I work for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks. Have for about twelve years now. Most of that time I've been stationed up in the Flathead National Forest area, north of Kalispell. Beautiful country up there. Dense forest, lot of wildlife, not many people once you get off the main roads. I'll tell you what, it's the kind of place that gets under your skin. What I'm about to tell you happened in September of 1996. Early September, because the aspens were just starting to turn. I was doing a routine patrol, checking some of the remote trails, looking for poacher activity. We'd had reports of illegal hunting in the area, so I was staying out later than usual, trying to catch someone in the act. I had a small cabin I used as a base, nothing fancy, just a place to sleep and store gear between patrols. It was about eight miles from the nearest road, accessible only by trail. I'd been there three days when it happened.
It was around 11 PM. I'd gotten back to the cabin maybe an hour earlier, had some coffee, was going through my notes. Completely alone out there. Closest ranger station was fifteen miles south. The forest was doing what it does at night. You know those sounds. Owls, wind in the trees, the occasional branch cracking. Normal stuff. Stuff you get used to. Then the forest went quiet. And I mean completely quiet. No insects, no birds, nothing. Just dead silence. That's when you know something's wrong. Animals don't go quiet like that unless there's a reason. I went to the window. Pitch black outside. No moon that night, clouds covering everything. I couldn't see more than a few feet beyond the porch. But I could feel it. You know that feeling when you're being watched? It was like that, but stronger. Like whatever was out there wanted me to know it was watching.
I grabbed my flashlight and my rifle. Standard protocol when you're that far out. Opened the door slowly, shined the light into the trees. At first I didn't see anything. Just the usual. Tree trunks, undergrowth, darkness beyond the beam. Then I saw it move. About thirty yards out, something stepped behind a tree. Not an animal. Not a person. It was too tall, had to be seven feet, maybe more. And the way it moved wasn't right. Too fluid, too deliberate. Like it was studying the light, figuring out what I was doing. I called out. Standard challenge. I identified myself, told whatever it was to show itself. Nothing. Just silence. Then I heard it.. this sound, low and rhythmic. Almost like breathing, but deeper. It was coming from where I'd seen the movement, but also from other directions. Like it was surrounding the cabin. That's when I saw its eyes. Reflected in my flashlight beam, maybe forty yards to my left now. In the pitch darkness, I could make out these large, pale eyes that seemed to glow with their own light - greenish-yellow, like oxidized copper. glowing eyes in the darkness sound terrifying - Ethan' They didn't blink. Just stared.
[ Story continues in the full game... ]