EDITOR:
MIRIAM BELLE
CREATIVE CONSULTANTS:
MIRIAM BELLE & SIMPLY_CYN
*
"EMERALD EYES, CRIMSON MOON"
***
It wasn't until he came back from taking the longest piss of his life that David Carson noticed his son was nowhere in sight. He listened for a minute, straining to here the slightest twig break or rustling of a bush. The forest was quiet and strangely devoid of any animal sounds today, calm and sedated. He buttoned his fly and stepped back into the clearing, his heavy black boots kicking up saw dust. He frowned and looked down the twisted, uneven path wrought from the thick brush.
"Michael?" he shouted.
Only his echo bouncing between the trees into the distance replied.
David wiped his dark brow with the back of his large hand and walked down the trail to his Dodge Ram truck. Maybe the boy had gone back for a soda? He hoped so. The forest carried the sounds of his progress as he navigated the overgrown trail, his obsidian black eyes scanning the infinite woods as he went. The fresh unbroken evergreen brush and pine trees greeted him as he reached the red truck. He opened the cab door and found only the Igloo ice chest, untouched and exactly where he had left it.
"Michael Carson get your ass out here, boy!" he shouted again, his heart beginning to pound.
David went back up the trail, this time at more of a run than a walk. The clearing was packed with fresh cut oak and cedar, a fine truckload for this winter. The smell of the wood was normally refreshing and soothing for David, but at the moment it did nothing to ease his panicking heart. The six year old had gone wandering off despite what he had been told. But then what could David expect? Wandering off and disobeying were a stock in trade for little boys.
"Michael!" he cupped his powerful brown hands together and bellowed, his voice reverberating through the woods, "Michael speak up!"
A crow, black as the night itself, soared overhead and cawed. David jumped, mad at himself for being startled by a damned bird. He looked down at the Stihl chainsaw and axe he had left by the tree trunk Michael had been watching him cut up since nine that morning. The large ear protectors the boy used to hide from the noise of the chainsaw were lying on the ground in a damp pile of orange sawdust and dirt. David picked them up and then felt something wet on the headpiece.
He looked at his fingers and saw a smear of crimson blood. Every muscle in his powerful frame began shaking as he stared at the blood in a stupid kind of awe. He licked his lips, looked out into the forest again and screamed his son's name, "Michael!"
Upon further inspection of the ground he found more small spatters of blood leading off into the shrubs. Grabbing his battered axe, David followed the blood drops over the brush and undergrowth, a clear trail of broken stems and branches leading away and to the north. He followed the trail like a determined bloodhound as fine flakes of snow whished in the air around him. He didn't think or reason. He simply followed with a murderously single-minded determination.
'Someone grabbed him,' he thought, 'Oh Jesus someone grabbed him...'
How could he not have heard someone sneaking up on them like that? Sure, the chainsaw had been screaming all day long, but there had breaks in between. Maybe a man could have waited for the saw to be running hot to creep up, but during the long pauses while David explained what he was doing to Michael there would have been a twig snapping or an old rotted branch popping in two to warn them. The forest was unusually quiet today, the calm before a major storm he had figured. Hearing a mole fart underground should have been easy enough. Losing a hyperactive six year old shouldn't have been.
"Michael!"
His heart was hammering now as he walked deeper and deeper into the Northern California woods. Heavy shadows were claiming the world as the gray clouds above became dark and foreboding. He could hear thunder rolling across the sky, another warning of the weather to come. The dead oak leaves beneath his boots slipped against the mud and threatened his footing at seemingly regular intervals as he treaded the uneven terrain. He gripped the axe with his hands tightly as the blood trail led him through several large collections of tangle wood and blackberry bushes. The thorns raked at his jeans and pricked at the dark skin of his arms. With each green leaf or brown branch he found blood dribbled on he became more and more possessed by his own fear.
"Please Jesus," he whispered, "Please Jesus in heaven..."
Finally, after managing to make it through almost fifty yards of thick foliage, he reached a large, decomposing cedar tree. The mighty tree had fallen years ago from the looks of it, it's bark splintered and decayed to washed out sienna. On the trunk of the tree was a large, dark smear of something wet. The rotted bark was soaked with it and David didn't have to touch it to know what it was. There was far too much blood for a little boy to loose and live.
Still, with tears in his eyes he shouted, "Michael! Where are you!? Talk to me, Michael!"
His terrified voice mocked him as it carried away on the wind, bouncing between the trees and plants in some sort of twisted game. David scratched at his goatee, his handsome African features contorted in a grimace of desperation. He held the axe in one hand and wiped the tears from his eyes with the other. He looked back at the stain of blood on the bark of the cedar as snow began to fall more evenly. The white powdery snow lighted on the rain drenched forest and began to coat.
"MICHAEL!" he bellowed as the wind kicked up, spinning the frozen flakes wildly.
A twig snapped behind him. David spun on his heel and looked into the woods, his eyes frantically scanning for any sign of his son. From behind another broken tree he saw something move. David felt a wash of relief and took a step forward. He smiled as he cried, "Oh Jesus, Michael. You scared me to death."
A low, guttural growl registered from behind the debris of the tree and the bushes in had destroyed in the fall. In the fading light, David saw more blood on this new tree. A lot more of it. He stopped in his tracks, the growl becoming a wet, sloppy snarl. His throat closed off as he listened, his grip on the axe becoming shaky and uncertain.
And then it rose up from its hiding place.
It was huge, the size of full-grown man only much more muscular and primitive. Coarse black, gray and brown fur covered its entire body like the coat a finely bred German Shepard might sport. It looked like a man, but the head was all wrong. Large ears, pricked to attention and slightly laid back against the skull twitched at the sound of David's gasp. Its muzzle was stained red with blood, pulled back from large gleaming teeth. Something ragged and fleshy was hanging from those mandibles. Blood tinged saliva dripped in long, ropy gobs from its bared teeth.
"Oh Jesus help me," David breathed, seeking a strength he knew he did not possess on his own.
But it was the eyes that made David believe he would never see another sunrise again. Powerful green eyes, like glowing emeralds embedded inside the creature's skull watched him curiously. The lids narrowed to slits and it let loose a mighty roar. The sound was deafening, forcing David back as he tried to cover his ears and keep the axe in hand. He could hear the sounds of a lion and bear in that ungodly release, a sound that was out of alignment of with the rest of the natural world. And then he looked down at its human like hand.
There was a bunched up length of cloth, white and stained to crimson black. He could see the bright blue number 7 on the ragged fragment of what had been his son's shirt. David felt the fear fall away from him and rage fill every fiber of his being. His mouth worked open and shut silently as he shook his head, the cry of anguish building up to match the bellow of this thing before him. They stood there for only a second, facing each other as two mortal enemies.
"My boy," David wheezed.
The thing opened its maw and hissed.
"MY BOY!" David screamed, his whole body tensed and thrown into the howl of pain, "YOU MOTHER FUCKER!"
David raised the axe into the air and charged forward. The creature recoiled back as though to run in fear, but it was only then that David realized his mistake. It wasn't giving him ground, it was back stepping for room. Room to lurch forward. It leapt from the brush with an eerie silence and ease, launching itself at him. The beast caught him in the chest and they both went sailing back towards where he had been standing before. David landed with a hard thud that forced the breath out of his lungs and nearly cracked his ribs.
"You," he gasped as the creature dug tremendous claws into his chest, "You fuck-"
His words were cut off as the beast snapped its jaws together over his throat and began tearing. Violent jerks and pulls, like those of a rabid dog feasting on his evening meal severed most of the tendons and meat from David's neck and head within a few seconds. He beat his hands mercilessly at the creature's head and shoulders. In a crazy moment of clarity, he realized that his axe had been taken from his hand and was now embedded blade first into the wet ground. Strangled gurgles and watery screams filled the winter wind for a few moments more before David fell out of this world, his last thoughts only of his son.
The forest heard one final meaty rip and the brutal snap of bone before the world fell silent again, save for the thunder overhead, followed by a long, triumphant roar that became a lonely howl.
***
"Buster," Dr. Catalina Hughes said as she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, "Is one sick dog."
On the wide examination table she held the golden retriever's head in her hands. The dog's nose was cool and soothing even through her latex examination gloves, his soulful brown eyes looking up as though to question her. She stroked the pure bred animal's blond coat of fur as his tail wagged woefully from side to side.
"Poor thing," Eve, her assistant, muttered as she prepped the shot. She looked at the long needle and tapped the side of the syringe as Catalina comforted the whimpering dog.
"It'll be okay," Catalina smiled and scratched behind the dog's ears. Buster nuzzled his snout to her white lab coat as she braced the dog for the injection.
"So, just for the sake of conversation," Eve pressed the long needle to the dog's hindquarters and gently inserted, "How are you doing?"
Catalina eyed Eve through her glasses, "Is this really the time for this?"
