Pain drowned out thought.
It came in waves, violent enough to make him retch, to make his vision pulse and darken. He rocked back and forth against the stone, clutching his ruined arm, blood slick and warm against his skin.
"I'm bleeding out," he whispered.
The words cut through the panic.
Bleeding out meant dying.
That, at least, was familiar.
With shaking fingers, he forced himself to move. Every instinct screamed at him to curl up and disappear, but something uglier, more stubborn, pushed him forward. He fumbled at his waist, teeth gritted so hard his jaw ached, and yanked his belt free.
The moment he loosened it, his arm screamed in protest.
"Fuck—fuck—fuck—"
He looped the belt around his upper arm, above what was left of his hand. His fingers slipped, slick with blood, his vision blurring as he pulled it tight.
Tighter.
Tighter.
The pain spiked so violently that for a second he thought he might pass out right there. He screamed, biting down on his sleeve to muffle the sound, tears streaming down his face as he forced the belt tighter still, twisting it until the pressure became unbearable.
Finally, mercifully, the bleeding slowed.
Not stopped.
But slowed enough.
He collapsed back against the rock, gasping, chest heaving, the world tilting dangerously. The forest seemed to lean in around him, shadows stretching longer as the dim red light above began to fade.
Night was coming.
The realization filled him with a new, sharper kind of terror.
"No," he whispered hoarsely. "No, no, no… not now."
He couldn't stay here.
The ground had tried to eat him. Whatever had done that might still be beneath him, waiting. And worse, he had screamed. Loudly. Desperately.
In a place like this, that had to mean something.
He forced himself to stand.
His legs nearly gave out immediately. Dizziness washed over him, his stomach lurching as he swayed. He clenched his teeth and took a step. Then another.
That's when he noticed them.
Marks.
Scratches on the bark of nearby trees. Stones stacked in unnatural little piles. Faint lines carved into charred wood, simple, crude, but unmistakably deliberate.
Signs.
Someone else had been here.
Hope flared in his chest, fragile and desperate. He staggered toward the nearest mark, then followed the next, and the next. The trail wasn't obvious, it felt more like a whisper than a path, but it was there.
And it was leading somewhere.
The light continued to dim as he walked. Shadows deepened, thickening between the trees, twisting into shapes that made his heart stutter. Every sound set his nerves on fire—the soft crumble of ash underfoot, the distant crack of wood, the imagined scrape of something moving just out of sight.
He moved faster.
The trail led him to another hollow, tucked beneath a massive slab of rock and a fallen trunk. This one felt different. The ground was solid. Dry. The air inside was stale, but still.
Safe.
At least… it looked safe.
He collapsed inside it just as the last of the light bled from the sky, his body finally giving up. He pressed himself as far back as he could, clutching his injured arm, breath coming in shallow, painful gasps.
Then he heard it.
A sound that didn't belong.
Not close.
But not far enough.
It wasn't loud. Not dramatic. Just a pressure, like the air itself growing heavier. His ears rang softly, a low, subsonic hum settling into his skull.
His heart stuttered.
"No…" he breathed.
The shadows outside the shelter shifted.
And with them came a presence.
He didn't see it.
He couldn't.
Something deep in his mind refused to let his eyes focus, as if simply acknowledging the thing would shatter him completely. His vision blurred, darkening at the edges, a sharp, crushing weight pressing down on his chest.
He understood without understanding.
A creature, a strong one, an abomination.
Just being near it was enough.
His thoughts unraveled. Fear spiked so violently it felt like his mind was tearing itself apart. His breathing became erratic, shallow, each gasp harder than the last.
His legs went numb.
His fingers trembled uselessly.
He tried to scream.
Nothing came out.
The pressure intensified, his vision collapsing into darkness as the world tilted and spun. The last thing he felt was the cold stone beneath his back, and the horrifying certainty that if the creature turned its attention fully toward him.
He would die without ever seeing it.
His consciousness slipped.
The forest remained.
Watching.