Miranda plunked her backpack down with a relieved sigh, sitting promptly down on the soft summer grass. She watched her friends toil the rest of the way up the gentle slope while she rubbed her shoulders. This was a good idea, she thought idly, as she watched Irene awkwardly slide her backpack off her shoulders near her to land with a solid thunk on the forest floor. Soon thereafter, heralded by a string of complaints, Heather and Claire joined the other two; they sat in silence for a few minutes, catching their breath. The hike from the road had taken the wind out of them, but they were still infused by the nervous energy that had prompted the entire debacle to begin with.

Their goal was simple- being residents of the town of Burkittsville (formerly known as Blair, as they were thrilled to have found out in their research), they were very well aware of what stories there were about the nearby Blair Woods. Old witches, ghosts of children, and hideous beasts all seemed too romantic for such a small, sleepy town in the middle of nowhere. Perhaps this was why they felt secure- safe, in a way. The stories were just unlikely enough to be intriguing without having the threat of possibility.

If nothing else, they would have a nice time spending the night in the woods. Nothing bigger than foxes, raccoons, and deer lived in the woods, keeping the surrounding area relatively safe from their nature-bound neighbors.

Miranda bounced in place excitedly, clapping her hands. Despite being a senior in high school, she felt a well of dizzied anticipation more suited to someone a few years younger. "What do we wanna start with?" She regarded the rest of the group, who had slumped onto their packs for a few minutes to take in the cooling air. Claire laughed, and reached up to palm away a fringe of dark hair from her eyes. "How about food? I'm starving."

"No fun!"

"Tough noogies," Claire responded, as she rifled through her back to pull out a small bag of jerky. The small meal, commented on as being the bane of their mothers' existence, if they ever found out, was consumed quickly. Heather had pulled out a flat wooden box from her pack, and grinned at the others. "Do you guys know how to do Ouija?"

It was a bit of a surprise, but nothing they weren't prepared to learn about. The four of them were fond of occultish things, and would convene after school to watch TV programs about ghosts and do tarot readings. Heather mapped out the importance of the board, explaining it would allow them to contact spirits from the other side "of the veil", as she put it. Everyone would send energy through the planchette, and the spirits would take the energy and push the planchette around the board and spell out messages.

A sober mood had fallen across the group, as they all placed their fingers on the small wooden triangle, equipped with a little glass circle in the middle. Heather had taken the role of the leader, and after a few moments of silence, prompted, "Is there anyone here with us tonight?"

To their vast disappointment, the planchette did not move. Questions were bandied about, going from the solicitous ("Are you afraid of us?"), to the absurd ("Do you like frog jerky," which got a round of jeers and scoffs). The group soon dissolved into laughter, the Ouija board and their project forgotten, until Irene stopped, and turned to the bulk of the woods behind her. "Did you guys hear that?"

She was teased lightly for trying to scare them, Miranda still laughing as she said, "Come on, Renee, you should have done that when we were trying to contact the spirit of Chief Woongamanga." Irene shook her head quickly, saying, "Shut up! Just listen!"

Silence descended upon the group.

For a few seconds, they could only hear peepers from the creek and the soft hush of leaves. Then, carried by a stray gust of wind, they could hear the sound of a man sobbing. It died off when the wind changed directions. Heather shot to her feet. "Oh, my God." She glanced around. "It sounds like someone's hurt, or something." She cupped her hands around her mouth, and belted out, "Hello?!"

A pregnant pause fell on the girls, all watching each other with wide eyes. Then, what sounded like a faint moan was carried to them on an eddy of wind. "We hear you!" Claire called, joining Heather. "Keep talking!"

Clear words came to them, just rising above the whoop of an owl, "Please… help me…"

"It's over there," Miranda stabbed to the path into the woods with a finger, clambering to her feet. She was moving before she was standing all the way, her legs numb from the extended period of sitting. "Hello?" There was no doubt in any of their minds that there was a person in the woods, and he needed trouble. All four girls, snatching up a first aid kit and their flashlights, piled onto the path, prompting the voice.

But even as they did, it seemed to get fainter, almost like the man was losing strength. By the time his pleas sounded as if he were just barely speaking a few yards away, they could see what looked to be a body crumpled in the bushes.

Irene gasped, and threw out an arm to stop the others from passing her. None of them did, crowding behind her with large eyes that shone from fear and moonlight. Heather swallowed, and tossed out another, "Hello?"

What looked to be the figure's head lifted to see them. "Please… help me." His voice was strained, as if it took a concerted effort to produce speech. His voice lifted at the end, not in a question, but as if he couldn't push enough air behind the words.

Claire was the first to push past, training her flashlight beam on the body in the bushes. It shifted weakly, a hand reaching up just barely past its hip before falling back to the ground. The rest of the girls followed her at a staggered interval, wariness puncturing their wish to help.

He seemed to be tall man, and his limbs tapered off into the dark where they sprawled in the bush that the light couldn't reach. He wore a filthy blue uniform, decorated with gold braid and tarnished brass buttons that glittered tiredly. The spurs on his boots, choked with rust, clicked as his legs churned weakly from pain. The compounded light revealed a chiseled face with a close beard and moustache and blonde hair. His eyes, even from their distance, were wrought with pain and fright. Claire froze a few feet away, taking stock of him, just out of arm's reach. "Are… you okay?" Her query was tight with caution. "Do you need help?"

His head tilted in her direction, a swath of red spreading down the side of his face, sinking into a flat dark blue on the shoulder of his clothes. Most of the blood had already dried, save for a wet gleam swaddling his head. He nodded at her slowly, the lids of his eyes heavy, a labored pant pushing at his chest. He swallowed, prominent Adam's apple bobbing, and he licked his lips before asking, "Why are you in the woods?"

"We heard you calling for help," explained Miranda. "Can you tell us your name?" The uniform had not escaped her, either- her father was an active historical re-enactor, and one of his passions was the Civil War. It was obvious this man was wearing a lieutenant's uniform, but it looked like he'd been wearing it for a while. Maybe he got lost doing a project.

The man shook his head, the momentum taking his head back to the forest floor where it stayed. Finally, his soft voice said, "Why were you here… to begin with?"

"Dude, uh, you might want to keep quiet, you're totally not in the shape to be playing 20 questions," said Claire, as she stooped over him to look at his head. He pushed away her hand before it reached his head, and his dull eyes had adopted a desperate fire. "Why were you here?"

"To… camp?" Irene hazarded from a few feet away, peering at him speculatively.

There was no immediate answer from the man. His eyes seemed to have distanced, breathing having suck into a series of short rasps, before he rallied himself again, blinking and setting his mouth in a line. He lifted himself, his arm shaking, and looked to the dark forest that stretched on behind him. "You have to leave," he said after a moment. He looked back to them. "Go. Quickly. You're not safe."

"What?" Claire looked into the forest, and saw nothing. "Listen, we have to get you out of here. You're going to die if we leave you."

"No." He pushed himself to his knees with effort, to the dismay of the girls. "Get out of this forest. Go home." They saw now that the white of his right eye was red from burst blood vessels, scratches lining his face.

The conviction and authority in his voice made them pause, doubt the safety that seemed obvious. Heather finally said, "Look, we're going to go get help. Just stay here, and we'll be back with people and get you out."

Real fear spasmed across his face, and he gained his feet with a grunt of pain. He staggered to Claire, turning her about with a feverish strength, and giving her a push that sent her stepping back onto the path with her friends. "Go, and run. Do not bring any one back." He bent double for an instant, clutching his head, before he took another halting step forward, raising himself just enough to herd them a little farther.

They retreated to two paper birches that stood on either side of the path, when the man dropped to his knees again, and crumpled to his side, face screwed tight with pain. "What's your name," pleaded Miranda, in a voice that betrayed just how frightened she was by this all.

"Robert MacNichol-" it came out mixed with a thin sound of pain caught in the back of his throat.

Somewhere, deep in the forest, an old woman screamed. They could not tell if it was rage or pain, but in their bones, they each of them felt a malevolence in that scream.

His eyes darted up, but he did not rise. "Go," he commanded thinly, the word drawn out from lack of strength and breath.

They fled.

Their packs were where they had left them, but the Ouija board had gone missing. None of them noticed it at the time.

The siren of Burkittsville went off at 11:45 PM, after a frantic 911 call from a group of girls who were calling from a cell phone on the road near the Blair Woods. They pleaded for help, because there was a man in the woods who'd been shot in the head. They thought they had heard an old woman in there, too. When asked who was the man, and if they knew him, they said no, just that they heard him calling for help, so they went to find him. His name was Robert MacNichol.

The resulting squad car from the sheriff's department and a spare State Trooper, accompanied by an ambulance, found nothing where they were led. They left the woods to take the girls' statement, which all corresponded to a tall man wearing a blue uniform. No, not like an Air Force uniform, they were hasty to relate. "A Union lieutenant uniform," explained one girl impatiently.

The search party assembled the next morning found nothing.

They were withdrawing from the woods, when the last to leave stopped at the edge of the woods to light a cigarette, shooing on the others who looked back for him. He smoked it out, dropping the butt to the hard-packed path, when he caught a whiff of blood. He scanned the area briefly, a stab of fear lancing through him. Maybe fifty feet away, a man stood on the path, and while he was mostly in shadow, he seemed to be watching the other man intently. He wore a moldering blue uniform, caked with dark patches and plastered with leaves. A saber sheath hung from one hip.

The searcher felt strongly that this man was not only the man the girls had described, but he was not the historical enactor they had supposed.

He turned upon his heel, and left as fast as he could without fleeing. He thought that he could hear, on a current of wind the pushed past him as he sped to join his fellow searchers, the sound of a man sobbing brokenly.