The Bones Under Greyveil

Shaleville Police Department

Date: July 15th, 2025

Lead Case Investigator: Detective Lance Giles

Evidence: A brown leather bound journal with a number of diary entries by one Jamie Trench.

Case Notes:

In relation to the missing persons file reported by one Sherry Trench, for her son Jamie and his fiancé Mary Plante. From Sherry’s testimony: “I have not heard from my son in days. This is not like him at all, I talk to him at least once a day. I… I… don’t know what I would do if something happened to him.”

The missing persons file had been opened by the Shaleville Police Department on April 6th, 2025, over two months before the scene was found by the Davis Hikers, David and Terrence. Jamie was supposed to meet his mother for their weekly Sunday brunch. He had not called in several days but “never missed a brunch, rain or shine I was sure my son would be at our regular booth at Darcy’s”, as put by Mrs.Trench. Mrs.Trench arrived at Darcy’s Diner, waited far beyond the time set by them each week, 11:15 am, and well into the afternoon. Mrs.Trench tried reaching Jamie several times throughout the day via text messages and phone calls as well as trying to contact his finance Mary Plante who did not respond either.

Mrs.Trench, extremely worried, went to Jamie’s apartment where she let herself in with a key the couple had made for her and began to look for any sign of her missing son. When she arrived she noticed that her son’s car was missing from the driveway.

Sherry Trench
“Everything was in its place. No sign of any break ins or ruckus. It was as if time had frozen in his little apartment.”

Mrs.Trench then after scouring her son’s living area and making multiple calls to relatives and close friends to the couple, she called the Shaleville Police Department to report Jamie and Mary missing.

SVPD arrived at Jamie and Mary’s apartment around 6:20 pm on the 6th of April to begin our initial inspection of the living quarters, looking for any sign of where the couple could have gone.

Sergeant Miles LaCorte
“Many times when someone goes unaccounted for like this they have gone on vacation and have not alerted the immediate family. They may not have any cellular service if they went outside of the country or on a cruise in the middle of the ocean. Hopefully the couple are just enjoying a relaxing time away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. We are going to do everything we can to locate Jamie and Mary.”

Officers searched the apartment top to bottom and found evidence that suggested the couple had left on their own accord. Several backpacks, sets of clothes, jackets, phone chargers, pairs of shoes, and most importantly medication was still in its normal place on the nightstand in the bedroom. Mrs.Trench explained her son has several antidepressants and mental health medications that Jamie needs to take daily. She stated he has suffered from severe panic attacks, anxiety, and depression which the meds help to minimize and prevent. The presence of the medication within the house raised some questions, if Jamie needed to take them everyday, why leave them here if he was going on a trip?

Sherry Trench
“My boy never misses a day when it comes to his meds. When he was younger and we first dropped Jamie off to college he suffered from extreme panic attacks. He would wake up shaking in the middle of the night, heart pounding, crying, hyperventilating and it would ultimately make him vomit. He could barely keep anything down and it took a while for him to acclimate to being away from home and to this new environment. The medicine helps keep all of that in check, he never goes without his pills.”

The investigators continued their search of the apartment for the next few days, turning over any nook and crannies for clues about where the couple went and interviewing their close friends and family.

Jessica Plante
“My sister probably just lost track of time. She used to be quite the party girl back in the day, maybe she wanted to relive some of the glory days back at school. When we get together and there’s liquor involved we could tear up Times Square if we wanted. We would wake up two days later, not remembering anything that happened in the last 48 hours with matching star tattoos on our ankles. She tried to pull Jamie into that kind of stuff but he’s kinda soft when it comes to partying. Maybe she finally got him to come out of his shell and let loose for once, god knows he needs it. I’m not worried, I’m sure they will show up.”

After several days of investigation at the couple’s apartment something was found that changed the trajectory of this case. When having a digital forensic analyst comb through Jamie’s laptop we were able to use the phone locator tied to his account to find where his cell phone had last been seen. It stated that the cellular device had last pinged off the cell tower on April the 8th, deep within the thick forests of the Greyveil National Park.

Now Greyveil National Park has always had this sort of mysticism behind it. There are countless stories of creatures that live in the woods, portals to other worlds, satanic practices, and deranged cannibals causing terror. Greyveil even has their own sort of cryptid, the Bonestalker.

Frankie Hannon (Local)
“People say that if you are out in the forest of the park at night you will begin to encounter strange things. First it will feel like someone is watching you from around every corner. The Bonestalker is said to be incredibly quiet and learns its prey before it strikes. It will begin to play with you, making you hear things in the night, twigs snapping, the rustling of leaves, and a heavy thudding of a massive creature following you. It has a distinct sound you have to listen for, the cracking of bones. If you are lucky, it will get distracted by something more enticing but if not, hunker down and pray to whatever God you like that it doesn’t find you.”

Ghost stories and urban myths aside, Greyveil has been the site of some actual gruesome cases in the past. In the 1980s there was a string of disappearances around the parks area. Locals going missing, seen one day, gone the next type of thing. This was before the modern day forensics we have today so finding a missing person was far more fickle. The real breakthrough in the case was when one of the local gas station owners spotted a suspicious vehicle filling up at the pump.

Otis Sherman
“I was just sitting there like any other day, reading the newspaper when a beat up old Volkswagen pulled up to the pump. The man stepped outside his car and came to walk in. He was a taller, skinny looking man, but he had some muscle to him, you could see it through the shirt he was wearing. He had a weird feeling about him, an air of false confidence was flowing off this fella like I’ve never seen before. He was smug too, that damn look on his face. I flashed a look again at his busted up car, the thing was in rough shape, I heard it coming in about a mile before they even got here. That’s when I saw it. The car jiggled a little bit, just a hair, up and down. The man had come in already so I told Jimmy to handle it as I checked on one of the pumps. I walked outside and saw it again, the trunk budged a little upwards, like something was pushing on it. I made my way over and discreetly took a look at the trunk. That’s when I heard it, the thumping and the muffled whimpers coming from the trunk. I rushed back inside as quick as I could and phoned the police, told them what was happening. I tried to stall the man, saying I could look at his car, fix what was making the noise but he barely looked at me before he got in and moved along. I got in my car and started to follow the man as quietly as I could, telling Jimmy to phone the police and tell them I went after him. I followed him a good bit until he turned into the park, that’s when I waited for the police. By god what we found in those woods will haunt me for the rest of my life.”

The police followed this suspicious individual into the Greyveil National Park, watched as he slowly and quietly made his way down a dirt path that was obscured by brush and parked his car. The man proceeded to reach in the backseat and pull out a handgun and move to the trunk. From the trunk a woman with her hands bound and mouth gagged was pulled out and forced down into the thick brush of the woods with the pistol against her head. The police took extreme caution, this was now an armed and dangerous situation with a hostage. Otis tagged along behind the officers, toting his hunting rifle. They followed the pair through the woods for a good hour before they arrived at a small outcropping. The sound of rushing water could be heard, drowning out all other sounds. The man forced the woman into the small pond, still holding the pistol against her skull and walked her towards the source of the rushing water, a 30 foot high waterfall. This is when the police acted, ambushing the man while in knee deep water. The man spun around, startled by the amount of guns trained on him. He quickly turned to grab the bound woman when a shot rang out and pierced his leg. The woman was able to inch a few feet away and into the arms of a nearby officer. The man knowing it was over then turned the gun on himself, putting it to his temple and pulling the trigger, ending the life of this sick monster.

What they found was that the kidnapper was a 34 year old man named John Vernon. A local plumber that had a loving wife and two children waiting for him at home. What the police found after surveying the area and talking to the victim, 20 year Angela Price, was that she had been on her way to her car after a shift at the diner where she worked as a waitress. He followed her to her car, forced her into the trunk and planned to take her to the waterfall to brutalize and kill her. The police searched the area around the waterfall and made a shocking discovery. There was a small chamber behind the falls, this is where Vernon committed the heinous crimes. Countless tools of his trade were strewn about a metal table, all covered in the blood of previous victims. A mattress lay on the ground where Vernon would do unspeakable things to the victims before torturing and ending their lives. A stack of beers and a Polaroid camera were found propped against a chair, the photos of his previous victims hung on the wall like trophies. All of the victims in the photos were of local residents that had gone missing in the past few months. All killed by this despicable monster.

Now could Jamie and Mary’s disappearance be related to the case from decades before? Perhaps there was a copy cat killer which surfaced after all these years. There was another couple who went missing a month or so before Jamie and Mary. Could they be related or was it all a coincidence?

We took our investigation to where Jamie’s phone last pinged within the park. The investigators pulled up to the small dirt parking area outside of a large metal fence that marked the beginning of the trails into the woods. The trails were well trodden and easy to be seen, not like back in the 80s when Vernon navigated them. Another car sat a few feet away from where police had parked. A cursory glance showed that the car had been left there for quite some time, twigs, leaves and the pollen in the air covering the car. When running the license plate through our systems it came up as being owned by Jamie Trench. This was a good sign, we were going in the right direction to find them.

We followed the GPS from the phone for a good while through the forest. For a while it kept on the marked trails until it suddenly veered off and through the woods. We prepared for a full on search team to continue the next day through the woods of Greyveil.

The next day we continued, approximately 30 people all equipped with walkie talkies and phones traversed and canvassed the woods following the signal. Finally after an hour or so of walking we found where the signal went dead. We searched the surrounding woods for the remainder of the day and for the next week. Nothing came of the search, no evidence that anyone had ever been through this part of the forest. No camping supplies strewn about, no footprints, no fragments of clothing, nothing that suggested that Jamie and Mary had ever been out here other than their car sitting, covered in the growing debris of the forest. Eventually, the search had to be called off, to the dismay of the family and friends of the couple, hoping we would at least give them some closure. We had looked through every dip, bend and bush that that forest had to offer around where the phone had last been located and beyond. We continued doing everything we could regarding the couple, interviewing countless family members, searching the car found in the parking lot for clues, going through search histories on personal devices found at the home but in the end it turned up nothing. The case slowly was moved to a cold case, continuing to work on it but prioritizing other cases in the meantime. It stayed this way, no major breakthroughs for the next three months until a pair of hikers walked into the station.

A call came through to the Shaleville PD around 3 pm on July the 13th from a couple of hikers, David and Terrance Davis. The couple had been hiking and camping in the Greyveil National Park, trekking through some of the unmarked parts of the woods when they came upon a grisly scene.

The Davis Couple

“It….I don’t even know what to say….. we stumbled across some sort of… murder scene maybe. There’s blood everywhere…. I can’t, Terry you talk to the officer, I’m gonna be sick (sounds of retching).—Hello… I don’t know what happened here. The trees are covered in blood and there are tatters of fabric and …. Oh my god. David, look up, there’s something in the trees.”

We arrived at Greyveil around 4 pm that same day after receiving that call. Several officers, myself included, met with David and Terrance Davis at the parking lot. David was seated on the lip of the open trunk of their SUV, face as white as a sheet, a blank expression overtaking his face. Terrance paced back and forth in front of him, chewing on his fingernails as the police arrived. As soon as we arrived, Terry, as he wished to be called, ran up to us and told us the situation. He stated that he and his husband had been camping in the woods as part of an annual trip they have been coming on for years. They were trekking through a particularly dense part of the forest that neither of them recognized before Terry misjudged a step that was close to a hidden hill and tumbled down it. David quickly made his way down to go find his husband and found him standing at the bottom of the steep hill staring listlessly into the woods. David met his gaze and found what had caught his attention, a bloody jacket caught in the low branches of one of the trees. The jacket was shredded in the back, dark splotches of crimson running through the fabric. When they got closer they noticed a trail of blood leading deeper into the woods. Slowly and carefully they followed the trail, deep divots within the ground like something pressed hard into it marking the way. They came into a small clearing where they found the scene. This is the way they took us to where the call was made. David stayed back in the back with one of the other officers that were at the scene while Terry led me and some other detectives to the clearing.

The clearing was devoid of trees but that was the least interesting part about it. The blood trail, which had been dried for some time now, led into the middle of the area. This was the only way into this small alcove as there was a large rock formation in the shape of a crescent. It was at least 15 to 20 feet tall and smooth around, no way to climb up from the middle. This seemed to be the glaring issue as we analyzed the scene. The area was covered in blood, splashed across the grass and the leaves on the ground, marking the trees into the clearing and splattering the smooth rock ahead. Strewn about the area were several man made items. A small first aid kit, some clothes, a backpack and a small leather journal. There also seemed to be a fashioned spear of sorts from a branch of a tree as the edge was whittled down to a point. That’s when Terry led our gaze to the trees on top of the crescent rock. About 50 feet up from the ground lay something stuck in the trees. A body. It was stuck, a large branch protruding from the center of its chest, hanging from the tree like some sort of sacrifice. The lower half of the corpse was missing, jagged strips of flesh and organ hung from the wound like macabre streamers. The intestines draped downward, trailing feet below the body, smearing viscera across the trunk of the tree. The most disturbing part of the deceased was the face. Where the normal features should have been was a large bloody hole, like someone had precisely cut this victim’s face from the head. There was a sicklingly sweet smell within the grove, like rotten flowers. I stepped away from the scene to usher Terry and David away, and frankly get a breather myself. Forensics set up within the next few hours trying to find anything they could about what happened and who this poor person could be. Days went by as photos, videos, sketches and evidence was collected and documented as precisely and carefully as they could be. Finally, a DNA test was able to be done on the samples of blood collected from the scene and the body itself. What we had feared the most had been confirmed. This was one of our missing people. The body was Mary Plante, disfigured beyond recognition. The DNA profile from the scene had correlated with one found within the DNA database. It seemed like Mary had done a DNA ancestry test in the past which was where her profile could be linked to the scene.

What could have done such a terrible thing to this girl. She couldn’t have climbed the tree and fell onto the branch, the impact was completely horizontal, like something had put her there. Not to mention what had happened to the lower half of her body and her face. Was this the result of some new serial killer within the woods of Greyveil? Maybe some animal attack but that wouldn’t explain the precise cuts around her face.

Soon we received the evidence collected from the scene and the most interesting thing was the leather bound journal. It was the journal of Jamie Trench who seemingly had been recording a diary of their trip throughout the woods. The journal itself was tattered and blood seeped through some of the pages but most of the entries could be made out. Now maybe Jamie was mentally ill or on some sort of drugs because the things documented within this journal could not be true. They speak of creatures haunting the woods and sigils of a cult. The slow descent of a man lost in the woods succumbing to madness. I will allow you to make your own conclusions as you read through the journal. For now I am going to continue to parse through the contents of the backpack to see if I find anything else useful.

Transcribed from the pages of the Jamie’s Journal

March 15th 2025

This is weird. I’ve never done anything like this before, writing down my thoughts and feelings in a book. That’s what Dr.Lamb said could help me process things. “Write down your feelings and bring the book to our sessions” is what she said exactly. Well this is me writing down my feelings. It’s been two months since Dad passed and it’s been rough. I relied on him for a lot, he was kinda the life raft that kept me and my mom above water. He would always be able to talk me out of my funk, like when I got my panic attacks, he could calm me down, bring me back from spiraling into the abyss. Not like Mary or Mom couldn’t do it but he had a gentle way about him, something inherently made you feel better when you talked to him.

“Your dad was the kindest man I ever knew. I never saw him without a smile on his face, even on the rough days.”

That’s what people would say about him, who he was so like I said, it’s been really hard not having him here. My attacks have been becoming more frequent since his death, harder to pull out of them. The meds help of course, they keep me on track but some days just get the better of me and then I’m in a Wendy’s bathroom trying not to dry heave whatever bile is left in my stomach out because my brain is overloaded. I swear I can still feel dad sometimes, a face in a crowd or a voice on the tv. It’s funny what grief can do to the mind.

Mary has been really helpful and caring since dad. She was the one who bought me this journal and has been encouraging me to write in it. Sitting here now I can see her lounging on the couch, looking out at the budding flowers peppering our front yard. She has always had this quiet beauty about her, like a picture from a master painter. Something truly special both inside and out. Maybe I should do something for her, show her I appreciate all of this. Maybe I should plan a trip for us.

March 17th 2025

I had a panic attack today. It was a pretty big one too, heart pounding, brain fuzzy, stomach spinning, the whole nine yards. And you know what triggered it, coffee. That’s right, fucking coffee sent me into a spiral. It’s the weirdest things that your brain connects to. The coffee reminded me of Dad of course, that cup of coffee he had every morning like clockwork. He would wake up, come downstairs and turn on the pot, and it wasn’t even good coffee either, it was like dollar store brand crappy stuff but my Dad said he loved it and drank it he did. I was walking past a cafe in downtown Shaleville, the rotary in the center of town where all the small shops are. I walked past a newer cafe that I had never seen before when the smell hit me from the open door. My breath froze up and my heart began to pound while tears welled in my eyes. I quickly ran around the side of the buildings where there was a small park and put myself on a secluded bench. I just let go and cried for about 10 minutes, trying to get myself back under control, trying not to spiral further. That’s when Mary called. We were supposed to meet at Darcy’s for lunch. She could immediately tell something was wrong when I answered the phone, trying to cover the nasally sound in my voice to mask the crying. She’s too smart for that though. She met me over at the bench where I was sitting and just sat with me, letting me feel everything I needed to while she comforted me. She really is a one of a kind person, I’m not worthy of having someone as wonderful as her. We went to lunch after and spent the rest of the day together.

I really need to do something for her. She loves the outdoors so I’ve been looking into some trips we could take. I found this national park that she had been talking about some time before, Greyveil or something like that. I guess it’s supposed to be really pretty during the spring when all the flowers bloom and there’s several small hidden places like waterfalls that people say are incredibly beautiful. I think I’m gonna take her there. Gonna have to get some camping stuff though.

March 26th 2025

I have been doing better recently. No big attacks. I want to try and leave all that behind me. I can’t be known as the guy who freaks out whenever something goes awry. My meds have been helping, especially since we upped the dosage on my normal stuff. It’s keeping me even. Even my mom has been seeing an improvement when we meet on Sundays for brunch. It’s been the highlight of my week for the last month. A return to normalcy if nothing else.

Oh… I looked more into Greyveil National Park for a long weekend trip for me and Mary. She’s been working so hard at the bank recently plus having to deal with me, I don’t wanna feel like a burden and I want her to know she matters to me. I don’t know, I just feel bad. I bought some hiking stuff and I’m gonna surprise her by taking her for a “drive” and we will end up at the park. I think she’s gonna be ecstatic and I’m still out of work right now so it will be a nice break for both of us.

I have been seeing some things about the forest that have left me a little uneasy though. Usually I’m a man of science, in the lab, recording data and seeing concrete evidence that something worked or didn’t. I’m not a superstitious person. I don’t believe in the paranormal or any of that crap but a lot of weird shit has been recorded within that park. I found an article going over some kidnappings that happened in the 80s I think. A ton of young women were killed by a serial killer I guess. Only one girl survived with the help of a gas station employee or something along those lines. I actually love true crime stuff so I got sucked into the history of the park. There was another odd occurrence that happened with something called a summoning pool. I guess there had been a cult roaming around the country looking for what they called “a place where the worlds came together to become one”. It was weird but everyone thought they were harmless as they weren’t violent or dangerous and most of the members who met people in town said they were perfectly friendly. That was until a park ranger was surveying the forest after dark, there was a call of fire within the woods and he was investigating it. He stumbled upon a group of 10 or so cult members in long red cloaks standing around a small reservoir of water, torches outlined the pool. As he stepped forward to confront them they all stepped into the pool of water. They raised a small knife and said something in a different language before slitting their throats and dropping to the water. The ranger was able to tackle the cultist closest to him, a young teen from the town who had fallen in with this crowd. He hesitated which allowed the ranger to grab him and throw the knife away. The other nine lay bleeding out within the waters, the ambulance too far away to save any of them. The only thing the boy said was “you ruined it, now they will suffer”.

All of that was so far in the past and I read that the park had a pretty big overhaul in the early 2000s to have places for campers, camp sites and bathrooms. It sounds pretty safe and we aren’t staying the night there anyway, I’m gonna get a hotel where we can stay. Either way it’s gonna be beautiful.

April 4th 2025-Entry 1

I surprised her. She was so excited when we pulled into the parking lot of the park. We are gathering our stuff now but I’ll write about our day later when we stop. I’m glad she’s happy.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. My leg really hurts. We took a wrong step and fell down a hidden hill. It’s pretty steep. I hit my head on the way down, so things are fuzzy, but I’ll try to write what I remember.

We arrived at the park around 11 in the morning. It was a nice day, warmer, good with a light jacket or sweatshirt and we had gathered our supplies for the day. I packed two backpacks full of essentials for a day of hiking: Our lunch, some snacks and water, a first aid kit, some flashlights and my knife. I had planned to be out for a few hours, enjoying the woods as the sun slowly crept into the sky showering a cascade of light down through the tall trees. The flowers were already starting to bloom as we put our backpacks on. A wide array of purple, yellow, and pink petals were slowly rising towards the sun, marking the path into the park. We made our way out. Walking along the well marked trails that had been etched through the trees from years of usage. It was quiet, peaceful, the birds were out and the spring breeze rustled the leaves creating a cascade of natural sounds. It was really nice. We walked for at least an hour before we stopped for a break. We found this picnic area that had been set off a little ways from the main trails. It looked like it used to be a camp site cause there was one of those stone fire pits but the park must have moved the site cause all that sat here now was an old table and the pit. We sat and talked about everything and anything while wolfing down the sandwiches I had prepared. Ham and cheese, basic but it was enough to keep us going and not too heavy as to make us feel gross. That’s when Mary spotted the sign.

“Hey,” She said looking at me quizzically. “What’s that behind you, in the tree?”

I turned and looked, scanning the tree for anything that could have caught her eye.

“What are you on about?” I questioned as she got up from the table to show me.

Mary pointed towards an old sign. It was 3/4ths engulfed into the tree, like time had forgotten about it. It was covered in a layer of moss that obscured what the sign actually read. I had no clue how Mary could have seen this thing.

She quickly tore the mossy film off the sign and ran her hand across. It was an old wooden plank with a simple etching into it. Most of the plank was being absorbed into the tree but some of the words could still be made out with a little effort.

-eaf Falls
he trai
<—

Mary’s eyes lit up. She loved an adventure, especially one off the beaten path. I shot her a look of caution back.

“Come on Babe,” she said. Making a pouting face and puppy dog eyes. “When will we get the chance to see falls back home!”

I looked back at her. She was right. We came out here to forget about life and enjoy being together. If I had to sack up and trek through the woods to find a waterfall, so be it.

“I had read that the falls around here are world renowned. Let’s do it.”

She smiled and made a cha-ching noise while pulling her arm down like a 13 year old boy. Jackpot baby. Mary pushed aside the brush next to the tree to reveal an old overgrown trail leading deeper into the woods.

“Okay. Promise me you won’t get carried away. We need to be back here sooner rather than later. I really don’t want to be stuck out here at night.” I said as Mary began to push her way through the foliage, practically running down the path.

“I promise,” she called back. “Loosen up a bit nerd!”

“Yep.” I sighed and followed her deeper into the forest. That was our first mistake.

We walked for what felt like another hour following the old trail through the woods. As we walked I noticed something. These paths must have been still in use by someone, maybe locals or teens who knew it was a good place to drink beer and smoke weed. The trail was well worn into the dirt, like a lot of people had walked this way before but it was much smaller than the main trails. It was only big enough for one person to stand on without going into the ferns on the sides. We had to walk single file one after the other like we were back in elementary school. The other thing was these weird little diamond things. They almost looked like ornaments hanging from the trees, delicately made intricate diamond shapes made out of twigs. On the inside of the diamond was a pattern of different colored yarn going into the center of the diamond. I spotted a few of them off the sides of the trail and hanging above us. Maybe it was to mark that this was still the path to the falls.

Soon we heard what sounded like roaring water from up ahead. Mary ran forward and stopped at the top of the small hill we were climbing up. She turned and smiled.

“We found it,” she yelled. “Hurry up. It’s really beautiful!”

I clambered up the hill. Panting as the slope got steeper with each step. I had no clue how Mary ran up this thing. After a minute I joined her at the top and we looked down at the falls. It was as pretty as she said. A small outcropping where a river on the opposite side of the hill flowed down into a small pond below and continued through the divot into a new stream. If we wanted to get down there we had to do a sort of spiral downward making our way slowly down the sloping ground.

“Come on, let’s go!” Mary said, pulling on my arm. That’s when the ground beneath us gave way. The soft dirt below our feet shifted. There was a layer of small rocks that shifted beneath our combined weight and began to roll down the hill towards the falls. Mary fell first. She was further forward than me. I tried to hold on but her pulling on me for support made me slip too. We both went down. Tumbling head over heels, the world turned around me like I was in a washing machine. I heard her scream out and her hand left mine and then it was black.

I woke up a few minutes ago next to the falls. My leg really hurts, I don’t know if I sprained it or broke the bone but I don’t see anything sticking out or in the wrong place. My hair is coated in sticky blood. A gash on the back of my head. The worst thing, Mary is nowhere in sight and the sun is starting to go down.

Entry 2

I’ve been looking around for a bit now and I don’t know where she went. I tried crawling back up to the top of the hill where we had fallen and looking around but I haven’t seen anything. We fell and from the second I hit my head everything felt different, like all the bright sounds and colors drained from the world around me. There are no birds around anymore, their chirps and whistles have gone silent. The blooming flowers are wilting, careening towards the ground in a macabre nose dive. Even the winds rustling through the leaves have gone still, only the rushing sounds of the falls behind me and every once and a while a loud crunch, like stepping on dead leaves.

At least my head stopped bleeding meaning that it couldn’t have been too deep, right? My leg hasn’t improved at all, so I fashioned a walking stick out of one of the fallen branches near me, it’s sturdy, it’ll hold my weight. I’ve been calling for Mary, making my voice hoarse as I scream. I can only wonder what’s happened to her. We shouldn’t be that far apart from each other and she should hear me. What if she hit her head too but it was much worse and she’s already bled out and I’ll never see her again because I was too slow to find her body. My heart is pounding. Ba dump ba dump ba dump in my chest, faster and faster until I spiral further and further down into the pit. I don’t have my emergency meds on me. Fuck. Why did I leave them in the car? Fucking idiot. Now Mary’s lost, alone and maybe even dead and you are acting like a complete fucking child. Dad would have never done this to mom if they were lost. Get up and find her. No matter what. Deep Breaths. Find Mary. Find Mary. FIND MARY.

Entry 3

I’ve been using the little light I have left to try and look for any clues where Mary could have gone but I have found nothing. It’s like she slipped into another world when we fell and I can’t even see any evidence of the trail back to the car anymore. The sun keeps dipping lower and lower through the trees, the light getting less and less. Idiot. Why didn’t you check your phone battery before we came out here? Everything else except the one fucking thing that could have saved you. I could have sworn it was full when we pulled in but who knows, everything is so hazy from this morning. I’ve been trying to stay near the falls but I think I need to try and find my way back towards the car. If I can do that then I can charge my phone and call for help. I hate the idea of leaving without Mary, knowing it’s at least a two hour walk back to the lot and she could be injured or worse. I need to get back, I need to save us.

Entry 4

I heard something in the woods. I’ve been trying to follow the path we came from but it’s just gone. Vanished. Poof. But I have this odd sensation that something is watching me from behind the trees. Like every time I step, something else takes a step, trying to mask itself. I don’t know, maybe it’s the combination of the concussion I’m sure I have and the panic attacks but I don’t feel right. These woods don’t feel right.. I keep hearing what I think is whispering. Like it is just under the wind, a hint of words I know? My head is just filling in the blanks where it wants, making me more paranoid than I need to be right now. I need to focus. Get out and calm for help. Go. Don’t look back, no matter what you hear Jamie. Keep moving forward, it’s all in your head anyway. God I hope it’s all in my head.

Entry 5

There is definitely something following me. Loud piercing sounds like branches cracking in half cut through the silent air as I keep moving further and further into the forest. I swear the forest feels like it’s alive. Swaying with each step, the moss on the ground moves up to engulf my feet as I trek further and further into unknown territory. I’ve long left the falls now. I was hoping that by some grace of god I could use the sun to help find my way back the way we came. I know it was on the left of me when we pulled into the parking lot. I remember Mary saying something about the glare.

“Move your visor over,” she grunted with the sun in her eyes. “I can’t see.”

The sun is on the right hand side of me now so if I keep it to the right and keep moving hopefully I can still find the trails that lead back.

Shit. There it was again. The crack, a dry branch splitting in half, sending splinters through the air. And the feeling of being watched is worse now. I feel like every time I look at a tree I should see a face poking around the side, waiting for me to stumble into its trap. It’s unnerving. The sun getting lower and lower is not helping the unease at all. It must be around 7 pm now. The sun has been setting around 7:30 recently so I really don’t have that much light left. Good thing I still have my flashlight even if I’m fucking terrified to be out here in the dark. Maybe I should try and stop for the night, wait out the dark and start my trek again in the morning.

Crack. There it is again. A snap, a thud, a rustle in the trees and that incessant feeling of eyes boring into the back of my head at all times. I really don’t like this.

There’s a little outcropping a few feet away from me. A tree fell and the roots came with it making a sort of hole I can slip into. It has a cover and maybe I can get some sleep and rest my leg, it still really hurts. Hopefully morning comes quickly.

Entry 6

I heard her. It was definitely her. She was calling my name out in the darkness. Her voice was far away and hoarse but it was her, Mary.

“Jamie!” She yelled, startling me from a restless sleep. “Help-“ Then her voice went silent.

I immediately got up from my sleeping position within the alcove. It had started to rain during the night, a cold whipping wind blowing the drops every which way.

“Jam…”
“….You”
“He….”

Fragments of words I know Mary is saying in the darkness. She sounds so far away though. I tried calling back, yelling for her in the dark but with each scream she got further and further away. The wind picking up, the rain pelting through the trees, hitting the leaves on the way down creating a sound like falling glass obscuring her screams. And that cracking, like a bone snapping in two, is getting louder and louder with each second. A low hum is filling the air, something different from the constant sound of rain and wind. Something else, like a deep guttural moan coming from the trees.

My heart is pounding. With each second Mary drifts farther away, but I can’t shake this feeling of dread — like if I follow her voice, both of us are never getting out of here. The rain is pouring harder now, each drop slamming into me like the world demanding I move. It’s so dark, like an abyss swallowing me whole, and my flashlight barely cuts through more than a few feet ahead. I know it’s silly, but ever since we fell, something has been wrong. Something has changed.

Still, I can’t leave her out there alone. Not if there’s even a chance.

I’m going into the dark. I’m finding my fiancée.

Entry 7

I’ve been walking for what feels like hours. The further I go into these accursed woods the clearer she sounds. The rain continues to pelt me as I march forward into the void. I’m cold. Freezing. Soaked to the bone in ice cold water and the wind cuts straight through my body, leaving me shivering as I continue to walk.

But I hear her again. Like a siren calling me to the deep I continue toward her even when I tell my body to stop. Even though I know with every fiber of my being it’s wrong, I just keep moving.

“Hel….help m..m…me, Jamie”
“L…et..s g…o hommm…e”

Her words stutter and twist, shaking, like someone trying to learn to speak for the first time again. It’s wrong. It’s so wrong. A mockery of her perfect voice, but it’s her voice- I’d know it anywhere.

The forest is alive with sound now. The rain, the wind, and that fucking breaking sound.
Crack. Drag. Crack. Drag. Crack. Drag

It’s like someone is pulling a bag behind them, pushing the leaves and debris on the forest floor out of the way with their feet. Each crack gets closer, louder, heavier. With each step it’s like bones breaking under a massive amount of pressure. They are forced to heal and then the pressure breaks them again and the cycle continues. And the air. It reeks of a metallic smell. It’s almost sweet. Like copper and rot.

The trees are close together and they drip. A deep crimson outlines the ground beneath my feet, like a river of blood leading me to my destination. Piles of rotting flesh sit under the trees. They twitch like they remember being alive, trying to cling to whatever life they had before this. The crimson trail leads me deeper into this twisted hellscape. I can’t stop now. I have to follow it. I have to know where she is. And then I see it.

The source of the trail leads directly to it. My light reaches forward into the night and lands in a small opening within the trees. There’s a deep heavy labored breathing coming from the outcropping. What lays before me is wrong in every sense of the word.

It’s tall, impossibly tall, nine feet at least. It’s hunched in the dark, perched on broken limbs. Limbs that are too long protrude from the giant’s torso. What should be its arms are bent at impossible angles, twisted, broken in places that should never break. Bone rips through its tissue paper skin like nothing, a deep red pouring from the festering wounds. Its legs are the same broken and disfigured beyond recognition. It moves ever so slightly, twitching but with each movement the sound comes back- crack crack crack- the sound of broken bones.

The flashlight shakes violently in my hands and I continue to trace over the creature’s appearance. My light lands on its head. A large buck skull sits upon its shoulders. It’s cracked and chipped, the antlers imposed into the side of the skull reach toward the sky at odd angles, bending and breaking like jagged spears.

Then I see why it’s perched like that. Before it lays a body. Overshadowed by the grotesque caricature that stands before it
– Mary.
She’s on the ground, covered in blood from head to toe but she’s breathing.

The creature shifts again, positioning itself directly over Mary’s head, each movement a cacophony of injuries. Then the low hum starts. The one I heard in the woods before. The creature begins to shake as its chest begins to push outward. First slowly, thump, thump thump until there’s a split. A sound like raw meat hitting the kitchen floor erupts forth as the chest of the beast cracks open, its ribs split wide and create a deep wound from within itself. As its chest bursts open, several small tendril-like protrusions fall toward Mary. The finger-like invaders place themselves deep within Mary’s soft face and begin to pulse. Every time they pulse, her voice gets clearer, stronger. The siren call gets louder and harder to resist.

“Jamie….”
It’s pitch was too low, like a tape that had been slowed down. Pulse.
“Jamie….”
“My….lo..”
Another pulse.
“My love…”
Pulse.
“Jamie, let’s go home…”

The creature leans in, tilting its skull toward her. Listening, learning. It’s getting better, close to her.

I can’t breathe. My mind is going a mile a minute. I step back, try and catch my breath. Just one step.

Snap.

The sound echoes through the trees.

The creature stops. The light catches in its hollow eyes.

Then it screams — a thousand voices tearing through the woods, human and not.

I drop the light.

And run.

Entry 8

This is it. My final moments on this earth. I know it. I can feel it in my bones, pounding through my veins.

I ran from the shambling monstrosity that I had witnessed in the clearing, dropping my light, my salvation in the dark. My heart was pounding and my brain swimming, trying to comprehend what I had just seen. It shouldn’t exist. It shouldn’t be. It was an unholy abomination, something dragged from the deepest depths of hell and thrown into this forest.

It’s dark. Darker than I have ever seen before. I couldn’t see two inches in front of my face but yet I still ran as fast as I could. I’m a coward. I know this. I’ve always been. Dad would be so disappointed. I left Mary back there, clearly in need of help. You are a fucking coward ands that’s how you’ll die.

The last image I saw will haunt me for what small time I have left. As the light slipped from my hand the beam fell upon the creature’s chest. The gaping open wound where those tendrils had poured out of. It was the gates of hell. There were maybe 10 fleshy and twisted faces embedded within the carrion of its chest. They were all different but most of them seemed to be women, twisted, their flesh merging together into one. One stuck out most prominently though. Mary’s face. It was new, barely disfigured but still there among the others. They all screamed, their faces contorted in pain beyond comprehension, tears of blood streaming down the disfigured faces as they wailed in time with the shriek from the buck skull. The sound rattled my bones, my teeth shook and tears immediately welled in my eyes before my legs allowed me to move.

The creature pounded after me, rattling forward on broken hands and feet. I can hear it, snapping the bones as it tears through the woods after me. The deafening hum returns in my brain.

I ran as far and fast as I could. Slamming into tree after tree, maneuvering my way through the dark the best I could before I fell. A root had protruded from the ground and wrapped around my foot, like the forest didn’t want me to escape. At this moment I felt a hot searing pain push through my back.

“Don’t ru…n”
“I’m righ…t he…re honey”
“You’re safe.”

It’s hot rotting breath on the back of my neck as it’s long sharp claw like fingers ripped into my back, pinning me to the ground. I could feel every shudder and twitch of it as it pinned me there, face down in the mud. The rain continued to pelt me as if the sky was weeping.

“It’s over…..now”

It said, changing the pitch of its voice, trying to match Mary’s again.

At this moment all hope was gone and memories of my life flashed before my eyes. My parents house with the dog, sitting on the porch as Dad told terrible stories to make me and Mom laugh. When I proposed to Mary on that snowy afternoon. My Dads funeral and my last conversation with him. It was all flooding back to me now. What would my Mom think happened to me? There one moment and gone the next. She can’t handle any more, this will surely break her. And Mary. If there is any life left in her back there, what was she thinking? My fiancée left me for dead in the woods?

No, I will fight until the end.

The claws pushed deeper into my already bleeding back when I remembered something. My pocket knife. It might not be much but it was something. Quickly I grabbed at the knife in my pocket and slowly flicked it open.

“Be one with us, Jamie”

It whispered, its head right next to my ear.

And in a flash I struck the blade upwards towards anything at my back. Thud, the blade sunk acceptingly into wet flesh.

The creature cried out and shook violently. Its grip on me lessened for a moment, one moment of action that I could seize.

I crawled forward, picking myself up through the pain. The pain in my leg, in my head and now in my back and I began to run again. I ran through trees, through bushes and thickets, getting my jacket caught in a tangle of branches. I ran until my eyes saw light, a single shred of moonlight breaking through the thick clouds and the trees. I ran until my feet left the ground and I fell again.

This is where I now lay. My leg is broken this time, the bone jutting outward in a sickening angle. The pain is excruciating, I can’t move without wanting to vomit. There is no way I can put any pressure on this to love. And to put the cherry on top, I’m trapped. Trapped against a giant rock that’s blocking my path, so I sit here. Using my remaining time to write my final thoughts. I can hear it moving through the trees faster now. Careening towards me like a run away train.

Mom I’m sorry you will probably never know what happened to me. I wish I was a better son, there for you more instead of curling into myself when Dad died.

Dad, I’m sorry I couldn’t be more of a man to protect what I loved.

And Mary I’m sorry I couldn’t be the partner you needed. I’m sorry I couldn’t get over all of my issues to value you more. You needed someone better than me and this is where it led you.

If anyone is reading this do not go into Greyveil. Do not go for that day hike into the forest. The forest is alive here and it will do everything in its power to never let you leave again.

End of Entries.

At the current moment the search for Jamie Trenches remains are still under investigation. Greyveil National Park has been closed until further notice. No one is allowed inside the forest.

-Detective Giles

Credit: Ethan Fuller

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