Chapter 43

Henry snapped awake when Thom hit the brakes. He was still on edge. Residual adrenaline clung to the inside of his veins. Thom pressed the brake pedal but the truck barreled forward in momentum. Henry looked out the front window.

An unmoving black object stood ahead in their highway lane. A solitary, black monolith.

Henry leapt up from the seat and pointed. “That’s it! That’s the black rock creature from my bedroom!”

The creature held out its arms. It looked like it was going to catch the truck with its bare hands.

Thom lifted his foot from the brake and hit the accelerator. He threw the steering wheel and the truck swerved to the side. The back end of the truck fishtailed wildly. Thom dropped the transmission into neutral and yanked hard again on the wheel. The truck spun around one hundred eighty degrees, and started going in reverse through the oncoming lane. The truck flew backward toward the creature.

The stunt surprised the creature. It was too slow to move over to the other lane and catch the careening vehicle. Henry realized the point of the daredevil move—the truck would rocket past the creature in the other lane, and it placed the gun-wielding driver immediately next to the monster.

The scene unfolded in slow-motion. Thom kept one hand on the wheel and grabbed the large percussion pistol in the other. He only had one shot.

A massive discharge of blue light erupted from the end of the gun and rocketed through the air.

The shot was off target.

It caught the upper right torso of the beast, splitting its shoulder and rending the arm halfway from the chest. The arm slumped partway, but the monster was unfazed. The car sped by and the monster began to chase them, using its half-dangling arm like a grotesque pole vault. It worked with its new incapacitation, leaping forward in bounds.

“Hang on,” Thom said and flung the steering wheel again, working the floorboard pedals in unison. The truck went into another skid and then back out of it, going forward. The wheels caught the pavement again and Thom dropped the transmission back into drive and hit the accelerator. He looked in his rearview mirror.

“I only wounded it,” Thom said. “It will come after us even though it’s maimed.”

“Dad, that was it. That was the thing in my room.” Henry turned around to look out the rearview window. “So that’s a Nekura?”

“It’s called a Bludgeon,” Thom said. “Yes, it’s one of the Nekura.”

“A Bludgeon?”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you run it over?” Charley asked. She had awoken with the swerving.

“You can’t.”

“Why not?” She sounded indignant.

“Because you can’t. There not vulnerable to attacks with physical weapons.”

Henry looked at the pistol lying in the front seat. “Then what is that?” he said, pointing.

“Later,” his father said.

Charley leaned over and whispered to Henry. “That was the monster in your bedroom? It looks too big to have fit in your room!”

“It didn’t.”

“We need to get off the roads,” Thom said. “We’ve shaken most of the Nekura with the tracker disabled.”