Anomaly

The ground shook with every passing second. Heavy sounds of wet earth and dry soil being dragged echoed all around us, reaching our ears like a constant warning. Amid those noises, one strange sound stood out: something like the chime of a bell, similar to the ones rams and sheep wear around their necks, vibrating every few seconds.
On top of that, we had no idea when it had all begun. The place was simply swallowed by a gray, silent fog, not dense enough to blind us completely, but thick enough to devour the surroundings just a few meters away, warping shapes, dulling colors, and making the world feel distant.
At that moment, all of us were hiding behind the dead trees scattered across the area, each person taking cover behind a different trunk. Almost everyone wore expressions of sheer horror, clearly carved into their faces, while keeping their hands over their mouths, doing everything possible not to make a sound.
The silence was absolute, heavy, suffocating. Everyone understood that, in that instant, even breathing could be fatal, because any noise could give us away. The thing moving nearby made a constant dragging sound, rough and uneven, echoing dangerously close to where we were hidden.
We had no idea what it was, why it was there, and, above all, we couldn’t explain how we hadn’t seen it coming. Something that massive, so enormous it defied all logic, should have been impossible to miss.
And yet, we only realized it was there when the ground began to tremble beneath our feet. The footsteps were heavy, absurdly heavy, as if every movement crushed the very earth. The dragging sound echoed through the area, growing louder, closer, more oppressive with each passing second.
And the worst part: this wasn’t the first time we had run into it. We encountered the creature for the first time about an hour ago. Now, this was already our third encounter, and the intervals between its appearances were becoming frighteningly shorter.
It appeared, vanished... and then returned, always closer, always sooner. A pattern began to take shape in my mind, cold and inevitable: the closer we got to my sister, the more that thing seemed to be hunting us.
I shifted my gaze toward one of the members of the response team, hiding behind a tree near mine. His legs were trembling irregularly, almost imperceptibly, while one hand was pressed tightly over his mouth, as if he feared that even the slightest sound might give him away.
His face, pale under the diffused light, showed pure terror. Our eyes met for a brief moment; he blinked, too fast, just before another spasm shook his body. Then he turned his attention back to the thing moving near us, concealed by the gray, blinding fog ahead.
The area was completely silent. I tried to make out, from the distant noises, what the hell that thing could be, but I couldn’t. It’s not like I had thermal vision or any trick like that, my sight simply didn’t pierce the fog.
And worse still, even using my special vision, I couldn’t see beyond it. The fog itself was an anomaly, or at the very least, a grotesque side effect of the true anomaly hiding behind it, like a living veil meant to block any attempt at observation.
We remained silent for a while longer. Seconds? Maybe minutes. I had no idea. The place was absurdly quiet, except for the constant sounds of something large stepping across the ground, heavy, regular footsteps that made the soil vibrate beneath our feet.
Trying to count that time felt pointless. Then the fog began to thin, slowly and gradually, just like the last times. The air started to clear little by little, signaling that the thing was finally moving away.
We stayed silent for a few more minutes, even after the fog had completely dissipated. The air still felt heavy, as if no one dared to break that fragile quiet.
Then came the first relieved breath, long, restrained. Then another, and another. Little by little, sighs began to echo from all around us, heavy with relief... but also with a lingering sense of dread.
The first to speak was Rupert, who was two trees away from where I stood: “I’m never going to get used to this...” he murmured, his voice faltering for a moment as he swallowed hard. After a brief pause, he added in a low tone: “It’s still terrifying”
Right after Rupert’s voice, another one echoed beside me, thick with sarcasm and exhaustion. It came from one of the anomaly response team members standing near me, Victor, and Rupert.
“Thanks for reminding me what a total shitshow this is, Rupert” he said, letting out a half-sigh before going on: “I’d actually managed to forget... for, I don’t know, about five seconds”
Rupert heard him and just shrugged, as if the complaint didn’t mean a thing. The other man sighed back, maybe annoyed by how indifferent Rupert seemed about the whole situation.
“Look at the bright side” Rupert said, drawing his attention again. His eyes glinted faintly under the dim light: “We’re getting one hell of a bonus if we make it out of this place alive” He gave a crooked, almost teasing smile: “From hell straight to paradise, my friends”
Rupert’s words made most of them lift their tired, anxious eyes from the ground. For a moment, the silence broke: they exchanged glances, and soon quiet conversations started here and there, in low, almost whispered tones.
One team member remarked with a restrained smile that he would finally be able to put a down payment on his wife’s dream house. Another said, his voice heavy with anticipation, that he could finally pay for the trip his daughter had been wanting for so long. Even if that spark of enthusiasm was purely about money, if it helped lift everyone’s spirits... who was I to complain?
The atmosphere grew a little lighter, though the tension still hung in the air. Even with the more relaxed chatter, everyone stayed alert, their eyes sweeping the surroundings cautiously, as if something might emerge from the forest at any moment. Rupert, noticing the scene, gave a small sideways smile and shook his head.
“I guess human beings really can’t live without money. We’re just as easy to manipulate as any animal less intelligent than us. The difference is, we’re not driven by food, water, or any other vital resource, but by money” Then he turned to me, his gaze carrying an almost ironic curiosity: “Interesting, right?”
I watched him for a few seconds in silence and simply shrugged. Then I looked away, turning my attention back to the forest around us.
I stayed alert, scanning the surroundings without looking away, but there didn’t seem to be a single soul nearby. Even watching from a considerable distance, I couldn’t make out anything beyond the motionless landscape.
That was exactly how it had been shortly before the thing emerged from the gray fog: I simply hadn’t noticed it approaching. It was almost as if, for an instant, it didn’t exist... and then, in the next, it was there.
“How much farther do we have to go?” Arthur asked, moving closer to where I was. His voice was low, nearly swallowed by the forest’s silence: “I get the feeling that... that thing is getting closer to the trees we hide behind every time it shows up” His body shuddered slightly, as if a sudden chill had run through his skin despite the stifling air. He swallowed hard before continuing: “I swear, this time it felt like it was passing right beside me”
That was a painfully accurate description of our situation. The first time, it had been as if the thing in the fog were distant, almost just a suggestion of shape in the shadows. But with each appearance, it seemed to draw closer and closer.
This time, it was different: the presence was so near that everyone held their breath, as if any movement could give us away, so close did that thing seem to be to us. While I was lost in those thoughts, trying to understand what was happening, Victor spoke, and his words cut through my drifting mind.
“Normally I’m good at spotting anomalies” he said, letting out a sigh as he ran a hand through the front of his hair, pushing it back: “Or rather... I used to be, at least before they started finding me first”
He paused briefly, his eyes narrowing as he gave a small shake of his head: “But this thing...” Another silence, thick with discomfort: “It just... appears. And then... disappears. As if it springs out of nothing and returns to nothing just as quickly. By the time my instincts finally pick it up, it’s already too close. Too close to pull back... too close for us to change course”
The place remained silent. Exhaustion showed on every face, in slumped shoulders, in dull, hollow stares. Then Victor went on: “I feel like the next time that fog shows up...” He cut himself off. His fingers drummed slowly against the grip of his weapon as he gathered his thoughts: “I have a feeling we’re probably going to have to fight our way through it”
I noticed everyone stiffen at Victor’s words. Rupert let out a low, weary breath, while Arthur stayed quiet, his gaze distant, clearly lost in thought. He wasn’t really wrong. In fact, I could sense my sister more clearly now, like an invisible thread pulling my attention in her direction.
She was thirty, maybe twenty, minutes away from where we stood. Even so, I was certain the fog, along with whatever lived inside it, would return before we could reach her. Yes... just as Victor had said, if we wanted to pass through that fog, we would probably have to fight whatever was waiting for us inside.
I’m not sure what kind of danger that thing truly represents. Even if I manage to drive it away for a while, I doubt it would really help us. At best, it would only buy us a few extra minutes before someone ended up being caught and dragged into the gray mist.
And when that happens, I probably won’t even be able to help, my eyes can see absolutely nothing beyond that opaque curtain, as if the world itself simply ceases to exist there.
“Either way...” Victor said, breaking the heavy silence and drawing everyone’s attention back to him. He took a deep breath before continuing: “I think we’d better move on, get out of here as soon as we can. Maybe...” He paused, as if weighing his words. When he spoke again, his voice was low, almost lacking conviction: “Maybe we can reach our objective before that thing comes back”
There was no response, only silence. Even so, everyone stood up. One by one, they began checking their weapons and adjusting their gear, as if preparing for something inevitable. Then Victor turned in the direction where I could feel my sister’s presence. His gaze lingered there for a moment, alert, almost tense. Then he looked back at me. I simply nodded in silence.
He sighed before speaking, a firm order leaving his lips: “Let’s go”
We started walking again, step by step. Our movements echoed in the quiet, my bare feet sinking slightly into the dry, cracked earth, while around me the heavy chorus of metal boots marked the group’s advance.
The dead forest swallowed us little by little: trunks twisted like bones, broken branches creaking under the weak wind. Ahead, the gray fog seemed to thicken with every meter we covered, denser, more suffocating.
We kept moving among the dead trees until we reached the entrance to a mountainous area. In front of us there was only a single passage, narrow and stifling, flanked by towering cliffs with jagged edges. The fog blanketing the sky made it impossible to make out anything at the heights above.
I tried to find another way in, but as far as my eyes could see through the dense mist, there was no other path. We were surrounded by a wall of dark, cracked stone with an ancient, almost rotting look, perhaps dead from the inside, if something made of rock could even die.
“She seems to be on the other side” Victor murmured beside me. His serious tone was steady, tightly controlled: “If that fog shows up again... with that thing along with it, we won’t have anywhere to hide” He paused, eyes narrowed as he studied our only way forward, narrow and suffocating. The damp air seemed to cling to the skin: “We’ll be sitting ducks, just waiting to be taken” Then he turned to me. His gaze assessed me for a few seconds, as if running through every possible outcome and finding very few: “You can’t shoot what you can’t see. And if we tried firing in any direction, we’d probably end up hitting each other in a place this tight”
I nodded in silence and looked back toward the passage, the only route we had left. Even from a distance, I could still feel my sister’s presence on the other side, calling out to me, lost somewhere deeper within that narrow corridor, surrounded by jagged ravines that seemed to tear at the sky.