Nightbringer by James Byron Huggins

off from her brain and struggled madly and then frantically.
    Blindness, tears...
    Floating...
    "God" whispered Gina. "Help—"
    It roared in anger, and then its hand was torn from her throat.
    Gina's legs buckled as she hit the floor but she instantly rose, despite the fact she hadn't yet drawn a breath.
    It is a unique experience to stand when you are gravely wounded. Only the upper part of your torso seems to rise, all life centered in your chest with your head rising above it, seeing everything within arm's length with lucid clarity.
    Her attacker was spinning through the middle of the chamber wrestling with ... a man?
    Michael !
    Gina shouted—more from shock than fear—as Michael roared and slammed it thunderously into the wall and the creature came off the stone like a hurricane before they went to the floor, revolving in murderous blows across the chamber. Then Michael threw out a leg to stop the spin and his right hand hit the beast in the throat with a crushing blow.
    Gina followed every move like a cat.
    Michael closed his right hand and the beast did feel pain—for a flashing instant Gina glimpsed what seemed like fear—because it howled and with a vicious twist threw Michael to the side.
    It rose snarling, grasping its throat with a clawed hand. Yet its right hand was open, fingers hooked like talons.
    Michael also stood, crouched like a gladiator. His hands were open and flexed, ready to grapple. Gina could see his silhouette, framed by the faint light of the distant stairway.
    Roaring, they charged each other.
    Their collision was titanic, and Gina fell back against the wall, barely seeing arms intertwining and releasing, grappling. She saw the creature twisted, arm extended—it had thrown a terrific blow and missed. Then Michael charged forward again, completely lifting it from the floor, slamming it into the wall.
    There was no finesse to this fight. It was pure power with the narrowest technique. In awkward holds they swayed back and forth, each straining volcanically to overcome the titanic strength of the other. But it seemed that neither was truly superior, that they might fight for an eternity before either claimed victory.
    Then Gina saw Michael's right hand flash up and close on one of the iron spikes protruding from the wall. Instantly Michael snapped it at the base and violently stabbed down. The sharp iron sank a foot into the beast's neck behind the collarbone.
    Blood struck the ceiling.
    Howling, the beast hit Michael with its uninjured right arm, and nothing could have resisted th at wrecking-ball impact.
    Michael sailed across the chamber as if shot from a cannon but somehow managed to touch one foot to the floor, turning himself in the air. He landed like a linebacker poised to rush his opponent.
    Gina didn't watch the creature. She was too captured by Michael—his skil l and strength and almost superhuman agility. Michael had barely gained balance before he charged forward. Gina spun her head to see a sheet of black melting into a wall of black—it was escaping!
    Michael was at the edge o f the same darkened tunnel, pursuing it as if he would pursue it across centuries and continents and hell itself when Gina regained her senses.
    "Michael !”
    Even as he hit the edge of darkness, his left knee bent—a single step to absorb and halt the impetus of his hurtling rush with such strength that he did not need another. Gina knew she had seconds to decide a dozen things and didn't surrender to the rush—never, never surrender to the rush—and made only one decision.
    Michael was a soldier—a highly conditioned and highly trained soldier—because only someone with extensive combat training could have done what he had done.
    Frowning with an anger that pronounced judgment on all before him, Michael stared into the darkness a long moment. Watching alertly, Gina said nothing and suddenly wished she had retained the presence of mind to retrieve the SIG.
    Slowly Michael retreated from the