It horrified Elijah, to hear so much pain surrounding him, and he immediately began trying to discern the source of it. Adrenaline surged through his veins as he got out of his sleeping bag and lent his actions urgency, stretching seconds into hours. Surely something must be causing this. A poison gas or literal acid rain. Maybe some large area spell similar to his Blood Roil Aura. Whatever it was, he needed to figure it out soon both to help the victims and avoid a similar fate. Unfortunately, the gloom of the dark forest meant his efforts at determining the cause were in vain. No strange lights, no strange smells. No discomfort beyond the ache of sleeping on a hard surface. Then something changed.

The screams deepened and became more echoing, their source seemingly shifting deeper into the animals’ chests. With the change in pitch came a change in tone, shifting from pain to anger and hunger. It was like the forest itself was screaming for his blood and meat to satiate it. Soon none of the previous tortured sounds remained and there was only rage. Rage and a need to feast so strong he could practically see the red haze of bloodlust descending around him.

That was enough to set the deepest instincts of Elijah’s brain into overdrive. The fight or flight response in his body was screaming at him to either start punching or start running. His vision blurred at the seeming omnipresent feeling of danger as he tried to focus in every direction at once. His shoulders clenched and he began breathing harshly. There was nothing he could do. Nothing in sight for him to fight, no direction that seemed safe for him to run in. A blink appeared in the corner of his vision and he somehow knew that when this was over there would be a notification waiting for him. A notification that had chosen not to appear in front of him so his concentration wouldn’t be broken. Despite this, he knew what the blue screen would say. His Hysterical Strength ability had been activated.

It was at this that whatever was out there found what was left of his dinner. The growling, hissing, and squawking redoubled in the direction he had come from, accompanied by the occasional scream of apparent victory or violent crashing as multiple creatures seemingly fought over ownership of the remains. The fighting quickly escalated as the sound attracted more and more of the creatures hiding out there in the night. Once or twice a scream was suddenly cut off as whatever creature had been crying out lost the fight for ownership of Elijah’s leftovers and then some, becoming more meat for the remaining creatures to fight over. Too terrified of the other creatures surrounding him to leave his tree and with nothing immediately threatening enough to push him into fighting, Elijah found himself unable to turn away from the source of the cacophony. His previously blurry vision narrowed in with razor sharp focus to the bushes separating him from the small stream. He felt like he could hear everything, even the scrape of claws on rocks and trees or hiss of breathing from fanged mouths as the creatures brawled.

He stayed like that, motionless and soundless, as the fighting continued. Nothing else could penetrate his absolute concentration upon something that every fiber of his being screamed was a threat. The cook-site, his cook-site, had become a war zone. He could only imagine the bloody carnage that must be erupting around the paltry bit of food he had left behind.

Eventually the fighting began to die down and the war-cries became less common. He heard one final roar, a resounding crash, and then blessed silence. In the following minutes, there was the occasional growl as the victor warned off scavengers. Occasionally a sharp crack would ring out as the unknown creature broke apart the bones of its victims to get at the marrow within or rip off chunks of its meal. This was preferable though, a well-fed apex predator that had driven off any other threats in the area.

While the sounds of the creature’s victory feasting were certainly enough to keep Elijah awake and fearful, they were not enough to keep the adrenaline pumping through him at the same levels. As the hormone driven energy left his body, mental exhaustion and leaden limbs took its place. He couldn’t sleep yet, not while whatever was out there continued to feast at the brook so close to him, but he could pull back his focus on it. He could blink his dry eyes and take stock on other things.

First and most importantly he was alive, and nothing had tried to come up the tree to get at him. His weary mind was thankful for this, a small sign of his safety. He definitely didn’t want to be out in the open at night though. Before he would have considered walking at night annoying, slightly dangerous, and all around more of a hassle than it was worth. Now he considered traveling past sunset suicidal. He would not end a day without shelter of some sort to hide away in. Well at least now I know why the Voice labeled this place a death trap.

#

While his night’s vigil never revealed the victor of that riverside deathmatch, eventually exhaustion did claim him. Late, late into the night and after whatever had been at the riverbank had finished eating. After the scavengers had come in and had their own, lesser fight over the rights to what was left. After they had finished and the forest had returned to silence. After hours of deathly quiet, as though the forest feared a single sound would set off a new round of screams and roars and fighting, Elijah could not keep the crash at bay any longer. The dull blankness took control of his mind and his body did not last long after.

#

His sleep was short and fitful, interrupted all too soon by the sun rising above the horizon. Sleep still crusted his eyes and it felt as though barely a second had passed since they shut. The temptation to pull the bag over his head and continue sleeping was powerful, but he needed to keep moving.

“The sooner I leave, the sooner I can hopefully find people. The sooner I find people, the sooner I can figure out what the FUCK that was last night.” He didn’t usually swear, but the previous night had been deserving of stronger language then his norm. “The sooner I figure that out, the sooner I can figure out how to protect myself from whatever it is. Then maybe I can actually claim this ‘True Power’ the voice mentioned.”

As he untied himself and worked his way slowly out of the sleeping bag, he replayed the night in his head. Then he cursed himself for a fool. He had had spells. Sure, activating them last night would have been very stupid as the light would likely have given him away, but he hadn’t even thought of them. If he had actually been attacked, he doubted he would have even attempted to use them.

“Need to get used to the idea of having them as an option.”

#

The first task he assigned himself after he got out of the tree was to investigate his cook-site. Knowledge was power, and he wasn’t going to ignore the potentially vital information that he might glean from scrutinizing the area just because he was scared. It would be far more terrifying to run into whatever that thing was last night with no information. Of course, maybe all he’d find was a large smear of blood and gore. Hard to say for sure that the search would yield anything of note. Better safe than sorry though, and there was nothing to be lost but a little bit of time. A few minutes was nothing when compared to the potential for game changing information.

Setting off into the woods, he tried to maintain that positive attitude. It was important to remember last night and act accordingly. To treat the woods like the threat they were. At the same time though, dwelling on it did him no good. If he spent too much time worrying, he might miss something. Or maybe it would just make him paranoid.

“Either way, best if I occupy my mind with something. One more reason to investigate the cook-site. Distractions are your best friend when dealing with stuff like this. Keeps you going. Keeps you doing something.”

Physical signs of the forest’s nocturnal denizens and their brawl were evident before he even made it to the stream. Large claws had torn sections from the tree that he had planted the offal next to and whatever had dug up the rabbit organs hadn’t paid much attention to if it was going through wood or dirt. Too frenzied by the promise of food, the thing had torn through anything standing it its way. Whatever it was, the unknown creature had had large paws. Easily as big as Elijah’s hands based on the width between the trenches slashed in the wood. The gouges themselves were unnaturally deep in comparison. While the space between each claw indicated some type of big cat, like a mountain lion, the claw length seemed to belong to a creature twice as large. Far too large for the creature to comfortably sheath or walk on.

The beast had left bite marks on the roots of the tree when trying to eat the rabbit innards, and those were also strange. They didn’t match anything he had ever heard of before. At least nothing from a terrestrial predator. Whatever had done this had multiple rows of incredibly sharp teeth, similar to a shark. The result was a crowded jumble of puncture marks on the wood and suggested a mouth with far too many teeth for its size. Similar to the claws, the teeth seemed oversized. Designed more as weapons then for their wielders comfort in day-to-day activities.

Scrape marks were visible in the middle of each bite mark. It appeared that in addition to the wicked rows of teeth, the creature had a cat’s barbed tongue. The organ had easily stripped the bark from the roots, revealing the sapwood beneath. Again, the sheer size of the scrape marks seemed to indicate a disregard for the creature’s own comfort when trying to close its mouth, or really do anything besides kill and consume its prey in the most horrific way possible. It had to be in constant pain, its own mouth betraying it as the tools used to savage its prey and scrape the meat from their bones ripped apart the creature’s own gums and palate.

Any root that had fit in the beast’s mouth had been bit through in its entirety, indicating incredible jaw strength. The strength of its limbs could be seen in the large chunks of wood that had been torn from the tree in addition to the gouges he had inspected earlier. Clearly this creature was strong. Far stronger than even something so large had any right to be. This was not something Elijah would ever want to contest directly in a fight. Better to flee or lead the thing into a trap. Wearing it down might work, but as he was now a single hit from the creature could very well mean death.

“And this was the creature that fed on the offal. Whatever monster won ownership of the actual meat was more almost certainly dangerous. This makes no sense. These are alpha predators. Why are they going after left over bits of rabbit?” He may not have hunted any, having absolutely zero way to properly utilize so much meat, but Elijah had seen signs of plenty of larger game yesterday. He had even stumbled upon one positively huge buck and two does that were quickly sent fleeing through the trees at his sudden appearance. There was no reason for something so large to be so desperate for food. These creatures had fought last night as though starving, yet the evidence before him indicated a strong, well-fed creature in the prime of its life.

“Of course, with magic in the mix who knows what’s really going on. Maybe this was the effect of something like my Hysterical Strength ability.”

With nothing left to be gleaned from this area, Elijah continued his walk toward the creek. Subconsciously, he had expected the earlier scene to inoculate him against anything he might find at the river. He was wrong. The oversized claws in the pawprints and the scraped bones were expected this time. What wasn’t was the sheer number and variety. The winner of the night was obvious, a set of paw prints in the mud betrayed the presence of something far, far bigger than the creature that went after the organs. The paws were easily six times the size of the first beast’s and sank deep enough to imply a heavy build even for its size. Five toes dotted the front of the paw and the claws were further offset. If the first scene had suggested something similar to a cougar, this beast appeared more ursine in nature.

Around it was multiple other tracks ranging from great, wolf like paw prints to small tracks that seemed reminiscent of a rat. He could only assume that the smaller prints were from the later scavengers that had shown up after the bear creature had had its fill. And despite the relatively meager scraps that had initiated the fighting, the creature had definitely feasted. He counted at least three large skeletons in area. The crushed and shattered nature of the scattered bones made it hard to tell for sure, but there seemed to be three general piles at any point. The bones were picked clean and not a single scrap of muscle remained, but dark blood stains were everywhere. In fact, the northbound path left by the ursine as it wandered away was clearly visible thanks to the bloody paw prints disappearing back into the forest.

“At least I know my spells will work on these things, could have been stuck dealing with giant spiders.”

It was unnatural how little remained of the carcasses. The scraped bones indicated tongues similar to the first creature, and the shattered bones showed signs of the marrow being removed by the same method. Hardly anything from the creatures remained intact. A legbone here, a rib there. A single skull remained intact in one of the piles, missing it’s jaw bone. The expected rows of teeth were there, crowding out the mouth and leaving Elijah thoroughly flummoxed on how the creature could ever affectively use the things for eating. They simply seemed so large as to be unwieldy. A pair of extra-long teeth marked the location of a normal mammal’s canines. The teeth were easily each a foot long and heavily reminiscent of drawings he had seen of saber-tooth tigers. The creature had a spike above each eye socket, reminiscent of a horned lizard despite the overall canine shape of the skull.

In fact, the spikes weren’t the only vaguely reptilian feature of the skull now that he looked closer.

“The temporal bone is wrong. Honestly it doesn’t even look like this thing had a temporomandibular joint, or at least not just a temporomandibular joint. A multi joint jaw like a snake maybe? Or something more like a lizard? Hard to tell without a mandible. Plus, I’ve only ever really done much with human anatomy. Still, that looks way to far back for a mammal.”

After he finished musing, he continued his search for anything that could help him. Unfortunately, what little had survived the night was not incredibly useful. All that was left here were paw prints, shattered skeletons, and the dried blood. Sighing, he could only refill his canteen and prepare to leave. No point wasting more time, the sooner he left the sooner he might find signs of other travelers. Hopefully they would be able to tell him more about what had done this.

He would need to try to catch food earlier in the day this time. Then cook whatever he got as a lunch meal rather than save them for dinner. He wanted to be able to put more distance between himself and further brawls between the nocturnal forest denizens then there had been last night. He’d stick to one meal a day for now, to try to give himself as much time as possible on the move. If he found fruit of some kind, he’d try bringing it with him. These creatures seemed highly carnivorous and unlikely to pay much attention to it.

The investigation had been both incredibly helpful and absolutely worthless. He had learned plenty. Their jaws were absolutely terrifying and there seemed to be multiple species. They came in a wide range of sizes, including at least one that had been large enough to apparently give elephants a run for their money. He had learned that they didn’t leave much behind after a kill. That they seemed to be some abominable fusion of mammal, shark, and reptile. Most importantly perhaps, he had learned that while the creature’s massive claws were a threat, the greatest danger was in their bite.

That said, he hadn’t planned to go sticking things in their mouths anyway. He hadn’t found anything that indicated a particular weakness he could exploit or narrowed down what they actually were. In fact, the investigation had created a host of new questions. Where did something so large hide during the day? How exactly did their jaw work? Could they unhinge it like a snake or did the bones structure just give them a lot of room to open their mouth and snap it shut with as much force as possible?

“Actually. I wonder. Maybe I did find something useful.” Elijah had enjoyed nature shows growing up. Steve Irwin’s death had been a traumatic moment in his childhood, but he had learned a lot from watching the man’s show. He remembered how easily crocodile jaws could be held closed. In truth, this was applicable to just about every animal. Jaws are built for closing with as much force as possible, not so much opening. Crocodiles were just easier to get a grip on the mouth of. He wouldn’t want to try it unless he had to, but these creature’s mouths had been large. Maybe he could remove their most dangerous weapon by looping some rope around it.

Sure, after he was done he’d still be dealing with massive claws, incredible strength, and their sheer size; but that mouth. That was their favored weapon and the truly nightmarish part of them. In Elijah’s mind they were the eponymous jaws of death. While everything else was dangerous, their mouth was more than that. It was alien, and that awoke a special kind of fear. The same fear that haunts you while in the dark, visiting someplace new, or seeing a shadow under the bed as a kid. Mankind’s possibly oldest fear. Fear of the unknown.

And if these Developers had their way, they would throw his entire species into a new world. A world where every man, woman, and child would have to deal with that fear. To deal with creatures like these and worse. He refused to let that happen. He refused to leave them abandoned in a dangerous place with no safety net. He refused to leave them to suffer what he was suffering. It simply wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. He would be there when they were crying for help.

His entire life had been dedicated to helping people, to keeping them safe. To being there when they needed somebody most. First in the national guard, heading out during natural disasters. Then as an Emergency Medical Responder. Sure, he had died so technically that life was over, but he knew deep down he could never stop it. His reckless need to save people whether they asked for it or not. Whether doing so would put him at risk or not. Never stopping in his quest to protect the people around him. To protect his community and show everyone that somebody would be there when they needed help. He just hoped he wasn’t biting off more than he could chew.