My Exodus

It was a dark and grimmy night, a group of friends went to a gloomy forest, two of them took a flashlight for visibility, they had turned them on, keep walking forward.

The beams sliced through the fog like hesitant knives, revealing twisted trunks and low-hanging branches that clawed at their jackets. Alex led the way, his flashlight gripped tight in one hand, the other occasionally brushing against Sarah’s arm for reassurance. Behind them, Mike cracked a nervous joke about how this was just like that one horror movie they’d all mocked last weekend, but his laugh died quickly in the damp air. Lisa clutched the second flashlight, sweeping it in wide, erratic arcs, while Tom brought up the rear, muttering about how the GPS had died the moment they crossed the treeline.

They were five in total, college friends chasing a stupid thrill. The legend of Blackthorn Forest had circulated for years on forums and late-night podcasts: hikers vanishing, strange lights in the canopy, whispers that sounded like your own name carried on the wind. It was all bullshit, they’d agreed over cheap beer. A rite of passage before graduation. No one believed in ghosts anymore. Not really.

But the forest felt alive. The ground squelched under their boots, releasing the stench of rot and something metallic, like old blood. Mist curled around their ankles, thick as soup, and the trees groaned in the windless night, as if protesting their intrusion.

“How much farther to the clearing?” Sarah asked, her voice tighter than she intended. She was the skeptic, the one who’d rolled her eyes at the plan but came anyway because Alex had given her that pleading look.

“Should be another half mile,” Alex replied, consulting the crumpled map he’d printed that afternoon. The paper was already damp, ink bleeding. “We set up camp, roast some marshmallows, and prove there’s nothing here but squirrels and bad vibes.”

Mike snorted. “Yeah, and if we hear chainsaws, I’m outrunning all of you.”

Lisa didn’t laugh. Her flashlight beam trembled on the path ahead. “Guys… did you hear that?”

They stopped. The forest fell into an unnatural hush. No insects, no distant owls. Just the ragged sound of their breathing.

“Hear what?” Tom whispered.

“It sounded like… breathing. Close.”

Mike clapped her on the shoulder. “That’s just your imagination, Lis. Or Alex’s sweaty ass. Come on.”

They pushed forward, but the mood had shifted. The flashlights seemed dimmer now, as if the darkness was drinking the light. Shadows lengthened unnaturally between the trees, forming shapes that dissolved when stared at directly. Alex felt it first—a prickle at the back of his neck, the sense of being watched.

An hour in, they found the first sign something was wrong. The trail marker they’d been following—a faded wooden post with a red blaze—lay splintered on the ground, as if torn out by massive hands. Deep gouges scarred the earth around it, too wide for any animal they knew.

“Bear?” Tom suggested, crouching to inspect.

“Too clean,” Sarah said. She traced one groove with her finger. It was perfectly straight, ending in a point. “And look at the edges. Like claws, but… precise.”

Lisa’s flashlight flickered. “We should go back.”

“No way,” Mike said. “We’re committed. Besides, turning around now would be admitting we’re scared of a spooky story. Come on, the clearing’s probably right—”

A low rustle cut him off. Not wind. Something deliberate, circling them just beyond the reach of the beams. They spun as one, lights stabbing outward. Nothing. Only the endless rows of black trunks and dripping leaves.

“Keep moving,” Alex said, forcing confidence into his voice. “Stay close.”

The forest grew denser. Branches snagged their packs, tore at their sleeves. The air grew colder, unnaturally so, carrying a faint odor of decay that worsened with every step. Lisa began humming an old lullaby under her breath, a nervous tic from childhood. No one teased her for it.

They reached the clearing sooner than expected—or perhaps the woods had rearranged themselves to deliver them there. It was a barren patch of earth, ringed by ancient oaks whose bark bore strange carvings: spirals, jagged runes, and what looked like crude human figures with elongated limbs and hollow eyes. In the center stood a circle of stones, blackened as if scorched by fire that had burned for centuries.

“Wow,” Mike breathed, stepping into the middle. “This is it. The ritual spot from the stories.”

Sarah set her pack down warily. “We’re not doing any rituals. We camp, we leave at dawn.”

Tom was already unpacking the tent poles, but his hands shook. “You guys see those figures on the trees? They look like they’re… reaching.”

Alex ignored him, focusing on gathering kindling. The wood was wet, but he managed a small fire with the help of a lighter and some cursing. The flames cast long, dancing shadows that seemed to move independently of the light. As they sat around it, roasting hot dogs on sticks, the whispers began.

At first, they dismissed them as wind through leaves. But the wind had died. The sounds were words—fragmented, overlapping, in voices they forgotten.

...come closer...

...we’ve been waiting...

Lisa dropped her stick. “Did you hear that? My name. It said my name.”

Mike laughed, but it sounded hollow. “Classic ventriloquist trees. Or echo from the highway.”

There was no highway for miles.

They tried to sleep in shifts. Alex took first watch with Sarah. The others zipped into tents, flashlights left on inside like night-lights for adults who should know better. The fire burned low, embers glowing like watchful eyes.

Around 2 a.m., Sarah nudged Alex. “Look.”

One of the carved figures on a nearby oak seemed to have moved. Its arm was extended farther, fingers splayed toward their camp. Alex blinked hard. Paranoia, he told himself. Just the firelight playing tricks.

Then the screaming started.

It came from Mike’s tent—high-pitched, guttural, cut short with a wet tearing sound. Alex and Sarah bolted upright. Tom and Lisa scrambled out of their tent, eyes wide.

“Mike!” Alex yelled, grabbing his flashlight.

They ripped open the flap. Mike was gone. His sleeping bag lay shredded, dark stains soaking the fabric. The back of the tent had been slashed open from the inside, or perhaps from something that had reached in. Bloody footprints—bare, elongated, with too many toes—led away into the trees.

“Oh God,” Lisa whimpered. “We have to run.”

They did. Flashlights bobbing wildly, packs abandoned except for the knives and one headlamp. The forest seemed to close in, branches whipping their faces, roots tripping them. Behind them, the whispers grew into a chorus.

...join us...

...flesh remembers...

Tom tripped first. He went down hard, flashlight spinning away. When they pulled him up, his ankle was twisted at a sick angle, but that wasn’t the worst. Something had bitten his calf—deep punctures oozing black fluid that smoked faintly in the cold air.

“It burns,” he gasped. “Like acid.”

They half-carried him, Sarah and Alex supporting his weight while Lisa swept the light ahead. The trees thinned slightly, but the path they’d come on was gone. Replaced by a new trail of those same clawed gouges, leading deeper.

Hours blurred. Exhaustion clawed at them. Tom’s leg worsened; the black veins spread upward, his skin splitting with wet pops. He begged them to leave him, but they refused. Friends don’t abandon friends. That’s what they told themselves, even as the whispers mimicked their voices perfectly.

Leave him. He’s slowing you down.

Sarah wants to run. She always does.

Lisa started crying. “It knows us. It knows everything.”

They found the ruins at dawn—or what passed for dawn in Blackthorn, a sickly gray light filtering through the canopy like diluted pus. Stone pillars covered in moss and more of those horrific carvings surrounded a sunken pit. At the bottom lay bones. Dozens of them, human and animal, arranged in patterns that hurt to look at directly. Skulls with elongated jawbones stared up at them.

Alex shone his light down. Something moved among the bones—a pale, sinuous shape, too long for a snake, with fingers at the end. It retreated into a crevice with a sound like cracking knuckles.

“We need to get out,” Sarah said. Her voice was hoarse. “Now.”

But Tom collapsed. The infection had reached his chest. He convulsed, eyes rolling back, and from his mouth came not his voice, but a chorus of the whispers. “You brought us gifts. Warm bodies. Fresh memories.”

Lisa screamed and ran. They chased after her, but the forest had other plans. Branches seemed to part for her, then snap shut behind. Alex and Sarah found her flashlight abandoned, still on, its beam pointing at a tree where fresh carvings had appeared: Lisa’s face, twisted in terror, etched into the bark as if grown there overnight.

Tom was next. They returned to him only to find his body hollowed out, ribs splayed like petals, the black fluid now a writhing mass of tendrils that slithered into the undergrowth. One tendril paused, formed a crude mouth, and spoke in Mike’s voice: “Told you it was like the movie.”

Alex vomited. Sarah dragged him away, both flashlights now failing, batteries drained far faster than physics allowed. The darkness pressed in, absolute.

They stumbled for what felt like days. Time fractured. Hunger gnawed, but they dared not eat anything from the forest. Thirst worse. Hallucinations crept in—Mike waving from between trees, Lisa calling for help, their own parents whispering apologies for sending them on this trip.

The truth unraveled slowly, pieced from the whispers and the carvings. Blackthorn wasn’t haunted. It was hungry. An ancient entity, older than the trees, that fed not on flesh alone but on fear, memory, and connection. It separated them to savor each thread of friendship snapping. It wore their faces, used their voices, because isolation was the true horror.

Sarah fell into a hidden sinkhole as night fell again. Alex heard her scream, then laughter—her laughter—rising from below. He lowered the dying flashlight. She was there, waving up at him, but her smile was too wide, teeth multiplying. “Come down, Alex. It’s warm. We’re all together.”

He ran. Possibly to avoid evidence.

Alone now, Alex clutched the failing light. The whispers surrounded him completely, no longer fragmented.

You were always the leader. Lead us home.

Your friends miss you. Feel how empty you are without them.

Visions assaulted him: the group laughing around a campfire that never was, safe and whole. The pain of their loss twisted into something seductive. Why fight? The forest promised reunion. No more loneliness. No more doubt.

His flashlight died.

In the pitch black, Alex felt hands—cold, numerous, familiar—grasp his arms. They guided him gently deeper. He didn’t resist. The carvings on the trees watched approvingly as new ones formed: five figures now, arms linked, eyes hollow but smiling.

By morning, searchers would find the abandoned packs at the edge of Blackthorn. No bodies. Just a new set of runes on the outermost trees, fresh and glistening, depicting the friends forever entwined in the gloom.

And if you listen on a dark and grimy night, near the treeline, you might hear them. Five voices, whispering together.

Keep walking forward until stumble your demise.

Either a life or death sceneraio. Either way.