I narrowly escaped, though definitely not unscathed. One attacked me first, clawing deep ripping away flesh while I screamed uncontrollably. The second fought the first to get pieces of me. I remember feeling its rows of sharp teeth sinking in down to the bone and yanking.
I had a strange sensation of something pulling free but had no time to think about it before one of them had ripped my chest open. I prayed it wasn’t too deep. I wanted to live. My hopes were being dashed faster and faster. The second one took my ear off like it was never attached to begin with… such ease.
The next 20 minutes were a blur as I was in and out of conciseness but I remember seeing them fight each other over something long and bloody about a foot away from me. I would have screamed if I could because when it finally dawned on me the pulling sensation I felt earlier was my now severed leg, I totally lost it. That’s why I thought I was hallucinating when I saw Kyla.
There she was, about 200 feet away. She was limping heavily, you could see the stark white bone of her knee poking through her flesh contrasted by the night sky. I looked at her harder because something seemed off… She was missing one eye, her bottom lip and she had been partially scalped… That beautiful raven hair soaked in blood…
She held a rifle in one hand. I was so sure that I was hallucinating. One squirrel had given up fighting for my severed leg after I heard a wicked scream from the beast and saw it was missing one eye. Good, I thought. You deserved that. I should have never let that thought escape because it turned right back on me as the other consumed my leg greedily.
It only managed to bite into my arm hard before I heard a loud bang. The creature made a horrendous sound as it whipped it’s head around to see Kyla with the shotgun in hand. She’d been knocked back against the tree from the recoil. I was so afraid for her. She was already injured so badly and there was no way a shotgun was going to take one of these beasts down let alone two.
I cried out in both agony and fear. I heard another shot ring out. Then a third that whizzed past the one ear I had left as the beast tried to run past me. I yelped but couldn’t hear myself. The second best trampled me while trying to run, it smashed my head hard into the dirt and that’s when it all went black.
The next thing I remember is waking up in the hospital with tubes and chords coming from everywhere on my body. The light was so bright I thought I’d died at first. The smell of hospital disinfect was ripe in the air and all the machines were going off but I could barely hear them. My head was pounding. I groaned. I could taste the saline they were pumping through my veins. Yep, I was alive.
It took me a second to orientate myself and that’s when I remembered everything. That’s when I started to freak out. I looked around the room and saw nobody so I searched desperately for the nurse call button. Two of them rushed in. “Laisa, get the doctor, he’s awake!” I still barely heard her. I was afraid I had lost my hearing from that shot whizzing by. The thought was momentary as I was way more worried about Kyla. It was my first question.
“Where is Kyla? Is she okay?!” The nurse tilted her head and had a look of sympathy on her face… “She’s here in the hospital, she’s okay but… she’s suffered some pretty rough injuries, the poor thing,” she told me. I didn’t care, I wanted to see her.
“Can I see her please?!” The nurse once again tilted her head and told me I’d have to ask the doctor first, that he would be in soon. The doctor came in shortly after and he told me it was amazing I survived at all and I never would have had it not been for Kyla’s intervention. I asked what happened to those beasts and he looked at me funny and told me she said it was a bear attack.
Kyla was a story sight but she was still so beautiful to me. I didn’t think it was possible but I loved her even more now. We almost died and I decided I wasn’t going to hide it anymore, I was going to tell her how I felt. But that could wait just a little bit longer… She opened her eyes and tried her best to smile.
“How are you feeling?” I asked. “Like I was torn apart by two squirrels from hell.” She let out a little giggle at that. Well, at least she still had her sense of humor. They did the best they could to make her look like she had before. Same for me. But we will always carry the scars… and missing pieces of us.
I just had to know what happened after I blacked out, were they gone forever? Did she kill them? Did they get away? I had so many thoughts jumbled I didn’t know what to ask first. I settled with, “are they dead?” She looked at me with a vacant stare and a look of sadness on her face, “no Chris, they got away, and I’ve been doing some research..”
I didn’t like where this was going… “What did you find?” I asked meekly. “Well it seems like they are summoned from Hell… and uh… they come back every 13 years…” My stomach dropped to my feet. I didn’t know how to process this. Who summoned them, why had we not seen them before? Why us? And they were dining back?!! I just laid my head in my hands and sobbed a little.
It’s been 5 months since it came. Autumn is far behind us and so are those freak squirrels. I finally told Kyla how I felt during our long stint in physical rehab. She really does amaze me more and more everyday. She surprisingly felt the same. We’ve decided to take it slow. We’re both going through some intense therapy. PTSD is real. I can’t be anywhere near trees or anywhere a regular squirrel normally hangs out.
Don’t worry though, we have years to prepare and believe me we will. I’ve already started finding all materials I can on the dark arts related to summoning hellish creatures. I haven’t found the right one yet, but we aren’t giving up. We’re also trying to find any and everything we can arm ourselves with that may help us in the fight.
We’re a sad sight, a few limbs missing and huge battle scars but we are determined. I also got my hearing back! I’m so glad for that because I’m going to need it. I can’t rely on Kyla alone. She already saved my ass once. Wish us luck!