watch, but the sight of one demon tearing apart another quite frankly makes me feel ill.” Yellow teeth flashed in the sunlight, glistening with thick, putrid saliva. “Ironic, really.” He lifted his hand in a small wave. And vanished.
Throat squeezing tighter still, Ven swung his stare back to the horrific thing waiting amongst the trees. “Fuck,” he muttered again.
The q’thulu stared at him with dead, black eyes, the thick tentacles of its face writhing and twisting. All seemingly reaching for Ven. Its thin, puke-green wings flapped once, slapping the tree branches in clumsy aggression. It took a lumbering step forward, a high-pitched keening, like the cries of an ill baby, slipping from its nonexistent throat.
Ven was not deceived.
“Jesus, you’re an ugly bastard, aren’t you?” He dropped into a crouch. “I don’t know who the wanker holding your leash is, but it’s time for me to go.” He pictured an empty car park, any empty car park and launched himself into the air.
Only to be slapped back down to the ground by a massive tentacle before he could fold space, the suckers ripping chunks of flesh from his torso.
He hit the sand with a grunt, the bones in his right shoulder shattering on impact. Agony detonated through his back, up into his neck, down his arm. He staggered to his feet, spinning around in time to see the tentacle responsible for his pain squirm back to its place amongst those spewing from the q’thulu’s face.
Ven bared his fangs, icy-hot pain stripping through his shoulder as the broken bones knitted instantly. Blood ran freely from the wounds torn in his torso, mingling with the sweat and sand caked on his chest. “That hurt, fucker.”
The q’thulu lumbered forward, wings battering the trees around it, displacing the air in decay-tainted gusts. Its lifeless black eyes stayed fixed on Ven, a terrible stare that made his flesh crawl.
Tensing his leg muscles, Ven prepared himself for flight once more.
And once again, was knocked to the ground.
“Oww,” he shouted. “Stop that.” He scrambled to his feet…or at least, tried to. In a whiplash-quick blow, a fat tentacle wrapped around his hip and punched its meaty tip straight into his balls.
A bellow of rage ripped from his throat. He threw back his head, gouging deep furrows into the malicious tentacle with his claws as he fought with the agony exploding in his groin.
The q’thulu squealed, the tentacle releasing its crushing grip. He dropped to the ground with a thud, new pain exploding in his body. Fists bunched, fangs bared, he lowered himself into a crouching stance. The creature looked fat and slow, but it moved faster than he did.
How the hell did he kill it?
You just do.
An unknown voice reverberated through Ven’s head. Undeniable. Impossible to ignore. A shiver ran through him at its authority, its ascendency. His lifeless heart thumped. Once.
Six thick tentacles lashed out from the q’thulu’s face, wrapped around the truck of a young eucalyptus tree, and tore it from the ground. A squealing cry pierced his ears and then the q’thulu threw the tree straight at him.
He leapt backward, just as the tree crashed into the ground on the very spot he’d been standing. Staring hard at the q’thulu, he took another step back, searching for even ground. He needed a plan of attack. He could sink his teeth into the flabby mass of pudgy fat that may or may not be a neck, hopefully severing its main artery, but did he really want to? He was hungry, but was he that hungry?
“I bet you taste like calamari, don’t you, fat boy?”
The q’thulu let out a low, wet grunt, wings trembling, tentacles lashing.
Ven eyed the hideous thing. “Never been a fan of calamari.”
He shot forward, aiming for the q’thulu’s grotesque neck, mouth wide, fangs lengthening. A shimmer of icy heat rippled through him, almost identical to the sensation he experienced every time he folded space. Suddenly his arms were longer and more muscled, his flesh no longer pale but jet black and leathery. He flexed his fingers and found them to be talons larger than an eagle’s.
The q’thulu’s dead eyes rolled. It hissed, its tentacles thrashing on its face.
Fucker’s scared, Ven thought, mid-lunge. Seconds before his massive wings—wings?—thumped once more and he slammed into the q’thulu’s equally massive form.
A piercing squeal shattered the still air. The q’thulu stumbled backward, its tentacles whipping at Ven’s face.
But even that was different. He could feel it. He’d changed. But into what? Gone was his nose, his lips.