Antipode, Part 1

“Son of a…” Taylor Rundel  began as he looked at his dead camera and seen that the battery had drained. It had been a brand new one, purchased the day before and had registered fully charged that morning when he slipped in in the camera.

It had taken him a good couple of hours to hike to the spot on Hungry Valley Indian Reservation, where he’d seen the strange shadow on Google maps. Taylor didn’t expect to see very much once he’d found the place, but he did want to take a few photographs.

Frustration washed over him like the dark clouds that seemed to appear from no place. As he sat and rested, he looked at the natural formation of rocks, which reminded him of a sort of stone-hedge.

As he watched, he realized that the cloudiness was more localized than he ever seen. A vague shadow grew and remained in the center of the stones.

Then Taylor thought he saw something more within that shadow, a form that he did not recognized. When it shifted again, he saw it clearer; a large shape that seemed to be trying to escape an opaque balloon.

What saw in that shape was terrifying and he scramble backwards from where he sat. It twist this way and that, pressing what he believed to be a head covered in tentacles, eyes and teeth.

Taylor wasted no time collecting his camera and racing away back to where he’d left his new ’92 Ford truck.