The Word Never, Never Should Be Spoken

Longing dripped off my chin as salty tears poured forth from my crystal eyes. Sharp pains launched up my tattered legs, for my feet were bare upon the forest floor. Scratches appeared along my arms as if I were a mere cat toy set to be destroyed by an untamed lion. My body ached, but there wasn’t a thing I could do; I mustn’t lag on my pace. If I stopped now who would remember the one man brave enough to take on The Beast.

Legend describes The Beast as a creature that eats children, a mutant destined to murder armies while they slept at night, and a monster so savage that if you placed a foot into the Dark Forest, you’d be marked as a meal by The Beast forever. I grew up hunting in these woods, yet never once encountered a small track that told me to run.

My mother said my father had died at the hands of The Beast when my dad left this earth, but I knew nothing could’ve been lucky enough to meet my father and live to see another day. A hunter at heart, such as my own dad, could take on anything and everything. He must have left us, and if I knew anything about my father, he would return to the only place he felt truly at home. The Dark Forest.

The day I realized my dad was really gone, I swore an oath to myself. I swore the day after I turned 17 I’d set out searching for him. I believe Pa left a trail for me that only I would be able to follow.

That day was today. I was following Dad’s tracks, and there was nothing anyone could do to stop me. I had been tracking for a couple hours, and then I saw it. The thing I had heard about as a wee toddler. The Beast.

It was everything the village had told me it was. It smelled of fiery ash, and was the color of mucky water. Dead leaves and trigs were tangled in the nest of rumpled hair covering every inch of its body, but the most disturbing thing about this creature were its eyes. They took hold of my gaze, taking my mind away from escaping. All I wanted to do was stare at the yellow soaked spheres for the rest of eternity.

I gunshot suddenly sounded in the distance, wait, no, not from far away, it had been the gun I held within my very own grasp. I saw The Beast kneel, toppling over where I could’ve killed the thing with one bullet. But I didn’t.

For some strange reason, I couldn’t hold myself to the standers of every other coward with a gun. I held myself higher than them, for I had the strength and will of a true warrior. I left The Beast there, and ran the way I’d came.

I lost both of my foot coverings while running, but I didn’t care. My heart beat fast with adrenaline, trying to keep up with the pace I was holding.

But then I heard a snap. Then a crunch. Then, to no avail, a thunderous bang erupted behind me. Turning, I found The Beast clashing towards me. He knocked down tree after tree as he pursued me. At this point, I was terrified.

Branches tried to trip, hit, and stab me, but, even as some did, I never once fell with defeat. As The Beast threw huge, heavy objects in my direction I dodged them. He was determined to kill me, and then I rethought my stupid decision to let the forsaken nastiness of a hair ball roam free. Why hadn’t I killed the musky smelling nightmare inducer when I had the chance?

Soon, it caught up, tackling me to the damp, rotten forest floor. I was stuck under it’s bulky mass, facing The Beast face to face.

It didn’t take long before I felt the creature’s pulse slow, and it’s body shrink to an abnormal human height. All the hair upon the figure shriveled into glands ready to hold the hair once more. This made it clear as to why I’d never felt frightened by thought of The Beast or The Beast’s lair, the Dark Forest. I now understood why The Beast had never entered my nightmares, and caused me to run scared to my mother’s room in the deepest depths of the night searching for her comfort.

The Beast had always been my father.