Wilderness Bradley Watker

I hobbled as fast as I could across the fasten. I didnt brass back and I didnt look down the former beca determination I didnt penury to know scantily how close it was, the latter because I didnt want to see the blood spurting from my foot. It was chasing me. I didnt human action round, entirely with each limped and painful step I knew it was right behind me, ready to pounce and end any futile hope of survival. It was so nuzzle, at my shoulder, on top of me, right through my brain. I could feel its breath pushing against my neck, salivating in hunger. why didnt it just finish me off?Maybe it wanted me to turn, maybe the mo ment I looked it would be on that point. Its wild eyes shining into mine, its wide mouth ready to make an aperture of my throat. The temptation to turn was immense. If I dark it would be over, I wouldnt flip to run hobble, limp, stagger anymore. I ascertain it growl, ready to pounce. My arms flailed, my servicemangled foot slipped in a coating of my own blood only exempt I ran, quieten I refused to look back. I kept thinking of survival, thinking thered be a future, thinking Id pitch it away and it was with that thin slice of hope that my legs disappeared from under me.I screamed, still it was a sound of surprise affable of than pain and it was woolly-headed in a terrible scream from across the moor. Who was that? Was it house? Was it Pete? Wed run together, free thinking it couldnt hunt down all(a) told three of us across these moors. solely was that right? It was a long way to run and we had no idea how swift it was. I closed my eyes and listened. It was check into. It was Mark screaming into the nighttime. It was Mark being torn a develop. I opened my eyes, slowly, and looked behind me. on that point was nonhing. There were no red eyes, there were no bloo topd teeth. Yet I could experience its breath so close, smell its foul raw hunger. But it wasnt there, Marks cries told me that. It had followed M ark the fattest one meat on the carcass for a favorable feast. But I could still hear its breath, trapped in my mind, telling me it was near, that despite Marks cries it was still hunting me.I steadied myself and looked around. Id tumbled into a crimson ditch, a jagged hole covered in blood. Every abut of passel, every patch of mud was smeared red. I blinked a couple of times and gagged as the stench one shot its way through my nostrils and thusly, under the lunationlight, I saw them. There were a dozen rabbit carcasses in the hole with me, each of them dissected and eviscerated by teeth. This is where it was before the bar, this is where it started before it came to us for the main course. I pulled myself up, stimulate Id vomit. Marks cries had stopped.Mark had been stopped. It was silent again, so I couldnt retch. If I threw up it would know where I was, it would find me easy. I crawled from the ditch, away from the blood and the smell. I lay on the grass, come uping my face pressed down, hoping the aroma of night time freshness would re blend in all others. I was tempted to just stay there, but the pain in my heel was too much. I had a knife in my shack, a good sharp blade. I could cut out the wound, remove the infection. The shack wasnt far. I knew this land, knew how to navigate these moors I just prayed I could move fast comme il faut it wouldnt catch me.I stood up, beatting my weight on my right foot, only cautious using my odd. I took my bearings. Marks cries had come from the east. What was it doing now? Was it feasting? Was it burrowing its nose into Marks blubber? Or was it going to use the lousiness to hunt down me and Pete as well?It had started in the bar what? Half an hour preferably? A bearing time ago? The Bar At The End Of The World we called it. There had been three of us in, and capital of Minnesota the bar-keep. No matter who else was there, the three of us and Paul the bar-keep were incessantly there. We were single men, away from civilisation, sprightly in the absence of any other gay companionship to have a kind of family to go to of an evening. It wasnt exclusive, we never made anyone feel an out rampr. When others came in from the moors they were welcomed, they were old friends. Even strangers received a cheery greeting. Wed had lost English motorists, Scotsmen in kilts, even once a Japanese coach party. We always treated strangers kindly, we always wanted the stranger to leave as a friend. We werent a bar which looked shifty and suspicious at every unknown who walked in. We smiled, we cheered, we brought some other round.The stranger who walked in that night was different. He looked cold, distant, unfriendly. He looked like a man who wouldnt appreciate smiles or cheers or any warm welcome. He was huge, the size and shape of a bear near seven foot of him. He lowered his head through the doorway and so straightened, standing dead still, staring at us on our bar-stools. Pete the frie ndliest, youngest and lithest tended to pounce forward and shake the pass off of whoever came in, he didnt with this guy. This man just stood and glared at us, like he was ready to growl if we came near.We were in the wild, we ourselves were part of the wild but he looked like he was born of it. His hair was greasy and matted to his simian shaped skull, his beard was torn and tangled, his skin was red and lined from exposure. His long jacket was the cook of every kind of dirt, his trousers were stained and short on his bruised calves, his torn shirt was only buttoned once cover off a dis meet and lined torso.It was Paul who spoke. Paul was the custodian and was never s handled of con forwarding the robustious elements his shotgun was never far from reach at a lower place the bar.Can I help you? he asked.The man did nothing, just continued to stare with passive venom.Can I help you? tell Paul.The man moved. He turned his head, slowly, towards the bar-keep.Whisky. said the man, his voice as dark as earth.You got money for that? asked Paul.It was never usually a problem. Once or twice wed had a tramp stray out that far and wed brought them drinks tramps have stories too. No one seemed willing to volunteer this time.The man took three strides, three strides which seemed to dent and echo against the floor. He grabbed a bar stool and swooped it under him. It was amazing those rickety old stools could take such a weight.Whisky. said the man.You got money for that? said Paul.They stared at each other. Paul kept his hand beneath the bar, clutching the gun. There was music on the jukebox, an old pop hit of the nineteen-seventies, but even though it played it was like lull had come and crushed it.The man brought his hand up, a brutal weapon of a fist huge, scarred and red. He opened it, dropping a dozen coins down onto the bar. He smiled at Paul, or gave what passed for a smile on that face.Paul let go of the gun and pulled out a clean codswallop.What kin d? he asked.Whisky.Paul shrugged and reached for a bottle the cheapest and poured out a measure.The whisky made itself at sept at the bottom of the glass, but the man just stared at it in disapproval.Whisky. he said.Paul poured another measure.Again the man stared at it with disgust strained across his wrinkled, bruised face.Whisky.Paul shrugged again and poured it so the glass was brimming with brown liquid.Helicopters I could suddenly hear choppers. They were up there, more than one patrolling the night-sky. I dropped to the grass and looked up, but couldnt see them despite the moonlight. How did they know about it? Who had called them? It took a long time to get a helicopter out here helicopters were city. They must have been hunting this thing awhile, must have track it down here. But what were they going to do now? It was an animal, it had natural senses they didnt know this moor, they didnt know where things were. It was ridiculous, what were city men in helicopters goin g to do against a beast like that?I lay still. They were on my stead. The police, the army, the trade protection authorities whoever they were we all wanted the same thing, we wanted it gone. But I knew they wouldnt be as alert as I would. Theyd come to the moors before looking for things, other animals roaming these parts. Theyd found them, theyd got them and so what if a topical anaesthetic got in the way of their sharpened bullets? It was collateral damage, it didnt matter. After all, we were too far away from the cities and the towns and the newspapers and the television cameras for anyone to care what actually happened. We were too far away for the death of a few yokel innocents to matter. But we knew. We knew it was as just as dangerous encountering a city man sent with a gun as it was encountering a beast.I got up slowly. What would I look like to them? A man limping in darkness across the moor, smeared with dirt and remains how was I going to appear to them?I tried t o figure out where they were the sound of propellers said they were close, but I could also hear that external respiration. I shuddered. I had to keep moving, I had to get safe. My shack, with heavy bolts on the doors and windows, was still a mile away. There was nowhere else though. nowhere between where I stood and my shack. Nowhere in that direction between the bar and my shack. It was all so desolate. I had to get home I could lock himself in, I had weapons, Id be able to treat my ankle and ease up myself a chance of a tomorrow. I just had to get off the moor. I didnt want to die out there from either sharpened teeth or sharpened bullets.The man had just stared at that glass of whisky. Rain fell, records changed on the jukebox and still the man watched that glass with slow contemplation. All human sound had died. Before the man walked in Pete was regaling us with a childhood story wed all heard three hundred times, Mark nevertheless could not stop sniggering at it now there was only silence. We stared at the man anxious of what he was going to do, scared of what he was going to do. Pauls hand was below the bar, tight on the gun. Maybe the man would just drink and leave. Maybe hed drink and start a conversation. Maybe.His hand reached quick for the glass. One moment it was lying still in his lap, the next it was dropping the brown liquid down his throat. He took it in one gulp, accordingly slammed the glass back to the bar and stared at it disappointed. He seemed to wonder if that was it. Paul reached his free hand to the bottle, to offer a refill, when the man jerked himself over the glass. He hunched his body over as if about to vomit the contents back in, his head so close he could have snapped the rim with his teeth. But he didnt. Instead he unfurled his tongue, pushing it into the asinine glass so it curled at the bottom and piled up on itself.The tongue was long, dark, thick it had ii black veins running and pulsing up the back. He pushed it into the glass and filled it. The receptacle crammed bounteous with purple contour spilling over the top Then he made a slurping sound, like his tongue was a paper-straw make for the last drop of liquid. He slid it out, but stayed hunched forward and unfurled it again, wrapping his tongue around the prat of the glass. He lifted it from the bar, tilting his head back and shaking whatever atoms of whisky might be left(a) into his wide eager mouth. He dropped the glass back to the bar carelessly, so it landed on its side and rolled. The man grunted as it came to a stop right at the edge.I wasnt far now, but still far from safe. The helicopters had moved away, but there were men on the moors. I could hear them communicating, I could hear the static of their walkie-talkies. They were armed and scared in the moonlight, and it didnt matter what they saw man, sheep, deer, great big beast theyd all get the same treatment. I kept moving, conscious of them, conscious of the salivating breath, conscious that one wrong turn and Id be exposed for all in the moonlight. I rounded a ridge, and there close enough to see was my shack. I felt so much relief I nearly wept, but then I heard them on the bank right above me. I hit bank-side and listened, they were chatting about vectors and closed downs and containing the area. All the time the beast was getting nearer.It was so dark out there even with the moon that it could have pounced from five feet and surprised me. Even with armed city men so close, it would still have time to tear out my throat before taking them too. They were above me so I couldnt move, but I could hear the beast and knew I had to move. The sound of its hunger was louder when I stopped. It seemed like it could attack from all sides, like I could be ripped apart by more than one of them. It was everywhere. What were those idiots doing? Why were they advertising themselves? I held my breath and listened to them and listened to it, and figured I wa s in for a bloody death.Then there were screams. From across the moor came dreadful cries, that even through the wind I recognised as Pete. I lurched forward from the bank, but then reality knocked me back again. Even if I knew where to run it would be too late. The screams swirled in the wind, they echoed, so it seemed that each death throe was repeated again and again across the moors. The men primed their weapons, but what were they going to fire at? It could be miles off, it could be bursting up from just over the next hillock. lastly there was movement, orders were given, the men raced away. I could still hear the breathing, rattling between my ears even with the screams. I could hear the helicopters swooping back. The men had gone, the helicopters werent near enough yet and it was as close as it had ever been. If I looked to my left I could make out the brickwork of my shack. I moved hastily towards it.With the empty glass in front of him, the man closed his eyes and became st ill. Why hadnt Paul shot him then? Why didnt he just blast him one? What had gone through Pauls mind to make him wait?But then the probability was gone, his eyes opened and he spoke.I get so lonely, he said. I get so very, very lonely. His voice was quiet, a growled monotone. I know the kind of life I lead isnt meant to have company, but still I am lonely. I think its an odd thing for me to have stick lonely I wasnt born lonely, I didnt grow up lonely, there was nothing in my life that suggested loneliness. But now I am alone. I dont shed the people I knew, I dont neglect the people who loved me some of them I cant even remember but I do miss the sensation of somebody else, I do miss there being another.I talk to myself a lot, I talk to myself and try to make sense of it, because after all who else is there to talk to? Sure, there are people like you. Theres the welcome of strangers when I can get it. But youre not my friends, youre not even my friends for the hours I spend here. Youre just people I meet. You dont like me and you dont trust me and Ill be trusty with you, you have no reason to do either. You know what I am, or you have a good idea what I am. You know what I have to do, you know what will happen next. And later on when Im alone I might regret it, but for nowAnd there it was an angry mass of hair, claws and teeth. It went for Mark first the most meat but Mark was strong and pushed it back. It was only for a second, knocking it off balance, but enough for the three of us to get passed. We scrambled, had almost reached the outside, when it clamped me in a hungry vice. I looked to my foot and saw its horrible mutated face, growling and supping at my flesh. I screamed and it was answered by a gunshot. Paul put both barrels into its back. It roared and let go of my heel, and I hobbled out as fast as I could. There was another shot, and then a scream from Paul.I reached my shack, fumbling in the darkness as I tried to open the door. I had to be quicker my blood was in the air, for certain I was going to be next. It was so near, its breath seemed to bruise the back of my neck. Finally the door opened. I slammed it behind me, bolted it, pushed furniture to block the windows. Outside were choppers, men running but they werent going to get near it. It was coming for me, stalking me.I opened the table drawer and pulled out my revolver, then went to my book shelves and cracked open a little box. It was a present, given to me as a keepsake, a lucky charm, in case I ever needed it. A silver bullet. I looked to the door and with shaking fingers slipped it into the chamber. The full moon shone on me despite the furniture. I could hear growling, panting, a nearby and desperate salivating. But then I heard a chopper, I heard men. It receded, cowering, taking a tactical retreat. The sound of breathing softened in my head. I took a gulp of relief and vomited on the floor. The vomit was blood red.I sat down, shaking with tears. I reached to the drawer and pulled out a carving knife, bringing it to my heel. But it was no good. The wound was deeper than Id realised, the teeth had sunk in further than I thought, meeting below my flesh. There was no way I could just cut it out, the infection was in me, rampant in my blood.I put the gun to my temple. Why not? Anyone who passed as my friend had already died that night. But then the moonlight fey me and I realised just how powerful I felt. I could hear the breathing again, friendlier now though. There was a new smell in the night air warm, welcoming. The beast was just the other side of the door, I could sense it. I could smell it, it could smell me. I put the gun down and smiled. I guessed neither of us would be lonely for a little while.