It was an incredibly still morning. The frost clung to the bark of the trees and the frozen leaves crunched underfoot. 

Danny stepped gingerly through the trees, clutching his rifle close to his chest. He walked slowly down the rocky bluff, flicking his head around cautiously at any noise he heard in the dark forest.

Daylight was still about an hour out, and Danny’s small flashlight gave off just enough yellow glow to make him confident that there were many eyes watching him at all times.

Just a little ways to go, he thought to himself. Just have to find that treestand.

He bounced the flashlight beam off the trees in front of him, looking for the orange ratchet straps that bound the stand to the tree. In the distance, he saw the familiar glow and his heartbeat slowed in relief. He wasn’t scared of the woods, or even what was in it, really, but nighttime in the woods really put him on edge. 

Must be primal, he laughed to himself.

A small glint of light caught his eye. He clicked his flashlight onto the nearest tree.

It was a small box with a large, wooden-spoon-looking paddle connected to the top.

My trail camera! 

He had forgotten he had set the camera below his treestand last season. It was a satellite camera even, and Danny looked at the camera for a moment, suddenly excited. He clambered up the ladder of the treestand and slung his rifle onto a nearby branch, whipping out his phone.

The camera had been sending him photos of whatever was tripping the sensor, but he had forgotten to download the app onto his phone. He quickly downloaded the app, the bright screen nearly blinding him in the cold, empty darkness. 

The camera had been dead for quite awhile now, but had still managed to capture thousands of photos throughout the summer. Danny picked the oldest picture and began scrolling through them. The camera was out in front of the treestand, about twenty yards from the base of the tree. It faced North, pointing along the base of the bluff, and Danny sat in the tree behind it, facing the same direction. 

Doe. Doe. Raccoon. Bobcat. Doe.

Danny sighed, letting a huge cloud of steam billow out in front of him. Thousands of pictures and no way to sort by “interesting.” 

Danny returned to the menu page, selecting the latest group of photos instead. 

The first picture was of Danny. He held a bag of deer corn, and the series of photos depicted the rather fast process of dumping a few bags onto the ground. 

The deer were very active that night, browsing the corn and stomping at the raccoons that tried to get too close. 

Squirrels raced through the piles, and crows swooped in and out of frame.

Then, something different. 

Whiskers, and a dark, black stripe bordering a small, pink nose.

Mountain lion, Danny thought, his breath shaking as he stared at the picture.

The next picture was the lion crouched over a pile of deer corn, and Danny thought for a moment that the cougar was eating the bait.

Danny swiped, revealing the lion ripping flesh from a small, tick coated deer.

No worries, cougars have huge ranges. He’s long gone.

As Danny scrolled through the photos, he was met with a fresh deer kill every single night. The same lion, the same spot, and an endless supply of slaughtered deer.

Danny shuddered, flicking his flashlight on and scanning the woods around him. He spotted the back of the camera at the base of the tree in front of him, but all he could see was the strap holding it to the tree. 

His phone lit up in his hand.

New Photo Received;

Danny stared at the notification for a moment, confused. He opened the camera app and looked at the new picture. 

It was the glow of his flashlight on the forest floor directly in front of the camera.

Strange, Danny thought. The camera should be long dead. 

Danny hadn’t put batteries in the camera since last year, and there were no recent photos on the camera that indicated that it had been functioning all this time. 

Danny went back to the pictures.

He counted 17 dead deer, and Danny began to wonder if there would be any deer left in these woods at all this year. After the last picture of the 17th deer, there was a row of black photos, and Danny thought that maybe the infrared light had gone out on the camera, but then, it was back.

He saw the same black screen, but this time half the screen was lit up with the infrared light, and the border between the two sides of the screen was a coarse line of hair. 

Something was standing very close to the camera. Danny scrolled. 

New Photo Received;

Danny checked the new photo, but saw nothing in the trees, so he went back to the older pictures. The black hair belonged to a creature he had never seen before. As it backed away from the camera, ever so slowly, it was revealed to look somewhat like a large chimpanzee, only its face was a dark shroud of long hair, hiding any facial features in the dark, sweeping curtain. The only facial feature Danny could see at all was a set of thick tusks poking out from behind the hair. Danny felt the beginning of a cold sweat as he looked at the freakish form of the creature.

It crouched over the deer corn, it’s back incredibly arched. It had dark hands and feet, and when standing was around five to six feet tall. In the last picture on the camera, it stood, walking away from the camera and into the night. It carried in its left arm a pile of fur and a piece of flesh. Connected to the flesh was a long cat’s tail, dragging behind the creature as it vanished. 

Danny was shaking where he sat. He wished it was sunrise already, but there wasn’t even a hint of daylight yet peaking over the mountains to the east. 

New Photo Received;

Danny’s hands shook as he opened the new photo. The bright phone screen turned black as the picture opened. The infrared light revealed something in the picture, and Danny didn’t understand at first. Then he made out the base of his treestand ladder in the far distance of the picture. Danny whipped out his flashlight and illuminated the camera.

The camera was now pointed directly at the base of the tree that Danny was sitting in. 

Danny kept his flashlight on the camera as he jostled quickly for his rifle. He pulled the bolt back hurriedly, and flicked the safety off.

New Photo Received;

Danny saw himself, the bolt of the rifle a blur in the picture. The camera hung sideways, and Danny looked to where the camera had been only to find the tree bare. Danny looked at the photo and at the trees around him.

New Photo Received;

A different spot this time, much closer and Danny saw himself looking for the camera.

New Photo Received;

Closer now, almost close enough to touch. Danny frantically searched the trees closest to him, and impossibly, he saw nothing.

Danny heard a loud crash as something hit the floor of the woods. 

New Photo Received;

It was a picture of the stars, and Danny put the beam of his flashlight onto the camera, laying on the ground at the very base of his tree. 

Danny sat shaking, unsure of what he should do.

His phone lit up, and Danny felt sick.

New Photo Received;

New Photo Received;

Two new pictures. He opened them, keeping his flashlight on the camera. The first picture depicted rays of light coming from the top of the treestand, completely bathing the picture and making anything else impossible to identify. In the next picture, something was blocking the light. A dark mass clung to the bottom of the ladder, and Danny could make out a glint of light bouncing off something shiny near the top of the dark mass. 

Danny looked up from the phone, a cold sweat coating his face as he gripped the gun tight. The ladder began shaking as something climbed towards him from below. He swallowed, gulping.

The tree itself was shaking now, too.

Danny began to scream. 

He pulled the rifle up to his cheek as a dark mass lunged at him.

New Photo Received;