Terrible plagues drive at the Land
When mankind interferes with his Hand
Nature balances itself and its power is Keen
But when humans interfere the reality for the Animals gets Mean
Servants our here for the Earth
And shall protect the animals in their true place of Birth
Others we Eradicate
So we can help guide the Earth toward its true Fate
So primitive.
Conversing, let aside working with them was, in itself, an insult.
Small, fleshy blood bags, barely more than fishes just learning to flop out of their salty seas.
Things would be so much simpler to just erase the species altogether, but they had festered and grown. Like a God sleeping over an anthill, they now covered all creation like warm blooded lice. Their self importance was only matched by their profound ignorance.
The Migo, Estalrrrll-Lthullance, mused silently. If only he could convince the newest of the Dark Gods, the incarnation of the one known as Vile Darken, to destroy all things human this would all end the quicker. But since Vile Darken was once human and the majority of his incarnations across the Multiverse were also human, this seemed unlikely.
Every battle needed fodder he supposed.
Yet his intellect so far surpassed the ape men that he found himself being forced to solve complicated math equations during his meetings with them, just to save himself from the profound boredom that he would require him to tear off their heads.
He blamed the great old Gods more than anything else. As they slumbered, content in the idea they ruled all, these mites had grown in power. Despite how much he feared to admit such things, they had even claimed some minor victories over his folk, in some places they had achieved much more.
Estalrrrll-Lthullance was a Migo. His was a race that had evolved from fungus to be the dominant species on multiple planets. From their undulating maggotish worm bodies spread twin batlike wings. Each end of their white bloated forms erupted with twenty tentacles which preformed functions ranging from constructing intricate devices to attacking prey and to the Migo nearly all forms of life were prey.
None of this concerned him for his chief scientist, Prrryst, had almost completed one of the most impressive feats of their generation. It pleased him to know it would be the doom of the warm fleshy ones and when it was time to shut down the apparatus so the tainted humans could survive long enough to control that wet world, perhaps Estalrrrll-Lthullance would insure that the shut down mechanism would malfunction.
Oh what a loss that would be.
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Decay crouched with the rest of his Toom. Despite being the Xemmoni ruler of the American Northwest, at least in his eyes, Decay liked getting his hands dirty. He knew his personal power became increased faster every time he devoured a soul, but the real reason he was out hunting remained that he loved to kill. Nothing got him off more than taking an innocent and then feeding on its life essence.
Sure he could claim that he was softening up the resistance in the area, but it would only be a half truth at best.
The constant rain and bellowing clouds of mist did nothing to slow the pack of Xemmoni Glooms. It was their element. It would be like asking a bird if the air bothered it or if a fish was angry about being in water.
Around them the leaves hung heavy with moisture and the water ran off them in threads. Small streams had formed within the clinging trees. Mud remained a constant and helped camouflage their soaked grey robes as they looked on at the trap they had set.
Much of the backwoods of the Olympian peninsula had already been claimed by his species before the real conflict had even begun. His minions were preparing these newer forces of recently corrupted Xemmoni to move out in mass behind his team’s wake.
His plan was to take Winthrop and then head due south avoiding Seattle. Other groups could lay claim to the city and battle for its prizes as they liked, but win or fail, Decay knew more than most that Seattle’s days were numbered.
He had his sights on loftier goals.
Wintrop might seem like a small step, but the little things added up and it would certainly not make sense to alert the local Law Enforcement while they still possessed the abilities to harm parts of his soon to be growing army.
Ghoul’s hoarse voice spoke over the patter of rain. “I can’t wait to feast on this town. Finally we’ll be allowed to do whatever we wish—all the things we deserve will be ours.”
“Yes,” Decay started. “Our waiting is over, but remember feast on the weak, but Darken the tainted and strong wherever you can. As our power grows, so shall our army.”
But then the time for words had finished for a police cruiser was slowly approaching the car wreck that he and his Toom had created. Its flashing reds and blues appeared blurred by the rain like a water color painting bleeding across a page.
The officers regarded the heaps of twisted metal complete with limp bodies for only a moment before exiting their squad car. Together the two men rushed forward, splitting up so they could each investigate one of the destroyed vehicles.
Decay nodded as he brought up the fog. Soon it surrounded the scene, but the officers remained too focused on the grisly sight they took in to notice. Taking advantage of their distraction, the Glooms advanced like ghosts moving through an undulating sea of grey.
Decay reached one of the officers first. He let his sickle fill his hand, but instead of slicing the man’s throat, he drove the rusted blade into his lower back. The officer gasped and arched backwards. Decay grabbed the man’s neck with his free hand and drew the man against him and deeper onto his sickle.
“Officer I would like to file a complaint.” Only a groan answered him. “I was hoping there’d be more of you.” A wicked laugh escaped his lips as he started to breath in the man’s life essence, which his race called Baal.
Splitting into two groups, much as the officers had done, his Toom fell on the dying men. They drained them dry of their life and spirit.
Ghoul wiped blood away from his mouth. Decay shook his head. His oldest follower could never keep himself from taking a bite or two. “They called in for back up.”
“As expected and their back up will call in for back up. Soon nothing will stay between us and the town.” His red eyes glowed in the darkness. “Soon nothing will stand between us and the world.”
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Prince Stygian, as he liked to be called, paced on the narrow deck on his isolated mansion that overlooked the north side of the San Francisco Peaks, which loomed over the small city of Flagstaff. The tormenting rain had softened to a thick drizzle and he allowed himself to bask in the fresh air before the sun would rise and plunge his world into grey.
Like all Darccare, Stygian worshipped the night and clung to the darkness. The dark skies calmed him, but he knew trouble and chaos would be disrupting any of the fake calm he might be allowing himself to indulge in.
Stygian’s body stretched tall and thin. Long white fingers run over the beads of moisture clinging to the handrails. They grasped a glass of blood red wine and he took a brief sip. His black hair was slicked back over his skull and his body became grind work of light and dark, arcs and motion.
Vile and the Dark Alliance had reached his world and nothing would ever be the same, not for him, not for the humans, not even the animals and plants would escape its wrath.
Rather than be destroyed, the Darcarre had joined the Alliance, as had the Glooms and the Caradon. Part of him had no problem joining sides with his worst enemies as long at it would bring change to the eons old stalemate that existed between the competing races of Xemmoni. Of course he hated the Glooms and despised the Caradon, but that rivalry ranked quite low on his current list of concerns.
First among them was the blundering short sided might of the Caradon. They tended to use their muscles and numbers to solve every problem, instead of their minds and manipulation skills, although he figured they might be on short supply in that department. Yet if they charged in and were damaged by the opposition, or even if they weren’t, Stygian had a good idea who they would be hitting up for more shock troops and fodder. Yes, the Caradon might be numerous, but in his eyes, one strong Darcarre with good foresight and plotting skills could accomplish more that two hundred of those muscle bound drooling freaks.
The Glooms were another matter. They were the secretive creators. Who knew how long they had been planning for this battle or what forces they could bring into the conflict. They tended to send in their minions and were more inclined to use their mental skills to avoid being slain needlessly. In many ways they could be a fiercer competition to the Darcarre than the endless minions of the Caradon’s armies of chaos.
He also wondered if his dubious allies noticed the flaw in their plan. They sought to create a world of mists where the Glooms would gain power and would allow the Caradon to move armies through unseen. However, there were certain regions of the Earth where such an influx of moisture would be resisted and harder to maintain. A good example of this was the south-western region of the United States.
This area would resist the banks of fog without any supernatural aid to the point where it wouldn’t be worth the waste of Baal to send more. With even a small center of strength, the Stalwarts could raise a resistance and with so many of the Caradon minions being aquatic, it would be difficult for both them and the Glooms to combat these areas.
This was one of the reasons he relocated to Flagstaff. The temperate sky island could be controlled and used to assault the desert in nearly every direction, yet was cold and wet enough for him to be able to use the strengths of his allies.
Now he just had to gain control of the region in time for this ownership to save the day for Vile Darken when he would need Stygian’s aid the most.
Yes, he had much to do, but another problem tugged at the back of his mind as his black boots marched over the wet planks of his deck.
The Splinter Darcarre.
Not every member of his race approved of the Darcarre joining the Dark Alliance. Many had refused to do so and had either actively or passively fought against both the Alliance and their own brothers. In his region there existed such a nest. It was lead my Klich and located in the ghost town turned artist colony of Jerome.
Klich and his brood were not strong enough to do much to threaten his plans, but they were dug into their mountain town like a black tick on a fat dog. He could finish them if he wished, but he doubted the task would prove easy and the last thing he needed to do was lower his strength.
The Splinters would have to wait and he would just have to hope that they stayed to themselves and didn’t lower his standing by having members of his own race, which he couldn’t control, living so close to him and in the center of what could well prove to be the final battle ground for the control of the whole planet.
Letting out a sigh, he summoned one of his followers telepathically. Nigh appeared moments later. “Yes my Prince?”
“Take another man and head into town. We need to learn what resistance if any may lurk there?”
“Stalwart or Xemmoni my Lord?” Nith said while folding his hands within his dark robes. Nith kept his head bald and had covered much of his arms and legs with dark angular tattoos, he looked like a vampire drenched in ink, but would serve him well.
“Both and anything else you might find. We are behind in our planning. Even mundane matters like controlling the leaders of the local law enforcement agencies must be considered. We need to work fast, but we also need to know what we are up against. I will leave this matter for you to begin.”
Nith bowed. “It will be an honor. I start at once.”
As Nith took his leave the sun began to struggle through the clouds to the east. The rain burned away and Stygian couldn’t help but take it as an ill omen.
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Undul loomed big enough to be six people, which was fine because he certainly wasn’t human. He belonged to what most Xemmoni, at least in their rare moments of honesty, considered to be the most powerful race amongst their kind, the Caradon. Without a doubt, they remained the most numerous of all the species. They were the undulating horde, the crawling chaos, the unstoppable plague of formless flesh.
Undul himself was nearly as wide as he stood tall. His bloated body looked as if it might burst if his tight disease-blue armor was removed. Everything about him seemed rounded. His shoulders, arms, and his protruding barrel chest all gave one the impression of an overfilled sack of skin being pulled past capacity. His head was no exception to this and lay over his thick shoulders like a bloated tick feeding off a drying corpse.
But only fools let his form lead them to underestimating his physical power. Undul was known to remove heads just by clutching his fist. One minute a being would be talking to the giant, a second later it was a headless fountain of blood.
Rage ruled Undul’s life during the best of times, but his current state remained far from that. One of his primary problems revolved around his species’ greatest strength, their numbers. When one grows too large, the masses become harder to control and more beings of questionable intent enter your ranks.
Undul, like many of the members of the Dark Alliance set to decimate the pathetic planet they hovered over, was not from the glowing green ball of mud below them. The conflict, which shouldn’t have been a conflict in theory, centered around the fact that the Caradon were already the mightiest race of Xemmoni on the planet in question.
These beings were horrific and bizarre to the extreme and made even creatures like Undul seem human in comparison. Yes, the Caradon might be the most monstrous of the Xemmoni races, but at least most of them could converse. This system’s Caradon came in a wide ranges of beasts each more unbelievable and insane than the former. He’d already been forced to deal with evolved Fungi who hinted at other colossal entities who, if their hisses were to be believed, considered themselves nothing less than Gods.
Undul didn’t care for the idea that after all the effort he’d put into this war, he’d be getting talked down to or perhaps killed by some lazy slumbering nasty who should have been taking care of the work of destroying this slime ball of a world so he wouldn’t have been required to come here in the first place.
His dark musings were thankfully interrupted by one of his underlings, an Aliquist named Elos, entering the chamber. The Caradon were not just creatures of chaos and monsters, they were also the master of the cell and experts on manipulating life. Where many were foul, creatures like the Aliquists were fair. Perfection made in a test tube. Undul hated them to a man.
Elos stood for a moment. Light played over him as his armor caught patches of the dim blue hewed illumination and glimmered through his gold mane. “My Lord, Overlord Darken has informed me that our next conquest session will be commencing in a hundred-minute. Is there anything you might require from me?”
“Yes, perhaps you could kill all the other members of this inane counsel of six.”
Eros didn’t dignify Undul response with an answer. “I was told each of you may bring a second. Would you like me to attend or should I summon a scribe?”
“Scribe,” he laughed, which caused enough spittle to fly from his lips to fill one of his mugs. “What sort of intricate plan do you think such beasts can aspire to? At best it will be you smash here, you crush there. Pah!”
“Perhaps in this case it would be best to stay out of their paths.”
“Yes, but words and boasts usually fall short of deeds in my experience.”
“You will get no argument from me on that account… my Lord.” Elos paused, but when no further words came from Undul, he said, “And about the meeting?”
“Yes, yes, you shall be my second. Have a slave fetch me my war mug. I have a feeling I will need something to help me get through this one.”
Elos left without another word and left Undul staring out the ship window at the rotating blue and green ball floating below them.
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Once he was known as Vincent Drake. They all were, but they weren’t any longer. Some things changed from planet to planet, world to world, but no matter what name he called himself, he had become the Darken, the Vile Darken.
As he paced the penthouse rooms he had acquired on the top floor of the Long Beach Hilton, Vile tried to block out the others, the endless others—the endless voices. Sometimes when he got busy and focused on some new goal or task, he could almost forget he was just one of many and pushed the intruding myriad into the background, but if he ever slowed or, like now, was being forced to wait on someone, his mind would let down his guard and they would come to him and they plagued him.
He knew that others, many others, had fallen. Their minds had snapped and they had gone under drowning within the waves of insanity that always threatened to overwhelm them all. Many of these fallen had grown strong by embracing their madness, but many more had become sloppy or inept and the loss of sanity had led to a sorrowful end.
But not him. Not on this world. With an audible scream he pushed the multitudes back. The endless babble of countless millions subsided for a moment, but never really left him. Shaking his head he tried to clear his mind. He had things to do, he told himself and secretly hoped he did them for a reason other than to occupy his mind.
Yet it was true, he had an unlimited amount of tasks that stretched before him. Of course he did, for soon he’d be the ruler of this floating ball of mud. Emperors tended to be busy folks, busy folks indeed.
But he wasn’t there yet and he knew nothing came easy on any world, least of all conquering an entire planet. Sometimes the conquering was the easy part compared to dealing with those allies he needed to acquire and keep to see it done. More often than not the minions of evil who already had plans set into motion didn’t take kindly to his appearance and then insistence that he was in fact not only rule of their world, but the entire Multi-verse as well. Those that refused to submit to his glory needed to be educated or often destroyed.
On this world the problems ran even deeper. Usually his incarnation was beset with overcoming the millennia old feuds between the different races of the world spanning evil known collectively as the Xemmoni. Here, however, there was a new twist. Large races of creatures and their Gods traveled from planets far away to settle on this life filled world, but over time these eldritch gods and their minions lost power and became dormant.
They withdrew from the stars and in most cases even the world they had chosen to settle upon. Some of their representatives had claimed that they had existed before the ancient races of Xemmoni and considered themselves above such conflicts. But that had to be impossible. He looked out toward the driving ocean waves. Yes, that has to be impossible doesn’t it?
He chuckled under his breath. Of course it is impossible. All evil being stem from the different races of Xemmoni. Yes, the beings of this world are odd, but aren’t all Caradon? He chuckled again, on this world, he was Caradon himself. As he was on many worlds.
Most Xemmoni in their darker moments agreed that out of all the races of Xemmoni, the Caradon remained the most powerful. There might didn’t just rest on their numbers alone, but again out of all the races they were the most numerous. Some scholars speculated that out of the two dozen races of Xemmoni scattered across the Multi-verse one in three was Caradon.
They were the undulating horror, the chaos that corrupts. The slithering mounds, but also much more. Where some Caradon were little more than tentacled pools of slime, others had created perfection out of the lifeforms they desired. Behind some of the writhing masses of bubbling flesh often stood being of incredible beauty and almost God-like perfection. And those proved to be the ones who worried him.
Yes, he mused, this world will be more difficult than most, but the power here is almost endless. If I can awaken those slumbering Gods, not only would I have the strength to rule this world about another dozen as well.
Such thoughts ebbed and flowed through his troubled and overloaded mind as the sun began to fade. It melted into the waves in the west and as a new darkness descended onto the world he knew that before to long this planet’s sun might become little more than a memory.
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Incense mixed with the clinging smell of sage. Smoke lingered in the room almost strong enough to make Vanessa’s eyes water, but she stayed focused. Her ritual was near its completion. She lit her eighth candle and then said her prayer for an Earth Blessing to occur.
I am a Child of the Earth
Let Nature Embrace Me
I live as an Animal
Let the Beasts Embrace me
I am at one with the Forests
Let the Plants Embrace Me
I am a Child of the Sun
Let the Light Embrace Me
I Feel the Freedom of the Bird
Let the Winds Embrace Me
My heart burns with the Fire of the Making
Let the Flame Embrace Me
I Come From the Water
Let the Rivers Embrace Me
I am as one with the Desert
Let the Sands Embrace Me
She had no unrealistic expectation for the short spell’s success. Her only goal was to get her garden growing early so it would get a jump start on the short growing session once it warmed up enough. When you lived in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado the growing season remained short indeed.
With the main part of her spell complete, she stood up to prepare to begin her Lesser Banishing Ritual. She froze when a soft humming radiated from the small alter of candles and incense she’d created. Before she had processed what could be happening, the humming grew in volume. Soon the very air vibrated like she was on an airplane during a hurricane.
The eight tongues of incense began to curl together. At first she thought they might be forming a lightning bolt, which had stayed a symbol of Hecate throughout the millennia. Then she wanted to slap herself. Here was the first real supernatural thing that had worked—the first she’d seen, and she idly speculated on its meaning when she should be fainting or curling up in a ball crying in terror.
Shaking her head, she dispelled such notions. This was a gift a… the incense moved and changed its form. Looking like lightning no longer, it became an elongated snake before her eyes. Grey and moving, it danced before her vision. Drawing her in, she allowed herself to become mesmerized in its serpentine movements.
Then, without warning, the serpent of smoke exploded sending wisps of grey into her eyes. Visions flashed and burned through her mind. She saw horrible things. Cities tumbled into the sea while other structures rose from it. Humanity crumbled as waves of death from both natural forces as well as unidentifiable creatures plowed through mankind.
A fear gripped her like nothing she had ever even come close to experiencing. She froze as more visions twisted before her and threatened to drive her over the brink of sanity. Just as she wondered if they would ever cease, the visions began to slow.
An eight pointed start materialized and on each point was a wavering face. She noticed two things before this last image faded. There was only one female face and it was hers.
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Dan couldn’t say he enjoyed his life much. Living in the middle of Phoenix was the closest thing to a hell on earth he could think of. Already, in just February, the temperature was almost ninety. He groaned while thinking about how the summer was going to be.
Add to this the miles and miles it took just to leave the track home suburbia behind him. It required a fifty mile drive just to see a plot of land without a house or business planted on it, not that he had time to head out into nature much. Dan worked full time, pushed himself through a master’s program, while helping care for his aging mother, who always acted like she was doing him the favor. Any little fragments of spare time he ever had were always eaten up by his school work.
After pushing back a long strand of dark hair, he sighed while lighting up a smoke. Even though his long work day was finished, he still had three hours of live classes and a forty minute commute home.
He took a long drag and then almost hit a car that suddenly slowed from sixty to twenty in front of him. He was just able to slam on the breaks in time, but as he watched, the car started to roll into another lane where a passing SUZ hit it full on. Both cars began to spin out of control and it was all Dan could do to remain clear of the explosion of glass and twisted metal.
Not knowing what else to do, he pulled over into the break down lane, but he almost didn’t make it as more cars went out of control and collisions occurred both before and behind him.
“What the hell,” he said aloud as he pulled over as far as the lane would allow. He saw a few other motorists trying to do the same thing, but those proved to be the exceptions. The majority of the vehicles plowed into each other. He had never seen such destruction outside of a disaster movie.
He decided that exiting from his pickup might be a safe call and he moved himself to the other side of the waist-high cement wall that lined the freeway.
Looking around he saw other people scrambling out of their cars and looking as confused as he was, but he turned his attention to those still on the road. A woman’s car coasted to a stop not far from him. Despite the risk, he rushed over to her ride.
Upon reaching the passenger window, he saw that she appeared to be unconscious. He banged on the window, but she didn’t move. He was banging again when one of the people on the side of the road yelled out a warning. Dan jumped back just in time to avoid a semi that raced out of control into the stalled car, which held the sleeping woman.
Feeling like his heart had just leapt out of his mouth, he stumbled back to the break down lane. Everywhere broken and burning cars filled the highway. He spotted more vehicles that had avoided the mayhem, but just stayed where they were. From the distance he could see several of them had drivers that appeared to be unconscious or sleeping.
Taking in the drivers there seemed to be no difference between them and the people on the side of the road. Both men and women stood there in fear. Both old and young were affected and yet also immune.
“Must be some poisonous gas or something,” a man in his sixties yelled.
“Then why didn’t it affect us?” A young man in shorts with a sleeve full of tattoos asked.
A woman on the edge of panicking clutched a young boy in her arms. “Whatever it is has affected my son, what should I do?’
Dan joined the other two men, near the mother. The older man looked over the boy and concluded, “He looks like he’s breathing normally. He just seems to be asleep.”
“But he won’t wake up.”
“Neither will anyone else,” Dan said and then joined the others as they ducked down due to another giant explosion.
The older man straightened up. “The only thing we know for sure is that we’re in a shitload of trouble.
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Lilly Ponds Arizona, for the first time in six years the delightful chorus of frogs can be heard echoing up from the Lilly Ponds as long as you kick a few people to keep their snoring down.
The high priest of Yig had this to say. “Ever since the Migo introduced crawdads into the Lilly Ponds, Yig’s loyal followers have done everything in their power to eradicate this invasive species and also win as many horseshoe games as possible. Now, after six years of struggle and hundreds of man hours, the frogs have begun to return to this beloved paradise. I…” The interview was forced to cease here as the big Viking of Yig burst into girlish tears. He was only able to choke out, “I love those frogs, man.”
The crayfish spokesman, Kenny the Crawdad was less pleased. “This is a travesty. Why should ingenious life be given special privileges? We deserve to eat whatever we please, even if we wipe out whole species and then refuse to leave a tip. Besides we promote life too. With the frogs dwindling, the populations of mosquitoes and black flies have never been higher.”
We also reached local ranger, Muscles McFitness. “When I first saw Zano and Bone down there, I figured they were just breaking the law any way they could, but when a giant crawdad severed my right arm, I knew that something had to be done. So I moved to San Diego and now I could care less what happens to those losers.”
The mad scientist William Lynn was also less favorable in regards to these developments. “Do you know how hard it is to dump crawdads into every body of water and stream in a whole state? Importing fish from Louisiana helps, but we mostly use the flying fungi of Yuggoth.” Sighing, he continued, “First, I have to open a portal to another planet, coax them through with honey, eggnog, glow sticks, and naked pictures of Diane Sawyer. Then half the time they eat the crawdads before delivering them, or they just dump them in the back of San Pelipis and fly off to devour poodles and listen to Disco while making love to toadstools.”
Lastly we contacted Saint Poncho. “All life is sacred, except those damn Palo Verde beetles.” After a ten minute discussion, we redirected him back to crawdads. “As I was saying killing is always wrong, unless it is something you don’t like, such as crawdads and lawyers and those damn Cleveland Browns. I hate that team. I’m not sure who I’d even vote for if they were through into the ring with Crawdads. I’d prefer they both eat each other to death. And did you know that if a crawdad pinches you, you become a zombie?”
Reports still say they have a long way to go before the ponds and streams are cleared of this invasive menace, and they may have to run back into town for more beer and ice. Still the outlook appears good for the children of Yig and soon the lands might return to their natural state of beer, babes, Frisbee golf, and huge clouds of marijuana smoke drifting through the pines, oh yeah and frogs.
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The day had started slow, which suited Jack’s hung-over brain just fine. Lunch hour proved quiet and Jack thought he might make it through another morning shift at Scallywags without much trouble, but of course that’s when things go wrong.
About two in the afternoon something hit the pub, which caused it to rock like an unmanned boat in a hurricane. While Jack fought to just maintain his footing, bottles tumbled from the shelves behind the bar and shattered into shards of flying glass. The bartender on shift was a young, petite woman named Holly and she shrieked as the boozes exploded on both sides of her. Instead of trying to flee, she froze. Another cry tore from her when a large bottle of vodka cracked her forehead and drew blood.
With a growl, Jack hurried her way, but moving over an undulating floor proved anything but easy. He dodged falling chairs and scrambling costumers as he made his way toward her.
When at last he reached the bar, Jack leaned forward and grabbed her by the waist. As if lifting a toy, he drew her over the bar and into the dubious safety of the rest of the restaurant. More shouts and crashes were heard, as Holly held onto him like a long lost lover.
Then, as quickly as it had started, the shaking dwindled into nothing.
Miles, one of the waiters, rushed up to them. “That was an earthquake, right?”
“I don’t think it was God bowling,” Jack replied.
As if suddenly realizing how hard she’d been hugging him, Holly drew away as her face blushed red. “Um, sorry, but that was really scary.”
“Worse things could happen,” Jack said, “But right now we need to take care of you. Your forehead is bleeding,” looking down, he saw her bare legs covered with all various splashes of booze, “and your legs could be injured too.”
As Jack guided the trembling girl toward the first aid kit, the manager, Larry, came rushing over. “Hey wait, we can’t leave all our costumers out here alone.”
“You watch them then,” Jack said. “I’m not going to have Holly go into shock on me. I’m sure a thousand injured are going to be overloading the hospitals in minutes. We’re going to have to fair for ourselves here.”
Larry met his eye and then nodded. “Okay, but there’s broken glass everywhere. This place is a litigation sandwich that’s about to have a bite taken out of it.”
“I say we close the place. No one will be coming here after all that. Give me a minute to help Holly and then we’ll come around and see what needs to be done next.”
Jack knew he took a chance talking to the shift manager so bluntly, but it appeared to have paid off, for Miles and Larry took off and got busy talking to the patrons and cleaning.
Holly looked up at him with her light blue eyes. “Thanks for helping me back there. It could have gotten a lot worse.”
Looking up at the television, he saw that the storm in northern Arizona had increased in it fury. “We had better watch ourselves, it still could.”’
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Yig Prime 