Short Stories

something is keeping us inside

My name is Maxine White; a group of tourists and I are trapped inside a small building in the ghost town of Terlingua. The monster that hunts us is some four-legged tiger with scales for skin and a tail like a scorpion. It has a mouth like an alligator and huge claws on each foot. I'll tell you everything I know, starting with how we got stuck in this situation. 

My friend, her dad, and I figured we would go worldwide. We went to Gatlinburg in Tennessee, the Grand Canyon, and New York, but last on our list was Wendigo Ranch; while there, my friend found out about Terlingua ghost town, and we booked a the next day a tourist tour. The next morning, my friend and her dad woke up and went to where the tour guide said to be. While waiting, a family of 6, a mom, a dad, four kids, and an elderly couple with a few teens, ended up on the same trip with us. 

Everything was going well in the middle of our trip till everyone's phones started to go insane, ringing as loud as possible with a government warning saying:

"Seek shelter immediately." 

This was when we heard an explosion outside the valley and saw a mushroom cloud over the city. Everyone panicked and stumbled onto the bus as the tour guide tried to keep everyone calm and get the bus moving. This was when the teens started to yell.

"There's something outside the bus!"

We all looked, but no one saw anything. The next thing I knew, I was waking up with a bleeding head and the bus upside down with people screaming and yelling. I looked around to see my friend was waking up as I was, and her dad was trying to help others. Everyone was okay for the most part. The elderly couple seemed to take the most damage, with the female not waking up as the older man shook her. This was when the tour guy screamed, and we all looked at the front of the bus to see the entire show being torn apart and him being dragged out and into the desert sand below. 

Everyone backed up from the front of the bus and near the back against the emergency door. Everyone was speechless as no one saw the thing that did it, but the sight of the massive claw marks and damage to the front was terrifying. This is when the mom screamed and backed up from the back, pulling her kids. The rest of us turned to see the monster staring through the emergency door glass. It began to claw at the mirror, sending shards everywhere on top of everyone. My friend and dad got off the bus with the family of 6, but the elderly male was crying over his wife not moving or paying attention to anything going on, and the teens were frozen in fear. 

All 9 of us run to the nearest house. I turned around to look; I wish I didn't as I saw the bus inside get covered in blood as the monster tore its way through the bus, killing those inside it. My friend's dad pulled me inside, where we had been hiding. We can hear it outside calling for help like a human. We know it's the monster because it's using my voice to call for help. No one's phones are working, and I will have this post everywhere, hoping one will work. So if you are reading this, please help us. We are in the white building with a garage next to the destroyed bus hiding from what is stalking us. We have been here for days, and everyone is getting hungry and thirsty. There are only 6 of us now. The parents went out to look for help and haven't come back. Leaving my friend and me with the kids, we can't last much more, so please send help.