Rushed by Brian Harmon

collapse or tip beneath his weight. 
    He dared a quick look down in time to get his foot out of the way of a slashing claw and scurried upward with renewed energy, spouting a frenzied string of words that he was pretty sure were not words at all but merely half-assembled grunts and terrified blubbering. 
    Something crashed against the bottom of the shaky structure.  He heard the clanking of metal rods striking the pavement and felt the platforms lurch beneath his feet, tilting perilously to one side, threatening to spill him into the reaching arms of the monster below. 
    He forced himself not to look. 
    Slipping between the support rods and onto the highest platform, he immediately began to crawl on his hands and knees back toward the far end of the structure as it wobbled beneath him, praying it would continue to support his weight. 
    Another crash.  Another reverberating clang of metal against stone.  Another sideways lurch. 
    His heart thundered in his ears.  He swore loudly, his voice cracked and shrill.  If he survived this, hopefully he’d recall this moment in a manlier light, but right now, he just couldn’t make himself care about that sort of thing. 
    Rising to his feet, he surveyed his surroundings.  He saw that he was standing just under the guttering, within reach of the roof.  He also saw that the beast was climbing over the far side of the scaffolding. 
    Something beneath him finally gave way.  The scaffolding jerked, tilted.  A thunderous clattering rose up.  The wooden platform snapped.  The monster dropped with a shriek.  Eric felt it move beneath his feet. 
    The very next instant he was clinging to the edge of the roof, his shoes scraping the brick surface of the wall, trying to find a footing as the entire structure beneath him collapsed into a pile of metal and wood with a clamor that might have carried for miles. 
    He could almost imagine hundreds of those coyote-deer things lifting their oversized heads and looking this way. 
    Desperately, he clawed his way upward, trying to pull himself to safety. 
    He glanced down to see what kind of mess waited beneath him, hoping there wouldn’t be a half-dozen steel bars jutting upward at him, waiting eagerly to run him through.  What he saw was the monster rising from the wreckage, its horrible face glaring up at him. 
    “Oh come on!”
    Freshly fueled by the panic of realizing that he had failed to break the beast’s focus and therefore remained in imminent mortal danger, Eric somehow managed to hook his leg over the edge and pull himself onto the roof. 
    Gasping for breath, he dragged himself away from the ledge as huge, yellow claws sank into the shingles and that grotesque face peered over the gutter at him.  Its bloody eyes were filled with rage. 
    “Just go away already!” 
    He scrambled to his feet and ran up the slope of the roof to the peak, scanning these new surroundings.  None of the rooftop looked remotely familiar.  Apparently, if he’d come the first night, he would not have found any reason to climb up here and enjoy the view.  He would have simply wandered through the grounds around this building, strolling leisurely. 
    This must be karmic payback for all those times he crabbed at his students for procrastinating on their papers. 
    Looking back, he saw that the monster had already climbed onto the roof and was now moving toward him, its teeth gnashing horribly.  He still couldn’t quite make out how the thing fit together.  Its huge arms hung at its sides, its claws almost dragging at its feet.  Those other limbs seemed to slither strangely around it.  They weren’t quite tentacles, but they weren’t quite arms, either.  He couldn’t seem to comprehend them.  Its green and black skin reminded him of tree bark, as if the thing were nothing more than a particularly ugly old tree come to life. 
    There was nowhere to go.  He was now stranded on the rooftop with no way down.  He might as well have