The sky darkened as something massive blocked the sun for a moment. At first, my mind couldn’t comprehend what I saw, but the lack of forelegs and the partial glimpse of the thing’s face formed a clear picture of it.

  It is amazing how much of the world a kid is exposed to in big enough cities. I found zoos to be incredibly useful in getting experience with wild animals from all over the world. The Como Park Zoo had these African fruit bats that were absolute units. They were also pretty cute, in an ‘I’m going to suck your blood, but not really unless you’re a papaya’ way.

  Imagine one of those, but the size of a 747 airliner. Oh, and it wasn’t a frugivore. If it ate fruit, it was part of a balanced diet of ‘eating a bunch of people and oops, that one had a banana!’ Fortunately, it was too big to get at us through the tree cover, and it likely didn’t spot us.

  Except it had.

  The massive bat creature smashed through the trees and landed before us on the path, broken branches and pine needles raining down around it. The damned thing was not quite a bat, with much more musculature in ratio to the ones back home. Its snout was more elongated than a fruit bat’s, with teeth made for rending flesh. The smell of rot and musk rolled over us before the dust had even settled, causing all of us to gag. Then, the beast screamed at us.

  The scream barely registered in my hearing, but it caused me to double over in pain and nausea. My ears rang as my stomach forcefully emptied itself, which prevented the concentration needed to use my spells. The building-sized bat scrambled forward, wings draped, and viscous fluid dripped from its open mouth and jagged teeth. Its claws tore up the path and hillside, causing the entire area to shift.

  The grip on my stomach eased as it rushed toward us, and I cast eleven Poison Bolts and five Ice Shards at the massive beast. My body involuntarily shivered at the combined feeling of the two spells spreading through my body. I struggled to focus through the intense sensation and on the oncoming monster. I didn’t want to be chomped. “Oh fuck! It’s coming right for me!” I yelled and scrambled back, falling on my ass.

  The bat thing snapped at me, almost getting my right foot. I kept scooting back on my hands and heels through the dirt and loose pine needles covering the hillside. Crack! My head rammed into a tree behind me, and I slumped, dazed. Bemused, I watched the bat creature stalk forward, eyeing me like I was the last piece of pizza and it was that guy. It turned its head to eat me, as if it were about to eat a hardshell taco. The beast then reared back, screaming.

  Harper had done one of her special, nasty attacks on the thing’s ass, and it snapped its wings out and back. This created a shockwave, pushing me against and past the tree like a rag doll. Almost as if in afterthought, I cast six Firebolts at it in quick succession, missing the main body, but burning a small patch of the massive bat’s wing membrane. The warmth of the magic suffused me.

  I didn’t see what happened next as I used the tree to pull myself up onto my wobbly legs. But the ground tremor and boom threw me back to the ground. I looked up, seeing a massive, glowing fist pulling back to hit the fallen bat. It must have been Jerseil. I had a sudden memory of my little brother waking me up to show me a cartoon clip on his phone of a little man riding a glowing hand singing like he was in a hair rock band. I think he had called it Scramblin’ Hand or something. Scranton Hand? I didn’t remember.

  But it made sense that it was Jerseil as he played his glittern like it owed him money. The dazed and sliding batzilla made confused noises while being pummeled again and again. It may have been the head injury, but I thought it was God-damned hilarious.

  Harper appeared beside me, checking the back of my head. “Finn, are you okay? Can you fight?”

  I put my hand where hers had just been and felt a sticky wetness. “I think so; it’s just a head wound,” I said, chuckling. “Are you seeing this shit? Kiaju Kilroy the Batzilla is getting pummeled by the Scategory Hand!” Realizing I just spouted nonsense, I laughed even harder.

  “Do you have a health potion?” she asked slowly with narrowed eyes.

  “Of course!” I slurred jovially. The health potion almost fell from my grip as I pulled one out and handed it to her. “Here you go.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Harper took the health potion, opened it up, and poured some on my head before she handed it back. “Drink the rest of this.”

  I took the bottle from her and drank it down. It wasn’t long before I was back to normal and horrified by the situation. The massive bat thing was still not back on its feet and seemed as out of it as I was. “How long can Jerseil keep this up?” I said soberly.

  “Not much longer. The two of us need to step in soon and help take this thing out. And that’s going to take us doing a lot of damage to it. Jerseil will probably need a moment, so what can you do to slow it down?”

  “Hmm, maybe I can pin it down with some Ice Shards through its wing membranes,” I said. “We’ll see how high its pain tolerance is.”

  I checked my mana and saw that I had 45 points left, so enough for four Ice Shards. If this worked, I wouldn’t need to drink too many mana potions. I looked at the dazed, gigantic bat creature. One wing of the bat creature stretched out up the hill. I cast the four Ice Shards, which manifested as spears of ice, into the wing and stapled it to the ground. It screamed, pulled out of its stupor. Its other wing slammed against the ground. As more of the hillside cracked, yards of earth slid, and a couple of pine trees leaned downhill with audible creaks and root snaps.

  I emptied a mana potion and tossed four more spears of ice into the free wing of the beast at different angles to better hold it. The bat thing howled in pain and rage, not pulling much at its pinned wings. And for good measure, I fired off 10 more Poisonous Bolts. With the bat being stationary and the level 2 greenish bolts being target-seeking, none of them missed. Not for the first time, nor the last, I wished I could tell if my targets were poisoned.

  I didn’t see Harper move, but with a slap on my shoulder, she was gone. A moment later, she was laying into the monster with her rapier. Every stroke left deep, widening gashes in the creature’s flesh. It was horrifying and strangely comforting to watch her deftly move around the monstrous bat and take apart its flesh a pound at a time. The merry wives would be proud.

  But the bat thing finally had enough. The skin of the wing membranes tore as it pulled itself free in ferocious jolts of movement. Its torn, bloody membranes maddened the beast, and it raged against the ground and trees near it. The ground shook as I hugged the nearest pine. Rocks ranging in size from golf balls to Volkswagens rolled and bounced past.

  Harper helped a wide-eyed Jerseil away from the rampaging beast. I surge-cast Chain Lightning at the gigantic wet-market reject, causing it to seize up with the voltage of my spell. Few things can deal with that level of electric shock. Smoke arose from its mouth and ears, but the torpor was only temporary as it shook it off to attack Jerseil and Harper.

  Jerseil, in a fit of heroism, pushed Harper out of the way, taking the full brunt of the creature’s swipe. He flew somewhere uphill and behind me, his yelled, “Fuck!” getting the Doppler treatment.

  My dumbass ran towards the injured Bat of Unusual Size, ready to do something. The maddened eyes of the monstrous being focused on me. The thing roared, spittle flying from its mouth. I got the feeling that it no longer wanted to eat me and now wanted to rip me to shreds and use my pulp to ease the pain of its wings. Or put me on a hot dog. Either way, I was fucked.

  Downing another mana potion, I glared at the massive bat. “Bring it, you piece of shit bird knock-off! I will burn your ugly ass!” I shouted defiantly. There was no fucking way I was going to let this thing hurt my friends anymore. A small voice in the back of my mind cried out in alarm about the danger I was putting myself in.

  I ignored it. Some things were worth the price.

  In a surprising burst of speed, the bat rushed me with its mouth open wide and screeching. I cast my new shield spell, Phantom fucking Wing. The spectral wings formed outward from my wrist almost too fast to follow. The resulting shield form extended about a foot past my fist and half a foot past my elbow, its oval shape formed of opaque, glowing feathers. I screamed in fear and rage as the bat-thing’s teeth slammed into the shield, glancing up and to the left. The blow sent me sliding back several feet. I tottered and almost fell. I’m proud to say I kept my footing at that moment.

  Then I did yet another stupidly brave and very idiotic thing: I charged at the bat monster. The part of me that was smarter than the rest cringed at the action and wondered what I could do this close up to that massive, building-sized beast. But there was a desire within me to end it, and I needed to do it up close. All the anger, all the despair and loss I felt demanded it. I had to do this in a very visceral way. I had no pity for this monster, and in that moment it embodied all the pain and fear I had experienced. The sky-rat had to die by my hand.

  I blasted it with a barrage of Poisonous Shot, followed by a surged Chain Lightning. Drinking another mana potion, I leapt, throwing the empty bottle at the monster’s eyes and slamming the still active shield into its muzzle. The impact broke a couple of its teeth, and I blasted four surged Firebolts through its open jaws and down its throat. Its insides burned hotter with each one. Harper and Jerseil were beside me, hacking and piercing the beast, their voices merging with my raging scream.

  I sobbed as we killed it, hating myself for the barbaric actions I took. At the same time, I accepted that we had to kill it before the beast killed us. Despite my mindset of doing as little harm as possible, a part of me gloried in the victory. Is this all we were? Killers? We had destroyed a monster with excessive violence. But I still felt horrible. Horrid. This place was hell.

  And I wasn’t sure who the monsters were anymore.