How Many Monsters?

Fear and anger both burn in my chest. An unpredictable combination.

My brother stands to the side, doubled over with laughter. Now is hardly the time for joy. The Unnamed is closing in. Twilight is a dangerous time to be outside. Yet here he is, his eyes wet from laughing so much.

“What is your issue?” I snap at him. We need to get home.

He wheezes. “I can’t believe… Mom painted the literal headlights! She’s painted over them! In black, too! Oh my god, this is hilarious!” He doubles over again, his hand smacking the hood of the car.

I stand up fast, and see what he’s talking about. Oh, for Pete’s sake. Mom went on a “decorating spree” a few days ago, painting the car in what she thought would repel anything looking to eat us while we were on our excursions. The horrible yellow-green color she used repels a lot more than any beasts headed our way.

And she’s painted the headlights pure black. I have no idea what possibly could have compelled her to think that was a good idea. Her head is nearly always in the clouds; it can be hard to get her to take anything seriously these days. My brother, Bear, has finally finished wheezing. I climb into the driver’s seat, my pulse steadily climbing. I don’t have anything I can scrape the paint off with, and the woods around us are already beginning to look foreboding. Winter always brings shorter days, but even this is a little early. I sigh as I turn the car on, Bear still chuckling beside me as he climbs into the passenger seat.

“It isn’t funny,” I say, anger making me short-tempered. “It’s nearly twilight. The Unnamed will be here soon. And now we don’t have headlights. How would you make anyone feel better about that?”

“Well.” He pauses. “The car isn’t dead, at least.”

“Oh, don’t jinx it.” I keep the car at a faster pace than normal, the beginnings of the Unnamed seeping between the pine trees. Unfortunately for me and my family, we live in an unnecessarily haunted-looking part of the forest. Even the squirrels have fangs.

The road ahead is well-paved, no potholes in sight. That will likely change as the winter grows deeper. I check the car’s battery level. Thirty percent. Beatrice is an older electric model, but this should be enough to get home, assuming I don’t mess up and get lost. The drive back from the canyon is about an hour. I pray we’re home before the Unnamed sets in for the night.

The Unnamed is both a harbinger of doom (not an exaggeration) and a protector. It wards off the truly horrible beasts, but that doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. Most of the smaller nocturnal creatures here travel in packs, with sharp teeth and haunting cries. The only time I ever saw a lone beast was when we first got here. I was new to the Unnamed. I made a mistake. I’m lucky I lived.

It’s dark without the headlights, and I know it’ll only get darker. We’ve just passed the halfway-home marker Mom made us put in when Beatrice makes a high-pitched sound. She starts slowing down even as I push the accelerator pedal. “Shit, shit, shit.” I mutter. “Bad time, Bea. C’mon. C’mon.” The battery reads seventeen percent.

Bear looks out the window, his fingers tapping on his leg. He smacks his lips nervously, and the sound grates in my ears like nails on chalkboard. My face twists when he does it again. I slap his arm gently.

“Sorry,” he whispers. “I always forget.”

Not a great excuse, but we don’t have time for that. I get out of the car and survey the area. The trees tower above us, moonlight sprinkling through the sparse clouds. The ground is covered in a thin layer of mud, which is strange, because it hasn’t rained recently. Any rain now would likely turn into snow.

There isn’t any wind, but my jacket feels useless all the same. My breath escapes my mouth in little clouds. There’s a lack of noise that my ears pick up almost instantly. Bear casually pulls out a gun he keeps in the car and stands by the driver’s side with the door open, ready to jump back in the car. A gun would do little more than annoy whatever beast that might decide to hunt us, but it makes him feel more protected to have it.

A twig crunches under my boot as I walk around the car, examining. Mom’s the engineer, but she hasn’t been very helpful since Dad disappeared. Nothing seems majorly amiss, so I gesture for Bear to try to get the car to move. It doesn’t budge.

We keep bicycles on the back of the car in case something like this were to happen. Thankfully, Mom remembered to put them back on after painting Beatrice, but they’re harder to ride after dark. They’ve got flashlights on them, but at this point it’s too dangerous to use them. It would attract too much attention.

A tree branch creaks in the wood. Bear and I freeze, our eyes wide and observing. My mind is thrumming, absorbing any piece of information I can get from my surroundings. I breathe faster, and slowly take a step towards the car. The Unnamed is nearly fully upon us. A thin line of mist wreaths itself around my ankle. I’ve long wondered if the Unnamed was somehow sentient. If it could sense intruders. I pray it can’t.

No more sounds come from the wood. I really don’t want to leave Beatrice here, but maybe we can come back in the morning with Mom. I worry Beatrice won’t be here in the morning. We are not the only people in this wood.

There is at least one group I know of that takes advantage of the Unnamed. I’ve seen them only a few times, but they hunt some of the creatures that roam at night. They generally stay out of our part of the forest and we theirs, but we are far out of our territory right now. I hate to think about what would happen if we lost Bea.

I walk around to Bear. “We should take the bikes home.”

He looks surprised. “There’s no way she’d still be here in the morning.”

I look up into the forest, scanning instinctively. “We can’t stay here. Something will find us, Bear, and I’d really not like to die tonight.”

His shoulders dip a bit. “I know. I just, what are we gonna do without the car? We can’t bike to the canyon everyday and back. It would take too long.”

“We’ll make a few trips to get our supplies back, then we can find somewhere else. Look, I’m not saying I want to leave her. But I’d rather lose the car than my life.”

“Fine.” He stands up. “But we’ll check first thing in the morning.”

“We can bring Mom out to examine her.” I take our bikes off the rack. My nose wrinkles at the mud. “We’re going to leave tracks.”

“It’s fine. The animals usually leave this road alone.”

There’s a first time for everything. And tonight feels off, in the air. The lack of noise. I keep myself alert.

I lock the car doors. We load as much of our supplies as we can onto the bikes. Our equipment is important to our research of this place. When we first got here, Dad, Mom, and I would run experiments on the Unnamed. We measured when it arrived, how long it took to fully settle in for the night. When it went away. Then Dad disappeared, and Mom’s not the same. I can’t tell if she ever will be. If she even wants to be.

Nothing more than the occasional creak of wood reaches my ears while we ride. I can feel my pulse rocketing inside my body, my eyes darting to each side. I hear the sound of wood breaking, somewhere to the right. Loud.

Nothing happens.

Nothing happens.

Nothing happens.

I try to calm my heart down. I have no intentions of passing out on top of a bike. We’re nearly home, anyway.

It takes me a moment to realize what’s off.

I can’t hear Bear’s bike.

I don’t stop pedaling, terror for my own life keeping me going. I take a look over my shoulder, but I don’t see him. A mangled piece of metal sits on the road a ways back. I try not to scream, with either panic or grief. I really don’t want to live this life alone with Mom. I’d go crazy. My baby brother.

No more sounds come from either side of the forest. The Unnamed is strong now, clinging to my bike. My chest feels empty, like someone hit pause on the emotional movie of my heart. My hands and feet feel numb, even buried under layers of gloves and socks. My face is not any different. I blink rapidly, holding back sound. I can’t cry now. I’m too close to home. A messed-up version of safety in this D-list world.

I pedal faster, the wind stealing my tears. My eyes feel cold. Another mile goes by. I’m going too fast down a hill. I can’t think straight. My bike tips. I’m unaccustomed to the extra weight of the equipment on the back of the bike. I fall.

My knee is bleeding. My hands are bleeding. Blood draws the monsters. Draws them close. Too close. My head throbs. I don’t feel my heart.

I need to get up, but the world is moving too slow. There are no stars above. None to save me from the fate of my brother. Only the moon stares down at me through the slivers in the clouds.

Take me, I try to scream. Take my soul and then my body. Don’t leave me here. Not with a woman who doesn’t know the taste of life anymore. Don’t leave me with a broken mind and broken bones.

A sniffle slips out my mouth. I don’t stop myself as a sob follows.

The Unnamed seems to fold itself around me.

It tickles.

I close my eyes and draw up my knees and give away my hope to the cold caress of loss.

There are many monsters in this wood.

One cries on the ground. It does not know hate yet, like the others.

A different kind of monster watches.

A shadow passes.

The wood is silent again.