I could hear a low rumble. Close by.
“…Somehow,” I finished, my voice dropping low.
I was in pieces. I couldn’t fight.
The dragon was close.
It couldn’t be simple.
We collectively drew back as the dragon advanced into an intersection. Brushing up against an older pickup, the great scaled beast shifted the vehicle out of its parking spot, sending it out into the middle of the road, bumper largely scraped off.
The damn thing looked like it could take on four modern tanks and win.
A hand gripped the back of Peter’s shirt, pulling him back, and me with him.
The satyr.
He raised a finger to his mouth.
The giant, as it turned out, was quiet. It moved at a plodding pace, but I suspected that in a long-distance race, it would beat a running human being by virtue of sheer stride and endless stamina.
Seven or eight seconds passed as it approached our general position, and then it exhaled, long and heavy. Hot breath steamed and froze on the giant’s thick facial hair. Its face looked to be carved out of rock.
There was a sound like a building settling as it turned its head one way, then the other.
Every movement was slow, calculated, as if he considered it all with great care, deciding each in advance, then carrying it out.
He stepped over the pickup, as if it were an afterthought, his head turning as he looked in the direction the dragon had gone, past the intersection one block over, and further down the street.
Bending down, he used one hand to seize the pickup truck the dragon had grazed, and moved it back into position.
He remained where he was, bent over, one hand still on the truck.
I couldn’t make out his face. Only the back of him, one leg, and a kilt of what looked to be cow hides, threaded into a continuous garment with thongs as thick around as my remaining arm.
I saw his leg tense.
“Balls,” Peter said.
“I don’t see-” Evan started.
“Go!” I said.
One slow, continuous motion. Turning counterclockwise, pickup truck still in hand, the other hand settling on the roof of a building for stability.
The giant hurled the pickup truck at us underhand, casting it down the length of the one-way street we were on.
Roxanne shrieked.
The truck was still airborne when she’d finished. The vehicle hit ground, not far behind us, flipping end over end, unpredictable-
The satyr went over it, as it rolled, leaping. Green Eyes, low to the ground, simply flopped over, dodging it as it scraped past. The maenad tackled Tiff and hauled her out of the way. Peter, overburdened, trying to move too fast, fell, taking me with him.
The truck rolled past.
The faceless woman, further ahead, turned just in time to meet it, as it skidded on its roof, already losing momentum. She stumbled back, trying to put her hands out to stop it, and then fell. A moment later, she stood and dusted herself off.
The giant loomed at the far end of the street.
“Thu!” the giant called out, his voice echoing much as the bell had.
“Fee fi fo fum,” Peter muttered.
Given free reign, causing devastation that was harder to explain as people woke up. How would the locals process it all? The fire, the destroyed vehicles and city property?
War? Call it an airstrike in the night? Something else?
They’d leave, the town would plummet into the abyss, and the giant and dragon…
Well, I supposed they were tough enough to work their way free. Probably.
The dragon reappeared. Perching on a rooftop, a matter of meters from the giant.
The giant reached up, and dug thick fingers into the dragon’s loose-fitting hide.
“That explains that,” I said. “The dragon’s master.”
“Almost obvious in retrospect,” Peter said.
“Ro!” the giant howled the word.
Attack.
The dragon, still perched on the rooftop, began drooling flame.
I glanced back at the alleyway that still burned. The fire and smoke had frozen in time. The effect reasserting itself.
“Shit,” I muttered.
“Yeah,” Peter said. “Well put.”
I started trying to move, but it was slow.
Peter, in turn, tried to help me stand, but once it was achieved, slower still. He could help me, but working on his own he couldn’t help me and move quick.
The dragon breathed.
A gobbet of flamestuff. It moved in an arc, a stream and a spatter trailing behind. A few dots of fire landed on the giant’s shoulder, and were brushed off. The fire slammed into the ground in the center of all of us, liquid sloshing out diagonally across the breadth of the street, sidewalk to sidewalk, before colliding with a parked car. Effectively cutting us off from one another.
“I need wood,” I said, as the flames embraced the parked car. “I need a body.”
“I would love for you to have a body,” Peter said. “Would love for me to have a body when all of this is over, too. My priority, as it happens. No offense.”
“None taken,” I said.
The dragon leaped.
It didn’t fly so much as it glided. It used the hot air from the fire for just a little extra lift, but it was too heavy to truly rise with the hot air, as vast as its wingspan was. Too dense.
It landed on the parked car, and the burning mucus splattered everywhere.
Drooling onto the blazing vehicle, it clawed at the metal, sending flaming scraps in the general direction of Tiff, Roxanne, and the maenad. The group scattered.
I swear the dragon smiled as it lunged forward.
The maenad broke a store display window just in time for the girls to disappear inside.
The dragon began to gather fire in its mouth to spit again. I could only hear the distant shouts.
“Leave me,” I said. “Run. Take cover.”
Peter dropped me, right in the middle of the street. He ran.
This is the power Johannes can bring to bear? I wondered.
I twisted around. One intact leg, one mostly intact arm.
I headed for the nearest store. Outdoor clothing. Boots. I traveled maybe two miles an hour, doing it.
A glacially slow pace, as I was out in the open. In full view of the giant. The dragon only just happened to be after moving prey.
Reach forward, pull myself forward another foot or two, toe digging in snow and ice for traction to push myself forward, using my broken hand, or the hard edge of my elbow. Where the ice was beneath me, it was possible to slide forward, harder to find traction. Where it was road and snow, the opposite was true. Never easy.
Reach forward…
The giant lurched forward. Dark eyes larger than I was now focused on me.
I continued moving, because there was little else I could do. Peter was already long gone.
Evan distracted the giant. Flying past, right at eye level.
Again, he did it.
Then he backed off. He was learning. Moving over to help the others with the dragon again.
The satyr had a weapon out, and whipped a stone at the giant. Barely a tap, but it got a moment’s attention, and a moment was apparently a meaningful amount of time to a giant, as ponderous and decisive as the creature was.
I reached the base of the store display, on the far side of the street, and I stabbed the window with the Hyena.
Glass broke, raining down around me.
The giant approached, covering more distance than I had with half a stride. It bent down.
I crawled through, over broken glass, and into the store. I tumbled down to the base of the display.
The hand reached through, breaking the display wider. Fingers scraped.