Tales of Mystery and Intrigue

Vita Carnis

AN: I based this one off of Darian Quilloy's famous analogue horror series Vita Carnis. The story takes place in the same universe, but I made my own characters. Please do go check out Darian Quilloy's amazing work if you haven't already!

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I stepped out of the car and my senses were immediately filled with the sound of birds chirping somewhere around us, the leaves rustling in the trees as they swung side to side. It was truly a beautiful sight: I could see many pine and spruce trees, moss around the hiking trail and the small blueberry bushes hidden amongst the moss. This was what I lived for.
“Leonila? Come on, we have a certain distance to clear today.” I snapped my head towards my so-called friend, Perdita. She had a snarky feel to her voice, like always. I always felt like she had something against me, ever since we met. I knew very well that she was only “friends” with me to get closer to my brother, but something in me refused to let go of her. We had already known each other for 14 years and our parents were great friends, so it would just be an inconvenience for us to not get along.
I took a step towards her, fixing the huge hiking bag on my back, “Yeah, sorry. Let’s get going.”
The four of us started walking along the trail after we had checked  if we have everything we need with us. This was going to be a long hike and just the thought of spending five days in a forest, completely surrounded by a thick forest with no electronics got me so excited. I was so glad that the others had agreed to spend my birthday hiking with me. Even Azrail, who was otherwise always busy, was able to clear up some space in his schedule for this. It was so great to see those three respect my passion and love for nature, even when there had been multiple mimic sightings around here lately.
“I still think that we shouldn’t do this… there have been three mimic sightings in the area lately-” Azrail was cut off by Perdita, like always. She didn’t like him either.
“Oh, shut up. Ahimoth and Leonila were kind enough to let us come along. Be grateful, for God’s sake.” Azrail and I rolled our eyes but we didn’t say anything for now. The last thing any of us would want right now was to start arguing; we had to bear with each other for five days and a fight wouldn’t really be ideal during any of them.
We finally got going  and I was trying to just take in and enjoy the nature, but of course Perdita had to somehow ruin it… She was taking tons of selfies of both herself and my brother. He looked  visibly annoyed at her actions but we both knew that he was way too polite to tell her to put the phone away. I didn’t bother with it either, since I didn’t want to ruin her seemingly good mood.

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Finally after three hours full of whining from Perdita about her shoes getting dirty and all of us having to bear with the annoying sound, we reached our goal for the day. We started setting up camp and we all agreed to make a fire before the beautiful summer sun sets.
“Hey, guys, I’m going to go and gather some wood for the fire,” I said, approaching the others, who were putting the tents up, “it would be a bother while it gets dark. You all can stay here and put the tents up.” I could see a look of disapproval and hesitation on Ahimoth’s face for a moment before he nodded after a small sigh to himself. He had always been really overprotective of me, no matter how many birthdays of mine passed. I appreciated it, sure, but it just got a bit overwhelming at times, and let’s not lie to ourselves- annoying. He had never approved of any relationships I was in, always saying that the person wouldn’t treat me right.
The other two didn’t seem to have anything against my idea, nor did they say anything about it, so I took the silence as approval and left the three of them to meddle with the tents, walking away from the little campsite we had set up. We had found a small slope to sleep for the night; the wind wouldn’t blow onto us as much and it would overall be a bit quieter down there. So, I headed uphill again, revisiting the chilly and moist air around me once more. I would probably need to search for wood under some trees, since it had rained only about an hour ago (I could clearly remember Perdita whining about it, like always).
I could hear the crunching of sticks and leaves under me as I wandered not far off from the campsite. I soon was about 500 meters away from the others and I was surrounded by small patches of spruce trees and a large, open field to my right. I approached one of the trees to my left and kneeled  down next to it, starting to pick up the dry sticks under it. The tree’s branches were nice and big, providing a good place for the older sticks to stay dry. I had been quite lucky to find as many under there as I did, but I wasn’t complaining.
My head snapped to my left when I suddenly heard the breaking of a branch. The cracking  sound ever so slightly echoed through the forest, causing a few birds to screech from the surprise of the sudden sound. My father had told me from a young age that if I ever heard the snapping of a branch somewhere near me when I was supposed to be alone, then I had to abandon everything I was doing, no matter what, and to then make sure that I had a clear escape, because a mimic is most likely on my trail. Thankfully, I had done some research about the whole Vita Carnis family before coming here, since most of them were dangerous and all and I wanted to make sure that all of us were safe, just in case something like this happened.
I stole a glance towards the field behind me. 
That was a clear escape, right? Mimics weren’t stupid. They were proved to be about as smart as humans. They could even mimic sounds, like: people talking, doors creaking, knocking… Mimics were known to not attack when there was a clear escape for it’s prey or when it’s victim was around other humans. So… it wouldn’t attack, right? If it even was a mimic, that is. But there really wasn’t any doubt about it… I could feel someone watching me. My heart was beating out of my chest. I was convinced that the mimic itself could hear it.
I slowly took a step back, clutching the firewood in my violently shaking arms while keeping a close eye on my surroundings. I could remember the VHS tapes I grew up watching in biology class. In the part about mimics, they had given us a small guide as to what to do in the case of  a mimic encounter.  They had basically said to stay in an open place or around others, to not try to attack it because it would be futile, and to “not panic”,  like always. But that proved to be way more difficult than I thought it would. They had a short introduction  to each of the Vita Carnis family members and even though I thought that they were pointless and unnecessary back then, I now thanked God that I had paid attention  to them back then. I took another step back and then started sprinting. I would be safe once I would be with the others.
I ran as fast as my feet could fathom, the burning in my lungs stung and stung, until it became too much to bear and I had to slow down a bit. The slope where the campsite was located already appeared in my field of vision and I could no longer feel the mimic’s predatory eyes on me. I ran down the slope towards the other three and they could see the panic in my eyes as I frantically looked around myself to  see if the predator had followed me.
“Uh… what’s wrong, Leo?” Azrail asked, concerned. His blue eyes were as kind as ever  and I was convinced that he and everyone else here could hear my heart drumming inside my chest.  My legs ached from the sudden sprinting that I had just done. I tried to answer the question that obviously every one of them had.
“I think there was a mimic on my trail.” I put the wood in my hands in the middle of the small circle of stones the others had seemingly set up for the fireplace. The sun was already setting, creating a golden hue around us. I had always loved Golden Hour, but I just didn’t have the time nor energy to admire it right now.
Of course, Perdita didn’t really believe me, “Yeah, right,” the annoyance in her eyes was clear as day. She was going to start complaining once again and we all knew that. “you were the one who wanted to come here and we all did, but now you’re telling us that you think a mimic was following you. I am not going back three hours worth of walking just because you’re paranoid and want some attention.”
“I’m not telling you that we have to go back,” I countered; there was no point in telling Perdita that I wasn’t lying, since she wouldn’t believe me either way, “I’m just saying that we should stick with each other more. No one is going anywhere alone anymore.”
The blonde girl just rolled her eyes at me, even though I could tell that she was actually happy to get to spend more time with my brother.
“Are you sure that it was a mimic? Maybe it was just a meat snake or a regular animal?” Ahimoth asked, a concerned yet questioning tone to his voice. I nodded. There was no mistaking the hungry, predatory eyes staring at me from behind a bush that made me feel so weak and vulnerable in the cruel yet beautiful environment called nature.
“Alright, then you’re right. Let’s not ruin the hike and just stay together. They barely attack when their pray isn’t alone,” Azrail stated the obvious in an attempt to try and ease my worries. I could see the concern and worry on Ahimoth’s face. He had always been scared of the skinless animals, and it was for a good reason. The scared look on his face almost made me rethink about continuing the hike, but he caught my gaze and gave me the sweetest yet saddest smile that I had ever seen from him. He didn’t want to leave for my sake, and I felt like I couldn’t let this opportunity slip away into nothingness to never be used again. It was my birthday and we needed to celebrate, right?
We all agreed to cook up a small dinner on the fire and maintain our energy and spirit, even in this situation. Thankfully, we had taken enough water along that we didn’t have to go off searching for a river somewhere. We finally went to sleep when it got so dark that we couldn’t see a thing anymore, even with the moon illuminating light from the night sky. The tall trees of the thick forest cast a shadow on us and the earthy ground under us.