Monstrum (37 page)

On the other hand, wounding this thing, even slightly, would make me feel better before I died. A whole lot better.

So I raise the sword, open my mouth and let all my rage roar up and out of me in a primitive war cry. I swing it down in a slashing arc, aiming for the tentacle that's resting nearest my feet.

The chimera lazily shifts its tentacles back in an undulating wave that puts them all out of my short reach.

This infuriates me further.

“It's not that easy, bitch,” I say, deathly calm.

This time, the chimera's amused chitter flashes several jagged teeth.

Your move,
it seems to say.

If this thing wants to play games, I'm up for it. It's on.

With another guttural cry, I stride forward with my lopsided body, advancing well into its space. Its reflexes are slower this time, possibly from shock, and it doesn't get its tentacles out of the way fast enough. I slash the panga into the nearest tentacle, but the skin is like a rubber tire and it's hard to do serious damage with a one-handed grip. The thing's flesh gives way enough to open up a thin red wound that's no more damaging than a paper cut.

With a negligent wave, the chimera backhands me with that same tentacle, striking me across my injured arm and sending me flying. White sparks of agony mar my vision as I land several feet away. My head hits the deck with a hollow thunk that makes my brain ricochet inside my skull. The blow's force is so powerful that I keep sliding on my belly, skidding feet-first toward the flames. The ship is now tilted at a sharp enough angle—forty-five degrees? Fifty?—to make it something like sledding down a mountain.

Thinking and moving faster than I ever have before, I pinwheel my left arm and stab the panga's tip into the deck. It only penetrates an inch or so, but it's enough to give me something to grip. To my utter amazement, I stop just in time, my toes inches from the flaming perimeter.

This tiny victory energizes me. Without waiting for the chimera's countermove, I tighten my grip on the panga's hilt as my feet scrabble for purchase on the slippery deck. The panga provides just enough support and stability for me to heave myself up to standing again. I stagger, nearly toppling back over before I regain my balance. The chimera watches me, eyes narrowed, while I run through my limited options. Given the sinking ship's angle and the churning waves, my opportunities to remain upright are limited, and I know it.

So I need to make every move count.

I lunge, feinting toward a tentacle to my right. The chimera, hissing with menace, whips that tentacle out of my way, and that's when I pivot left. There's another tentacle resting right there, and it's a juicy one, nice and fat. I don't bother with slicing motions now. Not with just the one good arm. Instead, I flip my wrist and bring the panga straight down, impaling it to the hilt in the upper part of the tentacle, a section that's meatier than an Easter ham.

For one unblinking second, as the monster and I stare at each other, the universe contracts down to just three things:

Me. The chimera. The blade pinning it to the deck and connecting us.

Then the gates of hell open up and swallow me whole.

The chimera tips its head back, drops open its lower jaw and erupts with noise violent enough to make my bones shatter. Its tentacles spasm, trying to drag it backward and away from the skewer, but the more it struggles, the more that injured tentacle gets sliced open. Its claws open and close, clacking, and its many legs ripple uselessly up and down. It can't get free.

It shrieks the whole time, each decibel a spike through my brain. And I know it's not possible, but I'd swear I can feel everything it feels.

Agonizing pain.

Blinding fury.

And I feel one thing that's all my own: an all-consuming desire for revenge—as bloody as I can make it.

Panic makes the chimera crazy for a few seconds, and its free tentacles whip and thrash, each one threatening to knock my head off my shoulders. I duck and dodge, giving up my precious grip on the panga long enough to cover my head with my good arm.

And then, all at once, its energy shifts and settles.

It quiets down, and the relative silence is so alive with menace—so
purposeful
—that I almost wish for another round of ear-splitting shrieks.

Oh, God
,
I think.
This is going to be bad.

A beat passes. Neither of us move.

I don't know whether it thinks of it first, or I do. But I know what's coming in the instant before it comes, and I know that this is it. My last chance for a decisive move.

The two of us spring into motion at the same time.

The chimera swings one of its enormous arrow-shaped claws up and opens it. Positions its two scissor blades around the impaled tentacle. Watches me with glinting eyes as it snips the tentacle off its own body, freeing itself and wheeling around, all its murderous energy focused on me even as it turns the other way.

Now it's my turn.

I dart forward and use every bit of my strength to yank the panga out of the dead tentacle. When it's back in my hand, the hilt solid and comforting against my palm, I keep going toward the chimera even though every survival instinct I possess is screaming for me to sprint in the other direction.

The chimera now faces away from me, so it can lift one of its remaining tentacles in that move it used on Murphy. This will be the kill shot, I know. The chimera has finally had enough cat-and-mouse with me and wants this little mouse dead.

Except that this little mouse doesn't want to die.

The tentacle rises a foot or two higher, and that's when I see it: the glistening pink funnel, about the size of a watermelon, through which this bitch plans to shoot its flammable ink on me.

Wait for it,
I tell myself.
Wait for it
. . .

The end of the funnel expands.

I spring forward, thrusting the panga as far up what passes for this monster's ass as I can.

The chimera shudders and squeals, sounding much more guinea pig than T-Rex right now, but my timing is off. Most of the ink splashes in a useless puddle beneath the chimera, but some of it sprays me. I just have enough time to get my good arm up to protect my head. The putrid black fluid splashes me, so icy cold that it stings like a million needles pricking my skin. The pain is so intense I have no choice but to leave the panga buried to the hilt and try to scurry backward. A new fear galvanizes me—that a lick of fire will touch we where I'm covered in this flammable ink, and I'll burst into a fireball the way Murphy did.

I'm not fast enough to escape the spasming tentacles. One of them swings wildly, sweeping my feet out from under me so that I land on my butt with my legs stretched out in front. I skid down the listing deck, realizing, with breath-freezing horror, that the only thing on the other side of the sloping fire is ocean.

Flailing and panicked, I'm able to slap my palm down on the deck to stop myself from sliding into those vicious purple flames.

This time, though, with no panga to use for balance, I know I'm not getting back up.

But as my last act on earth, I'm going to take this monster out with me; I swear to God.

Glancing wildly around and squinting against the searing heat, I see what I need. There, not two feet away from me, is a two-foot length of burning canvas that's got heavy brass grommets on the end. Part of the lifeboat cover, I quickly realize, my fingers closing around the end of it farthest away from the flames.

The chimera, bellowing and blundering in agony as its tentacles try and fail to reach the panga, swings around to face me. Our eyes connect. I say a frantic prayer that my plan will work. My arm lashes out and the canvas sails through the air, unfurling as it flies and streaking with amethyst fire. I kick my feet against the deck to get myself sliding again.

The chimera's eyes widen with unmistakable surprise.

And the last thing I see as I slide through the ring of fire and back into the water, is that my aim is true. The canvas lands on the puddle of volatile ink directly beneath the chimera, ignites and incinerates the thrashing and squealing monster in a mushrooming flash of light.

S
ome idiot is snoring. Loudly.

Which is a major problem because I feel like I've been run over by an eighteen-wheeler with snow tires and chains, and I could really use a forty-year nap.

I try to roll over and bury my head in the pillow, but I discover that my hands are bandaged and stinging and my right forearm, which is attached to my body by muted pulses of pain, is trapped and immoveable.

The surprise of this makes me start, and that's when I snort myself awake.

“And . . . she's back,” Gray says to a round of snickers.

I snap my eyes open and discover that I'm in a room—no, a cabin, because I can feel the ship's movement—filled with blinding white sunlight. It takes my poor throbbing pupils several blinks to adjust to this sudden illumination, but when they do, I discover a ring of smiling faces staring down at me.

Gray. Carter. Sammy and An. Mike. Dr. Baer. Some woman I don't know.

And Cortés, holding my left hand. My right arm is in a sling and tethered to an IV line.

The kids look like I feel—like resuscitated road kill, with assorted black eyes, scratches and bandages. No one is unscathed. They all seem hollow-eyed and exhausted, although this doesn't dim their enthusiasm at seeing me awake.

Dr. Baer's face, likewise, is bruised, battered and blistered, looking as though it's met the business end of a hot meat grinder. Cortés, whose eyes are ringed with dark smudges of fatigue, leans on a pair of crutches. But when our gazes meet, his smile is so wide and relieved it causes a sweet ache inside me.

Even so, I don't want to get too excited just yet. I can't maneuver myself up to sitting against the pillows, so An helpfully hits a button and the head of my bed rises.

“Are we—” I begin and have to pause to clear my dry throat.

“Someone pass her the water,” An commands. “Mike, you're closest. No, give her a bendy straw so she doesn't spill it everywhere. There you go.”

Mike holds the cup for me, and I sip gratefully before trying again.

“Are we alive?”

“We are, in fact, alive,” Carter confirms. “Well, I am, anyway.”

A memory clanks into place inside my aching head: I slid into the water. “How did you find me?”

“I was there the whole time in the lifeboat, trying to row to you,” Cortés says. His lips thin, then twist. He swallows hard, nostrils flaring. “It was so bright . . . with the flames. I saw it all.” He hesitates, blinking against the tears in his eyes as his face contorts.

I watch him, my heart hurting. I wish we were alone.

Dr. Baer slings an arm around his shoulders for support. The other kids shuffle their feet and look away, giving him a minute.

“Take your time,” Sammy tells Cortés.

Nodding, Cortés takes a shuddering breath and looks me straight in the eye. “I was afraid I wasn't going to make it in time.”

I open my mouth with no real hope that my voice will boot up again. Not when my throat is so tight.

“Thanks,” I say simply.

He almost smiles. “Anytime.”

Gray coughs, reminding me that Cortés and I aren't alone.

“And the chimera?” I ask.

“Blown straight to hell.” There's a gleam of triumph in Cortés's eyes now. “I'm hoping all the bits of it have been eaten up by the critters at the bottom of the ocean by now.”

“By now? How long have I been out?”

“Almost a day,” Dr. Baer tells me.

“Is my arm okay?”

“The ship's doctor was able to relocate the radius without much problem,” Dr. Baer says. “It might be a little sore for another day or so, but it'll be okay.”

“Good,” I say, relieved.

I look past my friends, discovering that I'm in a pristine and seemingly fully-equipped medical cabin with sliding glass doors and a small balcony that look out onto the water. No land is in sight, just the sky's bright blue against the choppy waves . . . and the forbidding wedge of gray clouds moving in across the horizon. I do a double-take, startled by the jagged streaks of lightning that flash inside those clouds, three in a row.