James Axler – Rat King

“No bullshit, J.B.,” Ryan said carefully. “I think we can take them if the

chance comes, so I need to know for sure.”

“For real? Might as well dump me now,” J.B. said flatly, drawing an appalled

glance from Mildred. “Slows me up too much. I’m as much use as a fart in a

methane tank.”

Ryan merely nodded. It would take a lot for him to leave J.B. behind.

But maybe what they were about to face was a lot. The sudden spray of earth and

the inhuman roar as it rose from the ground was certainly no small problem.

Chapter Thirteen

“Dark night! What kind of mutie is that?” J.B. whispered, rooted to the spot as

the creature rose out of the earth, showering dirt and dust that caught in the

whirl of the storm and formed an almost opaque curtain around the rising shape.

“Fireblast! Scatter,” Ryan yelled, pushing Dean away from him and falling in the

opposite direction, temporarily blinded as specks of dust hit his good eye,

making it sting and close in a mist of tears. He felt the earth beneath him as

he hit, rippling with the disturbance of the uprising.

He rolled, blinking and clawing at his eye to clear his vision. As he righted,

it returned to him in a blurred and distorted form. He almost wished it hadn’t.

It was a lizard of some kind, hideously mutated and grossly enlarged, but

probably descended from the Gila lizards that still roamed the desert plains.

Its tail flicked out behind it as it emerged from its hiding place and looked

around, the cold, blank eyes taking in the scene of confusion, unblinking in the

face of the storm and protected by a thick yet transparent skin that covered the

eyeball.

Ryan estimated the creature to be about twenty feet in length, stretching up to

five and a half feet in height at the tip of its head. About half of the body

length was in the tail, which flicked ominously behind. The bandy, scaled legs

were planted firmly in the soft, freshly churned earth, sinking deep into the

soil.

Casting a glance behind him, Ryan could see that their captors had retreated

several yards and were spreading out into a fan formation to try to deal with

the creature from a variety of angles, spacing themselves so that it wouldn’t be

able to take more than one of them with the wickedly vicious tongue that now

shot out toward Dean.

Ryan watched helplessly, knowing that he wouldn’t be close enough to help his

son. The tongue, dripping venom, snaked out at speed. Dean was still on his

butt, where he had fallen when pushed by his father as the lizard erupted from

the earth.

The boy yelped in shock and surprise, but had sense enough to allow his

instincts to take over. Pushing himself up with his feet, balancing by thrusting

his arms behind him, he scooted backward in an ungainly crab-like manner.

Ungainly it might have been, but it allowed him to get up enough speed to evade

the tongue, which lashed at the earth.

The lizard retracted its tongue, screeching in frustration.

Ryan made it across to his son in a few strides, plucking at Dean’s arm and

helping the boy scramble to his feet. Father and son retreated a few more yards

before taking shelter behind a pile of rocks and earth strewed about when the

lizard erupted onto the surface.

“Good evasive move,” Ryan panted. “You’re learning fast, son.”

“Either that or get chilled,” Dean replied with a grin. “But why aren’t they

trying to chill that thing?”

“Mebbe they’ve just got to take their time. They must be used to them,” Ryan

answered.

But it was a good point. What were they doing?

It was a question that J.B. and Mildred were also asking themselves. They had

dived to the ground and inched toward the scant cover offered by a few rocks. It

wasn’t much, but on the flat valley floor it was all they could find.

J.B. eyed the fan formation adopted by the outsiders, and also ran an appraising

eye over the blasters before taking another look at the lizard.