5/2 18:44

The sky had gone dark; along the whole highway there was nothing but the crisscrossing glow of streetlights and headlights. For a long while Hugo said nothing, just working to steady his breathing, while Kevin stared anxiously out the window at the Meuse River, gnawing at his nails, unable to relax in the slightest.

"What was that thing?" Kevin asked.

Hugo glanced at him. "I don't know. Some kind of mutant alligator? I've never seen anything like it."

"Christ, that thing can slide on its belly through shallow water too — that's insane."

"Yeah. Let's figure out where we're going first — looks like the Meuse is about to flood for real."

"Go beg the state for help?"

"That's the wrong direction. We went to the rec center to report to the Sheriff, but in the panic we ended up on the highway heading toward town instead."

"Oh — I hope they're all right. What's useful back in town?"

"Well, the station's got a few more guns, a stun gun."

Kevin turned to look at the churning river. "Anything to eat?"

"I don't know. No idea if anyone's even still in town — with rain this heavy, the mayor's probably already put out an evacuation order."

"Goddammit."

"What'd you say?"

Hugo followed Kevin's gaze. In the raging Meuse, something golden-yellow surfaced and sank, surfaced and sank. The next moment it burst up out of the water — the same thing from the recreation center. It had followed them the whole way down the Meuse. Hugo and Kevin, it seemed, had become its quarry — and in the water, relatively speaking, that thing moved faster than Hugo's rickety old cruiser.

"Christ."

The road ahead crossed a small bridge over the river, and at their current speed, there was every chance they'd meet the thing right on top of it. Hugo shifted gears and floored the gas; the tires slipped a little, rocking the car, but he had no choice but to push it faster across that bridge. The engine screamed as they beat it onto the bridge, and in that same instant the thing burst out of the water, jaws gaping with rows of long white teeth, lunging straight for them. Luckily his timing held — by the barest margin, the old cruiser escaped with nothing worse than one taillight sliced open by a swipe of its fin.

Now the Meuse ran alongside Hugo's side of the car, and the thing still hadn't given up — still accelerating, still chasing along the riverbank.

"What do we do now? What do we do?" Kevin, panicking, kept clawing at his own hair, his face bloodless.

"I — I don't know, I don't even know if the guns would do any good..."

The thing lunged up onto the bank again, and Hugo, startled, yanked the wheel toward the shoulder — but it missed this time too, and slid back into the river at once.

"Son of a bitch!" Hugo swore out loud, while the thing kept its predatory gaze fixed on them from the river.

"Can we actually outrun this thing?"

"Kevin, shut up, we are going to outrun it! We're—"

Before he could finish, the thing lunged again, but missed once more, only grazing the pavement.

"Go to hell!" Hugo's eyes went wide, terrified that the smallest slip would end in a crash — and whether it was a wreck or getting eaten, neither was a good way to go.

"I know it's a bad time to bother you, but we're almost into town."

Kevin said this, and Hugo glanced ahead — a green highway sign in white letters read "Meuse Town, 1 mile," and right after it, a nude female bust abandoned by the roadside. Hugo froze for a second, and then an odd, inexplicable grin spread across his face.

"What's funny?"

"Kevin, hold on tight. If this doesn't work, today's our last day."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Pray for me that the bar owner's exactly as lazy as he's always been."

"The bar owner?"

"Yeah. We're going to go grab a drink in a minute."

"A drink?"