The old town hall was built like a fortress. It had, in fact, served as a fort during the Revolutionary War, and as an armory during the 1800s. Once Todd and his mother were inside, the soldier slammed shut the heavy, steel-reinforced door and dropped the iron bars to seal the place off. All of the windows and doors were barred and the walls were made of heavy granite. It was, without a doubt, the strongest building within 20 miles.
Although Todd didn’t know the history of the building, he did sense its strength and security. The demon smashed against the door once and it did not open. Perhaps they might be safe in here after all, he thought.
The soldier was on his radio calling for reinforcements. Todd rushed to the window to look outside. His mother tried to stop him, but he was too fast for her. The sun had just set, but there was plenty of light to see by, with the streetlights and the spotlights from the Town Hall.
Sure enough, reinforcements were on the way. He saw a small convoy of men and equipment turning onto Main Street, and he heard a helicopter overhead. It looked like a lot of men-maybe fifty, he thought, and a couple of tanks and army trucks too. This wasn’t just the police anymore. Surely the army would be able to stop this thing. The army could stop anything. And he wanted to make sure he saw it all.
“Todd, get away from that window,” his mother scolded, tugging at him. He noticed that her face was white and she was having trouble breathing. She’d called it “labor pains” and that meant she was going to have the baby soon.
“I wanna see, Mom! Somebody has to know what’s going on out there.”
His mother was too distressed to argue. She sat cross-legged on the floor and breathed the way she was supposed to when she was having labor pains. Todd looked back out the window to see what was going on. He wanted to see the army destroy this thing once and for all, and then he could get on with his life again without being afraid all the time.
He watched as the demon turned away from the main door of the building and faced its attackers. Rather than wait for them to come to it, the monster went to them. Its first target was the helicopter. Todd couldn’t actually see the helicopter, but he could hear it above the building. The demon looked up at it, then launched into the air-Todd knew that’s what it was after.
He heard machine gun fire above him and the helicopter sound became louder, then drew away. More machine gun fire followed. Then there was an awful, screeching noise, as if gears were being ground up and turned backwards. Todd strained to see but the battle was going on above him and just out of his sight. He heard a popping sound, like the sound his uncle’s car had made the time they’d driven to Putnam and the engine broke because Uncle Matt hadn’t put any oil in it. Sure enough, he saw bluish-black smoke trailing over the top of the Town Hall. Maybe the helicopter guys hadn’t put any oil into their engine, either, he thought.
That’s when pieces of the copter began to fall. First there was what appeared to be a piece of the big propeller, and it was broken clean in half. The soldiers on the ground were close now, and firing up into the air. The propeller piece came spinning down to the ground, cutting through the soldiers like a lawnmower blade. Todd screamed as he saw a head fly off, and an arm. Several others went down like bowling pins as the blade sliced through them.
The remaining soldiers took cover, dropping to the ground or ducking behind the building, and the two tanks rolled forward. The rest of the helicopter blade fell straight down, like a spear, and neatly speared a soldier through the back as he lay on the grass, sticking through him and into the ground below. The effect looked like a science exhibit he’d seen where they pinned a beetle to a corkboard. The man squirmed for several seconds before collapsing.
“Todd, you need to get away from that window,” his mother was saying. It looked like her labor pains were over, so she was a threat now. He didn’t really want to look out the window, but he couldn’t help himself. He just couldn’t wait inside this building without knowing what was going on. Even if it were bad.
“It’s ok, Mom. The soldiers are gonna kill it.”
But now his confidence level in the soldiers had fallen. Another piece of the helicopter crashed to earth-this looked like the tail, and burned up in a small fireball. This one, at least, didn’t hit any soldiers. Then the rest of the copter crashed down across the street, right through the roof of the bank. A couple of soldiers caught fire and rolled around on the ground, frantically trying to put themselves out. Then a body dropped out of the sky to splatter in the road. Probably one of the guys in the helicopter, Todd thought.
Todd had never seen a dead body in his life, and now he was seeing them by the dozens-not only just bodies, but people being killed in horrible ways. Part of him felt sick and disgusted. The other part was just numb, as if he were playing a video game or watching a horror movie. But this wasn’t the Hollywood blood and gore like he saw in Fangoria when he sneaked a peek in the magazine at the drug store when his mother wasn’t looking. This was the real thing. The movies could come pretty close, but they couldn’t get the real thing. They especially couldn’t get the sounds. And the smells-the sickening smell of that demon, and the smell of people on fire-the smells were beyond anything he could possibly have imagined.
He thought for a moment that he might throw up again, so he turned away from the window for a moment and looked at his Mom. She looked as if she had been through a battle of her own. Actually, she had, he thought. They both had. And so far they had survived. His mother’s hair was all tangled, and her eyes looked tired and old. Her face was sheet-white. Still, though, she managed a small smile.
“I wish Dad was here,” Todd said. “He’d be able to get us out of here.”
“We’ll be fine,” his Mom said. “We’re safe here.”
Todd looked past her at the soldier guarding the door. Maybe, he thought. But that one soldier wasn’t going to stop this thing. He’d put more faith in the tanks. He looked back out the window and saw the two tanks taking up a position across the street.
The demon dropped into view, just in front of the town hall. For a moment, it blocked Todd’s vision, then it half-flew and half ran towards one of the tanks. The tank’s machine gun blazed, and bullets ricocheted off the demon and off the walls of the building. Todd instinctively ducked down and away from the window in case a stray bullet came thorough.
When he peeked back up, the demon was standing in front of the tank, holding a soldier above his head. The big gun of the tank fired at point blank range. The sound was deafening, and smoke filled the air, clouding over the area and engulfing the monster in black soot. Surely, that was enough to kill it, Todd thought. He watched and waited for the smoke to clear.
Everything was silent, shrouded in smoke and falling debris. Todd waited in anticipation.
“I think they got him,” he said softly. He glanced quickly at his mother. She looked like she was praying.
Then, as the smoke and dust finally settled, he saw it still standing there in front of the tank. The soldier it had been holding over its head was now nothing more than a piece of meat, torn and charred and ripped into pieces. But the demon was whole. It had taken a step or two backward, but still stood tall. The thing looked down at itself and picked a small, fist-sized piece of rock off its chest, where the tank shell had hit. That was all that had come off. The demon seemed to laugh, then threw the small piece of itself at the man on the tank with the machine gun, where it crushed through his helmet and instantly brained him.
Todd couldn’t watch the rest. He knew they were done for now, no matter what they did. The last thing he saw was the demon flipping the tank on its side. Then he ran over to sit by his mother, feeling the comfort of her arms around him. Although he wasn’t very good at it, and didn’t really feel like it would do any good, he joined her in silent prayer and tried hard not to pay attention to the screams and shrieks that were coming from outside the Town Hall.