Creatures of the night

This gathering of pine trees will have to do for the night. No, it's not a gathering. They haven't come here of their own accord, drawn by nature's purpose. They've been planted in near rows by unimaginative men with a 7 year harvest in mind. Sustainable forestry. They're touted as some kind of ecological victory, man managing the earth the way he's meant to. But you know real forests. This place is oddly hollow. It lacks character. But it also lacks people and that suits you just fine for the moment. 60km is no great feat, you left far too late in the afternoon to make a decent distance, but the dark is coming and you're hungry, you're tired. Time to make camp.

As you go about setting the hammock up you realise you are not alone. It begins as a mild itch over your face and legs, perhaps from the sweat of cycling and you wipe at your salty skin to clear the sensation. But it quickly returns and becomes more than a mild itch, almost a stinging. Mosquitos? You can't hear any. Some kind of bug? You're eyes have been straining far ahead all day and it takes a few seconds to bring your focus up close. Then you notice them. Just a few at first, white and fluffy looking, but so small, hardly bigger than dust, as if a tissue has exploded into a million pieces. And as you begin to see the first few, more become apparent. Swirling around you, onto you, up your nose, into the whites of your eyes, into your lungs if you inhale too deeply. However small, there might just be a million of them and they're supremely irritating. Swatting is useless as they've sensed you. Your warmth, the grime and salt on your body is a perfect feast for them. It's not yet dark, but the first creatures of the night are out.

They are driving you mad as you walk and run to different places, trying to set your stove up, walk away, come back to light it, away to chop the veges. Brief respites but as soon as you hold still they find you. You tell yourself you could choose to ignore them, be staunch and overcome this, but they've pushed you into a frustration that's coupled with your tiredness from the day and you become a mad creature yourself, doing your merry swatting dance while trying to crouch and prepare a meal so that you drop half of it on the ground. Still good, just with some added dirt and grass. You jump around getting into sleeping clothes and bag, knowing there's refuge in the cocoon of the hammock under the mosquito mesh. There you lie panting, dirty, sweaty. You're too hot, but you know the temperature drops considerably overnight. Continental weather behaves differently. Although it's humid, you know a cold will come so you stay warm and read until tiredness becomes overwhelming. Owls are hooting and dark has almost completely taken the sky as you drift off to sleep.

CRACK SHUFFLE CRACK. You wake instantly, startled by the noise. It's close. You feel the familiar shape of the hammock around you. All is dark. Camping. Cycling. France. Near Leon. Right. You know where you are now. Took a second but you've got your bearings and heard enough to know that whatever is out there is small, it's not human and poses no threat. As it continues to move around you guess at its kind. Hedgehog? No, too fast. A rat? Maybe. A big one. Did it just go up that tree? Maybe a chipmunk, a squirrel, those are around here. Other noises, branches creaking, breaking. Just the wind? Perhaps. Owls taking flight? Hunting the rats? Definitely some kind of bird up there. Never mind. Let these critters do their thing. You're sweaty, hot, tired and ask for sleep to take you back. It does.

HRRAAAAAAUUGH. An awful howl pierces the night and brings you back. A violent screech. It sets the dogs off, you can hear them barking in the distant homes of Leon. It carries a menace, sending a bloodcurdling chill down your spine. Not the mournful wail of a wolf. You know this from London, of all places. This is a fox. It continues its mocking howl into the night, laughing at the dogs trapped behind their fences. It wants the creatures of the forest to be scared, because if they're scared they'll be running, if they're running they'll be easier to find. What does the fox say? That amusing viral internet video plays in your head, but it's nothing like the reality. The fox tells you it wants to spill blood tonight. That's what its cry says and another joins in. The fox is no threat to you. It eats the little things. It takes longer, because no warmblooded creature could fail to be moved by that sound, but eventually sleep takes you again.

CRUNCH THUD CRUNCH. Back again and your heart is beating loudly, though with a feverish excitement closer to a thrill than fear. That was big. Is big. 30 metres? Maybe closer. Hard to tell in this dank, humid air. Makes the sound carry further. It's stopped, on the slope that you can't see but know gradually rises to the south of you. You know what you think it is, but didn't think to find any here. You instincts cry out the answer, but still you run through the other possibilities while breathing silently and still through your half opened mouth, straining for, SHUFFLE, there's a bit, give me more, CRUNCH, it's too big to be a dog, fox, goat even, it's movements are too cautious. It can't be a man, there is no light. Heeaah. There it is. Your senses are wired and you've managed to make out its breathing. There's no mistaking what's our there now. You've been a hunter too long. It's a deer. A decent size, too. Bigger than a fallow. Perhaps a red, or whatever similar breed they have here. The excitement fills you with an electric buzz. It's magnificent to be so close, the deer standing almost close enough to talk to. How hasn't he smelt you and run off? Are they not hunted here? Is he a stag, large but young and stupid? He must have smelt something of you or seen your bike when coming over the hill, and so he stopped in a hurry, the sound waking you. Now he's unsure what to do. Turning this way and that. He seems to want to leave but doesn't quite know which way to go. You love this, letting your ears and familiarity with this creature paint this picture in your mind, as though you are watching him on a hidden camera. You know what the outcome will be, but it's taking longer than you expected and every extra moment he spend with you is a privilege you are grateful for. What time of year is it? His antlers will be off. You've decided he must be a young male and that only his ego is keeping him this long, as if he wants to be more sure of the danger before he'll react to it. Finally he leaves. A louder push as he picks a direction, back up the hill, and footsteps which fade so quickly that you want to believe he must still be there, nothing could move so quietly, but you've watched this happen many times before. They glide like ghosts and are gone. This one's gone. So back to sleep.

CRASH CRASH CRUNCH SMASH CRACK and it continues, overlaid with a stream of staccato noises pitched at the level of human male speech and coming right at you, carelessly fast. You've woken straight into a panic and adrenaline is firing through you. A man? Two men talking? With a dog? Feet moving fast. They won't know what they're looking at with the hammock. You reach one hand to your headlamp hanging above, the other to the zip, so you can get out quickly, but then pause, not wanting to give away your exact position too early. Weapon? Your knife is buried in a bike bag. YOU ARE THE WEAPON comes the affirming inner voice, the fighter in you. You can blind them with the headlamp. Strike with hands and feet. Over the hill lies a road to Leon should you need to run for it, but if they come for you, make sure they regret it. It can't have been more than 5 seconds from waking as all these thoughts transpire and overlap and you strain to hear words in that unfamiliar language while holding rigid and willing the adrenaline to flow. But there is no light. No torches. No men would approach so fast without torches. Now the truth shines clear and you hear those low pitched, staccato utterances for what they really are. Pigs. Wild pigs, two of them. You've heard the same back home. Did they smell the tin of fish you left out with your rubbish? Never mind. They're of no danger to you. Or are they? You have a vision of one with large tusks approaching underneath the hammock and driving his tusks up and into you. It's not a pleasant vision, but you quickly dismiss it as absurd and call out a warning growl which send the pigs scampering away. Now what? The time... 2am. And it's no longer warm. That's not good. It's only 2am. The cold out isn't getting through to you, yet, but it's a long way to sun up. You feel your dampness in the sleeping bag, your sweat clinging to you. That's going to cause a problem later on, you're sure of it. But what else could you have done? You return to sleep but this time nursing a lurking fear as you wait for the last creature of the night.

It comes at 4am, slithering like a snake. It seems silent, yet its presence gives itself away. Crawling blindly, it has sensed you here and come to claim you. It is the cold. The last one out in the dead hours of the night and who all other creatures fear and hide from. It sniffs around, weaving past every tree and object, under every leaf. It is looking for you. You try to keep still and will him to pass on, not to notice you. But the sweat and beads of moisture in your sleeping bag betray your position, crying out, "Here he is! Come and claim him!" And the cold paws its way around you, feeling around the sleeping bag for thin points and trying to get in. There on your back, where it's squashed into the hammock, it sinks in cold fangs all over and starts drinking deep of your warmth. You shudder. No! Keep still? Or pull the hood tighter? You're not sure. There are no better clothes on your bike, It's hopeless. You must just wait for down. You are exhausted as well, your body so far from wanting to move. You try to ignore it and sleep again until the sun is up, but cold keeps persisting. "Now your feet are cold!" It mocks, it taunts, it teases, it takes. It whispers stories, reminding you of every time you've ever been cold. They are one in the same. They are now. This same enemy has found you here again. It's a very long hour and more filled with fretting and turning and lucid half dreams until you finally find some sort of sleep again. It is a cold awakening too, when the light reaches through the pines to tell you, "I'm back! Let's get on with the day then, shall we? But the cold you awake to, both deep in your body and your surrounds, is merely an absence of warmth. That creature who came in the night, that hungry beast who leaves his cold damp trail wherever he goes and sought to devour you, he is no longer here. Perhaps he follows the edge of the night around the world, seeking to despair and claim others, but he won't be back here for a while. You need to start moving. Get warm again. Swap your clothes out. Eat something. Get cycling. Look for coffee. The creatures of the night have passed. The day belongs to you.