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The most unusual cryptid hunter

A fiction for The Night Owl Contest

By Kimberly AzariasPublished 3 years ago 10 min read
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Image by Taymaz Valley on Flickr, Commercial Use License.

I want to get this down while it's still fresh in my mind. I’m rattled. To be honest, I'm still not quite sure what I saw.

Let me start with a little bit about me. My name is Alonzo Cattani. I’m an average Italian man: Five feet ten inches and an athletic build. The place I work for was absorbed into CUFAA back in January of 2017. My department worked in a similar way to the Forest Service in the U.S. It’s basically my responsibility to protect Italy’s natural resources and ecosystems. The reason I speak English? Well, I’m genetically Italian. My parents migrated legally to the United States in the romantic honeymoon phase of their early marriage, only to move back to Italy due to homesickness when I was fourteen. I’m bilingual. Having always loved the outdoors I got a job that allowed me to be outside regularly. I’ve heard my fair share of odd events during my time, and most of them could be scientifically explained. Hikers and campers being directionally impaired could be explained by the fact that they’re unfamiliar with the area and its natural landmarks. The event I’m about to tell you about is different from that sort of thing. It isn’t that I doubt what I saw: I saw it clearly. But it’s more that if I admit to it, if I give into this belief, it puts all other options on the table.

So where do I begin? I remember being called in one day for a particularly strange day at work. My subdivision received several complaints over the last week of hikers in Trentino-South Tyrol who had been bitten or attacked by a large snake. Of those who saught medical treatment, most of them couldn't give an accurate description of the snake that had bitten them. The reports varied in descriptions: some said the snake was light gray, others said it was dark gray. Another said it had feet. Now the variation in their answers was most likely because hysteria has a way of fooling the mind. It’s the same thing that exaggerates the size of a fish so that our minds make our catch seem bigger than it really was. In my mind I figured the reports differed so wildly because the hikers’ minds made them believe the offending serpent had whatever features the hikers themselves found the scariest. Despite all the differences, all the reports converged on where the incident took place, so I had a place to start looking.

I drove up to the mouth of the trail and parked my subaru forester on the road’s shoulder. Since it rained earlier that day, I knew at least some of the trail would be muddy. At the thought of traversing muddy terrain I was glad my work required me to wear boots. The mud also meant that any snakes would be easier to track. As I walked, I began to think about what I was looking for. I remembered a few people mentioning gray: whether light gray or dark gray, I thought gray would be a safe color to assume it was.

Slow Worms are also gray and native here: but they don’t get very big and are relatively unremarkable creatures. While technically separate from snakes since they are legless lizards, they could be mis-identified by someone who doesn’t know the difference. But Slow Worms are docile and even if one was in a bad mood and bit somebody, they aren’t venomous and pose no real threat to humans. I suspected a more probable culprit was a viper, although I still couldn’t understand why the toxicology reports were inconclusive if that was the case. Maybe it was just that the samples tested were, for some reason, corrupted.

Whatever the case, I kept my eyes peeled as I walked along the path, looking for anything obvious. If nothing stuck out to me I would branch out into the underbrush further away and see if I could find a burrow or other signs of a snake. The hikers all mentioned attacks happening at around the same spot: a bend in the path that wound close to a pond. I had been looking through the brush on the sides of the road when an uneven part of the trail made me stumble. I grumbled to myself mentally for taking my eyes off where I was walking. Catching my balance I noticed something I’d missed before: I was now stepping on a large, bending imprint in the mud that ran all the way across the walkway. Immediately I thought this was the path a snake carved in the mud as it slid across the road, but this track was easily ten centimeters across! It would have been one enormous snake, and the local vipers don’t usually get that big. There were also scratch marks on the sides of the main track, sort of like a Lizard or a Chicken claws, but more elongated, like the owner of the clawed appendages scraped the mud as it moved. Whether or not the hikers were right about all the details, I was beginning to believe them about its exaggerated size. But what about the clawed marks to the side? It could have been another animal that had taken a similar path across the road.

I swallowed and followed the track, which led me to the nearby pond. If it had come out of the water, there would probably be another indication of where it left. Eventually I did find another winding track leading away from the water, but it was harder to follow since it cut through grass, but I eventually found it again and I followed it as far as I could. The track ended at the base of a pine tree. I wondered if I should go back to the road and look for a different track to see if maybe a different one might lead to a burrow, or something easier to deal with than a tree, but as I considered this, I felt wet drops splash onto my left hand. It burned and I yelled with surprised pain, hobbling away from the tree and wiping the rest of the residue onto my shirt and pants. It was stupid now that I think about it, but I just wanted to get the substance off as quickly as I could. I was very confused: was snake venom supposed to burn? I cradled my aching hand and my eyes darted up toward the tree. I couldn’t see anything at first, but I heard a loud, angry hiss, like a mix between a snake’s hiss and an angry cat. I stared up in bewilderment as my mind raced about what to do about this. Then I noticed moving branches about three and a half meters above me. Should I run? Would it chase me? I didn’t know enough about snakes to know for sure.

As the branches swayed, I suddenly caught sight of its eyes. They were like a cat’s eyes and faintly glowed gold. My right hand moved to the holster of my beretta and I instinctively took another step back. I could see as it slowly descended toward me that it had two legs that dangled down. I cursed, still unsure of what, exactly, I was looking at. I slid the gun out of the holster and just as I was about to whip it up and fire at this monster, I heard someone give a loud whistle not twenty feet behind me. It scared me. I hadn’t heard him approach. Where had he come from? I instinctively snapped my head to him. Stupid, I know. But I wasn’t exactly thinking straight. Looking at him, this guy was almost as strange as the creature! He was dressed like a traditional Priest. He was blonde. There was a certain spark to him: a sense of confidence mixed with a well-kept visage that didn’t appear to me to be entirely manly, not that I was judging. He was staring through the sights of his firearm at the creature. I had taken his persona in an instant before my eyes snapped back to the monster.

The man’s whistle had pulled the creature’s gaze away from me. With its attention, he fired a tranquilizer dart straight into the side of its neck and the beast let out a hiss of rage. It dropped to the ground and the man slang his rifle strap over his shoulder. He took a few easy steps backward, grabbing a thin rope dangling loosely on the side of a tree, and waited. The monster was pulling itself along with its legs with an alarming speed. The man calmly waited until it came to just the right spot before springing the trap. The net engulfed the beast in a quick gesture. After a few minutes, the creature’s movements began to slow. Watching her writhe helplessly, I felt a pang of pity for her. I realized she was scared. Her strength abandoned her and she struggled, her movements slowing until she lay still. Once he was sure she would pose no threat, the stranger lowered his trap and the man walked several meters away to retrieve this large case that was shaped awkwardly like a huge cross.

“What is that? Who are you?” At this point I wasn’t sure I wasn’t dreaming. The guy made his way next to the beast before setting the pack down and opening up one of its many compartments. “Thes, my friend, is a Tatzelwurm,” his Irish accent assured me, and I noticed he was tall for someone of his ethnicity. “Been tracking thes one all over the alps. Don’ quite know what’s made ‘er so aggressive, but she’s slated fer relocation.” He handed me a brown vial with two words scrawled across the label: ‘Tatzelwurm Antitoxin’. He also gave me a bit of cloth to wrap my hand in. “Thes should take away that burning sting o’ yers,”. I accepted it and addressed my wound while he saw to the beast. I was both confused and enamored and that made me feel queasy. He tagged the the creature with one band around its arm, speaking softly to it while he worked: it was obvious he was a kind soul, eccentricity aside. He allowed me one last look before placing her in a large, metallic container with breathing holes. He asked me for a ride to where he’d parked his vehicle. Still reeling, I obliged. I was still in shock. I’m sure I asked him more questions but I don’t remember. I could tell I wasn’t the first reality-shocked person he’d dealt with, but the whole time he remained polite and professional.

“You were wondereng ef I was hunting, and en a matter of speaking, yes.” He pulled out his badge and showed it to me. The group he belonged to had a unique symbol: it was a barn owl flying with wings outstretched. The badge indicated that he was from The Hunter Society. I’d never heard of them. Honestly I found him a bit strange, and although charming I wasn’t against chalking his badge up to a glorified fake. I coerced him to stop by the closest station with me. He obliged. The higher-ups were quick to clear him and he loaded up his vehicle and drove away. I realize now that I never did get his name.

When I think of cryptid hunters, I think of amateurs running into the woods at night to look for something that doesn’t exist. But if this guy exists, if that …thing… he hunted exists, then that opens up a sea of possibilities and puts all other options on the table. And this thought terrifies me.

One thing is clear to me now: I still have a lot to learn.

urban legend
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About the Creator

Kimberly Azarias

Azarias is a pen name I will be writing under.

I have been writing in some form for over fifteen years, love cats and am some awkward blend between rational and artistic.

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