Chapter Thirty-Nine: Go. Faster.
Valerie must have followed my gaze and seen the ripples in the puddle.
“We have to get out of here now,” she said. “Run!”
We started running before we even knew what was chasing us. By the time we were halfway back to the truck, that had become clear.
I glanced back over my shoulder and saw booths and carnival games flying through the air behind us.
As the dust settled, I tried to make sense of the chaos around me. My eyes were drawn to a towering figure in the distance. It had been a thirty-foot-tall statue of a man, but now it was something else entirely - a monstrous gargoyle, with malformed wings that stretched outwards as if trying to attain flight if only they were able.
I could see the pain etched into its human face, twisted into an agonized grimace. Its long, pointed teeth gleamed menacingly in the low light, and its claws were too long for its hands. It moved like it was roaring, but no sound came out.
It was the statue of Bartholomew Geist, Carousel’s supposed founder, in the flesh.
Now a Grotesque. Plot Armor: 48.
As I watched in horror, the Grotesque stepped forward, its massive form casting a shadow in the starlight. Its eyes seemed to glow with an otherworldly fire, and I could feel the ground tremble beneath my feet as it moved.
The stench of death and decay filled my nostrils as the creature flapped its useless wings. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest.
In the face of such a monster, I felt powerless.
As I watched it destroy everything in its path, I couldn't help but wonder if there was anything that could stop it. All I could do was hope that we would survive long enough to figure it out.
Survival was possible, only just, thanks to Reggie’s sacrifice. Second Blood had passed. None of us had to die in this scene… but how would we get away?
Valerie tried to light another of the Molotov cocktails. She handed it to Arthur in hopes that he would be able to do more with it than she could. As the creature approached us, its thunderous footsteps and the claws that had replaced its hands created chasms in the earth.
The Molotov cocktail landed on one of its feet. Arthur fired his gun and managed to chip off a section of stone on its foot that had been solidified. He might as well have done nothing. The giant statue didn’t notice.
“Drive,” Valerie said, tossing me the keys that she had found.
As we approached the spotlight and truck, Arthur said, “Help me get the generator in the back of the truck,” to Valerie.
I jumped into the driver's seat. I wasn't a good choice to drive, but I was a bad choice for any part of this story.
Valerie and Arthur hoisted the generator up into the back of the truck. Valerie got up in the back with it and started rifling through Arthur's guns before finding his large shotgun.
I waited to see where Arthur was going to ride but he never came around to the cab nor did he jump up in the back of the truck before Valerie smacked the roof and yelled “Go go go.”
I floored it.
The little truck was not designed to go fast. I tried to coax every single ounce of speed out of it as I guided the truck up onto the road. I still didn't know where Arthur was.
Until I heard him screaming.
I saw the spotlight moving around behind us. Arthur was laying down on the small trailer that the spotlight was attached to.
He was aiming the light.
It took only seconds for the creature to catch us. If you watched it move, it looked like it was very slowly, lumbering about. However, it was moving at an incredible speed because of its long limbs. It started chasing us down the road.
It was hard to focus on driving when I was so concerned about that thing following us. I floored the little truck, but this wasn't a performance model. It was designed to be fuel efficient.
In the bed of the truck, Valerie was letting off shots left and right. Every time Arthur would turn part of the creature to stone, she would try to get a hit in.
At first, I thought she was wasting ammo but then I realized she had a plan.
The road between the fairground and the church was curvy. Getting a straight shot on the creature was therefore very difficult because as we went around a curve Arthur had to try to steer the light and keep it on the creature.
As fast as I could drive the Grotesque was gaining on us.
“Go. Faster.” Arthur said very loudly and very sternly from behind me.
The creature was reaching out at the spotlight trailer, coming within mere feet of destroying it right along with Arthur.
“It doesn't go faster!” I yelled back.
After a moment or two to think, Arthur responded, “Slow down.”
Why the fuck would I want to do that?
But I did. He had a high savvy and if he had a plan, I was more than willing to see if it could work out.
I slowed down a hair. I tried to keep an eye in the rearview mirror to see what it was he was doing. Previously he had kept shining the light in the creature's face hoping to blind it or at the very least keep it from biting into us.
Now he was aiming for the legs.
Genius.
I slowed down even more. The limbs were a tough target.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
Its footsteps were louder and louder as I slowed down. Arthur’s plan had better work.
Arthur was trying to get the large spotlight trained on the Grotesque legs. He was focusing on its calves and feet. It was taking too long. The creature was moving its limbs fast enough that the light couldn’t rest on them long enough for the entire limb to turn to stone.
Arthur needed to get the timing right.
We were careening around corners. Arthur was trying to keep the light on target. I tried keeping the truck as steady as possible for him but there wasn’t much I could do.
As we rounded a large curve, Arthur managed to keep the light on the creature's left leg for two, three seconds. Then five seconds.
The creature lumbered after us, swiping its long claws forward.
Seven seconds.
Crack.
Arthur must have successfully turned one of its legs to stone because I heard something break followed by a sound that I could only describe as “unscheduled demolition of building”.
The creature had fallen.
In my rearview mirror, I saw that one of its legs had snapped off.
Turning it to stone and shooting it wouldn't easily work on something this size but if you could turn one of its limbs to stone and then wait for it to try to put weight on it then he could use the creature's own weight against it, causing it to break itself.
The creature pursued us now on all fours (well, threes) trying to compensate for its broken limb.
It would be harder for that tactic to work again now that its weight was more evenly distributed among its 3 limbs and one partial leg.
Still, Arthur kept at it.
Crack.
Three of the creature's fingers broke off. Somehow with the pressure that was placed on them, one of them actually jumped into the air and overtook the car landing on the road in front of me.
Meanwhile, Valerie had spent at least 10 shots. I wasn't sure how much ammo she even had for that gun. I got the sense that she was trying to get down to the last bullet.
We had a huge advantage when cornering now because of its destroyed limbs. I took the initiative and sped up a little hoping to give us a little time for the next tactic.
After a few more bends, the church was right up ahead, we only had a few hundred more yards before we had to turn. I didn't know what would happen if this thing was still alive when we got to the church, but I had a feeling it would tear the place down looking for us.
Eventually, Valerie announced the phrase that I'd been waiting for her to say for most of the drive.
“I've only got one slug left!” She said.
I slowed down. It might not have been enough for the audience to tell but I'm sure that Arthur and Valerie could. In the rearview mirror, I saw Arthur aiming this spotlight up at the creature’s face.
“Better make it count!” he yelled.
As the creature’s face turned to stone, Valerie took aim and fired her last shotgun shell.
The round entered the creature's mouth and exited out the back of its neck, creating a profound crack and explosion as the remaining tissue was not strong enough to hold up the weight of the head.
The head snapped off and fell to the ground, smashing against the concrete.
The giant’s body convulsed and twitched as it lay on the ground, but it was killed.
Valerie’s Better Make It Count trope had given her a critical hit with her final round.
After the worst drive of my life, I turned at the church’s entrance.
Behind me, Arthur had somehow managed to turn the spotlight around and aim it up ahead at the top of the church.
The large, winged creature that had been there was gone.
Before we got too close to the church, I spun the wheel so that I could turn the entire truck around and have the spotlight in range to aim at the door of the building.
As we arrived, dozens of Grotesques burst from the door ready to come for us.
The spotlight created a roadblock, as much as they struggled to come forward, they could never push beyond the pile of petrified gargoyles that built up in front of them.
That wasn't a huge relief.
Because we were about to go into that building.
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