The Gateway

The Gateway - Chapter 29: The Beast of the Brierly

The Beast of the Brierly 

(former Prolouge)

Heavy boots pounded the earth, snapping twigs and reducing leaves to nothing under the extreme weight, the massive eight stone backpacks sagging down to the soldiers ankles as they slowly crumpled under the blistering sun. The thick forests around them seemed to providing no shade whatsoever, and the poor human soldiers trudged on through the sludge of the brierly forest. 

That was thing about Brierly; even in this weather, the ground remained moist and hard to walk on, it was most likely something to do with the rainforests ancient inhabitants, mysterious mages that cast many spells and enchantments for protection against the outside world. 

Although these mages were pretty nasty creatures to come into contact with, there was something much worse lurking in the darkness of the trees. It was probably similar in proportion and appearance to a person, it was not human, it was a much more powerful creature, and it was stalking it's unsuspecting victims from the shadows between the trees, however the humans did know it was nearby, after all it was the reason the Humans were here, it had been causing mayhem at the nearby military stronghold, it had already killed seven officers and kitchen boy, most of this platoon were scared for there lives, at least they were when they left, the majority were now too worn out to be fearful any more, and all they could think about was getting home.  

Suddenly a nearby bush rustled, it sat at the side of the track half dead from lack of light, but still holding enough leaves to conceal something fairly large, most of the men didn't even notice however and just continued to lumber along, some soldiers did notice the strange plant but they were too tired to do anything, it was probably harmless anyway maybe a small animal or a gust of wind. 

However if they had looked there would have been nothing there, or at least they would have seen nothing. If they had tried to reach down behind the leaves of the strange plant they would have felt the creatures matted fur and spiked back, cloaked by a dark magical veil strung together by a sorcerer of black magic, most likely the creatures master that it was sworn to obey. 

Although the platoon couldn't tell, the monster was moving, preparing for it's attack, it was running along just a few meters in front, greatly resembling a large playful dog as it ran on all fours, saliva dripping from it's open mouth and down onto the dirt of the forest track it spotted the soldiers, and it stared at them intently before its battered brain remembered its orders, the horrid creature began to slow until it eventually came to a halt and as instructed it stepped out into the middle of the dirt track standing dead still and glaring at the approaching soldiers, all they could see however was a slight blur on the horizon and therefore knew nothing of the danger that awaited them further down the track, the creature was growing impatient now it remained where it was but it had begun to twitch, hungry for the blood of the soldiers. 

"What's that up ahead?" asked Private Murdock, a relatively small soldier that had joined the army about a year ago. He was shivering with fear as he raised a shaking finger at a small object on the path a few meters ahead, the creatures foot was sticking out of the veil and was visible to the soldiers. "I don't know" replied the captain, stopping and pulling out his rifle "but I doubt it's going to be good" the other soldiers were copying him now, but Private Murdock simply crouched down at the back and readied a grenade. All was silent for a brief few seconds before the creature realised there was no use waiting as it had lost the element of surprise. So it crouched down low to the ground, so low it could press its face in to the dirt, it remained like this for a further few seconds. Apart from the sound of wind blowing gently through the trees it was silent, even the animals seemed to be steering clear of the stand-off. Then in a lightning fast movement the creature jumped and threw of the cloak, allowing the humans to see it. It soared across the sky far higher than any normal animal could have jumped, the dark shadow in the sky was joined by a flurry of birds, scared out of there trees by the relentless gun fire, the soldiers were desperately trying to shoot the creature out of the sky. It landed with a crash that sent the front row of soldiers tumbling to the ground, it then stood staring at the men with a crazed and demented look in its eye. The beast was challenging them to try something, and they did. Almost immediately after the creature had stood up again a small canister flew into the air, the grenade then exploded just in front of the creature, throwing up dust all around, Private Murdock realised shortly after he had thrown the grenade, that he had made a terrible mistake. More bullets were flying towards the creature but he just waved them of with his free hand and kept trudging mindlessly towards the cloud that now concealed the entire platoon. It was the perfect cover for the beast to ambush it's prey, and sure enough all the young soldiers could hear were screams, blood curdling screams coming from every direction, as the monster picked of the soldiers. "Run Private" stuttered the captain as he was dragged backwards by the monster, blood was pouring from the man's chest and he could hardly breath, and what's more, a grin was forming on the monster's crazed face. Murdock did not wait to see more and immediately turned towards the trees and sprinted, his ears filled with the captains dying scream, he glanced backwards to see a ten centimetre thick claw protruding from the poor army officers stomach. Blood pouring from the gaping wound, blood that the creature was drinking greedily, it however saw the young officer escape and hesitantly pulled it's claw back out of the limp and nearly lifeless body, spraying the soldier's insides on the floor behind him. The captain closed his eyes and the thing dropped his bleeding corpse onto the floor, it looked up and smiled showing its hideous rotten teeth, stained with the blood of its previous victims.