I am just going to start calling this my writing time, as I seem to continue to end up writing later than I intend to (yay ADHD). I might just call it my writing time and not worry about 10-15 minutes, but we’ll see (yeah, that failed, an hour this time).
Please leave your feedback and your own responses to the prompt. If you like what you are reading here, I would encourage you to check out not only my other Writing Prompts, but also my books as well!
Prompt: Your characters find a dead body.
Genre: Horror
Source: 105 Creative Writing Prompts to Try Out · PrepScholar
Time Spent: 60 minutes
Word Count: 2120
Prompt: Your characters find a dead body.
The three of us had spent a long evening by the fire, telling stories, making jokes, and yes, having a few beers, before we turned in for the night. Ever since we had met in High School, we had gone camping regularly over the summer, and now that we were in our 20’s it was no difference. It wasn’t nearly as often as we all hoped, nothing like being an adult to get in the way of spending time with friends, but at least once or twice a summer we had a long weekend camping.
It had been a pleasant night, with just the right type of chill that the fire nicely dispelled, and lots of stars and only a few clouds overhead. We were deeper in the wilderness than we usually were, but Sarah had said she found a perfect camping spot in the Sylvanmoon Woods for us, and she wasn’t wrong, she never was about such matters as she went hiking nearly every weekend.
Harry had been a little nervous about camping in Sylvanmoon, an ancient and secluded forest, little visited save by the most avid outdoors explorer, and there were odd stories about what was found in the woods, but Sarah and I talked him around in the end and he had the most fun of all of us around the campfire that night. He always did. He could be a little bit serious, a bit of a stick in the mud at times, but get a beer or two in him and he was the life of the party.
I had heard the stories about Sylvanmoon Woods, of course, everyone had. Stories of strange creatures, unexplained noises, and even the odd disappearance, but the woods were hilly, with many twisting paths, huge trees, and dense underbrush, I had always assumed that those people had merely gotten lost, or fallen into one of the ravines that cut through the area. I was not in as good a shape as I once had been, who is at 27, but I was still surprised as to how much of a slog it was got get into the Woods and to our campsite, a beautiful bare hill that looked over the twisting limbs of the many trees, and with a good view around for miles. The long hike and twisting paths had been worth it, the view, the stars, everything was perfect.
We doused the fire and stowed our food and anything else we did not want wild animals to get out, and we all went into our tent. We were good enough friends, never with more than a fleeting interest, physical or romantic, in one another, despite what certain former partners had suspected, so we all shared one large tent and curled into our sleeping bags and were quickly asleep.
A horrific scream woke us up from a deep sleep and at first all of us were checking for our phones, in case it was some weird alarm of video that started playing, but after a few moments fumbling, we all scrambled, tripping over each other, out of the tent. Harry had a can of bear mace in his shaking hand. Sarah held her utility knife with both hands in front of her, and I had picked up the walking stick I found and was holding like a baseball bath. If we were still teenagers, we would have thought we all looked like badasses, but the realities of adulthood told us all that we were all scared witless and likely made a comical site were we to see it from the outside.
We stood before our tent, quaking with both fear and the chill of the night air, for none of us knew how long, but slowly we relaxed as nothing new was heard. We let out a few breaths and Sarah had the idea to collect our flashlights, and have a look around. It took a moment to find our flashlights and, still clutching our makeshift weapons, we wandered around in a tight huddle.
Just outside the bare top of the hill, under the nearest tree, lay a body. As we approached, the light revealed odd markings, as if the body’s skin had been carved with intricate designs, and several tattoos as well, and the clothing was in tatters, and familiar. It looked very much like what Harry typical wore on camping, which was unsettling, but they were rare or unique clothes, so we initially did not think anything of it.
We grew close enough to see that the grass and dirt around was heavily stained with blood, enough that made me strongly suspect the body was dead, but after a moment, my training as a nurse kicked in, and a moved forward with, perhaps, more confidence than I truly felt, knelt by the body and checked for vital signs. On closer inspection, I could see that not only were the skin carvings deep, but there were several deep, gouging wounds, and there was a paleness to the body that I had only seen in those who had lost most of their blood volume. A quick check of the pulse and respiration told me that this man was, very clearly, quite thoroughly dead. There was nothing to indicate who he was or any identifying details about him, so I took a deep breath, braced myself, and turned the body over and screamed.
The body that I knelt beside was Harry. Still wearing the tan cargo shorts and loose polo shirt, that he so often sported when outdoors, which he currently wore, with the same haircut, facial hair, and everything else. Other than the strange symbols carved deep in his flesh and the multiple stab wounds, for that was what I was now convinced they were, around his chest and back. As a knelt in stunned silence, I heard a hurried series of whispers behind me and then a commotion and strange gurgle and whipped around the so pulling a knife from Harry, who’s breath came in wet rasps and he seemed unable to speak.
As Harry collapsed to the ground, I turned to look at Sarah, who at some point had donned black robes, embroidered with many of the same symbols that Harry’s corpse were covered in, who held a long and fearsome knife in her hand and sported a grin, wider than I thought possible and with greater malice than I had ever seen. . .except for the prank she pulled on Cody, her high school tormentor, in the final week of our senior year.
It occurred to me, as I stared at my friend of well more than a decade, in disbelief, that the reason that I had found the scream of terror that awoke us so odd was because it was my voice, my scream. It is something no one ever thinks of, but one of the great terrors you can experience, is hearing your own scream or your own voice in general, coming from somewhere outside of yourself. I could see out of the corner of my eyes the insane pose that we had struck as we were standing outside our tent.
Sarah was advancing slowly and I did not have time to figure out what was happening, I merely scrambled backward some ten feet before my back slammed into a tree. Sarah advanced slowly until she reached me feet, and then crouched in front of me.
“I am sorry, Lisa,” she began, and sounded like she meant it, “but time moves. . .differently in the Sylvanmoon Woods. I am not sure I can explain more than that, but when I came here hiking a few months ago. . .I feel like I spent years wandering the paths of the forest and we forced to make a home here, which I did.”
“How?” I stammered.
Lisa shrugged, “I couldn’t tell you the ins and outs, but there is an ancient tree at the heart of the forest that seems to control everything, plant and animal alike. It was the tree that granted me an ageless life, impressed by my survival skills and pleased to have an acolyte, and allowed me to step forth to bring it new acolytes. I felt that we would all love to spend our time together, but Harry refused and I was bound by my promise to the Great Tree to kill him.”
“He was our friend!” I cried.
“Along with you my deepest and dearest, but I have tasted life without age, without death, without responsibilities, and I cannot possibly go back. If blood must be shed for that dream, then I shall pay it!”
I felt that I had tears pouring down my cheek and my mouth just hung open. Sarah continued, “What will it be Lisa, do you join me? Or meet our friends fate?”
I had two inches on Sarah, and I had the stronger arms from my time in the gym, but in close proximity and being entirely unarmed, I did not dare try to escape. The eerie scene continued as, around a nearby tree, came another black robed figure that, on seeing me, lowered the hood and revealed. . .me. A me that seemed more rugged and with the same wild look in the eyes that Sarah flashed at times.
Perhaps it was an odd feeling of inevitability, perhaps it was a desire to escape the grind of my life and the many difficulties of the world, but I returned to Sarah and nodded slowly. With a genuine grin, she stood up, reached down to me, and pulled me up.
After staring for a moment into Sarah’s eyes, I looked around to see that, somehow, I was now wearing the robe and standing next to Sarah instead of in front of her. We were looking down at where I had been beside the tree, but I was there no longer, and didn’t seem to be for some time. I looked up towards the hill and saw that there was only one Harry on the ground, and the group of us were now running down the hill, toward the direction of the first scream.
With a tilt of her head, I understood that Sarah wanted me to follow, so I did. As we walked into the woods we exchanged only small talk about the strange passage of time within Sylvanmoon, and some other effects I might come to suspect. I could get no firm answer, but she seemed delighted in having true companionship. Feeling oddly pulled, I stopped, turned around, and began walking up the hill, to see if I could get a glimpse of what was happening. I came around a corner and saw Sarah talking to me, and me giving a vague responses and questions. After a moment, I felt drawn once more, and I stepped around the tree, came and knelt beside my younger self, and smiled. I could see myself reaching out my hand, Sarah taking it, and then I was back a little ways down the hill standing next to Sarah again. Hearing the rustle of leaves led me to guessing Sara and I were on the way down the hill.
With a shrug, I set off down the hill with my friend. We talked, in kind tones of our friend’s unfortunate demise, and armed ourselves as best we could, at least before we arrived at the destination. Reaching a well-maintained shack at the bottom of a secluded ravine, which I barely got down safely, and soon we were lying next to each other, for warmth and comfort, on the huge and cozy bed that dominated the main room. As I drifted off the sleep, part of me hoped that it was all just a dream I would soon wake from.
It was not to be, I awoke with the feeling of sunlight on my face, and found myself in a large bed in a modest cabin, with Sarah calmly sitting a few feet away. She gave me a kind smile and asked that I get up. It was time to meet the Greet Tree and see if he accepted me as a new acolyte, and then training would begin. I sighed, stretched a little before getting out of bed, and put on the robe that had suddenly appeared on me the previous night. With one last, sad thought of poor Harry, I followed Sarah out of her cabin. . .our cabin now? and followed her towards a massive tree somewhere maybe a mile distant. Not know what happened next always worried me, but I just kept putting one foot in front of the other and followed Sarah to the start of me new life.
Maybe I don’t just do quick and easy. Anyway, another short story that I rather like and got into a good zone of writing.
Hope you enjoyed and that you are having a wonderful day and get to do, or experience, something creative.
– Jon
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