Larry Correia - Monster Hunter Vendetta

The Tree shifted as it hit the portal, slamming its roots into the ground, breaking the magic cord and severing the connection to Alabama. The pillar of light disappeared and we were plunged back into absolute darkness. The Tree was still.

It was silent except for our frantic panting in the dusty air, and then an insectile chattering noise as the Tree settled into its new position. I couldn't see my hand in front of my face. It took us a moment to catch our breath. "Come on," Julie hissed. She grabbed the front of my armor. "We've got to go back for Nate."

I could barely make out her figure in the dark. Then three dozen bright white eyeballs opened in a wall behind her. "Shoggoth!" I raised my gun and triggered my flashlight. One tentacle impacted my chest, pinning my weapon and crushing me down. It encircled my arms and cinched tight. It was immensely strong. Another tentacle zipped around Julie's waist and hoisted her into the air. She swore at it. More eyeballs blinked in my face as I struggled helplessly.

"CAPTURED SACRIFICE," it wheezed in an impossible bass from half a dozen mouths. It was so loud that wherever Hood was, he had certainly heard it. The amorphous blob seeped across the ground, Julie held in the air, me dragging along on the dirt, disoriented, but seemingly going back in the direction we had come from. No matter how hard I fought, I was stuck. I tried to yell for help, but a wet appendage slapped shut over my mouth. It smelled like hot tar.

It dragged me for about a minute, only slowing when the light visibly turned red. The shoggoth had brought us back to the portal to the Old Ones. It spilled us to the ground, leaving us both coughing and gagging in a puddle of ooze, our arms still leashed to our sides. The necromancer was standing there, waiting, a giant undead automaton flanking him on both sides. The hole to the Old Ones' universe stretched before us, cloudy and red.

"You're dead, Hood," I gasped. "The Feds know where we are. They've probably got nukes inbound already. They'll never let your stupid Tree live."

He nodded. "Obviously. But this is just the first of many. On my own, I was barely strong enough to unleash one. In return for your sacrifice, my Lord will awake the others. This is the first and greatest, but there are hundreds more seedlings buried across the world." Hood smiled. "And even then, an attempt to cleanse the mighty Arbmunep with nuclear fire will just end up bathing this entire part of the world in a cloud of perpetual night. The Yith made the same mistake sixty-five million years ago."

"You'll never get away with this," Julie said. The wall of eyeballs turned on her, blinking suspiciously. "My men will make sure of that."

"Well, little Julie Shackleford is all grown up." Hood laughed hard. "Your men? That's a good one. Your Hunters are running for their lives, my minions at their heels. And even if they do manage to interfere, it won't do you two any good." He clapped his hands. "Great shoggoth, send these mortals to meet your almighty maker!"

But the blob didn't toss us into the portal. It hoisted Julie with one dripping arm and turned her upside down, studying her with lots of curious eyeballs.

"What are you waiting for?" Hood demanded. "I command you to put them in the portal!"

Julie's hair was dangling in the tar. It was like she was having a staring contest with the blob. "Mr. Trash Bags? Is that you?" she asked quietly.

The eyes all blinked at once. "CUDDLE BUNNY?"

Julie grinned. "It is you!"

I could feel the surge of emotion through the dripping tentacle as Mr. Trash Bags remembered. This time the dark lightning struck like a bomb.

"Hi," said the grubling. "I'm Julie."

"FILTHY MAMMAL," the Exile replied. The mammal grubling was to be devoured. The Exile was shamed. The Exile had failed-TERRIBLE SHRIEKING DOOM-the Exile had come here to devour the mammals that had battled the other servants of Horde. The Exile would please the master and no longer be Exile. Again it would be Number 786 of Horde.

"CONSUME!"

"You're funny," said the grubling. Air passed over the grubling's vocal cords and made a melody, not unlike the shrike-hounds of the howling gates and it made the Exile feel stop. New sound, word list on mammals called it giggle made the Exile feel not to devour the grubling. The grubling held up with its opposable thumbs an image of a tiny earth beast, made of cloth, stuffed with fibers. "This is Cuddle Bunny. Want to play?"

"CONSUME?"

"No. Play, silly." The grubling used its pathetic leg limbs to hop away. "Come on. You're my friend. You're like a big trash bag."

The Exile was confounded. The other mammals were made of hate and burning. The master-TERRIBLE SHRIEKING DOOM- was made of pain and orders. This grubling was of not kill. Suddenly the grubling changed to the Exile's current eyes and the Exile saw that this mammal was made of stars.

Confused. The Exile followed. The Exile became Friend.

At the time I had thought that the gnome's memory had been slightly alien. Mr. Trash Bags had just shown me what a real alien was. My head ached with haunting sounds, thought bubbles that popped like dynamite, and the lingering image of a tiny, perfect, glowing angel, with pigtails and a stuffed rabbit.

"Destroy them!" Hood shouted at the hesitating shoggoth.

"NOOO!" The simple beast remembered what was probably the only thing that had ever loved it. Two tentacles cracked like whips, splitting the automatons flanking Hood in half. The limbs tore through the shadow man, pulverizing the ground at his feet, but he merely re-formed in place.

Snarling, he extended one hand. "Traitorous amorph!" A bolt of fire leapt from his amulet, down his arm, and from his hand, bursting into the shoggoth, engulfing it in flames. "How dare you!"

"PROTECT CUDDLE BUNNY," the shoggoth thundered as it carelessly tossed Julie behind it. The burning blob surged over me, across the portal, and at the shadow man. I was released, and spun wildly through the tar. The flaming beast collided with Hood, burning bits flying in every direction. Already it seemed to shrink as it turned to ash. I slid through the goo, trying to get to my feet. The blob hardened and shattered into burning shards. There was a terrible piercing squeal as Mr. Trash Bags exploded.

Hood dusted the ash from his robe. "Never trust a blob to do a man's work." He took three steps and leapt across the portal, landing effortlessly beside me. I fired my shotgun into his head and he merely swatted it aside before grabbing me around the throat and lifting me off the ground. Half man, half darkness, the hole in his face quickly closed. "We already said our good-byes."

There was a mighty yell. "Pitt!" I glanced up in time to see Agent Franks sprinting toward us, leaping between the massive roots. He would never make it in time.

"Too late," Hood said as he heaved me into the center of the portal.

I broke the surface.

Time was different.

It was difficult to comprehend. Our existence doesn't really encompass this kind of experience. Time passed, but in different directions simultaneously. My brain hurt just trying to function.

My eyes still worked. The light was primarily red, but didn't seem to come from any particular source. It was utterly strange, alien. The air entering my lungs wasn't made of what I thought of as air, but it didn't matter, as enough time hadn't passed yet to breathe. I was floating in place, in a haze, almost like being on a cloud in some alternate hellish version of heaven.

Which according to the Condition, I probably was.

A creature made entirely of eyeballs floated past. It was tiny, but then I realized that with no scale, it might have been miles away and the size of a subway train. It was eating hornets made of razor blades and steam, but it didn't matter, because time wasn't passing. It just was.