Shadows of the Desert, page 17
Whatever the case, he realized that he would not have the luxury of letting Jason kill himself. His only options were to either snatch Jason and carry him back out to the desert or kill him as soon as he was within reach. Either option would expose him to at least the people on the lake and probably the Ranger as well. As he approached the road he decided on a plan. He would not risk having to deal with Jason’s surprising resourcefulness any longer. There was also the nagging and aloof aid which Jason was receiving that he would not hazard dealing with. He would get to Jason and wait for the right moment. When the time was right, he would kill everyone there; he would not be robbed entirely of his prey and the other people he would murder would just be added nutrients.
Jason had started walking directly toward the rising sun as soon as it crested the horizon. He felt very weak and sick to his stomach as he walked but he was emboldened with the belief and hope that following the sun would get him to the river very soon. As Jason continued, he came into an area that was becoming richer with greenery. The desert out there is not totally barren or without its green plant life, but this was highly suggestive to him that he was rapidly approaching water. He had little time to consider the notion before he caught site of the road. He started to half laugh and half cry as he dragged and pushed off his increasingly painful right leg. He stumbled as he came to the road and dropped to the ground for a moment and curled his fists full of dirt from it. He looked around and quickly realized he did not recognize this stretch of road at all. This led Jason to believe that he was somewhere north of the campsite he had set up. He had never been farther north on that road than Taylor Lake and he believed he was somewhere near there now. Jason stood up and began walking toward what he thought was south, along the road. He determined he would stay on the road, believing he was no more than a few miles from camp. He knew that the reality of it was that he could have been twelve miles away, for all he recognized. He did not let that bother him though; he knew he would either find help or the water very soon. He panted loudly as he pushed himself along the road as quickly as he was able. The only thing now he had to worry about was Shadow.
He was on the road for less than ten minutes when he saw the sign for Taylor Lake. It indicated the lake was to his left, which meant he was headed in the right direction. He turned off the main road and started to climb the uphill access road to Taylor Lake. He hoped there was someone there who could help him and if not, he would just drink the water from the lake and soak himself. He did not know if Shadow would be so brazen to present himself to other people, especially near the water. He did not care; he did not have a choice but to risk it. He needed help and he needed it now, moreover he needed water. The water would save his life and potentially help him kill Shadow.
As Jason climbed the hill, he felt a sting at his ear and batted at it. Shadow was near; Jason felt his presence and stopped his progress.
“I can feel you, you son of a bitch.” Jason grumbled in a low tone.
His awareness was heightened, and he stood for a moment looking and listening. He could not see or hear Shadow, but he could feel that he was close, his presence was as obvious as a heater in a dark, cold room. Jason moved forward at a measured pace hoping to get to the water before Shadow got to him. He crested the hill and looked down on the mud puddle of a lake, there was a sudden bright flash that came off the edge of the water; it wasn‘t from the sun glinting and he wasn’t sure what it had been. Whatever it had been, he knew he was in the right place, he did not know how he knew but he was certain of it. The tables had turned and for the first time in what seemed an eternity, he felt something like hope, and he was ready to fight.
He had never regarded a body of water with such a sense of tremendous relief before. As he descended the hill, he noticed there was an SUV parked at a campsite down near the lake. He looked out onto the lake and saw a yellow canoe floating with two people in it; it appeared they were fishing. He stumbled as he looked out on the lake and fell to the ground. He slid a few feet and clamored back up as he started to yell. He was stumbling down toward the water and crying out for help. The people on the canoe were apparently hesitant, as they did nothing but stare at him from the water. He could not blame them for their delay, really. He was not sure how well they were able to make him out, but he was a mess and most people out this far would probably be worried he was some sort of weirdo. He was an absolute disaster, with his left eye swollen almost shut, his clothing shredded and filthy, his right leg swollen and dragging as he walked. His left arm was also visibly swollen from where it had been broken and his skin was torn all over and spotted with blood. Anyone regarding him for the first time in this condition would no doubt wonder what the hell he had gotten himself into.
Jason reached the water’s edge as the couple began to row in toward shore. He collapsed knee deep in the water and started to drink. The water was dirty and tasted thick in his mouth, but he was well beyond caring what it tasted like or if it was clean. At that point, he would have drunk straight from a drainage pipe, if it were wet. He was panting and wheezing between gulps as the couple rowed up to him. He did not realize it, but he was also crying from relief and out of stress from what he had endured. A man jumped out of the canoe as they approached to within a few feet and leaned down to put his hands-on Jason’s shoulders. He was being helped to his feet as he scooped up more water with cupped hands.
“Jesus Christ man, what happened to you?” Lowell asked.
Jason did not answer as he allowed the stranger to help him back to shore. His mind had gone numb upon finding help and water, he had nothing to say. The woman jumped out of the canoe and beached it.
“Lowell, let’s get him to the truck and get him some water, I think he’s dehydrated.” Laura said.
Lowell draped Jason’s right arm over his shoulders and acted as a crutch to help Jason walk. Jason was a little taller than Lowell, so it worked well.
“Just lean on me and we’ll get to the truck and get you some fresh water. Laura, run ahead and get a bottle, would you?” Lowell asked.
Laura jogged out ahead of them to get Jason a bottle of water. Jason once again felt a stinging sensation on his right ear.
“Stop. Stop here.” Jason instructed.
They were barely out of the water when Jason asked Lowell to stop.
“What, what’s wrong?” Lowell inquired.
“He’s out there, he’s still out there. We’re not safe.” Jason said.
Jason was looking around, his right eye wide for the thing that had tormented him for the past few days.
“Who’s out there? Out where, what do you mean?” Lowell asked.
Lowell had stopped moving and looked up toward his wife, who had retrieved a bottle of water from one of their coolers. His instincts were in alarm mode, but he was assuming the injured man he was helping to walk was delirious. He tried to continue toward the truck.
“No, no don’t take me any further. We need to stay next to the water.” Jason told him.
Lowell decided not to argue and let Jason drop to his hands and knees on the ground. Jason had his head perched high and was looking around like a dear that had caught the scent of a predator.
“Hey, my wife will bring you the water. I’m going to the truck to see if I have any first aid stuff that will help you.” Lowell said.
Lowell stayed by Jason until Laura arrived and put the water on the ground in front of him. Lowell then motioned for Laura to walk with him back to the truck. He started to tell her about what Jason had been saying as they approached the vehicle.
“Look, I think you should go get this guy some help. I will stay here with him and make sure he doesn’t wonder off and get lost again. At least I am assuming he was lost; I mean he is delirious. He thinks there’s someone out there, someone dangerous.” Lowell explained.
Laura was processing what to do as a Ranger’s truck crested the road into the lake. They both immediately started to wave it down. The Ranger drove down to their location and stopped the vehicle as she regarded what was going on. Jan Setter recognized Jason as her missing person almost immediately and stepped out of the vehicle.
Jason’s eye had been caught by a shadow near the Pathfinder. The shadow would have been unexceptional if it were not for the fact that it had moved independently. A Ranger had arrived and was talking to the couple who had come to his aid, but Jason feared that Shadow would attack anyway, and they would all be dead soon. He pulled the knife Shadow had given him from his back waistband and poured out a little water from the bottle he had been given.
The couple and the Ranger all took notice as Jason began to quickly cut off the top of the one-liter bottle he had braced loosely in his swollen left hand. Jason was looking down at what he was doing and not paying attention to them. Jan went to the cab of her truck to retrieve a first aid kit and call in to announce she had found the lost camper. Jason looked up in time to see Shadow approaching from behind the couple that stood staring at him. Shadow no longer looked like a man at all. His shock blond hair was gone, and his facial features were that of some devilish lizard. He had two, great, red eyes with black, cat like pupils cutting down the middle. The eyes were set in from a jutting, cone shaped snout that housed a massive jaw. HIs body was basically humanoid, it had legs and what could be roughly described as arms, though they were scaled and barbed with small gray horns. The cloaks were gone and there was nothing but tar black, lizard skin in their place. His hands came to an end with long fingers tipped by gray talons. A total of eight barbed tentacles shot out from his sides, behind the armpits, down to his hips, four on either side, symmetrically placed. Jagged white teeth protruded from the crocodile looking snout and this thing was still nearly seven feet tall. His ribs showed through the flesh of his abdomen and the tentacles protruded as far from the body as he was tall. Jason knew what Shadow intended to do and cut suddenly through his water bottle.
“Run!” Jason screamed.
His shouted warning came too late as one long tentacle wrapped around Laura’s throat and another shot through the center of her back and out her chest. Extraordinarily little blood burst forth from where she had been impaled, as it happened so quick. The tentacle around her throat pulled tight and then snapped straight as her head popped off her shoulders like someone had thumbed off a bottle cap. Lowell had been standing to her left and just in front of her as it all happened. Lowell had been startled by Jason’s sudden shout and was focused on him when his wife had made a choking noise and there had been a pop followed by a wet, tearing sound. He turned in time to see her head fall to the ground and a black tentacle yanked out of her chest. Lowell had no time to realize that he had just witnessed his wife’s death. In one, fluid motion, Shadow was on him with a tentacle on each arm and a hand clasping his throat.
Jan heard the yell and following commotion and turned to witness something that no level of law enforcement training could have prepared her for. She watched as the decapitated body of Laura Wade crumpled to the ground and Lowell was lifted from the earth by his throat. It was not simply what was happening but what was doing it, that had her frozen, in shock. In her years as a Ranger she had come across a great deal of desert life and had never seen anything like what was attacking these people. She reached for her .9mm with a shaking hand and watched as the thing thrust its right hand into Lowell’s abdomen and tore upward to the chest. Lowell’s entrails spilled out and his arms were suddenly ripped off just below the shoulders as the monster crushed his throat and dropped him to the ground. Blood splashed down and spattered far enough to hit Jan in the face. She leveled her weapon as Lowell fell limply in the dirt. She fired off three quick rounds that found their target, it had been turning toward her. As the rounds punched into its chest there was a loud roar or cry it let out. It sounded like it might have been a lion crossed with a hyena by the noise it made. The most terrifying part for her though was that when she hit it, it did not drop; it simply disappeared.
Jason remained kneeling on the ground, only a few yards from the water’s edge. He had been ready to pass out before the new carnage jarred him and forced him to be alert. He witnessed two lives being snuffed out violently in less than fifteen seconds. The only thing was, Lowell was not quite dead yet; he lay on the ground making gurgling, coughing noises through a crushed windpipe. Jason watched as Shadow crouched to the ground and seemed to be poised to launch at the Ranger. She was not doing anything; she stood there, staring dumbly ahead after having hit Shadow several times. Jason feared that her hesitation would cost her, her life and quite possibly his as well. He took note that the bullets did effect Shadow, and he was frustrated that she had stopped firing.
“What are you doing? Don’t stop, kill it!” Jason shouted.
Shadows whole body jerked in Jason’s direction and he glared at Jason through those blood red eyes. The Ranger also looked in Jason’s direction but with panicked confusion.
“It’s gone, it’s gone, I think maybe I did kill it.” Jan replied.
Jason looked from her back to Shadow, who was still fixated on him. It occurred to Jason that she could not see him, it also occurred to him that Shadow was watching him because he was not supposed to be able to see him either. Shadow was measuring his next move, believing himself concealed.
“It’s not gone it’s right in front of you, right where you shot it before! Keep shooting, it’s crouched down right there!” Jason instructed.
“What?” Jan asked in a hurried, panicked tone.
“Shoot goddammit!” Jason screamed back.
Jan started firing off rounds in the area where the thing had been standing. She let ten rounds go in a matter of seconds as hot brass rained to the ground near her feet. Once more she heard that roar and realized that she must have hit it again. That scared the hell out of her because she could not see the son of a bitch; she scrambled to drop the empty magazine and refresh the weapon with a full clip from her duty belt.
Jason watched as Shadow recoiled from the fourth bullet striking him. He did not know where Shadow had been hit exactly, but it had hurt him and Shadow leaped upward, landing next to the Ranger’s vehicle. He was positioned to her rear and just to the right.
“Behind you, he’s right behind you next to the truck!” Jason warned.
Jan gasped and wheeled around as she reloaded her Ruger .9mm. The slide was closing just as she turned and he was upon her, she could see him again. A tentacle caught her by the waist as Shadow used his right hand to backhand the pistol from her grip. The gun flew free of her hands and landed about ten feet to her left. The tentacle around her waist pulled her toward it as she saw his left hand, balled in a fist, coming at her head. Jan instinctively threw up her arms to defend her face. She would later come to wonder if that guarding gesture was all that saved her life from the punch. Her right arm took the brunt of the strike and her humerus bone split in half as her arm was smashed along the side of her face. Jan’s head and whole body jerked violently to the left from the blow as her feet left the ground. The entire world blurred and flashed as she felt herself flying off the ground, nothing she could see was a discernable image. It all went black as her head struck the open passenger door of her truck. Jan’s unconscious body came to a rest just under the door and partially under the truck.
Jason could not see the entire melee that had just taken place, as the position of the truck had blocked the lower portion of her body as well as Shadows. He did not witness the blow that had struck her as she had ducked down a little bit just before she was knocked off her feet. He had heard her slap against the truck door and did see part of her body lying under the truck. That was enough for Jason to believe she was dead from the blow, for all he knew her head had been taken off. Jason could see Shadow leaning over and grabbing her motionless leg with what appeared to be his right hand. The talons at the end of the long, bony fingers sunk into the flesh of her thigh and blood quickly oozed out. Shadow started to pick her body up from the ground by the leg. This prompted Jason to intervene, he wanted to believe she might still be alive, and he would draw the attention of Shadow. He stuffed his knife back into the rear of his pants and stood with the cut off water bottle concealed in his right hand behind his back.
“Hey! Hey, you, sick fuckin freak of nature, do you think you can get to me before I get to the water?” Jason taunted.
Shadow released the Ranger’s leg and stood to his full height. He looked on at Jason and realized that it would do no good to pass from sight, this was no longer effective on him. What was more disturbing yet, was Jason had figured out his worst vulnerability. He knew he would have to act explosively to stop Jason from getting to the water, a decision was made in an instant and Shadow leaped at his prey. Jason held out his left hand in a warding gesture as Shadow leaped over the Ranger’s truck. Shadow changed back to the form Jason had been familiar with as he took flight. The only exception was there were no cloaks now, just a naked thing that looked almost human. Shadow slammed to the ground in front of Jason and a tentacle whipped out from behind his back and wrapped tightly around Jason’s left wrist; Jason was nearly brought to the ground from the crushing pain. Shadow was grinning at him again, Jason felt sure this was why he had chosen to look like a man once again; he wanted to taunt Jason with the facial expressions and words of a man.
