The Hallow

Alone… I break, in silence my soul begins to turn. The memories of a once sweet time has changed into something decayed, rotten. Life has two different meanings and I know that now. Only if I knew that long ago.

Hello, my name is Henry. I am… was a logger for my small town in Washington. I won’t list where I live or had my experience due to my life being threatened. My life was in danger as soon as I started to write this. Know this, they are real, they are coming and you are infected.

My experience started back in two thousand and eighteen. I was thirty two and had my logger job for about six years at that point. Everything was fine, I made great money and my family was very happy. Only on October fourteenth of that awful year I heard a strange noise, in a strange place.

My crew was set to cut some trees deep into a close forest. It was very out of the ordinary for these requests but it does happen.

My crew and I noticed how cold the temperature changed once we got to the location. The early mornings were always foggy and cold but something about that day was, it was off. The crew was getting ready to take the equipment off the truck and getting themselves ready to work. I was following them until I heard a call, a call I never heard before.

This call was a high pitched howl that turned to a low booming tone as it faded out. The whole crew stopped and looked towards the foggy woods where we heard it. We started walking through the fog, crackling branches and leaves under our feet. We walked about half a mile and that’s when we saw a den.

The den was huge, like any one of us grown men could walk upright into it. The crew got skittish and started to shift around, mumbling about who was going to go in. I told them I was going to call it in and nobody was to go inside the den.

I got to the truck and called in my findings to the station and explained the situation. After the call I heard screams of my crew with the sound of giant branches snapping. I wish I could tell you I ran in after them, I didn’t. I was filled with fear and hid under the truck like a coward.

One of my crew members ran to the truck with ripped clothes and a look on his face I’ll never forget, pure fear. He saw me and tried to crawl under the truck when something grabbed him. All I remember is trying to hold on to him while something on the other side tried to pull him away.

The face was a deer skull, the body was of a bear, and the lower half was just like a wolf but much bigger. The creature finally tore my crew member away from me as I watched in horror. The creature held him close and covered his mouth, it looked straight at me with eyes like a cat.

The creature simply spoke two words, “speak nothing”. I watched as the creature got swallowed by the ground and vanished like nothing had happened. I called in the events that just transpired, I sat inside that truck with the most fear I had ever felt. The wait and panic alone was hell.

Animal control, Fire department, Swat team, and the cops showed up. They looked around for hours and didn’t find one piece of evidence that anything had ever happened. The cops kept asking me about the den, I had to explain it a dozen times. The cops told me there was no den.

I ran back to the exact place I saw the den and the cops were right, nothing was there. I felt myself slip and reality was so twisted. I looked up to the sky and saw the creature sitting on a branch. The creature simply put his finger up to his mouth and said “shhh”. The way he spoke sounded like wind.

From that day, I had felt this tearing feeling inside my chest. I have to say something now because I don’t have much time. I have noticed the ground move around my feet when I walk outside. I have heard the wind blow with a slight shh. Please, please if you ever see the ground move around your feet or see a strange creature outside, tell no one.

  • BackStabber

    Honestly this was dope, I enjoyed it.

  • The writing style makes the story and the protagonist relatable and believable. Good work.