Monster

by Frank Peretti

  Reuben was on his feet instantly, like a dog whose master had returned.

  The two females rose at the same time, looked into the forest, and then flopped down to their hands and knees in formal greeting.

  Beck got on her hands and knees as well, not wanting to challenge the patience of the king who now emerged through the trees, light and shadow, light and shadow blinking on his face and chest as he walked. He was clutching something against his stomach with his hands and arms.

  Beck knew right away that he’d found more fruit, which brought a volley of questions to mind: Was it a farm, an orchard, or another baiting site? Were there humans around? Lastly, Will I get any to eat?

  Jacob came to a small gap in the trees, sank to his knees, and let the fruit tumble to the ground. The selection was suspiciously familiar: apples, pears, and bananas.

  Another baiting site, Beck thought.

  Reed knelt in the sand, staring, at a loss for words except to say, “I don’t know what to feel.”

  Pete was beside him, studying the huge footprints and needing a little time to become a believer again. “I’ve had my head turned around so many times it’s about to come unscrewed.” The similarity to recent horrors struck him. “Sorry.”

  “It’s him, isn’t it?”

  Pete studied the tracks where they approached and then returned in a beeline across the creek bed. “It’s him. Old alpha male, Mr. Scarfoot. He’s still out there, like it or not.”

  “So Fleming’s footprints weren’t a hoax after all.”

  Pete didn’t answer that but stood, scanning the area. “He took the bait, every piece of it.”

  Reed searched carefully around the perimeter of the raked ground. “Every piece?”

  Beck held back, waiting to see what the rules might be this time around. Surprisingly, Leah and Rachel approached the fruit almost together, Leah first, but Rachel only a few steps behind. While Jacob sat back and watched without comment, Leah took an apple and allowed Rachel to take one after her. She didn’t seem to mind Rachel sharing in the fruit as long as Leah chose first.

  Reuben sidled up to his mother in his usual way and helped himself.

  My turn? Beck wondered.

  She waited, watching Jacob. He did not look at her, which could have meant a lingering hatred, prideful rejection, or total indifference. She tried to read his body language for any clues as to which it was, but she couldn’t be sure.

  She waited for Rachel to invite her, and after Rachel had downed two apples with the group’s indulgence, she looked at Beck and pig grunted a call to supper.

  Beck approached slowly, braced for some kind of reaction.

  Jacob eyed her, his brow sinking slightly over his eyes, sending a warning, but just a warning.

  She dropped her eyes and bowed slightly, trying to look small and submissive.

  He glanced at the ground, scooped up a lump of his own dung, and popped it into his mouth, enjoying a fruit salad the second time around.

  Beck came up behind Rachel, who moved over to give her room. Beck spotted a pear and leaned in to pick it up—

  There was something lying next to it, and it was not a piece of fruit.

  Reed found a crumpled shred of white paper snagged in a stunted pine. He carefully worked it loose. It had been chewed and was slimy with saliva, but he peeled the folds open enough to read what was left of his own writing: the last line of some instructions about batteries, the words “I love you,” and his name. “I had this wrapped around the GPS with a rubber band.”

  Pete combed the surrounding ground with his eyes. “Well, obviously, it wasn’t Beck who picked it up.” He observed the chewed condition of the note. “Doesn’t look good for the GPS, does it?”

  Beck knew right away what it was. Reed, always the gadget nut, had shown her one in a sporting goods store. She’d managed to talk him out of buying it, but of course that reprieve only lasted a month before he brought home two. After they spent some quality time together learning how the gadgets worked, he put his in his car and she put hers back in its box.

  But that was then. She felt no cynicism now, not the slightest tendency to brush it off as a “guy thing.” That hand-sized device of yellow plastic with the LCD screen was nothing less than life itself. It spoke—no, it yelled—of Reed! This was so typical of him; he would have thought of this!

  He’s reaching for me! He hasn’t given up!

  Her hand trembled as she reached for it, reached for him—

  Leah picked it up and sniffed it.

  “Oh!” Beck stifled the squeal of alarm as soon as it escaped, her hand over her mouth. Leah shot a testy glance. Beck lowered her eyes—Careful, careful, don’t challenge her! Now Jacob was watching, his piercing eyes focused on every detail, looking for trouble.

  Beck tried to show interest in an apple, her hands shaking.

  Leah went back to sniffing the GPS. She stuck out her tongue and tasted it.

  Beck bit into the apple, trying not to look alarmed or interested, just letting her eyes pass over Leah without really looking. Oh, please, Leah, please don’t eat it!

  Reed and Pete stepped carefully, walking a square pattern around the baiting site, ten paces to a side, then twelve, then fourteen, probing and combing through the river grass, the flood-bent willows, and the knee-high pines, needing to know: Was it here? Did the beast pick it up and drop it? Eat it? Chew it and spit it out?

  They needed to know.

  The GPS fell to the ground, and Leah picked up a pear instead.

  Beck reached—

  Rachel was curious and picked it up.

  Beck jammed her tongue against the roof of her mouth, blocking a cry on its way out. Eye contact with Rachel was allowed. She tried it, her eyes imploring.

  Rachel didn’t notice; she was too fascinated with the strange object. She sniffed it, turned it over a few times, and then popped it into her mouth.

  This time Beck took the risk and made a sound, extending her hand.

  Snap! The plastic cracked between Rachel’s teeth.

  “Noo!” Beck took hold of Rachel’s arm and got half her attention.

  Rachel spit it out, flipping it off the end of her tongue.

  Beck caught it before it hit the ground, hoping, praying it would still work. It was slimy now, slippery like a wet bar of soap, but she hung on, clutched it against her heart. The case was cracked, but maybe—Oh dear God—maybe the electronics were still intact. She looked for the on button as she wiped slime away from the keypad—

  A hairy hand flashed over her shoulder and the GPS shot skyward.

  With a shriek and without thinking, Beck took hold of Reuben’s arm, reaching and grabbing with her free hand. His arm was impervious to her weight, like a thick tree branch, and as he stood he lifted her torso off the ground so that her feet were dragging. She groped for a foothold. He twisted, whipping her about. She hung on, fighting to wrest the device from his fist. Words were impossible; she shrieked, she yelled, she growled, she hit him on his arm.

  The females were on their feet, growling and barking, but not at each other. They were two mothers scolding their quarreling children.

  Beck locked eyes with Reuben. I won’t give it up. No, not this time! This is my life!

  She got both hands on the GPS and pulled. It could have been embedded in concrete for all the good it did.

  Her eyes were closed in a grimace when the blow came, a stunning haymaker across her face. She no longer felt the GPS in her hands; she no longer felt her hands. She went numb and oblivious, the world spinning before her eyes in a blur of sky, trees, grass, light, dark—

  She slammed into the ground but felt no pain, only nausea, as the earth reeled beneath her and her vision wandered, then went black. As if in a dream, she heard Rachel barking and protesting while Leah growled and snarled, but they sounded so far away, so very far away . . .

  Reed and Pete had walked and combed a square of fifty paces, an area that now included the creek bed and ro
ughly 150 feet of creek bank and adjacent forest. Now they stood at the edge of the creek bed, the dry river rocks under their feet, and reached a consensus.

  “It’s gone,” said Reed.

  Pete removed his hat, wiped his brow with his shirtsleeve, and responded, “It’ll make one heck of a scat pile.”

  Reed felt so numb, so empty. He’d been hoping for so long, and had that certain feeling so deeply, that he now hung in emotional space with nothing under him and nowhere to go. He couldn’t believe Beck was dead, but he’d expended his last hope that she was alive. For several minutes, he and Pete stood silently on the barren river rocks, waiting for the next course of action— not just in their search but in life itself—to come to mind while no water flowed past, no squirrels chattered in the trees, and no birds took an interest in the place.

  Pete finally suggested, “We can probably track it.”

  Reed didn’t answer for a moment, then asked, “Do you think those tracks at the Cryncovich site could’ve been a few days older?”

  “Could’ve been, but I doubt it.”

  “So Beck could have been alive then, but then she was killed soon after. Or maybe the Bigfoot tracks were real, but Beck’s were faked.”

  “I don’t think it much matters. I just remember what Sheriff Mills said before he was killed: ‘God help me, that thing’s walking.’”

  Several seconds passed before Reed replied, “Sort of says it all, doesn’t it?”

  “I would say so, yeah.”

  Now, as Reed felt weak and his knees feeble, he didn’t fight it. He sat down on an old gray log. Pete joined him. As the forest went on living, not mindful of them, they sat motionless, staring at nothing in particular, their eyes landing on those eighteen-inch tracks just once in a while.

  “I suppose we ought to track it,” Reed said at last.

  “It’s your call. If you’re finished with all this, so am I.”

  Reed took another minute to fish around in the feelings he didn’t seem to have anymore and concluded, “I guess I’m finished.”

  Pete rose from the log and offered Reed his hand. “Come on. Let’s get you home.”

  Pow!

  The rifle shot echoed upon itself, stretching out into a clattering roar that rippled through the hills.

  Pow! There it was again.

  Beck awoke as if from sleep, head throbbing, mind dopey, the world crazily sideways. Through the swaying, blurring, sideways blades of grass, she saw the Sasquatches huffing and stirring, alarmed by something. That was nothing new. They were always alarmed about something. Beck guessed they were going to run again.

  Yeah, they were going to run. Rachel hovered over her, panting and grunting, taking hold of her arm, yanking, trying to rouse her.

  She thought she might have heard something.

  Pete borrowed the radio from Reed and called in. “Sing? We heard some shots.”

  Sing came back, “Where have you been?”

  “What do you hear from the hunters?”

  “Stand by. There’s so much chatter I can’t make it out.”

  Pete waited, exchanging a concerned look with Reed.

  Sing returned. “Better get over there. They’re close to the creek bed, bearing 175, about half a mile.”

  “They’re south of us,” said Reed.

  “What’ve they shot?” Pete asked Sing.

  “Jimmy doesn’t know. Whoever did the shooting doesn’t have a radio.”

  “Okay, we’re heading over there.” Pete handed back the radio. “Lordy! If they bagged that thing . . . !”

  Beck saw the ground fall away, then start moving beneath her.

  She watched the grass and the Rocky Mountain Maple whisk by, then the trunks of trees and more trunks of trees and patches of light and shadow on the plant-cluttered ground, but all the while, search as she would, she saw nothing made of yellow plastic, kind of cracked, kind of slimy, maybe broken.

  Reed and Pete rounded a bend in the creek bed and heard the voices of two hunters uphill in the trees, laughing and talking it up, all caution and stealth thrown to the wind. One of the voices was Jimmy’s.

  “Doesn’t sound like they shot anything unexpected,” Pete muttered.

  The knowledge brought Reed no joy, but on the other hand, he didn’t care much anymore.

  They climbed into the forest, came over a rise, and found Kane down in a hollow, looking like a wild-eyed, white-haired mountain man as he knelt by the biggest black bear either of them had ever seen. He was holding up the head by the scruff of the neck and striking a pose while Jimmy Clark, in an unusually chipper mood, snapped his picture. When Wiley saw them he whooped long and loud. “Can you believe this?”

  Another voice came from higher up the hill. “You get him, Wiley?”

  “I got him!”

  A vague, camouflaged shape wearing a matching cap wove its way downward through the spindly trunks. Only when it came close did they recognize Steve Thorne, all marine, looking ready for jungle combat. His teeth stood out brightly against the green and brown greasepaint he wore on his face, which put them off balance. They’d never seen him grin before. “Now, that’s a record breaker, my friend!”

  “That it is,” said Jimmy, snapping another picture.

  Kane probed the thick black fur until he found a bloody spot on the flank. “Perfect heart-and-lung shot! He dropped like a rock!”

  Jimmy spoke into his earpiece. “Okay, everybody. We have a confirmed kill. Wiley Kane gets the trophy. Good work, and many thanks to all of you!” He laughed at the chatter coming back through the earpiece and relayed it, “Everybody says congratulations.” He spoke to the earpiece, “Sam and Max, you’re closest. I’d like to get you over here to help pack it out. Yeah, it’s a monster.”

  “Gonna dress him out?” Pete asked.

  Jimmy grinned up at them, jubilant. “Yeah, he’s too big to take out whole.”

  Pete set down his rifle and backpack, then spoke softly to Reed, “They’re gonna find out they shot a bear for nothing.” Reed answered, “I’d better stay here.”

  Pete nodded and stepped down into the hollow.

  Jimmy extended a hand, and Pete grasped it. “You were right,” Jimmy said. “It was moving south. Sorry to get the jump on you, but hey, Wiley saw it first.”

  Kane just grinned.

  Pete gave Kane a courteous smile. “For a minute I thought you may have shot something else.”

  Wiley knew what Pete was talking about. “Not today.”

  Pete took hold of the feet, studied the pads carefully, then looked up at Reed with a discreet wag of his head.

  Jimmy saw it. “This is your culprit, Pete. I’ll bank on it.”

  Pete kept his voice down. “I think the culprit’s gotten clean away thanks to all your noise.” He forced a smile Kane’s direction again. “But congrats on your bear.”

  Jimmy took out his hunting knife. “You’re welcome to watch.”

  Reed wasn’t the least bit interested and found a small log a comfortable distance away. Pete circled around to stand by Kane and Thorne as they watched Jimmy open up the bear’s abdomen with quick sawing motions of the knife. In just a few minutes, with a few quick cuts and a yank, the stomach rolled out on the ground. It was bulging. Jimmy sliced it open with one clean pass of the blade and it blossomed like a flower, the contents sending up a stench that made Kane back away.

  Jimmy probed through the contents with the tip of his knife. “Lots of berries.” He snagged some aluminum foil and food wrapping with familiar golden arches. “Robbed a garbage can somewhere.” Under the mass of berry pulp, seeds, and garbage, something caught on his knife. He pulled it up, letting the other contents fall aside. He lifted his gaze to Pete’s.

  Pete reached down and, with deft fingers, worked the piece of leather loose and spread it out. It was brown, with a row of fringe. It was unmistakable.

  Deputy Saunders’s crew had not given up hope even though Dave never had much to begin with. They combed the w
oods, four people working four quadrants, weaving back and forth according to compass headings, numbers of paces, and red ribbon markers, metal detectors sweeping the ground.

  The heavy equipment operator’s detector let out a squeal that made him jump—he’d never heard his metal detector actually find something metal.

  The sound was so loud and the man was so close that even Dave heard it. He ran to the spot even as the man dug hurriedly with his shovel.

  Clink! His shovel hit something.

  He probed farther, scraped, pried, dug some more, and finally wedged up—

  An old ax head.

  He got to keep it. The search continued.

  Sing called Cap to let him know the hunt was over. The news was such a foregone conclusion that it didn’t shock or surprise him. It only strengthened his resolve.

  “Well, it may be over for Jimmy and his crew, but not for us,” he said. “Get over here as soon as you can.”

  Sing said good-bye, closed her cell phone, and stood by her motor home, watching the final exodus.

  Jimmy Clark secured the last bungee cord over his gear in the back of his Idaho Department of Fish and Game King Cab pickup, gave Sing a good-bye tip of his cap, and climbed inside. The four rangers from the forest service were already in their pale green vehicle, the engine running. When Jimmy started out, they followed, easing down the road through the hamlet of Whitetail until their taillights vanished around a far bend in the road and all was quiet.

  Wiley Kane had taken great care in rolling and wrapping up his bearskin, setting it securely in the back of his old pickup so that only the bear’s snout showed from under the canvas. He was whistling happily as Sing approached him.

  “I want to thank you for your help, young lady,” he said.

  “I’m glad for you,” she replied.

  “Thanks. But I am sorry. All in all, this is not a happy day for you and your friends.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What’s, uh, what’s Officer Shelton going to do now?” he asked.

  Sing looked toward the forest where Reed had gone walking alone. “He’ll go on living.”

  “You figure he’s convinced now? I mean, he’s not going to be out there searching for his wife anymore, or hunting for Bigfoot?”