Arts & Culture

Deliver Us From Evil-Chapter 8

“Can’t this thing go any faster?” yelled Greg over the whirring and clunking emanating from the old tractor. 

Jenny screwed up her face as she tried to push the ancient piece of farm equipment to the next speed. 

“I wouldn’t be surprised to find out it’s actually Pharaoh’s chariot pulled out of the red sea,” she replied, gritting her teeth. 

“That’s far from consoling,” Greg called from his perch. He was hanging onto the left side of the tractor, as there was barely enough room for one person, let alone two, on the rust bucket. “Because the sea is closing in on us.” 

In the dust behind the seemingly snail-paced tires, the black creature slithered, coming closer and closer. 

“Oh, come on!” They both pounded on the tractor’s hood and prayed that it would move a little faster once they reached the paved road. 

“Actually,” Jenny yelled. “This is good.” 

“I don’t see anything good about this!” Greg responded, still looking back. 

“No, listen. I met this man, well, not really. Anyway, we have to get the thing back with the kids too.” 

His face went visibly pale. “How?” 

The tractor roared as it squelched across the muddy end of dirt road and onto the warm, firm pavement. Jenny looked back at him. “That’s why I brought you along! I don’t know the first thing about this stuff—” 

“Jen, I don’t know if I can—” 

“Well, I do know!” She steered down the main road aggressively. “I know because…because you’re the only chance they’ve got.” Glimpsing the black slime behind her she pushed the pedal down harder. “Once we’re inside the hospital room, I can try and fend off the creature, but only for a little while.” 

Greg nodded and set his teeth as a car passed by. 

“Hey kid,” a man leaned out the window. “That’s not safe, and probably not legal—Hey!” He tried to turn and cut them off, but his boat of a vehicle couldn’t handle the narrow street, and he found himself stuck across an intersection. 

Pulling into the parking lot in a wild flurry of black goo and agricultural grade tires, the two children raced as if their lives depended on it to the sliding glass doors of the entrance, and not without a hot pursuit from not only the thing but a couple of police officers who had been eating greasy burritos over the hoods of their patrol cars. 

Without attempting to check in, they raced into the elevator and smashed the close door button until it slid shut. 

“What floor?” Jen wondered out loud, breathlessly. 

“Three.” Greg punched the button. “It’s the kid’s ward. They’ll be there.” 

“Where’s the creature?” 

“Not sure,” he panted. 

As the elevator opened, the gentle lilt of the background music piano changed to an alarmingly loud siren, and the two instantly took off down the hall. 

“How do you know about the kids’ ward?” Jenny asked breathlessly. 

“When I broke my leg, remember?” he replied, suddenly grabbing her arm and pulling her into a slightly darker room. The door shut tight.  

“No, I don’t remember,” she gulped as they crouched down and waited for the running feet to pass by. 

Greg stared at her. “Oh, I guess that happened last year…yeah—” He was interrupted by someone in the gloom clearing their throat. 

“You’d better get moving on whatever it is you have to do,” said Grandad. 

“Yes,” joined Gran as she stepped forward to open the door, an umbrella clenched in her wrinkled fist like a sword. They both acted as if this were a completely normal occurrence. “We’ll distract, you two get them back.” 

Jenny almost laughed aloud. “Did you all plan this?” 

“Maybe,” her grandfather shrugged mysteriously. And stepping out into the cream-colored hall he cupped his hands over his mouth. “Hey! I saw them go this way!” 

“See you in a bit,” Gran smiled enthusiastically, and she too stepped out of the room and intercepted a police officer with her charming comments about the struggles of raising chickens in an increasingly non-agrarian society. 

Greg removed two tiny vials from his jeans’ pocket. “I need something round, with a lip around the edge.” He began rummaging in cabinets and drawers. 

Jen looked down at the two hospital beds. Gwenllian and Felix were sleeping, while IVs and oxygen raced into them, attempting to keep them from looking less transparent than they already were. Even now, she could see the white of the pillows through their hair and cheeks. 

“It’s so sad,” Greg’s voice said solemnly from somewhere behind her. 

“Yeah,” Jenny sighed, reaching out and touching Gwenllian’s delicate hand. Her fingers passed through it a little before she felt contact with the delicate palm. 

“Oh, well it is sad,” said Greg, sounding a little embarrassed. “But I was talking about something else.” 

His friend turned and watched as he picked up a plate off the counter that held a thick, melty slice of cheese pizza. “Do you want it? Cause if not I’m going to have to throw it out—” 

“You’re ridiculous!” Jen bore a hole into him with her eyes. “Why do you need the plate anyway?” 

“Um, well, see, I have to make this marble I have,” he withdrew one from his pocket and set it on the dishware, “move fast enough to…Jen, behind you…” 

Slowly, she turned. A black tentacle reached around the doorway, feeling out the latch, the floor, and pulling itself forward into the room. 

“Greg, be fast,” she breathed. Glancing around, she saw a blue plastic broom and took her chance. She brought it smack down over the creature’s head as it entered. 

It fell back, stunned for a moment, and then its arms seemed to sprout into double and then triple the number of tentacles, all waving and dripping with a new anger. Wrapping around the broom it snapped it in two and flattened itself to Jenny’s sneaker. 

She screamed, stomped, and tried to shake it off but it just began to scale her leg, squeezing with all its might and sending white shocks of pain through her. Blindly, she glimpsed what Greg was doing. The marble was invisible to her eyes from speed, and his face bent anxiously over the pizza plate. 

Falling backwards, she attacked it with her hands when a blue plastic dustpan whirled through the air and peeled the creature away for a split second. 

“Jen, listen to me,” Greg was saying but her head was spinning too much to see him. “Grab the plate with one hand, and Gwenllian with the other.” 

“Hey! There they are!” said a blue police uniform as it passed by the door. 

“Do it!” he yelled, and Jenny leapt forward dizzily, grasping for the girl and the dish. As her eyes refocused a crashing, crunching roar filled her ears and got louder and louder until it almost consumed her. 

Greg was on the other side of the plate, holding Felix’s arm. Everything started to look hazy. Everything got dimmer and dimmer and the roar subsided, as if everything were slowing to a stop. 

Suddenly, a scream echoed through the room, and she could just make out the creature clinging to her friend’s shoulders, tentacles suctioned to his head. 

And then it went dark.

 

 

Photo Credits: Pintrest

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