Open Gate (Three)

Open Gate

What in the holy hell was happening, the only words that John Nolan could muster into his rapidly spiralling thought pattern, one, two, three, no more than that he thought as he looked around the chamber as the slime creatures grew and slivered towards where he stead, his back to the two scientists and not sure what he should do now?

"Stay behind me"

He said in a tone akin to a whisper, the words just loud enough he hoped so that they would carry to the two men that he was supposed to be looking out for, the urge to turn and look at what they were doing was nowhere near as strong as the sense of curiosity and sickening revulsion he felt rising from his stomach at the sight of these creatures.

The closest creature to him was now no more than about 20 feet away, its movement slow as it slid along the ground, a trail like that of what a snail would leave behind as it closed the distance.

Now he stopped to focus for a moment, he could see the shape of the creature better, it was shaped much like that of a humanoid on the top half of it, with a head, shoulders and a pair of arms that reached out towards him. but the bottom half was more solid and lacked any visible legs, just a solid mass that clung to the ground and lurched ever closer.

"To hell with this"

He said suddenly and reached down to release the latch on the case that enclosed the pistols holster, with a click it opened and with a swift practised action he drew the weapon and raised it to point it directly at the creature now barely 15 feet from him and he could see a hole forming in what would have been its face and now a mouth appeared to him.

He continued to aim the pistol directly towards the head of the creature, the mouth now giving him a better idea of what he might be aiming at, a sickening squelching noise coming from beneath the creature as it began to move with a quicker pace towards him, perhaps aware of the danger the pistol posed to it.

This was enough to make John Nolan throw out the protocols of engagement, the warning he should have shouted was now replaced by the sound of the pistol firing as he held it in one hand.

He felt a small twinge of regret fill him, had he been too quick to draw down on this creature, the thought quickly vanquished as he saw the bullet strike the face of it and he felt a sense of exultation at the accuracy of his shot.

The feeling of victory slipped away as soon as it had formed, the bullet seeming to slow for a moment before it slid into the slime-like face and then exploded out of the other side of the thing's head, unlike a shot like this on another person, he would have expected it to fall to the ground, but it barely seemed to register the impact as it stopped for the briefest of moments before continuing its menacing approach towards him, the bullet having had minimal if any effect at all on it.

He let his hand drop back into place the pistol dropping lowering slightly and to where he would have expected the heart to have been if he had been firing at another human being, his other hand gripping the weapon as he fired off another shot into the creature.

This shot as with the previous one struck exactly where he wanted it to, this time the creature paused for a moment longer as the bullet exited out of the back of it, .its mouth opened for a moment and it let out a sickening screeching sound that echoed around the chamber.

John was not sure, if he had hurt it this time or just pissed it off to the point that it was willing to express itself, he hoped it had been the former as he stepped back and aimed for where he had shot it before.

Another shot rang out, but this time he did not have time to gauge its effectiveness, the creature seemed to find another gear and it lunged forward and he saw its arm come across and the pistol was smacked from his hand with the force of what could have been a baseball bat.

He felt the agony of the blow as it passed from his wrist and up his arm and he stumbled backwards as the creature threw a second wild swing at him and he heard it cut through the air with a whoosh-like sound.

He barely kept his footing for a moment before he felt himself fall backwards and his back smacked hard into the ground, he had enough about himself to lift his head forward to stop it too crashing into the hard ground.

He felt himself sucking air now, the fall having taken it out of him far more than he had wanted it too, his head turned to one side in a vague hope that his pistol had not been knocked too far from his hand, but that was not the case as he could see it was far from his reach.

To the other side of him, he felt something move past him and towards the creatures, was one of the scientists trying to do something damn fool-heroic or did they see another way to escape that he had missed?

The slime creature was now practically on top of him and he knew those powerful arms would soon come crashing down on him if the blow that had disarmed him was anything to go by, he would soon be beaten into a bloody mess.

The fight in him suddenly kicked in as his adrenalin surged once more and he swung his leg across towards the creature's lower half, perhaps he could knock it off its base and he might be able to get up.

The blow struck hard enough to have taken a man far larger than John Nolan from his feet, but he just felt his leg and foot slide into the slime as he forced himself to pull it back in revulsion, the last stand having no natural effect that he could tell.

John Looked up at the creature as it brought its arms up in an action that looked like it would bring them down in a combined smashing motion, much like you would see a gorilla do in combat.

With his body unwilling to cooperate, he let his eyes close, he did not want to let it end like this, but this was far beyond anything he had ever known nor understood, all of it too much for his mind.

"Stop"

The loud booming voice of Dr Meuller filled the chamber, it was perhaps amplified by the cavern, but it sounded far louder than he had ever expected the man to be able to project outwards. like a drill instructor screaming orders at the raw recruits under his training.

"Stop,I command you"

The Doctors voice boomed out once more and the crushing blows John had expected did not come, his eyes opening to see the creature still looming above him with arms raised in preparation to strike.

"What the hell"

John said as he turned his head from the creature to see where Doctor Heinrich Meuller stood at the centre of the chamber, the black diamond now in his hand and held high above his head as its light washed over him giving him an eerily scary visage.

Whatever the man had done, it seemed to have stopped the multitude of creatures in their tracks, all now stood stock still around the chamber with their heads slowly lowering as if in some form of reverence to the old man.

John had so many questions but could not help but just stare as the German stepped closer towards where the circular stone form of what would have been a gate for not the wall stood.

Doctor Meuller took another step forward and held the diamond out before him and its light spread out across the chamber and touched the wall before him and lit the area with some form of strange energy.

"Come forth, I command you, I command you, come forth now"

The words were delivered with an unearthly edge to them, a strange power that seemed to be amplified by the diamond the doctor held in his hand.

"Open Gate, open I command you"

The circular structure of the gate suddenly lit up with similar light to that of what the diamond projected and a wall of liquid-like blackness filled the centre of it as it solidified into something new and something began to emerge from that infinite darkness.

To be continued.