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Prologue
The three figures slowly made their way across the star-lit beach, the ocean surf swirling round their ankles. From the way they crouched, scurrying along the sand, you could tell they weren't supposed to be there. Ahead of them was a tropical jungle, surrounding a tall, craggy mountain. There should have been birdsong, even this late in the night. There should have been some sort of animal noise. There wasn't. On reaching the edge of the jungle, the leader of the three held up his hand, and motioned for the other two to crouch.
"What is it, Manitou?" The one that spoke in a thick Scottish accent was so large he looked like a boulder as he knelt on stubby legs. The other was female, and small enough to hide behind him.
"Something in the wind." the leader answered, in the voice of a Native American. He fumbled in his thick robe for a talisman and turned. From the light of the moon glinting off the sea, he looked much older than he was. His eyes seemed to glow yellow as he held the talisman, it was a claw of a bear, up to his wrinkled face. He stared intently at it, as if reading something on the shining surface of the claw. The other two waited patiently for him to finish.
"Come," the American told them. "We must make haste. Start changing now." With that, he struck off into the jungle. From behind you could see two bulges on his back, under his robe. His long, black ponytail swung as he walked at a fast pace through the jungle.
The large man lumbered along behind him, and the woman scurried to keep up. The man was wearing a torn t-shirt and shorts, and through the tears on these poked bristly, dark blue hair, fading to silver on his back. The woman's skin shone in the moon light in a way that suggested she wasn't entirely human.
Now the American was nearly gliding through the jungle, and the man had to swing himself along by his knuckles, like a gorilla would. His legs were much too short for running, and his arms were nearly as long as his body. The woman struggled to keep up, she was limping with both legs, if such a thing was possible. The man had to stop and wait for her so he could pick her up and carry her on his shoulder. From her vantage point on the man's impossibly wide shoulders, she could see Manitou discarding his robe as the hunches on his shoulders were widening and lengthening incredibly fast, and growing feathers all over his body not covered by the traditional baggy shorts he wore.
She looked down at the man's head, next to her. His skin had turned dark indigo and leathery, surrounded by the hairs that covered his body, which were now black. He did not have a human face now, it was more like an apes, with prominent eyebrows, sunken eyes and a squashed nose. Normally, this would have scared any person half to death, as the person who looked human a few minutes before was now resembling a silver-back gorilla.
However, these were not normal circumstances. She looked at her hands. Still all pink and pale, she thought. She closed her deep-blue eyes and concentrated. She felt the now familiar surge of animalistic power flow through her. She opened her eyes, which were now long slits and red, with a thin line for a pupil. The checked her hands again. Now they were green, scaly and clawed. She felt her face with her new hands. It was now a long, lizard-like snout. Craning her neck behind her, she could see her tail poking out through the special hole she had cut into her jeans especially for this purpose.
The American stopped running; they had reached the base of the mountain. The woman slid from her perch atop the ape man and stood on legs that had an extra, backwards facing pair of knees below the usual pair. She could see they had stopped under an overhang of rock.
"We're here then." The ape man grunted.
"Gng mphh mun," Manitou answered. A few sharp snaps issued from his head, hidden in shadow.
"Beak ssstill forming, huh, Manny?" the woman hissed. She didn't mean to, it was just the nature of the reptile.
A few more snaps were heard, and Manitou stepped from the shadows. Instead of a mouth and nose, he had a pointed beak surrounded by white feathers. His forearms and lower legs were that of an eagle, scaly, yellow and clawed. The rest of his body had brown and white feathers covering it, and he was flanked by a massive pair of wings. His eyes looked eagle-like, wide, yellow and vicious. Still, in all of their eyes you could see they were still human inside, even if they didn't look it outside.
"Sarah, do you sense any thing?" Manitou asked the lizard woman.
Eyes closed, Sarah felt around the island with the sixth sense all reptiles had, and which she had inherited. "Yesss, in the mountain. They are gathering."
"Let's go crack some freakin' skulls!" the ape man roared, beating his chest.
"Calm down, John. They'll hear us," Manitou whispered.
"Heh. Already did," said a voice as dry as a crypt. It came from the shadows between the trees. "Monkey boy crashing through the jungle." it sang in a taunting voice.
"Thought I killed you," said John gruffly.
"You can't kill me." The owner of the voice leaped onto John's expansive chest, faster than anything should move. It pushed its face with its taunt, grey skin towards his, its eyes with glinting red irises and tiny, pin prick pupils boring into his own.
"I'm already dead," it said, breathing the stench of rotting flesh into John's face. John grabbed it and threw it as hard as he could away from him, retching at the smell. It hit a tree with a sickening thud and slid to the floor.
"That's the second time you broken my neck, monkey boy," it snarled from its prone position.
"Leave it, John, we have a more pressing matter at hand," Manitou said as John moved to finish the creature off. Turning, John could see that Manitou was flapping his wings, holding Sarah aloft in the air.
"We must head for that cave on the mountainside," Manitou motioned to a dark hole halfway up the mountain. "I'm sure you can climb up, I must take Sarah."
"See you up there, then," John shouted at the rising figure.
"Ten seconds it will take me to rise. Ten seconds is all you have left, monkey boy," said the crumpled heap behind him.
"Whatever." John lumbered over to the sturdiest tree he could find, and begun to climb. The tree creaked the nearer he climbed to the top. At the top, he jumped off the tree and grabbed onto the overhang and scrambled onto it.
"Your ten seconds are up, monkey boy." As he heard that, a hand grabbed his ankle. John shook it off and stamped as hard as he could on it. The overhang shook as he felt the wrist break and heard the creature fall to the ground.
Better get climbing, he thought. He fought that creature once before, but then he had his friends with him. He couldn't face the D.M.W. alone.
He knuckled his way to a promising looking ledge of stone and began to climb, letting the instincts of the gorilla take over. He could feel it guiding his hands and feet to sturdy footholds, leaving his mind to think of a suitable plan of attack should the creature catch up.
Which it always did. The D.M.W. didn't need to sleep, eat or even breathe. You could run from it, but you had to stop to eat and sleep. While you did that it slowly caught up with you. It could walk on the seabed if it needed to. It felt pain, but that just made it more determined to kill you. Luckily, there was only one of them. It was part of an unknown plot to overrun the Earth with its allies. All that stood in their way was Manitou and his disciples.
Looking up, John could see he was half way there. Looking down he could see the creature following him. He found a nice, hard and, above all, heavy rock and threw it at the monster. It hit it square in the chest and it lost its grip on the mountainside. John continued to climb until he heard it smack into the ground. Looking down again, he saw it sprawled on the overhang. From the fall, he could see it had a broken leg as well as the wrist and neck he had given it before. Slowly, it managed to stand up.
"What the -" was all John managed before the rock he dropped flew back and smashed into his shoulder. He roared in pain, and the creature laughed in triumph.
"Screw you!" John yelled and started to climb, faster than before.
Sarah and Manitou where waiting in the cave mouth when they heard John's yell. Manitou motioned to Sarah to stay put as he flew out of the cave. Using his eyes, infused with the sight of the eagle he could see John climbing up to him, his shoulder bleeding. Below he could pick out the figure of the creature.
"This ends here," Manitou whispered. He took out one of the large tomahawks from his belt, hewn from stone and passed down his family line for generations. "Ancestors, animals of the air, guide my aim," he prayed, then threw down the tomahawk.
John looked up. He could see Manitou and a rapidly approaching lump of sharpened stone. It skimmed past him with a low whumming noise. Below he heard a shriek as it hit its target. He turned to look up and saw Manitou holding his arm.
"Come, we can do it," he said.
Up in the cave mouth, Sarah squinted down the tunnel. If she squinted, she could see thermal imaging, the way all lizards saw the world. The tunnel sloped downhill, and was longer than the mountain outside. Sarah was used to things like this. From the tunnel came sounds. She had heard them before, and fought a few of what made the sounds. But not this many at once. They sought to bring the world to an end. Some had powers like she, Manitou and John did, but were twisted by the madness that had created the other monsters at the end of the tunnel. Some of these monsters could look and sound like other people, people you knew and trusted. Others could possess normal animals and twist them into nightmares. They were all lead by a gigantic evil called the Nightmare, which was weak at the moment, but would become stronger if Manitou didn't banish it now. She remembered how Manitou found her. She and John were outcasts, those different from what was called the "normal" by the majority. Manitou was the witch doctor of a Native American tribe called the Diaox. The legends of that tribe say the outcasts of humanity will be called together and fight the Nightmare. Manitou had told her and John that they were the only ones he could find. He taught them to seek out their animal guide in what he called "vision quests." She had been on her vision quest and found her animal guide, which was a snake. It told her she was not alone in feeling that she was different to the people around her, and that she could trust Manitou. She turned to the sound of flapping wings. Manitou had just flown in through the cave mouth, holding up John with one hand. She noticed the blood-matted hair on his shoulder.
"I'm fine," he said gruffly, answering her question before she asked it. "Bastard has good aim. Manitou, you said that freak was blind, yet he saw me well enough and it's dark out there."
"Ssso?" Sarah interrupted. 'Its dead but ssstill moves around. What'sss your point?"
"Come. We don't want to hang around, especially with that involved."
Walking down the tunnel, the sounds grew louder. Among the noises of snarls and gnashing of pincers could be heard human voices. The one speaking had a Japanese lilt to it, and was punctuated by frantic buzzing.
"How long bzzzzzzz now?" it stuttered.
"Why does it matter?" This voice was nervous, Californian, and made you think of an owner ready to dart to the nearest hidey-hole.
"I bzzzzzzz can't wait. Bzzzzzzz how long, mazzzzzter?"
"Soon, Xanthi, soon." This voice was sly and oily. It also sounded very old, not in an infirm way, but a voice steeped in experience and malice. At the name, Sarah froze. She hated hornets, and Xanthi terrified her. "Hurry, acolytes," the oily voice spoke. "Prepare the gate! If we can't bring the Nightmare into this world, we will bring at least one of its prime horrors!"
Feet scuffled as something heavy was dragged across a stone floor. Liquid splashed as a fire was lit.
Soon after, the three reached the end of the tunnel, and hid in the shadows created by the now roaring fire. Looking into the cavern beyond, they could see the tunnel ended halfway up a wall. The ceiling was lost in acrid dark blue smoke, through which gigantic stalactites appeared. On the floor was a large pentagram, in the centre of which was a giant cauldron, surrounded by five figures in robes, who were chanting in a low drone. Outside of the pentagram stood the owners of the echoing voices. Xanthi stood tall and proud, wearing his torn, samurai like robes. The light from the fire gleamed off the yellow and black exoskeleton that covered his body. One of his pairs of arms was folded across each other while the other pair swung loosely at his sides, next to the pair of katanas he wore. He would pace across the cavern for a short distance, furling and unfurling his massive pair of insectile wings that hung from his back through holes in his robe. The other two remained still, one tall, but not as tall as Xanthi, and the other crouched away from the light of the flames.
"Come now, hurry," the tall figure said urgently, his face obscured by the heavy robes of saffron and black he wore, as another robed figure scurried forward dragging a large table laden with sacrificial knives, withered bits of insects and animals and a large flask of red liquid.
"I have made all the preparations you asked, master," the robed figure who had brought the table gurgled. The chittering and wailing of the unseen beasts grew louder, they seemed to come from the liquid in the cauldron.
"Thank you, Filth," the man in the saffron robes said. He said the name; Sarah supposed it was the figures name, without a hint of malice, as if it really was his name and not an insult. Sarah then noticed that "Filth" was leaving a thick trail of slime in its wake as it joined the others surrounding the cauldron.
The crouching figure had sidled up to the table and was closely examining the knives. He had double jointed legs like Sarah but was covered in grey fur rather than green scales and had a long wormy tail. He scratched a large ragged ear and wrinkled his rat-like snout at the smell of the red liquid.
"Don't touch, Robert," chided the saffron robed figure while it walked forward and picked up one of the knives with a calloused hand.
"Sorry, boss," mumbled the rat.
From their hiding place at the tunnel end, the three had a perfect view of the cavern and its occupants.
"The ritual will start soon," Manitou whispered, quite a feat if you have no lips.
"Wait," Sarah remembered herself in time not to shout. "There's people coming up behind us."
John spied a smaller tunnel of to his left. "In here," he whispered. Just after they managed to hide, whoever was coming down the tunnel arrived. The person emerged from the dark tunnel into the light and stood at the edge into the cavern. Well, kind of stood.
This person was a woman, and everything above her waist was human shaped, covered in deep blue scales. She had a head like Sarah's, except it was even more snake-like and had two circular flaps of patterned skin each side of her face. Below her waist was a snake tail, a ten-foot long, one-foot wide snake tail, which she slid across the ground on, the human torso leaning forward slightly.
She turned and peered back down the tunnel. "Will you hurry up?" she hissed like Sarah, but you could her in her voice and in her yellow eyes there was more animal and less human. From the tunnel came stumbling steps, and at last the D.M.W. limped into view.
The D.M.W. was more horrific than when John had fought it outside. It was a human male, wearing ragged, grimy shirt and trousers. The skin was stretched over bones and skull. The eyes with their hypnotic red irises bulged from the sockets. As it walked, you could see the head lolling to one side with its broken neck. Its right arm was sticking out at an odd angle because of the broken wrist and it limped for the broken leg. That wasn't the worst injury it had survived today. As it turned to face the snake woman you could see the back of its head. Half the skull had been caved in from the tomahawk Manitou threw earlier. The handle of the tomahawk was still poking out from the hole in the skull; clearly the creature hadn't bothered to remove it.
The creature moved to do something, but the snake woman grasped his arm and shook her head. They know we're here, Sarah thought.
"Ah, Anya," said the saffron robes. "I see you found him. Come now, don't dawdle, we're nearly ready." The snake woman silently slid from the tunnel mouth into the cavern down the wall, followed by the creature, who simply dropped. Sarah grimaced as she heard the noise of his other leg snapping as it landed on the stone floor. Even with two broken legs, it still managed to stand and totter over to the saffron robed man.
"They're going to begin the ceremony," Manitou whispered. "Sarah, you must stay here."
"Why? I can fight," Sarah answered back.
"I'm sorry, but you see those six around the pentagram?" Sarah nodded. "They are no ordinary monsters, like the ones you have previously fought. They are incarnations of what the Nightmare is about."
"Hey, Manny," John nudged his arm. "Something's happening."
Echoing up from the cavern, the voice of the cult leader came to them. "I see. Well, Anya has informed me of three interlopers. Agony, Wrath, take care of them." Peering out from their hiding place, John could see two of the figures walk out of the circle and slowly walk towards the tunnel mouth. From under the hood of one of them red eyes glowed, and the floor cracked where he walked. The other stumbled and slid across the floor, moaning.
"Ah, shit," John said. "They know!" he yelled.
"Stay," Manitou said to Sarah.
"But -"
"Stay!"
"Robert, go get my staff, please?" the saffron robes said. Robert, the rat man, nodded and scurried away. Xanthi stepped forward. "No. I need you to protect me."
"Yes mazzzzzter," Xanthi buzzed reluctantly. From across the cavern he could see the ape man jump down onto Agony, and see the eagle man swoop, pick up Wrath and throw it towards him. Xanthi caught the incarnation and set it onto its feet. It ran off to fight the ape man.
"Where izzzzzz Sorrow and Despair? Bzzzzzzz," Xanthi asked. Two of the four figures remaining around the cauldron had disappeared.
"Gone to find the other one," said the D.M.W. in a singsong voice. It was dancing around, trying to dislodge the tomahawk in its head. Xanthi reached over, yanked it out and tossed it away.
John was finding it difficult to fight Agony, the Second Incarnation. If he touched its red raw skin, it caused searing pain to shoot through him. Not only that, but it had revealed instead of hands it had massive, bloody hooks, which it was waving about with deadly speed. This close, John could see its face under the hood of the robe. The eyes were sewn shut, as was the mouth. It had no nose at all, just two holes. He managed to grab a piece of robe, trip it up and stamp on it. Unfortunately, he misjudged the stamp and stood on Agony's arm, missing the hook, but touching the skin. With a jolt of pain and a cry of rage, he toppled over. Wrath was tearing across the room towards him, screaming with anger. As Wrath ran, it left a trail of flaming footprints and part of its robes had burned away, leaving its arms free. They were so black they looked like a rift in space, and the hands were on fire. The red light from under the hood was blinding. As he stood up, a hissing gurgle made him turn. Agony was levering itself up on its hooks. Grabbing its hood, John slammed its face into the floor, knocking it unconscious. He turned in time to see Manitou toss Wrath into a stalactite.
Sarah turned away from the battle below because of a wailing voice behind her. From the gloom came two of the robed figures from the pentagram. One of them was just standing and wailing, while the other was walking forwards.
No escape, Sarah heard inside her head. Poor, useless girl.
The figure came closer. She could hear the jangle of chains under the robe, and under the hood she could see a featureless metal mask with two eyeholes showing bloodshot green eyes.
The hood of the wailing one had fallen back, showing a woman's head, made entirely of dark water, with its mouth open and the eyes glowing pale blue. Water dripped from the arms of the woman's robe. Sarah was filled with both a terrible sadness and a feeling of no escape.
Got you.
With that, chains flew from the arms of the metal faced man and the wailing woman shot streams of water at Sarah, binding her up so tightly she couldn't move an inch.
Down in the cave, Manitou was avoiding Wrath, who attacked by creating small explosions in the air. They were easy to dodge because Wrath had to clap its hands to make an explosion, so Manitou was forewarned and weaved through the air towards it. On reaching it, he grasped its shoulders and lifted it into the air. This close, Wrath was no threat; it could injure itself with one of its own explosions. Holding it with one hand, he clubbed Wrath repeatedly over its head with one of his tomahawks. Eventually, Wrath stopped struggling and went limp, the light from the hood diminishing to a dim glow.
For John, the fight wasn't over. He was making his way across the cavern towards the man in the saffron robes. The remaining two incarnations around the cauldron hadn't noticed him until he stepped into the pentagram. When he did, their heads turned to face him, and they began to walk over. Well, one walked, the other slithered. The slitherer reached him first and he punched it in the face. His arm sunk into the robes up to his elbow with a squelch and he struggled to free himself from the brown green mess the creature was made of. A searing pain struck across his back. Agony couldn't have waked up that quickly, surely, he thought. I practically broke its skull! He found it was the last incarnation, Insanity. This close, he could see its arms ended in thick long leather straps, the kind found on a straight-jacket. It must be wearing one underneath, John thought. Insanity giggled, and whipped him again with the straps. John roared and caught a strap in his free hand. He pulled the gibbering creature towards him, grabbed its head, pulled his other hand free, and rammed Insanity's head into Filth's. Picking them both up, the chucked them into the cauldron.
"NO!'" screamed the saffron robes. "Xanthi, kill him!"
Xanthi laughed, drew both his katanas and flew towards John, wings whining. Just in time, Manitou barreled into Xanthi, sending them both into Filth, who was climbing out of the cauldron.
"The ritual is ruined!" wailed the saffron robes. "I'll have your head for this, Manitou!"
Xanthi, Manitou and Filth struggled to disentangle themselves. Behind Manitou, the D.M.W. had decided to join the fray, wielding Manitou's tomahawk. What the D.M.W. didn't notice was that John was behind him. Bringing both his arms up, John roared and smashed his fists into the D.M.W.'s head, shattering the already fractured skull. The body of the creature dropped the tomahawk and fell forward.
"Recover from that you bas-urk." John gagged as Insanity wrapped its straps around his neck.
Manitou dragged Filth into Xanthi, who choked as he swallowed part of the foul liquid Filth was made of and began to wrench the katanas from Xanthi's grasp.
"Master!" came the voice of Robert. "I have your staff!" he yelled.
The man raised his hand, and the staff flew from Robert's arms and into his. Waving it, Insanity and John flew across the cavern to him.
"Manitou. Oh, Manitou," he called.
Manitou turned. The man had him trapped. Apart from Filth, Xanthi and the D.M.W., he was surrounded by his foes. Agony and Wrath had recovered, Sorrow and Despair has appeared with Sarah, still bound, and Insanity was steadily choking John. The man held his staff in such a way each ends of the staff were at John's and Sarah's temples.
"No, don't…" Manitou said, panic in his voice. Despair sighed. Oh dear, lost your friends now. Manitou heard in his mind.
"You ruined the ritual that would bring the Nightmare in this pathetic world. You almost destroyed my unbeatable creature." At this, the D.M.W.'s body sat up and began to piece its head back together. "It'll be another long year until the next suitable time for the ritual to begin again. The magic I am about to perform won't work on you, you're to strong, but on these fools it will."
Without warning, Manitou ran forward, but Wrath clapped, and the ground beneath his feet exploded, throwing him back.
The man twisted his hands, and John and Sarah screamed. Manitou jumped up from the floor, and tried again to reach his friends, but Filth had managed to grab his ankles.
"Get out, Manny!" Sarah managed to yell between screams. She was getting smaller, and her arms and legs shrinking. John was howling, also shrinking. Manitou flew up on to the tunnel mouth, dripping Filth. The screams stopped.
"Take them to the holding pens, Robert," said the man, the magic finished.
Manitou saw two piles of clothes, which Robert was fumbling inside.
"Yes, master," he said calmly as he took out a baby sized monkey and a tiny green snake.
Manitou saw Wrath clap again, and was running just before the tunnel collapsed.
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