Chaos Choreography (InCryptid, #5)(3)
Then the plesiosaur opened its mouth, made a horrifying keening noise, and darted toward us, moving fast enough to constitute a clear and present danger. I yelped, jumping out of the way. Dominic was a dark blur against the bushes as he raced for safety. The plesiosaur’s jaws snapped shut where I’d been standing only a moment before.
“Not friendly,” I said, in case Dominic had somehow managed to miss the memo.
“Oh really? Whatever gave you that idea?”
“There’s no need for sarcasm,” I called. In the distance, Dominic snorted.
The plesiosaur pulled back for another strike. I braced myself to jump again. The thing couldn’t stay in the reservoir, that was for sure, and I didn’t want to leave when there was a chance it might eat a jogger or something, but I wasn’t ready to kill it, either. There’d been no reports of it hurting anyone. There hadn’t even been any conclusive sightings, prior to me and my flashlight. It was just an innocent prehistoric reptile, doing what came naturally for innocent prehistoric reptiles.
The head snapped forward again. I jumped backward this time, using my momentum to turn the motion into a handspring. It was showy and pointless, but a girl’s got to stay in practice somehow, and besides, it wasn’t like we were in a lot of danger as long as we didn’t hold still. The plesiosaur was cranky and snappy, but it couldn’t leave the water. Well. I didn’t think it could leave the water. It probably couldn’t leave the water.
I decided to stay a little farther back from the water.
“Is there a plan? Or are you just going to keep jumping about like a startled cat?” Dominic’s voice came from behind me. He must have gotten through the bushes and worked his way around to avoid the plesiosaur.
“Those bushes are like half blackberry bramble,” I said.
“I’m aware,” said Dominic.
“I have a plan,” I said, tensing as the plesiosaur pulled back. “I’m going to wear it out, and when it submerges, I’m going to find out who thought it was okay to store their giant lizard in the city reservoir, and we’re going to have a little talk.”
“There will still be a plesiosaur in the reservoir,” said Dominic.
Sometimes he was so practical it made me want to scream. “That’s why God invented U-Haul rentals,” I said. The plesiosaur lunged. I leaped. From the blackberry bushes, Dominic swore. I allowed myself to smile. He was learning the dangers of questioning me.
Not that he had much left to learn. Dominic and I met in New York, where I’d been spending a year working as a professional ballroom dancer and he was doing the prep work for a purge by the Covenant of St. George. Naturally, we hit it off right away. He hit me with a snare, and then I hit him with my stunning wit and cheerful willingness to shoot him until he stopped squirming. It wasn’t your classic Hollywood meet-cute—more of a standoff with the cryptid population of Manhattan hanging in the balance—but we’d been able to make things work. Mostly because he was a nice guy, under all that Covenant brainwashing, and he had the common sense to find me mad cute, which meant he was also a smart guy.
“Please tell me you’re not planning to put the dinosaur in the back of a U-Haul.” There was a pleading note in Dominic’s tone, like he couldn’t believe those words had left his mouth in that order. “The company is still angry with us over the last U-Haul you rented.”
“I am a constant source of enlightenment and delight, and it’s a plesiosaur!” I chirped, and jumped again.
Two things happened then: three flashlights clicked on at the edge of the path along the reservoir, and a voice shouted, “Hey! What are you doing over there?”
“Oh, great, civilians,” I muttered.
Most people don’t believe in monsters. Sure, the general public enjoys a good scare. Somebody makes a movie about a cursed videotape or a haunted doll, and they’re right in the front row, shoveling down popcorn and screaming happy screams when somebody’s guts hit the floor. That’s not the same as believing. Some things we have to hide from science, waiting for the day when people will be ready to deal with the idea of talking mice or fish with fur. Other things science hides from itself, because no one really wants the night to be dark and filled with monsters. That era has passed.
The trouble is, nobody gave the monsters—better described as “predatory cryptids,” since “monster” is sort of insulting—the memo. They exist, and when given the opportunity, they happily eat people who don’t believe in them. This brought me back to the civilians running down the path in our direction, heedless of the fact that at the end of their jog, they were going to be facing a lot of teeth.
“Dominic,” I hissed.
“I’m on it,” he said. The bushes rustled, and he appeared a few yards down the path, running toward the flashlights.
“I married Batman,” I said fondly. The plesiosaur struck. I yelped, barely jumping out of the way in time.
“Stop harassing Nemo!” wailed an unfamiliar voice.
The plesiosaur turned toward it, neck stretching into a curve I could only describe as curious. Really tame snakes sometimes assumed that position. So did snakes that were thinking about turning something into a new source of protein. I gave serious, if rapid, thought to launching myself at the plesiosaur. I wasn’t wearing anything I couldn’t get wet, and it might keep somebody from being eaten.