This story all began in a small city in New Jersey, nearing the Pine Barrens forest, also just known as “The Pines”. Known for its haunted nature and years of history. A boy named Mateo Roberts had grown up in that town for years, nearing his mid twenties he needed to find a new job. Having gotten fired from his previous strange jobs by the owners who believed he was no longer fit to work there. He is hired by wildlife services in “The Pines” more known as “Pine Barrens”, to locate injured or lost campers and keep them safe until extraction.

Mateo was driving along the uneven road made of stones and slowly dispersing into a loose dirt path into the woods. Soon he would have to leave his car at the bottom of a tower for the next month, not being permitted to use it unless absolutely necessary. He is assigned a fire watch tower that he will stay at, his roommate being a fire watcher and him being a camper retriever and medic. No worker is permitted to stay over two months in a row, the wildlife services believing more social interaction is needed to not go insane being isolated from society.

Mateo headed up the tower, it being around 60 feet high on a somewhat tall hill. He arrived at the top, standing at the edge admiring the view from the top. What he saw was a deep green pine forest, dark blue rivers lining through the trees, and fog beginning to form light clouds around the lower trees as it got later in the day. He headed inside the tower top where the one-room bedroom would be that he would share with his roommate. As he walked inside, he saw another man sitting on a bed, across the room was an empty dull looking section of room. A bed with a dusty white bedspread, like an old canvas color, a caramel brown nightstand, and an old lamp with a pull string. As he examined the room, he turned back towards his new roommate holding a hand out to shake his hand. As his roommate stood up, handing him a piece of paper instead. 

“These are the job regulations for living in this tower and surviving the wildlife in these woods.” His roommate said as Mateo held the paper, staring at it then back at him.

 “What's your name anyways? I'm Mateo Roberts.” He said, looking at him once again.

“That information is on a need to know basis, and I already know your name.” His roommate spoke, sending an uncomfortable feeling waving over Mateo.

Mateo silently headed to his side of the room, feeling uncomfortable around this new roommate who he practically had no information about. He took off the dusty white bedspread, putting on new sheets he had brought. Sitting on the bed looking back towards the regulations paper he had so easily forgotten about. He leaned towards the old nightstand reaching out for the list, grabbing it, leaning back against his bed as he read them. 

They read as follows, #1 Don’t trust voices you hear in the woods that sound familiar. #2 If you see one of the ‘people’ in the woods, but your instincts tell you to run, trust your instincts and get back to your tower as fast as you can if they spot you. #3 Do not trust your roommate at night, Always check your nightstand clock to get the accurate time of when to ignore them. 11pm-7am is when you should not trust anyone. #4 If you by chance find an injured camper, bring them to your fire watch tower and leave them at the top till morning. #5 Do not try to call anyone inside the woods, there's no cell service, the voice you hear is a lie. #6 If you hear the forest go silent suddenly, you need to hide or get inside your tower as soon as possible. This can happen at any time, inside the forest or at your tower.

Mateo stared at the rule list, a horrified expression on his face as he slowly put it back on the nightstand. He looked towards his roommate, thinking it was some sort of sick joke they pull on new hires. But his roommate looked back with a serious facial expression, motioning towards the regulations.

“I suggest you follow those rules carefully, I follow the same ones.” His roommate said as he turned back to his book.

Mateo checked the time on the clock, it was nearing 11pm, he hadn’t realized time was passing so quickly as his eyes glared back to his roommate. He scooted back in his bed pulling cards out of his bag, shuffling them to keep himself busy. As soon as it hit 11pm, he avoided looking up from his bed at all to avoid engaging with what could be his roommate, or what could be something else. As he laid there, he heard strange noises coming from his roommates side of the cabin. He was trying his hardest to not acknowledge it as he rolled over, facing the wall forcing himself to fall asleep…

As he woke, he smelled the pine scented wind drifting through the now open windows in the tower’s cabin, a nostalgic smell since he grew downwind of the Pine Barrens as a child. Mateo sat up from his bed looking around the cabin, not seeing his roommate who he assumed was out on their daily route of the woods. As he stood, deeply inhaling the air, that day was a thrashing windy day with heavy fog out in the pines. It was expected with the upcoming spring bringing in lots of moisture and the rivers newly evaporating ice and water.

Mateo began to get ready, getting himself dressed in his work uniform. Not that it would matter much, no one could enforce the uniform onto him. He headed down the tower stairs, watching the bright sunrise bring a calming feeling over the foggy forest tops, yet something felt menacing and off putting in the forest. As he reached the bottom he double checked his pack that he had everything with him, once he had finished he began to walk towards the dense forest that greeted him outside of the clearing.

He walked the dense forest path, through the low fog that still lingered throughout the trunks of the forest. Mateo used a flashlight to navigate the path as it was still very early morning where the sun was not fully up yet. As he walked he began to feel uneasy, like something was watching him from the fog. He continued to walk, soon turning his flashlight off coming to a stop, he heard something in the woods where there was no path. Mateo grabbed a hatchet from his bag and began walking through the brush towards the noise, trying to make as little noise as he could as to not alert a potential predator.

He slowly approached the noise, it getting louder as he crept towards it. It didn’t sound like any predator he knew roamed these woods, but his instincts were on fire telling him to run. He ignored his instincts telling him to run, as he reached the edge of a small clearing, seeing a group of people facing away from him. They looked pale and sickly, but their talking amongst each other sounded incoherent, like they had all reached pure insanity. Mateo slowly took a step backwards, and lucky him, he stepped on a branch causing it to snap under his weight. As the crack echoed throughout the forest clearing, every one of the “people” turned towards him, they looked hollow, pale, sickly, they had sunken eyes but a maniac grin was plastered on every single one of their faces.

Mateo began to panic, his heart racing as they all began walking towards him and he realized he had broken one of the most important regulations. To never acknowledge the “people” that roamed the woods unless his instincts gave him no indication to escape or fight. Mateo turned, sprinting through the broken brush he had hacked down, towards the main path, hopefully leading back to his tower. He ran as fast as he could, stumbling over fallen trees and rocks. He could hear them following close behind, just far enough to not be able to reach him. Mateo made it to the foot of his tower, making a break for it up multiple stairs at a time. He was hoping they wouldn’t follow, but in his mind he assumed they would watch him in case he slipped up on the rules again. He was praying this was just a sick joke they played on the new hires of the wildlife services.

That night he sat in his bed, holding a book he had brought to read in the 2 months he would be there. He looked at the time, realizing his roommate hadn’t ever come back into the tower. But there he was, sitting in his bed, staring directly at Mateo. Mateo shot his eyes back down to the book cover, he was trembling as they sat there in silence. Soon his roommate began to make strange noises and contorted his body into strange, unnatural positions. Mateo stared down at the covers, not wanting to acknowledge the thing that was impersonating his roommate. 

He was trying to remember the last time he saw his real roommate. And he hadn’t in at least 15 hours. He saw his roommate last that morning, around 7:30 am at sunrise. It was mind blowing how his roommate hadn’t even come back for a rest, or even food or water. He hoped his roommate was alright, being in the woods with those ‘things’ that impersonated what appeared to be people. The thing impersonating his roommate soon went silent, and soon enough Mateo began to drift off into sleep as well.

Mateo woke around 8am, the morning spring breeze bringing the scent of pine filling up the cabin. He looked around, his roommate nowhere to be found, presumably left early or never came back. Mateo stood from his bed, stretching as he walked towards the windows of the cabin. Looking out into the pines, spreading as far as the eye could see, leaves flying through the wind, deep blue rivers slowly melting from the harsh winter like the color of polished sapphires, the dark green spines of all the trees. But what was best of all would be the sunrise, a bright orange and yellow, with mixes of other colors all throughout the sky that morning, like a jewel he could never reach.

He couldn’t believe that this forest was somehow haunted like he had been told, but remembering the prior day, he could understand it all fine. From above, it looked like a beautiful forest, a beautiful place to live. But inside the trees, everything was foggy, cold, and dark. The forest told a lie, yet only some would ever uncover, the ones practically sent to survive this living nightmare that surrounded the depths of this forest.

He got ready to survive another day in the forest, he headed down the tower stairs, towards a different path this day, a more populated one where campers enjoyed to hike. Mateo slowly approached the path, deeply inhaling the scent of pine, but also had a sense of dread washing over him. As he approached the path, walking towards it, into the depths of the forest. He walked for a long time, quietly humming to himself as he listened to the sounds of the forest, making sure to do all of his rounds on every known path, some un-marked as well. Most likely foot trails made by campers taking shortcuts towards areas they liked.

He heard the forest go silent, no chirping of birds, no crickets, no skittering of animals. It was just, silent, and he knew what this meant. He looked around quickly, sprinting towards a fallen log, with what looked like a small hole space dug under it, with brush surrounding it. He slid himself into the hole, covering himself with brush and debris from fallen branches. Mateo listened, trying to stay as quiet as possible and hide his heavy breathing from whatever was out there. He knew either a large predator had approached the area, or the things found him again. He hoped and prayed that it was a predator passing through.

As he laid there, sweating bullets, covering his mouth as he tried to mask his heavy breathing. He heard a scurry of footsteps approaching, they sounded somewhat normal, but his instincts were on fire to fight whatever was out there or flee. He peeked out from the brush, it was them again. But they felt different this time, more intense fear was washing over him, these ones felt more dangerous than the last. They looked almost no different, the same dull eyes, gray monotoned skin, somehow looking alive but not at the same time. Mateo stared towards the dirt, trying to bring his mind elsewhere, they would know if he was acknowledging their group. And he doubted they would make the same mistake of letting him go a second time.

He laid there, flat under the brush, thorns from the tree branches and dead ivy surrounding him. Mateo kept his eyes shut tight, trying to think of anything but the “people'' following him. He heard them searching for whatever they had sensed was watching them, presumably him when he first acknowledged their presence outside of his hiding place. Soon enough it sounded like they had scurried off, hopefully far away from him for as long as possible. He sat up, pushing the dead ivy, branches, and other things he had used to disguise himself in the ground. As he stood, he looked around hoping he hadn’t been tricked, wiping dirt and leaves off of his pants and out of his hair.

Mateo quickly grabbed his pack again, making sure they hadn’t taken anything from him, since he had failed at realizing he left his bag outside of his hiding space. Once he finished double checking the pack, he headed back off deeper into the woods, wondering if he’d see any real people today instead of just the ones hunting him. As he walked he heard rustling in a small clearing with leaf cover from above, his instincts didn’t tell him to run, but rather that someone or something needed help.

Mateo walked towards the clearing, cautious in case this was just a trick of the “people” again. But he wasn’t sure his instincts would tell him to go towards something that he assumed was dangerous. As he approached he slowed more, coming to a stop behind a tree looking into the clearing. He saw a few people sitting around a small campfire, they all looked very skinny and malnourished, as if they’d been out there for weeks. Mateo approached calling out to them, 

“Hey are you all alright? I'm with wildlife services!” Mateo called out, hoping they wouldn’t get spooked by the sudden yelling.

He saw some of them visibly jump when he called out, they turned and they looked relieved as they stood but began to stumble, they were visibly weak and most likely very hungry and thirsty. Mateo kneeled down grabbing water and snacks out of his pack, handing them to the people there.

“We need to get you all out of here fast, these woods aren't safe.” Mateo said as he grabbed his phone from his pack, texting his boss that they needed the extraction team to get these people out of the woods. He stood there holding the phone as the people ate and drank as much as they could. He let them eat as much as they’d want because he assumed they’d had little to none in the past few weeks.

“Make sure you don't eat or drink yourself into getting sick.” Mateo said, looking at them, sitting down by them until the extraction team responded to him to get the people back to the towers.

They soon set out towards the towers, Mateo having given them jackets so they wouldn’t continue to freeze in the newly ending winter wind. They soon arrived at the tower, him leading them up the stairs, letting them take lots of breaks since it was a very high climb. He made sure to stay with them the whole time, wanting to keep them safe. When they reached the top of the tower, he let them sit on his bed giving them new clothes and each a blanket. Soon the extraction team came, leading them all down the tower and into a car to bring them out of the forest.

Mateo watched from outside the tower, those people were lucky to survive and even more lucky to make it out of the forest alive. He looked up, watching the sunset, bathing the sky in purples, reds, and other warm colors. Mateo sat on the edge watching the sunset, he heard the stairs shaking the tower lightly seeing his roommate returning to the tower. 

“Hey where have you been?” He called down to his roommate, his legs hanging off the edge of the railing as he looked down at him.

“In the woods, got caught up with the “people”, they had a problem with what our jobs are doing” His roommate called back up to him shrugging as he soon walked inside the tower

Mateo soon went back into the tower as well, cleaning up the mess from keeping the people inside. He didn’t mind having to clean after them, it was his job to care for them after all. Mateo continued to clean, having small talk with his roommate, he didn’t talk much otherwise.

Soon he got the chance to sit down, laying flat on his bed looking up at the ceiling with a heavy sigh. He stared up at the ceiling thinking about that day, how many real people were actually out in those woods that he hadn’t saved yet. Mateo looked towards the clock, it had hit 11pm. He sighed, rolling to face away from his roommate, knowing they both followed the rules to a tee even if it meant ignoring the real roommate. Mateo had begun to understand that no matter what he needed these rules to survive the forest. He still had a little less than 2 months left in his term there. With as little human interaction as he had, he was surprised that he was still completely sane. Well, mostly sane at least with the things he’d already experienced, he couldn't even imagine what he’d see in the next few months.

Mateo drifted off to sleep, wondering what would await him the next day in this horrifying reality. A few hours later he woke up to the sound of thunder and rain pelting the roof of the tower. He groaned, knowing no matter the weather he’d have to go out and patrol his usual path and all the ones he mapped that were made by campers and hikers as shortcuts. Mateo slid out of his bed, getting into clothing suited for rainy weather, wearing a wind and raincoat along with it. He hated being wet, let alone in a humid and cold forest where there weren't any dry spots he could wait under. He grabbed an umbrella, heading down the tower with the umbrella held above him, he knew it wouldn't be able to fit through some spots of the tight woods though. He hoped that the rain would die down before the sun fully rose so it wouldn’t get even more humid. 

When it did it felt like he was breathing water in a hot room, like a sauna out in the woods. He couldn’t wait for the weather to calm down as he walked, trying to not slip and break his ankle in the mud and stones. He hoped that it wouldn’t cause a mudslide with trees in it like it had many times before, it was pretty much a swamp after all. During the summer his job would be even more difficult because you’d have to trudge through a wet, dingy swamp in some areas while trying to not trip over uncovered roots or be attacked by mountain lions in others. Occasionally Mateo ran into one of the few remaining ghost towns in the Pine Barrens, usually he avoided them though since he didn’t want to disturb what was pretty much New Jersey history.

He remembered the things that had hunted him when he first began, were they the lost residents of the Pine Barren ghost towns? Or were they just figments of his imagination that were haunting him, trying to get him out of the forest. He looked from the tree line into one of the ghost towns, wondering what came of those people who were there before the place was abandoned. Soon he went back into the woods, continuing to check his usual paths.

When he heard the forest go quiet, that's when he began to panic again. He had only experienced them a few times and every time he had escaped. This time he wasn’t so sure he could, he was deep in their ‘territory’, too close to the towns for their comfort. Maybe they were the lost people of those ghost towns, lost to the forest. And maybe he would be next, even if he wasn’t a resident of those towns, he would be a resident of the forest for another 2 months.

Mateo’s eyes darted around him, deep into the tree line, the silence only seemed to grow. It became more deafening by the second, he knew they were coming, the forest never went this quiet otherwise. He darted towards the denser forest, perhaps he could lose them in the deeper harder to navigate woods. He hoped he wouldn’t slip on the swampy ground, as his shoes got caught every so often, almost ripping them off of his feet. As he ran for the largest tree he saw, climbing up it using the branches that could hold his weight, trying to avoid snapping them so it wouldn’t be too obvious or too loud.

He could hear them approaching, not clearly but he knew it. The sound of branches just being shoved aside to make way for the creatures coming after him. The sound of running as if it was on dry winter ground, and not the swampy spring mud that would’ve made any normal person trip up at least once or twice. Mateo sat at the thickest branch of the tree, hoping it could hold his weight for what was most likely a long time to come.

He saw them approaching, huddling against the tree, trying to think of anything but them. To avoid them noticing him, he had to avoid acknowledging them even in the slightest or else they would know. He wasn’t sure how they did but based on what he’s experienced and heard from his roommate, they always knew even if they never came after the person. Mateo leaned back against the trunk of the tree, he couldn’t stop his instincts from making him think about it, his fight or flight was on and there was no way he was turning it off without actually escaping the threat.

Mateo closed his eyes tight, huddling himself into a ball, he could hear them surrounding the tree. They had found him and he knew it, he prayed and hoped they couldn’t climb trees but it never went his way, did it? Mateo heard clawing at the bottom of the tree, nails digging into the mushy bark, tearing it off then nails dug into the trunk. He heard them climbing up the tree, Mateo knew if he stayed here, it would certainly mean his doom. He stood, balancing himself on the branch, almost falling when he saw the people climbing. They looked more grotesque than the ones farther away from the abandoned villages. He panicked looked around, hoping there was another tree he could get in to be able to escape.

To his luck for once, he saw a tree only a few feet from his own branch. He hoped the branch he was heading for could hold his weight. But as we’ve seen, nothing ever goes Mateo's way, except for maybe this once. Mateo caught onto the branch hearing light cracking as he pulled himself onto it. He hoped he could for once have a decently good grip strength, the adrenaline in his blood helped as well. He saw the monsters had seen him jump, but they weren’t fast enough. Mateo jumped out of the tree, making a sprint for it into the deep woods, away from the abandoned villages.

He ran for what seemed like hours, but in reality it had only been minutes. And he knew he was most likely not going to be able to survive these woods. Mateo could hear them approaching, the same sounds as before, crackled branches being shoved aside, the sound of running on hard ground, the smash against damp trees if they took one misstep. 

Mateo’s adrenaline rush was starting to wear off, he could feel every ache, pain, the nausea, and definitely the injuries he had sustained when jumping off of a near 30 foot tree. He could feel every missed step into a sharp rock or thorn, his stamina was wearing thin. If he didn’t make it to his tower now, he didn’t know if he ever would.

As he sprinted he began tripping on dense wet roots, sharp jagged rocks, whatever was there. Like it was a purposeful move by the forest to prevent him from escaping. The creatures loomed ever closer as he ran, like he could never out run them. But he wouldn’t go down without a fight for his life, and probably the last day of his life. Mateo could hear them looming inches away, pretty much teasing him knowing they could easily catch him. As he tripped one final time, he went tumbling down a rocky hill into a shallow creek at the bottom.

The creatures watched from above, making a sound that sounded like laughter, they were mocking him for his efforts. As Mateo struggled to stand, the wind picking up lashing around him, he couldn’t keep his balance. Not with the thrashing wind and now leaves being thrown around him by it. As he fell to the ground, he knew it was over. This really would be his last day alive in these woods…

Mateo died that day, like many other forest rangers sent into this forest and campers who had been lost to supposed animal attacks. In reality, it was these creatures that stalked people down until they went insane. Mateo was ripped from his family, friends, and his roommate that he had begun to grow fond for. Now he was another spirit, roaming these woods to continue the cycle, as new forest rangers were sent in. The more died by his and the other hands, he wondered who was their real leader, they seemed to just think in a hive-like mindset. Days, weeks, months, years passed as Mateo stayed there, he didn’t know how long it had actually been since his premature death. But even as his new spirit-like self, he knew he could never return to normal life even if he were somehow revived. 

And he accepted that, he needed these woods just like it now needed him.