“Frank?”
“I hear it,” Francis replied. “Or more like don’t hear it.”
Derek glanced over his shoulder and found Danni had likewise abandoned the plaster kit in favor of her gun.
The silence of the woods was telling. Something was near, and it wasn’t them.
Derek held up a fist, signaling his group to be alert but not move. His instincts were telling him that something had snuck up on them – not a situation his group usually found themselves in.
Then again, they usually took their hunts more seriously than this one. Just now, they’d forgone communication via earpiece to blare out Mitchell’s report, giving their position away to everything within hundreds of yards.
Derek scanned the surrounding woods with both his eyes and ears, although focusing more on the latter. This late, in woods this dense, seeing wasn’t necessarily believing.
There was nothing but the quiet around them at first, but then Derek caught a noise, halfway between a cough and a wheeze, off to their left. A moment later, he heard a branch break.
“What the hell?”
“Get the thermal, Frank,” Derek whispered back at him. He turned and found Danni rooted to her spot, sweeping the surrounding bushes with her rifle. He caught her attention and motioned her over.
“Nice and quiet,” he said, in as low a tone as he thought he could use and still be heard. “Let’s not scare it off.”
Francis gave him a raised eyebrow in return, but he ignored it.
He wasn’t sure what was out there, but it didn’t sound particularly dangerous. More like an asthmatic kid stumbling around in the dark, which was ridiculous, but a far cry from the growl or snarl he’d been expecting.
He almost laughed out loud at that. The truth was, they had no idea what to expect. It wasn’t like the government archives contained much more than scattered reports on this creature, most of which contradicted themselves.
There came the sound of another branch breaking. Whatever was out there was moving ... none too stealthily, by the sound of things. That was odd in itself. Ambush predators that couldn’t sneak up on their prey wouldn’t last long. However, an injured predator, mad with hunger, would have gone for broke by now.
Foliage snapped again, followed by another wheezing chuff.
Derek’s eyes narrowed as he tried to determine what path their stalker was taking. It seemed to be circling them, but purposely staying just out of sight.
He turned and whistled briefly, catching Danni’s attention. He inclined his head, indicating she should close ranks with him and Francis. When she moved to join them, it was far quieter than whatever ... or whoever was out there.
That thought stuck with Derek. Was this some joke by Zeist and his buddies? Maybe some more of Yarlberg’s minions were out here playing with them for some reason. He hoped that wasn’t the case. You didn’t joke around with people who were armed and more than ready to use their weapons.
“Are we being played?” Francis whispered, no doubt thinking the same thing.
Derek shrugged, then did something he’d only had to do a few times before during a hunt. He’d learned long ago that if something sounded fake, it probably was fake. He raised his voice and called out, “If there’s anyone out there, identify yourselves now.”
The others relaxed their stances ever so slightly. If someone did show themselves, they didn’t want to accidentally shoot them. If they fled instead, it would be a waste of ammo to fire after it without a proper visual. In that case, they’d check for tracks and determine if it made sense to pursue.
The silence stretched out for a few more seconds, then there came a small sound from somewhere behind Derek – something striking a tree trunk, then tumbling to the ground.
“Did someone just throw a couple of pebbles to distract us, like they do in the movies?” Danni asked, her voice low but incredulous.
Derek lowered his gun and sighed. He wasn’t sure if it was teenagers or Zeist having some fun with them but, whoever it was, they were going to get his foot up their...
Something charged out of the bushes to Derek’s right. He had just enough time to sense its movement when he was bowled over by something big and heavy.
He rolled with the blow and came up to one knee. In the space of a second he saw that his two allies had been taken down as well. Francis lay on the ground holding his head. As for Danni...
He turned and saw her down in the grass looking up at something looming over her. She tried to raise her gun, but it was pulled from her hands.
Derek raised his weapon and switched on the attached flashlight, illuminating the scene before him.
He’d seen many a strange creature in his time. Most had been extant survivors, small pockets of an otherwise extinct species that had somehow thrived where others had not. He’d seen prehistoric hominids, birds, giant eels, serpentine whales, and more. What he saw in front of him, though, wasn’t like anything that should have ever existed.
What the hell?!
The creature was large, roughly seven feet, but grotesquely deformed. Several cyst-like growths protruded from its back, which probably kept it from ever fully standing upright. Amid these were boney protrusions which jutted out in strange non-symmetrical patterns. Its skin was brownish in color, if it could even be called skin. It was rough, almost scale-like in places.
Whatever it was, it turned toward Derek, gave a chuffing hiss, then took off into the bushes. He’d gotten, at best, a second’s look at it, but it was enough for him to recognize its alien strangeness, its wrongness.
Then he was back on his feet, cursing himself for not taking the shot. The truth, however, was that he’d been shaken – not only from being ambushed, but from what he’d seen. Besides, his teammate’s well-being was more important than pursuit at the moment.
Danni was already pulling herself up, a bit stunned but otherwise unharmed. She joined Derek at Francis’s side, but fortunately he, too, was already rising.
“You okay?” Derek asked them, even as he heard the creature retreating through the woods.
“Clonked my head good, but I’ll live,” Francis replied. There was a thin stream of blood dripping down the side of his face, but that seemed to be the extent of his injuries.
“Danni?”
“Bruised and scratched up a bit.” She held out her hands. In the glare from his flashlight, Derek could see long, thin scratches on her arms where the creature had grabbed her. “Where’s my rifle?”
Francis switched on his light as well and they took a brief look around.
Derek wasn’t surprised to not find the weapon. He hadn’t seen the creature drop it before it ran off. “I think whatever that was took it.”
“What the fuck was that thing?” Francis asked. “I only got a brief glimpse before it tackled me.”
Danni had already retrieved her sidearm, a Glock 22, and was busy keeping an eye in the direction the thing had disappeared in. “No clue. Derek?”
“Same here,” he replied.
“Did you get a good look at it?”
“Just enough to know it was more like something out of the X-Files than nature.” He took a few moments to explain what he’d seen, allowing them all to recover from the shock of the attack. When he was done, Danni offered a few additional details she’d noticed from her angle.
“Clawed hands and definitely a male,” she added, her eyes still wide. “A male what, though? Remember what you were saying earlier, about it being a disfigured squatch?”
“Sure as hell snuck up on us like one,” Francis replied, scanning the surrounding brush as they talked.
“Doubt it,” Derek said. “When it turned to look at me, there was no eyeshine. It didn’t remotely look or move like one either.”
Danni nodded. “Yeah, I thought so. I caught a hint of scales. Devolved reptoid maybe?”
“Again with the eyes,” Derek replied. “They were definitely mammalian.”
“So what does that leave us with?” Francis asked, to which Derek smiled in response. “No. Don’t say it.”
“Yep,” he replied. “I’m afraid so. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that was the Jersey Devil.”
As to what the devil actually was, Derek didn’t care to speculate further.
At least not until they tracked it down again.