Pandora’s Box...The Gift

TONIGHT THE FOREST KEEPS ANOTHER SECRET.

IT CHANNELS THROUGH THE LIMBS OF EVERY TREE THEN DISAPPEARS …FOREVER

“STOP!” Cry’s a distraught young man, “Don’t come any closer!,” he persists, backing up aimlessly.

“PLEASE!” He begs desperately, but again his pleas are ignored. He staggers haphazardly on overturned furniture, weaving through an abandoned cabin.

The room barely lit. The emanating flashes belong to the damaged fixtures above. Each charge sparks light over the unknown faces accompanying him in the room, freezing their cunning advances, moment by moment.

The young man continues to step back, sinking deeper into a corner, anxiously warning the eight strangers again.

“I’M BEGGING YOU, I DON’T WANT TO DO THIS!”

His words drowning into the night, over powered by the overwhelming desire to carry out their orders.

“DON’T MAKE ME DO THIS”, handing them his final warning, but nothing changed their course. The heavily armed men gradually gathering closer together to surround him.

Inch by inch they crept like lions, hungry for a meal. With synchronizing motion, the team assesses each one of their steps, carefully registering the precise path toward the assailant. Patiently waiting for that instance to pounce.

Treading lightly the team carry’s their momentum forward, tightly forming a secure perimeter around their mark believing that the juveniles apprehension was eminent.

Scanning the circumstances of his predicament, the lad realizes that he isn’t leaving without a fight. His demeanour now altered, he wasn’t cowering in that corner afraid and unsure, he just wished to be left alone.

Closing his eyes and taking a lasting breath, he split the intense silence. No longer was terror filling his voice, just ice cold certainty.

“You’re all going to die!”

Suddenly, everything in the cabin began to rattle, shift and shake. The wood logs beneath their feet loosening and pulling apart.

Surprisingly, the unknown figures parted ways with arrogance in favour of anxiety and disbelief. Yet their bravado pushes their curiosity against better judgment. They were eager to see what comes next.

The soldier to the left of his Colonel frantically questioned for some guidance.“Pearce, what the hell is going on?”

“Hold your ground Gents!” Pearce shouted, “And maintain your positions,” ordering his crew to stay put.

Doing as they were told, each man holding tight to anything that wasn’t shaking, but as quick as the quake materialize, it subsided just as fast with a few mild aftershocks, then stopping.

Regaining composed, the tactical group focus returned, aimed on their target. Except something was very wrong. An eerily shaped human like object took the place of the young man.

It defied description, it was something neatly resembling a person, identical in fact to the one that was standing in that very spot, but it wasn’t human.

It was liquid in substance, reflective and holding the qualities of mercury. The men stared at this ominous figure, but none could understand or guess what it was.

“DAN”, whispered the soldier to the left of the Colonel, “WHAT IS”, hesitating briefly, then motioned with his head towards the unidentified object in the corner, “THAT?”, darting his eyes back at the Colonel in search of a response.

Colonel Pearce could only muster under his breath, “How in the hell should I know”, trying hard to keep his wits on the task at hand, when he noticed movement in his peripheral.

“KRAMER!” Pearce yelled toward the man positioned at the far end of the room...“DON’T DO ANYTHING STUPID!” Kramer was a giant of a man, hulking in size over the others.

He began raising his rifle, looking to engage the entity. Once his rugged jaw met the hard metal, he was set!

With his ice-cold steely blue eyes, he peered through the lens of the night vision scope and just like the scratch of a matchstick, the broken fixture above their heads sparked and in a that flash, Major Kramer simultaneously and blindly opened fire.

The clatter of bullets spit out from the end of the barrel, the shells dripped like rain to the ground. Everyone squinting from the blistering bright blasts and shortly after the smoke had finally settled, they saw that nothing happened, this thing had absorbed each one of his slugs.

The soldiers were taken aback by what they witnessed, but not Major Kramer, he stood moderately impressed and not intimidated or immobile by the outcome.

He dropped his gun and casually proceeded to reach around his waist to grab his knife, but when he gripped the handle ready to spring it from its sheath a blaze of light streaked blindingly past them. The Majors body suddenly slumped forward, crumpling to its knees and slammed to the floor, headless.

Watching the horrific event unfold. The remaining men urgently recalling those chilling words and how grave they rang true.

It happened so strikingly quick, the ammunition swallowed by the thing in the corner was used in return fire and like a cannon ball, severing Major Kramer’s head from the rest of his massive frame.

Terrified, the leftover soldiers did what most men do given their situation, they looked to exact their own brand of justice, seeking revenge for their fallen friend, but they were wrong..., dead wrong!

And at will, shots were firing and spraying out from every direction all aimed at one target; the room lit up like a Christmas tree.

Each explosive blaze of light was seen across the nights sky, yet these brilliant glowing charges were followed closely by screams of agony and deathly cries for mercy.

When suddenly, the screaming stopped and in a moment, stark silence swept through the air, the cabin and across the lush thick woods.

The only sound, a cooing owl in the distance.

Then rumbling noises spilling from within as rapid shuffling of footsteps gathered speed, scampering over debris and broken glass until ... out walked the young man, unscathed and unharmed from the battle that ensued behind the front door he pushed open.

Gauging the area, he ensures that there aren’t any other threats waiting to attack. He bursts into a run and disappeared into the shadows!

....

Four hundred and eighty-two kilometres away, another similar event occurs.