The Demon Bear of Rugar Woods

It is said that the Lord of hosts gives, and he taketh away. In some ways we bask in his glory, like a boat left out to sea. And in other ways, we stand in a desert of emptiness. Many believe it to be chance. However, I have seen His ways. 

I stood, still holding a well-worn red collar in my left hand. The nametag was soaked in a thick crimson and illegible. Not that I ever needed to read his collar to know the name of my only friend. I wiped the black power on my right hand onto my pants and took in the smell of rotting cedar and gasoline. My eyes narrowed looking past my small domicile to yard behind it. A thinly fenced yard now gaped open. The dog house cracked open. I shoved Rusty’s collar into my pocket and swung the front door open. Rain had started as I approached the green-colored Ford. The door creaked open and I sat back in the old seat. I glanced across at the dog bed in my passenger seat. A long sigh found its way out of my lungs, and I slammed the door closed.  

Large tracks led from behind my yard into the Rugar wood behind it. The Ford’s lights illuminated the crime scene. From the spread of the toes, it wasn’t hard to guess what kind of animal could possibly kill a mutt as big as Rusty. The ridges on my nose curled as I rolled my tongue over my one gold tooth. It felt that much smoother than the others. A slickness like black ice in a blizzard. I stepped into the bear’s pawprint. My boot barely came to the middle of its center toepad. I scrowled again, letting my nose ridges bend my face. God made man the master of animals, but he never promised our changes wouldn’t act up. The tracks would lead towards the mountain; of that I had no doubt. Another long sigh, and I turned back to the Ford. 

I stared ahead through the plastering of mosquitoes on my Ford’s windshield. A grouping of old gnarled oaks, stained with decades of moss and rain, had been given a new paint. Crimson to match the coming autumn leaves. Obstructed by the smattering of insects, I had no choice but to take a closer look. I spun the wheel. The tires and axel bucked and fought as I pulled into the narrow ditch on the side of Kilgore Road. Mulberry trees hung low like nooses, lining the forest path. Another buck, and the old Ford finally came to a rest. Fuzzy headlight beams illuminated my heading: a pile of blood and viscera. I twisted the keys, and the engine went dead. The lights still glowed their faded yellow on the trees. Water dripped from the mossen sponges, dampening the smell. Late summer leaves piled around the grotesque kill. A more religious man would have prayed, offered some words to a higher power, but I was a man of God, not a man of religion. Those who say God works in mysterious ways are liars and full of deceit. They hide behind thick books in lofty places, unwilling to gaze upon God’s creation to understand his true plans. I understood the holy things well; God works through man, and I was the instrument of his wrath on this September night. 

I stepped out of the Ford. My hiking boots settled in the mud of the ditch. Cicadas screamed their refrains in the woods. Foxes knickered and scraped in the underbrush. Somewhere a coyote yapped for its pack, but it was the trees I was more concerned with. Despite all the noise, I heard nothing from the leaves. The birds of the sky were silent. Their wings have been nailed to the bark. Their beaks shattered on the rocks, lest they speak of the evils that lay in these woods. The body was fresh. Neck ripped open. Didn’t even eat the fatty tissue of the man’s well-developed stomach. I used the steel toe of my boot to turn the man’s head towards the woods. With a long groan, the body moved, gasping and fighting. The man pointed a finger deeper into the woods. 

I journeyed to the back of my Ford. The old pickup was rusting over its back wheels. What had once been metallic green paint was warped and oxidized. I shoved the key into the covered top and opened up the Ford’s bed. There, on as many fresh towels as I could find, were my tools of retribution. 

The first was a Remington Model 870 shotgun. Six shells capacity, black metal plating—a fitting final gift from an old friend. I took it into my left hand, feeling the wooden grip against my damp hands. The next was my Browning BAR, full automatic, an old war iron sight still proudly on the top. It went over my shoulder on a sling. The last was my old Tommy; the disc was snapped, but it still had one round in the chamber. I moved it aside to get the Apache Tomahawk underneath. It felt heavy and uncertain in my right hand. I tested a few grips holding the base and brandishing it at my trunk. Nothing felt right, and I slid it into an old pistol holster on my hip. With a long sigh, I took Rusty’s last memento from my pocket. I kissed the bloodied metal and slid the collar into the breast pocket of my flannel jacket. Then I lifted my arm, slamming the truck closed with a snap. 

The sticks and leaves crushed under my boots as I marched into the trees. Low clinging brush scraped on my worn jeans. The shotgun felt reassuring in my left hand as I cleared the glade. Muddy footprints lined the ground, all leading to a central spot. A small nook of the forest where the weeds didn’t grow. Only ashy birch and jutting rocks. It was dark, but I could still make out what awaited me: hanging from the twisting trees were shoddily made gibbets. Old car irons, metal sheeting—it was a small wonder they could hold the torn bodies above the forest floor. I stepped out into the gallow prison looking for a sign of my quarry. The cages were only about eight feet off the ground, just tall enough to make it interesting for whatever was eating them. Like when they would dangle food in a zoo. Or toss a ball down to the tigers. 

One of the old, rusting gibbets creaked. I looked up at the dangling prison to find a man still intact. His bare legs hung down, hairy, and brown like a kiwi-fruit. His white long-johns had been ripped from the thighs down and scrapes and cuts ran all over his ankles. He’d been in shackles. His coal-black eyes watched me with hatred boiling over. I cocked my head, looking up at him. Finally, the old-bearded man spoke, 

“What you come for, son?” I scanned over his scarred face. His white beard was ingrown from years in the woods, and his afro had a long streak of similarly white hair. 

“I’ve come for revenge, plain and simple.” 

“Oh who? These trees make for brittle targets.” 

“My dog got ate last night. Some grizzly cornered ‘im in his kennel and didn’t leave nothing for me to bury.” 

“Not just some grizzly. You lookin’ fer Belthazar.” 

“Same bear that ate those folk by the road?” I gestured, with my free hand, back to Kilgore. 

“Aye, same bear they strung me up for.” I looked past the old man to the other gibbets. Their occupants had already been snacked on. Bite marks on the torso indicated a bear of immense size. 

“Guess you got lucky, seems Belthazar was full ‘fore he found you.” 

“Belthazar don’t get full, no matter how many skulls he eats. Just weren’t my time yet.” 

“You’ll help me track him?” 

“Rusty musta really meant something to you, son. I’ll help you find the brown demon, but no promises; we don't just both get eaten.” I leveled the shotgun at the chain above his head. Just as I was about to pull the trigger, something in the woods caught my eyes. A human form watched from behind the safety of the dark aspins. Its skin was naked, like the rock, and long ritual markers criss-crossed its arms and chest. I lowered the Remington to level on the watcher. It just stared at me, eyes unblinking. 

“Bang,” I growled. My finger squeezed on the trigger, and the spray of death leapt from the muzzle. When the flash cleared, the form was gone. As was the aspin it had cowered behind. I racked another shell and turned back to the old-beard. He laughed an old, froggy laugh, and the forest was silent. 

We stalked back to the Ford in silence, but as soon as we touched the blacktop, the old-beard spoke. “I gotta blind around here. Been trackin’ Belthazar for a long, long time.” 

“If you been tracking him so long, how come you were in one of those cages?” 

“I was trackin’ a bear, I thought. Don’t gotta worry about locked doors or missing keys. Didn’t expect one of those freaks to wake me up at the foot of my bed and try to strangle me with my own socks.” 

“What do they get out of it?” 

“Guess some strange folk got too much free time with Uncle Sam distracted in the jungles. Went from dodging drafts to druggin’ folk.” 

“Why the grizzly?” 

“He ain’t no grizzly. Belthazar is a demon. I seen him kill men for fun. Knaw off they legs just to watch ‘em hobble.” 

“Where’s your blind?” I looked out at the dark Rugar woods. Birch trees swayed with a haunting bend. 

“Not far,” the old-beard pointed a gnarled finger into the dark embrace of the trees. I looked at the Ford. Two tires had been slashed and a dead squirrel was nailed to the windshield. It had been stretched out with its arms wide, like a cross. The tail was flat underneath it, bushy as the day it had died. With a sigh, I slid the Remington over my shoulder and took out the hatchet. 

“Lead on,” 

The vines were wet. Each hack just adjusted their ever-present grip on the logs underneath. I carved off more moss than bark as we tried to make our way to the blind. As I chopped and slashed my way through the green-rotted wood, the old-beard seemed to just slide through the wall of branches. I would catch him appearing just a few steps ahead, only for him to slip back into the dark void. My eyes scanned the edges of the tree, looking for any signs of the watchers. Or a bear. Suddenly, the old-beard stopped. We were in the middle of the thicket, with no clearing in sight. He began to scale the tall oak before us. His toe nails dug into the wood like a spike as he went. I stayed put at the bottom, listening to the trees rock and sway in the wet, northerly wind. The old-beard returned to the bed of the earth with a talisman around his neck, some kind of hollowed-out animal skull painted with turpentine, and a bolt-action rifle. A M1903 Springfield in shoddy condition. The wood base was replaced with a mossy oak branch. At least metal couldn’t rot. The barrel was held onto the spindly wood with electric cable ties. I let out a long, disappointed growl, but the old-beard laughed with his same froggy croak. 

“It don’t look like much, but inna pinch, it’ll work. “ He began to stalk back towards Kilgore. I looked once more around the spot, wondering how he’d recognized the blind. As far as I could see, his fresh toe-cuts were the only markings on the old oak. I couldn’t see any disturbed earth or distinctive signs. Then the September wind brought the smell of distilled tree sap. I began to reach up and try to climb the old oak. It was thick like a train without branches to hold onto. I tried to grip onto the old wood, but with the drizzle it was impossible to maintain a grip. The smell got stronger when a low rumble sounded. I let go of the tree. Slowly, I turned around on my heels. A battle cry. Belthazar. 

With the Remington in my right and the hatchet in my left, I began to chop my way through the old vines. The roars began to get louder as I reached an exposed cliff. The granite fissures cut the once proud ledge into pieces, making tight passages to the top. I swung the Remington onto my back and began to scale the chucks. The rock was loose and gritty, but I dug my fingers in and pulled myself up the narrow ledges. Breathy roars came from the top of the crag, but they were getting fainter.

 I came to a flat point in the rocks. A boulder about six feet wide must have fallen some decades ago and crashed into the hill. As I stood up fully on the stone, my boots crunched on the scattered peddles all across the boulder. I breathed in, listening for the roars. Instead, I heard more crunching. I looked up with a start, just in time to find a face leering down at me. Ashy skin, and cuts under the eyes in some kind of ritualistic tattoo. The watcher screeched and jumped from the top of the stones onto me. Its knees landed onto my shoulders, and the falling weight knocked me into the slanted wall of the fissure. I struggled madly as the bladed rocks pierced my flannel jacket and sank into my back. The watcher screamed a blood-curdling shout and continued to wail on my head with its closed fists. I wrestled its locked legs free and threw the heavy form onto the floor of the small canyon. Its head snapped against the rock, but quickly the watcher began to stand again. I swung down with my hatchet, splinting the attacker’s head. Then an arm grabbed my leg. I looked down to find arms reaching out from cracks in the rocks to grab at my legs. Yanking the hatchet free, I fired down at the rocks below. The shotgun pellets scattered on the rocks, and the flash of light and sound temporarily dazed me. I staggered up the cliff face, trying to crawl my way out. The rocks seemed to move and sway as limbs from the stone tried to bring me back down. I reached the top of the lich-encrusted ridge when there was a crack behind me. I turned to see a molotov go off, and the whole fissure ignited. Blue and orange flames seared the wet moss clean off the rocks. Screams of pain and fear drowned out any other noise. I regained my footing and quickly put the hatchet away to keep both hands on my Remington. 

“Quite flammable, ain’t it?" The old-beard held another mason jar full of turpentine and styrofoam. I cracked my neck and wandered over to him to watch the bonfire. Drizzling rain made the old-beard’s face slick and reflective of the light. 

“You got more of that stuff?” 

“I surely do,” the man said with a crinkled smile. 

🐻🐻🐻

Rugar Woods was eerily silent as the blaze began to die. The rocks had been licked clean of impurity and the stone was now gray and uncluttered by the moss and lichen. I followed the old-beard from a distance. My ears pined for the sound of the bear, but the woods wouldn’t hear my silent plea. For now, Belthazar remained out of my reach.

Hugging the treeline, we walked up along the rocky path towards a split in the forest. Gray asphalt offered a small clearing from the overgrowth of oaks and cedar. The old-beard clambered over the metal railing and stepped onto the road, first looking up and down the winding path. His face was transfixed into a kind of half-smile, like a man just on the verge of knowledge. Somewhere in the woods, I heard an engine. I waited just behind the railing, listening for the closing sound. Tires, gravel crunching, and suddenly twin headlines illuminated the road. Flashing red and blue. A lawdog’s siren. The old cruiser stopped right in the middle of the road without the car for any oncoming traffic. A scowl had begun to mar my face. A law dog stepped his fancy brown boots out of his car. He wore the typical khaki shirt and olive shorts. A long handlebar mustache and dark sunglasses. His hat even had the proud deputy badge emblazoned on the front. He spoke into the radio on his chest but his words, I couldn’t hear. Law dogs were the servants of man. Usually, it was my duty to punish their wicked ways by smiting them with the thunder of God. However, before I could reach for my Remington, the old-beard spoke, 

“You must be here about the fire. I can assure you, a little fall burning neva hurt nobody.” 

The law dog looked at us. I couldn’t see his eyes from under the sunglasses, but I could see the shiny revolvers on his hip. Ivory handle. Silver steel. Gaudy. His off hand piece was a little more practical. It had a leather grip that peeked out from the tactical front holster, and the front of the gray muzzle stuck out the bottom. A long iron. A better gun than most carried. 

“I’m looking for a missing girl. Fourteen years old, brunette hair. Said to be wearing a white nightgown.” The law dog’s voice was gravelly. Too many cigarette breaks in his pursuit of order. The old-beard’s eyes flashed with realization. 

“I seen ‘er. Thought she was one of my premonitions. Little thang, white silky dress about to her knees.” The old-beard motioned with a jagged gesture to the top of his knees. His hand waves back and forth with a cutting motion. 

“That’s right,” The law dog nodded. His left hand rested gently upon the revolver at his stomach. I began to test the weight of the ax in my hand. My arm tensed, and I feigned popping my neck. The law dog looked between the two of us, the old-beard standing in the road with his stick rifle. And me staring on with righteous hatred from behind the metal railing. 

“Have you seen her? “ The law dog turned to me. 

“Old man says she’s out here; isn’t that good enough?” I stared a hole into his black glasses. I knew why he was asking. He knew why I wasn’t telling. We waited in that forest, the rain still dripping off the old leaves onto the rotted leaves below. Like golden leaves on rotted trees, the facade could only last so long. Finally, the law dog broke. A smile crested my face. He leaned into his radio. 

“I got a lead, Langly. Gonna pursue it on foot.” The radio crackled some response, but I couldn’t hear it. The law dog looked back at us. 

“Best not leave that Chevy there. These woods put holes in nice cars like that.” The old-beard motioned absentmindedly with his rifle. The law dog looked back at his car. The lights still spun, but the siren was silent. 

“Where’d you see the girl?” He turned back, having taken a small notepad out of his breast pocket. 

“We’re looking for a bear,” I interjected. The law dog’s mustache twitched. H

“There’s a lotta poachers in these here woods. You gotta license?” I smiled. I wasn’t a poacher; God had given all his animals into the hands of man. I hunted only for food, not for sport, but tonight I made an exception. 

“Deputies don’t need one. We’re helping you find a missing person; that makes us a posse, don’t it?” The law dog slapped a mosquito that had mistaken his neck muscles for a buffet. Dark blood dripped off his hand as he stared us down. It seemed to stain and pool in a long line at the base of his palm. Then it dripped onto the highway below. He breathed in, and the khaki shirt he wore bulged with the muscles on his chest. 

“You help me find this girl; you can hunt your bear.” The old-beard and I nodded resolutely. 

The lights of the cruiser got darker and darker as we followed the old-beard deeper into the woods. Just as before, he seemed to materialize out of the dark branches at will. No matter how fast we walked, his curly, starched afro was always just a few feet ahead. Growing tired of the chase, the law dog spoke in his industralizied voice, “You live around here?” It was ambiguous who the question was for, as the old-beard was never in sight long enough to ask directly. However, I wasn’t planning to answer with anything other than a shell through his gut. 

“Oh yes. I lived out in these woods a long, long time.” The old-head’s froggy voice led us deeper through the trees. 

“By yourself?” It seemed coppers were unable to stop themselves from asking uninvited questions. 

“By myself, but not alone. I came here for the rocks below, and they led me here.” 

“The rocks?” 

“The dead.” The old-beard’s froggy voice was suddenly flat. 

“And who’s that?” The law-dog snapped a young sapling in half as we carried on. 

“The dead coming talking to me, and I lay them to rest.” 

“They contact you often?” The law dog started. Our conversation suddenly ended as we entered a clearing. A large aspen had been carved up with cuts of different sizes. It’s white bark was dripping with coagulated sap. 

“No, no!” The old-beard exclaimed. Holes had been dug into the earth. They were nearly uniform in size, three feet wide and about a foot deep. Remnants of glass and earthenware rested, shattered in the narrow ditches. As I stood over them, I made out the faintest glimmer of summer sunbeams in the dirt. Gold. Old-beard began to clamorously gather the pieces into his lap. 

“What happened here?” The law dog asked. Old-beard peered into the woods, his eyes straining so hard his neck went taunt. 

“They’ve found it!” Before any of us could ask further questions, a great howl filled our ears. It was the pitch of a wolf, but it rang on and on and on. Old-beard looked around with learned fear. 

“What’s that?” I finally asked. 

“The dead.” 

It wasn’t long till the howl became a shriek. And then the scurrying of heavy bodies began to fill the forest. I spun around with the Remington aimed into the woods. The sounds were legion. The shuffling seemed to come from every direction. The first broke from the trees and the law dog fired off his revolver. The thing’s head burst open like a rotten pumpkin and it lay still. Until its legs and torso twisted like a snake, and the thing continued to run at us on all fours. 

“The fire!” Old-beard croaked. He rushed to an old shack that leaned against one of the large oaks. I fired off into the trees and leaves, and decay shrieked in response. More shuffling gray bodies began to limp into the clearing. The law dog unholstered both his pieces and fired off into the decaying masses. Bullets seemed to slow them, which was more than enough for me. 

I fired again the holy thunder of my Remington dismembering on the zombies closest. With a cavity in his chest, he moved no longer. Another arm broke from the aspen’s paler than the trees, and I lopped it off with the hatchet. The arm lay still in the dirt and the leaves. I nodded resolutely. Severe the limbs, cripple the mass. 

The law dog must have realized too because he started blasting the zombie’s arms clean off their stumpy shoulders. I whirled around blasting another. His scarred and dismembered form crashed to the forest floor. These things, they still bore the scars. I was running out of room to fire. The glade was quickly filling with the dead and undead alike. The aspens had been replaced with pale forms illuminated only by gunfire and the moon. As the dead wandered closer, I saw it. There between the harrowed trees and the desolate dead, he stood. I knew him as I had once known my own brother. I didn’t need introductions or information. He was huge. Taller than any grizzly I’d seen with jet black fur like the scruffy black bears that played by the falls. He was muscular and bulky, built better than a tank. But it was his eyes that I couldn’t shake. The moonlight’s silver gloss couldn’t hide the red that stained his bloodied eyes. That was the bear. That was the fount of my anguish. 

I charged for Belthazar with a fury. The shambling forms around me slowed my progress, but I continued to chop and carve my way through their fettid flesh. I fired off rounds from the Remington until the shotgun barrel was silent. Belthazar stood on his hind legs a bit longer, but seeing me come close, he stepped back onto all fours. For a brief moment, he tried to convince me he was just some forest beast—some wild bear drawn to the sound of prey in the woods. As his red eyes watched with learn-ed gaze, I felt the great urge to replace his calm collection with fear. Fear of God. Fear of revenge. Fear of me. 

The moonlight sheared through the trees, and the rustling flesh was growing silent. I pushed through the groping arms into a glad with the great bear. It loomed, dark like the night air. Belthazar did not move. He remained still. Forward on his front legs. I loaded a shell into the Remington, and suddenly, Belthazar jolted to his back legs. His immense size seemed to fill the entire forest. I leveled the gun at his chest. He stood rigid as a bear would. His arm hung, slightly suspended by his huge muscles at his chest. He glared down at me with learn-ed eyes. The great bear did not move. I felt neither cold nor heat as I raised the Remington to his head. A shot at this distance would surely cave in his face. The great bear did not move. His red eyes remained locked on mine. He made no sound and he did not move. I squeezed the trigger, and a great blast went off. 

The sound and the light of heaven blinded me. But when the dust cleared, I saw the demon before me. Belthazar still stood. Pieces of shrapnel were lodged in his face and snout; one of his eyes had taken a hit directly, but it remained open, glaring down at me. I realized I had been done in. I quickly tried to load another shot, but the bear swung first. His great claws ripped through my chest, gashing open a wide cut and throwing me into a nearby birch. The wind went out of my chest, and I knelt on the ground, desperate to find my gun. Blood began to drip from the bear’s mouth. My BAR strap had been slashed; the rifle now lay on the ground a few feet from me. I began to dig my fingers into the earth and crawl for it. The earth felt cold on my fingers as lifeblood spilled out onto the murky ground. I reached out for the rifle, and a great trunk stepped down on it. Belthazar stood over me. I looked up at his bloodied eyes. The great bear did not move. Blood dripped from its mouth. Rage seeped from its core. I tried to yank the rifle from under its foot, but the weight was too much. I yanked and yanked, and the great bear did not move. Then a voice whispered like bellows in the caves, 

“You are alone.” I looked up to see if the bear had moved when fire spread from behind its head. A mason jar of homemade napalm crashed against the bear. It roared in pain and ran for the trees, but not before kicking my face with its back paws. As the lumbering beast disappeared, I sat in the glade with my hand on my rifle. Blood flowed down my face. I grit my teeth. Bear or demon, Belthazar’s head would be mine.