Dark Muse by David Simms

that monster back home had hurt her.
     

Chapter Six

    “Then dang it, girl,” Silver Eye hollered,
“don’t stop singing!” He pulled his harmonica to his lips and
motioned for the rest of them to start playing.
    Start playing? Start playing what? Muddy's
mind was still stuck on what he saw hanging from the lead
creature’s neck.
    Yet Corey, after a few fearful squeaks, began
echoing the old man’s staccato bursts of blues. His tone grew more
confident with each deepening breath.
    Otis beat a simple blues rock pattern,
locking up easily with the others. Muddy knew his friend felt just
as scared as he was, but when someone faced dying early every day
like Otis did, fear was a bit easier to swallow.
    Knowing his behavior to be cowardly if he
remained frozen, Muddy picked a few notes in the pentatonic scale,
the easiest scale there was for a rock guitarist. Silver Eye turned
to him and winked, a signal that things would be fine. How, he had
no idea. Yet it infused the guitarist with fire as he hit a few
chord stabs here and there, weaving in and out of the beat,
creating a weird syncopation.
    An off the beat rhythm.
    The creatures stood their ground, staying
still until the biggest one slowly raised both of his hands.
Despite the spell of the music, he’d broken free and set himself
for a strike.
    If the coming explosion knocked them hard
enough, their instruments might break—or worse, their bodies
themselves. Without the music that the band played, only a fool
would believe they would survive their attack.
    Silver Eye stopped his song and turned to the
little drummer. “My man, rip it up. Shut those oafs up .
Now!”
    Otis looked as if he had just heard a war cry
in Swahili, but nodded, maybe in comprehension, maybe in
resignation. He answered those doubts in the start of a twelve bar
pattern, something that rocked on its backbeat. He twirled his
sticks then pointed them at the beasts. With a deep breath, he
launched into the rhythm that caught the creatures off guard. Its
offbeat nature, similar to what the greats, the drummers of Led
Zeppelin, Aerosmith, Cream, Metallica, etc. played, countered the
straight ahead bass and snare rhythm heard in just about every
popular song nowadays. The power of what Otis played rocked their
insides—hard. One creature took a step, tried to steady itself
using the rhythm then tumbled. When it hit, its eyes glazed over
and arms flailed in confusion. Its fall and inevitable crash shook
the entire band off the ground at least a foot, but they kept the
music going.
    Otis intensified his drum retaliation. He became the thunder and shook all of the creatures in
their stances. One by one, the creatures attempted to rush the
teens but encountered the same fate as the first one. Each
stumbled, unable to lock onto the complicated, syncopated,
off-the-beat rhythm. Their crashes turned the path and grass into a
spongy springboard, sending each of the quintet into the air, back
down, then up again. Yet somehow, they remained locked into the
groove of whatever magic was created by the music. The harder the
drumming, the harder they fell. Otis’ thunder, their crashes.
Together, they formed a backbeat that any self-respecting rocker
would die for.
    Once all the creatures were down, quivering
and in obvious pain and confusion, Silver Eye conducted the song to
an end.
    Muddy saw his chance and before fear could
take him he ran right up to the fallen “thing” and lifted the
guitar string over the creature's head with a shaking hand.
    “Nice job, boy,” Silver Eye said, patting
Otis on the head.
    “Man, if this didn’t just happen, with those
things and that music, I’d pop you for that,” Otis replied, with a
semi-smile. “Nobody pets me.”
    The man retreated a bit, sincerely. “I
apologize, music man. After that show, no one should cross you; not
if they want to stay on their feet.”
    Otis nodded. “No prob. That was awesome.” He
looked at his sticks. “How did I do