Echo

The men hung back, whispers floating all around him. Red looked from Scotty to Echo.
    “What do we have here, boy? Kid; you gonna answer me?” Scotty’s knees shook. He needed to sit before he collapsed. He peeked at Echo from the corner of his eye. She just lay there in the dog blood, one of the men holding onto her antlers, the baseball bat in his hand.
    “Boss, how bout we use the animal for bait. Why waste ‘em?”
    “Hold on, Trolley. I need some info first. Anybody know you’re out here, kid?”
    “No.” Too late, Scotty realized he should probably lie.
    “What’s with the wings and tail; you some kind a freak?” Scotty said nothing.
    “Trolley, why don’t you give his pet there a taste a that bat?” Before Scotty could say a word the bat came down across Echo’s round abdomen, splitting it open, her golden blood spattering the bench.
    “ Nooo .” Scotty broke away, running to Echo. His tail rose high in the air, extruding its healing membrane. “You stupid fools; you don’t know what you’ve done.” Pressure and the smell of sulfur accompanied Scotty’s tail as it healed Echo, knitting her torn flesh and splintered bones together. The ground began to tremble. The men stood frozen, unable to process what was happening before their eyes. Scotty scooped up a dazed Echo, the ground now rumbling and heaving. He ran to the shed, hunkering down on the ground as the earth near the bench split open leaving a perfectly round hole from which a snake-like monstrosity emerged, shooting up in the night to hang threateningly over the men that cringed like cowards against the wheelbarrow containing the tragic evidence of their greed and brutality.
    The monstrosity from the hole undulated and hung poised in the air as if playing with the men, gently swaying as it considered its first victim. Everything happened in a split second. The head of the snake-like thing split open, extruding a thick pulsating membrane, similar to the one that resided in Scotty and Echo’s tail. It sprayed the men with a stream of black goop then dashed into the shed as the goop ate away at the men. Scotty got a big whiff of sulfur from the shed as the membranous snake emerged. It hung in the air, as if debating what to do with them. Slowly, it lowered until it fluttered massively in front of Scotty’s face. It moved imperceptibly as if it could smell him. Scotty felt chilled in the humid stinking air, afraid to breathe. It suddenly dipped down, wrapping itself tightly around Echo, drawing her up in the air away from Scotty.
    “ No. You can’t have her. Please. ” Scotty stood, reaching high into the air. “Please, please, don’t take her.” Tears dropped from his eyes, desperation clear in his cracking voice. The undulating membrane paused, let Echo drop to Scotty’s begging arms and vanished, withdrawing inside the hole, the ground collapsing behind it, shattered dogs and all.
    “Echo, Echo, come on girl, wake up.” Scotty held her close, tears dropping down on her face. He felt the aura before her eyes opened. His tears increased. “I love you, girl, don’t you dare leave me.”
    “I would never leave you, Brother.” Echo’s face looked up at his, her expression solemn and earnest. “We are married. You accepted the diamonds. I will make sure we are always together.” Scotty hugged her, feeling her tiny body shudder in his arms.
    “We better get out of here, pronto.” They cautiously peered into the shed, seeing rows and rows of healthy gleaming dogs, mostly pit bulls with a few toy size dogs, set to be used as bait. The cages were covered by dried and fresh blood.
    “They’re all healed already. From the Womb; it came to save us. It must have known about the evil humans and knew we would need help.”
    “That was the Womb?”
    “Not exactly; merely a manifestation of an arm of the Womb. It came to help us from the Hive.”
    “The hive in Sussex? You must be kidding.”
    “No, Brother Scotty. I do not know of kidding. I will be happy to have you instruct me to kidding so we can do it together. Now we must go to alert the authorities before more evil men come.”
    “My keys, we have to get the keys for the truck.” They rushed out to the disaster site, leaving the barking dogs behind them.
    Six skeletons lay on the ground in disarray, the bones dry and dissected. The wheelbarrow containing the murdered dogs, turned over on its side, the carcasses gone. Scotty moved frantically through the bones,