The Kalamalka Sacrifices

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. The flickering flame danced seldomly as broken panes of glass in thick pine boarded windows invited crisp oxygen into the stuffy, stagnant wood enclosure. Night after night, week after week, month after long-isolated month, the cabin shared no new memories with any new visitors yet, there it was—a pricket with a candle impaled upon its base and a flame that swayed back and forth. No additional light beside the moons could penetrate the window of the pitch-black interior of the cabin but you could tell someone or something was moving inside.

The cabin was located off a popular hikers trail outside of Vernon, British Columbia. Kalamalka Lake Provincial Park is known for its thick dense gathering of pine trees and breathtaking views of the Okanagan Lake and Valley. No time was more beautiful than on a warm summer evening when the sun was just about to retreat behind the hills and the moon stood guard, its light softly reflecting off of the water's surface. As beautiful as this sight was, deep within the thick of the forest, a cabin sat empty.

The cabin had been built from Ponderosa Pine and was erected in the late 1800s. The porch had plank floors that lay atop its pine base, held together by thick Rosehead nails, each six inches away from the last. This continued throughout the structure. Decaying, brittle poles of pine held up the canopy rooftop; its 2 x 3 panel-plank shingles curling at the edges from moisture damage over time. The porch wrapped right, all the way from the front door to the back door, and embodied five windows. One on the front of the cabin, next to a chipped and faded pine door, another on the right-side large enough for a person to fit their head into, two at the back (although one was off to the top left on this face of the cabin), and the last one on the left side of where the porch did not reach. Four of the five windows had glass panels in them fastened by a cross pattern of pine and seemed to be the only renovated attempt made to the cabin since it was built. The front door's color was patchy with white paint splotches dotted around it. It didn't have a door knob as much as it sported a thick steel latch with a ring-leader used to open it. As the sun went down and the moon began to shed its cool, ambient light across the forest, the candle in the cabin window continued to burn as fog cascaded amidst the forest's floor.

Inside the cabin, past the threshold of the grumbling roll composed by the hinges of the front door and the heavy thud and clank of the steel latch were; a single bed to the left, a two-person table with chairs in the center, a grimey stain-covered toilet in the back-right with flies buzzing around it and a kitchenette on the right wall accompanied by an antique wooden ice box. The whole cabin was run down, dusty, and had been abandoned for many, many years.

Until now.

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Rosie was an ambitious young woman. She just celebrated her seventeenth birthday. Instead of gifts at her birthday party, she asked her loved ones and friends to bring non-perishable food items for a food bank donation. She was that kind of girl-- Always thinking of others rather than herself. The teen was 5' 8", with dark black hair, brown skin, and a very unique style of clothing choices. Her favorite items of clothing to wear were summer dresses when it was hot outside and jeans with a hoodie when it was cold. She was confident, artistic, caring, and was aiming to attend the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. She had a true passion for Wildlife Preservation Studies and was somewhat a Dr. Doolittle when it came to animals. Rosie was a promising young woman with a bright future ahead of her; on the right path toward greatness.

She had been asked that school semester to lead a small group of 10th graders on a two-day educational wildlife camping hike through Kalamalka Park with the supervision of her environmental teacher, Mr. McKinney. Four students signed up for the hike besides Rosie; Andrew Andre, Eric Downs, Becky Smith, and Barry Stone. The trip was set to begin on a Saturday morning and end late in the evening that Sunday night.

A yellow school bus came to a winding halt as the air breaks were released. It was 5:30 in the morning and each student was prepared and ready to learn about what BC's forest bodies could offer in the way of wildlife. Rosie had her map ready with a route that was traced in red marker. On the map, she included way-points where the campsite was located for the night, a waterfall where she and her fellow students could swim for a few hours, and the gondola that would bring them safely back down the hillside Sunday evening. Everyone was ready and set out to gain knowledge of the Okanagan's wildlife.

After about two hours, the troupe came upon their first destination; The Waterfall! Excitedly, the students scattered and changed into their bathing suits to swim in the pond-like quarry.

Little did they know, something lurked within the trees; watching them frolic around as they tossed water at each other.

Heavily breathing and hidden by bushes, the creature's eyes darted from left to right. Sizing up the teens before fixing its milky-eyed gaze on Mr. McKinney.

The teacher spoke with authority when he mentioned he would be right back and instructed that the children be careful in the water. He had gone to relieve himself in an area where he could still hear the children playing but where no one would see him. Unfastening the button on his cargo shorts, the educator took some biodegradable toilet paper from his hiker pack and knelt down in a squatting position as his face and body began to clench tight.

Meanwhile, as Mr. McKinney evacuated his bowels, the creature hadn't taken his gaze off of him since he entered the thicket. The thing, some six to seven feet tall, hairy from head to toe with thick black spikey spines protruding from its forearms and shoulders was drooling a putrid yellow substance. Its skin was an off-tone black with a build like that of a wrestler, teeth caked in tartar and sharp like a shark's, three long five-inch claws on both hands and feet, and eyes as white as snow.

The beast, whose eyes were still locked onto the teacher, began sprinting toward him at an unsettling speed. It was like the thing was running on air as its footsteps could be heard as far as a whisper.

Before Mr. McKinney knew what was happening, he felt a sharp pain on the left side of his face. The beast, with unrelenting prejudice, sped by the man as it brought its cleaver-like limb down onto the teacher's skull, severing half of his brain, face, and mouth. Mr. McKinney, still conscious, gurgled and turned his head toward the creature, his one eye fixated on what the thing was gnawing on.

The beast made no noise as its razor-sharp teeth sunk into the educator's, now severed, eye socket. The creature's teeth were pulling away from his skin; flesh and muscle peeled away from the skull as it began consuming an eyeball. Mr. McKinney's right eye, the one still intact, rolled into the back of his head as his lifeless body fell to the ground into his own fecal matter.

The teacher was dead.

A short distance away, the 10th graders continued to play in the water, unaware that their adult companion was now something's lunch.

Rosie and Barry had raced each other from the edge of the shores' water to the waterfall. Freestyle stroke only, as Barry had put it; not that he would've won, he was a terrible swimmer. Andrew, Eric, and Becky were holding their bodies under the waterfall letting the water rush over their head and shoulders. It was relaxing and almost meditative for the youngsters.

Rosie counted down from three as she and Barry began to speed across the water. Midway through the race in-between freestyle strokes, as his head turned from left to right, Barry kept seeing a dark shape moving across the landscape. Not paying much attention to it, he focused on finally winning a race against Rosie. Splashing frantically faster and faster, Barry pulled ahead of her, making it first to a big brown rock that was baking in the sun. Taking in a big breath of air, he celebrated as he watched Rosie trail in behind him, humbly accepting her second-place moniker. As he went to give Rosie a high five, the dark shape he'd seen seconds earlier blitzed in his direction. Before he could react, Barry felt a sharp pain in his right shoulder.

Andrew, Eric, and Becky were still playing in the waterfall. The crashing sounds of water connecting to the quarry's surface heavily drowned out other noises around them, including Rosie's initial scream. As Eric stepped out from under the waterfall, he looked to the left of him where Barry and Rosie were and began wiping his eyes of water. Sounds at a distance were still faint but Eric's eyes were not deceiving him. Some twenty-five feet away or so, Eric saw the beast's claw hooked into his friend's right shoulder. He noticed how Rosie's eyes were wide and full of terror. The monster began lifting Barry out of the water like he weighed nothing more than a plush toy. Barry's scream was so loud that the other two in the waterfall could finally hear the suffering their friend was enduring. Barry's eyes were bloodshot as tears, snot, and drool ran down and around his face. The beast turned Barry's body so that their faces met. Its white eyes darted around Barry's face as if it were performing an examination.

Treading water and struggling to stay afloat, Rosie rapidly kicked her legs and arms backward to escape the gruesome scene. As her panic was setting in, she looked right toward the other children under the waterfall who had just started to clue into what had happened. To her horror and disbelief, behind each child stood a similar dark figure towering over them with yellow froth dripping from their mouths. She had wondered how they got their but before Rosie could warn the others to look behind them, she felt a solid mass at her back as her body rested on the bedrock of the quarry. She looked upward, bending her neck back, where her eyes were met with that of another. In the figure's right claw was Mr. McKinney's half-severed skull. Rosie was petrified by the sight, her eyes rolled into the back of her head and she fell unconscious.

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Carried across the wind were faint sounds of the forest. An unearthly fog poured continuously over the ground. The cabin had sat in isolation but welcomed its new visitors as the atmosphere was thick with murderous intent. In the window, the candle burned as moonlight penetrated the glass panes, lighting up certain areas inside the cabin. The children within... confined with restraints and gags.

Rosie regained consciousness, thinking she was waking from a nightmare, she was quickly met with the grim truth of reality. She did not dream of those creatures nor did she make up the sight of her teacher's half-consumed skull. Her classmates' sniffles and crying next to her reassured her of that. Barry was grunting with agony in the corner near the toilet; his right shoulder brandishing a wound the size of grapefruit. Becky and Eric were tied up across from each other, sitting on the chairs at the table. Andrew was laying on his stomach on the bed with his hands and feet hog-tied behind him. As Rosie tried to move she was met with resistance from restraints of her own. She was tied with her hands in front of her body with a rope that extended from her hands to her feet in a reverse hog-tie. All of the children's mouths were bound with heavy tape. To the left of Rosie, the steel latch door clunked and creaked open. Heavy footsteps followed the door opening and a man spoke in a deep, commanding voice.

"There's no point in strugglin'. Those restraints aren't gonna come loose 'er budge."

The man sauntered toward the two-person table, grabbed Eric by the shoulder, and pushed him off the chair. Eric hit the ground with a loud thud and grunted. The man pulled the chair out further for him to sit down and spoke again.

"Sorry 'bout your teacher. We didn't need him, see. He'duh just got in the way so I got my friends to take care of it. I'm sure you're curious 'bout what they are. Some call 'em Big Foots, others call'em werewolves but in all honesty, they're just people like you or me. They're the result of a failed ritual attempt gon' wrong. You can call 'em Demons. Dumb as a bag of nails but more loyal than your average German Shepard."

The mysterious man, bald and skinny with teeth as yellow as dandelions, reached into his jacket and pulled out a partially smoked cigar and a silver zippo lighter.

Lighting the cigar and puffing it to life, he continued to explain himself, "You kids... You might think I'm doing this to ya on purpose but I ain't. Time's run out and y'all just happen to mosey on along. Works better for me anyway. Either way, if it wasn't you five, it would've been five others not so different from yourselves. Rejoice in the fact that you will absorb what could have been another's pain and suffering. Ain't no better way for y'all to serve your fellow man right now. Consider it your last bold act as human beings."

The man stood up and removed the dusty and mud-covered overcoat he had on, revealing blue robes underneath. His garments were like that of a pastor or holy man of some sort. He threw his coat on the side of the bed, took two steps toward Becky then proceeded to grab her by her ponytail lifting her out of the chair before he threw her to the side near Eric. Whistling lightly, as if to call a pack of dogs, the dark creatures entered from the front and back doors. The teens, crying and screaming under their gagged mouths, kicked as hard as they could in attempts to break their restraints but to no success. The creatures ignored them at first as they focused on creating an open wide space in the middle of the floor. After that was done, each beast set their white eyes toward a child and moved in that direction. Grabbing the children by their bindings, the creatures held them tight as they manipulated them into a circle where they all faced each other. The old man's feet boomed with each step he took as he headed toward the candle in the window. Removing it from its space in the window, the man brought it to the center of where the children were, placing it down softly. As he did, he began chant what sounded like a prayer.

"By the dark power of Malebolge I entrust these pure lives into the seventh circle of hell. Oh great Malebolge, we live and die to serve your demands. Let these sacrifices open your gate, for we await your arrival and leadership into a new world."

The candle started to sputter and rage furiously. Before the children's eyes, a pentagram began to burn itself into the center of the floor, each sharp corner connecting at their feet or corresponding body part. The creatures, still holding the captive youth tightly, had their heads raised facing the ceiling as they all moaned and grunted along with the old man as he prayed.

Mortified and completely helpless, Rosie witnessed her friends start to burst into flames. It started with Barry. She looked over at him as he struggled to get himself free. As valiant as his efforts were, it was useless. As he sobbed through his gag, Barry's eyes started to ooze dark liquid while the whites of his eyes turned black. With a final gasp of air, his body was engulfed in flames. The fire was so hot that parts of the cabin began to burn. The demon holding onto Barry also burst into flames at the same time he did, quietly smiling to itself as the fire took over. The same thing happened to Becky and her demon a few seconds later. Then Eric and then Andrew.

Rosie knew she was next.

"Great King, Malebolge. We welcome you onto this plane. We worship your design and desire to be consumed by your thoughtful flames with gratitude. Come forth now! May the seal holding you within the seventh circle break and your judgment upon this ungrateful earth be set free!"

With that last chant, Rosie could see her eyesight fading. All her dreams of becoming a respected Ph.D. in her field of studies, her parents and siblings, and now her friends; had all come to an end for her. Rosie's eyes turned black and her tears turned dark. Screaming uncontrollably, she burst into flames along with the demon that consumed Mr. McKinney.

The ritual had been completed.

Outside of the cabin, the ground began to shake. The rumbling vibrated the hillside as all kinds of animals began to retreat from the area. Massive slabs of rock fell off of cliffsides and trees thirty feet tall or more snapped in half and fell to the ground. The cabin rocked back and forth as pieces of shingle and glass crashed to the ground.

As the youngsters burned, the flames took a life of their own; connecting to the center of the pentagram was a portal that had opened. An incredibly massive claw-like hand reached through the pitch-black center of the abyss and extended its pale grey arm through the roof of the cabin. Shingles erupted from the canopy outside as the monster's arm moved skyward for nearly forty feet. The arm snapped back downward toward the earth, crashing into the ground with explosive force. Pulling itself out from the portal, this new monster's other arm, head and shoulders continued to demolish the cabin as it entered our realm.

"Oh Malebolge," exclaimed the man, "you are everything I'd ever imagined! Bless me, great King! I am your servant!"

As the man finished his request, Malebolge pulled his right leg out of the portal and with tremendous force, stomped on the man's body, spraying viscera around the impact site.

In all his might, Malebolge, the King of the Seventh Circle of Hell, standing ten stories high, was now free to roam the earth at his will. His hide was pale grey with orange hairs all over his body. His mouth was unproportionate to his head, larger than any mouth you've ever seen with rows and rows of razor-sharp teeth. His pupils were bright purple surrounded by an emerald green sclera. The demon's body was fat around his waist and its arms and legs were long and thin, toned with muscle. Its hands and legs, as long and as heavy as a semi-trailer, adorned thick black talons.

Malebolge raised his head high, took a deep breath in, and roared toward to heavens an ungodly noise that killed anything within a thirty-foot radius due to the sheer loud force it exerted. The entirety of the Kalamalka Park and the Okanagan vibrated along with his battle cry; heard for miles upon miles away. Malebolge leaned forward, one leg in front of the others, and began sprinting across the landscape, covering incredible distances in a single bound.

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years. One day, a candle that had burned in the window had now brought an end to everything we've ever known. No mortal man nor woman can stop it now. The time of man has come to an end and the war between heaven and hell has just begun.

The End.