Chomby wanted so badly to drop the spear and run over to Xenon and Heather to make sure they were okay, but he still found it difficult to move his body properly. He noticed Heather was wearing a pink, floral-print blouse with a soft white skirt. Xenon was wearing his usual hat and trench coat. Since his appearance was still human, he knew Xenon was still disguised. Did they find out he was an alien or not?

Chomby also noticed both their chests moving in and out. They were still breathing at least. He didn’t know what fully happened to them, but imagining the two being tortured in any way made his blood boil.

He now focused on the spear. It had a simple, arrowhead for a tip while the body was made of a bright yellow wood. It had loops and swirls carved into it, as if to make it appear fancier. But, in reality, it just looked like a stick.

This whole situation made him feel too discombobulated to fully grasp what was happening. All he knew was that this entire thing was twisted. He hated it to his very core.

“Make some noise for the HARBINGER!” Bark yelled, snapping Chomby out of his trance.

The clearing burst into a cacophony of roaring applause and shouting.

“You got this, Harbinger!” A man yelled.

“Pick the old lady!” Someone shouted.

“That man’s gotta go!” Another screamed.

“I’m loving the S.F.X!” A final person laughed.

Chomby felt his body tremble. Special effects? He managed to control his legs for a moment and turned fully around to stare at the audience. He could see the many, masked faces bounce up and down with excitement. They seemed to be overjoyed by what they were experiencing. He swore he could see tears running down their cheeks, too.

He then looked at Bark – the enigmatic man who had been stalking Chomby from the beginning. This man. What did he promise them all? Lycanthropy? Did they all really want to be werewolves so much that they’d willingly sacrifice a real person to do it? Or were they tricked into this? What did Bark tell them? Did he pretend it was all just a show?

Within the uproar from the crowd, Chomby heard the faintest of coughs. He realized it came from behind him, so he turned back around. He was surprised to lock eyes with Heather. The old woman was no longer slumped over, but was looking at Chomby with fear in her eyes.

“Wha-what’s going on?” She stammered out. “Where am I?”

Heather squinted her eyes and looked around the clearing. Chomby noticed she tried to move her hands, but when she found they were restrained, her head lowered again.

“Oh, I… I see.” Her eyes welled with tears.

Chomby felt his stomach churn. He did his best to ignore the applause, but he found his body was impulsively moving toward Heather. Once he stood directly in front of her, he knelt down.

At that moment, he felt he could finally talk. He knew all eyes were still on him, but he didn’t care what they said or thought of him right now.

“H-heather?” he asked.

“I recognize that voice!” Heather’s head lifted up and she stared right at Chomby. “Chomby! It’s you? You… you’re the one in charge of all this?”

“N-no,” Chomby whispered.

“Please, I beg you. Let me go. My daughter doesn’t know where I am! She’s worried sick. Please!” Heather choked out between sobs. She lowered her head again and breathed heavily. “I never got to tell her I love her.”

Chomby felt his heart drop. He wanted, so badly, to reassure her that everything was going to be okay, but he didn’t know. He didn’t know what Bark had in store. What was Bark even thinking would happen? Surely he couldn’t have thought Chomby would be okay with doing this.

Chomby tightened his grip on the spear. The spear snapped. Chomby was surprised. Either he was holding onto the spear too tightly, or it really was a cheap stick.

He lowered his hands to his sides and stood up again. He backed into the center of the circle and turned around the face the audience. The majority of the crowd was still cheering him on, but he noticed a few people had began to stop.

Chomby felt his skin begin to tingle as his fury rose. He lifted his hands to his ears and flicked them forward into the ‘power stance’ he tried before. He then took a deep breath and shouted at the top of his lungs. “DO YOU ALL THINK THIS IS A GAME?!” His voice boomed over every other voice there, immediately silencing everyone. He didn’t realize he could get this loud.

He noticed that all the movement stopped. Even Bark seemed surprised by the volume.

Chomby pointed back at Heather and Xenon. He could see the two begin to stir. He assumed it was because of his loud voice. “Do you all think this is some sort of show where no one gets hurt? We’re talking about real humans here!” Chomby pointed at himself. “We are talking about my friends!”

No one spoke up.

Chomby scowled. His mind filled with hatred. “Are you all willing to murder someone just to become a werewolf?”

Bark looked between Chomby and the audience. He took the initiative to walk forward. “This is all a part of the test, brothers and sisters!” Bark stood at the edge of the circle, just out of Chomby’s reach, and continued. “The Harbinger is testing your vigilance! I promise you, he wants more than anyone else to meet Berithal.” Bark leaned toward Chomby and hissed out, “to reunite with SARGE.”

Chomby rolled his eyes and looked to the audience. Because he remembered Emily, he looked directly at her when he spoke. “If you thought this was all just an elaborate show with special effects and no one was going to get hurt, go to the police station. Now. You are dead wrong.”

Some of the audience, Emily included, started looking around at everyone else.

“Again, it’s a test!” Bark said. “Just think of it as-”

“THIS ISN’T A TEST!” Chomby shouted with his booming voice. He directly turned to Bark. “You promised me you knew how to help me find Sarge, but all you’ve done is throw me into the center of a stupid cultist ritual! What did you expect I’d do? Sacrifice one of my only two friends?”

Chomby noticed four people stand up. They sifted their way around the other audience members to get to the ground. Once they did, they immediately began to run away. Chomby noticed that Emily was one of them.

“I thought you wanted to bring Sarge back. To bring Berithal to all of us!” Bark shouted, trying to project his voice louder than Chomby’s. It was obvious to Chomby, and everyone in the clearing, that he couldn’t.

“Go to hell,” Chomby spat. He lowered his posture and stared at the audience. “This is my final warning to all of you. Leave. Go to the police. Tell them everything.” Chomby felt a hateful smile appear on his face. He was surprised that his lips were curled upward now of all times. “It’s about to get ugly.”

More than half the audience dropped from the bleachers and started running away. There were very few who stayed now. Whether it was out of fear, curiosity, or because they truly believed what Bark said, Chomby didn’t know.

Bark’s eyes widened. He started to back up. “H-harbinger! You can’t actually believe I’d make you… uh… hurt these two? They were going to be completely fine! It’s… it’s just a part of a show!”

“Heather didn’t seem to know that,” Chomby stepped forward. Bark took another step back. “Xenon sure as heck didn’t!”

“It was… uh… it was all a part of the plan! We had, uh… pigs blood! We were going to use that!” Bark gulped.

“Where’s the pigs blood? That what you’d used before when Sarge was investigating? You seemed about ready to let me stab someone in the throat. There were no fake blood bags when I checked.” Chomby started to laugh. He felt his smile become more manic. He couldn’t fully understand what was happening, but he assumed he’d hit his breaking point. “You wanna grab your pigs blood so we can pretend I tear your throat out? Or do you want me to do it for real, like you planned on having ME do to THEM?”

Bark tripped and fell backwards. Chomby took this opportunity to stand over him. Bark tried to kick at Chomby’s legs, but Chomby dodged out of the way.

“Either way, Bark, it seems I’m going to be killing someone tonight! Berithal comes with a sacrifice, right?” Chomby took a deep breath and screamed. “SO LET’S HAVE IT BE YOU!”

Chomby bared his fangs and dropped down, making sure to have his movements be fast. He saw Bark try and shirk away from him. The man’s eyes were filled with pure terror now. Perfect.

Chomby stopped just short of Bark’s neck and closed his mouth. He felt his smile fade. Without waiting for Bark to realize what was going on, Chomby snatched the front of Bark’s shirt and shot into a standing position, dragging Bark along with him.

Chomby narrowed his eyes and leaned in close enough to place the front of his snout on Bark’s nose. “That is fear, Bark. Maybe you’re not used to it, but don’t you ever forget it.”

Chomby let out his aggression by flinging Bark to the ground. Bark’s mask flew off his face. He lifted himself up with his elbows and stared up at Chomby. He opened his mouth. Chomby assumed he was trying to talk.

Chomby turned his head sideways toward Bark. “If you ever try and hurt me, my friends, or anyone in this town again, with your stupid, fake cult stuff, you’ll have more than just an attempted murder charge on your head.” Chomby tilted his head. He made sure that his expression was as cold and emotionless as he could make it. “I’ll find any legal means I can to, properly, end your life. Am I clear?”

Bark seemed to look past Chomby for a moment before staring him in the eyes. “C-clear as mud, Harbinger-”

“Call me that again and I will- Gaaaaachk!” Chomby was midsentence when he felt a sudden, severely sharp pain in his neck. He could see, in his peripherals, a splintered piece of wood and a hand holding onto its end.

“I’ve done as you requested, Father Bark,” a familiar voice squeaked out.

Chomby tried to turn his neck to see who it was. He just barely managed to catch a glimpse of Emily before the stick was forcefully pulled from Chomby’s neck. He could see a green liquid on the end of what he now recognized as the spear from earlier. He immediately knew that was his blood.

Someone nearby screamed, but he couldn’t quite make out who had done it. His head was already beginning to feel light.

Chomby shoved a hand to his neck and pressed down on it hard. He could feel a throbbing pain, but was surprised that no blood was squirting out. He tried to talk, or even make a sonic blast, but he only heard a hissing noise come from his neck.

“Mmm, close!” Chomby heard Bark say. Chomby saw Bark get to his feet. “Seems you missed an artery – if he had any, that is. I think you made him defenseless, at least!”

Chomby looked back at Emily. His eyes filled with horror. Had he misjudged Emily’s intentions? What about the other cultists? He looked up and saw that only the cultists who remained seated were there.

Chomby tried to back up to give himself room to think, but Emily immediately lifted the spear to his neck. “I- I am honored to be the one to sacrifice you, Harbinger. I- uh… I-”

Chomby stopped moving but still looked between Emily and Bark.

“Skip the formalities, Emily.” Bark waved his hand dismissively. “The harbinger did their job. You see, I figured something out!”

Chomby watched Bark approach him. A grin grew on Bark’s face as he examined Chomby closely.

“What is that, Father Bark?”

“The harbinger is, in fact, just a piece of clothing.” Bark sneered. “Just something for the divine deity, Berithal, to don a mortal body!”

Chomby wanted to grab hold of Bark, but he felt a need to hold both his hands to his neck to stop himself from bleeding. He tried to speak out his hatred, but he only heard a gurgle. He then felt a stabbing pain in his throat that caused him to involuntarily cough. He ended up spitting blood onto Bark.

Bark frowned and wiped away the blood. He seemed mostly unfazed by this. It made Chomby shiver.

“How do we remove the clothing, Bark?”

“Why, it’s quite simple,” Bark chuckled and lifted his hand to Chomby’s collarbone. “We just pull down the zipper.”

Chomby’s eyes widened. Zipper? Did he just say ‘zipper’? He couldn’t have possibly meant he saw a zipper now. Chomby had been checking for a month now and never found any. He’d even dug out his own fur to try and find it. Why would it be showing now? How?

He felt Bark’s hand rub around his chest. After only a few seconds, he felt it catch on something. With the pressure Bark put on it, the object sank into Chomby’s fur. It felt cold and metallic.

Chomby wanted, with all his might, to drop either hand to the zipper, but he felt his body already becoming weak from loss of blood. His vision started to blur.

“Just a siiiiimple pull,” Chomby felt Bark tug the metal object down, “aaaaaand-”

~~~~~

And thus, the story continues!

~~~~~

Chomby/Xenon/Sarge/Art/Story (C)  Juntarhenogu Me