Jeff

I woke up in a dimly lit room. I felt weight on my hands and ankles. I don’t remember what happened exactly, all I can remember are blood-stained walls and my own hand covered in blood.

“Oh, I see you’ve awoken.” I looked up to see a woman in a lab coat. She walked closer to me with her notepad as she looked at me. “Tell me, do you remember anything?” I was still confused about everything. Why was I chained up? What happened. But the only thing I could say was. “Blood.”

Hearing my own voice at that point startled me. That isn’t my voice, at least it wasn’t before. The voice was rough, scratchy and sounded more like a growl or a snarl. “Good, seems you have kept some of your consciousness from before.” She scribbled something down in the notepad. “Bring in the mirror.”

They brought a mirror. It was fairly large compared to the men carrying it, but it seemed to be about my size, maybe even smaller. They set it down in front of me. It was still covered up by the silk to keep it from getting dusty, I guess. “Now, before we let you see yourself, we want you to be prepared.” “w……w…what?” I slowly pushed out in confusion. She gave out a sigh and started to explain.

“In short, you died in a gruesome attack on your family.” The mention of it gave me flashbacks. The blood around me, the 3 dead bodies flickered in my mind. The image made we roar as loudly as I could. “Calm down mister Calter.” “Jeff. My name is Jeff.” “Well calm down Jeff. We are truly sorry about what happened, btu we must prepare you for what’s about to come.” I tried to calm myself, but the rage still remained/.

“As I said before, you died.” She paused to see if I’d rage out again. “And, as we had encountered and realised from few experiments, we found out that the so called ‘cryptids’ are real.” I guess my confusion could be read on my face. “Cryptids are… I guess in simple terms, they are monsters. Ferocious, dangerous and creatures of our nightmares.” That simple explanation seemed to work for me. “Now for the sad part… You Jeff…. You have been reborn as a cryptid.” As she said that, I looked down at my hands… I could not recognise them anymore. My hands looked more like talon with 5 sharp claws. They seemed to function as my hands before, but they felt completely different.

“Why?” “Why were you reborn as a Cryptid? That exactly is our experiment, what causes cryptids to be born and how to stop it from happening again. We still know very little, but what we do know is that Cryptids need 3 things to be born.” I lifted my head and looked at her to be able to hear all she ha to say better. “First, they have to die in or near a forest, like the one behind your house. It doesn’t matter how big it is, as long as you can be hidden from anyone’s sight. Second, the creature has to have died well before it’s time. This one is a lot harder to understand, but we genuinely believe it means people with a lot of life force.”

“Life force…” I seemed to understand what she meant. I and my family were outgoing and always happy with our lives. We might have not had a mansion or all the best stuff, but we loved our lives and each other. We could always camp, or hike and we were always together. It was more than anyone like me could ever want.

“And then there is one last thing. The most important thing. The death has to happen in a way where the creature is full of anger, regret or pure rage towards its direct or indirect killer.” Another image flashed in my head. I saw multiple men with bats in hand, but their faces were a blur to me. “Now that you’ve heard all of that, I will remove the sheet so you can see what you look like right now.” As the sheet fell, it revealed my current predicament.

I used to be a tall man, easily over 6feet, but when I saw the scale behind me, I was amazed. I stood 14feet tall creature even being slumped over. My legs were bent as if I’m preparing for a pounce. There were claws on my hands and legs. My whole body was fairly thin in compared to my height, but it didn’t feel weak in any way. My whole skin was in a dark blue colour, in a dimmer light it would seem black. But the thing that freaked me out the most was my face. Everything about my face screamed monster. My face looked like that of a rotting predator’s carcass. It had holes all over the place and it looked like the skin had already left it. My eyes seemed like they were deep in the eye sockets, and they gleamed in a strong crimson red. My nose and ears could not be seen, they were just holes in the head. And my mouth… it never truly closed. It was filled with teeth sharp as a knife. I couldn’t even recognize myself in the mirror.

“As you see, you have become something completely different. I understand that this is quite a shock to you, but we would like to run some tests if it’s okay with you.” I looked away from the monstrosity in my reflection. “Okay.” I said, trying to sound as little of a monster as I could.

They ran some tests to see my reaction, speed and power. By their reactions I presume I tested off the charts. “Seems like your tests came back quite remarkable.” I looked at her. “Thank you… doctor.” She looked at me with a soft gaze. “Clara, you can call me Clara.” I looked at her soft eyes and they made me feel at ease.

Clara was the doctor I met when I first woke up and the doctor who led me through this whole ordeal. She looked fairly young but mature for her age. She looked like she was in her mid-20’s with fair white skin and dark hair. The hair where always either in a ponytail or some sort of a hairstyle tightly knitted together.

….

It’s been about 3 months since I reincarnated… was reborn… transformed… or anything else you’d like to say, into this creature. When I asked Cara about this, she said that as far as they figured out is that this is soul’s rebirth into something that can finish what the last host couldn’t.

Today was the 1^st time that they wanted me to go out on a mission with them. “You want me to go out?” I had regained my ability to speak full sentences by the end of the 1^st day, but it took a while to make it comprehensible for the other people around. “Oh jeff, there are more cryptids like you out there, but most of them aren’t as friendly as you and a lot of them aren’t even able to communicate, since they came from a beast dying.” “So, you want me there as a guard dog.” Clara gave a chuckle “no, we want you as a member of our team to protect the humanity. While we do wish to protect the humans, if there is a possibility, I would be happy if you could stop the cryptid without killing it, or even fighting.” I gave it a thought. “I used to be in the military… I guess this is just an extension of that career.” I chuckled and Clara laughed with me.

….

We drove for a few hours, btu when we reached our goal, I recognised the forest just outside of my own hometown. It was the late autumn; the leaves were falling everywhere, and the chill had filled the air. It was the first time I was outside after winding up in the laboratory. I sniffed the air, to feel the fresh air circulate in through my body. As I took a deep breath, I could smell everything in the forest. I could smell the men around me, the perfume miss Clara was wearing and every creature in the forest.

“How do you like the fresh air?” “it’s… refreshing.” I looked around at the beautiful orange leaves still on the trees and those who are falling or already fallen. “It’s beautiful here. What are we looking for?” “It truly is. And I would love to keep it like this. We are here to stop a Cryptid who has been seen around these parts. We haven’t heard anything about it killing anyone, but we would like to keep it like that.” I took a whiff of the air and tried to see if I can smell the cryptid. “I don’t smell anything around here.” “It’s because the cryptids can hide their smells. You are doing it right now. It’s an instinctive action. Let’s head out, we were told that the creature is north from here.”

We walked about an hour, Clara told me that the first cryptid she ever saw almost killed her. She believes that it was a cryptid of her neighbour who had been killed by gangs on his way back. That’s what made her want to learn, why they are made, how to stop them from being made and if maybe there is a way to control the rebirth so that people wouldn’t lose their dear family.

As she started to talk about her family a bit more, I sensed something watching us. “It’s here.” Clara was startled by that. “You can see it?” “No, but it sees us. Tell everyone to circle and wait for me.” I dashed towards where I felt the gaze come from before anyone could say anything. It took almost no time to find the cryptid, it was just sitting there in the tree, waiting.

The creature was a lot smaller than me, it laid and moved on all four. It had claws as sharp as mine and fangs smaller, but they had a weird gleam to them. The creature snarled at me but climbed down the tree. It circled me for a while, sniffing the air around me. I didn’t make a move, but never lost eye contact. “I wish you no harm.” I said in as calm of a voice I could muster.

The creature gave out something between a bark and a roar. “You are one of them.” “You can talk? So, you were human.” “I was human, and I was happy, till they came.” That confused me. “Who came? Who are they?” “Your masters, the ones who are putting a leash on you.” The creature spit out a wile substance from his mouth. It seemed to burn the ground. “They are not my masters, we are a team, all they want to do is help.” The beast roared a loud laughter. “A team, then have they let you out on your own? Have they truly shown what they’re doing? No, because to them you are just a weapon, a pet monster to use for their own need. I was almost like you, but I managed to escape. I still remember what they did.”

The creature was making me think. Were they really my teammates or did they just want me to think so? Can I truly trust these people? I looked at the creature. “I presume you can see them now, can we talk while they are away?” The creature looked at Clara who was still being circled by the military. “I guess.”

We sat down on the ground, I almost doubled the creature in size, but it didn’t really matter. “You see, I awoke before they could get to me. They reached me just as I awoke, so they couldn’t touch me. They tried to convince me, just like they did to you, that they want to help. But I remembered what happened when I was still alive. I remembered the smells, the faces.” This struck me, for no matter how much I remembered my past life, I could never remember anything about the attackers that killed me and my family. “They came in one night when my family were at home. They wielded bats and shocking sticks.” As she told her story, I could see my own attack in my head.

“They started with our children. They beat them over and over, and over again while the others held me and my husband in place.” The sadness could be heard even in the roughness of her voice. “I screamed and yelled, I pleaded and begged, but to no avail. They were here on a mission, they were here to make cryptids.” My own mind filled with images of my family, how happy we were and how it all turned into hell that one evening. “They kept beating and pummelling our little ones till they stop screaming and their faces were unrecognisable.”

“After our two daughters were killed, they started on me. It seemed they wanted my husband more than me. They wanted him to be stronger. They raped me, beat me, shocked me till I was but inches from death. They made my beloved watch me slowly bleed out and die.” The images in my mind started to become more precise and the faces started to lose their blur one after another. “Then as I laid there, I saw my husband, beaten, shocked and tormented. I held on for my dear life, looking into my husband’s eyes so that he wouldn’t feel alone.” The images in my head cleared out completely, and that’s when the creature said. “I still miss and love him, I hope you’re safe Jeff.”

That last phrase stunned me. It shook everything in me as I realised who this creature was. That was also the moment all of my memories came back, and I saw… Clara entered the house right as I was blacking out and dying. Last thing I heard before dying was. “Good job everyone, this should give us a powerful weapon.”

“Jane.” I said with sadness and joy in my heart. My eyes tried to produce tears, but I guess this form didn’t have any of that. The creatures head jolted upwards. “How do you know that name?” I looked town at her, I looked at the creature who had once been my wife. “Jane, that’s the name of my wife, that’s your name.” the creature walked towards me. “Jeff? How could this be.” “They got to me in time. They somehow manipulated my memories. I believed they were there to help me.” Jane got up on 2 legs and gave me a hug. “They can’t hurt you anymore. They can’t lie to you anymore.” I embraced her back. “The government can’t control us anymore. We don’t have to fear them anymore.”

We broke off our embrace. Janes eyes lit up green and she growled out. “Now it’s time for them to fear us.” As she said that, she bolted towards Clara and the others. I tried to follow her as fast as I could, btu because she was moving on all four and more accustomed to the forest, I trailed far behind, by the time I had reach her, she has massacred everyone, except for Clara. She was sitting down on the ground, cowering as she looked on to Jane. “Jeff, Jeff, you have to help me.” She begged me to help her. I looked her dead in the eyes and said. “Jeff.” I took a step closer. “Jane.” Took another. “Jully”. I was almost next to her. “Anna” I was right in front of her face by this point. “I don’t know what you mean. Who…” before she could finish, I roared. “DON’T LIE TO ME! You know who they are, you organized the death of all of them.” “No, NO! I didn’t do anything like that, that creature, it… it has the power to control your memories.” I put my talon against Clara’s throat. “That creature is my lovely wife JANE!” and in one simple move, I ripped off her head. I returned to my wife. “Sweetie, are you okay?” Jane came to me and snuggled into my arms. “I am now, now that you are here with me.” I embraced her. “Now, I remember where I was being kept. If they wanted a monster, I will give them a monster.”