The Monster of Mtubu: IV

***Things get a bit more brutal...***

From a distance, the shapely movements of that giant woman appeared almost graceful. She could have been mistaken for a beautiful slave girl rather than the towering terror I knew her to be. We all stood staring shamelessly through a gap in the trees as she crouched by some object, presumably drinking from a pool. No one spoke a word for the awe we were in, and when she rose to her full height, demonstrating her glorious figure from behind, there were even one or two gasps. Then, in an instant, she moved and was gone from sight, hidden once again by the trees.

Montcliff jumped into action at once, without further debate, and started to unravel our ropes and tie them off together. He found a sturdy root to anchor them to and lowered the line down with as many of our luggage packs as could be comfortably tied to it. Strapping his rifle and some food sacks to him, he then began the descent himself. Taylor protested all the while that it was useless to head after the giant woman now; if she was dwelling in the region below, her tracks would be muddled, and we would have a hard time ascending this ridge again. Montcliff said there was no time for discussion, however, and he quickly moved down the rocks. Before he reached the bottom, Red set out after him and instructed us to follow at regular intervals, no more than two to the rope at a time. Taylor, though still aggravated, went next, and Yules clumsily followed him. It would not speak well to describe my efforts at descending that ridge, but it was no small task, leaving me exhausted and grazed at the bottom. Still, I made as timely a descent as I could manage, against Montcliff’s impatient berating.

At this juncture I came to realise that Montcliff’s anger was not directed at me, but at Hal, who had not yet begun to follow me. We could not see him whatsoever from our position, and it was first feared that he had deserted us. His head did appear before long, however, peering fearfully over the cliff, and it became apparent that the poor devil, having remained silent up to this point, was terrified of heights. Montcliff screamed at him to descend, but Hal shook his head and loudly apologised. He began to insist his regret with some fervour, and Montcliff cried out, “The idiot will bring her right to us!”

We gathered up our baggage from the floor and sprinted for cover as the vibrations could indeed be felt, the giant woman rapidly approaching through the forest. The five of us below the cliff found swift hiding places under another set of tree roots, shading us in a small hollow with holes looking back up to Hal. He was in a state of hysterics himself, and rather than fleeing he was still at the cliff edge, staring out into the forest watching the giant woman heading towards him. Her footsteps were growing painfully close, and there he was just staring. Montcliff cursed in frustration at his lack of movement, but there was nothing we could do. A moment later she stepped into view.

The sole of her giant foot appeared mere yards from our tree, hovering near us with a foreboding shadow. I could see the very detail of crushed timber stuck to her muddy sole, and observed the immense pressure her weight put on the ground as the foot came to rest. The leg followed and her body swung above us, blocking out the sky. From this vantage point, beneath her, she was as a moving mountain, a breathtaking spectacle in such size and grace that no man-made construct could equal. She did not pause, stepping towards the cliff, clearly focused on Hal above. I found myself praying desperately, as I had for Barkley, as I saw our guide suddenly flee from view. The ridge was much higher than the giant woman, but she made short work of finding secure handholds to pull herself up. Large rocks came cracking down around us under her weight, smashing through the bark of the tree and causing us all to hunch together in fright. As one particularly weighty rock thudded into the floor beside us, Yules let out a primal cry and jumped to his feet, to sprint off through the jungle. None of us gave pursuit, though Red hissed, “Damned fool, come back!”

Our attention was restored to the cliff as we heard a wailing cry from above, and my fears were that Hal had been grabbed. Up above, however, the monstrous lady was pushing herself up the rock, both hands on the ridge and feet looking for support, when Hal came rushing into view, screaming over the edge of the cliff. What possessed the man to think in such a way I could never say, for fear makes fools of the best of us, but he clearly planned to leap the distance between the cliff and the trees, rather than flee on foot from this advancing creature. I must say part of his plan was admirable, for we followed his hurtling body with our eyes and saw him rush headlong into the branches above, from which he did not immediately plummet down. The giant woman stopped climbing and twisted her head around to look at the trees, then she jumped back down with such a mighty crash that it felt as though the very trunk above us might cave in.

When the ground stopped shaking, I peered around to see she had come to a stop at the base of our tree, looking up into the branches, and was inspecting what must have been Hal’s desperate attempt to scramble higher. Here was where his plan was flawed, for he could no doubt not jump from one branch to another any faster than she could lift her arm, and her reach was enough to effortlessly pluck him from his escape. A bloodcurdling sound signified poor Hal’s capture, and sure enough the lady retreated her hand back into our view, fingers clamped about his waist. Hal was beating at her fingers with all his strength as he cried out curses and prayers in his native language. He started to repeat one phrase over and over as the giant woman stared at him curiously, and Taylor grimly whispered, “He is calling for his mother.”

“For the love of God, Montcliff, is there nothing we can do?” I asked in hushed tones, but the hunter’s gun was kept low as he stared at our giant in sheer awe.

No sooner than I had asked the question, the giant woman opened her cavernous mouth and pushed Hal screaming into it. Side on, this time, I got a full view of his final struggle, hands pressed momentarily against her teeth before his arms buckled under her strength and he was squeezed headfirst into the darkness. His legs kicked back as she released him from her hand, lips closing around his waist, and there was a brief relish from the monster as she appeared to savour him in her mouth. His feet thrust back and forth with a desperate speed, but they had no effect except to highlight his terror as he was slowly sucked into the mouth. Again, her cheeks bulged, and again her throat filled in a gross wave of flesh, emptying as Hal slid down it. I did not get to see her reaction to this horrific act, as I screwed up my eyes in painful sorrow at seeing another comrade devoured.

“It’s now or never,” Red urged, clutching his rifle close to him and glowering at Montcliff.

The latter man, however, replied without taking his eyes from the lady that towered above us, “Don’t be absurd. At her height, the best we could hit would be her waist, and I doubt we could do any real damage that way.”

“She swallowed him whole!” Red snapped. “If we fell her now, there might still be a chance –”

“Confront her and you’ll only follow him,” Montcliff retorted sternly.

Red hesitated, unsure of himself, and thankfully did not rush out from our hiding spot. The giant woman trod around the tree in careful strides, and we all tensed further as she seemed to be looking for more of our party. She crouched, but facing the other way, her behind quite unspeakably huge. She looked this way and that, over the jungle growth, and stopped short of our tree just as I felt I could remain still no longer. Then came a voice we all recognised as the good Reverend Yules, and in that moment we all held our breath.

“Dear beauty,” he called out, “you are a truly divine creature of God’s creation! We are intelligent like you, you must see sense that we are not like the others!”

“He’s lost his mind!” Red gasped, scrambling onto his side to get a better view.

Montcliff and I followed him, the hunter mumbling, “Let’s see what power his reason has on this monster.”

The Reverend was standing in a clearing of the jungle, arms spread. He looked up to the giant woman and boomed with an imploring tone, “There is much we can learn from each other, please just listen! The Lord commands that you understand!”

The giant woman was now raised to her full height once more, with her feet spread some distance apart as she looked down at our companion. Yules was certainly not fearless, his arms and voice trembling as he spoke, but the courage of Christ compelled him to stand his ground, and I must say that I wish it had not. As he continued trying to reason with her, she lifted a foot so large it could completely cover him, and this hovered near him as he eyed it in fright. Then she gave a quick prod with her big toe, and poor Yules tumbled under the pressure, offering not the slightest resistance to her relaxed move.

The Reverend scrambled back across the ground away from her, though incredibly his voice still called out, citing Bible verse. Her foot descended onto him and we cringed, fearing him crushed, but her foot twisted to the side and we saw that the priest was in fact stuck to the sole. Worse, her toes had curled over him; some dexterous move on behalf of the enormous creature had actually caught him in a grip, a toe either side of his head, and this giant foot plucked him from the ground. His voice rose as he did, and we saw that mighty leg carry him up a frightening height to her waist, where her foot tilted upwards to present him to her for inspection. We could see that Yules was struggling, but only in the sure discomfort of being smothered against an enormous foot; he was making no attempt to escape as he pushed at what must have been a wall of flesh beneath him. Likely the fall prevented any thoughts of jumping to safety.

He called out more Bible verse as her fingers closed around one of his legs and pulled him clear. It was almost as if for our benefit that the giant woman now turned on the spot, dropping her foot and giving us a full view of her front. Yules was lifted upside down, dangling by the one leg caught in her grasp. He hung before her face, his shirt draped about his head and his arms dropping beyond, yet he kept citing the Good Book. This seemed to interest her, to some degree, as she looked him up and down as he hung there, then she shook him for her apparent amusement, which sparked something in her eye.

Then came the inevitable feeding, and I would baulk from describing it if it weren’t different to the giant woman’s previous actions. Seeming suddenly to tire of his shouting, the giantess abruptly twisted and swung the Reverend to the side, smacking him into the rocks of the cliff. We collectively winced at this barbarism, but Yules continued groaning and muttering prayers as he now hung limply. The giant woman lifted him before her face, inspecting his injured state, then brought up her other hand to cup his head. This she guided towards her opening mouth, with a movement caressing and careful in a manner that belied her feral appearance. Yules’ moans rose loudly only to be smothered as she closed her teeth on him. He regained just enough energy to feebly shove one hand up at her nose before she bit down, hard.

I will not go into full detail, but what followed was a gradual and ghastly scene as the monster bit through the Reverend’s chest and chewed him up, one piece at a time. I tried to bear witness to his death out of respect, but I could only take in so much. When I looked away, I could not block out the sounds of her crunching through his bones. She ate through Yules in four or five mouthfuls, pulling him apart with her fingers and teeth, and made occasional murmuring sounds of pleasure. When she finished, and I looked again, I saw something of a smirk on her face, the most emotion I had seen her show yet. What’s more, her meal must have raised wind, for a burp rose from her like a hiccup. The monster rose a hand to her mouth with a chilling charm reminiscent of the sheepish coiling of a well-bred lady hiding involuntary gas.

Then she turned to leave us, walking with her hips swaying.

“God save us.” Red was the first to speak in uttered tones, crossing himself.

“We must leave now,” Taylor growled. “You have seen her, seen what she is capable of, there is nothing we can do here but go in good sense!”

“Poppycock,” Montcliff said, without the slightest hint of fear, rising to his feet and stepping out from our hiding spot. He had his gun braced as he watched the giant woman’s departing behind. “We have to follow her now if we’re to ever keep up.”

“We can’t keep up with that!” I intervened, myself. It was evident, watching her, that every step of hers, over in a moment, would mean a few minutes walk for us.

Montcliff was not interested, though, and said briefly “You are right. Good luck to you, Watkins.”

And with that, he bounded away with only his rifle for company, held at his waist. He followed the path of the giant woman and showed no sign of stopping as I called out after him. Red looked to me and asked if he should follow, in a tone that rather begged me to relieve him of the responsibility. I said it was no use; Montcliff was better off alone. We could not leave him, though, of that I was certain. We had to make these deaths so far count for something, and Montcliff remained our best chance of surviving this monster. There was, of course, too, the question of exactly what had become of the Spillerson party.

So, we divided what supplies we three could muster and headed on into the jungle after Montcliff. Yes, Taylor was still full of protest, but he did not leave us, bless the man’s soul.