The Night Guard

This concept popped into my head a bit ago and refused to leave. Enjoy!

As the clock strikes twelve, I see a shadow thrown onto the floor by the light of the moon. The only problem is, nothing in this room that I can see is making that shape. 

It's about that time. 

Just as I expected, the shadow begins to creep towards and up the wall. Narrowing my eyes, I reach under Emma’s pillow, making sure not to wake her, and retrieve two blades: One, a dagger, edged with poison; the other, a machete enchanted to burn when it bites into the flesh of its prey. 

The way this shadow is forming, I’ll need it. 

Said shadow eventually tires of the theatrics and pries itself from the wall, materializing into a scaly green abomination several feet tall, with 9 pairs of arms, 9 heads and yellow slit eyes.  

Emma really needs to stop reading about monsters at night.  

Nonetheless, I face the nightmare thing, widening my stance as all nine heads swing in my direction. 

Good.

Immediately I leap forwards, slicing into the thing’s chest with my dagger and raking my claws against its stomach in one go, causing it to hiss in rage. 

The poison will take a while to set in, so I bob and weave through the monster’s trunk like legs and filleting its skin from head to toe. As big and powerful as it is, I am like an especially quick-witted fly to it, killing it little by little as in tries in vain to catch me. 

Unfortunately, while I’m in mid-air on the way to its back, one of its heads rears back and clubs me in the stomach, sending me into the wall next to Emma’s bed.  

As I regain my senses, I feel the back of my head and find a small rip in the seam where my head meets my neck, and there’s even a bit of fluff I can touch.  

Right.  

Time to end this.  

With renewed determination, I get back to my feet, machete gripped tightly in my tail, and dive back into the fray, wall-jumping towards the neck closest to me. This far down, where the neck and the body meet, the Hydra is powerless.  

After what it did to me, it’s almost poetic.  

Nine. 

Eight. 

Seven. 

Six. 

Five. 

Four. 

Three. 

Two.  

By now, the thousand cuts I’ve given it are starting to take their toll. The remaining head is having trouble even focusing its eyes.  

With one final war cry, I leap forward, spinning my body and my blade like a buzzsaw... 

... 

The next morning, Emma padded downstairs to the kitchen with her stuffed lion, Bingo, in her arms, where her father was making pancakes. 

Her father looked behind him and smiled. “Morning, kiddo! Have a good night?” 

“Mm-hmm, but Daddy...” the little girl showed her father Bingo’s backside. “Bingo’s got a tear in his head! Can you fix him?” 

“Aw, sure, sweetheart! Just lemme finish breakfast and wash my hands. Did something happen last night?” 

Emma shrugged. “I dunno. I didn’t have any bad dreams.”

“Hm. Maybe he got into a fight!” he joked.  

Emma giggled. “Silly Daddy! Stuffed lions can’t fight!” 

Later, as Emma’s father was patching him up, against the pinch of the needle, Bingo smiled to himself.