Chapter 1
Ivan Newlands hummed softly to himself as he made his way through the forest, his earphones roaring in his ears, his music beating loudly, blocking out any and all sounds around him. It was a rather damp October morning, the rain still drizzling lightly above him, the forest soggy, he often came here to escape from his home life. His father yelling at his mother once more, something ridiculous he was sure. Ducking under a low branch Ivan looked about the wilderness in front of him, deciding to visit the creek, he kept to his left and weaved in and out of the thick trees. He stopped walking when his songs stopped in the middle of the track. Taking his phone out of pocket, he could only sigh out when he saw that his phone had died. Puffing out his cheeks, he yanked his headphones out of his ears and shoved them into his pocket. He knew he should of charged his phone.
Walking father towards the creek, Ivan listened to the soft pitter patter of the drizzling rain on the leaves and the accompanying creek. Knowing he couldn't be too far now, Ivan picked up his pace a bit, there was something he always did whenever he visited this creek. Going from a jog to a sprint, he felt himself break into a run now, his legs pounding heavily on the wet ground he was getting closer, he could see it, a branch hanging just at the edge of the creek. Narrowing his eyes, he picked up his speed. The branch now just close enough, he jumped, grabbing a hold of the sturdy branch, he swung his body with all his might, and let go of the branch, flying briefly through the air, he landed heavily on the other side, wet leaves and dirt now clinging to his jacket, he smiled and stood up, Getting across may be fun, but going back was a pain as there was no other branch on the other side to swing off of so that meant he had to clamber through the soggy muddy creek bottom and climb up the old fashion way, but, he'd worry about that on his way back.
Going straight, he wondered if his parents finally stopped fighting, sighing out he shoved his hands into his pockets and instantly stopped walking, and started to pat his coat pockets, then his pants pockets, he groaned out, his phone wasn't with him, It must of fallen out when he swung off of that branch. Letting out an irritable growl, he immediately backtracked towards the creek.
Once there, he peered down and grumbled out when he saw his phone landed face down in the sticky mud. Sitting down by the edge of the creek, he slid down careful not to hit any rocks on the way down. Landing safely, Ivan started to wade carefully through the mud, he hated crossing the creek this time of the year, the mud was always super adsorbent like quicksand, if you weren't careful you could lose a shoe. Seeing his phone within reaching distance, he did his best to reach down to grab it but the mud was giving him quite a fight today. Yanking his leg out of slop he forced it forward and did the same with his other leg, Finally, he managed to lean down and grab his phone. It was dirty, as expected, but it still worked.
Figuring his walk was pretty much done for, he decided that it was probably time to go home. Making sure his phone was now safe in his front pocket, Ivan started to march towards the other side of the creek. About halfway there he felt himself get stuck once again. Unlike last time, it was just his left leg that didn't want to move out of mud. Kicking and struggling, he looked down at his leg in desperation and then screamed out. A hand had a hold of his ankle. Still screaming, he twisted around and the hand let go allowing Ivan to fall back into the mud. Ivan sat there, breathing heavily, he almost wanted to wish he imagined it, but he knew he didn't as the hand was still in front of him. It was a thin pale hand, the nails on the hand were unnaturally sharp and pointed but also long. The hand twitched once before slinking away into the muddy depths. Ivan then narrowed his eyes and stood up.
"Is this some sort of joke? Who the fuck does that?! GET OUT OF THE FUCKING MUD NOW!" He screamed out his vocal cords almost stretching at the end of sentence. The mud did not move it didn't even look like anything was under it. After about thirty seconds of silence, Ivan marched over to the mud and started to dig away at it. Now it started to move, it was squirming violently until once Ivan dug enough at it, something came out of nowhere, slapping Ivan right in the face with all it's force, making the teen see stars. It was way to heavy to be a hand that's for sure. Once the stars faded, Ivan turned to see what exactly hit him, and he got his second shock of the day.
He was looking at, what seemed to be, a giant fish's tail. The tail moved up again, going to hit him once more, being quick, he jumped out of the way before the tail could smack him silly. Landing on the muddy ground again, he watched as the other half of the mud started to move. Two human like arms and hands came up first, and then, like a zombie coming out of it's grave, a humanoid figure rose up. Well, the torso and head of a humanoid figure that is. The hands came up and started to wipe the mud away from this thing's face. He then found himself looking into two ungodly bright blue eyes. Scrambling to back away, Ivan watched in horror as the thing started to crawl towards him, using it's long fingernails to dig into the mud and drag its lower half so it could get closer to Ivan.
Ivan was quick to jump up and just run, scrambling up the side of the creek and making it on the other side in record time, he ran even faster, his heart pounding madly in his chest, adrenaline kicking in, he just kept running until he was back home. Throwing himself inside, he slammed the door behind him and just leaned against the door.
"Ivan!" His mother gasped from the kitchen table, she gawked at his filthy state. Hurrying over to him she ushered him in.
"You're freezing! Go get into the shower now!" She huffed at him, toeing his shoes off at the front mat, he made his way into the bathroom and turned of the hot water. Still shaking horribly, Ivan looked at himself in the mirror, his face was pale making his freckles seem brighter than ever. Pulling at the bottom of his eyes he just rubbed his face, what he saw couldn't be real, it just couldn't of been. Steam started to fill up the bathroom, pulling off his muddy clothes and stepping into the shower he shut his eyes and could only put his hands to his face. Once the warmth returned to his body, which he really hadn't even noticed he lost, he decided that whatever was in that creek wasn't real, it couldn't off been real. Right?
