The Magician's Assistant

12

The "pile of trash" was slowly moving towards the doorway. It crawled along the floor. It wasn't very fast, but it didn't have much distance to cover.

Rachael realized whatever was in there was very large. It easily covered most of the floor. She took a step back and slammed the door shut. She went to lock the padlock back in place.

Before Rachael could lock the door again, it began to slowly lurch open as the monster on the other side began to push on it.

Rachael pressed her body against the door, and tried to push it back far enough to bring the lock back into place. She might as well have been trying to push a brick wall out of the way.

"Help me with this!" Rachael said through gritted teeth.

Erika was nowhere to be seen.

"You-" Rachael yelled.

The door slowly made its way further and further forward. There was a several inch gap between its edge and the wall now.

Rachael awkwardly lifted up her shotgun with one hand and stuck it's barrels through the opening. This only took a few seconds, but it felt much longer.

Rachael tried to pull the trigger. It didn't budge. Nothing happened.

Rachael muttered something unrepeatable under her breath. Had it malfunctioned? Was there something wrong with the ammunition? She ran through the possibilities in her mind.

Before she could figure out what was wrong, she felt the gun being pulled forward, into the other room.

"No!" Rachael screamed over and over again.

She tried to pull the gun away, but it was inexorably dragged further away. It was if the weapon was being sucked away, like it was sinking into deep mud.

Rachael suddenly froze for a moment. She realized why the gun hadn't fired. The safety was still on.

She flipped the safety off, and tried to pull the trigger again. There was no resistance this time.

The gun roared a single time, and was launched out of Rachael's grasp by a mix of recoil and the monster throwing it away from itself. An inhuman, indescribably sound of pain came from behind the door.

The monster relented just long enough for Rachael to fully shut the door again. She moved to lock it as quickly as she could.

Rachael began to slide the padlock back into place, but before she could, the monster slammed into the door again. She was knocked backwards, and nearly fell over as she stumbled away.

The monster seemingly backed off again, and the door gently swung open.

Rachael had ended up several feet away from the door. It was unlikely she'd be able to lock the door before something like that happened again.

She instinctively took a few steps back, and felt her foot strike something on the floor. It was the shotgun.

There was still one more shell loaded. She grabbed the gun and continued to back away. In the shadows, she could see movement ahead.

The dark mass was moving forward, towards her. It pulled itself along at walking speed.

Rachael aimed the shotgun at the center of the mass, and fired off her remaining shell.

The monster screamed and recoiled again. Rachael turned and headed for the stairs back into the cabin.

Right as Rachael reached the foot of the stairs, Gramps appeared at the top of them. He had