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"Be scared. You can't help that. But don't be afraid. Ain't nothing in the woods going to hurt you unless you corner it, or it smells that you are afraid."

--William Faulkner

"And that's why, without a doubt, Pulp Fiction is scientifically proven to be the best movie of all time."

Tessa made a passive-aggressive grunting noise as she stepped over a large rock in the path. The noise was an acknowledgement that she had heard Ritchie's well-reasoned, logical, and complete bullshit explanation. "Yeah, but ... you're wrong. Because Princess Bride, y'know, exists and all."

"I'm not saying it's not a good movie. It's a great movie. A fantastic movie." Ritchie pushed a branch out of the way, holding it back and allowing Tessa to pass underneath it, leaning forward to steal a quick kiss as she took the lead.

She couldn't resist a small smile, even if it did let down the defenses on the facade of stoicism she had worked so hard to maintain over the course of this trivial argument. "What was the line about 'buts?'" she asked.

"You have a nice one."

Tessa giggled. She hated that she giggled, but she giggled all the same. "The other line. 'Everything that comes before the word "but" is bullshit.' Something like that. I think it was from Game of Thrones."

"It was, and that show was a trashfire. Unlike Pulp Fiction."

"And Princess Bride."

"And Princess Bride," Ritchie agreed. "I forgot how we even got on this argument."

"You intentionally set out to be wrong about something," Tess offered. "And, I must say, you knocked it out of the ballpark."

"I'm pretty good at that."

"You must have had years of experience."

"Decades. I think we're almost there. Should be just over the hill."

Tess was happy to be finally arriving at the camping spot. She fucking hated hiking. She fucking hated the bugs, the wobbly rocks that twisted your ankles, the way her backpack had dug into her shoulders for the past three hours. And above all else, she hated the woods.

And not just these woods. Any woods. There was always a presence. It didn't matter where they went, what direction they walked, or how bright it was outside. Tess felt like there was always something watching her, just out of vision. It hid behind rocks, behind trees, behind herself even. She'd felt its presence even when she was a child. As a child she had once broken down into sobs while on a day-hike with her father. When he asked what was the matter, she could only say that the eyes were watching them.

She had once asked her father what she should do when a monster was near, but his reply was only to laugh and tell her in his own special way, "Monsters aren't real. But if they are, just call for your dad and I'll come running to save you."

"You're doing it again."

Tess was dragged back to the present. It was either that or bump into Ritchie, who had stopped along the path, waiting for her to catch up. "Doing what again?"

"Being freaked out. I thought you liked hiking?"

"I hate hiking. I'm only doing it because you like it."

"But ..." Ritchie seemed hurt, but not in the way she would have expected. "I hate hiking. I'm only doing it because I thought you like it."

Tess tossed her backpack aside and plopped on the ground. The campsite could have been five feet away, but she wanted a rest now. "Then why the fuck are we hiking?"

"You're always talking about it. You and your dad used to go."

"Doesn't mean I like it. I talk about the Karens at work, doesn't mean I don't want to throw them out a window."

Ritchie dropped down beside her. She rested her head on his shoulder. He had a shoulder that was just made for resting your head on. "We should find something else to do then."

"Like watch Princess Bride? In an air-conditioned apartment. With popcorn and beer?"

Ritchie put his arm around her. "It's a date. No more hiking?"

"No more fucking hiking. But lots and lots of popcorn and beer. And maybe a little bit of--"

"Wait." Ritchie's tone of voice suddenly changed. "What the fuck is that? Do you hear that?"

Tess listened, but aside from the sound of the gnats buzzing around her ear, she heard exactly nothing. "What are you talking about?"

"That noise! What the fuck is that? You seriously don't hear that? Listen."

The pair stopped talking for a solid ten seconds. Nothing. "What am I listening for exactly?"

"Jesus Christ, it's getting louder. That noise. That laughing noise. Or like an animal or something. Do coyotes sound like that?"

Tess punched her boyfriend in the chest. "Shut the fuck up. That's not funny. You know I get creeped out easily out here."

"Baby, I'm getting creeped out, too." Ritchie stood up, fumbled around in his backpack for a flashlight and shone it into the woods. Tess only then realized it was nearing dusk. "No, it's definitely laughing. Somebody is fucking with us. Hey!" He called out into the woods. "Real funny, asshole! How about you move it along, huh?"

Tess was now certain her boyfriend was serious. He certainly wasn't one to scream out into the woods for a simple prank. But there was no sound. Nothing like what he was describing. "Babe? Are you okay? There really isn't anything ..."

Ritchie suddenly jumped as if a loud noise that only he could hear had just startled him. He then crouched down and put his arm out across Tess's body as if shielding her from something. The motion would've been chivalric if there was actually something moving towards her. There was not.

"Babe, what the fuck?" Tess got to her feet, holding onto Ritchie's arm. "Did you see something?"

"Yeah. A deer, maybe? Fuck, is that what a deer sounds like?"

"Ritchie, your eyesight is shit. You couldn't see a bus approaching you. It's just a trick of the light or something. It's getting kinda dark."

The pair were silent for a few moments more. Finally, Ritchie picked up his backpack, shouldered it, and turned away from the woods and back towards his girlfriend. "Maybe. Yeah. I guess so. Holy shit, that freaked me out."

"YOU freaked ME out. What the hell was that, Ritchie?"

"I cannot fathom how you didn't hear that. It was everywhere. Like all around us. Like cicadas buzzing, but more high pitched. Some kids fucking with us or something. You seriously didn't hear that?"

"You seriously did?"

Ritchie nodded. "Maybe I need to sit down for a while or something. It's hotter than I thought it would be."

No, it wasn't. It was actually getting fairly cool. Certainly colder in the last few minutes that it had been. Tess didn't say anything, afraid that if her boyfriend was stressed out it wouldn't help the situation by disagreeing and worrying him further. "You said the place was right over the hill, right? Let's just get there, then. I wanna get a fire going before it gets dark."

"Yeah," Ritchie agreed. "Yeah, good call. Let's just ... Oh, you gotta be fucking with me. There it is again. Hey!" Ritchie started marching up the path, carrying his hiking pole like he was walking into battle with an invisible enemy that apparently only he could hear. "Let's go, mother fuckers! You want to keep fucking around? I got a gun."

He did not, in fact, have a gun. "Ritchie, wait! Just ..." Tess fumbled with her backpack, dropping it once on the ground before she managed to get it back on her shoulders. "Just, hey! Hang on! Where the fuck are you going?"

Ritchie was jogging now. He was soon over the hill and out of Tess's line of sight.

"God damn it, Ritchie, wait! This is how people get killed in horror movies." Tess picked up her pace, wanting to catch sight of her boyfriend as she crested the hill.

Only he wasn't there. The path ahead was in a straight line leading right into the clearing in which they planned to stay the night. There was no possible way he could've ran so far ahead that he was no longer visible.

"Ritchie? Ritchie! What the fuck? Ritchie!" Something was very wrong. Tess frantically looked in every direction, including the way in which the pair had just come. There was no conceivable way he could've jogged ahead that fast. Was he hiding behind a tree? "Okay, very funny, ha ha. Get the fuck out here. Ritchie?"

Ritchie didn't reply, but the laughter did. He was right. She could hear it now. It was high-pitched, almost a squeal, almost a laugh, almost the sound an animal would make if it was in pain. He hadn't been making it up, and he had certainly been justified in his reaction to the noise. It wasn't natural. Nothing was supposed to sound like that. It wasn't like nails on a chalkboard, it was like someone was scraping a rake across a steel wall.

Tess was in motion before she realized she had started running. The clearing was just ahead. If she was about to be stabbed to death by some machete-wielding woodland madman, she'd rather do it where she could more clearly see around her. Branches reached towards her, their cold fingers dragging at her shoulders as if they wanted her to stay, to see what was about to happen. She did not concur.

Her adrenaline was ordering her heart to pump pure battery acid into her veins. She ducked under a large branch, and for just a second she caught a glimpse of something in the woods. She only had a fraction of a second to observe it. It was standing on two legs, but it certainly wasn't Ritchie and it certainly wasn't human. Something about its head was just wrong, and it seemed to shimmer, like it was just under a watery surface, fighting to get out. She wasn't going to stick around to see if it was successful.

Tess broke through the treeline into the clearing, happy to be out under the clear sky and away from the terrible gloom of the pathway. Dusk was rapidly approaching, but Tess was happy to take in what little sunlight was remaining. She spun around, distantly hoping she'd find Ritchie standing behind her. But not only was he not there, neither was the pathway. She was certain she was facing the way she had come, but the pathway was simply not there. She began turning, hoping that she was mistaken, but nowhere she looked seemed to be the direction she had come from. Dreading what she knew she would find, she looked behind her in the direction she had been running, but the clearing itself was entirely gone. She was now standing under the forest's canopy, bereft of a clearing, a pathway, or any semblance of reality. Tess's one recourse was screaming. Screaming for help, for Ritchie, for her father, for God. None seemed intent on answering.

Tess was on the ground before she realized she had begun hyperventilating. She hadn't done this in years, not since her mother found an asthma inhaler that seemed to work for her. Maybe all of the screaming mixed with the fear she was feeling had pushed her over the edge. White phlegm was falling from her mouth, her adrenaline sinking into the cold leaves. Slowly she rose her eyes, careful of what she'd find. The maddening chorus was faint now, and Tess felt terrible when for a moment she hoped that meant that whatever was after them had chosen to follow Ritchie and not her. She should take the opportunity to run, to get help, to just get out.

Instead, she remained kneeling, rooted to the spot next to a large cedar tree as her breath slowly returned. She tore off her flannel shirt, using it to wipe the sweat from her brow and neck. Despite the cool dusk air, she felt more comfortable without the shirt. Maybe she'd be better off waiting until nightfall. She wasn't thrilled about the idea of being jumped from the shadows, but already the sun was hidden below the treeline and she'd soon be stumbling around in the dark whether she liked it or not. Maybe the thing couldn't see as well in the dark. Maybe.

Okay, she thought. Fine. In five more minutes it won't matter anyway. Wait until the sun is down, then start walking downhill. That was what you were always supposed to do, right? Downhill meant water, and water eventually meant civilization. Five more minutes.

And then ten. And then fifteen. And then twenty. The sun wasn't going down. She had checked her phone shortly before this insanity began, and she knew it was well past dusk. "Doesn't make sense." Tess dabbed her forehead with her jacket again. That didn't make sense either. It wasn't freezing, but she had been still for so long that she shouldn't still be sweating. "Fine. Okay. Fuck it. Just go."

Somewhere inside her mind, there was the whisper of the word "No," although for some reason it didn't alarm her. She rose to her feet, glancing in every direction for any sign of the figure. Why the fuck was it still daylight? "Shh," the voice whispered. "Stay."

There was no mistaking it now. She was about to die. But not right now, and not in this very spot. She tore off running through the woods, faster than she would've thought possible. She couldn't find the clearing, the path, the hills, just the lone and level soil and dead trees that imprisoned her. Just ahead she noticed something laying on the ground. It was a shirt. For a second, she thought she must have found Ritchie, but he was wearing a red shirt and this one was checkered white and black just like ...

It wasn't possible. She ran past the shirt and the cedar tree until she arrived at it once again, then ran past it again, and again, and again. "No," she whined. "Stop! Please stop this! Doesn't make sense, doesn't make ..."

Tess screamed in agony as the beast sank its teeth deep into her feet, tearing at the sinew, the muscle fiber, the tendons. She kicked back against her attacker, only to find that soon both of her feet were being chewed on. And her face, and her hands, and ...

She held her hands up to the dim light. There was no monster gnawing at her there, or on any of her extremities, but the pain certainly wasn't abating. Soon however she was screaming out for another reason entirely.

Her hands were ... wrong. They weren't hers. She was certain of that, though it made no sense. She rubbed her fingers together, filled with a sudden urge to clean the dirt from underneath her fingernails, only to find them flaking off one by one as she touched them. She screamed even louder as she saw how the tips of her fingers were growing dark even as they were becoming numb. As she stared down at them, she was disgusted to find a bloody tooth dropping into her palm, followed by another, then another, then a dozen. All human teeth. All her teeth. Running her tongue against her bleeding gums, she felt new molars growing in until they reached the size of her originals before continuing to grow until they stuck out beyond her lips.

"Hagg to gedd away ..." She was barely coherent to her own ears as she stumbled away. "Hagg to gedd--" She fell to the ground as the voice again whispered, "Stay." Her feet were in agony, her boots literally constricting them to the point where she was losing feeling in them. With trembling, misshapen fingers she first started to untie the laces of the heavy hiking boots before simply pulling them off of her feet. Something hard and flaky was rolling around inside of her socks, and when she pulled them off as well she saw that her toes were sharing the same fate as her fingers, black hard flesh pressing away her toenails. She could still walk without shoes. She could still get away. She could still get away.

Tess made it a few feet more before a horrible cracking noise brought her to her knees. She hugged her sides with her stiffening fingers, terrified upon finding that her ribs were pressing back against her palms. She was swelling, her back sickly cracking as she grew to the point where her shirt was becoming more restrictive.

"Fine!" she yelled, laughing. She felt certain she must have a fever at this point. "Eww wann a show? You gedd a show." She tried to pull her tank-top off, but her fingers just didn't seem to want to work anymore. Instead she just slid them underneath the fabric and ripped it down the middle with surprising ease, laughing hysterically the entire time. Her mad revelry ended when she saw a thick black line of hair starting at her collar line, passing underneath her bra, and trailing down across her naval until it passed the waistline of her pants. "No! Wadd? Wasis hapnen to me? Whad da fuck is happening to me?" Tess barely registered that her voice must have adjusted to her larger teeth. Her attention was again diverted to her hands and the black hair growing from her knuckles and creeping slowly down her forearms. She lifted her arms and saw two thick patches of hair growing from her pits that had certainly not been there this morning. A stench emanated from them--from her--that she at first mistook as the beast, or ghost, or shadow, or whatever it was returning. But the shadow wasn't there. Was it ever?

The black hair thickened quickly until it covered her body, a dense fur covering her from head to toe. She looked back and forth, now hoping that the creature existed after all. Anything would be preferable to what she thought was happening. She'd rather be torn to shreds than turn into this thing or have to hear ...

There was a laugh just beyond the hill from which she and Richie had just hiked moments ago. Not the maddening cacophony the monster had made, but real, genuine human laughter. Tess got to her feet again, crying for help at the top of her lungs as her voice trembled and broke. "Help! Help! He-e-e-e-lp!" She tore what was left from her shirt as her breasts began to swell, her nipples turning a dark black as they outpaced the rest of her breast in their growth until she had filthy gray dugs hanging from the end of them. A pressure in her waist soon had her pulling her pants away, releasing a swelling mound just above her lips. Just before it grew over them, she saw her labia sickly winking. The mound continued to grow until it hung halfway down her thighs, capped with two more dirty teats that stiffened in the cold air.

"And that's why, without a doubt--"

"Richie! Wa-a-a-a-it! Richie!" She stumbled towards the voices, tripping over her ungainly hooves. She reached for a nearby tree to lean against in order to regain her footing, but her hands were now simple, ugly things no longer able to grasp for purchase. "It's me-e-e-e-eh! It's me-e-e-e-eh!" Just as she had almost managed to stand, a pain unlike anything she had ever felt erupted from her temples as thick horns slowly pressed forward. "No! No! God, no!"

"... scientifically proven ..."

Tess fought through the pain, not registering that there were three trails of tears running down her face until her vision suddenly expanded to encompass the height of the trees surrounding her. Despite the fact that she was looking straight ahead, hoping against hope that she wasn't about to see her boyfriend walking over the hill, her brain was now being fed images by three eyes, one of which had sprung from her forehead like a Greek goddess. Her feral, rectangular pupils widened in the realization of what she was hearing as she prayed she wasn't about to see her boyfriend walking over the hill along with ... She fumbled with the hooves that had taken the place of her hands, rubbing her forehead, brushing against the horns and floppy ears sticking out horizontally from the side of her head. She instinctively blinked with her third eye as her fur rubbed across it. "Richie? Me-e-e-e-eh! Richie? H-e-e-e-e-elp me-e-e-e-e-eh! Ba-a-a-a-a-a-ah!"

"... movie of all time."

She could only bleat in agony as her nose and mouth pressed forward into a muzzle, a horrid snout that belonged on some base animal. The final touch was another sharp pain just above her ass as a short tail grew outwards, flicking back and forth slightly in order to spread her scent.

No horror she had yet endured could compare to what she was now seeing. It was Richie, walking over the rise followed by a voice she was very familiar with.

"Yeah, but ... you're wrong."

Yes, he was wrong. So was she, and so was ... she The other she. The other her. Everything was wrong as Tess beheld herself following just behind her boyfriend. Only she was Tess, and she was standing here as a freakish monster. He'd soon be telling her Princess Bride was a good movie. Then he'd complement her butt. Only he wouldn't complement it now, because it wasn't her butt. Her butt was here, covered in hair and dripping wet as her cunt slid between her legs to rest just under her anus.

"No! No no no! I'm here! I'm he-e-e-e-e-e-eh!"

There was no doubt the Tess standing a few dozen yards before her was the real thing. She didn't need a third eye to be sure of that. It was her, only she was her. Wasn't she?

"... trashfire."

Daddy! You said monsters weren't real. But I'm a monster and I'm real. Aren't I?

"... good at that."

Daddy, please! I'm calling! I'm calling, just like you said! Please help! Please please please help me!

"... over the hill."

Stop! Stop stop stop! Words no longer escaped her muzzle, for she was no longer capable of forming them. Instead she could only howl out in some horrid noise--half human speech, half the call of some monster her father had assured her didn't exist. And maybe he was right. The horrible noise echoed through the air, plaintively, pathetically, hopelessly, until finally she heard the worst sentence she would ever hear in what was left of her life.

"Wait." Ritchie's tone of voice suddenly changed. "What the fuck is that? Do you hear that?"