The Shocker
The man's condition was horrific.
His hair was gone, burned away entirely, and his skin had blackened like coal. The clothes he wore had charred and fused into his flesh, and across it all, black lightning scars branched out like thorns, so deep they laid bare the bone.
He never even made it to the middle of the corridor. He toppled headfirst, striking the floor with a heavy thud.
He did not so much as twitch.
"I-Is he dead…?"
"W-What the hell was that?"
The party members began murmuring in confusion. Miller's face twisted as well.
Something was wrong.
Minel felt a strange sense of dissonance. Judging by the atmosphere, none of them seemed remotely familiar with what a Shocker could do. If Chori had been bringing monsters to kill people, they would have seen this sight more than once. They would not be wearing expressions like these.
"Go take a closer look."
"What?"
"I said go look."
When Miller spat the order, one of the party members reluctantly edged forward. He reached the center of the corridor and stretched a hand toward the fallen man—then suddenly convulsed and collapsed backward onto the floor.
"Ugh!"
"What? What's wrong?"
The man turned to Miller with a face full of terror.
"I think I've been electrocuted."
"What?"
"There's still electricity—ugh. I-In the corpse. It's still there."
Clutching his hand, the man twisted his face in agony and could not get up. His legs were trembling so hard it was clear he could not put any strength into them.
Miller snarled at another party member beside him.
"You said that thing was a monster earlier. So why is it suddenly electricity?"
"I-I don't know. But he was definitely electrocuted to death."
Miller sensed that something far from ordinary had just unfolded. He turned to Minel and spoke in an urgent voice.
"A variable has appeared. From the looks of it, Group One has been wiped out. Until we figure out exactly what happened, we put catching Chori on hold."
Minel could not understand it. Losing Group One was a painful blow, but to declare an immediate retreat over that?
In Miller's eyes sat a deep, naked fear of the unknown.
Watching him, Minel spoke quietly.
"You went to face a monster wrapped in lightning without preparing for it at all? Then why did you go back to base and arm yourselves to the teeth in the first place?"
At those words, Miller narrowed his eyes.
"A monster wrapped in lightning?"
"The monster Chori calls Mother."
"What?"
Something was definitely off. There was a misunderstanding somewhere.
Minel was about to ask again when the misunderstanding resolved itself before their eyes—because its subject had arrived.
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
From the corner beyond the fallen man, a flash several times brighter than any fluorescent light flickered several times a second.
Thud.
Thud.
A monster of blue light, setting each foot down as quietly as a cat—the Shocker. Yet the roar that rolled out the instant its paws touched the floor shook the entire corridor.
The endless static pouring from its body shattered the nearby fluorescent lights without anyone flipping a switch, summoning the dark. In their place, the blue light rising from the creature itself filled the gloom.
"W-What… what the hell… is… that…?"
The man in the middle of the corridor flailed his arms and legs, trying to stand, but his shocked body would not obey. He kept stumbling and falling.
The Shocker's empty eyes slid toward him, and its feet began to draw together.
And then—
As if a flashbang had detonated, the entire corridor drowned in white light.
Flash—!
The fierce brilliance vanished as quickly as it had come. Minel blinked hard, forcing his eyes to adjust. The first shadow he could make out was the Shocker's massive frame, already at the center of the corridor.
Its mouth, split open all the way to the throat, gaped wide as it swallowed both fallen men in a single gulp. Empty eyes fixed on Minel while it held them between its jaws. Then lightning sank into their flesh, roasting their bodies a golden brown. Once they were done to its liking, the creature tore its mouth even wider and swallowed them whole.
Crunch. Crunch.
Crunch. Crunch.
Even as the blue-flashing monster chewed the two men, its empty eyes never left Minel—as if declaring that he was next.
"Miller. Get the party members out of here right—"
Minel could not finish. Miller was clutching both eyes, screaming without a sound. When Minel glanced back at the others, they were all the same.
The reason was simple. They had seen a Mystery their minds could not withstand. If they had seen it even once before, they would not be losing their minds now.
Definitive proof that the monster Chori called Mother was not the Shocker.
Then what, exactly, was Chori's Mother?
Unfortunately, there was no time to think further.
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
Blue light rose again from the Shocker's body as its feet slowly drew together. At its speed, a single bound would bring it here.
Minel wasted no time. He spun and threw himself into a full sprint.
In that same instant, a fierce flash from behind wrapped around him—as if someone had switched on dozens of fluorescent lights all at once. It was so bright that nothing was visible but the thick black silhouette of Minel's shadow on the floor.
He ran with one arm shielding his eyes, never slowing. Every ounce of his physical ability poured into pure speed.
But no matter how fast he was, he could not outrun lightning.
Zzzt!
Zzzt!
Blue bolts erupted from the Shocker, flashing through the already-bright corridor and striking Minel one after another—like lightning finding a lightning rod.
Zzzt!
Zzzt!
After loosing enough lightning, the Shocker turned its head toward one of the party members. Anyone nearby would burn too quickly; better to paralyze those farther out, then devour the ones close at hand first.
Crunch. Crunch.
Crunch. Crunch.
Like a cat tearing open a mouse's guts, the Shocker ripped into the burly man's body, tasting as it went. But no matter how much it ate, the bottomless hunger never filled. In the end, it gulped down everything in its mouth and looked around.
A few lay unconscious. Others were crawling away in every direction. The Shocker bared its teeth as it surveyed them—then its gaze stopped on one corridor.
At the far end, Minel had just reached the opposite hall and vanished around a corner.
Even after the Shocker had deliberately fired lightning into him and hit him clean.
That had never happened before. Living or not, nothing had ever escaped its lightning. A mere brush of the static that rose from its body was enough to make a body seize and a mind black out on the spot. Yet Minel had taken two bolts the Shocker had gathered and fired itself—and still run on unharmed.
It was possible only because of the electric resistance Minel had earned by scoring a perfect one thousand on the rare arcade machine on the 2nd Floor, the Voltage Forge.
But the Shocker knew none of that. To it, the sight was more than a fresh shock—it felt like a threat it could not name.
"Grrrrrr."
The Shocker had never made a sound from its mouth before. A strange emotion it had never felt in its life stirred the throat that until now had known only how to swallow food.
It drew its forelegs together. Even if lightning failed, nothing could move faster than it could. Its massive body began to drown in white light—
Flash—!
In the blink of an eye, it had crossed from one end of the corridor to the other.
"Wh… what—"
"Aaaagh!"
"…"
The Shocker swept its empty gaze over the ten men in front of it. They were the rest of Miller's party, drawn by the thunderous noise. The moment they saw the creature, every one of them clutched their eyes and collapsed where they stood—helpless long before any current touched them, their minds unable to endure a Mystery that exceeded them.
The Shocker had never feasted on ten people at once. Ordinarily it would have lost all control and gorged itself. But it had no interest in them. Its mind held only Minel—the one who had taken its lightning and remained whole.
It swung its head, scanning the halls. Soon it spotted Minel, fleeing hard down a distant corridor. The Shocker bared its teeth and swept a foreleg in a wide arc.
Thud-thud-thud-thud—!
All ten adult men went flying at once and slammed into the wall. The magnetic field generated by the Shocker's body pinned them there like iron to a magnet; they could not even fall free.
For the first time, the Shocker left prey uneaten when it was right in front of it—because for the first time, it felt something that outweighed hunger.
"Grrrrrr."
A cry thick with killing intent.
Minel glanced back. Those empty eyes were locked firmly on him. Reaching the end of the corridor, he slammed the light switch down. Darkness settled over the hall, and Hounds began to spawn—just as the Shocker's body started to bleach white again.
How long could the Hounds buy him?
He was about to spin away when the world in front of him flared.
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
Crackle-crackle-crackle!
Blue lightning branched in every direction, scorching the ceiling, the walls, and the entire floor. Every Hound born in the dark turned to ash the instant it took shape, scattering like dust. The corridor emptied in a heartbeat.
And in that same heartbeat, the Shocker stood before Minel at the corridor's end.
"…"
"Grrrrrr."
The Shocker shoved its massive snout toward him. Minel brought Silence up at once and carved a deep cut across its face.
Clang—!
An impact he had never once heard from Silence. The alien jolt through his grip nearly tore the sword from his hand.
Silence… could not cut it…
A line from the Backrooms Field Guide rose instantly in his mind. An electromagnetic field that permits no intrusion by metal.
The only mercy was that the Shocker, startled by the noise, had drawn back. The moment distance opened, Minel raised Noise and fired at its empty eyes.
Bang—! Bang—!
The thunderous reports meant nothing. The Shocker took no wound at all. It surged forward again and swung a foreleg hard.
Thud—!
The blow caught Minel square in the upper body and sent him flying down the corridor. The force was so great he nearly reached the midpoint before he stopped. He spun several times in the air and landed lightly. There was almost no damage, almost no pain.
"Thanks to the armor, then…"
He lifted his head and looked at the Shocker. Blue light was gathering around its body once more. The intensifying glow meant it was recharging its lightning.
Minel turned every gear in his mind. No answer came.
"…"
This was the 2nd Floor—there was nowhere to hide. Miller's party members and the Hounds could not even buy a moment. He could not match its speed, and even a lucky hit would not leave a scratch.
If it had come to this—
All or nothing.
The moment Minel steeled himself and prepared to charge, the wall beside the corridor clanked open in the shape of a door.
Chori.
"Get in!"
Minel's yellow-tinged eyes and the Shocker's hollow ones both snapped at once toward the child who had burst from the corridor wall.
"Hurry!"