Chapter 37: Among us

Chapter 37: Among us

The group readied themselves for battle, as much as a bunch of college students with little to no real life battle experience could possibly be.

Luna grabbed the pole of a standing lamp to use as a spear, Sam lifted up a chair wielding it awkwardly across the commercial building, but both Medusa and Uriel were barehanded. She didn't need a weapon because of her martial arts training while Uriel could make his revolver appear instantly thanks to his trait.

The group traversed the halls, shops and staircases without any luck in finding the skinwalker. There weren't any traces or clues left behind by the cunning creature, but something like that was to be expected considering how it enjoyed to play with its victims instead of facing them directly in combat.

More than hunters, they just looked weird and lost because that was precisely their situation right now. Their only hope of making it alive was to find the creature and... feed it a bunch of silver earrings. None of that made any sense, but they all saw how the skinwalker took a bullet to the head and survived. As strange as it seemed, even something as deranged as that was a better option than trying to kill it with brute force.

Uriel was even more dubious than the rest of his companions because he knew how unreliable his information was. After all, how reliable can the tale of an old Navajo witch doctor who barely mentioned a skinwalker's weakness be?

"Can you guys hear that?" Luna said, her eyes closed in an attempt to focus on the sound.

"I think it comes from over there." Sam said pointing towards a small room behind a counter.

Medusa fearlessly kicked the door open holding a battle stance right after the door opened. She expected to find the skinwalker inside or at least some sort of creature, but she was was greeted by the pitiful sight of a wounded young man sobbing.

"I tried... I tried so hard but it just won't die." Atomic's clothes were in shambles, his breath jagged, but there wasn't a single visible wound on his body. Uriel grasped Medusa's shoulder when she tried to head inside the bathroom to help Atomic.

"Don't go, he may be the skinwalker." He said shaking his head.

"Ah! Yes, I realized too late that if I got separated I wouldn't be able to come back to the group. Don't mind me, I'll stay in here until Miss Dragonfang returns." Atomic sighed

"I'm not falling for that trick." The skinwalker grinned. "I know what you want to do and I won't put it that easy." The creature said mockingly with Medusa's voice.

The skinwalker slowly but surely started gaining ground on Medusa, getting closer and closer towards Uriel. His hands were shaking, sweat running down his forehead clouding his view. The situation was far from ideal, especially after Medusa received a powerful elbow strike on the ribs that left her lying on the floor struggling to breathe. The cryptid then pounced on Uriel, but was stopped mid air by Luna who was brandishing the standing lamp pole as a spear. It wasn't sharp enough to pierce through the cryptid's tough skin, but at least she managed to save Uriel in the last second and pin the skinwalker to the wall.

"Fire now!" Luna shouted.

A deafening bang was heard and the tile right above the cryptid's head cracked into pieces as the bullet missed by just a couple centimeters.

"Ha, ha, ha! You missed your only chance!" Said the creature grinning ever more widely until its maw parted disfiguring its face, it grew taller as long claws erupted through its nails and its skin became black. The contrast of its now jet black skin and the white of its eyes made it look like a creature brought directly from a nightmare.

Luna struggled to keep the cryptid pinned to the wall, but it didn't resemble a person anymore and its crawls gave it a longer reach, even longer than Luna's improvised weapon.

Waving its long arm, the creature managed to leave a scratch on Luna's face with the clear intention of mimicking her, but Uriel wasn't going to allow it. Luna watched in disbelief how Uriel, instead of shooting his gun, jumped towards the horrid creature making a fist with his hand. The creature laughed maniacally at the flimsy evolved, opening its maw and waving its impossibly long tongue in an unsettling manner.

Uriel moved fast, maybe faster than he ever had, but the difference in speed between him and the creature was too much and he ended up getting caught in the air. Uriel's eyes widened up from pain, but he didn't let a single gasp or yelp. Now that the students were out of combat, the creature was able to savor its victory by licking Uriel's face, and then drawing him near.

"Do something, he'll get eaten!" Medusa shouted enduring the pain of her cracked rib cage. But not even Luna could help, she could only see how the incredibly strong and cunning cryptid opened its maw wider and wider to eat Uriel. Just before the skinwalker was able to close its maw to devour her prey, Uriel grinned and spitted an earring into the creature's foul mouth.

"Here's your medicine!" He said scornfully. "It was prescribed to you by a navajo witch doctor."

The creature let go of Uriel as it walked backwards, clasping its throat as if being burned from the inside. Coughing and twisting, morphing its appearance into that of many different people until its skin began to boil and evaporate leaving nothing but a single flux orb behind.