Scott Nicholson - The Gorge

“Makes sense,” Lane said. “We couldn’t run her in this rain anyway, even though the Muskrat is designed to handle heavy swells.”

“Just say maybe,” Farrengalli said, mocking the company’s slogan. Apparently, he had lost some of his loyalty when faced with the threat of attack by unidentified flying nightmares.

Vampires. Chupacabra. Raven Mocker. The Appalachians are the land of legends, not fairy tales.

“I can’t let you do that,” Castle said. “The subject is getting away. If we stop now, he’ll have a full day’s head start. Don’t forget, nobody else knows he’s here, so they won’t send backup.”

“Don’t your higher-ups expect you to check in?” Dove asked.

“We knew we couldn’t get a cell phone signal out here, and handheld radios don’t have the range to reach the field office in Asheville. We could have used shortwave radio or a satellite phone system, but the extra weight of the equipment was prohibitive. And, to be honest, nobody really expected Goodall and his partner to be here.”

“Yeah,” Farrengalli said. “And you didn’t expect bloodsucking, bat-freak fuckers to drop from the sky, neither.”

They listened to the rain for a moment, the walls of the gorge slowly becoming encased in fog. They were all aware the reduced visibility meant they wouldn’t be able to see the creatures descend for an attack.

“Maybe we left them behind,” Dove said. “Maybe they’re territorial.”

“Maybe,” Lane said. “But, assuming these things are an undiscovered, carnivorous species, they would need large game like bears, wolves, and deer. They would have to eat a lot of small animals to survive. And, of course, we have no idea how many of them there are.”

“You saw its eyes,” Bowie said to Lane and Castle. “It was blind. Maybe it’s a subterranean species and it works like a bat, using radar or echolocation to find its prey.”

“I told you about the bombs Goodall set off,” Castle said, his hand on the pistol holstered under his arm. “But it’s hard to believe these things have been hidden in a cave for who knows how many years without needing food.”

“They would have attacked somebody before now,” Dove said. “The Unegama Wilderness Area is remote, but campers, hikers, and kayakers use it all the time.”

“Maybe they have,” Raintree said. “The Cherokee told stories of those who got lost here. We have a legend about a man who was found so pale that at first he was believed to be a white man, back before even Daniel Boone walked these hills. The tribe was frightened, so they buried him under a pile of rocks at Attacoa, the high, sacred mountain above the river. When a young brave took his vision quest there, he found the rocks had been moved and the body was gone.”

“Is this like the Raven Mocker bullshit?” Farrengalli said.

Bowie noticed the group had drawn closer together under the trees, as if instinctively banding for protection against an unknown threat. “People go missing here all the time,” he said. “I don’t know if I’m ready to buy into any supernatural legends, but the gorge claims about one victim a year. You can drown, fall off a cliff in the dark, wander in circles until you starve to death. A couple of years ago, a man drove five hundred miles, walked the trails until he came to a campsite, and hacked a young couple to death with a hatchet. He didn’t know them, or even know why he came to the gorge. He later told police he just had to kill somebody.”

Lane blinked into the encroaching mist. “Okay, I’m rested. What do you say we get the hell out of here?”

Bowie checked his waterproof watch. “Six o’clock. Sunset is a quarter after seven but, with this cloud cover, it’ll be dark by the time we reach the base. Let’s deflate the rafts and get moving. I’m sure we’ll all feel better if we can get a fire going.”

Raintree and Farrengalli hurried to the task, while Dove took her Nikon camera out of its protective case. She angled a long lens up the length of the gorge, where the mist, the river, and the slick rocks made a soft study in gray. “Creepy but beautiful,” she said.

“If we get out of here alive, nobody’s going to give two shits about the Muskrat expedition,” Farrengalli said. “They’re going to want to know all about the bat-freak fuckers. Nightly news coverage, book and movie deals, chicks.” He sounded cheered by the prospect. “Hey, Dove, take a picture of me.”

Bowie noticed she focused instead on Raintree. The wrestler was much more photogenic, projected a quiet dignity, and no doubt his dark coloring triggered some sort of primal tingle inside her.

Let him have her, Bowie thought. After all this is over, I’m heading back to Montana by myself anyway.

Somehow, the thought of being alone in his cabin, except for whatever unknown creatures might be lurking in the mountains at the head of the Missouri Breaks, no longer offered security. “Safety in numbers” had never held much appeal to him, because “numbers” meant other people, and that meant responsibility. This trip had been plenty enough of a reminder that he no longer cared to have other people’s lives depending on him.

Besides, security was a psychological state, not a physical state, and after witnessing what Farrengalli had coined “the bat-freak fucker” rip into McKay’s neck, Bowie couldn’t imagine a night when the creature wouldn’t swoop down from the high shadows of his dreams.

Emitting that unforgettable, keening shriek that froze the blood and SkeeEEEEeeek.

It emerged from the mist at treetop altitude, a gray blur of sinewy limbs, ears peeled back, the glistening teeth in stark ivory contrast to the blackness of its open mouth.

When the unearthly banshee wail split the sky, Castle reached toward his armpit for his Glock. At Quantico, he’d been one of the fastest on the draw at those after-hours, impromptu contests at the shooting range, where even the few female agents had to prove their prowess. Those parodies of Wild West street showdowns were a test of skill that no one thought would ever make a difference in the field. While quick reflexes might win you a beer in a bet, you never expected your life to depend on the split-second reach from holster to trigger.

Now, when it counted, Castle’s arm was a hundred-pound tube of soggy sausage, lifting in slow motion, fingers numb and bloated. He wasn’t even halfway into his draw when the creature burst from the mist. It was a flurry of wiry limbs, its bald head and pointy ears just as alien and chilling as those of the first two creatures he’d seen. This was larger than the one that had taken The Rook, and still had the top of its skull intact, so it wasn’t the same one that killed C.A. McKay and then rose from the river in a resurrection that would have made Lazarus jealous.

Castle’s fingers touched the cool plastic of the Glock’s handle just as the creature struck Travis Lane at full speed, knocking him sideways into the middle of the group. Lane’s helmet flew free and bounced off Farrengalli, the loudmouth, who, like the others, was stunned into a deep freeze by the suddenness of the attack.

The nightmarish beast was a little smaller than Lane, squatting atop his body as Lane struggled on his belly, trying to rise and crawl away. Bowie was the first to react, swinging his backpack at the creature. The blow was ineffective, but the creature turned to Bowie and flashed a vicious mockery of a human grin, sharp incisors slick with saliva, the dark tongue flapping against the roof of its mouth as it gave a rattlesnake hiss.

See what got me? The Rook’s voice filled Castle’s head, unbidden, unwanted, causing him to lose his grip on the Glock before he could pull it free from the holster.