The scene only became more horrific as we drew closer. Different body parts were strewn here and there. The smell of now rotting flesh agitated your sense of self in the heat. The survivors, who had never seen me before just looked blankly into space as if in a daze.

It must have been that monstrous creature that we had just managed to avoid earlier. Perhaps, we hadn’t. It had simply satiated its hunger already. The thought sent a chill down my bones. Maybe it would be back.

I looked over at my companions. Tears were rolling down their faces at the devastation. I was thankful that I hadn’t known these people like they had.

Looking around I knew that I had to do something but it was difficult to know where to start. I went from place to place. Some people just wanted someone to hug me even though I was covered in blood myself. For others, I helped salvage their possessions. Some were relatively fortunate in that their tents were still intact.

For many, there was simply nothing I could do. Their loved ones were slain and everything they had was destroyed. It was easy to tell them apart. They were on their knees and their eyes a raw red.

As we rounded the corner of the hill, we heard a loud explosive roar. It was unlike anything I had heard before visceral, primal. It stopped us dead in our tracks. Then the acrid smell hit us.

“Don’t move,” Tabitha whispered, “if we stay perfectly still, it won’t register that we’re here.”

Then the monster appeared. It was huge, with large teeth, and relatively small front claws covered in large feathers.

I don’t think that I could have moved even if I wanted to, I was frozen with fear and a sickly feeling life was coming to an end.

It slowly moved its head to the left and then to the right. Fortunately, it didn’t sense our presence.

“Come on, get moving,” Tabitha demanded, “it’s gone now. We were very lucky that we were upwind or it would have smelled us.”

Grudgingly, I put one foot after another and began to move wondering how I ended up in this crazy situation knowing I had nobody to blame but myself.

Trudging up and down hillsides, sometimes traversing small streams. It was arduous. My feet were sore from walking around my hands were getting cut.

It took another hour to reach the campsite. and it was Tabitha who saw it first.

“No,” she roared out.

It lay in a valley between three peaks and most of it lay in ruins. The tents that provided shelter lay scattered around. Many were tainted an ominous red.