Part I: The Wicker Man

1
Pandemonium. Chaos. Death and destruction all around him. Debris flying. The ground shaking. Walls collapsing. Stench in the air. Stench of oil. Stench of fires. Stench of burned flesh. Smoke billowing, rearing its ugly head, blocking his vision, burning in his eyes.
Got to get away from here.
Carnage. Slaughter. A bloodbath. Women screaming. Children crying. Men sobbing. The rattle of chains. The thunder of guns. Soldiers shouting. An inhuman roar. More screams. Screams of pain. Screams of terror. Screams of despair.
Got to get away from here.
His feet thumb against the ground. He doesn't know where he's going, doesn't need to know, doesn't want to know. Get away. Just get away.
His head hurts. The smoke is thick, black. It burns his eyes, his lungs, even his skin. He can't see his feet, his hands. He stumbles forward, blind. Glass and rubble crumble and grate under his feet. Now and then he hits something soft. He doesn't hear the dying groans around him. His heart beats in his ears.
The smoke parts. A terrified scream. His own.
A slaughterhouse! A carnival of horror! People strewn all about, piled up on the rubble. People strewn all about, like puppets discarded by a careless child. Dead. Dead! They're all dead. Not one moves. Not one breathes. They're all dead, beaten, broken, burned.
Stinking heaps of rotting flesh. Piles of death, of decay. Broken limbs, flayed skin, charred faces. A dozen lifeless eyes staring at him. The face of war.
Terror grips his heart. His stomach turns traitor. He retches onto the street, what's left of it.
He doesn't want to die!
He turns around, wants to run again. Just get away from this. But he can't. Never gets a chance. The smoke parts. A huge beast lumbers out. Ugly. Threatening.
He doesn't want to die!
He's frightened. It's coming straight at him. Massive. Unstoppable. Crude, but unstoppable. A man rides on its back, pointing, shouting.
He wants to move, dive out of the way. He can't. He's frozen. Still it's coming at him, doesn't turn or slow. He wets himself and cowers. Mumbles prayers.
The massive beast grinds to a stop. The gun swings towards him. He's dead. He knows that. The beast roars. He screams.
He's alive. The beast roars again. He's still alive. He collapses on the ground. He laughs. Debris rains down around him. He scrambles out of the way. Another gun barks and the beast moves again. He jumps to his feet and runs. A piercing shriek, gunfire, the ground rushing toward him, dirt in his face, blood in his mouth. He turns around, stares in the direction of the shriek. His eyes dart here and there, looking for the source.
There it is! This can't be. Another beast, as big as the metal beast. A dragon. This can't be true. He was delirious. A dragon!
Black and red scaled mottled with dust and human blood. Eyes yellow as brimstone. Face hidden by a mask. Flanks and back clad in armor like a metal skin. Razor claws and teeth. Graceful. Fast. Deadly.
It roars. It charges. Guns shout. Sparks fly, metal skin unmarred. Chunks torn out of the ground. A howl. Metal protests. The iron beast topples over. Armor tears. Claws break iron and bone. Teeth rend cloth and flesh. Stench of oil. Stench of blood.
The soldiers don't scream. They're dead. But he lives. And he screams.
The beast pounces, snatches his foot in its maw. His bones snap. He screams louder. He doesn't want to die. It flicks its head, flings him through the air. His foot comes of between its teeth. He crashes into a wall, collapses on a pile of debris and corpses.
It stalks him, slow, deliberate. Looms over him, toying with its prey.
Thunder in the sky, but no lightning. Shadows pass overhead. Then the world explodes.

2
David Nichols stared into the sun. Sweat stood on his brow in thick drops. His breath came heavy and rugged. His heart thumped violently in his chest. His joints were stiff and his muscles tense. His stomach clenched painfully.
He hated that state. He hated it, but it returned every morning. Weak and helpless, he could do nothing but wait; lie on the ground and wait. But nothing ever happened, nothing changed.
He was not sick. At least not physically. He was not ill, but his mind was sick. His body was in good shape, but his mind was twisted and rotten.
Every night, the dream returned. The dream that was not his own. It haunted him, plagued him. Every morning, he woke up, sweating and scared. Every morning, he struggled not to scream. Every morning, he had trouble regaining his composure.
The dream was not his own. So much was certain. He had never been to such a city. He had never seen such a battle. He had never seen such an engine of destruction as in his dream. But he had seen the other beast before, the dragon. Navigators, the people called them. He didn't know why. And he didn't care. He called them fiends.
He wondered... No, that was impossible.
Enough wasting time. Every minute was precious. He had a quest to accomplish.
Grabbing a bough above him, he pulled himself to his feet. He stretched and flexed his muscles, relieving the tension of the night. Some of his joints popped. He scratched his thick beard, which failed to fully conceal the massive burnmark on his left cheek in spite of its density. There was no need for much morning toilet other than running his fingers through his rugged hair.
Out in the wild, he always slept in his full clothes, so he could stand and fight or run at any time. He never shaved. He rarely bothered to bathe.
Sure, he looked like a savage and smelled like a pig, but he was alive. And in this harsh world, few people cared about looks, and even fewer got a chance to bathe.
That he was still alive was a miracle though, given his strange companion. He had taken to calling it a companion the first time the roles reversed.
He had always been a hunter, even back at his home town. He had tracked many beasts, small and large. He had always found and killed them. And he had never failed.
But something was different about this beast. Something was off, just wrong.
It was strange. Most of the time he was following the beast, but on some days, he lost its trail, and the he could swear it was following him. This was one of these days.
He knew it was watching him. He knew, even though he could not see it anywhere, no signs of its presence, not even tracks in the soft moist soil. That sneaky bastard! He knew it was there! He just knew it. It wasn't some sort of hunch, or freaky extra-sensory perception. No, it was just plain old experience: Whenever he lost it, it was there, watching and following him wherever he went.
It was weird, and perhaps a bit scary. He hunted that beast, for he longed to kill it, yet at the same time fled it, knowing he could not. He was in good shape, his body was strong, but he was not yet ready. And something connected that beast to him, attracted it. It was always the same beast, the one with the missing eye. And it followed him like a curse.
He could not stay in any town for more than a night, for the townsfolk would invariably blame him for the beast's arrival so closely following his own. And truly he was the one to blame. Did he not know it followed him around? Did he not know the danger it posed to the innocent people of such towns? Did he not know its vicious nature, killing herd and man alike?
But why had it never attacked him? Why had it never tried to kill him? That was the scary part. The beast never harmed him. Every night he lay helpless in his nightmares, but it never killed him. Every day, he trekked alone through the woods, but it never attacked.
For some reason, it spared him.
Unanswered questions. With a heavy sigh, David picked up his backpack and slipped his gun, his greatest treasure, into its holster. He had been going west for months, and so he would that day. Humming to distract himself, he started down a winding trail.

3
The sun was climbing to its noonday height as David finally reached the village he had spotted earlier. From the top of the ridge, it had looked miserable. But up close, it was even worse.
A bunch of shacks and shanties leaning against ruined walls. Makeshift repairs made to the houses that were still remotely habitable. Leaky roofs, crumbling facades, broken windows. It looked like any other village he had been to.
Crude, but functional. The people survived.
Townsfolk were eyeing him warily from the protective shadow of doorframes and windows. Strangers always bode ill these days. Mistrust was natural. Mistrust was safe.
A little girl played on the street ahead of him. It was safe for her. Cars were no more than a legend or a myth for most people. Not to him, he had seen many cars already. But most of them had been immobile wrecks. He remembered only one that could still move on its own accord. Barely.
Her pink patchwork dress and her blonde piggy tail flutteredin the air as she ran to catch a ball a boy had just tossed, her bare feet stirring up clouds of dust. She laughed. A wonderful sound, untainted by the cruelty of a wounded world.
The ball bounced off the ground a few times and rolled to a stop against David's feet. He knelt down and picked it up. It was a fine ball, the kind that these days nobody knew how to make. It was a little treasure. Perhaps a greater treasure than his gun; both were relics of the past, but his was of war and killing, hers of peace and laughter.
She stopped a few feet away from him. She was scared, he could tell. In her place, he would have been scared too. Not only was he a stranger, but he was unshaved, unkempt, and unwashed. Covered in dust and sweat, and reeking of exertion and possibly blood, he must have appeared like a warrior of ancient legend. Brutal legends the girl could not know, and even he, the traveler, had only heard of. The gun, he knew, did not scare her. She probably did not even know what it was. Sweet innocence of childhood.
He turned the ball about in his hand and looked up at her. "What's your name, my dear?"
She didn't answer. He tried for his most winning, friendly smile, which wasn't much.
"Mommy says I should not talk to strangers."
"Your mommy is a wise woman. But it's okay, dear. I'm only here till dusk, or maybe dawn. I only want something to drink."
He bounced the ball once against the ground and caught it again. "So what's your name?"
"Michelle, mister." Her voice was timid. It had not been so before. Obviously, she was as scared of her mother's reaction as she was of him.
"Michelle, yes? That's a pretty name." He bounced the ball again, then tossed it to her. "That's a very nice ball, Michelle. Keep it well."
She smiled at him for a moment, but then ran away. He was glad that someone in this world could still find happiness.
Slowly he stood up again and strolled down the street, ignoring the hostile stares of the townsfolk.

4
The town was miserable, but the pub was lousy, and the customers even worse. Some of them looked more rugged and beggared than he did. Not one of them was even remotely close to sober. In fact, most of them couldn't even sit upright anymore.
The place reeked of bile and vomit and shit. Cockroaches the size of his thumb scuttled across the floor and rats crawled in the walls, some of them openly crouching in the corner and feeding of an old loaf of bread. The homebrewn spirits were served in mugs, dirty glasses, or whatever was on hand.
He wondered why the people of that village tolerated such a place. But he already knew. It kept the scum off the streets. That was why he was there.
Not that he considered himself scum. But the others did, and at least the scum treated him with disinterest and indifference. As long as he left them alone, they did not bother him.
David walked up to the bar and slipped onto one of the makeshift bar stools. The barkeep was a gaunt man, dressed in a shirt riddled with holes and as greasy as the glasses he served ale in. He ignored David. Intentionally. There was nobody else at the bar. Just him and the haggard barkeeper, at least two heads shorter than David. Quite daring to ignore a man who could snap him like a twig, and a savage looking stranger nonetheless. Daring, and probably dumb.
"What have you got here?" David inquired, still calm. He was used to such behavior. The barkeeper did not reply, instead pretending to be rearranging glasses and bottles under the counter.
"Hey, what have you got here?" David was still used to this behavior, but it was growing harder to stay calm. The keeper put a glass on the counter and poured some clear brown drink into it. He downed it himself.
"We don't serve strangers here", he grumbled at David.
Oh, David knew that sentence all too well. We don't serve strangers here, because you won't keep coming back. We don't serve strangers here, because we can't rip you off. We don't serve strangers here, because we're not sure you can pay. That's what it boiled down to.
"Look, I can pay." Actually, he could have bought the whole pub, but no need to make that public.
"We don't serve strangers here", the bartender repeated, pretending disinterest. This one was persistent. Persistent and annoying.
"I just want a mug of ale, okay?"
The bartender whirled around to face David, knocking the bottle with the brown liquid over in the motion and spilling most of it on the counter. David knew the smell of it. Whiskey. The real good stuff. What a waste. If the barkeeper kept the good stuff to himself, he didn't want to know what shit he served to his unlucky customers. "We don't serve strangers here! Now get lost and run back to the dirthole you crept from!"
The bartender was obviously growing angry. David already was. And that last bit had done it. His nerves snapped.
"This hole's as dirty as any other I've been to, so I'll just stay here. If you don't like that, your problem. I don't give a damn about what you do and don't. Now serve me a bloody drink!" He was screaming now and gesturing wildly. The barkeeper paled, and trembled. But he did not move.
"Now!" David slammed his fis onto the counter. The puddle of whiskey burst into blue flames. Somebody in the other corner of the pub screamed in shock. The bartender began to stammer incoherently.
David unclenched his fist and lifted his hand, shaking. Bright yellow flames rose from his fingers. He stared blankly at the fire flickering in his palm until his eyes lost focus.
"Not again..." was the last he choked. Then he collapsed.

5
Fire. Heat. Smoke. Shouts. Someone dragging him. The splash of water. Wet. Sinking into the mud.

6
David choked and gasped, struggling to get the smoke out of his lungs and fresh air into them. He couldn't feel his hands, but in turn his head felt like somebody had split his skull right in two with a massive axe. The same as always after one of his fits. His god-damn fits of fire.
Some know-it-all had once told him it was called pie-rho-can-isis, or something like that. Well, screw him! That fancy word sure as hell didn't help him control it. Every time he lost his temper, he ended up roasting property and people. And he didn't want to be that kind of morbid barbeque cook.
He was a freak. There was no denying that. But there was not even a controlling it. And he hated that. Without control, people died.
The people! There had been people in the pub! Hurriedly David propped himself up on his elbows and looked around. A crowd of people surrounded him, blocking his view on the buildings beyond. But for now, he didn't care about the building. He ran his gaze across over the crowd, and spotting a few people he had seen in the pub, he began to count.
One, two, three...
They were all there. They were all alive. None of them seemed even seriously hurt. Some were coughing, but that was all.
He sank back into the mud with a relieved sigh. Thank heavens nobody was hurt! He wasn't always that lucky. In fact, most of his fits had a really ugly end. He didn't like remembering them. Not at all.
In the corner of his eye, David noticed the building that had been the pub. And to his surprise, it still was a pub. Thin trails of smoke coiled out of the windows, sure, but it was far from being the smoldering pile of ashes he usually left behind.
"Whoever you are, you are hereby under arrest." He didn't know that voice, but before he could turn his head, a fist or boot struck his temple and he passed out.

7
"Good evening, mister."
David groaned. His ears rang from the blow, but at least that splitting headache was gone. And he knew that voice. The little girl from the streets. Michelle.
He turned around to face her, looking at her through the heavy iron bars that formed the cell in one of the few brick buildings in town. All his gear was tauntingly piled up on a desk behind her. Not her fault, he thought.
"Hello dear" David tried to smile, but it hurt terribly. He had probably sustained a few more punches and kicks while he had been out. His midriff and knee hurt as well.
Michelle shifted her weight back and forth on her feet. "What's your name, mister?"
"Huh?" He didn't know what he had expected she would say, but that was definitely not it. That dumb, startled grunt was all he could manage.
She giggled in reply. "I told you mine; now you tell me yours."
"Uhm, okay..."He still hadn't quite recovered from being taken so off guard by a girl half his height and a third his age. "My name is David. But... they call me the Wicker Man for... for the same reasons I'm in here."
She giggled again. She was obviously honestly amused about the situation. A situation whose gravity he could not yet fully assess, and she took it lightly. Children are truly blessed.
"Your fiery hands, right?" At that he fell out of his cot. He had not even sat up yet, but still he fell. How...?
"You know about them?"
"I've seen them." She stood still and lifted her chin proudly. "I've pulled you out of the bad house."
"You..." What? Impossible! How could a little girl ever drag a man his size? "Well... thank you. But you must be a really strong girl if you did that."
"Nuh, my friends helped me. Dad says smoke is bad for you. And we saw a lot of smoke. But we didn't see you. So we looked for you."
That explained how she had done it. And David was glad she had. If not for them dragging him out of the pub, things could have gotten really messy. He wanted to thank her again, but she was already at the door. "Bye bye, David" she shouted and disappeared.

8
The birds are crying their outrage in the trees above as the Wicker Man shuffles down a narrow trail through the underbrush. There is another human here. The tracks don't lie.
Slowly he works his way up a slope, but is stopped by the point of a spear. The young man on the other end of the weapon is handsome, and imposing enough even without his tool, muscular and easily standing near 7 feet tall. "What's your business here, stranger?"
The Wicker Man grins inside. Clearly the young man is guided by orders, not experience. That is the one question that rarely yields a truthful answer.
"I'm just a lone traveler seeking shelter for the night."
The young man straightens up and visibly stiffens, obviously sensing the half-truth of this reply. "That is not for me to decide. Go before me."
Chuckling to himself, the Wicker Man turns around and starts down the way he has come. Halfway down the slope, he ventures "What's your name, boy?"
"David."

9
The council gathers in a circle around the stranger, surrounding him on all side and blocking his exit. They're examining him, questioning him, discussing what to do with him.
David is standing off to the side. He's not allowed to the council meetings. He's not old enough, not wise enough. But he watches them. He can't hear what they are saying, but he can see their faces.
They don't like the stranger. Not one bit. Their faces show mistrust, suspicion, a hint of fear. Mistrust and open contempt, even unconcealed hatred. They loathe the stranger in their midst. He's dangerous.
He fumbles with his backpack and pulls something out, showing it to them, offering it. A murmur rises in the crowd. Some elders nod.
The crowd disperses. Only the three eldest and the stranger stay. David wants to go, but one of the elders waves him over. Slowly he walks over to them, wondering if this was punishment or honor.
"Ah, David. It's good that you're here. You and your parents will house this... friendly traveler for the night." David nods. One of the elders was holding a small machine. The stranger had bought his shelter.
"Yes, as you wish." He bows his head to the elder, then turns to the stranger. "This way, sir." He points in the direction of his home, and the stranger nods, walking down that path.
David wants to turn and go, but the elder grabs him by the arm and whispers into his ear. "You're our best warrior. Keep an eye on him!"
David understands. Honor and punishment.

10
The high-pitched chime of a bell rips David from his sleep. The alarm bell. He is wide away in seconds. The alarm bell means they're in deep shit.
"Wake up! Wake up! Raiders! They're coming our way!" Somebody yells outside. He can hear people running around. The town is preparing its defense. Frantic and chaotic.
He jumps out of bed and slips into his pants. No time for a shirt. It wouldn't help him anyway. Hastily, he grabs his spear and rushes out of the room.
The stranger is just coming out of his room, too, in as much a hurry as David. He pushes him back through the door and points at him. "You stay in here!" he yells.
The stranger just shrugs. "You're in charge, boy."
That is strange. Too strange. David knows the stranger won't listen. But he has no time to worry about that.
With wide bounding leaps he makes his way down the stairs and bursts out of the front door just as the thunder of hooves fills the air.
Followed by a cloud of dust, a dozen bandits storm into the town. They're all clad in heavy jackets, some of them openly brandishing stolen relics; clothes or even the occasional weapon. The townspeople don't stand a chance, and the bandits know that.
One of them stands up in the saddle, obviously the leader. "If you just hand over your valuable objects, nobody will be harmed." He pauses, waits for a reply.
A loud crack shatters the night. The bandits' horses grow wild, startled by the noise. They struggle to calm them down, but the bandit leader can't. He tumbles off his horse, limp and lifeless. His corpse leaves a trail in the dirt as his scared horse gallops off, dragging him behind.
"Where that came from, there's much more. So get lost before I send more greetings." The stranger. David whirls around and looks back at his home. The aged man is leaning out of the window, holding onto the frame with one hand and holding a large pistol in the other. He's already pointing it at the next bandit.
They look at each other, unsure who is in charge now that their leader is dead. "What, are you deaf? Or do I have to prove that I'm serious?"
One of the bandits screams and rushes off, deciding the leadership issue can be settled later. One by one, the others follow his lead.
As the last bandit rides out of town, the townsfolk cheer their unknown hero.

11
"I tell you, you're not safe here!" The stranger strolls around the circle formed by the elders, looking each in the eye. He has introduced himself as the Wicker Man, but has not given any real name. To David, he is still just the stranger. There is something odd about this man, and withholding your real name does not serve to sow trust.
"You're not safe here. I know that was not the first raid. If it had been, you would not have had an alarm bell nor somebody on watch. The raiders will come back. If not those of last night, others will. You have to defend yourself!"
His wild gestures serve to emphasize his every word in an almost ridiculous way.
"But the raiders are not the only threat. There are beasts lurking in the forest, the Navigators. You may not know that name, but you know they're there. You have seen them. All of you! The hulking lizards breaking through the underbrush, with scales as bright as metal. Those are the Navigators. And they're dangerous.
Perhaps they leave you alone now, because they are still afraid of you. But soon they'll feed of your herds. And one night, they'll come into your town, kill your women and children and feed of them!
They're vicious beasts! You have to kill them now! Now while they still fearfully back away from you!
For the sake of your own future, listen to me!"
An excited murmur runs through the crowd. The stranger smiles. "I can help you."
The murmur grows louder, then falls silent. The eldest nods. "What do you need?"

12
David is mad, stark raving mad. He feels like he'll burst with anger any moment.
All the stranger asked for was five strong men to accompany him. And David has not been chosen. He is the strongest man in town. He is the best tracker. He is the best hunter. But he has not been chosen.
He does not understand how the elders can withhold that task from him. He does not understand why.
Seething with anger, he sits at the edge of town and waits for their return.

13
As the hunters return, David understands.
Of the six who left, only three and the stranger return. And of the three, one can not walk on his own.

14
Before he knows what he's doing, David jumps up and charges up the hill. He swings his spear around over his head and smashes the butt end against the stranger's jaw, sending him spinning to the ground. He fumbles at his belt, reaching for his gun, but before he can get it loose, David's spear whistles down and pierces his forearm, pinning it to the ground.
David pants with exhaustion. The stranger writhes in pain. People come running up from town, alarmed by his screams of rage. The eldest arrives last, shocked by the sight of the stranger on the ground. He stares at David, about to proclaim a punishment, then he notices the three survivors of the hunting group.
"Put him in jail." The eldest turns around and leaves, but everybody knows whom he meant.

15
David stares at the man in the cell with unconcealed hostility. The man stares back.
"What do you want here, boy? Break my legs? Scratch my eyes out?" The edge in his voice is as sharp as any blade.
"Stop calling me ‘boy'! I'm twenty years old! I'm not a boy anymore." David is still boiling with rage.
"So what? Why are you here?"
"It's your fault! You led them to their death!"
"It's not my fault. It was prepared. It knew we were coming."
"Ah, shut up!" David jumps up and tries to slam his fist into the man's face, but he dodges and grabs David by the wrist. In spite of his injury, his grip is implacable. David tries to pull back, but instead the old man forces him against the bars of his cell.
"Now listen closely, boy!" The man hisses through clenched teeth. "The Navigators aren't just animals! They're vicious beasts, but they#re smart. And they serve a purpose! They're here to destroy us. And they will. They'll kill each and every one of us, one after the other!"
He lets go of David's wrist, but before he can pull back, the man grabs him by the head, his thumbs digging into his temples.
"I'll not go down with a whimper, boy! I'll go out with a bang!" David feels blood trickling from his temples as the man tightens his grip. "But I like you, boy. You're just like I was: young, ignorant, and full of rage! You'll be the next Wicker Man!"
Wracking pain shoots into David's bones. His heart races and all his muscles burn. Screaming, he collapses on the ground.
Then the world explodes in a tempest of fire and light.

16
David wakes up to a changed world. His head hurts, and he does not want to believe his senses. But he knows it's true.
The floor around him is charred black. The walls are marred with pockmarks of heat. The ceiling is gone, burned to ashes. The same fate caught the furniture, small piles of smoldering ashes the only testament of their existence. David stares at the pile that once was the stranger. He's dead, but things will never be the same again.
Not with that massive scar disfiguring his face, and that flame burning at the back of his mind.

17
"Hey, torchhand, wake up!"
David turned to them, but it was already too late. He got a boot in his side to forcefully wake him up. What friendly people lived in this town!
"What?" he growled at them, clenching his fist so hard his fingernails dug into his palms, withholding his anger.
"You know how to survive out there, right? So you know how to track."
"So what?" He got up to his feet, his knuckles turning white.
"Here's the deal: You help us solve a little problem we have, then you get your gear back and get lost."
David's fist connected nicely to the so-called officer's chin.
"Deal."

18
To most people, this spot in the forest looked like any other. In fact, he was sure they only brought him here because this was the last spot she had been seen. And even that was an uncertain assumption, since most of these people couldn't tell one tree from the other.
To most people, this spot in the forest looked like any other. But not to him. Back at his hometown, he had been the best tracker of them all.
The soil was disturbed. Twigs and thin branches and even the occasional bough had been snapped. Something big had moved through there recently. Not big as a boar, not even big as a bear. No, this had been bigger.
Kneeling down, he traced the three deep furrows with his fingertip where the beast had slipped, and then the shape of a three-pronged claw in the dirt at his feet. He had known what it was even before he found the tracks. The merely confirmed it.
He picked up a little pink patch that stuck to a branch. She had pulled him out of the fire once. Now it was his turn to return the favor.

19
David had spent most of the day working his way up a steep slope, little by little following the unmistakable tracks of the beast. Following its tracks and foaming with rage. What the bloody hell did they think he could do to defeat a Navigator if they kept his only weapon?
Burn him, his subconscious told him. That's what they thought he'd do. Yeah, sure. They thought it was easy. They thought it was a gift and a weapon, not a curse. They had no clue that he had no control over it.
But he'd make it. Somehow. With or without his weapon. It wouldn't have been of much use anyway. He could barely hit the broad side of a barn with that thing. But he'd make it. He was the Wicker Man, after all. He had a purpose, he had a destiny.

20
All his rage was drowned out in the confusion at what he saw. His hatred was forgotten for an instant. He was paralyzed with indecision. Michelle was alright. The beast had not harmed her. On the contrary, she did not bear a single apparent scratch. In fact, it almost looked like she was playing with it. No, not almost. It did look like she played with it. She tossed her ball away, and the beast returned it, carrying it in its muzzle, kicking it or pushing it with its nose.
They were playing. So the old man had been right. The fiends were smart, more than mere animals. Oh, those devils! To pretend harmless play and lure innocent children into the forest! David longed for his gun, to kill the demon, no matter how many shots it took.
He watched closely as the beast approached Michelle, ready to spring from his hiding place at any moment. The Navigator brushed its nose against her, tilted its head for a moment, then lay down and closed its eyes. Yes, lie down and sleep! Sleep helplessly.
Yawning, Michelle lay down right beside it. Innocent little girl, unaware of the danger she was in. Not long after, she joined the beast in slumber.
Carefully, David snuck out of his hiding place, as silent as any beast he had ever tracked. He approached Michelle without a broken twig or ruffling leaf. As he knelt down to pick the girl up, he was not surprised to find the Navigator was missing its left eye. He had suspected it was his companion from the instant he had found the tracks.
Slowly he lifted Michelle off the ground and turned to leave, but stopped after a single step. He had forgotten something. Something very important.
Taking a wary step backward, he knelt again and picked up the ball, slipping it into his pocket. For an instant, he could have sworn the spiteful yellow eye of the beast was peering at him.
But he knew that was just his fear playing tricks on him.

21
David Nichols sat on a bench at the edge of town, alone.
He could hear the voices of the townsfolk celebrating on the market square behind him. Celebrating him, and his rescue of Michelle. He could hear them shouting and singing. He could hear them dancing and drinking. He could hear the crackle of the huge bonfire they had made.
Her mother had thanked him through tears, at least two dozen times, and her father had agreed to pay for the damage his fit had done. But he was not in a cheerful mood. The beast was still alive.
Taking a little swig from the bottle of whiskey, he sank down onto the bench and into an uneasy sleep, plagued by dreams little influenced by the alcohol, and strongly by the fire.

22
Heat. Fire. All around him. Flames licking at his skin.
His home! His home is on fire! Ablaze like a stack of dry hay!
Got to get out! No time to dress! No time for anything!
Smoke fills the room, burns his lungs. Got to get out before it's too late!
He rushes down the corridor, down the stairs, blinded by the smoke. But he knows his way.
He runs through the front door and falls to the ground. He looks around, but his parents are not there. No! No!
He jumps back to his feet and runs back in. He has to find them!
The door to their room is locked. He forces it open, stumbles into the room. They're there, on the ground. Unconscious. But the beast! That beast perching above them, reaching for them.
He yells with rage and charges the beast. On the way, he snatches up the remnants of a chair, swinging them overhead and bringing them crashing down on the beasts's head. It splinters into a dozen pieces, but the beast shakes off the blow. All he's left with for a weapon is a broken piece of wood. That's enough.
He stabs. Puts all his strength into the blow. The wood sinks into the left eye of the beast. It roars and rears back, thrashing in pain.
He takes a mighty blow of its tail, sending him hurtling through the air. The window breaks at his back and he hits the dirt outside.
He gets back to his feet, wants to rush back in.
His home collapses.