Content warning: strong language, violence, depictions of child abuse and its lasting effects, and a prolonged medical emergency.

Read Part I First!

“Who’s there?”

No answer. 

It was too dark to see anything through the windows. All except for faint shadows that swayed in the wind. 

“Hello?” John said, louder this time, making his way to the door. “Look, this was my father’s place. He died a couple of weeks ago, and I’m just here to get a few things. My car is stuck in the mud outside. Any help would be…”

The door didn’t have time to squeal or moan as John threw it open. Light from inside spilled out, illuminating a narrow path to his still-stuck SUV. 

No one was there. 

He leaned out, shining his phone’s flashlight around, but the dense fog reflected all of the light back at him. 

The sound of trees swaying and cracking started again, but the fog sat impossibly still. Any wind should have easily moved it at least a little. 

John pulled himself back inside. It was just the woods being the woods. Nothing was out there, just in his head.

John

He spun around, searching for the voice that had whispered his name.

“Hello?” 

No one answered. He looked up and down the staircase but only the mounted animal heads looked back. They followed his every move as he looked around the room.

“Is someone there?”

The cabin strained and popped as it settled in the night air. The cracking sounds ran from one side of the roof to the other and then down the walls. The overhead lightbulbs flickered and went dark. 

Pale light illuminated the dense cloud that settled between John and the path just outside the front door. His breath caught again, shallow and labored. His hand shook as it reached into his pocket, searching for his inhaler. 

The angular plastic piece caught on his pocket’s edge. John wheezed and pulled it harder, but it refused to come out. He pulled one last time; harder and faster the inhaler pulled free as his foot lifted from the force. The floor finished the job his asthma started. His lungs refused the air he tried to force inside.

Blood rushed into John’s face. Sweat flowed down, stinging his eyes. His legs tried to pull themselves upright, but they only made his next fall to the floor that much worse. 

John forced himself to lie still a moment; he had to know where he was going. The inhaler’s metal medicine container caught a bit of light. It sat at the edge of the cabin’s small front porch; still and mocking him. 

“Fucking piece of…” he forced out past burning cheeks and tightening jaws. His hands and arms finally helped; pushing him up. His feet and legs took the cue, and he finally stood upright again.

The first step was shaky, but the second steadied itself. A third edged toward normal while the fourth demanded confidence. The open door was only a step or two away. He could probably make the rest of the distance in a single leap, like he’d done upstairs. 

One foot braced as his knee dropped. The other foot felt the floor shift beneath it, taking his balance with it. His chin hit first, teeth clashing, splinters from the old wood pressing into his skin. His eyes traced up to the door, just out of reach. 

“Please…” he mouthed without any air left.

Thick clouds of fog rolled more intensely, covering the front porch and the inhaler with it. John pulled himself forward; every part of him wanted to cry out. One hand lifted toward the door as it closed on its own. 

His mouth opened, trying to plead with the door to stop. The latch came down with a loud metallic click. It demanded the last word, just like Dad always did. 

Pitiful and useless, his father’s voice rang in his ears louder than ever. John’s fist pounded the floor, chunks of unfinished, old wood breaking off with each impact. His sweat ran hot, the smell of blood the only thing he could sense clearly. His whole body had become one dull, throbbing weight as he forced himself upright. He wobbled and stumbled forward, gripping the door frame and doorknob to steady himself. One small latch between him and open lungs. 

The door pulled open once again. Fog churned faster than before, yet there was still no wind. The trees had gone silent. 

John lurched forward, taking care to plant each step before attempting another. It couldn’t have been more than three from the door to the porch edge. Each one was more painful than the last. 

Finally, he saw the edge of the porch slip through the dense cover. His inhaler had to be very close. His knees hit the porch as he knelt, hand outstretched, feeling along the jagged wood edge for it. 

Smooth plastic met his fingertips and his hand did not hesitate. Relief was finally his as he pulled the inhaler to his lips and pressed the dispenser down hard. A small hiss gave him one soothing shot of medicine. One more and he would be back to normal. But the second press gave him nothing.

He shook it and pressed once more. Nothing. He had just refilled the prescription before driving out here that morning. How could it be…?

A door slam and a loud metal click pulled his attention back to the front door. 

“You’re kidding me right now,” he half-wheezed, walking back to the door. 

His grip slipped and slid around the old doorknob, but it never moved more than a few centimeters. He reached into his pocket for the key, but remembered he had never put it there. It was on his Dad’s old keychain in the middle of the living room table. 

“Stupid.” 

The night air shifted. Footsteps like someone running on tiptoes moved behind him and then darted away to his left and right. John gasped and held up his phone’s light to the fog; the roiling had become a swirling pattern, slow and hypnotic. 

“What the fuck is happening?” 

More quick steps, but in every direction, moving faster and faster. Until they came to a stop in front of him, but still shrouded by the relentless fog. 

“Who’s out there?” 

For a moment, nothing moved. John put his back against the old door, his eyes fixed forward, shaking as he breathed. 

Empty. 

The whisper carried dozens of voices, calling and responding. 

Empty.

It came again, louder. 

EMPTY

John leaped from the porch, pumping his legs as hard as he could. The SUV wasn’t far, if he could get to it he could lock himself inside until daylight. Figure out a plan once he could see two feet in front of…

His foot caught on something sticking out of the ground. His shin slammed into something sharp that cut through his jeans and into his leg as the rest of him went tumbling forward. He flipped over and yelled out, pain shooting up his leg, the taste of soft dirt filled his mouth. A warm wetness slid down his leg and into his shoe. 

“Fuck!” 

Light from his phone struggled against the fog again, but it was thinner than at the porch’s edge. John suddenly wished it wasn’t. The SUV’s front bumper sat just above the ground, still attached to the vehicle below. 

Footsteps moved through the fog again. John got to his feet, limping toward the path. He tried to hold onto his phone but his grip failed against his jarring movement. Footsteps moved all around him, closing their distance. He could hear breathing keeping pace alongside him. What felt like fingers brushed against his shoulder. John looked back and grabbed at the empty air. 

A loud click and then metal teeth tore through his jeans and into bone as he went back to the ground. He screamed into the night as the footsteps circled around, stopping just out of sight.

“Jesus, what the fuck,” John said, grasping at his leg. His hands found rusted metal teeth. “Goddammit, Dad, you fucking psycho!” He gripped and pushed as hard as he could, but the teeth only gave a little before sinking in deeper. 

One set of footsteps moved in closer, a tiny silhouette stood over John. His whole body went cold. He shook, unable to fight anymore. 

Stay

The soft ground opened around John as he screamed until the earth filled his lungs.