Might

Might

                Things went horribly, irreversibly wrong almost immediately after Starla arrived. Dwayne's relative who ran the show - a grumpy old biddy - had understated the size of the monster by three orders of magnitude. It wasn't 'half a man' in any dimension - it was roughly two and a half in every dimension.

                That was a shock, but things only went wrong when the idiot who'd caught it poked it with a cattle prod. "Check this out! You can do whatever to it, it won't care!" - zap - half-arsed metal chains flying everywhere. Starla bolted immediately, heading back into the twisty and poorly signposted corridors of the warehouse complex.

                A few screams and shouts came from behind her, but soon all she could hear was the creature smashing through the walls. A bit of poor luck, dark and poor directions made her wind up back where she started, bursting into a room with broken chains and a couple of mashed bodies.

                I guess we won't be doing this the easy way, thought Starla. The original plan was to buy the creature, and then transport it to where it could be safely killed. Starla's 'boss', the old biddy Selma, knew something those selling the creature didn't. It was moving into its reproduction phase, in which its normally passive behaviour became incredibly defensive instead. If it successfully gave birth it would become even worse - it would hunt anything nearby to feed its young. Its numerous young.

                Starla wasn't bothered by the gore. She wasn't really used to it; rather, death and gore didn't bother her. Dying bloodily a few times throughout her life had caused her queasiness about both to fade. Or so she said; the first time she died she was so young that she may just have never realised that blood and death didn't bother her by themselves. Only losing her friends had.

                The thought let her steel herself. The creature's somewhere here still, she thought, but not right here. Time to call in the cavalry.

                A distant scream made her jump a little. After a few worried breaths she pulled out her phone and rang the 'panic number'. "Ring it if the shit hits the fan," Selma had said. The shit and the fan were certainly getting intimate.

                Each beep of the dial tone seemed to take longer than ever before. Come on come on come on come on - Yes! she thought, ecstatic when a voice answered.

                "Hi, who're you after?" asked the voice on the other end.

                "... Selma told me to call if things go wrong," said Starla. "Things have gone really wrong."

                "Shit. What sort of wrong?" asked the voice.

                "The creature is two stories high and an idiot shocked it," said Starla. "It's rampaging through the warehouses now."

                "That... is almost a worst case scenario. We'll be there in ten. Get out if you can, and call if it leaves the warehouses. That's the worst case," said the voice.

                "Okay," said Starla. Whoever was on the other end hung up immediately.

                Starla poked through her pockets for a hair tie. She'd had her shoulder-length hair down to make a better impression on the sellers, but now it was time to run around. A few rogue hazel strands gave her trouble but soon enough she got it all tied back.

                The monster seemed to be fairly distant. Starla could barely hear the beast's thunderous footsteps anymore and she hadn't heard yelling for a little while. The sellers had probably escaped already - they'd know their way around the warehouses far better than Starla.

                She racked her brain for the way back out. It'd taken a few false turns to get in, but she was fairly sure that the way out was straight out of the door she'd entered, if you ignored all the walls. If she managed to keep track of which way she turned she'd eventually make it back to the car park.

                For the second time she made her way out the door and entered the maze of passages. Quite how a warehouse complex became such a warren confused her. Buildings usually made sense, and warehouses were meant to be efficient as far as she knew. Maybe the haphazard placement of buildings was part of the reason the entire complex was abandoned?

                Some progress later (she'd found some of the signs that should be along the way out) Starla realised that the slapping stomps of the creature were a lot closer. Far closer than she was comfortable with - each of the creature's steps caused the walls and roof to shake. A long abandoned pole clattering to the floor made her jump.

                It also attracted the attention of the creature. The slow, steady pace immediately changed to a charge, a horrendous crash letting Starla know that the creature had torn its way through yet another wall. She bolted down the corridor she was in, putting as much distance between her and the pole as possible.

                Just before she reached the corner the creature tall through the wall behind her with a crash. In her panic, she hadn't noticed it changing course away from the pole and towards her. She screamed a little.

                The creature slammed into the far wall then turned, finally giving Starla a good, close, terrifying look at it. It filled the small corridor completely from left to right, and towered up almost to the six metre high roof. Beyond that it was more or less a giant, armoured blob - two trunk like arms extended from its spherical girth, and she'd caught sight of one more at its back. Four small yet obviously incredibly strong legs sat around the creature's base - given where they sat, there were probably two more at the back.

                A strange eye crowned the blob. It seemed to squeeze up and around to survey the creatures surroundings, quickly settling on Starla. A vertically slit mouth appeared from nowhere, the creature's skin stretching to reveal it. It was toothless - probably not about to be used to eat Starla - but the creature did roar.

                Starla bolted, hoping to lose the creature in the maze of passages. Great thuds came from behind her almost immediately, getting closer and closer and... She dodged aside, the creature stampeding past her cacophonically. Immediately she slipped back out behind it and ran away from it again.

                Much less time than she expected passed before the creature was after her again. And it was fast. She dared a glance behind, and the fear that shot through her from seeing it almost released her bowels. A good place to dodge again was coming up - actually, there was a corridor nearby she could slip into and maybe lose it. She leapt to the side...

                But the creature was expecting it this time, and slammed one of its legs into the wall of the corridor. The wall shook, but held; and the creature smashed into Starla, crushing her against the wall. She barely had time to gasp before she was crushed and died in pain. Again.

                She must've taken longer running around the warehouse than she thought, because she awoke to a pair of people fussing over her with a medkit. "It looks like she has some organ damage," said one of them, "But the neck snapping killed her."

                "Uh," rasped Starla. Everything seemed to hurt, yet somehow especially her neck, right leg and ribs.

                "You're alright, honey," said the other. "A little broken, but alright. We did have to twist your neck back, though. Can you wriggle your toes?"

                Starla wriggled her toes. "Phew," the medic continued. "No actual nerve damage. That's really luck. I'm Jun, and this is Ray."

                "Hey," said Ray. "We're going to get a stretcher together and get you out of here. The rest of the guys are dealing with the monster now."

                A massive crash echoed through the warehouse. "We should probably go," said Jun. "If they can't get the beast knocked out they'll flush it out with fire."

                Starla nodded and let the medics do their work. The pain made her wince frequently, especially when they moved her a little. When they were nearly finished, she asked, "Have you guys got any pain drugs or something?"

                "No," said Jun. "Neither of us is an anaesthetist, and normal painkillers won't cut it. Someone with your injuries is usually unconscious, but you came back to life so..."

                "This might knock you out," said Ray. "Time to lift."

                Although she steeled herself, the pain when Jun and Ray lifted her onto the stretcher made her screech loudly. "Holy shit," said Jun.

                "She's got some lungs," said Ray. "Okay love, we're getting out of here."

                A curt nod from Starla and they were off. Somehow the two medics knew exactly which way to go - a blur of silent running and pain later left them outside. The cool night air and the sky above was a great relief, oddly.

                "They got the critter, right?" asked Ray. "I barely heard the message."

                "Yeah," replied Jun. He looked at Starla and said, "Good work keeping it here."

                "Not, intentional," said Starla, forcing both words out. Jun and Ray were carrying her more gently now, walking over to a van.

                "I wouldn't get it after me on purpose either," said Ray. "But it's a happy accident. Losing it would be awful, but angered like it was it would probably have smashed up the nearest town."

                Jun nodded. "Here we are. We'll get you to an actual hospital now - we'll come up with the cover story later, but we have people there to shield you from questions," he said.

                Starla yelped in pain again as the medics loaded her into the van and tied her and the stretcher down so she wouldn't shuffle about. "I'm not sure whether it'll make you feel much better, but it seems you're the only casualty," said Jun after a quick chat on his radio.

                A smile from Starla made Jun smile in turn. "Alright. We're off," said Ray. She put a comforting hand on Starla's leg. "Hold in there honey." Starla nodded, and the medics closed up the doors of the van.

                A few moments later the van rumbled to life, and then Starla enjoyed a two hour trip of corners and pained yelps.