Though, admittedly, you’ve also never been hunted before now, and you’ve no idea if your darting from tree trunk to tree trunk with the lightest steps you can muster strategy is working. You don’t know where you are or how much ground you’ve covered. The swamp brush all looks the same. And worse, you’ve no clue where the ol’ man Baker is. Telling from his last taunt, you’ve managed to gain some di-

"Sneaky thang, ain’tcha?"

Shit. He's closer than you'd thought. How in the fuck is he moving so damn fast?

You slow for a moment to survey your surroundings; gauging his distance, but the quiet crack of a stray twig makes your ears twitch. You dive against the nearest tree trunk, pushing your back to the bark opposite the sound and brace yourself as you listen for more.

Dammed if you can hear anything over the sound of your rapid heartbeat. You can only thank adrenaline for getting you this far.

Luckily, nothing jumps out at you. No sound nor sight disturbs your precarious hiding spot, and though your body aches and screams internally to stay put in the closest thing to safety it's experienced all night, your brain knows you won't truly be safe until you reach civilisation. So, with a half-steady breath, you start moving once more, your sore eyes darting to every nook and cranny as you go. In fact, the one thing you’re not looking at is the ground beneath your feet.

K-CHINK—CRUNCH

The harsh sound of metal slapping together and the wet breaking of what can only be flesh and bone breaking rings in your ears before a deafening, agony-ridden wail rattles through the trees so loudly you can only imagine flocks of birds taking flight to escape its ear-splitting volume.

As you crumble to the floor, you comprehend it's your scream, your flesh and blood—your leg—snapped within the jaws of a bear trap, and your body succumbing to the pain.

It’s not until your back is rested against crunching leaves, and you’re blinking up at the starry night sky that you realise you’d passed out from the pain.

Your leg is no longer ensnared by the bite of the bear trap's harsh, jagged maw, but you’re by no means free. Unnaturally cool fingers are clamped around your ankle, a stark but almost soothing contrast to the burn of your open wound, and the hot blood seeping out of it.

“Poor thang.” His twang makes you jump, your eyes locking with his cloudy grey eyes as you frantically try and fail to pull away from him. His icy grip is iron-clad. He’s smiling at you, which feels infinitely worse than any alternatives. “An’ jumpy too.”

When he starts to snap the fingers of his free hand just inches from your face, you seize your kicking in favour of reaching for him to claw and scratch and bite, but your touch against his is as effective as rain on rubber; your attacks simply roll right off.

"Do I have your attention?” He eventually asks as he easily shrugs you off.

“Fuck you, you fucking freak!” Your jab is as effective as your hits. Jack remains unfazed as he drags you across the ground, repositioning you until your wounded leg is stretched up high, the other anchored between his knees and the mud below you. Every curse and screech of objection ignored.

“You’re about to be a part of something wonderful." The worst comes to mind: that he’s about to snap your already brutalised leg in half or clean off maybe. Perhaps he’ll jam his fingers in it and start rooting around. What you don’t expect is for him to stick his cotton tongue out and start lapping at the blood.

Of all the horror you’d experienced tonight, watching the real-life myth of Jack Baker laving and swirling his tongue across the deep lacerations in your leg is the first thing to truly scare you stiff. You watch with wide eyes and a clamped jaw as he laps up every drop with a quiet, pleasured grumbles seeping from his chest with each lick. You flinching only when he bares his teeth and softly bites at the fat of your calf.

“NO—”

He’s fucking with you. Playing with his food; smiling around a mouthful of blood and even fucking winking when he finally pulls his head back, thankfully taking none of your leg with him. “That ain’t it, just gettin’ you cleaned up fer the real miracle.”

Whether it’s the blood loss, the horror of what you’d just experienced, or his clumsy attempt at fooling around, something has you feeling less on edge, if only enough that your heart rate has slowed to an almost normal pace for the time being. You wait, patience but apprehensive as he roots around for what you assume is his back pocket, and pulls out a little green bottle.

Drugs? Seasoning to pair with your gamey meat? You won't get far in your current state; maybe he’ll only take the one limb for tonight, and you can hobble away when he’s fattened himself on it.

Your eyes are getting heavy, dragging over his garish yellow button-up to his stomach; it's seemingly flat. His belly is what you’d wanted to examine, but your lethargic eyes droop to the swollen crotch in his khakis against your will.

Suddenly your fire returns, and though you know it’s useless, you start to struggle and swear once more, almost managing to kick the bottle from his hand before he can get a firm grasp on you again.

“Real feisty one, huh? Don’t know what's good fer ya.” He spits as he grits his teeth around the bottle lid to twist it open. Somehow able to keep you down with whatever ungodly strength he possesses. “Quit squirmin’, else I’m gonna have to put you down altogether.”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP, I AIN’T—” Whatever shit he just started splashing on your shin stings like an absolute… “MOTHERFUCKER!!”

As quickly as you’re consumed with blinding pain, it dissipates, not just to its formerly damaged state but to completely and miraculously healed. If not for the puffy, scarred skin left behind, you could be forgiven for thinking that you’d never been injured in the first place. The fuck kind of health insurance plan is this guy on?

Out of the corner of your eye, you see him watching you expectantly. Teeth still bared into a sharp smile, his eye and their blown-out pupils hungry. As you’d stilled in your shock, his hands had drifted further along your leg, his fingers drum against your soft thighs impatiently.

You won't apologise for struggling, nor will you thank him for fixing the problem he caused; if any of those are what he wants, then you'll be at an impasse, but you have a deep, instinctive feeling that he wants something else.

With ease, he starts to shift you both, displacing your other leg from between the lock of his knees. He parts your thighs, holding them open as he uses his still blood-stained teeth to nip and gnaw his way between your thighs.

“EMMM I don’t…” he doesn’t look up at you as you fumble for something to say, an excuse, an insult, anything. His sudden lack of interest in any part of you that isn’t in his sights makes it even harder to find the words. “… I should probably get back to running.”

“I ain’t lettin’ you go, cottontail.” His tongue is thick and still bright red. He unabashedly runs it along the seam of your clothed core before nuzzling into it, really getting comfortable. He takes a deep, hungry sniff and hums in approval at whatever he smells. “I caught ya. Now I get to eat ya.”