The park held all my best memories of childhood.

Through the short-cut horsegrass my friends and I would run without a care, up and down the slope that led into the beckoning woods.

In the ragged bushes and sharp brambles we would play, crawling like army soldiers through barbed wire, hiding like animals from each other.

All the while the woods watched, looming over all.

Tall, straight trees at the bottom of the hill, always weighed with leaves, always casting the forest in shadow. From the top of the hill, you couldn’t even see the forest floor.

As children we had been told to never go into the forest. We hadn’t, mostly, daring each other to get as close as we could at the bottom of the slope, brushing our tiptoes all the way up to the line of shadows and thistles that barred the entrance to the forest.

When I was a child I had loved the park, had loved the presence of the forest too, even though I never set foot inside it.

As an adult, it brings only dread.

My daughter was last seen running inside.

There are many stories about the Red Hood.

Well acclaimed is her viciousness in battle, her cleverness in developing the W.O.L.F. virus that can hack any behemoth in minutes, her fearlessness as she rides her stolen vehicles into battle.

But few tell the story of when she was a girl, living on the outskirts, scraping by as many of us do.

She was working for the rebellion even then, so they say, taking supply runs and ferrying information back and forth across the wastes, even braving the ruined cities of glass and metal that stand as warnings to all.

And it was on one of these trips that she met a man.

Who he was is hard to say, the name he gave long lost, never spoken. He was well dressed, clean, despite the twisted rebar and shattered windows that rose around him; and when he spoke, he was kind. He asked what was in her basket with such innocent curiosity that she hesitated to lie.

Inside, among stale bread and roots, were carefully hidden blueprints detailing the security on the colonised moon of Briar. One of the most valuable assets the revolution would ever come to possess. She had been tasked with delivering it with the supplies, to cross the ruined city and speak to no-one, stop for nothing.

But the man leaned in close, whispering that he was part of the rebellion too - a spy on the inside. He was there to help her, so he said, the ruined cities no safe place for a young girl. Who knows what beasts or even Crown forces could be roaming the streets, picking clean the carcasses or hunting fresher meat?

He spoke with such conviction that only when he reached for the basket did her senses return, and she struck him away with a hidden knife. He howled and fled, wounded but alive, while she hurried onward.

Crossing the city was hard, baking by day and freezing by night, looming towers shifting and threatening to fall, rubble below disguising unstable ground. She pushed herself as hard as she could, making the journey in a matter of days, barely resting as she carried out her mission.

But when she arrived at the compound…

“Hello?”

“Well hello, my dear. Do come in.”

The voice that answered her was none other than the cunning stranger she had met in the city.

Immediately she was on guard, hiding the blueprints in her clothes as she held the basket in one hand, a sharp knife in the other.

And not a moment too soon—

The door kicked outwards and for a moment she saw who he truly was. The ends of his coat sleeves were tattered beyond repair, revealing sharp, black metal where bioaugmentation had replaced his hands. There was a fresh scar over his face, knitted closed with inhuman ability. He was covered in blood.

Then he was on her like an animal, metal striking metal, scuffling in the dust and debris. She fought him off with all she had, kicking and slicing for every blow she received. As his teeth closed around her throat, she did the only thing she could, throwing the basket of supplies away.

The man chased it with a single-minded focus, abandoning the fight. She took the chance to flee.

Over cracked asphalt and shattered tiles she ran, tripping and stumbling to the very edge of the city, where she happened upon the Huntsman.

The Huntsman, not quite swayed to the rebellion at the time, took one look at the girl in floods of tears and gave her shelter. As she recounted her tale he took up an axe for clearing away the scavengers in the wastes, and when she declared she would return to kill the man, he promised to accompany her.

When the two of them arrived at the compound, they quickly noticed the blood in the air.

The rebels inside had been slaughtered like chattel, not a single one left alive. Standing at the centre of it all was the man, waiting for her, but he had been counting on her being alone. When he lunged for the Red Hood, the Huntsman lurched forwards with a hard swing of the axe, taking his head clean off.

They salvaged what they could from the compound, counted their dead, then took off into the wastes to search for another rebel outcamp.

… Rumours say the two have fought alongside each other ever since.

It’s quiet.

That’s the first thing you notice, the first thing that creeps up the back of your skull and makes you wonder if something is wrong.

A busy shopping centre like this should be loud, no matter how late into the night.

Now the only thing that fills the eerie silence is the faint buzz of electricity and the hum of the air-conditioning. The bustle and regular sounds of people somehow slipped away without your notice, you aren’t even sure how long the silence has been boring into your ears before you became aware of it.

You step out of the elevator and see no one. No customers shuffling from shop to shop, no security guards, not even a nightman closing up for the night even though you know this place is supposed to be open all hours. Some of the overhead lights are off, casting odd shadows on the floors below. The building feels abandoned.

It feels… very much like you’re not supposed to be here.

This had only meant to be a quick stop, grabbing something you needed before getting back in your car and getting out of here. Why were you the one alone? Why not one of the shoppers who shopped long hours and lost track of time entirely? Why not anyone but you?

Being the only person here when everyone is gone, alone in a place that is never empty, starts an itch of panic in you even as you try to stay calm.

You start to walk through the white-and-glass walkways, then run - if anyone called out to stop you, it would be a relief - do you remember which way the exit was? Yes; you run up to a large sign reading ‘Come Back Soon!’

There’s no exit near the sign. The large doorway just leads to more shops, a mirror of the place you’d run from.

An exact mirror, right down to the sign a little further in, letters flipped backwards. The hum of the lights seems to mock you, a reminder of where you are.

You back away from the doorway. You’ll have to find another way out.

Betty was the only one uncertain about the creek when Tom suggested it. She went anyway, of course.

After school the four of them walked until they found the creek - the first time for Betty and Kai and Jane, second time for Tom - finding a spot where the greenery was thick and there was an old log to sit on.

They made that their spot. Nobody went to the creek near the sparkling water and the rotting trees, so it was safe for four teenagers to sneak away to after school. They tramped grass and got wet socks running through the creek, they ducked behind trees and chased each other up and down the bank, Kai told them everything he knew about every kind of fungus they saw.

The first time anyone found something weird, it was Kai, thinking it was a stick insect. He picked up something spindly and brown, running over to show the girls and make them squeal - Betty did, Jane looked like she was going to thump him - but when he opened his hands, they all caught a glimpse of four thin limbs and a ruddy face. Then Kai yelped and the insect spread wings, disappearing into the trees as fast as they could blink.

“It bit me!” Kai yelled, “Stick insects don’t bite!” “Stick insects don’t fly either,” Tom said, who’d been furthest away and had only seen the flash of wings. Betty was willing to get into a pointless argument about stick insects, but Jane spoke up with the big thing they’d avoided voicing.

“It had a human face.”

Kai rubbed his nose, head bobbing side to side. “Yeah.” They didn’t really know what to do about that.

“Maybe you caught a fairy!” Tom said, clapping a hand on Kai’s shoulder.

Tom was the oldest - by a month to Kai, two to Betty, and only five days to Jane - and would argue he was the most mature. He was the one who would speak to grownups before the rest of them. So it seemed strange that he believed in fairies, but he struggled his shoulders and said, “You saw it, didn’t you? Fairies aren’t weirder than anything else we’ve seen.”

That wasn’t true - unless you counted the skeletal dog with mushrooms growing on it that Kai swore up and down he’d seen around the back of the school - but they all nodded their heads and moved on. It wasn’t like one fairy was going to keep them away from the creek; it was their spot.

Maybe seeing the fairy was like crossing threshold, because after that more weird things showed up at the creek. Most of the time the things kept a distance, trundling along on the other side of the water, and they’d all crowd around Tom on the log while he sketched them in his sketchbook.

Sometimes the things would watch them back, black beady eyes that may Betty hide behind Tom, flat grey eyes like pebbles, or sometimes eyes that looked much too human for the faces they were in.

Sometimes, rarely, the things wouldn’t stay on the other side of the river.

They came to their spot one afternoon and didn’t notice how still the air was, how quiet the creak was. Jane sat down on the log and then shrieked, scrambling back and falling into Tom, who also fell. They all saw the thing that crawled up where it had hidden under the log: skin muddy and patterned like a frog, long hair knotting over what must have been a face, single white eye peering out between strands. Its limbs were long and sinewy and folded over themselves in ways that they shouldn’t, tipped with claws that were dripping red. Betty shrunk back; Kai ran past her with a big stick and walloped the thing on the head.

“Run!”

Betty grabbed Kai, Tom grabbed Jane, the four of them ran and hobbled and stumbled all the way back to the main road.

When they stopped, the bleeding slash on Jane’s leg became obvious. Tom got them all back to his house because he knew where the first aid kit was, dabbing with disinfectant while Betty followed Jane’s instructions on how to get blood out of her sodden sock. They stayed together until late and got scolded by their parents for it.

The next day, Tom gave them iron nails and said he would find ways to protect themselves when they went to their spot.

“What else are friends for?”

“Aren’t they gorgeous?” Sel asked, as soon as they returned home. Cteno had been in the middle of eating her lunch when the knock at the door came, and just slowly munched on her sandwich as she looked over their shoulder at the creature in tow. The creature at their heels looked almost like a starved dog, long and scrawny and limbs crouching as it walked, wreathed with thick black fur that glistened the blue-green of magpie wings. Except, where even the largest of their dogs only came up to their waist, this one was nearly as tall as Sel was. She couldn’t see any eyes on the creature’s head under its thick fur, only a muzzle full of sharp teeth that flashed before it closed its mouth again.

Sel, the absolute animal-loving fool, reached a gloved hand beside those dangerous teeth and scratched the creature’s thick ruff. Long, thin ears flicked upright attentively, and Cteno reached for a knife incase it lunged. Then the creature leaned against their hand with a low sound that could have been a growl or a grumble.

“Um.” Cteno tried to think of a polite way to say ‘you brought a monster home’. “What is it?” “A dire wolf of some sort, I think.” came the cheerful reply. Sel reached up to scratch between the creatures ears, having to stand on their tiptoes, and in return the wolf turned its head and licked their mask, getting a laugh. ‘Okay,’ Cteno thought incredulously, ‘Basically a big dog then.’

“What does it eat?” She asked, now leaning against the doorframe with a little less concern. At least it wasn’t some eldritch and unknowable being. “Chickens, mostly. I’ll leave them out here until I can get a pen set up. Do make sure she doesn’t go after the cats while I’m gone.” “Right.”

Cteno was left to watch the creature as Sel scurried off, no doubt already dreaming up designs for a play area for their new companion. She eyed the wolf as it let out a very dog-like huff and sat down in the dirt, somehow becoming even taller. It didn’t seem all too interested in making trouble, at least yet, although it did seem to be looking at her from the way it tilted its head. After a while of watching, Cteno took another bite of her sandwich, and the creature perked up with a throaty warble. She looked at it. Looked at her chicken sandwich. Then she threw her lunch at the creature, seeing it snapped up in black jaws before it could even hit the ground. It was gone in a single bite, and Cteno vaguely thought that they’d need more chickens. The wolf’s tail flicked in a thin, whiplike motion that Cteno could only hope meant it was pleased, then it stood and padded towards her. Cteno held her ground, keeping a firm grip on her knife, but the wolf stopped in front of her and only bumped its snout against her shoulder.

“Ugh, your breath stinks.” She informed it, as she reached up to scratch the side of its jaw. The wolf huffed at her. “Aww, you’re bonding!” A voice chirped from the side of the house, as Sel reappeared. “See, I knew you’d get along!”

The wolf perked up as they approached, and happily snatched the chicken leg that Sel offered it. Once that was swallowed down with a crunch of bone, the wolf pressed its nose into Sel’s hands, searching for more food. Sel laughed. “Oh, you’re going to eat us out of house and home, aren’t you Sweetie?” “Did you seriously call it Sweetie?” “Because they’re a sweetheart!”

It began as all bad days do: with a restless itch in the back of his mind like a forewarning.

You’d think so long of having such in tune intuition would have helped him pick up when something bad was coming, but all he did was shake his head in a daze, smooth the prickling fur on the back of his neck, and set about his day.

Even when storm clouds dragged in across the sky and brought a dampener on things, he only thought to tut at the sudden twist in the weather, keeping his hood up. Yet still, he could not settle.

Come afternoon, the air tasted damp with the onset of rain, and the sun had been blotted out entirely.

The air smelled faintly of ozone.

It was as the wind started to pick up that he caught the smell, remembering all at once the unease that had sat with him all day. Suddenly the peace of the morning snapped and bent like a young branch, leaving him with nothing but panic.

He barely got inside before the storm truly began. Winds that had been playful before now howled through the streets, rattling the window panes so hard he feared they’d break, clattering its cacophony through the town. Thunder growled and broke across the sky like waves crashing. His hands thumbed over his ears nervously, hunching down as if to take refuge under the table. Then all the world was white for a moment.

The lightning was accompanied by a crack of thunder that shook the house. Through the sliver of the window, he could see a tree had been struck and caught fire.

The wind roared and the sky shook like the world was ending, and he dove beneath the tablecloth, curling up tight as the foundation of the house began to groan. He feared the building might split apart from the strain; it had before.

Hiding under the table, feeling the storm shake through him, he knew it would be a long night to live through.