Down The Cold Dark Barrel - Part One

Uncertain paths make up the world that should be left unfound. For each step marked in the ground is proven to be remembered forever. For all of its faults and successes.

Each step was new in the west, at least it was for good ol’ Winston Callubs. Growing up on the frontier of northern New York, he was most comfortable in such environments. Everywhere he looked, nothing else to be seen but the absolute landscape of unbounded wilderness. However, this new land was proving hard to grasp a good feeling for as there was danger of uncertainty at every walk of life.

Alone he was, wandering a trail cut between a forest of oak woods. The glowing sun rose up to meet with him in the middle of this trail, lighting his way on a golden road to nowhere. His fur lined boots brushed the dirt through, lifting it up into minute waves of crumbled rocks and withered foliage. With a furrow of his nose and a husky sniff, the wind was down with the smell of dry wood and mildewing carcass.

Winston traveled off the narrow path into the layers of overgrowth. Removing the dirk from his leg strap, the murder and disposing of this foliage proved an easy task for someone of his strength. Years of chopping wood to build homes from nothing will do that. Winston’s nose was set with guidance on par with that of a bloodhound. The putridness from this odor created a perfectly lined trail for him to keep track of. Through his sunken eyes, the whites of them drenched in blistering red veins, seeing past the thick, scratchy, critter infested quarter of land, the source of this overwhelming aroma was revealed. It was a carcass, but Winston knew this before he had even come to see it with his eyes. The smell was enough to give away all that he needed to know. Death was an endowed identifier.

A deer– a doe. It was a female. The body still warm, the tell-tale sign of the slashing gapes crossing over its gnarled exposed ribs were still steaming. And a bullet hole blasted through its hind leg showed signs of human interference. Winston could almost hear his thoughts explaining to him in detail what had occurred here. As if it was almost impossible for him to avoid any estranged detail presented in mere seconds. The age of the creature. What it ate last. Where it had been before coming to its demise. There was something odd about this doe. For it had an aura of unnatural capability from it for it did not smell like a normal doe. Winston noted this as he brushed over the untouched soft fur. There was one more detail of discovery about this animal. And one that was the most haunting and despicable revelation of all.

A second life taken from within the first.

Winston gathered up a pair of sticks, one longer than the other. Together he crossed and binded them with a long weed.

“Rest now. Go from this life to the next and I pray you will find more peace there than this,” he spoke with kind apprehensions as he laid the crafted cross onto the fur of the doe.

There was more to this discovery, however. For the next scent that ducked into his nose spun an entirely different tale to his mind. A tale more mysterious and gruesome than any other to be found in this simple land. A new body, torn to bits. Skin pulled in strings and gushed flesh hanging from bones. This body was that of a man, a wanderer. A standard rifle, a Charleville Pattern to be exact had fallen at his side. Laid by a tree, the man had no legs as they were torn from the skin they clung too. His torso ripped open to reveal all to be inside. His face, only half left to be seen, was frozen in a screaming horror. His final moments drenched in a forever waking fear of the inevitable.

Winston knelt beside this corpse and studied its presence. The events began to be revealed to him in dimensions of separate vicious attacks at a time. The tearing had been caused by the jaws of a great beast as evidence proved along the torn bits of flesh. Serrated teeth marks had yanked and pulled at the skin, easily ripping flesh from bone and bone from body. With how many points of attack there were, it was more than not a multitude of beasts.

Removing one tanned leather glove, he pressed his fingers into the flesh. Warm and wet, it squished under pressure as only a sign of recent creation.

A rapid shot of fire blasted from the distance. Birds flocked from the trees into the sky and Winston rose to his feet with them. The shots were followed by a series of grievous pleas.

“Help! Anyone out there!” the voice from another man called out from afar.

With the grip of his boots shifting back and a push of force, Winston was ducking, diving and leaping into the environment to find the one who needed help. And in place, rather than one man calling out for help, there were three shoved up into a tree avoiding a swarming pack of wolves below them. The one farthest up away from the rest, clambering with his footing between the splitting of the trunk, ripped sticks and branches as they were all he could muster up to throw at the wolves with no real effect. The other two hung lower, reloading their rifles for another round of worthless shots.

Frothing with feral foam, the wolves launched themselves up the tree to grab hold of the men with their ripping jaws. Scratching the wood deep with their hooked nailed paws and barking fiercely just to flare their razored fangs.

Winston leapt from a mound into this open area, landing firmly with a kneeling pose and ripped the rifle he hung around his torso to aim. Firing once, the bullet reached a shocking blow for all to be aware. Driven through the base skull of one of the wolves who was clinging on to the side of the tree. It fell and thudded to the floor unmoving in its final rest. The other beasts took offense to this and turned their way from the men who were cowering up in the tree to Winston who was prepared for anything to come. As they surrounded Winston at every angle, this marauding pack of feral beasts knew the advantage of numbers. However, Winston knew the advantage of a quick mind.

The rifle in hand, one wolf broke off from the rest behind Winston. A flick of his arm down allowed the rifle to release an edged bayonet at its end, and as the wolf leapt from its paws to pounce, Winston met it in the air with a spin that drove the blade deep into the side of the beast. Thrown away with the force of strength taking it far from the rest, the wolf awkwardly tried to walk off its wounds, but proved too severe too quick. It faltered to the floor, lying on its stomach as its life slipped away. Retaliation was then swift from the others, they leapt and ran through Winston to confuse him, but he only took reminders of each move and could counter with swiftness. Swiping his rifle wide around him, the wolves could not get enough space to grab a hold and overwhelm. But instead, they resulted in sloppy maneuvers of impatient jumps fueled by pride and proved disastrous for most as they met the end of his blade on more than one instance. Blood dripped, and then poured from beast and blade alike. Painting the fauna to the finishing touches of burning red death. This same blood caked Winston’s grizzled face and slicked into his long auburn hair. Few wolves left standing to go up against this even stranger beast of a man who had not seemed to even have a scratch on him. Those that could still hobble and run off did so in a hurry with the following piercing whimpers of painful fear.

Winston pulled the bayonet down, locking it into its original position on the underside of the rifle. The men in the tree climbed down, each struggling in their own way and the one at the top falling down to the floor at the end. He stood taller than his fellow men as they helped him to his feet. His blonde hair waved over his forehead that was printed with dirt from his fall. He wore a pair of long black boots and cream-colored trousers tucked within. He was fitted into a knitted hunting coat that went over a vested shirt.

“I’m fine. I’m alright,” he said, shaking them off and patting his body down from the dirt.

They approached Winston as he strapped the rifle over his back and pulled his hair behind his head to wipe out the drops of blood.

“That was quite a performance, sir,” he continued. “A great show of tenacity and strength. You have all the thanks I am able to give.”

Winston had finished fixing the rifle around himself when he looked up to study these men in detail. The taller one seemed normal enough, if not a bit eccentric for being so far out from any known town. The other two stood back, rifles ready in hand as if no trust here was between them. Both dressed in similar clothing to the lanky man in the middle. One sported a thick mustache that curled at the beginning of his cheeks and was smaller than them all. He also had on his head a flat top hat with a green and black dotted feather sticking out from its edge. The other was clean shaven with a shiny black rounded hat and an estranged look in his eye as he jittered with the rifle in hand.

“Your thanks is unnecessary.” Winston nodded. “What were you gentlemen doing to attract their attention?”

“Hunting,” the one with the curled mustache affirmed in a French accent. “What does it appear like?”

“Well, it appears like you were about to be served as dinner to a couple of pups.” Winston moved around them, looking over their presences.

“What?” the Frenchman spoke in offense.

“I beg your pardon, sir, these were not any ordinary dogs. In fact, they are much different than the wolves we are accustomed to in the colonies,” the tall man asserted.

“You are not in the colonies.” Winston knelt down over the wolf with the gaping hole in its skull. Studying the beast and realizing that what they spoke was true. These wolves were different from the ones he has come in contact with before. Larger, meaner, more gruesome in bodily structure. This would bring no surprise to Winston for the west was always one to offer such intricacies. Lifting up the head, he dug into the hole to pull out the iron ball from its lodging. Dropping the head down, he turned and showed them the bloody round.

“You should not waste shots like you were. You bide your moment and fire when you are most certain of hitting your target. Firing aimlessly will only hasten your death to come." Winston opened his tanned pouch and dropped the ball into it. “If you are not used to the world around you, why travel so far here? Just for a hunt seems an awfully long inconvenience."

The taller man stepped forward excitedly. “Yes, we do seem to be out of our element. However, I do own a large stake of land just north of here.”

“I believe it was south,” the Frenchman interrupted.

“No, it… wait.” The tall man looked around as a plaster of confusion appeared over his face. “Damn! What way was it? Everything looks the same!”

Winston did not bother more with this troupe and strolled past them again to the way he had entered.

“Hold on there, sir. You have asked us our reasoning for being out here. Now what is it you are doing so far out here as well?”

Winston stopped in place, firming his boots deeper and spinning around to face them once more. “Unlike you and your merry group of hunters, I am meant to be here. Tasked with being here.”

“Wait, I have heard of you. Yes, yeah you are one of the p--pi… pon… ah, what is it?” The Frenchman struggled to find the word and looked to the tall middleman for guidance.

“A Pioneer. It is true. Jefferson plans to claim the territory, does he not?” The tall man answered with an ask.

Winston answered back with an almost still nod.

“Oh what a wonder,” the tall man exclaimed. “How marvelous this is to see one of you in the flesh. Doing what you people do.”

“What you people do?” Winston folded his arms over.

“Oh, my apologies. I did not mean offense. It is only just that the stories told of you lot are so rare yet so wondrous all the same. There were claims of your existence, but it was all thought to be political propaganda. It is a rare sight indeed.” The tall man brushed through his hair to settle it back. He stepped forward with his hand out to shake. “Allow me to introduce myself and my compatriots. My name is Carter. Quincy Carter.”

Winston stared down judgingly at his hand and then back up to the man’s face without a hint of assurance he would shake it.

“Alright.” Carter lowered his hand along with his expression. “These are my compatriots, Timeo Bernard and Manfred.” Carter had pointed to both the Frenchman and the other with the crazed look in his eye as he spoke. Winston looked curiously worried at the man called Manfred who was only staring back at him with widened eyes.

Carter turned to notice and immediately explained. “Do not pay mind to Manfred. He has had that look in his eye for years since witnessing a bomb blow up a marketplace. He is harmless.”

“Harmless will do you no good out here. I suggest you make your way back to your land with haste. Night is approaching, and you do not want to be out here to see what it can bring,” Winston warned before turning away.

“Sir, what does that mean?” Carter called out in question.

Winston did not answer, continuing on his path back to the golden road. Upon reaching, it was a lot less gold as the sun had moved considerably out from the middle of the sky. He was alone again. Until he was not. As crawling out from the overgrowth, the troupe of unfortunate hunters followed him onto the path.

Winston sharpened back to them with frustration. “No, no, no. Go another way,” Winston aggressed, pointing in the opposite direction. “That way.”

“I truly am sorry for the inconvenience, sir. I am big enough to admit that we are lost. No idea where we are, nor where we have been, and neither where we are to be going,” Carter explained. “My master huntsman over here has seemed to have lost his touch with age.”

“Ey, I am but only a few years older than you,” said Timeo, shaking his rifle out in front of him.

“And my navigator had met an unfortunate demise very quickly at the hands of the mongrels,” Carter continued. “I have heard the rumored tales talked about you all. How there is nothing out of your reach. No challenge cannot be conquered, and no land cannot be found. If you were to lead us back home, you would be handsomely rewarded for it.”

Winston pondered this achievable reward. It is not his place to offer such an unguaranteed service for he prefers to travel alone. With the little compensation offered to him for the discoveries he makes and reports on, this offer seemed highly desirable.

“You do realize what you are all getting yourself into. The night offers very little safety compared to the day. Those wolves were the least of your worries for what stalks in the dark,” Winston warned once again.

“We are ready to push our heads long into the danger,” Carter stated ever so confidently. “Our mettle has tenacity to do so.”

Winston stepped up to them, close to the face of Carter who stood two feet taller than he. “Never will you be ready to witness what is to come.” He then whisked away from the troupe, heading north and opposite of the direction he was set on. “We must make ground before night sets in. This way.”

So on the foursome travelers headed through the encompassing forest. Unnerved with the thought of what a night in this strange new land could proffer.

***

White clouds shifted to gray as the sun dropped and the moon rose. A darkened blue canvas for a splatter of stars to litter the sky with a shine.

As the indications of night gleamed over the horizon, Winston had taken the troupe far beyond the trail back into the woods from where he had originally saved them. And even then, further from that point north as both Timeo and Carter had come to an agreement as to the path they had taken to get to their ambush of wolves. They were stopped now off the edge of woods before a wide landscape of roaming fields. Rock formations dotted the horizon of view and hills ducked down into more patches of trees even darker than those rocks. From this point they made camp as Winston set a fire while the men gathered around for their rest and warmth. Standing in the dark away from the fire, Winston held a pistol firmly at his side and leaned up against a tree for comfort.

Carter approached, but Winston did not look his way.

“That’s a peculiar firearm you have there,” Carter pointed out.

In his hand, Winston clutched a slick brown flintlock with silver trim and a grip around its barrel that could be used when the edged knife sticking out underneath was necessary.

Carter looked curiously over the weapon. “I’ve never seen a pistol such as this. How does it work, may I ask?”

Carter inched his hand out to reach for the weapon, until Winston lifted it up to his face. Loaded and aimed on his forehead. “You pull the trigger and everything goes dark,” Winston said, then lowered the pistol to his side. “Even for the one who is behind it.”

Carter’s nervous swallow was louder than expected and an even more awkward chuckle from him could not be held down. He stumbled back, still in the stir of shock from staring down the cold dark barrel. He gained even ground back by the fire, pulling out a glass jar from his bag and walking it back over to Winston. Handing it out to him, Winston glanced only for a moment to see it was filled with cut crescent shaped apples in a reddish jam. Winston had not come across this smell before. The apples sure, but the jam smelled of some sort of unknown berry.

Carter shook it as if it would make it more appealing to Winston.

“No thanks, not hungry,” Winston fibbed, studying down at his gun.

Carter opened the jar and scooped out an apple with a hankering of jam on top of it. He swallowed it whole while Winston just stood there glancing up at Carter's chewing enjoyment. The hunger secretly crept up into Winston as the fruity aroma had revealed it to always be there.

Through a full mouth, Carter spoke, “You sure you do not want any? My wife makes the finest berry and apple tart this side of the… well I don't exactly know where we are to define such. I guess this side of the states now perhaps."

Winston could feel his mouth water but dared not open to show this stranger the satisfaction he craved. He looked off, brushing the scent away with a wipe of his nose and a spit through his scrunched lips.

“Suit yourself.” Carter took another apple from the jar and sank it into his mouth. He wandered over, placing the jar down beside his bag.

“You know it would be the best thing if you all got your rest. Tomorrow’s hike through the fields will drain you dry. We should be up before dawn as the sun touches the night. No later nor sooner,” Winston stated assuredly.

Carter cleared his throat and sat down beside the fire. “The resting must wait. For now is the time to swap tales. My father always told me that around a fire is where one can share their experiences. You must have plenty to share. Come on, you should at least tell us your name.”

“My name has no meaning to you. Nor does yours to me. I have a job to do which requires keeping every one of you alive. Or at least fully capable of witnessing the dawn. There cannot be an affordance of distraction right now. Not around this fire. Not at this time."

“You, stranger, have the emotional state of a stone.” Timeo laughed. “Manfred brings up better conversation than you.”

Winston, not caring for the insult, reached into his side pouch and pulled out an implement made of a mess of sticks. Once fully removed from the pouch it had opened into a diamond shape with thin string keeping it all together. In the middle, held up by similar strings was a wrapped ball of leather with bits of cotton sticking out between the straps. Holding it by another string from the tip at the top, Winston tied it to a branch above to let it hang.

“What is that?” Carter asked, leaning on his leg in interest.

Collecting some fire using a stick, Winston lit up the leather and cotton amalgamation of this contraption as it hung there on the branch like a lantern. “This is a Moral Beacon. If someone or something were to make themselves known around us and were to have ill intent towards us. The flame and smoke would turn a deep green alerting of that unwanted presence nearby. Animal, human… or another entirely.”

The trio moved uncomfortably in their seats at the eerie words that Winston spoke. Looking at each other and back to Winston who came over into the light of flames.

“Another entirely? What on earth do you mean by that?” Carter asked.

Winston threw the stick he used to light the beacon into the campfire. The ashes and embers gusted and floated into the air, matching the glinting stars in the sky until fading away completely. He leaned down so that they must peer over the fire to see him.

“You move into this territory, yet you don’t know the land of which you call your home. You run folly into a world you don’t know how to traverse, and you get lost. You are lucky it was I who found you. For if it had been another, this conversation of warm greeting and consumption of delectable food would never have been. There is a reason the French want to part with this land, and why the United States of America are being tricked into taking it."

“It is because of Bonaparte. Small man wanted big pockets for his money. He needs the money for the war,” Timeo interrupted, reaching into his bag and pulling out a chunk of meat wrapped in some cloth. He stuck it onto his knife and hovered it over the flame to cook.

It had the same anomalous scent as the doe Winston had found first earlier. He made note of this but continued on anyway. “That is true, but not the whole truth, for this land can be quite the hindrance. On the mind and the soul. I am one of few Pioneers, as they call us who do the bidding of higher men. Jefferson blindly forced us into this territory to rid out problematic interventions that would make it difficult to colonize the land.”

Carter’s eyes quirked. “That’s not true. I heard—”

“You heard wrong,” Winston shot an interruption into Carter. “Never believe the words spoken by men in charge. For all they spin are tales to keep themselves on top of that great hill. What is not spoken about in the newspapers in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, or any other city that is a province of the new world is the truth. The truth they hide in order to keep the fear down so that they may rise up. Claiming to be gods and the world’s saviors. This land was never the United States to have. Neither was it for France to give. For even them, they had no claim to it.”

The troupe grew ever more curious, staring at Winston with eyes wide of intent.

“There are much more than just wolves to worry about.” Winston perched down beside the fire. The flames lighting his face to narrate his words. “Tell me, do any of you believe in ghosts?”

They all look at each other once more and are unable to hold back their shared laughter.

“We are only talking tales around a fire? What is there to fear from stories?” Timeo questioned with a hearty chuckle.

“Tales are only lies meant for pleasing or frightening children to bed. The truth is the only thing to fear here and now,” Winston continued in a serious tone as he rubbed his hands over the precipitous of the flames. “I have been exploring the territory for… I can’t even recall how long it's been exactly. Based on the cool breeze, I say we are coming past summer. Probably for a few months I have traveled in every direction, categorizing and labeling most fauna and animals I find in my journal here.” Winston tapped his bag to point out where his journal is kept. “Some old, some new. All generally normal qualities of life. Except for the fact that it is not. All this normal is to camouflage for what truly is hidden between. Insidious forms only such as a devil could have had a hand in creating. Ghosts, beasts, monsters that only feast on the fear that you give to them. Devilish creatures that stalk you in the day and take you at night. Dripping with saliva hoping that they get the chance to tear you limb from limb until all that is left is bone. And then they will eat that part of you too.”

Winston watched their childish smiles fade to syndromic signs of fear and worry. Carter swallowed hard and could not contain his constant twitching, looking around in worry of what could come out from the dark barriers of the woods.

“I have trouble believing you, monsieur,” Timeo asserted.

“For what gain would I have to trick you. No, I am warning you. If you stay here, you will die horribly. In a way that you cannot comprehend or expect.”

A musky scent flowed into Winston’s nose. Scrunching up and sniffing the air, loud cracking could be heard from a distance unfathomable to the unrefined human ear. From the corner of his eye, Winston could see that the smoke and corresponding flame faded into deep green.

“Oh my,” Carter exclaimed. “What is it?”

“Something is here,” Winston stood up and surveyed the dark slits between the trees. “And a lot of them.”

The hunters stood up around Winston, readying their weapons for any incoming attack.

“This is madness,” Timeo alarmed.

“Quiet,” Winston demanded.

Listening closely, the footprints that hit the floor running were not animal. The smell was that of anything other than human. Large strides in a wave of fury coming their way. There was an echoing silence from the darkness which surrounded their camp.

Suddenly, Winston heard the sound of a bow string stretching back and an arrow bursting through the air. He was unable to anticipate its speed as it shot through into Manfred’s eye. His now lifeless body fell back into the fire, crunching the wood underneath and spreading the embers out to the sides. Carter and Timeo were lost for words as they were lost for hope. And before they could even comprehend fully what had just occurred, men dressed in leather hides and fur with long raven hair had rage in their hearts and fury in their eyes as they came charging from the dark. They carried weapons of stone and wood to form a monstrative arsenal of deadly weapons. Tomahawks, spears and curved serrated clubs all came rushing out with them to Winston and the final two hunters around the fallen Manfred.

With his rifle laid over by the tree where the beacon hung, Winston unsheathed a hatchet from behind his waist as one of these crazed attackers swung at him with their club. Wood to metal, they met together. Nature to the modern world.

With the momentum of the clash, Winston used this to drag the attacker around to throw him on top of Manfred’s burning corpse. Rolling over the flames and catching fire himself, the attacker bellowed till his voice gave out to death. Then the battle began.

Carter and Timeo aimed pistol and rifle firing only one shot each until the need to switch to swords became the better choice. For they were on the defensive against this abrasive ambush of screaming warriors. For Winston, it was simpler and more effective to fight fire with fire. He chose an offensive position and charged toward a group of three each with rounded stone tomahawks. He took them on head first, slashing right and left as they swiped at him. The men attacked in a frenzy and did so grouped up together to overwhelm, much like wolves would. Winston hacked at arms and legs, swiftly cutting them down but unfortunately taking on some nicks across his arms and bludgeons to his sides and legs.

It seemed this attack would never end, as the attackers continued to pour out from the dark as if they were born just there at a rapid pace. Many followed back there injured and weak, many more fell before an escape could cross their minds.

Carter could handle a sword well, defending himself enough and striking back with elegance that showed true training with the weapon if not a bit outlandish. Timeo seemed more of a brawler and more sporadic with his attacks in swiping motions. As Winston was otherwise occupied protecting his own life, the attackers wailed and frenzied at the final two hunters. Before he could notice, Winston glanced over and saw them overwhelmed as Carter was whacked across his head by a club. He fell down unconscious from the hit and Timeo tried to defend him but was swiftly pounced on and knocked to the floor as well. Two of these warriors grabbed Timeo by both legs and dragged him away from the fire. Winston crossed over the body of another attacker with a hack and quickly apprehended this situation by throwing his hatchet from where he was into the chest of one the draggers. Winston then rushed over and tackled the other off of Timeo. They rolled away until Winston leapt off from him, pulling out the dirk from his side. He measured the blade across his face and in line with his arm, staring down this attacker.

The warrior shot his sight around before calling out in a language Winston had never heard before. After the shout, the warrior ripped off his leather shirt and dropped to all fours. Before Winston’s eyes, for which he thought he had seen all the horrors this new land could bring, he found another monstrous discovery.

The warrior's bones began to crack and split through the skin. The hands stretched and bent and arms curled back. Through the open wounds of flesh, long prickly hairs grew out and began to blanket over what was left of the skin. Something was tearing through to come out.

Winston slid into the corpse with his hatchet driven through, removing it and hacking at the monster to be. The blade was cutting through but then eventually only hit bone and upon realizing this, the transforming warrior threw one of its gangly arms in Winston’s direction, sending him soaring through the air into the tree that hung the beacon. Winston hit the tree with a great force and slid down its bark, knocking off the beacon and himself to ground.

Dazed and winded there was no sense of environment or normal sight for him. A blurred world of light and dark with moving forces in between. Pressing down on the ground to his side, he could feel the cool wood of his rifle now firmly in his grip. His mind came to allow his eyes to see clearly but it was too late. He scanned the area and could not see the creature forming. He stood up quickly, flicking his arm to release the bayonet on his rifle and waited…

And waited…

Silence all around. No warriors. No wails. A completely soundless time where all might seem that it was possibly a dream.

But no.

Not in the slightest.

From his side, a stick cracked which shuttered Winston’s body to a defensive position. Leaping from the vortexed dark, a large wolf pounced on top of him, pushing Winston down to the floor. Shoving the rifle up, the beast clamped its large jaws around its body, seemingly stopping it from consuming Winston whole. As the beast tried pushing past the rifle in its mouth, Winston studied its face and could see what he did not want to admit. In patches the fur was still growing across the skin into place and the eyes still had the whites to define a human.

This beast was once a man.

Hidden within the feeble body of man which was torn apart and put back together as an animal. It growled and fumed onto Winston’s face; the sounds of wails extended around the camp. The warriors who had survived the initial counterattack had begun to turn as well. Contorting their muscles and bones in unimaginable ways as they took the form of higher beasts.

With all his strength, Winston lifted the monster that snarled on top of him over his head and a few feet into the flames. The monster did not burn however, only immediately brushing off the embers that danced over its fur.

Timeo clambered to his feet and grabbed Winston’s hatchet that fortunately landed by him when Winston was thrown. He attacked one of these monsters that wailed with each cut he gave into its hardened spine. Another had leapt onto Timeo and there could be nothing to be done to stop what would happen. For this monster slapped away the hatchet from his hand and drove its growing prolonged claws into Timeo’s chest. Pulling down, the monster ripped open his torso allowing blood and bone to be exposed. Timeo bellowed horribly at the sight of seeing his insides out.

Winston leapt to his feet and ran over with his rifle in hand until the monster that marked him did so again by tackling him off to the side. Winston was weakened to help as two of these monsters drove their claws into Timeo’s legs and dragged him into the dark as his screams followed him through. Nothing was seen more of him and neither heard.

Winston fought with the final monster, slashing it with his rifle blade as the beast cut at him with its curved claws. Cutting his stomach and slashing his face until blood became as much part of the dirt floor as it had been within his body. They dueled on, and Winston was able to get a good crossing strike on the monster's glowing eyes which had taken their final form from their human perspective. A gash that would surely blind anything or anyone had caused the beast to whimper and leap back from him. Looking around, it then sprinted off into the dark where the rest of its sinister pack had fled to with Timeo.

They were gone as swiftly as they appeared. Winston fell to his knees and held himself up by his rifle. He looked around and saw the true chaos this land proposed to anyone. He thought all was lost then until a groan emerged. A human groan. For these beasts had not slain all who were there. Carter lifted up from his back, clearly dazed by the shocking blow that cut along his forehead with fresh blood to accompany.

“You live?” Winston asked, holding back a sharp pain along his body.

“I think so. Unless this is what comes after,” Carter answered, looking around similarly to the unsparing scene. “Where is uhm…”

Carter turned around to see Manfred's charred corpse, and the many other warriors who suffered death by gunshot wounds and sword strikes before they could turn into monsters.

“Where is Timeo?” Carter asked.

Winston struggled to get to his feet and hobbled over to him. Heavy breaths and a racing heart made it almost impossible to stand as he fell beside Carter.

“Are you hurt?” Carter rose up to assess Winston.

Winston removed his hand from the slashes across his body only to see blood caked onto it.

“I am fine. Just a scratch, nothing more,” Winston grumbled through his resilient pain.

“That is definitely more than a scratch. You need a doctor and fast,” Carter looked around curiously. “We need to get to my home. My sister is a practitioner with some experience in nursing. The quicker we get there the sooner you get to live.”

“No, I will be fine. Truly I am.”

“Truly, your guts are practically hanging out. My home was our destination no matter what. Might as well get a head start now on that dawn you spoke about.”

Carter reached down, throwing Winston's arm over his shoulder and struggled to lift him from the ground.

“Good lord you are heavier than you look,” Carter said, struggling with Winston’s weight pulling him down.

Winston groaned through the pain of constant shock and pulsing shooting across his torso. He and Carter walked down the small hill out from the woods and into the grass plains. Continuing the journey with weakened limbs that barely carried each of them along. Winston's eyes began to close on themselves. Snapping open and fading faster as the warmness of his wounds were turning cold with the chill from the breeze across the plains.

Not able to keep his strength up, Winston slipped from over Carter’s crutch and fell onto his side. He then rolled over onto his back, staring into the night sky and watching time fade as life passed through his eyes with memories wanting to be forgotten. All leading back to his father making him a man at a too young of age. Teaching him with a strong fist and a hollow heart. He laid in that grass plain, counting stars as he fell deeper into the dark.