Chapter 118: Prey, Part 20

Without meaning to, I turn my head aside, blinking away the burn on my retina. Lights glare out of the darkness, a line of four spots, like a cheap remake of Close Encounters, although I suspect the occupants of the glare are more like the bad guys from Alien.

Play the game...

"Baxter?"

The darkness shifts and there's that sound again...

And this time, I get it.

A giggle...

Hardly a sound Baxter would make.

A female sound...

I've never cared for giggling women, but that's just me. Always before, it's been simple irritation on my part. This sound sets the hairs prickling up my neck and my pulse yammering...

... and it occurs to me that the Bad Guy in Alien was in fact, a Bad Gal... a Queen...

It's a mad sound. An insane sound. It's the sound heard in every children's fairy tale since Hansel and Gretel pushed the witch into that oven. It's a sound that monsters make.