It lunged - closing the distance between the boys and death in a blink.
Its claws extended and brushed lightly against Axel's chin, leaving a gash.
Kale barely managed to pull Axel away to prevent the other claws from striking his throat but in the process, left himself vulnerable.
The creature slammed into Kale, sending him tumbling, putting some distance between the creature and them.
Before Kale or Axel could react, it jumped to a frightening height of six meters before landing and pinning Kale to the ground.
The creature's oily skin dripped onto Kale, and its odor smelled of burning oil.
It lifted its claws up and was ready to swipe down when something hit its head.
It was a small keychain - a monkey wearing glasses. Axel's.
The creature snarled and jumped towards Axel, who was already running.
Nobody expected Axel to join track — brainiac and all — but he turned out to be one of the fastest on the team.
He could cover a couple of hundred meters in a handful of seconds.
And yet, despite Axel's adrenaline-augmented speed, the creature in hot pursuit seemed to be closing the distance.
And even though he was in mortal peril, Axel's mind still functioned and worked quite effectively at that.
'Its speed, its slower than before.' Axel deduced as he kept on sprinting.
Sparing a second and taking the risk, Axel turned his head to the creature, only to see it smiling at him with crooked, rotten teeth.
'This damn thing is toying with me!' Axel paled as the gravity of his situation was starting to dawn on him.
This creature wasn't trying to kill him - it could have done that since. Instead, it was trying to give him a vague sense of hope so that it would take it away.
So not only was it vile, it was intelligent - a trait far worse than any other thing.
A loud horn drew the attention of the creature and him.
Looking at the source, Axel could see a car headed towards him.
The driver appeared to be targeting him as they faced him while driving at full speed.
He performed all sorts of simulated evasive manoeuvres in his head, where he managed to get out of the ordeal alive, but none of them were proving plausible, and so he prepared himself to get hit by the car.
But at the last second, the vehicle swerved and rammed into the creature that had been thirsting for his flesh.
The creature was almost comparable in size to the Toyota Camry.
Without hesitation, the driver continued driving with the creature still attached to the hood.
They drove at maximum speed into various roads and obstacles - fire hydrants, poles, anything that could perhaps kill or at least knock out the creature.
Making a final swerve, the driver had the car facing a brick wall.
The creature, at this time, was starting to show signs of understanding the functioning of the car.
It attacked the hood relentlessly as the driver accelerated into the wall and jumped out at the last second to avoid the crash.
The car collided with the wall and broke it completely.
Petrol dripped out of it before a spark ran across the exposed wires of the crash.
The vehicle exploded and sent some shrapnel flying into the driver's body.
Anyone would die facing such a collision and then an explosion so hopefully, the creature had died.
Running to the driver to see who it was, he was surprised to see that it was Kale.
"You know I can't catch up to you, so I decided to kill two birds with one stone." Kale chuckled as a brief sense of relief hit him.
"Catching up to you and killing that pest." He smiled as blood slowly stained his usually white teeth.
"Kale?" Axel held his best friend and felt the warm fluid flowing out of his sides from numerous holes in his body.
At that rate and with no medical assistance, he would die.
A faint rumbling drew their focus and the source ruined their hopes.
Indeed, anyone would have died facing such a collision, but that thought was their undoing.
They weren't facing 'anyone', their adversary was something far more malignant and tenacious than any human could ever be.
They watched, frozen by fear and despair, as the flaming pile of broken bricks started to move.
The scolding car that was on top of the bricks started to groan.
The creature burst out from the pile sending the car as well as some bricks flying with immense force.
Its body appeared weaker than before as it stared them down with eyes burning with primal fury.
Every single window within a five-hundred-meter radius shattered as the creature released a high-frequency screech.
Kale and Axel fell to their knees and clutched their ears as blood gushed out of their orifices.
The bleeding that ravaged Kale only worsened as the perforations in his body oozed out and pulsed out even more blood.
The two friends' senses went dull as their sense organs were being ravaged leaving only touch.
The creature limped out of the rubble and approached them with slow and wavering steps.
Purple blood dripped out of its slightly ajar mouth and corroded the road.
With each step, its condition improved drastically.
First, the slightly burned skin slowly healed.
Second, a deformed bone in the leg of the creature started to groan and heal until it was as good as new.
The blood that trailed out of its mouth climbed back up into its mouth.
And finally, the creature grew an extra pair of arms that appeared firmer and stronger than the other limbs.
Not only had it healed, it had evolved.
It stopped in front of Kale, the main reason for its previous condition, and gripped him with its clawed hands.
It lifted him off the ground and brought him to its face level.
One of the other two hands lifted and aimed for his neck.
Kale managed to look at the beast with bloodied eyes, and his breath caught as the hand fell like a guillotine.