On the Discovery of Birbour, Alaska, September 1st of 1948

Taken from the journal of one David Birbour, expeditionist and American explorer, from the Birbour town archives that are housed by Iris Henness, post-woman, doctor, and archivist.

Sheriff Boris Osipov, the only law this side of the Plyset Mountains, commandeered the Post Office’s solitary lounge chair to read. He was on duty, yes, but the morning had been blessedly slow. The property disputes, hunting mishaps, and drunken brawls that so plagued Birbour typically dipped between the hours of eleven AM and two o’clock and then peaked in the evening. If there were ever a time for the Sheriff to focus on himself, it’d have to be now.

The Rope Pub was tempting, but Boris had sworn off drink after the war. His comrades’ desiccated corpses strewn all across Berlin still visited him beneath the caramel of whiskey and swam in the lightened fog of vodka. No, reading was his only reprieve. A busy mind is a forgetful one.

But it wasn’t his comrades that Boris wished to forget.

It was instead the haunting visage of a man, great and hairy and impossibly tall, that haunted his dreams. The premonitions had grown so frequent, so vivid, that Boris struggled to separate his reality from that dreamscape. Both were so tangible that Boris would often awake in fright, grab his Mosin–Nagant M1944 Carbine, the only leftover from the war besides Boris’ reflection, and sweep his property for the creature.

It’d never appear.

But when his eyes closed . . .

Boris shook his head, taking a sip from his blackened coffee. Iris had the courtesy to brew some for him and he silently wished the woman were closer to his age.

She’d be a better distraction than old journals if she were more his type. Russian. Darker hair. Brown eyes instead of her almost incandescent blue.

Sighing and missing home, he opened the journal of David Birbour. The town, having taken its discoverer’s namesake, had a rich and robust history. Boris often found refuge in the minds of people long gone.

August 4th, 1895

The wind blows and the salty sea spray coats the tongues of the M.M.S. Barrymore’s crew. The cooling sensation puts me in a frivolous, poetic mood. But even as I fight the urge to dance, to jump and to sing hallelujah to our Lord for such a beautiful day, our languorous native guides’ attitude sours. The two of them stick out from the rest of my colleagues, but the Alutiiq are supposedly natives of our destination, the Parway Peninsula. However, whereas our American spirits yearn for home theirs seem to dread it.

I am lost as to why.

My First Mate demanded a meeting between us and the guides to discuss what to do once we made landfall on Parway Peninsula. We shared breakfast this morning as the sun crested the horizon, painting the entire sky in the beautiful orange hues of dawn. I only wish that the topics of our conversation were so pristine. There is only one word that remains in my mind as I wait eagerly for tomorrow morning’s landfall . . .

Nantiinaq.

The above is a creature in Alutiiq folklore. A humanoid monstrosity (or monstrosities?) that lives deep in the Plyset Mountains. Apparently, the local communities used to pay tribute to the thing, shying awake from its hulking, hairy figure as it devoured whatever they offered. The Nantiinaq legend was so frightening that the Alutiiq themselves avoided entire swaths of the mountains. It was this devil that darkens our guides’ spirits. Generations ago, according to their ramblings, the Alutiiq rebelled against the Nantiinaq, who demanded ever more costly sacrifices, and it chased them free of the mountains. This exodus is the source of Juneau, the Alutiiq refugees founding the village, now a city, in a safer locale.

All of this according to legend.

And speculative legend at that.

Nevertheless, savage mythologies will not sway me from marking myself in the halls of history. I will leave my mark, God willing, the Alutiiq be dammed.

-David Birbour

Sheriff Boris folded the journal closed and let it fall limp upon his thigh. The description of the Alutiiq legend, the Nantiinaq, brought to mind his dream. It was as if the poor guides of David Birbour shared the same daunting hallucinations as him. Behind his eyelids, and perhaps behind theirs as well, a creature of immeasurable strength and unimaginable terror beckoned. It demanded costly sacrifice.

Boris’ mind wandered to the Mosin Carbine that sat on his dresser at home. There were heaps of unboxed ammunition in the bottom drawer. It’d only take a moment to load, his practiced hands could practically maintain the weapon in the dark, and it’d take even less time to pull the trigger. This nightmare could end in a moment, he thought, and he could be reunited with his comrades. Perhaps those in the next life spoke Russian.

“Net!” He grumbled loudly, shocking himself out of his pitiful stupor.

“Are you all right?” Iris called from the other room.

“Yes!” Boris lied. “Just enjoying some reading!”

He could hear her chuckle.

Leaning forward, Boris pushed himself to his feet. The idleness of lounging was no doubt bad for his stiffened back, a leftover from an explosive force too close for comfort. Stretching, he strolled the small archives. Iris had a particular fascination with newspaper articles, a luxury that Boris himself longed for since the shutting down of the local press. In an effort to preserve the history of Birbour, she’d created a collage of highlighted articles on the wall that dated back to the first newspaper in 1905. Most of the articles revolved around the cannery and local fishing. As he scanned the wall, a picture leapt out at him.

It was contained within one of the last publications of the Birbour Press. A bolded, water-damaged box separated the captured image of a large, hairy monstrosity from the largely indecipherable text. The devilish thing was mid-walk away from the cameraman, but it might as well have been strolling toward Boris. His spine stiffened, his old war wounds throbbing, and he shivered in the warmth of the archives. Instinctively, he gripped the police baton at his waist, but he’d need something more powerful to keep such a demon at bay.

Beneath it lay the title, “The Birbour Monster?!” and some of the article was still legible.

“Sightings of the — have increased since — all around —. Locals fear — Native legends? David Bi— creature? — baffled! Local hunters — missing —. Picture was taken by — on Tuesday behind the Rope —. —Hoax?”

The air grew colder as his eyes fell on one last word.

“—Nantiinaq—?”

Boris wished that the photographer’s name were still decipherable.

“Hey, Iris?” He called out.

She came into the room. “Everything all right, Sheriff?”

“Yes,” he gestured to the image, “Do you know the man who took this photograph?”

She leaned toward the paper, her blue eyes narrowing. “Uh . . . nope! I do not. I suppose the only one who might is Mr. Rottenburough.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. He’s the one who shut down the press in the first place. If I remember correctly, it happened right after this article was published.”

“Is that so? What happened to the journalists?”

“Journalist. Only one. I think he left for Juneau to find work. When Rottenburough opened up the mine, you better believe that it caused a ruckus with the locals and the cannery. Politics and such. As far as I can tell, he bought out the newspaper to shut their little fear factory down.” She sounded displeased, but her eyes twinkled with the consumption of history.

“Shame. That must’ve happened right before I got here,” Boris responded.

She straightened and started toward the door. “Yeah—but only just before.” Iris disappeared into the post office proper. The front door dinged open and she engaged a customer, their conversation was muffled to Boris.

After one more glance at the newspaper, Boris returned David Birbour’s journal carefully to its place before plucking another random item off the shelf. This one was a solitary note detailing the disappearance of livestock over a year. The contents were dire, the author was obviously afraid of whatever had taken his animals. Within its contents there were chilling descriptions of slaughtered farm animals, each victim horrifically twisted and tied as if into a knot. It ended with the unnamed farmer’s plea for help since her last guard hound had been missing for days.

“Is there nothing pleasant in this entire collection?” Boris mumbled, returning the note. He checked his watch, knowing that his break was nearly over. Instead of gambling another nightmarish reading, he returned to the lounge chair and plopped down heavily. Burying his face into his hands, he tugged at his collar and undid his sleeves. The quiet was suffocating, Iris’ conversation with the customer faded into nothingness as the ticking of Boris’ wristwatch crescendoed into an impossibly loud shriek. He winced, the thunder of Berlin playing out like fine cinema behind his eyes. There was his comrade and brother-in-arms, a boy named Artyom, preparing to rush the steps of a building. He paused against the blackened shell of a destroyed tank, shouting at Boris to get down as lead flew through his skull, painting the metal. Boris reached for his comrade but could not reach him before his body slumped onto the ground. They had fought since Moscow, carving through the Nazis like butter only for it to end with a lucky ricochet. Enraged at his brother’s sudden passing, Boris rushed to the shadow-encased building. Within, dozens of fireflies sparked and twinkled as gravel leapt around his charging feet. No matter the circumstance, no matter the shrapnel lodged in his flesh, he would have revenge. Berlin would fall at his feet.

This scene had played out hundreds of times behind Boris’ eyes, but something new caught his attention as the steps enlarged. Within the abyss, the Nazis were already dead, twisted into grotesque totems around the furniture. Perhaps the most uncomfortable thing, though, was that the muzzle flashes were no longer fading. Like eyes from high off the ground, each one pointed at the same soul . . . Boris.

Covered in cold sweat, his alarm sounded, and the Sheriff snapped back into reality. Deciding then to sell his carbine as soon as possible, untrusting of his ability not to end this nightmare himself, he rushed out of the post office. Iris attempted a polite farewell, but Boris either did not hear or did not care.

Only one thing occupied his mind.

The Nantiinaq.