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Description
Awaken.

I rouse, gasping and sputtering as I inhale.  A cloud of dank, earthen litter fills my nose and lungs, cloying and musty.  A fit of coughing racks my body as I roll to my back.  Staring up into night's dark canopy, a shroud of leaves obliterates the stars of heaven.  Where am I?  I raise my leaden, pounding head from a pillow of decomposing leaves and peer into the surroundings, more darkness.  How did I get here?

Stumbling to my feet, hands extended, I search my way through tangled briar and towering trunks.  Roots snatch at my feet as branches claw my face.

This darkened forest harbors a sinister evil.  I can feel it, sense it.  The wind's soft rustle carries a muted, ominous voice, compelling… demanding!

Come?

Fear twists my gut and bile rises at the back of my throat.  The thumping of my heart fills my ears in a deafening crescendo. I must escape.

I run!  Leaves crunch beneath my stride.  Reckless, stumbling, I crash into pillared trunks.  Scrambling back to my feet I continue this mad, blind dash.

I try to get away.

A hint of starlight steals past the forest's sheltering ceiling.  The trees become less crowded, opening on a small clearing.

Closer, come closer.

Somehow my flight has only tricked my footsteps into blundering onto this foul unwanted visitation.  Foolish of me to think I could escape.

A lone tombstone juts from the ground, ancient leaning as if ready to topple.  No vines, no overgrowth flourishes anywhere near it.  They fear it, I think.

My legs betray me, and I curse the tread of my footfall as I circle around it.  I can sense its hunger.

There is no name, no epitaph carved into the marble.  Though it is blank, I stare with shock and revulsion.  I sense its restlessness.  I know enough to be scared.

Touch!

I attempt to stagger backward but find my motion carrying forward.  Against my own volition, my hand reaches out.  A cold iciness chills my bones as the pattern of marble swirls.  The writhing surface recesses with a name and date, Tom Baker, 1807.  The words barely burn in my thoughts when the maelstrom returns and it carves a new name and date into its face.  The inscriptions churn onward with quickening pace, marching forward in time, closer, ever closer.

A name, a date… it's today's date, if my recollection serves me correct.  Now, I know what it wants, what it demands.  I watch as my hands turn an ashen gray, my skin cold to touch.  Wings sprout at my back, and trembling fingers reach up to feel a grotesque mask, fanged and horned.  With a flap of wings, the gargoyle that is I, perches atop the stone.

Bring him.

Jim Sanders… that is his name.  He camps at the edge of this very forest.  I don't know how I know this, but I do.

Bring him.

My terror is greater now, remorseful, reluctant.  My voice is hard and unrecognizable.  "As master commands."  With a powerful stoke of my wings I launch into the heavens.

Description
Awaken.

I rouse, gasping and sputtering as I inhale.  A cloud of dank, earthen litter fills my nose and lungs, cloying and musty.  A fit of coughing racks my body as I roll to my back.  Staring up into night's dark canopy, a shroud of leaves obliterates the stars of heaven.  Where am I?  I raise my leaden, pounding head from a pillow of decomposing leaves and peer into the surroundings, more darkness.  How did I get here?

Stumbling to my feet, hands extended, I search my way through tangled briar and towering trunks.  Roots snatch at my feet as branches claw my face.

This darkened forest harbors a sinister evil.  I can feel it, sense it.  The wind's soft rustle carries a muted, ominous voice, compelling… demanding!

Come?

Fear twists my gut and bile rises at the back of my throat.  The thumping of my heart fills my ears in a deafening crescendo. I must escape.

I run!  Leaves crunch beneath my stride.  Reckless, stumbling, I crash into pillared trunks.  Scrambling back to my feet I continue this mad, blind dash.

I try to get away.

A hint of starlight steals past the forest's sheltering ceiling.  The trees become less crowded, opening on a small clearing.

Closer, come closer.

Somehow my flight has only tricked my footsteps into blundering onto this foul unwanted visitation.  Foolish of me to think I could escape.

A lone tombstone juts from the ground, ancient leaning as if ready to topple.  No vines, no overgrowth flourishes anywhere near it.  They fear it, I think.

My legs betray me, and I curse the tread of my footfall as I circle around it.  I can sense its hunger.

There is no name, no epitaph carved into the marble.  Though it is blank, I stare with shock and revulsion.  I sense its restlessness.  I know enough to be scared.

Touch!

I attempt to stagger backward but find my motion carrying forward.  Against my own volition, my hand reaches out.  A cold iciness chills my bones as the pattern of marble swirls.  The writhing surface recesses with a name and date, Tom Baker, 1807.  The words barely burn in my thoughts when the maelstrom returns and it carves a new name and date into its face.  The inscriptions churn onward with quickening pace, marching forward in time, closer, ever closer.

A name, a date… it's today's date, if my recollection serves me correct.  Now, I know what it wants, what it demands.  I watch as my hands turn an ashen gray, my skin cold to touch.  Wings sprout at my back, and trembling fingers reach up to feel a grotesque mask, fanged and horned.  With a flap of wings, the gargoyle that is I, perches atop the stone.

Bring him.

Jim Sanders… that is his name.  He camps at the edge of this very forest.  I don't know how I know this, but I do.

Bring him.

My terror is greater now, remorseful, reluctant.  My voice is hard and unrecognizable.  "As master commands."  With a powerful stoke of my wings I launch into the heavens.