The Damned Summer (The Ruin Trilogy) (27 page)

Lloyd's teeth snapped at the monster's face as it
sliced at the dog with its claws, forcing him to back up. Frank drew back his
fist and slammed it into the demon's jaw, breaking off one of its incisors.

The creature replied by kicking Frank back across
the room with its supernatural strength. The monster flew toward him as he
crashed into the wall, the air knocked out of him.

The beast's mouth was open wide, its claws coming
towards Franks face as it flew towards him. For a moment, Frank thought it was
the end until he saw Lloyd also flying through the air, clamping his jaws down
on the side of the demon's throat right before it reached Frank.

The fiend's claws quickly reversed back towards
Lloyd, trying to rip the dog loose of its throat.

Frank brought both of his fists forward into the
demon's face, trying to stop it from ripping Lloyd apart.

The monster slashed out at Frank's face with one of
its clawed hands, slashing Frank's face and neck, knocking him to the floor.

Frank's vision blurred as he crumpled to the floor,
pain burning across his face as his lungs still tried to draw in oxygen. From
the looks of the fight between beast and dog it appeared that either the demon
was going to rip Lloyd loose from its neck and kill him or they were going to
die together as they ripped each other's jugulars out.

Lloyd couldn't die. He had to live to protect the
child. Frank found the strength to raise up off the floor, grab the IV pole,
raising it up and slamming it into the demon's skull like a baseball bat.

The demon lost grip of Lloyd as the back of its
skull was caved in, which allowed Lloyd to rip the fiends throat completely
out.

Frank used the IV pole as a cane, leaning down to
the dying fiend.

"Your last chance to finish me off, and you
botched it."

The demon looked up at Frank, Lloyd hovering over
him like a hungry wolf. "Don't matter," it somehow rasped through its
mangled throat. "This fight has caused you to have a stroke that will end
your life. You are out of this fight regardless, which was the primary
goal."  

Frank nodded his head, feeling his life fading out,
like a dimmer switch slowly being turned down.

"You know," Frank spoke through dry lips.
"If you would have just let me be, instead of killing off my family, I
never would have got back in the fight."

The fiend glared at him, saying nothing.

"Your job would have been so much easier
without us involved, don't you think?" Frank smiled. "Without Lloyd
and I involved in this little ruckus, this would have been an easy slam dunk
for you. That's got to chew at you."

The demon coughed up dark blood. "Don't matter,
you'll be gone now, and the baby will be easy pickings without you around to
protect her."

"True," Frank agreed with a nod. "But
Lloyd will be here, and he was always the one you were really scared of."

Frank reached over, rubbing Lloyd's ear. Lloyd
returned a quick lick to his hand, still keeping an eye on the demon. Frank's
vision went into black, as the stroke killed him.

"This has to be the last funeral,"
Sarah thought to herself, watching Frank's
coffin slowly being lowered into the ground.
"This town has hit its
death quota for the rest of the year in just the last month."

She dabbed at tears for Frank, her mother,
her friends and herself as well.

"Stupid girl,"
she scolded herself, touching her stomach.
"Stupid
girl that has ruined her future. Might as well stop filling out college
applications and just go get a job at Joe's Cup. What's the point of even
finishing high school now?"

She felt a hand rubbing her back, she turned,
seeing that it was Jake, genuine concern seemed to be in his eyes.

Turning away, she barely concealed a sigh of
annoyance. In all honesty, Jake had stepped up to the plate to the best of his
limited ability. He had a part time job working at the grocery store, had been
going to school regularly and had even pulled his grade point average up to a C
plus, right on the edge of a B. He was respectful to her dad to the point of
servitude and was constantly thanking him for letting him stay in their home,
always asking him if there was anything that needed fixed or worked on around
the house.

"I'll be honest with you honey,"
her dad had said to her one night when Jake was at work. "I knew that boy
was going to drive me nuts living here, but I was completely wrong on how he
was going to make me crazy."

"How's that," she had asked, still
uncomfortable with Jake's new residency in their home as well at that time.

"I thought he would just be sitting on
his ass all day, doing nothing, but watching TV and thinking he can smoke in my
house. Instead he is constantly thanking me and asking what he could do to earn
his keep here."

"That's a bad thing?"

"Of course not, but I'm running out of
ideas. The next thing you know, he's going to ask me if I want a foot
massage."

She had replied with a fake, almost forced
laugh, cause even though it should have been funny, it wasn't. Nothing was
anymore.

She wasn't uncomfortable about Jake living at
the house anymore, now she was just annoyed. Even though he was doing
everything he could to make things work, all she saw was the cause of
everything that went wrong. It seemed like he was able to completely destroy
her future in a blink of an eye. A part of her knew it wasn't right to blame
him for everything, but she just couldn't get it out of her head. It's all she
seemed to dream about at night. She kept trying to climb out of a sewer
manhole, but Jake kept pulling her back down. She would look down at him,
screaming to let her go, and there he would be, only now he was some strange
green slime monster, clinging to her like a parasite.

"Stay,"
he would demand, as his face slowly oozed
away to sludge.
"This is where you belong now."

Most of the dreams weren't that bad, but
occasionally she would have that one, forcing her awake, wrecking the rest of
the night for her as anxiety crawled over her heart like a swarm of spiders.

She forced herself to just breath. Things
were tough right now, but she'd get through it. She was going to graduate and
go to college. She was going to show this baby that there is nothing that can't
be accomplished, if you set your mind to it.

She looked back at Jake, giving him a fake
smile. She had her mind set on being a good mom, but as much as she tried to
give Jake a chance, every day she wanted him gone more and more, whether it was
right or not. He was bad news, and it was only a matter of time before this
facade he was carrying on would eventually crumble.

The demon watched Sarah from a distant
tombstone, leaning on it.
"We'll, we're half way there,"
it
said to itself.
"Once Jake is completely out of the picture I can focus
on her doubts at motherhood."

The slime dream had worked wonders on her
already troubled feelings with Jake. The damn dog was in the house with them as
well, and it was limiting his access to Sarah's dreams, but nowhere as well as
when Frank was around. From what the demon could discern, Frank seemed to be
the one with the skill of finding the path to get in the demon's way into the
dreams of others, while the dog was the warrior that made it so hard to get by.
Without Frank, Lloyd was having a hell of a time finding him before he slipped
past into dreamland. At best, Lloyd was catching him half the time.

"Just like the old days, when Franky was
solo," the monster said. "Separately, you two just ain't much
concern."

The demon let out a big stretch. "Now
this is going to be like taking candy from a baby." He chuckled, looking
at Sarah's stomach. "Only I'll be taking a whole lot more than just
candy."