Chupacabra Khan (Nornir)

The maps they handed out to tourists really didn't do squat. Sure they listed an impressive array of historical buildings and old monuments, but they had been useless for getting Kiara to anywhere that mattered. She should have just gone back to that nightclub she worked at and asked Miss Viper for directions. But then the map couldn't really help with that either. No way forward no way back.

She had been stuck in the middle of the city and had spent the best part of the day following random people who seemed to know where they were going. In hindsight that probably hadn't helped matters. In desperation she'd flown herself to the tippy top of the tallest building in the area and surveyed the landscape. There had been no sign of Titans Stadium anywhere. Dejectedly, Kiara sat down on the domed-shaped rooftop, and then turned to watch the sports activities inside.

"Hang on..."

She landed gently somewhere in the stands, drawing alarmed looks from the fan-base and at least one admonishment for blocking a patron's view. Apologising, she removed her mask and slipped between the rows, walking down the steps. In short order she was intercepted by security who, bless them, wanted to see her ticket. Perplexed, Kiara admitted she didn't have a ticket, but wanted to see the horse racing stables.

"Why?"

"I'm hunting a chupacabra. And yours are the only stables within city limits. I'm sure you realise the importance of this matter and will lend me your every assistance. Which way is it?"

"I understand. Follow me, miss."

A minute later she was thrown outside.

It was dark by the time the stadium had emptied. Kiara had camped out on their rooftop ever since her forced evacuation. She was lying on her stomach, peering through the makeshift sunroof in the dome's exterior. Maybe now she could stand guard on the farm animals without incurring the wrath of the local farmer and his goon squad.

Yet just as she made up her mind the move, the ground beneath her shuddered. Electronically driven gears were closing up the sunroof. Kiara pushed herself like a penguin, sliding through the rapidly closing gap. Her toes had cleared the danger zone a mere second before it clamped together. Yet she did not fall. She looked up and saw that one of her anklet dressings had been caught in the seal. Tzul dangled upside-down ponderingly as maintenance staff shut down the last of the floodlamps.

"I hate this city..."

Entoma had heard of it by chance from a swarm she sent out to survey that area of the city. An apex predator lurked around the Titans Stadium preying on unsuspecting creatures after nightfall. Thinking that this was another opportunity to observe a monster that was a threat to humans, she decided to come looking for the creature herself. The last monster she observed proved to be quite entertaining and so she had high hopes for this one.

As expected, the place was closed and seemingly locked up tight: a minor annoyance. If not for the fact that she was here for surveillance, she would have cut open the doors in a heartbeat. To minimize the chances of triggering alarms of any sort, she decided to enter from a place a normal human wouldn't have the ability to access from outside, namely a window. She looked up and scaled the wall in front of her with superhuman dexterity before reaching her target entrance. It turned out to be the window of one of the restrooms.

Quietly she opened the door leading to the hallway, only to run into a night watchman making rounds with his flashlight. Entoma was momentarily blinded and spit out her web on reflex in retaliation. The man was wrapped from head to toe before he could finish saying anything, limiting him to making only muffled noises. She would spend the next few moments staying in that spot until her vision adjusted back to normal.

It had all begun a few nights back. Somewhere in the industrial district a meat locker malfunctioned and left a lot of produce to defrost over a long weekend. The owner had sent out a maintenance crew to fix the issue. When they opened the doors they were ambushed by a creature with huge eyes and a ridge of spines along its back. Kiara came across the scene twenty minutes later as animal control arrived. She had been looking for the bathroom.

Overhearing events, she insisted on getting involved. Heading into the meat locker, she'd discovered a heap of cow carcasses drained of blood. She was promptly informed that they had been frozen this way. "Yes. But the chupacabra didn't know that." Kiara pointed to a set of fang marks on the neck of each corpse, "Where's the biggest corral in this city?" They told her to get rid of her.

Kiara tore the trapped frond from her costume and floated back to earth in a sheath of astral energy. The cultivated pitch grass felt pleasant between her toes. That same useless tourist map had proudly informed her of the Titans Stadium facilities. That it was highly interchangeable. With surfaces for hosting football, hockey, baseball, and (most relevant to her) horse racing. She entered the tunnels in search of a sign that could point her stableward.

It was dark in the hallways, and Kiara stumbled along blindly in hopes of finding a light switch or catching a whiff of horse butt. She would smell the stables before she saw them, of that she was certain, but cities were so annoyingly sterile, its odour would be weakened. After wandering aimlessly for an unknown length of time the girl heard noise. Not a lot of noise, but just enough to suggest activity. She shifted blindly in that direction, bumping into bins and stepping lightly on cold tiles.

Eventually she rounded a corner and found a beam of light. On her hands and knees, she shuffled along a carpet until the torch was in her hand. This would make progress a lot easier. She wondered why anyone would leave such a thing just lying around. Careless. Kiara stood and shined the torch around the hallway. ^_^

Just as Entoma was getting ready to move on, the beam of light shined once again from somewhere behind her. Someone else found them already? Killing people outright was so much simpler than sneaking around was what she thought, but this served as training. No doubt learning to be more subtle would serve her well in future operations. Rather than confront the newcomer, she dashed in the opposite direction, her footsteps lighter than one might expect. It slipped her mind that trying to hide was pretty much pointless by now. She had left a wrapped up man back there and along with half the hallway being covered with webbing, it would certainly alert whoever passed by to the presence of someone unwelcome.

Once she was confident she had put some distance behind her, she looked for a way down to the lower floors, descending on the first flight of stairs that came to view. The animals were kept on the ground floor. Unless the monster preyed on humans it was more likely she would run into it down there. She paused to consider if she ought to get assistance from bugs to scope out the place but since she was up against something unknown, her modus operandi dictated that she kept her cards to herself for as long as she was able to.

Before long, she reached her destination and was alerted to the presence of the animals due to their unexpectedly loud neighing. She could sense a bit of restlessness in the air as though the horses were afraid of something. Entoma crept closer and peered inside the dimly-lit stables. The first thing she noticed was that the light at one of the furthest corners was out and whatever horse should have been kept there was quiet compared to the rest.

The foyer was covered in a sticky, fibrous substance that surprised Kiara. This couldn't be normal. She toyed with the idea that it might have been angel hair, but then noticed some similarities to silk webbing. Her skin crawled. That would have to be one big spider. She was no stranger to mammoth arachnids. Her home country of Belize boasted many of the world's worst. But she had learned to live with their menace. Never before had one been bigger than a tarantula.

Muffled noises came from nearby. Tzul flinched and shined her torch towards the sound. It was a cocoon of sorts. She expected it to hatch and a dozen baby spiderzillas to come crawling out, but it just kept squirming. Kiara inched close and then hit it with her staff. The bundle of web cried out in pain. A very human expression that. She approached less cautiously and crouched down beside it. Yes, this was definitely a human. Kiara found and expanded a mouth hole.

"Please! You don't have to do this!"

"Do what?"

"Hurt me."

"Hurt you?"

"Hurt me." Kiara smacked him with her staff again, "Argh! Please, stop!"

"Stop? But you just said..." There was no pleasing some people, "Can I help you out of there?"

"Yes! Please. A-Are you not..."

"I didn't put you in there." Kiara confirmed. Hmm. Seems the man had mistaken her for the attacker (can't imagine why), which begged the question - why did he think he could reason with an eight foot spider? Interesting, "I must go find something sharp. I will be back momentarily."

Kiara wandered into another corridor, no more sure of where she was going than when she was blind. She passed a room of lockers, some showers, and then slipped into a partition which led into an open-air compound. She smelt the horses and completely forgot what else she had been doing. The stables were only accessible from two other zones. In one corner there was a huge set of iron trellis gates that led straight onto the pitch, in the other was a triple bolted barrier that connected to a car park. Kiara saw a large white tent intended as an animal hospital, and of course the stables themselves.

There were still no lights to be had but as she swept the grounds with her torch she identified another piece of spider silk. It was here. Maybe the chupacabra was secretly a giant... Nah. That would be silly. However, she wasn't a big believer in coincidence. This spider issue would need to be addressed. If you wanted to attract a spider, you pulled on its web. Kiara found a small bell connected to the side of the stables and rang it.

Entoma's train of thought was interrupted by the sudden ringing of a bell somewhere close by. Her eyes darted from one horse to the other, thinking that one of them caused it. Perhaps it was a mechanism designed to get the attention and call over a human attendant. Well, whatever was making the animals uneasy was definitely not her as she had only just gotten there. Whoever came looking after hearing the bell might prove to be good bait for whatever was in there.

The insect queen slowly withdrew from her position, going around the back and waiting for someone to appear. Meanwhile she could hear some fairly audible shuffling noises coming from the stables behind her. The neighing and stamping of hooves grew louder and more frantic.

Animals were very attune to the ways of the unknown. With no shared commonality or feasible mechanism, most domestic pets could see ghosts. Why was this possible? Many in the magic world had taken their best guess, but it would be refreshingly honest if they would admit that they didn't know. All we knew for sure was that magic wasn't involved. There were forces at work that were neither mystical nor scientific. And Kiara prayed nightly that we never uncovered its nature. She was content to take an agitated animal at its word.

The bell had caused quite an uproar. Benighted acquired a heightened state of awareness. Still in gloom she marched boldly down the line of stables towards the darkened corner, gravel crunching underfoot. A meaningless tumult from the chargers focused her mind and caused her to shine her torch up at the roof. There was a hole. And the limb of something pulling itself up. She dropped the torch.

Kiara had never seen a chupacabra before but she had encountered their work in Southern Mexico. They were a reclusive pack of creatures that drained livestock dry of blood. Her first thought would have been vampire, but she was under assurances that they had nothing to do with the afterlife. They were flesh and blood. What captured her interest was that there were no folk tales depicting such creatures. Not in her neck of the woods. These were a new blight upon the land. Not an ancient evil but something wretchedly juvenile. Cryptids, they called them.

"Chupacabra! You are exposed here. In the middle of a city. I am a shaman. But tonight I can be your shepherd. I can take your to greener pastures. Forgotten pastures. If you will quietly-" A droplet of blood dripped down onto her mask. A moment after that the dark shape above lunged at her. Kiara brought her staff crossways across its mouthpiece and fell to earth under its weight. The chupacabra hissed rabidly on top of her.

A moment later a blast of astral energy had uppercut the critter high into the air. Kiara heard it crash somewhere back on the roof. She hastily stood up and came to stand under the dim lighting, chest heaving. So it couldn't be reasoned with. Good to know.

As expected someone did appear. But rather than some night watchman or stablehand, it was a masked girl? A normal person would have spent a few more seconds being puzzled but Entoma didn't really mind who it was as long as someone drew the attention of the creature in the darkness. The insect queen peered into the stables once more as the masked girl went to examine the dark area. Said girl was attacked by something from above seconds later. That was Entoma's cue.

The masked girl wasn't a pushover it seemed as she managed to drive of the creature back above. Entoma would take advantage of this situation by climbing up on another side to see the creature for herself while its attention was elsewhere. It was still too dark to make out its appearance. This time, the insect queen wished there was more light. As she crept closer, the wood beneath her feet unexpectedly creaked audibly. So much for approaching quietly.

The chupacabra wasn't any worse for wear from the landing. It inverted itself head over heels until it was back to standing belly-side down. It seemed to be using all four limbs. There was terror from the horses in the stable below. One threw itself against the doors but only succeeded in shaking the building. The cryptid scuttled back along the roof to the hole when it caught sign of movement on the rooftop. It rotated itself in the direction of the sound and then released another shrill hiss. The spines on its back flared up threateningly.

At ground level Kiara could hear the commotion and extended her hand out to air. The dropped torch shot towards her, as if moved by a poltergeist, and fell into her hand. It had stopped working. Kiara bashed the device twice against her leg and suddenly it shone again. Unaccountable feats of electrical engineering being just one more of her many talents. She then levitated herself to roof height and swept the summit.

The beam of light put the chupacabra in stark contrast mere moments before it darted at Entoma. When the conspiracy nuts described it as reptilian in nature, they were greatly mistaken. The large alien peepers were actually compound eyes. Its leathery skin was really a hardened carapace. And contrary to popular belief, it had no fangs, nor even any teeth. What there was instead was a duel proboscis flinging blood everywhere. This was no vertebrate at all. The chupacabra was an insect!

What greeted Entoma was a strangely familiar sound of scuttling. And buzzing. Basically all signs pointed toward giant insect even before the creature came into her field of vision. There was a tiny tinge of pride in heart in knowing that tonight's apex predator was one of her own. But there was little time to appreciate this fact. Contrary to what she had in mind, she was now the prime target in this predator's sights.

As the large bug charged at her, she grabbed its proboscis just as it was an inch or two away from digging into her skin. Then again it probably would have been stopped by her shell. Surprisingly she found herself being pushed back, though it was mostly because she could get a good foothold up there. She eventually found herself shoved off the roof area and back on the ground where she put a few meters between herself and the monster insect, staring it down.

Honestly, now that the insect queen had determined its nature, it wouldn't be hard at all to just subjugate the creature to her will. But she was up for a little exercise tonight - a rare happening that doesn't occur very often. She was interested in seeing what this predator was capable of.

Benighted One's eyes widened as she realised there was somebody else in the vicinity. There on the rooftop - a second form. And the frenzied creature was targeting them! This was bad, very bad. Never had she ever heard of a chupacabra attacking a human. For all they knew the exchange of fluids could invoke some unforeseen consequences. Maybe it could turn them into a... werechupacabra!

No that was silly.

At any rate Kiara had claimed responsibility for this mindless brute and it would be very bad form to allow it to devour someone within the first five minutes. She levitated herself after the ongoing struggle, wincing at the noise of impact, but then exhaling with relief when she saw the stranger was able to stand. There was more light now, and Tzul could make out the features of the girl. She was spry but in one piece. Though not for much longer if the giant marauding insect had anything to say about it.

The chupacabra parted what must have been its mouth-piece, emitting its feral hiss, which was vaguely reminiscent of a cockroach. It crawled across the courtyard laterally to Etoma but never taking its eyes off of her. Kiara descended from the skies, her staff glowing a faint purple, as she made to drive it into the beast's head. In hindsight, she could have just fired a beam of energy.

As if blessed with some sixth sense the beast twisted and caught her staff in its mouth once more. It rose onto its hind-legs and spun her round and round in a big circle. Crying out, Kiara let go of her staff and was launched across the clearing, rings jangling, on a bearing towards Entoma. There were ways to make a first impression. This was not it.

"That softened it up a bit."

After dodging her all night Entoma found herself in the path of a close encounter with the masked girl she had spotted earlier. It was a much closer encounter than she expected though. Perhaps due to not having much time to think, the Insect Queen elected to just catch the flying girl in her arms and she did so with relative ease.

She looked at her curiously and was seemingly trying to form an opinion of the girl, but the large insect wasn't likely going to give them that luxury. Before Entoma could even say hello to the human in her arms, the creature began its attack.

Kiara felt the weight of another pressed against her. She may have been light but she was surprised to have been supported so well. Deliriously she fixated upon the chupacabra again. Three of them were dancing around each other making the noise of sweet birdsong. But however sweet the voices in her head the nightmarish face was unmistakable in intent. It bounded at the pair.

Concerned for the safety of the bystander first, Kiara sent a beam of astral energy at the girl holding her. It would knock Entoma clear across the compound with just a little less oomph than usual. If they hit anything on their way Benighted would have to apologise later. But she hadn't claimed responsibility for the damage caused by the mounting stools or bails of hay, just the chupacabra.

Successful or not, Kiara would now be free of the stranger and flipping weightlessly in the air. She didn't like to launch attacks when she wasn't holding her staff but she didn't have the luxury of time. From her palms another blast of astral energy shot when the chupacabra was too close to dodge. It skidded across the ground at dizzying speeds until it collided with a stable block. And though it must be fatiguing, it shrugged off the physical blow.

Still floating, Kiara set herself down on her feet now just in time for the next attack. The giant insect picked up a sealed barrel of water and threw it at her. Kiara held up her hand as if considering blasting it, but then at the last moment recalled how useless her powers were on objects.