The car was as she had left it, with the passenger door ajar. There was blood on most of the front seat. In the dark, it looked like black ink had stained the upholstery. Black chunks hung from the ceiling near the driver's seat. Another chunk hung from the keys in the ignition. The remnants of Christopher's murder scene made Juniper queasy, but she couldn't clean it up. Juniper was tired. Too tired to wipe up blood, brains, and then attempt to drive all night. She was reaching for the unlock button on the passenger door when she heard a whisper.

"Pretty. Young."

Thing? She finished in her head.

"Fresh." Was the next whisper. Whomever was whispering to Juniper did not share her love of Michael Jackson songs.

She wanted to ask, "Who's there?" or "Stay away from me", but she knew neither comments would help her predicament. The culprit could not be seen. From either direction, the road was still and calm. She wished she could say the same for her nerves. Nevertheless, she felt another presence nearby. Juniper heard it breathing behind her, but when she turned back towards the car, there was nothing. She was, as the phrase went, being royally fucked with.

Four bullets. Was that enough?

Out of the darkness, Juniper saw something that seemed beyond the work of bullets. The figure was large, washed white by the moonlight. Where there should have been one face, there were three faces fused together. In the center, there were two eyes, and a flat slope leading to a maw full of stalactite fangs. On either side of its face(s), there was another eye, and the beginnings of another mouth. Skin from its face had folded over, leaving a look best described as...overlapped. The body seemed human, but for the waxy hard skin.

For all Juniper knew, the creature was a living and breathing thing. Yet, there was no emotional signature coming through. It was an inhuman creature, one made for this afterlife. When she saw its face(s) come out of the shadows, she forgot about the gun. Her horror at seeing the creature robbed her momentarily of her sanity. Inside, she was as emotionally blank as the demon. She came back to herself when the thing faded back into the shadows.

"Fuck my life," Juniper said.

She dove into the car, scrambling to get into the driver's seat. Blood and brains be damned, she thought. Outside, a loud screech carried on the wind. Another screech answered, and another, but they were further away than the first. The bastard is callin' in the cavalry. Her hand closed over the keys and she squashed a clot of blood in her palm.

"It's okay, they'll be time to freak out later," she told herself. "Drive, damnit."

At her own urging, Juniper turned on the car. Directly blocking her escape was the monster. She screamed and hit the gas pedal in reflex. The car's engine revved, but it didn't go anywhere. It was a minute before Juniper understood she had neglected to shift out of park.

While Juniper was groping for the stick shift, she watched the monster with one eye. It was standing, waiting. In the full glare of the headlights, the thing didn't seem to be real. It was a man with a Halloween mask on. An incredibly lifelike mask with four blinking eyeballs. Her hand found the right hold, and she shifted into drive. Meanwhile, the creature made no indication it feared the oncoming vehicle. That was fine with Juniper; she meant to run the motherfucker down. 

The demon didn't go down so much as it went up and over the car. She saw the body fly up, and in the rearview mirror, a tumble of flesh fell behind the car. Her next reaction was to brake. The thing could not be dead. Couldn't be. To make sure, she put the car into reverse. Before she could crush the monster underneath the wheels, large wings opened up on its back. They were similar to bat wings, having the same look of stretched skin and veins. One difference was the silver spokes sticking out of the downward angle of each wing. The spokes were at least two feet long, and they looked sharp.

"Time to go," Juniper said.

She put the car back in drive, and pushed down hard on the gas. At the speed she was going, she couldn't tell if the monster was following her or not. It was too dark. Really, she needed to concentrate on going around the few stalled cars on the road. Juniper glanced in the rearview for a few seconds. Maybe fifty feet back were two dark silhouettes. They looked like birds, but that isn't what they were at all. Ahead, Juniper could see the road was clear. She was in the country, where commuters had been rare. It was alright to accelerate past fifty miles an hour safely.

When she swerved around the last car on the road, Juniper watched the needle on the dashboard jump from 48 to 88. It seemed that 88 miles an hour was too fast for the creatures to keep pace with. In the driver's side mirror, she watched the demons stall in the sky.

Three winged monsters hovered up high, angry that they had missed their prey. Their wings were almost beautiful against the moonlight. Being so far away, Juniper was fascinated by how closely the trio resembled fairies. It was a thought that calmed her, enabling her to drive on for the next three hours.