Back in my final year at MSU I was invited to take part in a research expedition to the Sjaunja wetlands in northern Sweden. It was part of an exchange through the AWC (Arctic Wellness Cooperative), funded by members of the Arctic Council and private actors in the area.
Me and Roger ‘Rog’ Dawson took a flight in early May. During the 55-minute layover at Arlanda (Stockholm) we met up with Helene Ångermark from the Royal Institute of Technology. When we arrived at Umeå airport, we met up with the last member of our expedition; Camilla Östermo from Luleå University.
From there, it was just a long drive north.
The Sjaunja wetlands are enormous. We’re talking about 700,000 acres of mire and wetland just above the arctic circle. In optimal conditions, and excluding factors such as sleep, food, terrain, and weather, it’d take about 11 days to walk across. In my head, it conjured up images of the Dead Marshes from Lord of the Rings, but Helene assured me it was nothing quite as dramatic.
Rog and I had no idea what to expect. We’d gotten our equipment pre-purchased. The swedes were in charge of everything practical on-site, excluding our personal equipment. We were scheduled to spend four days in the actual mire, and four more days accounted for travel. And sure, we had wildlife and camping experience, but you can’t prepare for something like the arctic mires.
May is a strange time in northern Sweden. While technically spring, it can still dip into sub-zero temperatures (Celsius). The weather can range from blazing heat in the afternoon to frost in the early morning. So while we had a variety of clothes, we still had to be flexible enough to change throughout the day. There’s no “one thing fits all” up there.
The further north we drove, the more things started to look the same. Long stretches of road through the wilderness that seemed to go nowhere. Nothing but moss, undergrowth, and sprinkles of spindly trees. I was chewing on my last slim jim when Helene brought up her laptop.
“So we have eight designated sites where we need to do some sampling,” she said. “But Camilla and I have been talking, and we think we ought to get at least one further in. We have to go a bit offroad to get some reliable results.”
“When’d you talk about this?” I asked.
“Gotta read the group chat,” said Rog. “I told you to get in on that.”
“I’m in, I’m just not getting notifications.”
“Then you’re not in.”
“I’m telling you, I’m in.”
“Either way,” said Helene. “If we take a detour north after site 3 we ought to get some reliable samples before we reach 4. It should work with your schedule.”
“You’re the locals, you got this,” said Rog. “I leave this to your judgement.”
“We’re not locals,” said Camilla. “I’m from Luleå, that’s like a… four-hour drive. Stockholm is like a 12-hour drive from there.”
“So we’re going in blind?” I asked. “None of you’ve been there before?”
“That’s kind of the point. To get acquainted with it,” said Camilla. “To get something for the next group to compare when they do another expedition in five or so years.”
“All about long-term cooperation,” smiled Helene. “Like it says on the website.”
Rog leaned over and patted me on the shoulder, holding up his phone.
“I just checked, and you’re not in the group chat.”
We were stuck in that car all day. We reviewed our notes, plans, equipment, and route. Much of what spurred the expedition to begin with were reports of wildlife changes. The indigenous Sámi people had moved their reindeer herds north, claiming that their animals were getting sick from the soil. There’d also been reports of reduced fish population and increased bird migration in the south-west. We were there to measure possible toxins and soil changes to, if possible, determine a cause. But first, we needed samples; which was the meat of the expedition.
There started to pop up little villages along the forest road. Well, maybe not villages, more like loose collections of houses within view of one another. Red houses with white corners and metal roofing. How anyone could live that isolated was beyond me. Still had great phone coverage though, somehow.
We passed through a town with a name I won’t even begin to pronounce or spell. Too many vowels. It was our last stop before we got to the wetlands, so we made sure to stock up. Camilla got us some extra batteries.
When we finally arrived it was dark. We’d been following a gravel road for the past 40 minutes. There were 6 houses in a semi-circle along the road, one of which we’d rented for the night, the rest were abandoned. Camilla dragged her stuff in and collapsed on the living room couch. Helene took the downstairs guest room. There was a second bedroom upstairs with three smaller beds for me and Rog to occupy. I was asleep the moment my head hit the pillow.
The following (early) morning, it was all hands on deck. Helene was preparing sandwiches in the kitchen while Camilla checked our equipment. All batteries charged; all containers properly marked and sorted. She was meticulous, and at 5:30 am, we were ready to go.
I took a moment to soak up the atmosphere. The smells felt alien, yet familiar. The air was buzzing with insects, and I could hear nesting birds in every direction. Despite the four of us being the only people in the area for miles and miles, it felt very much alive. It was a vast forest without a canopy, with the waking sun gazing down on us from an endless sky.
Helene took the lead, with Rog following suit. Then there was Camilla, and finally me. There were paths marked with orange flags showing use the intended way.
“Anyone know any good songs?” asked Helene.
“You could teach us some,” said Rog. “Preferably something we can pronounce.”
“As long as we make noise,” said Camilla. “It keeps the bears away.”
We began our rendition of ‘små grodorna’ as we trotted along the path, going deeper into the wetlands. Minutes later, it was clear to me there’d be no way to navigate the mire without those little flags; everything looked the same. The same trees, the same bushes, the same moss; and no clear paths to follow.
We weaved and bobbed through the mire. We all wore these tall rubber boots and pants, along with backpacks that only reached halfway across our backs. There’d be spots where we’d have to wade through water that could reach over our knees, so we had to keep as dry as possible. It was a pain to walk through, and I could feel a rash growing on my thigh within the first fifteen minutes of walking.
We reached our first site at 7 am. Camilla brought out the testing equipment. She and Rog took turns calling out what kinds of samples they were getting while Helene recorded it all on her laptop. I cataloged and stored everything. Took us about 30 minutes, all in all. As we packed up to move to the second site, Camilla pointed out something in the undergrowth.
“Lots of animals here,” she said. “Look.”
She pointed at the ground, but I saw nothing. I shrugged.
“How do you say it… hjortron? Helene, what’s that in-“
“Cloudberry.”
“Right. There should be cloudberries here. See the petals?”
“What the hell is a cloudberry?” chuckled Rog. “Never heard of it.”
“Makes great jam,” added Helene.
“Maybe we’ll see some further along,” said Camilla. “Where there’re less animals.”
It took us another four hours to get to the second site. We spun around in circles for a while and had to get the satnav to find our way back. Standing out there with water up to my knees, looking for those orange flags… it was scary. Camilla seemed confident though.
“At worst, we’ll just go straight southwest,” she said. “As long as we can see the sun, we can navigate.”
True enough.
When we got to the second site, there was a stretch of dry ground where we could rest. We stopped for lunch. Helene set up a portable stove to make us some coffee while Camilla and Rog got the samples. Soil, water, vegetation, all kinds.
“Still nothing,” said Camilla, poking around the moss with her feet. “No hjortron.”
“Cloudberries,” Rog added.
“Right. Cloudberries. All gone.”
“Is that strange?” I asked.
“Sort of. Reindeer usually don’t go this far out.”
We finished up and moved to site three. We were finished just after dinner time. We had a few more hours until sunset, so we decided to move north. Camilla and Helene had mapped out a place where we could get more reliable samples, and it’d just be a few hours off the trail. There’d be plenty of dry land to set up camp as well, so it didn’t mess with our schedule too much.
When we stepped off the trail and left the orange flags behind, I got this itch along my spine; like I was stepping into something out of my control. Those little flags were the only trace of civilization left. Without them, we were in the deep wilds.
And still, no cloudberries.
We set up camp around 8 pm. The sun was getting low, but we had plenty of flashlights with us. We changed our clothes, set up our tents, and crawled into our sleeping bags. Camilla read an article on erosion, and Helene uploaded her best images to Instagram. Even now, we still had great cell coverage. Rog was taking notes and double-checking our batteries.
I twisted and turned back and forth for hours, but I just couldn’t get any shut-eye. My eyes kept popping back up. Long after the others were asleep, I was still up. It was useless to keep trying, so I decided to walk it off.
I stepped out of the tent and wandered around for a while. The horizon was blood red and the sparse trees cast long gangly shadows across the camp.
A thought hit me; we’d forgotten to set up the mosquito lights. This place ought to be flooded with mosquitoes, but there was nothing. It was all quiet. Not a bird, not an insect, nothing. Just creaking branches, carefully swaying in the wind. Compared to what we’d felt when we first stepped into the mire, this was… dead.
It was almost midnight when I saw something in the distance. There was this long stretch of ankle-deep moss water next to our campsite. I’d looked out across it for at least ten minutes before I realized that one of the trees wasn’t a tree – it was a reindeer.
The thing had been standing perfectly still, not even moving its head. I’d mistaken its antlers for branches. I sat there looking at it for at least half an hour, and in all that time it didn’t move a muscle. Not a twitch of the neck, nothing. Never seen anything like it.
Eventually, I got back in my tent. I barely got any sleep.
The reindeer was gone by morning. I told Camilla about it, and she insisted that they were skittish creatures; they’d stay away from us. Maybe it was just curious.
We got the extra samples early in the morning and started to move east towards our main route. By then we all had soggy feet and a sour mood. Camilla and Rog had a long and intense discussion about preservation efforts and EU regulations, while Helene kept stopping to take pictures for her Instagram.
At around 9 am, we all heard something in the distance. The discussion died down as we all tilted our heads and listened. At first I thought it was a wounded animal. There was this rising and falling squeal, like a big bird call. It took us a few seconds to realize that it was a person.
A monotone scream, over and over. The exact same pitch and tone. This desperate, heart-wrenching death scream.
“Hjälp,” said Helene.” Someone’s calling for help!”
We circled back and tried to locate the sound, but it just seemed to get fainter and fainter; as if whoever called for us moved further away. We tried yelling back, but they didn’t seem to get any closer.
After about half an hour, we couldn’t hear them anymore. Rog was visibly shaken; his cheeks flushed and eyes watery. We were all a bit uneasy about it. Camilla tried to make sense of it, saying it might’ve been an animal, but we couldn’t figure out which one. Still, it had to be an animal. Had to be.
As we made our way to site four, we shared our thoughts. There were a lot of things out there that didn’t add up. No birds, no insects. No animal droppings or markings. It felt off.
We found our way back to the main route with the orange flags. Following them, we spotted something that would come to haunt us forever. On the path ahead was this large overarching tree; much larger than others in the area.
And from the tree hung no less than four reindeer carcasses.
They were seemingly placed there; the antlers tangled into the branches. Dry and tattered flesh dangled like sick fruit. Hooves gently tapping against one another in the mild breeze, like a nightmare wind chime.
Helene put away her phone and Camilla stared, slack jawed. Rog looked at me for reassurance, but I had none to give. Camilla tried to say something but lost the words along the way. Composing herself, she gave it another try.
“Sometimes the, uh… the bears. They hide their prey.”
“This isn’t… this isn’t hiding,” said Rog. “This is full display.”
“I don’t know what to tell you.”
We looked around, spotting strange markings on the bark. Mostly hoofmarks, but also something else.
We were all shaken after seeing it. It haunted me. I could almost imagine hearing the dead hooves if I stopped to listen. Helene had gotten her phone back out and didn’t look up from it.
We got to site four at 1 pm. Same procedure as always. Camilla and Rog got the samples, Helene took notes, I cataloged and stored it. We had a late lunch but couldn’t find anywhere to set up the kitchen to make coffee. We were going into the deeper mire, and dry land was getting sparse.
Following the orange flags, we had to stop several times to navigate. We were coming up on what should be a large lake, but there was nothing there. A slope into more moss, with no trees. If anything, it looked like the water’d been drained. Helene took some pictures, but Camilla was convinced we were off track. There was no way a lake would disappear on its own; we had to be going the wrong way, no matter what the satnav was telling us.
Still, we followed the flags. And just past 2 pm, we got to this enormous open space where the trees spread out. We could see for miles ahead.
And somewhere out there, we heard it. Again, someone calling out for help. The same monotone scream, the same pitch.
This time, we didn’t call back. Instead, we just stood there, listening. We identified at least two sources; one to the north-east, one to our west. The screams were coming from two different directions.
“It has to be a bird,” said Camilla. “A mating call, or a-“
“That’s not a fucking bird,” whispered Helene. “That’s a person.”
“What’s more likely, Helene?” asked Camilla. “That a pair of identical twins are following us and calling out to us, or that we’re hearing the echoes of a nesting bird?”
“I don’t think anyone here is an ornithologist,” said Rog. “So we can’t tell for sure. But yeah, I don’t think that’s a person.”
“It’s saying ‘hjälp’. Birds can’t pronounce ‘l’ or ‘p’. Say what you want, but that’s something else.”
We went through site five and stopped for the night halfway to site six. I was getting nervous. I kept imagining that repeated call for help out in the mire. I thought I saw antlers among the dead trees a few times. I was getting paranoid. Site six was our furthest point before we started to circle back, but this was dangerous territory. One sprained ankle could mean aborting this whole expedition.
The orange flags had stopped some time ago – they didn’t reach across our whole route. We were on our own from this point forward. Camilla was confident though, and with only three more sites to go we were ahead of schedule.
There was barely enough dry land for us to set up our tents, but we made it work. The ground was moist, and I had a puddle of something cold next to my feet. It was uncomfortable, to say the least.
I collapsed into an uneasy, but welcome, sleep.
Rog gently shook me awake sometime in the middle of the night. He held a finger to his lips and motioned his hand to his ear, as if telling me to listen.
There was that scream again – and it was much closer.
I dressed myself and got out of the tent. Camilla and Helene were already up. We all huddled together at the edge of our camp, looking out across the mire. It was too dark to see, but the screamer couldn’t be far off. Camilla held up her flashlight and gave us a nod. We nodded back. We had to see what this thing was.
She turned on the flashlight.
There were a dozen reindeer, about sixty feet ahead of us. All standing at the exact same angle, looking directly at us. No one blinking, moving, or recoiling from the light. We all froze, not wanting to make any sudden movement. These were supposed to be timid woodland creatures, but something was off.
One of them slightly opened its mouth, stared at us, and called out a perfectly human ‘hjälp’.
Helene covered her mouth, holding back a scream. The reindeer, one by one, called out to us. All with the same mechanical movements and identical voice. Hjälp.
It was fucking eerie.
Rog decided enough was enough and got up. He tried to make himself big, stretching out his arms and waving them up and down. He huffed and yelled, trying to scare them off. They didn’t react in the slightest. That is, until the reindeer at the very front turned its head to look directly at him.
It slowly raised its front legs and leaned backwards. In a matter of seconds it was standing upright, like a human. The others coalesced around it, circling like a school of sharks – all while screaming out, over and over, calling for help.
“Don’t… don’t provoke it,” whispered Camilla. “They’re… they’re sick. They look sick.”
“We should go,” said Helene. “Right now.”
No one argued. Camilla stood guard while the rest of us packed up as quickly as possible, all to the sound of constant screams for help. We were sloppy, but considering the panic I had building in my chest it was a miracle we got anything at all.
Rog and I were halfway through stuffing the tent into its bag when we heard something. Movement in the woods, and another scream for help. This time, from the west. Rog got another flashlight and checked it out.
As he turned it on, I could see a dozen more eyes looking back at us.
They were much, much closer.
“They’re everywhere,” gasped Rog. “They’re everywhere.”
“It’s… it’s a herd,” said Helene. “The Sámi, they used to move herds through-“
She was interrupted by another scream. This one by a reindeer right next to us, within arm’s reach of Camilla. But the scream was lower, drawn-out, and much clearer. The upright reindeer in the middle of the mire was still standing there, staring at us.
As the scream died down, we all held our breaths. No one wanted to move. No one wanted to act. It all hung on a thread-bare balance, and anything could tip the scales.
Then, chaos.
Hooves came trampling through camp. These massive 300-pound creatures, running completely wild. Knocking into one another, crashing through bushes, running headfirst into trees, stumbling over rocks and roots. They were like frenzied sharks, smelling blood in the air.
One of the reindeer reared up and bore down on Camilla over and over again. I could hear her chest snap as all air was pressed from her lungs. Her flashlight tumbled out of her hands, rolled into the mossy water, and was swallowed by the dark.
Rog took off running, but didn’t get far. One of them bit into his arm as he tried to get past, sending him reeling into the ground. From there they had no trouble pounding him into a pulp; heavy hooves breaking bones like they were dry pasta.
It was absolutely, dreadfully morbid.
I crawled on all fours, trying to keep out of sight. There were so many of them, but they only seemed to attack what was directly ahead of them. Still, one might stumble over me and decide to kill me, but I was running out of options. I kept to the ground and moved slowly. My hands sinking into the inch-deep moss, the ice-cold water floating to the surface. My veins ached. There was screaming all around me, and somewhere in the torrent of wails, both Rog and Camilla had gone silent.
One of them almost tripped over me, giving me a mild kick to the chest. I say “mild” only because it didn’t kill me, but I’m pretty sure it bruised a couple of ribs. Another stepped on my thigh, ripping open a two-inch long cut along the side. Still, little by little, I made it out.
I kept going forward. No matter the sound, no matter the pain, I kept going.
As the sun rose, I couldn’t hear them anymore. I’d collapsed in the moss, panting like I’d run a marathon. There were no songbirds, no insects; nothing. Just me, the sun, and the mire.
I used the elastic band from my underwear to make a makeshift bandage, using dry moss from a tree to soak up the blood. It wasn’t a deep cut, but it could easily get infected. I could still stand, but I felt this sting of pain in my chest with every breath I took. I could see a deep bruise forming, going straight from blue to a reddish purple.
I was lost. I was in the middle of nowhere, with little to no equipment.
I’ve never been so freaked out in my entire life.
I screamed and cried. I don’t know for how long. One moment I wanted to lie down and just wait for someone to find me. The next moment I wanted to run blindly straight ahead.
After a while, I composed myself. I thought about what I’d learned about the area, and what I’d seen. I knew there were flags put up along safe routes. I could also use the sun to navigate. If I went straight south-west, I should stumble upon the flags again. From there, I’d just have to follow them. I’d either pop back out where we started, or on the other side of the wetlands.
Still, either way would be a long walk, and there were no guarantees that I’d make it.
But I had to try.
I tried not to think. Not to reflect. I focused on the road ahead, and the position of the sun – everything else was secondary. But every flash of what happened that night felt like a cut in my stomach. The way Camilla’s flashlight disappeared. Roger’s scream with that first bite.
The only one I couldn’t account for was Helene.
I hoped against hope that she got out. That she had the same idea as me. Maybe I’d meet her down the line. If not, I could tell the police there was at least one person unaccounted for. They’d have to send a rescue party.
I must’ve walked for hours. It is surreal to walk in a space where all you hear is yourself. There’s usually some sort of external sound; a car passing by, a squawking bird, a humming motor. Something, somewhere, off in the distance. Out there, there was nothing. Just the ever-present crackling sound of dry branches snapping under my heels as I limped forward, step by step.
I lost all concept of time and swayed back and forth between single-minded purpose and scatterbrained despair. But in a moment of clarity, I stopped to listen.
The screams again.
They were ahead of me, so they weren’t following; they were merely in the area. I flinched as I saw branches move in the wind. My reptile brain thought they were antlers. I hunkered down and listened.
Helene.
This scream wasn’t like the others. It wasn’t the same sound, over and over. They were different and irregular. She wasn’t screaming for help, but in pain. She was alive.
Now, I had two choices. I could try and keep moving until I found the flags, and just hope to get out somehow. Or I could try to find Helene and her things. She had the satnav, last time I checked.
It was a battle between my instincts and my reasoning. I’d be putting myself in danger either way. But if I could help her, in any way, I had to try. At the very least I could try to fetch some supplies.
I followed Helene’s screaming. She was heading straight north, deeper into the mire. She was on the move. Slowly, but surely. I measured the distance. After a while, she stopped screaming. I figured she’d passed out.
It took me about an hour of searching before I found something. There was a young tree that’d been stripped of leaves and covered in blood, like someone had grabbed the bottom of it and dragged their hand along it. There were clear red stains across the leaves. There was no trail to follow, but I could hear something moving to the north. Maybe more reindeer. Maybe Helene.
The ground started to get muddy. There were algae and reeds drying in the sun. I could hear screaming in the distance. Not like Helene. Not like a person. Just those creatures, pretending to be people.
But there were more of them now. So many more. I could hear dozens of them, screaming back and forth. Screaming for help.
I pushed on. I had to see. To know. There was something up ahead, and I needed answers.
There was a small hill, and after that, a sudden drop. I crouched at the edge, looking down.
There was this… dried out lake with a deep crack in the ground going down the middle, revealing parts of a dark underground cave through the mud and debris. I could smell the moss drying in the sun. It must’ve been mid-day by then, and the sun was casting harsh shadows across the mire.
There were hundreds of reindeer. Hundreds. Some standing up, others shuffling along on all fours. All moving in a circle around the crack in the ground, where something massive moved.
Some of the reindeer were dragging things along. Pieces of flesh. Dead birds and fish. I could’ve sworn one of them was dragging parts of Camilla’s tent. They were neatly lined up and took turns dumping whatever prize they had into the crevice. Those who had nothing to contribute stayed on the sidelines, eating. Everything looked so different in this light, I could’ve sworn most of the moss and flowers they ate looked strangely blue.
And there, among the debris, was Helene. Her unconscious body was being unceremoniously dragged through the mud and dumped in front of the crevice. I could see her head moving, struggling to regain consciousness. I could see her mouth moving, but there was no way to hear her over the wailing screams of the creatures.
But for a short moment, I could’ve sworn she saw me. Just a moment of recognition.
Then, without a sound, something emerged from the crevice. A long bone-white hand, large enough to wrap its fingers across her chest, carefully dragging her into the dark.
For a moment, the reindeer got quiet. An awful crunch echoed through the makeshift clearing, and seconds later, the reindeer made a new sound. This time, in Helene’s voice. A tired, barely conscious voice.
“Come down,” it said. “Help me.”
These four words were repeated, over and over, by all of them. In her voice. In all constellations and combinations.
“Come help. Help come. Down. Help. Help down.”
The horrid screams, replaced by a dying whisper. A whisper intended for me.
I was too afraid to move. I stayed there, looking down. Every now and then, that large bone-white arm would emerge. Sometimes to put away something inedible, sometimes to grab hold of a reindeer to drag into the deep. At one point, a white finger touched the forehead of a reindeer, making it stand up on its hindlegs like a humanoid. Those who stood up seemed to be of great importance, as the others circled them.
But there was no one to save, and there was nothing left for me to gather. All that was left was for me to leave, and never look back.
I kept going south. Every now and then, I’d hear them. A whisper of “come help me” making its way through the sparse vegetation.
“Come.”
“Come help.”
“Help me.”
These things were everywhere, and they were looking for me. Reindeer have a great sense of smell, so I took a short dip in stale lake water to hide my smell. My leg would definitely get infected.
I limped my way through the undergrowth, stopping only to listen for clues on what paths to avoid.
By nightfall, I still hadn’t found any flags. My leg was in such a burning pain that I couldn’t lean on it anymore, and my muscles ached. I was constantly out of breath, not wanting to draw too much air into my lungs. But I had to keep going. There was a good chance that I’d die out there if I had to spend the night in the open. Temperatures could easily dip into freezing.
Once the blood red sunset started to gleam in the distance, I knew I was short on time. My hands were shaking, and I could barely stand. I could barely move. Everything in me wanted to just sit down and hope for everything to be okay in the morning. It was so easy to trick myself into doing so, but I just kept going.
I stopped. There was something up ahead.
I caught a glimpse of eyes, reflecting the setting sun. For a moment, they locked onto me. And a second later, it burst into a sprint.
I thought I was done for. I had no fight left in me. I turned to run, but I only made it a few steps before I tripped.
Then, a gunshot.
The reindeer collapsed next to me. Those big black eyes meeting mine. It struggled to breathe.
“Help… help me,” it whispered, in Helene’s voice. “Come down. Come help me. Come.”
It didn’t understand what it was saying. It was just… noise. But there was something there, and as that reindeer opened its mouth to speak again, I caught a glimpse of it. Something thin and bone-white, lingering far down its throat. Something vaguely humanoid. A second pair of eyes, looking up.
Then, another gunshot.
I was blinded by a flashlight. There were three men, all speaking Swedish. All dressed in some kind of logging company jackets, with trucker caps. They all had these yellow reflexive vests on them. I told them I didn’t understand, and they changed to heavily accented English.
“British? American?” one of them asked.
“American,” I said. “We… there was… I…”
“Attack, yes? They attack,” he nodded. “We know, we know. Come.”
The three men dragged the reindeer away, tied a rope around its antlers, and made a great effort to hoist it up a nearby tree. Just like the tree I’d seen with the others just days prior.
“Keeps them here,” said the man who’d helped me. “Make a… gräns. Border?”
“Like a… a warning,” I added.
“Yes, like a warning,” he nodded. “They understand.”
We looked up at the dead body, hanging from the tree.
“They… smarter, here. Know more.”
I was taken back to their base camp. About eight people living in caravans. They gave me fresh clothes, hot dogs, beer, and warmed me up by the fire. They disinfected my thigh and stitched me up. While I tried to sleep off my upcoming fever, they called the police, and the embassy in Stockholm.
And the next day, I was on a plane back to the states, like nothing ever happened.
The aftermath has been pretty much… nothing. It was classified as an animal attack and dismissed. I talked to a few people from the AWC about it, and they called it a “sincerely regretful incidence” and asked me to “remain discrete” as to not discourage future climate change studies. The AWC still operate in that area, by the way. I’ve gotten no answers as to what they’ve done with the soil samples, or if they ever looked into what I saw in the mire. All I know is that no one wants to talk to me about it.
The only people I’ve gotten answers from were the hunters. They were eager to share their stories, claiming that the government refuses to listen. I’m still in e-mail contact with some of them, and there’s… a lot to unpack. But in short;
There was a quake in the mire. Something came out of the lake. It did something to the wildlife in the area. It stole hundreds of reindeer from local Sámi herds. It seems to be expanding; stopping only where it finds immediate and violent resistance.
And over time, it seems to learn.
This was some time ago, and I don’t feel comfortable revealing the entire timeline. I don’t want to give anyone more reason to silence me. But I know this is bound to happen again. Something similar happened in West Virginia back in 2013. A lake drained in Greenbrier Valley, and then all hell broke loose.
It’s only a matter of time before it happens somewhere more public.
And when it does, remember;
It seems to learn.