Page 3 of King from the Sky

Chapter Two

There, standing about fifteen feet from her rummaging through the medicine drawers, was a man. He appeared to be about six feet tall and handsome. His features were sharp and chiseled. His eyes were piercing and the body that was on full display due to the fact he was only wearing a very torn up pair of dirty jeans was muscular and lean.

But he wasn’t a man. He was only half of a man as far as she could see. The other half of him was a… lion?

His face kept changing. One second he was a man and the next he was turning into a lion with a long, thick mane, huge foaming jaws with large teeth and the most menacing eyes. His hands were deformed claws that were trying to manipulate the pill bottles to identify the pills that he was trying to take.

How was this possible? She had to be dreaming. She was hallucinating. There was no way in hell she was really witnessing this.

Emily’s stomach began to flip from side to side inside of her abdomen. She felt more nauseas than she had ever been before as she waited for her guts to empty themselves, but nothing was happening. As she waited to be sick on the floor she felt her world growing dizzy and dark. She was hyperventilating.

Emily used to get panic attacks when she was younger, but she had not experienced this for years. She thought she had it all under control; had moved past all of those demons. Her friendships had been so instrumental in her recovery over her anxiety issues in recent years.

But now witnessing this monstrosity taking place in front of her the concept of fear was taking on a brand new definition that far exceeded what she knew as fear; she was petrified to the very core of her soul.

And she was frozen stiff. She could not move a muscle, her body reacting as it tried to somehow deal with what the external world had just thrown at her.

Emily had to calm down. There was nothing in this world that she couldn’t handle. She kept repeating the mantra in her head, learned at the therapy sessions she went to when she was a teenager. She had to remember that she was still in control of herself. She was stronger than anything in the world. Nothing could erase her.

The creature fell to the floor, wincing in pain as it struggled with the medication. It brought its deformed claws to its head cradling its skull, writhing in agony.

Emily could see the blood spilling on the floor. This thing was hurt. It was hurt badly. It appeared to have been shot and it was in horrible pain. Its wailing cries bounced off the walls screeching in her ears and pounding into her brain, leaving echoing aftershocks to bounce around inside the cavities of her skull. Emily brought her own hands up to her ears to block out the sound, certain that her ears were actually bleeding.

She had to get out of here; this thing was going to kill her if it got up. She tried to calm her mind down enough so that her flight response would kick in. The being frozen thing was pointless, she thought. She had to move; she had to call the cops or… somebody.

“Help me…”

The creature’s voice was low and guttural as if it were drowning in its own fluids. It was an odd combination of a lion’s roar and a man’s voice. It was unreal. Emily was losing her mind. She was absolutely losing her mind. Why had this happened to her? Her life was really good; she had just had an amazing night hanging out with friends, why would her mind decide on this exact moment to shut down. Was she really that tired? Or had she just snapped and lost complete touch with reality?

She began to move backwards, slowly, amazed that her legs were functioning again. She was afraid of what this creature might be capable of. It might have been faking for all she realized only to rip her to shreds when she tried to run, flying through the air with its lion strength and pouncing on her.

“Help me…”

The voice came again and this time it was mostly human.

Emily could see the lion receding as the whole man came through. His face was a contorted twisted expression of pure agony. He pointed to the wound in his chest and she could plainly see the blood pouring through his now human fingertips.

“Help… make the pain stop…” The man groaned as he reached for the pills that had spilled onto the floor.

Emily couldn’t take it any longer. She had to help this man, creature, or whatever he was. The gold in her heart would not let her sit by while an innocent creature suffered. She was sure she was going to die in the next few minutes. That thought never left her as she rushed to his aid.

She moved to the other side of the room, walking past the man/lion on the floor and grabbed the pain meds from the right drawer which was locked. She grabbed the morphine and a needle, measured out the dose, flicked the needle to push out any air that might have been trapped and injected him in the arm.

The lion roared to life and Emily leapt backwards against the wall in fear. She shielded her face with her hands and dropped the syringe to the ground. Then she waited. She waited for the horrible thing to tear her apart limb from limb. She had never felt so terrified, but she had never felt so calm either. It was as if she had finally accepted that she was going to die tonight, but she could feel good doing it because she had died trying to help someone else.

“Are you ok?”

The voice cut through all of her mental chaos and terror to bring her a single, clear message—she was not going to die.

“Are you ok?” The man asked again.

Emily uncovered her face and looked ahead. The man was lying on the floor still, bleeding profusely from the wound in his stomach, but he was just a man. There was no sign of a lion anywhere. Emily looked around the room, her eyes growing wider until they felt like they were going to burst out of her skull.

Emily had not even realized that she had whacked the back of her head pretty solidly when she jumped back as the lion roared at her. She had not even felt the impact or the pain until now as she tried to stand up and the flashes of pain shot through her cranium causing her to wince. She decided on a slow approach.

Emily was surprised to see her legs were still working and she was able to get to her feet and actually move freely again. She had not been sure she would ever have that pleasure again just a few minutes ago.

“Miss—are you alright?” The man groaned again.