Kaelen's eyes slowly blinked open as he felt himself being lowered down to the ground. He felt groggy and had to rub the sleep from his eyes before he could see very well. The sun was so low in the sky that it hid behind the mountains, but painted the sky a vibrant red-orange. As Kaelen was propped up against a tree, he could hear the trickling sounds of water running through a stream in the distance. He could also hear voices from far away but couldn't make out what they were saying. The boy tried to look through the dimly lit forest towards the sounds, but a wiry, gray skinned body blocked his view.

"Where are we?" Kaelen asked, looking up at the hideous creature's sad eyes.

It didn't give one of its characteristic moans, instead remaining silent as it reached a misshapen hand out to touch the boy's face. It ran its thin fingers down his cheek and pushed its forehead against his, closing it's milky blue eyes. Kaelen blinked up at it curiously.

One of the voices in the distance shouted out loud enough that Kaelen could hear his own name being called. He craned his head around the creature to look through the trees behind it. The forest was steadily growing darker as the sun set, but far off in the distance, Kaelen could see the piercing light of flashlights searching through the thick woods for him.

"I'm here!" Kaelen shouted out, hoping they would hear him.

The creature began to breathe fast, ragged breaths and let out a pained whimper, suddenly pulling the child close to it in an embrace. Kaelen looked at the side of its head as it buried its ugly face in his shoulder.

"It's okay, they found me. I can go home now." Kaelen smiled and hugged the creature back, but it cried a pitiful noise making the child frown.

The voices of people looking for Kaelen drew closer and he could hear one of them shout that they thought they heard him calling. He watched the lights flicker through the trees as they continued to search before looking back at the creature, which was silently sobbing in jerky motions as it clung to him.

"I'll miss you too. But I have to go home now. My mommy and daddy are waiting for me. Please let me go home," Kaelen whispered softly to it, patting the creature's back to try and comfort it.

Slowly, it pulled away from him, looking at the child one last time. Kaelen looked into its foggy eyes and saw a pleading loneliness staring back at him. It made him too sad to look for very long, so he stood up and kissed the creature on its forehead.

"I love you and I'll miss you. Thank you for helping me." Kaelen heard the creature give one last, long, sorrowful moan before the shouting of the search party grew close enough that he knew that his friend had to leave.

Kaelen turned away and started to run towards the voices and lights streaming through the trees. The sun had gone completely down by the time he came into view of the first person. As their flashlight fell upon Kaelen, lighting him up in all his dirty, scraped up glory, the stranger shouted loudly to the rest of the group.

"I found him! He's alive!" The man ran over to Kaelen and scooped the child up in his arms, turning around to head back to the rest of the group that were now slowly emerging through the trees to the same spot.

Kaelen looked over the man's shoulder to scan the trees for his friend, but couldn't see anything but the tall lines of black tree trunks making up the forest. He continued to stare into the woods as people surrounded him, the sounds of voices thanking God and walkie talkies crackling into the night to notify others that the boy had been found safe and sound filling his ears.

"Let's get him back to his parents back at camp," one of the voices said as Kaelen was passed from one set of arms to another.

As they wrapped a blanket around him and carried him back through the woods, lots of unfamiliar faces crowded him and asked him questions, but Kaelen didn't answer any of them. His eyes were focused at the base of the trees he'd come from. Even when he was offered a bottle of water to sip on, he took it and raised it to his mouth slowly, spilling it on the front of his shirt before making it to his lips because his eyes were locked on the forest.

Eventually the search party made it back to Kaelen's parents at their campground. He heard his mother cry out and finally broke his gaze from where he'd come from to look at her as she ran to him.

"Mommy!" He opened his arms out to her as she threw hers around him.

"Are you okay, baby? Tell me you're alright, Kaelen!" She said frantically, squishing him tightly in her embrace as his father joined them with Ryla sleeping in his arms.

"I'm okay, Mommy," Kaelen's voice was muffled against her shoulder as she cried.

"It's okay now, he's alright. He's home safe," Kaelen heard his father say, reassuring her and wrapping one arm around them both.

His whole family embraced each other and Kaelen felt his fear melt away as the exhaustion set in. His parents voices lulled him to sleep in his mother's arms while the search party celebrated and the police and EMT's made sure everything was alright. Kaelen slept through all of it, letting his body and mind rest from the traumatic events and forgetting about everything for one brief, sweet moment.

----- --- -----

Asher and his wife had seriously considered cutting the camping vacation short and going home early after their son's disappearance, but since they had found him safe and healthy and he insisted that he didn't want to leave, they went ahead and stuck it out for the rest of the planned trip. They did, however, refuse to let him or their young daughter out of their sight for even a single second after that. Kaelen didn't seem to mind though, he stuck close to his mother's skirt and didn't show any interest in exploring by himself at all now that he was back. If he wanted to go look at something, he held tightly to his mother's hand and made her come with.

Despite all the dread and worry that had started their camping trip off, Asher and his family were actually enjoying their vacation now that everyone was together again. They had played in the creek together and cooked hot dogs over the fire and now they were currently going on a hike together through the forest, careful to stick to the trail, of course.

"Look, Daddy, over here!" Kaelen looked up at his father and pointed to a small plant growing just off the side of the dirt path.

It looked rather ordinary to Asher, so he raised an eyebrow at his son as the boy pulled on his hand and dragged him over to it. "What is it?" he asked Kaelen.

"Look under the leaves, there are berries you can eat." Kaelen's father watched as the youth bent over and plucked some blueish-purple berries and held them out for him to try.

"Are you sure? Just because they look like you can eat them, doesn't mean you can. They might be poisonous," he tried to warn his son, looking skeptically down at the little orbs in his palm.

"They aren't, they're just sour tasting," Kaelen said, looking down at them.

"How do you know?" Asher asked as his wife carried their little girl over towards them to see what they had stopped for.

"My friend in the forest taught me," Kaelen said, suddenly turning and scanning for something in the trees.

Asher frowned and raised an eyebrow, following his son's gaze into the forest but seeing nothing. "What friend?" he asked, turning his head back to Kaelen.

"I don't know..." The little boy continued to stare into the woods with a distant expression.

Asher and his wife exchanged concerned looks before he knelt down to his son's level and gently guided Kaelen's head back to face him.

"He was scary, but he helped me find you guys again after I got lost," Kaelen said, looking into his daddy's brown eyes.

Asher nodded his head and looked down at Kaelen's little hand, still holding the berries in his fist. "Well, if your friend likes to eat these berries, maybe we can collect some and leave them out for him tonight as a gift to thank him for bringing you back to us."

"Like leaving cookies and milk for Santa?" Kaelen asked with a smile.

"That's right." Asher returned the smile and took the berries from his son's hand, pulling the front of his shirt to make a basket out of it and dropping the berries in it. "Let's see if we can find some more."

Kaelen grinned and nodded his head before taking his dad's hand and continuing down the path, keeping an eye out for any more of the blueish-purple berries along the way.