a shot anyways?” Tadhg asked. “Drop by his house and fucking torch it or something?”
“What the hell is that going to accomplish?” Serena asked. “That’ll just drive him further into hiding!”
“That’s the point,” Tadhg said. “Maybe he’ll be too scared to show up at the Samhain celebration.”
“Tadhg, that’ll just delay the inevitable,” Peter said. “The elder thing said that Kevin has to die if we want to prevent a worldwide disaster. We’re probably going to have to attend the Samhain celebration in order to stop him. Unfortunately, I don’t really have any ideas as to how we’re even going to get close to him.”
“You can leave that to me, Peter,” Tadhg said. “I have a plan.”
Is that the first time he’s ever called me “Peter”?
“Okay…let’s hear it,” he said.
***
Later that night, after everyone else had returned to their rooms, Peter sat on the end of the bed. Heidi looked at him from across the room.
“So…Peter?” she asked. “Is…are you okay?”
“I don’t know.”
She sat down on the end of the other bed.
“You’re probably repulsed, right?” he asked. “Especially you, because you actually slept with me.”
“Peter, I…all I want to know is how do you feel about me? I just want you to be honest.”
Peter thought back to when he helped Tadhg escape prison. The man had asked him if a “thing like him” could even feel love.
“I like you, Heidi,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed all the time we’ve spent together thus far…even if you tried to brand me that one time. I…I like all of you…so I don’t know if that’s love. I’m not sure if I know what love feels like. That’s the best answer I can give right now.”
Heidi sat next to him and threw one arm around his neck. For a moment they just sat there, looking into each other’s eyes.
“That’s good enough for me,” she said.
She hugged him, and he cried into her shoulder.
***
The next day, they checked out of their rooms, and everyone except Tadhg and Silas returned to campus.
Peter spent hours browsing the internet, looking at any news article he could find regarding the previous day’s events. As he had feared, there were several viral videos of him flying through the sky above the city or walking back from the river to the hotel. Luckily, he was unidentifiable throughout.
Some time after the sun had set, he heard a knock on his door. Peter answered it and saw Eric on the other side.
“Hey, man. What’s up?”
“Not much, just looking into all the videos people took of me yesterday, making sure nobody had any way to dox me.”
“Shit, that’s rough. You have any luck?”
“I think so.”
“Anyways, I thought I’d come and try to cheer you up. I know you’ve been feeling like shit.”
Peter couldn’t help but smile.
“Thanks. I appreciate it.”
“Let’s go for a walk,�
� Eric said.
Eric led him around the main campus building to the front.
“Wanna grab a drink?”
“Dude, you should know that I can’t actually get drunk; alcohol doesn’t affect me.”
“What, so you’ve just been pretending to get drunk in order to fit in? You’ve been drinking fuckin’ beer, of all things, this whole time without getting drunk off of it?”
“Yup.”
“Jesus, man.”
“I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’ll still hang out with you.”
They entered the campus bar, and Peter saw that everyone who was at the hotel sans Tadhg was sitting at a table at the back; even Silas was there. They all waved as Peter and Eric approached.
“We all decided to get together and unwind after what happened yesterday,” Eric said. “It was my idea to make it a surprise.”
Peter pulled up a chair next to Heidi and kissed her on the lips. There were already several pitchers of beer on the table; none of them were more than half full.
“God, you guys, I don’t know how you found time to have sex when you were at the hotel!” Victoria said.
Peter and Heidi both turned crimson.
“How did you know?” Peter asked.
“Thin walls,” Isabelle said. “I could hear pretty much everything.”
Heidi buried her face in her hands.
“Oh my god.”
Peter sighed and poured himself a beer. He looked over at Eric, who rolled his eyes before shooting him a knowing smile.
He felt Heidi’s lips against his ear.
“You know, Victoria told me all about your time at Mabon. She decided to hold off since we hadn’t slept together yet. Now that we have, what say we do a little swinging?”
Peter turned to face her.
“What do you mean?” he whispered back.
“Right, you aren’t human. I’m saying we should each try taking someone else home tonight.”
He felt her hand brush up against his thigh.
“Um…there’s a bit of a problem, Heidi. See, I can’t get drunk. Everyone else has already been drinking, and I kind of want to avoid any appearance of impropriety.”
“What? Then why are you drinking?”
