As always, my dream starts atop a hill on a cloudless night. I lie on the tender grass as the cool wind tickles my nose. The sky is deep, midnight blue and the full moon seems oddly dim. I gaze at a few scattered stars.  One, two, three, four... My mind wanders over the celestial bodies, connecting them and forming a strange symbol.  In all there are nine points to the web-like design, and each reaches out to the others.  It’s a pretty constellation. I’ve never seen it before. It stands out in the heavens tonight.

A sound drifts over me as a hollow echo.  It distracts me. I push up onto my arms, curious. Like a rabbit, my ears strain to detect details of the muffled hum in the dark night. I stir, listening for impending danger.   

It becomes more discernable: children laughing. I relax with the knowledge that there’s no threat.  It’s just infectious laughter and I giggle in response to their playfulness.

I stand up and stare out into darkness, towards their playground games. I can’t see anything but a grayish-black mist tumbling over the meadow. My eyes squint determined to see what’s hidden behind the thickening curtain of fog.

Something doesn’t feel right to me. There’s something about the air. It’s just not right, suffocating like when there’s too much pollen in the wind. I feel pressure in my chest and struggle with my allergies. The pace of my breathing quickens to compensate.  Uneasy, I labor to think straight and assess the situation.

Should I go down there and check on things?  Uneasy and anxious I start to walk towards the noise.  But the children fall silent. Unsure, I wait. The awkward silence seems weird and unnatural. Then, only then I hear their haunting screams.

“What?” is all I can manage to muster, and I start to lose my footing on the narrow path. Someone’s hurting those children! My heart starts to race. I don’t understand! In my confusion I stamper on towards the meadow and can no longer feel the pathway below my feet.  Rather, the ground is uneven and choppy. What’s happening down there? It’s becoming ever more difficult to gasp air as my mind speeds through possibilities.

 My intuition tells me to take care of myself first. Hide! Something evil is out there. Pain . . . The children are in pain. My conscience forces me forward, and I tear down the hill in a full out run.

Far from graceful and in darkness and foreign terrain, I fumble down the knotty hill toward the piercing screeches. I can barely think. I just know I need to get to them. There’s something odd about all this yelling.  The shrill sounds are absorbed by my body with a heightened sensitivity. I can feel them, a powerful affirmation we’re linked. The intense fear psychically connects our emotions. Their little minds worry, not sure how to make it to safety, yearning to be protected.

Individual terror stricken cries permeate my brain, like a fermenting egg suspended in acidic vinegar. The shell of each child dissolves, and I stare straight into the centre of their being.  I shiver in response to the sheer explosiveness; the collective panic.  I’m paralyzed for a moment. Petrified! My head pounds with resonating anguish of the wounded. The depth of despair that sets in among those who have forsaken hope overwhelms me. 

I focus on the immediate danger, dazed and confused. The smell of ashes fills the air and coats my lungs. I see the children. A school! That’s where we are. There are about a dozen children darting in all directions, overcome by mass terror.

What’s frightened all these children? My head swings from left to right searching for an answer. The fear swells within the children as they become aware they’re being targeted.  The instant curiosity of children is quickly replaced with intense loneliness. Their little racing hearts throb. Unlike adults, they don’t experience that sense of regret like we do.  Rather, they’re searching, in their innocence for someone to protect them, for some happy ending fairytale.  But, as they wish for their homes and families, I know there’s no one coming, but me. Today there’s no fortunate turn of events that allows the innocent to damn the evil. My connection to their minds dissipates and I concentrate on finding the cause of all of this chaos. I search the shadows.

There it is! A large, dark figure, hairy and muscular, half-dressed in torn clothes standing there hunched over. It’s the very picture of a werewolf from the movies. It’s as if it had transformed from a human and is still wearing remnants of the clothes it wore. Dark and mystifying, I can’t move. Suspended in time, I gape blankly at the creature.

His mask of hair covers his face, with the exception of his yellow eyes. They have long, sinuous black slits running lengthwise down the centre.  No wonder the moon is eerily pale; it has had the source of its grandness torn from it, only to grant the beast the keen sight he needs to hunt his prey tonight.

Those eyes fixate on me for a moment and then scan the night for a closer prey.  I follow his line of sight and wonder what the beast is going to hone in on.  I try to connect to his mind but it’s difficult to discern the constant fluctuation of images that flutter across the surface of its consciousness.  If you can call it that! It’s more like instinct really.  It’s looking for something to distract itself. It’s hungry yet is searching for something specific.

I feel the energy pulsating through its every pore as if I’m at one with it.  Every cell charged and ready to react to any number of situations that dart through its mind at every whim.  Its attention is on nothing specific, confident it knows that what it wants is coming. I try to concentrate on the beast, to force it to reveal its true intentions. 

Beyond instinct, below the immediate need to feed, is desire. There in lies the truth. I delve deeper only to reveal that the beast is here to bring death to someone specific. It wants to find something that will specifically cripple his target, a trap for the object of his desire.

Yes, now I can see it clearly. Oh god, he has come to for me. Yet, he’s savoring the process, the hunt.  I take a single step backwards, overwhelmed by the beast’s secret objective.

I blink and he’s on top of a little girl no older than five, her blond curls sprawled along the grass like golden waves crashing with the tide. Odd, that such beauty exists amidst revulsion. It’s as if I’m looking at a child-like version of myself. He has her in his iron grasp and she looks helplessly at me. What do I do? How can I help her? I look around, trying to find something that can end this. Something sharp, or blunt, heavy but there’s nothing available in this playground of horror. I glance back at the girl and take a deep breath of self loathing resentment. I’m too late.

All I can smell is the crimson blood that has come to surface in the large wound on her neck. The fluid gushes from the well of flesh, and her eyes go blank.  Heartache, sorrow, grief my instincts for self preservation prevail. There’s nothing more I can do, but save myself.

I turn and a gasp escapes my dry lips. Did it notice? Just run! My heart pounds and releases a hot rush of adrenaline into my limbs. I try to scurry away to safety but I can’t move. Oh shit! It has me! My breathing accelerates. My mind is a flurry of options: scream, fight, scratch, kick; just do anything. The scream never escapes me. It’s caught in the confines of my tightened larynx, and all I can do now is scratch at the arms that have caught me by my waist.

It whips my body to the ground. I land hard, my hands flailing to claw at the slippery grass. I try to inch backward. Like a crab being yanked from a tank for dinner, my attempts to escape are in vain. He’s moving too fast. I don’t even see him and then he materializes on top of me.

Realization beckons to me as the pressure of his knees firmly pin my arms in place. Buck! Get him off! Get out of here! But before the thoughts are communicated through my neurons to reach my limbs, he has secured my legs too. The stench of him is wretched, a mix of compost and rot seasoned with the metallic scent of blood.

All I can do is listen to the last few children scream as they shoot past us like a flock of birds intent on the freedom of the sky. As I prepare for my death, I heave one last meager breath. The beast weighs heavily on my chest. And I stare up at the beautiful constellation. Like magic, a crude hammer and long, iron nail appear in the creature’s hairy palms. Deeply, I dare to peer into those majestic yellow eyes. Can I plead for my life? There’s no stopping what comes next. The nightmare always ends the same; with his right arm held high he wields the hammer…