The night is dangerous–where primal fears lurk. The moon shined high in the sky with its pale complexion like that of a bright ghost. The trees were thick and and the snow even thicker. Ravens would soar cawing throughout the night, their cries soon joined by the howling of wolves.
Someone though took the challenge to hike in these woods late at night. He wore a blue and gray winter jacket, similar to a varsity jacket. He had a beanie on his head covering what hair he had. The man surveyed his surroundings and seemed to see a log on the ground laying. He then took a seat on said log and still looked around at his surroundings, he then took his bag from his back and proceeded to open it. He grabbed a flask with some sort of hot drink inside, his clammy frost bitten hands were warm by the drink being in proximity.
The man looked around the area and let out a depressed sigh. He clasped his hands around his face. He continued to look around and as he listened he heard the sounds of elk and wolves. He got up and continued walking making his way through the woods. A ring started to buzz from his phone and he picked it up.
¨ Yo yo yo, so how′s the search going¨ said a voice on the other end. The other voice was from a women who sounded like she was in her mid twenties. ¨ Nothing yet, been a few hours in here and I haven′t seen shit¨”the man said. He had a deep voice that was clearly tired. ¨ Can you send me the location of the kid¨ He asked taking glances around his surroundings.
¨ Yeah sure thing Lawrence– yeah got it the last sighting was a few yards up ahead¨ she said. Lawrence began walked up the trail tired and heard the sounds of wildlife. He could hear the skitters of animals like mice and rabbits in the snow. He then saw it–an old rotting moose corpse. It’s throat had been and punctured, while the stomach had chunks missing. Both of it’s antlers were broken with frozen dusted blood leaking from them. Lawrence knew he was in national park with dangerous wildlife. Wolves, Cougars, and bears, he was privy to it all. But t the issue was he was still pretty early in the park, if anything rangers should have been here and the kid should have been found.
¨ Hey Paige how far in bear country are we” He asked
¨ I wouldn't say that far at best it would be very hard to even meet one¨ she said. He took a deep breath ¨ There′s a dead moose looks about a week maybe a month old¨ he said as if he was gasping for air. There was no response on Paige′s end, he checked to see if he could still get her. Though he realized bad reception had got him, and now he couldn't call her as well as he would have hoped. He looked at the map and saw a cell tower on it. ¨ Just need to go out there and see¨ he said out loud to himself. He walked along the path thinking about the decisions that led him to this current state. Lawrence was on an off day earlier that morning, he was planning on spending some time with his son, who was coming back from university. Unfortunately most of the officers were out for the winter break, so only he was available. However he didn't expect it would in the forest near the town.
He kept hiking along the trail for a few minutes and then found the cell tower and tried to make connection. Lawrence decided to turn the flashlight on his phone on to see the tower. It was old like something built in the seventies and it looked rusted like copper. As he scanned the tower and saw those long dangling wires that seemed to go through the trees and into the night. ‘Maybe I can get a signal’ he thought looking at the telephone wires. He then saw a saving grace in the tower, up at the top their seemed to be a room like structure and so he climbed. As he climbed higher he could smell copper rust,which smelt very wet and damp.
He had to really grab the tower with all his strength otherwise whatever was lurking in the woods would be the least of his worries. He managed to get to the room on top after a few minutes. He then took a rest and slumped in the room after the climb, giving himself a deserved rest. He pulled out his phone and tried to make a call. It took a minute before the phone managed to get a faint signal of sorts, and then a voice came back to life on the other end.
“There you are, I was trying to get your last known location” Paige said frantically. Lawrence let out a chuckle before telling her about how he found the tower. “ I see, have you found the kid yet” she asked. All he let out was a sharp no, he wanted to believe that the kid could still be living. But the chances of that were quite slim. He went outside the compartment just slightly to take a peak, he listened to see if the boy was out their crying for help. But no sound came, only the sounds of the wild animals and that of the cold harsh wind. He sighed “we might have to check in the morning, I don’t think I can see a damn thing in this light”. There was regret in his voice as said those words, he then slowly turned his head back inside.
“Alright if you say so, just stay there and i’ll try and send someone over to your location” she responded before ending the call there. Lawrence then sat and began to wait out the night. He pulled out some stuff from his backpack like a gun, a couple of flash lights, a sandwich, and then a book. He start eating the sandwich and then pulled out a pencil too. He began to write about the case and what had happened.
He did this for a couple of minutes and was feeling very tired. The case had left him feeling sore physically and mentally. He then slowly began to drift to sleep on the cold metal plates of the tower. However before he could enter a deep sleep, something disrupted it. It was a noise he had never heard before. It was a low growl of sorts. But it sounded like nothing he had ever heard. But hearing that roar ignited one sensation throughout his entire body, it was fear. He grabbed his gun in one hand and a flashlight in the other. He knew it was unlikely whatever was down there would be able to get him from the tower.
He took his flashlight and aimed it at the trees. It was hard to make out anything. Too much darkness tonight. So the forest laid still and dead, as if Lawrence was the only one in the forest. However something did catch his eye, it was a small figure. It looked fuzzy from a distance, but the light made it somewhat clear. It had a lot of baggy clothes, like a jacket and hiking gear. He kept shining a light on it and saw that it looked almost like a little boy. Like the same little boy who was missing. In an instant he was off and came down the tower.
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He brought his gun and his flashlight as he climbed back down. Once he was back down he slowly walked towards the body. As he came closer the rotten stench of fresh meat began to engulf his lungs. As he crept closer it came into vision, it was bloody and mangled. It had blood oozing from the head, and it’s throat had gruesome bite marks. The face was torn with chunks of flesh dripped out. Several fingers were bitten off, and the stomach was torn into with blood and guts scattered everywhere.
This was the kid and he was dead, he was probably killed in the morning from the looks of it. Lawrence then got his phone and called Paige, as he tried getting a hold of her he tried to analyze the scene. Lawrence had seen many attacks before. But this one felt different, bear and cougar attacks were much different compared to this.This one looked like the animal wasn’t startled or spooked like many others. But that it had actually attacked for predatory reasons. He saw a small trail of blood and tracks to the distance, either the animal got him from there, or that was where the creature took off. He noticed that the tracks looked slightly similar to those of a cat. Lawrence took a deep breath of air and walked in the direction of the creature.
As he walked the smell of blood grew fainter and the forest smell grew thicker. Signs of life seemed to vanish as Lawernce kept walking through the woods. The sounds of wildlife died down to an almost complete stop and the tracks seemed to go on endlessly.
That was until Lawrence seemed to reach a stream with small parts seeming to be frozen. It didn’t seem like much at first until he noticed something in that small frozen part of the ice. It was a bone of some kind, probably some animal that had been eaten a long time ago. He ended up continuing onwards past the stream as the tracks continued past it.
He then climbed up a steep hiking trail which made him feel exhausted. He reached a point to the trail where a log layed and sat there. It was now quiet if he had to guess the time now was probably the 2 am. The phone had no signal and he couldn’t tell if Paige was even close to the area.
He thought of his son, at this point he probably got off of his flight and was probably getting picked up by his friends. Lawrence wondered what his son had done since he came back from college. He had so many things he wanted to tell him about what had changed.
He sighed as he looked up to the stars at night, they are so beautiful when there’s no city lights he thought to himself. He went back down to the rocky snow terrain, he was tired but knew he had to see what got the kid. He saw the tracks continued off downwards which he soon followed. It took him a while but he eventually made it to a clearing of sorts. It was a railroad however it was extremely old, it had not been used for a long time now.
However the tracks seemed to follow those animal’s pathway , with the scent of blood not far behind. He readied his gun and slowly shadowed the footprints along the tracks. As he continued walking he heard another loud roar along the tracks. This time however it sounded close, without any hesitation he continued and came across a train car. Darkness of the night made it hard to see how the car exactly looked like. To him it had an old ethereal look to it.
As he went around it curious he heard a crunching sound underneath him. He looked down, it was hard to make out. It was white from the looks of it and felt really hard. He didn’t want to pull out his phone, he didn’t want to attract whatever was out there coming after him. He slowly crouched. Then reached out. His fingers brushed the hard slick cover of shattered human bones.
The creature had definitely came through, what shocked him was that it was actually eating people. Polar bears wouldn’t be this far in, plus wolves, bears, and cougars rarely hunt humans. He knew he would be getting nowhere with this case unless he took some drastic risks. He gulped as he pulled out his phone and took some snap shots of the bones and the car.
He then noticed a tuft of fur on ground next to some drops of blood. It was a pale orange, it was pretty thick so the creature had to be big. He put the tuft of fur back into his pocket and decided that should be it. He then heard a ding on his phone and went to check on it. It was Paige she had made it into the area and managed to find some people willing to come. A slight smile came onto his face reading that message, however it was far to early to celebrate.
As he began to leave the train car and meet up with the others, he began to hear a strange sound. It was a large clanging sound coming from the top of the train car. A sound of walking came closer and closer to Lawrence as he tried to escape by slowly backing up. He didn’t know what it was but every cell in his body was telling him to run. A deep booming snarl hit his ears, and his body slumped.
He couldn’t move his body, he was now at the mercy of the beast. His body was against the harsh cold snow which obscured his vision. He could hear something sniffing and growling close to him. He felt the snow shake as it came closer to him. He took a deep breath and in a split second pulled out his gun from his holster and shot the beast.
The next moments were tricky he saw a flash of orange strike him and that was all he could see. He let out a scream on pain as he clutched the area the beast had struck. His head was burst with pain. When he removed his hands from his face, they seemed to wet and sticky. So he ran as fast as he could, but it was hard. He didn’t know where he was going or which direction he was even running in. He was just hoping that Paige or maybe someone might be able to help right now. Lawrence listened and heard the sounds of a stream, as he hurried towards he felt the ground starting to feel uneven, but he couldn’t slow down especially since that creature couldn’t be that far behind. He took deep breaths trying to catch his breath. ¨ Tua-i, tua-i ¨ he said to himself calming himself down.
Before he had a chance to get to the stream he felt the uneven ground disappear in the blink of an eye. Instead it was replaced with air and the weight of gravity causing him to loose balance and fall to the ground. As he tumbled down everything seemed to slow down. His body was bombarded with sharp pain coming from almost all directions. By the time his body stopped he could barely lift his chest of the cold ground.
He extended his arm out hoping someone might be able to help. But no one did, besides the cold air that was so thick that even he could feel it. Lawrence then heard something approaching and it was unmistakable. It was the beast, it had caught up to him and unfortunately now there was no escaping it.
He felt the hot breath melt away the cold air that was near him. He felt the breath encircling his neck as the beast slowly began to clamp down on it. He tried to gasp for air. But nothing came out. The creature slowly began to lift him. He felt it slowly lift him higher–and higher. To the point where his knees were barely of the ground. He felt sick as the air slowly disappeared. Lawrence was now only left one thought. His home and his son. He tried to open his eyes one last time, but all it seemed to offer him was an inky black abyss. ¨Quyana¨ he muttered in his final moments.
In the end there was nothing he could do, all he could do was pray that it would all be over quickly.
