Holly hid in the hay loft and cried. She could still hear the dieing screams of her friends as the monster from the woods ripped them to shreds with his teeth and claws.
This was supposed to be a good day for Holly and her friends. A happy day. The last day they would have together before they all went away to separate colleges next week.
They had finished their senior year of high school, and were determined to cram in as much time together in their last summer together as possible.
They had hung out at each other's houses more often than not, went on camping trips, had barbecues, hung out at the mall or a park quite a bit, and yes, they had gone hiking a lot just like they had today. Today's activities did not go as planned however. Far from it.
They had met up early at a public access spot near the river. One normally used to put boats in the water, but that was not the plan. They just needed somewhere to park their cars.
There were seven of them at the start. Holly had shown up with her best friends Maggie, Jamie, and Carroll. They were quickly joined by Holly's boyfriend Bill and his two friends Matt and Jeff.
They started at eight in the morning, and the plan to hike as far as they could by noon, when they would stop and have a nice picnic lunch before continuing on in a round about way that would hopefully lead them back to their cars by the time it was starting to get dark. Then they would go out for a bite to eat together, the perfect end to what was to be the perfect day.
How did it go so wrong?
The day had been wonderful. They hiked and had their picnic. Then hiked some more. Everything was fine for the next two hours or so after they ate.
But then they met that horrible man.
They had been walking, talking and laughing. Not a care in the world. Holly was holding Bill's hand wondering what would happen to them next week when they went off to different schools, when they walked into a small clearing and what could only be described as something straight out of a horror movie.
There was blood everywhere. A dead deer laying in the middle of the clearing. It had been torn apart. A man was squatting down beside the deer. He was naked and covered in the deers blood.
The naked man was gulping down a chunk of raw deer when he was interrupted by Matt.
"What the Hell?"
The naked man now looked up at them and swallowed the chunk of deer that was in his mouth. They all starred at one another for a long time.
The man then put a bloody finger in his mouth to suck the blood off of it. He pulled the finger out with a wet popping sound and got to his feet.
The man had no modesty, and was not at all ashamed of how the friends had found him. "I'm sorry." He said. Then stepped aside and pointed at the dead deer. "Do you want to get in on this? It's really delicious. "
"No thanks." Bill said as everyone seemed to know what to do at the same time they all started to back away from the blood covered man.
"Don't go!" The man said as he took a step towards them.
They all stopped and looked at him again, not sure what to do.
"It's really rude to interrupt a man while he eats, then turn down his invitation to join him."
Bill once again answered for everyone. "No thanks. We have to go now."
Holly would have already been running away if Bill had not been holding her hand.
"Run and I'll kill you! " The man was almost yelling now. "Stay, and we can have us some fun. Doesn't that sound nice to you?" He was all smiles as he took another step towards them. He stopped and his smile faded when Bill pulled out a handgun and pointed it at the man.
Bill let go of Holly's hand and put himself between the man and his friends.
Holly couldn't believe what she was seeing. "Bill! Why did you bring that?"
"Just in case." He shrugged. "You never know."
"No you don't. " the man was frowning as he looked at Bill. "You better be absolutely sure about this boy. I do not like to be interrupted while I eat. I do not like rude people declining my friendly invitation to join me while I eat. But even more than that, I hate people that threaten me with guns."
"Just stay away from us!" Bill yelled at the man. "We're leaving. "
The man smiled as he noticed that Bill's hand was shaking as he pointed the gun at him. He could resist no longer. He jumped forward and screamed, "BOO!"
Bill fired the gun. He must have panicked when the gun went off because he kept firing until the gun was empty.
Nobody moved. The man stood their with a look of shock on his face. Most of the bullets had hit him. One had even hit him in the head.
The man was the first to break the dead silence that had fallen after the gun shots. He started laughing. "You brought the wrong kind of bullets." He said as the bullet holes in his body began to pucker up and spit out the bullets with wet kissing sounds before healing up completely.
Everyone was stunned at what they were seeing. The man took two big steps to stand in front of Bill, but by then, the man was no longer human.
He was now about seven feet tall and covered with hair. His head looked like a dogs head.
The monster grabbed Bill and lifted him into the air before he tore him in two. Everyone was running now.
The monster's inhuman voice screamed at them. "Yes! Run! Run! Run as fast as you can!" Holly thought the sound it made after saying this kind of sounded like laughter, then her blood went cold as the monster made a new sound. It sounded like a cross between a lion's roar and a human scream.
Holly lost track of everyone except for Maggie, Jamie, and Jeff. The four of them tried to stay together as best they could.
Maggie stopped running when she heard Carroll screaming. Jeff yelled at her. "Keep going! We can't help her!"
Carroll's screaming stopped as quickly as it had started. Maggie was crying. "But she's our friend." She pleaded.
Jeff almost stopped to go to her. But as he looked back at her and started to slow down, the monster landed on the ground beside Maggie with one great leap. It locked it's jaws around her head and then crushed her skull with its mouth before running back into the tree's dragging her body along with his teeth.
The three remaining friends had lost their way in the woods with their panicked running, but they managed to stay together.
Finally the woods dissapeared and turned into a cornfield. And they stopped at the edge. "Did we lose it?" Jamie asked.
As if to answer her, they could hear the monster's screams coming towards them once more.
"Run!" Jeff yelled before running into the cornfield. Holly and Jamie wasted no time following him.
Holly was running next to Jamie with Jeff just a few feet ahead them. But then two large hairy hands grabbed Jeff and he dissapeared into the corn screaming.
His screams did not last long.
Holly and Jamie kept running. They ran until the cornfield dissapeared around them and they found themselves running across a barnyard.
They headed straight to the farmhouse in the middle of the place, but the monster cut them off. "I win!" It snarled. The two girls turned and ran off in two separate directions.
The monster must have followed Jamie, because Holly made it to the barn and went inside to hide.
As she hid in the hay loft she could hear Jamie start to scream before everything went quiet. All she could do was cry.
Then she heard a voice. It took her a moment to realize that it was Matt. He had made it to the farm here at the end of the cornfield and was yelling at the house as he moved towards it.
"Help us!" He called. "Is anyone here?"
Holly wanted to yell at him to be quiet. That the monster was here. But she was too afraid of giving away her hiding place. So she just listened and hoped that the monster had moved on.
Then she heard the sound of a window being smashed followed by Matt's screams as the monster got ahold of him.
Holly stayed hidden in the hay loft and cried. All of her friends were now dead. This was supposed to have been a good day. A happy day. How could it have gone so wrong? Why did this have to happen?
She stayed in the hay loft for what seemed like hours before she started to move.
But as she stood up, the monster entered the barn. He had turned back into a human at this point.
He walked into the barn just as naked as when she and her friends had found him. The only difference was that the blood now covering his body was that of her friends.
Holly didn't know what to do.
"There's no point in hiding now." The man called out to her before putting a finger in his mouth to suck her friends blood of it. He pulled the finger out with a wet popping sound. "I can smell you girl. Don't make me come up there and get you."
"You killed my friends! " She yelled at him.
"Yes I did. They did not do so well in our little game. But you... You did better than I would have expected." He started to suck the blood off of another finger. "Now get down here. I will not ask nicely again. "
Reluctantly Holly did as she was told. She knew she was going to die now. Might as well get it over with.
He watched her climb down out of the hay loft. Now licking blood off the back of his hand. "Come here." He said when Holly had climbed down.
Holly did as she was told.
"Now. Are you ready to die?"
Holly started crying again.
"Oh please. Non off that now. I told you that if you run, I would kill you. You and your friends lost far and square. "
Holly just sobbed as she waited for the killing blow.
The man just looked at her for a long moment then smiled at her. "This was fun, wasn't it? "
Holly didn't answer.
"Of course it was. But I am thinking why should the fun end here? Would you like to live?"
Holly just stood there.
"I asked you a question. Would you like to live? "
Holly nodded through her tears.
"Are you willing to play the game again? "
Holly just starred at him.
He leaned towards her and started sniffing at her hair. "I have your sent now girl. Go home. I will track you down. Once you have new friends we will play again." With that the man left.
Holly fell to her knees and cried.
Ps. This is work of fiction
