Run & Hide by Beatrix Hollow

22

My breathing was sedated, calm. My eyes slowly followed Mothman flying away, out into the forest, swooping up and away with Ava clutched in his claws. Just a dark stain in the sky. Fucking bastard.

Someone was slowly writhing towards me, their body moving more like a worm than a man. I couldn’t move much at all anymore as the person came closer. They hissed out as their face scratched into the pavement.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Brandon spat out, spittle flinging from his lips as he slid over to me. I sighed and looked up at the sky, watching Mothman circle around something in the distance. Brandon finished his way over and managed to maneuver up on his knees to look down at me. I shifted, going back to a man instead of a monster. A curtain rising back up to show the human he knew.

“What the fuck,” Brandon huffed out like me shifting was a personal annoyance. He turned to look at the dead bodies, maybe checking they weren’t about to leap up at him. The leader was face down, blood pooled under him. The hunters were dealt with but now I had to go get Ava back from that other monster.

Except not right now. Right now, I needed to sleep. My eyes started to slide closed.

“Don’t go to sleep!” Brandon growled out at me. His lip curled up in distaste as he looked over my body. He hobbled around so his back faced me then wiggled his fingers at me. “Untie my wrists before you pass out.”

I blinked slowly then dragged my tongue over my lips. Finally, I flexed my fingers, making sure I could still move them.

“Closer,” I whispered slowly. Brandon grumbled but managed to get the rope next to my hand. It took a while, pinching and pulling without any strength. I only had to get one loop loose enough for him to manage the rest. It wasn’t a complicated knot.

He turned back around, rubbing his wrists and looking me over as if my chest were about to burst open and an Alien was going to shoot out at his face.

“What the fuck are you?” He asked. I didn’t answer. I was tired, so tired. My eyes drifted shut.

I didn’t sleep long. The tranquilizer shots were weak even by human standards. I think they had loaded up with darts intended for small animals, like raccoons. Maybe the stronger stuff was harder to get their hands on.

My eyes cracked open. I was in the passenger seat of a truck. Brandon sat next to me on the driver’s side, gripping the wheel. We were still parked on the bridge and it was still night. The truck wasn’t turned on.

Brandon looked like he’d aged. His eyes seemed sunken slightly into his head, his skin paler than I’d ever seen it.

My body was slumped, spread out across the bench seat. I pushed up but Brandon didn’t look at me. His knuckles were white, gripping the wheel too tight. How long had he sat there like that?

“They’re gone. Matthias—” he cut off, his voice choking as he said the name.

“How long was I out?” I asked. Brandon swallowed and seemed to come back to himself some.

“An hour, I think. I’m not sure. It took forever to drag your massive ass over. I tried looking for the keys in the… well no one out there had the keys I don’t think. It was hard to search the bodies too much.” His voice faded out then he peeled his fingers from the steering wheel and sagged in the seat. He dragged his hands down his face and wiped at some tears that had crawled from his eyes.

His face was red and puffy, the eyes bloodshot. Clearly, he had been crying. My teeth pressed together tightly in discomfort. His pain weighed on me. It was thick in the car. I didn’t know what to do though. I wasn’t the type to offer comfort to anyone but Ava.

My eyes slid to the scene outside the windshield. Grady was out there, along with the dead hunters. I noticed a puddle of blood with no body and lunged forward in the truck.

“Where’s the leader?”

“What?” Brandon asked frantically, leaning forward. “He was there. He was dead! I looked in his pockets for the keys. He… Fuck!” Brandon snarled. He punched the steering wheel and a short honk blasted.

“We need to go,“ I said, reaching for the handle and opening up the door. I slipped out of the car. My leg muscles were loose and shaky. I swayed and my knees kept giving away as I took steps. I looked drunk but could at least stand up and move.

Brandon came up beside me, his head jerking back and forth, looking out for anything.

“Where did he go? He was right there. Did he fall off?” He finally asked, sounding hopeful as he craned his neck to peer over the edge of the bridge. I shook my head as we moved slowly towards the woods.

“No. A corpse doesn’t heft itself off the bridge. Neither does a living man. He’s alive,” I said. Brandon slid his gaze to me and it stuck there as we moved off the bridge. I went the opposite direction of the trail, pushing into the forest towards where I’d seen Mothman flying.

“Where are we going?” Brandon asked, following without hesitation.

“Ava.” Instead of arguing or asking for more details he just nodded. After a couple minutes of walking his energy began to deplete and the haunted look came back to his eyes. I didn’t like it—knowing what the cause was. I wasn’t going to hug him or say it was okay or anything but I could give him something to concentrate on that wasn’t Matthias and the rest of the band.

“It’s Mothman that has her,” I said. His eyes widened as his attention snapped to me. I kept pushing through the forest. Something in my gut told me I was getting closer to her, going the right way. “He stole her from me,” I said in anger.

“Fuck…” Brandon mumbled looking disturbed and confused. “He plans to uh… eat—”

“No,” I snapped. I was still tired, my muscles burned from our walk. Off the trail was harder work. We stepped over fallen logs, shuffled through plants, and thorny veins snagged on us.

“I don’t think he eats people. He doesn’t look the type,” I said in amusement, thinking back to when I beat him in a fight. Without his gun, he was just a furry fucker with wings. Brandon grimaced at the tone of my voice. His eyes sliding back to me in between watching his progress in the forest. I sighed.

“I don’t eat people either.”

“Of course not,” he snapped in agitation but swallowed thickly afterwards. The sound of twigs snapped under our feet as we walked.

Loren was alive and out there. He wasn’t going to just let this go. He very well could be following us. Actually, I expected he was. I didn’t have the energy to deal with him though. If he was just going to slink around I’d let him for now.

Brandon and I had a little ways to go and I needed to reserve my energy, build it back up. My body was still sluggish, wavering around the woods. I had to reach out and use nearby branches as support to help my wobbly legs.

“I’m starving,” I grumbled, thinking food might help me shake off the drugs faster. Brandon stiffened and I recalled what we just talked about. I laughed at him and after a moment he started to laugh too. We kept laughing until tears began rolling down his face and he had to suck back in his noises or else he’d start sobbing.