Nish was sure he’d heard something. And it wasn’t just Jesse up again to stoke the fire: this sound had come from outside the shelter.

He hadn’t been able to sleep. He could hear Travis snoring. He could make out the girls huddled against each other. He could see Jesse closer to the fire, his face turned toward it.

The fire was crackling. Rachel had explained that it was caused by the resin in the spruce. It was spitting and sizzling and snapping…snapping?

No, the snapping was coming from outside! Nish held his breath.

Snap!

Something was moving through the trees!

Nish could feel his heart pounding. The wind kicked the sides of the plastic tarp and it rattled and rippled the entire length.

Snap!

“Trav!” Nish hissed.

No answer.

“Jesse!”

No answer.

“Rachel!…Liz!”

Nothing.

Nish didn’t know what to do. He didn’t want to shout for fear of alerting whatever it was on the other side of the tarp. He also had to go to the bathroom–bad. Too much Coke.

Quietly, barely daring to breathe, Nish waited. He counted to a hundred, then to two hundred. He was desperate, now, to go to the bathroom. Three hundred. Four hundred. He had to go!

Satisfied that whatever it was had moved along, he quickly pulled himself out of the sleeping bag. It was freezing cold–particularly for a twelve-year-old about to unbuckle his pants!

Nish stepped around the edge of the shelter. He’d go so quick, he figured, the hole in the snow would be like a bullet had passed through. But he never even got to try.

Something was breathing nearby…something big!

Nish was shaking. He could see nothing but pitch black around him. The trees were like huge shadows, with darker shadows below them. And one of the shadows was moving! He could hear growling, and snarling!

“Uhhhhhh!” Nish started. He didn’t dare move.

He could see eyes! At first he wasn’t sure, then he saw them again, yellow, shining.

The thing lunged. He could hear the intake of breath, the growl. It hit him dead centre in the chest. Nish went down, gasping. He could smell the animal. Sharp, rancid, disgusting. He could smell its panting breath–hot, and fouler than anything he had ever smelled. Nish thought he was going to throw up.

He still couldn’t see. He was down and the beast was striking him with its paws, the claws ripping into his arms and sides and tearing out his insides. He began to scream.

He screamed and gurgled, sure that it was blood rising in his throat. There was no pain…yet. But he knew he was badly injured, probably dying. All he could see was the burning eyes, all he could feel was harsh, thick fur, all he could smell was the foul, dead, disgusting smell.

Nish tried to move and could not. If his legs and arms were broken, he couldn’t feel them. He could feel a terrible warmth on his stomach, a sickening warm sensation that could only be his own blood pouring out.

“I’m dying!”

He tried to warn the others, but they wouldn’t wake. He could hear the tarp tearing as the beast ripped through it. He could hear snorting and ripping. He turned, barely, the warm liquid of his own insides cooling now. So this, he decided, is what it feels like to die.

He could see the beast dragging something. It was Travis! It had torn Travis out of his sleeping bag and was dragging him off.

“TRAAAAVIS!!!”