Sinth Stalker - Pearl Tate Page 0,20

his shoulder, and the strange men and one woman aren’t slowing down. The biggest is almost to my stalker before I realize he’s waiting for me.

Really? Feeling for the trunk to my right, I try to balance myself, cursing the fact that I’ve lost my backpack as I fumble above my head for another branch with my left hand. When I slap the branch with enough force that it hurts, I grasp onto it and pull myself up. The other bumbling, disgusting people have started to slam into my stalker, and I turn away when I see one of them latch onto his arm with their teeth.

My eyes flicker to his as nausea and pity sweep over me. He helped me, and now they’re attacking him. Clearly, he’s not with them. He’s not some kind of break-off member who stumbled across me. Climbing two branches higher, I’m probably six to seven feet above his head by the time I look down to see him fighting with the five of them.

And really, it isn’t even fighting. For one thing, fighting would mean they put up a fight. You know, something that lasted at least a minute or so, like what I was doing with the first woman he killed. Her crumpled body still twitches occasionally. Gross.

No, this isn’t a fight so much as cleaning. It’s fast. The first guy, who was the biggest, is dead before I even look back down, and the one who took a chunk out of his arm is chewing it! Blood streams down his chin as he continues to bump his body forward over and over. His eyes are unseeing as three others nudge into him from behind, all of them lunging toward my stalker.

Instead of pushing them away as I expect, I watch from above as he grabs two and hugs them to his body with their arms pinned to their side and facing away. They don’t try to get away, and they’re only struggling to turn around in his arms. Neither compares to his size.

For a second, there’s a slight shimmer in the air around them, and it’s as if prisms of light flicker around them right before they explode in his arms! What did he just do?

I’m still reeling in shock while I hug the trunk as the other two people, a younger man and a super old guy who can barely stand up straight, practically fall into him in their haste. But the next thing I know, they run into each other as the stalker’s body shimmers and seems to fade to an almost transparent texture. I’m still blinking in shock when he jumps and reappears next to them, grabbing them both the same way he held the others—facing away with their arms pinned down.

Then bam!

They blow up just like the others. It’s the most incredible yet scary thing I’ve ever seen. What kind of weapon is he using that he can make people explode like that?

As I watch him pick up the original woman’s body whose neck he crushed, he shimmers again, and she explodes into dust just like the others. Her remains rain down around him, and I feel slightly woozy to see him start coughing. That’s super gross.

He has to be inhaling them. Slowly, he stops waving the air around him and looks up at me. Snapping my mouth shut, I stare back without a word. What can I say? I consider all the questions I have, but then he looks away, turning around, and takes a step back and disappears! Totally gone!

Staring down at my backpack, I wonder what the odds are I can get down and grab it before he comes back? Where did he even go? A new idea pops into my head. I suddenly start to wonder … is this guy human? Besides the fact that he’s more physically fit than anyone I’ve ever seen in person, he’s been able to essentially jump from one tree to the next, and now it’s confirmed. He can fucking disappear.

Just as I shift to lower my leg to the branch below, I see the telltale shimmer, and he reappears, setting down a small canister before glancing up at me and picking up my backpack. I watch, frustrated, as he shimmers before walking away and disappearing again! What the fuck!

Now I’m pissed! That bag contains everything I hold dear. Mementos and clothing and water. Not all my money, but about half of the cash I took from Einar. He