Inside

The monster stalked towards him. He knew he couldn’t get away this time. He was tired. He was hurting. He was backed into a corner. He looked up into it’s cold dead looking eyes in resignation. It wouldn’t be long now, he knew that, as he watched it raise it’s fist one last time to smack him down and make sure he never escaped again.

The fist started to fall, and he flinched away, knowing it would hurt one last time. But the blow never fell. After a second he looked up to see a young knight in armor with a number 47 on the back holding the fist away.

“Hey buddy, mind if I sit here?”

“Uh, sure if you want too,” he answered.

He stared in confusion as this young knight began to fight the monster. He stood toe to toe with it, deflecting its strikes and striking back. Never backing up or giving ground, but unable to force the monster back either.

“Hey,” the knight called over his shoulder, “I’m having a group of friends over to my house for a barbecue. You wanna come over?”

“You want me to come to your house? ME?” he stared in shock at the knight.

No one had ever said anything like that to him before. Always the monster had driven them away. They’d come around for a while, but inevitably it scared them off. It couldn’t seem to hurt them directly, but whenever it knocked him down or clawed him, they usually left.

“Come on,” the knight laughed, “it’ll be fun!”

“Sure,” he shrugged, “I’ll come.”

Suddenly from the monsters flanks came an older knight and a Sorceress. The knight wielding a large spatula and tongs, but with a belt around his waist with hammers, screwdrivers, and wrenches. The sorceress blasting the monster with spells one after the other.

“How do you like your hamburgers son?” the older knight asked as he smacked the monsters leg out from under it with the spatula, “Eat as much as you want! That just tells me you enjoy my cooking, I take it as a compliment,” he grinned as he twisted the monsters arm behind it’s back with the tongs.

“Consider our house your house,” the sorceress intoned, causing the monster to flinch and back up a step, “If you need a place to sleep we have an extra bed. I’ll make you a key so you can get in whenever you need to.”

For the first time ever, the monster fell. It rolled to it’s feet, looking confused and scared. It obviously wanted to get to it’s target but that was getting more and more difficult.

He heard the strumming of a guitar. For the first time in a long time he took his eyes off of the monster and looked around. There stood a beautiful bard strumming away, but when she started to sing he thought heaven had come down to him. Looking down he noticed that his wounds were healing, he could stand again though he’d been down on his knees for a long time.

He could see that the monster was getting weaker. It would only retreat so far, and though the warriors were fighting valiantly they could only push it so far. However, now he could breath, stand, and move.

Suddenly he heard the young knight cry out. He turned to see the knight lying on the ground crawling away using his arms to drag legs that weren’t responding. As he looked on in horror the monster suddenly grew twice the size it had been before and made a bee line for him. He stood like a deer in the headlights.

The older knight and the sorceress jumped between them and while slowing it down, were steadily losing ground. He was terrified that the monster would get him again, frozen in place watching it come for him.

Suddenly from the side came the young knight, this time on a mechanical contraption where his legs used to be. He buzzed by, taking the monsters legs out from underneath of it, immediately stopping it’s advance.

“Don’t worry about me, man,” the young knight laughed, “This won’t slow me down at all. Maybe you should pay attention to the bard.”

Turning to the bard he saw her smile at him.

“Yes! Of course I’ll marry you,” she smiled and then began to sing with even more power and vigor.