u/Equal-Strike2732

Entry one.

The dusty cracked ground stretches on without an end in sight. It seemed as if you could see the next town, if you just had large enough binoculars, whispy lines of ephemeral streams like streachmarks broke up the desecate cracks that mirrored those that ran across my lips like a macabre filigree. Water is scarse out here, the only wave to be found are those in the sea of sand.

Our little town based on a hallow promise, died long ago.

Most abandoned when the company up and left, I guess we weren't profitable enough, others slowly decided to leave. Then there's me and my kin, and those who wander in, some stay for a time, but most end up drifting on the wind or lying with the sand amd dust around town. Bandits are no stranger to us, though they are no more estranged from death as they are anyone who roams this desolate range. The only lawman who wandered through, was a Texas Ranger who was looking for a kid for some reason, I can't reckon why now. He stayed for a time wandering about the range, causing a ruckus each evening, as he battled his way back to town to regale us with things alien to him, but all to common for our weary minds.

A bull sized coyote carried him up the mountains like a sack of taters one day. Haven't seen no lawmen since, I reckon he wasn't of much importance to them, they didnt even send him with a horse.

Entry two.

The mines never ran dry, gold still lays in its veins. We call them the Tommy knocker caves, now that the unholy creatures moved in. They don't cause much trouble, but every now and then, a big one will get a wild hare up its ass and tries to move into one of the basements around here. we had to burn down two buildings because of them, the wretched varments infest the building bottom up, covering the windows in feces so they can move about in their new abode, day or night. Fire is the only way to kill them, since you can't get your hands on the slippery bastards who never show themselves in light less delicate than that of a cloudy night.

Mountain lions used to roam the ranges and fill the curpuscular air with their shrill cries of revelry for the hunt. The sound of rumbling as the herds of carnivorous bison stampede through the range, now replace the calls of the once nobil hunter. The bison herds left the range devoid of life, save the areas where the Tommy Knockers roam, the bisons only rival in strength and gluttony.

Entry three.

Another drifter came through town today, his stature that of a lanky cotton wood tree that stretched far above its peers, bending under its own weight, eyes like a rattle snake, the expression of a hawk, and the complexion that of a blistered cactus.

The smell of figs and mustard wafted off his raggedy duster as he moved about the town, bringing out what rats had evaded the ravages of the land and leaving them rotted as he walked past.

Cahil my nephiew ran out to greet him, but crumpled into a pile of clothes and stringy putrid flesh not 10 paces from the strolling fiend. Not a word was spoke as he left the town and into the range of death and dust. The smell got so bad in the mid day sun, we shoveled every festering lump we could find and dumped them at the entrance of Tommy knocker cave, except Cahil, we took what was left of him out into the desert and left him for the king vulture, a solemn offering to a fleeting god. Tonight ends like all others, the rumble of the bison and screams of the Tommy Knockers battling it out somewhere in the range, but it seems a little closer than usual tonight.

Entry four.

He stared off into the range, his thoughts like the dunes of sand that bordered the hills, dry and desolate. His mouth hung open in a pained scream that only the damned in the depths of tartarus could hear. He shambled his way along the edge of the desert, drifting through town, his skin stretched over his bones like a leather drum, eyes sunken into his skull never to be found, his skin as pale and cracked as the dried bed of the salt lake, oozing what blood was left in a spiderweb of sticky, puss filled scabs, we tried helping him, but he just kept shambling through, and groaning the desert lullaby, wandering and singing his mournful tune into the horizon. A dark cloud of smoke came up in the distance over the range today, now that the sun went down, we know what it is. A great fire, casting an orange, devilish light on the ceiling of smoke it had made through the day, it seems to be moving closer. Last time this was seen, a scouting party was sent out to see what it was, only one man made it back with a story so tall, we thought he may tip over telling it. Apparently a pack of Tommy Knockers had devised a way to trap some of the flesh eating bison using fire, they had lured the beasts into an area of tall grass, where they had destroyed the grasses in one area and with an old lantern from one of the mines, lit the grass ablaze when the bison were in the bare spot. Once trapped, the Tommy Knockers jumped through the blaze in a frenzy, like a fox in a hen house, they slaughtered and gutted the beasts stringing the gory tendrils across the desert in abstract shapes of blood and bile. Agast at the site, some of the men lost their confidence and contents of their stomachs, alerting their position to the vile critters from the caves. Another slaughter issued of those who had not began running quick enough,being picked off one by one until just jones was left, the last thing he recalls seeing of the other men were the Tommy Knockers stringing their intestines across the boulders and cacti, that made up the hellish landscape.

Entry five.

The fire is closer today. The sound of the carnivorous bison screaming is growing louder and their rumbling weaker. A man named Byrne standing not too much higher than most persons knees and dressed in a dapper style came to town, he is staying at the Inn, a peculiar building that has never been in a state of disrepair or untidyness, and has never needed maintenance for as long as i can remember, which is why we put all newcomers there. Some just up and dissapear over night, others have stayed for a long time without issue. We told Byrne of these peculiar happenings, but he assured us, the he was of no concern to the entity inside. He stayed a few nights and each day he went down into the mines and came back with a bucket full of gold ore, which he placed into his coin pouch, a strange item considering it was no bigger than his hand, yet held more than a cart of ore inside. When he had his fill of ore, he trotted off into the desert, clover popping up at his feet and withering in the scorching heat as he left them behind, the delicate leaves crumbling and blowing like dust in the gentle breeze.

Entry six.

The smoke now makes a half moon around the town. No drifters today so far, just the mundane drone of sand, the song of the dunes singing themselves to sleep as the smoke rolls over them casting the lie of rain, a promise of death across their grains. The nashing of the Tommy Knockers ripped through the night as they moved from house to house. To whomever finds this tome, leave now, while you have the water to make it across the desert, dont stay and find the same fortune in pain I and my kin have, here at the edge of everything.

My grandfather in his old age and addled with dementia told me a story about when his father took him to the valley of the shrike.

It was early one morning when we had no chores to be done, I woke up to my father shaking me "wake up and piss, the world's on fire!" He yelled before storming out of my room. we had prepared for a hunting trip in the morning and Ma was in the kitchen with a skillet full of eggs and a pot of coffee on the potbelly stove. Pa made his way out to the pump house to gather the hunting gear and put it in the truck. "Morning darlin" ma said as she fixed me a plate and we chatted about whatever you chat about over breakfast, when pa came in, face covered in a gaudy ammount of camouflage paint bordering on the offensive and a giant smile on his face. "You ready to go huntin, son? I have a very special place picked out today" I rolled my eyes, thinking it was the neighbors property a few miles down the road, "you're a hooligan, you know that right?" I replied, he scoffed, "who, me? No I dont think so. But it really is a special place, not just Jerry's back yard." I perked up at this and finished my eggs quickly while pa filled a thermos full of coffee. "Rifles are in the back and your gear as well, you can put it on, on the way. We need to get there before the sun rises. Dont forget the face paint, its very important." I raised my eyebrow at this. "Are we hunting turkeys, you know they are out of season right now." He shifted slightly, his smile faltering a little. "Uh, no we are hunting deer, but there are birds in the area-" ma interjected "I told you, I didnt want you taking him there." Pa shot her a glance. " Ma, i understand your concern, but the boy needs to know, especially since they are being seen outside of the valley now." Ma just waved him off and he sighed. "Well Jimmy, we better get going before she changes her mind." With that, we left.

The old Chevy truck groaned and bounced on the bumpy mountain road, making it challenging to put on my hunting gear.

on our way to the hunting spot that pa was still being secretive about it, despite the very conspicuous conversation with ma. "Now, when we get there, we need to be very quiet. We will have to hike in for about an hour so we dont spook anything with our truck." I nodded, "what exactly is out there that ma is worried about?" He gave me a glance and a sly grin. "I don't want to spoil the surprise, trust me, you wouldn't believe me if I told you anyways." I chuckled, "you do tend to tell a lot of tall tales". He huffed at that. "Tall tales. is that what you call my stories?" He asked with a hint of guile in his voice.

When we pulled up to the spot we were to hike in at, pa pulled the rifles out of the back. I grabbed my 270 bolt action winchester and he had his 30.30 lever action Henry, the only ammunition we could get was full jacket ammo, so we filed the tips to make our own hollowpoints, we couldn't afford scopes, not that they would do too much in the thick brush in these valleys and hollars.

As we hiked in, we stayed silent, making sure to raise our feet as to not rustle leaves while following the game trails as much as we could, until pa signaled to move off the game trail and down this big hill down into a valley. He whispered in my ear with a more serious tone in his voice now "we need to stay absolutely silent from here on out. Stay behind me, move when I move." I nodded and followed him down the hill, creeping below the willows, and through the thorny brambles, stopping every few minutes as pa listened. Eventually we came upon these massive trees streaching above the valley like giants, branches that ended in sharp points lined the grain silo sized trunks and seed pods the side of canoes littered the forrest floor. Pa pulled out a field guide of north american plants and pointed at the honey locust, then gestured with his hands to say "large and tall." Then gestured to sit down. He pulled out a mesh blanket with fake leaves sewed to it and put it up as a make shift blind, then sat down next to me.

We sat and listened to the silence of the night being broken up by the sporadic croaking of a tree frog somewhere in the forrest of giants.

False dawn came and with it the bustling sounds of early morning songbirds, deer waking up and shaking off the morning dew, squerrels playing around the underbrush, a quick glance up almost sent my stomach to the ground. A buck was impaled on one of the giant spikes of a locust tree. Black dried blood matted its fur and its eyes glazed over and mouth agape as if it was still screaming, I wondered through the pained groans of my stomach, how it got up there.

Pa grabbed my shoulder and put a finger to his lips when chirps of a songbird like the crack of lightning rang through the valley and everything went completely silent. Pa tightened his grip on my shoulder trying to hide the shake of his anxiety, making the pit in my stomach grow, why did he bring me here if he was this scared? The booming, buffiting sound of giant wings filled the air as a Grey bird with a strip of black over its eyes like a racoon mask the size of a horse landed on one of the branches of a honey locust about 200 yards in front of us, its jerky bird movements exasperated by its giant size. The sound of the feathers rustling against each other could be heard as if it was right next to us. It then hopped from branch to branch until it made it to the impaled deer and began ripping it apart, devouring a whole quarter of it at a time. when it was done, it looked around, its sudden movements sending a jolt through my spine every time it turned its head in our direction. We sat as still as possible, breathing shallow and slow. The sound of beating wings filled the air again as another one of those birds came in, but with a mountain lion in its talons, which thrashed about trying to get some purchase on the thick flesh of the birds feet, only stopping when it was impaled by the bird and both flew off in unison as the mountain lion hung from the spike, growling through thick red foam, pouring from its mouth. Pa shook my shoulder and motioned for us to leave, he didnt even bother taking the blind down. The silent hike back was filled with terror and extra caution as the sound of our hearts trying to burst out of our chests from fear filled our ears. The sound of a flapping wings and the groaning creaking of a tree branch with immense weight on it broke the surrounding silence. I froze, expecting pa to do the same when he screamed, "Run Jimmy!" I turned for a split second and pa had his rifle raised into the air, firing as rapidly as he could. "COME ON, YA BASTARD, IM RIGHT HERE, FUCKING GO Ji..." He was cut off when the giant bird landed on top of him with a sickening crunch, its head hitting the forrest floor as it thrashed from the fatal shot pa made. I grabbed my rifle and began to run back to the truck, making sure to stay below the willows as I ran, the sound of flapping wings came ant went as I ran.

The sight of the truck was a beautiful site, in all its rusted glory, I jumped into the driver's seat and racked a round into the chamber of my rifle, truck door still open, I scanned the trees for the bird, it was standing on the ground, the trees here far to small to bear its weight, it slowly stalked toward the truck, its sporadic movements giving it away. I aimed my rifle and put a round in its left eye. I closed the door and pulled the key from the sun visor and drove off as the bird writhed on the ground. When I got back home, I told ma what happened. She called her cousin, a mountain of a man and he went to search for pa. He came back with only Pa's rifle and bad news.

Later I got out one of Pa's birding books and looked up what I saw that day for answeres. Stairing back at me from the page was the black masked bird called a loggerhead Shrike.

The hair on the back of my neck stood up as the crunching of leaves grew louder. unbothereed by the sound I had attributed to squerrels, I kept moving toward the overlook.

The tin of fish gasped and bag of crackers crinkled, as the salty smell mixed with the sugary aroma of the ponderosas lazily swaying in the breeze as the morning dew evaporated off their needles. My eyes rested on the horizon, capping a valley, with a beauty only nature can sculpt. Turkey vultures circled above, surveying for their next quarry as the valley floor teemed with deer and songbirds. The crunching of leaves pulled me from my trance, it was geeting late anyways, so I packed the remains of my lunch and continued down the trail.

The crackle of the fire mixed with the gurgling of the river as the flicker of flames cast dancing shadows across the trunks of the pines, the orange glow terminating at their sides. The smoke wafted in the breeze through the shadows like phantoms.

Beams of light shining through the fluttering leaves, cast dancing shadows on the tents canvas, the usual sounds of the morning were absent, no songbirds, or frogs singing in a chorus, as if the forest was still asleep. The sound of a whisper shot lightning through me, with my knife in hand, I peeked out, only to catch a glimpse of wiry black hair slip into the pines. After some coffee and a light breakfast of trailmix and deer jerky, I set my bearings for the mountain ridge to the south. Unsettled, by the mornings events, but unshaken, I pressed on with my knife and bear spray at the ready. The trail was overgrown with twisted pine branches and brush oak, hacking though with my trail knife was a chore, my heart beating loudly was the only sound that filled my head and set my tempo, a break for water here and there broke up the monotony of cutting branch after branch, through what seemed like an endless wall of the same few trees and bushes, "what the fuck" I said to myself and in response, something crashed through the forrest away from me like a deer falling down a steep hillside. I turned around just in time to see brush oak being thrashed in the distance as something barreled through the brush. Not wanting to stay in there any longer, I retraced my path, back to my camp the previous night, a hand on the bear spray the entire way.

After setting up camp, I fastened my knife to my hiking stick, for a make shift spear and built an extra large fire, the numerous dead dry limbs around made good fire wood, but it burned fast so I had to keep collecting more. By the time the sun set, I was walking into the woods to collect more wood, making sure to keep my fire in eyesight, the rustling following me around and stopping when I tried to look at it. "Whauauat thuuaaah fuuuck" rattled a raspy and grissled voice from the darkness, followed by a wet groan. Startled, I dropped the wood i gathered and raised my spear, screaming as loud as I could, backing away toward the campfire, the rustling following with my pace, only stopping at the edge of the fire glow. With spear and bear spray in hand, I listened to my own scream in that things horrible voice all night, getting closer as the fire burned down and the orb of light that offered me some sense of fleeting security and tossing whatever twigs and flammable material I brought with me that I could spare into the fire to spare me a few more minutes of distance from the thing screaming at me. I clicked the light on my watch, 4:58 am. "Shit. And hour and half until dawn" I whispered to myself, stoking the fire and tossing another sock in, a flash of light from the cotton burning illuminated a face just barely visible, only discernible by the shadows cast on its sunken eyes, on the other side of the fire, I jumped back and heard it crashing through the forrest screaming my scream. Breathing a sigh of relief,knowing the thing was gone for now, I ventured out to get the bundle of sticks I had dropped earlier, the pine needles and slivers of bark crunched beneath my feet mixed with the percussion of my heart as I gathered the now scattered bundle of sticks. A different sound pulled me from my concentration. A whisper from behind me. "Until dawn" it sounded different from the first voice, a bit more gracile and smoother. I whipped around and pointed my spear in the direction of the voice. To my surprise an emaciated woman was crouching a few meters from me and baring her teeth. I took a step back and slowly inched closer to my fire. The woman began growling and matching my speed, crept toward me. "STOP!" I screamed at her, she flinched, but remained undeterred from her pursuit. "STOP, STOP, STOP, STOP, STOP!" she began screaming back at me, maintaining her speed with mine, until I broke off and ran back to my fire making sure not to drop my bundle of sticks this time, tossing them into the fire stoking it as the woman stood outside of the fire light, screaming stop at me, he voice getting hoarse as the minutes passed and my sticks burned, my patience waning for the sauntering light of the morning sun i wrapped a cloth around my the shaft of my spear near the blade, bundling in sticks with it and sticky pine sap that dripped from the trees heated by the light of the campfire. I lit the bundle and started the long walk to my car.

Each step was a waking nightmare, as my foot hit the ground a corresponding rustle would sound just two meters away, just out of the light, ash from the torch falling down, leaving a line marking my trail, the embers floating by my head as the sickening sound of breathing and footsteps just out of sight, counting my own breaths to stay calm, fearing what might happen if I ran.

Embers, embers are all thats left on my makeshift torch, casting a fleeting light around me, the trees closing in and my breath getting heavier, drowning out the sounds around me, rushing to get more light, I scooped some pine needles into a pile and blew on the torch, making the embers glow bright. My heart dropped when I noticed the cold breath on the back of my neck, screaming I swung the torch behind me, but it simply flung into the darkness as I ran down the trail, thump, thump, thump, I wasn't sure if the sound I was hearing was my heart, or my boots hitting the hard ground, the yellow glow of light pole in the parking lot cutting through the trees like a beacon on foggy seas sent another burst of addrenaline through me. The keys jingle as I fumbled to get them out of my pocket while running through the parking lot, clicking the button on the fob feverishly, the lights on my car flashing like a strobe in response. The sound of the door locking once I sat down mixed awith the breath I didnt realize I'd been holding since entering the parking lot filled the cabin of the car, when my car shook violently with a loud thud, I turned my car on and threw it in reverse, hitting the gas, a desheveled man with a long beard, wiry hair and rags for clothes was stumbling toward my car and screaming, one arm waiving frantically, the other hanging limp and at an unnatural angle, terrified I slammed the car into drive and peeled away, my headlights leaving the twisted pines and the man for the road home, the adrenaline dwindled, my breathing slowed and my heart no longer racing, the song dont fear the reaper playing as the breathing in the back grew louder.