FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

There was no greater siren call to a young, aspiring filmmaker than rumours of something lurking in the woods. Cherno had been following the story from one end of the country to the other. Recounting the possible close encounters, interviewing the locals, having them describe the sounds they heard in the night. Even thousands of miles apart, the tales they told carried some stark similarities that persisted between each telling. Either they were all somehow collaborating, or there was something to it all. He couldn't believe it was a coincidence.

Nobody had disappeared yet. But as the stories became increasingly detailed, increasingly certain of what they saw for a brief moment out alone in the wild, it sounded like it was only a matter of time until someone did. He started to get visuals descriptions. Faint things, based only on blurry glimpses. No one had yet snapped a photo, for one reason or another. They dropped their phone. Or it wouldn't work. Or they simply didn't have it with them. But eventually he sat down with one small town conservationist, a tired raccoon whose eyes were even darker than usual, like he hadn't slept in days. With enough coaxing, he coaxed him to make a simple sketch of what he thought he saw out in the woods.

It was a narrow figure, something like a person but moving on all fours. Thin to the point of almost emaciated. Face like a hollow skull. Cherno got a good shot of the drawing with the camera, suppressing his own grin. This was gold. Maybe the ranger was just putting him on. But if he was, he was doing a fine job acting. And that was all Cherno really needed. He kept the camera on that strange sketch, and asked one more question.

"What do you think it is?"

"Not a matter of what I think it is." The raccoon paused for breath, oddly short on it. "That's a wendigo."

"You sound very sure of that."

"I'd stake my life on it." He lowered his voice to a mutter. "Maybe I already have. This town is cursed."

Cherno adjusted his volume levels. "Could you say that again?"

"No."

The raccoon just gruffly snorted and picked himself up from his chair without another word. That was all the deer was getting out of him. He picked up his camera and returned to his car, considering. That was good material. Really promising stuff. For an intro. He couldn't make much off of rumours and sketches. And with the travel wearing down his budget, he was going to need to come up with something fast. Something that would be marketable, if not exactly groundbreaking. Maybe it was a cliche. But he was going to have to venture out in search of the supposed wendigo himself.

Alone, of course. For one, he couldn't' afford to pay anyone to accompany him. For another, it was just more effective and creepy if there was no one else there with him. Plus, if he ended up getting nothing and having to fake some scares, there was no one there to blackmail him or reveal the secret. Of course, he wasn't stupid. He made sure to tell plenty of people exactly where he was going. He equipped himself with a map, compass and GPS, flashlight, plenty of water and food, medical supplies, and even a flare gun. There was no way he was getting lost, and even if he did, someone would be coming to find him. The raccoon seemed a grumpy sort, but plenty of his other colleagues agreed to look for him if he didn't check in by the next morning.

He was surprised how well they took it. It was easy to assume they might find the whole thing exploitative. Trying to make money off their small community, no matter how bad it made them look. But instead they were highly supportive of the idea. Even seemed visibly relieved when he suggested it to them.

"Better you than me," a junior ranger admitted. The calico cat's tone made Cherno suspicious.

"Why do you say that?" he asked, wishing he had his camera on.

"Just. I don't know how to explain it. There's just this feeling I get some days, when I wake up." The cat wiped at his brow. "Like I should just not show up to work today and go out on my own instead. Without telling anyone. I'm not sure why that keeps popping into my head, but sometimes I feel like I'm just going to do it. I'm not usually so impulsive, you know? Anyway, I'm glad you're going. You're sure you're going to be okay all on your own? I mean ... I have my job, but maybe if I asked the boss ... "

"I think it'll be best if I get just pure footage. No distractions. Thanks though." Even as he said it, Cherno felt himself wondering why he was so insistent on going alone. Maybe a friendly ranger would have been good company. But he didn't correct himself.

"Alright. Well, you stay safe. Don't see many bears these days, but you see one, just make sure you make plenty of noise. Surprisingly timid fellas."

"Thanks. Will do." Cherno nodded.

With all the arrangements made and all his supplies stuffed into an ample backpack, he pulled his car up a dirt road and parked it alongside the forest. It wasn't a huge area. He probably could have walked from one side to the other, directly through the middle, in less than two hours. If something monstrous was really hiding there, he would find it. Or at least some sign of it. That might be evidence enough. He made sure his camera's battery was fully charged, and he set out into the trees, tapping his hooves through the lush summer grass.

The day was bright and nearly cloudless, warm with gentle heat. Not exactly prime mood-setting weather, but it did make for a good hike. Maybe he could repurpose the footage as some sore of nature documentary if nothing good happened. He really wasn't sure what he was expecting. It occurred to him that it could be dangerous. Maybe some serial killer in an elaborate disguise. Or a rabid wild animal that nobody had managed to identify. Or something else. But he wanted to find it. Needed to see the supposed monster for himself if he was ever going to be satisfied. So he kept marching.

"It's Thursday. July twenty-sixth. I'm just making my way into the forest outside town now. If this wendigo really exists, I'm going to find it," he narrated, doing his best to keep the camera steady as he went. "I'm probably not going to say too much while I'm filming. I don't want to miss any unusual sounds. All the footage that you're seeing now is real and only edited for time. The hunt begins."

He wondered if he was being cheesy. Ah well, he could fix it in post. As he walked, he was glad he chose not to narrate his progress too heavily. There was nothing to talk about. It was little more than empty forest, with the sound of cawing crows and branches drifting in the breeze the best he could get for compelling audio. This was going to require a lot of editing when he was done. But he made sure to capture everything, holding the camera up to his eye as he walked, seeing the world slightly magnified. Just to make absolutely sure he didn't miss anything. Whether it was real evidence or simply something he could use effectively.

The sun remained a persistent annoyance, washing out all his shots. But he wasn't as warm anymore. The deeper he walked, the more the thick leaves and branches stretched across the sky above him. The light changed, and the shadows grew longer. Gone was the dusty scent of a small town, replacing by something more natural. Lush, overgrown forest and dew still left from the morning, sheltered from the sun by that elaborate canopy interlocking above him. It was enough that Cherno simply stopped in his marching a moment to draw a deep breath into his lungs, savouring the perfect summer air. He felt perfectly in his element, out there away from the roads and the machines and the general bustle of civilization. Liberated from the worries of day-to-day life.

As he continued in his marching, he didn't even bother to check his map or GPS. He had an unshakable feeling of confidence in the direction he was going. Forward, ever forward, deeper into the welcoming woods where he belonged. He was still holding his camera, but he wasn't looking through it anymore. He held it by his side, pointed forward, capturing the empty hike. It couldn't really record what he was feeling. That increasingly blissful freedom he felt as he put miles between himself and every other person who might have interrupted his experience. He caught himself sighing often, just to imbue himself with the fresh air around him.

He wasn't watching the time, but the sun seemed to be setting early. It hadn't felt like he was out there long. It dipped to the crest of a distant hill, casting intricate shadows through the branches that sheltered him. The air itself was changing. It grew damper, more soothing. Even the scents were different. Where before he had been striding through the lush green and hazy air of a bright summer day, the evening brought the cool scent of autumn with it. Cherno wasn't exactly cold, but he wouldn't have rejected a hot drink right about then.

The leaves were changing colour. Their vibrant green became a striking red as he delved deeper into the forest. He couldn't hear anything anymore. The birds silenced their songs as the early evening fell. The wind no longer rustled through the trees. There was only Cherno, and the falls of his hooves, the gentle jostling of his pack upon his shoulders. He stopped, and for the first time since he started he looked behind him. What he saw had him abruptly raise the camera back to his eye.

For as far as he could see, the leaves had turned. He thought it merely a few nearby trees on first noticing, but even when he adjusted the camera's zoom, that stark red foliage stretched on for as far as the device could record. He had left the summer forest entirely behind, and was surrounded by a fiery expanse of autumnal crimson. The trees slumped as if with fatigue, the effects of the premature season visible upon them. He had welcomed the silence when it first fell upon him. Now he was feeling like he was trespassing. Like every single noise he made, every breath was disturbing the untouched nature around him.

He was mostly certain he hadn't gone anywhere but in a straight line, but just to be sure he pulled out his map and GPS to try to pinpoint his location. The device was guaranteed even in isolated places like that. Perfect satellite positioning, or so it promised. Yet when he turned it on, the display gave him a set of coordinates that didn't make a lick of sense. He was in another country entirely, according to those numbers. And when he gave the device an irritated shake, it changed its mind and told him he had in fact moved to another continent. Then to the middle of the ocean. Then somewhere nearby, but impossible to reach on foot in such a short time. It cycled rapidly like that for a while, before finally giving an error reading.

Cherno frowned at it, and held it above his head. Just his luck that he would pick the one middle-of-nowhere town in the entire country that didn't have satellite coverage. Or maybe the damn thing was just malfunctioning. He did get it second hand, after all. While he gazed upwards at darkened sky, he couldn't help but notice the intertwined branches had thinned. The leaves were gone, leaving only bare, brittle twigs. In between them something thin and fluffy fluttered down towards him, landing directly on his nose. It was cold.

The snowflake slowly melted onto his fur as he gazed in disbelief at the solid wall of grey clouds above him. The sun had vanished behind them, leaving him bathed in that ambiguous semi-dark state that could have been any time of day. Neither sunset nor sunrise, but too dull and colourless to be called daylight. Cherno put the GPS away and instead raised the camera again, scanning all around him, documenting the bizarre phenomenon. The leaves were gone, not even fallen but simply vanished. The air was crisp and chill. And the snow continued to fall.

When he took a step again, he was kicking fresh powder aside. He wasn't sure where he was going anymore. Simply let his body pick a direction, pressing forth at a steady clip through the impossible winter's eve. Eventually the powdered snow beneath his hooves didn't feel as fresh anymore. It crunched, packed hard atop the withered grass. He was ankle-deep and feeling the chill upon his fur. Starting to shiver as he pushed on through the falling flakes. They were blowing about as the wind picked up, and Cherno thought of little more than shelter. He saw only bare trees in every direction.

He wasn't freezing yet, but he wrapped his arms around his own chest, shuddering as he kept the pace swift. No time to slow down and give up, as much as he simply wanted to slump against a tree and rest. Though the cold plastic made him flinch, he raised the camera up again, making sure to film his surroundings as the snow piled up high around him. He cleared his throat, seeing his frozen breath puffing out in front of him, and began to narrate again.

"I'm not sure how this is happening. It's the middle of the summer and I'm seeing snow. My GPS isn't working anymore. I don't know where I am or how to get back. Can barely see more than a few feet in front of me. If this is something supernatural ... well, I don't see how it couldn't be at this point."

He kept walking, taking his mind off of how cold he was by continuing to speak for the camera. Flipping it around, he filmed his own face for a time. And tried not to look too frightened.

"I'm not sure how long it is until nightfall. But I'm obviously not dressed for this kind of weather. If something is out there, if it's toying with me ... I hope it shows itself soon."

He paused for effect, and scanned the camera all around him once more. The trees gave him nothing. Finally, he just went rifling through his pack.

"I know I brought a flare. I feel like I haven't even walked far, but I'm obviously somewhere else entirely. Someone else needs to see this."

He loaded the bright orange gun with a flare and held it in his hands a while, turning it this way and that, feeling distrustful of it. Something told him it wasn't going to fire. That whatever was lurking in the woods would keep him from being rescued, by any means. Yet when he pointed it upwards and pulled the trigger, a bright flash of red light went screaming up into the air, reflecting on the piled snow. It burst loudly enough to shake the dead branches all around him. The echo took some time to fade. And when it did, there was silence.

Someone had surely seen it. All he needed to do was keep warm and safe for as long as it took them to find him. He didn't want to move too much from his position. So he simply found a particularly sturdy tree to stand under, one whose bare branches and broad trunk offered him at least some reprieve from the blustering snow. As long as he could avoid the full force of the wind he could avoid frostbite, he figured. Though he was already shivering. And he also felt a certain warmth in the air. One that almost encouraged him to leave his safe spot, and instead wander off in pursuit of its source.

But that would have been madness. He couldn't give in to such thoughts. The body did strange things in the cold, but he knew how to survive. Even when his mind started to wander and fill with thoughts of something watching him. Movements in the shadows, between the trees. Distinct sounds of crackling twigs as creatures moved through the cold darkness. In time, he realized that his own slow breathing wasn't the only one he was hearing.

It started distant. Little more than a breeze among the blowing wind. But it grew more prevalent the longer he waited there. A ragged sound, like scraping wood. It was hard to call it breathing when it didn't seem to follow any sort of rhythm. It grew faster as he listened, his ears perked, his camera pointed in the direction he thought he heard it. A ragged sound, wooden, hollow, echoing. First it was on his left, and then it was on his right. It shifted as it grew closer, until he even tilted his head straight back to see if it was coming from above him, but there was nothing there.

Another sound accompanied the first. Something rubbing, scraping against the distant trees. It was coming from all directions, sounding like a hundred claws rending at brittle bark. Or maybe more of a grind - Cherno recognized it as something he might make himself, whenever his antlers scraped against something. But this was bigger. Louder. Rolling from his left ear to his right and back again. Something was approaching but he couldn't tell from where. And the camera was getting nothing but snow and shadows.

It wasn't quite a growl that compelled him to flee, but something similar. He couldn't explain it. A hollow rattle at first, growing into something more guttural, something he could feel as much as hear. It shook his bones until he could feel it in his stomach. If he had any remaining doubts that something was approaching, then the noisy parting of nearby trees told him plainly. He didn't think, only acted. Followed what his body, his instincts told him, and that was to run. As quickly as his hooves would carry him, hefting his supplies precariously, holding his camera out in front of him as he went barrelling into the summer blizzard.

Behind there was a primal scream, a sharp sound that nearly deafened him. Shrill and sharp at first, like the cry of a wild cat, but it changed as it extended. Continuing breathlessly until it was lower, more like an extended groan. A gurgling in an unseen throat. It came with a constant huffing, an arrhythmic panting more powerful than the winter wind. And then came the crunch of something large thundering through the snow behind him. Eclipsing him with its shadow as it charged up behind him, no matter how hard he sprinted.

Knowing it was pointless to keep running, Cherno whipped around. He planted his eye to the viewfinder of the camera, and pointed it right towards his hulking pursuer. All he caught was a glimpse. A shrouded figure, its face a cracked skull wrapped in long, sodden strands of black hair. Jagged fangs unlike any animal's were lined up within, bared to him as it lumbered towards him in a hunched gait, hands pressed down into the snow. He saw white fur, and a narrow, partly emaciated figure. Those were all the details he managed to capture before it was upon him with a snarl like two stones being rubbed together.

He dropped his camera as he toppled. It hit him hard in the chest, shoving him flat to the ground. He kicked and struggled, fighting uselessly against a strength much greater than his own. Flailing, squirming, but pinned flat for a moment before the feeding began. Cherno got no warning, no chance of escape before he felt those many teeth sink into his flesh. Hooking deep and tearing the meat right from his bones. He screamed as he bled thickly into the snow, marking it as much as he did the monster's stark white fur.

It didn't have a face exactly, but could move its jaws like any just fine. It bit deeply, piercing easily through his skin. It yanked its head from side to side, tearing through every single layer, shredding his skin and flesh like it were made of little more than paper. He was left to listen to his own body being messily chewed up between the chews of the monster above, listen to every single crunch and squish of his flesh and bones. His right arm couldn't endure the attack for long, and he felt it torn away from him with a snap of jaws. The blood and bits of him rained down upon his chest as he listened to it being stripped of meat, slurped nearly clean before finally being gnawed upon until it broke to splinters.

Cherno hadn't passed out, but he wasn't going to last much longer. He lay bleeding out in the snow, his struggles ceasing as he choked and whimpered beneath the massive wendigo. The initial shock of pain had faded as he numbed over, leaving him merely twitching as his expression glossed over. Dying as the creature fed upon him, ripping him apart with increasing ferocity. Stuffing as much of him down the open gullet nestled within that bloodstained skull, feeding its narrow belly with Cherno's flesh as if it might have died without it. Feeding a hunger the likes of which Cherno couldn't even fathom. He couldn't fathom much anymore.

Rather than simply let him bleed, the wendigo spared him any further suffering by leaning forth and wrapping its jaws around his throat. Cherno's entire head was tucked into its maw with, leaving his face flat against the wendigo's outstretched tongue. It was black and almost inky, oozing a strange substance that was evident even amid all of his own blood. He didn't feel the final bite, but he heard it. A crackling crunch that snapped right through his neck and spine alike. Severing his head in a single chomp. And then chewing. Cherno was still aware for a few brief seconds, just long enough to know what had happened, until his skull was crushed between those fangs and the darkness came. His mind fell empty as it was chewed to bits by the famished wendigo.

The creature continued until there was nothing left but a stain upon the snow. It pulverized his bones, his antlers, even his hooves. It left nothing behind as it crawled back into the shadows once more, drenched in its victim's drying blood, lashing a lengthy black tongue along its fangs and skull for one last taste. Its gait was slumped and haggered, weary, but its belly was full of meat. Just as the falling snow began to conceal the bloody mark of what had happened, the meal within its gut swiftly began to melt. The creature shuddered and groaned until its middle flattened once more, the whole process taking little more than a minute. Cherno was consumed and gone, and the woods were silent once again.

***

It wasn't so much that Cherno awoke as he was simply there. He was sprawled out in a warm place, the crackling of a campfire melting the nearby snow. Scrambling to sit, he jerked about, swearing he could still feel the beast's teeth upon him. There was no chance he could have survived such a maiming, if it happened how he remembered it. He set to rapidly touching over the parts of his body where he recalled the pain the most, but there were no wounds, no scars. No sign of any damage. He refused to accept he had imagined it. But it was hard to explain how even his clothes were intact again.

His pack was nearby. On top of it was his camera, undamaged despite the attack. He grabbed for it and turned it on. There were several hours of footage, and he cycled through until he got to the final minutes. His footage of the supposed wendigo was grainy and out of focus, leaving nothing more than an outline visible before it pounced upon him. Then the video went black, but the sound blared from that tiny speaker. Cherno recoiled in horror as he listened to his own screams, to the sound of his body being torn apart, and even to his own final gasps fading amidst the crunching of his bones.

He didn't know how he was still alive, much less intact. He did know that he was alone again, and that it had grown dark. And in the distance, there was a voice. It was singing or maybe chanting in the night. Throaty, thunderous, like a towering wooden instrument rather than a real voice. The notes were long and shaky, the language unfamiliar. Cherno couldn't have spelled what he heard phonetically if he tried. He was pretty certain that it was a language he had never heard before, something he wasn't even equipped to understand. Yet as he listened, images simply began to appear inside his head. Shapes he'd never thought possible. Distant places where physics as he knew them didn't apply. Glimpsed only briefly, but long enough to leave him dazed and disoriented if he focused on that humming death-chant for too long.

An instrument joined the voice. A faint rattling, like wooden chimes. Then the scrape returned. Like a rusted saw hacking through an ancient oak. Cherno rose to his hooves again. The hunt hadn't ended just because he'd been caught once. He rifled through his pack for something that might have helped him fend off the primal beast, but settled instead just on his flashlight. But that was likely to give him away, he realized, so instead he cast it aside and picked up his camera. The dark blue of the early night was gone, leaving it black as pitch, but if he turned the nightvision on he could look through the lens and see his surroundings relatively clearly. If bathed in an eerie green glow.

He left the rest of his supplies behind and set out with only the camera to keep himself safe. There weren't many places to hide among the trees, but he pressed on anyway. Trying not to let the sound of the approaching creature shake him. Resisting the urge to panic and just run. His every muscle was tense as if they might burst, but he kept himself low as he trudged as quietly as possible through the accumulated snow.

The creature's song sounded mournful. Maybe even pained. Cherno couldn't much feel sorry for it after what it had done to him. But he found himself at least partly curious what its story might have been. He wished he could capture it on camera, wished he could attempt to communicate with it. But there was nothing to do but hide after it had shown him its true intentions. The trees parted, opening into a clearing that was somehow full of trash despite how far he surely was away from the town. And some of it struck him as oddly familiar.

It wasn't just the usual throwaways that he might have expected to be dumped out in the middle of the woods. The misplaced objects around him were too specific for that. There was an old school desk and chair, and looking at it through his camera brought back the faint remnants of a memory long since pushed aside. A sudden buzzing startled him, and he was nearly blinded when he pointed the camera to its source. Lowering the device, he found himself shielding his night-blind eyes from the glare of a streetlight. Its flickered there, unexplained. He could have stood watching it for longer if not for the realization that basking in its light made it easier to find him.

Cherno swiftly moved back into the shadows, swinging his camera over the other scattered oddities. There was the husk of a swing set, a broken old plastic slide. All of it long since abandoned and fallen into disrepair. To think that there had been a school all the way out there was already unsettling enough to him. But he couldn't help but recognize them. They were only vague memories, but he somehow had no doubts that those abandoned playthings had been taken from his own childhood school. And when he saw the locker, he knew he wasn't mistaken.

It was opened slightly, unlocked. He stood filming it for a while. His old number, 1385. He even recognized the little scratches he'd left on it with his developing antlers. He didn't want to open it, but his body worked against his mind, swinging it wide before he could stop himself. There was nothing there but for some old stickers he still recognized. A few old bands and videogames, stuff he liked as a kid. And in a moment, he was back there, forgetting of the forest and his pursuer, knowing little more than growing up and having fun. A distant bell rang in his ear, and he could hear tapping footsteps and the voices of old friends long forgotten.

He found himself thinking about the choices he had made in his life, and the things he had said that he regretted. Friendships he'd let drift in pursuit of other things, the last words ever spoken to each other promises to reconnect in the future. And then there were the grudges he still held, people who he sometimes wished were dead for how they treated him, so many years ago. He had never really thought about that anger he still held within him until then, as he stood there, recalling the musty smell of those old hallways.

The scent of the snow and cold returned to him when he heard the creature approaching. Groaning out its saddening song, clattering with its every heavy step. He still couldn't tell what direction it was coming from, but it was louder and thus closer. There was nowhere he could run, and only one place he could hide. Contorting himself up as tightly as he could, he lunged forth and stuffed himself into that locker, craning his head to the side so his antlers would fit, somehow managing to close the door behind him.

There was barely any room to breathe in there. He couldn't maneuver well enough to get his camera up to his eye. The light from that tall streetlight faintly glowed through the vents as Cherno simply held still and remained quiet, even slowing his breathing. The rumbling song was near, and with it came a rattle and the sound of crunchy snow. Cherno managed just a peek at the wendigo's outline through the locker. It was standing on just two legs this time, towering as tall as some of the trees. Then the streetlight cracked and burst, raining broken glass down to the forest floor, shrouding Cherno in complete darkness. He had only sound to tell him it was still near.

It breathed in strange, shuddering gasps. Like it was barely able to control itself and its convulsing muscles. The sound of each step was a heavy one, sounding like a stampede of hooved creatures rather than simply the one. As the wendigo came near, Cherno could feel its warmth. Almost sweltering in comparison to the surroundings. At least, if he got caught again, he would be warm for a little while. But he couldn't let himself think that way. He simply braced himself and made sure not to whimper in fright as he listened to the wendigo pacing back and forth through the fragments of his memories.

Cherno didn't quite breathe a sigh of relief when he heard its voice fading, finding it hard to believe that his hiding spot might have worked. His heart wasn't pounding. He couldn't even feel it. And as he listened to the beast trudging off, leaving that clearing, he was stricken by a thought. It didn't know where he was, but it was close. This was his chance to capture it on film and prove he wasn't just crazy. Making sure not to let it creak, he slowly pushed the locker open, raising the camera back up once he had room to do so.

The wendigo was still pacing, hunched but standing on two legs. From behind, Cherno saw a tall, lithe figure. One that reminded him slightly of his own, right down to the short tail that adorned its rear. It even had antlers. They were complex and overgrown, and Cherno even caught them moving, changing shape as their owner scanned around the area, pausing in its singing to sniff the air. There was a collection of unidentifiable trinkets and totems hanging from those antlers, made of wood or feather or bone, explaining the constant clatter that followed its every step. When it turned, he found he was looking at a male creature, with a bare sheath and balls exposed to the elements, but he wasn't focused on those. That smooth, white skull was pointed directly at him.

Most eyes glowed green in the camera's nightvision. The wendigo's were simply black. Four of them, nestled in hollow sockets on a skull that resembled a deer's. Except the jaws were much to broad, stretched back too far, showing off an overlapping crocodile grin of pointed teeth. Cherno risked the sound of zooming in just to get the perfect shot of that monstrous visage. The wendigo lingered for a while, looking one way, then another. The footage couldn't have been better. He didn't seem to know where the buck was, wasn't moving any closer. Which meant Cherno was taken completely by surprise when he felt the tight grasp around his throat.

His cry of fright was stifled by that hold, and he was plucked from the locker and into the air as if he didn't weigh anything. He dropped his camera to find himself looking directly at the wendigo's form in front of him. He wasn't where he'd been standing on camera. The moonlight shone through the trees, illuminating the creature's form just enough to let Cherno see him snarling. Saliva ran from his skull as he opened his jaws before the deer's face. There was no reasoning with him, no begging or breaking free of his hold.

Cherno's kicking hooves against the wendigo's chest did nothing to dissuade him. The wendigo began consuming without pause. The buck found himself bathed in the beast's breath, hot enough to make him slightly sweat as he felt that inky tongue wrapping around his face. It flexed and stretched in ways that weren't natural, almost more like an amphibian's than a deer's. And soon, it replaced the wendigo's hand upon his throat. Curling around him, bathing him in that strange, slimy substance that oozed down his fur, marking and staining it. And he felt the monster take a solid hold of his rump, starting to shove him upwards with a brutal, wrenching grip that clutched at him possessively. Cherno was his food, to consume and keep.

He wondered if the wendigo had forgotten about his antlers as he got shoved headfirst into his gullet. But rather than harm the monster's throat any, they simply bent or snapped on impact. The creature's flesh was stronger. He felt those teeth framing his throat, and then his chest. Nibbling, gnawing. Now and then pricking him enough to draw just a slight drop of blood. The wendigo was shaking as he ate him whole. Shuddering in pleasure, or something else. Cherno found himself oddly soothed by the heated confines of the throat wrapping all around him. Even slippery and coated in saliva, it was more welcoming than the icy cold surroundings he was leaving. He felt himself tempted to simply relax, to give in. Accept his fate as wendigo food as if it were his purpose.

But there were still his instincts to deal with. He couldn't just ignore the fact that he was a deer, being eaten by a predator. There wasn't pain like last time, aside from the occasional sting of teeth piercing his skin. But there was panic. The slick squeeze sliding down his chest and towards his belly was tight, confining. And it led down to a deadly gut that rumbled hard in anticipation of living meat. Not just the torn shreds as before. A whole, breathing deer to digest alive. The thought of such a treatment brought the fight back into Cherno's stunned body, and in time, he was kicking and fighting with all his might all over again.

It didn't smell like innards down there. It was more like descending into an underground lake. A damp scent surrounded him, going along with a soothing heat that kept the cold away. His body told him to give up, but there endured that spark of instinctual terror in his mind that kept him from holding still and accepting his second fate. He felt himself being bent, maybe partly broken. The wendigo's teeth dug deep into his skin, drawing blood that mingled with the bare-skulled creature's dark saliva. And all around Cherno there were only those constant sounds. The increasingly deafening glurk of a slippery throat wrapping around his entire body, while the monster shook and shuddered violently around him.

The air was humid but plentiful inside the beast's stomach, Cherno soon found. His antlers were all bent out of shape, barely holding to his head, cracked and crumbling in places as he got his head shoved down into the wendigo's gut, still largely unharmed. His hooves wiggled all about, framed between those deadly teeth. He felt those jaws coming down on them, and he felt them outright crack under the pressure. There was nothing such a powerful bite couldn't crush. It was like he was reminding Cherno how much worse things could be for him. But the buck didn't much take to the mercy - once he was getting snugly tucked away in the darkness of that gurgling gut, he made good use of the abundant air by letting out a scream. His own voice echoed back at him, barely escaping to the outside world, and soon was drowned out by the constant rumble of his surroundings gurgling to life.

If a stomach could be aggressive, that was exactly what it was. The wendigo had a hunger that could not wait to be sated, and Cherno was food. The deer's cries were silenced by the pressure squeezing inwards on him, the chamber lunging at him from all sides to clamp and compress his body into a manageable ball. He felt his joints popping, limbs being rearranged, his flexibility tested as he was kneaded into an unnatural shape he could barely maintain. It brought forth his gasps, but any effort to call for help was muffled. He couldn't even scream as he got nearly crushed, the air forced out of his lungs by several particularly hard squeezes. He could hear something going crunch, but he didn't feel the pain of broken bones just yet. His arms and legs were going numb.

Any claustrophobia Cherno might have felt was only worsened by a sudden rush of fluid. It didn't simply coat him, but rather began to immerse him from the hooves up, while he fought to keep his head as high as he could. The digestive juices came up to his chest, then to his throat, all in a matter of seconds. Everything was moving at a terrifyingly rapid pace. He could only raise one of his arms, the other dislocated and unresponsive, and he used it to shove at the walls around him as hard as he could. Trying to make more room for himself to keep from going under and drowning in those bubbling juices. When that didn't work, he simply made a fist and started thumping, pouring his dwindling energy into at least protesting his own digestion.

It didn't slow the wendigo, didn't seem to bother him any. Cherno couldn't tell if he was moving or not. He only knew his immediate surroundings. Bathed in darkness, knowing only sound and touch. And the smell. It was acidic in his lungs, burning his throat even when he kept his mouth sealed tight to avoid swallowing any of the rising fluids. The heat grew overwhelming until he wanted nothing more than to escape and roll around in the freezing snow. And he had to tilt his muzzle back to keep out of the rising acid. In doing so, he could feel his own fur floating on the surface. Stripped away from his body as the digestion rendered him bare-skinned all at once. Then it was on his exposed skin, and that was when he felt it.

At first it was little more than static shock. Then it was itching, but he didn't dare scratch. The noise around him grew more dire and the chamber squeezed even tighter to his body, until he felt his knees right up against his chest while he began to peel apart. Layer by layer. Irritating until it was simply painful, but only briefly. All was numb in time. He could still feel somewhat, enough so that the sensation of his own body falling apart was immediately obvious to him. He was collapsing downwards, sinking into a sludgy, partly liquefied state from the hooves up. With one last desperate grasp towards the ceiling of the chamber, he felt his strength failing, his limbs no longer responding to him, and the whole of his body sinking beneath the surface, fully immersed in those ravenous acids.

It was on his face. In his nose, his eyes, his ears. Flowing into his throat no matter how hard he tried to prevent that. Everything was melting. His skin was largely gone, and the meat beneath was rapidly softening until only bones remained. Their ligaments and tendons broke apart between them, leaving individual joints floating about the sloshing mess around him. His features were reducing down to a skull, and his antlers fall free from his head. While all the havoc was most evident on the outside of his body, his innards fared no better. Though he had no idea the true extent of the damage, he could feel vital pieces simply failing. Cramping up in distress and then melting from their position. His body couldn't hold together for much longer, but somehow he was still alive.

Even in that flooded stomach, with every digestive sound filtered through the layers of melted flesh and acid, Cherno could hear that voice again. Slowly singing to himself in the woods, a slow and forlorn murmur. The buck could feel it as much as hear it. He knew he was dying, again. He could hardly tell what was happening to his body any more, but there wasn't any pain. Drowning, breaking, melting, but spared from the worst of the gory details. In place of fear and torment, he felt strangely released as he faded. With every earthly sensation gone, there was only the dark void, opening up before him. For as long as his mind remained functional and undigested, he slipped into a few fleeting moments of ecstasy, glimpsing the nothingness that was so much greater than himself.

When the bulge that rounded the wendigo's gut crushed harshly inwards, the buck ceased moving. Ended by that decisive squeeze, but still churning. Still being processed down into little more than bone-strewn paste. Not even those survived for long. Such was the potency of the wendigo's digestives, there were hardly any traces of the deer left, mere minutes after being eaten. Simply a belly full of liquid venison to be absorbed, that rounded middle flattening back over as if he was never even there while the gluttonous monster's song became a shrieking wail into the frozen night.

***

The fire was still burning bright beside him. It was like he'd never left. Cherno basked in that glow, in that soothing heat, watching as the logs remained steadfast in the flames. They never crumbled, never withered. For all he knew they would burn forever out there in the middle of the woods, no matter how strong the wind blew. He huddled there a while, feeling the cold against his back, and the warmth before him. No small part of him wanted to remain perfectly still, to wait there forever. Maybe he was safe there.

The memory of his dying sensations remained strong, almost felt. He broke out of his stupor to rub over his body, checking to make sure everything was still there. There was no sign of injury, no sign of wounds fresh or healed. He was simply back to where he started last time once again. Beside him were his supplies and his camera, neatly piled as before. He jolted upwards when he remembered the footage that he'd died to capture. Leaning over, he opened up the camera, and went back through his recordings.

Everything was there. The desk, the broken swing set, even the old locker. He hadn't imagined any of it. But when he finally got to his vital footage, to that clear shot of the wendigo pacing around in front of him, the picture suddenly became blurry. It bounced and twitched, filling with static. The sound was still there. Cherno couldn't help but listen to it all. Every single slurp, every swallow, and his muffled screams vanishing down the creature's gullet, until his voice was silenced by the cacophony of digestion. He heard himself die, again, and he considered what his continued existence could have meant as he tilted his head back towards the moonlit sky.

He still didn't have usable footage. So when he heard the distant rattle, and the sound of heavy hooves trudging through the snow, he gripped his camera tight. Everything else stayed behind as he got up to flee once more. The wendigo wasn't singing this time, nor was he growling. Simply approaching in his direction as Cherno dashed off into the dark, observing the frozen forest through a filter of green. It never changed, never gave him any hope of ending. The trees all looked the same through the camera. He wondered if he was going in circles, even when he never seemed to turn.

The clattering continued behind him, but he saw nothing when he pointed the camera over his shoulder. His initial run was more a jog as the minutes continued. Pressing through snow up to his knees had him soaking and exhausted, puffing hard before he had even made it far. If he was making any progress at all. He was cold and damp, his chest and muscles aching, but he wouldn't stop for anything. He wasn't going to let the wendigo catch him this time.

But he could hear him getting closer. Every time Cherno felt himself slowing down, the hunter closed in. Not sprinting after him, but merely following. Letting the pursuit wear him out. Cherno had no perception of time anymore, and the darkness never lifted, but he was running for what felt like hours. It might have been days for all he knew. Every basic need was aching at him, but he remained there in the dark, keeping his distance from that wooden clatter that loomed in shadows behind him. Unseen but ever present.

His jog became more of a stumble as his body started giving out. The battery indicator on his camera screen was flashing red as the green glow flickered. But it was becoming unnecessary as he continued on. There were glimpses of light above. The slightest hint of the sun as he forced himself to continue. Maybe the light would prove a deterrence to the monster behind him. Before his camera died, he swung around and zoomed in on the misty forest just behind him. Just long enough to catch a brief shot at his pursuer.

The wendigo looked different then. He had a face not unlike Cherno's own, taking the appearance of a deer but with gaping jaws that split through the middle of his features. Even with his fangs bared, he looked sullen, weary. His eyes were completely dark, and there were four of them. Two more set in his forehead, lacking any sort of glimmer. He wasn't as thin anymore either, remaining lithe but looking healthier, with more meat on his bones compared to the first time Cherno saw him. He was looking directly at his prey, his expression neutral, focused. Neither running nor walking, simply striding forward on his great long legs, unceasing in his pursuit.

Cherno couldn't run anymore. He could barely walk, his legs having gone numb in the cold. Even from a distance he could feel the heat the wendigo gave off. It called to him. Maybe they could simply curl up together, and Cherno would be warm again. Comforted. He was all but bent double, barely able to hold himself on his hooves, even as the morning came and the air grew less oppressively cold. Every step was one he forced, no matter how much his body shook, utterly devoid of energy. Drained of everything but pressing on just a few more inches. Maybe that would be enough.

He finally just fell to his knees, dropping his camera in the snow. He didn't care if he got the footage or not anymore. All he could do was give up. Even just resting for those few seconds was already a relief. The cold was melting from his body as the wendigo strode up behind him, and then moved around in front. Cherno remained on his knees, raising his hands to clasp them together as if praying to the god of the forest. The beast regarded him for a while, wearing a solemn face that was like Cherno's own, but devoid of all colour.

When he reached for Cherno with those clawed hands of his, the buck only flinched somewhat. The chase was over and he lost, but every moment he spent in the presence of the wendigo was helping him recover. He was warm again. His muscles didn't ache as badly. He even caught his breath with time. The creature tilted his head upwards with a single finger, and they looked into each other's eyes for a time. There was an emptiness the likes of which Cherno had never seen before in the wendigo's black gaze. Not devoid of thought, but more a window into something he couldn't comprehend. He was more than simply a rabid beast, or at least that was the sense that he gave.

Their moment was broken when he lunged as Cherno. Neither biting nor swallowing this time. Instead, the buck simply found himself knocked down into the snow. It was shallow by then, a thin layer atop the dead grass that was growing warmer as it melted. Lithe or not, the wendigo was heavy, and had Cherno pinned there beneath his weight. The buck couldn't help himself. The longer he looked up over that gleaming, snowy fur, and felt himself being overpowered, the more excited he found himself. There were two instincts in his body he never could ignore. One was to flee at the sight of a predator, no matter how much it hurt to keep running. But even stronger than that was the desire to submit when faced with someone more powerful. Held down in the forest, he let himself be stripped bare by those deadly claws, offering himself to the wendigo's primal lust.

Of course such a monster was sporting something big. It pushed forth from a broad sheath, as inky black as his tongue, coated in a similar substance. Despite his cervine appearance, his cock was canine. It dripped above Cherno as he simply watched the creature tear away his clothes in awe. His skin didn't go entirely untouched. Now and then those claws pierced him, making him flinch slightly, but he didn't mind too much. He wanted to submit. To pleasure the monster who had been repeatedly consuming him. To let something supernatural ravage him like no one else ever could.

Soon, he found himself on his face. The wendigo flipped him with ease, shoving him down and mounting him all in a single aggressive motion. A snarl erupted from those clenched fangs, and black saliva dripped onto the back of his head. He wasn't sure what to expect, whether he was going to be broken in two at first thrust. But he simply lifted his short tail and offered himself up to the ancient spirit, to the fearsome monster, and was soon rewarded with that slick, slime-clad shaft slipping sweetly inside of him. It fit him perfectly, or at least it did after some stretching. All the way down until that heavy knot thumped against his taint, while the wendigo huffed steaming hot breath into his hair.

He was sweating, even in the middle of his wintry surroundings. The beast was pure heat. And he was still an animal in the sense that he wasn't one for a slow, erotic mating. He was rutting Cherno without any buildup. No need for him to gain momentum when he was as powerful as he was. Pumping, thrusting, spanking him down into the damp grass with that engorged knot. Wrapping a hand around his throat and tugging him closer. Cherno's arms flopped below him, unable to reach the ground as he dangled there. The wendigo seized one of his antlers, and yanked on it harshly, wrenching his head back. Somehow, it was coming loose. Just as that knot began to plunge inside of him, spreading him wide with the relentless pounding.

He never slowed, never tired. The monster had energy beyond anything mortal. Cherno found himself whimpering, even bleating. He didn't make that sound often. Without anything to hold onto, or to brace himself, he found himself simply flailing his arms about while he was shaken back and forth. The impact was shaking his entire body, making any padded parts of him jiggle all about. That knot got trapped inside him briefly, reducing the wendigo's thrusts to a rapid, one-inch pumping. It didn't stay tied for long, yanking right back out in a squelch of fluids, pouring down to Cherno's balls. The shock of stimulation made him yelp out, only to grow breathlessly silent as the creature knotted him all over again.

In and out it went, with a heavy pop every single time. The speed was excessive, and Cherno simply found himself embedded in the dirt below as the monster rutted him. The grip upon his antler was violently yanking his head to the side every few thrusts, until there was a sharp crackle like a stomped twig. Then he heard crunching. It took him some time to register what happened, to realize the sudden imbalance he felt was a result of his missing antler. The wendigo chewed it to pieces while he fucked the deer, not even pausing in his lusty aggression. Somehow, Cherno hadn't been broken by that ruthless rutting, hadn't shattered beneath all that strength.

Though he was breaking in another way. From timidly submissive to warmly, happily enjoying being bred like ... whatever a female wendigo was called. His body was giving in, slumping, going limp but for his own arousal as it throbbed up against his belly. He was spurting all the way to his chest, adding to the sweaty mess on his fur. His mouth hung open, tongue flopped from his jaws. His eyes were barely seeing, watery and bright. It surely was a strange sight to see the snarling monster aggressively fucking a drooling, blissful buck, but Cherno couldn't help but lose himself to the pleasure.

The wendigo hardly seemed to be trying to pleasure him, but when he jammed his knot in one more time, holding it there, grinding, humping, bulging Cherno's belly, it was enough to set him off. The deer couldn't help but blow his load all over himself in a sudden gush thick and potent as any he'd ever given, rocking his hips wildly as the pleasure alone milked him of those spurts without a single touch to his cock. He was rewarded with an even heavier rush of heat gushing up inside of him. The beast's cum was thick and strange - its texture hardly felt like any other Cherno had felt inside of him. But there was no mistaking it. He gave a shaky cry and finally just moaned out as he kept on emptying his balls, feeling the wendigo's own nestled up against them. Clenching, tightening, milking out every single drop of monstrous seed to bloat out the buck's soon sloshing belly.

They remained tied for a while. Cherno panted harder than he ever had. He was soaked and filled, feeling the fluids inside him jostling about with every little motion. The wendigo shook and rattled, huffing even more hotly behind him. Letting his cock flex and spurt a few more times. His cum did strange things inside Cherno. He felt it moving on its own, spreading to other parts of his body. Spreading a hot, smooth feeling all the way to his finger tips, repelling the cold around him. A blessing, a curse, a corruption. He didn't know, but he knew it felt good.

He was roused from his soothed, orgasmic state by another sudden pop. The beast didn't keep him close for too long. Cherno had almost felt intimate, snuggled back there against him, comfortably huddled together beneath a monster who had already killed him twice. But he wasn't dealing with a person, exactly. He flopped to the ground once he was released, dripping that strange black cum, gazing up at the creature. Admiring his features, his bright white fur, devoid of the bloodstains it had worn before. Maybe he had simply absorbed it, like he had with the rest of Cherno two times already.

There was a rumble. Cherno thought it was a growl, but it was the wendigo's stomach. He was still hungry. Two entire deer wasn't enough to satisfy him. He loomed above, offering a deep look. He tried to look right back, but he could only meet one pair at a time. It still wasn't clear if the creature could truly think or if he was operating on little more than instinct. He didn't speak and he didn't make any effort to communicate. But as he held that intense stare, gazing directly into Cherno's eyes until he felt as if his mind was being read, it almost felt like he was asking permission. His stomach still needed more meat. Cherno had already submitted to his lust. He didn't lunge or attack until the buck slowly nodded to him. As hesitant as the deer was, the sad look on the wendigo's face was one he couldn't resist. He wanted to make him feel better.

Those jaws gaped and dripped before him, made much more clear in the faint glow of sunrise. It was purely darkness within that maw, as if outright absorbing the light. Cherno couldn't even make out the details at the back of his throat. His breath was hot and thick. He might have been wearing a face at the moment, but his jaws were just as deadly. And within, there was nestled that snakelike tongue, easily stretching out to wrap around the buck's soft throat, tugging him close as the wendigo wrapped him up in a hungry embrace.

He was gentle with him this time. Still devouring him whole, but he was careful with his teeth. His claws stroked up and down Cherno's back, scratching him pleasantly, seeming to be putting an effort forth to keep him soothed. Feeding him slowly between his lips, letting him slide down into his throat a little at a time. Cherno was tense, nervous. The last visit to the creature's belly hadn't exactly been kind to him. But he wasn't fighting this time. He accepted his fate, his new role as food. When he managed to relax enough, the swallow felt more like a massage.

Even more pleasant was that tongue. It could do things no other could. Cherno felt it wriggling all over his body, almost tentacle-like in its flexibility. It was slick and warm, caressing up and down his chest. Tasting each and every detail before they were swallowed whole. Cherno felt it slurp up beneath his arms, down his chest and then around, stroking down his spine. His cock was still oversensitive, half-soft as it got tossed around by that tendering licking. The wendigo even went right up beneath his tail, sloppily stroking between his cheeks, tasting some of the dark, oozing cum that ran from beneath the buck's tail. If he wasn't mistaken, it felt like the creature was being generous to him. Intentionally pleasuring him even while eating him alive. Cherno wanted to think so, at least.

The heat was ever-present, but it wasn't stifling. It reminded him of the campfire he had left behind. A welcoming warmth that let him forget about his worries. Even the noisy gurgling below didn't scare him. He let his body settle and simply submitted to being consumed, to being treated as meat. The wendigo shook and twitched at times. Violence shuddered through his body, and was just suppressed. Cherno squirmed his way between the wendigo's newly formed lips, until his hooves were pointing towards the grey sky above, reflecting the glimpses of the sun behind the clouds.

He heard a heavy gulp, and felt that slimy tube rubbing all over his soaked body as he descended. He couldn't help but be fascinated by the process, by the force and strength working to overpower and send him down for processing. Even as he slipped down into that warm belly, he couldn't feel afraid. His claustrophobia was gone, and maybe even his fear of death. The churning started almost immediately as before. As gentle as the hungry creature had been with him up until then, digestion was another thing. He couldn't fully hold back the tide of his enduring hunger.

Cherno felt the acids flowing. Heard the hissing noise of his own body being worked over. Layer by layer. Pound by pound. He tried to simply think of it as a stay within a particularly cramped hot tub - but the squeezing, crushing grip eventually made him gasp a little. His body was rapidly weakening, giving in to the wendigo's curse, to his appetite. If the stories he heard was true, he would be little more than a temporary reprieve, never to truly sate him. But he didn't mind anymore. As his higher functions began to shut off, his lingering glow of orgasm a light in that dark void of a stomach, Cherno simply let himself submit. To be taken and used as a prey as he melted down into little more than a meaty mass at the bottom of a gut.

It seemed to go even faster than the last time. His limbs twitched and detached. His entire body caved inwards, the churns crushing him to paste. He felt a couple pinches, a couple burns, but mostly there was simple release. A liberation of every regret, every worry, everything that had every troubled him, lifting from his chest as he was reduced to little more than bone. Just as before, there was that brief burst of ecstasy at feeling himself ceasing to exist. Then, there was nothing but the shrinking outline of what used to be a deer, weighing down a snow white belly. Softening, becoming more indistinct, breaking apart into separate pieces. Then flattening over as he digested down completely, gone from the world but for the nourishment he provided the hungering one.

***

Cherno was partly surprised to find himself in the woods once more. Some part of him was certain he was meeting his true end. But he was alive, whole, and unharmed as ever before. The cold had receded some in favour of morning. The sky remained grey and wintry, but the chill had mostly departed. The fire remained crackling beside him, the logs never faltering, burning on eternally. He got to his hooves.

The wendigo was already there, seemingly waiting for him. He stood partly concealed behind a tree, his narrow frame matching with the icy trunk. The way he was peering out at Cherno, silent and seemingly tentative almost made him look like he was shy. The buck was slightly shaky on his hooves. Though his wounds and digestion alike had shown no lasting effect on his body, he was tired. It felt like he had been in that forest for a lot longer than a single night, and he hadn't slept for any of it. He watched the monster right back, meeting his gaze, uncertain of what to do.

Eventually, the deer-like beast came out from his hiding spot. He walked up close to his victim, standing tall above the fire, the glow of the flames reflecting off his white fur. Then he simply crouched down, planting his hands between his hooves, lowering himself to roughly Cherno's height. He looked calm, even docile. The deer gave a quick glance over to the his supplies, and to his camera. This would have been the perfect moment, the perfect shot. But the wendigo changed his mind for him.

In that moment he looked away, the creature's deer-like face changed again to something more frightening. Skin receded to show the skull beneath his face once more, and he clacked his teeth together as a scraping growl welled up in his throat. Cherno jumped back in alarm, and continued backing away. The wendigo followed, slowly, crawling, swaying back and forth. Looking more animal by the moment. He let his tongue dangle down from his bony jaws, dripping that pitch black substance onto the snow. He scraped his claws into the ground beneath him. His antlers grew and stretched with a sound like wood crackling in a fire, wrapping outwards and reaching towards the buck as if to ensnare him. The bones that dangled from them jangled back and forth, rattling a threatening tune to him. His would be among them if he didn't flee. Though the warmth and sadness of the monster called to him, Cherno did as he was silently told. He ran.

The dead branches all around him grew less barren as he went. He didn't look back, but he could hear the grating breath behind him. The leaves he saw upon the trees were dry and dead at first, but as he ran through the thinning snow, he saw colour there in time. Dull brown, turning to a light orange, and finally to that bright, vibrant red he'd seen before. Though the hue reminded him of blood, he was greatly relieved to see it. And when he stepped out from under the barren grey sky and into the morning sun once more, he felt as if he had broken free of unseen chains. He staggered and stumbled to a stop, bent double and panting hard. Behind him, a rattling, mournful cry echoed from the hollow skull of his pursuer. That was when he finally looked back.

The wendigo had stopped his chase, crouched low at the edge of his forest, right on the last remnants of the snow. He dipped his head and gave what sounded like an extended moan, before looking into Cherno's eyes. The buck looked right back. It would have been easy to spit at the creature. To curse him for the pain and fear he'd caused. But watching him sit there, drooping, his hair a tangled mess partly stuck to that black-eyed skull, Cherno couldn't help but feel some sympathy. And so when the wendigo extended a lanky, overlong arm towards him to offer his bony hand, Cherno stepped back into the forest to take it, grasping softly. He felt a squeeze.

It was a strange thing to come over him so suddenly, but he wanted nothing more but to hug the creature. So he did, wrapping his arms tightly around the slender middle of the monster who had already consumed him thrice over. He was a little more padded there, a little less frightfully thin, at least for the moment, thanks to the deer's contributions. The embrace almost seemed to startle him, and he just went rigid for a time before finally returning the hug, his long arms encircling Cherno, bending in strange ways.

When he spoke, his voice was surprisingly soft and gentle, though beneath his words there was an ominous rattle, a rumble in his throat almost like a hiss.

"I'm sorry," he said.

Cherno looked up at the wendigo. He was wearing a face again, mirroring the buck's own appearance at least to some extent. As easy as it would have been to hold a grudge, he just smiled instead.

"It's okay. You're a wendigo! That's what you have to do, right?"

The creature shook his head. Cherno perked his brow.

"No? What are you then, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Something worse."

There was something deeply sinister about those simple words that took the breath from Cherno's lungs, stifling his ability to answer. The beast went on.

"But to you, yes. Think of me as your wendigo. I am Oghden."

Getting a name helped Cherno calm down. He offered a friendly tone. "Hi Oghden. I'm Cherno."

"I know."

Though cautious, Cherno reached up and ran his fingers through Oghden's hair. It was surprisingly silky, if a bit tangled.

"You don't have to look so sad. I understand if you're hungry."

"More than you might think."

Again, there was something more beneath his words, something about the rattling breath in his throat growing sharper as he spoke that made Cherno wary of who or what exactly he was hugging. The wendigo reassured him.

"I won't hurt you anymore. You escaped. Those are my rules."

"I think you let me go, to be fair."

Oghden nodded. "You earned it. I am new to this. Someday, I hope it might help people leave their troubles behind. But I cannot resist the hunger completely. It is always there."

Cherno tipped his head. "Was that what all that ... stuff was about? Those bits of my old memories, I guess?"

"Yes. I don't quite have it right yet." For a moment his expression brightened, almost a smile, though it was hard to tell with all those teeth. "Thank you for the practice."

"You're welcome, Oghden." Cherno shifted until he was outright sitting in the wendigo's lap. They remained hugged closer, maybe even snuggling. "I didn't know what I would find when I came out here. It definitely wasn't someone like you."

"It was foolish. You have neglected much in pursuit of me. There are other things you can do. People who miss you. You will see."

Cherno just pursed his lips. For a moment he felt a reflection of the creature's sadness. Finally, he just leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek, suppressing a giggle at the startled reaction. "You're probably right. You seem sweet for someone who ate me three times."

Oghden gave him a deep look, regarding him with those four unblinking eyes. "You remember it as three? Good."

Cherno leaned his head back. "What do you mean by that, exactly?"

"Sometimes I make mistakes. The hunger is always there. I have regrets."

Given he could distinctly remember himself being torn apart or digested alive, Cherno didn't like to try imagining what those forgotten instances might have been like. He still didn't hold it against the wendigo for doing what seemingly came naturally to him.

"It's okay, Oghden," he reiterated. "I'm not mad at you."

That brought a sigh from the lithe monster. He sunk down and pressed close. "Thank you. I will be better next time. Please do not tell them about me. I do not think the world is yet ready."

"I won't. Can I visit you again? Do I just ... keep walking until I find you?"

"I would like that. My call will guide you." And with a pause, his tone grew a little brighter. "I will return your things, as well. I have no use for them. But I will have to erase your video."

"That seems fair. You did give me my body back, after all." Cherno was sad to lose his chance at such a breakthrough, but he would figure it out. He'd figure something out.

They sat in silence for a time. Staying close. Touching. Cherno brushed at Oghden's hair with his fingers, and the wendigo ran his claws through the buck's own in return. They huddled together in the cold, and for a while, Cherno felt safer than he had ever been. No natural threat could frighten him when he embracing that supernatural hunter like an old friend. He did hope they really could be friends, at least in some way. Even if it meant getting eaten again. And again.

They parted with a little smooch right on the lips. Oghden almost looked like a person by that point. He was still too tall, his proportions too stretched and lanky, and of course there were those frightful fangs and eyes. But aside from all that, he had the appearance of a gentle, feminine buck. Cherno even wondered if he had taken inspiration from himself for such a look. The wendigo could have been his monochromatic cousin, with just a few adjustments. He just offered a smile in passing, and he just knew somehow that this wasn't goodbye for good.

The bright red leaves receded to more modest colours as he walked. Soft oranges and yellows that matched well with the crisp autumn-like scent all around him. He thought of hot tea and pumpkin pie, all the pleasure of the season. Even when he continued walking, the blazing summer heat never returned, nor did the bright green forest he had entered. Yet in only a few minutes of pacing forth, he found his car again. Buried in crumbled leaves, almost completely concealed on the side of the road. That seemed strange to him. He had only been gone for an evening.

Even stranger was the sight of the ranger's station when he pulled up. The building was the same as he remembered it, though the lot was empty when he arrived. There was a bulletin board just inside the front door, and something fluttered in the gentle wind. The poster had been there for a while, weathered and tattered to the point he couldn't read some of the smaller print. But there was no mistaking the obvious. That was a picture of himself up there, lifted from his most recent online profile. It was placed right beneath a single, bold-typed word:

MISSING.