James Moore - SNAFU - Hunters

Without looking at the tattoo, it lurched to the side, but too late before Colin was on it. Spectral flames erupted as the ghoul seemed to come apart into four pieces. Colin grinned as he pulled the sword out from a hunk of burning torso where the blade had finally stopped.

“Looks like you were right, Nick.” I turned to see the Armenian standing, pick raised at his side. A figure stood in the passage before him – fat, vaguely feminine, and naked, reminiscent of a Paleolithic Venus. It had no face at all, only a smooth blankness.

Nick stepped closer, nearing the range for Ozkareen’s shock missile.

A vertical slit opened along the creatures face like a lipless mouth. The crack lengthened, stretching down its body, between its sagging breasts, and splitting its hanging gut. Then the demon unfolded like a flower and Nick screamed.

Thousands of eyeballs filled the inside like the seeds of a pomegranate. They rolled and moved in swirling patterns, set to some unheard music. A honey-like aroma flooded the chamber, but beneath that, lurked the eye-watering ammonia stink. Nick’s screams ceased. His raised arm lowered and fell limp to his side. Ozkareen slipped from his grip and clanked to the floor.

The demon moved closer. Slender tendrils, rooted at the mass’ center, wriggled toward him.

“No!” I charged toward it, and raised my warding eye before me, thrusting it over Nick’s shoulder.

The rolling eyes all zeroed in on my palm and then seemed to boil along the flower’s surface. The demon flew off like a swimming jellyfish, slinging dust as it surged away into the darkness, tendrils trailing behind it.

Nick’s head lolled. I caught him as he stumbled forward and vomited. Colin stepped in and helped me move him to a sitting position, my eyes never leaving the dark passage through which the demon had fled.

Nick feebly reached for Ozkareen lying in the dust.

“Here,” I said handing it to him. “Are you all right?”

Still panting, Nick nodded. “What… was that?”

“I don’t know. I–”

“You’re the fucking Librarian,” Colin snapped.

Setting my jaw, I pulled off my pack and opened my tablet. He was right, this was my job. They’d killed the demons, while I’d only killed a mindless servant. I scrolled through the record. While the tell-tale smell and resemblance to the Venus were certainly noteworthy, the sheet of eyes reminded me of something I’d read before, something I thought I’d never encounter.

Nick crawled to his feet and stood behind me. Whether real or imagined, I could feel his mounting impatience. It was getting away.

“Here,” I said, clicking a file. A crude image of a Japanese screen peppered with eyes filled the top of the page.

“What is it?” Colin asked without taking his gaze from the passage. His free hand touched his chest, surely feeling the rosary beneath his shirt.

I licked my lips, reviewing the scant description. “A mokumokuren.”

“Mokuwhat?”

“Mokumokuren,” I repeated. “Extremely rare. Thought to be extinct. Last one reported in Turkey 1892. No mention of stealing eyes, but said to… entrance its prey with hypnotic patterns of eyes . Lives in dark places, moves in aquatic fashion, and it can strangle you with its hundred tentacles.”

“Lovely.”

“What hurts it?” Nick asked, peering closer.

“Pure quartz.”

He grunted. “I don’t have that.”

“I have one shell.” I clicked off my screen. “Mixed load, but quartz is in it.”

“Just one?” Colin asked.

“Better than nothing,” Nick said. “Load it and let’s get after that thing.”

Quickly, I stored my tablet away and withdrew a lumpy, rolled bundle. I unfurled it, revealing a rainbow assortment of hand-loaded shotgun shells. Moving my fingers along the rows I removed a white plastic shell with a red and black band. I clicked open my Remington and switched it out with one of the obsidian loads before putting the bundle away. “Ready.”

Nick held out his hand and I gave over the sawed-off. The yellow light flooding the room had begun to wane as the slain ghouls returned to their once human forms. The honey aroma had faded, but the cat-piss stink seemed to have gotten worse. Nick took point, with me behind him, Hounacier in hand.

We moved slow, checking each chamber and crevice before going on. The passage wound its way deeper, angling sharply before leveling out. Fueled with paranoia, my heart pounded and sweat beaded my gritty face despite the cold, unmoving air.

Nick moved toward a pit-like vault, but I touched his arm.

He turned toward me and I pointed down at a low crevice in the wall by his feet. The limestone dust before it was rippled like miniature wind-swept dunes.

Instantly, he moved past to the other side, his holy weapon raised. I drew my mirror and angled it at the hole. A tunnel, no more than eighteen inches high and two feet wide, extended into darkness.

I nodded to Colin beside me and he lowered his torch, shining the crimson beam along the tight passage. It extended a little over a meter before opening into another chamber. Relaying this to my partners, I crawled onto the smooth floor.

Nick cracked one of his last glow sticks, filling our tunnel with brilliant orange light then he hurled it down the shaft before me.

The stick ricocheted off the tight walls, finally bouncing to a stop just a few feet inside the room. The chamber appeared small, but I couldn’t see much from my limited view. I extended the mirror’s handle to its full length and stretched my arm as far as I could to get a better look.

It wasn’t long enough to reach and I had to crawl a little inside, my arm out before me. Rotating the mirror, I saw no exits. I pushed it out a little further for a better view. Black whip-like strands shot down from the ceiling, wrapping around my mirror and ripping it from my grip.

I cried out in surprise, banging my head as I tried to scramble back. More tendrils fluttered along the top edges of my tunnel, reaching blindly. A palpable waft of sweet nectar filled the passage. Colin seized my belt and dragged me back out.

They didn’t have to ask what I’d seen.

“Exits?” Nick mouthed.

I shook my head, panting, then pointed upward. “On the ceiling.”

“What do we do?” Colin whispered, his mouth so close I could feel his breath on my ear.

“If we try to crawl in we’re dead before we can make it,” I replied, looking back down the now empty hole.

Nick crouched beside me, silent as he studied the shaft. He shook his head steadily, seeming to run through our few options.

I licked my dusty lips. “I have an idea.”

Nick gave me a look and I pulled off my pack and lay on my back. I drew Hounacier. “Give me my gun. Push me through. Fast.”

Colin shook his head.

“It’s the only way.” I mimed firing the Remington, then hacking the machete.

No! Colin mouthed. He looked to Nick for support, but the Armenian nodded instead.

“It’ll work. But I’ll go. I’m senior knight.”

“You don’t have this,” I said, opening my palm. “Bang,” I whispered, miming pulling the trigger, then dropping the gun and rolling my empty palm before me. “I’m the only one that can do it.”

Nick’s lips tightened. He handed me the sawed-off. I’ll push you through , he mouthed. Then you , pointing to Colin, push me. One, two .

I nodded.

Colin looked at Nick, then to me. Finally he nodded. “You need earplugs.”

“Ah.” I reached for my pack and drew out the yellow foam plugs Nick had given us. With those firmly in place, I returned to position, gun and Hounacier against my body and before my face.

“Close your right eye,” Nick ordered.