The Cinders of Dezu

18th: Moss Linga (3)

Cairo shook his head and almost dropped her as he suddenly felt her body in his arms.  She was very firm and yet very soft. He kept it together as he placed her feet first on the ice. Talia was trying to settle how slick the ground was when it began to move. She balanced herself as she looked down. The outline of massive moose-like antlers waded under them. A slithering body of arms and tentacles pushed the ice up as he slid just beneath their tiny frozen island. Talia slipped and almost fell as the ice cracked between the two of them.

"No, actually, pick me up!"

She grabbed Cairo's arm and swung herself onto his back.

"Go! Go! Go!" she yelled in his ear as she wrapped her legs around his waste.

"Aaaoooaaa! Aaaa!" Cairo said as the ice started to rock and break apart.

"Make more! Go!"

Cairo looked around as the ice pieces got farther and farther apart, splashing water up to them. He put his arms out. A sheet of ice started forming rapidly, linking the pieces back together.

"Hang on," he said as he took a running stance.

Cairo took off. He moved across the ice, not running but jetting across it with a speed he never could have imagined. He felt like videos he'd seen of expert figure skaters. Only his feet had a power to them. Not like something from muscles, but an energy. Something coursing through his body that impelled him across the ice. He felt both exhilarated and terrified as all at once he saw the crystal sheets forming ahead of him and heard the sound of shattering behind.

A roar echoed across the water. A sound like a guttural churning of an engine mixed with the sound of a high pitched rage induced scream. Cairo was moving fast, but the nearness of the sound made him worry he wasn't moving fast enough. The edge of the lake was perhaps two to three miles off, and even moving at what he thought could be close to a car on a city street, there was no guarantee he'd make it that far in enough time.

He began to turn his head back when he felt Talia's hand grab his jaw and face him forward. She leaned into his ear to talk with wind blowing past them.

"You drive. I'll handle the back view."

"My rearview mirror?" he said, his eyes on his hands forming ice as fast as he could make them.

"What?" she said.

"Nevermind."

Talia looked back and decided what she had told him was definitely the right call. Rising above the surface were the aquatic boney, moose antlers with the furious eyes of Moss Linga. Rushing water and chunks of ice streamed past his scaly face. He was biting through the ice sheets in massive lurches forward. Talia could see some of his tentacles peek above and between his antlers as they partially left the water behind him to propel him forward. With each powerful lurch he got closer and closer.

"Can you go faster?" Talia asked.

Her tone was calm. It was meant not to disturb Cairo's focus but it only made him more agitated as he could tell what she was doing.

"I just got these powers! I don't know what I'm doing!"

His legs began moving in a skating motion in an attempt to speed them up but his body moved faster than his legs were carrying him. Talia took note that his leg movement was more doing a show of speed rather than getting them to the shore any quicker.
Talia unwrapped her arms from Cairo and tightened her legs around his waist. She leaned her torso backwards until she was facing upside down. Putting her hands together she formed orbs of flame the size of beach balls, lobbing them at the face of their pursuer.

Moss Linga closed his eyes as the orbs struck his face. She had shot him four times when he had finally had enough. With a final snap and shattering of ice he and his antlers receded under water, leaving the ice road undisturbed. Talia hung upside down for a moment watching. The lake was quiet behind them. She leaned up and wrapped her arms around Cairo again who had not let up his speed.

"You got him??!" he said.

Suddenly, a hole in the ice burst open next to them. The reveal was a monstrous arm and the crazed eye of the creature peaking up at them before it quickly sunk down again. Within seconds it happened again, but this time ahead and to the right of them. Cairo curved left quickly and keep moving.

"No," said Talia, "I think I just gave him better ideas."

Moss Linga slipped back under again. In seconds, his arm emerged right in front of them. When Cairo zigged to the right, a second arm emerged. Antlers and a star broke through the ice ahead and out rose the beast. He violently swung his arms around as he rose high enough for his tentacles to start snaking through sheets of ice themselves. Cairo slid to a stop and began sliding quickly left and right just trying to stay out of their way. He couldn't see the shore past the wicked body of the ruler of the lake.

He was stumbling and struggling to keep his balance as his ice churned and was ground up under the tenacious lumberings of the the monsters appendages. Talia started to slip. He started to panic and grabbed her arms to hold her up. It was no use. She slipped from his fingers before he could get a good grip. He almost fell before he turned around. Water and shattered ice sloshed around him, but no Talia.