Chapter 19: Chapter 18- Running the Gauntlet

Kaz's mangled body was at our feet. Bones were sticking out, his bowels were spread over the ground, and the blades of grass around the corpse were a rusty red. Where the head was, was anyone's guess. Seeing him like this was a relief, though. He had no Vengeance left on his body, which meant that whatever fuckery was afoot was locked to the necklace.

Haunting and Susy were huddling behind me. Haunting was still vomiting, and Susy was trying to soothe her.

I looked around once more. "Nothing else nearby…"

I had the butterflies fly around for extra security, but everything was quiet. I stationed them on some trees and had them keep an eye out.

"Mari," Haunting said, finally done with her vomiting.

"I recommend keeping your eye closed, please."

"No, I'm fine, I'm fine… I don't have anything left in my stomach… We're not just going to leave him here, right?" 

I locked eyes with her, and she looked down in response.

"He chased after us because of me—"

"Because of ME, you mean."

"No, come on—"

"Anyway, we can bury him. Not sure if there's anything we can use, though… We might have to make do with our hands."

Susy dragged a log bigger than her body over. "I found a log. Can we use this?"

I looked at the girl and then at the log she had no business innocently pulling up. "Well. I think I can use it… but you two should probably stick to sticks and stones."

"Okay." Susy dropped the log and casually walked off to the side and came back with much more reasonable branches.

"Wow. You're fast," I said. "Anyway, we're doing this, yeah? Alright... We'll dig a little, and I'll push the body in... Then we'll cover it with dirt and leaves. Sounds good?"

The two nodded, and we got started with carving out a hole for the mangled body. 

We worked for two hours in relative silence, with Haunting making nauseating sounds every so often. Once we had a shallow grave done, I got on my knees and started searching Kaz's pockets. The man had been wearing a jacket and jeans--more than enough reason to hope he might have something useful on him. Speaking of 'useful,' I searched his sleeves but couldn't find his sneaky gun. He must have dropped it...

"Oh my god, Mari," Haunting said while holding her mouth. "How can you do that? Oh my gosh, you just touched intestines!"

"Yeah, my dad was a butcher, so I grew up with my hands in pig guts," I said. "Anyway, we need to check if he has anything. Even a wallet. If we leave here, we could give the wallet to next of kin or something--"

Haunting crouched down next to me, green-faced, and started poking his chest pockets.

"When I said 'we,' I really just meant 'me.' You don't have to do this--"

"No! I'm not letting you do this by yourself... Oh my god--don't breathe through your nose, Haunting, don't do it..."

"Uhuh... Well, I've got a wallet," I said, plucking the black leather item from his pocket. I put it to the side and looked at his body one last time. "Yeah, I'll just push this in--"

A cold, wet breath blew into my ear and made my heart jump. Haunting had tensed up, too, and was breathing heavily.

"Haunting?"

"Yes, Mari?"

"Did you feel a strange--"

"Breeze? Almost like someone was breathing down my neck? Why yes, I did," she said, her voice getting higher with every word. I couldn't tell if she was excited or terrified.

"Huh?" Susy said. "I didn't--"

"Susy. Do not move," I barked.

The butterflies--I had recalled them while we dug because I didn't want to waste the Vengeance. I calmly let a butterfly slip out from my finger and then had it position itself where it could see what was going on behind us--

I gasped. 

"Mari?" Haunting whispered.

"No, sorry, just a hiccup..."

There were two spectral figures behind Haunting and me. They were hunched over us like they were trying to see what was beyond our shoulders.

"Mari, what do we do?" Haunting asked. "I don't know if I want to look."

"No, it's fine... I'll look." I took a breath and looked over my shoulder quickly. The figures disappeared the moment my head moved, so I missed them. The butterfly caught the moment it vanished, though.

"Nothing behind us..." I said. My eyes went to the floor as I passed my fingers along the surface.

Haunting turned on her toes and scanned the ground too, noting, "I wouldn't expect ghosties to leave footprints... then again, it depends on the type. They leave footprints in flour if they're a house ghost."

"That's really specific," I said as I looked around the forest.

"We're looking for footprints?" Susy asked.

Haunting nodded. "Yeah, so that we can catch the ghosties by the tail--oooh my gosh! MARI! Over there!"

I looked where she was pointing, further back the way we came. My eyes went wide as she dug her nails into my shoulder and shook me.

"MAAAARRRRIIIIIIIIIIIII!" she cried. "I don't think that's a person!"

There was a white figure at the other side of the forest. It looked like they were staring at us. They only stayed there for a few seconds before turning away and disappearing into the forest again, though.

"Mari... should we follow them?" Haunting asked, her hand still glued to me.

I shook my head and returned to shoving Kaz's body into the hole. "No. I saw a woman in white yesterday, and she's the reason I got trapped here. To quote one of the villagers--those things aren't helping us."

"Oh... okay... Weird... But also, REALLY cool. Hmm? Susy?"

Susy nonchalantly pointed at the space where Kaz's head would have been and looked at us. "I found footprints."

"Seriously?" I pushed Kaz's body into the shallow grave and checked near Susy's feet. "Holy shit. Footprints. There are actually footprints."

Haunting squeezed her face against mine as she stared at the footprints.

"Haunting?"

"Yes, Mari?"

"Your face is really close to mine, don't you think?"

"Oh, sorry." 

She separated, and I actually got to study the prints without her breathing my air. "Hmm... I can't see the distinct marks of toes... This actually looks like someone was walking around in boots."

"But... does that mean someone found Kaz before we did?"

"Maybe..." I looked up and noticed that the tracks were going away from the body and where we were. "They didn't look like they were in a hurry..."

"I think these are fresh-ish, right? They disturbed the grass and haven't been covered up again. The ground's moist too."

"Yeah..." I looked further and then realized the obvious. "Hey, where's Susy--"

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"HEY! Over here!"

Both Haunting and I turned and looked behind us and a little to the side.

"How did she get over there?" I asked, shocked to see Susy waving at us from behind some bushes. 

"She can be quiet when she wants to be, I guess..."

"The footprints led over here!" she said.

I was perplexed. The footprints led away from Susy and us. Did they actually curve around to get behind us? It was a good stretch away too...

We got up and went over to Susy quickly. She pointed at the ground behind the bushes.

"I think someone was lying down here, girls!" Susy said.

I couldn't say she was wrong. The grass here was a little longer than usual and flattened as if a large mass had been lying here.

"This is totes creepy," Haunting said as she got to the other side of the bushes and crouched down. "Hey! There's a hole in the bushes! I can see the grave super well!" she said as she buried her face in the bushes.

"So, the implication is that someone was watching us?" I asked, a little bothered I didn't make the butterflies fly farther around.

"Hmm, there are a lot of wood shavings here," Haunting muttered.

I looked around again as I made the one butterfly from earlier flutter around high above us. I had my sense of my consumption rate now. I could keep the single butterfly out for another four to six hours, though I hoped I wouldn't need to be so wasteful right now.

"It doesn't look like there's anything else in the area..."

"M-M-M-Mari," Haunting whimpered. 

I looked over the bushes at her and Susy, and then saw her looking up at a hollow in the tree beside the bushes. 

"I noticed there were a lot of wood shavings around, so I followed them and I noticed the tree and then I looked up the tree and it's really creepy, Mari!" Haunting cried.

I jumped over the bushes and looked up at the hollow. It was a bit higher than my head, but I could reach it and the piece of wood that was in there. I pulled it out--

"I knew it!" Haunting cried as Susy hugged her.

"God, we're just going through a whole creepy gauntlet here."

"It was watching us, Mari!"

In my hands was a crude wood sculpture depicting two humanoid figures, one with a very big log, and the other with a fair-sized stick, digging a hole. They even left a little bit of wood to mimic the mound of dirt the two were piling up. I looked over at our own mound and had to give it to the artist--they captured the scene pretty well.

"The freaks of this forest sure do like their crafts."

"Mariiiii!" Haunting cried. "Shouldn't we be more freaked out?!"

"Haunting, what happened to the girl that had the gall to call this place an 8 out of 12, after surviving the freaky deer."

"That girl broke after she touched a corpse!" she cried back.

"Well, at least you're honest." I looked at the sculpture again and checked it all over. "It's a little annoying that someone was watching us." I looked at the girls and chuckled. "They could have helped us out, you know?"

Susy nodded. "I agree."

"But it's a monster..." Haunting whimpered.

"Yeah, it's a monster-rude person," I shot back. I put the carving into my pocket--

"Seriously?" Haunting asked, visibly repulsed.

"This is where you draw the line? I have an amulet with a freaky eye in my pocket."

"It's different!"

"How?"

"That sculpture's really shitty--there's nothing magical or mysterious about it--it's just some creepy stalker's shitty hobby." She picked up a handful of shavings and threw them into the air. "He was whittling while watching us and doing who knows what!"

I rested both hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes.

"M-Mari," she said, red-faced.

"Calm down. You're hysterical. You'll calm down, won't you?"

"Yeahokay," she quickly replied, pressing her lips together and looking at me with wide eyes. Susy giggled in the background, meanwhile.

"Good," I said as I got up. "We need to finish burying Kaz, so let's get that done."

The three of us made our way back to Kaz while my butterfly fluttered above us.

"At least Kaz's body is still there," Haunting said with a sigh.

"How are you staying so calm, Mari?" Susy asked.

"Well, there was this really tightly-wound guy yelling at people that the fuckery going on was just scare tactics. In other words, the forest is just trying to get a rise out of us. For whatever reason."

"Wow," she said, trailing off.

"How are you so calm?"

Susy shrugged. "I don't know. This doesn't feel real..." she chuckled at me while looking embarrassed. "Maybe it hasn't really hit me yet... but actually... I'm having a lot of fun."

I raised a brow at that. Haunting, too, lifted her head. I could practically see her ears pressing against her hat.

"I mean, corpse aside," she said. "The time before we found the corpse was very nice. Even the little scare I had seems funny in retrospect. I'd never get to have something like this in the city."

Haunting tugged on my sleeve and whispered into my ear. "Mari, I'm starting to think Susy is a little odd."

"Now you say that?" I shook my head and disregarded Haunting. "Susy's probably got the right idea. We can't let this place get to us."

We got back to the grave, and I grabbed the log. "Come on, you two, we've got to get the dirt on him."

"Yeah... Let's get this done and get out of here," Haunting followed.

"I'll make a cross we can stick on the grave," Susy sang.

We got to work, though Haunting kept stopping to shoot me weird looks. She apparently didn't like that Susy was humming while making her little cross.

Well, we got the job done in the end. The body was sleeping beneath a pile of dirt, we said our final words--

"Rest in peace, Mister Kaz."

"Sorry for running off with your bag... but I promise I'll do my best from now on."

"Yeah, Kaz, didn't really know you, but yeah... Hope you're somewhere that is fitting for you."

--and we set off again... The butterfly didn't notice any fuckery during that time.

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