The Beast Within

A jet black Dodge Super Duty pulled up next to the side of the road. In the back of the truck was a bunch of hunting gear: a camouflage jacket and a few guns. Something was going to go down, and that something was a bear hunt. Samuel Martin had been waiting all year for this. The fall in Maine was beautiful, especially if you were out in the sticks away from everyone. He lived in Bangor with his wife Julia, and he had always made it a thing to come back to Birchwater, Maine. There were awesome streams to fish here and lots of woods to hunt in. This place looked like it hadn’t been touched since the turn of the century. He turned the truck off and then pulled the key out of the ignition and slid it into his jeans pockets. His dark blue eyes were looking out through his windshield. A few bugs had splattered on it, and there were a few spots of bird shit on it. It was fine; everything was fine.

He opened the driver-side door and jumped out of the truck and walked around the back of it. He grabbed the hunting gear that was in the truck. He pulled the camo jacket over his shoulders and started walking towards the clearing. He had a few guns with him. A few of his buddies were supposed to meet him here soon. They were bringing the beer and the horror stories from their mundane lives. This was also a bonding experience for him as well; a few of his cousins from Connecticut were coming up too. He hadn’t seen them forever. Right now, he was looking for a spot to make camp at.

“This might be a good spot.” Sam said as he dropped the guns on the ground. It was about 150 feet from his truck. He shouldn’t leave the guns unattended, but he needed to go back to the truck to get the cooler. He should’ve waited for his buddies to get here. They could’ve helped; he was just too excited to be out here again. He walked back to the truck and grabbed the cooler. It was red and beat up, but it could still hold ice and not leak too bad. He didn’t like to throw stuff out if he could help it. He walked back to the spot where he had dropped the guns off. He put the cooler down next to the guns.

He then walked around picking up some wood, twigs, and sticks, and he made a teepee cone formation with the wood. This was going to be the campsite for the night. They were going to be out here for at least the weekend. After walking around for a while, he was getting a bit tired. He sat down on the cooler to rest for a minute or two. He heard something buzzing from the inside of his jeans pockets. He blinked. It was probably his phone, and he was surprised that he could get service out here. He was surprised that his Verizon service reached out here.

Now he was getting a weird, unsettling feeling, like he was being watched by someone or something. He shook his head. This was probably just his mind playing tricks on him, or he was just imagining things. When he was younger and visited areas like this before, he always felt weird shit. There were stories about the woods being haunted. He never believed them. He dug a pack of cigarettes out of his breast pocket and then lit one up. He started sucking the smoke out of the cigarette and then blowing it out. He dug his phone out of his pocket as it buzzed. He looked down at it and then unlocked it. He looked at the messages he had got. One was from his wife, and the others were from his friends: Josh, James, and Frank. It seemed like the three of them were running late and probably would be there within the hour. He stood up and shook his head.

“Alright, shit happens.” Sam said as he shook his head and lifted the top off of the cooler. He grabbed a premade Italian sandwich that he had grabbed from The Tradewinds Market in Milo, Maine before he headed over here, and he also grabbed a one-liter of Moxie. He set those two things on the ground before he closed the lid and sat back down on the top of the cooler. He unwrapped the sandwich and put it on his lap and then began munching on it. He reached for his one-liter of Moxie, twisted the cap off, and took a big swill of Moxie.

“That’s some good shit!” Sam grinned as he devoured the rest of the sandwich. Then he took the plastic wrap and balled it up into a ball and then pushed the wrapper into one of his pants pockets. He didn’t have a trash bag out or anything. He then heard something howling. He turned his head to look in that direction. The howling was coming from a dark path. He didn’t know what was down there, and he probably didn’t want to. The howling started for a minute and then started up again. He then started to hear aggressive grunting. It almost sounded like gorillas.

“That’s not normal.” Sam said as he looked towards the dark path. He got up off of the cooler and walked towards the dark path. It did feel like something was calling him towards there. Something was howling again, and a few more grunts. Something in his head told him not to walk this way. His legs were moving without him. It was like they were their own entity.

He stopped walking for a minute and then blinked. “I really shouldn’t go further than this.” He said. He stared off into the darkness, though. He wanted to go further and push on. He knew there was something out there, and it probably wasn’t good either. The stories of these woods being haunted—could they be true?