Diaz Plan Chapter 18

Captain TickTock watched, impassive, as two of his guards threw oil-soaked torches through the front windows of the farmhouse. He had four men around the back door, the only other exit. He could just barely make out the frantic, panicking figures of the princess through one of the windows, along with the owners of the farm. If he could capture the farmers, he was going to have to hang them for defying the crown. If they got away, well, burning down their farm would have to be enough.

Suddenly, off to his right, there was an explosion of pink light. From where the boy had landed, he realized, before he had even turned around.

He didn't know what, exactly, he was looking at. It was like the night had grown hundreds of mouths, lined with fanged teeth. It was like some huge, branching, morphing tree of smoke, with a thousand laughing tongues, and one huge, all-white eye in its smoky depths, rooted about thirty feet from him. The two guards he had sent to retrieve the boy's body were screaming, screaming, screaming until it seemed like their throats had to rupture. Captain TickTock raised his sword.

Like a spreading oil blot, the creeping nightmare oozed forth and swallowed up the two guards in snapping jaws, cutting short their screams. Captain TickTock ducked as the thing surged forth again, just barely managing to dodge a slavering, humongous mouth that would have easily swallowed his head. As the thing soared above him, he raised his sword to cut into it. It didn't seem to notice, only spewed some viscous black goo. "Oh, perfect," he growled as he was coated in the thick slime.

The nightmare creature roared past him and slammed into the side of the now flaming house, collapsing one of the walls. Fragments of flaming wood flew far, landing in the pumpkin field, which soon began to burn as well. Guards were screaming, running, while tendrils of toothy darkness snatched them up left and right. The people inside the house were screaming. The fire was quickly building to an inferno. The situation was lost. There was no salvaging it.

Captain TickTock looked back to where the howling fissure of mad darkness had originated. There, a sobbing girl was trying to drag away the boy he had flung aside earlier. TickTock's lantern eyes flashed red fury. "You," he snarled, pointing his sword and advancing on them.

Janna dropped Marco and screamed as the hissing, clanking steam robot bore down on them.

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When the torches had first come through the windows, Star had tried to tell the Poyles not to toss water on them. She hadn't been quick enough though, and when they did, the oil on them splashed everywhere, sending fire all over the tiny farmhouse, quickly setting curtains and rugs ablaze.

"This place is going to be an inferno soon," said Mrs. Diaz.

"We have to get out of here!" Star cried.

"Star...they probably have guards around the back." Mrs. Diaz shrugged. "You said you knew this robot, right? Maybe we should just surrender to him. I want to see if Marco is alright."

"I-" Star began, and then from outside there was a huge flash of pink light.

"What was th-" said Mrs. Poyle, and then in a huge roar the eastern wall collapsed, sending flaming rubble flying at them. Beyond the wall was a sick, alive darkness, with dozens of snapping, roaring jaws.

"Oh god, Ferguson," Star whispered, sinking to her knees. She was dimly aware of Mrs. Diaz pulling her away from the roaring madness, dimly aware of the sounds of screams. After what seemed like an eternity the Ferguson-thing shuddered back away from the collapsed wall, oozing back out into the fields, which were quickly become engulfed in flame, chasing fleeing guards.

She felt herself being pulled to her feet, dragged out into the night, running between pumpkins that had become towers of cracking flame. Mrs. Diaz was shouting for Marco, while Mr. Poyle was screaming that they had to get to the forest. Star didn't know where Mrs. Poyle was. The fire was spreading incredibly fast. By necessity, they were forced towards the forest, Mrs. Diaz screaming for Marco every step of the way. At some point, Mr. Poyle became separated from them, and they had no choice but to continue to the forest without him

They were nearly to the trees when Janna, of all people, ran into them, out of breath and singed.

"Janna?!" Star gasped in shock. "Were you with Marco? Is he alright?"

"I had to leave him behind," Janna gasped, "I had to - he's after me-"

"Who-"

"PRINCESS," called a screeching, metallic voice. They all turned to face the fields, which were now a solid sheet of flame. From the flames strolled a smoking Captain TickTock, sword in one hand, pitchfork in another.

Mrs. Diaz, Janna and Star stepped backwards towards the trees, and TickTock, never breaking stride, flung the pitchfork at them. They ducked, and the pitchfork stuck, quivering, in a tree, where Star's head had been moments before. Hardly pausing, TickTock began sprinting at them, sword drawn, eyes two red hell-lights, like a train bearing down on them.

And then, from the sky, floating down like a sheet, like an endless cascade of folding madness, came Ferguson, collapsing between the robot and Mrs.Diaz, Star and Janna, flowing, collapsing, surging towards Captain TickTock. He hacked at the darkness as it pushed towards him, then, cursing, fell back into the field of flames that was the farm. Ferguson oozed after him, happily ignoring the flames, and the two disappeared into roaring inferno that was the pumpkin farm.

Janna, Star and Mrs. Diaz ran into the forest, not stopping until the fire was no longer visible.

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Some time later, Captain TickTock emerged from the flames. It had begun to rain, and the raindrops hissed as they struck his red-hot metal surface.

He had run from the moving nightmare, run until he thought that even his metal legs would give out. But eventually the thing had apparently lost interest in him and moved off towards Bandit's Point, which was now a cacophony of screams. He glanced towards the village in the distance as an explosion rocked it, setting off a fresh chorus of screams. There was little he could do about that now.

"Captain?" came a quavering voice from behind him. The one guard that he had, in the middle of all that chaos, managed to slap some discipline into. So he had survived.

"Get me some water, soldier," said TickTock casually. "I am overheated."

"Yes, Captain. And our prisoner?"

The steam robot wheeled around. In the guards arms, bound and gagged, but with furious eyes, lay the prone form of Marco.