Overlord

44

Slater ran back and forth along a short stretch of the shore, trying desperately to see through the thick curtain of fog. He couldn’t be gone, not after all this. To be snatched up and carried away like that, she refused to allow that to be her last memory of Sam Aston. But she couldn’t put the image of Tate’s desecrated body slapping back onto the stone from her mind.

“Jo, I think we need to go!” Syed said, grabbing hold of her sleeve.

“No!” she shouted.

“There’s nothing we can do. We’ll be next. Let’s take our chances in the tunnels, find a way out.”

Jen Galicia stepped up, a bloodstone spear held in a white-knuckled grip. “I think she’s right, Slater. We have to go.”

“I won’t leave him!”

“You saw what it did to Tate!” Syed said, her voice tight with the effort not to cry.

“Look out!” Jen yelled, and the three of them ducked as another jet black, dripping tentacle whipped past them.

“We have to go!” Syed said.

They moved away from the water, ducking as the tentacle quested across the rock for them. Then a sudden, bass rumble made the ocean shiver and Digby O’Donnell cried out, as if in pain. Slater looked over and saw he had dropped the idol into the roiling sea. The tentacle reaching for them stilled for a moment, then slowly withdrew.

She frowned, looking from the retreating tentacle to Digby and back again. Then Dig was face down in the water, his back moving up and down as he thrashed around. He rose, triumphant, the glowing idol held aloft once more. Two more tentacles whipped back through the swirling mist, reaching for them.

“Get down!” Slater yelled, and all three of them dropped to the hard, cold stone as the tentacles crossed in the air above them, seeking and writhing. Slater understood. The idol was the key. Not just in terms of symbolism, but it somehow called the overlord. Directed the giant, instinct-driven animal mind of the thing. She had no idea how, but it seemed too evident to ignore.

Before the tentacles could loop back around again, she dashed forward and tried to wrest the strange statuette free of Digby’s grip. It was hot, searing her skin. She cried out, dropped back and scrabbled in her pockets for gloves. Warm sheepskin, the outer layer thick leather, she hoped they would be enough. She pulled them on and began to wrestle with Dig again. He cried out nonsensical babble, pulling the idol close to his body and trying to move deeper into the ocean, pulling her with him.

Slater was in good shape, but O’Donnell showed surprising strength. He let go with one hand and elbowed her in the mouth. She grunted in pain, staggered backward as she tasted blood, and sat heavily into the water. It swept up over her shoulders, splashed coldly into her face, but that had the advantage of clearing her head from the ringing of the blow.

“Fuck you, Digby!” she growled, and hauled herself back up, her clothes heavy from being sodden.

Another tentacle reached past, then she heard a grunt of effort and another bass moan as Jen Galicia slashed at the shining black flesh with her bloodstone spear. Digby cried out in pain along with the beast and Slater took her chance. She drove herself forward, chest deep in the cold sea, and swung a punch at Digby’s jaw. She connected with a satisfying crunch, made him grunt in pain, but he stayed up and didn’t release the idol.

Jen continued to slash and stab at the tentacles with her spear, trying to buy them time. Syed waded out into the sea, heading for Slater. She welcomed any help she could get against the crazed O’Donnell, but then screamed wordlessly as another thick tentacle snaked out of the mist and plucked Syed up and away.

Tears in her eyes, Slater turned her attention back to Digby, trying to catch up to him, but wading through the shoulder deep water was too hard. He was taller, stronger, able to keep his distance from her, grinning as he held the glowing idol above his head.

Slater growled, tried to push faster and saw Jen coming in from the other side, heading for Digby’s back. But did the woman have the strength to carry on? Her face was pale, darkness ringed her eyes. And was Aston still even alive? She had to believe he was, but even then, she was failing.

Through O’Donnell’s eyes, Aston witnessed Slater’s pain and struggle. He tried to take control of O’Donnell’s thoughts, tried to make the man drop the idol again, but ironically, it was the idol that seemed to make the man invulnerable to him. And once again, the creature’s awareness was back on the present and Aston was drawn in again. That thick tongue-like appendage with its slavering, teeth-filled sucker, reached up for him once more.

A sudden thought occurred to Aston, a memory of something O’Donnell had said. They do my bidding. He had been talking about the mantics, about how the group was safe from them if O’Donnell willed it. If he couldn’t convince Digby to do his bidding, maybe he could get the mantics to respond.

Several of them still milled around in the mist on the shore, confused by the complicated and contradictory thoughts of all those sharing the hive mind. Too much free will was being exerted on something that should work as one unit. Aston forced his attention to a small group of three of them near the struggle between Slater and O’Donnell. He put thoughts of threat and danger into their minds. Then he directed that thought at Digby O’Donnell, forced the mantics to see Digby as the danger, as the source of the confusion. “Finish him!” Aston shouted, with his voice and his mind. “Take him out!”

The three simple-minded creatures turned and waded out into the water as Aston felt the touch of cold, black slime on his face. He snapped back to his own present and realized the tooth-filled sucker was about to clamp over the top of his head. With a shriek of panic, he slashed at it with his dagger.

The overlord bellowed in pain, quickly retracted a few feet, then immediately came for him again. Using all his strength, Aston drew back his arm and flung the dagger directly into the approaching, slavering maw.