Luna took a long step backwards as the creature broke through the surface to stare right at her. A nightmarish head of tentacles was all she could see in the dark, hovering in the middle of the pool - facing her with features unseen.
She reflexively raised the hammer-scythe above her head and was about to strike, when another image flashed past her mind. It resembled a memory, but distinctly different - more akin to a scenario she’d make in her head as she struggled to fall asleep, of horror and dread lurking in the darkness. In this scenario, she swung at the pool and toppled over, dropping into the dark, murky depths to be swallowed by more of the monstrosities hiding within.
She’d never spoken so directly with her meat before, but the point was clear - the warning was sound. She’d be a fool to strike at it. She instead took a long step backwards to gain some distance from the creature, only to see it follow her perfectly. Another image - this time of a shark that had scorched itself into her mind; a shark that moved just like this creature… it was already aware of her - stalking her… readying to pounce.
“Go home, Pupper…” Luna muttered through the side of her mouth, but the hound did not move. It stayed a pace behind her, but did not escape.
Finally, the inevitable happened. Before she could repeat her command to the hound, her heel got hooked on a tangle of roots, finally tipping her backwards onto the wet mire.
A crashing sound of water sounded as the dark figure launched itself up from the pool. She struggled to get her eyes on it - everywhere she glanced, she could see nothing but the darkness of the mire. That was until she felt the cold, clammy appendages clamp down around her leg.
Pupper was barking loudly at that point, howling at the creature creeping over the mire. From what Luna could make out, it resembled and appeared like the torso of a man. But rather than arms and legs, it spurted dense bunches of tentacles that were already in the process of claiming her weapon and legs.
“Fuck! Pupper, go!” Luna shouted at the dog. And go, she did.
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Pupper’s massive, white form appeared over her to assail the Monstrum from behind, clamping her long snout and impressive rows of teeth down on the creature’s center. Its response was immediate - it loosened half its tentacles from Luna’s legs and instead turned them on the hound, wrapping the beast in the fleshy vines.
Hearing Pupper’s whine of panic, Luna felt time stop. Dread overcame her as in the span of a single second, the horrors of the world threatened to crush her. Starting from the death of her mother, she was forced to live through the helplessness of hiding from monsters such as these - monsters she’d briefly considered a dreadful fairy tale, only to have her life destroyed by them. Now, like then, it had come from the depths - simply appearing when she last expected it…
But something promised her a way - something at the edge of her mind. Something that didn’t need the weapon it had claimed, something far more potent than she, alone could be.
Luna roared with pain and fury as her hands split between her index and ring fingers. A long, curved claw unfurled from inside her wrist, cutting through her own flesh with its razor-sharp edges. She tightened her hands into fists and looked down into the terror-stricken, glistening eyes of her protector - silently promising: “Not today, Pup.”
She jerked her upper body downwards and unleashed the fury of that passing glance of hopelessness - of being chased by the beasts, of losing Guy to them.
Luna’s tight hands led the razor-sharp claws to its butter-smooth flesh, spraying her and the hound with droplets of its warm, nourishing blood.
Logan had promised that the best way to kill them was with fire and the second-best was to simply keep cutting. Keep crushing. Keep destroying until it could no longer regenerate. At that moment, she was glad to not have any fire handy and set her mind to destroying it - freeing the hound first of all.
She only wished she could’ve seen it - the slaughter she was unleashing on the Monstrum. She had gotten up and freed her companion; now, it was her moment to shine - to take back what they’d stolen from her. Her freedom - her dignity.
Seated atop the thorax-like body, she slashed faster and faster, cutting tendril after tendril until they stopped spurting. And only then, when it lay motionless and writhed on the mire, did she get up to shake the hammer-thing free from the vines and turned its flat end up. With a grin, she used her transformed appendages to grip it tightly, sinking it down on the body with all her might to spray the mires with warm, cooling, savory gore.
And in the darkness, a few steps away - staring at her and her murderous hound, Jorn grinned as widely as his cheeks would allow.