Falls Peak

Chapter 14

Kyle looked to the sky, as if it would hold some answers for him.

The sky was almost white, with the dark, bare treetops giving it a jagged pattern around the edges of the clearing.

He wasn't sure how he'd gotten here, separated from the others, or when the snow that surrounded him had began to fall. Unless he was totally delusional, the group had entered the forest on a warm September evening. Although the Iowa weather was often hard to predict, this was extreme.

Kyle shivered as he took in his surroundings. There was not another soul in sight and he wasn't afraid to admit that he was scared.

"Jess?" He called. "Matt? Katie?" When none of them responded he grew desperate. "Anybody?"

Once again no one called back to him. This seemed to go on for so long that he almost missed when he finally got a response.

"Kyle . . ." A whispered voice called, so low that Kyle thought it was in his head at first.

"Kyle . . ."

"Who's there?" He asked nervously, trying to walk towards the sound but his legs refused to move. "Who said that?"

"Kyle . . ." The voice croaked again.

"Hello?" He yelled, panicking.

"I'm here!" The whisper turned mischievous and sinister before whatever was holding Kyle's feet in place gave way and he fell face first into the crisp snow.

"Ugh!" He groaned as he hit the ground and taking a mouthful of snow. He spat out what hadn't dissolved in his mouth and saw that small specks of blood were coming out with it. "What the hell?" He asked himself, wondering how such an injury could occur from such a short fall. However when he looked up, all thoughts of anything were gone from his mind in an instant.

When Kyle looked up from his sprawled position, he was confronted by a face that looked like a giant, white crow with a beak that was at least a metre long and solid, black, featureless eyes. If that wasn't bad enough, whatever it was was screeching at him, deafening him.

"Shhhheeeeaaaaaaaaaaaa!" The creature hissed.

"Holy shit!" Kyle cried in fear, quickly climbing to his feet and running away from it.

Just as he thought he would get away, he felt a sharp pain in his back before collapsing to the ground once more.

In agony, he risked a look back at what had happened to him, and was horrified to see that a large hook-like claw had pierced his flesh and was digging into his back, towards his spine.

"No! Please!" He begged, only to be ignored by the frightening animal.

Before he could say anything else, the claw began to drag Kyle's helpless body back to where he'd originally fallen.

"Nooooo!" He cried again before opening his eyes and squinting almost instantly.

Jess was standing over him.

"Are you ok?" She laughed.

His heart still racing, Kyle checked his surroundings to see that he was back where the kids had set up camp and nothing seemed out of place.

"Yeah," He hoarsely answered. "I guess I was just dreaming."

"About who?" He saw Katie smirking at him as she was packing away her tent.

"I'm amazed you didn't catch a cold," Jess told him. "You must have slept outside on the ground all night."

"After all my hard work setting up the tent too!" Joked Matt. "Well now you can pack it away yourself!"