Nick flinched and raised his arms to protect himself. He heard something collide with a crunching sound. He didn't feel anything. No, he felt something pass by his head, and he felt his feet against the ground.
For whatever reason, the tentacle hadn't hit him. Or maybe...?
Nick slowly opened his eyes and glanced down.
'Still one piece.' The tentacle had not torn his body in half or anything.
'But then what was that crunchy sound?' Fully aware of the tentacle slowly withdrawing back to the house, Nick glanced behind him.
He frowned.
A big, green, bird-like thing lay squashed on the ground. The tentacle stopped retreating. It slowly reached for the bird, careful not to startle Nick again. It grabbed the bird and pulled it into the basement.
Nick looked on, unsure what to think. But he stepped back into the house.
That bird had tried to get a bite out of him. That's what it looked like, at least. And the tentacle had saved him.
If the tentacle wanted to eat him, he probably wouldn't be able to resist it. For now, tentacle monster or not, it seemed he was safer inside his house.
It had first given him a massage and then gone for the bird instead of him. He still grabbed the bat by the door, though as he looked into the darkness of the basement.
As the tentacle slowly crawled out of the basement and made a question mark while looking at him, Nick pointed the bat at it. He wasn't sure how it was looking at him, but he could feel its gaze.
"You...No eat me. Okay?" He said. He didn't know if it understood him since it still looked like a question mark.
"Me no taste good," he said. He then pointed at the forest outside.
"Bird delicious. Very mhm." He rubbed his belly.
The tentacle slowly bobbed up and down in what Nick assumed was a nod of agreement. It was a reaction to his words. It might not understand him perfectly but it was good enough for now.
Nick and the tentacle looked at each other.
'What now?' Nick wondered to himself.
He didn't know where he was, how he had gotten there, or what to do about it. And now he even had a tentacle monster in his basement.
"I didn't take any drugs before going to bed, did I?" Nick frowned and looked out through the open door again.
He had never been on a trip this bad before if that were the case. He also didn't know where he would have gotten those drugs from.
His eyes widened suddenly as he realized something.
His water worked. His electricity worked.
He sprinted up the stairs toward the phone still on his nightstand. Maybe his wifi worked or maybe he somehow had a signal in the middle of nowhere.
It wouldn't be the first time his provider surprised him.
Nope. Dead as a rock.
Computer maybe?
Nick rushed to his office.
Nope. Dead as another rock.
Zach returned to the living room on the first floor and slumped in the sofa with a sigh. The electricity worked, but he couldn't even start the devices that might help him reach the outside world.
He glanced at the remote on the coffee table.
'No way, right?'
He pressed the on/off button on the remote. The television screen stayed dark, but only for a moment before flickering.
'No signal, huh.'
Nick couldn't access any channels, but the screen itself worked. That meant he could hook up the DVD player and watch some movies.
"Better than nothing, right?" He glanced at the tentacle that had snuck out of the basement and was watching him curiously.
It nodded.
Nick frowned.
"Do you understand me?" He asked.
It nodded again.
"I assume that's a yes. Can you shake your...head?" Nick winced as he said it. He wasn't sure if it was right to call it that.
"The tip? of your tentacle?" He corrected himself.
The tentacle bobbed up and down. If that meant yes, it meant it could shake its tip.
"No, I meant like, can you do that for me? That should mean no, right? If nodding means yes."
The tentacle bobbed up and down again before wagging from side to side like it was shaking its head.
Nick's eyes widened.
"That's great!" He could communicate with the tentacle monster in his basement!
...
"Do you mind if I ask you questions, then?" He asked. Since he could communicate with it, Nick figured he should try to figure out how much trouble he was in.
The tentacle shook its tip. No, it didn't mind.
"Are you going to eat me?" He asked.
The tentacle hesitated for a moment.
"Like the bird," Nick explained.
The tentacle shook its tip.
"That's good. Are you in any other way a threat to my physical or mental well-being?"
The tentacle shook its tip.
"That's good. Can I trust you?"
The tentacle nodded.
"That's good unless you can lie. Can you lie?"
The tentacle nodded.
Nick was a little surprised. If it wanted to deceive him, it should have said that it couldn't lie. Telling him it could lie meant making it an open possibility that it had lied about the previous questions.
Maybe it did want to eat him.
"Did you lie just now when answering any of the questions I just asked you?"
The tentacle shook.
"...Would you tell me if you did lie?"
The tentacle hesitated before nodding.
Nick wasn't even sure why he was asking questions he couldn't trust the answer to. He sighed. He glanced out the window. The forest was still there.
"Did you...Did you have anything to do with my house being in the middle of a forest?"
The tentacle didn't move for a couple of seconds before nodding slowly. Its tip also moved in a circle while it nodded.