Prologue
Gil Mercer loved camping. He couldn’t remember a time when the prospect of being outdoors didn’t cause a tingle of excitement deep within him. Something about being away from the normal hustle and bustle of society really called to him. He couldn’t imagine a better place to be; a man in his mid-thirties experiencing the joy of birds chirping and deer dashing through the underbrush. He took a deep breath. The air smelled clean. It smelled right.
Having spent his youth growing up in Detroit, one wouldn’t have expected him to have such a love of the outdoors. Most of the year, Gil had been a typical city boy enjoying the occasional after-school game of b-ball with his friends, watching TV, and causing the usual mischief of a kid his age.
Gil’s mother, however, had insisted on a different course of action during the summer. Every year, she would sign him up with the Boy’s Club of America or the Fresh Air Fund and make sure he spent a good chunk of the summer months where there were trees to climb, grass to run through, and campfires to tell ghost stories around. She had claimed it would broaden Gil’s horizons, show him there was a world beyond the asphalt and scarred building facades of their neighborhood. Gil wasn’t stupid, though; he knew it was mostly to make sure that he didn’t fall in with a bad crowd.
While school was in, his studies had kept him fairly busy. His mother would accept no less. However, once school ended, idle hands could easily become the devil’s playthings. Gil had seen his fair share of friends get themselves into increasingly more serious levels of trouble from year to year. He’d come back at the end of each summer to find that some of them were in trouble with the law, some had become addicts, and occasionally one would just be gone – never to be spoken of again.
Some of the other kids from the inner cities had been bitter about being sent to camp. They’d complain endlessly of being stuck out in the boonies and do their best to find a way to be kicked out of the program. Not Gil, though. From the moment he had stepped off a bus and gotten his first taste of nature, he had been hooked. No matter how great the preceding winter had been, come June, Gil would be itching again for the outdoors. It was a love that had never left him.
It didn’t matter even when there weren’t others to share his enthusiasm. By his junior year in college, he had saved enough to purchase some decent gear of his own. That way, whenever there was a long weekend that didn’t require him to go back home, he was ready. He’d pack up his gear in the old clunker of a car he had bought from his uncle and pick a direction. Any would do so long as no skyscrapers marred the view ahead. The wilderness was like a sort of soulmate to him. Girlfriends had come and gone, friends had moved away, jobs had changed, but the outdoors were the one constant in Gil’s life. It was, he thought, his rock, for lack of a better term.
That thought caused him to chuckle as he walked upstream toward his little camp. He had spent the morning fishing in a spot he’d found during some cursory exploring. He had bagged a few keepers, but in the end had set them all free. Gil wasn’t much of a cook and his wife, Maria, would have sooner filleted him than gut a bunch of fish.
He frowned ever so slightly as his thoughts turned toward his family. He loved them with all his heart, make no mistake. His wife was a lawyer for a global energy syndicate. She was the smartest, prettiest, and funniest person he had ever met. Sure, that last one typically only appeared after a good number of cocktails, but it didn’t matter. For Gil, it had been love at first sight. After three years of trying to win her over, it had finally been love at about the thousandth sight for her. Shortly thereafter, they were married in the suburbs of Chicago. Gil had argued in favor of a honeymoon at Yellowstone but had been overruled almost immediately. They instead had spent a week on a beach down in Barbados.
If Gil had any regrets about marrying Maria, it was that she did not share his love of the outdoors. During the course of their nine years of wedded bliss, he had made absolutely no progress with regards to changing her mind. Her idea of roughing it was a weekend of being pampered at a spa. To her, the woods were an insufferable hell of biting bugs, poisonous snakes, and all sorts of things that wouldn’t bat an eye at eating her alive.
So, too, had it been with Carl. The birth of their only child had been nearly mind-blowing for Gil. Not only was he now a father, but his child was a boy, a boy to carry on in his footsteps and share in his interests.
Sadly, it had not come to pass. Carl was a great kid in almost all aspects. He earned good grades, was popular, and was even polite – a rare thing in children these days. He was everything that any parent could hope for. Unfortunately, he also shared his mother’s disdain toward Gil’s passion. Sure, he could convince his son to come on the occasional weekend layover, but the boy usually grew bored within an hour of setting up their tent. To him, Mother Nature had nothing to offer that could compete against his PSP.
Thus, Gil was forced to compromise, usually in their favor. He’d get a weekend here or there, and he’d always reserve at least three days out of his yearly vacation for a getaway. However, these were typically lone outings. Family trips almost always went in Maria’s favor, especially since she was usually smart enough to plan them close to either a theme park or fairground. In doing so, she knew Carl was always sure to side with her. Gil had to admit it was hard to plan a good camping trip within walking distance of a killer roller coaster. Plenty of those places had dedicated campgrounds. However, they were often so congested and filthy that he would have preferred a week sleeping in his mother-in-law’s backyard.
This year was different, though. For the first time ever, Gil had won the argument over the family vacation. He had offered his wife a compromise of two days in San Francisco in return for driving east through the Rockies and taking a week-long camping trip deep in the backwoods of Colorado. Neither Maria nor Carl had been happy about it, but even they had to admit that fair was fair. Both had promised to keep an open mind and try to enjoy things; Gil, in return, had assured them that if the campout was a disaster, next year they could have their beaches and amusement parks with nary a peep from him.
Unfortunately, three days in, it was looking like Gil might be forced to live up to his word. No matter what sights he showed them, his family had been unceasingly miserable. Truth be told, he was glad they had slept in today. His little fishing excursion was the first real enjoyment he had gotten so far on this trip.
The loud snap of a stick he stepped on brought Gil out of his reverie. It was silly, but it seemed to have nearly the same report as a gun going off. No wonder, Gil realized a few moments later. All had become silent around him. The chirps and chatter of creatures scurrying through the underbrush had disappeared. He stopped walking and looked around, suddenly glad he hadn’t kept any of the fish he had caught. Silence like this usually meant a predator was near.
Gil was no fool. Loving the woods had meant learning about them, too. He’d heard similar silences before. Still, he wasn’t particularly worried. A black bear would typically give a wide berth. As long as cubs weren’t involved, they were often happy to leave people alone. An angry cougar could be a potential problem, but they were ambush predators, and the stream upon which he walked had a nice, wide bank. He was probably too far away from the brush to make a good target.
He decided to give it a few minutes. If things didn’t go back to normal by then, he’d begin hooting and hollering. Most animals would think twice before charging a full-grown man making a boatload of freaky noise. Worst case scenario, he had bear spray in his jacket pocket. An eyeful would send even the ballsiest bruin running for the hills.
A low grunt from across the stream bed caught his attention. Gil turned and began scanning the area for signs of movement. The noise hadn’t been a familiar one, but he wasn’t fool enough to think he had heard every sound in Mother Nature’s arsenal.
The grunt came again, this time a few yards to the left of where it had originated. A wild boar perhaps? He didn’t think they were indigenous to these woods, but that didn’t necessarily rule it out. More likely a feral pig. Gil didn’t relish the thought of having to climb a tree, all because he had stumbled across a nasty side of bacon with an attitude problem.
Whatever it was, it was moving. It was also apparently aware Gil had heard it because, a few seconds later, it ended all pretense of sneaking about quietly. Leaves crunched and something moved past branches, snapping them as it went. Considering the sounds, something large was out there – and it was no pig.
Gil bent down, taking care to keep his eyes on the area from where the noises came. He picked up two flat rocks from the stream. At once, he started banging them together. The loud noise reverberated off the trees. It would have been enough to rattle the resolve of most bears he had come across in his adventures.
He stopped what he was doing and listened. There was silence for about twenty seconds, and then a sound carried back to him. It was the same noise he had just made. Was it an echo?
A moment later, it happened again. Impossible, thought Gil. Bears didn’t bang rocks together. It would have been quite the task given their lack of opposable thumbs.
Almost immediately, all the tension drained from him. “Carl! That better not be you!” he yelled toward the bushes.
If his son was playing tricks, that gave Gil some hope. It meant he had finally given up on grousing in front of his video games and had decided to live a little. He was within spitting distance of their camp, so the risks were low. He’d go easy on Carl so as to not spoil what little progress had been made.
“Last chance, Carl. Come on out.”
Still no response. Either the boy was being obnoxious – not unheard of – or it wasn’t him. They were pretty far out, but this was still a known camping area. It was very possible he had stumbled across another hiker having a little fun at his expense.
The normal sounds of the forest finally returned. Whoever had been lurking there, having what they no doubt thought was a good joke, had moved away from the area.
Gil sighed. Assholes. Even in the big woods, you couldn’t always escape them. He wasn’t too upset. He had played his fair share of pranks on fellow outdoorsmen in the not-so-distant past of his youth. No harm done, he thought as he continued on his way.
He rounded a bend and could see the site about fifty yards away. Odd, he thought. Where were the tents? He should’ve been able to see them, especially the gaudy orange one he shared with his wife. It stuck out like a sore thumb in all but the deepest of woods. It was practically a beacon in the clearing where they had made camp.
Oh shit! He was afraid this would happen. Bored and miserable, they had gone and packed everything up in the SUV. He wouldn’t have put it past them. They were probably thinking that if they put up a united front he’d have to cave and drive them back to civilization. Well, they had another thing coming. As far as Gil Mercer was concerned, a deal was a deal. He had no tolerance for welchers, especially in his own family.
As he got closer, he noticed things weren’t as he had first assumed. The site wasn’t stripped clean after all. Maybe he had caught them in the act.
No, there wasn’t any movement. If they had been scurrying like ants to pack things up, he’d have seen them by now.
It wasn’t until Gil reached the edge of the camp that a sinking feeling began to enter his gut. The bright orange tent was still there, after all. But it had been pounded into the dirt – flattened, actually – and was plainly missing a few large chunks. There was still just enough color left for it to be unmistakable.
A moment passed while this sank in, and then Gil dropped his fishing gear and sprinted full speed into the campsite.
“MARIA! CARL!” he began shouting as he circled the center of the clearing. Here, it became evident exactly how bad things were. The tents were destroyed and the sleeping bags torn apart. Debris littered the entire area. It looked like a tornado had hit. Hell, it looked like someone had dropped a bomb on the place.
Gil had never seen anything like it. He’d seen hungry bears attack campsites before. They’d make a hell of a mess – but nothing like this.
The thought of bears brought another uncomfortable feeling to the pit of his stomach. He forced himself to look more closely at the surrounding area. It didn’t take him long. Gil was no tracker, but even he could see the rust-colored stains on the grass. It told a grim story.
Even so, he refused to believe it. It had to be something else. The SUV! He was sure of it. He’d go there and find them waiting for him, then they’d all have a good laugh and drive off together. He held onto that thought like a drowning man. It was the only thing keeping him on his feet.
He continued shouting for his wife and son as he raced to where their vehicle had been parked, about fifty yards away.
Gil ran through a copse of trees and tripped over something hard sticking out of the dirt. He pulled himself to his knees and saw it was one of the doors of their Dodge Durango. He immediately felt like he had stepped out of reality and into one of the horror movies that he and Carl would occasionally stay up late to watch. In the eerie silence of the forest, it was almost unreal.
The silence! Gil hadn’t noticed it while he’d been shouting Maria and Carl’s names, but now he did. The sounds of the woods had once again retreated into nothingness. For a few seconds, all he could hear was the beating of his own heart. Then he heard another of those grunts from earlier.
Gil turned toward the sound. Less than twenty yards away, just outside of the tree line, stood a nightmare. It was nearly nine feet tall and at least twice as broad as him, all of it muscle – hairy muscle.
It stared at him with red-rimmed eyes that bespoke of intelligence tinged with madness. Brown fur covered the creature from head to toe, except around its mouth. There, the fur was stained the same rust color as the grass in the campsite. The creature opened its mouth wide and let loose a roar that sounded as if it had escaped from the gates of Hell itself.
Gil’s bladder emptied as the beast charged him.
The next two minutes were both the longest and last of his life. Much of what came out of his throat – while he could still make noise – was little more than inarticulate screams.
However, one thing was certain. During those few minutes, Gil Mercer loved camping a whole lot less than he usually did.
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