My brothers took me on a Snipe hunt as a joke. We found one.

Whenever you go camping with some friends, sit around a campfire at night there always comes the time for everyone to share a spooky story with the rest. And while the others are retelling urban legends or talk about that time they woke up and saw a strange shadow in the room, I brace myself for my turn. Even if it can be difficult for me to talk about it at times, I know that in this setting, it would be a crime not to share my story of the time my brothers took me snipe hunting

For context, I (Elaine, F, now 34, then 16 years old) live in a small town near the Appalachian Mountains, naturally it’ completely surrounded by nature and trees, and was already known to have its fair share of spooky occurrences. Growing up, it was almost normal to have the local newspaper talk about the sighting of some strange critter, UFOs in the sky, cattle mutilations or odd footprints found in the woods. These were routinely followed by the usual amount of bigfoot fans or other cryptid fanatics wanting to investigate for themselves. One of the most famous events was the disappearance of a young boy, only 5 years old, which made national headlines and sparked a huge search party through the entire wilderness. Parents couldn’t explain it, said one moment he was there, the next: gone. 48 hours later he was found, luckily unharmed but his discovery was by sheer luck. Somehow, he ended up several kilometers away from the spot he was last seen and way up on a mountain. In short: there is no way he could have walked all that distance himself with his tiny legs. I was only ten, but I remember the whole thing vividly. There were two phases to how both locals and the news talked about it: At first there was a lot of concern about the boy as the search was organized and we were all holding our breath hoping he would be found. Then, once he was found and it became clear that this was one of these spooky things, the people around me were suddenly very hesitant to talk about it. But there was no stopping what was to come: Soon the parents and searchers found themselves interviewed by the first book author who thought that the boy was taken by the feral people of the woods, or in another word: Bigfeet. It was all part of the course by now and in the end, they obliged and gave him their story. Most people here are at best ambivalent to all the paranormal stuff, some are actively annoyed and then there is me, who is utterly fascinated by it. It began, as far as I remember when I was 8 years old and one of my distant aunts sent me a book about paranormal things for Christmas. I doubt she thought much about it, I must have mentioned the reputation this place has to her once and this being the only thing she knew about me probably thought this was the perfect present. She had no idea how right she was. I absorbed the entire book, from ghost sightings in English castles, to alien abductions and crop circles, bigfeet and yetis, sea and lake monsters, I loved it all. Sometimes I would spend hours just looking through its huge, illustrated pages. The stuff that stuck with me the most (and sometimes made too scared to fall asleep) was everything I knew was going on right outside my door. The book had an entire page about cattle mutilation, for example, it explained how space aliens sometimes abduct cows to cut them open with laser tools to look at their insides and learn about earth biology. It even had a big illustration of two grey beings with large brains pointing a red laser at a dead cow on their operating table inside the spaceship. By the time I had fully absorbed the book, I resorted to using the family computer to keep searching for these things online. This interest got a lot of hazing from my two older brothers, Fred and Rudy and my dad always disapproved of it. Never to the point that he took the book away from me, but he more than often threw some remark my way about how this “just couldn’t be good for you”. My friends at school weren’t too different, not mean or anything, just not at all interested, which I can’t really blame them for. The one exception to this was Milo. A boy about my age, I met him at the bus stop by complete coincidence and we just kinda started talking. I mentioned my paranormal interests in passing, not expecting him to care in any way, but that’s exactly what he did. For whatever reason he seemed to actually enjoy listening to me yap about this stuff, the entire bus trip home. Even if it was brief, just having someone I could share my interests with who didn’t make fun of me felt very refreshing. There were a few moments where we talked again, but being in separate classes they never amounted to much. He didn’t live too far away, yet I never got the guts to just ring his doorbell myself. But enough background talk, you all want to read about my true paranormal encounter after all. It all began only a few weeks after my 16th Birthday, when our town was struck by another series of cattle mutilations. These were the first in several years, definitely the first since I got my book, so naturally I was dying to see one of them for myself. But my dad strictly forbid me to go look for the dead animals and that it was just the work of normal scavengers, nothing to see here. One day, I got to see one anyway.

.It was a nice Saturday morning, my dad was out with my brothers, my mom was watching TV and I just got out of bed, when the doorbell rang. “Elaine, could you be a dear and get the door?” my mom yelled from across the house. I groaned, thinking it was probably one of her friends, but obeyed nonetheless. The moment I opened the door, my mood changed instantly. It was Milo. “Hi.” he stammered. “Uh, hi.” I responded back. “You, uh… always wanted to see one of the cows, right? The one’s that got, uhm..” He nervously motioned his finger across his neck. My eyes widened: “You know where one is?” He nodded. “Who is it?!” my mom yelled again. “Just a friend from school, mind if I hang out?” I yelled back, trying my best to out-volume the TV. “Sure, why not! As long as it’s not a boy!” She yelled before turning the TV up even more. I gave Milo a conspiratorial grin, then grabbed my camera and went out to get my bicycle. With a dramatic gesture of my arm I went: “Lead the way!” and he rode ahead. We made our way to one of the farms, which he explained belonged to his uncle. This was the third time one of his animals was affected, after the second one he hired one of his friends to keep an eye on them at all times. “Did he see anything?” was my immediate question, but Milo just shrugged. “Haven’t talked to him yet.” We arrived at the farm, and I stopped my bicycle next to the field of cows still alive, but he drove a few feet onward before realizing I had stopped. “Aren’t we going here?” I asked pointing towards the cows. “Well…” he looked even more nervous than usual. “that’s not where they found it. It’s in here.” He pointed towards the woods. I looked back at the fence around the other cows. It wasn’t damaged, neither was there any way for the cows to escape on their own. To add to the growing mystery and my growing intrigue was a yellow warning sign on the fence with a lightning symbol: it was electric. “Ooo, that’s mysterious, isn’t it? How did it get all the way out there?” He just shook his head again to say ‘I don’t know’, then hopped back on his bike. I followed him, with the excitement of a mystery tingling in my stomach. That’s all I treated it as back then, a fun mystery hunt. I had no idea what I was really getting myself into. We drove into the woods on one of the trails, but soon had to leave our bikes behind and proceed on foot. For a little while we made our way through the shrubbery, it took a bit for Milo to find the right spot. “There it is!” he pointed towards a small clearing. From between the bushes I could see two men standing around a large brown lump on the forest floor, right in the middle of a heated argument. “Bullshit!” yelled the one on the right. “Oh no, that’s my uncle.” Milo whispered. “Can’t let him see me here.” For now, we stayed hidden and watched the argument unfold. The other one, wearing a wide hat and a red shirt, tried to defend himself: “I swear, that’s how it happened! Do you really take me for some sort of liar?” But Milo’s uncle wasn’t having it: “Just admit it, you left your post to grab a beer, and when you got back, she was gone!” “Come on now, if that was true, I would tell you a better lie than that! But I swear on the bible I’m not lying! I was sitting there, watching your herd like you told me to, when suddenly she went right into the air. Just flew off by herself towards the mountains, I’m telling you! I spend the rest of the day searching for her, finally I found her here like this.” He pointed to the brown lump in front of him. Now he had my full attention, but Uncle Milo interrupted him yet again: “What nonsense is-, have you been talking to my nephew too much? Recently he’s been having all kinds of strange ideas about spaceships and what not, no idea where he’s getting it from. Am I the only rational man left in this goddamn town?!” I looked over to Milo, he averted my gaze and almost seemed to blush a little. I had no idea I’ve been such a bad influence on him. The fight between the uncle and his buddy continued for a bit, accusations of “dirty liar” and “false friend” being thrown all around the woods. Finally, they seemed to be able to settle their differences somewhat, decided to go report the dead cow to the sheriff and left. After we made sure they were out of reach, we carefully crawled out of our hiding spot. As we approached the dead cow, the farmer’s words kept ringing in my head. It went into the air and flew away by itself? I still vividly remember that moment, seeing the thing for myself for the first time. Briefly, the façade of a fun mystery hunt began to slip, and I got a glance at the true horror we were dealing with. The most striking part was its head. The upper part of the head seemed almost normal, no scratches or bites or any sign that it was preyed upon. Except for the eyes. They were gone, completely gauged out, only the void of black empty sockets were staring back at me. Even more unsettling was the lower jaw, while the top half has been left almost intact, beneath it everything but the blank white bone had been removed. And it was completely blank, not a single shred of skin or flesh or blood remained. In fact, there was no sign of blood anywhere on the carcass or its surroundings. The rest of the body had seemingly random pieces of flesh missing, but once again, no sign of blood. The intact pieces, meanwhile were barely decomposed, as if it had just been freshly dumped here. That thought made me look up at the surrounding trees. Several of them did in fact have large branches either damaged or snapped off entirely. This naturally could have been caused by winds, but it did certainly evoke the idea of something hurling this cow down from far above.

I’m not sure how long we just stood there, looking at it. There weren’t even any flies around or maggots or whatever animals you usually expect to see on a fresh corpse. Despite how odd and disgusting it looked, I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Something about those hollow dark eyes just seemed to draw me in. “Well, uh… do you like it?” Milo’s words finally snapped me out of my trance. “I… I don’t know.” “Oh.” He lowered his head. “Maybe I shouldn’t have showed you this.” “Nono, it’s just I… I wasn’t ready, I guess. Ready for it to look like this. I mean this is exactly what I always wanted to see, just-“ “Milo!?” I got interrupted by a loud voice yelling from the bushes. Moment later, his uncle stepped out, his buddy and the sheriff behind him. “What the hell are you doing here? I told you to stay away from this!” He could barely bring out a “I’m sorry, I-“ before his uncle turned to me: “Aren’t you Pete’s kid…” he struggled to remember my name for a moment “Elaine?” “It’s not his fault, I told him to bring me here.” I tried to defend Milo as he grabbed both of our arms, but it was no use. “I’m taking you home and telling your father what you did.” He continued to rant as he dragged us through the woods towards his pickup truck: “He told me you’re a troublemaker alright, but I expected better from you Milo! Since when are you such a rulebreaker, huh?” He just walked along in silence, his head low to the ground, while I kept fighting back: “Don’t punish him, I’m the one who dragged him out here, it’s my fault.” By now we had reached his truck, and he angrily swung open the door. “Oh, so he learned it from you then? Then maybe he shouldn’t be spending his time with troublemakers like you. Now get in!” Somehow that sentence hurt more than the idea of him getting punished. The idea that he would be forbidden from seeing me again. We didn’t speak a word during the entire ride. He first stopped at Milo’s house, brought him inside and stayed in the house for a few more minutes, probably telling his parents what he did. By the time we got to my house, my dad and brothers just returned from wherever they were, one step away from entering the front door when the uncle’s truck came to a screeching halt in front of them. He barged out, grabbed me from the back seat and immediately started yelling: “I just caught your daughter snooping on my property, taking a real good interest in my dead cow.” There was no way his property extended that far into the woods, but that didn’t matter. Things got worse from there, I got another long lecture from my dad and was sent to my room. I slammed the door behind me, spent another few moments being angry at them, but all of that was soon washed away by the memory of what I saw in the woods today. Now it all felt exciting again, almost out of instinct I grabbed my book and flipped to the page with the two aliens dissecting the cow. It suddenly seemed so real, the cow being lifted from the ground sounded like a tractor beam pulling it into a spaceship far above the clouds, there it was examined by two scientists from another world who saved its eyes, blood and tissue samples for further analysis before dumping it back into the woods. My next concern was Milo, I hoped his parents wouldn’t be too harsh on him, and I knew I would find some way to see him again even if they were against it. I wished I could call him on the phone, but being grounded in my room, there was no way to reach it. So, I just sat around for a while, looking out the window and wondering what to do next.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door. “It’s me, Rudy. Can I come in?” one of my older brothers asked on the other side. I knew he just wanted to make fun of me, so I said: “No.” “I’m not gonna tease you, I promise. I have something important to tell you.” Reluctantly I caved and let him in. For what it’s worth, he actually did look serious this time. I sat back on my bed and sighed: “So, what is it? And if it’s another joke you can save yourself the time and just leave right now?” “It’s not, I told you.” He insisted. “I’m here because I think it’s time to tell you the truth. Do you want to know what me, Fred and dad, were doing all day? We were hunting the Snipe.” My eyes narrowed in suspicion. He continued: “The Snipe is what keeps taking out all the livestock. Every few years it wakes up from its hibernation, comes out at night to snatch its prey. Luckily, it steers clear of humans, but that’s also what makes it so difficult to track. No one has ever seen it, just its footprints and the dead animals it leaves behind. Every year, we go out there to hunt it down and kill it. Or at the very least scare it back into hiding. It’s been a family tradition since our great grandfather, known as Abraham van Helsing, the Great Snipe Hunter. He might very well be the reason they’re so afraid of humans.” To say I was skeptical of his sudden tale was an understatement, but he insisted: “I’m not making this up! We’ve tried to keep this dark family secret from you, but now that you have seen the truth for yourself” he began to speak in a very dramatic tone “I believe the time has come for you to step into your great grandfather’s footsteps and join us on your first Snipe hunt!” “So, you want me to come with you right now and hunt for this ‘Snipe’?” I asked. “Yeah, with me and Fred.” he nodded. I didn’t believe a word of his ‘Great Snipe Hunter’ tale, however I did see an opportunity in this new development. “Is dad coming along too?” I asked. “Oh no, he uh, he had enough Snipe hunting for the day and needs some rest. But he gave us permission to take you out on this hunt and share some of his tools of the trade.” Right. I’m sure he did. “Soooo…” I asked sheepishly. “If this Snipe is that hard to find you would appreciate any additional help, right? If I could just make a phone call real quick I might get someone else on board.” A brief smirk flashed across his face before he resumed his serious demeanor. “That would be great actually, I’m just gonna go ahead and make sure mom isn’t in the living room. Of course, she agreed to the Snipe hunt it’s just…” “I get it.” I reassured him “She doesn’t want me talking to boys, even if it is in service of the great van Helsing.” “Exactly!” he nodded, before moving back out of my room. “I’ll tell you when the coast is clear.” he winked, then closed the door behind him. I didn’t know if Milo would actually go along with this, I didn’t expect him to after the trouble he got in. All I wanted to do was just check in on him, see if he’s okay. Not a minute passed before Rudy came back in: “Bad news, she’s in front of the TV again. I’ll go and distract her, then you do your phone call, but you have to be quick.” Just like that he ran back down the stairs. I slowly snuck after him, making sure not to set off any of the creaking steps, just in time to witness some of the best acting I’ve even seen from him: “Mother! Come quickly, there is a problem mother!” The noise of the TV came to a sudden stop. “What?! Where?!” she yelled. “In the garden, mother! A dastardly woodchuck is eating your beautiful vegetables!” “What!” Her scream echoed through the house, followed by a flurry of angry footsteps and the slamming of the garden door. Now was my chance. I ran into the living room, grabbed the telephone and dialed his number. It beeped for a few seconds, before someone picked up. Someone with a friendly, soft voice: “Hello, who is this?” I hoped Milo himself would pick up, but it sounded like his mother. “Hello, I’m a friend of Milo’s, may I speak to him please?” I said in my most polite voice. “No problem. Milo!” She called upstairs. A few moments later, he was on the phone: “Elaine?” “Yeah it’s me, sorry about what happened, are you in a lot of trouble?” I was relieved to hear him say: “Not at all, my parents are a lot nicer than my uncle, they even allowed me to meet with you again, as long as I stay out of trouble.” “Great!” I yelled a bit too loudly. Afraid that my mom might hear me I toned down my voice a bit: “That’s great. My brothers are about to go hunting for the thing that killed the cow. They said it’s called a Snipe and it’s afraid of humans, only eats livestock.” “I never heard of that.” he sounded skeptical but not disinterested. “Well, you’re not the descendent of the Great Snipe Hunter van Helsing.” He chuckled a bit “Okay…?” “Wellll…” I continued “My brother said it’s ok if you come along too, and if you’re not getting into trouble for it… And if you want to of course.” “Yeah, always! I mean… I should probably ask my mom first, but if she says yes I’m on my way!” A big grin started to form on my face as he said those words. “Ok, cool! See you soon then. I hope. Bye!” The call didn’t end a second too soon, as the garden door was opened again: “I didn’t see any woodchuck!” mom grumbled. “Ugh, that fiend, must have gotten away!” Rudy entered the kitchen first, seeing I was still in it, he motioned me with his eyes to get out of there, before stalling mom a bit more: “But I just had to tell you, you know how concerned I am about your sweet vegetables, if anything ever happened to them…” “Yes my sweet boy, you did so well-“ I didn’t hear the rest of her response as I quietly slipped out the front door. Seeing Rudy’s obvious flattery work it’s magic on her was a special kind of feeling, a mix between wanting to laugh out loud and throw up at the same time. Outside I was greeted by Fred, who had a rifle around his back. “I’m guessing dad gave you permission to use that too?” I asked him. He scoffed: “Of course he did. Otherwise I wouldn’t be wearing it. You sincerely think I would ever break one of his rules?” “He would neeever.” Rudy agreed as he slid through the door. “A sweet little lamb, that’s what he is.” “Don’t call me that.” Fred looked annoyed, which Rudy only seemed to enjoy. “So then, are we all ready to go?” he asked as he opened up dad’s pickup, which Fred was just now learning to drive. I’m not sure he ever drove it himself without dad’s supervision. “Not yet.” I stalled him. “We’re still waiting for Milo, remember?” “Right!” he turned to Fred. “We got one more recruit for the hunt.” “Great.” Fred responded. “With such a large search party, who knows, we might actually find it.” He put on a strange grin. Meanwhile Rudy tried to put on his serious face again: “God, I hope so. That beast has taken too much from us already. It’s time we put a stop to this.” A few moments later Milo arrived on his bike. “Heyy, so you’re the new recruit? Nice to meet you. You can leave that bike right here, we’re taking the truck. Because this,” he slammed on the truck’s back “this is where we will be taking the Snipe’s dead body and parade it around town!” “Okay?” He seemed a bit nervous as he put his bike down. “But I have to be back before it gets dark, alright?” Rudy sighed: “You didn’t tell me your friend was such a nerd.” he murmured, but clearly loud enough for Milo to hear. “Hey, don’t be mean.” I told him, then walked over to Milo. He seemed embarrassed just to be there. “Don’t worry about them, they’re a bit, uhh… older brothers, you know? You can sit next to me in the truck.” That last sentence was followed by a loud “Oooooooo!” from Fred, to which I must have given him my most evil stare yet because he shut up immediately. “Everyone ready?” Rudy yelled after we all sat down. “Then let’s get that Snipe!”

While Fred was driving us up to the woods, Rudy took his time to tell us about the “tools of the trade” of Snipe hunting, passed down from the great van Helsing himself. “This:” he held up a cow’s bell “is a cow’s bell. Cows are the Snipe’s favorite food, right? So, what’s the best way to attract one? Pretend to be a cow of course! What I need you to do is ring this bell and give me your best cow impression.” “Got it!” I responded, but he didn’t back down: “I mean right now! You need to practice. Out there in the woods, an imperfect cow impression could spell the death of this entire mission.” That got a chuckle out of Fred, to which Rudy immediately turned around: “My brother, this is serious!” but I could tell he was barely containing his own smile “This beast has haunted our community for so long, robbed us of our livestock. What we are doing here is for the good of, of humanity, yes sir!” “Alright, alright. Jesus, at least let me focus on driving.” Fred responded with increasing frustration while Rudy turned back to us. “Here.” He handed me the bell. “Cow impression, now!” At this point, there was no getting out of it. That’s what I get for going along with one of their schemes. Every single “moo” that escaped my mouth for the next two minutes was followed by some comment from Rudy: “Come on, you can do better than that.” “Yes! That’s more like it. Keep going!” “Brilliant!” “Absolutely marvelous. With that we’ll catch that infernal beast for sure!” This had to be one of the most embarrassing moments of my life, right in front of Milo nonetheless. Speaking off, now Rudy moved on to him. I dreaded what kind of task he had prepared for him. “The next item, which is irreplaceable in any snipe hunters kit is…” he made a dramatic pause while pulling it out of his backpack: “Cheese! Snipes are irresistibly attracted to cheese, like a mouse to… something probably. So you, new recruit, just hold onto this cheese for me alright?” “Sure.” he slowly grabbed it. I felt so bad for him, he was clearly uncomfortable in that car. He also didn’t have any siblings on his own, so this was his first encounter with older brother hazing. By now we’ve already been driving through a path in the woods for a while, when Fred finally stopped the car. “Here we are. Get out snipe hunters! The Snipe was seen in this area only a few hours ago, it’s our best shot.” “I thought Rudy said no one has ever seen it.” I asked. “Yes, until today.” Rudy jumped in. “We got our very first description, they said it looked like a large wolf, larger than a man, walking on its hind legs. Isn’t that scary?” “Sure, it is.” I was close to rolling my eyes at this point. I was honestly just hoping to hang out with Milo for another evening, but of course being around them, I should have known better. “So, you two have done this before, you lead the way and we will follow.” “Sure thing!” Rudy turned to Fred. “Come on, brother, let’s catch this beast!”

Rudy and Fred went ahead into the woods, following a trail that only became narrower the longer we stayed on it. I tried talking to Milo, but our conversation was immediately interrupted by Rudy: “Focus you two lovebirds! The snipe could be anywhere. Remember everything that I taught you. The bell and the cheese, you still have them?” I took out the cow bell, while Milo searched his pockets for the small piece of cheese. “I think I lost it.” Rudy gave an exaggerated groan: “That was a family heirloom! Passed down from-“ “The great van Helsing himself, I get it.” Milo said in a sarcastic tone I wasn’t used from him. Rudy meanwhile got over the loss of his valued inherited cheese fairly quickly, as he continued: “Nevermind. As long as we have the bell, this hunt may still turn into a success after all. You two will act as our lure.” he gestured towards the thick brush ahead of us. “So, feel free to step ahead. We’ll be right behind you, taking the shot as soon as it appears. Be brave, snipe hunters!” Rudy passed us an exaggerated salute, which I returned: “Sure thing, snipe hunter general.” I didn’t mind this development at all, I’ve been meaning to speak to Milo without having them interrupt anyway. Not 10 seconds after we started walking, Rudy yelled after us: “I’m not hearing any cow noises!” Just to get him off my back, during our following conversation I made sure to make some noise with the bell every once in a while. Soon I heard Rudy’s chattering grow quieter and quieter, not long into the walk they were already out of earshot, probably on purpose. Maybe they were hoping we would just get lost in the woods, spooked by some forest animal and then tell everyone how we’d seen the snipe. I didn’t know, and in the moment, I didn’t care either. But before I could say a word Milo was actually the first to talk to me: “You do know they’re just making it up, right?” I looked at him almost disappointed: “Of course I know, come on. Look, I’m so sorry for how this turned out, I thought this would be just a fun evening of us, me and you looking for cryptids in the woods, but… I should have known better.” “It’s ok.” he said, then fully processed what I just said, probably even before I did. “You only did this because I was coming along too?” “Yeah, of course. If you would have said no, I probably would have told them to stick their pranks somewhere else and just stayed home.” “Well…” he hesitated “then I’m glad I came along.” then he changed the subject: “So, what do you think is behind these cattle mutilations?” I was waiting for him to ask that question, and he looked like he was waiting for me to respond: “The snipe, obviously. Duh.” We both laughed a bit. “But really, isn’t it interesting what your uncle said? That it was lifted into the air by nothing? I’m not saying I think it’s aliens, but…” “but that’s exactly what you think?” He knew me too well. “Alright, you got me. But you saw what the cow looked like. I’ve never heard of a predator that drains out all the blood, neatly cuts out parts of the flesh, oh yeah and the eyes, then leaves the rest behind. All I’m saying is, it would be cool if that’s what it is: Alien scientists dissecting our livestock to try and understand how our biology works. Maybe they have a big laboratory in their spaceship and lasers that they use to cut into it” the longer I talked the more I could see a wide grin forming on his face, which only got me more excited “and it’s eyes are now swimming in a jar somewhere for other aliens to look at.” “That would be really cool.” he agreed “But also kind of terrifying. If they can just beam them up and cut them open, I mean who says they won’t do the same to us?” “There always have been these strange disappearances…” Seeing the actually seemed to get a bit scared I quickly added: “but no one was ever found with the same mysterious mutilation as far as I know. Maybe these people just got invited to explore outer space with them.” Now he smiled again. “I wish I could do that.” “Me and you both.” I agreed. He nervously looked back to the ground for a moment, then took a slow deep breath and began talking again: “Listen, Elaine?” I was all ears. “I’ve really enjoyed spending time with you recently. And maybe this isn’t the best moment to say something like this all alone out in the woods, but-“ “Hold on, I am so sorry to interrupt you right now, I really am. But: did you see any sign of my brothers? At all?” We looked around to find that we had lost track of them entirely, or they have lost track of us. Nothing but trees around us. To add to our situation, it was starting to get dark. “Oh no. Yeah that’s typical.” I sighed, then rang the cow bell a few times “Alright you two, if you want to pop out and scare us, this would be the moment!” Nothing. I rang it again. But the only sounds that returned were the rustling of leaves, and the chirps of a single evening bird. “Real funny. I bet you’re right around the trees over there. But I caught you! You can come out now!” Now I was starting to actually get a bit concerned. “Maybe we should make our way back to the trail?” Milo suggested. “Good idea.” I agreed. But that was easier said than done. We’ve been walking through nothing but wilderness for quite a while now. All we could do was just head in the vague direction we came from and hope for the best. As the sun was fading, the environment grew less and less familiar. The green leaves slowly faded to black, their thick cover dimming what little light there was left. Soon it became impossible to tell if we were walking towards civilization or far away from it. Or if we were just walking in circles. As the last chirping faded away, we finally had to admit that we were in fact lost. We decided to rest for a moment, to try and assess our situation. Our surroundings were getting darker by the minute, and we didn’t even have a flashlight with us. In the end we agreed to make use of what little light we had left, and keep walking, but might very well have to spend the night in the forest. Being out in the woods like this, alone, in the dark, it unlocks a kind of primordial fear in your brain. I was so glad to have Milo here with me. The moment we continued walking I instinctively grabbed his hand. He was surprised at that, but I just told him: “I don’t want us to be separated too.” He looked at me, then over my shoulder. “Elaine? What’s that behind you?” That’s the exact sentence you never want to hear in the woods at night. I almost didn’t dare to turn around, but knew I had to. To my relief, there was nothing standing directly behind me. What he was looking at was a light, bobbing up and down between the trees. Followed by the sound of a familiar voice: “Milo? Elaine?!” It was Fred, and Rudy right next to him. “We’re here!” I yelled, while ringing out the cow bell. The bobbing light rapidly approached and in a few moments we were all reunited. “I’m so glad you’re ok.” Rudy sighed in relief. “Both of you.” “Just get us home alright?” I asked them both. “You two had your fun, but I had enough of this.” Rudy bend down to me, and said in a low, guilty voice: “Listen, Elaine, I have something to confess. This whole snipe hunt thing was just a dumb joke. Our great grandfather wasn’t really-“ “I know.” I looked him dead in the eye. “Rudy. We watched Dracula together. You really think I wouldn’t recognize the name van Helsing?” “But the real problem is…” he continued “I may not be entirely sure anymore where the right way is, and…” “We’re lost.” Fred interrupted. “We have no idea where we are. We’re just glad we bumped into you again.” Now Rudy started apologizing profusely. “I’m so sorry for this, all we wanted to do was to have you walk around with that cow bell and then one of our friends would jump out the bush with a werewolf mask and scare you. But he didn’t show up or we missed him or he got lost himself and…” “And now we’re all lost, huh?” I sighed. “Rudy. You and Fred, you have got to be the dumbest brothers imaginable.” I turned to Milo: “Well we don’t know the way back either.” He shook his head in agreement: “We probably shouldn’t have went this far off the trail.” “Yes.” I said, now audibly frustrated and turning to my brothers again “We probably shouldn’t have.” “I’m sorry.” Rudy apologized again “I usually know my way around these woods pretty well-“ “Save it for dad.” I cut him off. “It’s already getting darker, we should turn around and try to find our way back now, before it becomes impossible to see anything.” Defeated by its captain’s dumb idea, the snipe hunting team turned around and continued its quest for the way back. But the darker it was getting, the more difficult that proved to be. By the time the sun had completely set, and the stars were clearly visible, we were nowhere near a regular trail. Soon we were faced with the inevitability of having to camp out in the woods for the night and resume our search tomorrow. “At least we have dad’s rifle with us, in case any animals try to attack.” Somehow this comment was followed by more guilty silence. “What?” I asked around. Rudy mumbled something about it being loaded. “What was that?” I asked again. “It’s not loaded. But that’s not my fault this time!” Fred tried to defend himself: “Who brings a loaded rifle to a snipe hunt? You know I can’t handle this thing!” The two started fighting, I sighed again and continued marching forward when my foot bumped into something. Something that wasn’t wood or a rock or a pile of leaves. At this exact moment, whatever fun we were still having vanished. And the real horror began.
“Give me the flashlight, there is something here.” Still in the midst of his fight with Fred, Rudy took a moment to respond but finally handed it to me, without paying much attention to what I said. I shined it down and moved the bushes that were covering the thing out of the way. As soon as I did that, all the blood in my body turned to ice. I couldn’t even get myself to say something. Milo was the first one to notice: “Is something wrong?” Then he saw it too. “Uh… R-rudy?” “What now?” he asked annoyed, then took a look himself. He had the same reaction as us. On the ground was a dead body. A dead human body. Barely decomposed, but half its face was nothing but exposed skull. And both eyes were gauged out. No sign of blood. “No.” A whisper escaped Rudy’s lips. “What the hell are you all staring at?” asked Fred, still unaware of the horror in front of us. The moment he saw it, he blurted out a name: “John?” This wasn’t just any person, it was their friend. The one supposed to scare us with the werewolf mask. “No!” Fred collapsed to the ground. “No come on, you can’t be dead! Please!” Fred continued his now sobbing stammers, which already started losing coherency. Meanwhile Rudy was the first to snap out of his shock. He jumped up to Fred and began trying to drag him away from the body: “Fred! Fred we have to leave, please. We have to get out of here.” “We can’t leave him!” Fred cried. But Rudy didn’t back down: “We can’t help him anymore. Don’t you see, whatever did this, it’s probably still here. It’s still here!” That snapped him out of it. With great reluctance he backed away. So began our march of terror. We didn’t dare to turn the flashlight back on, or speak a word to each other. I could still see it in burnt into my eyes, that eyeless corpse, the exposed skull. We marched on, bumping against trees, stumbling over every branch, rock or root along our way. Fear had turned to a primal urge for survival, we could only pray that we were getting closer to a path, or some sign of humanity, anything. I kept a tight grip on Milo’s hand the entire time, it was the only thing keeping me from bursting into sheer panic. That and the knowledge that if I did so, it would only make us more noticeable. The full moon was rising, illuminating the surrounding woods ever so slightly. Just enough light to turn every bush into a cowering monster, ready to pounce, every branch into a slender arm reaching out for us. At the same time, I could feel my sense of hearing heighten with every second. I heard every crunching leaf, every snapping twig beneath our feet, forced to wonder if it was really us who made that noise. We stopped periodically, stood completely still and listened. Listened for any footsteps that weren’t our own. Silence. We moved on. Stopped. Listened again. Continued. Once the silence was shattered by a loud, distant howl. It almost made me scream. It may have been nothing but an owl. But we didn’t know what we were running from. What the snipe actually was. Silly as it may seem now, that’s what we resorted to calling it. Something no one has ever seen before, its presence only marked by the mutilated victims it leaves behind. For hours and hours we walked on, watched the moon rise from the horizon over our heads, until physical exhaustion overtook our fear. It was amazingly quick, one moment every fiber of my body was begging me to get out of here, the next I’m on the ground, unable to take another single step. With nothing else to do, we were forced to take a rest deep in the bushes. As Fred sat down, I saw he still had his hands clutched around the useless rifle. Rudy slouched down next to him, while Milo huddled himself close to me. So close I felt his heart beating nervously along mine. I don’t remember if I ever fell asleep, the rest of the night seemed a constant state of slipping in and out of consciousness. Exhaustion fighting terror, and none of them were winning. As day finally broke, I welcomed the warm rays of the sun, just happy to still be alive. Fred was the first one to speak: “They’ve probably sent out search parties for us by now.” He heaved himself up from the ground while leaning on his rifle, then gave an exhausted groan. “Let’s hope they find us before it gets dark again.” “Maybe we should just stay here.” Milo suggested. “My dad said, if I ever get lost it’s best to stay where I am.” Now Rudy got up as well: “Maybe not a bad idea.” Meanwhile Fred was taking a good look at the environment. “I’m afraid we only walked further in, this doesn’t seem familiar at all.” “You know trees, they all looked the same.” Rudy waved him off before sitting back down. “I’m sure they’ll find us. Remember that kid that went like 10 kilometers in two days? They still found him.” By sheer luck, I wanted to add but felt there was no need to bring the mood down even more. We camped out here for the next few hours, taking turns walking around and yelling for help while ringing the cow bell. At least that thing was good for something. And Rudy was able to bring back some edible mushrooms from his turn. Well, he ensured us they were edible, and none of us felt sick after eating them so good enough. Our only companions besides ourselves were the birds in the trees and the constant army of bugs, buzzing us at any given moment. There was some large bugger around me somewhere, I couldn’t see him but I heard his loud noisy buzzing as if it was right next to my head, when something was approaching from the bushes. We jumped up, hoping it was searchers. But whatever it was, was running towards us at high speeds, snapping twigs and branches all around it. All of a sudden a large deer with huge antlers jumped out and bolted right between our group. We had to jump in all directions to not get trampled by it. A second later it was followed by two smaller ones. Meanwhile the buzzing grew louder and louder, it sounded like an entire nest of hornets closing in rapidly. We just started running. Whatever was coming, the deer were far more scared of it than of us. We bolted in the same direction, running and running as fast as our feet would take us, but it was no use. The buzzing was almost right on top of us. A sudden gust of wind went through the trees, whirling the leaves around as if a helicopter had just flown overhead and just like that, whatever made the buzzing sound had overtaken us. We still kept running out of sheer panic until we reached a large clearing. In the center were the three panicked deer, turning their heads in all directions. The buzzing seemed to come from everywhere at once and strong winds were blowing through the grass and leaves all around them. I thought surely there had to be an enormous swarm of insects around them, but no matter how much I strained my eyes I couldn’t see any. Several times the deer attempted to run back into the cover into the woods, only to be scared back into the center by some unseen force. The one with the antlers made one final effort to defend itself, it jumped forward and started swinging its crown wildly through the air. This proved to be a fatal mistake. The buzzing turned to a nasty high pitch, a swift breeze of wind whooshed through the entire clearing. And the deer was lifted into the air. By nothing. None of us could believe our eyes as it flew away on an erratic flight path, zigzagging across the sky. Relentlessly swinging its antlers through the air. Somehow seemed to damage whatever was attacking it. Without warning, it plummeted straight towards the ground. Even from a distance we heard it crashing through several layers of branches. The buzzing, which had grown quieter as the deer was carried away, now increased aggressively and it felt as if a raging storm was suddenly directed towards us. We ran again, away from the clearing, away from this incomprehensible force. In no time at all, the buzzing was right on top of us again, creating a whirlwind of leaves between the trees. We just froze, looking up at the clear blue sky above us, knowing there had to be something there. But all our eyes told us the same lie. Fred raised the rifle in a futile attempt to threaten it. The buzz now seemed to circle us, one moment it was in front of us, the next one behind us, getting louder and quieter again, almost trying to urge us to keep running. For a brief moment, we had an illusion of safety. The thing can’t get us here, we thought. Until the tree in front of us started shaking violently. The same instant the buzz changed from the drowning roar of a hornet next to your ear to a more subtle sound. Very defined but low pitched. It seemed to reverberate off of every single tree, and I could feel it drumming in my chest like a subwoofer. The tree continued to shake, branches fell down to the ground. We all backed away, still unable to keep our eyes off of it. The closer the sound got, the more a new sound made its way through the low bass. A barely perceptible high pitched noise mixed within it, like a screaming cicada. Another branch fell down, part of the bark was ripped out and with a loud thud, something landed right in front of it. Leaves flew several feet into the air in the spot it presumably landed. My head felt dizzy as the sound echoed between the trees, only seeming to get louder. It had lost all sense of direction or origin. Despite the clear weather and sunlight, I felt completely blind. I knew something was in front of me, I could hear the twigs snap as it moved, heard its body brush against the trees. Yet my eyes continued to lie to me, told me there was nothing there. “Stay together.” Fred whispered to the rest and I knew why. It waited for the deer to move away from the rest before attacking. Right now, it was pacing us like a wolf. The more it moved, the harder it was to maintain a sense of its position. The screaming cicada noise had increased to a sharp pain in my head, all I wanted to do was run away from it. But I knew, I felt it in my bones, that that was exactly what it was waiting for. More twigs were snapped, leaves moved on their own. I jumped as something touched my face. It felt like a huge, long hair. Suddenly, the noise stopped. Everything went quiet. The tree was shaken once again, violently. Silence again. We didn’t dare to move. Had it left? Or was it still sitting there, waiting? Trying to trick us? For what felt like hours we stood there, frozen. Looking at nothing. It was a bird that broke the silence. It flew up to the tree, right into our sight, landed on a branch and started singing. As if everything was normal. We all let out a collective sigh of relief. “What… was that?” Milo asked, his voice shaking with terror. None of us could respond. And none of us wanted to. We all looked at each other, as if searching for confirmation that this did indeed happen. Or reassurance that it didn’t. But it did. We’ve come face to face with a real Snipe. And we lived to tell the tale. That’s all we needed to know. “What the hell do we do now?” Fred asked, still catching his breath. “Keep moving, what else is there to do?” I answered. “Keep away from clearings and listen for any buzzing sounds.” The others silently agreed and were already starting to move away when I noticed something. On the tree the snipe had climbed down from, it looked like it left a mark. Two long slashes right along the bark. It looked odd, oddly fascinating. I don’t know why that’s where my mind went to in a situation like this. In a moment of strange curiosity I stepped forward, to get a closer look. What followed was a series of impressions, impossibly quick. The buzzing returned. A sharp pain pierced my chest. I lost the ground beneath my feet, was thrown around violently back and forth, the others screamed and a second later I was high up in the air, wind blowing in my face. I only caught a glimpse of the woods far beneath me and the distant mountains approaching rapidly before I felt a piercing sting in my arm and fell unconscious.
I awoke in complete darkness. I had a few seconds to wonder where I was and recall what happened before pain shot through my entire body. My chest felt like it had been stabbed by knives all over. The ground beneath me was cold, hard rock. The only sound was my own heavy breathing. The one thing I couldn’t feel was my left arm. I tried to move around, but my body wouldn’t budge. The only thing I could achieve was a slight shuffle in my right arm. Maybe it’s best if I stay quiet, I thought. That thing could be right next to me for all I knew. For a while there was nothing. No sounds, nothing to see. It could have been hours of this. The longer I sat in complete darkness, listening for any sounds, the more it worked upon my mind. I became convinced that it already gauged my eyes out. Deprived of any actual sounds, my ears began to make out a constant background buzz in the silence. I thought I felt something touch my face. Image after image came flashing before my eyes, John’s mangled corpse, the floating deer, the shaking tree, the slash marks, the forest and mountains seen from above. Milo’s scream as he watched me being taken away. The first real sound I heard send a startle through my body. But it was nothing but was a slight whistle of the wind, followed by a cold breeze. This gave me hope that, wherever I was, there was an exit nearby. I tried to move my arm again, this time it worked a little better. Inch by inch I felt my way around. I bumped into something next to me. After another brief shock, I dared to touch it again. It was my backpack. With all my strength my hand climbed it and reached for the opening, grabbing hold the first thing inside. It was the flashlight. I pulled it out and kept it gripped in my hand as it plummeted back to the floor. Without even thinking I clicked the button to activate it. The light was blinding, it was so bright I had to close my eyes which felt like they were burning. But I had eyes! Something about that burning feeling gave me more hope. I could see and I could feel. I was still alive. The first thing I saw as my eyes began to adjust themselves to the dark was that I had dropped the flashlight again in my shock and that it had rolled to the other side of the cave. That’s where I was. A cave. Somewhere in the mountains. I kept looking. There were things on the floor, things I couldn’t quite make out at first. The odd thing was, they seemed to be neatly organized, placed in a row along the cave wall. Small patches of different colors, each with two things on top of them, two round things, and white, with parts of red. They were eyeballs. Eyeballs placed on top of patches of fur, fur of different colors, black, brown, white patches or in one case: Skin. Pinkish human skin. The sight almost made me gag, if my body would have allowed me to. What made it worse was that the two eyes, presumably John’s were positioned in such a way that they seemed to stare right at me. Placed next to the skin patch was a batch of long brown fur. Instead of eyeballs, this one had a long snout with bent teeth sticking out of it. It took me a while to realize that this wasn’t the remains of a real animal, but a rubber werewolf mask. I tried to get up once again, this time my legs moved a little, but still didn’t allow me to leave. In that moment my worst fears were realized. A buzzing sound began to echo through the cave. Quiet at first, then more noticeable, followed by a strong gust of wind. My heart stopped. The loud buzzing soon faded into the second, lower pitched one, which became even more unbearable than it was in the woods. It filled the entire cave to the point it seemed to emanate from the walls themselves. It felt like a swarm of screaming cicadas were nesting right inside my head. Luckily for me, it only took a few seconds for it to cease. The only sound now was the tapping of feet along the cold floor, along with something heavy being dragged behind them. It came closer and closer until finally, the body of another deer came into view. Motionless, yet seemingly dragging itself further inside. It stopped. Glistening in the light was a line of puncture wounds in its body, with blood slowly dripping out. From each hole, a single drop of blood rose into the air, each drop forming into a hook-shape while staying in the same formation. Like a row of invisible knives, only made visible by the blood stained on them. There they remained, frozen in mid-air and I watched as they vanished one at a time. A short while later, no trace of the Snipe’s position remained. The patter of invisible feet continued. For a brief moment, my entire body was touched all over by what felt like two long, animate hairs. It took all my willpower to stay completely still and hold my breath, until it moved on to something else. The tapping sound wandered to the other end of the cave, where it stopped again. The lighting of the entire room changed, as the flashlight began to float through the air. It turned around itself several times, before being dropped back to the floor with a loud thud. The patter headed back in my direction, then the deer was dragged in fully to the center of the cave. Nothing happened at first. Then I witnessed something which I will never be able to forget, an image burnt into my skull for the rest of my life: I saw the Snipe feed. Right in the view of the flashlight, a round wound opened into the deer’s flesh and pillar of red blood rose into the air. It went higher and higher until it almost touched the cave’s ceiling. From there on, like it reached the top of a water slide, it made a sharp curve back down, then quickly leveled off. It continued its flow forward until it reached a round invisible sack, where it started to accumulate. As the Snipe kept pumping more blood in, more and more of its internal structures slowly became visible. Blood vessels faded in, led by a single long pumping vessel along its back, followed by more complex digestive structures and other organs, then nerves. The thin membranes of its wings. The whole thing seemed to last forever, and I had to witness every single disgusting detail. Soon basic leg structure became apparent. The blood was pumped into four stilt like legs, and two folded arms in the front, similar to those of a mantis. Meanwhile at the back end, a long crooked stinger became visible. Brain and head structure were next, but before they could fully reveal themselves, the blood flow cut out. Apparently, the deer was completely drained. Next, the walking bundle of stomach and vessels took one step to the side and, with some structure not yet visible, carefully removed one of the deer’s eyes. The eyeball appeared to levitate out of the socket, and remained frozen in the air, in close proximity to the still translucent brain. It just sat there, holding it up like this. As the blood continued to flow, two long thin antennas began to fade in, which were furiously examining the singular eyeball. Finally, it gently placed it down on the deer carcass, cut out a piece of flesh from the face with a sharp mandible on its head which was just turning visible. It then carefully lifted the deer’s head to remove the second eyeball and after another lengthy study placed both of them neatly within its collection. For a moment it just sat in front of them. Then it reared its head around the cave, letting its long feelers sweep along all its contents. I was terrified it would take me for its next meal. But it just walked over to the other end of the cave, drew its legs slightly closer to the body and stopped moving. Not actively anyway, I could still see all its innards pumping the blood around. The last pieces of its head began to fade in, a long mosquito-like trunk, along with its outer exoskeleton, finally beginning to cover up all the insides. The only thing I never saw were eyes. Even by the point it was fully visible, the place on the head you would expect two large bug eyes to appear remained blank. But I couldn’t ponder this right now. I may have survived up to this point thanks to a miracle, but all it needed was for this thing to wake up hungry for another midnight snack. I waited for it to make another move, but as the exoskeleton faded in, the only movement that remained were the rhythmic pulses of its abdomen. I still hesitated even attempting to move while it was present but knew I had no other choice. The thing that gave me the proper boost to try was seeing the first parts of its body turn white on the edges. Not very pronounced yet, but it was the first sign that it was starting to lose pigmentation again. I tried lifting myself up. To my surprise I was actually able to get to my feet. Still a bit wobbly, but it was enough to attempt an escape. Holding my breath, I carefully reached for the backpack, eyes locked on the Snipe. I grabbed it. No reaction. I had no choice but to leave the flashlight behind, as it was right next to it. Slowly, very slowly, I made my way towards the tunnel one step at a time. Each of my footsteps was far louder than I wanted it to be. I backed out of the cave more and more, until the Snipe was no longer in view. The flashlight was nothing more than a dim glow, the only thing ahead was darkness. Then I felt another cold breeze. The exit couldn’t be far. I inched my way along the wall, even more careful when setting down my feet. I still couldn’t avoid kicking into a rock, which sent it flying a few feet ahead. I froze, listening for any noise from the Snipe. Nothing. I pressed on. Turned another corner. And words cannot describe how relieved I felt to see a dim light shine through the dark. The very familiar whiteish glow of the moon. Followed by the sweet breeze of freedom. This promise made me throw all caution into the wind, I rushed forward, past another dark tunnel towards the light. My foot landed on a rock. It flew backwards. I tripped. I fell. The rocks banged against the floor, echoing like gunshots through the entire cave. Not a second later it was filled by that awful buzz. I got up, ran to the exit as fast as my legs could carry, the tapping of Snipe legs growing louder and louder, I turned my head to see its eyeless pale face rush around the corner, then sprinting straight towards me. The wings in constant motion. I couldn’t outrun it. My brain went into overdrive. Its blind, it hunts though sound, so I might just… As a desperate last ditch attempt, I grabbed into the backpack, pulled out the cow bell and started shaking it as violently as possible. The resulting sounds were ear shattering as they echoed from the cave walls, but they had the exact effect I had hoped for. You could see the sudden shock travel through the Snipe’s whole body, its legs twitched violently and it started turning in place, trying desperately to locate where this sudden sound had come from. It wasn’t deterred for long however, within a few seconds it continued its pursuit, but with movements that looked more like a blind, drunken rage. That’s when I threw the bell with all my force into the open tunnel, and with sheer anger the snipe jumped right after it. I ran out of the cave, finding myself near the top of a tall, wooded mountain. In a panic I ran straight for the nearest cover, but tripped again, and this time I didn’t manage to pull myself back up. All I could do now was crawl into a bush and stare into the gaping mouth of the cave. But the snipe never came. Perhaps it thought I had gotten lost within the cave system, or there was some basic instinct telling it not to exit its hide while digesting. I crawled deeper into the woods, my leg was badly hurt from the second fall, so I could only limp from tree to tree. Still, everything was telling me to get as far away from that cave as possible before daylight came. As far as my limited strength could carry me. I crawled for what felt like several hours, with no aim or goal. Just away. A strange noise, followed by a sudden wind, almost sent me into another panic. The next moment I was engulfed by a bright searchlight. It was a search and rescue helicopter. Ground troops arrived at the scene shortly after. I vaguely remember being enveloped by a warm blanket and carried towards a car. Then I must have passed out. My next memory was waking up in a hospital bed, with my parents, my brothers and Milo at my side. “Easy now.” my mother calmed me down. “Its alright, you are safe.” Apparently, I was mumbling something in my sleep about the Snipe and blood and eyeballs. A lot about eyeballs. Some of the doctors thought I had gone delirious. My leg was wrapped in a thick cast, I broke it during the fall. My brothers and parents had already signed it, along with Milo, who drew a little heart next to his signature. This is where I spent the next few days, always with someone at my side. They all wanted to know what happened of course, but I wasn’t quite ready to talk about it yet. That was until I had no choice but to do so. Before my leg had any time to heal, the police paid me a visit and wanted to hear everything. I learned that they have been holding Rudy, Fred and Milo in custody, suspecting them of having killed me and concocting the snipe story as a cover up. At least until I showed back up, with a mysterious change in elevation. I told them everything, they simply thanked me for my time and left. No idea what they made out of it. Now that the cat was out of the bag, I decided I might as well tell the rest. Mom was very skeptical of it, she politely agreed with what I said, but I could tell she didn’t believe a word. In fact, I only later found out she asked the hospital staff personally to have me tested for drugs. As for Rudy, Fred and Milo: They didn’t need convincing, they saw what happened. Dad had his own take on the matter: “I know you’re not a liar, sweetie. None of you are. I don’t know what happened to you out there, and honestly, I do not care. I’m just glad to have you back.” My story made the local news, then got passed through the usual paranormal circles and I even got my own entry in a missing person spooky mysteries book. Even now I sometimes get jumpscared by my own face in the thumbnail of a video about paranormal happenings in the Appalachians. But undoubtedly the best thing to come out of all of this was Milo. Not long after this incident he asked me to be his girlfriend. I said yes, and we’ve been together ever since. We even ended up getting married only two years ago. So if any of our distant relatives happen to be reading this: Have you ever wondered why, every time you ask us how we met we just shrug, or say “Just kinda happened”? This is why. I am sorry for Aunt Gertrude who we ended up dumping this entire story onto after she wouldn’t stop asking. Even showed her the original newspaper article and book chapter, complete with an artist’s illustration of the Snipe mid-feeding. She was never the same after that.
Of course I’ve spent a lot of time pondering these events, we both did. Despite how traumatizing everything was, I still can’t help but feel some level of fascination towards it. I don’t know if it was an alien, some kind of escaped lab experiment or just an undocumented species, hidden by its perfect camouflage. Our town didn’t have any more cattle mutilations after this, at least not for the time while we were still around. Maybe it went into hibernation, moved on to a different territory or went back to whatever realm it came from. But I don’t think it’s gone for good. I have developed a bit of an aversion to heavily wooded areas and maybe that’s not entirely irrational. So, if you ever find yourself in an area with a series of strange animal deaths, or strange buzzing sounds from the woods, maybe it’s better not to take your younger siblings Snipe hunting. You might just find what you’re looking for.

Credit: Michael Baldur Jansen