It rushed towards the monster like a broiling wave of heat. The air squirmed under its might.
They collided and the beast slammed into the wall with its full hulking mass. The ground shook and dust fell from the ceiling. It thrashed with all of its power, crushing the concrete beneath its stubby arms and disgusting jaws.
“We can’t get through!” Victor shouted from behind while trying to steady himself.
Sean pushed another wave of energy out and felt the power collide with the primitive mind that controlled the monster. Its attempts at resisting his influence only caused it more pain and damage.
Abruptly, the movements stilled, and the fleshy creature slammed into the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. The grouped looked amongst themselves with the first signs of hope since their attempt at escape began.
They waited and watched for any sign of life before growing brave enough to proceed past the comatose creature.
They inched forward, going slower and slower as they neared it. The trio pushed their backs against the crumbling concrete and crept forward. As they stepped closer to its sickening maw, Victor brushed against one of its many unfocused eyes, scraping a layer of sticky fluid from it.
They all froze as they saw his pant leg get sucked to the creature's body.
He jerked it back only for the whole creature to shake slightly. The trio shared a worried look before they reached down to free him.
They pulled as hard as they could only for the fabric to slip off of him. The polyester track pants were thoroughly stuck to the monster, pulling down his boxers with them and showing everything they contained to the world.
Sean and Devon looked at each other before coming to a silent decision. The tattooed man grabbed under his arms while Sean took hold of his shoulder.
“Wait, what are you guys doing?!”
They all froze as the familiar sound of the meatball stole their attention. They flicked their gazes down the hall and saw the meaty beast reforming after its last collision.
“I guess it’s been pretty long since we lost it.”
“We need to get the fuck out of here!” The young hispanic man went pale.
The rest of the body was twisted around itself in its horror filled thrashing and would have been highly dangerous to even try getting past. They only had one option and an iffy bet to save them.
Sean grabbed Devon’s attention and nodded back towards the collapse halls. He nodded in understanding before turning to look at the meatball once more.
It was just starting to move. The short path only gave them seconds to act before they would join the mush that made up its horrific features.
“Now!” He shouted and pulled Victor by the arm.
The young man landed in his embrace with Devon crashing to the ground mere moments later in an attempt to not crush the smaller guys.
“Oh, thank god.” Sean looked up to the Reaper who had his eyes tightly closed and his hands covering the sides of his face.
“Hey do you wanna-”
The meatball slammed into the end of the hallway, splattering them with a mixture of its juices and the eldritch inchworm that they had just done in. Sean grabbed the man in his arms out of surprise.
“Stop cuddling and get up! Don’t give it time to reform!” The tattooed man shouted back and rushed past the meaty mess.
Victor opened his eyes and looked at Sean below him. Their noses were less than an inch apart. Their stare lasted for a quarter of a second too long.
“We can kiss later, just get off me already.”
They scrambled to their feet and rushed past the slowly reshaping ball. The trio picked up the pace as the taste of freedom began returning once more.
The dark tunnel was worlds apart from the clean and manicured view they had been given of the rest of Drake’s facility, but they were in no mood to complain.
A minute of running and a few turns later, they finally found their salvation. A massive metal door reminiscent of a vault sat before them with a fluorescent emergency exit sign flashing above it.
“This has to be a trap. Why would a mad scientist have a well-marked exit.”
“He took all of this infrastructure over from the city. My dad used to do repairs on the sewers before the monsters started appearing more frequently. This is a cut off between two of the eight sewage systems of the city and it should lead to some escape ladders if we go far enough.”
The coworkers looked at the young man with a hint of surprise.
“What? I can’t know shit?” They merely shrugged before moving to the locking mechanism. A round wheel that looked more at home in a submarine than a sewer.
The click of heels made them all freeze in place. They all slowly turned to look at the source. Down the hall, wreathed in red emergency lights that flickered on and out, the psycho was taking slow but purposeful steps forward. Each footfall beating down on their hope.
“You know, I really wasn’t expecting you to get past any of my experiments, let alone all of them. Color me impressed. There must have been dozens.”
The flickering lights made him look even more imposing.
“Well, we really only had to deal with two.” Sean responded as his hand began slapping at the taller man behind him. A brief look of annoyance overtook the crazy person before slipping back to the calculated stare that had just adorned his face.
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Devon felt for the metal wheel but refused to peel his eyes from the scientist.
“That door takes five seconds for one of my specialized beasts to open. More like thirty seconds for one of you.” He took a few more steps forward before pausing. “Why is his dick out?” All three of them turned to look at the young hispanic man's legs that had just been freed into the cool tunnel air.
They stared with a variety of complex emotions before turning to look back at the scientist.
Drake rolled his eyes.
“You know, my experiments are cathartic. Truly wellsprings for my emotions. Therapy if you may.” He moved forward once more with a heavy click of his heels. “And then my raw materials get out and start running around my home. I mean imagine if your bread loaf decided to grow legs and make a mad dash for your front door. Beyond jarring if you ask me.”
Devon turned and began spinning the door locking wheel like his life depended on it.
“You won’t get to finish that. I am gonna go over there and rip your spines out of your body. The bones aren’t of much interest to me after all.” He spoke like it was already guaranteed.
The fleshy beasts flashed through their minds. The clear end result to their precious bodies if they failed now.
“Hold on Drake, we can talk about-” Sean stopped as the scientist burst with motion, far faster than he had ever seen someone moving in such tall heels.
Devon threw his whole effort at the locking mechanism while the psycho rushed at them. Sean moved ahead to meet the charging man while Victor stood frozen in shock, pantless and confused.
“You better be loads of fun. After I saw all that stuff in your DNA, I got pretty excited!"
They met halfway down the hall.
Sean threw a punch towards the lithe man only for his body to bend unnaturally around the blow. His spine seemed to have a mind of its own as the upper body stayed its course and his thin muscular legs bent to move him safely. He was more like a biological gimbal flowing with the vibrations rather than a human being.
Drake's skinny arm flicked forwards and found purchase under Sean’s chin, coiling like a snake seeking to constrict its prey. He could do very little more than stumble forward while pulling at the arm that was rapidly depriving him of oxygen.
“Argh-Hel-p-plea-” His begging ended as the arm constricted tighter.
The full weight of the psycho flung around his side, throwing him to the ground and latching around him like some twisted piggy back ride. Darkness soon began to creep into his vision after only a few seconds of the hold cranking onto his neck.
“Vic-Vic-”
The younger man rushed towards the grapple as he began to lose consciousness. Sean’s feet flailed in the air, slowly losing the vigor they had mere moments before. Nothing he was doing loosened the ironclad grip that only seemed to grow tighter by the second. A faint ringing had developed in his ears as the pressure finally subsided.
Everything filled with life again. A warm flush fell over his body and his vision returned. He went to sit up when a blow to his back shocked him
‘I’m in a fucking fight. I forgot!’ He pushed himself against the ground and away from the man below him. A deep inhale of stinking air sucked through his teeth as he tried to regain awareness of what was happening.
“Ow, you asshole!” Victor shouted behind him while a cacophony of noises filled the air.
Sean stumbled to his feet and looked towards Devon rapidly spinning the wheel and then at the gruesome fight.
The lithe scientist had wrapped himself around Victor in much the same way he had done Sean mere moments before.
One of the young man’s arms dripped with blood while the other yanked at a hand that was cranking his ankle at a strange angle. Painful grunts left Victor's lungs. His attempts to stay upright failed as they tumbled to the ground with Drake taking the top position.
Sean shuffled towards them. Blood had finally returned to him, freshening his senses back to normal. A faint hint of weakness persisted but the fight wouldn’t be paused for him. He curled his hand into a white knuckled fist and fell to his knees as the attack came down to the villain's shoulder.
At the last second, the psycho’s whole upper body twisted away from the blow in an inhuman contortion. The fist slammed into the concrete, barely missing the leg the man had just abandoned. The ground shattered under the blow with the help of Sean's enhanced strength. Small shards shot into the air and a thin layer of dust floated from the ground.
“Aoooh. Okay. I told you you’re good material.” Drake had a twisted grin on his face. His pearly white teeth peaked through his puffy lips.
“Fuck you!”
“Fuck….you.”
The pair of fighters took turns cursing the scientist out while taking in deep labored breaths.
“How about we-” Sean’s attempt at buying time failed as the scientist bolted forward with the same deadly grace as before.
Victor scrambled to his feet as they waited for the clash to happen. The hallway was just wide enough for the pair to stand shoulder to shoulder with a small gap on either side of them. The horrifyingly fast approach left them stunned as they moved to meet him.
Closer and closer they grew, yet the momentous clash never happened.
The scientist pirouetted and leapt from one leg into the air, straight overhead in a display of perfect bodily control. A blast of air pushed past their faces, causing them to slam their eyes shut. They planted their feet to skid to a stop and turned to look behind them.
Drake was running straight for Devon with a maniacal grin spreading over his face with every step he took.
The man looked more terrified than Sean had ever seen before. Tight lines appeared at the corner of his mouth as he prepared for the inevitable skirmish. Despite the arriving apocalypse, he hadn’t stopped spinning away.
Sean threw his hand forward and a blast of psychic energy flew towards the attacker with all the force he could muster. The scientist leapt into the air with his hands in a clawed grip, ready to shred the man to pieces.
Right before they could meet, Sean’s attack smashed into the psycho. The psychic energy suffused his body and funneled into his brain. Before it could get to work scrambling his mind, it was rudely rebutted like it had just run into a brick wall.
The man flew by Devon with a surprised look painting his face. His head whipped around to stare at the offending individual with a slightly feral look.
“Keep on surprising me, I love it.” The sick grin sent shivers down Sean’s spine.
The reprieve didn’t last very long as he shot back towards Devon with a determined expression. The pair met with violence on the mind. Fast jabs launched at the fragile looking man's face only for him to squirm his way out of the attacks. Low kicks flew out, smashing into Devon’s calves with brutal efficiency.
The onlookers burst into motion, running forward to help their comrade. The singular man held up much better under the scientist's assault than either of the other two.
By the time they made it, neither side had taken an edge. Their combined might pushed the scientist away and back into the dimly lit hall.
“I think I’m almost done. Distract him!” Devon turned back towards the wheel and got to his task.
Victor took the lead, rushing towards their enemy with his exposed bits flapping in the air.
In a display of grace, Drake spun around the lunging figure and flicked his heel into the bare crotch. The toe box of his high-heel caught the man’s nuts and flung them into his lower stomach like a pendulum.
“OOOOOOOOOOH!” Sean shouted in despair as he watched the sight unfold from a distance.
The sound of meat on meat left him queasy. Victor fell to his knees and immediately began vomiting bile from his empty stomach.
“Oh shut up. This is why I gave up on those bits. Too much vulnerability for so little benefit. Whatever, let’s end this.” Sean watched as Drake did a series of strange motions with his hand that caused his wrists to click as they moved.
The fingernails extended into long knife-like instruments that shimmered under the flickering lights. His hand straightened into a spear-like shape and turned his attention to the downed figure crying at his feet. Sean knew what was about to happen.
The young man on the ground wasn’t long for this world.
A deadly weapon shaped like a hand was about to pierce through his spin and yank it out like bones from cooked fish. Drake's prophecy would come true. A horrible pit formed in his stomach. They had almost made it to freedom.
The trio of adventurers escaping a maze filled with horrible monsters and gruesome scenes. Fantastical in every way.
Sean reached out to the villain with all of his desires at the forefront. A red glow rapidly formed on his hand and lashed out with its viscous light melting through the dark hallway.