We destroyed a rock formation. It was something's home.

I guess in some ways this is a confession. But I swear to God, I never meant to do it. None of us did. It was all a big accident. We shouldn’t have even been there, man. All the little squabbles, all the stupid in-fighting and recklessness… we didn’t know where we were! I was young. When we ended up lost, I thought maybe if we just laughed, we would show the world how unafraid we were, and it would be indifferent to us. But I know now that there are places we shouldn’t go. We stumbled across something that wasn’t indifferent at all. It was hungry. Hunger is the difference… I should have known better. I’m sorry.

The Utah landscape passed by in a streak of copper through my window as we hurdled to our doom.

After we settled in at the AirBnB, we went straight to bed to prepare for the trails in the morning. I couldn’t guess what the others—Bryce, Robby, and Jess—dreamt about, but theirs couldn’t have been darker than mine. I dreamt that we became lost in the woods. Every turn was identical to the last. When I turned towards the others, they were gone, and I was surrounded on all sides by black rock. I had wandered into a narrow channel where a river once flowed. Then, around the bend, there came the roaring thunder of water.

I awoke covered in sweat, heart pounding, to the sound of the toilet flushing. I laughed. 

We took to the trails at first light.

The first few trails we explored were the “must-see” fare you would find on the first page of the travel brochure—easy-going (but crowded) with a beautiful view at the end. Nothing special.

It was getting late, but we weren’t terribly tired yet. We agreed on trying out a lesser-known trail on the outskirts of town that Bryce had taken once as a kid.

Bryce led the way. I strayed towards the back. Robby and Jess flirted with each other between us.

We had been on the main trail (even if I did remember which one, I would never say) for several hours. It was a massive step up in difficulty over the first trails. The three of us followers were entirely dependent on Bryce’s guidance, each wrapped in our own thoughts and seldom speaking to each other. Bryce called back towards us sometimes, but I was the only one that seemed to hear him.

From time to time I offered up my nature knowledge to the group. Bryce was the only person I knew in the group, so I wanted to impress the others. And to be completely honest, I found Jess cute. So, I would call out the names of passing berries, trees, and the occasional deer hood or raccoon paw. Jess was nice enough to give me a polite “Oh, really? That’s awesome!” after each fact. Robby just rolled his eyes every time.

“You guys down for a detour?” Bryce called.

No one said anything. Robby and Jess were looking at photos on his phone and I was lost in thought. Earlier in the day, Robby had made a comment about my hiking outfit—a simple pair of hiking boots, a trail hat, a fanny pack, and a fleece pullover in case it got cold—that I couldn’t seem to shake. Was it really “corny”, or merely appropriate for the occasion? Is it lame to prepare? What did Jess think…?

“Hello? Detour?”

I startled and gave him a thumbs up. I had no clue what I had agreed to.

“Great. Detour it is.”

There was a thin, scraggly trail branching off ahead. Bryce pulled back tree limbs and kicked aside a pile of brambles with his boots and ushered us in.

It looked rough. I almost changed my mind, but I took a sadistic satisfaction in subjecting Robby and his athletic shorts to wilder conditions. Maybe when his shins were covered in blood, he would take that “corny” comment back.

It didn’t take long for Jess to complain.

“Where are we going, Bry? My feet hurt,” she said, swatting bugs away with manicured hands. Normally Robby would have teased her for that comment, but the trail was on a steep incline and we were all struggling to keep up.

Bryce didn’t answer. He just soldiered forward, and we could do nothing but follow.

It was soon clear why he insisted on this excursion.

The trees ahead began to thin, and we stepped out onto an overlook more beautiful than any I’d ever seen. The entire world glowed orange before us. It was like a rock forest. We had seen similar formations on the previous trails, but they seemed dull in comparison. These blazing sandstone obelisks, striped with gradients of pink and yellow, glowed like fireflies—pulsed, truly pulsed—as if they were living primordial beings secluded in this secret canyon, or the emerging fingers of God’s Great Hand.

The four of us stood in hushed awe. It was a long time until anyone spoke. Regrettably, it was me.

“How are we going to get back? It’s almost dark.”

The rest of the group shot glances at each other. Robby sighed.

“Relax, Vic,” he grumbled. 

“I’m just asking. Someone has to think of these things.”

“Don’t you see this, right in front of us?” Jess said and gestured with a sweeping arm.

“Well yeah, it’s amazing, don’t get me wrong, I just…”

“Jesus, are you gonna have another panic attack, dude?” Robby sneered.

“Robby—” Bryce said.

“That wasn’t my fault!” I yelped. “That road was completely fucked! Jess was sick too!”

Jess quietly shied away from us.

“Jess is a woman, Vic. Are you a woman?”

“You’re a bully, dude.”

“I call it like I see it. It’s not my fault you’re a pussy.”

“Fuck you,” I whispered.

“What? Did you say something?" Robby got up in my face and I leaned away.

"No," I said quietly.

"No, I'm pretty fucking sure you said something, bro."

Bryce stepped between us. "Enough, guys."

Robby backed away from me and I exhaled. The sun was lower now—the sky had turned purple and red like a bruise. It was colder, too.

“Vic asked a good question,” Bryce said. I smirked at Robby. “I didn’t think it would take this long to get here, so that’s on me. But the fastest way back now is straight through the canyon.”

“Bry, I can’t hike that!” Jess cried.

“You’re gonna have to. Listen, the park is closed now, and they don’t fuck around with their security. They patrol these trails, but they don’t patrol this area.”

“Well why not? Are we not supposed to be here?” I asked.

“Not really, no.”

Robby laughed. “That’s fucking gangster, Bryce! I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“This part of the park has been closed for a long time,” Bryce continued. “I guess there was something wrong with the water coming out of the spring in the 60’s.”

“Ew, like what?” Jess asked.

“I don’t know, it was tainted, I guess, but it doesn’t matter. The spring is dry now. If we take the canyon, we can get back to the parking lot in half the time.”

We all shared uneasy glances.

“Anyone have a better idea?” Bryce asked.

So, we started down the canyon.

There was a rocky escarpment a ways down that allowed us to reach the canyon floor without using any equipment. I was grateful for my boots. Jess’s tennis shoes slipped halfway down and she suffered a nasty scrape on her knee that left her hobbling. I offered her my undershirt for the bleeding—she took it without a thank you. Robby tossed her arm over his shoulder and helped her along.

Bryce led the way. He wore a headlamp that cut a clear path through the blue dark that was gradually settling over the canyon.

The basin of the canyon was mostly smooth, flat sandstone, which made for an easy hike. Occasionally we passed bristlecone pines. They loomed in the darkness like silent observers. They were majestic in the daylight, but under the shaky flash of Bryce’s headlamp, they were twisted and charred and ancient.

I heard Jess’s teeth chattering. I offered her my fleece immediately.

“Thanks, Vic. Such a gentleman,” she said. I just smiled.

The orange dreamsicle atmosphere of the park I had enjoyed before had disappeared over the horizon with the sun. All that remained in the approaching darkness was an endless and unfamiliar wilderness that seemed to crowd around us. I felt like I was inside the camcorder of a found-footage horror movie.

I studied my companions’ faces. Jess’s was miserable, Robby’s furious, Bryce’s intent. I can only guess at my own, but I’m sure it was more worried than I would have liked.

“Where the fuck are we, Bryce?” Robby said suddenly.

Bryce kept moving ahead. “Almost there. We’re almost there, guys. Don’t worry.”

An owl hooted in the distance. The light was fading fast.

“What if they towed our car?” Jess said. “The parking pass expired at 8.”

“Fuck that, what if we’re lost? What if Bryce forgot the way home?” Robby said.

“That’s not helpful,” I said quietly. 

Robby turned on me. “Oh, is that not helpful Vic? Right, because you’ve been so fucking helpful today with your little factoids.”

“Robby, relax,” Jess said, still leaning against him.

Bryce was stopped ahead looking down at something.

“It’s cool Jess,” I said, “That’s just the way he is.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Ranger Vic?” Robby jeered. 

“You are so jealous of my knowledge.”

Robby laughed. “Yeah, that’s what it is.”

“Guys!” Bryce called. There was urgency to it. “Come here!”

Robby and I threw one last scornful look at each other and then we all made our way towards the glow of the headlamp. Jess was still limping, but she no longer needed Robby’s support.

The thing Bryce was so excited about was a short distance below us, further into the canyon. His headlamp was illuminating a massive chunk of orange sandstone.

“Cool, man,” Robby muttered. “A rock.”

“Look,” Bryce whispered, and his hand shot to my arm. “It’s moving.”

And it was moving. I think.

It was covering a hole, or a recession in the ground. Perhaps long ago there had been a natural pool there, or maybe a spring, but one way or another, this massive boulder had wound up on top of it like a sewer grate. The underside of the boulder seemed to be eroded away so that the weight was now uneven, and the rock teetered slightly, as if a good push could topple it aside.

It was hard to tell in the shaky light of the headlamp, but the boulder seemed to sway from side to side. It was a natural movement akin to the billowing of a willow tree in the wind.

“Let’s go check it out.” I don’t know who said it. I like to imagine it was Robby, but… maybe it was me, after all.

As we approached, I noticed that the ground was changing. The sandstone clunking underfoot softened to a sandy crunch. All around the sandstone boulder was evidence of a riverbed—dark trails, flat stones, and most notably, cracked curling patches of sediment snug like puzzle pieces.

Robby smacked a hand on the rock. I winced. But the rock didn’t move.

“Did you see this thing on your first trip, Bryce?” he asked.

Bryce shook his head. “No, but I feel like I remember my Dad warning us to stay away from it.”

“The spring,” Jess said suddenly. “This is the source of the old spring!”

I’d forgotten about Bryce’s story by then. No one wanted to say it, but we knew she was right.

And so what? The spring was clearly sealed now. Though the boulder had surely been more solid when it was first placed, it still easily weighed over a ton. Even if we wanted to, we could never move it. Besides… tainted water? What did that even really mean? A little tummy bug? An invasive species of algae? If it was truly dangerous, they wouldn’t have left it sitting out in the open like that.

Robby was resting against it. Again, it seemed to shift.

“Maybe don’t touch it, Robby,” I said.

“Yes sir, Mr. Ranger Vic, sir!” he said like a cadet, bolting upright and saluting. Then he scoffed and leaned against the rock again. “Fuck off.”

“The rock isn’t going anywhere,” Bryce said.

“But—” I started.

“Yeah, Vic, relax. It’s been there for like six decades,” Jess added.

I looked around at all of them. Each stared at me with the same exasperation on their faces. It’s like I was their snobby teacher, and they were waiting for me to remind them of the principles of Leave No Trace, or chide them for being late to class, or in some other way remind them that I was better than them, more responsible, more reasonable, more mature.

“Why do you guys shit on me for being smart?” I blurted. My face instantly went red.

Robby laughed condescendingly.

“We shit on you for being obnoxious about it,” he said.

After the first outburst, the second came easily. “No, it’s more than that. It’s definitely more than that. Do you guys even like me?”

“We like you,” Bryce said. “But maybe just take a chill pill, man. You’re stressing us out.”

“No, Bryce, you stressed us out by dragging us out here to the middle of nowhere and getting us lost, and you’re mad at me for pointing it out.”

“Don’t blame Bryce,” Jess said. “It’s not his fault. It was an awesome view.”

“Yeah, the view was sick, but it wasn’t worth all this shit,” Robby said.

I glanced at Robby and caught his eye. I couldn’t believe he took my side on something.

“You’re such a fucking autist, man,” Bryce said, raising his voice to me. I couldn’t see his face through the glare of the headlamp. “You know I did you a favor inviting you, right? The three of us made a separate group chat, and no one but me wanted you to come. And now you’re riding everyone’s balls about wearing the wrong thing and touching fucking rocks. Clearly I made a mistake.”

Everyone was quiet for a moment.

Then, I guess I snapped.

“Nah, you’re right,” I said. I threw my hat on the ground and stormed over to the rock. “Fuck the rock. Fuck it.”

Everyone watched in silence as I slammed my hands into the side of the rock.

I instantly regretted it. The rough surface scraped patches of skin from my palm. But I kept going.

“Let’s fucking knock it over, dude!” I hollered. “Come on!” Again and again, I slammed into the rock. It didn’t seem to be moving.

Awkwardness settled over me after a few seconds. I probably looked like a psychopath. I thought maybe I could show them I wasn’t a complete stick in the mud, but I think my frustration bled through.

I was just about to stop when Robby joined me.

“Fuck this fucking rock, dude,” he said as pressed his hands against the rock and fell into my rhythm.

A wave of relief washed over me. 

I guess pushing the rock was something like a joke. I can’t fully explain what we were thinking. All I know is that Robby and I were both laughing.

A moment later, Jess joined us. Then, eventually, so did Bryce.

We all heaved against the rock with all our might, laughing like friends.

The rock didn’t move. Like I said, we couldn’t have moved it if we wanted to.

But the rock wasn’t what was holding it in place. I understand that now. 

I was shifting the position of my hands when I touched something wet.

At first I thought it was condensation or something, but when I pulled my hand away, I felt the tacky residue of it stuck on my fingers.

“Bryce,” I said. The others noticed I was no longer rocking and slowed.

The flash of Bryce’s headlamp turned in my direction.

When it did, I caught a glimpse of my hands. They were red.

“What the fuck?” I shouted in disgust. I staggered away from the rock and wiped my hands on my pants.

“What’s going on?” Jess cried.

“Shine your light on the rock, right there,” I told Bryce, pointing.

He did what I asked.

On the surface of the rock was a smudged sigil painted in blood.

We were shocked into silence.

“What the fuck is that?” Robby said finally.

“That wasn’t there before,” Bryce murmured. “That was not there before.”

We studied it.

It was perfectly reflectionally symmetrical. It stretched from the very bottom of the rock where it met the ground to the very top. 

It consisted of strange geometrical symbols like hieroglyphs.

You would imagine the edges to be irregular, but they weren’t. It was as though they were stenciled.

I saw the smudged print where my hand had fallen. The sigil was broken.

“What the fuck?” Robby said.

“Anyone recognize this?” Bryce asked.

I turned to tell him no, absolutely never in my life, but I stopped. Something appeared over Bryce’s shoulder.

It was a rectangle. It was just floating there. I never would have noticed it in the dark if it hadn’t blinked into existence right in front of my eyes.

I furrowed my brow and pointed. Bryce spun around and the flash of the headlight reflected off of it. It was metal.

I took a step forward when something else appeared: a panel of chainlink fence, rimmed with barbed wire. The sign was attached to it.

We were all staring now, speechless.

Another panel appeared beside it. Then another. Then another.

We all turned in unison as we watched the perimeter appear around us piece-by-piece until the circle was complete.

We were trapped.

It took us a while to accept it. Each of us had our turn with the fence—lacing our fingers through it, shaking it, climbing it, cursing, asking “how?”—but it was as real as anything.

Had it been there the entire time? The sigil, too? I couldn’t help but believe the red carpet had been rolled out for us. It was as if something knew we were coming and removed all obstacles in our way, for a short time. But to what end?

My question was shortly answered.

I was climbing down from my turn on the fence, my face sweaty and the tip of my finger dotted with a drop of red (it was real barbed wire, after all), when I saw the rock move.

It didn’t topple over, like I feared it might after how hard we pushed it. It didn’t collapse. It didn’t crumble or crack.

It floated.

It rose silently into the air like a balloon.

Bryce’s headlamp showed the underside of the rock was worn with claw marks.

See, it wasn’t the rock that held it. It was never the rock. It was the sigil.

The hunk of sandstone drifted like a cloud until the headlamp couldn’t reach it, and the only measure of its shape was a moving absence of stars like a hole in the sky.

We all craned our necks to watch it go.

Then we looked down into the hole it left.

It was a shallow pool of water, still and clear.

Huddled in the corner was a dark figure. It was roughly the size of a small black bear.

When Bryce’s headlamp fell over it, it flinched.

Its back was made of a jet black metal like oxidized iron. It was curled up on all fours. It looked like a huge pangolin. That must be it, I thought. A pangolin. I could even make out the shape of powerful claws on its hands.

The water rippled.

The figure’s back began to arch.

There were cries of fear, anger, and confusion, but I didn’t discern anything my friends said. My body stepped back involuntarily, but my eyes were fixed on it.

It began to lurch and gag rhythmically. It was a wet noise.

For a moment I thought maybe it was dying, like it was allergic to air.

But no.

It arched hard and with a sick moan, it purged a red cloud from its throat into the pool of water.

“What the fuck is it doing?” someone said.

The animal (that’s what I assumed it to be) lurched again and out came another plume of red. The brilliant color of the expulsion quickly bloomed and rushed out towards all edges of the water, faster than I thought possible.

Then it lurched again.

Wave after wave of fluid flowed into the spring water until it was a dark maroon.

We were all moving away from it, desperate to turn away but terrified where it might move in the darkness.

The animal finally stopped.

It looked at us.

Tiny, dark eyes peeked up and considered us vacantly.

Then it sank into the opaque red pool, out of sight.

“Holy fuck!” Bryce cried, his back now against the fence. “What the fuck is that thing?”

“I don’t know,” I panted. I was against the fence, too. We all were.

Jess was in hysterics. She blubbered incoherently while Robby did his best to hide his own panic and comfort her.

The pool had fallen still.

We were talking, trying to make sense of things and failing, when the bubbles started.

The sound rose out from under the tones of our conversation secretly, like the loudening gurgle of a flooding creek.

Robby saw them first. He pointed, eyes widening.

Red bubbles were rising from the center of the pool. They were growing stronger by the moment, until they were raging like hot tub jets.

The pool began to rise.

We all looked at each other in fear.

“Climb the fence,” Bryce shouted. “Now!”

Everyone raced up the chain link with a chorus of clinking metal.

We went as high as we could before we hit the barbed wire.

The water began to overflow from the hole. The red water raced out in all directions and pooled beneath us. Eventually, it started to trickle down into the canyon where it had once flowed sixty years ago. The pool, however, remained under our feet.

I was on the far side opposite where the water was streaming, and I was the only one with dry ground beneath me.

The animal was still nowhere to be seen.

“You have to climb towards Vic!” Bryce instructed.

My palms were slick with sweat. I was terrified to lower to the ground for fear that the water might suddenly surge and swallow my ankles. I had no idea what the red substance was. Eggs, maybe? It looked like a mammal, but I couldn’t imagine another reason an animal would expel fluid like that.

The rest of the group started to carefully climb towards my side of the fence.

Robby was the farthest away, then Jess, then Bryce. It didn’t take long for Bryce to make it beside me. Jess, however, was struggling badly. I could tell her knee was still bothering her by the way she avoided bending it, and she was still breathing hard and whimpering.

“Hold on, Jess,” Robby reassured her. “You got this. Just a little farther, okay? You got this, I swear to you.”

“I don’t know,” Jess said quietly. “I don’t know, I don’t know.”

The water was rushing loudly now. The surface of the pool’s center still bubbled violently.

“When we get out of here, I’ll take you on a date,” Robby said, smiling. “Somewhere nice in the city. Not a tree in sight.”

She laughed nervously. I think that’s what did it.

Jess slipped.

Her body fell into the water with a splash. She landed on her hands and knees. The water came up to her chest.

We all held our breath for an agonizing moment. 

Robby was just starting to yell for her to climb back up when the screaming started.

I caught only glimpses of her decimation. I've filled the gaps in my dreams.

She reared back quickly from the water, and I saw she was covered in red dots like bugs. A few scattered dots stuck to her face from the splashing, too.

The bugs were swelling quickly.

Jess screamed in agony, trying to wipe the bugs away, but for every one she removed, another appeared somewhere else. Her hands were covered in them.

She threw herself against the fence, nearly knocking Robby down with her. She thrashed and thrashed.

The bugs were swollen up like water balloons on her skin. She smacked one and I saw it burst in a spray of blood.

They were draining her.

We all cried out, but there was nothing we could do.

Jess’s skin began to raisin and pale. Her eye sockets grew dark, her fingers knobby and taut. Her ribs poked out against her wet shirt, which hung loose from her frail body. I saw the flex of every muscle fiber under her skin.

She shrunk like a pillow sealed in plastic.

The screams stopped.

In all, it was likely only a matter of seconds, but her suffering felt like an eternity.

The remaining husk of Jess’s body sank down into the water as silently as a piece of paper.

A stream of swollen bugs left her and swam towards the bubbling center of the pool, skimming the top of the water like running salmon, where they disappeared beneath the surface.

Robby was cursing and sobbing as he hurried to our side of the fence.

Bryce and I looked at each other in shock.

We had to get the fuck out of there.

I was no longer afraid of the barbed wire. I began climbing up.

“Wait,” Bryce said. He began to take off his jacket awkwardly, switching hands on the fence to get the sleeves off. He handed it over.

I held a sleeve and tossed the jacket up to drape over the barbed wire. I didn’t think it would do much to protect us, but it was better than nothing.

No sooner had I taken my first step up when I heard Robby scream.

The animal was on his leg.

It was half out of the water, its claws gripping Robby’s ankle and knee, its head buried in his calf like a turkey leg. There was something strangely human about its movement—the way it held its neck, the way it bent its limbs to readjust its grip, the way it hungrily moved its head.

Blood poured down Robby’s leg into the water.

Where the blood fell, the bugs coalesced and swelled. I saw them jostling together and leaping out of the water like koi after a scoopful of fish feed.

Robby screamed endlessly. He couldn’t kick the animal away with his other leg or he risked falling; not that kicking would do any good against its armor. He could only hold on for dear life.

The animal let go of Robby’s leg. There was a great cavernous gash on his calf where its teeth had been.

Robby pulled away from the creature and fled upwards, trying to make it over the fence. His injured leg kicked wildly.

With its great claws, the animal scooped a handful of the swollen red tadpoles from the water and brought them up to its snout. Its teeth sunk down and they popped with a juicy squelch. The animal gulped the runny blood down its throat like egg yolks. Its black face was covered in bright frothy red.

Robby’s hands met the barbed wire. He didn’t have any screams left. His body must have been pumping with so much adrenaline that he hardly felt the metal rip his arms to shreds. 

He kept going. He surely cut a vein in his arm, because the blood came running down like a faucet.

The animal lurked beneath him, watching indifferently. It leaned back and allowed the blood that leaked from Robby to spatter across its face. Then, with a thick leathery tongue, it lapped the drippings up and smacked its lips. Though its eyes were small and dull, I recognized in them the very human emotion of joy—of satiation.

With a great effort, Robby slung his tattered leg up over the fence, flinging out an arc of blood that came pattering down on the water like spring rain and set the bugs a-leaping.

I realized that I had hardly been breathing for several slow, slow moments. I gasped. The air in my lungs kickstarted my senses, and I resumed my climb.

The jacket did little to lessen the punishment the barbed wire inflicted on my body.

Iron clawed into me like hot knives.

Pulling my body off of the wire required force. The barbs velcroed to me.

I couldn’t help crying in pain.

The jacket did do something to shallow the length of the barbs, but only slightly.

Bryce watched me, then Robby, then me again, with a horrified and anxious expression as each of us made our way over. I was faster than Robby, obviously.

The animal made no attempt to stop us. It didn’t chase after Bryce, either.

I pulled myself over the fence and fell triumphantly to the dry ground outside.

It was completely dark now. The only light was the faint glow of the moon and the ever-changing beam of Bryce’s headlamp.

Then Robby fell after. He hit the dirt with a thud just at the water’s edge. He didn’t cry out.

He was covered in blood. The headlamp fell over him for a moment and he flashed red. The blood was still running, pooling beneath him.

Robby was hardly conscious. In that brief glimpse, I saw no light in his eyes. He barely moved—just sat up, patted dirt and blood from his pants, and sat staring ahead, his silhouette swaying back and forth.

I knew he was surely going to die.

Distantly, I heard Bryce following after me, cursing and grunting.

“Robby,” I yelled.

He didn’t look at me.

Then, without ceremony, the animal began eating him.

Its claws passed through the chainlink as though it wasn’t there. I heard the rattle, and in the next instant, Robby’s head was gone.

With great, horrible arms, the animal pulled Robby’s head through the hole in the fence and held it close like a jack-o-lantern, dripping and vacant and still hot. Then, it tossed the head over its shoulder into the cold spring water with a splash. Bugs swarmed around it and swelled.

It was a merciful end, at least. Like a lightswitch turning off. At least, that’s what I’ve told myself in the years since. It makes things easier.

I’d like to say that Bryce and I did the “right” thing in that moment—screamed, rushed to his body, fought the thing away, or anything remotely heroic—but the reality is that we didn’t do anything but flinch. When something truly awful ever happens to you, you’ll understand. The only reaction possible is the one hard-wired into your brain. We’re just animals, after all.

So, we flinched, and then we kept moving.

I pulled myself away from the fence and tried to stand. Every bend of my joints set an open wound screaming, but I managed it.

Bryce finally made it over the fence and landed close to me.

The hard-wiring. You have to understand the hard-wiring.

I could lie, you know that? I could easily lie to you now and tell you I pulled Bryce to his feet and we ran off together while the animal drained the blood from Robby’s body.

But I didn’t.

I was breathing hard. My eyes flashed over to the animal. 

It was watching us.

I understood in that moment that the animal didn’t care about the blood. It knew that there was more to come—so much more. Gallons would come swimming up tadpole-by-tadpole from the river it made.

No, it needed a sacrifice. That’s what it wanted. 

It wanted Bryce. 

I know it! I could see it in its eyes! It communicated to me somehow, in a way I still don’t understand. But I knew what needed to be done. Oh, yes.

I still can’t tell if what I did next was the natural work of my brain, or the animal’s dark command. Were they really even two different things?

I grabbed a rock.

I didn’t see him as my friend. I didn’t even see him as a person. I saw him as a corpse.

I staggered forward with gritted teeth and struck Bryce in the head.

He collapsed instantly. It was sad, really, how he fell. I almost laughed. To think I had been scared of him! Felt the need to impress him! Let him give me orders! How mighty he was then, lying unconscious on the dirt in the middle of nowhere, like he never lived.

I stripped the light from Bryce’s head and put it on myself. Then I dug into his pocket and took the car keys.

I looked at the animal one more time.

It was looking back at me. 

Spots of old blood—Jess’s, probably—had begun to flake off its face, while brighter red streaked down its jowls and over its skin. Swollen bugs swarmed in the water around it eagerly, having returned from Robby’s shrunken head, waiting to be popped and swallowed.

I don’t think it was an animal, after all. Do animals smile?

I turned and ran.

I didn’t tell anyone. Not the cops, not my family, not anyone.

I started over somewhere else. It was easy. Like I said, I was young.

I saw on the news they found some women and a few kids dead, dried up like raisins. Tons of animals, too.

The spring is dry again now. It didn’t take them long to close it back up.

But I know it won’t hold forever.

Eventually, the animal will be hungry again.