I kicked the creature’s corpse off me. Now that it was dead, the horrific sight of its malformed body gave me shivers of disgust. Ugh. Six antennae-like eyes stared blankly into oblivion and sharp claws were forever frozen in a manic attempt to thrust me away. Glancing down at the rather large tear in my favorite jeans and the accompanying flesh beneath, I had to admit its efforts hadn’t been in vain. But a lesser demon that couldn’t even hold human form on Earth was not exactly going to end up on the winning side of this battle.

Looking around, the evidence of our skirmish gave the barren landscape the look of a freshly meteor-showered field. Somehow, we had uprooted the gnarled trees that had managed to survive decades of everything else. The thing’s body lay in a massive crater that I wasn’t sure I’d had nothing to do with.

As I watched, the ground opened up and swallowed the hideous–whatever it was supposed to be. The ground continue to simmer and smoke even after the body was completely gone.

Time to split. I’d overstayed my welcome. I wasn’t relishing running into the various government entities who would soon swarm the “mysterious” crater. I rushed over to my Camaro, cursing the new scratches and shattered window–if that thing ever crawled back out of the depths of Hell, I would be first in line for a repeat performance if only to beat the crap out of it one more time. 

I hopped in through the open window and drove off just in time to catch the barest hint of encroaching siren.

Here’s hoping my trailing cloud of dust was settled by the time they found my handiwork. I’m going to need to change my tires to hide my trail–again.