The Medusa Ritual
Dr Rafe Bardon, Director of the uber-secret US Office of Unidentified Phenomena (OUP), sends his best agent, Pierce Mostyn, to retrieve a book of arcane and deadly knowledge before its owner can use the tome to unleash a reign of terror upon America and the world.
The thrilling adventure begins now!
The Medusa Ritual
A Pierce Mostyn Paranormal Investigation
by
CW Hawes
1
An eerie, high-pitched piping came from the clearing in the woods. Filtering through the trees was an orange-colored iridescence.
“We found it, Mostyn Pierce,” Helene Dubreuil’s words appeared in Special Agent Pierce Mostyn’s mind.
He gave her a hand signal indicating he’d received her thought, and whispered into his headset, “Dotty, do you hear the piping and see the glow?”
“I’m not deaf and blind, Mostyn.”
“Good. I want you and NicAskill to move down the hill and flank the thing from the east.”
“Got it,” Dr Dotty Kemper replied.
“Do you copy, Jones?” Mostyn asked.
“Yep. You want Doc Petrie and I to move in from the west, I take it.”
“I do.”
“On it, Boss.”
“Baker here, Mostyn. Dr Stoppen and I will hold the entrance to the ravine so it doesn’t escape.”
“Good, Willie Lee,” Mostyn replied. “Helene and I will attempt to make the capture. We’re moving out now.”
Mostyn shouldered the bag of transmitters for the Electronic Confinement Array. Helene carried the activation device. She held Mostyn’s hand and dematerialized them both.
Mostyn and Helene crept through the woods, because Helene wasn’t sure if the thing could or couldn’t see them in the dematerialized state and Mostyn wanted to play it safe. At the same time, Dotty Kemper and Special Agent Kymbra NicAskill moved into position on the east side of the clearing, while DC Jones and Dr Winifred Petrie moved into position on the west.
The closer Mostyn and Helene crept towards the clearing, the louder the piping and the brighter the orange glow became. In addition, Mostyn began to smell a putridly rancid odor wafting on the light breeze. It took all of his will power to keep his stomach from heaving out his hastily eaten lunch.
In his ear, Mostyn heard Kemper’s voice, “My God, what is that stench?” Focused on the task at hand, Mostyn ignored her.
Helene’s voice sounds in his mind. “We are almost on the edge of the clearing.”
Mostyn sent his thoughts back to her. “We’ll plant the first transmitter directly ahead, and then move around the creature clockwise.”
“Yes, Mostyn Pierce.”
They broke into the clearing. Before them was a giant, orange spheroid object. It’s surface pockmarked with what looked like craters. Mostyn thought the thing looked like an orange moon.
Helene gasped. “It’s my Lord—”
“Focus, Helene!” Mostyn thought.
But it was too late. Helene’s concentration broke and they flickered back to visibility. In that instant, an arm of orange goo shot our towards them. Mostyn pushed Helene to his left and dived to his right. The arm of goo passed between them engulfed a tree and withdrew, ripping the tree out of the ground. When the tree made contact with the surface of the sphere, it vanished.
Another orange tentacle shot out towards Mostyn, who rolled out of the way. The tentacle withdrew, sticking to it were grass and rocks.
Mostyn was headed for the tree line when a scream blasted through his headset. He turned and saw Helene, who’d been snared by one of the things protoplasmic tentacles, being pulled towards the monster.
NicAskill’s voice blasted through Mostyn’s headset. “Incoming!” she yelled. And a moment later a bolt of lightning flashed out of the trees, accompanied by a tremendous thunderclap. Mostyn was knocked off his feet by the concussion of the rapid change in air pressure. From the corner of his eye, he saw the lightning bolt strike the monstrosity.
The creature’s piping shot up the register until it was almost out of the range of human hearing. Waves of red and black and gray spread across the sphere from where the lightning bolt struck the thing. The monstrosity rose into the air, and again NicAskill’s voice was heard to yell, “Incoming!”
The second lightning bolt blasted its way through the trees and struck the now slowly rotating spheroid. The creature dropped back down to the earth. The weird orange light began flickering and a dark gray began spreading out from the wounds inflicted by NicAskill’s weapon.
Mostyn got up on his hands and knees. His eyes swept the clearing, looking for Helene. He spotted her some seventy feet away from him, lying face down.
He started crawling towards her, and was only barely aware of Jones’s voice coming over the headset saying, “I got this!” A split second later, a rocket screamed out of the woods, struck the monstrosity and a dull whump sounded as the thermite warhead ignited.
The high-pitched piping sound of the thing soared beyond human hearing. From inside the giant monstrosity, Mostyn saw an ever expanding red glow, and then flames burst out of the thing like volcanic eruptions.
A scream rent the air. A scream that came from the creature and one that was human, all too human. The monstrous obscenity collapsed into a black, burning ooze.
Mostyn jumped to his feet and ran the remaining distance to Helene. He felt for a pulse and found one. She was still alive. He pressed a key on the radio control box. “Sumer Base, come in Sumer Base, over.”
“Sumer Base here, Mostyn.”
“Target destroyed. We have one casualty. Need emergency evac.”
“Roger, Mostyn. Dispatching now. ETA, four minutes.”
The other team members arrived. Dotty Kemper knelt next to Mostyn, and held his hand. “She’ll be alright, Pierce. She’s tougher than all of us.”
“I hope so, Dot. I hope so.”
“I know so,” Dotty replied. “Now we need to get as much of that goo collected as we can for the lab. Bardon will be pissed as it is. The least we can do is save the remains.”
“Right, Dot.” Mostyn stood. “Alright everybody, let’s collect as much of that goo as we can. The lab will want it.” He looked at Dotty.
“I’ll stay with her, Pierce.”
Mostyn nodded and followed the rest of his team to what remained of Tommy John MacIlhenney.
To Be Continued!
In the meantime, Nightmare in Agate Bay “is an entertaining and action-packed read” — John Paul Catton, author of Tales from Beyond Tomorrow
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The Medusa Ritual is copyright © 2019 by CW Hawes. All rights reserved.
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