Chương 152: Chapter 152
The night was cold as the wind blew through the trees, rattling their skeletal branches against each other. The forest was quiet, too quiet, as though it were holding its breath. The stars above had been swallowed by thick clouds, leaving only a black void stretching over the endless expanse of the park. A single beam from a flashlight sliced through the dark, trembling as its owner stepped forward, feet crunching the frozen leaves.
Jack had always loved the outdoors. He'd spent most of his life hiking, camping, and exploring the national parks of the United States. There was a peace in the isolation, a calmness in the vastness that helped him escape the noise of the world. But tonight, as he made his way through the woods of Yellowstone, that familiar comfort had been replaced by a gnawing unease.
He tried to dismiss it, blaming the long day of hiking and the cold that had started to seep into his bones. But the feeling was persistent, a creeping awareness that something wasn't right. He glanced behind him, his heart thudding in his chest as the beam of the flashlight caught only empty trees and shadows. The trail behind him stretched dark and silent, untouched by anyone's footsteps.
Jack had heard the rumors, of course—everyone had. The stories about people disappearing without a trace, vanishing into thin air while hiking or camping alone. The park rangers called them "misadventures," blaming everything from wild animals to falls. But Jack had never believed them. He wasn't superstitious, and he didn't believe in ghosts or monsters. He was just a man in the woods, a man who knew the terrain, the animals, and the dangers.
Tonight, though, he couldn't shake the feeling that he wasn't alone. Every rustle in the underbrush, every snap of a twig, made his skin crawl. It was like someone—or something—was watching him, waiting. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled, and his breath hitched.
He quickened his pace, determined to shake off the discomfort, but as the minutes passed, it only grew worse. The deeper into the woods he went, the darker it seemed to get, even though he knew the sun had only just dipped below the horizon. The shadows seemed to stretch longer, the trees more dense. Jack could feel the weight of something pressing down on him, suffocating him.
He stopped and turned around again, shining the flashlight down the path. This time, there was something there. A figure. Tall, thin, and impossibly still. It stood in the middle of the trail, a mere silhouette against the trees. Jack's heart skipped a beat as he tried to make out the details, but the light from the flashlight was too weak to reveal anything more.
"Hello?" Jack called out, his voice sounding too loud in the silence. "Is someone there?"
The figure didn't move. No sound came from it, not even the rustling of clothing or the shift of weight. It was like a statue, carved from the night itself. Jack's mouth went dry, and he took a step back, his eyes locked on the shape ahead.
Then, in a soft, almost imperceptible motion, the figure tilted its head. Not just a glance, but a slow, deliberate turn, as if it was studying him. Jack's breath caught in his throat, and a chill swept through his entire body. He couldn't explain why, but the sight of the thing made his blood run cold. It wasn't just the stillness. It was something in the way it moved—or rather, how it didn't move at all.
A feeling of dread settled over him, thick and oppressive. Something was terribly wrong, but his legs wouldn't obey. He tried to move, to turn around and run, but his body refused to cooperate. His gaze remained locked on the figure, his mind spinning with confusion and fear.
Without warning, the figure started to move, but not in a way that made sense. Its legs didn't seem to bend as it glided forward, its feet never touching the ground. It drifted through the trees, its presence seeming to defy every rule of physics Jack had ever known. As it moved, the trees around it seemed to bend, as though the air itself was being distorted by its proximity.
Jack finally snapped out of his stupor. He spun around and bolted, his heart pounding in his chest. His boots crushed the dead leaves underfoot, the noise deafening in the otherwise silent forest. He dared not look back, but he could hear it. The thing behind him was moving too, but it wasn't making a sound. It wasn't even breathing.
He ran faster, faster than he ever had before, his legs burning with exertion. The trail blurred in front of him, the darkness closing in from all sides. His flashlight flickered, the beam weak and untrustworthy, casting long shadows across the trees. The deeper into the forest he went, the more he realized the trail was unfamiliar. This wasn't the path he had been on. He hadn't taken any turns. He hadn't veered off.
But the forest had changed. The trees loomed above him like silent sentinels, their branches twisted and unnatural. The air felt wrong, thick with something that pressed against his skin, something that made him feel sick, dizzy. He stumbled, nearly falling, but caught himself just in time.
Then the quiet returned, punctuated only by his ragged breath. He stopped, panic surging in his chest. His flashlight had gone out. He slapped it against his hand, desperate, but it was useless. The darkness was complete. There was no light left.
The sound of movement returned, quiet but unmistakable. It was behind him. It was close. His chest tightened, and he spun around, heart hammering in his throat, but there was nothing there. No figure. No shadow. Just the oppressive blackness, pressing in from all sides.
Then the voice came. It wasn't a voice like anything Jack had ever heard. It was distorted, unnatural, like the sound of something trying to speak but couldn't quite get the words right.
"Why…run?" it asked, the syllables garbled, slithering through the air like smoke.
Jack's mind screamed at him to run, to keep moving, but his feet wouldn't obey. He stood there, frozen, his hands trembling as the voice came again, closer this time.
"You cannot…escape."
The words chilled him to his core. His stomach turned. He tried to move, but his legs felt heavy, his body weighed down by an invisible force. He couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't do anything but wait.
And then, from behind, he felt it. The brush of something cold against his skin, like fingers trailing across his back. He gasped and spun around, but no one was there. His eyes scanned the blackness, his breath shallow and quick. He could hear something, the faintest of whispers, like a hundred voices blending together, speaking in tongues.
Jack tried to scream, but the sound caught in his throat. He stumbled backward, tripping over something unseen, falling hard to the ground. His head hit the dirt with a sickening thud. The world spun around him, the whispers growing louder, like the wind was carrying them from a thousand miles away.
A hand reached down to him, impossibly long fingers curling around his wrist. He screamed, but no sound came out. The thing lifted him, its grip like iron, pulling him into the air as though he weighed nothing. His feet dangled below him, kicking helplessly as he was dragged through the woods, away from the trail, into the heart of the darkness.
Jack tried to fight, tried to scream, tried to do anything, but it was useless. The woods swallowed him whole, and the thing—whatever it was—never spoke again. He felt his consciousness slipping away, the pain in his wrist and the cold pressing into his chest, a final, crushing sensation. The last thing he heard was a whisper in his ear, garbled and incomprehensible, as everything went silent.
And when they found him the next morning, his body was gone. No sign of him remained. No trail. No evidence. Just the empty forest, cold and silent once more.
No one would ever know what happened to Jack. No one would understand what he had encountered that night. But in the dark corners of Yellowstone, it waited, patient, watching, knowing that one day, someone else would find their way into its grasp.
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