nor did he want to see the other men dead. Jaz pushes him away and looks at him with disgust, “You coward!”
“Not a Coward!” Nate screams, mad rage taking over, “Imma kill that Kreecha!” her face suddenly brightens, she hugs him quickly, and then they both run, Nate leading. They run to the Garage nearby. Nate picks up a long pole made of steel. He doesn’t know what the hell it was used for; but he knew this- It was sharp.
They run back and find that the spider is struggling to battle with just two legs on each side, a machete is stuck in one of its remaining three eyes. As they close in they see the spider trying desperately to kill Rakhib, but Rakhib dodges and strikes like he was a gladiator from the movies. But he runs out of luck as he tries to jump away from a low swipe, he bumps into another man with a baseball bat and the spider’s leg runs through his stomach. He dies screaming, “Haleema! Faraz!” the names of his wife and son, whom he would never see again, at least not in this world.
Jaz screams out again in despair. Nate screams out in rage. He runs ahead with the metallic pole held before him. He is about to thrust it into the spider’s body when a feathery wing hits him in the face. He falls back, pole held high. He doesn’t have time to look at what hit him as the Spider stumbles towards him blindly (for now, a pitchfork was in the third eye) it towers over him, right above the sharp pole. Nate doesn’t have the energy to thrust it upwards, but he finds another way. He looks at a butcher to his right. The butcher nods, understanding the plan. The butcher then screams something in his tongue, all the other butchers understand and they hack at the legs. It takes only a moment to cut off two of them and the spider falls, the pole drives through it, poking out from the other side, smeared with colourless blood.
With the creature dead, Nate shouts out happily. But none join in. What the hell? He thinks, Why aren’t they cheering?
He stands up and looks around to find everyone looking at the dead creature. Nate screams and falls down again, taken aback by the gruesome sight. The Spider had turned back to its human form. The gangster lay there, legs and one hand missing, face coated with blood, no eyes. A long sharp pole through his chest. And yet the tattoo of the Spider was clearly visible, horrible as ever, over his bloody cheek and the remaining hand.
A large shadow passed over the body. Nate looked up and found the thing that had knocked him down. A gigantic Bald Eagle was soaring around, and people were gazing up, trying to make out the situation. A giant Spider is weird enough. But this-
A kid screams and all head turns to see a giant Tiger rip apart a woman’s head. Chaos all over again. a wild Boar, a King Cobra, a Bear, a Bull, all in giant sizes. Creatures all around.
People scream, but they are silenced by a roar. They look in the direction to see a giant Lion. A few seconds later the giant turns into a man, he is naked, but he doesn’t seem to care. He has a tattoo of a Lion on his shoulder and another on his chest, “Creatures! Turn!”
All around, the wild animals turn into men, all the gangsters from the Kreecha family. The Eagle lands softly and turns into a woman, the wife of the gang’s leader, the ‘Lion’
“We apologize, humans,” the lion-turned-man says, “We are so sorry. We assumed that we could keep our secrets safe here in this wretched place. We were wrong. Two kids and one of our own kind gave us away. So please forgive us, because for our race to grow, we need it a secret. Please forgive us!”
Nate knew what this was leading to. Jaz knew what this was leading to. Even the frightened little girl by the fruit shop, who was clutching her cat to her chest knew it, so did many people. But they all prayed for one little chance. But the one they pray to might not always be there for them.
Silence. Slowly the Kreechas start turning back into their creature forms. They move back, some run to the other side of the hood, forming a ring around the humans. The Lion says some words before he turns, “Please forgive us. We need our secret to be ours and ours only. For that, we must slaughter you.”
And slaughter they did.
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About the author
Nishanth Anchan KN writes short stories for the humour and horror genre. He is sixteen and lives with his family in Karnataka, India.
Thanks to
My Dad and Mom- For telling, “Horror is bad!”, since I’m a rebel, it turns out be encouraging, seriously.
Friends on Goodreads (Aashi, Aishu, Numey, Purvi, Vani and others)
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