by C. G. Mosley
“I don’t see anything,” John said.
“Me either,” Cochran said.
Emma took another step forward. “Oh my God, I see it.”
“There used to be a deep ditch that ran through here,” Cliff explained. “That thing piled logs across the top of it and then covered it with straw and leaves. Perfect camouflage.”
John squinted looked closely at the ground for any sign of a den that something could live in. After his eyes scanned the environment closely for almost a full minute, he finally spotted it.
“I see it,” he muttered. “There’s an opening there. It looks like it just goes into the ground. I assume that’s the entrance?”
“That’s right,” Cliff said.
“How much room is inside there?” Cochran asked. He could apparently now see it too.
“I remember the ditch and it was deep,” Cliff answered. “There’s plenty of room in there.”
“And you’re sure it’s in there?” Emma asked.
Cliff glanced at his watch. “Pretty sure, yes.”
“So, what do you propose we do now, Agents?” Cochran asked, glancing at both John and Emma.
John clenched his jaw. He thought of Lucas’ lifeless body he’d seen a short time ago. It angered him and he wanted to avenge the child’s death. He wanted to make sure it never happened to another kid again.
“Let’s go get it,” he said, taking a step forward.
“Wait,” Emma said, grabbing him by the bicep. “What do you mean ‘let’s go get it’?”
He pulled his sidearm and made sure a bullet was in the chamber. “I mean, we’re going to go in there and kill it,” he explained.
John could see something in Emma’s eyes that he had not seen very often. It was fear. Seeing this troubled him and he decided he’d have to question her about it more later. For now, taking her into the wood ape’s den in that state would not be wise.
“Emma, stay out here with Mr. Lowe,” he said, trying to give her an out. “We’ll go in there and if the thing’s in there, it won’t be alive much longer.”
She looked at him, a mixture of anger and relief on her face. “You’re sure you don’t need me in there? I’m sure Mr. Lowe will—”
“I’m sure,” he answered, cutting her off. “Stay with Mr. Lowe and we’ll be back as soon as possible.”
She sighed and for a moment, he thought she’d argue. Eventually, however, she pulled her own gun and said, “Alright, but hurry the hell up.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied, and John then led Cochran and his deputies to the entry of the wood ape’s den.
As they drew near the entrance, a foul stench began to fill their nostrils.
“What the hell is that?” Billy asked, a little too loudly.
John halted when he heard the deputy speak and was terrified his carelessness had given them away. He kept his gun pointed into the entry before him as Cochran gave his deputy a vicious look that made it clear he was not to speak another word.
“Milk, do you think all of us should be going in there?” Sheriff Cochran asked.
John could hear the uncertainty in his tone.
“I think if there are more of us in there, then there are more guns in there,” he replied. “More guns seem like the best option, don’t you think?”
Cochran smiled and nodded. “Lead the way,” he said, gesturing with his hand.
John inhaled deeply through his nose, but immediately regretted it when the foul odor made its presence known again.
Here goes nothing, he thought.
Chapter 6
As he entered the opening to the rogue wood ape’s den, John realized it was extremely dark. He knew his eyes would adjust and help some, but he really needed extra light. Fortunately, Sheriff Cochran clicked a flashlight on behind him. John felt the ground underneath him slope downward as the darkness began to envelop him. He kept his gun pointed ahead of him and Cochran did the same with the beam originating from the flashlight. John’s eyes stayed wide open; he was too afraid to even blink.
“God, the smell,” Cochran whispered just behind him.
The smell was intense, and John, unfortunately, knew it well. It was the smell of death, and not just any death. Dead humans were what it was. As the other deputies closed in behind him, other flashlights flickered on and more of the wood ape’s home became illuminated. It didn’t take long to find out where the smell of death was originating. There were skulls everywhere and they were unmistakably human. Among the skulls were other bones of all kinds, all of them also human.
“Dear God,” John said softly.
Sheriff Cochran and the other deputies shined their lights all around the enormous structure. All of it could be seen, and aside from articles of clothing, chunks of meat, and bloodstains, there was nothing else to be found.
“It’s not here,” Cochran said. “The damn thing isn’t here.”
John lowered his gun and slowly looked back at the sheriff. “Then where the hell is it?”
***
“Agent Honeycutt, are you able to see anything?” Cliff asked anxiously.
Emma had made him stay even further away, behind the trunk of a large oak tree.
“No, Mr. Lowe, I do not,” she replied, somewhat aggravated.
She’d been angry with herself for allowing John to talk her into staying behind. He’d figured out she was afraid, and it infuriated her. She’d basically been relegated as babysitter for Cliff.
“Well, do you hear anything?” Cliff asked.
She rolled her eyes and sighed deeply. “No, Mr. Lowe, I do not.”
“Do you think something is wrong?”
She was about to really lose her cool with him and turned around to let him have it, but a noise from somewhere to her right caught her attention.
“Did you hear that?” Cliff said, whipping his head around in the direction of the sound.
“Quiet,” Emma whispered in a demanding tone.
She drew her gun and the two of them stood deadly still for what seemed like a full minute. Just as Emma was beginning to feel better about the situation, she caught a whiff of something that made her pulse quicken.
“Mr. Lowe, how does that thing smell?” she asked, trying to keep her composure.
Cliff didn’t reply and when she turned to look at him, Emma immediately noticed his face was ashen. He was staring intensely at something behind her and to her right.
“Mr. Lowe,” she said nervously. “Wh—what’s wrong?”
Cliff was breathing hard, and his eyes were wide. Clearly, there was something behind her that was terrifying him.
“It’s him,” he muttered, slowing raising his hand, his finger pointing over her shoulder.
Emma swallowed hard and forced herself to turn and see what had terrified him so badly. When she did, the dark creature towering before her bolted for her with a quickness she had never expected. Emma had just enough time to fire her gun, but the wood ape seemed to expect it and spun out of the way just as she pulled the trigger. The beast then grabbed her arm and wrenched the weapon free from her grasp.
Emma fought the wood ape with all she had, and as the beast pulled her forward, she thrashed and kicked. It was all in vain. Before she even had time to register what was happening, the wood ape hooked an arm around her abdomen and bolted past Cliff into the nearby dense foliage. She could hear Cliff screaming for help, but his cries grew faint quickly, a testament to how quickly the beast moved away. A sinking feeling overcame her as she soon realized that by the time John and the others came out of the creature’s den to investigate, she’d be long gone.
***
“What the hell happened?” John yelled as he ran quickly to where Cliff was standing. He noticed Emma’s gun laying in the leaves at Cliff’s feet and snatched it up.
“It took her!” he cried, clearly distraught.
Sheriff Cochran looked around in all directions, pointing his shotgun every which way he turned.
“Which wa
y did they go?” he asked, a tone of fury overtaking his usual calm voice.
Cliff pointed to his right, his hand trembling. “It moved so fast.”
Without hesitation, John bolted in the direction Cliff was pointing. He began yelling for Emma and to his dismay, he heard absolutely nothing in reply. The only sound he did hear was the footsteps of the sheriff and his deputies frantically trying to keep up with him.
“Milk!” Sheriff Cochran called after him. “I think we should split up, so we’ll cover move ground!”
John didn’t reply, but he could hear the men fan out in different directions behind him. He stayed straight and suddenly thought he’d heard a scream from somewhere far ahead.
“Honeycutt!” he yelled. “Are you out there?”
Every step he made crashed onto the leaves that covered the forest floor. It made hearing anything quite difficult. He strained his ears with all his might but despite his best efforts, he heard no reply to his calls. What he did hear, however, were more calls from Sheriff Cochran. He slowed his pace as he began to wonder if he or one of his deputies had found her. After mulling it over, he finally decided it best to stop and listen again. Panting, he leaned over, his hands on his knees. John expected to hear the sheriff again, but instead, he heard screaming.
***
Emma felt helpless but refused to give up her efforts to get free. The wood ape’s hairy arm was large, and she could feel the bulge of its muscles pressing against her as it ran. She struck the creature with her fists until they hurt and grew numb. Even though the beast smelled horribly, her desperation drove her to bite its arm. To her utter dismay, the wood ape seemed to not even notice. Emma spat the foul taste from her mouth and continued to thrash wildly, hoping perhaps the beast would give up and drop her.
Suddenly, the wood ape did come to a stop and drop her to the ground. The fall was painful, but Emma hardly noticed. She used every precious second to claw at the earth to put as much distance between her and the creature as humanly possible. She struggled mightily to get to her feet and just as she was beginning to wonder if she’d injured one of her legs, she felt the wood ape’s long fingers wrap around her ankle and yank her violently backward.
Emma began kicking her legs and it was at this moment she realized that one of them was indeed injured. She wasn’t certain, but her right leg felt broken. A sharp pain began to radiate from her foot and all the way up to her hip. It seemed to grow more intense by the second.
“Get your damn hands off me!” she screamed, still furiously kicking at the beast’s abdomen.
The wood ape soon had her dangling upside down as it stood straight and raised its arm high above its head. It’s one good eye glared at her and she could clearly see the hatred behind it. The monster’s mouth opened slightly, and Emma was able to see blood-stained teeth. She thought of Lucas Hurst and despite her best efforts to control it, her fear began to swell like a wildfire tearing through her core.
She knew what was coming. The wood ape’s snarl and ugly expression spoke more than any words could. Its grip tightened around her ankle. Emma howled in pain and if she hadn’t known better, she’d have believed someone was compressing a vise to torture her. The tightening continued as the creature squeezed tighter. Emma screamed louder, to the point she felt she was nearing unconsciousness. Then, suddenly, she was released and tumbled headfirst to the ground.
The blow to her head was severe and her neck bent awkwardly to one side. Emma was dazed to the point she was unable to move momentarily, but her eyes were open. Though momentarily blurred, her vision slowly came into focus to reveal that the beast had dropped her because it had been attacked. There was another wood ape squaring off with the one that had taken her. This one was slightly smaller, but it seemed undeterred by that fact.
Oh my God, it has green eyes…
The larger wood ape growled, and the sound Emma heard chilled her blood. It then sprang forward, leaping high and downward at her rescuer—the creature that had once been Kurt Bledsoe. The two beasts engaged in a heated, violent battle. The fight initially consisted of biting and numerous attempts at choking. Things then became more violent when the rogue wood ape grabbed a nearby rock and attempted to cave in Kurt Bledsoe’s face. The attack was thwarted when Kurt reached up and grabbed the beast’s arm as it swung down at him. Kurt then kicked the rogue wood ape between the legs, forcing the beast to roll off him. It howled in pain and rolled back and forth on the ground. Kurt then stood and tried to stomp on the beast as it writhed in agony. The rogue wood ape rolled out of the way just in time and somehow found the energy to regain its footing.
Kurt Bledsoe and the larger wood ape stood facing each other. Just as the two beasts prepared to engage in battle yet again, shots rang out from behind Kurt. Emma watched in horror as two bullets tore through the back of Kurt. The rogue wood ape took a back-handed swipe at its injured counterpart and sent Kurt hurtling to the ground beside Emma. It then tore through the forest, easily making an escape just as John made it to the scene.
He pointed his weapon at the head of Kurt Bledsoe but just as he was about to pull the trigger, Emma screamed for him to stop. Her words came off as a demand, not a plea. John was used to hearing this sort of tone from her, and though he was skeptical, it made him stop what he was doing.
“What the hell do you mean stop?” he yelled back at her, fury in his tone.
“This is Kurt Bledsoe!” she snapped back.
“No shit,” he muttered in disbelief. “Weren’t you just telling me that he’s dangerous? I saw what was going on. He was going to kill you!”
“No! He was trying to save me from the rogue,” she screamed at him as she attempted to get to her feet.
John could see her struggling and put a hand on a shoulder, forcing her to stay down. “Don’t,” he said. He then paused to peer over at Kurt. He was clearly injured and not a threat. John holstered his weapon and knelt beside Emma. He immediately noticed blood pooling around her right ankle.
“What happened to your leg?” he asked.
“Doesn’t matter,” she grumbled. “Stop holding me down and help me up.”
John ignored her and pushed back her pants leg. As soon as he saw bone poking through the skin, he gasped.
“What?” she asked. “How bad is it?”
He glanced at her and knew it was no use in lying to her. “It’s bad. Trust me and hold still.”
Seconds later, Sheriff Cochran arrived. His eyes grew wide when he saw Kurt Bledsoe injured and bleeding on the ground in front of him.
“Did you shoot him?” he asked. He sounded disappointed.
“Yes,” John said. “I thought he was hurting her.”
“He wasn’t?” Cochran asked.
“No, he wasn’t!” Emma shouted, clearly frustrated that everyone assumed Kurt was trying to harm her. “He fought the rogue off.”
“Sheriff, call some help for Honeycutt,” John said. “She’s injured.”
“Of course,” he answered. “But what about him?”
John looked over at Kurt Bledsoe.
“He saved my life,” Emma said. “Get him patched up and hide him before Walker Laboratory shows up.”
John glared at her, unable to believe what he was hearing.
“Are you serious right now?”
“You’re damn right,” she snapped back.
Chapter 7
Before becoming a dispatcher for the Baker County Sheriff’s Department, Shelly Snow had worked as a receptionist and assistant to Dr. Fredrick Duvall at the veterinarian office in the Dunn town square. During her eleven years in that role, she picked up a lot of knowledge and experience on how to care for and treat wounded animals. Over the years, she’d occasionally treated pets that had been wounded by all sorts of means. There’d been dogs and cats that had suffered injuries from everything from car strikes to coyote attacks. With all the experience she’d acquired, nothing Shelly had ever done prepared her for the injured creature that was writhing in pa
in in the back of Sheriff Ray Cochran’s patrol car. The wood ape barely fit in the car and it took up every square inch of space in the backseat.
The deputies pulled the cumbersome beast from the car and then carried it into the station. Cochran followed them and offered Shelly a smile as he strode past. It was a pathetic attempt to calm her and it failed to do the job by a long shot.
“Wh—what is that?” she stammered, following them all to the first holding cell inside the jail.
Cochran unlocked the door and swung it open, its tired hinges squeaking loudly in protest. Billy and the other deputies dropped the wood ape onto the concrete floor as carefully as possible. It was bleeding profusely from two gunshot wounds to its back.
Sheriff Cochran turned to her, placing both hands on her shoulders. “Shelly, you know exactly what this is,” he said softly. “I need you to see if you can patch him up. Can you do that?”
Shelly was barely listening. Her attention was on the wood ape as it snapped and growled, clearly from the pain it was experiencing. Cochran shook her lightly.
“Shelly,” he said, a little louder this time. “I need you to look at me.”
She did as he asked, her eyes wide and foggy from the shock of it all.
“Can you patch him up?” he asked.
Shelly sighed. “I—I can try. I think so.”
“Good,” Cochran replied. He looked to Billy. “Get the first-aid kit and assist her with whatever she needs.”
The deputy nodded and saw to the task. The sheriff turned his attention again to Shelly.
“No one is to know that this thing is back here,” he told her sternly. “I’ve got to go check on something. I won’t be gone long, but if anything happens, call the hospital. That’s where I’ll be.”
Shelly looked at him curiously. “Is everything okay, Sheriff?” she asked. “Are those agents alright?”
He gave her a long stare that said more than any words he could’ve spoken. “I’ll be back,” he said, moving away from her.
Cochran headed for the exit and met Billy, first-aid kit in hand. “Remember what I said,” he said, pointing at him. “No one is to know about Kurt Bledsoe.”
