The forest was just starting to come alight with the first rays of the autumn sun.  Convoy had decided to prioritize speed over safety, and was rolling through the spooky-looking woods.  They had encountered an unknown, sizable number of SCP-363, “Not Centipedes,” at approximately 0330 hours.  Everyone scattered, grabbing a gun and a flare to help light their way and recognize each other.  Inevitably, however, they had gotten separated.
	“Hello?” the young woman called.  Tall, willowy, the 5'9 former Army helicopter mechanic pushed her way through the foliage and underbrush.  The trees were just starting to turn, radiant reds and oranges standing in counterpoint to the ACU camouflage pants she wore, and the blank tan tee-shirt.  She reaches for the radio on her belt, and keys it.  <<Dodridge, this is Cunningham, respond.>>
	Silence echoes back to her, the silence of the woods.  She swears, shifting the rifle in her hands as she feels the weight of the cold steel.  She looks from left to right, eyes scanning the woods for any trace of Convoy.  Privately, she wondered if she would ever see her group again.
	From behind, the short, sharp sound of a twig snapping.  With a quick breath, she turns around, rifle coming up as she barks a short command.  “Identify!”  Her voice, clear and precise, cuts through the eerily-silent woods.  Her breath rasps in her chest as she turns around, activating the mike again in a futile gesture.  <<Any, respond please. This is Cunningham requesting support.>>
	An answer comes, but not from the radio and certainly not from the source she expected.  “'Ello, poppet.”  The voice is sharp and grating, biting off the last syllable.  The source of that voice is a ropy body, spindly and almost impossible-looking, surmounted by a demonically-grinning carved pumpkin, lit from within by a demonic, hellish red glow.
	Save for those two words of greeting, the woods are silent.  A hand flies to the woman's chest.  “Fuck! You startled me...do you know where everyone is, Mr. Shank?”
	Shank's only response is silence.  His silence echoes that of the woods, blank and oppressive.  “Is...is everything okay...?” The woman tilts her head slightly.  Shank stares back into her eyes...so much malice lives there.  So much hatred.  The woman bites her lip.  “M-Mr. Shank...?”
	The brightest thing in the woods right now is the demonic grin of the one named Shank.  The rest of the world, in the peri-dawn light, seems to dim in comparison to the hatred, the raw, feral malevolence, issuing forth from Shank.
	“...About time I got ya alone, innit?”  The voice is horrible, gravelly, with a hint of Breton inflection.  Even more horrible is the fact that the pumpkin's terrifying grin does not move.  Her eyes go wide as Shank pulls a sickle from somewhere, reaching around to his back.  “Come along...”
	The lady trembles, swallowing, but stands her ground.  “Mr. Shank...please...let's talk,” she says, voice quavering.  “I don' think so,” he responds harshly, in that horrible British mockery.  “I've had ta put up wit ya chunterin on about tea an' Vance an' the kid an' that fuckin' cat.”  The sickle moves, steel flashing down.  “Talk is over.”
	The scything blade strikes home, scoring a long, shallow cut from Cunningham's cheek to her navel.  It wells and begins to bleed.  “I want you bleeding,” he seethes.  Cunningham cries out, in a shocked tone, “Please!  I've been nice to you, I trust you!” Her rifle comes up, stock pressing into her shoulder.  “Best thing, innit?” Shank says amusedly, as her finger squeezes home on the trigger.
	Shank cackles like a starved raven as the bullet passes through center mass, leaving behind little evidence of its passing.  In panic, she drops her rifle, jamming her hand on the radio switch.  <<Someone!  Anyone!>> Only silence responds to her desperate cry.  A high, shrill, inhuman cackle chases her as her path takes her on a winding journey, a leap over a brook and ducking to avoid smashing into a low-hanging tree.  Her lungs burn with exertion, blood flowing from the cut on her chest as she weeps, tears falling and soaking the ground.  Still, she runs.
	The laughter chasing her stops.  The whispering sound of leaves rises quickly in its absence as something leaps from trunk to trunk.  She ducks behind the dubious cover of a tree and frantically keys the radio.  <<Anyone, this is Jill!>> the panicked whisper emerges.  <<Shank...is hunting me, please...please respond!>>  The terror is evident in her voice, the fear of one who sees their death approaching.  Her radio answers back with a burst of static.  The figure cavorts through the air and whips itself around a tree branch, before landing right on top of Cunningham.
	She screams as the creature grabs her neck, chopping at her again and again with that sickle, blood staining the blade as she is cut deeply.  She looks at him with terror in his eyes, then fumbles for her lighter.  Her radio blats again, and a male voice can be heard under the static, but his words are unintelligible save for a <<-come back!>> in the middle.
	The sickle embeds itself in the tree after the sixth bloody strike.  As Shank pulls out a wicked-looking cleaver to continue his work, her shaking hands manage to get the lighter into position, and a flame takes root in the center of the demon's abdomen.  A voice, a real voice, far off in the woods, echoes the radio's call.  <<Cunningham, Harding, come the fuck back!>>  The demon screams as the fire lights.
	He screeches, the sound of a mis-tuned violin combining with the scratch of nails on a chalkboard as his arms split into two, then two again, each of the limbs holding a different blade  He strikes, and misses.  Cunningham scrabbles for her radio.  <<HELP!>> she screams, her terrified cry echoing across the forest.
	Immediately, the clear voice comes back.  It's male.  <<Harding responding!>> it cries, and the crash of underbrush is heard both across it and across the way.  She fumbles with her lighter again, but the wind from the demon's retreat puts out both the fire on the lighter and the flame in its body.  “JUS' DIE YA FUCKIN BINT,” he cries in frustration as he slashes forward.
	The wild flailing finds a pair of rusty scissors embedded in her neck.  Cunningham slumps against the tree, eyes wide with shock, but still clear.  She makes an odd choking sound as Shank says, “...Finally.”  The blades drop to the ground and he wrenches his sickle out of the tree, arms creaking back into place.
	Unable to react, Cunningham merely gazes with horror-stricken eyes as Shank puts his sickle behind his back, stooping to the ground to retrieve a smaller knife.  The demonic pumpkin and his wicked, short knife fill her field of view.  She screams as her world is rendered ultimately, irrevocably black as Shank, with an inhuman precision born of hours of grim practice, severs the optic nerves and cuts her fearful, brilliantly forest-hazel eyes from her skull.
	Her shrieks continue to fill the air as the demon puts those eyes into a pouch on its chest, laughing darkly.  “Thank 'ee, miss,” is the last thing she hears from him as he bounds away, leaving the air to fill itself with her cries and moans, trembling hands pawing at her face, whimpers of pain and raw, primal fear echoing through the crashing brush.
	Her radio, on her belt, barks out.  <<Cunningham!  Cunningham!  Fuck's sake, Jill, come back!>>  The panicked, fearful voice goes unanswered, however, she still busy with her pained exploration, her not-eyes darting this way and that, brain attempting to reason why it is no longer seeing.
	A significantly louder crash and grunt of exertion foretells Harding's entrance onto the scene.  SCAR-H rifle leveled and wearing a police officer's Kevlar, his eyes widen in shock as he sees Jill's collapsed form, fingers probing the empty sockets that used to hold eyes of a similar shade to Harding's own.
	His rifle clatters to the forest floor, barrel pointing accusingly in the direction of Shank's flight, a dark, admonishing finger.  Several quick footsteps and labored breathing indicates that he has drawn close to Jill, followed quickly by the sensation of being lifted.  She whimpers, fingers tracing her face.
	“Wh....why can't I see...?” she moans pathetically, the injured whine of a cat as she feels Harding's breath on her face.  It is a fortunate thing that the scissors missed her throat, else she would not have been able to talk at all.
	“Oh, god...oh god, Jill....” comes the equally-pathetic, low-pitched moan from the strong-feeling man holding her close.  “I....no...”  He refuses to address her question, or even to realize that it had been asked as he presses his body to hers and looks at her ruined, still-beautiful face; as if, by the very force of his will alone, he could restore the eyes so recently reft.
	“Hold me....” she whispers softly, hands seeking Harding's and winding around them, fingers interlacing with his as her eyebrows relax.  “Vance...”  His hands squeeze hers reassuringly, and he whispers futile, pathetic nothings at her, soon-to-be-broken promises of her safety and condition.  Though he refuses to believe it, Jill will surely die here, broken and bleeding.
	Her head finds his shoulder, and nuzzles against his neck.  If he disregards what he knows to be true, and ignores the blood staining his clothing, he can almost, almost imagine that they are back at camp, sharing a tender moment.
	He can feel her panicked heartbeat against his chest, and the labored, pained breathing from her lungs.  Both slow, settling into Vance's embrace and preparing themselves for the more permanent embrace of death.  “Vance...” she whispers, barely audible even in the utter stillness of the forest.  “I...I love you...don't let me go....”
	“Never ever,” comes the hoarse, choked voice from the man.  He sobs, hand moving to support the back of her head as he lifts her off of his shoulder, forcing himself once again to look at the ruins of her face.  He leans down, tendering the softest of kisses to her lips.  They force themselves into a pained mockery of a smile.
	“Ah...”  She sighs, and in that sigh, she breathes her last.  Life flees her frame as her face settles into its final repose.  Vance cradles her head for some moments longer, then lifts her slowly-cooling body in his arms and retraces his path...