Bogleech.com's 2013 Horror Write-off:

"Wendigo Tale"

Submitted by Masami

“Your flesh looks delicious!” Jack screamed between clenched teeth.

It had only been about two days since he got back from his trip, and now he was in a mental hospital. What had he become? His family and his friends had all left him to rot in this hospital.

All by himself, in this room with gray painted walls, he continued to scream “Let me out you bastards! I will eat you alive! Let me return to the Wendigo!” That’s when his doctor, Dr. Grady looked up from his paperwork, and stared at Jack through the one way glass.

“The Wendigo?” Dr. Grady asked into the microphone. This had been the first time that Jack had mentioned anything other than eating human flesh.

“Yes doctor, the Wendigo…He will come and together, we will consume you…Only the Wendigo understands…He will take your soul...” Dr. Grady was surprised by this. He had studied Native American culture for about a year in college before realizing that he wished to become a psychological Doctor. But he knew well of the Wendigo.

Native Americans from the Algonquin tribe told legends of a demonic creature associated with cannibalism. Scholars taught that the Wendigo myth was created as a way to reinforce the thinking of cannibalism as a taboo. The name of this beast has even been used to associate a type of mental disorder, wendigo psychosis, which makes the sufferer crave human flesh. Jack was suspected of having this, but telling him about the Wendigo made Dr. Grady nervous.

He knew about the Wendigo, and he believed the myth to be true. His colleagues ridiculed him for his belief of the Wendigo, as any sensible man would. But Dr. Grady knew better than to fall into conventional thinking and regular beliefs.

He knew that if he fell into the thinking of modern science as a whole, he would perish, for all people, especially scientists, need to have an open mind. Without an open mind you are closed and can’t learn anything.

After a moment Dr. Grady said to the microphone “Can you tell me what happened to you on that trip?”

“Of course I can! If you wanted to know, why didn’t you ask me?” asked Jack in a mocking tone.

Dr. Grady responded “Because I was under the impression that you had a mental disorder. You were thought to be…unreliable.”

“Unreliable! Ha, you make me laugh, doctor.”

“Can you please explain what happened, Jack?” Dr. Grady asked.

Jack said “Yes sir, doctor, but when this story is over your flesh will be the next meal of the Wendigo.”

Dr. Grady gulped. He believed Jack. He believed that the Wendigo will come, and feast on his own flesh. But Dr. Grady wanted the truth. “Ok, begin.”

“Well, doc, my friends and I decided to go camping in a forest not too far away from here. We planned this trip for about a month. It was me, George, Alex, Scarlet, and Raven. We got camping gear together, canned food, hunting rifles, and fishing rods. We were going to stay out there for as long as we wanted. It was going to be our ‘getting the band back together’ trip.”

“At around one in the afternoon, Alex pulls up in his pickup truck with Raven riding shotgun. I threw my stuff in the back, and sat down in the back seat. All the people I mentioned were friends from high school. Haven’t seen them since 12th grade. We were all in our second year of college. We talked about everything that happened to us since we graduated from high school. We talked about relationships, new friends, ambitions. I personally didn’t do anything all that important, but I contributed to the conversation regardless. After about a forty-five minute drive, we got to George’s house. We picked him up and it took a solid hour to make it to Scarlet’s place. After she was in, we set out for the forest.”

“Jack, where are your friends now? Did anyone else make it out with you?” Dr. Grady asked. Jack looked down…and then smiled. His grin was sickening to Dr. Grady. “No one else survived. They all made excellent meals for me, and the Wendigo.”

“Ok…continue, please”

“No problem. This is just stalling the inevitable. I hope you know that.” Dr. Grady knew this completely well. “After parking the truck outside the forest, we got our gear from the back, and started hiking out. About thirty minutes of endless hiking took place. We were laughing and telling great stories of our college lives.”

Jack smiled again. The same sickening smile. Then he continued. “We stopped in a large clearing. There was decent tree branch cover, and enough sticks around to start a fire. There was even a river nearby, so fishing was going to be easier than expected. Yes sir, it was going to be a good trip.”

“When did the Wendigo make itself known to you and your friends?”

“Well, it was there since we took our first step into the woods, but we knew something was wrong when Scarlet went missing for three hours, and then came back as if nothing had happened. It was already growing dark, so we were getting fire wood together. Then, she went nuts. Scarlet picked up a huge stick of firewood and was beating Alex with it. After she drew blood, she dropped down onto the floor, and started licking up the drops of blood.” Dr. Grady looked up from his note taking to see Jack, smiling once more. He had been smiling the entire time as he told this new tale.

Dr. Grady then asked “But you didn’t know it was the Wendigo?”

“No doc, how was I supposed to know it was an eight foot, Native American, cannibalistic demon that made her act that way. We knocked her over the head with some fire wood. ‘That crazy bitch damn near killed Alex’ is what we thought.”

“Little did we know that the beast was watching us, reveling in our confusion and pain. Oh it fills me with triumph to know that I alone serve him, the Wendigo.”

Then started to laugh uncontrollably. His laugh was so great that he began to cough and wheeze. Dr. Grady could hear a quiet knocking sound while Jack was laughing. A sort of tap, tap, tap…pause…tap, tap, tap that filled Dr. Grady with fear.

“Jack, get yourself together!” Dr. Grady screamed. Jack was still laughing, as if by some uncontrollable urge was forcing him to. “Ohh Doctor!” Jack cooed every so often through the laughter. When he was finally finished Jack said “Doctor, doctor, doctor. You ask the worst questions, you know?”

Dr. Grady, growing concerned yelled out “Finish your damn story! I don’t want to be your sacrifice!”

“But doc, this is only beginning to grow interesting.” Dr. Grady still heard the tapping. “I hear it, Jack. I hear the tapping!”

“Do you now? Heard the same noise the first time the Wendigo appeared. The tapping drew on through the entire night. Didn’t get any sleep.”

“What does it mean?”

“It means that the Wendigo is after you, doc. You have been marked. He wants to consume you, and here I was thinking he wouldn’t show himself for a good hour or two.”

“Finish your story, now!” screamed Dr. Grady, now in a panic.

“No need to holler, doc. I’ll finish, don’t worry. So after Scarlet’s episode, we tied her up to a tree, so she do anymore harm. Alex was already up and dressing his wounds. He was all patched up within a few minutes, couldn’t really find anything else to do.”

“The whole time, Scarlet’s screaming shit like ‘It’ll kill you, and skin you, and eat you alive! We are all going to die!’ We were talking about what a crazy bitch she was, until we saw a huge shadow on a neighboring tree. Goddamn was it huge! Nearly was eight feet tall.”

“After we see the shadow, we are all like ‘Fucking Nope!’ and we run as fast as we can back to the campsite. We heard Scarlet screaming in agony while we ran. We bolted down to the open field, and packed all our necessary stuff up. After everything was packed up, we booked it down the path to the truck.”

“We made it about half way until the Wendigo caught us. It was so imposing. All we could see was a shadow, standing over us. The shadow had long antlers protruding from it The antlers were dripping blood. Then it attacked”

“With a single slash, it cut Alex in half. Doc, his guts flew everywhere; all over the trees and bushes and ferns. His blood sprayed on us. Raven was crying and screaming, and I heard it giggle or chuckle. It was laughing at us. The Wendigo then let out a blood curdling screech. It pushed us all to the ground in one swipe. It must have taken my soul when it hit me because I uncontrollably got up, walked over to George, still on the ground, and ripped into him.”

“At this point, I was ripped George apart with my bare hands. I was gutting him, pulling out veins and organs and eating them. He was screaming and conscious the entire time.” Jack began to snicker. To laugh. Then to scream in satisfaction. Dr. Grady, already growing paranoid over the tapping, was hearing a new sound. A scratching sound, almost like an animal.

All of his fear and terror and paranoia culminated in Dr. Grady screaming out “IF YOU WANT ME, COME GET ME!” The smashing of a nearby door reminded him of what a horrible thing he just did.

It saw a huge, eight foot shadow standing over Jack. Jack was still howling with satisfaction. “Good job, doc! Hope it works out for you!” The Wendigo then cut Jack loose of his restraints, and then sliced him in half. The Wendigo then turned to Dr. Grady and whispered with half a breath “You…are…next.”

Dr. Grady backed up against the nearest wall. He should have escaped the minute Jack mentioned the Wendigo. He was now about to die, and it was all his own fault. Dr. Grady began to weep. He cried in a frantic manner, for his brother, mother, and wife. He cried because he will be gone, and he will never see them again. He was done. He was finished.

The Wendigo stood outside his door, drinking in the satisfaction of the emotional pain it was causing. It laughed to itself, a cruel, horrid laugh, born from half a breath.

Two minutes passed, until the Wendigo busted down the door. Dr. Grady, in a panicked state, picked up a brick, and hurled it at the beast. It hit the Wendigo. It screamed in frustration, and continued to walk closer to him.

Now, the beast was upon him, and it began to slowly rip open his side with one long, jagged, disgusting claw. Dr. Grady’s intestines spilled out, followed by blood, and other organs. The Wendigo grabbed his arm, and began to tear it off. It sliced around Dr. Grady’s left shoulder blade and twisted it. The creature tore Dr. Grady’s arm off like a person would do to a turkey on Thanksgiving.

Dr. Grady was still fully conscious, and in tremendous pain. The beast bent down to his face, and Dr. Grady, with his final breath spit in the Wendigo’s disgusting, skull like face. It recoiled, surprised. Then Dr. Grady passed on.

The Wendigo spent the next hour carefully and precisely skinning and butchering poor Dr. Grady’s corpse. All the edible flesh was stripped away from his body. Now that the Wendigo had eaten it’s full, it began to move back towards its woods. Fortunately for all the people on the street that day…you can’t see it in the morning sunshine.