My name is Alex I’m a C.I.T Guard, Cash In Transit or for the more novice people, an armored truck guard. The company I work for-well that’s not really important, and sure I’ve had plenty of things happen throughout my seven years working. I’ve even had a few attempted robberies. I say attempted because they never got any money. However, nothing compares to this.
We were on our way up to make a delivery way up in the north woods. My driver, Mike, an out of shape retired cop from a small town. He was listening to some podcast on his phone and I was in the passenger seat trying to sleep. Our route started before sunrise. I awoke to Mike giving me a slap on the chest,
“Huh? What? Where are we?” I said in a half awake yawn.
“We passed the last town about 30 minutes ago, you know that one with the shitty little gas station at the edge of it,” Mike replied. “But that’s not why I woke you up. Look up ahead.”
Mike said all this while slowing the armor truck down to a crawl. Up ahead we could see the red and blue flashing lights of a police car. Sunrise was not for another hour at least. The patrol car’s emergency lights were casting everything in an almost purple haze in the dark fog. Mike stopped the truck and I got out and approached the police car. I could just make out that it was a state police vehicle. The officer that got out of his car had his uniform pressed and ironed, shoes polished, duty belt without a scuff on it, and that stupid state police hat everyone knows. His persona screamed, ‘everyone is getting a ticket, no exceptions.’ I approached him and said,
“Good morning officer.”
“It’s Trooper. Trooper Hazen.”
“Oh, I’m sorry Trooper Hazen,” I said back. But in my head I was thinking, ‘Wow, what a dick.’ “So why is the road closed?” I continued.
“Some storms came though the area late last night and took out the power lines. The road is closed until they can clear the road. Everyone needs to take the road though the National Park.”
I thanked the trooper and explained to Mike what the trooper told me. He got the truck heading down the road. As the road twisted and turned, the tall trees closed in on us. I let the rumble of the truck engine lull me to sleep. Before closing my eyes, I could have sworn I saw something jump from tree to tree keeping up with the truck in the darkness. It was something big- bigger than something that should be able to jump like that. Had I known that was going to be my last peaceful sleep for months, I would have enjoyed it more.
Crunch………..Crunch……Crunch………..Crunch BOOM. I awoke to a loud bang and the truck violently shaking.
“Crap, I think we blew out a tire,” Mike yelled as the shaking of the truck started to intensify.
Mike was able to regain control and pull the truck off the road and to a stop. I got out to check out the problem with our truck. Sure enough the front driver side wheel was flat. Not just flat, it was shredded. It was like someone attacked it with a weedwacker from hell. Bits of rubber were hanging on, but most of the tire was gone. The rim was half sunk into the shoulder of the road. I saw a glimmer of light reflecting off my flashlight beam. It was stuck to a hunk of rubber still attached to the rim. I squatted down to examine it closer. I picked it up and thought it looked like bone. I flipped the object over along with the chunk of rubber it was attached to. In my horror I dropped the object, took a step back and started to dry heave.
It was in fact bone, but not like any I’ve seen before. Keep in mind, before this job I was a reserve deputy for a sheriff’s department. I’ve seen my fair share of crime scenes, but this was something grotesque. It appeared to be a human spine approximately six inches in length, with what appears to be teeth sticking out of all sides about four to six teeth per vertebrae. They were not human teeth, but what almost looked like snake fangs but much thicker, wider, and taller then normal fangs. The fangs looked like they were fused to the spine, like someone or something took JB weld and just stuck fangs all over. I picked up the spine tooth spike strip thing between my thumb and forefinger and showed Mike.
“What do you think it is Mike?”
“Well Alex, this looks like some voodoo cult stuff right there. The town where I used to work had a cult and they made all kinds of weird effigies like that. My guess is they were having a cult meeting and just left it on the road.” Mike said.
“Mike, the tires in our truck have a reinforced kevlar wall inside and they are not supposed to go flat, let alone get torn apart like that.” For emphasis, I picked up a chunk of rubber with a hole clean though it and the Kevlar backing. Mike waved his hand in a ‘It’s no big deal motion.’
“Here, set up the hazard cones and I’ll call headquarters and let them know where we are. They can get a wrecker out to us and we will be on our way In an hour max,” Mike said to me as he was handing me the set of collapsible cones.
As I began walking behind the truck, flashlight in one hand and cones in the other, I tripped on something and the cones went flying. I looked down and it was another spine tooth thing, but this one was smaller and some of the teeth looked broken and damaged. Ahead of me, next to one of the drop cones was another one. Beyond that were two more. I tilted the flashlight up exposing more of the road to the light of my flashlight. In doing so, I saw what had to be six or seven of the spin teeth things scattered all over the roadway. Each one differed in degrees of damage.
I looked around for cones just wanting to get them set up and be back inside the relative protection of the armor truck. Finding three of the four cones on the road, I scanned around with my flashlight and saw that the last cone tumbled off into the ditch. ‘Oh great,’ I thought to myself. I began to make my way down the ditch. After a few steps, I lost my footing due to the soft soil and slid down. I landed with a wet slap. The ditch had a few inches of running water in it. In my struggle to stay upright I dropped my flashlight into the dark muddy water of the ditch. I stood up, pants now soaked with water, and began looking for my flashlight. After a little while I was able to locate my flashlight. I clicked the on button but nothing happened. I slapped the head of the flashlight against the palm of my hand and on the third hit the flashlight came to life.
I grabbed the stubborn cone and chucked it out of the ditch and onto the roadway. I began to climb out of the ditch. I was about half way up when I heard a noise that caused me to stop in my tracks. Behind me in the woods, I heard a deep wet guttural growl. It was at this time my flashlight went out. I tried to do the same trick as last time. I hit it one time against my palm and as I raised it to try again, I heard a loud splash from behind me. Whatever it was, It was big and very close. I was about halfway up the ditch and the water was about two to three feet below me. I could feel the warm breath of this creature on my neck. I slowly moved my right hand and felt for my sidearm on my hip. I slowly unsnaped the retention device keeping my pistol in its holster. The sound was like a firecracker in the stillness of the night. Whatever was behind me changed from a heavy breath to a deep growl. I pulled my pistol from the holster while rolling to my left and then extended the gun out in a two handed grip, arms slightly bent to absorb any recoil. I activated my gun’s weapon light, but there was nothing there.
Absolutely nothing. I twisted my back and moved my shoulders left and right scanning the ditch and the wood lines and still nothing- just a ripple of water from whatever was standing behind me just mere seconds ago. Keeping my pistol in my right hand, I scanned the tree line back and forth. I clawed my way out of the ditch and back onto the road. Forgetting to set up the cones, I walked back to the truck. I opened the door and plopped myself down in the passenger seat.
Mike looked at me and said, “You look like you saw a ghost. Also, I’ve got bad news and worse news.”
“What is it?” I replied.
“Well the bad news is I’ve got no cell phone services this far north.”
I looked at my cell phone, which told me the same thing- no bars, no service.
”Also, someone, aka you, is going to have to walk and find a landline phone to call Branch so they can get a tow truck out to us.”
I took in a sharp inhale of breath and blew out a raspberry at him. I sat in the passenger seat for about five minutes trying to compose myself. I got up, took the keys off my belt and unlocked the door leading to the back of the armor truck, and walked back to the small wall locker. I entered my pin into the keypad and was rewarded with beeping and the sound of the locks disengaging. I opened the door and hesitated for just a moment and grabbed the 870, 12 gauge shotgun. I found the slide release button and started ejecting shells.
After about the third pump of the shotgun Mike shouted back, “What are you doing back there?”
I ignored him and after the shotgun was empty I reached up to the top shelf of the locker and grabbed a small cardboard box of Winchester XP3 magnum sabot slugs and began thumbing them into the magazine tube of the shotgun. After filling the tube, I racked a round into the chamber and made sure the weapon’s safety was on and thumbed one more round into the tube. Shotgun in hand, I made my way back to the cab of the truck, tossed Mike my keys to the back and got out. Before I closed the truck door, Mike turned to me and gave me a perplexed look. Before he could speak I said,
“Bears Mike, freaking bears.” I closed the door and began my walk.
I was walking for what seemed like forever, but in reality it was probably more like 30 minutes. The fog seemed to get denser by the minute, even with the new flashlight I grabbed from the truck before I left. I was slowly losing the battle of penetrating the dark, foggy night’s embrace. The rhythmic thump, thump, thump of my boots along the pavement finally gave way to a soft crunch of gravel. It’s a driveway, I thought. Let’s hope it leads to a ranger station or anyone who has a phone I can use. Even after all this walking, there was still no cell service. I turned and began to make my way down the gravel road. I walked a few hundred yards and saw it. Like a lighthouse in the fog warning ships, the slow rotation of the amber work lights from a utility truck. As I began walking towards it I was thinking, ‘Man, what kind of reaction will I get?’ When a shotgun toting armored truck guard just walks up on someone, it gets you thinking. I’ll probably have to answer some awkward questions.
I was now a few feet from the back of the utility truck and could just make out the red glow from the brake lights. I was about to call out a ‘Hello’ when a noise came from in front of the truck that made the word catch in my throat. A wet crunching sound like someone biting into a watermelon full of dried sticks emanated from just in front of the hood. I got down low and crouched behind the rear bumper of the truck. What I saw caused my blood to run cold. An animal like I’ve never seen before was in front of me, illuminated by the truck’s lights. It had paws like a lion, the legs and body of a wolf and what looked like the head of a bear. It was covered in thick saggy scales, like a Komodo Dragon. I tried to back away from the truck. I put my hand out to help me get back to a standing position. My hand touched something warm and sticky. I pulled my hand back. In the glow of the brake lights the viscous liquid looked black. Motor oil, I thought. It was then that the coppery tang assaulted my nostrils. I looked back at the monster and it was eating something I could easily make out in the green and sliver of a reflective vest. The creature stood on its hind legs and began to cough and hack.
With a wet smack, it expelled a white object onto the ground. The creature got back down on all four paws and smacked the object away. The object rolled in my direction and stopped just short of hitting my boot. It was one of the spine tooth traps. ‘Oh dear lord! This thing throws up the bones,’ I screamed in my head. My stomach was somersaults and I broke out into a cold sweat. I was focusing so hard on trying to keep the contents of my stomach from making an unscheduled appearance that I did not see the monster rise onto its hind legs and reach its front paws over the light bar on the truck. At that moment, it gave out a deep growl.
The Creature looked down at me as I was squatting down by the rear bumper of the truck. I looked up and we locked eyes. Its eyes were neon purple, almost the color of a black light in some techno club. It looked down at me with a, ‘Well well, it’s my lucky day grin.’ I sprang from my squat with the biggest jump I have ever done, raised the shotgun to my shoulder and took a quick second to pray that I put slugs in the shotgun. I put the ghost ring sights on the creature’s chest, right where I assumed the breast bone would be and fired. Everything went into ultra high definition slow motion. I began to rack the shotgun. I could see the slug and the wad leave the barrel of my gun. It hit center mass and the slug mushroomed out on the creature’s chest and came to a dead stop. The mangled slug dropped onto the roof of the truck with a metal thump. The skin around the impacted area was cracked. The creature let out a roar and I fired again, hitting close to the first place I shot. The creature’s skin cracked and fell away in a roughly six inch ragged hole that revealed what looked like soft pinkish red flesh under its almost armored skin. The Creature howled in pain and leapt off the truck going over my head and landed about sixty feet behind me. I spun around, racked the shotgun and saw the creature run at me. I aimed for the head and fired the round. It bounced off the creature’s forehead, leaving a crack in the skin but nothing else. The creature turned all its forward momentum into lateral movement and leaped sideways into the tree line as if the law of physics were merely a suggestion.
Although I was alone, I felt eyes on me form the forest. I ran towards the utility truck and tried to open the door but it was locked. I tried breaking the driver side glass to gain entrance but was unable to do so with the butt of my shotgun and I didn’t want to waste a bullet on it. I left the truck and ran back down the gravel road. All the while I could hear trees rustling and branches snapping. All of a sudden the creature appeared behind me. I turned to fire. The creature stood on its hind legs and let out a rawr that caught me off guard and caused me to trip over my own feet. I fell and the shotgun discharged a round and somehow struck the creature’s left paw taking the second most outer claw clean off.
The creature swiped at me with its right paw knocking the shotgun out of my hand causing it to go flying behind me. I heard it clatter and skid on what sounded like a paved road. Next thing I knew I was pinned to the ground with the monster’s paws pressing into my shoulders as it hovered over me. I tried kicking at it, but it was like kicking at a weighted blanket. The creature did not really seem to notice my struggle. Its purple eyes bored holes into mine and I knew this was the end. The creature raised its right paw claws extended. My body went rigid, all my muscles went tenses as I waited for the killing shot. There was a loaded THWACK followed by a heavy pressure on my chest. Then all at once the pressure was gone. I opened one eye and saw the creature had raised the paw again, this time I forced myself to keep my eyes open. I watched the paw with those razor sharp claws come down dead center in my chest with a loud THWACK.
Then it dawned on me. It hit me in my kevlar vest, but more importantly dead center of the steel rifle plate in my vest. The creature let out a rawr right in my face. My nostrils were overwhelmed with the smell of rotting meat and pennies. I could see droplets of red on its monster size teeth and feel the hot stickiness of its breath. The creature raised its paw in a third attempt when I made my move. With its paw no longer pinning my right shoulder, I reached down and pulled out my Glock and brought it tight against my chest. I let out the most primal, guttural scream of my life and pulled the trigger. There was no amining, no seeing where my shot placement was, the creature was on top of me so close I could not miss. This was unadulterated how fast can I pull the trigger and empty the mag into this abomination from hell. I let the recoil of the Glock naturally work its way to the monster’s body. Every round that hit caused it to twitch like it was getting shocked by electricity. The 40 caliber rounds felt more like a cap gun against the thick scaly hide of the creature. The last two rounds in the magazine hit the exposed flesh of the creature’s chest. It jumped off me and writhed on the ground in pain. I rolled to one side, jumped to my feet and did the fastest reload of my life.
The creature’s pain only seemed to last but a few moments as it was up on all four paws again and leaped into the surrounding forest. I searched around, using my weapon mounted light and saw nothing. The fog was still thick and the air was deathly still. I started jogging towards where I thought the shotgun had landed. After a few steps I found the paved road and there was the creature looking back at me. I fired one round and it leaped back into the tree line away from the road way. Not knowing which way was the way back to the armor truck, I picked a direction and ran.
Run, run, run, shoot. Run, run, run, shoot. This is how it went on for what seemed like forever. I’d be running at damn near a sprint. The creature would appear seemingly out of nowhere and lunge at me while I would turn and fire. It would jump back into the woods and the running would continue. I did not even bother to holster my Glock, but instead kept it in my right hand and kept running. Was I hitting it every time it appeared- no, not by any means. I could not figure out why it would keep attempting this until the last time I shot at it. The slide locked back on my Glock.
I reached down to my belt for another magazine and to my horror I realized I was out of ammo. I holstered my pistol, put my head down, and ran as fast as I could. I had to be getting close to something I thought. My lungs were burning and my heart was pounding like a steam locomotive racing down the tracks. Black pin prick spots started floating around in my vision. I was exhausted. Then I heard the sound of paws running on concrete behind me. I realized a bit too late that this thing was trying to get me to use up all my ammunition. At the exact moment I thought the creature would be on me, I looked up and saw headlights coming towards me. The outline of a car appeared in the fog, followed by the flashing of emergency lights. I’m saved I thought. When a voice boomed over a loudspeaker,
“Freeze, state police show me your hands!”
I stopped running and raised my hands.
The voice said, “Get down on the ground!”
I complied, not knowing what else to do. I heard the sound of handcuffs being rachaited, and felt the cold steel on my wrists. My pistol, now empty, was pulled out of my holster. A strong hand picked me up and I looked to see Trooper Hazen.
Between big gulps of air I croaked out, “There’s…something…. out there….in the woods.”
Trooper Hazen paid no attention to that and replied with, “You’re under arrest for unlawful discharge of a firearm, reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct, and illegal hunting.”
“What?! No, you’re not listening to me,” I exclaimed.
I was placed into the back of the squad car and my pistol was placed in the glove box up front. I tried to explain to Trooper Hazen who sat down in the driver seat.
“Now I’m going to have to Mirandize you. You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you can’t……” he continued on as a deep growling sound came from the roadway just out of reach of the cruiser’s headlights.
”Hey Hazen, just drive us out of here ok? Don’t worry about…,” I stammered.
“Hush you” Hazen shouted as he smacked the prisoner cage, got out of the cruiser, and stood behind the driver door.
“Hey man, uncuff me before you walk out there and get yourself killed. At least give me a fighting chance.”
Hazen spun in place to face me, “Are you threatening me? I don’t take kindly to threats.”
“What?…No, I was just,” I fumbled.
“Well now you’re getting charged with threatening a police officer. Just sit there and shut up. Cool your heels while I go investigate.” Trooper Hazen ordered.
The growling grew louder. Trooper Hazen unholstered his service pistol, adopted a two hand grip on the weapon and walked heel to toe into the fog.
Minutes passed with not a sound to be heard. A scream, a human scream breaks the stillness of the predawn morning. Then the sound of silence washed over the area like a tsunami.
‘Well he’s dead, time to try to get out of here,’ I thought to myself.
I’ve been in the back of cop cars enough during training at the sheriff’s department to know that what I was about to do was like riding a bike. I leaned to one side, and twisted at the waist to undo my seatbelt, and then worked my handcuffs in front of me so they were no longer behind my back. I was about to perform step two of the five step process of escape when a single gunshot echoed out of the fog. A few seconds elapsed then another shot rang out, and then another. With each shot coming a little faster, I started feeling a little more panicked and rushed. They were getting louder each time and I could faintly see the muzzle flash in the dissipating fog. The gun fire grew closer and then stopped. I heard footsteps running, and the sound of heavy breathing.
Out of the fog came Trooper Hazen. His right arm dangling useless at his side. It was all cut up as if it went through the world’s biggest paper shredder. Ribbons of uniform and flesh hung losey on what remained of his arm, all of it covered in a slick crimson stain. His left arm was attempting to put a tourniquet around the right arm. Trooper Hazen hopped into the driver seat, breathing heavily and with a look of sheer terror on his face. With his left hand he put the squad car into reverse. The tires barked and squealed as they sought purchase on the road. The tires finally bit into the roadway and we went flying backwards. I looked over Hazen’s shoulder 25,35,45,50. I was about to yell,
“Hey man ,slow down!”
Before I could say anything though, everything in the squad car went airborne. I came slamming down into the footwell of the squad. We hit something and Newton’s first law had it out for me as I slammed my head into the prisoner cage and my world went dark.
I awoke sometime later In a daze with my head throbbing. Sunlight was streaming through the canopies of trees. It took me a minute to come to and remember where I was. The squad car was about 50 feet from the road back in the wood lines. The rear end of the vehicle was smashed into a big oak tree. The side window was smashed and allowed for easy escape from the backseat. The front of the squad looked like a Jackson Pollock painting.The top half of Trooper Hazen was missing. Only the lower half of his body remained. I rummaged around his duty bag that was seatbelted into the passenger seat until I found the small silver handcuff key. I unlocked my cuffs and let them drop by my feet. The glove box was open and paper along with other items were thrown every which way. I found my pistol In the passenger side footwell. It was scuffed up and had some red stains but no worse for wear. Even though it was empty, having the weight of the Glock in my hand felt comforting to me. I grabbed the squad car’s radio mic which brought a surge of hope. I pressed the transmit button,
“10-33 10-33 officer down. I repeat, 10-33 10-33 officer down. Send additional units, EMS, and rescue 10-33 10-33.”
I was rewarded with nothing but static. I switched channels and repeated the message a few times with no luck. I looked at the roof of the squad car and saw the light bar and the antennas were ripped away. I looked for Hazen’s portable radio, but it was ripped off his belt. His holster was empty and his service weapon was gone. He had two full Glock mags on his belt that were the same as mine. I was able to load my pistol and after digging in his duty bag, I came across a third mag for my pistol and two AR-15 mags. Another flicker of hope filled me and was just as quickly distinguished as the AR-15, still in its mounter rack had its barrel bent at some unholy angle.
With my magazine pouches filled and my Glock loaded, I left the remains of Trooper Hazen behind and walked back to the road. I found the tire marks that the squad car left and walked in the opposite direction back towards the armored truck.
I walked for some time when I came across a park ranger and saw crime scene tape everywhere. I was close to the gravel road by now and I did not realize how far I had run. The park ranger looked at me and said,
“Son, you look like someone set you on fire and put you out with a wet fork.”
He brought me to a waiting ambulance where the paramedic gave me a once over and released me. I gave a full debrief to the head park ranger, leaving out the part where I was arrested. The park ranger looked at me questioningly and then told me that lots of strange things happen in these woods. He made the assumption that it was probably just a bear and that that’s what attacked the two construction workers, along with myself and the trooper.
He ended by saying, ”As for your tow, we saw your truck on the side of the road an hour ago. Let me get one of my rangers to give you a ride back to your truck.”
I rode in silence for a few minutes when Cory, the park ranger, who was giving me a ride said, “Hey, isn’t that your shotgun laying there?”
Sure enough it was. Just on the other side of the road was my shotgun. He pulled over and I retrieved it.
“Whoa, careful now it’s still loaded,” Cory said to me.
“Oh yeah it is, isn’t it?”
With the shotgun laying between my legs, barrel facing down, I pressed the action release button and pulled the pump back to release the one remaining slug and I put it in my pocket. We drove for a bit and then made a turn down another road. It was a road I have never been on. Something was nagging at the back of my mind.
“Hey Cory, how did you know I still had a shell in the shotgun?” I asked.
“Well lucky guess I suppose,” Cory said back.
I looked over at him and got a better look. He had his ring finger on the left hand bandaged up along with a bruise on his head. It wasn’t a very noticeable bruise, but just about half an inch and almost a perfect circle.
“What happened to your finger and head?” I asked.
Cory chuckled and said, “Cut my finger off doing woodwork and I fell into a bookshelf.”
Cory took a deep breath in and said, “Alex there are things that live in these woods. Things that need to remain a secret. ‘’ He slowed the vehicle to a stop and put it in park. “Sometimes In order to keep a secret we can’t let people go.”
As he said all this, my heart started to race and the hair on my neck stood up. I slowly reached into my pocket and pulled out the shotgun slug. I quietly slipped it into the breach and slowly pumped the action down until it made the softest of clicks. I looked over in horror to see Cory’s nails grow to sharp looking daggers in front of my eyes. Cory’s eyes were closed. His clothing was getting tight and starting to stretch and a red stain appeared on his uniform shirt where his breast bone should be. He opened his eyes and they were purple. This half person half monster turned to me and said in a deep growling voice,
“The sun makes it harder for us to change. Nothing personal, we just can’t let our secret get out.”
It lunged across the cab of the truck. I swung my shotgun up with the pump landing in the crook of my left arm, the barrel touching the red stain on his chest. Cory looked down in alarm. I gave him a sly grin and pulled the trigger.